My great great great grandfather (Casper Jacob Rossow) had a daughter who married Johann Andreas Jeurgen Hilgendorf in Neuenkirchen, Kreis Anklam 1827. I believe they had four children, two sons -Carl Ludwig Wilhelm Hilgendorf and Johann Freidrich Wilhelm Hilgendorf. I found a Johann Hilgendorf in the 1880 Chicago census, married to a Wilhemine.

Is it possible your Fred Hilgendorf was one in the same? Wives names were complex and she may have used Sophia.

I don't have too much on Johann Anreas Jeurgen Hilgendorf (the father) except he was born 1809, and died 1863 in Neuenkircken. It is likely that the children immigrated to IL about 1860-1870, as did my own gr gr grandfather. If there is a connection, they would have been my great great grandfather's (Johann Joachim Carl Bogislaff Rossow) cousin, who came here to Chicago in 1866.

One of his brothers, Johann Freidrich Rossow married a Rassman and they moved to Thurow where he was a coachman and their children were all born. One of their daughters, Johanne Freidrike Wilhelme Rossow had as her sponsor a Marie Funk, born Albrect, in 1862. It is certain they must have known your family there.

It was a small world then in Pommerania.