My great, great grandfather Leon FISCHEL immigrated through New
Orleans, Louisiana in 1850 >from Rhineland-Palatinate. I want to find
names and locations of his family in what was then called Barvaria.
Can you please give me contact info on Archives in Ingenheim or Speyer
vicinity and other resource suggestions?

Thank you, Bert Fischel, Dallas, Texas USA bert@...

Albert:
The Palatinate is west of the Rhine and thus has had civil registration
since around 1800. Almost all of the records survive, and the originals
are generally kept in the town where they were created, or whatever town
incorporated the original one. For Ingenheim you'd need to write to
Billigheim-Ingenheim. The relevant office is called the Standesamt.

The Palatinate has many fine resources. The State Archive in Speyer has
muster books, among other things. These are alphabetical registers of
20-year-old men in each town, with description of the family and a log
of what happened to the individual being conscripted. "Ran away to
America" appears there quite a bit, as does "to be arrested." They also
have emigration records and many other things.

Roger Lustig Princeton, NJ Research coordinator, GerSIG