I will start a discussion of the immigrant, John Thomas, who presumably came in 1717, though there is no positive proof of it. The young Thomas family may have been among those who were temporarily stranded in London.
John Thomas was born as Hans Wendel Thoma[s] in Neuenbuerg on 17 April 1712, to Johannes Thoma and Anna Maria Blanckenbuehler. His mother was almost 25 years old when he was born. Normally we would think that the boy would have been called Wendel since that was his calling name. Perhaps he preferred Hans to Wendel, a rather uncommon name. In Virginia, he became John.
Neuenbuerg is in Baden-Wuerttemberg today. Before these two states were combined into one, Neuenbuerg was in Baden. Prior to that, throughout the Eighteenth Century, it was in the lands belonging to the (Catholic) Bishops of Speyer. Neuenbuerg was on the edge of the Bishop’s domain and about two miles away there was a Protestant church in Oberoewisheim to which the Blankenbuehlers went. Since there are two Neuenbuergs, only about twenty miles apart, the Neuenbuerg where the Blankenbuehlers lived was in the Kraichtal district northeast of Bruchsal. The Rhine River is just to the west a short distance.
A daughter, Ursula, was born to Johannes and Anna Maria Thoma on 8 Nov 1714 and she died the same day. About a year later, another daughter, Anna Magdalena was born on 24 Nov in 1715. The family that emigrated consisted of the father and mother with two children. In Virginia (presumably, but perhaps on the trip), Margaret and/or Michael were born. In Virginia, the father Johannes Thoma died before the time that the immigrants took up their land. Anna Maria married secondly Michael Kaefer, by whom she had five surviving children. The will of Michael is a tremendous help in determining the family for he names his children and his wife’s children.
Anna Magdalena married Michael Smith, Jr. Margaret married Henry Aylor. That Margaret married Henry Aylor was only determined in recent years. The confusing factor was the will of Michael Kaefer where the spelling is atrocious. The families of the two girls, Anna Magdalena and Margaret, are well known.
Michael was married twice and the tradition is that he was the father of twenty-five children, not all of whom are identified. For unknown reasons, the families of John Thomas (as he became known in Virginia) and Michael Thomas are not in the German Lutheran Church of the Robinson River Valley.
(30 Mar 06)
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.