Instead of jumping right into the multi-generational tradition of service in the US Navy among my husband's relatives (would have been too obvious? No?)...I'll kick off the first of my "Maritime Monday" posts with a nod at one of my several German immigrant ancestors. Ship travel? Check! On 18 Septemer 1868, my 3rd great-grandfather Anselmus Ostholthoff arrived in New York aboard the German steam ship "Smidt" after a trans-Atlantic journey from Andervenne, Germany. His traveling companions - wife Maria Anna (Toepke) Ostholthoff, their eldest son Johan Gerhard (2 years), and daughter Anna Maria (9 months). The following snippet from their arrival documentation [1] indicates that Anselmus ("Selmus") was a farmer from Andervenne. His stated destination after New York: Virgina. This is curious to me, because I have record of Anselmus living in Cincinnati, Ohio in 1870 [2] . At this point, Mr. Ostholthoff is no longer working as a ...