An excerpt from a journal kept by Johann Weyker, a Luxembourg farmer who settled in Ozaukee County, Wisconsin, is representative of the immigrant experience.
In the year 1845, I, Johann Weyker, a native of Oberpallen, bade farewell to Germany, i.e. the village of Sterpenich in the Province of Luxembourg and county of Arlon together with my family made up of my wife and four children, and we came hither to America. We left home on May 15th of that year and went aboard ship in Antwerp, whence we left on May 25th. The sea voyage took us 40 days and we landed happily in New York on July 4th. The fare cost 75 franks per person. And from New York to Milwaukee we travelled in a fortnight using steamer and railroad. The fare was 12 dollars per person. In Milwaukee we stayed up to four weeks. And each day we went out to have a look at the land, and finally we discovered this beautiful country near Port Washington. It deemed us most proper and so we bought land from Congress for 10 shillings per acre. That year we were indeed the first settlers in the area around Port Washington. And in the fall of the year following we numbered already 60 German families. My implements in these early days were a few tools, some pieces of furniture like a stove, etc. and they cost me $160; add to this 6 cows for $14-15 a piece, a team of oxen for $50, a chariot for $58 and victuals to start with for $150. [4]
The Weyker family, who arrived in New York aboard the ship Silvanus Jenkins along with fifteen other families, were among the first Luxembourg settlers of Ozaukee County, Wisconsin. [5] All of the families were from villages along the new border between Luxembourg and Belgium and from the Belgian province of Luxembourg, which had been part of Luxembourg until six years prior to the Weyker emigration. Whatever their professions in the old country - the majority were Tagelöhner, "day laborers" - nearly all immigrants became farmers upon their arrival in America. [6]
Individuals - Pauly Rockwell Cleveland Boncquet and allied families
37
-11 years
