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| Thanks to the work of Clark Moor Wier Will (the baby on the right below, 1893-1982), we have good information about the branch of the Will family which settled in Oregon. Our current computer records contain 766 names. However, we know little about who went before, and who else is out there. Perhaps the World Wide Web will turn up some other connections. I hope people will feel free to get in touch. I would be grateful for any information, and will be responsible for sharing it; if there are questions, I'll try to find somebody who can answer them. Three generations of the Will family, fourteen people in all, immigrated from Bavaria to the United States in 1834. They found their way to the Pennsylvania Dutch communities of Bucks County, Pennsylvania, and from there to a farm in Muscatine County, Iowa. How the connection was made is not known, but the 1850 census shows all of them living in Bethel, Missouri, a communal society founded by charismatic preacher Wilhelm Keil. Perhaps the Wills had kin or connections in the Rappite communities (Harmony, Economy, Phillipsburg) which were experiencing unrest at the time: some members of those communities did join Keil at Bethel. However, it is known that Keil's missionary scouts reached Muscatine County, so perhaps they were recruited in that manner. In any case, they joined Keil and stayed, emigrating overland to Keil's new community, Aurora, Oregon, in 1863. The first generation was Johann 1762 (I use the dates of their births to distinguish between the Johanns) , a sister Margaret, and a brother, Wolfgang. There is no mention of Johann's wife. Johann was born in 1762 In Bavaria (Krugshof?), and died in Bethel, Missouri, in 1852. The second generation included a Johann 1793, who was born June 3, 1793 in Bavaria, and who died in 1869 in Aurora. Johann's first wife was Susannah Dorothea Preuss; his second was Margaretha Elizabetha Friedlein. There is conflicting information about Susannah Dorothea: some records indicate that she died in 1829, but the 1850 census shows a Susannah Will living in Bethel with all of the children, while Johann lived elsewhere with his brothers. (I thank Mary Bardell for noticing that fact.) Johann was a stonemason.
The third generation of immigrants was comprised of the younger Johann's children John, also a stonemason, (pictured above right, in his old age), Heinrich, Nicholaus, Leonard, Anna Susanna Dorothea, Urban, Catherina, Dorothea, and Anna Barbara. Their brother George was born in 1839 in St. Louis, Missouri. All of them remained close to the Bethel/Aurora communities all of their lives. That's enough for now. My Great-Uncle Clark Moor Will spent a lifetime accumulating information about the Will Family and the Aurora Colony. As yet, I haven't even seen all of Clark's work. I'm hoping I have mentioned enough names, dates, and places to trigger a possible connection, and I'll continue to add to the family pages as time permits. --RPW
| CHRISTINA MILLER WILL and John Will of Aurora, my great-great-grandparents. The photo appears to be taken against the same backdrop as the one below, of their son John William and their grandchildren. John Will died in 1899, and Christina in 1905, both at the home of their daughter, Otillia Will Wolfer, in Hubbard, Oregon. THE CHILDREN OF John William Will appear variously shocked, wistful and restless in this family portrait dated August 21, 1893. Their mother, Lillah May Wier Will, had died giving birth to the twins three months before. John William himself was dead seven months later, his obituary citing “quick consumption” as the cause. John William Will was my great-grandfather; the children are, L-R, my grandfather Enoch Israel, Christine Agnes, John William, Jr., the twins Charles Moor Wier and Clark Moor Wier, and on the far right, Mary Adeline. |
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Copyright © 2000, Robin P. Will, robin@robinwill.com Rev. Oct. 2000, URL: http://www.robinwill.com