Hi all, I knowthat you all had a great time at the reunion. I thought y'all over theweekend. I found a couple of Orange Co., VA references on John Thomasthat I need help trying to decipher if it was the English John or myGerman John. At least there only seemed to be ONE Michael Thomas inOrange Co. records so that was a help. If the names connected with the references were other Germanna names --I just claimed that John as the German one but one had no namesconnected and one had unfamiliar names -- so anyone know these people Orange Co., VA Order book July 1742 John Thomas, having taken the ususal oaths, was sworn to his military comminsion of Ensign. Not sure what oaths they are speaking of BUT if it was oaths of allegiance -- he took them in Jan of that year Orange County, Virginia Order Book 3, p 313 28 January 1742 [OS] Andrew Garr, John Adam Garr, Lawrance Garr, Lawrence Grays, DevaldChristler, Martin Vallick, John Zimmerman, Peter Fleshman, ZachariahBlankenbucker, John Zimmerman alias Carpenter, John Thomas, ChristopherUhls & Frederick Bomgardener, German protestants having produced aCertificate under the hand of George Samuel Klug Minister of the German Congregation in Orange County that they withintwo months last past had received the Sacrament of Lords Supper, prayedthat they might partake of the benefit of an Act of Parleament made inthe thirteenth Year of the Reign of our Sovereign Lord George theSecond by the Grace of God of Great Britain France and Ireland King Defender of ye faith &c Intituled [sic] an Act fornaturalizing Such foreign protestants and others there in mentioned asare Settled or Shall Settle in any of his Maties [sic] Colonies inAmerica Its on their Motion ordered that they take the oath appointedby Act of paliament to be taken instead of the oath of allegiance &Supremacy & the abjuration [?] oath and Subscribe the test wch they all Severally didaccordingly between the hours of Nine and twelve in the forenoon &Its therupon further ordered that ye Clerk give them a Certificate oftheir having taken the afd oaths & subscribed the Test With all of the Thomas family being so active in military endeavors --this was my FIRST reference to anything military for John so it seemslogical -- that he took the oaths needed-- and then was appt to themilitary. Anyone with any ideas on this? And the Ayler question How does Anna Magdalena Schneider Aylor relate to Henry Aylor whomarried Anna Margaret Thomas. Was this his mother -- I note in the willof Henry Schneider that he had a grandson Henry but I was not sure ofthe time frame Cafer/Kaiffer/Clore I found Kaiffer as Cafer on some records and found a couple that Iinterpreted as Cafer and were interpreted by others as Clore. I founddeeds with MK for Michael Kaiffer but did not look at the actual orderbooks to see if they had this mark. Orange Co. WB 1 page 236 Inventory of Georg Teater May 23, 1744 by Michael Cook, Michael Smith, Michael CAFER (?) My Smith question was John Michael Smith SR known as John or Michael (thought that might help differentiate them -- the younger seems to beknown as Michael) WB 1 pge 509 Inventory of John NIcholas Blankenbaker Oct 26, 1743 by George Utz and Michael CAFER (?) Is this guy -- Cafer/Kaiffer or Clore Need help! And then this John -- English or German DB 3 pg 66 Feb 22, 1738 Charles Curtie, gentleman of Orange Co to John Thomas, lease andrelease for 29-18-0 for 372 acres in St. Marks Parish corner CharlesStephens, Larkin Chew's line, Robert Holderman line on the river side.Witness James Porteus, G. Home, Christopher Zimmerman ( only Germanname that I recognized) Could John buy land before he was naturalized -- his land previous tothis date were patents and grants. I did not find a sale for this land-- would it have been in Culpeper Co records? Lots of questions. Did everyone who wanted a copy of the map project get one? Take care all, Marilyn