HAMPSHIRE — Ella Johnson Memorial Public Library has slated “The French Invasion: An Interactive Cemetery Walk” at 7 p.m. on Thursday, at St. Charles Borromeo Catholic Cemetery along Getzelman Road in Hampshire. According to Kelly Sheahan, reference specialist at the library, a wave of settlers from the Alsace-Lorraine region came to the Hampshire, Burlington and Pingree Grove area between 1852 to the 1880s. The Village of Hampshire was incorporated in 1876. The Alsace-Lorraine region was once a part of the Roman Empire. It later became part of France until the Treaty of Frankfurt gave it to the German Empire from 1871 to 1918. The 1919 Treaty of Versailles signed after World War I returned the region to France. It was taken over by Nazi Germany in 1940 during World War II. The region became part of France again after the war was over and is still a part of France today. “This region has been caught in the middle of many political and military intrigues,” Sheahan said. “The fall of French Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte kicked off instability in the region and made people want to leave. Most of the people coming here were farmers who wanted to move to the land of opportunity.” There are a number of multi-generational Hampshire families today whose ancestors came from the Alsace-Lorraine region such as the Schiesher, Dumoulin, Drendel, Conro, Herrmann, and Seyller families. Direct descendants of some of these families will dress in period costume and stand by their ancestor ’s graves on Thursday night so they can talk about the person they will portray. The cemetery walk will answer questions such as: What did these settlers leave behind? How did they get here? What was their life like when they arrived? Were they fleeing, or were they running toward a better future? For more information, contact the library at (847) 683-4490; _www.ellajohnsonlibrary.org_ (http://www.ellajohnsonlibrary.org/) .