George Michael Pfalzgraf was born 12/2/1781, somewhere near Paris and was later forced to move to
Alsace-Loraine near Straussburg with his people due to the war. He married a lady by the surname of
'LEET' and they had only one son, George Michael Jr. born in 1809. Their family home was a stone house app.. two and a
half miles from the Rhine River. The story has it that the Pfalzgraf's were a wealthy and influential family living
on a manor before the war began. This family joined with a party of families leaving for America on Easter
Sunday (4/1/1832). The trunks were loaded and all were ready for travel to La Harve, France (the sailing point)
when George Sr.'s wife died. After her burial the parties departed for La Harve, France enroute to America, with
wagons loaded and the women walking, they proceed through the streets of Paris. They landed in Baltimore,
Maryland in July 1832 and took tobacco wagons to Barnesville, Ohio arriving there in the last half of August
1832. Among the party was George Sr., George Jr., a cousin and a maiden named Elizabeth Diehl, who later
married George Jr. They purchased government land near Woodsfield, Monroe County, Ohio at the going rate of
$1.25 per acre. They sat out to clearing the land, digging a spring and building a house which was complete in
three days. Of course the house had dirt floors and furnished with furniture made from the trees. They cooked at
a fireplace and slept on the floor, there was no glass or metal in the construction of the house. George Sr. was a
stonecutter by trade, he never remarried and he never learned to speak English, he died 7/5/1852. George Jr.
was a teamster before coming to America, here he worked two yokes of cows, hauled charcoal to make gun
powder and raised potatoes as his main crop. An average crop was 1200 bushels per year! He married the
maiden that came to America with his party, Elizabeth Diehl, she worked the wheat fields carrying wheat to a
water mill three miles away. In 1833, she borne the first child of this union, Jacob (Jake) at home in their cabin. She wrote to father telling him that they had two hogs for butchering, 40 bushel of wheat and a good supply of
potatoes. She also told him that they had to burn the wood to get rid of it! Seven years later the Diehls came to
America.
This family history furnished by Claremont C. Pfalzgraf 7/67 to Forrest
D. Pfalzgraf, Woodsfield, Ohio. Found in the published history of Philip Christman & Rosina Pfalzgraf written by Lena Kahrig Gatten. |
