The Six Zweifel Brothers (3) - Mary Zweifel

Part 3 - The Next Generation
If you missed Part 2 of the story, go here . . .
If you missed Part 1 of the story, go here . . .

By the 1880's the five surviving Zweifel brothers were all married and raising families in the Town of New Glarus and the Town of Washington in Green County, Wisconsin. They came to America in 1853 and 1854 as part of a wave of Swiss settlers from Canton Glarus, Switzerland. When they arrived, they found a community of immigrants that were very familiar to them. These were German-speaking farmers, many of whom they probably knew from the "old country." The brothers put down roots in southern Wisconsin. Two of them went off to fight in the Civil War and both survived. One brother died young but the rest acquired large farms and raised large families.

A Birds-Eye View of New Glarus in 1891.

The Six Zweifel Brothers (2) - New Glarus

Part 2 - Becoming Americans

If you missed Part 1 of the story, go here . . .

In the middle of the 19th Century, six brothers, the sons of Johann Heinrich and Ursula would join the growing migration from Canton Glarus, Switzerland to New Glarus, Wisconsin. There is still some speculation as to the exact date or dates the brothers came over and what ship or ships they might have traveled on. What we do know is that all, except one, were recorded in the church records at New Glarus by 1854 and all seemed to settle in the town of New Glarus or the Town of Washington in northern Green County, Wisconsin.

A typical Wisconsin pioneer log house. The Zweifel
brothers may have encountered and lived in houses
similar to these when they first arrived.

The Six Zweifel Brothers (1) - Glarus

Part 1 - From Switzerland

One of my ancestral lines is the Zweifel family from Linthal in Canton Glarus, Switzerland. When my Great Great Grandfather, Frederick Roth, came to America in about 1880, he would be settling in an area already populated by many from his homeland. Soon, he was married to Maria (or Mary) Zweifel. While he had just arrived in this new land, she was born here and grew-up in post Civil War America.

The Port of Le Havre, France in 1841. Le Havre was an important emigration
port for Germans coming to America. Over 1/2 million German immigrants
sailed from Le Havre in the 19th Century with most landing in New York.
Some of the Zweifel brothers came through Le Havre.

Apollas Holcombe - Short Biography

Apollas Holcombe - Patriot and Pioneer

Apollas Holcombe was born in 1791 in Salmon Brook, Granby, Connecticut. He was one of six known children, all boys, of Micha Holcombe and Hannah Hayes. Micha, a Revolutionary War veteran, was the son of Joseph Holcombe and descendant of a puritan colonist named Thomas Holcombe who came to the new world around 1630.

Apollas Holcombe was born in Granby, Connecticut. Originally called Salmon Brook, this
was the home of five generations in this line of the Holcombe family. Located in north
central Connecticut, the area between the branches of the small stream called Salmon
Brook is still home to many Holcombe descendants from other lines of the family.

A Big Peterson Family Reunion

Finding New Sources, the Website Helps!

I do not get a lot of comments or even that much traffic to this site but that does not mean that having the website has not paid-off. In fact, I have received a number of high quality contacts who stumbled onto this blog and realized a connection. The most significant of these has been on the Peterson/Moe side of my family. A few months ago, not long after I posted: Peterson - Moe . . . What's in a Name?, I was contacted by three different individuals on that side of the family, including one from Norway. That was really exciting for me.



Peterson, Moe and others families gather at Wisconsin Dells in 2011.
They brought with them a wealth of resources to share.

Lars P. Moe - Short Biography

Lars Moe, Minnesota Pioneer

Lars Moe was born on July 14, 1844, in Norway. He came to America in 1864 with his parents, Peter Olsen Moe and Anna Augundsdatter Lad and several siblings. They first went to Black Earth, Wisconsin and then settled on Section One in the northeast corner of Town of Blue Mounds.

Lars and Ingeri about 1890

Wilderman Family (2) - Colonists & Pioneers

Part 2 - West, Into the Frontier
Find Part 1 of the story here . . .

Note, this post has been revised. The original 2-Part Wilderman Family series has been updated and more information has been added. The series has been expanded to 3 Parts with most of the new information found in Part 3.

In 1751, Jacob Wilderman and Johann Meyer left their small village in Baden, Germany and came to Colonial America. Among the 20 or so in their party were Johann Meyer's wife and four children, including daughter Elizabetha, who would later become Jacob's wife. They lived in Pennsylvania and Maryland. This was the home to many of the Pennsylvania Dutch settlers who came to the new world from the Rhine Valley in southern Germany. Jacob and Elizabetha's oldest son, George, grew up in this colonial environment and came of age right during the American Revolution.

Maryland about 1780; Baltimore and Ann Arundel Counties are in the upper center of the map.

Wilderman Family (1) - Colonists & Pioneers

Part 1 - German Colonist is the New Word

Note, this post has been revised. The original 2-Part Wilderman Family series has been updated and more information has been added. The series has been expanded to 3 Parts, with most of the new information found in Part 3.

There is a lot of German ancestry in my blood, on both my mom's and dad's side of the family. They are from many different parts of Germany and most settled in the Midwest (namely Wisconsin) in the middle of the 19th Century. The Kahl, Ostenberg and Bilse families were in Blue Mounds; the Goth family in Middleton, the Hermann family in Verona; the Goldner family in Chicago (possibly via Michigan); and the Pazel and Ebersold families, also in Chicago. These are typical of the ethnic Europeans that came to American in waves from the 1840s right through to the first World War. There is, however, another German family in my ancestry that came to America much earlier. They arrived before the country existed and settled in the British Colonies in the middle of the 18th century.

Colonial Philadelphia Street Scene.