Janet and Robert Wolfe Genealogy --- Go to Genealogy Page for Benedict Mellinger

Notes for Benedict Mellinger

1648 The Thirty Year's War ended and Palatine land-owners in Germany encouraged refugees from the Swiss canton of Berne to settle in the Palatinate in order to re-populate the devastated region and tend the farms. Good contracts were offered, some with guarantees of religious autonomy. Bernese authorities persecuted Anabaptist-Mennonites in Bern, Switzerland. There was a peasant revolt in 1653 in Berne. [1]

c 1654 Benedict Mellinger was a Mennonite and migrated from Berne, Switzerland, perhaps from the Lower Aargau region of Switzerland, to the Palatinate in Germany. [2]

1654-1684 Benedikt Möllinger lived in Ruchheim [which is near Ludwigshafen], Baden, Germany. He bought a house at Ruchheim from Nickel Heimen in 1654. He was mentioned in Ruchheim records also in 1660, 1662, and 1683. [3] [4]

1694 Benedict Mellinger signed a letter against Jacob Amman at Ohnenheim, Alsace on March 13, 1694 as a Mennonite minister from the Pfalz. This letter precipitated the split of the Mennonite church, which allowed social contact with non-Mennonites in activities outside the church, from the Amish, who were not to have any contact with non-Amish people anywhere, even if they were family members. Benedict Mellinger and his son Jacob were Mennonite, but Benedict's other son was a member of the Ruchheim Reformed Church. [5] [6] [7] [8]

Research Notes:

See: [9] [10]


Footnotes:

[1] Charles Whitmer, "Swiss Anabaptist Refugees from Canton Bern in the German Palatinate in 1671," Pennsylvania Mennonite Heritage 24 (April, 2001), 2-18.

[2] Scott A. Mellinger and Philip T. Mellinger, "The Mollingers/Mellingers of the Cocalico Valley" Journal of the Historical Society of the Cocalico Valley 33 (2008), 2.

[3] Scott A. Mellinger and Philip T. Mellinger, "The Mollingers/Mellingers of the Cocalico Valley" Journal of the Historical Society of the Cocalico Valley 33 (2008), 4.

[4] Richard Warren Davis, Mennosearch.com Family Notes, Mellinger B, [Website].

[5] Ernst Müller, Geschichte der bernischen täufer. Nach den urkunden dargestellt, 315, [HathiTrust], [GoogleBooks].

[6] Jonas Smucker Hartzler and Daniel Kauffman, Mennonite Church History (1905), 100, of 100-101, [GoogleBooks].

[7] Henry Frank Eshleman, Historic Background and Annals of the Swiss and German pioneer Settlers of Southeastern Pennsylvania (Lancaster, PA: 1917), 129, item 10, right column, [GoogleBooks], [HathiTrust].

[8] Scott A. Mellinger and Philip T. Mellinger, "The Mollingers/Mellingers of the Cocalico Valley" Journal of the Historical Society of the Cocalico Valley 33 (2008), 4.

[9] Philip Mellinger notes on Descendants of Johannes, son of Benedict Mellinger, [URL].

[10] Scott Mellinger summary notes on Mellinger, [URL].