The story of Hessian ancestors being among those captured at Trenton seems to be a common myth in many of our family histories. Mine began at least as early as 1912 and I suspect that is was a simple Hessian=Trenton=my ancestor. After a lot of searching, my ancestor, Matthaeus Konrad Will of B5, the Bayreuth grenadier company, was a member of this company at least as early as 1775 when he is recorded as marrying Eleanora Kunigunda Glaeser at St. Georgen (part of present day Bayreuth) where the grenadier barracks was located. His name also appears on the 1802 list of those who didn't return that Bob Brooks mentions. In our case, the story is a bit more complicated. His wife dies in 1823 in Bayreuth and is identified as the widow left behind by the grenadier Matthaeus Will who was sent to America. In reality, Matthaeus (aka Matthias) apparently became associated with the Sivley family of southern Shenandoah County, VA, "married" their daughter Catherine and had at least f! our children by her, one of whom was my ggggrandfather John Henry (aka Henry) Will who later settled in New Market, VA. Matthias appears in Rockingham County, VA records in the mid 1780s, obtains a 28 acre Land Office Grant near Timberville, VA, and is gone by 1803 when his land is sold. We assume that he died about this time because one oral history mentions that he died at age 50. This makes sense as church book records show him born in 1750. To make a long story short, he left behind a wife and daughter in Germany and started another family in Virginia. Given his regiment, it also makes sense that he was among those captured at Yorktown and marched off to Winchester and Frederick. I'm still trying to find out how he got to Rockingham County. I think that when the Germans were offered the opportunity to buy their way out of captivity or join American regiments in 1782 that Matthias may have chosen either route. I suspect however that he became a member of the Rock! ingham County militia as the assignor of his Land Office grant was bot h a captain of the county militia and justice of the peace. He may have also had a brother or cousin named Christian Will who died in 1782. The family myth is very simple but gives the ancestor the wrong name. It states that "Henry Will" was a Hessian captured at Trenton and joined the American forces and for this he was given a land grant near New Market, VA. The only land grant given to anyone with the surname Will in the Virginia records is Matthias Will who gets his 28 acres about 5 miles from New Market, VA. Curt ----- Original Message ----- From: Bob Brooks<mailto:rcbrooks@pivot.net> To: AMREV-HESSIANS-L@rootsweb.com<mailto:AMREV-HESSIANS-L@rootsweb.com> Sent: Saturday, March 05, 2005 11:29 AM Subject: Re: [HESSIAN] Question?? for you to ponder ==== AMREV-HESSIANS Mailing List ==== Taglines are supposed to give you instructions on how a mail list works. Please read them, and remove them and part of the original message (keeping enough of message for a reminder) before sending out an answer. One last word - Messages should not exceed what you can type on two letter pages, if you want to say more, make it two messages - Part one and Part two. `````````````` To unsubscribe: send an email to AMREV-HESSIANS-L-request@rootsweb.com<mailto:AMREV-HESSIANS-L-request@rootsweb.com> and write one single word unsubscribe in subject line and text field. No other words or explanations or it won't work. ============================== View and search Historical Newspapers. Read about your ancestors, find marriage announcements and more. Learn more: http://www.ancestry.com/s13969/rd.ashx<http://www.ancestry.com/s13969/rd.ashx>