Jakob Philipps and the Arrival of His Family in Ugartsthal
Genealogical research is sometimes a matter of finding a single document that makes it possible to solve a question that has remained unanswered for years.
I have finally managed to establish the date when Jakob Philipps and his family, including his son Johann Nikolaus Philipps, arrived in Ugartsthal (Galicia).
This important finding is the result of research in Austrian archival collections and the careful comparison of historical records. One of the documents I discovered provided a valuable clue, allowing me to narrow down the chronology of the family's settlement.
The date is 1783 – an important piece of information for reconstructing the early history of the Philipps family in Galicia.
The story of the family's journey from Lorraine to Galicia, their settlement in Ugartsthal and the subsequent generations is presented in my book: German Settlement in Central Europe Under the Habsburg Monarchy - the chapter Jakob Philipps settles in Ugartsthal.
There is much more to this story than a date in an archival document. It is a story of migration, settlement and the lives of German-speaking colonists who helped shape the history of Galicia.
