Bruchmühlbach - Miesau in der Pfalz

Bruchmühlbach-Miesau

At the conclusion of the Thirty Years War (1648) the Palatinate was decimated and depopulated, and land was offered for resettlement. Hans Reinhard Munzinger of Switzerland came as a young man down the Rhine River with his wife Margarethe and took a plot of land at Miesau in 1660. Although he was obviously a member of the Swiss Munzinger family, which traces it origins back to the 1200s, his particular ancestry has not been discovered.  Modern research suggests that the Swiss family originated in Münsingen, a village belonging to the Freiburg principality between the Rhine River and the Black Forest.

Hans Reinhard Munzinger had four sons, three of whom settled in nearby villages after their marriages, and the eldest of whom remained to inherit the Miesau property in accordance with the tradition of that time.  The modern descendants of this family refer to the four "lines" of descent by the names of the villages where the sons of Hans Reinhard Munzinger lived: Miesau, Mittelbrunn, Bruchmuelbach, and Gerhardsbrunn. While there have been numerous Munzinger emigrations to the United States, it is interesting to note that they are almost entirely from the Bruchmuehlbacher line -- the "Linie Bruchmühlbacher".

Aerial view looking southwest down Kaiserstrasse (the old road from France). The yellow arrow is pointing at the Adam Munzinger "Poststationshaus" or Post Station House, where Napoleon Bonaparte allegedly spent the night on his march to Moscow in 1812. The tall chimney in the rear is from the days when a later owner operated a tannery there.

Miesau-Bruchmühlbach region of Palatinate (now Rhein-Pfalz).

Ancestors of Anna Margaretha Schneider, who married Philip Munzinger and lived in Bruchmühlbach

Article about Bruchmuehlbach and Sickinger Hoehe where it is located.

Fourth and final page of article.