This is a Message Board Post that is gatewayed to this mailing list. Classification: Query Message Board URL: http://boards.ancestry.com/mbexec/msg/an/5k.2ADE/579.600.606 Message Board Post: We are related. You are first person who has mentioned Kipgen. I can never seem to find others who have this name and there just are no references on any of the ancestry boards. Anyway I am the grandaughter of Francis William Arensdorf who lived in Roseland and then moved to Lincoln County NE which is western NE around North Platte. There are many Arensdorf kin in that area. Thought you might like the following post that I saved. We have seen specific ways in which the metaculture of Luxembourg is reflected in the metaculture of Luxembourger settlement sites in Minnesota. Now we will turn our attention to the best-known Luxembourgish settlement in Iowa. St. Donatus, the first Luxembourger immigrant settlement west of the Mississippi, is located along the shores of the river, just a dozen miles south of Dubuque, Iowa. Ironically, until recent years, St. Donatus was mistakenly referred to as a "historic French settlement," most likely because its original name was Tetes des Morts, a name, legend has it, that was given to it by French missionary Father Louis Hennepin. Legend also has it that the origin of the name lies in a battle fought on the banks of a nearby stream: Father Louis Hennepin, according to tradition, is said to have placed the name Tetes des Morts on the map to perpetuate the legend of the battle fought on the banks of that stream. On a certain hill near the present site of St. Donatus, a battle was fought by the Winnebagoes, the Sauk and the Foxes with their old enemy, the Sioux. The Sioux were victorious and drove their enemies over a cliff into the river below. On hearing this legend, Father Hennepin called the place "Tetes des Morts" (Hills, 79). The first Luxembourgers, the John B. Noel family, arrived in the area in 1838 after spending some time in the eastern part of the United States (History of Dubuque County, 712). Crossing the Mississippi River could be very dangerous, especially when, as Gonner notes, early icing could cause shipwrecks (51). According to his account, in December 1846, ships coming up the river from New Orleans had great difficulty, and "several thousand immigrants were stranded in Cairo, Illinois, with no money. Helpless, they suffered greatly. Many died from dysentery" (51). A group of immigrants from Luxembourg fared better earlier that year, arriving safely in the Dubuque area and continuing south to Tetes des Morts. Among this group were Peter Gehlen, Charles Hoffman, Nic and John Streff, and John and Adam Tritz, all from the Olm and Kehlen, Luxembourg, area. The following year, 1847, they were joined by a larger group of Luxembourger families from the Feulen and Merzig areas, among them Peter Siren, John Freiman, Henry Anen, Adam Braun, Pete Theisen, and one of my maternal great-great-grandfathers, Nicholas Nemmers (Tritz, 26). The immigrants' Catholic heritage was central to their lives and, in 1848, a log cabin church was built and a Catholic parish formed. It was given the name, St. Donatus Parish, and was "dedicated to St. Donatus, patron and protector against storms, July 4, 1851" (Krull, 2).