Schnepp Johannes Hans

The Alsace-Lorraine region of present-day France has «belonged» to both France and Germany in the past.It originally was part of the Holy Roman Empire, but gradually became part of France from 1552 to 1798, by way of conquest and diplomatic compromises.After the Franco-Prussian War, it was annexed by the newly-created German Empire in 1871. It remained in German control until after WWI.In 1919, the territory was returned to France by the Treaty of Versailles (another «diplomatic/political» solution).In 1940, the territory was once again annexed by Nazi Germany, but reverted to France after WWII in 1945. It has remained French territory ever since.An interesting thing about this portion of France is that if you look on a map in small-scale, you will see that the towns and villages have German names. If you look at it geographically, it looks as though it should be part of Germany. Actually, the early occupants of that region were Germanic in origin, not French. At the time when immigrants were leaving that area and coming to America, they were predominately of German origin and spoke German, not French. These Colonial emigrants from Alsace-Lorraine settled in PA and VA among other German emigrants.Looking at the names in this database, I see many, many people with German names, from towns and villages with German names, but actually from what is now (and was then) France! Many researchers have them from «Alsace-Lorraine, Germany»; but, the dates for these people don\'t support entering them being born or married, or having died, in Germany. For all those events and dates, the territory was FRANCE.Following is a list of «German» surnames from «Alsace-Lorraine, France» who emigrated to America, and whose descendants married almost exclusively into other German families in PA and VA, and sometimes into our «Germanna» families:DUTT, BECKER, BEIBEL, CONRAD, FORNEY (spelling?), FREIMANN (FRYMAN), HABER, HAUPMANN, HEIRONYMUS, HELFER, KRUM (CRUM), LIEBENGUT, LOHR, MAUSER, MLLER (MILLER), SCHIRMER (SCHYMER), SCHNEPP (SNAPP), SNAVELY (spelling?), STEPHAN (STEVEN, SEPHEN, STEPHENS), STOCKEL, WEIDACH, WOHLJUNG.One might wonder WHY these people living in France had German surnames and lived in towns and villages with German names. Well, the truth is, as stated above, this area of Europe had always been inhabited by people of Germanic origin. The fact that the area changed hands several times between France and Germany didn\'t change the fact that they were GERMANS! The towns and villages from which these people immigrated lie between about 3 miles to about 15 miles from the French-German border. If you look at a good map of this area, and see where the border runs SE down to just north of Saint Avold, France, it seems logical that the border should continue southward to just east of Audincourt, France. If the border actually followed that course, all of «Alsace-Lorraine» WOULD be in Germany, as it should be. West of my imaginary border, all of the towns and villages have French names; east of that line, almost all of the towns and villages have German names! So much for politics and diplomacy when it comes to nations getting together and drawing borders. [GWD]

shepherd, herdsman