Person:Martin Heffelfinger (2)

Martin and Anna Maria (Gysin) Heffelfinger left Switzerland for America. During the voyage, Anna Maria died. Martin and the children entered at Philadelphia in 1740 on the ship Friendship. Incidentally, about 60 others died during the voyage also. Source: Faust, Albert B. and Gaius Marcus Brumbaugh. Lists of Swiss Emigrants in the Eighteenth Century to the American Colonies. Volume Two. Washington, D.C.: National Genealogical Society, 1925. Reprint. Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Co., Inc., 1976 (Lancour 131). From Ruth J. Heffelfinger (Hilfsw BIO 9 34 1941/1962), genealogy found at the Staatsarchiv des Kantons Basel-Landschaft: Ruth writes on page 22 "According to Henry Heffelfinger of Meyerstown, Pennsylvania: "Martin arrived in Philadelphia September 23, 1740 in bad physical condition from the rigors of starvation, but he did not remain at Philadelphia very long, and was urged by Caspar Wistar, a brass button manufacturer and extensive land owner from Philadelphia to remove to the frontier where Caspar's sister already resided. Martin must have readily agreed to come to the Conestoga. Now the Conestoga is more or less disputed as to its original designated area and I am at a loss to place it property, but am of the opinion this was what was late the White Oak district, lying between Conestoga Creek and Tulpehocken Creek." (The name is familiar because of the pioneer covered wagons that later moved westward out of this region.) "Martin remarried, to whom I do not know as yet, it may have been the Wistar woman. Only first names were referred to in his will and he mentioned the child still unborn. He is reputed to have died of pneumonia, taking cold and his rundown condition was unable to fight off the disease."