Metz Family History


Our first Metz family immigrated from Hayna, Pfalz. Hayna is a very small town west of the Rhine River. The Metz ancestors have been traced back to Joachim Metz who was born in 1633 and died in 1699.

Between 1673 and 1689 King Louis XIV of France, pretending to act on behalf of his sister-in-law, a Pfalz princess, invaded Pfalz. In the subsequent general European war, the War of the League of Augsburg, French designs on the Pfalz were frustrated, but the retreating French army systematically devastated the area. After the French war only 7 homes in Hayna were left standing and habitable. Only 7 homes were lived in. The Metz family and the Rang family survived. Click the link to 'Hayna' then 'History'.

Our story really begins with George Martin Metz. George Martin was a Master Builder in Hayna. A home he built in 1802 is still standing and in use in Hayna today. A link to the house and the plaque on the house is to the left.

George Martin was born in 1758 in Hayna. In 1788 when he was 30 years old he married Margaretha Metz. George Martin and Margaretha had 7 children before she died in 1801. George Martin then married Maria Eva Rang in 1803 and they had 5 more children before he died in 1814.

After George M. Metz died Maria Eva and 4 of her children (Jacob, Elizabeth, Joseph & Caroline) immigrated to Cincinnati, Ohio in 1835 and 1837.

In 1835 when Elizabeth was 26 years old, she and her younger brother Joseph immigrated to the U.S.A. They left Europe at the Port of Le Harve, France aboard the Salem arriving at the Port of New Orleans of November 13, 1835. She may have met Jacob Weiler, her future husband, aboard a steamship comming up the Mississippi on her way to Cincinnati. On 5/31/1836 she married Jacob Weiler in Hamilton County, OH.

Jacob Metz was courting Josepha’s older sister Maria Christine Metz. Jacob and Maria Christine had decided to get married, but when the young lady heard that Jacob intended to go immediately to the United States of America to seek his fortune she refused to go. Undaunted Jacob asked her younger sister Josepha to be his bride. She accepted so Jacob married Josepha Metz on 9/1/1837 in the Catholic Church in Hayna.

Not long after the marriage, Jacob and Josepha were at the Port of Le Havre on the French coast. They boarded the Bolivar and were on there way to America. On November 20, 1837 they arrived in New orleans, LA. They made their way up the Mississippi and Ohio rivers to Cincinnati, OH.

Early in 1838 Maria Eva and her family purchased the Metz Farm on Like Run Pike (now Queen City Ave.) in Green Township just west of Cincinnati.

For the complete history of the Metz Farm see the the link to 'Farm property' to the left.



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