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Pennsylvania Chapter, Palatines to America Selected Photographs, II |
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This is a view of Niederholzklau which is located a few miles west of Siegen. Johann Peter Gudelius left here in 1750 and emigrated to Pennsylvania. At Manheim, where he lived, the name is sometimes spelled with a “t” instead of a “d.” There is no church in Niederholzklau and the residents walked the short distance to Oberholzklau to go to the Reformed church. |
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The nearer group of buildings is on Planckenbichl farm where Matthias Planckenbühler lived in 1650. This is in Gresten-Land about 50 miles west of Vienna, Austria. His great-great-granddaughter, Margaret Thomas, married Everhard Hupp in Virginia and moved to southwestern Pennsylvania. Some people claim she was the first white woman west of the Allegheny Mountains but such claims are difficult to prove. |
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This is the Evangelische (Lutheran) Church in Schwaigern, Württemberg. Engravings of the late 1600s show that the tower looked the same as in this picture. Johann Georg Frederich Willheid, born 1723, came to Pennsylvania in 1731 where the family settled along the line with Maryland near Chambersburg. He had a cousin in Virginia where the name was more commonly spelled with a “t” as in Willheit.
The tower is most likely to be retained as a church evolves and grows. Very few church buildings have their structure they had in the early eighteenth century.
The time is now about half past four or as the Germans say, “halb funf,” meaning half to five. |