Befuddled. That was my situation six months ago when I discovered a second Duewel family living near Warren County, Missouri about the same time as my Duewel ancestors. Countless hours were spent trying to figure out how the two families might be related to no avail. Fortuitously, one of the descendants from the other family wrote a book about his ancestors’ first 100 years in America. Surely this would explain everything! I located the book on microfilm and scoured through every page hoping to find a reference to my ancestors. Not one mention. Horseplop! Later, I had high hopes my researcher in Germany might connect the dots but that didn’t happen either. Das ist nicht sehr gut!

If there is a relationship between the two Duewel families (and of course there is) it goes back quite a bit and it may not be solvable.

So you can my imagine my surprise when I came across a Duewel descendant from the other family hanging out with the Winters in my family tree. Wesley Duewel, my 3rd cousin, 2x removed, is a prolific author and well-known spiritual leader. Twenty-five of the seventy years he’s been tending to the spiritual needs of others were spent in India according to his publisher’s website. Now, I am very fond of my Indian friends but I spent about 25 days in India and concluded that I loved American bathrooms more than life itself. Twenty-five years in India is impressive.

Not exactly how I imagined connecting with the other Duewels, but I’ll take it.

Kenfolk: Tranthams
Relation: 3rd cousin, 2x removed
Common ancestors: Wesley’s father was a Duewel but his mother sprang from the Winters; Wesley’s 2nd great grandparents, Anton and Catharina (Bracht) Winter, are my 4th great grandparents

References:
http://www.faithgateway.com/author/wesley-duewel/