The Fischbach family had five adult children. In Germany, one of them, Elizabeth, is believed to have married Hans Jacob Richter, in 1711, and they came on to Virginia. Two other Fischbach daughters had the same name, Maria Elisabeth, which has made the positive identity of them more difficult. The two are believed to have married Johann Speilmann and Melchoir Brombach. B.C. Holtzclaw made the assumption that the older one married Melchoir Brombach, and the younger one married Johann Spielman. The two sons have already been mentioned, so five families can trace a connection to the village of Trupbach through the Fischbachs. Six members of the Fischbach family (counting the parents) came as Fischbachs, and one came as the wife of Hans Jacob Richter.
When one attempts to count the individuals who constituted the First Colony, the known names do not account for the 42 people which the records say came. More names are needed in the form of one or more families. One family has been proposed for this. The evidence for them is entirely circumstantial, but still it is good evidence. About eight people are required, especially with several females. It might seem likely that the family came from the same village as some of the other members, and perhaps were even related. They should also disappear from the Germany records.
The Otterbach family meets the requirements, with only one drawback. They had four daughters who were unmarried at the time. They came from Trupbach. A fifth daughter was already married to Hans Jacob Holzklau. The drawback to their nomination as the missing family is that there is no record of the two sons in Virginia. Therefore it is necessary to assume that they died in Virginia, probably before the move to Germantown, since they had no land there.
One daughter, Ellsbeth or Elisabeth, is assumed to have married Peter Heide, as his second wife. Elisabeth Catharina, about 16 when they came, married John Kemper in Virginia. Maria Catharina, about 14 when they came, married Johann Joseph Mardten. Anna Catharina, only about 8 when they came, later married Harman Fischbach. Thus, five families, Holtzclaw, Hitt, Kemper, Martin, and (Harman) Fishback can trace a connection to Trupbach through the distaff side. There are more people to consider, but Trupbach is in the lead for the number of family connections. This analysis also shows that a number of the people at Germantown were related to one another. All of the villages that have been mentioned so far, Trupbach, Seelbach, and Oberfischbach, are close together and not too far from Siegen.
More of the individuals in the First Colony had an association with this same small geographical area. We'll look at these in the next note.
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.