Johannes Ulmer

Marriage #1 8 March 1710

Johannes Ulmer, 21 years old, married Anna Catherine Kopp 8 March 1710 in Enzberg parish, Enzkries, Wurttenberg, Germany.

He was a school teacher in Enxberg before he came to the colonies. He served as a quartermaster sargeant in 1710, and later as a drummer, in Capt. Göck's Company of the Baden-Durlach Infantry.

By 1733 he had taken a position as Schoolmaster in Enzberg.

Marriage #2 8 Sept 1722

Johannes Ulmer, 33 years old, married Anna Margaretha Weeber 8 September 1722 in Enzberg parish, Baden-Wurttenberg, Germany. They had several children that were born and died in Germany BEFORE they came to the colonies.

1742

The motivating forces to encourage this family to come to the colonies were religious and economic difficulties in Germany, on the one hand, and the energetic activities of an American promoter named Samuel Waldo on the other. They were among the German Protestants from the Rhine Valley, seeking economic betterment and religious freedom. Germany at the time was still in shambles from the disastrous Thirty Years War and its aftermath, making the New World wilderness seem quite inviting by comparison. The British government took the view that Englishmen were more needed in their own homeland, and that Germans and other unfortunate folk could just as well help populate the colonies, provided that they were Protestant and unfriendly to France and Spain. The Queen of England even circulated pamphlets in Germany propagandizing on the advantages of the New World. Agents were sent out to sign up emigrants by any means possible (they became known as Seelenverkäufer, or "soul sellers").

They crossed the ocean aboard the Lydia, captained by James Abacrombie and arrived at Broad Bay, now Waldoboro in September of 1742. More than 200 Palatinate and Würtemburg residents, mostly middle-class Lutherans, had signed on to settle on Waldo's grant. The group included a theologian, a physician, an engineer/surveyor, and also a schoolmaster named John Ulmer, our direct ancestor. The group assembled in Mannheim in the Rhenish Palatinate, then proceeded in large boats down the Rhine to Rotterdam, where they had to wait for eight weeks in Mühlheim while Waldo's agents arranged for a ship. During this time 40 or 50 colonists turned back for home or chose other routes to America. Finally the main group boarded the Lydia, a square-rigged three-master, under command of Captain James Abercrombie, and departed from Deal, England on August 18, 1742. Little is known of the specific details of the Atlantic passage, but it required 38 days, arriving in Marblehead, Massachusetts on September 24. The ship was not overcrowded, so most passengers probably arrived in good health.

In Marblehead the passengers were treated to a sort of "state reception" by Governor Shirley, members of the General Court, and Col. Waldo, who encouraged them to write happy letters to their relatives at home urging them to come over in the following season. After being wined, dined and entertained, and after dispatching their letters back home, the colonists reboarded the Lydia and were taken to Broad Bay where a somewhat different reception awaited them. There was no town, no church, and no buildings ready for accommodation. There was only wilderness, with the occasional small cabin by the riverside. The colonists and their freight were unloaded at Trowbridge's Point, and they were left to fend for themselves.

Fortunately Waldo had provisioned them well during the stopover at Marblehead, so they were ready to dig in for the winter at Broad Bay. The colonists had brought little of their own supplies, being allowed only a single wooden chest each; it contained clothes, a little bedding, family records from the Old Country, a Bible, a Prayer or Hymn Book, a copy of Arndt's Das Wahre Christentum ("The Far Reaches of Christendom"), the Augsburg Confession of Faith, and Luther's Catechism (if they were Lutherans) or the Heidelberg Catechism (if they were Reformed Church). Luckily the colonists were also blessed with a full eight weeks of unseasonably mild weather in which to construct log cabins before winter set in. Waldo deposited with them additional food supplies before ice closed the river for the winter. In the spring of 1743, after a snowy winter, they proceeded anew, developing a successful and happy settlement.

They may have had one daughter born in the colony after 1742. Elizabetha Barbara married a Johann Stepen Levensaler in 1763 in Broad Bay no Waldoboro.

1745

An obvious leader for the Broad Bay Colony. John apparently acted as Lutheran lay minister or Sunday School teacher for abt.20 years.

Took family w/him on Cape Breton Expedition to Louisbourg, with Zouberbuhler and Waldo. Worked to keep Broad Bay Germans together and make sure all returned to Broad Bay. Stahl gives following quotes:

"John [Ulmer], Sr. was at Louisburg in 1745, and tradition has it that on the night of May 2nd he led the Broad Bayers in the successful attack on the arsenal northeast of the harbor which contained great stores of military and naval supplies..."

Citation: Pomala Black, compiler, "Johannes Ulmer," Person Page 7548, Your Heritage genealogical database, site updated 8 November 2011, accessed 16 September 2026.