Individual Details

Augusta came to America in 1849 when she was fifteen with her father and 21 year old sister Wilhelmine. They sailed as steerage passengers from Bremen to New Orleans, Louisiana. Nothing is yet known of her early life in Germany. Presumably her mother died earlier and her father decided to try his luck in the new country. According to what her father put on the passenger list, he had been a merchant in Wintersdorf. Wintersdorf is a former municipality in the district Altenburger Land, in Thuringia, Germany. Augusta also says she was born in Altenburg on her marriage record.
They made their way north to Louisville Kentucky where there was a large growing German community. By 1850 Louisville was reported to be the tenth largest city and Kentucky the eighth most populous state. By the 1850's 35% of Louisville's population would be German, totaling 18,000. Augusta and her sister soon married, Augusta in 1853 and Wilhelmine in 1854, both to other German immigrants. Sadly, Augusta and GH Hollenkamp's first two children died young. Letters dated from the summer of 1856 show that the two new husbands traveled together to visit relatives back home in Wintersdorf. In one of them GH asks how little Lisette is getting along. This daughter was not listed in 1860.
At first her husband ran a tavern. The family is listed in 1860 surrounded by a boarding house and coffee house with two young children, her father working as a salesman and her husband's first cousin Theodore Hollenkamp, as the barkeep. No information is available on how the Civil War affected the family. According to Louisville history many Germans were pro-north and opposed Kentucky seceding to the Confederate States. Since GH was too old and her children too young, nobody in the family took part in the American conflict.
Sometime before 1870 their circumstances changed. In the 1870 census, GH Hollenkamp is found working as a traveling salesman in Fayette Co. Kentucky while Augusta, her three children, and her father, are still in Louisville living with her sisters family, the Ruewe's. Henry Ruewe was well off financially though he and Minnie never had any children. Augusta, two of her children, John Henry and Minnie, along with her father John Graefe are still making their home together in 1880. GH Hollenkamp is missing from the census, possibly he is still traveling as a salesman. Daughter Mary Augusta had recently married. An article written in 1888 about son-in-law Lafe DeWitt says how, "On Jan. 29 1880 he married Miss M.A. Hollenkamp, an educated, charming young lady, niece of the late J.H. Ruwe." Obviously her uncle was better known in the community than her father. The Ruwe's had their own residence in 1880.
Whether she ever lived with her husband again is unknown. On 11 May 1887 G H Hollenkamp entered The Little Sisters of The Poor, a Roman Catholic charitable home for the aged that first came to Louisville in 1869. He died there on 27 Nov 1890. Augusta lived with her widowed sister the rest of her life at 619 Lampton Street. There she raised her granddaughter Nellie Dewitt. Nellie, born in 1895, is listed with her grandmother in both the 1900 and 1910 census.
Augusta outlived everyone in her family. Her husband, her sister, and all her children, passed away before she did. She died of influenza on Jan 6, 1916, age 81 years 11 months 19 days. Her sister Wilhelmina Ruewe died the day before on Jan 5, 1916. Her funeral was held at the Third German Methodist Church, and burial was at Cave Hill A-559.

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Birth	17 Jan 1834	Germany, Saxony, Altenburg
Baptism	17 Jan 1834	Wintersdorf, Thüringen, Germany
Immigration	17 May 1849	New Orleans, Louisiana from Bremen, Germany on the Johann Smidt
Marriage	17 Oct 1853	Saint John German Evangelical Church, Louisville, Jefferson, Kentucky, United States - Johann Gerhard Henrich "G Henry" Hollenkamp
Census (family)	10 Sep 1860	5th Ward, Louisville, Jefferson, Kentucky, United States - Johann Gerhard Henrich "G Henry" Hollenkamp
Census	16 Jun 1870	4th Ward, Louisville, Jefferson, Kentucky, United States
Census	3 Jun 1880	Louisville, Jefferson, Kentucky, United States
Census	9 Jun 1900	Louisville, Jefferson, Kentucky, United States
Census	1910	Louisville, Jefferson, Kentucky, United States
Residence	Jan 1916	619 Lampton St., 3rd Ward, Louisville, Jefferson, Kentucky, United States
Death	6 Jan 1916	Louisville, Jefferson, Kentucky, United States
Burial	7 Jan 1916	Cave Hill Cemetery, Louisville, Jefferson, Kentucky, United States

Spouse	Johann Gerhard Henrich "G Henry" Hollenkamp (1820 - 1890)
Child	Elizabeth Louise Hollenkamp (1854 - 1860)
Child	Lisette Hollenkamp (1856 - 1860)
Child	Johann Heinrich "John Henry" Hollenkamp (1857 - 1900)
Child	Mary Augusta Hollenkamp (1859 - 1905)
Child	Wilhelmine "Minnie" Hollenkamp (1862 - 1884)

Father	Gottfried "John" Graefe (1803 - 1894)
Mother	Christiane (1806 - )
Sibling	Wilhelmina "Minnie or Miena" Graefe (1826 - 1916)

Notes