One of the rules which was used in the rewriting of the Register of the German Lutheran Church (Hebron) in 1775 was that no family was to be included who had children born before 1750. When they set up this rule, they probably did not realize how much trouble it would give them. Though the rule seems simple enough, its application in the case of one family gave the writers a problem.
Zacharias Blankenbaker married a widow (Alcy), who had two daughters. The two daughters were born before 1750. The children of Zach and Alcy were all born after 1750. How was this family to be handled or treated? Were they to be included or not? After debating the question, and postponing a decision until they were almost to the end of the rewrite, they decided to include the family without the two daughters of Alcy. So Alcy had all of her children by Zach included, while her two daughters by her first husband were not included.
If a published Wayman family history is believed (no documentation is offered), it would indicate that Alcy had married a Finks. This may be possible, because the family of Mark Finks, in the 1738 Orange County Tithables, had two Tithables in it. One would have been Mark, but the other one could not have been a son of Mark. Perhaps this person did marry Alcy (whose formal given name, as well as her maiden name are unknown).
Alcy’s two daughters were Elizabeth and Mary Magdalena. Elizabeth married Peter Broyles, and Mary Magdalena married, second, Henry Wayman. Zach and Alcy had a daughter whose name was apparently Mary Elizabeth, though she seems to have used Mary alone.
When Zach and Alcy were choosing sponsors for their children, they were all chosen from his relatives. Five times he chose his brother, Michael, and five times he chose his brother, Jacob. Three times he chose his aunt, Catherine Broyles. Once he chose his uncle, Jacob. Twice he chose Elizabeth Blankenbaker, his brother Michael’s wife. Once he chose Elizabeth Garr. Without knowing Alcy’s parentage, I cannot say that none of these people were her relatives, but it appears that Alcy was from a family who did have not a strong affiliation, if any at all, with the Lutheran Church.
In the cases where the sponsors are all chosen from one parent’s family, the use of uncles and aunts was sometimes a necessity. We had a similar situation with Conrad Künzle and Rachel Barlow.
When you have lived with the names and studied the people, it becomes very easy to start thinking of them as friends and to use familiar names for them.
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.