Background
Ziegler was born on July 13, 1748 in Heidelberg, Germany, to Johann Heinrich Ziegler, hatmaker, and his wife, Louise Fredericka Kern.
Ziegler was born on July 13, 1748 in Heidelberg, Germany, to Johann Heinrich Ziegler, hatmaker, and his wife, Louise Fredericka Kern.
Enlisting under Weisman in 1768, Ziegler served in the Russian army against the Turks on the lower Danube and in the Crimea, and was wounded and promoted to commissioned officer. At the end of the war in 1774 he emigrated to Pennsylvania and settled in Carlisle. At the news of the battle of Lexington he joined as third lieutenant the battalion of riflemen led by William Thompson, which took part in the siege of Boston. He fought at Long Island, Brandywine, Germantown, Paoli, and Monmouth, being wounded in the first battle. He was commissioned captain on December 8, 1778. He was commissary general of the Department of Pennsylvania, with headquarters at Waynesboro (1779-1780) and served with his regiment around New York for a year. In June 1781 his regiment joined Lafayette in Virginia, serving there until after the siege of Yorktown. In January 1782 his unit was attached to Greene's army in South Carolina, with which he remained until mustered out, January 1, 1783. He returned to Carlisle and opened a grocery store, but left it to accept a captain's commission under Josiah Harmar about the middle of 1784. During the next six years he was stationed at Forts Mackintosh (Beaver, Pennsylvania), Harmar (Marietta, Ohio), Finney (at the mouth of the Miami River), and Washington (Cincinnati), and at the Falls of the Ohio. In 1790 he was with Harmar on his indecisive expedition against the Indians. In the crisis that followed, Ziegler, since October 22 a major of the 1st Infantry, was sent to Marietta and succeeded in averting the Indian menace from that district. He was with Arthur St. Clair in the fall of 1791 on his disastrous campaign and covered the retreat of the army after the defeat. When St. Clair departed for the East he left Ziegler in command of the army, but the intrigues of James Wilkinson and others who were his seniors in the services so disgusted him that on March 5, 1792, he resigned from his command and from the army. He bought a farm about four miles from Cincinnati but sold it in 1797 and opened a store in the town. During the first two years after the incorporation of Cincinnati in 1802 he was president of the council, an office which carried with it the duties of chief magistrate. He served as the first marshal of the Ohio district (appointment confirmed, March 3, 1803) and as adjutant-general of Ohio (1807), and at the time of his death was surveyor of the port of Cincinnati (appointment confirmed, December 9, 1807).
In politics Ziegler was an ardent Democratic-Republican.
Member of the Society of the Cincinnati
Ziegler was of medium height, with dark complexion and round, good-natured face. His carriage was erect and martial, and he was always affable and polite. He was an able administrator and disciplinarian, thoroughly honest and straight-forward in his dealings with others, noted for his deliberation, care, and precision in business and military affairs.
On February 22, 1789, at Marietta Ziegler married Lucy Anne Sheffield, a native of Jamestown, Rhode Island.
