By FRANK MEYER
Leader correspondent
John Kriewaldt with one of his 22 horse [sic] outside the family cheese factory in 1911.
Kriewaldt and Eberlein — two anchor names in the Shawano community with records of distinction and service. Their history constitutes a fascinating story in many unique ways.
Many fields of endeavor — law, public office, dairy farming, cheesemaking, and judiciary service constitute parts of this combined family legacy.
Frederic C. Eberlein, former district attorney and now retired, has provided a detailed chronology of a family history that spans both decades and continents.
One member of this enlarged family, Martin C. Kriewaldt, distinguished himself as a professor of law, a barrister, and wound up as a justice of the Supreme Court in Darwin, Australia.
In 1895 the Rev. Emil Kriewaldt and Emma Eberlein were mamed in Shawano. Emma was born near Hermansfort, where she attended grade school, her family then moved to Shawano. Finishing high school at age 16 she returned to Hermansfort to teach, then to Shawano. The local paper reports that at age 19 at a teachers conference she was assigned the topic of “maintaining discipline in a one room school.”
The Rev. Emil Kriewaldt was a graduate of the Lutheran seminary in St. Louis. Soon after their marriage in 1895 he received a “call” to a Lutheran church in a rural area in South Australia.
Martin was the third of four sons.
In 1914 Australia declared war on Germany. Many people of Germian ancestry were subject to persecution, their homes confiscated, imprisoned, books burned, German-made pianos became kindling wood for patriotic rallies.
The family stood firm until the death of the Rev. Kriewaldt in 1915. Unwilling to face persecution alone, she abandoned her parish and home and returned to Shawano, with her four sons and lived with the Eberlein and Kriewaldt families.
One son worked on a ranch in California, another, living with the Kriewaldt family attended the University of Wisconsin school of agriculture and studied cheese making. The third, Martin attended Shawano High School and graduated in 1918. His classmates, among others, were judge Dillett and Louis Cattau.
Martin C. Kriewaldt, in a photo from the 1950s — who graduated from Shawano High School in 1918 — was a justice on the Supreme Court in Darwin, Australia. He died in 1960.
Martin received a regents scholarship and attended the University of California at Berkeley, pursued an honors program and participated in varsity debate.
After two years he transferred to the University of Wisconsin law school at Madison, made law review, graduated with honors, elected to Phi Beta Kappa, and was awarded the Vilas medal for forensics.
After the war, he returned to Australia and finished his law training at the University of South Australia law school. He practiced as a solicitor and barrister in Adelaide, and was a professor of real property law at the university, editing a treatise on real property law, still used in Australian and New Zealand law schools.
Commissioned as an officer in the Royal Australian Air Force he served in the South Pacific until the end of the war in 1945. However, he was retained in the military to serve as a judge on a military tribunal which tried Japanese war criminals. The trials, took place on the isle of Morotai — the scene of many atrocities, and included crimes committed against Australian soldiers, depicted in the movie “Bridge Over the River Kwai.”
The world’s attention became directed to the plight of the Australian aborigines, long a persecuted“ people in that land. Judge Kriewaldt was appointed by the prime minister of Australia to replace a “racist judge.” The fairness and temperament of judge Kriewaldt drew exceptional acclaim from the columnist-author Robert Ruark who praised judge Kriewaldt following his sentencing of two wealthy white brothers for “beating six black “aborigines with stock whips.”
The world might be truly proud of Mr. Justice Kriewaldt,” wrote columnist Ruark. At that time such sentencing of white people was extremely rare.
Upon judge Martin Kriewaldt’s death in 1960 the aborigine people accorded Kriewaldt a rare honor and held a ceremonial ritual known as “Corrobore” in his recognition.
A law building in Darwin bears the Kriewaldt name and the capital in Canberra has “Kriewaldt Boulevard.” ”
The Kriewaldts of Australia, the United States and Canada held a family reunion in 1995, the year marking the 1O0th anniversary of their first departure from America.
Attending this event in 1995 were Mr. and Mrs. Arthur Kriewaldt and Mr. and Mrs. Frederic C. Eberlein of Shawano, several cousins from Canada plus about 50 Kriewaldts living in Australia.
“I am proud to say that Justice Kriewaldt was my first cousin and my godfather,” said Frederic Eberlein.
It is worthy of note that the Kriewaldt name and reputation are still of great standing and continues in law practice in Australia. Martin Kriewaldt Jr. of Brisbane, Australia is a partner in the largest firm on the continent and serves on several boards of directors. On occasion he visits relatives in Shawano.
Frank Meyer lives in Shawano.
Source: Frank Meyer, “Kriewaldt, Eberlein families of service,” Shawano Leader. Undated photocopy acquired from Frederic C. Eberlein.
Eberlein genealogy and photographs 