Nr. 802:

I continue with the families who are candidates to be included in the Second Colony.  One family is the Barlow family, which had a land patent in 1726 and was sued by Spotswood, two good criteria.  Unfortunately, this family has never been found in Germany.  In fact, the German name is uncertain, which makes the search more difficult.  Though many church records have been filmed, not all have.  You will notice that the primary search is made in the church records.  One does not need the complex German for these as would be the case with civil records.

Conrad Amberger was sued by Spotswood, and had a land patent in the year 1728, two years later than most of the Second Colony members.  The delay in the land patent may have been due to the location, which was southeast of Mt. Pony, and outside the Robinson River community.  The Amberger family has many associations with the village of B�nnigheim, though other locations are involved also.  The "Before Germanna" monographs have a rich history for Conrad's ancestors.  Descendants who plan on visiting the "home country" should consult this information.  Just recently, the villages of Brackenheim, Botenheim, and Cleebronn were mentioned.  You could walk from any one of these to B�nnigheim before Fr�hst�ck (breakfast).  B�nnigheim is a little larger than the average village; it has two churches.

John Broyles has excellent credentials for membership in the Second Colony.  He was sued by Spotswood, he had land in 1726, and his proof of importation says he came in 1717.  Can't beat that!  Johannes Breyhel is associated with two villages, Du�lingen, where he was born, and �tisheim, where he married Ursula Ruop, and lived until he came on to America.  These two villages are farther apart than you would want to try to walk in one day, and the reason for the move is not known.  Du�lingen is about twenty miles almost due south of St�ttgart, and is a community (one church) that is about fifty miles away from the "center of mass" of the "Second Colony villages" that have recently been discussed  �tisheim is about six or seven miles south of Oberderdingen, where Matthias Blankenbaker was living.  Oberderdingen is on the southwest corner of the region we have been talking about, so �tisheim is definitely outside the region that has been discussed so far.

Excepting Du�lingen, all of the "Second Colony villages" are on one page of my Atlas, which has 176 pages for the old West Germany.  One page would be more than ample in size for the villages of the First Colony.

In the name Du�lingen, the third character is "ss" for which the Germans have a special character, i.e., "�".

Nr. 803:

For a break, here is an early Germanna immigrant who did NOT come from the same area as many others did.  That is John Harnsberger, with a name that looks very German, and is simple, but gave people fits in spelling it.  It turns out that he was from Switzerland, where his immediate ancestors are to be found in the village of Thurgau.  The church was Evangelical, which usually means Lutheran (but I thought the dominant Protestant group in Switzerland was the Reformed church).  When one sees the spelling of the family name, Heerensperger (Swiss), one better appreciates the difficulty of spelling it in English.  In the German-speaking areas of Switzerland, the same given names, when found in Germany, duplicate the Swiss names, judging by these earlier names in the Harnsberger family:  Susanna, Margaretha, Hans Cunrad, Jacob, Hans Joachim, Ursula, Dorothea, Hannss Hansmann, Dorothea, and Hanss Caspar.  Several of our Germanna people have an element of their ancestry in Switzerland.  (Thanks go to Pam Benckhuysen for some of the information here.)

Michael Holt (Hold in German) came as a young bachelor and found a wife in Virginia.  He was accompanied by his mother and step father (John Spade/Johannes Sp�th).  They were from the village of Stetten am Heuchelberg, which is a bigger name than the village.  There are four roads out of town, one to Gemmingen, one to Schwaigern, one to Zaberfeld, and one to Brackenheim.  All four of these villages have been mentioned and none are more than a few miles away.  Incidentally, descendants have sponsored some research, which has disclosed some technical errors in the "Before Germanna" account.  Michael Holt's claim to being a member of the Second Colony is based on the lawsuit of Spotswood against him, and having land patented in 1726.

Andrew Kerker's claim to fame in the Germanna community is that he is an ancestor of all of the Carpenters who descend from John Carpenter.  Andrew Kerker immigrated in 1717.  (He stated this in his proof of importation, which also noted that his wife, Margaret, and daughter, Barbara, came with him.)  In Germany, he was Andreas Kercher, a miller at Zazenhausen (in 1709); however, it appears that he may have moved from village to village to find work.  At Zazenhausen, the birth of Barbara is noted (she was born 2 Apr 1709).  Today, Zazenhausen is a northern suburb of Stuttgart.  As such, it is hard to distinguish as an entity on the map.  It is outside the region from which most of the Second Colony came.  Harnsberger and Kercher are two Second Colony families that did not live on the one page of my map atlas.  (The early John Broyles was also off the page, but he was on the page at the time of emigrating.)

When did the Second Colony come together?  Probably not until they found themselves looking for a ship to take them to Pennsylvania.  Some of the people traveled together from the day they left their homes, but the group, as a whole, did not coalesce until later.

Nr. 804:

The name John Motz appears only a couple of times in Virginia, once in a land patent, and once on a proof of importation.  After that, he disappears.  There is a candidate person in Germany, where Johannes Motz married Maria Apollonia, daughter of Johann Leonhard Maubars, at Bonfeld.  The one church village of Bonfeld is about four miles north of Schwaigern.  This marriage was in 1716, and a daughter, born later in the year, did not live.  A more famous and visible resident of Bonfeld was Jost Hite who left in 1709.

George Moyer (Majer) may be from the "two-church" village of Gross Sachsenheim, which is about halfway between Heilbronn and Stuttgart, but slightly to the west of a direct line.  In Virginia, George Moyer was an indentured servant of Robert Beverley, the historian, who was a partner with Spotswood in western land speculations.  Spotswood picked up the partnership interest after the historian died, and George Moyer became one of the people that Spotswood sued.

Philipp Paulitz was sued by Spotswood, and stated, in 1727, that he came nine years earlier, which is close enough to 1717 to count.  In Virginia, he did not lead a very active life, and little is known about the family.  In Germany, Philipp Paulitsch was the father of eight daughters, of whom six died in infancy.  These daughters are recorded in the church at Ottmarsheim, which is about eight miles south of Heilbronn.  As such, this village is on an adjoining atlas page and, of the villages we have discussed, the mostly easterly.

Christopher Zimmerman came from Sulzfeld.  His land patent was dated 1726, and he stated, in his proof of importation, that he came in 1717.  Sulzfeld lies in the middle of an irregularly shaped space, whose corners are Neuenb�rg, Oberderdingen, Zaberfeld, and Gemmingen, all villages that have been mentioned.

All of the villages that we have mentioned so far lie in the modern German state of Baden-W�rttemberg.  In 1717, the political picture was more murky.  Many of the people lived in the Kraichgau, which was a series of independent feudal estates.  And, the people from Neuenb�rg lived on the lands of the Catholic Church.

One other person who is a candidate for Second Colony membership is Nicholas Yager, and he came from the west side of the Rhine River, in the State which, today, we would call the Palatinate.  He was living in the very small village of Falkenstein, which is about twelve miles north of Kaiserlautern.

Recently, when recounting those Second Colony people, who did not live in a village on the common map atlas page, I failed to include George Utz, who lived to the north of this page.  There have been a few people to the north, west, south, and east of the basic map page.

Nr. 805:

We have been through the German homes, if known, of the First and Second Colonists.  For some families we had to admit that we do not know the village of their origin, but on the whole it is surprisingly few that are unknown.  As we continue in time, we will find that less is known about some of the later arrivals.

It has been said there was a third colony, and some have gone so far as to say it consisted of forty families.  The fact is that while some people did come in the years just after 1717, they did not all come in the same year, and there were less than forty families.  In other words, there was no third colony.

One family who probably came in 1719 was the Kabler family.  This commenced a long sequence of people and families, who came from villages that had already sent emigrants to Virginia.  In the case of the Kablers, the village was Sulzfeld, from where the Zimmermans came.  There is a record of a birth of a Kappler child in 1713 in Sulzfeld, but even more telling is that Friedrich Kappler selected Christopher Zimmerman to be a sponsor at the baptism of his son Christoph on this occasion.  In Virginia, the Kablers and Zimmermans were across-the-road neighbors.  Both lived in the Mt. Pony area.  Both men were coopers.

We must remember that when Christopher Zimmerman left in 1717 he planned on going to Pennsylvania.  Christopher found himself in Virginia in December of 1717, or perhaps shortly thereafter.  Before long he had to write back to Sulzfeld and tell people there where he was located.  There was no organized mail system then and one had to be resourceful.  Generally, this meant finding a ship's captain who, for a fee, would take your letter across the Atlantic and perhaps to Rotterdam directly.  There the captain would find a ship that plied the Rhine River to take the letter along farther.  In the last stages, a "runner" would deliver the letter (and probably expect a fee from the addressee).  So Christopher Zimmerman must have written home shortly after arriving, perhaps before he had left the dock area.  Within eighteen months of Zimmerman's landing, Friedrich Kappler would be leaving Sulzfeld.  I have been amazed that these things could be conducted, under such poor conditions as this.  In the case of the Kapplers, it would appear that some message from the Zimmermans would be the catalyst for his departure.  Considering the common origin in Germany and the decision to settle in the Mt. Pony area in Virginia as neighbors, the arrival of Kabler could not have been a random event.

There was another very early arrival, but I have not seen the connection to a still earlier arrival.  This is the Willheit family.  Though the Cook family, which include a Reiner representative as Frau Koch,  came from Schwaigern in 1717, these families did not seem that close to the Willheit family.  Why did the Willheits pick Virginia and not Pennsylvania?  Pennsylvania was much better known as an objective.

Nr. 806:

Two emigrants have been mentioned from Sulzfeld:  Zimmerman and Kabler.  There was a third, Christoph Uhl, but the only thing that we know that Uhl had in common with the other two was the origin in Sulzfeld.  Uhl gave his origins as W�rttemberg when he was naturalized.  Sulzfeld was in Baden, but the line between these principalities ran almost through the village.  It would have been possible for Uhl to have been born in W�rttemberg, while his children were baptized in Sulzfeld, which is in Baden.

Christopher Yowell had a land patent in 1728, which suggests that he might have come at the same time as Kabler.  The comments in the last note, about the apparent communication of Christopher Zimmerman back to Sulzfeld, would apply to Uhl as well as to Kappler.  Even though Zimmerman might have addressed his comments to Kappler,  these letters were meant to be news for general distribution as much as a personal communication.  In other words, Zimmerman was writing to everyone in Sulzfeld as much as he was writing to Kappler.  Probably Kappler and Uhl traveled together even though they do not seem particularly close.

There may have been a fourth family from Sulzfeld, but we have no proof yet that the names mentioned in Sulzfeld are the same as the people who appear later in Virginia; however, the suspicions remain in my mind.  When children of Christopher Zimmerman were being baptized, sponsors included Ludwig Fischer and Anna Barbara Fischer.  There was a couple of this name in Virginia, but the analysis of ages shows they could not be same couple.  It is possible though that the Sulzfeld Fischers were the parents of the Lewis Fischer in Virginia.  And it might even be possible that the Sulzfeld couple did come to Virginia, where their appearance was masked by that of the son, of the same name as his father, who married a girl of the same given names as his mother.  The thing that suggested that this might be the case was the fact that the Orange Co., Virginia, tithe lists for the late 1730's shows two Lewis Fishers.  When I combined this with the appearance of a Lewis and Anna Barbara Fischer in Sulzfeld, I began to wonder.  If I were looking for Lewis Fischer in Germany, I would certainly start with Sulzfeld and its vicinity.  [All of the thoughts of this paragraph are tentative and put forth only because they suggest a place in Germany to commence a search.]

As to the names of the modern German states, Baden-W�rttemberg is changed the least with time, and is the same in German and English.  Siegen is in Nordrhein-Westfalen, which I believe is a modern name.  The German name for the state which we have identified as the Palatinate is Rheinland-Pfalz.  In the early eighteenth century, the Palatinate had different geographical boundaries and extended into the area that is now in Baden-W�rttemberg.

Nr. 807:

Matthias Castler was confused with Theobald Crisler by modern historians.  The families were quite separate and the German names were very distinct.  Matthias Castler was found in Germany as Matth�us Gessler, who married Susanna Christina Schnell, in 1711, in the village of Berg bei Stuttgart.  The groom's father and the groom were weavers, while the bride's father was a schoolteacher.  I could not find the village of Berg bei Stuttgart in the index to my atlas, but the name gives a hint as to the location, which would be south of the Second Colony.  The births of three children are recorded at Enzweihingen, W�rttemberg, which may be taken as indication of where they were living just prior to emigration.  This small village is just south of the majority of the Second Colony villages.  We presume Matthew Castler was an early Virginia immigrant, because his first land patent was 1728, just two years after most of the Second Colony people obtained their land.  Perhaps he left Germany in 1719.

Another family who married in Berg bei Stuttgart was Lauentius Greyss, police accountant, who married Maria Euphrosina Schott.  A daughter was born to them in 1716 at Untert�rkheim, W�rttemberg, where he was still listed in the parish registers in 1720.  His first land in Virginia was patented in 1727 in Hanover County under the name Lancelot Crest.  But shortly thereafter, he patented land, in 1732, in the Robinson River Valley.  This land had one corner in common with Matthias Castler.  Whether there was any influence in choosing this location because both men had been married in Berg bei Stuttgart is unknown.  Untert�rkheim is a suburb of Stuttgart, being just a few miles to the east from the center of Stuttgart.

A family who left Germany in 1719 was the Crisler family, but they did not go to Virginia.  They went to Pennsylvania.  A member of this family was Theobald Crisler, who was only ten years old at the time.  After several years in Pennsylvania, Theobald moved down to Virginia, perhaps in conjunction with the Garrs who came down from Pennsylvania about 1734.  Johann Theobald Christele was born at Lambsheim, in the Palatinate, in 1709.  Today, Lambsheim is a suburb of Ludwigshafen, being about seven miles west, and a little north, of downtown Ludwigshafen.  This makes two families now who came from the Palatinate.

Nr. 808:

There is no question that several Germans emigrated to the Germanna area in Virginia in 1719.  Still, there were hardly enough to constitute a colony, especially in the numbers that have been mentioned in some histories.  I am intrigued more by the reasons that they came.  Frederick Kabler, we saw, was a friend of Christopher Zimmerman.  Also, I find the process of communication fascinating.  It seems so primitive to us, yet it worked.

Another family who appears to have come in 1719 was the Wayland family.  Thomas Wayland was granted land in 1728 in the Robinson River Valley.  He was not sued by Spotswood.  His importation statement is silent on the subject.  I have wondered if the Waylands and the Blankenbakers were friends in Germany.  In Virginia, there was an early marriage between the two families.  There was a Blanckenb�cher-Wieland marriage in Germany not long after the original families left Germany.  It makes one wonder.

Thomas Wieland married Maria Barbara Seppach, in 1711, in Willsbach, W�rttemberg.  Then, two children were born in Waldbach, also in W�rttemberg.  These two villages are neighbhors, and about five to six miles east of Heilbronn.  Thus, they become one the most easterly points from which the emigrants left.  Since the Blanckenb�hlers came from the western-most point in Baden-W�rttemberg, there was a good separation between the two families, Blanckenb�hlers and Wieland, in Germany.  The Blanckenb�hler-Wieland marriage in Germany took place in Unter�wisheim, a village much closer to the Blankenbakers than to the villages above for the Waylands.  Nicholas Blankenbaker married Catharina Barbara Wayland in 1738 or 1739.  He was a weaver.  Unfortunately for the name, he died in 1742.  With a name like Blankenbaker, Nicholas was probably related to the family that came to Virginia but we do not know how.  Whether Catharina Barbara was related to the Virginia Waylands is unknown.

The Wieland family in Willsbach and Waldbach had a history which goes back several decades in that geographical vicinity.  The history of the family is quite rich for several branches, though the depth back in time is not extensive.  For more information, one should consult the Before Germanna booklets, Number 12, in particular.  The marriage and death information about Nicholas Blankenbaker was found by Jean Strand.

NOTE:  When Thomas Wayland patented his land in Virginia, his patent included all of the land of John Broyles who had arrived two years earlier.  In a lawsuit which followed, Wayland lost all of the land that Broyles had patented.  How this could come about is a mystery.

Nr. 809:

A man in the Robinson River Valley about whom little is known is Henry Frederick Beyerback.  Three facts about him are:

1) Peter Weaver sold him land in 1742,
2) Peter Weaver sold him more land in 1744, and
3) Beyerback's will was proven in court in 1746.

Henry was born 9 Feb 1684, at Windischbach, and he married at �hringen, both villages being in W�rttemberg.  These villages are slightly to the east of the Wieland villages in the last note, so Beyerback (Beurbach or Beirbach) now takes the prize for coming from the easternmost village.  Whether the Beyerback family had any impact genetically in Virginia is not known.  While reading his history, I was struck by another name which makes the Beyerback history more significant.

A sister of Heinrich Friedrich Beyerbach, Dorothea Margaretha, married, on 19 Sep 1719, Andreas Leonhard Bullinger.  The birth of Dorothea Margaretha Beyerbach was in Windischbach.  Now, the name Andreas Leonhard Bullinger is getting too close to Andrew Ballenger in Virginia to let this observation pass by without comment.  Andrew Ballenger was sued by Spotswood who seems to have favored the Germans with his attentions, not the English.  An Edward Ballenger appears in the community slightly later, and his relationship to Andrew is uncertain.  From the dates, Edward could hardly have been a son of Andrew, nor does the name Edward sound all that Germanic.  So Andrew Ballenger may have had this spelling of his name just because it was close to the English name Ballenger.

Another individual in Virginia who is a mystery is Johann Michael Stoltz, who is first mentioned in land patent (as a neighbor), in Hanover County, in 1725.  In that same year and county, he had his own land patent.  Then in 1732, he had a patent on the north side of the Robinson River.  He is a tithable in 1739, and died about 1742.  Cerni and Zimmerman found two individuals in Germany of this name, both from W�rttemberg.  Not enough is known about the man to tell if either one of these is the correct man.  The locations in Germany are close to those of other emigrants so no clue is furnished by that information.

Another early immigrant to Virginia in the time frame of the Second Colony is Jacob Crigler.  Like Christopher Barlow, we are uncertain as to the spelling of the name in Germany.  And we have not yet found the location from where he came.  Jacob was the first of the Germans to be sued by Spotswood, but Jacob was lucky.  Spotswood had sought 34 pounds sterling, an astronomical sum; the suit was dismissed with the consent of both parties, with Crigler agreeing to pay the cost of the suit.

Nr. 810:

Another early immigrant to the Robinson River Valley was the Tanner family whose German name was, to judge by the way that it was written at church, Gerber.  German GERBER = English TANNER.  Unfortunately, we do not know where the Tanner family came from.  There is another related Germanna family, the Burdines, all of whom have a German ancestor, Catherine Tanner.  The nationality of the Burdines is not certain so it makes it difficult to find the town or village or farm from where they immigrated.

William and John Carpenter were early to the Robinson River Valley, and we do know how they spelled their name, Zimmerman.  Unfortunately, like some other names, Zimmerman occurs quite often in Germany, so searching for them is time consuming.

An individual who appears in several lists, e.g., the immigrant list of the Germanna Foundation, as an early immigrant is John Broyles II.  It has been shown that this name is a misreading of the record at the courthouse.  James Brown showed that there was no John Broyles II, and that, in fact, the name in the record was actually John BELL.  (Please see Myths and Fallacies. on the Main BROYLES/BRILES Family History web page.)

Johann Rouse (probably Rausch in German, and also spelled RUSH later in America) was an early immigrant, since he had a land patent in 1728, in the Robinson River Valley.  The land here was probably being divided up in the early 1720's, even though patents were not applied for, and issued, until later.  The origins of John Rausch are unknown.

So the takings in this note are meager; there were no villages to describe.  At least we were able to say that it would be fruitless to search for the home of John Broyles II (since he didn't exist!).

Following notes will return to the area of Siegen for the second wave of immigrations from that region.  Then, we will return to later immigrants to the Robinson River Valley.  If you think I have missed any immigrants in the time up to about 1730, please let me know.

(The James Brown that I mentioned earlier has died.  He did some wonderful research, which he published in Beyond Germanna.  As the editor of that Newsletter/Journal, I miss him.)

Nr. 811:

In 1734 there was a well-organized exodus from the Siegen area to Virginia.  It was well organized, in the sense that they acted collectively with a definitive purpose.  Probably, Jacob Holtzclaw had been organizing the group (from Virginia).  First, it had been necessary to acquaint those in Siegen with the opportunities in Virginia.  Holtzclaw already had some land in the Little Fork where a number of people could be settled.  Because of the uncertainties in the trip, and the need for reinforcement, they were probably advised to travel together.  In the end, a good sized party left the Siegen area and arrived at Philadelphia, on the ship Hope, on 23 Sep 1734.  The Hope was from Rotterdam and had stopped at Cowes.  One remarkable thing is the small size of the passenger list.  There were forty-nine males above sixteen, forty-five females above sixteen, fourteen boys and seventeen girls; in all, 125 passengers.  A second remarkable thing is that only two ships brought Germans to Philadelphia in 1734.  Probably a representative from the group in Virginia met the Hope, perhaps even with a wagon or two to help convey the chests to Virginia.  The majority of the people probably walked from Philadelphia to Virginia.

Let's look at some of the people.  There was Hans Jacob Fischbach, 30, and Catherina Fischbach, 28.  Jacob Fishback was a nephew of Philip Fishback, of the 1714 Colony, and came from Trupbach.  His godfather was Jacob Holtzclaw, of the 1714 group.  We should not be surprised that the group of friends and relatives had an emphasis on relatives.  Writer B.C. Holtzclaw felt that the sponsorship of Jacob Fishback by Jacob Holtzclaw indicated they were relatives, but the details escaped him.

Another man was Hans Hendrick Hofman (John Henry Huffman), who is not to be confused with the later immigrant, John Henry Huffman, who was a brother of the 1714 John Huffman.  The relationship to other Germanna people was that his wife, Anna Margaret, was a Spilman.  This was a young couple, aged 22 and 20, respectively, with no children.

Johanis Jung, 40, and his wife, Anna Maria, 32, were old enough to have a family.  They had three children:  Gerderuth, 5, Harman, 4, and Elizabeth, 1.  They were also accompanied by Elizabeth Catherine Jongen (the female form of Jung), aged 32, and Anna Cathrin Jongen, aged 20.  (The latter two women were cousins of John Young.)  John Young (Johanis Jung) became the reader of the church in the Little Fork.  Apparently he was a nephew of Jacob Holtzclaw, being a son of Jacob's sister.

The group included Johanis Nohe, 40, his wife Maria Clara, 40, and their children:  Gerderuth, Anna Catherine, Maria Clara, and John Jacob, who were 16, 10, 5 plus and 2 plus, respectively.  Frau Nohe was an Otterbach, a niece of Herman Utterback, of the 1714 Colony.  You will remember that Jacob Holtzclaw's father-in-law was Herman Otterbach, so the Nays were related to the Holtzclaws.

Nr. 812:

In the last note, the fascination of looking at the relationships of the new immigrants to the prior immigrants pushed the question of the villages of their origin aside.  To clean up that question, Hans Jacob Fischbach came from Trupbach, Hans Hendrick Hofman was from Bockseifen, Johanis Jung was from Trupbach, and Johanis Nohe was from Trupbach.  The only new village is Bockseifen which is so small (zero churches) that it is usually given as an appendage of Freudenberg.

Freudenberg enters prominently in the future discussion, so it merits being located now.  It is about ten miles west, and three miles north, of Siegen.  It is the largest of the villages that have been named around Siegen.  It makes a picturesque site with its black and white half-timbered houses.

Still, in the year 1734, and on the ship Hope, there were two Johann Henrich Otterbachs.  The difference between them is that one was apparently 36, and one was 21.  The younger was a nephew of Frau Nohe, and a great-nephew of Harman Otterbach, of the 1714 Colony.  The young Henry Utterback was born at Trupbach.  The elder Henry Utterback was the uncle of the younger man, was the brother of Frau Nohe, and was the nephew of the 1714 Harman Utterback.  This Henry was also born at Trupbach.

The final member of the group was Joanis Richter, age 26.  B. C. Holtzclaw had thought that this John Rector was a first cousin, once-removed, of the 1714 Rector; however, James McJohn did an analysis of the church records in Germany.  He wrote, "From an examination of the church records in Nassau-Siegen, it is not possible to infer any relationship between John Rector and John Jacob Rector, even though the names and point of origin suggest there may be one."  The analysis was published in Beyond Germanna, in volume 4, the number 2 issue.  This John Rector is usually identified as the one who died in 1742.  John Rector and his wife are to be identified with the town of Siegen.

This raises the question of the popularity of our Germanna names in Germany.  The phone book (German that is) shows 126,165 Fischers, 109,163 Webers, 87,955 Hoffmans, 75,130 Richters, and 54,880 Zimmermans.  I do not have a count of some other popular names such as Schmidt and its variations.  Rupp, in his "Thirty Thousand Names", shows eight Richters who came in through Philadelphia.  It should not be assumed that all of the Rectors are associated or closely related.

Nr. 813:

I have written about the emigration of the First Germanna Colony (of about forty-odd people), and of the Second Colony (of about seventy-odd people).  Both of these Colonies, being early emigrants from Germany, had to find a way to London, where they were to find a way of going on to their destination.  Each Colony had a major disaster in London.

The First Colony had been expecting Christoph von Graffenried to meet them and to have the tickets for the balance of the journey.  On the contrary, Graffenried was not there, and, when he did arrive, he was broke.  Furthermore, his initial help for the Germans was to advise them to go home to Siegen.  Imagine the looks of shock on their faces when they heard this!

The Second Colony signed on with Capt. Tarbett, master of the ship Scott.  Barely had they agreed with him for a trip to Pennsylvania, then he was thrown into jail, probably debtors' prison.  This put them into a limbo.  Perhaps they had already paid him some advance money.  Certainly they were left wondering what was going to happen next.  And the time schedule became very uncertain.

Apparently each group survived its individual woes, and remained a group with a common purpose.  How did they do this?  Surely there were many different opinions about what should be done.  I suspect that one individual came to be accepted as the spokesperson, or leader, for the group.  While not everyone might have agreed fully with this person, they accepted the his decisions.

In the First Colony, I would nominate Jacob Holtzclaw as the natural leader.  We have seen, on more than occasion, that he seemed to be a leader.  He kept the records when the group worked on developing the mines for Spotswood.  He was one of the trustees for the land purchase at Germantown.  In recent notes we have seen that he led the 1734 emigration from the Virginian side.  The individual that the Moravian missionaries called on during their visits to Germantown was Holtzclaw.  The one other individual to whom the group might have listened to was Rev. H�ger, but he probably declined an active role, due to his age, and lent his support to Holtzclaw.

In the Second Colony, if I had to name one male individual of the group, it would be Cyriacus Fleshman.  He was married to Anna Barbara, who was the head, by blood, of the largest sub-contingent in the Colony.  Later, in Virginia, Fleshman signed petitions to the government.  (I have certainly wondered about the role of Anna Barbara herself, due to her unique position.)

In both groups, despite severe troubles, they seem to have held together as a group and persisted in their objectives.  I would believe that the acceptance of a leadership role by one member provided the focal point and concentration that was needed.  The members rallied around the leader's decisions and supported him.

Nr. 814:

After the 1734 immigrants from Siegen, more exactly from Trupbach, no more additions were made to the First Colony in Virginia for four years.  The two groups, in 1713/14, and in 1734, traveled in years when there was little traffic on the Atlantic Ocean.  The First Colony came a few years after the mass exodus from Germany, in 1709, which had left an unfavorable taste in the British public life, and German immigration after 1709 was discouraged.  So, the First Colony came in a period of relative quiet.  The group in 1734 also came during a quiet time, as only two ships docked at Philadelphia from Germany (Rotterdam) in that year.

In 1738, a large contingent left the Siegen area, from the Freudenberg parish.  This group was larger than either of the two earlier groups.  And in this year, many Germans decided to emigrate, which strained the ability of the shippers to handle the crowd.  The 1738 group left Freudenberg early, on March 13.  At Rotterdam they found a ship that had been chartered by a Society that was taking Swiss emigrants to Virginia for a colonization project of Byrd.  This well suited the needs of the Freudenberg group, as they wanted to go to Virginia.  Thus, they joined the ship Oliver at Rotterdam.

The passengers on board the Oliver should have paid more attention to the actions of Captain Walker.  After leaving port and encountering some damage from a storm, he returned to the port from which he had just departed, and said the Oliver was overloaded.  He resigned as Captain.  The owners merely hired another captain, who probably regretted the action.  The first departure of the Oliver from port had been in late June.  So, the Freudenberg contingent had probably encamped outside Rotterdam (the Dutch would not let them into town), from April until June.  They never made it to any American port.

Off the coast of Virginia, a storm sank the Oliver on a sand bar.  It sank far enough that many people were trapped below deck (they were probably seeking shelter from the January weather, which was bitterly cold).  So, the trip had lasted more than six months.  Food had been a severe problem, and the lack of nourishment led to much disease.  Combined with the sinking, and the ensuing drowning, fewer than one of three of the original passengers survived.  Fifty-three men, women, and children had left Freudenberg.  We do not know how many of these arrived.  We do know some of the men, who represented just a handful of the original group.

Had the full group arrived, it would have strengthened, or augmented, the First Colony considerably.  As a result of the losses, probably some married women arrived as widows, and perhaps married into the Germanna families.  And, some of the men could have done the same.  Genealogically, it shows the difficulties of constructing families.  We are not sure of the exact set of players.

Nr. 815:

Blessed are the pastors that write down the name of emigrants.  Pastor G�bel in Freudenberg wrote, "As information I wished to write down on these pages that today, the 13th of March, 1738, there left for Georgia, the new island under the protection of His Majesty the King of England, out of this land and parish, with the knowledge and consent of the authorities of this our land, the following named persons, some of them householders with wife and children, others single male persons, namely:  "  The pastor then proceeds to list about eighteen family units, of which I will simply give the surname:  Seelbach, Waffenschmidt, Ernstorf, Bach, M�ller, Creutz, Weidman, Steinseiffer, Hoffman, Schmidt, Klappert, Gudelius, M�ller (brother to the first one), Halm, Schneider, Hirnschal, Schneider, Schneider.  I can't tell whether the three Schneiders are related.

The majority of these came from Freudenberg, but some were from Plittershagen, Boeschen, and Antoss.  The last two names are not in my atlas but they must have been close by.  Plittershagen is just to the south of Freudenberg.

Not many of the people above are to be found in America.  B. C. Holtzclaw, in writing about them, placed emphasis on the pastor's statement about Georgia, and then assumed that some of them moved up to Virginia.  But his explanation did not explain the total lack of any of the names in Georgia.  Klaus Wust, who has studied German immigration at great length, came to the conclusion that the people joined the ship Oliver which was shipwrecked off Virginia within sight of land.  The evidence of the Moravian missionaries seems conclusive on this point.  This also explains why so few of the names appear in later America history.

Holtzclaw recognized that these names are to be found in Virginia:  Bach or Back, the two M�ller brothers known as Millers, Wiedmann or Wayman, and John Hofmann (brother of the Hofmann who came in 1734).  He did not recognize that the male Creutz made it also.  He was a neighbor in Virginia of John Frederick Miller.

As the last note discussed, these names are the male heads which we know from the surnames.  If they were married when they came, the odds are against the wife surviving.  (Only six of the male surnames, of the eighteen who left, are known in Virginia.)  In some cases, the wife alone may have survived, but she remains undetected because of a remarriage.  The Atlantic trips were very hard on the children, but it is probable that some survived and were later adopted by others.

Jacob Holtzclaw, who was probably the leader in recruiting and advising the emigrants, must have felt very bad about the outcome.

Nr. 816:

It has sounded as if the emigrants from the Siegen area had a proclivity for traveling together.  The three groups, leaving in 1713, 1734, and 1738, did travel together, and two of the groups consisted of more than forty people each.  A few families did come individually.

Johann Jost Konst (or Kuns) arrived at Philadelphia in 1737.  Probably this is the man who was later known as Joseph Coons of the Little Fork.  This was strengthened by the same ship (the Nancy) bringing also Matthias Hofmann, who was the brother of Henry Hofmann of the Little Fork colony.  But this Matthias did not go on to Virginia.  He joined the Moravians in Pennsylvania.  Later when the Moravian missionaries visited Virginia, in particular the Little Fork and Germantown, they would say hello to Henry from his brother Matthias.  Joseph Coons was a nephew of the 1714 Joseph Coons, who was also his godfather.  The later Joseph Coons was born at Niederndorf, a couple of miles southeast of Freudenberg.

The two Crim brothers, Johannes and Johannes Jacob, came through Philadelphia in 1740, probably with young families.  Again, these later arrivals settled in the Little Fork.  They were born at Oberschelden in the Oberfischbach parish.  This is another village, among several we have discussed, just outside the western limits of Siegen.  They were nephews of the 1714 John Spilman.  In Virginia, the name is usually rendered as Grimm.

In 1743, Johann Henrich Hofmann, brother of the 1714 John Huffman, came to Virginia.  He settled in the Robinson River area, where his brother lived.  At a still later time, another brother, Johann Wilhelm Hofmann emigrated, but he settled in Pennsylvania.  These Hofmans were from Eisern, just a few miles south of Siegen, in the Catholic area.  They attended the church in R�dgen, a very small village about one mile east of Eisern.  The Hofmans also came into Siegen to the Protestant Church there.

Johann Jacob Heimbach came about the same time as Johann Henrich Hofmann, who is known to have come in 1743.  Perhaps they came together, but no solid information on that is known.  Heimbach was born at Trupbach, and was the nephew of Mrs. Harman Utterback, who had come in 1714.  John Young, of the Little Fork group, was a relative also.  In Virginia, the name became Hanback.

The archives in Siegen hold a copy of a letter that Henry Huffman wrote from Virginia.  He was asking John Steinseifer to conclude a business matter in Germany, which would result in money for Huffman, and to bring it along to America.  Letters were the principal means of communication across the Atlantic.

Nr. 817:

Several people landed at Philadelphia with names that were the same as people who had come earlier, and settled in or next to the First Colony.  I mentioned one of these, Matthias Hofmann, who settled with the Moravians in Pennsylvania.  Another one was Johann Wilhelm Hofmann (probably no relation to the previous Hofmann), who was a brother to the 1714 John Huffman, and to the 1743 John Henry Huffman.  He too settled in Pennsylvania.  Johannes Brombach married Anna Juliana Kemper, and they settled in Pennsylvania. (Both of these had relatives in the Germanna community.)  The Second Colony also had members, whose later immigrant relatives did not join them.  We have seen examples of newcomers putting down their roots beside friends and relatives who were already there, but not everyone did this.

As we read the immigration lists of the Eighteenth Century, at Philadelphia, which was about the only place keeping such records then, we encounter names that are the same as some of the earlier names.  Some of these people may have been relatives, but we do not know where they settled.  We are looking for settlement in the vicinity of the earlier ones.  So it takes fairly conclusive evidence to say that some of these immigrants did become Germanna "citizens."

One name at Philadelphia is Daniel Buttong, Bouton, or Button, who came in 1739.  He probably was the originator of the Button family in the Germanna community.  Research in Europe indicates that Daniel Button was related to the Youngs.  Johannes Steinseifer left in 1749. and he was probably motivated to come to Virginia because his wife was a Schuster, and the wife of John Henry Huffman (Robinson River) was also a Schuster, but apparently not a sister.  These two men were in contact by letter (a copy of which is in the archives at Siegen).

B. C. Holtzclaw essentially stopped searching for new additions to the German population after about 1750, even though the Germans were continuing to come, right up to the Revolutionary War.  In fact some Germans came during the Revolution, with their transportation paid by the British government.  The inventory of German families in Fauquier and Culpeper Counties is incomplete.  There were more families than is popularly mentioned.  One should keep a very open mind on this aspect.

Predominantly, the people from the Siegen area came in groups.  Only a small percentage came as individuals.  Of these, it appears most had a relative already here.  So the people either traveled with someone familiar, either family or neighbor, or were headed for an area in which already lived relatives or former neighbors.

Nr. 818:

The scene shifts once again from Germantown and the Little Fork, where the majority of the people from the Siegen area settled, to the Robinson River area.  In 1732, Frederick Baumgartner arrived at Philadelphia on the ship Johnson.  He quickly went to Virginia, where he probably was assisted by his uncle, Michael Willheit, from Schwaigern.  Frederick Baumgartner quickly married and had six children before he died, in early 1746 (NS).  Several families came from Schwaigern, whose principal exports seemed to be people.  Not only did they come to America, but even more went to Russia into the German settlements there.

Christian Klemans (Clemonds, Clements) has not been located in Germany.  He was a fairly early emigrant, as he had a patent on Deep Run in 1734.  He married the daughter of his neighbor, John Paul Vogt.  Both of these men moved to the Shenandoah Valley.  The children of Clements married individuals known as settlers of the Valley, such as Trout, Barrier, and Liner.  Two of the daughter-in-laws of Christian have unknown maiden names.

George Frederick Crible arrived at Philadelphia in 1743.  His origins are unknown and his life in Virginia is obscure.  He died intestate in 1764.  He had land close to the "Dutch" farm used for support of the church and its minister.

The Hirsch brothers, John and Martin, were born in T�bingen, W�rttemberg, in 1718 and 1715, respectively.  This village is quite a way south of Stuttgart, and is not in the neighborhood of any of the villages known for the Second Colony.  It is interesting to consider why the Hirsch ("Deer" in America) brothers came to the Robinson River Valley.  As of now, we do not know anyone else who came from the same vicinity as the Deers.  Apparently, the brothers did not come at the same time, since John Deer married the widow of Frederick Baumgartner about 1746, and Martin did not come until 1749.  Cerny and Zimmerman suggest that a land sale by George Long indicated John Deer might be a son-in-law.  It remains unresolved as to why John Deer came to Virginia.

The Delph origins are obscure.  In Germany, the name was probably Delp; at least that is the more common spelling in Germany today.  The early history in America is also obscure.

The Finks origins are obscure as are the Fisher origins.  Probably both of these families came to Virginia in the 1730's, but from where is not known.

Some of these second (or third?) wave people are proving more difficult to find in Germany than the earlier people.  Since we are inclined to believe that a motivation for coming to Virginia is the presence of friends and relatives, this seems unusual.  Why don't we find an association in Germany?

Nr. 819:

The last note was filled with a series of frustrations.  I continue in this note.  Theobald Fite, and his wife Barbara, sold land to John Zimmerman in 1759.  He is shown as Tebald White, in the Culpeper Rental of 1764.  He was a chain carrier for Henry Aylor, in 1776, as Tivolt Fife.

John Fray purchased land in 1764,in Culpeper Co.  Where he came from, and when he came, are not known.  Probably, he married Rebecca Swindell.

There are mysteries enough to keep researchers, on both sides of the Atlantic, busy for a long time.  We have an Anna Mary Gabbard, who wrote her Culpeper will in 1761,leaving everything to her grandson, Henry Jones.  In 1731, the ship, Pennsylvania Merchant, brought a contingent from Schwaigern, including Frederick Gybert, Catrina Gybert, Elizabeth Gybert, Julian Reiner, Barnet Reiner, Sabina Gybert, and Matthias Gybert.  Catrina Gybert was the step daughter of Michael Willheit, early pioneer from Schwaigern.  Catrina had been married twice, and Frederick Gybert was her second husband.  He signed a road petition on 3 Feb 1742/3, in the Shenandoah region of Orange Co., as Frederick Gabbart.  I have wondered if Gabbart and Gybert might be the same name, and if Anna Mary Gabbard was a relative of Michael Wilheit by marriage.

Andrew Garr and his family landed at Philadelphia in 1732, lived a short while in Pennsylvania, and then moved down to the Robinson River Valley.  Why?  I don't think he had any relatives in the area, or even friends.  Apparently, moves were sometimes made for other reasons.  The origins and ancestry of Andreas Gar are perhaps as well known as for any Germanna citizen.  In Germany, he came from a region that was well to the South-East of the Second Colony origins, and was in what is now called Bavaria.

I mention the Garriott family here, because there were a number of marriages between this family and the English and German families.  The Garriotts may have been neither.  The Culpeper Classes show a Garriott Vandyck which suggests a connection to this family also.  The Garriott origins are unknown, even the nationality.  The only safe thing to say is that the family did not come with Lafayette.

(NOTE from Webmaster of these Pages:  Might the GARRIOTT family not have been GAROUTTE, a French family, who immigrated about this same time to New Jersey, and then migrated into Virginia?)

The Gerhardts were in Orange Co. in the 1740's.  Very little is known about them.

It is surprising how much is known about the first immigrants, but the immigrants of twenty, thirty, or more, years later are less well known.  Is this because the later ones are coming for reasons that have little to do with who is already there?  There is a lot of research to be done and meanwhile there is a lot of frustration by descendants.

Nr.  820:

Philip Hupp died in Culpeper Co. in 1761, leaving a family, which probably had children who were teenagers, or even older.  When he came to Virginia, and what was his origin in Germany, are unknowns.  Families that had some association with him include:  Aylor, Baumgartner, Rowe (Rau?), and Thomas.

Members of the Jacoby family start appearing in the 1740's, in Orange County.  Later, John Francis Lucas Jacoby married Frederica Lotspeich, in London (apparently, when he had returned to England on a visit), and they returned to Virginia.  The Lotspeichs were from the village of Frankenthal, in the Palatinate, a few miles northwest of Ludwigshafen.  The nationality of the Jacoby family is not absolutely clear, but it is assumed they were German.

John Kaines (Kains, Kines) received a patent for 400 acres, in 1736, adjacent to John Huffman, Christian Clements, and Edward Ballenger.  He was an appraiser of the estate of John Stinesyfer in 1761.  He died in 1767, and appointed his friends, Harman Spilman and John Stinecyfer, Jr., as executors.  Since these latter two men are from the Siegen area, it may indicate the origins of Kaines.  In a verbal codicil to John Kaines' will, the witnesses were Harman Spilman, John Henry Stinecyfer, and Anne Mary Huffman.  (The two men who had been nominated as executors refused to serve.)

Matthias Kerchler proved his importation in 1736.  Peter Weaver used his headright in obtaining his 1736 patent, for 400 acres.  Kerchler is not to be confused with Andrew Kerker.

Rev. Klug came from eastern Germany.  He was ordained as a minister at Danzig.

Probably, Joseph Kooper (Keuper, Cooper) was a German.  He lived in the Mt. Pony area, with Zimmerman and Kabler.  He patented tracts of land acres in the Fork of the Rappahannock River in 1726 and 1728.

John Kyner was in the 1739 Orange Co. tithables list.  B. C. Holtzclaw confused his name with Reiner, a family which came later.

Mostly, the names that are recounted above are "mysteries".  The next one has a known source, from a community well known as a source of Second Colony immigrants.  The man is Paul Lederer, and he came from Schwaigern, in 1733.  I have not tallied the families completely, but Schwaigern and Trupbach are in a race for the most emigrants.  Schwaigern would win if the emigrants to the eastern lands were counted (i.e., Russia).  Both of these places would lose to Freudenberg for the number sent to Virginia, if the voyage of the Oliver, in 1738, had not been so disastrous.

Nr.  821:

The attempt now is to survey the people who came in the period 1730 to, perhaps, 1750, into the Robinson River Valley, or the area to the north.  One person, who came earlier than this is George Lang (Long or Lung), who might even be counted as a Second Colony member.  On his proof of importation he said he came in 1717, with his wife Rebecca, and in 1731, he patented 300 acres of land on the Robinson River watershed.  The land was stated to be adjacent to Andrew Kerker, J. Huffman, and M. Castler.  Most of the Second Colony members received their land in 1726, so this patent, which is five years after the others, casts some doubt that he was a member of the Second Colony.  He deeded land to Michael Russell (Rossel?) and to Martin Hirsch.  His associations always seem to be with Germans, so he probably was German also.  It would be unusual for a simple name, like the English Long, to be widely misspelled as his is.  He said that he came on the ship Mulberry, but I would not feel happy saying this was the ship the Second Colony came on.  He probably came separately from the Second Colony, and had a different history prior to settling down in the Robinson River Valley.  The Germans simplified their history at the courthouse and skipped details.

Jacob Manspeil patented land in 1734 on Deep Run.  Apparently, he came as a bachelor, for he paid for his land with eight headrights:  his own, Jacob Broyle, Rose Paulitz, Susanna Hance, Peter Hance, Margaret Hance, Catherine Hance, and Adam Hance.  This is a varied set, which has no Manspiels except himself.  If I were studying his history, I would not forget these names.  The surname Hance may be a bit of a challenge.  A tentative village has been put forth for Manspeil, but his identity is not certain.

Jacob Miller lived next to Adam Yager on Mt. Pony.  He was naturalized in 1742/3.  Very little is known about the man, except that he appears with a wife, Rebecca, in deeds.

George Adam Ra�ser came to America from Germany in 1754.  He lived for a while in New Jersey before moving to Virginia.  It has been of interest to me that the ship, bringing the Garrs in 1732, also brought a Georg Adam Riser and Hans Georg Riser (as well as a Hans Michael Criger).  I have wondered if there was a reason here for the Ra�sers to come to Virginia.  Did they know the Garrs?

With the lack of good solid information, it is easy to get carried away with speculation.  The ship that brought the Garrs also brought Joh. Christian Shultz, age 30, who is identified, on the passenger manifest, as a Christian minister.  This is the man who ordained both Johann Caspar St�vers (the father became the minister of the German Lutheran Church on the Robinson River).  Had the Garrs become acquainted with Schultz, and, through him, learned of the Lutheran congregation in Virginia?  People have moved for lesser reasons than this.

The same ship also brought John Philip Sauter (Souther) and Hans Georg Kuntz, and two other men, with variations of these surnames.  We could populate the colony with the names we find!

Nr. 822:

John Railsback and his brother, Henry, were from the village of Eisern, the home of John Huffman of 1714 fame.  It is no wonder that John Railsback settled in the Robinson River Valley, where the Huffmans and Steinseifers lived.  They were fellow emigrants from Eisern.  John Railsback arrived on the ship Nancy in 1750 as Johannes Reesbach.  Fellow passengers on this ship included Creutz, Brumbach, Weissgerber, and Jung.  These are all Germanna names.  After arriving in America at Philadelphia, and going down to Virginia, John Railsback moved to Kentucky and thence to Ohio.  I cite this to show that some people do get around.

Another 1750 family was the Reiner family.  They had relatives in the Robinson River area.  Probably they had "friends" also, for the Reiners were from Schwaigern.  The first Reiner to Virginia was Frau Koch, the wife of Michael Cook, who came in 1717.  She, Mary Barbara, was the sister of Hans Dieterich Reiner, the 1750 immigrant with his family.

Maria Rossel was a communicant at the German Lutheran Church.  Michael Russel was a witness to the 1750 will of George Clore.  Though named as executor in George Clore's will, he renounced the job.  A Mary Kassel was a sponsor at the church in 1771.  Probably this is a misreading of Rossel.  We know little about the family, but it might be well to remember that Michael R. was prominent in the will of George Clore, whose family came from Gemmingen.

A George Slaughter had a 300-acre patent in 1733 next to Germans.  At the German Lutheran Church, the name Schlatter appears several times.  If the latter name were pronounced in German, an Englishman living in Virginia would probably think of Slaughter.  Like many other German names, this was probably the process whereby the name slipped into a more familiar English name.  Little is known about the history of the man.

John Snyder first appears in Virginia when he witnessed the will of Michael Willheit, the Germanna pioneer.  Possibly John Snyder was also from Schwaigern.  There was also a Philip Snyder, and both of these were probably unrelated to the 1717 Henry Snyder.

Two or three of the families that have been discussed have a Sauder in their ancestry.  The name Sauder could easily become Souther or Sowder.  Whether the Souther family is related to other Germanna families is unknown.

As I write these recent notes it is discouraging to realize that we know so little about so many of the Germanna families.  A disproportionate share of the research has gone into the earliest families.  Also, it is sad to note that the later the family came the less is known about them.  There continue to be major finds but time is so short.  Many of the families that we are talking about lived in areas other than the Virginia Piedmont, which is one reason that I favor a lenient attitude toward defining the boundaries of this list.

Nr. 823:

Johann Georg Dieter emigrated from Schwaigern in 1727 with his wife, Maria Margaretha Luttman, and two children.  They lived for a while in Pennsylvania, where another son was born.  Then, in 1736, he obtained a patent for 200 acres on the south side of the Robinson River, adjacent to Roger Quarles and Michael Cooke.  In Virginia, the name became Teter (another popular variation for people named Dieter was Teeter).  George Teter died in 1744.  His widow and children moved to Rowan Co., NC, and then to Pendleton County, in today's West Virginia.  There were many marriages with the Henckel family.

John Paul Vogt came with a mature family in 1733, but the place of origin is unknown.  He said that he was born in Frankfurt.  The name Vogt has had many spellings, some of which really obscure the name.  Also, he was in the habit of using all three names and many listeners heard the Paul Vogt as one name.

Another family which has obscure origins is Walk.  This name could have been Volck, a fairly popular name in Germany.  (The second wife of John Huffman, 1714 immigrant, was Maria Sabina Volck.)  Martin Walk came in 1728, and his village of origin is unknown.  His connections by marriage and business suggest that he could have come from the Kraichgal, where so many Second Colony people originated.

Johann Leonhart Ziegler came through Philadelphia, in 1732, and moved on to Virginia, where he married Barbara Zimmerman.  From his land holdings, it would appear that he lived in the Mt. Pony area, where the Zimmermans and Kablers where his neighbors.  Though not proven, it is highly probable that the Zieglers came from Sinsheim.  The Pinnegars (Benninger) came from here and they were closely associated with the Zieglers in Virginia.  Sinsheim was about eight miles northwest of Gemmingen, and was the fringe of the area from where the majority of the Second Colony came.

So far, Germanna immigrants through about 1750 to 1760 have been mentioned.  A few may have been missed so, if any more are known in this time frame that have not been mentioned, please speak up.  The influx of Germans after this time did not stop, even though some of the older residents were leaving the community.  Some of these newer German citizens may have been transients, and, in fact, it is known that this was the case with some.  A transient was often on the move, looking for a new home, and traveled only a limited distance in any one year.  A community might have its appeal and the family might stay for a while before moving on.  Some probably decided to stay indefinitely.

Nr. 824:

As we move later into the eighteenth century, Germans continued to come to the Germanna area, but their motivations were more mixed than they were for the early inhabitants.  The very first inhabitants, the First and Second Colonies, arrived in Virginia for very unusual reasons.  The First Colony came to mine silver.  The Second Colony came because they were kidnaped by the captain of the ship which brought them.  The Germans who came in the next thirty years or so came because of the people who were already here.  This is when we get the friend and relative influence.  In this time period, we should seek the point of origin of the later people by studying the people with whom the later arrivals associated.  As time went by, this became less of a reason.  Motives became much more mixed, and in many cases they escape us entirely.

During the Revolution, we find there were additions from Germany whose motives were completely different.  In fact, they generally wished not to be here, especially at first.  As they became acquainted with the German communities and the life that they could have here, they changed their mind.  Almost universally, they had no friends or relatives here.  Instead they saw an opportunity for a new and better life.  These were the British Auxiliaries who are called the Hessians, though only a minority was from Hesse.  (The parallel to this is the habit of calling Germans in general, "Palatines".)

The existence of such people in the Germanna community was not even suspected until very recently.  So far, three men have been discovered, and more may be found.  The path-breaking find was made by Louise and Jim Hodge, who started only with the name Charles Frady in Culpeper County.  The name did not even look German.  By the persistent efforts of Jim and Louise, they found that Charles Frady was the sound-alike Carl Simon Wrede, who was a British Auxiliary.  He was being held as a prisoner of war by the Americans.  Probably, the Americans were not greatly concerned that he escaped from their custody and joined the German community in the Robinson River Valley.

Several more late arriving families can be named; these are people whose motivations for coming are not apparent.  Their history prior to Culpeper is not even known.  All we can do is pick up their story in Culpeper County and carry it forward.  Some families that come to mind as examples are the House, Chelf, Bungers, Arbaughs, Dozers, et al families.  That we do not know the communities and their inhabitants better is a disappointment to me.

Nr. 825:

The accuracy of secondary reference sources for history and genealogy is generally not good.  Some time back, I went through what had been written about the history of the Germanna Colonies, pointing out things that were in error, and where they might have originated.  Recently, on the Spotswood list, there was a discussion of the accuracy of books which give some Spotswood history.

The book by Charles Campbell, "Genealogy of the Spotswood Family in Scotland and Virginia," was published by Joel Munsell Press in Albany, New York in 1868.  A writer spotts@nr.infi.net says that he has a copy of the book and it is fairly accurate regarding the Governor and his descendants, but the earlier history is dubious.  Ultimately, the references are to early genealogies such as one Douglas published in his "Baronage."  Little reliance should be placed on the statements in this work, where the material submitted for publication was intended, principally, to magnify the importance of the Scottish gentry.  Douglas accepted for publication anything submitted to him, and the families submitting the material were not bashful about extravagant claims.

Since there was social esteem in an extended genealogy, they were invented.  Some families, of less imagination, just copied other families' genealogies.

The tendency is to think that genealogies from the Peerage, or the Baronage, or similar books, are of better quality.  In actuality, there was more at stake here which led to greater incentives to manufacture one's family history.  And, the publishers had one motive, which was to sell books.  They had no scruples about publishing fiction.  Some of the things that were published were worse than our "glory volumes" when it came to certitude.

A work which is copied unquestionably from others is probably not worth the media on which it appears.