Trier

The nearest airports to Trier are Luxembourg (bus to Luxembourg main railway station, then train to Trier) and Frankfurt-Hahn (direct buses to Trier). If neither of those are available the "real" Frankfurt Airport is also possible, but further away.

Luxembourg (if the covid restrictions are lifted a year from now) Findel airport is practically next door to Trier as the crow flies.

Will you be getting a car, or will you remain in the city? I've happily stayed at a very old fashioned hotel half way up a big hill, and walking (there is a footpath) takes a person in good shape.

If that's where he emigrated from, do you know where he lived before the upheaval?

I've been to Trier many times - even had a pharmacy give me the right things to stabilize my knee when it exploded once. Nice folks, as is everybody there that I have met.

Trier is one of the very few times I might suggest Ryanair - they fly (or did before covid) into Hahn airport (what they call Frankfurt-Hahn) which is much closer to Trier than FRA, the usual Frankfurt airport (which is another good choice).

If you do elect to use Ryanair be really really careful to read ALL their conditions and extra fees because your really cheap ticket may not wind up so cheap...

Where are you headed after Trier?

If you fly into (or out of) the main Frankfurt airport (FRA) your train to/from Trier will travel through the Middle Rhine Valley. It's Germany's most scenic train ride and a good place to see a thing or two on the way.

Fly to Luxembourg, take in that city, the head northeast to Vianden, Luxembourg and across the border to Trier.

Russ, probably back to the US. I thought I'd end the trip there. I've never been, I probably need to do my homework on Trier.

Nigel, my great grandfather lived in or around Neurath ( I think that's how it's spelled), a more rural area near Trier, and like lots of other Catholics, was run out of Germany by Bismark. They left Germany and arrived in NYC in 1885, I think. From there, they went to live in Sprague, Washington, about 70 miles west of Spokane. It is high desert there, wheat, rye, etc are grown. He worked on the Great Northern Rail Road, but contracted some disease and died about 1900.

I can't wait to go to Trier and see the headstones behind the church with my name on them. I'm hoping there might be some family records so I could find out more about them.

"I'm hoping there might be some family records so I could find out more about them."

I'd encourage you to do as much as you can ahead of time on Family Search or Ancestry. I found microfilm of small town church records in Germany from the 1720's-1750's. I was actually at the Family History Library in SLC so looked at the microfilm on the viewers there. I don't know if it's been digitized yet (this was in 2016 or so) but my word, there was probably miles and miles of film available.

I am not sure what the status of LDS library access is now but pre-pandemic they used to allow non-church members to access the genealogy-related services at their church locations. Some areas also had folks who would be able to help you on certain days of the week.

PS Trier is very cool. I was there for the start of a RS tour and even with a couple of extra nights did not see everything I wanted to see.

I don't see a Neurath in the vicinity of Trier. There is one near Düsseldorf but that's unlikely where you will find what you are searching for.

There is Naurath (Wald) (Naurath in the forest) about 25km east of Trier by road. I don't see any rail to the area.

Could this be where you will be successful? Perhaps...

It is a TINY village with a population of only about 200 on just a handful of streets. I don't see a church of any type there. There is a very small stone chapel but I can't see if it is in use. The photos of the chapel have a pic of an interpretive sign identifying it as "die Felsenkapelle - der hl. Walburga geweiht" (the stone chapel of holy Walburga - like saint). It does say (of course pre-covid) that it is open on Saturdays, Sundays and holidays. There is a very small cemetery down the Hauptstrasse towards the volunteer fire station. Because of German strong personal privacy laws Google Streetview isn't allowed there, but using the satellite view I can see that the small cemetery has just a few graves in it.

Good luck with your search.

Thanks, Nigel. I know I need to do homework here before my trip. I may rent a car once in Trier to explore where my relatives lived

Pam, thanks for the info. I probably need an Ancestry account to see what I can find before I go, as well as determining what I want to see in Trier.

BTW, my maternal great grandfather, a blacksmith, left St. Paul in the early 20th century, as cars were becoming popular, and moved the family to Couer d'Alene.

If it's emigration records you want, consider Hamburg. Most emigrants left from here, and there are extensive records available.

I just returned from a trip to Germany, where we spent 2 nights in Trier. We stayed at the Mercure Hotel Trier Porta Nigra. It was reasonably priced and the location could not be beat--it was right across from the Porta Nigra, the old city gate, which then leads down the main street to all of the Unesco Heritage Sites.

Catherine, sorry I didn't see your last post! You can see what you can find on www.familysearch.org before you purchase an Ancestry membership as you'd need the International one. I encourage you to copy off any documents you find as they can be hard to find again, lol.

I don't keep my family tree on Family Search as others can change your information (insert eyeroll here) but you can look at others' family trees if they have them searchable. Sometimes the information is accurate, sometimes it's not or you'll see their "documentation" is someone else's tree.

Interesting about part of your family moving to Coeur d'Alene!

I'm hoping there might be some family records so I could find out more
about them.

Pam is totally right, try to find out as much as you can ahead of time. If you want to do research during the valuable time you are here, you need to know ahead of time where to look, and opening hours.

Let's start with the town. You have quite a choice of different towns by the name of Neurath. Neurath near Arzfeld is the one closest to Trier with that spelling, but of course it could also be Naurath (Wald).

Then, you need to know where to find the information. The original documents you would want to look for are the church records which are usually kept in the parish. I don't know how accessible these are during Covid. Many of these church records have been converted into microfiche which might be stored in some central church archive. And some of these of course have been digitized and might be accessible via those genealogy sites (Ancestry etc.).

If you can handle some basic German, you might give this website a try. It's free and does not require an account. There is also a website for church records which does require an account and is not free of charge, but you can at least check for free if they have even uploaded the church records from the towns you are interested in. Unfortunately, they have not uploaded the church books from many places yet.

I can't wait to go to Trier and see the headstones behind the church
with my name on them.

Having seen a number of Americans quite shocked when they visited the cemeteries of their ancestors, I hope you are aware that graves are not kept for eternity here. It is very unlikely that you will actually find the grave of any great great grandparents unless it happened to have a historic tombstone that was considered worthy of being preserved.

If it's emigration records you want, consider Hamburg.

Or Bremerhaven. They have a fantastic museum on emigration.

Thanks, everyone. Lots of goid information.

Catherine, i just saw this post and thought I'd chime in. I'm heading to Germany for a month and will doing research on my father's family who came from there (both sides). One side from Ostbevern and the other from the Hannover area.

It is true that many emigrants left from Hamburg, but generally it was the citizens of the southern and eastern area. Many of the west and northern areas of Germany emigrated from Bremen. Unfortunately, all of Bremen's emigration records dating before 1874 were completely destroyed. That doesn't mean you can't find them but you'll probably need to check US immigration records (which you can do on familysearch.org). I found one side of my dad's family by looking up Baltimore immigration lists. I was lucky in that I knew the city they arrived and the year.

I would encourage you to start on familysearch.org (as Pam said). It's owned by the LDS church but is completely free. Yes, records can be changed but for your purposes, it should work well. It also has an abundance of records that other people have found and added, such as death certificates, marriage records, census records and so on. When i first started using it (less than a month ago), I could only go up 4 generations (to my 3rd great grandfather). However, once I input my name and my dad's name into the familysearch records, all of a sudden my family tree expanded from 1836 all the way back to the early 1600's.

So you really can find a ton of information there, and it will lead you to even more info. This morning, I actually accessed records of my 3rd great grandfather's marriage at St. Ambrosius Church in Ostbevern. I was able to see a photo of the handwritten entry dating back to 1814. I found it using this website - https://data.matricula-online.eu/en/deutschland. If you do search here, use the list (in the blue box) rather than the map to find records as the map is more confusing. And as Pam and Anna said, it will be easier if you do a lot of your research ahead of time.