Peter Auer was born about 1737 in Contwig, 6 kilometers east of Zweibrücken in what today is the German state of Rheinland-Pfalz. He married in the Catholic Church there on 5 May 1761 to Maria Magdalena Brungardt. [See Brungardt Family.] They had two sons, each born in Contwig: (1) Franz Peter, baptized on 5 March 1762; and (2) Simon Peter, born on 28 February 1765.
Soon after their second boy was born, Peter and his family immigrated to Russia, and the youngest son, Simon Peter, died on the journey.
The remaining Auer family, along with daughter Anna who was born in route, arrived in the colony of Rohleder on 14 June 1766. Peter Auer, a craftsman (Handwerker), his wife Magdalena, and children (Franz Peter, age 6; Anna Maria, age 1) are recorded on the 1767 census of Rohleder in Household No. 9.
In 1788, Peter Auer and his family moved from Rohleder to Herzog.
The widow and children of Peter Auer (senior) are recorded on the 1798 census of Rohleder in Household No. Rl09.
[Franz] Peter Auer (junior) and his family are recorded on the 1798 census of Rohleder in Household No. Rl15.
Descendants of Peter Auer are recorded on the 1834 census of Rohleder in Households No. 5, 19, 47, 65.
- 1834 Rohleder Census (Households No. 5, 19, 47, 65).
- Mai, Brent Alan. 1798 Census of the German Colonies along the Volga: Economy, Population, and Agriculture (Lincoln, NE: American Historical Society of Germans from Russia, 1999): Rl09, Rl15, Mv2434.
- Parish records of Contwig (LDS Film No. 489413).
- Pleve, Igor. Einwanderung in das Wolgagebiet, 1764-1767 Band 4 (Göttingen: Nordost-Institut, 2008): 49.
Corina Hirt
Brent Mai