FAMILY ORIGINS

The Koelln family was Lutheran and resided in Hainholz, Germany in the Schleswig province. Hainholz is southeast of Elmshorn.

During the Thirty Years' War (1618-1648), the defeated troops of Wallenstein made their camp in Elmshorn (1627). The following year the town was of the plague ravaged and burned by marauding Croatian troops. During the Swedish war, the late phase of the Thirty Years' War, a Swedish army marched through the town and devastated it (1643). In 1657, during the First Northern War (1655-1660), Elmshorn was where Swedish troops under Charles X. Gustav battled with the Danish troops. On April 24, 1750, 47 houses and nine barns were destroyed in the Great Fire of Elmshorn. In the great flood of 1756, there were nearly 600 deaths. During the Napoleonic wars from 1813 to 1814 Elmshorn was occupied by a hostile army of Russians, Swedes and Prussians. After this death and destruction, the town recovered through its vibrant whaling/maritime trade industry. Since 1945, Elmshorn fulfilled an important function as a rail and telecommunications hub. In 1875, there were about 7,000 residents in the town, but it now boasts a population of around 50,000.

The family later moved to Neuendorf, a row village at B 431 between Elmshorn and Reihendorf and borders Raa Besenbek on the east, Kruckau on the south, Kollmar on the west, and in the north on the municipality Gemeinde Altenmoor. The name Neuendorf (new village) is attributed to the emergence of a "new settlement". The estimation of the settlement is around 1400. The first church was inaugurated 1504. It served as a source of shelter from the constantly returning storm tides of the time. In the year 1627, the houses and the church were burnt down during the Thirty Years War. The inhabitants, who had fled to Altona and Hamburg, rebuilt Neuendorf after the war. The economic structure of the town consists of agriculture and small industrial concerns. Neuendorf has a current population of around 900 residents.

LIFE IN DENMARK

Hinrich Schoof, the husband of Anna Koelln, was born in Neuendorf, which is 5 km. west of Elmshorn and 2 km. away from the estuary of the Elbe-River in the province of Holstein, north of Hamburg.

Magdalena Schoof, Anna Koelln's daughter, was born before Anna married Hinrich Schoof. Therefore Magdalena was considered illegitimate.

In the presence of the midwife Engelbrecht, she had to indicate who the father of the newborn Magdalena was. Hinrich Schoof was off at sea when his daughter was born. Eventually Hinrich went on to become a cottage-based farmer.

Anna was employed by Paul Schmidt in Hainholz in 1799. Magdalena Schoof's godparents were Rebecca Muenster, Margaretha Harder, and Elisabeth Duncker, all from Hainholz. Hinrich Koelln and Lucia (Rieck) Koelln were deceased at the time of their granddaughter's birth.

SURNAME ORIGINS

There is a place called Kolln-Reisiek (Koelln-Reisiek) north and west of Hainholz, which is how the Koelln clan may have received its family name. Kolln-Reisiek's population is 2,810. In the 16th Century, it was called "Colling" or "Collinge". The name Kolln means "tip of a plant".

The surname Rieck may be a misspelling of the more common German reich, which means 'rich'.

The surname Schoof is both German and Dutch and comes from Middle Low German schof and the Middle Dutch scoof or "sheaf"; it's likely a metonymic occupational name for a sheaf-binder (someone who would bind grain together).

The surname Kelting origins from the word "celt" or "celtic". There are several possible explanations for the family name: (1) From a field name or place in northern Germany; (2) The Celts were an Indo-European and ethno-linguistically diverse group of tribal societies in Iron Age and Roman-era Europe who spoke Celtic languages; (3) There are Rhineland charters in Latin which use such phrases as celtes seu fracmina lapidum to describe chips of stone used for making a road; or (4) It may have also been used to describe long, thin prehistoric stone or bronze adzes, chisels, hoes, or other axe-like tools.

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