Adam Körbel was born 13 September 1711 in Hofstetten, near Kleinwallstadt in Bavaria. He was the son of Andreas Körbel and Maria Barbara Raab. Adam married Anna Catharina Reichert in Höchst-im-Odenwald on 23 July 1759. Anna Catharina was born 25 March 1720 in Höchst-im-Odenwald. Her parents were Johannes Reichert and Anna Catharina Grossman. Adam Körbel and Anna Catharina Reichert had two children, both born in Hofstetten: Maria Barbara, born 5 April 1760; and Johann Adam, born 6 April 1762.
The surname spelling varies in earlier church records and later published translations.
The family arrived in Russia on 10 August 1766. Anna Catharina is recorded on the 1767 Census of Grimm as a widow, along with her son Johann Adam, in Household #84. The surname is spelled "Kerber" in these two sources.
In the 1775 Census of Grimm, Adam is reported as a stepson in Household #28, with his surname spelled "Kerbach". In the 1798 Census of Grimm, Adam is reported in Household #13, with his surname spelled "Kerbel".
The Kerbel settlers in Grimm and the Körbel settlers in Hussenbach are cousins. Adam Kerbel’s father (Andreas) was the brother of Johann Valentin’s Körbel’s father (Marcus/Marx Körbel). They all trace their ancestry back to Matthäus Kerbler and Anna Catharina Bolender who married in Eschau in 1662.
- Parish records of Eschau, Dekanat Aschaffenburg, Bavaria, on Archion.de
- Parish records of Höchst-im-Odenwald, Dekanat Erbach, Hessen, on Archion.de
- Ortsfamilienbuch Eschau (Amt Wildenstein), online, Verein für Computergenealogie
- Pleve, Igor. Lists of Colonists to Russia in 1766: Reports by Ivan Kulberg (Saratov: Saratov State Technical University, 2010) p. 312
- Pleve, Igor. Einwanderung in das Wolgagebiet, 1764-1767 Band 2 (Göttingen: Göttinger Arbeitskreis, 2001): pp. 84-85
- Rye, Richard, and Bachtiar Kholmatov, translators. 1775 and 1798 Census of Grimm (Lincoln, NE: American Historical Society of Germans from Russia, 1995)
