An epic journey

 

Google Maps. Curitiba, Paraná, Brazil.

Before I shift from the Halter family to another branch of the tree, I thought I'd close out the story on Caroline Bauer with her move from French colonial Algeria in the mid 1860s across the Atlantic to southern Brazil. I've already shared Caroline's birth record from Bas-Rhin, France in 1838, where she was listed as the illegitimate daughter of Rosine Bauer (and possible daughter of Jean Pierre Halter). Caroline moved with her mother, brother Marcel, and Jean Pierre's children to Oran, Algeria as a teen in the mid 1850s.

She met and married 25 year old Melchior Schaefer in Oran in 1857 at the age of 19. Two years later, she gave birth to a daughter, also named Caroline. Sadly, this child died in 1861. Caroline gave birth to three boys in Algeria between 1860 and 1865: Melchior Jr in 1860; Victor in 1863 and Baptiste (or Jean Baptiste, later known as Joao Baptiste) in 1865.

It's unclear when the family decided to move from Algeria. I have not extensively researched the economic and political situation that Caroline and her extended family may have encountered in colonial Algeria. Jean Pierre Halter died in January 1858. Caroline's mother Rosine died in August 1860 when Caroline was 22 with two young children. Then with two more infants in the household, the Schaefers either first relocated to France in 1867 or moved directly from Algeria to Brazil. Some trees show Caroline delivered a son named Nicolas in France in 1867. Either way, it was quite a journey to go from France to Brazil in the mid to late 1860s. 

I cannot imagine the route taken. Maybe they sailed from Mediterranean France to Sao Paulo or Rio, following the promise of work to the farms in Paraná State. I have not extensively researched Melchior or his trade, or what might have pulled them from Algeria to start anew in Brazil.

The Schaefers first appear in the records in Curitiba, Brazil in 1871, with the baptism of their son, Adolpho. They eventually had five more children in Curitiba.

Melchior Sr. died Curitiba in 1926. Caroline, known in Brazil as Carolina, died on 22 April 1929 (see record on FamilySearch) at the age of 91. From trees on Geneanet and FamilySearch, there's a number of descendants from the Schaefers in Brazil. It's possible there are DNA matches to Allison's Memaw as she's closer in time to Jean Pierre Halter (if he was Caroline's father).

Caroline and Melchior would have seen dramatic change in their lifetimes. They moved from France and Germany to North Africa during a tumultuous war time and colonial period, then to southern Brazil when it was an empire at war with neighboring Uruguay. The Schaefers were there for the formation of the Brazilian Republic and the first World War. They had a huge family who became Brazilian, not knowing about their family connections further north in America.

For now, this post brings my dive into this line of the extended Halter family to a close, as I'll be returning to a different branch on Allison's side of the tree.