Urban TANNER, #15
I believe that I recounted my search for Ergersheim which I hoped would lead to Urban Tanner (Robert Tanner in Virginia). At first, I was finding only one place with that name and it was in Bavaria. The reason that I did not find more was that I had added “Germany” to the LDS place search. Omitting this, one finds there are at least two. The second one is in Alsace. Way back in October I ordered two films and I had to wait about ten weeks for them to come in. When they did, I found that I had not given the correct number. So I lost ten weeks. I reordered with the correct numbers and one film has come in. Briefly, it is film 0765370, "Registres paroissiaux", for the locality Ergersheim. It contains “Baptemes 1706-1793”. I was interested in the years 1706 to 1709 since Urban Tanner was in the church books at Westhofen in the spring of 1709. Unfortunately, there was no Tanner in the period 9 JAN 1706 (the first entry) to 10 JUL 1709.
This is a Catholic church and some of the words are in Latin but I could read enough to see the child’s name and the parents' names. The names were distinctly German; for example: Bernard, Schnider/Scheider, Herrmann, Groff, Kauffman, Stumpf, Rauel, Rostel, Grimm, Erhart, Moll (Wilhelm Abraham), and Meyer. The writing was clear (as these things go) in a combination of Roman and German script. Names are often Latinized. One of the unusual characteristics is that the witnesses (sponsors) signed at the bottom of the information.
The film that has not come in is 0765371 which has Baptemes, "Mariages, Sepultures, 1706 to 1792", also for Ergersheim. I am not too encouraged about this as I would not expect to find any baptisms in the 1706 to 1792 period since they seemed to be on the film that I have looked at. Nor would I expect to find a marriage or death for Urban Tanner in this time period.
There are some other films which might have information. Besides the church records, there are civil records that have been microfilmed.
Since Tanner is a popular in the German-speaking parts of Switzerland, and we already have had evidence of several Tanners there (though the ages were not correct), and since a popular migration path from Switzerland was to Alsace and then on to America, I am still of the belief that I am barking up the correct tree. Still, it is best not to forget that there is an Ergersheim in Bavaria and this suggests that Austria might have been the point of origin.
This is, by no means, a brick wall. Sooner or later, we will scale it.
(29 Jan 2008)
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.