Catharina Zeller

Anna Catharina was a European woman who became a legend, mostly of her own imagination. Presumably born to a Lutheran peasant family in Palatinate, near Alsace, she would marry Jacque Sellaire, and bear six children, including ancestor Henry. Due to religious and economic oppression, she was determined to make a better life, and led her family to the Dutch Republic and then to England. Here, when her husband passed in 1709, she would use the moniker “Lady Clothilde” for the first time. Destitute and widowed with children in tow in a foreign country, she struck out to the colonies certainly due to the influence of William Penn and Queen Anne. On her manifest to New York, she is listed as “Lady Clothilde de Valois” of France, wife of Jacque Sellaire, with sons Henry and John, and two grandchildren. There has never been a Lady of this name anywhere in French or European history. But it gave her access and respect, so she kept up the façade. From New York, in 1723, she traveled with other destitute Palatine families through the wilderness and down the Susquehanna River to Tulpehocken, the lands that Penn owned. Here she would secure land in Newmanstown near Womelsdorf. However, without adequate funds, she simply squatted lands. It was a deep wilderness with frequent Indigenous skirmishes, but she was surrounded by other religious and economic refugees and with the help of her adult children and neighbors, built home and cultivated a farm. It wasn’t until 1741 that the 200 acres was legally warranted to son Henry, as was the 50 acres deceased brother John has warranted. Catharina would forge on as the Royal Lady Clothilde, raising her remaining children and grandchildren, eking out a life where she could come and go as she pleased, find property, practice her religion, and offer opportunity to her progeny. Catharina lived into her late eighties and was buried at Reed’s Lutheran Cemetery.