South Brisbane Boge's

War Comes to Fuhlendorf

In the Thirty Years War (Danish-Lower Saxon War), Christian IV, King of Denmark and Duke of Holstein, takes the lead of the Protestants as head of the Lower Saxon district.  His main opponent, Wallenstein, leads his own mercenary army into the field as the imperial commander-in-chief.  After the battle of Lutter am Barenberge (Aug. 17-24. 1626), in which Tilly was victorious over Christian IV, Tilly and Wallenstein conquered Holstein in 1627.

Easter 1628 the imperial troops reached Bramstedt and made it their base.  Thus the disaster of war with all its consequences also fell upon the parish of Bramstedt.  Fuhlendorf was particularly affected. The reports about that time of horror date back to the year 1629.  Although they are almost limited to statistical data, they speak a clear language. Nevertheless, six farmsteads (1,3,5,7,8,9) remained family property.  The remaining four farmsteads lay desolate and ownerless. There is almost no information about the former owners and their relatives. The scanty reports are silent about loss of life and also about the extent of destruction. 

In 1629, the Danish government appointed Marx Boye ('Mars Lütt'), as bailiff, who was able to make the farmsteads habitable again and then occupy them with capable farmers, mostly only after five years of community work.

Move to Lentföhrden

Hans Boye did not inherit the family farm in Fulendorf, and appears to have moved to the village of Lentföhrden, about 8km south.

Hans married Abel Runge in 1726 and possibly took over the running of her father's farm (which may have been why he moved to Lentföhrden in the first place).  According to an entry in the church books in 1740, Lentföhrden had 14 settled families, of which Hans is listed as a Vollhufner.

Lentföhrden was and still is a small village (190 inhabitants in 1828, 2,300 in 2005) and was first recorded in 1479.  It sits on geest, a sandy/gravelly raised landform in Northern Germany that was dry and less fertile though provided protected against storm floods.  Despite this though the land provided everything the townsfolk required:

“In the moorland and heathland stretching from the south to the west, people could make peat and gather heath as feed for cattle. Following the broad meadow valley, an extensive forest stretched to the east, providing construction and fuel material. From the centre of the actual area of life to the west and north, finally, lay the most beautiful subsoil that people could think of.” 

- Lentföhrden Town Chronicle 

Hans and Abel had 3 children together Hartig, Metta and Abel before Abel passed away in 1734.  Hans remarried to Elsabe Kroger and they had 5 children together.  Hans died in 1762.

At the age of 27, and now living in Wiernekamp, Hartig married Anna Margaretha Behrends in Sülfeld (a couple of villages over) in 1753.  Hartwig was most likely a Kätner or Cottager (as later his son is listed as).  A Cottager was a small farmer who had a cottage to live in and a small amount of land to use as his own plus a few cows and/or sheep.  Around 1795 Hartwig Böy is listed on a land survey as having 4 Tonnen (approx. 5 acres) of land in Wierenkamp and this is most likely what he was given when he was expelled.  Maps from the time show that it’s probable the family cottage was along a secluded lane at what is today 12 Wierenkamper Weg, Schmalfeld (this address would also seem to be on the old border between Lentföhrden and Schmalfeld).

Quite often the farm did not provide enough sustenance for which the Kätner needed to support his family and he supplemented his income by other means.  Timber was a good source of income for the Wierenkampers; wood was needed as fuel, to build houses, for furniture and for the endowment of children.  However, the Danish king claimed ownership of all the hardwood on the land and appointed Foresters to prevent the theft of this valuable resource.  This claim was disputed by the locals however and they risked heavy fines and punishment to fell trees and effectively nick them from the king.  However, the Wierenkampers often outwitted the king’s men:

“The Royal Forrester, who oversaw the Lentföhrdener Wohld (forest), was very afraid of the wood thieves and poachers in Wierenkamp.  When riding along the road from Kaltenkirchen he would fire warning shots into the air to scare them away.  That was the signal to the Wierenkampers to quickly hide their axes and hatchets. They then sat in the house of Hartwig Böge, which at that time also had a bar selling Honigschnaps (honey schnapps), and played cards.

The Forrester entered and asked "Have you seen the poachers?".  The answer was always "No, we haven't!".  "Strange," the Forester would say "the moth must smell that I am looking for it".  The Wierenkampers grinned to eachother and went on playing.  When the Forrester left the men went back to their work.”

- Lentföhrden Town Chronicle 

The Wierenkampers were helped by the fact that the forestry officials themselves were often the farmers' own sons and consequently the poachers were rarely turned in.  This story shows that Hartig was an enterprising fellow and supplemented his income by cutting timber and distilling honey schnapps.

Succession

In 1759 Hartig and Anna had a son, Dierk.  As Hartig and Anna grew older their son would have taken over the running of the small farm and it seems he built a small cottage for them to live in:

“Hartwig Böge's son Dierck built an Altenteilerkate (a cottage where older members in the family would live in retirement, separate from the main farm house) exactly on the boundary between Schmalfeld and Lentföhrden. When the enclosure movement [i.e. division of common land] got under way, the Lentföhrden people wanted him to tear down the cottage, since half of it stood on their side and they did not want to include him in the division of the common land.”

- Lentföhrden Town Chronicle 

In 1788, at the age of 28, Dierk married Wiebke Lamack at Kaltenkirchen.  At the time of his marriage, he is described as a Käthner (cottager) in Wierenkamp, son of the Abschieds-Manns (retired) Hartig Böhe and Anna Margarethe Behrends.  In the same year Wiebke gave birth to the couple’s first child, Margarethe.  Following Margarethe two more girls, Anna and Wiebke, would be born.

Sometime between 1791 and 1795 Hartwig died and the small farm passed to Dierk.  Through succession some farms remained in the same family for centuries.  As in many other parts of Germany, the inheritance customs meant that the youngest son (not the eldest) took over the farm from his father, and if there was no male heir, the youngest daughter got possession.  Division of the land was not possible (without permission from the lord) as the land was common property and many farms were simply a garden and a house paddock anyway.  When the youngest son inherited the farm, the rest of the children were given their value share of the inventory (the possessions of the farmer) and became Einwohner (resident).  Fortunately for Dierk, it seems he was an only child and so inherited everything his father owned.  

Close to Christmas 1797, Dierk and Wiebke had their fourth child, a boy they called Johann Hinrich.  1800 would prove to be a black year for the family.  Towards the end of the year Dierk died, aged 40 years, and sadly, two of his daughters Wiebke and Margarethe, died within days of him.  They were buried at Kaltenkirchen.  It is not known what caused the deaths, though the quick succession would suggest a possible outbreak of disease.  This left only Wiebke, as the matriarch, and young Johann and Anna in the family.

The young Johann Hinrich Böge (junior) was called up sometime around 1859 at the age of 23.  He served as a Menig (private) in the 15th Infantry battalion of the Danish army, and was barracked at Kronborg Castle at Helsingør (Elsinore), Denmark.  Kronborg is best known as the set of Shakespeare's play Hamlet, and is located on a strategically important site commanding the Sound (Øresund), a narrow stretch of water between Denmark and Sweden.  As a Menig, Johann would have been kitted out in a striking blue uniform such as the one shown.Beyond that Johann was barracked at Kronborg we know no more.  However the Second Schleswig War ignited in 1864 with Austrian and Prussian troops moving first into Holstein and then into Schelswig.  They drove the Danish army out of Schleswig-Holstein, and with the Treaty of Peace of Vienna, the Danish Kingdom renounced all claims to the duchies.  Austria took over administration of Holstein and Prussia Schleswig.  Johann would still have been eligible to be called up being 28 age, he therefore may have played some role in the conflict.In 1859, while Johann was away in the army in Denmark he had a child out of wedlock called Anna Magdalena.  The following year he married Anna’s mother, Catharina Margaretha Puls, who seems to have been working for Johann (senior) on the family farm at Wierenkamp.  The couple had Catharina (1862) and Johann Hinrich (1865).

The Voyage to Queensland

On May 19, 1866 the 54m long, three masted sailing ship ‘Beausite’ slipped out of the Elbe River in the charge of Captain Bruhn.  It was the ship’s third voyage from the port of Hamburg to the far flung colonies of Australia and she counted among her 389 passengers Johann and Catherine together with their young son Johann (Catharina and Anna are not listed on the passenger list so it is likely that they had died or were left with relatives). 

As Danish carpenter taking a similar voyage from Hamburg to Queensland described his first impressions aboard the ship:

“What a motley crew we were: Germans, Danes, Swedes, Norwegians, a Russian Finn, and an Icelander. There were many nationalities, but in the majority of cases extreme poverty was evident in their dress and stamped upon their faces, and it was easy to see that the same spirit of recklessness which filled me had somehow also been instilled into them.  Nearly everybody had guns, revolvers, and knives, which were promptly taken from us as we stepped on board … None of us knew anything about Queensland, and many were the surmises and guesses at what the country was like and what we were going to do there.”

- Thorvald Weitemeyer, Missing Friends 1871

First Generation Australians (John and Catherine)

The Australia of 1866 was a harsh and underdeveloped collection of far-flung British colonies that had only ceased being called New Holland in the mid-1850s.  Explorers such as Burke and Wills where just beginning to provide an idea about what was in the interior of the island and convicts were still being transported to Western Australia.  Queensland had recently separated from New South Wales to become an independent colony and had plunged into an economic crisis pretty soon afterwards leading to severe unemployment.  The entire colony had a population of only 96,000 (approx. the current population of Rockhampton).

The German arrivals were quite popular in the new colony and had a reputation as hardy and industrious workers.  As labourers especially, they were sought after for their rural experience, limited knowledge of English (making it difficult for anyone wanting to stir up trouble with their employers), their similarity in appearance as their neighbours of British origin and their shared Christian faith.  Sir Thomas McIlwraith (Premier of Queensland, commented that:

"Having disembarked from the ships and spent one or two days in the Immigration Depot, the German immigrants disappear.  One hears or sees nothing of them for 18 months or a couple of years, when some fine day they return from the bush in their own attractive turn out, wife and children seated high, and all well-dressed and happy-looking."

- German Australia 

Johann and Catharine were discharged at the immigration depot at South Brisbane (on Hope Street).  The depot provided temporary food and accommodation for immigrants until they were able to find work - which they were expected to take at the first opportunity.  The conditions at the depot were aweful and often worse than had been on the ships, a newspaper article from 3 years earlier describes the accommodation:

“There are three wooden sheds - some people are rude enough to call them dilapidated barns - at South Brisbane, for the reception of those immigrants who, on their arrival in Queensland, find themselves unfortunate enough to be married.  The largest of these sheds, the dimensions of which are something like 70ft [21m] by 35ft [10m] ... at present accommodate no less than 200 men women and children.  That the atmosphere of the place polluted as it must be with so much effluvia of a baneful character, is fearfully injurious to the health of sickly women, and very young children cannot be denied, not to speak of the effect it is likely to produce in the constitutions of strong men… Some distance further on, at the top of the ridge on which is erected the German Lutheran Chapel, there are a number of tents provided by the government, occupied by some eighty or ninety Germans recently arrived per Beausite [an earlier voyage].  They have, however supplemented the number of tents... by the errection of sundry gunyahs [bark huts], which give a somewhat picturesque effect to the scene.” 

- The Courier (Thu 1 Oct 1863 Page 2)

Very little is known of the couple’s early years in Queensland.  It seems that Johann found employment as a labourer and the couple lived at One Mile Swamp (later renamed Woolloongabba, Brisbane) not far from where they had first landed.  At the time Brisbane had a thriving German immigrant population which maintained a Lutheran church, Deutschen Kranken-verein (German Club), Deutscher Liederkraz (German Glee Club), Deutscher Turn Verein (German Gymnastic Club) and German Rifle Club.  It’s likely Johann and Catharine would have fallen in quickly with the German expat community.

In 1868, at the age of 26, Catherine gave birth to the couple’s second son, and named him Henry.  However, she became ill soon after Henry’s birth and died 18 months later in 1870 when Henry was just 2 years old.  Johann never remarried and Henry remained an only child living with his dad.  Queensland was the first state to bring in free education in 1875 so Henry may have benefited from this and learnt English, though probably continued speaking German at home.Unclaimed letters, whose addressees were published in the Government Gazette in an attempt to find them, indicate that Johann at least (of not the family) spent some time at Hay's Inlet (near Redcliffe) sometime before June 1867 and possibly Albert River around 1875 and maybe even later, Rockhampton (around 1879).

At some point, Johann and Henry moved to the locality of German Bridge (present day Holland Park) thus named for the many German immigrants in the area.  They lived behind the German Bridge Hotel on Logan Road and Johann worked as a labourer/farmer probably at Highfield Dairy or Mount Gravatt Dairy, well-known businesses in the area run by the prominent Glindemann families.  At this time Aboriginal groups that hadn’t been displaced (with ‘King Jacky', ‘Queen Mary' and ‘Lumpy Billy' as their leaders) also lived along the creek near the Holland Reserve, now Mott Park, and Nursery Road areas, and corroborees were still held at the junction of Raff and Logan Roads.

After possibly receiving a basic education, Henry may have been apprenticed as a blacksmith at around 14 or 15 years of age, as was the norm at the time.  The apprenticeship would have run for about 4 years where he would have learnt the metal working trade from his master.  The blacksmith at this time was a vital occupation and would shoe horses, mend farm tools, manufacture nails and many other useful implements.  Henry may have had to move away from his father for this.  When he was around 17 (1885) he appears to have been living in a 'humpy' (a bark hut) at Slack's Creek near Beenleigh, an area with a high population of Germans.  It was here he had £5 4s 6d stolen by an older American lad.Johann and Henry lived on a 39 acre property known as 'Greenwald' owned by Andreas and Johanna Glindemann, themselves German immigrants who had arrived in 1863 aboard the ‘Caesar Godeffroy’.  Andreas built and ran the German Bridge Hotel, a well-known establishment in the area and later operated a small dairy that Johann may have worked on.  Johanna was originally from Grünewald, Prussia (now Mieszałki in Poland) so probably named Greenwald (an Anglicisation of ‘Green Forrest’) after her hometown.

In 1890 John (as he was then known by then) died of liver and heart disease at the age of 51 and was buried at South Brisbane Cemetery.  At the age of only 21, and as his only family member, Henry’s father’s death would have come as quite a blow.  He inherited his fathers’ possessions which amounted to £116 value and no property. 

Rising Fortunes (Henry and Joanna)

Following the death of John, Henry (also known as Harry) lived in a boarding house run by the widower Joanna Glindemann (who had by now lost her husband) and ran a shop known as Boge's Forge at the back of the German Bridge Hotel.  In 1892 he became the first Boge eligible to vote and enrolled on 4 October of that year.  Following the death of her husband, a relationship appears to have blossomed between Joanna and her young border (who was 16 years her junior) and in 1893 (Joanna 40, Harry 24) Joanna gave birth to the couple’s first child, Mary Sophie.  Joannna had four children from her previous marriage to Andreas and there was inevitably some trouble joining the two families.  One such incident lead to Harry taking Charles Tritton (licensee of the German Bridge Hotel) to South Brisbane Police Court.  Harry accused Mr. Tritton of forcibly detaining his 8 year old step daughter Joanna.  Kate Glindemann (Joanna's 20 year old sister) however defended him testifying that Joanna stayed at the hotel for a week at her request and the reason for her detention was "the treatment which the child had been submitted to at home".  Harry’s case was dismissed.

Determined to make the joined family work, in 1895 their second child John Henry was born and the couple were finally married at their home six days after the birth.  As the husband of Joanna, it seems that Harry gave up blacksmithing for a time and took over the running of the dairy on the land Joanna had inherited from her former husband Andreas.  It’s possible that Harry changed the name from the Mount Gravatt Dairy to the Eclipse Dairy at this time.  It was also around this time that he dropped the umlauts from his surname and Böge became consistently Boge.

1897 saw the birth of their third child, and second son, Ernest William.  After giving it a few years it seems that dairying wasn’t Harry’s forte.  In 1900 (around 7 years after taking over) he put up for sale the inventory of the farm, which consisted of:“26 head of very choice young cows, some of which are in full milk, balance to calve during August and September; 1 Black Brittany Bull, 2 Stanch Light Harness Horses, 2 Stanch Plough Horses, and 1 first-class Saddle Horse, Milkcart and Harness, Plough Harness, Farm Implements, Dairy Utensils, also small Milk Round.”

And put up for lease the land and house:

“…containing 39 acres, 6 acres of which are under cultivation, securely fenced, permanent water, together with 10-roomed house, milk sheds, and necessary outhouses, &c.”

The advertisement in The Telegraph newspaper says that the inventory was being sold unreserved at auction due to the owner’s “immediate departure for Cairns”.  Whether family troubles or just a good opportunity had prompted the idea to move, for one reason or another, it appears the family didn’t follow through with their plan to migrate north and remained in Mount Gravatt.Harry went back to blacksmithing and had a succession of shops behind German Bridge Hotel, opposite the Mount Gravatt Hotel and behind the shops at Greenslopes.  Jack remembers that he used to shoe police horses and claimed to have shoed a horse that Kate Kelly (Ned Kelly’s sister) rode when she came to Queensland.Sometime in the early 1920s the family moved to Henry Street at Greenslopes.  This was likely financed by the sale of the ‘Greenwald’ farm, as Harry and Joanna were able to purchase one large house, and two smaller ones at Greenslopes which they rented out (these appear to survive today as Nos. 13 and 15 Henry Street, Greenslopes).  In 1929 ‘Greenwald’ was marketed as ‘Glindemann’s Estate No. 1, Holland Park’ preserving the name of the original owners.

At the end of 1928 Joanna placed an ad in the Brisbane Courier newspaper for help with “light domestic duties”.  Johanna had taken a day trip to Bribie Island or Redcliff aboard the ‘Koopa’ (maybe without Harry as he did not always go with her) and had fallen on the stairs and broken her hip.  The ad may have been a result of this accident.  This trauma was too much for the 76 year old Joanna and she passed away early the next year.  Jack remembers Joanna as a stern lady: “When we visited she would give us a job to do as soon as we walked through the door - like polishing the silverware - and then, when we were finished, she would give us a billy to take down to Irvine’s shop on Logan Road to get ice cream.”

Harry remarried at the age of 64 to Dora Emily Woodley, who was 10 years his junior.  The marriage was not a happy one though and three years in Harry was the subject of a court case brought by Dora attempting to compel him to pay her maintenance.  An article covering the case describes Harry as “an elderly, bald-headed man with a pinkish complexion and white moustache…”.  The case was dismissed though it was the subject of a lengthy article in a publication called Truth, under the headline ‘Elderly Couple Failed to Find Happiness’.  In 1941, after 7 years, the couple were divorced on the grounds of desertion - it seems Dora had shot through. Not one to be deterred, Harry, now 75, remarried yet again to Elizabeth Jones and resided at Geelong Avenue, Holland Park.  However this marriage was also short-lived with Henry passing away a year later.

He left to his two sons real estate (two Henry Street properties) to the value of £972 and personal effects to the value of £416.

Third Generation (Sonny, Ernie and Sophie)

John Henry

John was born in 1895 and was known as Sonny.  He attended school and followed his father into the Blacksmith trade specialising as a Coachsmith.  While he was 19 at the outbreak of the Great War in 1914 it seems he didn't volunteer for military service.  In 1918 he married Scottish girl Alison Jack at her family home of 'Ochtertyre' on Logan Road, Mt Gravatt.  Alison had been born in Crieff, Scotland and emigrated to Australia on the 'Perthshire' in 1909 (aged 11) with her parents, John and Jane, and 6 siblings.  Alison was known as Alice and it seems that she was pregnant when the couple where married, as 5 months later she gave birth to the couple's first child, Jean Claris.

The young family lived at Temple Street, Coorparoo for a time, later moving to Plimsoll Street at Greenslopes in the early 1920s.  About this period Greenslopes was lit by electricity for the first time.  In 1923 their second child, Jack Henry, was born. Sonny worked at Sargeants (a blacksmith company) and for 35 years as a Generalsmith at South Brisbane Gas and Light Company - where he was reputedly mentioned in a gas journal.  The gas works were located at West End and the gas stripping tower, a cutting edge piece of kit at the time, today stands in Davies Park as an iconic souvenir.Sonny must have had an interest in birds as family photos show him with show cockerels and an advertisement in a 1939 newspaper has him putting up for sale no less than 80 homing pigeons!In 1959 Sonny apparently had a stroke pulling out a post and he died of a heart attack about one year later, aged 65.  Alice was much longer lived, passing away in 1990 at the age of 91.  At this time she was living at Cinderella Drive, Springwood.

Ernest William

Ernest was born in 1897 and was known in the family as Ernie.  When he was a teenager Ernie was involved in a shooting accident.  The story goes that he was out parrot shooting one day with his brother John and a few mates when a shotgun one of the boys was holding went off.  Ernie received the charge of shot to the left side of his face and was extremely lucky not to have been killed.  He would live with the scars from the accident for the rest of his life and the few photos there are of him always show him with his left side facing away from the camera.

In his youth Ernie was an excellent cyclist and appears frequently in cycling results in newspapers of the time, especially 1914-1915, racing for the Scout Amateur Cycling Club in Brisbane.  One photo shows him as winner of the 10 mile road championship and 5 mile club championship. Sometime later Ernie moved to Ingham, just north of Townsville, a small town of around 1,000 people.  Ingham was a centre for the sugar growing and milling at the time and it’s probable Ernie worked in the industry.  In 1917, he married a Scot (like his brother) by the name of Isabella Rose Angus who came over to Australia from Turriff, Scotland.  The couple had four children in Ingham; Thelma Rose (1919), Ernest William (1920), Henry Alexander (1923) and Patricia Dorothy (1926).

During the Second World War Ernie enlisted as a Private in the 16 Battalion Volunteer Defence Corps in 1942, despite his advanced age of 44.  The Volunteer Defence Corps was a part-time volunteer military force of the Second World War modelled on the British Home Guard.  He remained in the VDC until the end of 1945, two months after the Japanese surrender.  At some stage Ernie and Isabella moved back to Brisbane.  Isabella passed away there in 1971, with Ernie dying at his residence on Newmarket Road, Windsor in 1974.