Recently, mention was made that Richard Birdine was a contributor to the Evangelical Lutheran Church (Hebron) in the Robinson River area when they were raising funds in 1733. Probably Richard Birdine (or Burdyne) was not a German. This raises the question as to why he made a contribution. Most likely, he had married a German woman.
This contribution of Richard Burdyne is the earliest known record of him in this area. He had no land patent. Robert Tanner deeded him 212 acres on 12 Mar 1738. In the 1739 tithe list, Richard Burdyne was located in the sequence of Zacharias Fleshman, Peter Fleshman, Richard Birdine, John Wilhide, Michael Claur, . . .
Richard Tanner (Gerber) was a German who had land patents in 1728 and 1735 in the vicinity of the individuals named above. Robert Tanner testified in 1720 that he came to Virginia with his wife, Mary, and five children, Christopher, Christianna, Katherine, Mary and Parva (Barbara).
Richard Burdyne was nominated as executor in the will of Henry Frederick Phierpack (Beyerback) but Burdyne did not serve.
Richard Burdyne's will, written 22 July 1761, named his wife as Catherine. It is thought that she was the daughter of Robert Tanner.
There is one Burdyne record at the Hebron Church. Richard Burdine (Jr.) and his wife, Dorothea, were the parents of Veronica, b. 15 Dec 1782. The sponsors were John Tanner and Magdalena Tanner. Dorothea was Reginald's (Richard and Original are two other names in the records) second wife. She was probably a daughter of Christopher Tanner and a first cousin of Reginald. In 1817, Dorothea Burdine is named in the distribution of the estate of John Tanner, brother of Dorothea.
Taking all of these records together, it does seem probable that Richard Burdyne, Sr., married Catherine Tanner. Though this event, a much longer association with the Germans begins.
Mixed nationality marriages were not rare; they occur with a greater frequency than we might expect. It has a lot to do with the sizes of the groups. In small groups, marriages outside the group are much more common just because the opportunities within the group are limited. The First Germanna Colony had several mixed nationality marriages. The Second Germanna Colony, the largest of the groups, had the fewest. When the mixed marriages do occur, we wonder how the partners came to meet and how they courted with only a limited knowledge of the other's language. But then language may not be a prequisite for courtship.
We gratefully acknowledge the work of John Blankenbaker who published over 2,500 Germanna History Notes via the Germanna-L@rootsweb.com email list from 1997 to 2008. We are equally thankful to George Durman (Sgt. George) for hosting the list and republishing the notes via rootsweb.com.