Prose and Passion: one hundred years of cellotude

During the plague years I have been writing up a musical family memoir built around the biography of our venerable old cello. After completing a draft version in German (some chapters accessible through the link above), I have now started translating it into English, so here comes chapter 1, introducing Heinrich the cello and its eponymous owner, as a short blog series - one entry for each of the sections of the chapter (this entry also includes a very brief introductory passage before the first subheading). There will also be a few old photos with each entry.

All ten parts are now live, click the link at the bottom of each part to move on the the next one.

Table of contents:

UPDATE 2.3.2024. I've added some extra photos to each entry, in addition to the one that each already had at the top. And a few more links.

"One hundred years of cellotude" is one of various title ideas I have been kicking around. I'll also use this as a tag to link the instalments of the English text, such as not to swamp the more general tabs with this content. Instruments of time and truth would be perfect - but there is already an early music ensemble by that name.

Chapter 1

A cello called Heinrich

Heinrich came into our family roughly a century ago, and definitely before 1924, but we don’t know exactly when and how. We know that Heinrich is a cello made in the tradition of Saxony in the late 19th century. The young cellist in my family baptised the instrument Heinrich after their great-great-grandfather in the name line, who was the earliest known owner and player of the instrument. To avoid confusion, I will refer to him as Max Heinrich, even though in real life he only used his second Christian name.

Before we come to Heinrich the cello, let us first get to know Max Heinrich the cellist and his family. Their lives were decisively shaped by the key innovation of the 19th century, the railways.

Staff at Tangermünde Railway Station, 1889.

A railway family

On December 7, 1835, the steam locomotive Adler (Eagle) travelled from Nürnberg to Fürth and thereby opened the age of railways in the German Confederation (a patchwork of principalities that lasted from 1815 to 1866). German engineers followed the lead of the British pioneers of railway technology and copied the details like the gauge and the propulsion technique that had already been proven in passenger services since 1825. Within half a century, the expansion of German railways overtook the British role model, At the beginning of 1885, the German Empire had the world’s largest network with 39,000 km of track, with Britain following in second place with 31,000 km. Today both networks are significantly smaller.

Initially, railways in the German Confederation emerged from a colourful mixture of state and privately-funded initiatives. In Prussia, however, and then after 1871 in the newly founded empire, the state took the lead and only left smaller local endeavours to private companies. One key reason for state leadership on long distance rail development was that Prussia’s rulers had recognised the importance of railways for rapid troop movements. For the same reason, the entire network has been more strategically planned than the British one, much of which has grown out of wild races between competing investors.

The advent of railways facilitated travel in ways that had been unimaginable a generation earlier. In 1839. a young pianist called Clara Wieck suffered some serious discomfort travelling from Leipzig to Paris on a stagecoach. Just ten years later, and then known as Clara Schumann, she could play concerts between Paris and St. Petersburg using trains to cross the continent at ease.

The dramatic expansion and efficient running of a vast railway network that in many respects surpassed the one we have today required countless employees in roles that hadn’t existed before, and thus couldn’t be inherited in the old feudal style of bygone times. Thus they brought opportunities and social mobility to many, along with the geographical mobility and the chance to see the world beyond your native area.

People in four separate branches of my family tree used these opportunities independently of each other, including the parents of Max Heinrich the cellist. Richard Heinrich and Maria Louise married at Breslau (today Wroclaw, Poland) between 1877 and 1880. Maria was eight years older than Richard and had been widowed twice. She brought a son from a previous marriage into the family. They had a daughter in April 1880, and then Max Heinrich was born September 11 1882, completing a patchwork family that stayed relatively small for the time.

Richard, born in 1852, was spared military service in 1874 because of knock-knees and height. He was assigned as a “second-class reservist” meaning that in peacetime he had no military obligations of any sort, but until his 31st birthday he could be called up if there was a war. He was lucky, as the peace lasted more than forty years. He didn’t even live to witness the war that was to end the empire.

We don’t know much about old Richard, but we do know that he worked for the railways as an office clerk. At about the same time, another great-great grandfather of mine worked with the Reichsbahn Elsass-Lothringen where he eventually became a station master, and yet another one was a railway worker at Gütersloh. The daughter of that last one, travelled along the line to find herself another railway man, whom we will meet in the next chapter.

Like the other railway employees in the family tree whom he never met, Richard came from a modest background that soon gets lost in the mist of time. His father was a carpenter, apparently, and we’re already struggling with the identity of his paternal grandfather, who may or may not have been a coachman. Maria’s father was a shepherd.

As an office clerk (Bureau-Ass.), I imagine that Richard was kind of a precursor to the 20th century’s ubiquitous secretaries. Not the most glamorous social ascent, but his workplace was clean and dry, and his work didn’t ruin his health, in contrast to the many who signed up with the flourishing mining and steel industries. And he got to see a bit of the world.

Three times Richard and his family moved to an entirely new town, in a different area. Looking at the dates when these places were connected to the railway network, they match his moves. I conclude that he was involved more with the setup of new rail links than with the operation of existing ones – until he found his personal terminus.

Following his tracks one move at a time: His daughter Gertrud was born in 1880 in Neurode, still in his native Silesia. The railwau links from Neurode to Glatz opened in 1879 and in the other direction to Waldenburg in 1880. The latter required the construction of a bridge across the Schwarzbachgrund which at the time was the highest railway viaduct in Germany. Neurode was just a small town of 6,000 inhabitants but there were significant mining activities in the area, so I assume the transport of freight must have been the economic driver motivating the investment in the line with that spectacular bridge. Neurode was still reasonably close to home, only 60 km from Breslau.

Two and a half years later, when Max Heinrich was born, the family was already further away, in Thuringia, specifically in Zella St. Blasii, now part of Zella-Mehlis. There, the lines to Erfurt and Meiningen were built in 1881-1884 enabling onwards travel westwards to Schweinfurt, Würzburg and Stuttgart. Today, this track forms part of the shortest link from Stuttgart to Berlin.

Musically, Max Heinrich’s birthplace may have been touched ever so gently by the genius of Johann Sebastian Bach, who was born in Eisenach, just 40 km away, and lived in the district capital Ohrdruf, only 20 km away, from 1695 to 1703, while he served an apprenticeship with his older brother Johann Christoph and also played the organ for the local church.

We know that Max Heinrich stayed at Zella for more than a year, because he was vaccinated there just after his first birthday. The smallpox vaccine was the only vaccination that existed at the time, so the certificate doesn’t mention what disease is targeted, only that the legal requirement for vaccination has been fulfilled. In Prussia, vaccination was mandated since 1815, and in the German Empire since 1874. The certificate notes that the vaccination was successful in the first attempt, meaning that a pustule formed at the site of the cut. From the small print on the back we learn that the procedure is to be carried out up to three times if the first and second attempt don’t yield a visible result. Eleven years later, Max Heinrich received the second vaccination, also with immediate success – by then the family had moved on to Tangermünde.

Some time between 1883 and 1888 the family moved from Thuringia to Saxony-Anhalt (in today’s nomenclature of federal states), first to Stendal and then to the nearby town of Tangermünde. At around the same time, a short branch line of 10 km length linking these two towns was built,

Planners had originally considered Tangermünde as a stop on the mainline from Berlin to Lehrte, but it lost out to Stendal. Only in 1888 travellers from Tangermünde could travel down the branch line to catch long distance trains from there. The branch line was developed by a shareholder company mainly to serve freight from the sugar factory at Tangermünde, but it carries passengers to this day.

Tangermünde was the last stop in the journeys of our railway clerk, thus we have to assume that he had a permanent job there, not limited to the duration of the development project. A group photo of the entire staff of the line taken in 1889 outside Tangermünde station (a slightly cropped version appears above) shows 25 people including one woman. Richard is one of those wearing a uniform with shiny brass buttons. I guess this was the prerogative of those who didn’t have to do dirty work. He is standing nearly in the middle, below the station clock.

The station master on the other hand keeps a low profile in the background, standing in the entrance of his office, with the big sign “Stationsvorsteher” above the door. He wears a tie and a hat and manages to look modest while also making his important role unmistakably clear.

Max Heinrich's parents, Johann Friedrich Richard Groß (*1852 in Breslau), left, and Maria Louise Mentzel (*1844 Skronskau), atanding on top of the boulder. Photo dated 1900.

Tangermünde flourished as a member of the Hanse trade network in the 15th century, but was then bypassed by most historical events, including the construction of the main railway line. Its numerous historical buildings including the town hall, gothic church, the city wall and several of its gates are impeccably well preserved. The wall owes its survival to the fact that much of it also serves to prop up the city on the slope leading down to the river Elbe, and to protect it from floods.

In the summer of 1888, Max Heinrich visited the Volksschule (people’s school) in Stendal, and from the Bürgerschule (citizens’ school) in Tangermünde. In 19th century Prussia, Bürgerschule was almost as good as the Gymnasium, but without the last two years leading to the Abitur qualification, and it only offered Latin but not Greek. His reports from 1894 and 1895 show good marks in drawing, history and singing, with all subjects apart from singing sliding from the first report to the second.

Heinrich at school around 1892- second row from front 3rd from the left.

The reports also offer us samples of Richard’s signature. Acknowledging the impressive results of 1894 he signed as „Richard Gross / Eisenb. Bur. Ass.“ A year later, the less glamorous results were only signed with his last name. In both cases, the name is framed in an oval shaped garnished with a flourish at the bottom – I am still not sure whether that is purely decorative or has some hidden meaning.

Max Heinrich received his confirmation in 1896 in the very beautiful Stephanskirche in Tangermünde. Not just from any old vicar but from the superintendent and head vicar named Fenger. In the relevant almanac for the clergy of the province Saxony dated 1903 he is listed as Franz Heinrich Leopold Fenger with the note: „Rother Adler-Orden IV. Classe“. The same source also gives us an overview of the school system in Tangermünde and the distribution of faiths among the 11,500 residents of the town (1,152 Catholics, 41 Jews, 24 of the Apostolian community, four Mennonites, three Dissidents).

April 1896 marks the end of Max Heinrich’s education at the Bürgerschule. According to his police records, he remained at Tangermünde until 1897 and was then registered at Stendal from 27.12.1897 until 24.10.1899/, but we don’t know what he did there during that time. Conceivably, he may have started an apprenticeship there and left without finishing it? There is a sewing table that he allegedly built, so I imagine he may have been a carpenter’s apprentice, which would make sense in that his paternal grandfather was a carpenter as well. On the other hand, I also heard of a similar item bought after 1918 as a kit for self-assembly, so the legend that he built the piece may only refer to assembly rather than building from scratch.

Within his teenage years he must also have acquired or improved his musical skills as he later signed up with the army as a musician. Stendal today has a music school, but I can’t find any trace of a more advanced institution like a conservatoire. Then again, these institutions have a habit of disappearing. Sadly we may never know if he already played the cello then.

What we do know though is that in November 1900, just after turning 18, he identified as a musician. He signed a book he read with: „Heinrich Groß Musiker, in Bielefeld.“ And no, I haven’t the foggiest idea what he was doing in Bielefeld. We have strictly no connection whatsoever to that city apart from this one inscription. The book is a collection of novellas by W. O. von Horn (1798-1867), and we will get back to its content later. A second note reveals when and where he read it – sounds like a holiday or spa break: „Gelesen 30. Nov. 1900 in Bad Warmbrunn im Rosenheim.“ This book will be an important piece of evidence later on.

Read on:

Strasbourg in the Belle Epoque