Wiederspahn

The Gelnhaar parish register records that Johann Heinrich Wiederspahn from Usenborn married on 5 August 1751 to Juliana Engel, daughter of Johannes Engel.

The baptisms of seven children born to Johann Heinrich Wiederspahn & Juliana Engel are recorded in the Gelnhaar parish registers: (1) Johann Adam, born 22 May 1752, baptized 23 May 1752; (2) Anna Elisabetha, born 16 February 1754, baptized 19 February 1754; (3) Johann Heinrich, born 17 December 1755, baptized 23 December 1755; (4) Heinrich Ernst, born 4 March 1758, baptized 8 March 1758; (5) Johannes, born 1 March 1760, baptized 5 March 1760; (6) Anna Maria, born 1 August 1762, baptized 4 August 1762; and (7) Johann Leonhard, born 18 March 1765, baptized 20 March 1765.

Johann Heinrich Wiederspahn, his wife Julianna, and children (Johann Adam, age 17½; Elisabeth, age 15; Johann Heinrich, age 12; Georg Ernst, age 7; Johann, age 6; Anna Maria, age 4; Johann Leonhard, age 2½) arrived from Lübeck at the port of Oranienbaum on 16 August 1766 aboard a galliot named Frau Diederika (Lady Diederika) under the command of Skipper Johann Joachim Lunau.

The parish register of Schilling records that while en route to the colonies, a daughter named Barbara Elisabeth had been born in Kolomna on 15 March 1767 to Johann Heinrich Wiederspahn & Julianna Engel.

Johann Heinrich Wiederspahn (age 42), a craftsman (Handwerker), his wife Julianna (age 42), and children (Johann, age 18½; Elisabeth, age 15½; Heinrich, age 12; Ernst, age 6; Johannes, age 4; Barbara, age ¼) are recorded on the 1767 census of Walter in Household No. 61. They had arrived in Walter on 25 August 1767.

Before 1816, Wiederspahn descendants were living in the neighboring colony of Frank.

The lists of the recruiter Johann Facius record that the Johann Heinrich Wiederspahn family came from Gelnhaar, and the 1767 census of the Volga German colony of Walter also records that Johann Heinrich Wiederspahn came from the German village of Gelnhaar near Hanau.