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OTHER FEATURE STORY - Support your local brew-houses - Your complete guide to all of Shoreline's Clubs Search for roots leads couple to Germany PART ONE OF A THREE PART SERIES DETAILING CHRISTIANE HELBIG AND PHIL SANDERS' SEARCH FOR PHIL'S BIOLOGICAL PARENTS Christiane Helbig Special to The Ebbtide I grew up always knowing my family. I never had to wonder about my background or who my natural parents were. However, the man I married did not have the luxury of this knowledge. He was born Dieter Kniege in Heidelberg, Germany, in 1950, and adopted by an American Army lieutenant colonel and his wife, who changed his name to Phil. Eventually he became a naturalized U.S. citizen. Christiane and Phil travelled across the Atlantic in hopes of finding roots. Photo courtesy of Christiane Helbig Phil never felt any desire to research his ancestry until I came into his life. Being from Germany, I must have awakened a curiosity and an urge in him to learn about his history. All he knew of his natural mother was her name and that she and a child had died in a fire in Mannheim in 1953. Phil's wish was to find his mother's grave. My knowledge of German local government was beneficial, and I knew which offices to contact. Since my husband does not speak German, I translated a letter to the city of Mannheim registrar office to start the search in September 1998. We received a response stating the dates and places of birth and death of Frieda Angeloch nee Kniege, Phil's mother, and Anneliese Kniege, his stepsister. The person answering our request assumed that the grave no longer existed and suggested contacting the Mannheim cemetery. It became clear that this could be an endless exchange of letters with government offices referring us from one agency to another. We decided to pursue our search in person and planned a visit to Western Germany. The orphanage where Phil had lived for the first six months of his life was located in Heidelberg, and we wanted this city to be our base of operations. We arrived on the afternoon of Monday, Jan. 25, 1999, and we gave ourselves one week to complete our "mission." Out of curiosity, Phil picked up a Heidelberg phone book in our hotel and found only one listing under his original last name, Kniege. To him, this seemed very surprising, as he had not realized that his last name was so uncommon. On the same day, after checking into our hotel in Heidelberg, we drove to the main cemetery in Mannheim. Now it was up to me to explain our request to the cemetery official. Unfortunately, he could not find anything under the last names Angeloch or Kniege in his computer, since it contained only "newer" information. He left the room and came back with a huge old book. All the entries in this book were handwritten in old German script and difficult to read. He managed to find the last name we were looking for, and paused. "I am not sure if I should tell you this," he said, "but it has been so many years, and I guess you are here to find out." He then told me that Frieda Angeloch nee Kniege had committed suicide on Dec. 31, 1953, and taken her 9-year-old daughter with her. Their bodies were cremated, and the funeral urns were sent to Jaegersburg, a small town in the Saar region about 150 miles west of Mannheim. Phil Sanders was born Dieter Kniege, in Heidelberg, Germany. He was adopted by an American couple when he was a child. Photo courtesy of Christiane Helbig I was barely capable of translating those cold and shocking facts for Phil. I knew it would hit him very hard and unexpectedly. I took his hand, guided him out of the building, and offered to drive. He had always been told by his adoptive father that his mother died in a fire. This devastating revelation was the most shocking fact he had learned in his life. I was glad I was with Phil to help him through this tremendously emotional time. We sat in the car for a while, living out our emotions and gathering our thoughts. Months ago, Phil had tried to contact the Mannheimer Morgen, the local newspaper, assuming a fire that killed two people might have been reported in the newspaper. He never received an answer to his request. Now we knew it was not a fire but a different, very tragic event. The newspaper archive was located in downtown Mannheim, and open until 4 p.m. We were running late. The musty smell of the past overcame us when we entered the archive. The archivist asked us what we were looking for and then provided us with a thick newspaper archive book containing several original newspapers from January 1954. Dec. 31, 1953, happened to be a Thursday. Newspapers are not published on Sundays and holidays in Germany which meant there were no papers on Jan. 1 and 3, 1954. I decided to scan the Jan. 2 edition. Phil was trying to help, but it is hard to read a newspaper if you do not speak the language. I looked at Jan. 4 and could not find anything. To me, it seemed Jan. 5 and 6 would already be too far, but I flipped through them. We were both ready to give up when I looked down and asked Phil to move his hand from the page and saw what we were looking for. "Died Together" was the title. I was shaking and with every word I read, it became clear that it was Phil's mother and stepsister I was reading about. The article was short, about an inch in length, and did not mention any names, which is typical for German newspaper articles. It stated that a 46-year-old woman, who suffered from mental depression, had killed herself and her 9-year-old daughter with "illuminating" gas. Part two of this series is in the February 14, 2003 edition of The Ebbtide. Part three of this series is in the February 28, 2003 edition of The Ebbtide. © 2003 Shoreline Community College™