Cyphert A history of the Cyphert family Home
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|| The Cyphert/Seyfert/Seifert Names


|| Your Cyphert Number


Sources

|The history sections are based primarily on Henry Cyphert, Jr.'s narrative from information gathered in

  • Strassburger and Hinke, Pennsylvania German Pioneers, Vol I
  • Passenger List 135 C at the court house in Philadelphia, PA
  • Montgomery, History of Berks Co, Vol I, p 694
  • Deeds of Berks Co, PA, Berks County Court house, Reading, PA, 5/20/1790, Seifert, Philip Est to Philip Seifert, Bern Twp., 1790, vol 11, p 477.
  • Scott, History of Jefferson Co., PA.
  • Goshenhoppen Church Records of Goshenhoppen Church, Berks Co., PA as recorded at Berks County Historical Society, Reading, PA
  • Marriages and Deaths, 1818-1865, Westmoreland Co., PA, vol I, p31
  • Westmoreland Republican Newspaper, Sept 12, 1823
  • Westmoreland County Historical Society, Greensburg PA
  • United States Federal Census for 1850, Limestone Township, Clarion Co, PA
  • Genealogical and Personal History of the Allegheny Valley, PA, Vol 1, p. 275, prepared under the supervision of John E. Jordan, LLD.
  • Pennsylvania German Pioneer, Vol 1 and Passenger List 135-C Court House, Philadelphia,Pa.
  • The Aarons of Crates by Paul and Catherine Shannon show Philip as being from Alsace Loraine.
  • Pennsylvania German Pioneers
  • Burgert, Annette Kunzelman.Eighteenth Century Emigrants--The Northern Kraichgau

additional information comes from

  • BobReinsel's Cyphert Genealogy
  • Edward H. Quintner, Most Blessed Sacrament Church, Bally, Pennsylvania, 1976
  • David Seifert, decendent of Johannes Seiffert.  A letter from George M Seifer, grandfather of Daivd Seifert, states that the Cyphert brothers were from Hollern Zollern
  • letter from Allan Harvey Cyphert, 1/20/2004
  • many emails, letters and phone calls from folks who've sent their own piece of the story.

Previous The Cyphert Stories
Last updated August, 2005
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As far as we can tell, everyone whose name is spelled Cyphert is a descendant of three brothers who immigrated to the Americas in the mid 1700's.  There are also some cousins who wound up with Seyfert or Seifert spellings of the name.

The story begins in Alsace, a region on the border of Germany and France.  Three brothers, probably the sons of one Stephen Seifert, emigrated to the New World during the mid-1700's.

  • Philip arrived in the United States on September 25, 1749 aboard the Speedwell, piloted by Captain James Creagh, which journeyed  from Rotterdam,Holland, to the port of Philadelphia,Pennsylvania, accompanied by the ship Ranier. The Speedwell's 240 passengers were from Wurttemberge (a region in Germany), Alsace and Hanau (a town near Frankfurt, Germany) Among these passengers was Philip Seifert, born in 1730 at Lotheringia, Alsace Lorraine, who had begun his journey with a trip down the Rhine to Rotterdam.  Philip settled in a primitive area that is now northern Berks County, PA, where he acquired a farm of 75 acres and raised his family of three children in the Roman Catholic faith. Oldest son, Philip, Jr.(1), remained on the family farm until after his father's death November 02, 1784, and his descendants adopted the Cyphert spelling.  Second son, Joseph (2), became a miller and farmer, taking over the family farm upon his father's death.  His descendants remained in the Philadelphia area and retained the Seifert, Seyvert and Seyfert spellings.  A daughter, Mary Elizabeth (3),  married John Grett, a name that is now spelled Crate.  Her descendants also settled in Western Pennsylvania and have remained in contact with the Cypherts.  (In the absence of early birth and death records, it is possible that other children were born to Philip Seifert but did not live to adulthood.)


  • Adam, believed to have moved to Warren County, NJ.  We have only limited information on Adam's branch, which might have migrated further West and settled in Ohio.  (An Adam Seifert arrived on the Ship Fane on October 17, 1749, but he was the son of Michael Seifert of Schwaigern,Wuerttemberg, and apparantly not the brother of Johannes and Phillip.)

 

  • Johannes, born March 19, 1734, followed on September 16, 1751, arriving on the Brothers.   Johannes died April 18, 1795 at Bucks County, PA. and his descendants generally spell the name Seifert or Seyfert.  

 

  • Stephen Seifert, the father of three boys, Philip, Adam and Johannes, emigrated in the late 1740's.  This particular Stephen Seifert, who was from the Black Forrest region on the border of France and Germany, has not been definitively identified as the father of our ancestors, but the link seems reasonable to me!  This is the current topic of discussion at Cyphert Chat, if you'd like to add some information!
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The Cyphert Name

The Cyphert name has been recorded variously as Seivert, Seyfert, Seifert, Sauvert, Syphert,Syft, Cypher, Seywert, Cypress,Cyphers, Sifrid, Sifrit, Sifritt, Syfred, Syfrett, Syphers, Sypress, Syprers, Sanneffert,Sauffert, and even Corbett. It is assumed that the immigrating Philip Seifert spoke little or no English, and there is no reason to believe he was literate in any language. He signed the log of the passenger ship that brought him to America with an "x". Given his origins in Alsace, his own pronunciation of the name was probably closer to the French Sauvert, even though the Dutchmen at Rotterdam listed his name on the passenger records with the German spelling, Seifert.   Once in the colonies, a French priest, Fr. Delvaux, spelled the name Sauffert in 1793, and Fr. Paul Erntzen, successor to Fr. Delvaux, continued the French accent in 1794 with the baptism of Susan Sauvert.

The first known use of a "Cy" spelling occurred with the listing of "Philip and Barbara Cypher" as the baptismal sponsors of Jacob Aaron, son of Thomas and Susan Aaron, born February 13, 1816. An additional note provides a clue to the sudden change in spelling:

"The preceding entry is the last Baptismal entry writtten by Father Helbron. In Autumn 1815 he went to Philadelphia to consult a physician. On his return trip Father Helbron died at Carlisle,April 24, 1816. All entries that follow were written by Rev. G.F.X. O'Brien, pastor of St. Patrick's Church, Pittsburgh. Father O'Brien attended Sportsman's Hall until December 29, 1817, on which date Rev. Charles Maguire, who had  been appointed pastor, arrived."

Father  Helbron had spelled the family's name several  different ways over the years, but Father O'Brien, an Irishman, consistently  spelled it as Cyphert (probably reflecting his familiarity with the British names, Cipher and Cypher).  In addition, the German "Grett" became Kret, Crait, and finally Crate. The Irish priest spoke--and spelled -- with a brogue!  Meanwhile, the brothers who remained in Pennsylvania's eastern counties emerged with the name spelled as Seifert.

The moral of this story is that it's probably best to ignore the advertising you see for a "Cyphert Coat of Arms".  All they'll do is send you German Seifert information and tell you that Cyphert is a variant spelling.  It's just as accurate to say that Seifert is a variant spelling of the French Cyphert.  Until someone starts to search the records in Alsace Lorraine, we'll never know how those priests might have spelled the name...and it probably varied from priest to priest there as well!

"A major complication of doing research on the family tree is that names are spelled differently at various times. Often, those whose name was being spelled could not write their own name or did not know how it should be spelled. People recording names wrote what they thought they heard and did not check to see if the name was recorded correctly. Sometimes the name may have been spelled correctly, but bad penmanship made it difficult to read. At times those who recorded the name did not speak the same language or did not write English or German or Latin in the same way.

At Goshenhoppen a priest that spoke Flemish or French or perhaps a dialect of German would translate German and Irish names into Latin for the official record. Later this record was translated to English for publication. A similar procedure occurred at Latrobe and Greensberg and their mission churches. William became Gilimus, James became Jacob, and Dennis was translated into Dionysius. Seifert through many variations turned into Cyphert. Gret, became Cred or Crete and then Crate. Aron or Aren or perhaps even Arents became Aaron. Reinsel evolved into Reinsel, Ransel, Rensel, and Ransil. However the spellings Reinsel and Ransel have been found in Germany in the 1600's.

Throughout this volume I have attempted to spell the names as they appear in the original records. Although this may cause some difficulty in understanding exactly how the record fits together, I believe that it is desirable to follow this practice in order to be helpful to future research efforts. When reading the volume, it may be best to ignore the vowels and put one's faith in the consonants."


Evolution of Seifert/Cyphert branches

Entries in the Goshenhoppen Registers 1741-1819 show the evolution of the family's name:
Seibert 1743
Seyvert 1790
Sauffert 1793
Sauvert 1794
Seifert 1812

Meanwhile, in the Catholic Baptisms in Western Pennsylvania, 1799 - 1828, the name evolved as
Seyvert 1800
Seyverth 1805 - 1810
Seywert 1808
Seyffert 1805
Seyfert 1808
Seifert 1805 and 1818
Seiffert 1813
Seyfert 1812
Seybert 1812
Cipphers 1821
Cypher date 1815 Recorded by Fr. G.F.X. O'Brien an Irishman

Sugar Creek
1842 Philip Cypher Married Anna Denny

Crates Death Record
Elizabetha Seifert1843
Benjamin Seifert 1851
Maria Elizabet Seifert 1851
Semanthee Cyphert 1852 First Spelling as Cyphert in Church Record
Philippus Seifert 1856 (born in Berks County)
Johannes Cyphert 1856

The last use of Seifert in Church Record was in 1910 for Mrs Seifert Age 91

Crates Record of Marriages
Cyphert 1858

A Note on the Cypher Name
At least one branch of the Cypher family traces its lineage to Maria Cipher, who arrived in the UK in 1630 from somewhere on the continent and was probably Flemish, based on her occupation as a weaver in Gloucestershire.  Maria refused to tell the local vicar the name of the father, so her daughter Jane retained the name, but spelled it Cypher.  Presumably, some of the Cypher families in the U.S. are of British origin, with no link to the French/German Cyphert families except the spelling habit of their Irish priests. (Thanks to David Cypher for his family information.)
 

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Your Cyphert Number


You will see a number after the name of every individual listed on these history pages, as well as after the names of many individuals in the Cyphert directory.  This is a number that indicates their relationship to Philip Cyphert, the immigrant who's decendents we all are.  The system is simple.  Philip had three children, Philip (1), Joseph (2) and Elizabeth (3).  The second generation gets a second number, so Philip's children are Philip, Jr. (1-1), Catherine (1-2), Anthony (1-3) and so on.  My great-grandfather, A.A. Cyphert was thus (1-3-1-4), the fourth child of Anthony's first child.

If I tell you I am Dale (1-3-1-4-1-4-4) Cyphert, you can simply count the number of generations to see my relationship to Philip Cyphert.  In addition, you can easily see the birth order, which helps you identify all these Cypherts as your various distant cousins.  For instance, I've been corresponding for years with Allan H. Cyphert, (1-3-6-2-4-2). By matching up the numbers, we can see that we are both decended from Anthony, but branch off there, making us fourth cousins, once removed.   I suppose now you want to know what a once removed cousin is.....That just means my dad and Allan H. were the same number of generations from Philip, and fourth cousins.  I am a fifth cousin of Allan's daughter, Nora.  A cross-over of generations is "once removed"....sort of like fourth-and- a-half cousins.