Search for content in message boards

Gefaell's Everywhere!

Re: Gefaell's Everywhere!

suzi Clayton (View posts)
Posted: 10 Mar 2006 7:49PM GMT
Classification: Query
Dear Jon
I know about your Gefaells because my mother made contact with your American Gefaells in the 1960s. Your American Gefaells are linked to the Spanish Gefaells. If you put in the name de Vivanco Gefaell there are lots of mentions on Google about an author ( a woman) who is well known in Spain for her books. She corresponded with my mother for quite a while. Her children and nieces and nephews form the Spanish branch of the Gefaells. There are a lot of them, from 10 children! They have (generally) been very successful in business etc.
I guess you realise that the Spanish and American Gefaells were Jews originally although the Spanish branch took the Catholic religion when they went to Spain. I don't know what the American cousins did. Senora de Vivanco went to Austria after the war to try to find her aunts but they had all been taken to the Camps and had died. s far as I know the American and Spanish branches were all that was left of this Gefaell family.
I do have the Family Tree of the Spanish branch.
If you want to e-mail me then I am at suzi@darkhorseuk.com.

Re: Gefaell's Everywhere!

Posted: 31 Dec 2006 4:07PM GMT
Classification: Query
Hello Suzi,

Re: Ulrich Gefaell

I've just been looking at the 1841 census on findmypast.com and they've got an Alvage Gefaell (clockmaker) living with his wife, Ann and children, Joseph, Andrew & James in Commercial Road, east London. As you know, many errors in transmission occurred when the records were made. Do you think this might be Ulrich & his family? The ages for Alvage & Ann both seem to be 10 years too young but the children's ages seem correct.
As a matter of interest, I did pop into the London Metropolitan Records office and found the confirmation record of their marriage at St Dunstan's Church, Stepney on 20th May 1829. I did find this a bit ironic because when I was at school we used to have our Christmas Carol service in the same church!
Regards & happy new year.
Alan

Re: Gefaell's Everywhere!

Posted: 12 May 2008 3:22PM GMT
Classification: Query
Surnames: Gefaell. Clark. Baxter
Hi Alan,I am a direct decendent of the Gefaell family (my maiden name). My Father was George..Son of Charles.
I have been trying to research the Gefaell name for several years. I have in my possesion the original Gefaell family logg book..starting from Ullrich, which has been handed down through the generations.
I have just discovered this website and wondered where you sit in the family tree? (so to speak).
I was also very interested to read that you have seen the registration of marriage of Ullrich and Ann...and wondered...did it confirm that names of their parents,as I would dearly love to find further information prior to Ullrich. I would mention however that the date of marriage entered in our family tree logg book..is 20 May 1820! I look forward to hearing from you. Regards Maureen.

Re: Gefaell's Everywhere!

Posted: 12 May 2008 3:54PM GMT
Classification: Query
Dear Maureen, I know you. You are my second cousin. I am the grand-daughter of Alice Watts, elder sister of your grand-father, Charles. I seem to remember coming to stay with you for a few days when we were very young. I have seen the notebook you mention. Ulrich was born 1st July 1800 in Germany, I think near Freiburg, in the Black Forest but have found no record of this birth. He married in 1829, 20 May.
I am still researching Gefaell but other lines back are more detailed. Do you know all about the Pottons?
Regards
Suzi.

Re: Gefaell's Everywhere!

Posted: 12 May 2008 4:08PM GMT
Classification: Query
Surnames: Gefaell
Hi Suszi, of course I remember you!
I do not know about the Pottons, other than the information I have in the book, I inherited from Dad.
On that note..I have the year 1820 and not 1829, clearly logged for the marriege of Ullrich and Ann!!! I would dearly love to be able to go further back than each of their birth dates.
I found this site by chance....and saw an entry from an Alan who said he had seen the marriage regester, I just wondered "if" by chance the names of Ullrich and Ann's parents were mentioned, which would of course be another lead. Who is Alan?
Regards Maureen.

Re: Gefaell's Everywhere!

Posted: 12 May 2008 4:19PM GMT
Classification: Query
Dear Maureen
go to the Message Boards for Gefaell and you will see ~Alan Clark has found the marriage of Ulrich and Ann for 1829. I think possibly the 'tail' of the number 9 has failed to show in the notebook? The record is there for St Dunstan's and in fact their first child was born in June 1831 which would seem to fit.
I will have to think back to know how Alan Clark fits in with our Gefaells. It's a long time since I looked at our Family History. The Pottons go back to 1715 and I have the full details.
Suzi.

Re: Gefaell's Everywhere!

Posted: 12 May 2008 5:22PM GMT
Classification: Query
Surnames: Gefaell
Hello Maureen(cc Suzi),

I have been in contact with Suzi a few times but not for a long time. Yes, I can confirm that Ulrich & Ann were married on 20th May 1829 at St Dunstan's in Stepney. I was working close to the London Metropolitan Office and popped in to check the microfilm that they have. Alas, there were not any details of their parents' names.

My grandmother, Agnes Gefaell, was born in the quarter July/Sept 1870 in Mile End. Agnes married Walter Clark in 1896, that's where I come in!

Agnes's father was Joseph Ulrich Gefaell - Ulrich & Ann's first born - and he married Bridget Donnell from Tipperary on Christmas day 1859 at St Mary's & St Michael's RC Church, Commercial Road, Stepney (nice to know that there is some Irish in there somewhere!).

If you want to email me on alanaclark@ntlworld.com, I'll forward the info. that I've dug up, although I think Suzi is far further down the road than me.

I've replied here 'on the quick' but I think that one correspondent (it could have been Suzi) thought that there might have been a family connection through the clockmaking, in Leeds.

One of the things that intrigues me is that at the time of the 1841 Census Ulrich (Alvage) and Ann are living together in Commercial Road, Stepney but ten years later, he is lodging in Blackheath Road, Greenwich but Ann is living in Lower Fenton Street, Stepney. I know transport would have been an issue in those days but I wondered if they might possibly have been separated?!?

Do you have any record of Ulrich after the 1851 Census or any record of his death?!?

I would be very grateful for any information that you might be able to supply to me.

Regards,


Alan





Re: Gefaell's Everywhere!

Posted: 16 Jul 2008 3:07AM GMT
Classification: Query
Would love to learn more. My father is Bob Gefaell (Robert Gefaell) who was born/raised in Short Hills, NJ w/ his brother John Harrison Whittaker Gefaell (Jay Gefaell). Grandmother was Nancy Johnston upon her death, but was Nancy Strange Gefaell at my father's birth.

I know of an uncle Bobby Gefaell who lived (lived? was battling cancer last I heard)in San Francisco - apparently an accomplished jazz drummer/muscian...

Re: Gefaell's Everywhere!

Posted: 5 Mar 2009 5:41PM GMT
Classification: Query
Hello ,
I gather you must be Pat's great grand child ...and I'm your cousin-once-removed more or less
There are over 50 gefaells in Spain, more or lesss the same amount in England, some still left in Austria and Ucraine and Poland and , yes, it was a Jewish surname although we are not jewish anymore...
Write to me and I can send you the family tree so that you can complete your side and send it back to me...
This is my bother Pablo and mine personal project...to try and link as many of us as possible before we forget where we came from
Love

Re: Gefaell's Everywhere!

Posted: 7 Sep 2009 8:40PM GMT
Classification: Query
Surnames: Gefaell
Dear John Eugene

I am one of the very numerous Gefaell tribe from Spain (though I live in Toronto). From my mother, Hedy Gefaell, I got some family photographs that include photos of her aunt Hedy, who was Jewish just like her father Wilhelm but had managed to first marry an Austrian count and then divorce him to marry ARTHUR G THOMPSON, a "rich American" in the pulp and paper business. Hedy and Thompson married in 1915.
I believe that the first Hans/John Gefaell (your grandfather, I believe) left Austria at around that time and worked for his brother in law Thompson's firm in New York City. (I have in my possession one or two letters between him and his brother Wilhelm, my grandfather, who had lived in Spain since 1913). Hedy lived at very fancy addresses in and around New York and died in a tragic accident in the early 1920s, without having had any children. According to the family tree compiled by my cousin Pablo Gefaell, Hans/Jack had three kids, John (Jack), Pat (who married Sandy Maxwell, a Madison avenue exec), and Bob.
Was your grandfather Hans/John? If so, I wonder if he was as "in the closet" about being jewish as my grandfather. If he was indeed in the closet about that, you and the rest of your family should know that Hans had one brother (Anton, known as Toni) and two sisters, Hermine (Mina) and Rosa, who were murdered by the Nazis. Their mother Pauline, who was around 90 years old, also "died" in the Gestapo headquarters in Vienna in 1942.
It's taken several people a lot of time and effort to get this information, and I think it should be shared with the rest of the extended family.
There are some English Gefaells who, if they are related, are only related way back when; but the US branch descended from John/Hans and Annette are definitely the first cousins of the Spanish Gefaells of my mother's generation.

Best wishes,

Mariana Valverde




per page

Find a board about a specific topic