Pierre Girard (son of Jean Pierre Girard and Marie Madeleine Mathieu) and Maria Magdalena Weiter (daughter of Ulrich Weiter and Salome Regnitz) married in Ludweiler on 7 June 1740. Ludweiler was originally called Ludwigsweiler, a village established in 1604 by Count Ludwig II of Nassau-Saarbrücken, and was initially settled by French Huguenots who had fled France because of religious persecution.
Pierre and Maria Madeline had twelve children. They were baptized in either Ludweiler or nearby Saarbrücken on the following dates: Susanne Elisabeth, 9 April 1741 in Ludweiler; Pierre, 11 September 1742 in Ludweiler; Jean Henry, 30 December 1745 in Ludweiler; Anna Suzanne, 30 September 1748 in Saarbrücken; Maria Magdalena, baptism not found, confirmed in 1763; unnamed child, 25 November 1750 in Ludweiler; Johann Daniel, 24 October 1751 in Saarbrücken; Johann Jacob, 19 December 1755 in Ludweiler; Johann Christian, 26 November 1756 in Saarbrücken; Phillip, 3 January 1758 in Ludweiler; Johannes, 17 April 1760 in Ludweiler; and Anna Catharina, 10 May 1762 in Saarbrücken.
The Lübeck marriages report the marriage of Pierre Girard and Anna Regina Rau on 16 May 1766.
Pierre Girard, his wife Maria, and children Johann, Jacob, Ulrich, Maria, and Anna, along with son Pierre and his wife Anna, arrived in Russia on 18 June 1766. On the Moor First Settler's List the Girard families are reported in Households #19 and #20 with their surname now spelled Schierat. There is a notation that both families moved to Dreispitz in 1768.
There are two individuals on the 1798 Census of Dreispitz who may be members of this family: Katharina "Schirau", age 38, in Household #37, and Jakob "Schirg", age 42, in Household #43. The movement tables in the 1798 Census indicate that Daniel "Scheer" moved to Holstein in 1797, and he is reported on the 1798 Census of Holstein, age 47, in Household #9.
- Parish records of Ludweiler
- Treinen, Otto. Die Einwhohner von Ludweiler Warndt von 1604-1880 mit Stammlisten (1967), FHL Film # 1336851:4.
- Lavall, Heinz. Die Einwohner von Ludweiler-Warndt von 1604-1735 und deren Vorfahren (Völklingen-Ludweiler, Germany: Heimatkundlicher Verein Warndt, 2004), FHL book 943.42/L10 D2L.
- Mai, Brent Alan and Dona Reeves-Marquardt. German Migration to the Russian Volga (1764-1767) (Lincoln, NE: American Historical Society of Germans from Russia, 2003): p. 166
- Pleve, Igor. Lists of Colonists to Russia in 1766: Reports by Ivan Kulberg (Saratov: Saratov State Technical University, 2010) pp. 85
- Pleve, Igor. Einwanderung in das Wolgagebiet, 1764-1767 Band 3 (Göttingen: Nordost-Institute, 2005): pp. 160-161
- Mai, Brent Alan. 1798 Census of the German Colonies along the Volga: Economy, Population, and Agriculture (Lincoln, NE: American Historical Society of Germans from Russia, 1999): Volume 1, pp. 394, 395, and 490; Volume 2, p. 1082
