European Heritage
This chapter discusses the derivation of the family name and presents what is known about the family history prior to immigration to America.
DERIVATION OF KESSLER/KESLAR/KESLER SURNAME
Research has yielded two possible explanations of the family surname, one related to occupation and the other to geography. The name is essentially Germanic in origin, although it is found quite frequently in other parts of Europe including Switzerland and Russia.
In the first instance the name is occupational, being one of the surnames based on the profession pursued by the original bearer. As such, the name derives from the Old High German word “chezil” which gave birth to the Middle German word “Kessel” meaning “copper.” The name “Kessler” was potentially derived from “Kessel” which means “coppersmith.” Thus, the original bearer would have been employed in this way. During the Middle Ages, before the advent of industrial development, such a skill would have been much sought after and held in particularly high regard in the community.
Alternatively, the surname may be of local origin, derived from a geographic area and used by those with a strong association to that area. There are several towns named Kessel located in Germany and Switzerland. The word “kessel” denotes a hollowed-out area of land and was the name of settlements that bore that characteristic. The “er” ending in German surnames often denotes “one who hails from” and thus the name simply signifies “one who hails from Kessel.”
According to early records the name dates back at least to the thirteenth century. Wernherus der Chesseler lived in the Monastery at Cennenbach in 1251. Erbo Kesseler lived in Strassburg in 1261.
GEOGRAPHIC ORIGINS
The Kessler ancestors who immigrated to America originally resided in Winden, Germany which is located in the southwest region, west and slightly north of Stuttgart. Nearby towns include: Niederhorbach (N 500 50’ 0”/E 70 21’ 0”), Barbelroth, Hergersweiler, Dierbach and Oberhausen. Winden is only 8 miles northeast of Germany’s border with France, near Wissembourg, France.
Winden is located in Rheinland-Pfalz (an equivalent of a county or state in Germany). Winden is considered part of Zweibruecken Duchy, which is where some important documentation related to our family’s immigration to America was located.
EARLIEST HISTORY
Zweibruecken History
Zweibruecken is located approximately 40 miles west of Winden along a fairly direct route. In the map included below, Zweibruecken is in the upper left corner of map and Winden is in lower right corner. It is certain that our descendants came to America from Winden. It is possible and perhaps likely that the Winden Kessler family is related to earlier ancestors from Zweibruecken because there is a name pattern that continues over hundreds of years.
The Zweibrücken region has been populated for many centuries. Roman settlements, many of which have perished in recent centuries, were located in the valleys of Schwarzbach and Hornbach. The much older town of Saarbrücken, founded in 1 A.D. and located to the west of Zweibruecken was a fiefdom ruled by the Counts of Saargau. In 1150 the Counts built a castle in Schwarzbach immediately above the confluence with the Hornbach River close to the border between Germany and France and just south of present day Zweibruecken. It could only be entered over two bridges. The castle and Zweibruecken settlement which developed quickly under its protection was first documented in 1170 in the times of Friedrich Barbarossa.
In 1140 the last of Zweibrücken’s counts sold and pledged the castle and city of Zweibrücken to the Electoral Palatinate (Kurpfalz). Stephan, son of elector Ruprecht III of the Palatinate inherited Zweibrücken and the surrounding county and founded the Duchy Pfalz-Zweibrücken, where Zweibrücken became the capital city and residency.
Within a relatively short period the town developed into a booming city. In the year 1488 the first book printer, Jörg Gessler is mentioned as residing there which explains why Zweibrücken is among the 64 German cities known for their earliest use of the printing press. These cities published incunables — books, pamphlets, and broadsides (large sheet of paper printed on one side) during the earliest stages of printing in Europe, up to the year 1500.
At the turn of the 15th to 16th century Duke Alexander built the first church (Alexanderskirche) and in 1523 Johann Schwebel proclaimed support for Martin Luther’s reformation teachings. Duke Wolfgang founded a Latin school as part of this monastery named “Gymnasium bipontinum illustre” and its library is still in use today. Duke Wolfgang commissioned the geometrician Tielmann Stella from Siegen to measure and write about the administrative district of Zweibrücken, which provides the earliest description of Zweibrücken.
During the Thirty Years’ War (1618-1648) Zweibrücken was conquered and destroyed after having first successfully repelled an attack from imperial troops. Also, during the following French reunion wars under Ludwig XIV, Zweibrücken was battered and once again seriously destroyed. Until the conclusion of the peace agreement of Rijswijk in the year 1697 Zweibrücken was occupied by the French. The duchy then came to be ruled by the Kingdom of Sweden through succession. Karl XI and Karl XII were dukes of Zweibrücken and kings of Sweden at the same time. However, they never saw their ancestral country and were represented by governors who governed the duchy well and made a considerable contribution to its reconstruction.
In this era of Swedish rule the Polish King Stanislaus Leszczynski came to Zweibrücken because the Swedish King Karl XII granted him asylum. Among the artists and civil servants who came to Zweibrücken in Swedish times was the architect Erikson Sundahl who built a new palace for the new Duke of Zweibrücken, Gustav Samuel Leopold, between 1720 and 1725 following the death of Karl XII.
During the reign of Duke Christian IV (1735 – 1775) the city and the duchy experienced a period of growth and prosperity. The duke provided architectural and cultural leadership that gave Zweibrücken the urban look of the ducal town it currently has and his connections to the European royal houses gave Zweibrücken an importance which elevated it from a small and unimportant duchy. At this time Zweibrücken experienced its cultural and economic peak. In 1757 Christian IV founded the regiment Royal Deux-Ponts which attacked Redoute 9 (a fort) in the battle of Yorktown in 1781 under the command of his sons Wilhelm and Christian, Counts of Forbach, and thus made a decisive contribution to the victory of the Americans.
The last reigning duke of Zweibrücken had to flee from the French revolutionary army which marched into Germany and the duchy was ravaged, the splendid buildings of Zweibrücken and the duchy were burned. However, the special aspects that Johann Wolfgang von Goethe had found remarkable during his short visit to Zweibrücken in 1770 remained.
Having lost almost all of its importance after losing its place as a royal residence, Zweibrücken retained much of its charm and history. In Zweibrücken the Palatinate Supreme Court was settled, the old tradition of printing was continued, from the highly-productive crafts enterprises new iron works arose which evolved into important manufacturing companies over the years. The practice with the Code Civil established by Napoleon I and still in force as well as other ideas adopted from France and America had deeply impressed lawyers and advocates of Zweibrücken. Thus, Zweibrücken became birthplace of the first free press organization and first democratic movement in Germany.
Iron works, shoe factories, weaving mills and breweries were the dominant businesses in Zweibrücken until the 20th century. The horse races which were started in 1821 have become an annual event. In the year 1914 on the ground of the former ducal gardens the rose garden of Zweibrücken was built which is one of the most important rosariums in and beyond Germany.
Palatinate Migration to America
Throughout the Nine Years War (1688–97) and the War of Spanish Succession (1701–14), recurrent invasions by the French Army devastated the area of what is today Southwest Germany. The depredations of the French Army and the destruction of numerous cities (especially within the Palatinate) created economic hardship for the inhabitants of the region, exacerbated by a rash of harsh winters and poor harvests that created famine in Germany and much of northwest Europe; however, the more specific background of the migration from the Palatinate, as documented in emigrants’ petitions for departure registered in the southwest principalities, was impoverishment and lack of economic prospects.
The migrants came principally from regions comprising the modern German states of Rhineland-Palatinate, Hesse, and northern areas of Baden-Württemberg along the lower Neckar. During the so-called Kleinstaaterei period when this migration occurred, the Middle Rhine region was a patchwork of secular and ecclesiastical principalities, duchies, and counties. No more than half of the so-called German Palatines originated in the namesake Electoral Palatinate, with others coming from the surrounding imperial states of Palatinate-Zweibrücken and Nassau-Saarbrücken, Baden, Hesse-Darmstadt, Hesse-Homburg, Hesse-Kassel, the Archbishoprics of Trier and Mainz, and various minor counties.
What triggered the mass emigration starting in 1709 of mostly impoverished people was the promise of free land in the American Colonies. In 1711 the Colony of Carolina had promised the peasants around Frankfurt free passage to the plantations. Spurred by the success of several dozen families the year before, thousands of German families headed down the Rhine to England and the New World. Because of the concentration of Palatine refugees in the colonies, the term “Palatine” became associated with German. Until the American War of Independence ‘Palatine’ henceforth was used indiscriminately for all ’emigrants of German tongue’.
While this migration occurred more than three decades before Johannes immigrated, it is possible that he was in contact with some who had made the journey and talked about life and opportunity in the Americas.
Kessler History in Zweibruecken
Johannes Kessler was born in approximately 1410 and died after 1452. He was Zweibruecken mayor as of October 16, 1452. His father was Andreas Kessler, who was born in approximately 1370 and is mentioned in an April 3, 1394 document as a son of the deceased Jacob Kessler (1335 – 1394) also of Zweibruecken. Johannes married a von Menger of lower nobility status. This family had considerable real estate in the surrounding vicinity. The ancestry of the von Menger scion can be traced to A.D. 1190 because of its prominence.
Johannes Kessler fathered Heinrich Kessler I who was born in 1440. He was a goldsmith and also served as mayor of Zweibruecken. Heinrich I fathered a son, Heinrich Kessler II (1485 – 1550). At this point we have a four-generation gap in ancestral knowledge dating from Heinrich II to Thomas Kessler, who was born in 1623 (see table at end of this chapter).
As noted earlier, the period from 1618 to 1648 was a time of war. During this Thirty Years’ War Zweibrücken was conquered and destroyed. This period was followed by the French reunion wars when the town was battered and once again seriously destroyed and occupied by the French until the peace agreement of Rijswijk in the year 1697. This could explain the genealogical gap and a potential reason why the family relocated from Zwiebrücken to Mulhofen, Germany, on the eastern side of the Palatinate Forest and very close to Winden, the town from which our ancestors emigrated in 1759.
Our family descended from Thomas Kessler who, as noted above, was born in 1623 in Ilbesheim, Mulhofen, Germany. Thomas was the grandfather of George Bernhard Kessler who immigrated to America in 1751. Thomas’ wife (George Bernhardt’s grandmother) was also a Kessler, but from a different and unrelated family bearing the same surname. It is from this female Kessler line that the ancestry can be traced back 800 years to A.D. 1190 and is linked to considerable prominence in Medieval Europe. As it turns out, our family scion stems from two different, apparently unrelated Kessler families, both with historic roots in the Palatinate region of southwestern Germany.
Thomas had at least two sons, Thomas and Hans Nicholaus Kessler (1662-1720). Hans Nicholaus is our direct ancestor and was Johann George Bernhard Kessler’s father.
European Generations
| Jacob Kessler | b:1335 d: 1394 |
| Andreas Kessler | b:1370 d: after 1410 |
| Johannes Kessler | b:1410 d: 1452 |
| Heinrich Kessler I | b:1440 d: after 1485 |
| Heinrich Kessler II | b:1485 d: 1550 |
| Unknown | Estimated 1510 |
| Unknown | Estimated 1535 |
| Unknown | Estimated 1570 |
| Unknown | Estimated 1600 |
| Thomas Kessler | b:1623 d: after 1662 |
| Hans Nicholas Kessler | b:1662 d: 1720 |
| Johann George Bernhard Kessler | b:Nov. 8, 1711 d: Jan 1, 1792 |
[1] An incunabulum refers to any of the rare, early examples of movable type editions of classic books such as Chaucer printed in the last part of the 15th century.