Connecting the Hilke Family

My husband's grandma, Lilly, was a Hilke. She was the second child born to Edward Otto Hilke and Mary B Schulling. I had the privilege of knowing her before she passed and we also had the privilege of introducing our daughter to her as well. Other than Lilly, I have only met one other Hilke relation. Lilly's niece Nancy; daughter of Eugene and Jeanie Hilke. My information has been compiled from what was given to me by my father-in-law, some from Nancy, and research from online sites such as Ancestry and Missouri Digital Heritage. I never realized how many Hilkes were out there until I started trying to trace them. I kept running into duplicate names with slightly different birth dates but had different parents. So it has been a little difficult tracing the correct family lines. The purpose of this blog post is to clarify some research that has been done and to prove which line is the correct line and how they are related to the other Hilkes in the St. Louis, Missouri area. I will share as many sources as I can to prove this information.

Below is the basic line traced back as far as I could prove at the time. The names are highlighted.

As stated above, Lilly was the second child born to Edward Otto Hilke and Mary B Schulling.
Here are all the children of Edward and Mary. (Not in order; look at the dates for correct order)

This information has come from my father-in-law Paul, son of Lilly and Joseph Rickards. This is where I have gotten majority of the photos as well. Only a few have come from Ancestry. Below is Lilly's obituary from when she passed away in 2006.

Lilly M. Rickards (nee Hilke), age 98, died on Saturday, March 11, 2006 at the Mary Mount Manor in Eureka, Mo. She was born on May 28, 1907 in Holden, Mo.
She was the beloved wife of the late Joseph F. Rickards; dearest mother and mother-in-law of Paul (Mildred) and the late Keith Rickards; dear grandmother of Lisa (Rob) Frank, Traci (Tim) Granger, and Mark (Jenni) Rickards; dear great-grandmother of Andrew, Hayden and Milessa Frank, James Granger, and Sancia Rickards; dear daughter of the late Edward Otto and Mary (nee Schulling) Hilke; dear sister of Grace Wakeman, Eugene Hilke, and the late Frances Schnittger, Laura McCollum, Ruth Chandler, Edward Hilke, and Lucille Loddeke; dear aunt, cousin and friend.
Mrs. Rickards was a retired employee of the U.S. Post Office, member of Rock Hill Baptist Church and was a former, long time parent volunteer at the Bellefontaine Habilitation Center. Memorials suggested to the Parents Association of BHC, 10695 Bellefontaine Road, St. Louis, MO 63137 or W.M.U. c/o Rock Hill Baptist Church, 9125 Manchester Road, St. Louis, MO 63144.

This is where the information got confusing. Tracing back from Edward Otto Hilke. Let's start with what we could find on him. He was known to everyone as Otto. We started with his headstone at Laurel Hill Gardens on Page Ave in St. Louis, Missouri. Lilly, her husband Joseph and her son Keith are also buried here along with her sister Ruth Chandler nee Hilke.

From this, we were able to get their birth years and death years. Edward Otto was born in 1878 and passed away in 1959. After adding this information on Ancestry, I got hints for Census records and a hint for his marriage to Mary Schulling.

1940 Census

1930 Census

1920 Census

1910 Census

1904 Missouri Marriage License

Along with these hints, other hints were coming up for an Otto Hilke with a similar birth year. I also started looking at other Ancestry member trees. Most of them had Otto's father being George. But the year did not match up. That Otto was born around 1876. Now since Census records can be off by a few years, I was inclined to take this as gospel truth, especially since there were a ton of records and people were accepting this. So it is easy to just go down this path as others did. Then I searched on Missouri Digital Heritage for the death certificate of Edward Otto Hilke. They have Missouri Death Certificates starting in 1910 and are currently up to 1965. (They are adding more every day, so don't forget to check there often.) As you can see from the Death Certificate below, this proves that the parents of this Otto Hilke were Edward Hilke and Unknown Schmidt. The informant on this certificate is Otto's daughter Frances.

Missouri Death Certificate

Now that I have the correct parents, I am able to find the 1900 and 1880 Census. The 1900 census shows him living somewhere as a Farm Labor. The 1880 Census lists him with his parents along with a couple of siblings: Edward, Maria (we now have a first name for his mom, Anna Maria), Maria, and Gerhart. The address on the census has them living on Obear Ave. I actually have a photo of the house on Obear that was given to me by my husband's dad. So that also confirms the correct family.

1900 Census

1880 Census

1527 Obear
St. Louis, Missouri

Thanks to the census and the hints on Ancestry I found the death indexes for Edward and Annie M. (Anna Maria) Hilke. Their addresses were listed on the index which matches up with Obear. I was also able to find another child from the Missouri Birth Records, Mary Elizabeth Hilke. There was also a Margaret Hilke, but the Missouri Birth Records were missing for the year she was born. Now you may be wondering why I am taking the time to mention these two particular Hilke children. Well, they will be keys to helping me trace other Hilke relations later. But let's finish tracing Edward and Maria first.

Edward Hilke Death Index

Missouri Birth Record
Mary Elizabeth Hilke

I also found the 1870 Census. The census has Edward and Mary (Anna Maria) listed with a son, George. (His death record has him passed away in 1872). They also have a few other people living there, along with an Otto Hilke. Another Otto and possible relation. Sadly, the 1870 census does not have a relationship listed, yet another key to tracing more Hilke relations. Otto is listed as a Grocer. (Important information for later)

1870 Census

From here, there are no other census records tracing Edward and Anna Maria. They were both born in Germany so it's possible they immigrated around this time. I have yet to find their marriage record. It is possible they married in Germany before immigrating; no proof yet. Anyway, this is where the trail goes cold. I could not find anything that lists the parents for either Edward or Anna Maria.

So I decided to trace the other Hilke's in the area. Trace each of them by the census records and connect them. I won't bore you with all the ins and outs of the search and how I connected them. I will just share my results. The following Hilkes are siblings to Edward Hilke: George, Otto, Gerhart, Christopher, and Anna Marie. Proof following. As you can see, similar names were used quite a bit. So I traced them all by birth dates from census records and death records. The death records were extremely helpful. Between these records and an obituary for Christopher Hilke, I connected George, Gerhart, and Anna Marie with him. Their parents are listed as Henry Hilke and Mary Fraizer. I also have Otto's death certificate, but it lists an Arnold and Margurette (close to Mary) as his parents. The father doesn't match, but this information is coming from his step-son and is considered secondary information, as this son was not present at his step-father's birth. I plan on getting more obituaries from the St. Louis County Library Headquarters on Lindbergh as soon as I can.

George Hilke Death                            Gerhart Hilke Death

Otto Hilke Death                          Anna Mary Sack nee Hilke Death

Christopher Hilke Obituary and Death Certificate

Well, that still leaves Otto and Edward having yet to be connected. That took a little more digging. Since both Edward and Anna Marie passed away in 1890, they still had two children that required being cared for: Mary Elizabeth and Margaret. They were only 6 and 4 when their parents passed. Since the 1890 census is unavailable, (ugh!)I needed to find them in the 1900 census. That would make them 16 and 14. Turns out Mary Elizabeth went and lived with Otto and his family. It helped that it had her listed as Niece.

After much searching, I found that Margaret went and lived with Christopher. She was listed as an adopted daughter.

So that was a start to connect Edward with Otto and Christopher, but as the saying goes, the more sources you have to back up your information the better. So onward I search. It's time to look over all the information I have collected to glean info from them. Remember back when we found an Otto living with Edward back in 1870? Could that be a brother? The age doesn't quite match up, but census records are not always accurate with age. Ok, so where is Otto in 1880? Took some searching, but found him with Christopher, listed as a brother.

Ha! There we go! And he is listed as a Store Keeper, similar to a Grocer as in 1870. Upon further research, I found a newspaper article about an Otto Hilke that worked as a Grocer on Bellefontaine. That was his address in 1880. So that helped solidify this lead.

Oh my, as you can see, he was a bad boy. Based on the information in the article, we see the Schmitt family lived near the Hilke family, confirmed by the 1880 census. I plan on trying to acquire court records on this event if they are available.

Now here is the biggest find I've gotten as to date. Thanks to some helpful members in GAA, they found the Probate record for Edward Hilke. I had originally seen this hint on Ancestry but thought it was for another Edward Hilke in Franklin County, Missouri. This definitively proves Edward's relation to Christopher and George. Here are my findings:

Settlements listing children, Application letter named Christopher Executor and lists George as a helper

Edward Hilke last will and testament

Soon after this, I went to the Missouri Digital Heritage site and did some searching through the guardianship files. I did find an index mentioning Edward's daughter Maria A Hilke and his brother Christopher. That could be Maria Elizabeth or Margaret. I would have to send away for this particular record. When I get this record, I will share it.

So after all this research, it is safe to say the parents of these Hilkes are Henry Hilke and Mary Fraizer. There is no record or proof they were ever in the United States. I found everyone's immigration information except, of course, Edward Hilke since he passed in 1890. I have not found any naturalization records yet. After 1880, the census records had a spot for citizenship, so I was able to find some naturalization records and even some ship manifests. One manifest that stuck out to me was one dated July 22, 1896. A long time after the initial immigration. George and Christopher were the only two listed. They also had applied for a passport for this trip.

Christopher Hilke Passport App            George Hilke Passport App

From here, I only have an opinion. I think it's possible George and Christopher went back home to settle up the death of their father. Again, I have no proof of this, but this is just my assumption. If I ever find more information, I will update this post.

After all is said and done, I think I have proven to the best of my current ability the Hilke connections. If you have information to add or that is contrary to what I have here, please contact me. Bear in mind, you need to have proof to back up your information. Provide sources and cite them as well.