Johny Cerny and Gary Zimmerman found the birth record of Hans Christoph Zimmermann (no relation) at Sulzfeld, Baden. He was born 16 Mar 1692 (this might have been either an old style date or a new style date and they did not specify which) to Christian Zimmermann and Maria Eva Unknown. His paternal grandmother was Maria Schuchter, a surname very similar to, if not the same as, the second husband of Anna Barbara Schöne, who married first a Blankenbühler and thirdly a Fleischmann. (Cerny and Zimmerman have much more information in Before Germanna, volume 9 . For pictures of Sulzfeld, click here .)
Christoph Zimmermann married Dorothea Rottle, daughter of Martin Rottle, baker, on 27 July 1710. Christoph was 18 years old and Dorothea was about 23. They had one child, Johannes (John in Virginia), who was born in 1711. Dorothea died in 1714 and Christoph married Anna Elisabetha Albrecht that same year. Several children were born to this marriage, mostly in Virginia.
In 1725 Christopher moved to the first of his land patents in the Mt. Pony area of (today) Culpeper County. A near neighbor of his was Friedrich Kabler, who also came from Sulzfeld. These families had known each other in Sulzfeld. John Zimmerman, the eldest son of Christopher, moved to Robinson River Valley, where he married Ursula Blankenbaker, the daughter of Johann Nicholas Blankenbaker. The other children of Christopher lived near their father. One wonders if John Zimmerman did not like his stepmother and if this was the motivation for moving to the Robinson River Valley. It may be nothing more than John having a liking for the German language which was not used very much in the Mt. Pony area.
The Zimmerman family is to be distinguished from the Carpenter families of William Carpenter and John Carpenter who lived in the Robinson River Valley. Generally, the Carpenter family used the name Carpenter but some of the writers at the German Lutheran Church would write the name as Zimmerman, which has confused investigators. One must learn to distinguish the Zimmermans, who are Carpenters, from the Zimmermans who are Zimmermans.
The recent report about the Zimmerman family was in error on the location of Christopher’s birthplace. It was Baden, not Alsace; the two towns are on opposite sides of the Rhine River. They did not leave because of religious persecution, but because they wanted to make a better life for themselves. Except for John Zimmerman, who lived in the Robinson River Valley, the other Zimmermans had nothing to do with the German Lutheran Church, which eventually became known as Hebron. They were not opposed to the church; they simply lived too far away.
Christopher Zimmerman and his family who lived with him rapidly became English-like in their ways. When Christopher wrote his will, he had no problem with having two English persons as witnesses.
(20 Oct 01)
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.