This is just going to be a quick entry on this rainy morning - two months after I put in my request to the New York City Municipal Archives, I finally got one of the five records I asked for. It usually takes this long. At least this long. But I had forgotten. And I was antsy for a response. The record I got was the marriage certificate for Hulda Lindemann and Martin J. Wolbern, who were married Nov. 3, 1901 in a Brooklyn Lutheran church. It was the record I was least antsy for, as it gives me no brand new information, but it's an important document none the less because it confirms that the Hulda Wolbern who died in the General Slocum steamboat disaster in 1904 was my Hulda Lindemann. The certificate states this Hulda Lindemann was born in Germany about 1876 to Casper Lindemann and Margaret Voigt - everything that jives with what I know about Hulda's sister, my great-great grandmother Augusta Lindemann Stutzmann. One of the witnesses to the marriage was Lena Lindemann, who was another sister of Augusta's and Hulda's. So everything jives. This is my Hulda. I looked at the signatures on the back of the certificate and I got sad looking at Hulda's - seeing someone's signature makes them feel more real, like a piece of them has manged to reach through time to you. Any time you look at these signatures, you're looking at the writing of someone who is long gone, but I was struck by the notion that she maybe she was so happy that day when she was signing her name, excited about the possibilities the future held as she began her married life. Little did she know that three years later she would be dead at 28 in an awful tragic accident. I felt a little like the ancient Greek Cassandra, who had the power of prophecy but the inability to change the future. Looking at Hulda's signature, I know what her future holds, but because it already happened, there's nothing I can do to change it.
I'm hopeful that since I received one document this means my others are on the way. I'm bracing myself for Hulda's death certificate, which I feel will be more of an emotional experience than these records usually are for me. But I'm looking forward to the marriage application records I requested, as I'm hoping they'll shed some light on some of my Irish ancestry...