I have been privileged to read a draft of Cathi Clore Frost's forthcoming book on the Clore family. One of the daughters of Michael Clore, the immigrant, was Margaret who married Johann Paulus Lederer, also known as Paul Leather or Leathers. Margaret and Paul had a daughter, Mary, who is mentioned in her father's will as Mary Yowell. Cathi makes the statement that perhaps the John Yowell who witnessed her father's will was Mary's husband. This would not be an unusual situation.
I was checking the Leathers in my recent book, " Hebron Baptismal Register ", and I found the following baptism pertaining to a mother Mary Lederer Yowell:
The father was James Owl, and the mother was Maria. The book also notes that Owl is probably Yowell (thanks to Andreas Mielke who shows a knack for finding English equivalents of German names). So far nothing is proved by this baptismal statement about the parents because there is nothing that says this Maria is the Mary who is mentioned as Mary Yowell.
Looking at the sponsors, they were Nicholas Lederer, Marg Lederer, and Marg Klor. Nicholas and Margaret are also children of Paul Lederer and Margaret Clore, so they would be siblings of Maria Yowell. The Margaret Clores would be cousins (there were three possibilities by blood and marriage) of Maria Lederer Yowell. As I result, I have no doubts that the Maria Lederer of Paul and Margaret married James Yowell, not John Yowell.
We were very lucky to find a James Yowell in the Baptismal Register. In the whole register, the name Yowell never appears as such. Once Elisabetha Yowell appears as the wife of Jacob Broyle but her maiden is not given. In the baptism above, the name appears in the Register as Owl. I do not know why the Yowell name is so rare at the Lutheran Church, but it appears to be even rarer than the Finks name.
Perhaps I should add, from the Baptismal Register, that the baby's name being baptized was Rhode, that she was born 13 Jan 1777, and that she was baptized 28 Feb 1777 by Rev. Jacob Franck. Franck succeeded in getting many people to church who had never been to the church (to judge by the number of people who first appear in the Baptismal Register when he was the pastor). It is no wonder that the congregation sorely missed him when he left after three years.
(28 Jul 03)
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.