Family lives

Kjesten Schmidt

September 11, 1818 – 1899

Peter’s mother and Milly’s paternal grandmother, from a Danish family of craftspeople, teachers and clergy.

Places in a Life

Follow recorded birthplaces and homes through the years. Numbers connect the map to dated records; gold marks a birthplace. Markers show approximate towns or regions, not exact houses. A recorded year does not establish an uninterrupted stay.

Kjesten Schmidt

Recorded birth and home locations for Kjesten SchmidtDENMARKSeptember 11, 1818 · Birth — Brøns, Schleswig, now Denmark1Brøns

Dated entries correspond to the numbered places. Enable JavaScript to select entries and zoom.

  1. The profile records Brøns as the birthplace and its heading gives September 11, 1818. Name and place follow Peter’s family account; modern country label is Denmark. Marker precision: broad village area; historic border labels retained.

    Source for this place

The family account connects Kjesten’s inheritance with the Ballum shoe business in 1853. Business establishment is not used as a dated residence record.

Present-day coastline: Natural Earth. Historical place names are retained in the records. The map and dated list also remain available without JavaScript.

Her Danish family

Peter recorded Kjesten’s birthplace as Brøns in Schleswig. Her father had a blacksmith shop, land and a five-room house. She grew up among seven brothers and a sister. His account describes shoemakers, blacksmiths, a teacher, a minister and a seaman among her brothers.

Life with George

Before her marriage, Kjesten kept house for a brother who had inherited the family business and home. She and George Frederick Dortzbach married on the same day as that brother. Her inheritance helped start their Ballum shoe business. Together they endured fire, illness and the loss of a flock of sheep, while raising their four children.

Remembered by her son

Peter emphasized his parents’ affection for each other and their religious faith. Kjesten died in 1899, aged eighty-one according to his account. Peter and Ida’s eldest daughter Milly was named for her two grandmothers, Kjesten and Emilie.

Sources for this biography

Based on the family’s written histories. Recollections and compiled records are identified here so they can be revisited as the archive grows.

  • Peter P. Dortzbach’s biography — Peter’s recollections, recorded by his granddaughter Eileen Townsend; Word transcript and scanned versions RB010–RB015 and RB022–RB025B.
  • Personal History of the Dortzbach Family — Clara Dortzbach, October 25, 1984; scans HS001–HS011, incorporating material supplied by Jen Peter.
  • Family tree supplied by the family — Relationship chart provided by the owner in October 2026. Used alongside the written histories.