Christoph Kegele, a farmer, his wife Margaretha, and children (Johanna, age 13; Georg David, age 10¼; Johann, age 7; Margaretha, age 5) arrived from Danzig at the port of Oranienbaum on 29 April 1766 aboard a two-masted merchant ship named Der Kleine Andreas (The Little Andrew) under the command of Skipper Jacob Jensen.
They settled in the Volga German colony of Hussenbach. Sons Georg David and Johannes are recorded there on the 1798 census in Households No. Hs052 & Hs045, respectively. Daughter Anna Margaretha is recorded on the 1798 census of Frank in Household No. Fk001.
Johannes Kegele and his sons are recorded on the 1811 census of Hussenbach in Household No. 45 along with a note that he died there in 1806.
Georg David Kegele is recorded on the 1811 census of Hussenbach in Household No. 52 along with a note that he died there in 1804. There are no apparent male descendants of this line.
After 1811, the surname appears consistently on the 1834 and 1857 censuses as Kegler (rather than Kegele).
The Oranienbaum passenger list records that Christoph Kegele came from the German area of Württemberg.
- 1811 Hussenbach Census (Households No. 45, 52).
- Idt, Andreas and Georg Rauschenbach. Auswanderung deutscher Kolonisten nach Russland im Jahre 1766 (Moscow: Idt & Rauschenbach, 2019): 29.
- Idt, Andreas and Georg Rauschenbach. Deutsche Kolonisten im Jahr 1766 in Oranienbaum und in den Siedlungsorten: Die Kuhlberg-Listen (Moscow: Idt & Rauschenbach, 2024): 48.
- 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): Fk001, Hs045, Hs052.
- Pleve, Igor. Lists of Colonists to Russia in 1766: Reports by Ivan Kulberg (Saratov: Saratov State Technical University, 2010): #26.
Brent Mai
Sue Nakaji