John Henry Kolbe
ONE OF THE EIGHT SONS, AND THE ONE WHO LIVED LONGEST OF THOSE FOUND. Baptised 29 July 1800, father John, mother Mary, batch I02559-1. TNA RG 4/4631 folio 100: died 13 April 1832, buried 22 April, AGED 32 — twelve years before the obituary that counted him among the seven already gone. AND HE SPEAKS. Old Bailey, session of 13 January 1819, trial t18190113-149 — Richard Kerr indicted for stealing “one coat, value 6l., the property of JOHN HENRY KOLBE”. His own deposition: “MY FATHER IS A TAILOR, AND LIVES IN CHURCH-STREET, SOHO. On the 9th of January, about eleven o’clock at night, I stopped at the Star and Crown public-house, Westminster, and left my coat over my horse’s head — I had a chaise standing at the door; I saw the prisoner go out, and suspected him — I went out, and missed my coat.” NOT GUILTY. HE WAS EIGHTEEN, and his brother George Augustus sailed for Algoa Bay the following year. It is the only voice this archive has from the Soho house, and it corroborates the rate books’ address from a source that had no interest in it. AND THE LONDON GAZETTE SAYS WHAT BECAME OF HIM. 12 MAY 1824, issue 18027 page 796: the partnership of “JOHN GOTLOB KOLBE AND JOHN HENRY KOLBE, OF CHURCH-STREET, SOHO, IN THE COUNTY OF MIDDLESEX, TAILORS” dissolved — father and son, in business together, at the address he gave the court five years earlier. Then 9 OCTOBER and 16 NOVEMBER 1824, issues 18069 page 1668 and 18080 page 1900, in the INSOLVENT DEBTORS lists, petitions to be heard at Portugal-Street, Lincoln’s-Inn Fields on 5 November: “KOLBE, JOHN HENRY (SUED AS HENRY KOLBE), FORMERLY OF NO. 22, NORFOLK-STREET, MIDDLESEX-HOSPITAL, AND LATE OF NO. 4, MANSFIELD-PLACE”. HE WAS TWENTY-FOUR, OUT OF THE FAMILY BUSINESS AND OUT OF SOHO IN THE SAME YEAR HIS STEPMOTHER DIED, and he was dead at thirty-two. 20 SEPTEMBER 2026 — AND HIS FATHER WRITES ABOUT HIS DYING. MSB 751, the letter of 23 August 1830 to his brother at the Cape: “HENRY had wrote to you himself & left his letter at the Mission house to be forwarded to you… he keeps up pretty well at present, but what effect the winter may have upon him if it should set in very cold, as it did last winter, is perhaps not doubtful, since it must prevent him from taking exercise by walking, & which is a great means of keeping down THE DROPSY, OF WHICH HE BEARS STILL THE SYMPTOMS… I trust also that you will join your prayers, that he may vouchsafe to prepare him to a fit state of meeting his God… HE APPEARS AT PRESENT TO BE RESIGNED TO THE CATASTROPHE.” HE HAD TWENTY MONTHS LEFT. And the same letter’s closing — “kind love from your SISTERS & BROTHER” — makes him THE LAST OF THE EIGHT SONS ALIVE BESIDES GEORGE AUGUSTUS, so that the obituary’s “last remaining of eight sons” became true on 13 April 1832, twelve years before it was printed. AND HE MARRIED THREE MONTHS AFTER THE TRIAL: Westminster Marriages — JOHN HENRY KOLBE AND MATILDA FORD, 26 APRIL 1819, ST MARGARET WESTMINSTER, both of that parish. He was eighteen. A MARY ANN MARIA FORD KOLBE MARRIED AT WHITECHAPEL IN THE FIRST QUARTER OF 1847 — GRO index volume AZ, 840, page 16 — and “Ford” carried as a forename is how families carried a mother’s maiden name. SHE IS VERY PROBABLY HIS DAUGHTER. AND THE PRESS GIVES HIS TRADE, WHICH THE GAZETTE DID NOT. Law Chronicle, Commercial and Bankruptcy Register, 13 January 1825: “KOLBE John Henry, of Norfolk-street, Middlesex-hospital, LAST OF MANSFIELD-ST., KENTISH TOWN, TAILOR, DRAPER” — so he set up on his own account in his father’s trade, and the Gazette’s “Mansfield-Place” is Mansfield Street, Kentish Town. THE MAY 1824 DISSOLUTION WAS REPORTED IN AT LEAST SIX LONDON PAPERS, all of them putting HIS name first: “J. H. Kolbe and J. G. Kolbe, Church-street, Soho, tailors”. AND THE 1830 LETTER SHOWS HIM DOING AN ORDINARY THING. Packing a year of newspapers for the Cape, his father notes one number missing — “the one of the 4th of Decr last, which cannot be found, supposing that HENRY, WHO HAS THEM EVERY WEEK, AFTER I HAVE DONE WITH THEM, — has lost”. The father read the paper first and the son had it after. IT IS THE ONLY DESCRIPTION THIS ARCHIVE HAS OF WHAT ANYBODY IN THAT HOUSE DID WITH AN ORDINARY EVENING, and he had four months to live when it was written.
Every record naming John Henry Kolbe →
No family is drawn here, because none is recorded. This archive holds John Henry Kolbe as a name on a document — a witness at a font, a signature on a form, a person named in someone else's list — and has no record of who their parents, spouse or children were. That is a statement about the sources, not about the person. Every record naming them →
The record
| Name | John Henry Kolbe |
| Also written | married Matilda Ford, 1819 — and not the JOHN HENRY KOLBE of the Bloemfontein registers, who is JAN HENDRIK, born 1849 |
| Born | bapt. 29 Jul 1800, St James, Westminster |
| Died | 13 Apr 1832, buried 22 Apr 1832, German Lutheran Church |
| Line | Kolbe |
| Confidence | Documented |
| From a tree | not documented That Mary Ann Maria Ford Kolbe is his daughter. It rests on the forename Ford and nothing else; the certificate has not been ordered. — the rest of this record rests on documents this archive has read, and that part does not. |
What the archive holds
ONE OF THE EIGHT SONS, AND THE ONE WHO LIVED LONGEST OF THOSE FOUND. Baptised 29 July 1800, father John, mother Mary, batch I02559-1. TNA RG 4/4631 folio 100: died 13 April 1832, buried 22 April, AGED 32 — twelve years before the obituary that counted him among the seven already gone. AND HE SPEAKS. Old Bailey, session of 13 January 1819, trial t18190113-149 — Richard Kerr indicted for stealing “one coat, value 6l., the property of JOHN HENRY KOLBE”. His own deposition: “MY FATHER IS A TAILOR, AND LIVES IN CHURCH-STREET, SOHO. On the 9th of January, about eleven o’clock at night, I stopped at the Star and Crown public-house, Westminster, and left my coat over my horse’s head — I had a chaise standing at the door; I saw the prisoner go out, and suspected him — I went out, and missed my coat.” NOT GUILTY. HE WAS EIGHTEEN, and his brother George Augustus sailed for Algoa Bay the following year. It is the only voice this archive has from the Soho house, and it corroborates the rate books’ address from a source that had no interest in it. AND THE LONDON GAZETTE SAYS WHAT BECAME OF HIM. 12 MAY 1824, issue 18027 page 796: the partnership of “JOHN GOTLOB KOLBE AND JOHN HENRY KOLBE, OF CHURCH-STREET, SOHO, IN THE COUNTY OF MIDDLESEX, TAILORS” dissolved — father and son, in business together, at the address he gave the court five years earlier. Then 9 OCTOBER and 16 NOVEMBER 1824, issues 18069 page 1668 and 18080 page 1900, in the INSOLVENT DEBTORS lists, petitions to be heard at Portugal-Street, Lincoln’s-Inn Fields on 5 November: “KOLBE, JOHN HENRY (SUED AS HENRY KOLBE), FORMERLY OF NO. 22, NORFOLK-STREET, MIDDLESEX-HOSPITAL, AND LATE OF NO. 4, MANSFIELD-PLACE”. HE WAS TWENTY-FOUR, OUT OF THE FAMILY BUSINESS AND OUT OF SOHO IN THE SAME YEAR HIS STEPMOTHER DIED, and he was dead at thirty-two. 20 SEPTEMBER 2026 — AND HIS FATHER WRITES ABOUT HIS DYING. MSB 751, the letter of 23 August 1830 to his brother at the Cape: “HENRY had wrote to you himself & left his letter at the Mission house to be forwarded to you… he keeps up pretty well at present, but what effect the winter may have upon him if it should set in very cold, as it did last winter, is perhaps not doubtful, since it must prevent him from taking exercise by walking, & which is a great means of keeping down THE DROPSY, OF WHICH HE BEARS STILL THE SYMPTOMS… I trust also that you will join your prayers, that he may vouchsafe to prepare him to a fit state of meeting his God… HE APPEARS AT PRESENT TO BE RESIGNED TO THE CATASTROPHE.” HE HAD TWENTY MONTHS LEFT. And the same letter’s closing — “kind love from your SISTERS & BROTHER” — makes him THE LAST OF THE EIGHT SONS ALIVE BESIDES GEORGE AUGUSTUS, so that the obituary’s “last remaining of eight sons” became true on 13 April 1832, twelve years before it was printed. AND HE MARRIED THREE MONTHS AFTER THE TRIAL: Westminster Marriages — JOHN HENRY KOLBE AND MATILDA FORD, 26 APRIL 1819, ST MARGARET WESTMINSTER, both of that parish. He was eighteen. A MARY ANN MARIA FORD KOLBE MARRIED AT WHITECHAPEL IN THE FIRST QUARTER OF 1847 — GRO index volume AZ, 840, page 16 — and “Ford” carried as a forename is how families carried a mother’s maiden name. SHE IS VERY PROBABLY HIS DAUGHTER. AND THE PRESS GIVES HIS TRADE, WHICH THE GAZETTE DID NOT. Law Chronicle, Commercial and Bankruptcy Register, 13 January 1825: “KOLBE John Henry, of Norfolk-street, Middlesex-hospital, LAST OF MANSFIELD-ST., KENTISH TOWN, TAILOR, DRAPER” — so he set up on his own account in his father’s trade, and the Gazette’s “Mansfield-Place” is Mansfield Street, Kentish Town. THE MAY 1824 DISSOLUTION WAS REPORTED IN AT LEAST SIX LONDON PAPERS, all of them putting HIS name first: “J. H. Kolbe and J. G. Kolbe, Church-street, Soho, tailors”. AND THE 1830 LETTER SHOWS HIM DOING AN ORDINARY THING. Packing a year of newspapers for the Cape, his father notes one number missing — “the one of the 4th of Decr last, which cannot be found, supposing that HENRY, WHO HAS THEM EVERY WEEK, AFTER I HAVE DONE WITH THEM, — has lost”. The father read the paper first and the son had it after. IT IS THE ONLY DESCRIPTION THIS ARCHIVE HAS OF WHAT ANYBODY IN THAT HOUSE DID WITH AN ORDINARY EVENING, and he had four months to live when it was written.
The documents
…This is John Henry Kolbe , baptised at Westminster on 29 July 1800. This archive has his font, his deposition in the Old Bailey in January 1819 ( “my father is a tailor, and lives in Church-street, Soho” ), his marriage to Matilda Ford three months later, his bankruptcy in 1824, and his burial in the German Lutheran register on 22 April 1832. Now it has his illness, and his father’s grief, twenty months before the end.…
The Marriages
…1764 18 Nov 1845, London Johan Hendrik Cassimir Kolbe 1863, Orange Free State 14 Sep 1923, Bloemfontein — aged 60 John Gerson Eliezar Kolbe 7 Jul 1822, Uitenhage 3 Apr 1868, the farm Leeuwberg — aged 45 John Gottlob Kolbe — — John Henry Kolbe bapt. 29 Jul 1800, St James, Westminster 13 Apr 1832, buried 22 Apr 1832, German Lutheran Church John Kolbe — — John Kolbe the younger — — Julia Kolbe — — Juliet Rosinia Kolbe bapt. 9 Jan 1792, Westminster — Louisa Maria Kolbe 13 May 1810, bapt.…
The People
…The Kolbes Five pages that test it The DSAB draft His father’s letter Home George Kolbe Documented — — Godfather at the same font, the same day. He carries his own father's name — George Augustus Kolbe, the 1820 Settler, dead at Colesberg nine years earlier. The Barry fonts The Kolbes Namesakes Jan Hendrik Kolbe also written John Henry Kolbe, in the Bloemfontein registers — and NOT the John Henry Kolbe of Soho, who died in 1832 Documented 5 Jul 1849, baptised Fauresmith 9 Oct 1849 1924 HIS PARENTS ARE NAMED IN A BAPTISM REGISTER, AND THE QUESTION THIS ARCHIVE ASKED ALL MONTH IS ANSWERED.…
Jan Hendrik Kolbe
…A. KOLBE — a name this family carries in three generations, and one more reason to want VAB MHG M777, which would name all twelve children at once. He is the second of two Kolbes to marry a McCabe in ten months. AND ON 2 AUGUST 1869 HE AND HIS BROTHER TOOK CHURCH MEMBERSHIP AT BLOEMFONTEIN ON THE SAME DAY — “John Henry Kolbe” and “Willem Johannes Kolbe”, both entered that date in the Free State registers, which was Willem Johannes's twenty-second birthday and fifteen months after their father died.…
John Henry Kolbe
…Baptised 29 July 1800, father John, mother Mary, batch I02559-1. TNA RG 4/4631 folio 100: died 13 April 1832, buried 22 April, AGED 32 — twelve years before the obituary that counted him among the seven already gone. AND HE SPEAKS.…
The Register
…s Fredrik Kolbe Birth 1928 · with: Caroline Hartmann record ↗ South Africa, Civil Marriage Records, 1801-1974 John Gerson Eliezar Kolbe reconstructed 7 Jul 1822, Uitenhage · 3 Apr 1868, the farm Leeuwberg — aged 45 no public link reconstructed by this archive John Gottlob Kolbe reconstructed — no public link reconstructed by this archive John Henry Kolbe reconstructed bapt. 29 Jul 1800, St James, Westminster · 13 Apr 1832, buried 22 Apr 1832, German Lutheran Church no public link reconstructed by this archive John Kolbe Birth 1910 · with: Margaret Fortune record ↗ South Africa, Civil Marriage Records, 1801-1974 John Kolbe reconstructed — no public link reconstructed by this archive John Kolbe the younger reconstructed — no public link reconstruct…
The Timeline
…KOLBE” — beside a mare of John Kolbe junior and a riding horse of Jephts, a man of colour living at Leeuwberg. The only document in this archive that shows her doing anything at all. Anna Jacoba van der Merwe Leeuwberg 2 Aug 1869 Document Two of the Commandant's sons take church membership at Bloemfontein on the same day John Henry Kolbe and Willem Johannes Kolbe , both entered on 2 August 1869 in the Free State registers — which was Willem Johannes's twenty-second birthday , and sixteen months after their father died. Two brothers presenting themselves together is a household act, and it is the only day this archive can see the two of them in one place.…
Others on the Kolbe side
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A dossier is every mention of a person anywhere in this archive, gathered automatically after the site is built and linked back to the page it appears on. Identity here is by NAME, not by resolved individual — where two people share a name they share this page, and the archive says so rather than guessing. Nothing on a dossier page is new evidence; it is the same evidence, brought together.