Widower Johannes Zimmer from Wallernhausen married on 26 June 1766 in St. Mary's Lutheran Church of Büdingen to Anna Maria Erck, daughter of Christoph Erck from Nidda.
Johann Zimmer, a farmer, his wife Anna Maria, and daughters (Anna Margaretha, age 10; Christina, age 7) arrived from Lübeck at the port of Oranienbaum on 18 August 1766 aboard the galliot named Die Perle (The Pearl) under the command of Skipper Gerhardt Hermann Thomsen.
Two Zimmer children are recorded in the Volga German colony of Yagodnaya Polyana. The first is presumed to be the daughter of the above noted couple. The relationship of the second has yet to be determined.
(1) Anna Margaretha Zimmer (age 13) is recorded on the 1767 census of Yagodnaya Polyana in Household No. 77 along with the Konrad Bähr family. Konrad Bähr's wife is Anna Katharina Erck.
Anna Margaretha Zimmer from Yagodnaya Polyana is recorded on the 1798 census of Frank in Household No. Fk093 as the wife of Johannes Krehning.
(2) Johannes Zimmer (age 8) is recorded on the 1767 census of Frank in Household No. 78 along with the Johann Heinrich Frick family. Johann Heinrich Frick's wife is Anna Margaretha Erck.
The 1767 census records that Johannes Zimmer came from the German village of Wallernhausen in the Fulda region.
There are no known surviving male lines of this Zimmer 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): 786.
- 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): Fk093.
- Mai, Brent Alan and Dona Reeves-Marquardt, German Migration to the Russian Volga (1764-1767) (Lincoln, NE: American Historical Society of Germans from Russia, 2003): #715.
- Pleve, Igor. Einwanderung in das Wolgagebiet, 1764-1767 Band 1 (Göttingen: Der Göttinger Arbeitskreis, 1999): 431.
- Pleve, Igor. Einwanderung in das Wolgagebiet, 1764-1767 Band 2 (Göttingen: Der Göttinger Arbeitskreis, 2001): 193.
- Pleve, Igor. Lists of Colonists to Russia in 1766: Reports by Ivan Kulberg (Saratov: Saratov State Technical University, 2010): #6288.
Brent Mai