Wikimedia® Commons image - Ingelheim 1645  by the 17th Century engraver Matthaus Merian the elder.

Friedrich Schweickhart
Immigrant to Pennsylvania,
arrived Philadelphia on the ship Dragon, September 26, 1749.
 Friedrich was born c1727 in Nieder-Ingelheim, Rheinhessen, Hesse-Darmstadt, Germany,
now Ingelheim am Rhein, Rheinland-Pfalz, Germany

                                                                     by Iris Teta Eubank Wagner
                                              
During the twenty years following Friedrich's arrival in Pennsylvania, his surname Schweickhart evolved, likely through cultural interchange in the areas where he lived in Lancaster and Cumberland Counties.  Swiss settlers and settlers from Northern Ireland were well established in Rapho Township in Lancaster, where Frederick's first land record in 1752 in Pennsylvania is found on the Rapho Township Warrantee Map.   The warrant is in the name of Frederick Swygart , which may indicate a Swiss influence.

Frederick likely sold the Rapho Land in 1762 and headed west across the Susquehanna to settle on unwarranted land in Cumberland County.   His name is written as Suagert on the first tax list for Fermanagh Township in 1763.  His surname is written Sweikert on the 1767 application to warrant land, and have it surveyed.   The 1768 survey of that tract reads Swekart.   On subsequent surveys in Cumberland County where his name appears, it is written Swegart, Swagart,  Swagarty, and Swagerty in 1769.

Frederick's eldest daughters were baptized as Maria  and Elizabeth Schwigerty at St. Michael's Evangelical Lutheran Church in Pfoutz Valley, the oldest settled area in Cumberland County.   On Tax Lists during the 1770's and on Revolutionary War records, the name is most often written Swagerty, with slight variation.

From Friedrich's immigration  in 1749 through his death in Tennessee in 1803, this narrative, to be in four parts, will include copies of original documents, book and periodical references, and in the absence of documents, discussion of circumstantial evidence and possible theories in context with historical background.  

This first narrative will discuss Friedrich Schweickhart in Germany.  Frederick Swagerty of Lancaster and Cumberland Counties, Pennsylvania contains land records, tax records,  and Revolutionary War service records, and a few clues to family relationships. 

With grateful appreciation : Several descendants of Frederick Swagerty have shared research through the years in this difficult process to find Frederick's true genealogy.  I thank friends, and cousins I'm fortunate to know and with whom I share ideas and research :  Tom Miller, a descendant of Frederick's son Thomas Swagerty, who immigrated with his family to Arkansas in the 1820's and was one of three commissioners who founded and surveyed Benton County; Mary Swaggerty Slowey, whose lineage comes through Claiborne Swaggerty who lived in Knox County, Tennessee; Todd Layman, from the lineage of Frederick's son James Swagerty, Sr., who lived in Cocke County, Tennessee; Dixie Richardson, from  Frederick's son Benjamin Ailor Swagerty who  moved from Tennessee to Indiana in the 1830's ; Marguerite White Williams, also from James Swagerty, Sr. ; Annice Graddon Eberle, who corresponded through the years with her aunt and first cousin, Fanny Swagerty Eubank and William Eubank . . . . . Iris T. Wagner
                             †

A little historical context to think about and consider
The surname SCHWEICKHART is said by some historians to have originated in Switzerland during the 1200's, around the area of Konstanz,  near the head of the Rhine River in the Alps.   The name Schweickhart is found during the Middle Ages as an hereditary surname, of variant spelling, in church records in south Germany.   Schweickhart families, like others in the regions of the Upper and Lower Palatinate and Alsace, undoubtedly fled from, or were caught up in, the political and religious wars lasting several centuries.  The devastating and long-lasting conditions caused by The Thirty-Years War (1618-1648) depopulated entire regions as people fled from one area to another to escape invading armies and marauding bands of vagrant troops.  Rhein-Hessen lost between one-third and two-thirds of its population.  After The Thirty Years War, the state religion became Lutheranism.  Some Catholic and Reformed groups did continue in Hessen, which prior to the year 1867 was called Hessen-Darmstadt.

(right) The Rhine-land Palatinate in 1547 --- Switzerland, Alsace, Baden and Wurttemberg
The city of  Mainz (Mayence on the map) is located where the Rhine River curves west into the Rhineland-Palatinate.  Nine miles west of Mainz is the present town of 
                       Ingelheim am Rheim 
which was created  in recent years by the consolidation of several small towns, Nieder-Ingelheim and Ober-Ingelheim among them.  These two villages, located where the Selz River flows into the Rhine, share an imperial history that reaches back to the time of the Emperor Charlemagne, who built his KaiserPfalz castle at Ingelheim between 774 and 788.  As the area became open to citizen settlement, these two small villages began to develop.  Less than a mile apart, the two towns  became distinguished by their locations along the Selz River.  Ingelheim, the town of KaiserPfalz, lower down the river toward the Rhine, became known as Nieder-Ingelheim,  while the town higher toward the head of the Selz became Ober-Ingelheim.  On the 17th century image of Ingelheim at the top of this page, Ober-Ingelheim is the close village over the hill to the left, and indicated so, but not quite legibly.  
                                                                                    

(below) A portion of the Map of the Carolingian Empire
in 814, the year of Charlemagne's death.
Shown on the map just west of Mayence, is Charlemagne's Ingelheim,  which was an important imperial location during the Middle Ages until the 15th, and into the 16th centuries.
                                                                        (at right) Coat of Arms of  the historical  town
of  Ingelheim, which carries the castle insignia.

Maps : Perry Castaneda Map Collection,
University of Texas, from The Historical
Atlas by William R. Shepherd.
  
The old imperial location of Ingelheim eventually became the town of Nieder-Ingelheim.  The Coat of Arms of  Ober-Ingelheim does not carry the castle insignia.  Carolingian rulers used Charlemagne's fortress castle into the later Middle Ages, 12th  through the 15th centuries. From then through early modern times an imperial court of the Hessen-Darmstadt area was located at Ober-Ingelheim.               
                                                                                            † 

The family of Abraham Schweickhart, born 1690, of Nieder-Ingelheim,
and his sons Frederick Wilhelm and Abraham

Mary Swaggerty Slowey is a descendant, and researcher of Friedrich Schweickhart's genealogy.  Several years ago she discovered records of an Abraham Schweickhart family of Nieder-Ingelheim.  The source is a book of area  family genealogies, "The Families of Nieder-Ingelheim and Frei-Weinheim," by Rolf Kilian and Franz Weyell.  Mary's work on this is a vital contribution to this narrative and genealogy, and her work is gratefully acknowledged.

ABRAHAM SCHWEICKHART, the elder, was born in December, 1690.  He was a city official for the town of Nieder-Ingelheim. He died in 1740.  He had a first wife, but she is not named.  There are three children named in the record :
      Elizabetha, born April 4, 1720 and baptized on April 7, 1720
      Anton, born January 22, 1722, died March 11, 1728  (Anton named for his grandfather, Anton Schweickhart,
      Johan George, born August, 1724.                                                            born in 1658)
     
Abraham married his second wife in 1725.  MARIA ELIZABETH LITZERICH was widowed in 1725 by the death of her husband Johannes Litzerich of Grofs-Winterheim, a small village near Nieder-Ingelheim.  Abraham and Maria had three children :
      the eldest Friedrich Wilhelm was baptized June 1, 1727
      evidently a second son named Anton, baptized July 13, 1731
      Abraham, baptized October, 1733
      Catharina Elizabeth, baptized March 14, 1736. 
In addition to his own name, these family first names are the same as Frederick gave several of his older children, who have been identified.- Maria, Elizabeth, Abraham, and Catherine.

Sarah Swagerty O'Haver family
There is in the record of the descendants of Friedrich Schweickhart's daughter, SARAH SWAGERTY O'HAVER, the given name Frederick William.  Sarah's son James Kobler O'Haver had a son named Frederick William O'Haver born 1837 and died in 1864 in Carlisle, Indiana.  By tradition and being the eldest daughter at the time of her father's death, it was Sarah Swagerty who inherited the Schweickhart Family Bible, which she later carried with her when the family moved to Indiana.  The present owner of the Bible is unknown.

Evidence of Friedrich of Nieder-Ingelheim to be the Emigrant aboard the Dragon
(Below) is a page of signatures of male immigrants who arrived on the ship Dragon, September 26, 1749, took the Oath of Abjuration and Allegiance and qualified for naturalization.   The signatures of  JOHANES N. ROSS and FRIEDRICH SCHWEICKHART are high-lighted and enlarged just above their signatures on the page.

The Oppenheim List
An article by German genealogist Friedrich Krebs, with translation edited by Donald Yoder, references several emigrants from the Oppenheim area, who received permission to emigrate in 1749, and two male emigrants who are said to have gone "secretly" to America. 
From Krebs and Yoder, Item 19, p78
        Johann Rooss and Abraham Schweickart from
           Neideringelheim  went "secretly" to the  New Land, and
           their property was confiscated.
           One Johanes Ross [Johann Rooss] arrived at
           Philadelphia on the Ship Dragon, September 26, 1749 ;
           the name following his in the ship list is Friedrich
           Schweickhart.
           (Number 137 C, the Oath of Allegiance and Abjuration,
           from Strassburger and Hinke, Vol.2)
                                    ---
In Item 15 of the same article, in 1749, Christian Meckel from Elsheim with wife and three children was given permission to emigrate on condition that the inheritance Christian gave his son , who did not emigrate with the family, would be secured by the authorities to an account that would bear interest.  Christian was required also to pay a supplementary tax of 26 florins for the permission to emigrate. 
       
 Strassburger and Hinke, Volume 2, p466
 Pennsylvania German Society                                            
   

Jerry H. Collins genealogy on Rootsweb : A man named J. Nikolaus Roos was the father of Anna Maria Roos, born 1760, who lived and died in Nieder-Ingelheim, and married Johann Matthias Hartkopf.  Their daughter, Maria Amalia Hartkopf married Anton Schweickhardt.  This Roos/Schweickhart reference indicates a  connection between these two families.  Evidently, Roos families and Schweickhart families are connected in Nieder-Ingelheim.  Research is ongoing.

A theory as to how Friedrich Schweickhart of Nieder-Ingelheim might have come to America
If this Friedrich Schweickhart aboard the Dragon is the son of Abraham, the elder of Nieder-Ingelheim, he was born into a family, likely of some stature in this important, historic town. Judging from the quality of this Friedrich's signature, he was an educated young man.  If he was the son of Abraham, the elder, being twenty-one or twenty-two years of age in September,1749, he may have recently completed college studies. 

Military Conscription Lists  Evidently there were military conscription lists of young men of eligible age. This is another item from Krebs and Yoder:  From the the village of Oberingelheim in 1742 :

        Philips Odernheimer, Peter Weitzel, Ulrich Strassburger, and the widow of Nicholas Dorr are
        said to have sent their grown sons to the New Land, a few weeks ago, and with the knowledge
        of the entire village gave each one of them 100 florins and various victuals for the trip.  These sons
        were still subject to vassal duties and were even incorporated into the last [most recent]
        conscription of young men.  . . . . List A gives Odernheimer's age as 22, Weitzel 26, Dorr 23,
        and Strassburger 25.  The four men arrived on the emigrant ship Loyal Judith, at Philadelphia,
        September 3, 1742.

Gone "secretly" to America ?
Friedrich, and his family, would have expected Friedrich's name to appear on a military conscription list, for he would  have been nearing his 22nd birthday in May, 1749.   Perhaps the Roos family, too, was concerned for Johannes in respect to the conscription list.  Their families may have been so concerned that they gave each of the young men money for the trip down the Rhine, as did the families in the item above.  When the authorities were made aware that the young men had gone, they termed it "secretly." 

Frederick's father ABRAHAM SCHWEICKHART died in 1740 when Friedrich was age thirteen, and probably heir to a portion of his father's estate, which would have been devised to pay for Friedrich's education.  By the spring of 1749 Friedrich, with studies perhaps behind him, wanted a life other than that of the military.

The assets which were confiscated may have been Friedrich's remaining portion of his inheritance from his father's estate, which may have been still in his father's name in 1749.   The legacy could have been held in trust by his mother, or the probate court.  The authorities may have seized the assets of Abraham Schweickart, the elder, when learning that Friedrich had gone to America without permission.

Friedrich's brother, young Abraham Schweickhart 
Young Abraham Schweickhart, who was baptized in October of 1733 in Nieder-Ingelheim, would have been age fifteen at the time the Dragon set sail from Rotterdam, and not over age sixteen when the ship arrived at Philadelphia..  Only males over sixteen were required to sign the oath.  If the Captain's List A would be available today, it may reveal that Abraham, being a minor,  was in Friedrich's care aboard the ship, if indeed Abraham was ever on the ship.  It is indicated by the Nieder-Ingelheim record that Abraham may have had a deformity of one of his legs.  As difficult a journey as it must have been, to have a disability would have made the five to six-month trip much harder to endure.  Young fifteen-year-old Abraham may never have left his family in Nieder-Ingelheim.

Whether this Friedrich who signed the oath in Philadelphia was the Friedrich Schweickhart of Nieder-Ingelheim and brother of young Abraham, we can't be sure.   Yet, it is by several records in Pennsylvania that Johanes Ross, who also is said to have gone "secretly" to the New Land, and Frederich Schweickhart, seem to have remained close during the time Friedrich lived in Pennsylvania.

A man named John Ross is mentioned in Todd Layman's extensive work on the genealogy and surveying years of Frederick's son Abraham in Tennessee.  Abraham Swagerty was a major player in land acquisition in early east Tennessee, and left behind numerous land, court, and deed records.  Abraham was a District Deputy Surveyor for early east Tennessee, surveying numerous tracts for Stokeley Donelson, Tennessee's first surveyor general, and son of one of the prominent founders of Nashville, John Donelson.
                                                _______________________

A personal narrative from the year 1750 describes the long journey from Germany to America 
An emigrant from the town of Heilbronn describes from a personal perspective the process of mid-18th century emigration from the Palatinate :  (from The Source: A Guidebook to American Genealogy)

As the voyager writes :
This journey lasts from the beginning of May to the end of October, fully half a year, amid such hardships as no one is able to describe adequately with their misery.  The cause is because the Rhine boats from Heilbronn to Holland have to pass by twenty-six custom houses, at all of which the ships are examined, which is done when it suits the convenience of the custom-house officials.  In the meantime the ships with the people are detained long, so that the passengers have to spend much money.  The trip down the Rhine lasts therefore four, five, and even six weeks.  When the ships come to Holland, they are detained there likewise five to six weeks.  Because things are very dear there, the poor people have to spend nearly all they have during that time.

The reference goes on to explain the time spent at English ports for customs clearing, supplying the ship with provisions, and waiting for favorable winds, took from fourteen to twenty-one days.  When at last the ship set sail, the ocean voyage took from seven to twelve weeks before at last arriving at the port of Philadelphia, the busiest port by far in mid-18th century.

Towns of origin for passengers who sailed aboard the Dragon
The ship Dragon arrived at the port of Philadelphia, September 26, 1749, with 563 freights [passengers] aboard.  The emigrants were from the Palatinate and Zweibruecken area, as described in the ship list.  Only male passengers over age sixteen were required to sign the oath, which renounced his country of origin and pledged allegiance to his new country and to the king and government of England.  Included on the ProGenealogists Palatine Project website are the names of a few passengers and family members who were aboard the Dragon.   Of those listed, their villages or towns of origin are in Baden and Bayern-Pfalz.

                            †

Schweickhart families and Traditional Occupation
In studying a family's history that is sparse on documentation, it's helpful to note a similarity of occupation that follows through generations of family.  Schweickhart families are frequently found referenced with occupation in the industry of wine and ale - brewers, distillers, wine dealers, tavern  keepers.  FREDERICK SWAGERTY's name is found on the 1780 Tax List of Industries for Fermanagh Township, in Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, as the owner of a Distillery, and as a keeper.

George Schweickhart was born in Birlenbach, Bas Rhin, Alsace, France, in 1825.  His father Jean Daniel Schweickhard was born into a family who had lived for generations in Wingen and Climbach, Alsace - both towns two to three miles from the Alsace border with Germany, and about six miles southwest from Wissembourg.    George Schweickhart immigrated to New York in 1836.  Later, in 1855 he bought a brewery in Wauwautosa, Milwaukee, Wisconsin.  Wisconsin writer Jerold Apps' book, Breweries of Wisconsin, includes a brief biographical item : "Schweickhart had come to Milwaukee from Buffalo with the idea of starting a farm.  However, as his family had been brewing for hundreds of years in Muehlhausen, Alsace, he could not pass up the brewing opportunity."  Schweickhardt's son-in-law Adam Gettelman later bought the company, and Gettleman descendants operated the brewery until 1971, when it was sold to the Miller Brewing Company.

Peter Goettelmann (1814-1887), was Adam Gettleman's father.  He emigrated from Hesse-Darmstadt and moved to Milwaukee, Wisconsin.  "In Milwaukee the Goettelmann family merged with the aristocratic Schweickhard family from Alsace, leading to the
   establishment of the A.Gettleman Brewing Company in 1871 on the site of the original Schweickhard brewery.",
Ancestry.com - Public Member Tree by Susan Farrar. Permission given use of photo and biographical information.
                                             ______________________________

The Johannisberg Abbey across the Rhine River from Nieder-Ingelheim
The history of the Schweickhart family of Nieder-Ingelheim may be woven into the history of Schloss Johannisberg Abbey.   Benedictine monks identified the location of the abbey as one of the best sites to grow grape vines. They began construction of the monastery in 1100, and consecrated the church  in 1121.  Of the abbey's original buildings only the 900 year-old-wine cellar and church (right) have survived. The long series of wars during the Middle Ages took their toll.
      
By 1716 the buildings of the old monastery were in ruins and the vineyards in total neglect. At that time the property was purchased by the wealthy German Prince-Abbot of Fulda, who built a baroque palace on the site and completely replanted the vineyards with 294,000 choice Riesling  vines during 1720-1721.           
The baroque castle, completed about
1730, rises above the Rhine River         (above)  The original 900-year-old church at Schloss Johannisberg.
surrounded by Riesling vineyards.                                                                            Wikipedia photo - Roger's 4336 photostream


The rebirth of the Wines of Alsace . . .
. . . excerpt from  francemonthly.com, an online newsletter since 2000.
"It is impossible to speak about the wines of Alsace without evoking the vicissitudes of its history and of the wars that tore this area apart years ago.  The rebirth of the wines of Alsace and the excellence of its nectar as we know it today are closely linked to the last four centuries of suffering and destruction. . . "

Alsace and the Rheingau in Germany share a history as producers of the best Rieslings in the world

Since the time when the abbey's vineyards were restored, there have been two major locations for Riesling vineyards and wine production - Alsace and the Rheingau.  The map  (above) shows the location of Schloss Johannisberg (A). Ingelheim am Rhein is a mile or so down the mountain, across the river by ferry, and the mile or so to Ingelheim.

A Schweickhart ancestor with expertise in the cultivation of the Riesling vine in Alsace may have come to the estate early in the 18th century to aide in the restoration of the vineyards, or in some phase of production. 
                                              ______________________
 

There is also the tradition of Schweickhart men of the church -
Eastward a few miles beyond Mainz on the Main River is the city of Aschaffenburg, where a Renaissance castle was built between the years 1605 and 1614.   The castle was built for Archbishop Johann Schweikart (1604-1626).                                                                                                                                                                    

Portrait of Johann Schweickhardt von Kronberg,
Archbishop of Mainz . . .(portion of the work)
Artist : Gerhard Bruck. Medium : Pen and ink wash.
Sold by Christies London, 2007.

Notes for Lot 81, Christies London  -"Johann Schweickhardt von Kronberg was Archbishop Elector of Mainz from 1604 to 1626.  The See of Mainz was the most powerful in Germany, and brought with it the position of Archchancellor, most senior of the three spiritual Electors of the Holy Roman Empire.   Schweickhardt was therefore Archbishop-Elector during the Defenestration of Prague and the Bohemian Revolt(1618), and was a significant figure in the crises following the death of the Emperor Matthias II (1557-1619) during which Catholic and Protestant factions disputed the succession and precipitated the Thirty Years War.  We are grateful to Dr. Norbert Suhr and Mr. Gernot Frankhauser of the Landesmuseum, Mainz, for identifying the sitter and the associated print."

                                      ________________________________

The Schweickhart family of Lahr, Germany, keepers of the Blumen Inn
We again acknowledge the research of Mary Swaggerty Slowey.  Mary's correspondence with an archivist in Lahr introduces us to another Schweickhart family who lived in Lahr, Schwartzwald, Germany, in the 18th century.

The Blumen Inn, or "guesthouse of the Flower" was a favored gathering place for citizens in the city of Lahr, Germany, located across the Rhine River a few miles southeast of Strasbourg.  The inn was a guesthouse with wine cellar. Innkeeper was CHRISTIAN FRIEDRICH SCHWEICKHART born July 26, 1730.  Christian Friedrich's father was Johann Jacob Schweikart.  The name is also spelled Schweickhardt in several other entries in the church book and the Flower Inn. Christian's mother's name was Anna Barbara Morstadt.

The standard immigration resource written by Werner Hacker, Emigration Out of Baden (city) and Breisgau (region nearer Switzerland) in the Eighteenth Century, Upper and Middle Rheinlands, do not include the name of Friedrich Schweickhardt.  But, we know that a man named Friedrich Schweickhart did emigrate in 1749. 

Lahr was Protestant after the Reformation.  In 1558 through 1567, the monastery there was dissolved and Lahr became exclusively Protestant for the next several centuries.

It may well be that Friedrich of the Blumen Inn might have boarded a boat along the Rhine or Moselle Rivers at Zweibrucken and traveled to Rotterdam.  He could have traveled to Zweibrucken by a main road in north eastern Alsace through villages where other Alsatian emigrants lived at the time of their emigration.  He would have arrived in Rotterdam, where possibly the three - JOHANNES ROOS, ABRAHAM SCHWEICKHART, and FRIEDRICH SCHWEICKHART, perhaps from Lahr, boarded the Dragon and sailed for Pennsylvania together. 

Was Friedrich Schweickhardt born in Alsace?
There may be validity to a claim of family tradition which holds that Friedrich, or a son, THOMAS SWAGERTY, was born in Alsace.  In the early 19th century in Arkansas, Thomas was a minister in the Methodist Episcopal church, and also one of  three original commissioners who founded Benton County, Arkansas, when that county was formed in 1837.   Researchers of Thomas' line say he was likely born circa 1783.   Another of Frederick's younger sons, JAMES SWAGERTY, SR. is documented by Bible and census records to have been born in Pennsylvania in 1773.  So, doubtful that Frederick's son Thomas was born in Alsace.  Was Frederick born in Alsace?  With more research into the genealogy of the Schweickhart family of Lahr, as well as other Alsatian Schweickhart families, we may find the answer.
                                                 _______________________

Schweikhard Winery in Rheinbollen, Germany, in the Rheingau - Rheinbollen, Germany, is located a few miles west of Ingelheim am Rhein.  http://schweikhard-weine.de
                                                ________________________

Ancestry Image, 1790 U.S. Census, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Frederick Schweickart, wine dealer in 1790 Philadelphia
In a letter from an archivist at The Historical Society of Pennsylvania written to Schweickhart descendant and researcher Todd Layman,  "In the 1790 Census there was a Frederick Schweickart in Philadelphia, with no other household members.  He was not listed in 1785, but in 1791 he was listed in the Philadelphia directory as a wine dealer at 83 North 4th Street, and in 1795 he had the same listing.  In 1825 he (or a son or other?)  Frederick Schwikkard is listed as a wafer and sealing wax manufacturer at 127 Vine . . ."

_______________

There are locations to look further, local church and civil records of  locations in Germany and Bas-Rhin, Alsace, and that process is ongoing.   Of the published and known records of emigration, there is only the Friedrich Schweickhart of the Dragon. 

                                      † 

      Sources :
Ralph Beaver Strassburger and William John Hinke, Pennsylvania German Pioneers, Vol. 1 and Vol. 2 ( the signature edition, p466) of the Ships' Lists, Pennsylvania German Society, 1934.

Irene M.Griffey, Earliest Tennessee Land Records & Earliest Tennessee Land History, Clearfield Company, Inc., reprinted by Genealogical Publishing Company, Inc, Baltimore, Maryland, 2003, pp384,385.

Thomas Perkins Abernethy, From Frontier to Plantation in Tennessee : A Study in Frontier Democracy, Chapter: Jackson, Blount, and Sevier, Southern Historical Publications No.12, University of Alabama Press, 1967, p173.