Joseph Thomä, a farmer, and his wife Maria Klara arrived from Lübeck at the port of Oranienbaum on 8 August 1766 aboard the pink Cargo under the command of Lieutenant Moses Davydov.
Maria Klara died and Joseph remarried to widow Eva Elisabeth. They settled in the Volga German colony of Köhler on 21 August 1767 and are recorded there on the 1767 census in Household No. 84 along with Eva Elisabeth's son, Johannes (age 17) [surname believed to be Helmer].
Johannes Helmer and his family are recorded on the 1798 census of Köhler in Household No. Kl55.
- 1834 Köhler Census (Households No. 60, 92).
- 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): Kl55.
- Pleve, Igor. Einwanderung in das Wolgagebiet, 1764-1767 Band 2 (Göttingen: Der Göttinger Arbeitskreis, 2001): 380.
- Pleve, Igor. Lists of Colonists to Russia in 1766: Reports by Ivan Kulberg (Saratov: Saratov State Technical University, 2010): #4203.
Brent Mai