The Heckenbach Surname

Before the end of the 14th century, things were on such a small scale that common people in Germany had no need of last names. About that time, however, the population grew, the need for taxation increased, and people began to trade and settle in other places. So the citizens acquired last names. This trend had begun with the wealthier families but now filtered down to the lower classes. These new names came from a man's trade, from some physical characteristic, or from his father's name. There are two explanations of place-names as surnames. Since ours was never a family of lords, it must be that some medieval ancestor of ours moved from the village of Heckenbach, out to a neighboring village. He thus acquired his name. It was a local name, an Eifel name, tied to one geographic location, not one like Miller that could have originated anywhere.

The earliest record I've found was in Frankfurt in 1597, although the spelling was a little different. Church records in the Eifel were kept only after the Reformation, beginning around 1650, but much later in some towns. The books for the town of Heckenbach begin in 1654, but there were no Heckenbachs in it at first, although a couple of families lived there for a time in the 1800s. There are several records from Ahrweiler from the 1600's. By 1720, they were numerous in Niederzissen, Wehr, Ober-and Niederdürenbach, and Niederlützingen, wandering eastward to the Rhine.

Our first direct ancestor shows up in 1735. He moved to Brohl from Niederlützingen and the municipal record states that he was a well-to-do man.

There were other Heckenbachs in a dozen towns in the area. They may have been distant relatives of this one, or descendants of others who had wandered out of the village of Heckenbach years earlier. They have dispersed ever since, even though originating at one point.

In 1977 I found 26 Heckenbachs listed in the Rhineland's telephone directories. There were others in scattered parts of Germany. For most of them, any kinship with us would evidently go back very far, and be impossible to prove, although I sometimes find some more closely related.

Christian and John Adam were the ancestors of about 50 US Heckenbach households a generation ago, and probably more today, virtually all the Heckenbachs in the US. There are a some exceptions though :

1. John Heckenbach, age 36 (1834) shows up in the 1870 US Census in St Joseph, Buchanan County, MO.  He appears with Rosina Heckenbach (presumably his mother age 72) (1798), a wife Sophia age 28 (1842), 5 children: "Clam" age 10, Emma age 8, Sophia age 7, John age 5, and Caroline age 3. Rosina and John were born in Würtemburg, Prussia. Sophia was born in Baden, and the children were all born in Missouri.
2. Also in the 1870 Census in Hensley, Champaign County, IL was a Peter Heckenbach age 20 who gave his birthplace as Sweden.
3. There were Louis and Daniel Heckenbach in the 1900 US Census in Hazleton City, PA, but the writing is unclear
4. 1910 Richard Heckenbach, waiter, age 35 in Manhattan Borough, NY.  
5. Karl Heckenbach from Linz migrated to America in the early 1900s. 
6. In the 1920 census in Hartford CT is a record for Matthew and Christina Heckenbach. They were ages 61 and 56 and were listed as being from Bavaria. Then a 1922 Ellis Island record shows Joseph and Christine Heckenbach ages 63 and 59 were returning from Germany to their home in Hartford. 
7. The 1930 Census shows a Carl Heckenbach born 1893, with a wife Kate, born 1900, living at 56 E 87th Ave, NYC. Carl was an apartment superintendant, and had become a US citizen in 1927 in Pennsylvania.
8. Hermann Johann Heckenbach, born in 1939 in Wittlich, Germany, married in Oklahoma in 1958.
9. I am familiar with three other, as yet unrelated, Heckenbachs who have moved from Germany to the US in more recent years.

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This Page was created May 5 1999, and last updated May 26, 2007