Josef Hummel of Neukirch: Faith, Revolution and a Divided Community

A Village at the Edge of Revolution

The Revolutions of 1848 were a wave of liberal and nationalist uprisings that swept across Europe, challenging established political orders. In Baden, the movement became particularly radical, culminating in an armed republican uprising in 1849 before being defeated by Prussian-led forces.

In the small Black Forest village of Neukirch, these events were not distant constitutional struggles played out in Frankfurt or Karlsruhe. They unfolded through village meetings, militia levies, disputes over local government and, in the case of Josef Hummel, a deeply personal conflict over religion and political authority.

Neukirch

Josef Hummel (1810–1870) was a watchmaker and watch trader who became mayor of Neukirch in 1847. During the upheavals of 1848–49, he would find himself caught between competing political and religious loyalties.

Relatives in the 1926 Census

The following is a list of relatives appearing in the 1926 census of Ireland.

Co. Kilkenny

My great-grandparents John & Albertina Holmes along with their children Pammy, Tom, Jack and Fred, in Charterschoolland, Kilkenny

Co. Wexford

Their eldest son George Holmes, boarding in Main Street, Wexford

Co. Kildare

John's brother Samuel E Holmes and his wife and daughter (both Eleanor), in Monasterevin, Co. Kildare

An Introduction to My Family History

This blog traces the Holmes family and the related Zimber, Kirwan, Nagle, O'Flaherty, Ashmore and Quinn families, their connections, and the stories that have emerged from researching them.

The research ranges from the Midlands of Ireland to Waterford and Tipperary, from Dublin to the Black Forest of Germany and the goldfields of California, and from nineteenth-century military service to the lives of ordinary families recorded in censuses, church records and other surviving sources.

The articles below are grouped by family connection. Some follow a particular ancestral line; others explore individuals or collateral branches whose stories have emerged during the research.

Edward Kirwan Snr - On The North West Frontier

A Dublin Labourer's Son

Edward Kirwan was born in Dublin in late 1863 or early 1864, the son of Patrick & Catherine Kirwan, and grew up in the parish of St Catherine’s in the densely populated inner city. His early life was shaped by the working-class environment of Dublin in the mid-Victorian period, where labouring work was common and military service offered one of the few structured routes to stable income and travel. By the age of 18, he had enlisted in the British Army, joining the 1st Battalion of the 22nd Regiment of Foot (later the Cheshire Regiment) in Dublin on 26 August 1878. At enlistment, he was recorded as 5 ft 5½ in tall, with a fresh complexion, brown hair, hazel eyes, and minor scars on his forehead and forearm. His profile is consistent with the broader pattern of Irish urban recruitment into the British infantry during this period, particularly from Dublin's working-class districts.

Soldier of the Empire

After initial training in Buttevant, Co. Cork and home service, Kirwan was deployed to India in October 1879. This placed him within the North-West Frontier military system at a time when British forces were consolidating control following the Second Anglo-Afghan War (1878–1880). His service record situates him within a network of interconnected cantonments rather than a single fixed garrison. These included Peshawar, the principal frontier headquarters and administrative hub; Nowshera, a forward staging cantonment exposed to malaria-prone lowlands; Cherat, a hill station used primarily for convalescence and recovery from illness; Ambala, a major rear-area cantonment and depot; and Allahabad, part of the wider imperial logistics system through which troops were processed into and out of Indian service. Within this system, soldiers were routinely rotated between stations, often in response to operational requirements, climate, and health rather than formal combat deployment.

British soldiers on the North West Frontier c 1880

Witches in the Family: The Tragic Fate of Bartle and Waldburga Faller

Family history often brings unexpected discoveries. While tracing my Faller ancestors from the Black Forest region of southwestern Germany, I came across a darker chapter from the 17th century: two members of the family —  Bartle and Waldburga Faller, the brother and sister of my 9th great-grandfather Jakob Faller — were executed after being accused of witchcraft in the Freiburg area during the height of the European witch trials.

Their story came to me only in fragments (see the graphic "Hexenwahn im Schwarzwald" below), but it offers a haunting glimpse into the fear and uncertainty of life in early modern Germany.

The Faller Family in the Black Forest

The Faller family lived in the rural Black Forest communities northeast of Freiburg im Breisgau, in what is now Baden-Württemberg. Life in this mountainous region was difficult even in the best of times. Families depended heavily on farming and livestock, and survival could be threatened by harsh winters, poor harvests, disease, or war.

Fallengrund