[Having been out of the habit of writing these notes for about ten days, I forgot to write one last night for sending this morning. In reading this morning's mail, I saw a note by Fred Rump on the German-Life list which struck a responsive chord. So I am copying it for retransmission here. How many of these reasons have you heard for our Germanna citizens? I will try to return to our current thread (the Redmans) on which we have had responses.]
"There are certain common refrains we find among our emigrant ancestry. Several of the most common are: They stowed away on a ship to escape something; they served the emperor in some high capacity, but transgressed against him and had to run away; they were noblemen and owned a castle, but got disowned because they married beneath their station; they left to avoid the military; they deserted the army; but held a high rank as an officer. Seldom does anybody list the real, and most probable, reason: They left because they were so poor they had nothing to eat and wanted a better life for their children. The availability of land is what they dreamed off.
"Sure there was some resistance to the military service. Who wants it? But, at the bottom, there was a very normal desire to be free and own something they could never have in Germany. So you might want to take all those old stories with a grain of salt, and find out just what the conditions were your ancestors left."
Fred Rump
4788 Corian Court
Naples, FL 34114
941-775-7838
FredRump@earthlink.net
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.