John Blankenbaker's Germanna History Notes

Note 1838

[To correct some recent mistakes that I have made, I review the situation in the Thomas family.]

Anna Maria Blanckenbuehler was the youngest child of Anna Barbara Schoen and Johann Thomas Blanckenbuehler.  She was born 5 May 1687.  She had three older siblings, Hans Niclas, Hans Balthasar, and Hans Matthias.  However, Anna Maria was the first to marry, even though she was 24 when she married.  She married Johann Thomas, the son of Albrecht Thomas, in 1711.  Two surviving children, Hans Wendel Thomas and Anna Magdalena Thomas, were born in Germany on 17 April 1712 and 24 November 1715, respectively.

In Virginia, John Thomas and Anna Maria Blanckenbuehler were the parents of two more children, Michael and Margaret.  Then the father, John Thomas, died and Anna Maria Blankenbaker Thomas married Michael Kaifer/Kaefer.  Michael Kaifer in his will names five daughters and their husbands, though the spelling is so atrocious that the actual identity of one husband was uncertain until a few years ago.  Since Anna Maria Blankenbaker Thomas Kaifer was the mother of nine surviving children plus one who died early, and since the mother did not have any children until she was 24, we have a good idea about when the children were born, even in Virginia.  We do not know the sequence of some of the children.

The four children of John Thomas and Anna Maria Blanckenbuehler married as follows (to the extent that it is known):

  1. John Wendel Thomas was married twice and the maiden names of his wives are unknown.
  2. Michael Thomas was married twice.  The maiden name of his first wife is unknown.  His second wife is said to be Eva Susanna Margaret Hart, but no proof of this is known.
  3. Anna Magdalena Thomas married John Michael Smith, Jr.  Their children are known from gifts of land made by John Michael and Anna Magdalena.
  4. Margaret Thomas married Henry Aylor.  Some say that this was his second wife, but I know of no evidence that he was married twice.

Maybe in the next note, I can review the children of John Wendel Thomas and his first wife.
(12 Feb 04)

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.