Johann Georg Wetzel, a farmer, his wife Anna Sabina, children (Martin, age 15; Sophia, age 10½; Christian, age 7½), and mother-in-law Katharina Elisabeth [surname not recorded] arrived from Lübeck at the port of Oranienbaum on 7 August 1766 aboard the ship named Nordstern (North Star) under the command of Skipper Detlev Behling.
Johann Georg Wetzel, his wife Dorothea, children (Johann Martin, age 15; Johanna Sophia, age 12; Johann Christian, age 10), and his mother[-in-law?] Maria Elisabeth are recorded on the list of colonists being transported from St. Petersburg to Saratov in 1767 along with a note that the mother[-in-law?] Maria Elisabeth died en route.
They settled in the Volga German colony of Jost on 19 August 1767 and are recorded there on the 1767 census in Household No. 58.
The Oranienbaum passenger list records that Johann Georg Wetzel came from the German region of Sachsen (Saxony). The 1767 census records that Johann Georg Wetzel came from the German village of Litschen in the region of Sachsen (Saxony).
There are no known surviving male lines of this Wetzel family among the Volga German colonies.
- Idt, Andreas and Georg Rauschenbach. Auswanderung deutscher Kolonisten nach Russland im Jahre 1766 (Moscow: Idt & Rauschenbach, 2019): 33.
- Idt, Andreas and Georg Rauschenbach. Deutsche Kolonisten im Jahr 1766 in Oranienbaum und in den Siedlungsorten: Die Kuhlberg-Listen (Moscow: Idt & Rauschenbach, 2024): 661.
- Pleve, Igor. Einwanderung in das Wolgagebiet, 1764-1767 Band 2 (Göttingen: Der Göttinger Arbeitskreis, 2001): 208.
- Pleve, Igor. Lists of Colonists to Russia in 1766: Reports by Ivan Kulberg (Saratov: Saratov State Technical University, 2010): #5255 (p.337).
- Rauschenbach, Georg. Deutsche Kolonisten auf dem Weg von St. Petersburg nach Saratow: Transportlisten von 1766-1767 (Moscow: G.V. Rauschenbach, 2017): #2083-2088.
Brent Mai