Here is a family whose name presents no problems. Ackermann is a name of a job, and means Ploughman, a name found everywhere at the time. In the agricultural pecking-order, the ploughman is better off than the simple cultivator or grower.

He owns a cart and cattle, so he can plough the land. Frequent in Switzerland, many branches came to Alsace. However, as with many common names, all the Ackermanns were not of the same family.

The Ackermann families were firmly established in SOULTZ

Gasser, in his valuable "Record Book of the town of Soulz", provides the genealogy of several Ackermann families from Soulz. One originates with Caspar Ackermann, from Raedersheim, who married Catherine Weschler in Soulz in 1600.

From this branch came Bernard Ackermann, Innkeeper at the Lion Inn and miller in Soulz at the end of the 18th century. In 1766, when he was 24, he was 5 feet 1 inch, and accordingly was able to be enrolled in the militia.

Near Raedersheim, the village of Ungersheim also had Ackermann families, one of whom was Henri, the Schoolmaster. His son Jean married a girl from Muespach le Haut in 1690. From Moyen-Muespach, Christian Ackermann went as far as Hirtzfelden to marry Reine Simon in 1766.

About fifteen years before, Georges Ackermann had left Muespach-Moyen to marry Anne-Marie Dirringer at Folgensbourg.

Coming back to Ungersheim, where, in 1758 André Ackermann took as his wife Catherine Lossier. André is no other than the son of the miller Jacques Ackermann, from ... SOULTZ !

Another Ackermann family, originally from Geisswasser, came to live in SOULTZ in 1739, where widower Caspar Ackermann married Anne-Marie Engel, from the ancient glassmaking family of Glasshutte on the heights above Rimbach.

A third family with the same name arrived from Switzerland after the Thirty Years War.

The Historical and Biographical Dictionary of Switzerland carries a large section on the Ackermann name. These families were numerous and gave birth to illustrious offspring, being well represented in the Cantons of Aargau, Fribourg, St Gall and Zurich, Schaffhausen and Thurgovia.

Those from Aargau Canton, living in Wegenstetten, gave rise to several branches in Alsace. We can name the family at Luemschwiller, where Jean Ackermann married a Keller in 1712. In Koetzingue, another Jean Ackermann married Anne Zeiger in 1703. Finally at Bantzenheim was celebrated in 1724 the marriage of Otto Ackermann and Cléophé Luidwig.

And other Cantons provided Ackermann families who came to Alsace. For example Anne Ackermann from Mümliswil in Solothurn. She married Jean Behe at Froeningue in 1690. From the same Canton, Anne Marie Ackermann (born in Hägendorf) came to Thann to marry Thiébaut Wagner.

From Lucerne, another Swiss Canton, came several Alsatian Ackermann families. One of the centres of emigration from this Canton was the town of Wangen, where a SOULTZ Ackermann family came from. Again from Wangen came Jean Ackermann who married Anne Zoliger from the same town at the parish church of Koetzingue in 1664.

The millers of SOULTZ wore the coat of arms of the Lucerne Ackermann: "of silver to a peak of three green sections topped by three golden ears of wheat". The arms of the Ackermanns of Entlebuch, near Lucerne, contain the miller's wheel. Research done in the Lucerne district sources reveals how widespread was this phenomenon.

More than twenty Ackermann individuals or families from this Canton left for Alsace. Moreover, this research is far from over. We note, for example, the marriage of Jean Ackermann, originally from Menznau in the Canton of Lucerne, to Elisabeth Bannwarth at Gundolsheim in 1660. Jean had already been settled for some time in Westhalten.

Coat of Arms: the Ackermann wore Silver on a Green mountain topped by three Golden Ears of Wheat. (Drawing by Pierre Ganter)

Despite the Treaty of Munster in Westphalia (1648), which ended the Thirty Years War, peace lasted but a short period. The problems of Dutch succession brought back to Alsace the armies and a spate of atrocities.

On May 23 1675, Bernard Ackermann was killed by the militia at Guebwiller. A member of the brotherhood of St. Sebastian, he was buried at the Soulzmatt cemetery. His on Jean Paul, married Elisabeth Beck at Rouffach in 1689. Several years later, Catherine Ackermann, also from SOULTZmatt, married at Rouffach Jean Caspar Roman from Ungersheim.

At the end of the 18th century the Ackermanns were also present at Wettolsheim, Zimmerbach, Blodelsheim, Baldersheim, Oberentzen, Blitzheim etc., as well as in the large towns of Upper Alsace.

Like most great families from Alsace, the Ackermanns provided their contingent of emigrants to the New World. To New York and New Orleans, they came from Guebwiller, Linthal, Jungholtz, Cernay, Berrwiller etc . . . (refer to passports and lists in 'The Alsace Emigration Book'.