Howells Family in Canada

Hugh Howells and others in front of the family home in Winnepeg.

After a short time at Lewis Howell's farm in Seskatchewan (read more about that on this page.), Gabriel Howells decided to move his family to Winnepeg, Manitoba. They settled in town and he began to do carpentry and bricklaying. They lived there for at least 10 years. By that point, the children had grown up and started moving away to the West Coast, and so when Gabriel retired, he and Selina Roberts moved to join them.

Gabriel and Selina celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary in 1924 with most of their children and grandchildren in attendance.
Back: L-R: Jim Kay, Selina Cockrill (nee Howells), Esther Howells (nee Henderson), Ted Howells (behind Esther's shoulder), Mary Ellen Cockrill (behind and between Ted and Violet), Violet Cockrill, Winnie Kaye (nee Howells) (behind and between Violet and Cassie), Cassie Cockrill, Selina Cockrill (nee Howells) (behind and between Cassie and Eliza), Eliza Jones (nee Howells), Thomas Cockrill (behind Eliza and Catherine), Catherine Williams (nee Howells), Daniel Jones (behind Catherine) Middle: L-R: Tommie Cockrill, Earl Howells (on Gabriel's lap), Gabriel Howells, Ivor Jones (on Selina's lap), Selina Howells (nee Roberts), Eddie Cockrill, Alan Williams Front: L-R: Marguerite Kay, Merle Jones, Gwen Kay, Edwina Jones, Marjorie Jones

Eliza Howells and Catherine Howells.

One of the Howells sisters.

Howells Sisters.

Selina Roberts, Eliza Howells, and one of her sisters.

Catherine Howells married Robert Wynne Williams on February 17th, 1918. They had four sons. Catherine was admitted to an asylum named Essendale on March 2nd 1937, for Manic Depressive Psychosis. She died March 27th, 1937 at the age of 49.

Welsh Ancestors

Catherine (Catti) Jones was born in 1825 in Llanfhangel, Wales. On May 11th, 1849, she married Howell Gabriel who was born on August 9th, 1822 in Dolgelly, Wales. They had 9 children, the eldest of whom was Gabriel Howells, born on August 24th, 1849.

Hugh Roberts was born in 1819 in Llanenddyn, Wales. He married Ellen Griffiths (Pugh), she was born in 1824 in the same town. They had 2 children we are aware of. Their eldest child, Selina Roberts, was born on May 26th, 1846 in Duffryn, Wales. 

Picture of Ellen Griffths, Hugh Roberts, and their granddaughter Eliza Howells, circa 1885.

Gabriel Howells and Selina Roberts were married on February 21st, 1874 in Dolgelly. Their children were: Ellen Catherine Howells was born on March 3rd, 1875. Died on December 6th, 1877 in an influenza outbreak. Howell Gabriel Howells was born on April 26th, 1877. Died on December 9th, 1877 of the same cause.
Selina Jane Howells was born on October 1st, 1878. Gwen Mary (Winnie) Howells was born on December 12th, 1880.
Hugh Cadvan Howells was born on January 21st, 1883. Eliza Ann (Bessie) Howells was born on April 29th, 1885.
Catherine Howells was born on June 11th, 1887. Edward Gabriel (Ted) Howells was born May 14th, 1891.
The family immigrated to Canada in March of 1892, and settled with Gabriel's brother, Lewis Gabriel, and his family in Seskatchewan, Canada.

Above picture of the Howells family before immigrating to Canada.

Benjamin Jones and Hannah Griffiths lived in Merthyr Tydful, Wales where they raised their children and ran the local post office. They had seven children.
David James (Davy) Jones was born in 1873.
Joseph Jones was born in 1876.
John Joseph (Jack) Jones was born in 1879.
Daniel Thomas Jones was born on January 17th, 1882.
William M Jones was born in 1884.
Mary H (May) Jones was born in 1886.
Sarah (Sophia) Jones was born in 1889.

Davy Jones was Hannah's favorite of her children. He was recovering from a cold when Hannah's hat flew off her head and landed in the lake. He gallantly waded in to get it, developed pneumonia because of the chill, and died shortly thereafter. Hannah never forgave herself.

Hannah Griffiths. Her grandchildren called her Gu, pronounced gee, southern Welsh for Grandmother.

The Galicians

Leon Seneft and his wife, Mindel (Minnie) Hilinger, lived in the country of Galicia in Eastern Europe, a region that is now part of Southern Poland and Western Ukraine. They had 5 children that we know of. When the children were still young, they moved the family to London, England. We know little of their life there, only that Mindel, died March 20th, 1913. We also believe Leon served as a Rabbi while in London.

Leon Seneft and Mindel's children were:

Alex (Alec) Seneft. Alec's Hebrew name was Elias. He was born on June 2nd, 1883.
Jack Seneft was born on September 13th, 1891.
Jennie Seneft was born in 1893.
Annie Seneft was born on May 18th, 1893.
The last child was a son, but we unfortunately have no identifying information about him. We do know that he married and had 4 sons and a daughter named Kitty. Kitty Seneft married a man named Solomon, and they had two children.


Alec Seneft at Camp Douglas.

Because the Seneft family came from an area that was part of the German Republic, and because they still had German citizenship, at the beginning of World War I, Alec and possibly one or both of his brothers were sent to a camp for enemy aliens, known as Camp Douglas. In this photo, we can see Alec in the center, we believe the gentleman on the far right may be his brother. The Jewish population of the camp was kept in a separate location from the rest of the populace and treated less well then the other enemy aliens. Since they were in the camp, they also could not become citizens, and once the war was over, they were expelled from England and sent back "home" to Germany.

Alec Seneft and friends at Camp Douglas.

Feiga Golda Reich married Benzion Kresch. They lived in a village named Czudek in Galicia. This village is now located in Southern Poland. They had six kids. We know that Benzion died sometime between 1907 and 1919, and we also know that there was a Pogrom on Czudek, and believe that it is likely he was either injured or killed in that attack. After Benzion's death, the family began to move away.

Naftali Mendel Kresch was born September 2nd, 1890, he married Rosa Lowenbraun and they had 2 daughters. They left from Antwerp in 1941 and immigrated to South America along with their daughter, Sabina, her husband, and their child. Dora Kresch was born on January 15th, 1892. In 1919, she and her sister, Minna immigrated to Frankfurt together. For more information about her family, visit this post. Minna Kresch was born between 1892 and 1902. After immigrating to Frankfurt with Dora, we know she married and escaped from Germany before Hitler's full rise. Haim Kresch was born before in 1902. Haim disappeared shortly after the WWI, and no one in the family knows what happened to him. Erna Esther Kresch was born in 1902. She married a man named Ginter, and he and their three children escaped the Nazis, but she did not. She died in 1943, there is a record of her in Yad Vashem. She is the only one in our line that we know of who was killed by the Nazis. Aharon Kresch was born in 1904. He left for Luxembourg before 1930, and moved to Israel in 1934 with his wife. Many of Aharon and Erna's descendants live in Israel today.

Jutland Hansens

Hans Knudsen was born December 22nd, 1824. He married Christine Jensdatter, December 2nd, 1854. Christine was born September 12th, 1834. They lived in Hindskov, Denmark. They had 8 children. Their first child was Jens Christian Hansen, born July 30th, 1858.

This photo is likely of Hans Knudsen's farm.

Ivare Kristine Christensen was born May 7th, 1845. Jorgen Larsen was born on August 3rd, 1837. They married on November 19th, 1863, and lived in various locations near Vejle. They had ten kids, including Mette Margrethe Larsen, commonly known in our family as Tante Margrethe. Ivare and Jorgen's first child was Else Katrine Larsen, who was born on October 25th, 1865, in Ringive. This photo of Ivare and Jorgen was found by one of our Danish cousins in a museum in Vejle.

Ivare Christensen and one of her sisters.

Jens Hansen and Elsa Larsen married October 1st, 1885 in Ringive. They had 8 children.

This is a photo of Jens's farm in Hindskov.

Jens Hansen and Elsa Larsen's children.
Aage Hansen, born April 12th, 1895.
Hans Jorgen Hansen, born May 7th, 1888.
Holger Skov Hansen, born August 8th, 1891.
Hansine Kristine Hansen, born July 30th, 1886.
Alfred Hansen, born October 8th, 1897.
Adolf Hansen, born June 24th, 1907.
Ida Kristine Hansen, born November 1st, 1900.
Not pictured: Hans Knudsen Hansen, born September 6th, 1903.

Four generations of the Christensen family.
Elsa Larsen, Florence Allnalt, Evelyn Hansen, Hans Jorgen Hansen, Ivare Christensen.

Hans Jorgen Hansen immigrated to England where he met Florence Allnalt. They married December 22nd, 1923 in Saint Albans. They had two daughters, Evelyn and Patty. Their descendants now live in England and Australia.

Sealand Hansens

Rasmus Hansen was born in Knudstrup, Alstead, Denmark on October 20th, 1845. By the 1870's he had inherited the family farm, which is called Stubbegaarden, and still exists today though is no longer owned by the Hansen family. At that time, he was married to Maren Nielsen. She died July 17th, 1879 before they had any children.
On January 11th, 1881, he married Maren Sofie Olsen. Maren Olsen was born June 27th, 1855 in Slots-Bjergby to Ole Larsen and Bertha Marie Schroder. Ole left Denmark, promising his wife that he would send for her and her three daughters, two from a previous marriage, once he was settled, but he only sent her a vase.

Rasmus and Maren had six children. Julie Oline Hansen, born December 26th, 1886. Herman Hansen, born June 20th, 1882. Maren Hansine Hansen, born October 15h, 1884.
Hans Kristian Hansen, born July 5th, 1890. Johanne Kristen Hansen, born October 24th, 1891. Ole Hansen, born August 7th, 1892. In 1895, Rasmus died of Pneumonia. Herman was the oldest and only 13, so Maren and the children struggled to make ends meet. Maren Hansine and Herman did most of the labor required to run the farm, while Oline went to work for a neighbor, Ole Hansen, who later became Denmark's first Minister for Agriculture and also the first commoner to work as a minister. She moved with him to Frederiksberg, a town outside Copenhagen, where she lived until at least 1911, before emigrating from Denmark.

Herman Hansen married Marie Jorgensen, November 22nd, 1908, and they had two children. Herman took possession of the farm once he was of age, and his son, Frede Hansen inherited after his death.
Marine Hansine Hansen married Hans Peter Larsen, and they had five children.
Hans Kristian Hansen left Denmark to find his Grandfather, and stayed in the US. It is unclear if he succeeded in his mission, but he did meet his Grandfather's brother and his family. Hans married Mary Katherine Shawler Deats.
Johanna Hansen committed suicide May 9th, 1916.
Ole Hansen died of drowning June 11th 1910.
Maren Olsen lived until May 18th, 1923.

The Bordewich family

Johan Bordewich was born in August 1st, 1802 in Trondheim, Norway. He married Leonharde Marine Linkhausen and they had 11 children. Leonharde died due to complications in childbirth with their eleventh child in October 25th, 1846. After Leonharde's death, Johan became involved with the children's teacher, Jacobine Hansdatter, and had a child with her. Jacobine and her child, Petra were sent away, and then he became involved with her replacement, Heinrikke Pauline Roness, and had another child with her. He refused to send them away, and when she became pregnant with their second child, he married her on September 22nd, 1860. They had four children together. He died May 22nd, 1872.
His trading post was located in the Lofoten Islands in the town of Lyngvaer. He served as mayor of Vaagen from 1857 to 1860. Much of the information we have on this time came from the notes he started after Leonharde's death.

We believe this is a photo of Johan with some of his huge family, but we are not sure. If you have any identifying information about anyone in this shot, please let us know.

Hans Heinrick Bordewich was born in the Lofoten Islands in 1935. He was the fourth born child of Johan and Leonharde, and the second born son. His brother moved away while waiting for their father to retire, so Hans became the heir to the trading post. But then Johan remarried, so Hans and his wife Kaja moved their family to Henningsvaer where they lived until their death. Hans died in September 17th, 1893.

Kaja Angell was born March 18th, 1835 in Grono, Norway. Her parents died, and she was adopted. We do not know if Angel was her birth name or adoptive name. She and Hans were married July 14th, 1859, and they had 9 children, one of whom Hans Richard Angell Bordewich, was becoming a famous artist but died early at the age of 32 during an Influenza outbreak. When Richard died, Kaja took over care of his son so her daughter in law could go back to work and remained in Oslo with them until her death, September 22nd, 1922.

Leonharde (Harde) Bordewich was the first legitimate, and second child of Johan and Heinrikke. She was born February 18th, 1861. She married Heinrich (Henry) Bergithon Bordewick who was the son of Hans and Kaja. He was born February 23rd, 1862. They had three sons, Bjarne, Harald, and Hans Heinrich. All the boys were born in the Lofoten Islands.

When the boys were still young, Henry and his brother Eivind decided to find a way to make more money because the fishing was drying up where they lived. Henry and his family would move to Belgium, where they would take orders for fish, and Eivind would send the fish down. They took along several Norwegian girls, including one of Harde's nieces, Margit Olsen, to help with the housework. Unfortunately, the Dutch did not like the Bordewichs, so much so that they family moved to Grimsby, England after less than a year. Grismby was chosen because Harde's brother Peter lived across the water from there in Hull. They stayed there almost ten years. At some point Henry got his English citizenship and changed the spelling of his last name from Bordewich to Bordewick. Their eldest son, Bjarne was taking his tests to get into Cambridge when the family decided to move again to Vancouver, Canada, where Harde's sister Anna was living with her family, the Kjelsberg's. Henry died, September 18th, 1930. Kaja died May 18th, 1944.

Bjarne Bordewick

Bjarne Bordewick

Bjarne Bordewick

Unknown, Bjrane Bordewick, Hans Bordewick, and Harold Bordewick.

Unknown Bordewich relative.

Unknown Bordewichs.

Photos on this Blog are part of the Hillinger family photo archive. They are copyright Shannon Hillinger and Mika Bartroff, except where marked. They are available under the creative commons license for purposes of genealogical use. If you wish to alter or to use them in paid works, please contact us at elfflame at Hotmail dot com, or Shannon  at hillinger dot org.