German Evengelical Reformed Church Cemetery

Site #12

Designated April 17, 2003

As early as 1863 some sort of schism befell the old German Lutheran church on Racine Avenue which had been founded by Christian Damm and his fellow German immigrants in 1848.  A majority of the congregation wished to leave the Lutheran church and form a German Reformed church.

German Reformed.jpg

In June, 1865 this group acquired a piece of land about a mile west of their former church.  In his diary Peter Swartz documents that in June of that year work began on the new brick church, which was dedicated on November 26, 1865.  In addition to the church there was a parsonage with a small German school and a new cemetery.  This was the last historic cemetery founded in New Berlin.

Of interest are the two monuments of early settlers born in the 1700s – Carl Wilde (1788 – 1866) and Angelica Kratz (1799 – 1881).  The Swartz family had a large marker and the family’s remains were moved to Prairie Home Cemetery in Waukesha many years ago.By the 1960s the church was gone and all that remained was the cemetery to mark the lives of these early German immigrants.

German Evangelical and Reformed Church Cemetery Handout (PDF)