Johann Friedrich "Frederick" Hilgen (April 3, 1805 – March 27, 1878) was a German American immigrant, miller, and Wisconsin pioneer.
He emigrated to the United States in 1832, settling in a German immigrant community in Charleston, South Carolina, where he remained for over a decade.
[1][note 1] While living in South Carolina, Hilgen was also a member of the volunteer militia company the "German Fusilier Society".
[1] Hilgen and several of his partners and friends began looking for a new home in the early 1840s, and became aware of the nascent German immigrant community thriving in the village of Milwaukee in the Wisconsin Territory.
In 1843, Hilgen and his compatriots sold their business interests in Charleston and moved to Milwaukee, buying a store together on Water Street in the downtown area.
Later that year, Hilgen made his first visit to the area of Cedarburg, on the road between Milwaukee and Green Bay, Wisconsin, and quickly decided that he would relocate there.
Shortly after his purchase, he and Schroeder began construction of a saw and gristmill on land that they believed would be suitable for the center of a village, the mill was completed in 1845.
[1] Throughout the latter half of the 1840s, Hilgen was also actively engaged in a mission to recruit other similarly motivated German Lutherans to come settle in his village.
[1] After a decade of growth and commerce in Cedarburg, by the mid-1850s Hilgen and his associates decided they needed a more extensive and durable mill facility.
[1] The decision to leave Charleston was in part motivated by the fact that Hilgen and his wife lost four of their first five children—Hilgen blamed South Carolina's heat and humidity.