My Patrilineal Roots

My patrilineal ancestors who was the first of my patrilineal ancestors to emigrate to the United States was born in  Rimbeck, landkreis Halberstadt, in Saxony-Anhalt (formerly known as Sachsen, Prussia), shown here:

The birth record from the local church which was built between 1742 and 1760 is:

It says:

Karl Andreas Christoph Willike, born 17 Feb 1823 in Rimbeck, Province of Sachsen, Deutschland, died 2 Oct 1898 and was buried 5 Oct. Age 75 y, 7 mos, 15 days.

He emigrated to the U.S. from the country then known as Prussia, in order to avoid the draft in advance of what came to be known as the Revolutions of 1848. As explained at the link:

The revolutions of 1848, known in some countries as the springtime of the peoples or the springtime of nations, were a series of revolutions throughout Europe over the course of more than one year, from 1848 to 1849. It remains the most widespread revolutionary wave in European history to date.

The revolutions were essentially democratic and liberal in nature, with the aim of removing the old monarchical structures and creating independent nation-states, as envisioned by romantic nationalism. The revolutions spread across Europe after an initial revolution began in Italy in January 1848. Over 50 countries were affected, but with no significant coordination or cooperation among their respective revolutionaries. Some of the major contributing factors were widespread dissatisfaction with political leadership, demands for more participation in government and democracy, demands for freedom of the press, other demands made by the working class for economic rights, the upsurge of nationalism, and the European potato failure, which triggered mass starvation, migration, and civil unrest.

The uprisings were led by temporary coalitions of reformers, the middle classes, the upper classes (the bourgeoisie) and workers; however, the coalitions did not hold together for long. Many of the revolutions were quickly suppressed, as tens of thousands of people were killed, and even more were forced into exile. Significant lasting reforms included the abolition of serfdom in Austria and Hungary, the end of absolute monarchy in Denmark, and the introduction of representative democracy in the Netherlands. 

The revolutions were most important in France, the Netherlands, Italy, the Austrian Empire, and the states of the German Confederation that would make up the German Empire in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The wave of uprisings ended in October 1849.

As noted here: 

Growing discontent with the political and social order imposed by the Congress of Vienna led to the outbreak, in 1848, of the March Revolution in the German states. In May the German National Assembly (the Frankfurt Parliament) met in Frankfurt to draw up a national German constitution.

But the 1848 revolution turned out to be unsuccessful: King Frederick William IV of Prussia refused the imperial crown, the Frankfurt parliament was dissolved, the ruling princes repressed the risings by military force, and the German Confederation was re-established by 1850. Many leaders went into exile, including a number who went to the United States and became a political force there.

Thus, the Prussian part of this wave of revolutions was a failure and a step backward for democracy.

Karl's brother also emigrated at that time, but rather than settling in the fairly newly formed free state of Ohio, he migrated to one of the slave states of the South. Both brothers were alive during the U.S. Civil War and were in states on opposite sides of that conflict. My side of the family has basically lost touch with the descendants of Karl's brother.

A generation after the Revolutions of 1848, a federal German Empire, with the former Kingdom of Prussia at its core, was formed in 1871. After losing World War I, the Weimar Republic replaced the German Empire's monarchy in 1919. This initially promising democratic experiment eventually failed, however, in part, as a result of the harsh circumstances forced upon it by the Treaty of Versailles, giving rise to the Third Reich of Nazi Germany whose expansionist efforts caused World War II. 

A lasting democratic regime was finally put into place after World War II, in which Nazi Germany was ultimately defeated, in West Germany, while East Germany became a Soviet style one party state until the Soviet Union fell in 1989. Germany reunified on the model of West Germany in 1990.

When World War II ended, my German relatives were on the East German side of the division between West Germany and East Germany. As a practical matter, they were impossible to get back in contact with until my father did so, not long after Germany reunified. Some of them opened up a bar and pig roasting restaurant after reunification.

My wife's family is similarly situated. But the separation in her case has not been resolved. The ancestral homeland of both sides of her family was in North Korea. Some made it to the south around the time of the Korean War, and some didn't. No one has heard any word from those who didn't since then. Her parents, and some of their siblings and children, in turn emigrated to the United States. Korea has genealogical records that go back about five centuries, but the records for her family are currently out of reach.