Johann Leonhard Lohnes (1680 - 1733)

Born 25 Feb 1680 in Pfirschbach bei Höchst im Odenwald, Hessen-Darmstadt, Holy Roman Empire

Ancestors

Husband of Anna Catharina (Barth) Lohnes — married 8 Feb 1712 in Odenwald, Hessen Darmstadt, Central Europe, Germany

Descendants

Died 27 Jan 1733 at age 52 in Pfirschbach bei Höchst im Odenwald, Hessen-Darmstadt, Holy Roman Empire

Problems/Questions Profile manager: Nancy Fillers [send private message]

Biography

Early Life
Johann Leonhard Lohnes was born on February 25, 1680, the son of Johannes Lohnes (wife Catharina Meisner), and the grandson of Hanss Lohnes, who was a Gemeindsmann (a town councilman responsible for investigating irregularities in the community) in the small farming village of Pfirschbach ("Cherry Brook") about 1.5 miles from Höchst. At the time the Lohnes family lived there, Pfirschbach, and Höchst as well, were in the Landgraviate of Hesse-Darmstadt, which was within the Hochrheinischer Kreis (Upper Rhenish Circle) of the Holy Roman Empire, which wasn't dissolved until 1806. (See Odenwald, Then and Now section.)

Leonhard, like all other Lohnes children, was likely taken within days to the Convent Church ("Klosterkirche") in Höchst, about 1.5 miles from Pfirschbach, for baptism. This was where all the religious rites took place (baptisms, marriages, burials, as well as church services. The church still stands today. (See sources for link to German page with photographs.)

According to German cultural norms, he was given two names at baptism: Johann, a spiritual name derived from St. John, and Leonhard, the "Rufname" or name he would be called in everyday life. (Please see the German Names section if you aren't familiar with these traditions.)

The Lohneses seemed to be fairly upper middle class. His father Johannes (1646-1721) was surely a tradesman, as was his uncle Leonhard (1654-1733) who was a Wagner (carriage maker or cart maker).

Marriage—And a Big Mystery Solved
At the age of 21, Leonhard was married to Anna Catharina Barth (1689-1761), the daughter of Johann Ludwig Barth and Magdalena Karch. The wedding took place at the Convent Church in Höchst on February 8, 1712.

There was no birth control in that day, so Leonhard and Catharina soon began to fill the house with babies.

Unfortunately for the record-keepers of the 20th and 21st centuries, the baptismal records of the day recorded the child as son (or daughter) of "Leonhard and Catharina Lohnes," with no other identifying information, such as mother's maiden name or date they were married. As it turns out, there were TWO Leonhard Lohneses who had married TWO Anna Catharinas, nine years apart, so that the two women's childbearing years overlapped.

This researcher was very perplexed when she first began trying to decipher the baptismal records of the two Catharinas, because there were sometimes two living children given the same name, or two children born months apart within the same year. What was going on here? It was like trying to trace strands of spaghetti on a plate!

The research took at least a solid week of work! The mystery was solved upon finally discovering that THIS Leonhard's first cousin, also named Johann Leonhard Lohnes (1682-1754), was the one who had married Anna Catharina Flath on February 4, 1721. THAT Leonhard was the son of Johannes's brother—THIS Leonhard's uncle Leonhard (1654-1733), the Wagner, whom I mentioned above, and a woman named Anna Maria Jung (1655-1727). The first cousin Leonhard was tied to Anna Maria Jung, because her name (as his mother) was on his death record. Johannes and his brother were both sons of Hanss and Catharina Reeg.

So now, with that information in hand, the separation of the children was a matter or organizing what was known, and applying some logic. Any children born before 1721 (the other couple's marriage year) must belong to Barth, so Anna Elisabetha (1712) and Anna Catharina (1716) had to be hers. Also three of Barth's sons—Johann Georg (1714), Johannes (1719) and Nicklaus (1724) were brothers who went together as a "set" and had to go with Barth as well. (Multiple family traditions, as well as emigration records, back this up.)

You can't have two living children with the same secular name in the same family, which meant that Johann Nicolaus (1726) and Eva Catharina (1729) had to go with Flath. And then Anna Margrethe (1726) had to go with Barth, as we already had Nicolaus (1726) born to Flath. And finally, some of the last children to be born (1732-1736) were probably Flath's, as Barth would likely have reached the end of her childbearing years.

Children
After finishing the research, we were left with the following children born to Leonhard Lohnes (1680-1733) and Anna Catharina Barth (1689-1751):

1. ANNA ELISABETHA (1712 - )
2. JOHANN GEORG (1714 - Probably late 1763) - Emigrated to Philadelphia in 1752, with his wife Catharina Elisabetha Kahl and eldest son Johann Peter. He is found in the St. Paul's church records at Red Hill, Montgomery County, Colonial Penn. (Note that he was not named Johann Georg Adam and did not serve in the Revolutionary War. See the Urban Legend section)
3. ANNA CATHARINA (1716 - )
4. JOHANNES (1719 - 1794) - Emigrated to Nova Scotia in 1750 with his wife Anna Barbara Kahl and five children. Barbara Kahl was the younger sister of Elisabetha Kahl, Georg's wife, above. Both were daughters of Johannes and Maria Elisabetha (Wolffram) Kahl. The two couples were married on the same day: 13 Nov 1736.
5. JOHANN NICKLAUS (1724 - 1792) - Emigrated to Philadelphia from Rotterdam aboard the ship "Two Brothers" (Captain Thomas Arnot), arriving on September 28, 1753, and bringing with him his brother Georg's three remaining children: Johann Leonhard, Johann Georg and Anna Margrethe, who appear in the St. Paul's church records.

Leonhard died on December 28, 1733 in Pfirschbach. He was probably buried in the churchyard at Höchst.

German Names

At baptism, our German ancestors were given two names.

The first was a spiritual name, derived from the name of a saint (for example, Johann, from Saint John). The spiritual name was not equivalent to a "first name" in America. Families would quite often use the same spiritual name for all the boys (and a different one for all the girls).

The second name, the "Rufname" or "Call Name," was the secular name by which the child would be known at home, and in everyday life. Thus, a child baptised Johann Georg, was called "Georg," never "Johann"! The same secular name would never be given to more than one living child, but was often reused if an earlier child had died.

The only exception to this was the name Johannes, usually given as the only name at baptism. (Note the -es ending.)

For example, a family might have children baptised Johann Heinrich, Johann Georg, Johann Peter, Johann Leonhard, Johannes, Anna Maria, Anna Catharina, Anna Elisabetha and Anna Margrethe. At home, these same children would be called Heinrich, Georg, Peter, Leonhard, Johannes, Maria, Catharina, Elisabetha and Margrethe.

Note, as well, that the name Catherine is English, while Catharina and its Americanized derivative Catharine (with two a's) are German. Similarly, the name Elizabeth (with a "z") is English, while the old German version is normally spelled Elisabetha, with derivative Elisabeth.

Your ancestor's old records in America will normally be found under the secular name. (The biggest mistake you can make is to convert Johann to "John" and search for the records under "John," whereupon Ancestry will comply by giving you hints for all ten thousand misfiled records from everyone who has made the same mistake during indexing.) The only name that was truly "John" was the name Johannes.

Odenwald, Then and Now

A Word About 17th-18th Century Odenwald
FamilySearch baptismal and marriage records for the Lohnes family consistently show the place name as "Kr. Erbach, Starkenburg, Hessen, Deutschland," or similar. This is incorrect. It seems that these records were "standardized" to what was the modern location at the time the records were collected, probably between 1938, when FamilySearch began its genealogical operations, and June 5, 1945.

Odenwald of the Holy Roman Empire
At the time our Lohnes ancestors lived in Odenwald, the area was in the Landgraviate of Hesse-Darmstadt (created in 1567 by a four-way split of the lands of Philip I, Landgrave of Hesse.) Hesse-Darmstadt was within the Upper Rhenish Circle (Hochrheinischer Kreis) of the Holy Roman Empire. Yes, the Holy Roman Empire still existed until 1806!

The Province of Starkenburg / Subdivision of Erbach
The Province of Starkenburg was created in 1806, upon the fall of the Holy Roman Empire. It was not dissolved until June 5, 1945, when the Berlin Declaration announced the Allied Occupation of the German Empire. Erbach, one of seven subdivisions within the Province of Starkenburg (but actually not even the correct one for Hoechst!), was created in 1832. The creation of the modern country of Germany, containing the state of Hesse (in which Odenwald sits), was announced on December 1, 1946.

Odenwaldkreis With Modern Germany
Today, in modern Germany, the area of Odenwald is called Odenwaldkreis, a Kreis being more or less equivalent to a US county. Odenwald sits within the State of Hesse within Germany.

The city of Erbach, within the Odenwald area, was long the residence of the Counts of Erbach, who traced their descent back to the 12th century. It is now the seat of the tiny district of Erbach within Odenwald, one of twelve districts. In fact, the area where our ancestors lived is encompassed by the tiny district of Höchst, surrounding the city of Höchst. It is in the far north of Odenwaldkreis.

The tiny district of Erbach surrounding the city of Erbach is not equivalent to the then-subdivision named Erbach within Starkenburg. Erbach once held the entirety of Odenwald, but today it is simply a small region containing the city.

Summary
In summary, then, the place names of "Starkenburg" (1806-1945) and "Kr. Erbach" (1832-1945) have nothing to do with either the place name where our ancestors actually lived ("Odenwald, Hesse-Darmstadt, Hochrheinischer Kreis, Holy Roman Empire") or its place in modern Germany ("Höchst district, Odenwaldkreis, Hesse, Germany").

Urban Legend

There is, circulating on the Internet, a tale believed to be something of an "urban legend." It was mentioned on this page, before the profile update. It states that a man named Johann Georg Adam Lohnes (THIS Leonhard Lohnes's son, under an incorrect name) enlisted as a Captain (Hauptman) in the German 8th Regiment (state not specified) in the American Revolution. He lost a leg, so the story goes. Then, it says, he went back to "Germany," where he later died, leaving an orphaned son "John George Adam," who was brought to America by relatives.

There is so much wrong with this story that it's hard to even know where to begin!

1) Leonhard Lohnes's eldest son was baptised Johann Georg Lohnes. The name Johann Georg Adam (sometimes given as Johann Georg Adameus) does not conform to the cultural norms for German baptisms (see the German Names section above).

2) By the time of the Revolutionary War (1775 - 1783), he would have been 62 - 69 years old—too old to be of fighting age, when life expectancy was about 38 years.

3) Despite a lengthy search, including of the DAR database, no service record for him was located. There is one record for Patriotic Service, but that belongs to his son George, which mistakenly calls him George Adam (he was baptised Johann Georg) and which has the wrong date and place of birth—ca. 1737 Pennsylvania, rather than 1744 in Odenwald. The earliest DAR records came from user-supplied data on the earliest applications, so some applicant supplied bum data.

4) He didn't go back to "Germany," because Germany didn't yet exist. The Holy Roman Empire wasn't dissolved until 1806.

5) As of 1776, his three sons (Peter, Leonard and George, born 1737, 1742 and 1744) would have been 39, 34 and 32 years old, respectively—not exactly orphans.

6) ALL OF HIS CHILDREN were brought to America in 1752 and 1753, over twenty years before the war. So why would he have returned to Europe when his family was in America?

7) One final reason his serving in the Revolutionary War isn't believable: The Palatine immigrants—tens of thousands of them—came to America because the area in which they lived had been so ravaged by nearly 100 years of endless wars that there was widespread famine and economic deprivation. They hated war! After seeing the aftermath of a century of war, they wanted nothing to do with it.

This story wasn't believable to begin with, but for all the reasons above, this "urban legend" has now been thoroughly debunked!

Sources

Convent Church in Höchst:
Kloster Höchst on Wikipedia. The page is in German, but you can scroll down to see photographs of the beautiful interior of the Convent Church, parts of which date to the 12th century. Visited on 4 Feb 2023. You can also watch a YouTube video to hear the sound of the church bells in the early-12th-century tower. The surrounding buildings, formerly used by Augustinian nuns, have been converted to a Hotel and Conference Center and (Summertime) Youth Language Education Center, and modernized with WiFi and internet.

Marriage Record for Leonhard Lohnes and Catharina Barth: "Deutschland Heiraten, 1558-1929," database, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/pal:/MM9.1.1/JHMW-28J : accessed 14 June 2016), Leonhard Lones and Anna Catharina Barth, 08 Feb 1712; citing Evangelisch, Hoechst Odenwald, Starkenburg, Hesse-Darmstadt; FHL microfilm 1,193,268.

Birth Record for Georg Lohnes: "Deutschland Geburten und Taufen, 1558-1898," database, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/pal:/MM9.1.1/N843-F42 : accessed 14 June 2016), Catharina in entry for Johann Georg Lones, 26 Aug 1714; citing ; FHL microfilm 1,193,268.

Emigration Records for Sons Georg and Johannes: Auswanderungen aus dem Odenaldkreis (Emigrations from the Odenwald Region). Gieg, Ella. Volume 1. Page 167. Typeset by Erba-Druck, Lützelbach. Published by Neuthor-Verlag, Michelstadt, 1988.

Emigration Record for Son Nicklaus: Pennsylvania German Pioneers: A Publication of the Original Lists of Arrivals in the Port of Philadelphia from 1727 to 1808. Strassburger, Ralph B. In three volumes. Vol 1. Published by Pennsylvania German Society, Norristown, PA; 1934.