The Danenberg Family
This is the family history of Peter Danenberg's family: where they came from, how they
crossed oceans, and how we know. It joins four lines: two from the farms of Vidzeme and Courland in
Latvia, one from Dublin in Ireland and from Texas, and one from the Pacific Northwest, where the American
lines met. Every fact on a person's page carries its source, and every family link says how strong its
evidence is.
Four family lines
Danenbergs
Peter's father's father's line, from Courland (Kurzeme) in western Latvia. Arvīds Danenbergs
(1913–1996) was an agronomist. In 1944 he fled with his wife and small son to Germany, lived four years in the
Haunstetten displaced-persons camp at Augsburg, and in 1949 sailed from Bremerhaven to Boston, then farmed in Ohio
and Michigan. His parents were Alberts Danenbergs and Zelma Forstmane.
Sirlaks and Smukule
Peter's father's mother's line, from Rauna parish in Vidzeme. Elvīra Danenberga, née Sirlaka
(1912–2011), a pharmacist, wrote the memoir of her life to 1949. Her father
Mārtiņš Sirlaks kept a shop in Cēsis; his family farmed Vīstuči at Jaunrauna for
generations. Her mother was Emma Smukule.
Hall and McCabe
Peter's mother's father's line. Charles Henry Hall (1920–2001) was born in Vancouver, Washington, to
Charles Hall, probably a Texan who served in the First World War, and Susan May McCabe, born in
Dublin, who came to America as a girl. Who her parents were is still an open question.
Estella, Alderson and Barnhart
Peter's mother's mother's line. Estella May Alderson (1916–2008) grew up in Portland as the daughter of
Winter Scott Alderson and Carrie May Newman, but she was adopted: her original birth record is very
probably that of a Seattle baby registered in 1916 as Phillis May Barns. Her birth family, possibly the
Barnharts of Whatcom County, is the subject of ongoing research.
How we know
The site is built from 231 sources: Latvian church registers and estate revision lists, displaced-persons
records from the Arolsen Archives, US censuses, draft cards and passenger lists, Irish civil registers, newspapers
in Latvian and English, two family memoirs, and Peter's own tree of 2007–2015. See Sources.
Each parent–child link carries an evidence label:
- documented
- at least one record: a register, census, card, obituary.
- tradition
- only family memory or a family tree, so far.
- probable
- good evidence, not yet proven.
- possible
- a lead worth pursuing; not established.
What is not yet known is listed openly under Questions.
Recent discoveries
- Where the name came from. The Danenberg surname dates from 1835. In the estate revision list
of 7 June 1835 for Gross-Bersen (Lielbērze), in Dobele district, Courland, the manor people appear "with their newly
adopted family names", and family no. 6 is "Familie Dannenberg": the children of Jurre (Jurģis) Dannenberg, a
joiner born about 1795 who had died in 1832. In the 1826 list the same man has no surname at all; he is "Jurre
Tischler", Jurre the joiner. So the family were Latvian manor serfs and craftsmen who took a German-sounding name
when Courland's peasants were given surnames, not German immigrants. That this family is the origin of our
Danenbergs is likely but not yet proven (Latvian State Historical Archives, via Raduraksti).
- The crossing. The Danenbergs and Elvīra's mother Emma sailed from Bremerhaven on the US Army
transport General R. M. Blatchford on 28 June 1949 and were admitted at Boston on 7 July 1949. The ship's
manifest and the refugee organisation's sailing list both survive (Arolsen Archives; US National Archives).
- Two weddings. Elvīra wrote that she and Arvīds married twice, once at the registry and once in
church. Latvian newspapers of the time date the church wedding to Christmas 1941 at Cēsis, a year later than the
memoir remembers.
- The Sirlaks farm. Church registers and estate revision lists now carry the Sirlaks line back three
generations at the farm Vīstuči, Jaunrauna, to Mārcis Sirlaks, born about 1821. Aina Sirlaka's memoir of 1998
tells the story of the farm.
- Emma Smukule's baptism. Found in the Rauna register: born 25 December 1885 by the old calendar
(6 January 1886 by ours), the daughter of a farmhand, Dahw Smukkul, and Marie née Kahjon, as the German-language
register spells them.
- Charles Hall, soldier. Draft records and California newspapers show a Charles Henry Hall, born in
Comanche, Texas, in 1891, leaving Mariposa County for Camp Lewis in September 1917. He is very probably Peter's
great-grandfather. DNA matches on Peter's mother's side point the same way, to a family line in central Texas.
- Estella's first name. Washington birth indexes and the Aldersons' own late registration point to
her original birth record, as Phillis May Barns, born in Seattle on 5 May 1916.
- A Baltic line. Peter's Y-DNA belongs to haplogroup N-Z16980, a Baltic line: the Danenbergs were
Latvians, whatever their German-sounding name, as the 1835 surname list also shows.
- Elvīra's memoir found again. The English text her son translated in 2004 turned up in an old email
archive, and a Latvian typescript of 2010 shows passages the English lacks. Read it here.
Explore
- People: 372 people with pages, by family line.
- The family tree: the interactive tree, with every link's evidence.
- Timeline: the family's dated events against the history of the century.
- Migration map: Latvia to Michigan, Ireland to Oregon, Texas to Washington.
- Record forms: how to read a 1914 Ellis Island manifest.