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 irchenbüch is the German word for church book. Church books, or
Kirchenbücher, are a Church's register of births, communions, confirmations, marriages,
and deaths.
The Kirchenbüch on this site was transcribed by Mr.
John Daggan, of Trinity Evangelical Lutheran Church, Staten Island. The church book
entries on this site (baptisms: 1859-1877, 1882-1895 (3,030) and marriages 1882-1893:
(473) and deaths (475)) are the only entries currently transcribed. As additional
parts of the church book are transcribed, we will post that information.
The church books for Trinity Evangelical Church are
typical of church books for German/Germanic Protestant congregations in the nineteenth
century. Generally, in the United States and Germany, these books were written in the
German language and usually in old German script. Handwriting varied from easy to read to
barely decipherable. These are only some of the challenges for transcribers of
German/Germanic church books.
Also, the level of detail in the church books varies
by pastor. For baptisms, some pastors wrote a person's specific town of birth and their
parents’ towns of birth. Other pastors only recorded "Dtshld" (an
abbreviation for Deutschland) for a person’s place of birth or their parents’
towns of birth.
Church books can provide a rich supplement to civil
records, as do the entries on this site. Civil birth, marriage records for Richmond County
(Staten Island) generally do not include the specific town of birth for a person’s
parents.
Church books often pre-date civil records, as do the
Trinity Evangelical Lutheran Church records. In 1788, Staten Island was divided into four
towns: Northfield, Southfield, Castleton, and Westfield. In 1860, the town of Middletown
was created from parts of Southfield and Castletown - Trinity was located in this
“new” town in the village of Stapleton. The geographical areas called
"towns" contained both incorporated and unincorporated villages, like other
counties in New York State do today. Six years later, in 1866, the incorporated village of
Edgewater was created - Trinity was now located in this incorporated village that had
included the villages and areas known then, and now, as Stapleton, Tompkinsville, and
Clifton. Edgewater, as an incorporated village, became responsible for keeping its own
vital records among other things. Vital records surviving from the village of Edgewater
only begin in 1885. |
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Needed Confirmation Class Pictures include: Any before 1908, 1913,
1914, 1916, 1917, 1918, 1919, 1920 German , 1922 English, 1923,
1924, 1925, 1926 English, 1927, 1929, 1930 English, 1931 English,
1949 |
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