I visited Saulxures, Plaine and Schirmeck today (Sept. '99).
They are small hamlets (Saulxures the smallest) in the hills of Alsace.
The terrain is very similar to Adams County ..... the South
Mountain region where I traced my line back through. It was
Saturday morning and there was nobody around to talk to ...... as
if I could converse with them! The drive took only about 45 minutes
from Strasbourg. The first thing that hit me as I drove into
the area was the lumber industry .... which seemed to be the only
industry besides farming. I remember that my great-great
grandfather, great-grandfather and grandfather all worked in this
industry, the first two in Adams County. Some of the pictures that
I took show how the hills have been stripped of timber.
Could this have been a family trade that attracted them to the area
of Pennsylvania in which they settled?
Saint Michel de Saulxures was built in 1792 (there is a bicentenial plaque on the wall for 1992). Most of the graves in the graveyard are 20th Century ... without dates .... two with Strasbach's. I wonder if the people are cremated to save space and put in the "family" vault. There is absolutely no room for further graves in either Saulxures or Plaine. I didn't see any other cemetaries, but maybe if the church was in a different place (during the 18th century) another graveyard exists.
Xavier Strasbach's name is on the WWI monument outside the church. His name ALSO appears on the monument in Plaine. Does that mean that they lived between Saulxures and Plaine having connections to both? There was only one other name that was on both monuments.
Plaine is only a few miles away (as the crow flies) .... on the other side of the mountain. Both towns are situated on hillsides. Plaine is about twice as large as Saulxures ...... the church is similar ..... the graveyard is twice as large with many more Strasbach's buried there.
Schirmeck is more of a town...the main road goes right down the middle. There are actually stores and shops. The church is much larger. I saw no navigable waterway here ....... may we assume that the family must have trekked to the Rhine via ground transportation?
It could make sense that there are many more Strasbach's in the Plaine Cemetary since Nicholas took his large family to America, thus removing them and their lineage from the Saulxures Parish. In either town there was no place where you could go to ask questions. In fact, I don't believe that mass is regularly celebrated in these churches. I saw the same schedules in Saulxures, Plaine and St Blaise La Roche indicating that mass is rotated between the three locations each week.
