Coming from a not explicitly mentioned place in the duchy of Braunschweig-Wolfenbüttel, Johann Heinrich “Howeh” and Maria Dorothea Meineke were married at the monastery of Meyendorf, as one can read in the church books of Remkersleben. They decided to settle in a village called Emmeringen first where both their children were born. After a short stay in the neighboring Neubrandsleben, they moved to Oschersleben with their son Johann Christoph, which marks the creation of the Oschersleben branch. Both mentioned villages are nowadays districts of Oschersleben.
Heinrich died about 20 years before his wife Dorothea. While his death entry is fairly short, only estimating his age to 59, his wife was said to be born in Schöningen based on her death entry. But although Schöningen belonged to the aforementioned duchy, no traces of her could be found there.
The variant “Howeh” most likely occured because Heinrich pronounced his surname like we would today with a long “e”, which leads the “g” in Howeg to be less acctentuated. This in turn would’ve led the priest to believe that there was no actual consonant after the long “e”, only marking the length of “e” with the German elongation “-h”.