I recently started researching my family history, but was having quite a bit of difficulty with the records I was finding as they were all in German. I started trying to translate them on my own, but without much success. It was then that I went to look for someone to assist me and found germanheritagetranslations.com. Gretchen has opened a door into my family history that I never would have found without her assistance. Her prices are very reasonable and she is happy to help not only with translations, but also providing context for both regions and time periods as well. I now have names and locations for family members that I didn’t even know existed. Gretchen has helped me bring lost family history back to life. I have enjoyed working with her and highly recommend her services.
I had always been told I was of German descent, but when I went and looked it up, it appeared to be in France! Gretchen explained that at the time my letters were written (1897), the Alsace region was still part of the German Empire and German was the predominant language. So it turns out, I am German after all.
Frau Fuchs entdeckte auf der Rückseite des Schriftstücks, das ich ihr zur Übersetzung geschickt habe, eine Notiz über die Beerdigung einer unverheirateten Schwester eines Verwandten auf der väterlichen Seite meiner Familie. Diese Frau wird nirgends sonst erwähnt! Das finde ich sehr spannend und will nun unbeingt herausfinden, wer sie war.
Ms. Fuchs discovered a notation on the backside of the document I had send her for transcription. It mentions the burial of an unmarried sister of a paternal relative. This woman is not mentioned anywhere else! I am quite intrigued and now determined to find out who she was.
Gretchen did such a wonderful job translating the correspondence between my German great-grandparents when they first met as teenagers. Like so many young men of his generation my great-grandfather later died in WW2. My great-grandmother passed when I was still an infant and my mother had already immigrated to the United States. I never met either of them, yet through their letters I feel I got to know them.
I pride myself on my fluency in German and my ability to read the old German script. Among a bundle of documents I recently received from Germany, was one that just didn’t make any sense to me. My ancestors had owned a small pub close to the city of Wittenberge in Saxony-Anhalt. The scribbled note was an IOU from a farmer patron, written in his native tongue of Low German. Thank you, Gretchen, for solving this mystery so quickly.
Thank you so much for the fast turnaround on the letter I sent you. My mother enjoyed the German transcript that came with the translation. My high school German is rusty, so I will stick to the English translation. But maybe my son will give it a go when he comes home for summer break.