Reinhold Subritzky

From a village on the Baltic edge of the old Polish world to a German town called Lüneburg — the road that made a name. ¹

The name that started everything

Subocz → Lüneburg · 1785–1833

Every Subritzky alive today carries a name that one man chose. Before him, it did not exist. He was born Romualdous Zubrzycki in a small village on the far eastern edge of the old Polish–Lithuanian world — and somewhere on the road between there and a new life in Germany, he became Reinhold Subritzky. This is the story of the man at the very source of the family: a bricklayer, a soldier, a husband, and the beginning of a name that would one day cross the world to the Far North of New Zealand.

Romualdous's christening record, found in the church at Subate in 2005 — the first proof, on paper, of where the family began. ²

Subocz, 1785

Subocz, Kurland (now Subate, Latvia) · 1785

On 6 February 1785, in the village of Subocz — known today as Subate, in what is now Latvia — a child was christened Romualdous, son of Ignatius Zubrzycki and his wife Christina. His godparents were Isidorus Zubrzycki and Agatha Adamowiczowa.For generations this was only a family story — until, in 2005, Stephen Subritzky travelled to Subate and found the actual christening record in the village church. It was the first hard proof, on paper, of exactly where the family began. His father Ignatius owned land in Subocz and was still recorded there in 1816. Romualdous had a brother, Johanne Anton (known as Jan), and a sister, Catharina.

Before any legend of kings and crowns — a young man learning to lay brick and mortar. ³

The bricklayer

Subocz, Kurland · 1801–1804

From 1801 to 1804, young Romualdous served his apprenticeship as a bricklayer under Master bricklayer Behn, in Subocz, qualifying as a "Fellow Bricklayer." It's a small, human detail that cuts through every grand legend that would later attach to the family: before he was anything else, he was a tradesman who worked with brick and mortar and stone. His apprenticeship papers survived — and years later, in Germany, he would need them urgently for one particular reason: he wanted to marry.

1812: the disastrous Russian campaign. The family history holds that two brothers marched out — and could never go home again. ⁴

Napoleon's road

Russia → Hanover · 1812–1816

In 1812, Romualdous and his brother Jan are said to have joined Napoleon's Grande Armée for the disastrous Russian campaign. After the catastrophe at Moscow, the family history holds that the brothers could not return home — and instead struck out west, toward the relative safety of the Kingdom of Hanover.Whatever exactly happened on that long retreat, one thing is certain: it set a bricklayer from the Baltic on the road to a German town called Lüneburg — and to the woman he would marry.

1812: the disastrous Russian campaign. The family history holds that two brothers marched out — and could never go home again. ⁴

Napoleon's road

Russia → Hanover · 1812–1816

In 1812, Romualdous and his brother Jan are said to have joined Napoleon's Grande Armée for the disastrous Russian campaign. After the catastrophe at Moscow, the family history holds that the brothers could not return home — and instead struck out west, toward the relative safety of the Kingdom of Hanover.Whatever exactly happened on that long retreat, one thing is certain: it set a bricklayer from the Baltic on the road to a German town called Lüneburg — and to the woman he would marry.

Lüneburg, 1816 — the town archive records the exact day a bricklayer "from Riga" arrived, under a brand-new name. ⁵

A new name in Lüneburg

Lüneburg, Kingdom of Hanover · 1816

Here, in Germany, Romualdous became Reinhold, and Zubrzycki softened into Subritzky — a name that "looked less Polish," as the family always told it. Whatever the reason, the name was new. The family have always said it never existed before him.

Sophie and Romualdus, hand-painted in traditional dress, on their marriage date — 16 November 1817. With no photograph of Reinhold possible, this is the closest the family has to seeing them together. ⁶

Sophie

St Michaelis Kirche, Lüneburg · 16 November 1817

On 16 November 1817, after the banns were read on two successive Sundays, Reinhold married Sophie Elisabeth Körber at St Michael's Church in Lüneburg — joined together by Pastor Crome. He was 32, a journeyman bricklayer; she was 19, a weaver's daughter from nearby Uelzen who had lost both her parents young. The marriage record still names them both.From this union — a tradesman and an orphaned weaver's daughter, neither with a drop of the royalty the legend would later claim — came the entire family.

Four children carried Reinhold's name across the world. This is Ludolph — the eldest son, later a sea captain in New Zealand. ⁷

The children who carried the line

Lüneburg, Kingdom of Hanover · 1818–1830

Reinhold and Sophie had a family together in Lüneburg. Four of their children would carry the line across the world, later anglicising their names in New Zealand:

A small, human detail: when the youngest, Johann Anton, was baptised, his uncle and namesake — Reinhold's brother, Johann Anton "from Riga" — was there to witness it.

Reinhold never left Germany. But nine years after his death, the name he made would sail for the far side of the earth. ⁸

1833

Lüneburg, Kingdom of Hanover · 24 June 1833

Reinhold died on 24 June 1833 in Lüneburg. He was around 48. Sophie was left a widow at just 35, with young children — and, by the custom of that time and place, her life was considered all but over.It was not. Nine years later she would board the St Pauli and sail for the other side of the earth, and the name Reinhold gave the family would take root in the Far North of New Zealand. He never saw it. But every part of what came after — Nelson, Maldon, Houhora, three families, thousands of descendants — began with him.

A whispered inheritance: kings, a hidden red book, and a name changed "so they could not be found." ⁹

The Legend

Poland → the Far North · passed down the generations

This is where Reinhold becomes larger than life. For generations the family carried a whispered story: that the name was not really Subritzky at all — it was Sobieski, the royal house of Poland, and that the family "changed it so they could not be found." There were tales of a little red book in which Sophie kept records of a life among royalty — a book said to have been read, laughed at, and destroyed. Of tunnels beneath the Houhora homestead and smuggled treasure. Of the Polish Crown Jewels. Of a Napoleonic painting hanging in the parlour that "clearly depicted a royal occasion."Older still is the documented nobility that sits beneath the royal legend: the Zubrzycki-Kusza line, traced by family historians back through Polish–Lithuanian nobility — and, in the oldest tellings, all the way to the Tartar House of Subotai and the right to bear the Kusza shield, granted in 1495.The paper trail proves a bricklayer from Subate. The legend is the part the family chose to keep alive — and perhaps that is its own kind of truth.

1. St Marien-Kirche, Uelzen — by Oxfordian Kissuth (own work), via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0.

Kurland

Where the name began — and the record that proves it.

The christening record, 1785 — Found by Stephen Subritzky in the church at Subate in 2005: Romualdous, son of Ignatius Zubrzycki, christened the 6th of February. The single document at the root of the whole family.

Subate — The village in Kurland — now Latvia, then the eastern edge of the old Polish world — where he was born, and where he served his apprenticeship.

The journey — From Subate to Riga to Lüneburg: the road that carried a bricklayer, and a brand-new name, across a continent.

Lüneburg

Where Romualdous became Reinhold.

The town-archive entry, 1816 — Entry AB1063: "Reinhold Zubritzky from Riga settled as a fellow bricklayer in Lüneburg the 20th July 1816." The first time the new name appears in writing.

St Michaelis, Lüneburg — Where he married Sophie Elisabeth Körber on the 16th of November 1817.

St John's, Lüneburg — Where he was buried on the 24th of June 1833, aged forty-eight.

The bricklayer's trade — Apprenticed under Master bricklayer Behn, 1801–1804. Before any legend of crowns, a man who worked in brick, mortar and stone.

Sophie & Romualdus, 16 November 1817 — A hand-painted folk artwork of the couple in traditional dress, on their wedding day. With no photograph of Reinhold possible, it is the closest thing that exists to seeing him.

10. Marriage register, St Michaelis, Lüneburg, 1817 — from John Anderson's Maldon Story archive

Memorial Video

Moments that capture his spirit, humour, and the love he shared.

Zvonko Knez - A Life Remembered

Moments From His Funeral

Moments to be treasured forever.

Every family has a story it cannot prove. The Subritzkys' begins with the man who changed his own name.

The Reckoning:

Stephen Subritzky spent fifteen years chasing these stories, and wrote down what he found with the same honesty as everything else: there is no proof on paper of any crown. What there is, is a christening record from a village church in Subate, dated the 6th of February 1785 — the son of a landowner named Ignatius Zubrzycki, not a prince.

(Click here to view PDF 👇)

So why did the legend begin? Nobody knows. And the family has never quite been able to let it go — because as one writer of it put it, where there is smoke, there is fire.

We have kept the stories here, exactly as they were handed down, and we have kept them separate from the record. Both are part of who he was.

Sophie is buried in the family cemetery at the foot of Mount Camel, at Houhora in the Far North — a few hundred metres from the homestead her sons built for her, and where she spent the last fourteen years of her life.
It is a long way from Uelzen.

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Old Sophie has more than three thousand descendants.If you are one of them — and if you carry a story, a photograph, a name, or a correction — feel free to share it here, as this this page is not finished, and it's not only ours, but yours as well.Feel free to reach out.

Share a story, a photo, or an update about Sophie

The Maldon Story is a family project. It is not a business, it is not for sale.This page was built from the work of others.

Stephen Subritzky, whose "Subritzky Family History from 1785 to 1915" is the backbone of everything here, and who gave fifteen years to it.Mike Subritzky — "The Subritzky Family Legend", "Golden Book of Subritzky Nobility", "Subritzky Ships".John Anderson, whose "The Wagener's of Maldon, Victoria, Australia" - told in collaboration with sister Marilyn Anderson - traces the Wagener and Subritzky lines back through months of archive research in Maldon and correspondence across two countries.Maria Beniston (née Subritzky) · Alan Wagener · Bev Sharp · Laurel Jonkers (née Quelch) · Jenny Briars and Jenny Leith, "The Road to Sarau" · the Kaitaia Museum and the Alice Evans collection · the Maldon Museum, Victoria.