Melchior Dietrich, a cobbler (Schuhmacher), and his wife Maria arrived from Lübeck at the port of Oranienbaum on 16 August 1766 aboard a snow-brig named Neptunus (Neptune) under the command of Skipper Johann Graap.
Melchior Ditrich and his wife Maria are recorded on a list of colonists being transported from St. Petersburg to Saratov in 1767 along with a note that they both died in route.
The Oranienbaum passenger list records that Melchior Dietrich came from the German region of Worms.
There are no known surviving male lines of this Dietrich family among the Volga German colonies.
- Idt, Andreas and Georg Rauschenbach. Auswanderung deutscher Kolonisten nach Russland im Jahre 1766 (Moscow: Idt & Rauschenbach, 2019): 34.
- Idt, Andreas and Georg Rauschenbach. Deutsche Kolonisten im Jahr 1766 in Oranienbaum und in den Siedlungsorten: Die Kuhlberg-Listen (Moscow: Idt & Rauschenbach, 2024): 736.
- Pleve, Igor. Lists of Colonists to Russia in 1766: Reports by Ivan Kulberg (Saratov: Saratov State Technical University, 2010): #5887.
- Rauschenbach, Georg. Deutsche Kolonisten auf dem Weg von St. Petersburg nach Saratow: Transportlisten von 1766-1767 (Moscow: G.V. Rauschenbach, 2017): #6340-6341.
Brent Mai