Fellman – Bachmann – Zeisert

This is the Fellman surname itself, not the colonial New England and Hudson Valley families that married into it. The paper trail is short compared with those older clusters, and it is better for it: a dated crossing, a named minister, a German headstone, and a census that records the household as Mennonite.

The historical circumstances of the Waterloo settlement — and why it is a different German story from the 1710 Palatines in Dutchess County — are on Why they moved.

The direct line

Robert → Dorothy (Fellman / Ross) → Willard Harrington Fellman → Harry Robert Fellman → Ezra Fellman → Samuel Fellmann (1820–1863) → Samuel Fellman (~1794) of Ödheim.

Württemberg, not Baden

🟢 Samuel Fellman (b. about 1794, Ödheim, Heilbronn country — historically Württemberg) married Elisabetha Zeisert (also Zeisset; b. 13 Nov 1792, Willenbach – d. 28 Apr 1855, Württemberg). Willenbach is a Hofgut two miles northwest of Ödheim, recorded in the Ödheim Catholic registers. It is not a Baden village.

The GEDCOM, and older notes on this site, sometimes flatten this into a “Baden wave.” That is the wrong duchy. Baden sits next door; Christina Bachman, the next generation’s wife, was from Baden. The Fellmans themselves are a Württemberg family from the Heilbronn/Kocher country.

⚪ Samuel Sr.’s own father is listed in the tree as Henrich Fellmann, with no dates. Leave him as a name on a chart until an Ödheim parish entry is in hand.

Willenbach and the Zeissets

Willenbach had a Mennonite congregation in the late 18th century. Four Mennonite tenant families are documented on the estate in 1806.

🟢 Abraham Zeisset (d. c. 1786) — elder of the Immelhausen and Hasselbach Mennonite congregations in Baden; moved to Willenbach in 1783 and served that congregation until his death. Source: Global Anabaptist Mennonite Encyclopedia Online (GAMEO). He is the published patriarch of this surname in the Heilbronn country.

🟡 The tree attaches Elisabetha as granddaughter of that Abraham, via Abraham Zeisset (1755–1808, b. Ödheim, d. Willenbach). That is consistent with the published Zeisset reconstruction (Loretta M. Hoerman, The Zeisset Family in Germany; Catholic registers of Ödheim covering Willenbach). It has not been re-read from the parish books for this site, so the exact parent link stays plausible rather than documented here.

Samuel Fellmann of Waterloo (1820–1863)

🟢 Samuel Fellmann, miller. Stone at Sandhills Baptist Cemetery, Woolwich Township:

geboren März 1 1820 / gestorben Sept. 12, 1863 / Alter 43 Jahren / 6 Mo. 12 Tage

Find a Grave memorial 203644128. The 1863 date is the real death. The GEDCOM’s second death, 17 Jul 1888, is his widow’s death copied onto him — see Debunked Myths.

🟢 Married Christina “Tina” Bachman of Baden on 17 October 1847 in Waterloo Township. Minister: Bishop Benjamin Eby (ordained bishop 1812; the settlement was first called Ebytown for him; by 1847 the village was already Berlin, later Kitchener). Announced in the Deutsche Canadier, 22 Oct 1847; also in the Wellington District marriage register, 1840–1852.

🟢 1851/52 census, Waterloo Township, Div. 3 p. 17:

• Samuel FELLMAN, miller, Germany, MN (Mennonite), age 30
• Christina FELLMAN, wife, Germany, MN, age 36
• Jacob, 4; Philip, 3; Magdaline, 1 — all Canada, MN
• Margaret SCHOCK, servant, Germany, MN, 12

That census is independent of the marriage record. Eby marrying them put them in the Mennonite world; the enumerator listed the household as Mennonite. They did not stay in that church. Samuel is buried in a Baptist cemetery; by 1871–1881 several of the children are Baptist or Methodist. A German family that landed in a Mennonite township and then shifted Protestant is a documented pattern in Waterloo County, not a contradiction.

Around 1852 the family moved from Waterloo Township into Woolwich. Samuel died at 43, leaving Christina with a house full of children. She moved into Berlin and kept a boarding house. 🟢 Berliner Journal, 19 Jul 1888: “The widow Christine Fellmann died in Berlin at age of 63 years, 5 months and 11 days” — 17 Jul 1888. That works out to a birth around early 1825.

🟡 The 1851/52 census age (36, so ~1815/16) does not match the death notice (~1825). The newspaper age is specific to the day; census ages are often rounded. Treat c. 1825, Baden as the working birth, and do not promote the census year into a fact.

🔴 Christina’s parents in the GEDCOM are Gottlieb Christoph Bachmann of Creuzburg, Thuringia, and Eva Magdalena Schwanz of Förtha. That is a different German state, hundreds of kilometres from Baden. Same-name hinting. Her parents are unknown until a Baden parish is checked.

The Waterloo children

Compiled from the 1851/52 census, later Ontario records, and the Sandhills / Mount Hope / Hanover cemeteries. Ezra is on Samuel’s Find a Grave as a son and is independently placed in this household by a marriage record (below).

• 🟢 Jacob Bachman Fellman (22 Sep 1848, Waterloo Twp. – 27 Jun 1888, Berlin). Merchant. 1881 census: Methodist. Died of phthisis (tuberculosis) after six years; Ontario death register #017839; Berliner Journal 5 Jul 1888. Buried Mount Hope Cemetery, Kitchener. Married Elizabeth Delight Buckberrough, 6 Nov 1878, Waterloo — witness: Ezra Fellman of Waterloo.
• 🟢 Philip Fellman (b. 1848/49, Canada – d. 3 Dec 1909, Rochester). Another Waterloo-to-Rochester move, a decade after Ezra.
• 🟢 Magdalena “Maggie” Fellman (13 Feb 1851 – 21 Aug 1898, Berlin).
• 🟢 Annie Fellman (14 Nov 1852 – 13 Apr 1884, Berlin) m. Kalbfleisch.
• 🟢 Samuel Fellman (31 Aug 1854, Woolwich – 7 Nov 1926, Hanover, Grey County). 1871 Berlin census: Baptist. Buried Hanover Cemetery.
• 🟢 Ezra Fellman (~1858, Waterloo – 10 Dec 1896, Rochester) — the direct ancestor; see below.
• 🟢 Israel Fellman (b. 1859, Woolwich). 1871 Berlin: Baptist.
• 🟢 Christine “Tiny” Fellman (calc. 17 Oct 1860 – 21 Apr 1886, Berlin) m. Hymmen.

⚪ Extra GEDCOM children (Margaret b. 1851 Germany; Albert d. before 1871; a Henry who shares Jacob’s death date of 27 Jun 1888) look like duplicates or merges. Do not treat them as extra proven children.

🟡 Rev. Jacob Fellman (10 Oct 1837, Völkersleier, Bavaria – 23 Jan 1918, Oak Park, Illinois) married Mary Schneider in Waterloo in 1866 as “son of Samuel and Elizabeth.” Waterloo Region Generations charts him as Samuel Jr.’s brother. Bavaria is not Ödheim, and Elisabetha Zeisert died in Württemberg in 1855. Same parental given names are not enough. Leave him as a possible collateral, not a proven uncle.

Ezra Fellman — Waterloo to Rochester

🟢 Born about 1858, Waterloo. In Waterloo as an adult: witness at brother Jacob’s wedding, 6 Nov 1878. Rochester city directories 1888–1892. Married Emma Barrett (of the Dutchess County Barrett–Barnes–Bartle line), 16 Jan 1889, Rochester.

🟢 Died 10 Dec 1896, Rochester, of consumption (tuberculosis) — the same disease that killed Jacob eight years earlier. Age 38. Residence: Reynolds Street. Buried 13 Dec 1896, Mount Hope Cemetery, Range 4, Lot 86, SE 1/4 (Find a Grave 231433738). Death notice in the Democrat and Chronicle, 12 Dec 1896.

That is the handshake generation: German Waterloo miller’s son marries into the Hudson Valley patriot cluster, in a booming canal-and-rail city, and dies of the same TB that was moving through his siblings.

🟡 Harry Robert was born 21 Apr 1880, nine years before Ezra and Emma’s civil marriage. Late civil registration of an earlier union is common in this period; so is a child from a previous relationship raised in the next marriage. The original birth record has not been pulled for this page. Parentage of Harry as Ezra and Emma’s son is the working reconstruction (Mount Hope links him as Ezra’s child; the GEDCOM agrees) and should be confirmed against the 1880 birth and the 1889 marriage return.

Harry Robert Fellman (1880–1950)

🟢 b. 21 Apr 1880, Canton, Bradford County, Pennsylvania (the tree also has a weaker “Oct abt 1879” variant). d. 14 Apr 1950, Ventura County, California, of heart disease. Buried Ventura.

🟢 Married Christine Bartle Barnes, 17 Sep 1903, New York City (newspaper notice). That is the second in-law cluster on this surname line — the same Barnes/Bartle frontier family as Emma Barrett’s people, a generation later. See Barrett–Barnes–Bartle.

Documented moves, not folklore: Rochester 1892; Brooklyn through the 1910s; Spanish-American War service (1898–99) and the 1900 census in Cavite, Philippine Islands; return via Brest/Hoboken, June 1919; Hempstead / Baldwin, Nassau County, 1925–35; Maricopa County, Arizona, 1940; Ventura / Oak View, California, by 1944.

🔴 A baptism dated 10 Dec 1875 at Quakertown, Bucks County, PA — five years before the 1880 birth — and an 1880 census as grandson in Richland, Bucks County, belong to a different Pennsylvania Fellman cluster (18th-century Palatine families around Heuchelheim / Upper Salford / Quakertown). That is a hint-merge, not a childhood in Bucks County. See Debunked Myths.

Willard Harrington Fellman (1909–1980)

🟢 b. 18 Apr 1909, Rochester – d. 15 Apr 1980, Oak View, Ventura, California. Also recorded as Willard Harry Ross. Married Margaret Mary Dowling (the Irish line), 9 May 1940, New York City. Military service 1942–48. Daughter Dorothy (3 Jan 1943, NYC – 10 Nov 2015, South Dennis, MA) also used Ross. The Ross surname is a documented alias on this generation, not a separate paternal line.

What this is not

• 🔴 Not the Bucks County / Montgomery County, Pennsylvania Fellmans (Philip Fillman of Heuchelheim, 1724, and the Quakertown cluster). Same spelling, different century, different German origin.
• 🔴 Not a Jewish or Alsatian Fellmann family. Occupational German Fellmann (“hide-man”) is the etymology; this branch is a Christian Württemberg family in a Mennonite township. The name discussion is on fellman.us.
• 🔴 Not the 1710 Palatine Barthel/Hack/Lutz group in Dutchess County. Three German waves, three churches, three decades. Do not collapse them because the later in-laws lived in the same New York corridor.

DNA: Ancestry’s “Southern Ontario, Northern New York & Northern Pennsylvania Settlers” journey matches this Waterloo landing and the later New York/Pennsylvania residences. The match list will almost never show the word Fellman — the name died on the American branch, and the Ontario cousins married out as Snell, Master, and Hymmen. That is expected, not a failed line. See Why there are no Fellmans in the DNA match list.