I don't know if this will help or not, but back in 1988 when I was researching my Rothar/ROTHAAR, et al ancestors from Gau-Odernheim, H-D, I had exhausted the LDS microfilmed church records for that town, but many of my ancestors were noted in the film from the early 1700s marriage records as having been born in that place, and yet there were no birth records on the films for the earlier period. I then wrote directly to the kath. church in Gau-Odernheim inquiring about earlier records, and the priest forwarded my letter to a area civil administration group in Alzey(I think the name was a Verbindungsgemeinschaft, or something like that), and they sent me a wealth of additional information going back four more generations, female ancestors included. I was dumbstruck. So, even if church records may (or may not) have been destroyed by war, there is a POSSIBILITY that some other records may still exist, and it worth taking a shot at. Sometimes it is possible to find other records besides churchbook records, and in many cases duplicate church records exist in other repositories. Good luck! Madeline ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Message: 1 Date: Wed, 22 Dec 2010 12:17:42 -0800 From: "D.L. MacLaughlan-Dumes" <dmac@physics.ucla.edu> Subject: [HESSE] Where to go from here? Gro? Zimmern records before 1640 To: hesse@rootsweb.com Message-ID: <D3CA5D30-3FB7-49EE-9C04-B50F099B4AAB@physics.ucla.edu> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 The short version of the question: do any church records exist for Gro? Zimmern prior to 1640? LDS microfilm covers the town pretty well beginning in 1640 and onward, and by good luck and many weeks perusing the film I've found that I have a number of ancestors there (surnames include St?rger/St?rcher, Dressel, Breidenbach, Dietrich, Herbert). But going back earlier in Gro? Zimmern doesn't appear possible from microfilm. Does anyone know whether there are local archives in Hesse Darmstadt that might contain records earlier than 1640 and, if so, whom I might contact to do more research? I've found some of my folks in microfilm of other towns nearby (Spachbr?cken, Gro? Umstedt, Reinheim) but it's pretty occasional. Gro? Zimmern is the town I'd really like to research further back, if possible. Suggestions would be most welcome. Regards, Debra MacLaughlan-Dumes http://sakionline.net/familypage ------------------------------