Within the site you will find a record of the travels of the Bürger/Berger family. Our journey starts in Bobenthal, Südwest Pfalz and then in 1736 to Gœrsdorf in Alsace Lorraine. During the French Revolutionary Wars and the Napoleanic Wars the family were forced off their land and had to leave the vineyards and their home in France and escape to Minfeld and then Freckenfeld where they lived for nine years before moving on to Jockgrim in the Rhineland-Palatinate of Germany in 1789.

Following a lot of unrest in the area due to frequent attacks by French troops and Mathias being made a Military Fugitive by the advancing French Army, the family decided in 1809 to take up an offer made by Catherine the Great and make the long migration to the Beresan Valley north of Odessa on the Russian Steppes. Here they were offered freedom of Religion, exemption from military service, interest free loans and freedom from land taxes.

A century later, following a lot of bad crop years and unrest in the towns and villages of the colonists, many sought a new life in America. In 1903, my Great Grandparents, George and Elizabeth Berger and their family all emigrated from the port of Hamburg and arrived in America through Ellis Island. Here they caught a train to Richardton, North Dakota. They then made their various homestead claims where they farmed and raised cattle on the open prairies.

My Grandfather, Kasimir sold his Homestead by auction in 1912 and emigrated to Saskatchewan, Canada. The rest of the family stayed in America. My father was born in Canada and came to England during WWII with the South Saskatchewan Regiment and never returned.