In the last note, we had the names of several individuals who could have been from Nassau-Siegen, but the mere duplication of the names does not insure that they were. Hank Z. Jones did a study of the New York 1709 immigrants with a special emphasis on finding their German origins. He found the following people in New York with Nassau origins.
Jacob Bähr had Jacob Cuntz as a sponsor when he was born. Peter Giesler’s family history has mentions of Peter and Johann Fischbach, and of Oberholzklau. Peter married Anna Lucia, the daughter of Hermann Hoffman. Johann Friderich Häger was the son of Rev. Henry Hager of the First Germanna Colony. Johann Henrich Haeger was a cousin to Johann Friderich Häger. A sponsor of Weller’s sister was Agnes Holtzklau at Salchendorf. Hyeronimus Weller married Anna Julian, the daughter of Jacob Cuntz.
Also, 107 people emigrated from the Nassau-Dillenberg region in 1709. Remember that all of the people mentioned so far are only the people who made it to New York. The New York emigrants were only three thousand out of about thirteen thousand people. A rational estimate is that several hundred people left the Nassau region in 1709.
Many of the people in the 1713 emigration had relatives in the 1709 emigration. All of the 1713 emigrants would have been aware of the departure of the 1709 people. Coupled with the poor economic conditions in Nassau in 1709 and 1713, it is possible to see the strong influence of the 1709 departures on the 1713 emigrants. The ones in 1709 had shown that it was possible, which encouraged the 1713 group to think it was possible for them.
(From
Beyond Germanna
, page 36ff.)
(25 Jun 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.