Johanna Schoengarth Spiegel bio

My Great-Grandmother, written by Clara Spiegel Schaper (daughter of Johanna Schoengarth Spiegel), 1970.
   I {Clara Spiegel Schaper} remember hearing my mother {Johanna Schoengarth Spiegel} give me information concerning the life of her Grandmother {surname Von Rudolph}, the daughter of a German nobleman, Von Rudolph.
   Somehow my grandfather (Carl Schoengarth) became estranged from his mother {surname Von Rudolph}. She was an ardent "Roman Catholic". The woman {Helene Hippa} he married was a "Lutheran". My great-grandmother {surname Von Rudolph} was a widow for a while, but later on she married a man by the name of ____ Viesse. She had always been living in good circumstances and continues so for the remainder of her life. In contrast my grandfather {Carl Schoengarth} 'humbly worked' his land and also made shoes for a 'living' for neighboring peasants.
   As youngsters, my mother {Johanna Schoengarth Spiegel} and her brothers walked many miles during---"Christmas Time" to visit "Grandmother Viesse". They felt tires on the way and wanted to turn back but one of my mother's {Johanna Schoengarth Spiegel} brothers (August) kept up their spirits with bits of humorous poetry which he orginated at the moment.
   Upon their arrival, their grandmother {surname Von Rudolph Viesse} made them comfortable as well as gave them good food to eat. She also allowed them to get a good nights rest before sending them on their way back to their home. She also gave each one a bag filled with "Christmas bakery" together with the usual 'good bye': "You could have bread but you tread upon it with your feet". In other words she intended to disinherit their father.
   My grandfather {Carl Shoengarth} and grandmother {Helene Hippa} did not visit her and at some time in later years they had heard that she had died, leaving 'everything' to her husband.
   My grandparents {Carl & Helene Hippa Shoengarth} with their eight children came to America, "The Land of Religious Freedom". Communism in America is trying to destroy this precious--heritage.
   My great-grandmother {surname Von Rudolph Viesse} never dreamed that the boy poet who once trudged that weary road with his sisters and brothers, to visit their grandmother {surname Von Rudolph Viesse} would become the progenitor of Judges of Courts, in the United States of America. {Clarifications by Sara Bader Hemp, 1998}.