In the list of names in Note 1747, we were noting problems. The names in this list are south of the Robinson River. Earlier we had the names of people (in 1739) of people north of the Robinson. It was a surprise to read the name of Lewis Fisher in both lists. Does this mean that there were two Lewis Fishers? Or did one man dwell to some extent in both areas? In the other list, he lived on the land of his father-in-law, which is consistent with his general history.
I have been inclined to believe that there might have been two Lewis Fishers, each of whom married an Anna Barbara, which has masked the fact there were two couples with the same names. It could be, probably would be, that they were father and son. Besides the name appearing twice in the Tithe Lists, there is one other fact that helps support the idea of two couples. Mrs. Margaret James Squire, when she was researching the Zimmerman family in Sulzfeld, Germany, found that the sponsors at one of the baptisms was a Ludwig Fischer and his wife Anna Barbara. The couple that we generally know in the Robinson River Valley would not have been old enough to be the sponsors for the Zimmerman children.
There is another duplication of names which occurs in Pickett's 1739 list. The names are Daywall and Daywol Cristler. These two names are only seven apart and were taken by the same man. One would ask, "How did the compiler get his names?" Did he ask each person personally, or did he visit a neighborhood and ask an individual who lived in that area? If there were only one Daywall Cristler, it would be hard to have asked the man twice and to have recorded his name twice. The Crislers had been in the community less than a decade. The known history from Germany, and from Pennsylvania where they lived for a while, does not suggest there would be two people with this name.
There is one more list of tithes but it contains no German names. There are also lists of names of people who could not be found by the Sheriff. That is, they did not pay their tithe and the sheriff was sent out to collect. Here are some of the excuses given by the sheriff(?):
Ran away, ran away, ran away, no effects, not found, no distress, a mistake, not found, no distress, not found, a mistake, not found, ran away, ran away, no distress, ran away, not found, I know not the man, dead no effects, ran away, no effects, I know not the man, not found (x4), ran away (x3), etc., etc.
Though I did not see any German names on this list, it may have been a partial or incomplete list and applicable to another section of the county.
These lists are incomplete and fragmentary. If they were complete, there should have been German names from the Little Fork area, but we do not have them.
(02 Sep 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.