First, the story. It's rather long, I'm afraid, but I have spent hours on the computor trying to find records for my Hegley-Drummer ancestors, paid libraries and genealogists for small bits of information and had little luck with anything else. The problem lies in not knowing the correct spelling of either name, only the various spellings (Drummer/Hegley/Hegly/Heckley/Heckly) that entered the family story over the years, an 1860 Ohio census that spelled it "Hegley", a cemetary record that spelled it Hagly, and a ships passenger list that spelled it "Hugein". Nor do I know for sure where in Switzeland they originated. I'm going to resort to writing the word-of-mouth story of my g-g-grandparents' lives, as it emerged over the years, in the hope that there is information in it that might mean something to somebody, somewhere. I'll use quotation marks on specific words and expressions to indicate that those were used by various relatives who told me the bits and pieces of the story. I have no idea how much of it is true. It's rather strange.

My great-great-grandfather, Joseph "Hegley", fought in Napoleon's army as an "impressed" Swiss citizen "for about five years", up to and including the Battle of Waterloo, which he escaped "through a swamp". He may have been an officer. After he returned to Switzerland he got a job of some sort with a wealthy family named "Drummer"(Trummer?). The Drummer family "owned a bridge over the river" and derived their wealth from the toll that was charged on it. Joseph and Catharina Drummer, a daugher of the house, eloped and were married, and Catherina was "disinherited" as a result. It was not Joseph's position as a servant that the family objected to, however, but the fact that he was Catholic and Catherina was not. She converted to Catholicism after her marriage. Her original religion is unknown. Joseph and Catharina had fifteen children, the first twelve of them boys. Nothing else is known about their lives in Switzerland.

In 1844 the family emigrated to the U.S., arriving in New York on the ship Zurich on June 3 of that year. Joseph's age is given as 59(?) and Catharina's as 44. With them were their six surviving children: Joseph; 20, Franz, 18; Peter, 16; Ludwig, 8; Catherina, 6; and "Ursula", 4 (Mersula, my g-grandmother, born July 10, 1842, "in a small town near Basel"). The family lived in New York for "about five years", then bought a small farm in Stark Co, Tuscarawas Twnp, Ohio. The sons were not happy in Ohio and soon returned to New York. After awhile "nothing more was heard from them" One of them (Peter?) may have gone to sea and was drowned, and one of them may have become a "master weaver".

All of Mersula's (known as Mary most of her life) siblings disappeared over time, and I have found no evidence of them in the records. The 1860 Stark Co., Ohio, census lists only J Hegley, age 96(?!); Catherine, age 62; and Mary, age 18". Catherina Hegley died in Ohio in 1871, age 73. I have found no death record for Joseph. Catherina's daughter Catharina married someone named Jake Brandt around 1855 and may have died at abt. age 23. They may have had three children. Mary(Mersula) married James Ralston in about 1862 in Ohio. They had eight children.

In about 1886, when my grandmother, Mersula's daughter, was about 12, her mother received a telegram from someone in Europe informing her of an inheritance, which she was required to claim in person by traveling to Switzerland. Although Catherina Hegley had been dead for 15 years, and my g-grandmother's last name had not been Hegley for almost 20 years, someone in Europe obviously had some knowledge of her married name and address. And if her mother had been "disinherited", why was Mersula named in someone's will? Whatever the case, the family had no money for the fare, and therefore Mersula refused the inheritance. This caused a great deal of excitement in the family and is one event I am quite sure actually happened. My grandmother was not an otherwise excitable person and wouldn't have fabricated the event. This is the main reason I have wondered if there isn't some bit of truth in the rest of this story.

That's about it. I have included all the information I've found in a few records, along with the story. The only region of origin in Switzerland that is recorded in my grandmother's scrapbook is her mother Mersula's Basel birthplace. The Hegley/Drummer families may have lived and/or originated elsewhere in Switzerland. Although my grandmother always insisted her grandparents were French-Swiss, others of her brothers and sisters have on occasion stated in censuses that they were German-Swiss.

For the record, Mersula died in 1939, aged 97. My grandmother Florence, Mersula's second-youngest child, died in 1972, also aged 97. My father died at 92, his sister at 96. For that reason, Joseph's stated age in 1860 is not as suspect as one might suppose. One of the ages listed in the two records I've found is obviously false, however.

I am hoping that someone reading this recognizes details in the story that might have been handed down in his or her own family, or that there might be details of the story that suggest to people who know Switzerland well places where I might find traces of my ancestors' lives. I would so like to know the end of the story someday. Who were the Hegleys, and who were the Drummers, and did one of them really own a toll bridge "over the river"? Was there really a lost inheritance? Did Joseph Hegley really serve in the French army for five years and at the Battle of Waterloo as a Swiss soldier? Was he born in 1786 or as early as 1765? Can anyone out there help?