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 1932
Children's Letters

Georgene Mellenbruch (youngest daughter of Uncle George), in Richill, Missouri, loaned a booklet titled "Memoirs of Mr. & Mrs. H. F. Mellenbruch." This little treasure was printed in 1932 by Dale Mellenbruch (Uncle Louis' second son). It included letters from six of the nine children, recounting early memories of their father. The obituary of Grandpa Mellenbruch, describing his Civil War experiences, was reprinted in the booklet, as was his last letter to his children.

From Louis
I think you might consider father a self-made man as he acquired most of his education by making use of every opportunity that presented itself. He told me that he learned to read by watching his father read from an almanac. I remember seeing secretaries' reports of literary societies in which he took part both in the home neighborhood in Indiana and in the hospital while he was convalescing from his wound. His actual schooling was very little. I think he said he went to town school six or nine weeks. Rev. Borches was a great help to him and I think it was his influence that made father what he was. He read much and his reading was usually in the educational line. Sister Sophia has a copy of Vergil's Aenead which he studied in the army and which contains dates and addresses that he wrote in while campaigning in the south.
While we were still in Indiana father taught songs to Henry, Tom, and myself; then after we had been in Kansas a few years, he sent for a small organ and we would have to sing almost every evening. Sometimes he would be busy reading and we would slip off to bed, and of course we could not come back; but we had a hired man by the name of Henry Schroe who was always anxious to sing and he used to call father's attention to the fact that it was time to sing when he saw us sneaking off to bed. We sang "Songs of Glory No. I" and "II" and when we started our Sunday school in 1887 we learned the songs in our hymnal. I surely enjoy hearing and singing those old songs.
Father told me how he suffered when he was taken from the battlefield to the hospital. He said he was taken in a one-horse vehicle and with every step the horse took, the pain was almost unbearable. He gave flaxseed poultices much credit for his recovery.
Father had a narrow escape in the fall of 1877, I think, when we were digging the stock well at the home place. The dirt had all been removed and we had only about ten feet more to wall up with rock when we had a rain.
Ordinarily we used "Old Dave," a large blind horse, to raise and lower the dirt and rock but on account of the mud we decided to use two horses on this occasion. We had rigged up a sort of a derrick with tubs, pulleys, and rope and uncle Will Meyer would remove the plank from over the well when the horses would raise the rock. The two horses pulled too far and broke the rope so that the tub (a half of a barrel) of rocks dropped, going right through the plank that was over the mouth of the well.
How father got out of the way no one knows but there must have been some quick thinking and some good luck connected with it. Needless to say we took off one horse and as soon as we had recovered from our nervousness, proceeded with the work.
Father wanted us children to go off to school but did not want us to go very far away on account of mother's health. This, together with the fact that there was a lot of new, rich farm land available, is probably the reason why nearly all of us were attracted to the farming industry.

From Tom
Concerning my father I would say first of all his example and admonitions in my early life have been of great value and a blessing to me all these years. His love for his Savior was manifested in many ways as was also his love for his fellow man. It was his constant desire to build up God's kingdom here on earth. When sickness or great financial losses befell neighbors he was ever ready to help and sympathize.
There was one great gift that father possessed, which I have often wished and longed for and that is his wonderful self-control which was manifested under all conditions. No doubt his service in the Civil War was a great help and schooling in this respect.
In person father was a plain every day man, not much for style. I always remember him as wearing a full beard. On Sundays he would put on his clean shirt with collar, (no neck tie), Sunday suit, and shoes; then he was ready for church services. I recall that on one occasion we managed to get a neck tie on him. He wore it until he wanted to go to bed. He tried every way to get the tie off his shirt but finally gave up and wore it to bed.
He always seemed to enjoy outdoor life and could name almost any kind of animal, plant, tree, bird, or insect.
One of the many incidents of his war experience that he related to us comes to my mind. It shows that he was not without humor. It seems the army had been marching all day and the soldiers were very tired when they stopped to camp for the night. It happened to be father's time to prepare supper and when he tried to find some water for the coffee he had to go back quite a distance to a small muddy stream that they had crossed. When supper was ready he called them but they were too tired to get up. The he said, "Come on, boys, and eat. We have milk in our coffee." Then they all came at once. For a while he did not tell them where the milk came from and when he finally told them they could hardly believe it as the coffee looked so like it was served with milk.

From Sophia
I have been asked by Dale to write about our mother. However I can hardly separate the two of them in my thoughts excepting the years we had her after our father had died and her youth as she told it to us and of this I can remember only too little.
She was born in Germany and crossed the ocean when she was four years old. A scourge of cholera broke out on the ship, and, owing to the attempts of parents to hide their dead children so they would not be thrown overboard to be eaten by the sharks, she was almost cast into the sea alive, so drastic were the measures taken by the officers.
Her stories of her life were of the wilderness of Indiana, the clearing of the timber, etc. Since she was the eldest of the children and four years the senior, she was compelled to work hard for her father and in pity for a delicate, kind mother she would help her while her father rested. Thus her girlhood was spent and as a result after her marriage and during the rearing of her own large family her health was never good and we as children never knew her to be strong and well. Our father had a knowledge of medicine, could count pulse, and knew the symptoms of diseases and so was able to help her in her heart attacks and other illnesses. I remember how I sat in a corner and cried as I watched some one helping him to walk her up and down the room holding her up, and doctor when he came said if he had not done this she would have died.
Ill health did not prevent her from doing kind deeds for other people. The neighbors lived farther apart in those days but depended on each other for nursing, laying out of the dead, and assisting in many other ways, and our parents surely did their share of this.
I remember hearing my mother grieving on one occasion that she had been unable to pray for a dying neighbor woman because she was educated in German. She had prayed in German and had finished with the Lord's Prayer. Father comforted her and said that the Lord's Prayer was enough for all.
At this point may I mention that at different times my father was called on to conduct funerals when there was no minister and would also lead the singing.
After our mother was called from this life, we were often made happy by people telling of kindnesses from her such as words of encouragement and little gifts and favors, these from people who had no claim on her save that of need, as she could give it. Although she always dressed plainly, those who knew her best respected her most. I can still see her going into a store wearing a calico dress and a black sunbonnet and if at all possible the proprietor would wait on her himself but the clerks would be listening for her jokes and greetings.
What shall I say of her? I can tell of her ever busy hands, knitting our stockings, patching our clothes, cooking large quantities of food, and feeding many people on Sunday such as had come from the est to make their home here in Kansas and needed to be invited to a home.
Alice Isely, who now lives in Wichita, told me not long ago of a birthday dinner to which she was invited at our house when brother Louis was 15 years old and how mama had laid a sprig of chrysanthemum at each plate (the first she had ever seen), and how papa had hitched up the horses and had taken them all to Sunday school after dinner.
I like to remember the Sunday evenings when papa and mama would sit and sing together out of the old "Psalmist" and I wonder which of us children has her "Starck's Hand Buch" from which she would read prayers and I shall never forget how she would retire to her bedroom and pray aloud for her children, church, and so forth.
The last years of her life she had to spend without our father and they were lonely too. She knew her precarious state of health was such that she needed always to be ready for the final summons and so when she would leave us she would tell us good-bye with the full knowledge that it might be the last good-bye and so it was to be. Her death was sudden and gave her no time for a farewell greeting.
Thank God for our mother and may her prayer be answered as she prayed that those whom God had giver her might all be there to meet her and live in heaven with her.

From Anna
Music was one of father's greatest gifts. He loved music of all kinds but singing is what he loved best. He began teaching singing in Indiana and continued in Kansas almost to the time of his death. He liked best to have a blackboard on which to write down the different scales. As soon as one key was learned he would write down another. By going over these scales we learned to pitch our voices and to sing by note. He used a tuning fork to get the pitch for himself.
When he would hear band music he would think of his army life and would place a gun or even a stick on his shoulder and would keep step while his face beamed with smiles.
He always went to Hiawatha on Decoration Day to march and be with the soldiers. The following incident shows how determined he was to go one year.
We had so much rain that the Walnut creek bridge washed out so we had to cross the ford. One of the horses decided he wanted to splash water and refused to pull the spring wagon out, so father took off his ----------, -------------- up his trousers, and carried all of us children to the bank. He then walked a mile for another team and we went on to Hiawatha. Most men would have gone back home since it was only four miles and he had six more to go.
Sacred music was what he loved best. He always said the singing of hymns brought him and others that he taught closer to their Savior. On his death bed he requested the beautiful hymn "Jerusalem the Golden." It was very hard for me to sing but Mrs. Claycamp and her daughter Carrie helped me.

From Fred
As I cast about for something to write concerning my father, H. F. Mellenbruch, many thoughts and incidents come to my mind, but since in the past few months our Sunday school lessons have been about the missionary work of St. Paul, I have often thought of his mission in the northern part of Jackson County, some 20 miles south of the old home place. He was not content only to labor and pray for his own church home of "Spiritual Zion" as he often termed it, but had a desire or longing to find some place where the word of God and his saving grace had not been brought to a very great extent. So in the year of 1894 or 95 he began his weekly trips to this settlement of Swedes and Danes and soon he had gathered together a few families and organized a Sunday school which met at ata schoolhouse about two miles south of the county line and halfway between Whiting and Netawaka.
These friendly people appreciated the interest that father displayed in their behalf and ata fine spirit of cooperation manifested itself at all times. The names of some of the families that come to my mind are the Christiansens, Olsens, Nassens, Beldens, Wrights, Grays, Beamens, and Banakas.
As in all such work there were many discouragements and difficulties the most serious of which were the distance and the poor roads in and around the Indiana reservation, yet the season was never too hot nor too cold for him to go to his mission.
Mother Mellenbruch, while never very active in this work was helpful in this that she encouraged him and looked after things at home, in other words, kept the home fires burning, when he was gone.
Well do I remember the last visits to his beloved mission during the Christmas season of 1897. Christmas came on Friday. Our program was given on Thursday evening and on Christmas day after our morning services father with ata few others went down to the program in Jackson County and stayed all night. Father remained till Sunday when I went after him riding one horse and leading one for him. Horse-back riding was much more popular then than now. I shall never forget our ride home that Monday morning. The weather was moderate and we did not hurry but talked of many things and he spoke of the fine Christmas programs and good cheer.
During the next week it snowed and by the first Sunday after New year there was ata foot or more of snow on the ground. When he proposed to go to the mission again we tried to dissuade him for he was not feeling very well and we did not like to see him start out in such deep snow, but he said he wanted to go at this time for the roads would be muddy later. This trip in the deep snow proved too much for him for the horse he rode was not an easy rider and as ata result he went to bed on Monday afternoon and had bleeding of the nose which troubled him all through his sickness.
I do not recall that he was up much after that and on Tuesday or Wednesday we called Dr. Pontius. This was on January 5, I think, for he was sick for 33 days and he died February 8.
You will wonder what became of the mission. As I remember they carried on for ata while but it eventually failed, but I am sure that father's work was not in vain for some of them are members of the Lutheran church at Netawaka and some moved away and I firmly believe that much good came from his work there and that when his Master called him home his greeting was, "Well done, thou faithful servant. Thou hast been faithful in ata few things, I will make thee ruler over many things. Enter thou into the joy of thy Lord."
We, his posterity, would do well to pattern more after him in this work and in this respect. I cannot help but compliment brother Louis and sister Laura for their work among the Mexicans in the Rio Grande valley.

From John
It is ata pleasant recollection to me that father tried to make the tasks which he asked me to perform, pleasant and interesting. For an example, as he cultivated the potatoes with ata one-horse cultivator I must follow up and pull the weeds that were in the row. He asked me to take ata tin box along and place in it one of each different kind of weed that I might find and he would tell me the name of each one; then when the whole family was together that evening I must tell mother the names of the different weeds. In some mysterious way (perhaps by the hand of an older brother), ata potato found its way into this box and when I came to it the family all had ata good laugh at my expense.
Nearly every farmer has some one phase of stock raising in which he is most interested and most successful. I think father's forte was in the handling and feeding of hogs for he always seemed to know how to do the right thing at the right time and in the right way and he spared no pains in taking care of the brood sows and the pigs in bad weather. Many, many fine Duroc Jersey hogs went to market from his lots.


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