The German and Swiss Settlements of Colonial Pennsylvania: A Study of the So-Called Pennsylvania Dutch

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THE GERMAN AND

SWISS

SETTLEMENTS OF COLONIAL A STUDY PENNSYLVANIA: OF THE SO-CALLED PENNSYLVANIA DUTCH

BY

OSCAR KUHNS Member of

the Pennsylvania

Society of the Sons of the

Revolution, of the Pennsylvania-German Society, the Lancaster County Historical Society

and of

NEW YORK

HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY 1901

PUBLIC LIBilAiY

123 60 15 ASTOB. LENOX AND

TILDBN B-OLNUATIOXS L It 1039

Copyright, 1900,

BY

HENRY HOLT &

CO.

ROBERT DRUMMOND, PRINTER, NEW YORK.

THIS BOOK

IS

DEDICATED BY THE AUTHOR

TO THE MEMORY OF HIS ANCESTORS

GEORGE KUNTZ AND

HANS HERR PIONEER SETTLERS OF

LANCASTER COUNTY, PENNSYLVANIA "

Die Enkel gut thun an die Miihen ihrer Vorfahren zu denken."

— Freytag.

3i

PREFACE. The

object of this book

is

to give a

complete

yet concise view of a too-much-neglected phase of

American

origins.

The author has

especially

tried to be impartial, avoiding as far as possible

and allowing the facts to speak themselves. As a book of this kind can have

mere for

rhetoric,

no real value unless

it is

reliable, authorities

have

been freely quoted, even at the risk of making the number of foot-notes larger than is perhaps suited to the taste of the general public. Bern, Switzerland, October

i,

1900. iii

CONTENTS. PAGE

Preface

.

Chapter

iii

.

I

II

The Historic Background The Settling of the German Counties

i

OF Pennsylvania

30

HI.

Over Land and Sea

IV.

Manners and Customs of the Pennsylvania-German

62

Farmer

in

the

Eighteenth Century V. VI. VII. VIII.

Language, Literature, and Education. 115

The Religious Life In Peace and in

153

War

193

Conclusion

Appendix— Pennsylvania-German Family Names. Bibliography

Index

83

221 .

.

.

230 247

259

V

THE GERMAN AND SWISS SETTLEMENTS OF COLONIAL PENNSYLVANIA.

CHAPTER

I.

THE HISTORIC BACKGROUND.

Of

all

the great nations of

Western Europe

during the centuries immediately following the discovery of America, Germany alone took no official

Spain

part in the colonization of the in

New World.

Florida and South America, France in

Canada and Louisiana, Holland

in

New

York,

England in Massachusetts and Rhode Island, and even Sweden in New Jersey, took formal possession of the territory settled by their subPrevious to the American Revolution it jects. is

estimated

that

over

100,000

Germans and

Swiss settled in Pennsylvania alone, to say nothing of

New

York, Maryland, Virginia, Georgia,

and the Carolinas.

And

yet this, for the times,

extremely large immigration was not recognized by the

home

officially

country, and the settlers

THE HISTORIC BACKGROUND.

2

themselves, instead of founding a German empire in the West, became at once the subjects of

a foreign power. Nor does it follow necessarily that the German character is not adapted to the work of colonization

;

at the present

time

Germany

is

at least try-

ing to take her place in this kind of expansion, and the not-distant future may show her to be, in this as in other respects,

no inconsiderable

rival

of England.^

One

"

highly important cause of this emigration without a head," as it has been called, was un-

doubtedly the demoralized condition of Germany

consequence of the terrible civil and religious wars that again and again swept over that coun-

in

try.

As

a final result of these wars the

Roman Empire was broken

into fragments

Holy ;

one

German-speaking people were separated from their fellows and merged with Hun-

half of the

gary and Bohemia to form Austria Riehl, the great German ethnologist, colonizing power of his fellow countrymen, ^

is

;

while the

convinced of the

— the peasant classes

" Seine Ausdauer und Zahigkeit macht den deutschen Bauer zum geborenen Kolonisten. sie liat ihn zu dem grossat least

:

artigen weltgeschichtlichen Bcruf geweiht, der Bannertriiger deutschen Geistcs, deutschcr Gcsittung an alien Weltenden zu

werden."

(Die Biirgerliche Gesellschaft. p. 63.) JohnFiske, however, gives as the only cause of England's supremacy in colonization

Quaker

the principle of self-government.

Colonies, vol.

i.

p. 131.)

(Dutch and

THE HISTORIC BACKGROUND. other half was principalities,

split

up into

whose

little

chief efforts

3

kingdoms and for nearly two

hundred years were directed to recovering from the blighting effects of the Thirty Years' War.

But while the above-mentioned the lack of official

German

facts

explain

colonization, they also

account for the enormous and almost spontaneous movement of emigration to America, and especially to Pennsylvania, at the beginning of

The Pennsylvania German of to-day, who seeks to know why his ancestors came to this country some two centuries ago, the last century.

must

cast his eyes

backward to the Reformation

and the century and a

half following thereupon.

The Thirty Years' War was one of the most destructive wars in history.^ Not only were city, town, and village devastated in turn by the armies of friends as well as of foes; not only did poverty, hardship, murder, and rapine follow in the wake of these strange armies, with their multitudes of

camp-followers; but the whole intellectual, moral, and religious character of the German people received a shock that almost threatened it with annihilation.^ ^

Cf. Freytag "Dieser dreissigjahrige Krieg, seit derVolkerwanderung die argste Verwiistung eines menschenreichen :

Volkes."

(Bilder aus der deutschen Vergangenheit, vol. iv.

P-S-) 3

' '

Man mag

fragen, wie bei solchen Verlusten

und so griind-

THE HISTORIC BACKGROUND.

4

Of

all

the classes which suffered the dire con-

sequences of the Thirty Years' War, none suffered more completely than the peasants, or farmBefore that event the yeomanry of Germany were in a state of great prosperity. Their houses ers.

were comfortable, their barns capacious, their stables well stocked with horses and cattle, their crops were plenteous, and many had considerable sums of money safely stored away against a rainy day

^ ;

some even boasted

The outbreak of was like the first

of silver plate.^

the religious wars in faint

Bohemia

rumble of the coming

tempest, and before long the

full

storm of war broke over Germany

of

the

The

suf-

fury

itself.

ferings of the countr\' folk during the thirty years

Freytag has which are drawn from

that followed are almost incredible.

furnished

many

details

documentary sources, and yet which seem too Not only were horses heart-rending to be true. and

cattle

which

carried

shifted

away by

the various armies

back and forth over the length and

lichem Verderb der Uberlebenden iiberhaupt noch ein deutsches Volk geblieben ist." (Freytag, vol. ni. p. 115.) Freytag says that three things, only, kept alive the German nationality: the love

t>f

the people for their own homes, the and especially the zeal of the clergy,

efforts of the magistrates,

(p. 116.) * ^

See Freytag, tii. pp. 103 ff. Illustrirte Geschichte von Wiirtemberg,

p. 473.

THE HISTORIC BACKGROUND.

5

not only were houses, barns, and even crops burned; but the master of the

breadth of the land

;

house was frequently subjected to fiendish tortures in order that he might thus be forced to discover the hiding-place of his gold

;

or, as often

happened, as a punishment for having nothing to give.

At

army

the

and would

live

the approach of a hostile

whole village would take for weeks in the midst

to flight, of forests

and marshes,

The enemy having

departed, the wretched survivors would return to their ruined

or in caves.^

homes, and carry on a painful existence with the few remains of their former property, until they

were forced

Many were away

to slain,

fly

again by

many

of the

new invasions^ young were lured

to swell the ranks of the armies,

many

fled

and never returned to their native villages. The country which had shortly before been so prosperous was now a wilderness to the cities for safety

«

For a vivid account of

this life see

W.

O. von Horn,

der Unterpfalz." "Johannes Scherer, der Wanderpfarrer in to the sufferings of the especial interest are the references ancestor of the wellwas the times made by Yillis Cassel, who Extracts are known family of that name.

Of

Pennsylvania

ff. given in Cassel's Geschichte der Mennoniten, p. 431 f tells us in his diary a Swabian peasant, Johannes Heberle,

that

he was

Dank wir

forced to

fly

thirty times:

" Gott

Lob und

sind diesmal noch gern geflohen, weil es die letzte

Flucht war, die 29. oder ungefahr 30." Neujahrsblatter, sechstes Blatt, 1889.)

(Wurtembergische

THE HISTORIC BACKGROUND.

6

of uncultivated land,

marked here and there by

the blackened ruins which designated the site of

former farms and villages.

Freytag gives some most astonishing figures of the losses incurred.

Taking

as a sample the

county of Henneberg (which he says was more fortunate than the other parts of Germany), he states that in the course of the cent, of the inhabitants

war over 75 per

were destroyed; 66 per

cent, of the houses, 85 per cent, of the horses,

over 83 per cent, of the goats, and over 82 per cent, of the cattle.

It

is

a bloody story, says

Alore than Freytag, which these figures tell. three-quarters of the inhabitants, more than four-

worldly goods destroyed. So complete was the desolation that it took two hundred fifths of their

years to restore the same state of agricultural prosperity.^

These

facts are true to a

still

greater extent of

other parts of Germany, and more especially of the Palatinate, which from

its

position

was most

exposed to the ravages of the contending armies. ^

Following are some official statistics given by Freytag In nineteen villages of Henneberg there were in the years 1849 1634 1649 Families

1773

Houses

1717

316 627

1916

1558 Similar statistics arc given in regard to horses, cattle, (Vol.

III.

p. 2J4.)

:

etc.

THE HISTORIC BACKGROUND.

7

Palatinate has a history at once interestthe deing and important. Its inhabitants are scendants of the group of German tribes called

The

the Rheinfranken, with an admixture of the Alemanni, the latter of whom had occupied the land until

496

when Chlodwig, king

A.D.,

of

the

Franks, defeated them in a battle fought somewhere on the Upper Rhine.^ They were and are

among the best farmers in the world, in many districts having cultivated the soil for thirty still

Situated as they are along the are said, great water highway of Europe, they by those who know, to combine the best qualities "^

generations.!

North and South, being distinguished for indomitable industry, keen wit, independence, and a high degree of intelligence.^^ During the Midof

The Alemanni afterwards

9

settled in Svvabia (Wiirtemberg)

and Switzerland. u Kraft dieser angestammten Lebensklugheit hat sich der Franke in der Pfalz, am Mittelrhein iind Untermain den Boden 10

dienstbar gemacht wie kein anderer deutscher

Die

"

(Riehl,

Pfalzer, p. iii.) Cf. Riehl,

calls the

Die

Pfalzer,

and Hausser, Geschichte der Rhei-

"In journeying through it [what Middle Kingdom] all the way from Strasburg to Fiske says

nischen Pfalz.

he

Stamm."

Rotterdam, one

is

:

perpetually struck with the general diffusion

of intelligence and refinement, strength of character and perand there is reason for believing that at any sonal dignity time within the past four or five centuries our impression would have been relatively very much the same." (Dutch and ;

Quaker

Colonies,

I.

p. 10.)

THH HISTORIC BACKGROUND.

8 die

the Palatinate had

Ages

been

among the the German

most powerful and influential of states; it had rejoiced in great and enlightened rulers like Conrad von HohenstaufTen, Frederick the

Wise (who recognized

the tolerant

the Reformation),

and

and broad-minded Karl Ludwig, the

along the Rhine and the

The country Neckar was known as

the garden of

the University of Hei-

protector of the Swiss Mennonites.

Germany;

delberg was one of the oldest and most influential

seats of learning in

The

Europe.

terrible disorders of the religious

blow

a deadly

wars dealt

and glory.

at this prosperity

It

was the Elector Palatine Frederick V. himself who, by accepting the crown of Bohemia, precipitated the Thirty Years'

tracted to his

own country

The horrors

war.

here on a

still

related

larger scale.

War, and thus the

full

at-

fury of that

above were repeated Hausser tells how, at

the capture of Heidelberg by Tilly in 1622, the soldiers,

not

content

with

fire,

plunder,

and

rapine, pierced the feet of the wretched citizens

with

nails,

burned them with hot

irons,

and com-

mitted other similar barbarities.^^

" At

this time occurred the plunder of the celebrated library of Heidelberg when the priceless manuscripts and lx)oks were carried off to enrich the treasures of the Vatican. Napoleon

in his turn

robbed the Vatican library, and

books and manuscripts stolen were returned

in 1815 part of the to Heidelberg.

THE HISTORIC BACKGROUND. So again

9

in 1634, after the defeat of the

at Nordling-en, different

in their retreat

Swedes

bands of soldiers swept

over the Palatinate, utterly disre-

mishandling persons and deHausser says that the destroying property. vastation of the land, just recovering from its garding

former

The

all

law,

cavalry of

behind them

was

beyond imagination. Horn and Bernard of Weimar left

destruction,

terrible traces of plunder, destruc-

and death; hunger, violence, and suffering were on all sides. The years 1635 and 1636 mark tion,

the period of the most terrible misery.

years 1636-38 famine and pestilence to the

suffering.

The people

came

tried

to

In the to

add

satisfy

hunger with roots, grass, and leaves even cannibalism became more or less frequent. The gal;

lows and the graveyards had to be guarded; the bodies of children were not safe from their moth-

So great was the desolation that where once were flourishing farms and vineyards, now ers.

whole bands

of wolves

roamed unmolested.

might seem as if the above statements were extravagant or were mere rhetorical exaggerations. It

Yet these

facts are

given almost in the very words

and judicious German historian.^^ For the North of Germany this state of affairs came

of a staid

practically to

" Ludwig

an end with the Peace of West-

Hausser, Geschichte der rheinischen Pfalz.

THE HISTORIC BACKGROUND.

lo

1649, by which the pohtical

phalia in

Europe was

finally

toleration, at least,

three confessions

—

For the

formed.

settled

the

Upper

title

and a condition of

Palatinate, however, the respite

of short duration.

Palatinate

Duke

of

was agreed upon between the Catholics, Lutherans, and Re-

was

to the

map

By

the terms of the peace

was taken away and given

of Bavaria,

of Elector, while a

who also received the new electoral title was

created for Karl Ludwig.

Under

the wise administration

of

the latter

prince the land began slowly to recover from its desolated condition the banks of the Neckar and ;

the Rhine had

become a

desert; the vineyards

were gone, the fields covered with thorns instead of the former flourishing villages a few ;

Yet

wretched huts were found here and there. so favored by

Heaven

is

the improvement was rapid.

returned

;

this

fertile

land that

Many who had

fled

lands were plenty, taxes were light.

Other colonists came from Switzerland, Holland, The town of France,^"* and even England. '*

Among

the founders of

Germantown were

certain

Dutch

families from Kriet^shcim, near Worms. (See Pennypacker.) So also a number of the Huguenot settlers of both Pennsylvania

and

New

New York were

from the Palatinate.

The

settlement of

was so called by the Frencli in memory of the land which had been their home for many years. (See Bainl, The Huguenot Emigration to America.) Paltz in the latter State

THE HISTORIC BACKGROUND. Frankeiithal was almost these foreigners.

entirely

discard

to

princes to

govern

be

of

the

his

inhabited by

Religion was free

wig was much more liberal than had been. He was one of the

ii

;

Karl Lud-

his predecessors first

of

German

the

idea

that

in

subjects

well

they

must

same confession

as

order all

The

himself.

Anabaptists, or Mennonites, who had lived for a number of years in the Palatinate, and

had often been oppressed, now received from Thus the Karl Ludwig freedom of worship. country in a short time began to prosper anew.

So great was the change that the French Fieldmarshal de Grammont, who in 1646 had passed through the devastated land, twelve years

later

"

was filled with amazement at the change, as if no war had ever been there." In the years 1674-75 the war between France and Holland, into which the Elector of Brandenburg and the Emperor Leopold had been drawn, brought destruction once more to the Palatinate

—lying

as

countries

it

did between the two contending

—and

years remained

the

painful

fruitless.

It

efforts

of

twenty

was the purpose

of

Louis XIV. to render the Palatinate useless to his enemies.

Turenne,

who had

received definite

orders from Versailles to devastate the Palatuiate, did his

work thoroughly.

Once more

the

THE HISTORIC BACKGROUND.

12

monotonous

tale of

misery must be told

man, citizen, peasant plundered; cattle

noble-

:

fields laid

waste;

carried off; even the clothing torn from

the backs of the wretched victims.

What

could

not be carried away was destroyed; even the bells and organs were taken from the churches. At

one time seven

cities

and nineteen

villages

were

burning; starvation once more threatened the homeless peasant. This, however, was only the prelude to the famous, or rather infamous, destruction of 1689.

In

1685

the

Simmern-Zweibriicken dynasty

died out, and the

Neuburg

represented by Philip William, inherited the electoral title of the

was

line,

juncture that Louis

Palatinate.

It

XIV. made

his utterly unjust

at this

and unrighteous

claim to a large portion of the Palatinate in the name of the daughter ofthelate Elector, EHzabeth,

who had

married the

Duke

of Orleans, the disso-

French king. that Elizabeth had no

lute brother of the

of the fact

land,

and did not herself claim

All this in spite legal right to the it.

At

this ef-

on the part of Louis, all the princes of Northern Europe leagued themselves against

frontery

him

England, Holland, and Germany stood as a solid mass against the intrigues of France. ;

Louis

— feeling

his inability to

cope single-handed

THE HISTORIC BACKGROUND.

13

with this mighty coaHtion, and determined that ' if the soil of the Palatinate was not to furnish supplies to the French it

would

mans

"

should be so wasted that

it

at least furnish

no supplies

— approved the famous

minister, Louvois, to

"

bruler

le

to the Ger-

order of his warPalatinat."

The

surpassed even the horrors of the Thirty Years' War. The recapitulation of such scenes only becomes monotonous scenes

and

that followed

finally

loses

its

effect

on the imagination.

Macaulay's description, however, is so vivid that we give a few extracts from it in this place. "The

commander announced to near half a million human beings that he granted them three days and that within that time they must themselves. Soon the roads and fields,

of grace, shift for

which then lay deep in snow, were blackened by innumerable multitudes of men, women, and children flying from their homes.

the

work

of destruction

.

went on.

.

.

Meanwhile

The

flames

went up from every market-place, every parishchurch, every country-seat, within the devoted The fields where the corn had been province.

sowed were ploughed up. The orchards were hewn down. No promise of a harvest was left on the fertile plains near what had been Frankenthal.

Not

a vine, not an almond-tree was to

THE HISTORIC BACKGROUND.

14

be seen on the slopes of the sunny what had once been Heidelberg." ^^

During

this

;

round

Reformed

trying period, the

pecially suffered

hills

es-

were burned, or on both sides of

their churches

turned over to the Catholics

;

the Rhine Protestantism received a deadly blow. It

was the desire

of

Louis not only

to seize the

The country, but to crush out heresy there. Elector Philip William, Catholic though he was, promised to help his oppressed people, but died He was before he could accomplish anything. even forced by the poverty of the land to dismiss Protestant pastors, teachers, and

many and

to

combine or

to

number

a

dissolve

officials,

of

churches and schools.

And

time the religious condition of the Palatinate enters as an important here for the

first

factor in preparing the

German emigration

way

for the

movement

to Pennsylvania.

of

Hitherto

province had enjoyed religious freedom. After the Lutheran Elector Otto Heinrich the the

land had a succession of Calvinist rulers, until the accession of the

Neuburg

of Philip William in 1685.

ans and Reformed had had sion and the former at the

'^

It is

far

History of England,

person true that Luther-

many

had often

hands of their by

line in the

a bitter discus-

sufifered injustice

more numerous vol. in. p.

112.

rivals.

THE HISTORIC BACKGROUND. But

was

all this

trifling

15

compared with the

sys-

tematic oppression begun by John William^ and continued by his successors for nearly a century. *5

Philip William, the

first

of the Catholic rulers

was a kind-hearted, well-meaning man, by no means intolerant in matters of His son and successor, however, was religion.

of the Palatinate,

by others. He had been educated by the Jesuits, and after be-

weak

in character,

coming the

and

easily led

ruler of an almost completely Prot-

estant land he

still

retained the Jesuits as his

political counsellors.

At the conclusion

of hostilities

between France

and Germany, the Protestant church in the PalaThe French had tinate was practically crushed. everywhere supported the Catholics

in their usur-

Reformed church-council was reduced to two men, and the Jesuits held full sway. In one place the Protestant inhabitants were pations

;

the

compelled to share their church property with the Catholics; in another they were deprived of everything; before the end of 1693 hundreds of Reformed and a number of Lutheran churches

hands of the Catholic orders, to say nothing of the parsonages and schoolhouses.^'''

were '*

in the

Son of Philip William, who died

" To add

in 1690.

to their trouble a contest

broke out at

this

between the Reformed and the Lutherans, much to the faction of the Catholics.

(See Hausser.)

time satis-

1

THE HISTORIC BACKGROUND.

6

The Treaty

by which was ended the war between France and Germany, was of Httle benefit to the Protestants of the Palatinate.

of

Ryswick

in 1697,

They were compelled

to accept the status

quo of the Catholic usurpations.

On

the basis of

the clause to this effect in the treaty, colossal

made by

claims were

In 1699 the

the Catholics.

French diplomatist brought a list of 1922 places, mostly in the Palatinate, which he claimed for the Catholics;

if

he had succeeded

in

carrying

through his demands, Protestantism in the Palatinate would have received its death-blow. very probable that John William had conspired with France, Rome, and the Jesuits against his Protestant subjects, in introducing It is

into the Treaty of

Ryswick the clause concerning

the condition of the Protestants in his dominions,

and thus became, verrather forth

in

"

as

Hausser puts

instead of

all

that

"

" it,

Landesvater."

pertained

to

the

Landeslience-

Reformed

Church he followed the tactics of his Jesuit counsellors. He seemed to care more to restore Catholicism than to restore the prosperity of the " an inconceivable land. In 1697 he declared it as

mark

which they must ever keep sacred, that the electorates of the Palatinate and of Saxony had again fallen into Catholic hands." When John William in 1698 came back to his of divine favor,

THE HISTORIC BACKGROUND. dominion, the

first

time since

its

destruction,

i? it

was not to heal wounds, but to add new ones to The large majority of the Reformed Church.

Reformed or there were but few Catholics. Yet

the inhabitants of the land were

Lutherans;

1^

the Elector, with a

show

decree to the effect that

open

of tolerance, issued a all

churches should be

to the three confessions.

This tolerance,

however, was only apparent, inasmuch as, while the Protestants were obliged to give up part of their churches, the Catholics

remained in undis-

In this way turbed possession of their own. alone two hundred and forty churches were

opened to the Catholics. Other oppressive measThe Protestants were reures were enforced. quired to bend the knee at the passing of the Host, and to furnish flowers for the church festivals of their rivals; while the

work

qf proselyting

was carried on publicly by the Jesuits, who had been called in for that purpose. The Swiss Mennonites, the Walloons, and the Huguenots, who for many years had found a refuge in the Pawere now driven from the land; many went to Prussia, Holland, and America. latinate,

While no great oppression was publicly made, ^8

The Lutherans were

hitherto they the

had about

Reformed Church.

not nearly so numerous, however ; forty churches under the supervision of

1

THE HISTORIC BACKGROUND.

8

was a constant system of nagging,— what would now be called a pin-pricking policy. yet there

Often they would be beaten for refusing to bend the knee in the presence of the Host, and for reTheir

fusing to share in Catholic ceremonies. pastors w'ere driven

By one

away or thrown

into prison.

single decree seventy-five schoolmasters

were rendered penniless. Hundreds of petty persecutions on person and property were made. It is a subject of legitimate pride on the part of the descendants of these people to

they

could

Church and

be

not

crushed.

of the Palatinate

know

that

The Reformed

showed

itself to

be bold

the various congregations

self-sacrificing;

held firm and would not change in spite of violence; the pastors were unyielding

—there

not

is

an example of one who was a coward or proved untrue to his office. Hausser pays the following tribute

to

the steadfastness "

those days of

trial

tion prevailed

among

:

of

the

Church

in

Earnestness and moderathe persecuted congrega-

and the petty persecutions that followed the peace, were excellent means for purifying the morals, and since tions; the terrible sufferings of war,

the days of Frederick IV., the Protestants of the

good a moral

Palatinate had not maintained so

conduct as

in the

reaction."

One

'

'

Leidenjahren

eflfect

of the Jesuit

of all this, however,

was

THE HISTORIC BACKGROUND.

19

spread of pietism and mysticism, which manifested themselves in rehgious emotion. the

A

pastor of Heidelberg, sect

which looked

release out of

all

of the people,

deeply afifected religion.

Henry Horch, founded a

for the

end of the world as a

their sorrows.^^

The

great

body

however, although undoubtedly by pietism, remained true to sound

These conditions prevailed throughout

the whole of the eighteenth century. to time the Protestant rulers of

Europe

From

time

interfered,

and promises would be made, only to be broken. It would be a tedious repetition to give further what has already what went on for

instances of this persecution;

been given may stand for nearly one hundred years.

To

the above historical and religious condi-

which prepared the way America we must add the

tions

for emigration to

corruption,

the

tyranny, the extravagance and heartlessness of the rulers of the Palatinate; all through the

eighteenth century their chief efforts seemed to be directed to a base and slavish imitation of the life

of the

French court.

While the country was

this time that Kelpius came to Pennsylvania, It was also only a short await the coming of Christ. the sect of the Dunfounded time later that Alexander Mack '3 It

was about

there to

kards.

VI.

For other examples of the

pietistic spirit see

Chapter

20

THi;

HISTORIC BACKGROUND.

exhausted and on aces were built,

verge of ruin, costly palrivalling and even surpassing tlic

luxury those of France; enormous retinues were maintained; while pastors and teachers in

were starving, hundreds of court officers lived in luxury and idleness. The burden of feudalism still

lay heavy

chasm bebecame more

upon the peasants;

the

tween them and the upper classes and more widened. Down to the French Revolution the peasant

and

were forced

his children

to render body-service, to

pay taxes

in case of

sale or heritage, to suffer the inconveniences of

hunting, and, above prived of

Such a Hausser is

all

to see themselves de-

all,

justice.2o

state of things "

says,

In this

became

way a

intolerable.

As

part of the riddle

explained which seemed so mysterious to the

statisticians of that time,

i.e.,

why

precisely in

these years of peace the population of the Palat-

Schlozer was

inate diminished so surprisingly.

astonished at the fact that from no land in the

world relatively so many people emigrated as from this paradise of Germany, the Palatinate.

A glance

at the fatherly

dise will give us the

government

key to the

hundreds allowed themselves Spain

(in

1768),

" Cf.

of this para-

riddle.

to

be

Many

lured

where they were promised

Freytag,

vol. ni. pp.

427

ff.

to tol-

THE HISTORIC BACKGROUND. erance.

By way

of

21

England so many were

shipped to America that for a long time the name of Palatine was used as a general term for all

German

emigrants."

In the above pages we have gone somewhat into detail in regard to the condition of

inasmuch

in the Palatinate,

afifairs

as that province fur-

nished by far the largest contingent of the Ger-

man

emigration to Pennsylvania. Many of the statements made, however, apply equally to

Wiirtemberg, Zweibriicken, and others of the petty principalities in the neighborhood of the

The whole

Palatinate.-i

of

South

Germany

had suffered from the Thirty Years' War, hence the same conditions which led to emigration

—

poverty, tyranny, and religious intolerance isted everywhere,

tion

its

each province having

— ex-

in addi-

local causes.

There

is

one country, however, which

fur-

nished a very large contingent to the emigration

and which was

to Pennsylvania, ^^

One

free

from the

or two facts will illustrate the condition of Wiirtem-

berg after the Thirty Years'

had 8200 inhabitants

;

War.

in less than

Before that event Stuttgart two years 5370 had died ;

the total population of the land in 1634 was 414,536 ; in 1639 there were not 100,000. (Illust. Geschichte von Wiirtemberg,

For a graphic description of the destruction of Zweibriicken see Heintz, Pfalz-Zweibriicken wahrend des dreissigp. 512.)

jahrigen Kricges.

THE HISTORIC BACKGROUND.

12

Years'

horrors of the Thirty Switzerland.

To

War.

That

is

war was

a certain degree this

Untouched them-

for that country a blessing.

Swiss received thousands of fugitives from the neighboring lands. This influx of people

selves, the

raised the price of land and brought about a veri" table boom." The contrast between unhappy

Germany and

thus graphi" I then traveller:

peaceful Switzerland

by a German came to a land where there was no cally portrayed

is

fear of

enemies

or of being plundered, no thought of losing

life

and property; where every one lived in peace and joy under his own vine and fig-tree; so that I looked

upon

this land,

as an earthly paradise."

22

rough as

The

war, then, did not prepare the gration in Switzerland as

Germany; and

yet real

and

emigration existed.

this

it

it

seemed,

devastation of

way

for later emi-

had done

in

South

sufihcient causes for

While Switzerland has

ever been regarded as the ideal land of freedom, it was, after all, up to the present century, but little

of

more than an

office

were

in

in

such

aristocracy. cities

as

The emoluments

Berne and Zurich

the hands of a few patrician families,

generation after generation, held all The lower classes, those who tilled of^ces.23

which,

2'

Dandliker, Geschichte dcr Scliwciz, n. p. 694. especially true of the eighteenth century

" This was

;

cf.

THE HISTORIC BACKGROUND. and who labored with

the soil

23

their hands,

had

government and but little real freedom. The feudal system, which had existed for a thousand years in Switzerland, was not no share

abolished

in the

till

French Revolution swept

the

relics of the past.

away with many other the period which

we

tax, body-service,

and

ments

of the feudal

it

During

are studying, tithes, landall

the other accompani-

relations

between peasant

and lord flourished apparently as vigorously as Add to this the traffic in soldiers which ever.2-* forms so deep a blot on the fair name of Switzerland, and which was a constant source of discontent

some

among

the people,^^ and

we may have

idea of the secular causes of Swiss emigra-

tion during the last century. Dandliker, n. pp. 632 and 710; HI. p. 30: "Von freiem Verfugungsrecht der Gemeinden, vonfreierWahl der Gemeinde-

behorden war

iioch keine

Rede";

and again:

"Allgemein

der Zug zur Aristokratie. ferner jener Zeit eigen oder Verfassungstatsachlich AUerorten haufte sich die Gewalt,

war

:

Handen Weniger." "Das Feudal- oder Lehenswesen, "Dandliker, ni. p. 33

gemass, in den

:

Grundlage der Es beStaats- und Gesellschaftsordnung erhalten konnen. in wirtlischafthauptete noch immer seine voile Herrschaft Teil auch in der zum lichen und socialen Verhaltnissen,

.

.

.

voile tausend Jahre lang hatte es sich als

.

" Staatsorganisation. '5 At the end of the

fewer than

War of the Austrian

seventy to eighty

foreign service; and the

Years'

War

(1756-63).

.

.

Succession (1740) no

thousand Swiss soldiers were in

same number took part (Dandliker, in. p. 19.)

in the

Seven

THE HISTORIC BACKGROUND.

24

The

chief cause, however, of the earhest Swiss

Pennsylvania was of a reWe shall have occasion later

to

emigration

ligious nature.

to ites,

the

of

speak

who form

religious

life

During the

of

so

striking

the

fifteenth

of

origin

a

]\Iennon-

the

feature

Pennsylvania

of

of

the

to-day.

and sixteenth centuries the

Berne and Zurich contain frequent references to the measures taken to root out

annals

of

this sect,

many

of

whose doctrines were

to the state churches founded by

ful

Zwingli,

especially their refusal to bear arms.^^ their first

appearance

distaste-

From

in Switzerland in the early

decades of the sixteenth century, the ]\Iennonites

were the victims of systematic persecution on the part of their Reformed brethren; even the death-penalty being inflicted on a number, while in others w-ere thrown into prison, exiled, or

—

the case of a few

— sold

to the

Turks

as galley-

slaves.

From

time to time single families and individuals had fled across the frontiers and sought '"

is frequently given as the reason for Berne's severity Thus the Bernese ambassador or Menonnites. the against the in Holland excused persecution of the Mennonites on agent

This

the ground that the only possibility of defending a state depended on the power of the sovereign to call the subjects to

arms

in case of need, etc.

Taufer, p. 260.)

(Miiller,

Geschichte der Bernischen

THE HISTORIC BACKGROUND.

25

refuge in the Palatinate, where Mennonite communities had existed since 1527. In 1671 the considerable emigration took place, when a party of seven hundred persons left their native first

land and settled on the banks of the

These were afterwards the supporters compatriots,

who

willingly

Rhine. of their

or unwillingly

Switzerland in the following years. tine Swiss had to suffer the same

left

These Palatrials as their

neighbors, but were treated with even more intolerance.

Poverty, floods, failure of crops, the billeting of foreign soldiers, all contributed to

make large

their lot intolerable,

numbers

of

them

Switzerland in the the

settlement

on

and

finally

induced

to join their brethren in

movement which the

Pecjuea

in

resulted in

Lancaster

County.

The above-mentioned and

religious,

causes,

both

secular

produced a widespread discontent

and fostered the prevalent desire for emigration in Switzerland.^''' That it reached important dimensions may be inferred from the fact that Zurich passed decrees against it almost annually "Die Armut

manchen Gegenden und dazu die plotzlich eintretenden Notzeiten zwangen jetzt im achtzehnten Jahrhundert zuerst die Schweizer zur Auswanderung. Vereinzelt war diese zwar sclion im siebzehnten Jahrhundert vorgekommen, wurde aber erst jetzt haufiger und allgemeiner." (DUnd'^

liker, vol. Ul. p.

in

186.)

2

THE HISTORIC BACKGROUND.

6

from 1734 to 1744; even Berne, which had previously sent Michel and Graffenricd to prepare the its

way

for a Swiss colony in Georgia,

policy,

and

in

changed

1736 and 1742 published decrees

forbidding emigration.^*^ In the preceding pages

we have endeavored

to

give the historical events and social conditions which form the background to German emigration to Pennsylvania,

and without which that

Of emigration would never have taken place. course in addition to these there were many other direct and indirect causes, such as Pcnn's

Germany ,2^ and the pamphlets descrip" his Holy Experiment," which he after-

travels to tive of

wards caused

to be published in English,

Dutch, and German, and which were scattered broadcast over South Germany. So, too, the efforts of

Queen Anne and her Golden

Book,

which

brought that flood of Palatines to London, in 1709, out of which were to come the settlements

on the Schoharie and the Mohawk, and later those on the Tulpehocken, in Berks County, **

See Good, The

German Reformed Church

in the United

States, p. 172. Speaking of the party which left Ziirich in 1732, Salomon Hess, one of tlie pastors of that city says "There was no good reason at that time for them to leave :

their fatherland, but they were seized

go

to

«»

America."

See Chapter

by an insane

(Dubbs, Ger. Ref. Ch. II.

p. 253.)

desire to

THE HISTORIC BACKGROUND. Pa.

George

II. also

directly at the

As

27

published proposals aimed

Mennonites

in all other affairs of

in the Palatinate. life,

so in this matter

work undoubtedly when the Mennonites

of emigration, personal

We

much.

know

that

did set-

Lancaster County, their first care was to send one of their number back to the Old World, in order to bring over their friends and brethren. tled in

We

read in Christopher Sauer's letter to Governor Denny in 1755: "And when I came to

and found everything to the contrary from where I came from, I wrote largely to all my friends and acquaintances of the civil

this province,

and religious

liberty,

etc.,

and of

have heard and seen, and my were printed and reprinted, and provoked

the goodness letters

privileges,

I

many thousand people to come to this province, and many thanked the Lord for it and desired their friends also to come here." ^° Speculation, too, entered as a powerful stimulant to emigration. As soon as the ship-owners

saw the large sources of profit in thus transporting emigrants, they employed every means of attracting them. Thence arose the vicious class of "

Newlanders

Such 30

are

"

described in Chapter III.

some

Brumbaugh,

A

of the leading causes of preHistory of the Brethren,

p. 377.

2S

THE HISTORIC BACKGROUND.

Revolutionary German emigration to Pennsyl-

and

vania, general

But even

rect.

been

effective

sity to *'

German

native

their

character, that

combined

strangely

(so

with

country) that has been the disof German character from the

of their history

this trait

indi-

not for the innate propen-

it

"

trait

tinguishing

was

were

home and

love for

and

these causes might not have

emigration of the

Wanderlust

dawn

all

direct

particular,

down

to the present.^^

which has ever

when

country

led

them

scarcity

It

to leave

of

land,

and religious conditions, famine and war have furnished the immediate occasion. It was social

which

this

led

to

the

vast

movement

of

the

"

"

Volkerwanderung in the fourth and fifth centuries, and to the colonization of Prussia and Silesia ries

^;

it

and fourteenth centu-

the thirteenth

in

was

this that in

sent successive waves of

our own centur}' has

German immigrants

populate the Western States;

it

was

to

this that in

century sent the Palatines and Swiss to Pennsylvania, there to take root, and the eighteenth

to ^1

build

new homes

"Die Liebe

Wandertrieb."

""Seit

in

zur

for

themselves and their

Heimath und daneben dor

(Freytag,

vol.

i.

den Kreuzziigcn

unerhiJrte

p. 60.)

der

alte

Wandertrieb der

Deutschen wieder erwacht war, und Ilunderttausande von Landleuten mit Weib und Kind, mit Karren und Hunden nach

dem

goldencn Osten zogen."

(Ibid., vol. n. p. I57-)

THE HISTORIC BACKGHOUND. children

and

their

children's

well they succeeded in this in the following chapters.

we

children. shall try to

29

How show

CHAPTER

II.

THE SETTLING OF THE GERMAN COUNTIES OF PENNSYLVANIA. It would be an interesting and

valuable thing to study in detail

all

certainly

a

the facts con-

cerning the whole subject of German innnigration to America, or even such immigration in the eighteenth century.

New

York,

New

There were colonies

in

Maryland, Virginia, Georgia, Louisiana, North and South Carolina, and even so far north as Maine and Nova Jersey,

The German settlements in Pennsylvania, however, were more numerous and more important than those of all the other States combined. In the other States the Germans formed Scotia.^

but a small percentage of the population, and have influenced but little the character of the State development;

while those in Pennsylvania

have from the beginning down to the present day formed at least one-third of the population, and have undoubtedly exercised a profound in'

For bcK)ks on

this subject see Bibliography.

30

GERMAN COUNTIES OF PENNSYLVANIA.

31

on the development of the Quaker Commonwealth and of the neighboring States, es-

fluence

pecially those to the south

and west.

Many

of

book apply equally well, the Germans of New York, Mary-

the facts cited in this

however, to

land, Virginia, etc.^

In the present chapter an efifort is made to give a general view of the streams of immigration which flowed into Pennsylvania between

We

the years 1683 and' 1775.

period into three parts:

first,

or from the founding of

coming 1

of the

may

divide this

from 1683 to 1710,

Germantown

to

the

Swiss Mennonites; second, from

710 to 1727, the year when the immigration

assumed large proportions and when tistics

to be published;

began

extends

to

outbreak

the

of

official sta-

the third period the

Revolution,

immigration for a numDuring the first of the above

which put an end ber of years.^

to all

periods the numbers were very small; the second period marks a considerable increase in 'Indeed

Dutch" Those

in

in

common

includes

the

New York

parlance the expression "Pennsylvania Germans of Maryland and Virginia. are often

confused with their Holland

others. neighbors, both by themselves and ' not does This book contemplate the discussion of

German

for this phase of the subject

immigration after the Revolution see Loher, Geschichte und Zustande der Deutschen in rika, and Eckhoff, In der neuen Heimath. ;

Ame-

GERMAN COUNTIES OF PBNNSYLy,4NU.

32

numbers, which during the

enormous

period swell to

tliird

size.

The Pennsylvania Germans may be

said

have a Mayflower, as well as the Puritans.

to

In

1683 the good ship Concord (surely an appropriate name when we consider the printhe year

of

ciples

Penn's

peace

and harmony which marked

"Holy Experiment"!) landed

at

Phila-

— then a straggling village of some fourdelphia, —having on board a score houses and cottages,'*

number

German and Dutch Mennonites from Crefeld and Kriegsheim. With this little group the story of the Pennsylvania Germans be-

small

gins.

of

In order to understand

they thus shall have to note

why

came to the Xcw World, we some important religious movements which

cliar-

acterized the seventeenth century.

The Reformation

many

sects

nent.

We

in

England gave rise to as and parties as it did on the Conti-

may

find

an analogy between the

Lutheran Church and the Church betw^een the

Reformed

(or

of

England; Calvinists) and the

Puritans (or Presbyterians);

and between the

Anabaptists or Mennonites and the Quakers and This analogy is no mere fancy; we Baptists. " Such as they are," adds Penn, who gives these figures in a letter to the Free Society of Traders in Lon"•

Proud,

don.

I.

263.

GERMAN COUNTIES OF PENNSYLVANIA. know

Z?>

on Puritanism; the England were both Luth-

the influence of Calvin

Hanoverian kings of erans and Churchmen (the former

in their pri-

vate, the latter in their official capacity);

and

modern Church historians have declared that General it was from the Mennonites that the Baptist Church in England sprang; while Barclay

says of George Fox, the founder of the "

We are compelled to view him as Quakers, the unconscious exponent of the doctrines, practice, and discipline of the ancient and stricter party of the Dutch Mennonites."

words

^

Thus,

in the

"

Judge Pennypacker, to the spread of Mennonite teachings in England we therefore owe the origin of the Quakers and the settlement of

of Pennsylvania." ®

When

William Penn became a Quaker he was

with missionary fervor; among his other "labors in the field of missions he made two journeysto Holland and Germany. The second journey filled

was made

in

1677 and was fraught with moment-

ous consequences for the subjectwhichwe are discussing. On July 26th of the above year, Penn with several

friends

—among

whom

were

the

well-known George Fox, Robert Barclay, and George Keith landed at Briel in Holland, hav-

—

5

8

Religious Societies of the Commonwealth, p. 77. The Settlement of Germantown, p. 66.

GERMAN COUNTIES OF PENNSYLl^ANU.

34

ing as their object

"

to

extend

tlie

principles

and

organization of the Quakers in IIoHand and Germany."' It was not the first time that such efforts

had been made; as far back as 1655 WilHam Ames had estabhshed a small Quaker community at Kriegsheim, near

and

nate;

later

\\'illiam

Worms,

in the Palati-

Caton, George Rolf,

Benjamin Furley," and others had

visited the

Palatinate.

Penn's

Germany coincided with the movement in that country.^ The movement are partly to be sought

visit

great pietistic

causes of this

to

wretchedness and sufferings of the times, and partly in the stiff formalism into which the in the

Church had tion

that

fallen.

The comfort and

satisfac-

could not be found in Church and

State were sought for in personal

communion

with the Holy Spirit. Men turned from the coldness of dogmatic theology to the ecstasies of religious emotion.

In the words of Spener, the

great apostle of pietism, religion was brought " from the head to the heart." This movement

spread

in

a great tidal

wave

excitement over

of

Furley afterwards became Penn's agent and played an important part in inducing German emigration to Pennsylvania. * Penn himself says: "And I must tell you that there is a '

breathing, hungering, seeking people, solitarily scattered up and down the great land of Germany, where the Lord hath sent

me."

(Works, I^ndon, 1726,

vol.

I.

p. 69.)

GERMAN COUNTIES OF

PENNSYLy/INIA.

35

Germany, Switzerland, Denmark, Sweden, and

The

even England.

"

collegia pietatis," or the

—

meetings for the study of the Bible, 'One might call them adult Bible-classes, were held every-

—

where.^

was

It

Penn came.

to friends in the spirit, then, that

He

kindred souls,

was everywhere welcomed by and their meetings were deeply

marked by the outpouring of the Holy Spirit.^ The places visited by Penn which are of in*^

terest to us in

our present discussion are Frank-

fort-on-the-Main, Kriegsheim, near Worms, on the Upper Rhine, and Miilheim-on-the-Ruhr;

have not been able to

I

—a Holland, — from

he visited Crefeld, tiers of

any evidence that not far from the fron-

find

city

which, as well as from

Miilheim, the earliest settlers of

Germantown

came,

Penn reached Frankfort on August 20th, and there met a number of pietists, among whom were Dr. Wilhelm Petersen, his wife Johanna ^

This was not a movement of secession from the established

churches

;

among

the pietists were Lutherans, Reformed, and

Spener was a Lutheran and opposed to secFor an interesting summary of pietism see Freytag.

even Catholics. tarianism.

One

of the well-known literary results of

it

is

Jung-Stilling's

Lebensgeschichte. ^^

He

how

at Frankfort

"people of considerable note, both of Calvinists and Lutherans," received them " with gladness of heart and embraced our testimony with a broken and reverent

tells

" spirit.

(Works,

vol.

i.

p. 64.)

GHRM^N COUNTIES OF PENNSYLV/iNIA.

36

Eleonora von Morlau," Daniel Behagel, Caspar Merian, Johann Lorentz, Jacob van de Wall, and

who

others,

afterwards became the founders of

the Frankfort

Company, and thus

German emigration

the fautors of

Their Pennsylvania. names certainly deserve to be remembered. After leaving Frankfort, Penn went to Kriegsto

heim, where, as before stated, a of

company

little

German Quakers had

held together since the

Ames and

Rolf,

some twenty years be-

tells

us in his Journal,^- he

visit of

Here, as he

fore.

found, to his great joy, a

and

"

meeting of tender

faithful people," and, after writing a letter to

Karl Ludwig on the danger of religious intolerance, he returned to Holland and England. In 1681

payment

Penn received from Charles H.,

of a debt of £16,000 sterling

government owed his grant of an immense between the king

" For

New

father.

in

which the

Admiral Penn, the

tract of territory, situated

Jersey and iMaryland,^^ to which

—against

Penn's

own

wishes,

however

the Lives interesting autobiographical extracts from and his wife see Frcytag, Bilder aus der

of both Petersen

deutschen Vergangenhcit,

vol. iv.

" Works, vol. I. p. 72. '* The indefinite language

pp. 29

ff.

which this grant was couched led afterwards to long disputes between Pennsylvania and Maryland, and was the occasion of the contest known as 01 Cresap's War. in wlii h thf Ciermans of the present county

York took a prominent

part.

in

GERMAN COUNTIES OF PENNSYLVANIA.

—gave the name diately planned

ment

"

of Pennsylvania. " what he called a

37

Penn immeHoly Experi-

government, a State in which religious as well as political freedom should be granted to He went about at once to attract colonists all. in

new

colony, and soon after the formal confirmation of the king's grant there appeared in to his

"

Some pamphlet entitled Account of the Province of Pennsylvania in America," in which the advantages of the new London

slender

a

State were set forth in a favorable light. at the

same time a German

lished in

Amsterdam,

translation

entitled

"

Almost

was pub-

Eine Nachricht

wegen der Landschaft Pennsylvania

in

Amer-

ica." 14

who may be called the Bradford of the Germantown settlement, writes in an autobiographical memoir as follows: Francis Daniel Pastorius,

"

Upon my

return to Frankfort in

1682

"

(he

had been travelling extensively through Europe, " I was glad to enjoy the chiefly for pleasure), former acquaintances and Christian friends, Dr. Schiitz, Eleonora von Merlau, and others, who sometimes made mention of

company

of

my

William Penn of Pennsylvania, and showed letters from Benjamin Furley, also a printed 1*

The same

translation

was published

me re-

in praiikfoi-t in 1683,

as part of a larger work, " Diariuni Europaeum."

GERMAN COUNTIES OF PENNSYLVANM.

38

concerning said province; finally the whole secret could not be withholden from mc lation

they had purchased twenty-five thousand

that

acres of land in this remote part of the world.

Some

of

them

themselves, families and

and with them life

in a

to

transport

This begat such soul to continue in the society,

my

a desire in

resolved

entirely

all.^^

to lead a quiet, godly,

and honest

howling wilderness, that by several

let-

requested of my father his consent." In the mean time the Quakers and Mennonites

ters I

Kriegsheim had heard of the wonderful possessions of the quiet and gentle Englishman who of

had

visited

them

a few years before,

and had read

how under his laws liberty of conscience was promised to all who should settle in the new colony. Comparing this prospect with their own unhappy condition, they immediately resolved to seek relief

in

Penn's

land.^*'

By

had received the consent of with a **

sum

of

this

time Pastorius

his father (together

money), and thereupon went

to

None

of tliem, however, did this. Their motives were undoubtedly identical with those thus "After I had sufficiently seen the expressed by Pastorius '*

:

European provinces and countries and the threatening movements of war, and had taken to heart the dire ciiaiiges and disturbances of the Fatherland. I was impelled, through a special

guidance from the Almighty,

to

go

to

(Pennypacker, Settlement of Gcrmantown.

Pennsylvania," p. 75.)

etc.

GERM/fN COUNTIES OF PENNSYLVANU.

39

Kriegsheim, where he saw the leaders of the intending

Peter Schumacher, Gerhard

settlers,

Hendricks, and others, and with them discussed the preparations necessary for the long journey.

He

then descended the Rhine to Crefeld, where

he conferred with Thones Kunders, Dirck Her-

den GraelT brothers, and others, who followed him across the ocean six weeks later.

Op

man, the

Pastorius thus became the agent of the Frankfort Company, of the Kriegsheimers and of the

He

Crefelders.

sailed

and arrived

ahead

of the others,

June

in

Philadelphia August 16, where he was heartily welcomed by Penn.^"

6, 1683,

'"

Francis Daniel Pastorius was no ordinary

man

;

indeed

it

probable that there were few men in America at that time He was born in Sommerhausen, equal to him in learning. is

Germany,

Sept. 26, 165

1,

studied at the Universities of Stras-

burg, Basel, Erfurt, Jena, and Altdorf, taking a degree in law at the latter place in 1675. Soon after he travelled in Holland, England, France, and Switzerland, bringing up at Frankfort in 1682, as noted above.

He was well

acquainted with Greek,

Latin, French, Dutch, English, Italian, and Spanish, as may be seen from his commonplace-book written macaronically in

these various languages tracts

from

this

Germanica.

and

entitled the

"Beehive."

See also Pennypacker, pp. 109-114. himself a small house, over the door of wrote: " Parva domus sed arnica bonis: procul este " Unser Gouverneur, als er mich Whereat, he says, built

for

einen Lachen frischete."

Ex-

book have been published in the Americana Pastorius

which he profani." besuchte,

aufschluge und mich ferner fortzubauen an-

(Beschreibung von Pennsylvanien, ed. by Kapp.

p.

GERMAN COUNTIES OF PENNSYLVANIA.

4°

Pastorius was the advance courier of the prospective settlers of

men

teen

Germantown.

July 24th thir-

together with their families sailed for

New World

on board the Concord, reaching Philadelphia October 6, 1683, some two

the

months

after Pastorius himself.^**

thereafter

A

short time

hands were busy getting

all

the winter in

new

the

settled for

colony, then separated

from Philadelphia by a stretch of primeval est broken only by a narrow bridle-path. Whittier wrote what he considered his best poem, Pennsylvania Pilgrim," on Pastorius

23.)

for-

"The

:

"

Simply, as I

fits

my

theme, in homely rhyme

sing the blue-eyed

German Spener taught,"

(Works, *'

vol.

etc. I.

pp. 322

flf.)

One

single American poet has devoted a few lines to the In Whittier's of this band of German pilgrims. " " Hall the lines are found. Pennsylvania following

arrival

" Meek-hearted Woolman and

that brother-band.

The sorrowing exiles from their " Fatherland." Leaving their home in Krieslieim's bowers of vine, And the blue beauty of their glorious Rhine, To seek amidst our solemn depths of wood Ereedom from man and holy peace with God ;

Who

of all their testimonial gave Against tlie oppressor, for the outcast slave. Is it a dream that such as these look down

And

first

with their blessings our rejoicings crown

(Works,

v..].

?

"

III.

p. 58.)

The

reference in the eighth and niiitli lines is to the protest against slavery made to the monthly meeting of the Quakers, 18, 1688, by Pastorius, Gerhard Hendricks, and the two den Graeff brothers. Pennypacker (p. 197) has rojirinted

April

Op this

must interesting document.

GERMAN COUNTIES OF PENNSYLVANIA.

41

Pastorius was no mere dreamer, but an active

and able man.

was soon

Under

his supervision the land

and a prosperous That they had many hard-

cleared, houses built,

community founded.

goes without saying. Arthe year, they had only time to

ships to suffer at

first

riving so late in

build cellars and huts in which

much

year with ple

made

calling

it

"

hardship."

they passed the Pastorius says peo-

pun on the name of Armentown," because

the settlement, of lack of sup-

could not be described," he continues, nor will it be believed by coming generations,

plies.

"

a "

"

It

what want and need and with what Christian contentment and persistent industry the German in

township started."

Yet

want soon gave way to one of On October 22, 1684, comparative comfort. William Streypers (who had written to his this state of

brother the year before for provisions), writes: " I have been busy and made a brave dwellinghouse, and under

it

a cellar

fit

to live in

;

and

T

have so much grain, such as Indian corn and buckwheat, that this winter I shall be better off than

I

was

last year."

October 12th of the same "

I year Cornelius Bom wrote to Rotterdam have here a shop of many kinds of goods and :

edibles.

Sometimes

I

ride out with merchandise,

and sometimes bring something back, mostly

GERMAN COUNTIES OF PENNSYLVANIA.

42

from the Indians, and deal with them in many ways. ... I have no rent or tax or excise to pay. have a cow which gives plenty of milk, a horse to ride around my pigs increase rapidly, so that I

;

summer

had seventeen, where at first I had only two. I have many chickens and geese, and a garden, and shall next year have an orchard, if I remain well, so that my wife and I in the

are in

We of

good

I

spirits."

have dwelt thus

in detail

Germantown, on account

its

importance as

German settlements Moreover, we are fortunately in

the pioneer of ica.

of

on the settlement

owing

in

all

to the labors of Seidensticker

Amer-

condition,

and Penny-

packer, to follow the movement, step by step, from its first inception in the old Kaiserstadt on

the banks of the erly

Love

Main

in the

to the infant city of

New

World.

The

Broth-

rest of this

chapter must be given more briefly. Letters like the above undoubtedly influenced others to emigrate, for the settlement of

new

we read

in the

The however, which we

arrivals every year.

only considerable addition,

find in the last years of the century

when an

interesting

annals of

band

was

of mystics,

in 1694,

forty

in

number, settled on the banks of the Wissahickon, under the superintendence of Johann Kclpius, a

GERM/iN COUNTIES OF PENNSYLVANIA.

man

of great learning,

though

full

43

of vagaries. i''

Their object in coming to the New World was to await the coming of the Lord, which they firmly believed would occur at the turn of the century.

In their hermitage on the banks of the Wissa-

hickon they cultivated physical and spiritual per^^ fection, studied and taught; among other ''Arnold (Kirchen- und Ketzer-Historie,

vol.

n. p. 1104),

under the heading " Mehrere Zeugen der Wahrhcit," speaks '' as follows Heinrich Bernard Coster, Daniel Falckner, Joh. M. und Peter Schaffer samt andern die nach PensylKclpius vanien gezogen, Briefe und Schrifften aus America zu uns :

iibergesandt

samt ilirem tapffern Glaubens-Kampff, und wie Secten herdurch geschlagen urn die Frey-

sie sich durcli alle

heit in Clnisto zu erhalten."

The

real leader of this

colony, however,

was

Joh. Jacoo grundgelehrter Astrologus, Magus, Cabalista und Prediger aus dem Wiirtembergerlande," who had " and with wife resolved to forsake "das undankbare Europam

Zimmermann, — "ein

and family and forty companions to go to America, but who died at Rotterdam on the eve of his departure. (Arnold, vol.

II.

p.

1

105.)

Whittier (in hi^ "Pennsylvania Pilgrim") speaks of "

Paitifiil

Kelpius from his hermit den

By Wissaliickon, maddest of good men, Dreamed o'er the chiliast dreams of Petersen." 20

men

^Yg ggt a glimpse of the character and the ideals of these in the following

pleases

me

words written by

here [Pennsjdvania]

scholar, priest,

and nobleman

is

at the

(jne of

them

:

"What

can be peasant, same time," "To be a

that one

peasant and nothing else is a sort of cattle-life; to be a scholar and nnihing else, such as in Europe, is a morbid and selfindulgent existence." (Penn. Mag., vol. XI.) There

is

a singular

GERMAN COUNTIES OF PENNSYtyANM.

44

things they built an astronomical tower, from which they kept constant watch for the signs of the

coming

This community lasted

of Christ.^i

only a few years,

its

logical successor being the

Ephrata community.22 The second period begins with the advent of the

S^^•iss

Mennonites

without doubt

is

This movement

in 1710.

closely connected with the set-

The

tlement of Germantown.

relations

between

the ^lennonites of Holland and Switzerland had

always been very close. Twice had the former made formal protest to Berne and Zurich in re-

gard

to the persecution of their brethren;

they

resemblance between this community of scholars and the Pantisocracy dreamed of by Coleridge and Southey one hundred according to which "on the banks of the Susqueto be founded a brotherly community, where selfishness was to be extinguished and the virtues were to reign years

later,

hanna was

supreme."

He believed that lie was to be Kclpius died before 1709. taken up into heaven alive like Elijah, and was bitterly dis*'

appointed when he felt the approach of death, and the chariot At his fimeral, the body was buried fire did not appear.

of

as the sun

was

setting,

and a snow-white dove was released

Heavenward, while the Brethren, looking upward with uplifted

hands, repeated thrice,

Auferstehung."

"

It

(See Sachse,

" Gott gebc

German

was Conrad Mutthai, one of

ihm eine

Pietists, p. 248.)

the last survivors of the

Hermitage on the Ridge, who advised Conrad the

Conestoga,

solitude.

tliere

to

live

a

selige

life

of

go to contemplation and Beissel to

GERMAN COUNTIES OF PENNSYLVANIA. had subscribed large sums

of

45

to alleviate

money

the sufferings of the exiled Swiss in the Palatinate,

and a society had been formed

for

the

purpose of affording systematic assistance to their suffering fellow believers.

It

all

was through

them, undoubtedly, that the stream of Swiss emigration was first turned to Pennsylvania, where the success of Germantown seemed to assure a similar prosperity to

all.^^

We

have seen above how widespread the Anabaptist movement had been in Switzerland, especially in the cantons of Zurich

and Berne.

their doctrines, that of refusing to bear

all

was the most obnoxious

Of

arms

which de-

to the state,

pended on

its

citizens for defence in time of ag-

gression.

It

must be confessed

that the Swiss

Mennonites were the most intractable

of people.

Exiled again and again, they persisted every time in returning to their native land.--* In 1710

" As

early as 1684 at least one of the inhabitants of Germantown was a Swiss, Joris Wertmuller from Berne see letter from him to his brother-in-law Benedict Kuntz in Pennypacker, ;

p.

152.

In 1694 George Gottschalk came from Lindau on

Lake Constance. **

The

condition and treatment of the Mennonites in Switzer-

Quakers in New England. were the same, while the Calvinistic theocracy of Massachusetts, in its union of Church and State, closely resembled the government of Berne and

land were very

The

doctrines

Zurich.

much

like that of the

of the

The Quakers,

two

like

sects

the

Mennonites,

were fond

01

GERMAN COUNTIES OF PENNSYLVANIA.

46 the

Canton

rid of its

Berne

of

itself

made an

effort to get

troublesome sectaries by sending under

number

escort a large

of

them

to Holland,

ing thence to deport them to America.

hopThis

through the refusal of Holland and England to be a party to such enforced emigra-

effort failed

tion.

In 171 1, however, the Mennonites of Berne

were offered

free transportation

down

the Rhine,

permission to sell their property, and to take their families with them on condition, however,

—

that they pledge themselves never to return to

Their friends in Holland urged

Switzerland.

them

to

do

and especially through the untirthe Dutch ambassador in Switzer-

this,

ing efforts of

Johann Ludwig Runckel, the exportation finallv occurred.25 About this verv time be^an land,

the settlement of Lancaster County by Swiss

Mennonites, and undoubtedly many of the above were among them.2 8s. per head.

ment made with Captain Osborne, given in Penn. Mag.,

vol.

xni.

of the

p. 485.)

(See the agree-

Pennsyvania Packet,

68

Ot^ER

LAND AND

SEA.

they would then be sent in ships to Rotterdam, and thence carried to \'irginia. First, however, in Holland one-half of the

and the necessary beer

fare

must be

cured

paid,

;

and additional provisions

24 pounds of dried

:

of butter.

pounds

cheese, 8^

to provide themselves

still

se-

pounds of They were advised more liberally with beef,

15

with garden-seeds, agricultural imple-

edibles,

ments, linen, bedding, table-goods, powder and earthenw^are,

furniture,

lead,

pecially

to

money

and

stoves,

es-

"

seeds, salt, horses, swine,

buy

and fowls."

We

may

take this as a type of what was a

outfit for the intending settler at that time.

full

In

actual fact, however, the majority were far from

being so well provided

on the charity the

*

Thus

that

of

1

tity

Indeed, so great was

the

who

those

Mennonites

the Schwenckfelders

family generously gave them of

often they had to depend

of others.^

destitution

Holland

;

tell

us

passed

through

of

country

that

how a wealthy Dutch

for ships' stores 16 loaves, 2 casks

4 casks of beer, 2 roasts, a quanof wheaten bread and biscuit, 2 cases French brandy. It

lollands, 2 pots of butter,

pleasing to add that the Schwenckfelders were not ungrate" returned after ful, and that this "bread cast upon the waters is

many days

;

for in 1790, hearing that business reverses

come upon the descendants

of those

fathers, they sent over a large

sum

Gencul. Kec. of SchwciickfcliJers.)

\

who had

of money.

had

helped their

(See Heebner,

OVER LAND /iND

SEA.

69

''

formed a committee on

Foreign Needs," the

purpose of which was to collect money for the assistance of their destitute brethren and others

who were

constantly arriving in Holland on their

way to America. Even in the best was

however, the food

of cases,

likely to give out or spoil,^ especially

journey was unusually long. This

in the

if

days of

Sometimes the

sailing frequently happened.

the

trip

was made in a few weeks, while at other times as many months would pass. Thus when Muhlenberg came over they were 102 days on board. In a letter written

1732, he says

" :

by Caspar Wistar December 4, In the past year one ship among

the others sailed about the sea 24 weeks, and of the 150 persons

who were

thereon,

more than 100

miserably languished and died of hunger; on account of lack of food they caught rats and mice

on the

and a mouse was sold

30 kreuHe mentions another ship which was 17 weeks on the voyage, during which about 60 ship,

for

zer." ^^

Unser Tractament an Speis undTranck war fast schlecht, denn 10 Personen bekamen wochendlicli 3 pfund Butter, tagAlle Mittage 2 lich 4 Kannten Biers und i Kanten Wassers. Schusseln vol! Erbsen und in der Woclien 4 Mittage Fleisch, und jedesmal von dem und 3 Mittage gesalzene Fisclie Mittagessen so viel aufsparen muss dass man zu Nacht zu ^

'•

.

essen liabe." ^^

Dotterer,

.

.

(Pastorius, Beschrcibung, p. 36.) vol. n. p. 120.

Perkiomen Region,

Ol^ER

70

LAND AND

SEA.

persons died. Many more similar details might be given. The discomforts of the journey were many; the boats were almost always over

The Schwenckfelders

crowded.

relate that their

ship of only 150 tons burden liad over 300 persons on board. Later, in the days of speculation,

overcrowding was the rule. Often the ship had to w^ait days or even weeki for favorable winds or the necessary escort. Pastor

Kunze,

Amerika,"

in

tells

"

his

how

July 20, 1770, but

it

they passed Land's

Reise von England nach he came on board his vessel

was the 6th

of

End and we ;

August before

learn from Pas-

although he embarked on his ship September 25, 1747, they did not finally sail till January 14, 1748; he arrived in Philadel-

tor

Handschuh

phia April it

5.^^

was necessary

The

that,

Surely under such circumstances to possess their souls in patience.

actual sea

voyage was invariably fraught

not with danger, although the latter was by no means seldom. Sickness did not fail to declare itself; the mortality was often exceswith fear

if

On

sively high.

the vessel in which

Penn came

over thirty-six people died of the small-pox; this was only an earnest of the terrible harvest of death

in

the

"

following

years.

Hall. Nacluichten,

1.

p.

Of 155.

the

three

OyER LAND AND thousand who came to

SEA,

New York

71

in

1709 nearly

one-sixth had died on the voyage, and Sauer says that in one year more than two thousand had

succumbed

hardship and disease.

to

Indeed,

when

speculation had taken possession of ocean transportation, sickness was so unfailing a concomitant of the journey that later in the

ship-fever "

century

was generally known

in

Philadelphia

Children especially suffered, those from one to seven years rarely sur-

as

Palatine

fever."

viving the voyage.i2 There is a world of pathos in such simple statements as those which we find

Naas:

"July 25th a little child the next day, about 8 o'clock, it was

in the diary of

died;

buried in the sea; August 7th a

and

in the

same hour

August 23d again

a

little

a child died,

little

child died,

boy was born; and was buried

on the nth again

at sea that evening;

child died, without anybody having noticed it

was

nearly stiff; the 13th a

in childbirth,

children,

left

now."

little

it

until

young woman died at sea,

with three

them before and now the third, born, so that the husband has no one

two

the one just

and was buried

a

of

13

The danger

of

shipwreck was always

"

at

hand,

He says he himself saw no less than Mittelberger, p. 23. sea. thirty two children thus die and thrown into the 1'

Brumbaugh, pp. 112

ft'.

OyER LAND AND

72

and the legend the

of Palatine

Light

of a vessel of

memory

SEA. still

preserves

German immigrants

Block Island, with the loss of almost every one on board.^^ During nearly the whole of the eighteenth century England was at

wrecked

off

Avar with

some one or other

of her neighbors;

added, of course, to the dangers as well as " the vexations of them that went down to the this

1702 she joined the Grand Alliance against France; in 1740 she was at war with Spain; from 1743-1748 and from 1756sea in ships."

In

France again; while ever on the horizon hovered the fear of the Turk.^'^

with

1763

political

During the early part of the century the x\merican coast swarmed with pirates and added a new terror to ocean travel.^ ^ vessel '*

all

as a strange

was excitement and

examples of shipwreck, Mittelljerger. pp. Wliittier has a poem on the Palatine Light.

See, for other

34-36.

"

was discovered,

As soon

It

was not mere

rhetoric

when

the Mennonites of German-

town, in their protest to the Quakers against sl.avery. wrote " How fearful! and faintliearted are many on sea when they see a strange vessel. l)eing afraid it should be a Turck, and :

they should be tacken and sold for slaves in Turckey." Watson says that Pastorius was chased by Turks in 1683. (Annals, p. 61.)

Fiske says that never in the world's history was piracy so thriving as in the seventeenth and the first part of the eighhe places its golden age from 1650-1720. teenth century '6

;

(Old Virginia and her Neighbors,

vol.

II.

p.

338.)

Ol^ER

LAND AND

SEA.

73

on board, until it could be ascertained whether it was friend or foe. We have a vivid

fear

glimpse of

this

excitement at such a

Muhlenberg's Journal: Shortly " a two-masted vessel Dover,

The

toward them.

moment

in

after

leaving

sailed

directly

captain, stating that occa-

sionally Spanish privateers

had taken ships by

pretending to be French fishing-vessels, made a display of both courage and strength, by com-

manding

the

drummer

to belabor his

drum, the

be loaded, and everything to be made ready for defensive action; then asked the foe,

guns

to

through the speaking-trumpet, what they wanted, and received the comforting answer that they were Frenchmen engaged in fishing." In the account given by a member of Kelpius's party in 1694, shots were actually fired by the enemy,

one of which broke a bottle which the ship's boy was carrying in his hand; fortunately, however,

no further damage was done. are

frequently

ments.

related

in

Similar scenes

contemporary docu-

i'''

In general, however, the days passed

much

do now, in alternation of storm and calm, sunshine and rain. The ordinary events of hu-

as they

'^ Cf. Handschuh's Diarium, in Hall. Nach., i. p. 163; also Narrative of Journey of .Schwenckfelders, in Penn. Mag., vol.

X. pp. 167

ff.

OVER LAND AND

74

man

went on

life

in

this

SEA.

little

floating world,

tossed about by the waves of the sea; poles of in close

human

the two

and death, were and even amid the hard-

existence, birth

proximity;

^'^

ships and sadness there was still room for courtship and marriagci** Various means were em-

ployed to pass away the time,

among

men-

those

tioned by Muhlenberg and others being boxing (by the sailors), singing worldly songs, disputations,

mock-trials, etc.

amusements

the

eral the

These were, however, In genof passing the

chiefly of the English.

Germans had other means

In practically every account we have they are shown to be deeply religious, holding divine time.

service daily,

and particularly fond

grand old hymns did not desert

of the Church.-"^

them

incidents which

of singing the

This piety

in times of danger, as

might be quoted show.

1*

On

^^

In the journey of Goetschi's party

almost every voyage children were born at

down

many

Muhlensea.

the Rhine, he

had appointed four marriage officials for his party. At Neuwied four couples went ashore to be married, among them Wirtz, who married Goetschi's daughter Anna. (Good, p. 176.) 20

"These

ptxjr people often long for consolation, and I and comforted them with singing, praying, entertained often and exhorting; and whenever it was pt)ssible, and the winds

and waves permitted tliem

on deck."

it,

I

kept daily prayer-meetings with

(Mittclljerger, p. 21.

Hallesche Nachrichtcii, vok

I.

pp. 156

Cf. also Ilandscliuli, in fT.

)

OFER LAND AND

SEA.

75

us that during the above-described excitement at the sight of what was feared might tells

berg

prove to be a Spanish war-vessel, he made

in-

quiry after a certain Salzburger family on board, and was pleased to find the mother with her chil-

dren engaged "

singing Luther's battle-hymn, Ein feste Burg ist unser Gott." ^i Wesley in

describes a similar incident which occurred dur-

A

terrible ing his voyage to Georgia in 1736. storm had arisen; "In the midst of the psalm wherewith their service began, the sea broke over,

mainsail in pieces, covered the ship, and poured in between the decks, as if the great deep split the

had already swallowed us up. ing began

among

A

the English.

terrible

scream-

The Germans

asked one of them afterward, 'Was l^sic'] you not afraid?' He answered, 'I thank God, no.' I asked, But were not your calmly sang on.

I

'

women and children afraid? He replied mildly, No our women and children are not afraid to '

'

;

die.'

" 22

The

earliest

groups

Germans came over un-

of

companies or organizations, mostly religious, such as the Frankfort Company, the party of mystics under Kelder the auspices

21

^^

of

special

Mann, Life and Times of John Wesley,

II.

Journal, vol.

I.

M. Miiblenberg, p. 17.

p. 45.

OyER

76 pius,

LyiiWD

AND

Schwenckfelders

the

Moravians

in

1742;

SEA.

in

1733,

and

often a clergyman

the

would

personally conduct his flock across the ocean, The Mennonites as in the case of Goetschi.

who came

1710 and the following years were helped by their brethren in Holland, where the Mennonites were not only to Lancaster

tolerated, but

nent.

Not

County

in

had become wealthy and promi-

forgetful in their prosperity of the

trials of their less

fortunate brothers, they had

formed a society for the aid of the Palatines and Swiss who were forced to leave their native lands;

with the

money

nished the

money

thus collected they furnot only with passage-

emigrants to America, but with provisions, tools,

seeds, etc.^^

During the greater part

of the eighteenth cen-

tury, however, especially the latter half, the Ger-

man and

Swiss emigrants were the victims of

fraud and oppression.

The English ship-owners,

seeing the profit of transporting the emigrants to be greater than carrying freight, employed every means to induce emigration, chief among

means being German adventurers who had themselves lived in Pennsylvania. They would

these

*'

See the interesting account of their services by Do Hoop by Judge Pennypackor in Penn. Mag., vol.

SchcfTer, translated

n, pp. 117

ff.

Ol^ER

LAND AND

SEA.

77

throughout Germany, induccountrymen, by the most exaggerated

travel luxuriously

ing their statements concerning the riches to be found in the

New

sea.

World, to try their fortunes beyond the " These agents, known as Newlanders,"

were generally men of the most unscrupulous character.

The

contemporaneous accounts of these abuses are given by Muhlenberg, Sauer, and best

Mittelberger.2^

According

Newlanders received

to

the

former the

passage and a certain

free

fee for every family or single

person

whom

they

could persuade to go to Holland, there to arrangements with the ship-owners for

make

how

they

transportation.

paraded

in

fine

Muhlenberg clothing,

tiously their watches, rich people do.

and

pulling out ostentain general

They spoke

were the Elysian

tells

their

of

acting as

America

as

if it

which the crops the mountains were of

Fields,

in

grew without labor, as if gold and silver, and as if the rivers ran with milk and honey. The victims of these blandishments, ^*

Muhlenberg is the most temperate, Sauer the most inThe book of the dignant, and INIittelberger the most lurid. latter must be read with a great deal of allowance. He was a and to leave forced evidently disappoiiited man, being and return home, he gives a picture of the sufPennsylvania ferings and disillusions of his countrymen in that province which does not accord with what we learn frcjm other sources.

OVER LAND AND

78

on arriving

in

SEA.

Holland, having often to wait a long

time before leaving, were frequently obliged to

borrow money from the contractors themselves, in order to buy provisions and pay their pasBefore leaving they had to sign an agreement in English, which they did not undersage.

"

If the

parents died during the passage, the captain and the Newlanders would act stand.25

as guardians of the children, take possession of their property, and,

children for their

arrival in port, sell the

own and

dead parents'

their

On

arriving at Philadelphia, the agreesigned by the emigrant in Holland, to-

freight.

ment

on

gether with the total amount of

money

loaned,

passage and freight, is produced; those who have money enough to pay the exorbitant de-

mands

are set free, after being

examined by the

doctor, and taking the usual oath of allegiance at the court-house. All others are sold to pay

the transportation charges." ^c berg,

who

So

far

Muhlen-

gives an exceedingly clear and inter-

esting account of this nefarious system.

topher Sauer,

at that

Chris-

time, through his news-

paper and almanac, perhaps the most influential

German " One

in

Pennsylvania,

of these agreements

xni. p. 485. ^* Hallesche Nachrichten,

is

vol.

is

moved

to indigna-

published in Ponn. Mag., vol. 11.

pp. 459

fi".,

note.

Ol^ER

LAND AND

SEA.

79

On March

tion at the state of affairs.

and

15

again May 12, 1755, he writes two letters to Governor Denny, remonstrating at the abuses. He tells

how

how

in

the emigrants are packed like herrings,

consequence of improper care two thousand died in one year. " This murdering trade made my heart ache, especially when I heard

that there

was more

by carrying them sels

profit " alive."

by

their death than

They

with passengers and as

much

chants' goods as they thought

the ves-

filled

fit,

of the

and

mer-

left

the

passengers' chests, etc., behind; and sometimes they loaded vessels with Palatines' chests. But the

poor people depended upon their chests, wherein was some provision such as they were used to, as dried apples, pears, plums, mustard, medicines,

vinegar,

brandy,

butter,

clothing,

and other necessary linens, money, and whatever they brought with them; and when shirts

behind, or shipped in some other vessel, they had lack of nourishment." their chests

Not

all

were

left

the victims of these unscrupulous ship-

pers were poor and of humble rank. pressly says that

Sauer ex-

many had been wealthy

people Germany, and had lost hundreds and even thousands of pounds' worth by leaving their in

obliged to live

"

and are by being robbed, poor with grief." These state-

chests behind, or

8o

Ol^ER

LAND AND

SEA.

ments are borne out by Mittelberger, who says that people of rank, skilled people,"

"

such as nobles, learned or

when they cannot pay

their pas-

sage and cannot give security are treated like ordinary poor people, and obliged to remain on

some one buys them.^'^ But enough has been said to show how great was the abuse, and to justify the indignation of

board

till

]\Iuhlenberg and Sauer.

These abuses contin-

ued long afterwards, even down to the

first

de-

cade of the nineteenth century; indeed, the worst cases occur after the Revolution, and hence after the period discussed in this

there

is

book.

no use dwelling on such

were undoubtedly, to a greater or

After

details;

all

they

less extent, the

necessary accompaniments of a great, unsupervised movement of emigration; a movement

which, although it had its dark side, was nevertheless fraught with untold blessing to thousands.

The custom

referred to above, of selling the

"

Mittelberger, p. 39. case of "a noble lady"

He who

gives an example of this in the in 1753

came

to Pliiladelphia

with two half-grown daughters and a young son. She entrusted all her fortune to a Newlander, who robbed her in ;

consequence of which both she and her daughters were compelled to serve. J"hn Wesley in his Journal, under date March 6,

1736,

tells

who came

to

the story of John Rcinier from Vevay, Switzerland,

America "well provided with money, Inx^ks, and being robbed by the captain, was forced to sell

drugs," but, himself for seven years.

OVER LAND AND passengers

known

as

to

their

pay

charges,

— redemptionism, was

the

Germans.

tom

existed

81

SEA.

—a

custom

not confined to

In the previous century the cus-

among

the French of the

West

the "engages," as they were called,

dies;

ing themselves to serve three years. the Huguenots were thus disposed

system was also in vogue colonies except

New

England.

to

—intended New Jersey, — urges

of

coming

Proposal of 1675,

it

to the

in

to

as a

New World

all

Insell-

Many of.^s

the

of

The

English

Fenwick,

in his

draw immigration reasonable means and obtaining a

Furley, Penn's agent, also urges the thing. In Pennsylvania it was entirely re-

plantation;

same

spectable, tinction

and many who afterwards grew

came over

this way.^^

servants seem not to have in the

The Germans

come over

eighteenth century;

to dis-

later,

until well

as

on

however, they

became very numerous.

The

condition of the redemptioners was not in general very hard. They were usually well ^* ^^

Huguenot Emigration to America. Among them are said to have been Matthew Thornton, Baird,

one of the Signers of the Declaration of Independence; the parents of General Sullivan; the wife of the famous Sir Will-

iam Johnson of Mohawk Valley; and Charles Thompson,

sec-

retary of the Continental Congress (see Watson, p. 544). Gordon (p. 556) writes that many of the German and Irish settlers this class, "

from whom have sprung some of the most reputable and wealthy inhabitants of the province."

were of

82

Oi^ER

treated, protected

LAND AND 1\\'

SEA.

the law, and at the end of

their service received a certain outfit.^^

for a single

man, or

for children,

it

Indeed,

was often

of de-

cided advantage, being a sort of apprenticeship in which the customs of the new land were learned. It is said that

some

voluntarily sold themselves

for the sake of the experience they

would

get.^^

The chief hardship was when a whole family became the victims of fraudulent merchants, and on arriving in a land of freedom, as they fondly hoped, saw themselves torn asunder, sold to different parts of the country, parents

and children

being thus separated for years, perhaps forever.^s '"

See Fenwick, Furley, Kalm,

etc.

' Kalm, vol. i. "Many of the Germans who p. 304, says come liither bring money enough with them to pay their pas:

sage, but rather suffer themselves to be sold, with a view that during their servitude they may get some knowledge of the

language and quality of the countrj- and the like, that they may the better be able to consider what they shall do when they have got their liberty."

Cf. also:

"For many young

very good that they cannot pay their own freight. These will sooner be provided for than those who have paid theirs, and they can have their broad with others and soon

people

it is

learn the waj-s of the country."

Brumbaugh,

p.

(Letter of John

Naas

;

see

123.)

"

See the pathetic account given by Muhlenberg, Hallesche Nachrichten, li. p. 461: "Weit und breit von einander, unter allerlei

selten

Nationen. Sprachen und Zungen zerstreuet, so dass

sie

ihre altcn Eltern, oder auch die Geschwister sich ein-

ander im Leben wieder zu sehen bekommen." Evangeline must have frequently repeated

The

itself in

story of

those days.

CHAPTER

IV.

MANNERS AND CUSTOMS OF THE PENNSYLVANIAGERMAN FARMER IN THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY.

Although

Germans

of the early

of

many

Pennsylvania had been dis-

home; although Mittelberger

at

wealthy

Christopher Saner says that

"

tinctly tells us that

persons of rank, such as

nobles, learned or skilled people,"

were often

sold as redemptioners, yet the large majority of the eighteenth century settlers were poor. of course

was through no

fault of their

devastations of the Thirty Years' pecially the

own

This ;

War, and

the es-

wanton destruction ordered by Louis

XIV.

in the last

tury,

had reduced

decade of the seventeenth cento poverty

thousands

who had

been prosperous farmers and tradesmen; and not for two hundred years was this prosperity who remained in the fully restored to those

Whatever property they had been exgather together was used up in the

Fatherland.i able to

•

See p.

6.

83

THE PHNNSYLI^^NU-GERM^N FARMER.

84

penses of descending the Rhine and crossing the ocean, or was stolen by the unprincipled shipowners and their parasites, the Xewlanders.

was not long, however, before was transformed into prosperity and

this

It

was

poverty plenty. This

especially true of the JSIennonites,

when

the land was cheap, and

quantities thereof. diate

who bought

Later, property

neighborhood

who came

in the

of Philadelphia

large

imme-

and the ad-

became dearer and dearer, and be obtained at all. Those who came

jacent counties finally

not to

towards the middle of the century had to move further

and further

into the wilderness

beyond the

Blue Mountains or across the Susquehanna.^ After

the

Revolution,

however,

prosperity

reigned throughout the whole of the farming regions of the State. This prosperity was not entirely due to the peculiar conditions of Pennsylvania at that time; others, both of those who came before and of those

who

afterwards followed the same kind of

did not succeed.^

was

It

life,

largely due to the in-

domitable industry, the earnestness, the frugality, Dahero gehen sie immer weiter fort in das wilde Geund aus Noth weiter fortgelien milssen in die bllsche, »

.

.

.

noch unbebauten Einoden."

(Muhlenberg, Hall. Nach.,

I.

p.

342.') »

Pastoriiis says of the

Swedes and Dutch that they "are

have neither poor economists,

bams

nor

stalls. let

their grain

THE PENNSYLVANIA-GERMAN FARMER. and the consummate agricultural mans.^

When,

skill of

S5

the Ger-

they had been

in the Palatinate,

houses, barns, cattle, and crops, one thing they had still kept: the skill inherited from bereft of

all,

thirty generations of land-cultivators, a skill that "

had made the Palatinate "

literally

the

garden-

of

Germany.^ same skill, brought to Pennsylvania, soon changed the unbroken forest to an agriculspot

This

tural is

community

doubtful

adapted to

Germans

settlers as

its

any

in the world.

It

ever any colony was so perfectly

if

of

as rich as

Pennsylvania was to the

one hundred and

fifty

years ago.

The

though heavily timbered, was fertile and only needed the hand of the patient husbandman in order to blossom as the rose; when the Gersoil,

mans

arrived this condition was

fulfilled.

While

English and Scotch-Irish neighbors usually followed the course of rivers or larger streams,

their

thus lessening the labor of clearing, the Germans and Swiss would plunge boldly into an unlie

unthreshed,"

Irish likewise

etc.

were

(Pennypacker,

138.) inferior in this respect to the p.

The

Scotch-

Germans, wlio

soon had possession of the best farming land in the State. * " The Germans seem more adapted for agriculture and the improvement of a wilderness, and the Irish for trade," etc.

Penn told Pastorius " dass ihm der Eyffer der Hoch-Teutschen im Bauen sehr wohl gefalle." 5 So called by Schlozer one himdred and fifty years ago. (Proud,

II.

p. 274.)

86

THE PENNSYLI^ANIA-GERMAN FARMER.

broken wilderness, often the nearest habitation,

fifty

or sixty miles from

knowing

well that

where

the heaviest forest growth was, there the soil

must be good.^

could, in very truth, say

They

with the Swiss in Schiller's "

"

Wilhelm

Tell ":

Wir haben diesen Boden uns erschaflen Durch unserer Haii'le Fleiss, den alten Wald, Der soust der Biiren wilder Wolinung war, Zu einem Sitz fur Menschen umgewandelt." '

The

best soil in Pennsylvania for farming pur-

poses is limestone, and it is a singular fact that almost every acre of this soil is in possession of

German where

farmers.^ are

all

be said to skill

If

we may make

excellent,

Mcnnonites may

illustrate to the

highest degree the " Riehl says, der

Wo

agriculture; as

in

the

a distinction

Pflug durch goldene Auen geht da schliigt audi It is due to der Mennonite sein Bethaus auf." ^ the fact that Lancaster in limestone soil

and

is

County

is

especially rich

largely inhabited by

Men-

"the back lands being generally three tu one richer than those that lie by navigable rivers." (Proud, I. p. *

Penn

says,

247-) '

*

Schiller,

The

Bethlehem

"Wilhelm Tell,"

n. 2.

Coxe

said not long ago that a letter from written to his grandfather asserts that in Pennsyl-

late

Eckley B.

you are on limestone soil, you can open your mouth Pennsylvania Dutch and get a response every time. (Pro-

vania, if in

cecdings of Penn. Ger. Soc, »

Die

Pfiilzer, p. 374.

vol. v. p.

102.)

THE PENNSYLVANIA-GERMAN FARMER. nonites that

county '"

United States.^^

not

mere

any one

who

This

fact, as

has become the richest farming

it

in the

is

87

rhetoric, but a sober statement of actual

will take the trouble to look

cultural statistics of the country

up the

agri-

In the history find the statement

may

easily see.

of Lancaster County by Ellis and Evans we made that " within the memory of the oldest inhabitants there

had been no entire

failure of all its crops." Six-sevenths of the entire area, or 463,000 acres, are farm-lands. In 1890 the value of agricultural products in Lancaster County was

Lawrence County, N. Y., the next agricultural county had crops valued at $6,054,160, or while

$7,657,790, richest

St.

$1,603,630 less than Lancaster. As an instance of the rapidity with which the

new

settlers

became prosperous we may take the inventory of the goods " and chattels of Andrew Ferree of Lancaster County, who ' '

died in 1735, only twenty-five years after the that county

"

first

:

To wheat

^8 — wheat and

in the stack at

in the ground,

To a plow and two To two mauls and

rye

£^A- 0-0

£6

To great waggon, £12 —

little

waggon,

;^5...

pairs of irons three iron wedges, 9s.

.

—to

four old weeding hoes, 4s

To

a spade and shovel, 8s. three dung forks, los

To two

broad-axes, 12s.

—

adze, 7s

To sundry tools,

carpenter

tools,

—

a hand-saw,

hooks

matock and 18-O

to joyner's

axe and

^i — sundry joiner's

£2

—

19-0 3- S-o 12-0

;^2-5s

old iron

17- o-o i-io-o

13-0

to a

To seven duch sythes [sic'\ To four stock bands, two pair To

settlement in

hinges, sundry

14-0 to five sickles

and two old I

i-o

88

THE PENNSYLy/INIA-GERM^N FARMER. It is

surprising

how

rapidly agriculture pros-

In a letter on Bradpered Pennsylvania. dock's campaign, written by William Johnston, in

September 23, 1755, we find the following re" marks: Pennsylvania is much the best country oi any

I

have seen since

continent, and

To

I

have been upon the

much more

plenty of provisions

a cutting-box, twf) knives,

^aggs, ^2-ios

To two

—

To To

pair chains, 14s. to five bells, 12s

—

to

twenty-

— two hackles,

3-10-0

^I-IO 2-16-0

and other horse geers at.. other horse geers at _^i-ios. to a man's

four smal chains

saddle at

To

£i

—

;i{^i-io

—to two fowling

three falling axes at los.

pieces, £2 To a large Byble To twofether beds

2-10-0 at

£6 — to wearing

cloaths,

.

—

.

—

pot-racks, £1 four working horses. ;^24

two

To

colts,

£11

grown cows at ,^15 young cattle. ;^i3-io

six

—

—

to a

35- 0-0 to

ten

head of 28-10-0

—

T(j

two

a spinning-wheel,

To To

sley, 6s.

—

to

2-12-0 2- 6-0

mare and

eleven sheep, £'i~ij

—

13-0-0

2- 0-0

To

chests, 15s.

3- 0-0

2- 0-0

£7 To sundry pewter, £2-% — to a box iron, 4s. To sundry iron ware, £2 to a watering pot, 6s. To sundry wooden ware at £1 to two iron

To

i- 4-0

to swine,

^i-io.

.

.

Ss..

i- 3-0

2- 8-0

to cash

cash received for a servant girle's time.

5- 7-0

...

3- 0-0

7^2-

8-6-

THE PENNSYLf/ANIA-GERMAN FARMER. than Maryland or Virginia."

^^

89

Of Lancaster, "

the county town, Johnston says:

You

will

not

inland towns in

England so large as this, and none so regular; and yet this town, I am told, is not above twenty-five years' standsee

many

ing,^ is

2

and a most

delightful country

round

it.

It

mostly inhabited by Dutch people." That this prosperity was largely due to the

Germans is acknowledged by the English themselves. Thus Governor Thomas says in 1738: " This province has been for some years the asylum of the distressed Protestants of the Palatinate and other parts of Germany, and I believe it

may

truthfully be said that the present flour-

measure owing to the industry of these people." We have an interesting glimpse of the skill with which these ishing condition of

it

is

in great

^^

'^

Penn. Mag.,

vol.

xi. pp.

93

ff.

It

will be

remembered

was

the youngest of all the colonies except time of the Revolution it was second at the Georgia, although

that Pennsylvania in population. ^' ^'

Lancaster was laid out by James Hamilton in 1730. by the General Assembly

In the preamble of the act passed

of Pennsylvania in 1787 to incorporate a college in Lancaster are the words ''Whereas, the citizens of this State of Ger:

man

birth or extraction have eminently contributed

industry, economy, and public virtues present happiness and prosperity,"

by

their

to raise the State to its etc.

In

recent times

Bancroft has said that neither the Peimsylvania Germans nor others claim for them the credit due them.

THE PENNSYLy/INIA-GERM/1N FARMER.

90

farms were worked

made

He

b}'

in the description of a trip

Governor Thomas Pownall

visited

"

Lancaster,

a

pretty

in

1754.

considerable

town, encreasing fast and growing rich," and " I saw some of the finest then goes on to say :

farms one can conceive, and in the highest state of culture, particularly

of a Switzer.

Here

it

one that was the estate

was

I first

saw the method

watering a whole range of pastures and meadows on a hillside, by little troughs cut in the side of the hill, along which the water from of

springs was conducted, so as that when the outlets of these troughs were stopped at the end the

water ran over the sides and watered

all

the

ground between that and the other trough next below it. I dare say this method may be in use in England. I never saw it there, but saw it here

first." 1*

It is

no wonder

that, in

view of such extraordi-

nary prosperity on the part of many who a short time before had been destitute exiles from their

Benjamin Rush exclaims: "If it were possible to determine the amount of all the native land,

property brought into Pennsylvania by the present German inhabitants of the State and their an^*

Penn. Mag.,

culture

is

vol. xviii. p. 215.

seen likewise in the

This same

German

skill in agri-

settlements in

York, Maryland, Virginia, and even Ireland.

New

THE PENNSYLVANM-GERM^N FARMER. cestors,

and then compare

it

amount

of their property,

the

form such a monument

economy

of

with the present contrast

human

would

industry and

seldom been contemplated

as has

91

in

"

How different," he any age or country." " is their situation here from goes on to say, ^^

what

it

was

in

the princes of

Germany! Could the subjects of Germany, who now groan away

their lives in slavery

from an eminence

man

and unprofitable labor, view

month

in the

of

settlements of Strasburg or

June the Ger-

Mannheim

in

Lancaster County, or of Lebanon in Dauphin

County,

or

Bethlehem

of

Northampton they be accompanied on this venerable German farmer and be

— County, could eminence by a

by him that many

told of

grain,

in

full-fed

of these extensive fields

herds,

luxurious

meadows,

orchards promising loads of fruit, together with the spacious barns and commodious stone dwell-

ing-houses which compose the prospects which

have been mentioned, were all the product of a single family and of one generation, and were all secured to the owners of them by certain laws, I am persuaded that no chains would be able to deter

them from sharing

^5

the

Manners of

P- 55-

German

in the

freedom of their

Inhabitants of Pennsylvania,

THE PENNSYLy^NU-GERMAN FARMER.

92

friends

Pennsylvania jects."

and former fellow sub-

i«

Dr. Rush himself gives us

many

valuable hints

methods by which such striking results were obtained. His little pamphlet on "The Manas to the

ners of the

German

written in 1789,

is

Inhabitants of Pennsylvania," the most valuable of all the

eighteenth-century sources which throw light on the subject tails

we

are discussing.

He gives many de-

as to the thoroughness, far-sightedness,

attention to

little

man methods

and

marked the GerThus at the very out-

things which

of farming.

while the Scotch-Irish or English farmer would girdle or belt the trees, and leave them to set,

ground, their more far-sighted neighbors would cut them down and burn them, the rot in the

underwood and bushes being grubbed out of the ^ By this means a field was as fit for ground.^ cultivation the second year after it was cleared ^*

For further

Weld

glinipst-s of tliis pro.^perity see the

(1795) and

Travels of

An interesting detail (1825). the appellation "King" applied to a rich An old "Dutchman" once ?aid, speaking

Saxe-Weimar

in this connection

landed proprietor. " The of a

is

people call mc tlie king of the manor [townhim the king of the Octorara." In the and call they ship], MS. genealogy of the llcrr family, one sheet is marked friend,

"King"

Herr. "

halten niaiichtn sauren Tag, den Wald Mit weitversclilungenen Wurzehi aus/.utoden." (Schiller, "Wilhclm Toll,"

Und

ii.

2.)

THE PENNSYLV/iNIA-GERM/iN FARMER. as

was twenty years afterwards.

it

tended that

tlie

93

They con-

expense of repairing a plough,

which by the other method vvas often broken, was greater than the extra expense of grubbing the field in clearing. Their foresight and carefulness were also shown in their treatment of horses

and

cattle.

However economical they might be

with themselves, they were never so towards their

These were so well fed that the horses

live stock.

"

performed twice the labor of those horses, and the cattle yielded twice the quantity of milk of those cows, that are less plentifully fed." The Pennsylvania German's horses were well known "

over the State.

all

horse seems to

feel

the Indeed, says Rush, v.'ith his lord the pleasure and

pride of his extraordinary size and fat."^^ Not only were the horses well fed, but they were kept

warm

in winter

and spared

all

unnecessary labor, such as dragging heavy loads of wood for winter fires, or driving about the country for mere In this way they were able to pleasure.

^8

when

feats of strength

perform prodigious

the

This love for animals

is an inherited trait cf. Freytag, Freude des Landmanns war die Zucht seiner grosste ;

"Die

Rosse."

(I.

a

p.

307.)

proverb another form is applied repeats

sterbe

isch

Schrecke."

Meyer (Deutsche Volkskunde,

still

to

ka Verderbe

p. 212) near Heidelberg wliich in " Weiber the Pennsylvania farmer

current

:

!

Aber Gaulverrecke, des

isch

e

THE PENNSYLV/INI/i-GERMAN F/IRMFR.

94

time came, dragging the immense loads of produce over rough roads to Philadelphia, sixty miles or

The

more away.

farmer's

first

was

well cleared

care after getting his field

to build

an immense barn,

in

which no expense was spared to make it comfortable and ample. This was invariably done

any thought was taken of building a permanent home for himself. These great

before "

Swisser

"

barns, as they are called,^^ are

one

to the present day

down

of the characteristic fea-

tures of the landscape in the eastern counties of

Pennsylvania, and have often attracted the attention of travellers, not only in the past,-*^ but in these days

of

railroads,

when

the

traveller

is

whirled through Lancaster and other counties

on

his

way

West.

A

detailed description " not be out of place here. They

to the

them may are two stories high, with pitched roof, sufficiently large and strong to enable heavy farm-

of

teams to drive into the upper story, to load or unload grain. During the first period they were built

mostly of logs, afterwards of stone, frame,

'*

Either on account of the chalet-like projection of the upper stories, or because many of the farmers were Swiss. '"

The Duke

of

Saxe-Weimar says he was

struck with these barns,

many

of tluia

churches.

ii.

175 ami 177.)

(Travels, vol.

jip.

particularly

looking like large

THE PENNSYL^^ANIA-GERMAN FARMER.

95

or brick, from 60 to 120 feet long, and from 50 to 60 feet wide, the lower story, containing- the stables, front.

with feeding-passages opening on the The upper story was made to project 8 or

10 feet over the lower in front, or with a fore-

bay attached, to shelter the entries to the stables and passageways. It contained the threshing-

mows, and lofts for the storing of hay and grain. The most complete barns of the present day have in addition a granary on the upper floors,

under the driving-way, a wagonshed, with corn-crib and horse-power shed atfloor, a celler

tached."

21

The houses built of logs.

at first

were temporary structures

The preparation

for the

permanent

number

of years, dwelling was before the actual building operations were begun. Stones had to be quarried, lumber sawed and al-

the business of a

lowed

to

season;

two generations

frequently

and Evans, Hist. Lane. Co., p. 348. This same architectural pride of the farmer may be seen likewise in the *'

Ellis

Palatinate to-day; cf. Riehl, "Seine Oekonomiegebaude legt der reiche Gutsbesitzer mit einer fast monumentalen SchOnheit

und Dauerhaftigkeit an und schmUckt seinen Garten

lieber als

den Kirchhof."

calls the stables

Pfeilern

"wahre

Meyer (Deutsche Volkskunde, empfindet '

Vor

in

Elsewhere he

Prachthallen, massiv aus Stein, mit

und Kreuzgewolben."

man

155.)

p.

(Pfiilzer,

Bayem

(Ibid.,

p. 33)

:

vor einem

einer Ainet (Einodhof) soil

p.

190.)

Cf.

also

" Formliche Ehrfurcht stattlichen

Einzelhof:

man den Hut herabthun.'"

THE PENNSYLVANIA-GERMAN FARMER.

9^>

assisted

in

erecting

the

homestead.

family

"

These houses were generally built of stone (some of them with dressed corners), two stories high, with pitched roof and with cornices run across the gables and aiound the

German

if

if

built after the

Many were imposing

idea.

arched

cellars

with easy

rooms,

hung

open

oak-panelled

in

One

underneath,

stairs,

weights." of the

stone

story.

modelled

A

after the

or with a chimney at either

pattern,

gable-end,

old

in the middle,

chimney

large

first

English or Scotch structures having

spacious

most

fireplaces in partitions,

and

of the

windows

22

most interesting features

houses

hallways

are

the

quaint

of these

inscriptions

which adorn most of them, usually high up on the gable wall.2^ ]\Iany inscriptions consist simply of the initials or

" Weld,

names

of

man and

wife, with the

says the houses were mostly built of stone and as good as those usually met with on an arable farm of 50 acres in a well-cultivated part of England. (Travels, p. in 1795,

For pictures and descriptions of some of these old houses see Croll, Ancient and Historic Landmarks in the 115.)

Lebanon Valley. " This was a common custom

in the Palatinate; the religious

sentiments expressed are only seen on Protestant houses, and, significantly enough, date chiefly from the years of trial in tlie One of the earliest of seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.

such inscriptions was

made by

the wife of the

Count Palatine

Johaim Kasimir of Zweibriicken, over the portal of

tlie

Castle

THE PENNSYLVANIA-GERMAN FARMER.

97

date of building.

Others, however, are proverbs or quotations from Bible and hymn-book, and thus throw a good deal of light on the practical

and pious character the Weidman house

of the builders.

Thus on

Clay Township, Lancaster County, are the following words: in

''Wer will baueii an die Strassen Muss ein jeder reden lassen." ^*

On

Peter Bricker's

Township,

in

house, in

West Cocalico

Lancaster County, built of sand-

stone in 1759 and ten these words:

still

as

good

as new, are writ-

"Gott gesegne dieses Haus, Und alle was da gehet ein und aus; Gott gesegne alle sampt, Und dazu das ganze Land."

more pious is the inscription on a log-house Albany Township, Berks County, built by

Still

in

Cornelius Frees in 1743.

On

Katharinenburg, consisting of her

a large iron plate

initials,

the year (1622),

and beneath, "Wer Gott vertraut, hat wohl gebaut." (Riehl, Die Pfalzer, p. 198.) Tn Switzerland, also, such inscriptions were common, as we may see from Schiller's "Wilhelm Tell" (i.

2),

where, speaking of Stauffer's house, he says " Mit bunten Wappenschildern

:

ist's beraalt,

Und

weisen Spriichen, die der Wandersmann Verweileud liest und ihren Sinn bevvundert."

2*

Riehl (Die Familie,

of this verse

p.

199) gives the following variation

:

"Wer

da bauet an Markt und Strassen, Muss Neider und Narren reden lassen."

THE PENNSYLy^NlA-GBRMAN FARMER.

98

which had been walled

in

on the side of the build-

ing are the following lines:

"Was Alls

nicht zu Gottes Elir'

Glauben

Merck

auf,

gelit ist

O

Sunde;

theures Hertz,

Verliere keine Stunde.

Die iiberkluge Welt Versteht doch keine Waaren, Sie sucht und fiiidet Kotli

Und

Next

to barn

last die Perle

fahren."

"

and dwelling-house the most im-

portant architectural product of the Pennsylvania Germans is the great Conestoga wagon, which

Rush

called the

"

ship of inland commerce." Be-

fore the advent of railroads these

means towns

of of

between

transport

vegetables,

fruit,

and.

chief

farms

and

the

them the wheat, whiskey, which

In

Pennsylvania.

were the

—

alas!

often formed a side industry of

many

a farmer,

—

were carried for miles to Philadelphia. Says " Rush: In this wagon, drawn by four or five horses of a peculiar breed, they convey to market, over the roughest roads, 2000 and 3000 pounds' In the weight of the produce of their farms. months of September and October it is no un-

common

thing on the Lancaster and Reading

roads to meet in one day of these

wagons on **

their

Montgomery,

fifty

or one hundred

way

to

Hist., of

Philadelphia,

Berks Co.

THE PENNSYLVANIA-GERMAN FARMER. most

of

These

which

teams

belong-

were

to

stately

German

99

farmers." in

objects

those

owner and driver alike took pride in them and kept them neat and trim. They con-

times;

heavy horses, well fed and curried, wearing good harness, and sometimes adorned with bows of bells, fitted so as to form sisted of five or six

an arch above the fully selected to

collar.

These

bells

were care-

harmonize or chime, from the

small treble of the leaders to the larger bass upon the wheel-horses. The wagon-body was neces-

and strong, but by no means them the wheelwright and black-

sarily built stanch

clumsy. Upon smith expended their utmost

skill

and good

taste,

and oftentimes produced masterpieces of work, both in shape and durability. The running-gear

was invariably painted red, and the body blue. The cover was of stout white linen or hempen material,

drawn

tightly over, shapely, fitted to

the body, lower near the middle and projecting like a bonnet in front and at the back, the whole

having a graceful and sightly outline.^^ In addition to the labor in the

fields

and the

larger interests of the farm, the cultivation of the garden, which was the invariable adjunct of each and Evans, Hist. Lancaster Co., p. 350. The railroads put an end to these wagons. Tliey reappeared latter in the well-known "prairie schooners." '5

Ellis

^^C,t\ i^p

lOO

THE PENNSYLl^/INIA-GERMAN FARMER. was

lioiise,

no small

of

A

itiiportance.

ilowers has always been

tlic

love for

characteristic of the

natives of the I\-ilatinate,2' and this love

is

as noticeable in Pennsylvania as in the at

country;

house

the present day there

quite

home-

not a farm-

is

country, or even a small dwelling in town, that is not adorned with flowers of many in the

kinds, often rare.

They form

the one bright

touch of poetry in the otherwise hard routine of farm-Iife.28

More

important, however,

from a practical

point of view, was the cultivation of garden vegetables, in

which the Germans soon reached the

foremost rank

;

Rush

says definitely that

"

Penn-

indebted to the Germans for the prin^9 cipal part of her knowledge in horticulture." " " of a number Since the settlement," he says, sylvania

of

is

German gardeners

the neighborhood

in

Philadelphia, the tables of

all

of

classes of citizens

"Im

ubrigen Rheinland erfreut sich wohl auch der gemeine Mann am Blumenschmuck seines Hauses, aber so allgemein wie auf dem linken Ufer der Pfalz nirgends." (Riehl, *'

Pfalzer, p. 192.)

Richl traces this love for flowers back to the

days of Roman occupation of the Rhine. *8 See Ritter's History of the MoravianChurch inPluladelpliia, parsonage in addition to peach, pear, and plum trees there were various kinds of roses,

for description of the

garden of

lilacs, heart's-ease, lilies, etc.

"

Rush,

p. 23.

tlie

;

THE PENNSYLVANIA-GERMAN FARMER.

loi

have been covered with a variety of vegetables in every season of the year." days was a profession and a hard and laborious one, although one sure of

Farming

in those

The whole

profitable returns.

his labor, his thoughts, his

volved about

of the farmer,

hopes and

fears, re-

one thing.^^ Industry was the idleness and sin went hand in

this

highest virtue, " When hand.21 "

life

a

young man," says Rush,

asks the consent of his father to marry a

his choice, the latter

does not so

much

girl of

inquire

whether she be rich or poor, but whether she is industrious and acquainted with the duties of a "^

good housewife." Even the superstitions vania Germans largely agricultural ***

In the

life.

to see

It is interesting

do with farming "

life

of the early Pennsylclustered about their

last century,

how many

and

in

of their proverbs

some had

to

:

Im kleinsten Raum Und pflege sein, er

pflanz einen

Baum

bringt dir's ein ";

" Eine gute Kuh sucht man imStalle"; "Gut gewetzt ist halb gemaht"; "Ein kleines Schaf ist gleich geschoren"; " Futter macht die etc. Giiule,"

31

" Arbeite treu und glaub es

Dass Faulheit

Der Mussiggang

Und *'

Hence

alle

the proverb,

Sparbiichse."

fest

iirger ist als Pest,

viel

Boses

lehrt,

Art von SUnden mehrt.'

"Eine

fleissige

Hausfrau

ist

die beste

THE PENNSYLy/tNM-GERMAN F/1RMER.

I02

places well

strange

on

had many and curious practices. These

in the nineteenth, they

belief?

which

superstitions

they

brought

from

the

Fatherland run back their roots to the early It seems to be twilight of German history.

another phase of that deep touch of poetry so characteristic

of

German

character and which

has so powerfully influenced the

ment

in

more recent

times.

pietistic

of the

Many

of the eighteenth century, both in

move-

customs

Germany and

Pennsylvania, are survivals of heathen customs that have

come

floating

down

the centuries, the

flotsam and jetsam of the religious beliefs of our

pagan ancestors. One of the most widely spread the

influence

of these be-

heavenly bodies. When Shakespeare makes Cassius say, "The fault, dear Brutus, lies not in our stars, But in ourselves, that we are underlings," liefs

is

he alludes to a

of

belief that

the

was well-nigh universal

the Middle Ages, that the peculiar juxtaposi-

in

and planets at the birth of any have a lasting influence on the

tion of the stars

individual will life

of the

new-born

child.

Among

the Pennsyl-

vania Germans the signs of the heavens were always noted and recorded at the birth of the child,'3

"

and we are

told that the hermits

This was an old German custom.

on the

Goethe begins his

THE PENNSYLVANIA-GERMAN FARMER..

103

by the In the old German alma-

Wissahickon partly gained casting of horoscopes.

their living

nacs certain days were marked as lucky or un-

lucky ;2-* any one born on these days was

engagements or poverty tracted then were sure to be to

doomed

marriages

;

failures,

con-

and the

man would

wise

business.

begin no legal or other kind of Ascension-day there should be no

On

Of

letting of blood.^5

was a knowledge

especial interest to farmers

of the times

different phases of the

moon had

observed from the almanac, for in the

waxing

of the

to

be carefully

cereals planted

all

moon grew more

rapidly

Things planted when

than in the waning. "Wahrheit und Dichtung

The

and seasons.

"

with these words

:

"

Am

28.

the Au-

dem Glockenschlage zwolf, kam ich in auf die Welt. Die Constellation war gliick-

gust 1749, Mittags mit

Frankfurt lich

:

nirte '*

Die Sonne stand im Zeichen der Jungfrau, und culmifijr den Tag," etc.

These were Jan.

March 21

;

am Main

14, 16;

Aug.

10, 15.

nal of

April

20, 21

2,

3,

17, 18;

4,

6,

May

11,

8

7,

Sept. 10, 18; Oct. 6

;

12; Feb.

i,

17,

18;

June 17; July 17, Nov. 6, 10 Dec. 6, ;

;

(See Owen, Folk-Lore from Buffalo Valley, Pa., Jour-

American Folk-Lore

The custom middle ages, was '5

;

i,

10,

Society, vol. iv. ) of blood-letting, universal throughout the still in full sway in Pennsylvania a hundred

In the Journal of Christopher Marshall, under the years ago. date May 13, 1780 (at Lancaster) we find this entry: "This was a remarkable day for the German men and women,

So many came that I bleeding at (Dr.) Chrisley Neff's. he must work hard to bleed the whole. presume Strange infatuation." (Papers of Lane. Co. Hist. Soc, vol. ni. p. 156.)

THE PENNSYLy/INM'GERMAN FARMER.

I04

moon was

in the

sign of the

abundant.

When

the horns of the

Twins would be

moon were

down onions must be planted; beans, and early potatoes, however, when the horns were up. Apples should be picked in the dark of the else they

would

during the

moon,

Hogs should be

rot.

slaughtered otherwise the moon,

of the

waxing

meat would shrink and be poor. Even the thatching of houses should be done when the horns of

moon were down,

and when

or the shingles would curl; fences were built, the first or lower rail

should be

laid

the

when

the horns were up, while the

stakes should be put in and the fence finished

when

the horns were down.

the affairs of

done

life

" literally

Omens were

which were supposed

by the book." It

frequent.

a bird entered the room,

if

Such are a few

if

was

a sign of death

a horse neighed or

a looking-glass were

at night, or

broken

same thing was supposed

;

the

to be true

dreaming of having teeth pulled, or ing some one dressed in black. of

As water was one for every house,

"

it

of the is

be

^e

dog barked

if

to

of

of see-

most important things

not surprising that super

-

This view of the influence of the moon's phases is as old itself: "Aus demselben Grund, aus welzu Ariovist's Zeit den Gernianen gclin'en,

German history chem weise Frauen

as

dass sie nicht vor etc.

Neumond

die Schlacht Ijeginnen soUten,"

(Riehl, Kulturstudien, p. 47.)

THE PENNSYLVANIA-GERMAN FARMER. natural

means were employed

to discover

it.

105

The

following device of "smelling" for water was once common " Hold a forked willow or peach limb :

with the prongs down, and move over the spot where water is desired. If water is present, the

down in spite of all you can do; it has been known to twist off the bark. The depth of water may be known by the number and stick will turn

Ore can be found the

strength of the dips made.

same way." Also curious signs.

If

in

their

way were

the weather

the ears of corn burst, a mild winter

will follow;

but

will

be cold

they are plump. If the spleen of a hog be short and thick, the winter will be short, and vice versa. If on Febit

if

ruary 2d the ground-hog comes out and sees his shadow, he will retire to his hole and six weeks of cold weather will follow. is

on the ground,

So,

when

the

snow

turkeys go to the field or the If guinea-hens halloo, there will be a thaw. cocks crow at 10 p.m., it will rain before morning. if

Witches were believed

in

to

a

more or

and not only human beings, but inanimate objects, and even operations extent,

as

butter-making,

were

more

or

less

less

cattle,

such sub-

Horseshoes or malign influence. broomsticks laid across the door were supposed ject to their

to

keep them out.

Silver bullets shot at a pic-

io6

THE PENNSYLV/1NM-GERMAN FARMER.

ture of a supposed witch

or her

would bring about

his

death.-"'"

The use of amulets and incantations was more or less common. By means of the former it was " believed that one could make himself kugelfest," i.e., proof against bullets.^^ As was natural when doctors were few and far between, suwas largely predominant in medicine. Especially were old women endowed with curaperstition

tive

powers.

Those who were born on Sunday

were supposed to have power to cure headache. Among the strange methods of healing may be mentioned the following: To remove warts cut an apple, a turnip, or an onion into halves and rub the wart with the pieces and then bury them under the eaves of the house. A buckwheat cake placed on the head will remove pain; and breathing the breath of a fish will cure whooping

To cure " falling away " in a child make bag of new muslin, fill with new things of any

cough. a

''

There was, however, none of the fanatic cruelty once so prevalent in Germany and which has given to Salem, Mass., such a baleful notorietj^ in American history. '* This superstition was once wide-spread

Luther believed in " Der Glaube, dass Feinde verfesten .

it

man .

.

in

Germany

;

See Freytag, vol. ni. p. 73 den Leib gegen das Geschoss der

firmly.

kOime,

:

ist iilter als

"

das geschichtliclic

II was said of Captain Lcben der germanischen Vrilker. " and in the French Indian Wettcrholt, War, that he was kugel-

fest."

THE PENNSYLVANIA-GERMAN FARMER. kind, and place it

ting

it

on the breast

107

of the child, let-

In the mean-

remain there nine days.

while feed the child only with the milk of a young heifer. After nine days carry the bag by the

little

finger to a brook that flows towards the

west and throw

it

over the shoulder.

As

the

contents of the bag waste away the child will recover. Perhaps one of the strangest and yet

most interesting that of

of all these quaint

powwowing, or

the use of magic formulas

for the cure of certain diseases.

esting to see this survival

ago

in

our

own

certain parts of

customs was

down

country, and

Germany,

of a

very interto a short time

It is

still

flourishing in

custom which

is

as

German language itself. Some of the remains of Old High German and Old

old as the earliest

Saxon poetry are

the so-called

"

Segensformen,"

not very different from powwowing.^^ The latter

was once believed in by many of the Pennsylvania Germans. It was supposed to be especially efBcacious in nose-bleed or blood-flow; in re-

moving pain from cuts, bruises, burns; and also in skin-diseases. Thus the goitre was cured by looking at the Avaxing moon, passing the hand over the diseased part, and saying, "What I sec

must ^^

"

Cf. Cf.

increase,

what

I

feel

must decrease."

^°

Braune, Althochdeutsches Lesebuch, p. 81. Meyer, Deutsche Volkskunde, p. 116: "Hat es [a

io8

THE PENNSYLV/iNIA-GERMAN FARMER.

more curious

Still

described by Dr. in

existing

words were

is

W.

Lehigh

cure for snake-bite,

the

Hoffman as formerly The following County. J.

recited:

" Gott hot

alles arschaflfen

und

alles

war gut

;

Als du alle [alter] Schlang, bislit ferflucht, Fcrflucht solsht du sei' und dei' Gift."

The speaker then with

the

index-finger

made

the sign of the cross three times over the wound, each time pronouncing the onomatope tsing.-^^

Even

in religion these superstitions

had

their

opening of the Bible at random and taking the verse which fell under the finger as the direct word of God a custom which, more

place, and the

—

or less changed, has lasted for nearly fifteen hundred years "*- was once employed by the Mora-

—

vians in

all

the affairs of

life,

including marriage,

child] ein Muttermal, so blickt die Mutter, das

Kind im Arm,

auf einem Kreuzweg in den zunehmenden Mond und spricht, indem sie das Mai mit der Hand bestreicht Alles, was ich :

sehe,

nimmt

zu, Alles,

was

ich streiche,

nimmt ab."

*'

Proceedings of Penn. Ger. Society, vol. v. p. 78. ** "Der uralte Aberglaube, weklier schon im Jahre 506 auf von dem Concilium Agde den Christen verboten wurde, kam

wieder in Aufnahme

man

schlug die Bibel oder das Gesangzufiillis^eni Wortlaut die EntscheiduTig bei innerer Unsicherheit zu finden, der Sprucli, auf welchen der

buch

auf,

um

aus

Daumen

;

—

war der Ijedeutsame ein Brauch, der unserm Volke haftet, und von den Gegnern '' Stillen im Lande "] schon um 1700 als ^le is speakinc; of the 'Diiumehi' verhohnt wurde." (I'Veytag, vol. iv. p. 18.)

rechte

noch heute

traf,

fest in

;

THE PENNSYLy^lNM-GERM/IN FARMER. and

is

109

actually used to-day by the Mennonites in

choosing their bishops.

The

unremitting-

toil

;

the monotony.

soon

was one of few recreations came to break

of the Pennsylvania farmer

life

Up

before sunrise and to bed

such was the ordinary routine, day after day, year after year. Later in the cenafter sunset,

tury

came more and more the usual

ties,

quilting and husking parties, country fairs,

rural festivi-

Very common were the

markets, and vctidus.

butcherings

—when

would help

in the killing of

the

friends

of

the

family

hogs and the preparation of the many kinds of sausages; and es" " frohcs in which the pecially common were the various kinds of fruit-butters, of which the Pennsylvania

Germans were so

huge ketdes, tended

to

and

fond, were boiled in stirred

by friends and

neighbors invited for the purpose.^^ In general, however, life was uneventful, " one

common round events in

of daily task."

all lives

—

The

birth, marriage,

were the occasion of more or

three great

and death

—

less celebration, the

weddings and funerals being attended by large concourses of people, who came in wagons from far and near. The custom of providing food for *'

Cf.

Riehl

(Pfjilzer, p.

267) for a description of a similar

combination of business and pleasure in the preparation of Obstlatwerge in the Palatinate.

no THE

PENNSYLV/tNIA-GERMAN FARMER.

long distance many had to come, soon grew to be conventional and too

visitors, due at first to the

often excessive. plains

of

this

Muhlenberg frequently comexcess at both weddings and

funerals.

An

interesting

funerals

one

of

description

" is

given by Mittelberger:

known more than

fifty

Enghsh

these

In this man-

an invitation to a funeral

ner such

of

is

made

miles around in

twenty-four hours. If it is possible, one or more persons from each house appear on horseback at the appointed time to attend the funeral. While the people are pieces

is

coming

good cake cut

in,

handed around on a large

into

tin platter to

those present; each person receives then, in a goblet, a hot West India rum punch, into which

lemon, sugar, and juniper-berries are put, which After this, hot and give it a delicious taste.

sweetened cider ple

have nearly

is

all

served.

.

.

.

When

the peo-

assembled and the time for

come, the dead body is carried to the general burial-place, or, where that is too far away, the deceased is buried in his own

the burial

field.'*-*

**

is

The assembled people

ride

all

in silence

of these old private graveyards are now utterly neirlected and overgrown with weeds Riehl's description of

Many

;

the neglected graveyards in the Palatinate is almost word for word true of many in Pennsylvania "Eine verwilderte Ilccke :

THE PENNSYLVAhllA-GERMAN FARMER,

m

and sometimes one can count from one hundred The to five hundred persons on horseback. coffins are ah made of fine walnut wood and

brown with a shining varnish." ^^ It must not be inferred from the above references to rum and cider that the Pennsylvania Germans as a people were especially addicted to stained

drank

;

in

years ago every one " were a England the settlers

One hundred

strong drink.

New

beer-drinking and ale-drinking race

—as

Shake-

speare said, they were 'potent in potting' ;"^^ and no public ceremony, civil or religious, occurred

which great quantities of liquor were not drunk.^^ The custom of drinking at funerals, in

Regellose mit Gras und Gestriipp verwachsene Erhuhungen zeigen die Griiber an." (Pfalzer, p. 407.) He attributes this neglect to the traditional dislike of the Reformed

umzaunt

sie.

people to all pomp and ceremony even in death it is still more true of the Mennonites, who seek the utmost simplicity in all ;

things temporal or spiritual,

—in

life

"Ein

and death.

Mit-

glied der Gemeinschaft im Bemer Jura ausserte mir gelegenman soUte nicht genotigt sein. die Toten auf

tlich die Ansicht,

den Friedhofen zu beerdigen ein jeder Grundbesitz thun diirfen." (Muller, p. ;

^5

up

In

all

fcr if

sollte dies

auf seinem

62.)

was careful to gather making the shavings and sawdust and place them in the coffin, any portion thereof should be brought into a house, these coffins the carpenter

death was sure to follow. *8

Alice Morse Earle, Customs

and Fashions

in

Old

New

England, p. 163. *^ In the record of the ordination of Rev. Joseph McKean,

112

THE PENNSYLy/fNIA-GERMy4N FARMER.

which Muhlenberg reprehends so

stoutly,

was

observed by the Scotch-Irish and the the Puritans of New England.*** Indeed we have equally

the authority of Benjamin Rush,

who has been

in Beverly, Mass., in 1785, these items are found in the tavernbill

keeper's

:

30 Bowles of Punch before

tlie

people went to meet/"3

ing

6 80 people eating in the morning at i6d i 10 10 liottles of wine before they went to meeting .... 10 4 68 dinners at 3s

44 bowles of punch while 18 bottles of wine

at dinner

8 bowles of brandy

cherry Rum 6 people drank tea

4

8

2 1

14 2

i

10 gd.

^

Mrs. Earle gives the following bill for the mortuary exin 1678: penses of David Porter of Hartford, who was drowned

£0 By a pint of liquor for those who dived for him By a (juart of liquor for those who bro't him home ... By two quarts of wine & i gallon of cyder to jury of inquest 8 gallons

By By I

is.

2

5

&

3 qts. wine for funeral

£1

15

16

barrel cyder for funeral

12

coffin

Windeing

With

this

feast of

18

sheet

we may compare

the

Johannes Gunire and

bill

his

for the

double funeral-

wife of Germantown,

1738:

&

Cakes at sd Burialls Gamons Cheese & Butter

Bread

Mol.\sses

&

Sugar

....

£1 i

10 152 143

in

THE PENNSYLl^ANM-GERMAN FARMER. 113 called the father of the

Temperance movement

Pennsylvania Germans were not addicted to drunkenness.^^

United

in the

States, that the

In this chapter we have endeavored to give a brief sketch of the Pennsylvania farmer a hun-

would be

some value

dred years ago.

It

more

into detail

concerning the routine of daily

life.

The

to

go

book, however, will not

nor perhaps would these the same interest as those which

permit fer

limits of this

of

this,

details oftell

of ele-

gant mansions, stately equipages, and all the pomp and circumstance of colonial Virginia and New England. The houses of the simple folk

whom we

are discussing, their furniture, cloth-

ing,^^ food,^i

and

all

the accessories of

were

life

marked by plainness and comfort rather than by Hard work, good health, an easy conelegance. science, independence begotten of possession of

a comfortable

home, and land enough

to provide

*^

This notwithstanding the fact that hard drinking has ever been and is to-day a national failing of the Germans. The

deep religious movement in Pennsylvania one hundred years ago tended to keep the people moderate in drinking. 5° This was at first homespun and very simple. The Moravians, Mennonites,

Amish, and Ephrata Brethren had a spe-

cial garb. ^1

Typical Pennsylvania-German dishes are Sauerkraut, fruitNudels, Schnitz und Knep, many kinds of sausages, Schmierkind of '-Fasnachts" coldslaw, butters," cruller), (a '

kas, etc.

'

114

THE PENNSYl.y/INIA-GERM/iN FARMER.

for all their cestors, a

life

depreciation

ground

of

wants

—

this

was the

life

of our an-

not altogether to be looked at with

even

from

the

present

vantage-

modern comforts and conveniences.

CHAPTER

V.

LANGUAGE, LITERATURE, AND EDUCATION.

Among

the

phenomena conPennsylvania Germans none is

many

nected with the

more

interesting

striking than their persistence in chnging

Here we have a group

to their dialect.

of people

living in the very heart of the United States, sur-

rounded on

all

sides

by English-speaking people,

almost every family having some of

its

branches

thoroughly mixed by intermarriage with these people, yet still after the lapse of nearly two hundred years retaining to a considerable degree the

Even

language of their ancestors.

in large

and

flourishing cities like Allentown, Reading, and

Bethlehem much and home-life

is

of the intercourse in business

carried

persistence of language

on is

in this patois.

one

evidences of the conservative

This

of the strongest

spirit

so character-

Pennsylvania-German farmer. This love for their language, which to-day may be regarded as a really striking phenomenon, istic

of the

was only natural one hundred and

fifty

years ago. 115

Ii6

LANGUAGE, LITERATURE, AND EDUCATION.

was then new, the Germans formed a compact mass by themselves, the means of communication with their Enghsh neighbors were rare it would have been surprising- if they

Tlic country

;

had not clung was precisely

to the this

language of their

same love

for

fathers.

the

It

mother

tongue which led the Puritans to leave Holland, where they were in many respects comfortable enough.

And

1

was regarded a stubborn and

yet this very natural desire

by some

at least as evidence of

ignorant nature.^ The very efforts English the motives of many of

—

more or ^

less

mixed

"They wished

English traditions," p. 74.)

Winslow

to etc.

—

to

made by

whom

the

were

do away with the use of

preserve their English speech and (Fiske, Beginnings of New England,

(in his Brief Narrative,

quoted by Palfrey,

Hist, of N. Eng. i. p. 147) says the Puritans did not like to tliink of losing their language and tlieir name of English,"

and longed that God might be pleased, "to discover some where they might place unto them, though in America, live and comfortably subsist," and at the same time "keep their names and nation." "Jede Provinz," says Goethe. .

'•

in

liebt ihren Dialekt,

welchem

denn

er

die Secle ihren

ist

.

.

doch eigentlich das Element,

Atem

schopft."

(Meyer, Volks-

kunde, p. 279.) * In 1755 Samuel Wharton proposed, "in order to incline them to become English in education and feeling quicker," that the English language should ht used in all bonds and legal

and that no newspaper should be circulated them unless among accompanied by an English translation.

instruments,

LANGUAGE, LITERATURE, AND EDUCATION,

German only tended

n?

to strengthen the stubborn

love for their language in which their Bible and hymn-books were written and in which their services were held.

Indeed, the following prayer, which was introduced into the litany of the Lu-

theran Church, in 1786, smacks of what many would now call real fanaticism " And since it :

has pleased Thee chiefly, by means of the Germans, to transform this State into a blooming garden, and the desert into a pleasant pasturage, help us not to deny our nation, but to endeavor that our youth

may

be so educated that

schools and churches

but

may

a

attain

may

still

German

not only be sustained,

more

flourishing condi-

tion."

The vernacular thus

religiously preserved

was

not the literary language of Germany, but a distinct dialect. We have seen that the vast majority of emigrants to

Pennsylvania during the last century came from the various States of South Germany the three principal ones which ;

furnished settlers being the Palatinate, Wiirtemberg, and Switzerland. The inhabitants of these three form two ethnical entities which are

more

or less closely allied, Wiirtemberg and Switzerland being practically pure Alemannic, while the Palatinate is Prankish with a strong infusion of

LANGUAGE, LITERATURE, AND EDUCATION.

Ii8

blood

Alemannic

in

certain

thereof.^

parts

Hence

it

follows that the Pennsylvania-German

dialect

is

a mixture of Prankish

Of course

and Alemannic.

there are subdivisions in these dialects,

the Swabian of Wiirtemberg being different from that of Switzerland, and the mixed speech of the

Palatinate different from both.^

The Pennsyl-

vania German, then, has as a basis certain characteristics derived fied

from

these dialects, modi-

all

and harmonized, many

of the original dif-

ferences having in course of time been so transformed that to-day the dialect is in general

homogeneous.

The

accurate study of any dialect

is

one of

great difficulty, and should only be undertaken by a specialist who has been thoroughly trained in the subject of phonetics

and who has made a

long and careful personal study of the facts on the spot. This is not the place, nor is the writer competent, to give a esting dialect.

full

treatment of this inter-

There are some

however, which are easily understood and which at the same time form the most striking characteristics. *

.See Riehl. p.

*

See Paul's Grundriss

105

facts,

ff.

der Germanischen Philologie.

also Riehl, Pfalzer, p. 273

The

vol.

variations

pp. 538-540 the dialect of the Palatinate may be studied in the four " Volksdichter " Kobell, Nadler, Schandein, and Lennig.

I.

in

;

fT.

LANGUAGE, LITERATURE, AND EDUCATION. 119 Such are the takes

open)

and

as

aa,

following

the in

schlof

woge (waagen),

German

used

for

hem

(heiin),

e

hem

coming

and

ei

Jie

iibcr, etc.).

del

is

(thcil),

Germaji dia-

in all

becom-

simplified,

= hdhe,

bes=bdse), and ii bebrick briickc, ivvcr

=

— biiclicr, (bichcr

i

c

(zsjahr);

as

ciu,

As

(bdiimc).^

(here=hdrcn,

zvor

(jahr),

a

frogc (frogcn),

(schlaf),

mixed vowels are

lects, the

ing

jor

less

German

the

of

place

or

(more

:

=

The above vowel changes

are exten-

frequent are the changes of en in a few words to ci (fcicr fciicr, scheier= sively

used;

less

=

and of

schcucr),

ci

= weihe). A zvoy

and

ai to

oy (moy

very interesting

= inai,

zzvarch = zzvcrg,

Even

kirche.)

=

phenomenon

the influence of r on the preceding

= erbc,

oy

i

or

::ay'kcl = zirkcJ,

c

ci,

is

{arve

karch

=

some words under-

the vowel u in

= — goes a similar change {dazvrsch durst fazvrch In some cases an inorfurcht, kazvrz-=knr::). ,

ganic vowel is developed between a liquid and the following consonant {milich milch, marikt

=

=markt,

starick

= stork,

barik

= berg).

In regard to the consonant-system the following peculiarities may be noted: g between two 6

we

In

many words

find both

JHed

a wavering in this use of and JHa'd; and especially are the

there

is

w Dutch as we did in English. sweet and delightful it is to a New-Born Soul!" (Dotterer, Of Antes Whitefield says he "seemed to Hist. Notes, p. 84.) have drunk deeply into the consnlations of the Holy Spirit."

farther,

.

6

Among

.

.

I

the rare bibliographical treasures in Pennsylvania

THE RELIGIOUS

LIFE.

confusion and dishonesty which

I57 so

often

ac-

companied an ocean voyage then, made every to get possession of the precious book.

efifort

how even redemptioners saved their chance earnings to buy copies. One of the first things a man did on getting married Muhlenberg

was

to

us

buy a family

universal

demand

his

lish

tells

Bible.

It

was

to supply this

that Sauer undertook to pub-

famous

Quarto.

Nor

were

these

Bibles mere ornaments of the centre-table; they formed the daily food of those who possessed

them.

The people

fest," their

of those days

were

"

Bibel-

memories were stored with the best

passages; and this is true not only of adults, but of little children as well.

The same statements apply which was held the Bible.

It

in

to the

hymn-book,

almost the same reverence as

was not

left in

the

pew

at church,

but shared with the Holy Book the honor of being read constantly and learned by heart.'^ They to-day are the copies of the Bible published by Froschauer of Zurich, and brought over by the early Swiss Mennonites. '

are given by Muhlenberg in Hall. Nach.

Many examples

Take

as a single instance the pathetic story of the death of a

When too weak himself to sing the hymns, six-year-old boy. "deren er eine schone Anzahl gelemet, " he would ask his " Als sein parents to sing. Verlangen erfuUt war, gab er seinem Vater einen liebreichen Kuss zum Abschiede, begehrte

hemach wieder auf den Vers sungen:

'

sein Bette,

und indeni

beiderseits Eltern

Breit aus die Flijgel beide,

O Jesu

meine

THE RELIGIOUS

158

LIFE.

"

"

were not only Bibel-fest," but Gesangbuchfest," and in times of danger, sickness, and death comfort and strength were drawn from the grand old hymns of the Church. Many touching and inspiring stories might be told in this connection, like that of

Barbara Hartman, who

years' captivity

among

the Indians

after

was restored

whom

she only recognized the latter sang to her the hymn,

to her mother,

many when

" Allein und doch nicht ganz allein, Bin ich in meiner Einsamkeit.'"^

with which she had often or that

daughter to sleep;

cradled her

more

still

John Christian Schell and four sons, who kept at bay a band

story of

Indians and Tories

all

infant

inspiring

his wife

and

of sixty-four

night long, shooting at

them from the windows, and keeping up

their

courage by singing lustily Luther's old battle" Ein feste Burg ist Unser Gott," emhymn, phasizing,

we

well

may

believe,

especially the

lines:

"

Und wenn die Welt voll Teufel wUr' Und woUt' uns gar verschlingen, So fiirchten wir uns nicht so sehr, Es muss uns doch gelingen."'

Freude,

Und nimm

dein Kiichlein ein,' entschlief er sanft und

seinem Erlciser." This interesting story

stille in ^

(vol. is

11.

p. 468.)

given in detail in Hall. Nach.,

vol. H. p. ®

479 ff. Kapp, p. 262

ff.

It is

family was rescued on

a satisfaction to

tlie

following day.

know

that this brave

THE RELIGIOUS

What

LIFE.

has been stated above

IS9

is

perhaps only another way of saying that the whole religious

Pennsylvania Germans was This movement, strongly marked by pietism. which we have spoken of before, was not a of

life

the

early

propagation of dogma or a new ecclesiastical polity, but the immediate application of the teaching of Christ to the heart and conduct, a revolt against the formalism of the orthodox church; it

was

Germany what Methodism became

to

later

to England. It

is

interesting to note the development of

pietism in Pennsylvania. Almost all those who came over in the early part of the century were afifected

by

it;

Company was

nay, the Frankfort

formed by the members of one of the socalled Collegia Pietatis founded by Spener; hence Germantown owes its foundation to this movement.

Zinzendorf

Schwarzenau

and

the

the

Baptists,

Moravians,

the

Schwenckfelders,

who founded the United Brethren, and Muhlenberg, who had been educated at Halle, then the centre of the movement

Otterbein and Boehm,

in

the spirit to excess

—

were thoroughly imbued with of pietism. The same tendency, carried

Germany,

all

and manifesting

seen in the Society of the

itself in

Woman

mysticism, in the

is

Wilder-

i6o

THE RELIGIOUS

LlhE.

ness founded by Kelpius, and in the Ephrata

Community.

The stream

of emotional religion, thus having

source in Germany, gained new strength in Pennsylvania, where all conditions were favor-

its

development. While in Germany it practically died out as a force before the end of the century, in the New World it flowed on in

able to

new

its

channels,

and

finally

culminated

in

the

founding of several new denominations, which ^° to-day are strong in numbers and influence.

The

great majority of

Germans in colonial the two principal con-

Pennsylvania belonged to fessions, Lutheran and Reformed, the latter coming chiefly from Switzerland and the Palat-

former from Wiirtemberg and other parts of Germany. Their numbers in the Quaker colony were nearly equal. inate, the

One phenomenon which

a

centurv'

ago

at-

was the perfect harwhich existed between

tracted widespread attention

mony and good the two.^i '"

feeling

There had been

The United Brethren,

Dunkards. n 'I Which violate,

...

harmony

a time in the Father-

the Evangelical Association, the

fellowship has also been preserved sacred and inso that one may well desire that such traces of

mi^jht also be found in

Germany." (Life of Schlatter, Rayiial, Burke, and others speak in hisjh terms of the harmony existing between all the sects and churches of p.

139.)

THE RELIGIOUS

l6i

LIFE.

when jealousy had existed between them and when petty quarrels had divided them. The common sufferings and persecutions in more reland

cent times had tended to

From

ences.i2

the

smooth over

moment

their differ-

they arrived in Pennevidence of hostility.

we see but little The members of both denominations being poor sylvania

and dwelling in sparsely settled communities, they were unable to build separate churches, and in the majority of cases they founded Union churches,

^^

in

which they worshipped on

alter-

In some cases this arrangement has been continued down to the present day.^* nate Sundays.

In view of this community of interest, members of one congregation often worshipped with

Reformed frequently intermarried, baptisms, marriages, and funerals the other, Lutherans and

Pennsylvania,

—overlooking, however, the numerous petty quar-

Between the Moravians on the one side and the Lutherans and Reformed on the other there was a very strong feeling. 1' Bei aller Zerstiickelung der Glaubensparteien haben die Pfalzer nach langen Kampfen sich endlich vertragen gelernt." rels.

' '

(Riehl, Pfalzer, p. 379.) 1* Such a church had been built in the seventeenth century Karl by Ludwig in Mannheim, common to the three confes sions

and

" zur

dedicated

heiligen

Eintracht."

(Riehl.

Pfalzer, p. 386.) ^*

Some

of these union churches are

nominations also Cocalico

;

common

to other de-

is Mellinger's meeting-house, in West Lancaster County, in which worship

such

Township,

Lutherans, Reformed, Mennonites, and Dimkards.

1

THE RELIGIOUS

62

were performed by ministers

LIFE.

denomina-

of either

tion, and, in general, lines of

demarcation were

very loosely drawn. Indeed, it would probably have been difficult for many of the people to say

what were the

essential difTerences

between the

Lutheran and Reformed churches, and a story is

man who

told of a

said that the only difiference " Lutherans said Vater Unser,"

was that the

while the Reformed said this dulled the

"

Unser Vater."

All

edge of denominational feeling. pass from one church to another,

was easy to and throughout the eighteenth century Lutheranism was looked upon as closely allied to the It

Church the

of Englandj^-"^ while in a similar

manner

Reformed Church was classed with the Pres-

byterians.^^

A

crying need of both churches before the fourth decade of the last century was the supply of regular ministers, of

any,

while

the

^*

See p. 146, note.

'*

Thus in which

into

whom

number

of

the constitution of the the

Reformed

delphia Co.) was merged gregation being

satisfied

there were scarcely

church

members

new Presbyterian

church

of

we read: "And that the shade

churcli

Frankford of

the

(Philasaid con-

difference

be-

principles of the German Reformed Church and those of the Presbyterians of the United States are scarcely discernible and unimportant," etc. (Dotterer, Hist. Notes,

tween

p. 27.)

tlie

In colonial documents the Reformed are frequently Dutch Presbyterians, or Calvinists.

spoken of as

THE RELIGIOUS

LIFE.

163

amounted to many thousands. Often the schoolmaster would read sermons and conduct serThere had been some distinguished men vices. who in an unofficial way had tried to introduce some order; among the Reformed there were John Philip Boehm and George Michael Weiss, the former of

whom

founded the churches

in

Conestoga Valley and perhaps in Lancaster. The earliest Lutheran church was founded in Falkner's

Swamp

in

especially active,

1720.

and

The two Stoevers were

at every cross-road

founded

a Lutheran congregation and opened a church ^'^ record; most of these churches still exist. It

was

official

not, however,

and systematic

till

the fourth decade that

efiforts

were made to or-

" One

of the early churches with which the name of John Caspar Stoever is connected is the well-known Reed chur ch, in Tulpehocken, founded in 1727 by the settlers from Schoharie,

Like the cathedral of Durham, it was "half house of God, half castle" and served as a fort against the Indians. Mr. L. A. WoUenweber alludes to this double function in the

N. Y.

following lines: "

Do Do

droben uf dem runde Berg, steht die alte Riethe- Kerch Drin hot der Parre Stoever schon ;

Vor hunnert Jahr manch Predigt thun Gepredigt zu de arme, deitsche Leit In seller, ach so harten Zeit. !

Audi wor die Kerch 'n gute Fort Gegen der Indianer wilde Hort — Un schliefen drin gar manch Nacht, Die arme Settlers wo lien bewacht."

;

1

THE RELIGIOUS

64

LIFE.

ganize the scattered congregations of Lutherans

and Reformed

in

Michael Schlat-

Pennsylvania.

a native of St. Gall, Switzerland,

ter,

America

in

came

to

1746 for the purpose of studying the

church situation, and of devising some means of

Through

help.

the aid of the

Reformed Synod

and the generous contribution of friends in Germany, Holland, Switzerland, and even England, he was enabled to bring over in of Holland,

1752 six young men, regularly ordained ministers,

and

settled

them

in Philadelphia, Falkner's

Lancaster, Reading, and other places. 1792 the German Reformed Church in

Swamp, Until

Pennsylvania was under the general supervision

Holland Synod; since that date its affairs have been administered by its own organiza-

of the

tion.i^

Henry Melchior Muhlenberg occupies same

relation to the

Lutheran Church

in

Penn-

sylvania as Schlatter does to the Reformed.

was a man feeling, if

of learning, energy,

and administrative

a better adapted

all

Germany

man

talent.

the

He

deep religious It is

doubtful

could have been found in

to undertake the peculiarly difficult

task he was called to do.

The

story of his

life,

his travels, his labors, his tact in dealing with the '8

At the end of the year 1899 there were 240, 130 members German Reformed Church in the United States.

of the

THE RELIGIOUS

LIFE.

165

problems connected with the loose relations then prevailing among churches and sects, difficult

—

•

these, as

all

he relates them

the Hallesche Nachrichten,i^

in his diary

and

in

must inspire every

reader with profound respect for this pioneer of the Lutheran Church in America, and the father of a distinguished

line

of preachers,

warriors,

statesmen, and patriots.^*^

Through

his efforts order

members

was soon introduced

Lutheran Church; new congregations were started, and those already in existence were strengthened. The sub-

among

the

of the

sequent history of the Lutherans

is

different

from

Reformed Church, which to-day is almost entirely composed of the descendants of the early Pennsylvania Germans, whereas the Luththat of the

erans have received exceedingly large additions from the vast immigration from Germany in our

own

In the country at large there are the Pennseparate bodies of Lutherans,

century.

many

—

'5

Muhlenberg came to Pennsylvania under the auspices of Orphan House founded at Halle by August Hermann Francke, and for many years wrote back detailed accounts of

the

his labors, which,

with the reports of other ministers, have title of "Hallesche Nachrichten."

been published under the They are of extreme value customs, the religious '"'

Among

and

for the student of the

manners and

social condition of the times.

his descendants

were General Peter Muhlenberg

Frederick Augustus, Speaker of the House of Representatives William Augustus, founder of St. Johnland.

;

;

1

THE RELIGIOUS

66

sylvania

LIFE.

Germans being members

of the

"

INIinis-

terium of Pennsylvania and Adjacent States." problem of capital importance to both Re-

A

formed and Lutherans came into prominence during the

first

decades of the nineteenth cen-

tury and gradually

assumed wide

significance.

The question whether the services should be held exclusively in German began to be agitated at

As

the English influence was strong. 1803,

was

where

in the larger cities, especially those

first

when

the Rev.

called to Trinity

early as

Henry A. ^Nluhlenberg^i Church in Reading, it was

understood that he should often preach

in

Evidently the time was not ripe

lish.

Eng-

for so

we soon find the experiment abandoned and German exclusively used. The great a change, for

movement, however, could not be kept down; the natural order of things brought it more and

more sult

to the front, so that in

was the

splitting

part of which

up

many

cases the re-

of congregations,

would continue

one

to hold services

German, while the other would introduce English.22 The change, however, came slowly and

in

was stubbornly opposed by the conservative ''

ele-

Grandson of the patriarch Henry Melchior. Such was the origin of llie St. Paul's Reformed Churcli in Lancaster, built almost next dwjr to the First Church; English *'

is

used exclusively in both

at the present time.

THE RELIGIOUS ment.

It

LIFE.

was undoubtedly owing

servatism that so

many

of the

167 to this con-

younger generation

and joined other churches. Feeling ran so high that the Reformed Synod of Frederick, Md., left

1826 publicly rebuked a young minister for giving an address in English.^^ in

It is

claimed that the Moravians are the oldest

Protestant denomination in the world, dating back to the days of Huss.

reformer,

the worship of

secret

own

many

After the death of the great of his followers continued in

God according

to

their

while openly professing to be of the Catholic Church. Their secret

doctrines,

members

heresy being discovered, they were forced to

from

their native land,

and

in

flee

1722 settled in

Count Zinzendorf, where they founded the now historic town of Herrnhut. Zinzendorf, who was a Lutheran, became much interested in their peculiar views, and finally

Saxony on the

estate of

Missions joined them and was made bishop. from the beginning were one of the chief func-

Moravians, and they already had sent missionaries to Greenland and other places tions

before

of the

coming

to

America.

It

was

natural, then,

that they should cast their eyes to the heathen

In 1735 a number of missionaries came to Georgia with the intention of

across the Atlantic.

2'

Life of rhilip Schaff, p. 153.

i68

THE RELIGIOUS

LIFE.

and preaching the Gospel to the Indians; but the war with Spain interfered with their plans, and in 1740 they came to Pennsyl-

settling there

where they bought

vania,

a large tract of land

and founded Bethlehem. 741 Zinzendorf came and took charge of the new settlement. He was inspired with the

In

1

laudable desire to unite

all

the

German

Protest-

ants in the colony, and organized, or rather took

charge of, the movement already started, and which was known as the Pennsylvania Synod.

John Gruber, Henry Antes, and John Bechtel had met in 1740 to talk over the unsettled condition of religion in Pennsylvania,

German sects and denominaOn December 26, 1741, he published a

vised a union of tions.

and Antes ad-

all

circular inviting representatives of the different

communions mantown, in

"

to attend a general

meeting

at

Ger-

not for the purpose of disputing, but

order to treat peaceably concerning the most

important articles of

faith

and ascertain how

far

they might agree on the most essential points."

A

met January 12, 1742, at the house of Theobald Endt, where the above-mentioned Pennsylvania Synod was organized. Dur-

number

of people

ing the next ten months seven of these Synods

were held

in different places, at

which Lutherans,

Reformed, Schwenckfelders, Mennonites, Dunk-

THE RELIGIOUS

LIFE.

and Separatists were present.

ards,

169

The

project

through denominational jealousy. Bechtel, Antes, and others joined the Moravians, being attracted by Zinzendorf. It was the actions and failed

success of the Moravians which hastened the

coming of Schlatter and Muhlenberg, whose aim was to care for the long-neglected interests of the Reformed and Lutheran churches.^-* The missionary efforts of the Moravians

among

Indians

the

greatly

prospered;

many

converts were made and the settlements of Gnadenhiitten, Friedenthal,

The

labors of such

and others were founded.

men

as Post,

Nitschman, and Zeisberger, calls

the

"

John

Spangenberg,

whom Thompson

Eliot of the West," present a

picture of piety, self-denial, and patient endurance rarely equalled in the annals of missions.

The French and Indian War wath

its

intensified

At one time the existence of the Lutheran Church in Lancaster was threatened by Nyberg, its pastor, who himself went over to the Moravians and wished to carry the congre'*

The gentle Muhlenberg frequently indulges harsh language concerning what he calls the machinations No doubt Zinzendorf was ambitious and of the Moravians. gation with him. in

John Wesley, who ardently admired him at first, came to see this later. (See Tyerman's Life of Wesley, vol. I. Yet the Moravians in Pennsylvania were inspired by p. 207.) true evangelical zeal; Schaff calls them a "small but most imperious

lovely

;

and thoroughly evangelical denomination."

THE RELIGIOUS

I70

LIFE.

race-hatred interfered with and practically put an end to the mission-work on a large scale.

The

doctrines of the Moravians were not very

different

from those

of the Lutherans; ^^

they

were only marked by a greater depth of religious Their feeling and the spirit of self-sacrifice.

manners and customs were peculiar to themAt selves and are picturesque and interesting. first

the settlement at Bethlehem was communis-

but

tic,

erty

in

took

1760

a the

place,

division

the

of

community

prop-

retaining,

however, a tavern and a tanyard, 2000 acres near Bethlehem and 5000 near Nazareth. The profits on the property sold were devoted to the cause of missions.

In the olden times there was

a sharp distinction

made not only between

sexes, but between the different ages tions of the

same

sex.

Each

class

the

and condi-

had

its

own

place in church, often lived together, and had its

own

peculiar

festivals.

The women were

outwardly marked by means of ribbons, children wearing light-red, girls dark-red, the unmarried sisters pink, the '*

ing,

married

The Moravians do

women

blue,

and widows

not indulge in the habit of dogmatiz-

and refuse controversy.

lated creed of their own, yet

forth no formuon the Continent they declare

They have put

Augsburg Confession with its twenty-one The great theme of tlicir preaching is doctrinal articles. Christ. Jesus (See Thompson, Moravian Missions, p. 9. ) their adhesion to the

THE RELIGIOUS

Even

white.26

LIFE.

ijl

in death these distinctions

were

kept up, and in the graveyard at Lititz the bodies were buried according to age.^" There was and a deep touch of poetry over the religious

is still

of the Moravians.

life

Not only were head and

heart cultivated in religion, but also the aesthetic nature. This was largely done by means of

music, in which they excelled and which from the earliest times they have cultivated. Music, often very elaborate,

marked

all

their services

and added a refining influence to the emotions excited by religious worship. Bethlehem is still thoroughly Moravian in many of its features, and few towns in the United States ofifer more objects of interest to the traveller than are to be seen

here in the

way

of schools, old buildings, church,

and graveyard.

The Roman

Catholics had

little

influence in

Although toward the middle of last century their numbers were greatly exaggerated, yet they were actually very small, in 1757 being less than fourteen hundred in all. Of provincial Pennsylvania.

^6

Henry, Sketches of Moravian Life. For description Moravian dress (with picture) see Ritter, p. 145. *'

"No

ornaments were allowed

of

to disturb the

simple uniformity of the tokens of remembrance the marble slab was even limited in its length and breadth to 12 X 18 inches, and ;

these

all

1820 an

flat

on the grave-mound."

offer of

$7500

(Ritter.)

for the privilege of a vault

As late as was refused.

THE RELIGIOUS

172

German Catholics most

few

llie

Protestants, and to-day lic

LIFE.

it is

afterwards became

rare to find a Catho-

of

Pennsylvania-German ancestry. There is no more interesting or picturesque

sect in the countr)', or indeed in the world, than

As

the Mennonites. in the first

they played so large a part settlements of Pennsylvania, and as

many thousands

so

from them,

it

Americans are descended

of

worth while

is

To

space to their history .^s

we

origin

shall

through

them

church.

While

to

them to their the Waldenses and

days of the primitive connection between the

the

the

Mennonites and Waldenses proved

trace

have to go back to twelfth and thirteenth centuries,

the

of

to devote a little

is

not

absolutely

historically, yet there is a fair

argument

made out by is

the supporters cf this theory.20 It proved that in those places where the Men-

nonites, or Anabaptists,

first

arose there had been

long periods of time communities of Waldenses and related sects. The doctrines were the for

*8 It is

singular

Mennonites, — due effort

on

how

little

is

undoubtedly

known to

in this

the desire

country of the

and consistent

their part to be "

little and iinkno\vn, Loved and prized by God alone."

*'

In recent years the arguments have been strongly

up by teien.

Keller,

summed

Die Reformation und die alteren Reformpar-

THE RELIGIOUS

LIFE.

173

same: refusal to take oath, non-resistance, rejection of a paid ministry and infant baptism,

and of religious worthese things the Mennonites are

simplicity of dress

In

ship.

all

the logical

if

and

life

not the actual successors of the

Waldenses. historical connection

If this

would indeed be an inspiring thought,

it

proof,

were capable of

and one fraught with profound

belief in the

on-

working of Providence, that through the Dark and the Middle Ages, in the days of ignorance, corruption, sin, tyranny, and persecution, the true God, composed of those who worshipped Him in spirit and in truth, should be car-

Church

of

openly, then in secret for long centuries, then finally, at the outbreak of the Reried along,

first

formation, once

more boldly coming

forth

and

proclaiming that true religion and undefiled consists not in form or ceremony, not in magnificent cathedrals built by man, but in the heart and in the

life

Jesus.

of the followers of the

The Mennonites,

no theology, cared not

like the

Waldenses, had

for intricate discussions

of philosophy, but took the

His teachings as

meek and lowly

life

of Christ

and

only rule of conduct. They did not believe in the union of Church and their

putting pressure on any one in mat" " ters of religious belief; Believe and let believe State,

nor

in

THE RELIGIOUS

174

was

out

hear

to

but

him;

make them

the truth as

If

the

of

sword, prison nor or

any one could persuade Bible, they were willing

their motto.^°

them

LIFE.

neither

exile,

persecution,

fire,

could bend their

wills,

recant what they believed to be

it is

in Christ Jesus.

Not only were

they steadfast in the faith, but they rejoiced dying- the death of martyrs.^^

The Mennonites have

often

in

been confused

with the Anabaptists of the Munster rebellion, was almost identical with that of J

it

The

ofifice

till

Baker as

Mack

1729

;

till

in 1735.

that year

THE RELIGIOUS Settlements were

ferent

later in Virginia

and

es-

where the Dunkards are

still

Their doctrines are not very

dif-

pecially in Ohio,

numeroLis.^i

made

i8i

LIFE.

from those of the Mennonites;

like

them

they disbelieve in infant baptism, refuse to take oath or to bear arms. They differ from them in the

mode

of baptizing,

which they perform by

dipping (tunkcn), hence the

name

of

Tunker or

Dunkard. Perhaps the most interesting phenomenon of religious

life in

early Pennsylvania

was the

rise

and progress of the German Seventh-Day Baptists and the establishment of the monastic community at Ephrata, in Lancaster County. We have seen that Beissel with a few others left

the Conestoga church and

came

to Cocalico

Creek, where they settled down. Beissel was a man of unusual abilities, though of only limited education. He was born in 1690 at Eberbach in the Palatinate, where his father

was a baker, a

trade which he followed himself.

verted to pietism, however, he

came

Being conto Pennsyl-

vania in 1720, intending to spend his life in soliAfter leaving the tary communion with God.

Conestoga church he

lived for a time the

life

of

There are in all 108,694 Dunkards, divided into Conservatives, Old Order, Progressive, and German Seventh-Day Baptists, the latter of whom amount to only 194. *^

1

THE RELIGIOUS

82

LIFE.

a hermit on the Cocalico, surrounded by many who built themselves cottages and imitated his ascetic

tracted

life.

those

Among

whom

he thus

was a German Reformed minister

at-

of Tul-

pehocken, John Peter Miller, and Conrad Weiser, a Lutheran (who afterwards left), and later

some

of the leaders of the

Dunkards, Kalkloser,

Valentine Mack, and John Hildebrand. As the numbers increased it became necessary provide accommodations for them, and in 1735 a convent for sisters was erected called Kedar;

to

1738 a corresponding monastery for the breth^ren, and later many other buildings were built. in

In 1740 there were thirty-six single brethren and At one time the society, inthirty-five sisters. cluding the married members, amounted to nearly three hundred.

The

ruler or prior of this

—

com-

munity, Conrad Beissel, called by his followers Gottrecht Friedsam, seems to have been a

—

man loyal

of great personal

affection

of all

magnetism and drew the who met him. He was

looked on with mystic affection and even wor*^

A number

of these old buildings are still standing, and the curious visitor can see the rotjms in which the inmates the chapel in which they worshipped, and even the utensils which they used one hundred and sacramental very fifty years ago. Interesting descriptions of Eiihrata have been lived,

given by Seidensticker and Sachse.

THE RELIGIOUS ship,

some going so

second

LIFE.

far as to

183

regard him as a

Christ.-*-^

would be a pleasant task to give a detailed account of this strange community, its poetic It

midnight religious services, often lasting till daybreak, its weird music, its exaggerated mystic piety, its monastic garb and cloisits

customs,

ter

names;

**

but

would lead us too

all this

The community gradually

far.

died out, until at pres-

remnant remains, who still meet however, from time to time, and worship in the ent only a small

manner Still

of their ancestors.

another interesting sect

Schwenckfelders,

so

named

Schwenckfeld of Ossing

that

is

of

the

Casper von

after

who was

in Silesia,

a

This was the evident meaning of a verse in one of the hymns v^^hich Sauer published for Beissel *'

:

"

Sehet,

seliet,

sehet an,

Sehet, sehet an den

Mann

!

Der von Gott erhiihet ist, Der ist unser Herr und Christ,"

and which was the cause of a quarrel between the two. Penn. Mag., **

Some

vol.

(See

XU.)

of these

names were genuinely

poetical,

such as

Genoveva, Eusebia, Petronella, Blandina, Euphrosina, Zenobia. Whittier, who alone of American poets has felt the Sisters

poetry of Pennsylvania-German ards, beginning "

life,

has a

Hymn

;

Wake, sisters, wake, the day-star shines Above Ephrata's eastern pines The day is breaking cool and calm. Wake, sisters, wake to prayer and psalm." ;

of the

Dunk-

THE RELIGIOUS

184

LIf-E.

contemporary of Liilher, and who incurred the wrath of the latter, because of his pecuHar tenets, chiefly

concerning the Eucharist, the efficacy of

the divine

and

Word,

On

infant ]:)aptism.

followers

were

Anabaptists.

human

the

nature of Christ,

account of the

frequently

confused

Many clergymen and

latter his

with

the

nobles in

and elsewhere espoused his doctrines, especially in Licgnitz and Jauer, where almost the

Silesia

whole population were his adherents. Later they were persecuted first by the Lutherans, then

by the Jesuit missionaries sent to convert them in 1 In these troubles only one thing was left 719.

them

—

flight.

In 1726

more than one hundred

and seventy families escaped from Harpersdorf, Armenruh, and Hockenau, and making their way on foot to L^pper Lusatia, then a part of Saxony, found shelter near Greisenberg, Gorlitz, Hennersdorf, Berthelsdorf, and Hcrrnhut, where they

were hospitably received by Zinzendorf

and the Senate of Gorlitz.

They

lived in

Saxony eight years, but in 1734 were forced once more In 1732 two to take up the life of exiles. families

went

and the advice

to Pennsylvania,

and

their report

of certain benefactors in

Holland

induced forty families to follow. They arrived Sep-

tember 24, 1734, settled,

in

I'hiladclphia,

where some

while others went to Montgomery, Berks,

THE RELIGIOUS and Lehigh counties.

LIFE.

185

They now form two con-

gregations, with three hundred famihes and five churches or schoolhouses.'*'^

We

have already discussed the strong pietistic tendency in Pennsylvania, and how it manifested itself

not only

in the sects,

but

among

the regular

This deep, personal religion was It is especially cultivated by the Moravians. confessions.

well

known

John Wesley was first brought the defects of a mere formal or-

that

to a sense of

thodoxy and the need

of a heart-religion

through the Moravians. On his journey to Georgia, he came into close contact with David Nitschman,

and, after landing, with Spangenberg, and learnt from them the power of God as manifested in the

was through Peter Boehler in London that he finally became convinced of the possibility of a saving faith, instant conversion, and the

heart.

It

joy and peace of believing.'*^ This early connection with German emotional religion had far-

reaching consequences. that *5

Methodism

Among

in

It

is

a

singular fact

America was founded by Ger-

the well-known Scliwenckfelder

names

are

Wieg-

Hiibner, Heydrich, Anders. Hartranft, Schultze, Weiss, Meschter. *6 See Tyerman's Life of Wesley; also Wesley's Journal. In

ner,

Kriebel, Jiickel (Yeakel),

He writes: ''I 1738 he spent nearly two weeks in Herrnhut. shall this Chriswould gladly spend my life here. Oh, when " tianity cover the earth, as the waters cover the sea ?

86

1

THE RELIGIOUS

LIFE.

mans who had been converted by Wesley, who himself had received from the Moravians some of peculiar doctrines

his

—doctrines

which he

in

turn passed on to his fellow countrymen and which were destined to exert so extraordinary an influence on the religious

of the

life

New

W'e have seen that of the Palatines ran

London

in 1709,

some

World.

who

over-

three thousand were

sent to Ireland.

In 1756 Wesley visited the town

of Ballygarrane

and preached

of

whom

tain

own

to the

Germans,

says in his Journal:'*" "They reof the temper and manners of their

lie

much

country, having no resemblance to those

among whom they live. among this plain, artless, whole town came together praised

God

I

found much

serious people. in the

for the consolation."

ber were Barbara

Heck and

life

The

evening, and

Of

this

num-

Embury, who, on account of difficulties in the way of getting a living in Ireland, with many others came to New York. This was in 1760, and six years later Philip

Embury

held the

Philip

first

Methodist meeting

in this country, in the historic sail-loft in

John

Street.48

Methodism was introduced a

little later

into Pennsylvania

by Captain Webb, one of Embury's

*'

June

*8

Buckley, Mist, of Methodists in the United States, p. loi.

16, 1756.

THE RELIGIOUS

Boehm

Martin

of

187

who welcomed it was Lancaster County, who had

Among

assistants.'*^

LIEE.

those

been a Mennonite and

was one

later

fluence

in

Methodist

of

Asbury

Pennsylvania.

the

The Boehm

founders of the United Brethren.

homestead became a centre

of

in-

frequently

many powerful revivals were held, the German and Swiss farmers in the

stopped here,

numbers

of

neighborhood were converted, most famous of son of Marall being Father Henry Boehm,

—

tin,

—who

was

Asbury's

travelling-companion

many years. Methodism spread more slowly through the cities, and it was only after the be-

for

ginning of the present century that churches were founded in Lancaster, Reading, and other cities.

of the

To-day a large proportion

and ministers

German

in the State are of

members

Pennsylvania-

descent. ^°

not the only way in which Methodism has influenced the German inhabiThis, however,

tants of the

nied *'•'

that

is

commonwealth. Although it is dethe United Brethren Church was

See Penn. Mag.,

vol. xii.

Philadelphia as well as in ing was held in a sail-loft. '•'^

Among

It is

New York

the bishops are

a

little

curious that in

the

first

Methodist meet-

Bowman,

A

Hartzell.

and Keener

glance at tlie minutes of tlie Pennsylvania (Church South). conferences will show how large a percentage of the ministers ai-e

of Pennsylvania-German descent.

1

88

THE RHUGIOUS

founded

LIFE.

in imitation of

Methodism, yet the latter certainly exerted a vast deal of influence on the former. The two founders of this denomination were Martin Boehm and Philip William Otterbein, the former a Alennonite, the latter a pecu-

spiritually-minded

liarly

Reformed

minister.

Both Boehm and Otterbein experienced convergenuine Methodistic sense of that

sion, in the

word, and both, moved by the Spirit, began to preach a heart-religion. Great success attended their efiforts,

and thousands crowded

In 1768,^^ at one of these meet-

vival services. ings, they

their re-

met

for the first time,

each other's neck cried out,

'"

Wir

and

falling

on

sind Briider."

Some

years after a regular church organization was formed, and received from the above inci-

dent the

name

of

For many relation between

United Brethren.

years there was a close fraternal the newly founded church and the ]\Icthodists;

they adopted

many

features of the Discipline,

and prayer-meetings, the itinerant system, annual and general conferences, and other details. For many years fraternal delegates

had

class-

were sent to the respective conferences, and letters were written bearing friendly greetings. Otterbein was the intimate friend of Asbury, and it *'

The

date

is

Brethren, p. 78.

not sure.

See Berger, Hist, of the United

THE RELIGIOUS was on the advice

LIFE.

1S9

he went to

of the latter that

Bahimore, to the German Reformed Church, which later became the first church of the United Brethren. It

seemed

to

early years in gelical

work

English,

be the policy of Methodism in its America to discourage all evan-

carried

—apparently

on

were convinced that out.

in other

because all

languages than the

authorities

others would soon die

Hence they welcomed

made by work among

the efforts

the United Brethren in evangelistic

Germans, and consequently both were on and without denominational friendly terms the

jealousy.

Some

propositions were

Nothing came

indeed did desire a union and

made looking toward

of them, however,

and

this end.

after

some

years both denominations ceased sending delegates and friendly messages to the respective conferences.

The United Brethren Church was almost

exclusively

Germans and

is

of

composed

now

largely

originally

Pennsylvania

made up

of their

descendants.^^ Still is

more

closely connected with

Methodism

the Evangelical Association, founded by Jacob

Albright,

who had been brought up "

264,980 members in

all.

a Lutheran,

THE RELIGIOUS

I90

and who of

his

in

1796,

LIFE.

"yearning

salvation

for the

neglected Gemian-speaking brethren, started out as a humble layman to spiritually

preach to them the Gospel of Christ. His labors extended over large portions of Pennsylvania

and into parts

of

Maryland and Virginia and

sulted in the saving of

many

re-

souls." ^^

Albright had originally no thought of founding a new religious organization, but finally, in 1800, he yielded to the oft-repeated and urgent requests of those whom he had led to the Lord and began the

work

of

organization.

Their

Discipline,

largely taken from that of the Methodists,

published

in

1809.

how thorough was: — they

A

was

glance therein will show

the influence of the latter

Church

have quarterly, annual, and general

conferences; bishops, presiding elders, the itinerancy, class-meetings, and other Methodist characteristics.^^ *^

See Discipline of the United Evangelical Church.

**

Albright had

knowledge of English and preached in If Asbury had cared to form a German ministry within Methodism, this separate body of German Methodists probably would not have been formed. The original conference in 1807 called itself

German

the

little

to the people of Eastern Pennsylvania.

'Newly formed Methodist Conference.' Albright had and was such still in his heart, faitli, and

l)een a Methodist,

practice. p. 193.)

(See Berger, Hist, of the United Brethren in Christ, In 1899 there were 117,613 members in the Evan-

gelical Association.

THE RELIGIOUS

The

LIFE.

191

schism which seems ever present in reHgious bodies, manifested itself in the EvangeHcal Association. Some dozen or fifteen years ago,

spirit of

certain

questions

arose

the

concerning

General Conference and especially the episcopacy, and gradually the differences of opinion grew so widespread, that in 1891 two General

Conferences were held each claiming to be the legal representative of the Church. Hence arose the

body known

Church, the

was held

first

in 1894.

were made

as

United

Evangelical General Conference of which

In their Discipline no changes the

in

the

accepted

doctrines

the

of

Church, but several new articles were added and the language of all was changed.^^

Another body

of Christians widely spread in

Pennsylvania is the Church of God, sometimes called Winebrennerians from the founder, John

Winebrenner.

He

was a minister

of the

Re-

formed Church, and settled in Harrisburg 1820, where a revival soon broke out under

in

his

preaching. This being regarded as an innovation in the customs of the Reformed Church,

Winebrenner met so strong an opposition that the doors of his church were closed against him, and about the year 1825 he was forced to sepa'*

The United Evangelical Church now has 59,830 members.

THE RELIGIOUS

192 rate

LIFE.

His preaching was Germans, and in 1829

from his denomination.

heard by great numbers of

a regular organization was established. to their doctrine of

with the Baptists.

God, however,

is

Owing

immersion they are classed

The

polity of the

Church

of

Methodistic in some respects;

Annual Eldership corresponds to the Annual Conference, and the General Eldership to the

the

General Conference.^^

We

have only space here for a word or two on the influence of other English denominations on the Pennsylvania Germans.

In

many

cases the

Presbyterian, Episcopalian, Baptist, and Sweden-

borgian churches, especially in large cities, are swelled in numbers by the descendants of these people. ^^

The membership amounts

at present to 38,000.

CHAPTER IN PEACE

AND IN WAR.

Mr. Fiske has estimated

who

lish

settled in

have increased

VII.

that the 20,000 Eng--

New England

before 1640

to fifteen millions.

Considering

the large families of the old-fashioned Pennsylvania Germans it would seem probable that the

100,000 or

more who came over before 1775 have

multiplied at least as rapidly as their Puritan It would be a moderate statement, neighbors. then, to say that to-day there are

between four

people in the United States who in some line or other can trace their ancestry to

and

five million

German and Swiss settlers Of these not far from two

the early

of Pennsyl-

vania.

million

still

inhabit the State founded by their ancestors. This

mass

of people

must have had more or

less in-

fluence on the development of the United States,

and they themselves must have been largely moulded by their new surroundings. As Frey" In dem unaufhorlichen Einwirken tag says, des Einzelnen auf das

Volk und des Volkes auf 193

IN

194

IN IVA R.

PEACE AND

den Einzelnen

liiuft

das Leben ciner Nation."

*

In the present chapter we shall endeavor to

show some

of the

fluence manifests

the

new

tics

and

in

ways

itself;

which

how

this

mutual

the people have

in-

met

conditions in which they were placed; what has been their attitude to the State in poli-

various wars through which the

in the

country has passed since they came; in short, to tell,

in brief outline, the share that the

have had

Germans

in the

development of Pennsylvania particular and the United States in general.

in

we are struck by the fact Pennsylvania Germans have not stamped

In regard to politics that the

themselves so strongly on the country as their numbers would warrant. Great statesmen and

men

of national reputation are not

not so

much

—

so proportionately, for instance,

as in the case of

In

numerous

Huguenots and

Pennsylvania down

to

the

Scotch-Irish.

middle of the

eighteenth century the public offices were almost entirely in the hands of English-speaking people, In'the city of Lancaster the office of burgess had

always been held by an Englishman

till

1750,

Cf. also, "von solchem StandFreytag, vol. iv. p. i. das Lebcn cincr Nation in einer unauflx'irverlauft punkte ^

Wechselwirkung des Ganzen auf den Einzelnen und des Manues auf das Ganze. Jedcs Menschenleben, auch das Kleine, giebt einen Thcil seines Inhalts ab an die Nation."

lichen

{^lOiJ.,

vol

1,

p. 24.)

PEACE AND IN IVAR.

IN

when Dr. Adam

S.

Kuhn was

that time, however, the

ipS

From

elected.^

German element

is

more

and more represented, and since the Revolution their proportion of local officers in the towns and Berks, Lancaster, and the other counties

cities of

Up

has been very large.^

however, the

was

to the

Revolution,

Germans Nor is this

activity of the

political

largely confined to local affairs.

wondered

to be

Hitherto they had formed a

at.

compact body of their own, pre-eminently a rural population, whose chief occupation was to found

homes

for themselves

World.

Then,

and children

too, they

where there was

little

in the

had come from

chance for

New

a land

political

ac-

where the government was despotic, and where the country-folk had little or no voice in tivity,

the affairs of state.

This

is

true not only of the

The Lutheran

pastor in Lancaster, Rev. Joh. Fr. Handschuh, gives expression to his joy over this event in his diary ^

;

"Den

20. Sept.

kamen

einige Kirchenrathe

und

erzalilten

mir

mit Bewegung und Freude ihres Herzens, wie unsern Kirchenrath Dr. Adam Kuhn hiitte man zum Oberbiirgermeister At the erv/ahlet." (Hall. Nach., I. p. 542.) .

.

.

.

.

.

also a Lutheran, was elected while of four other Lutherans elected one Unterbiirgermeister,

same time Jacob Schlauch,

was High Constable, and three others were assessors. ' For instance, in Reading all the chief burgesses (ten in number) and twelve of the seventeen mayors have been Ger-

man

(1883); a similar proportion prevails for justices of peace, \i\ the aldermen, etc. borough of Kutztown all the burgesses

except one have been German.

1

IN PE/ICB

9^

^ND

IN H^AR.

Palatinate and W'iirtemberg-, but also of Switzerland, for even in that land of freedom, the proto-

type of our

own

whatever

political rights

the

land,

peasantry had no

until nearly

one hundred

years after the emigration to Pennsylvania began.^ It must also be remembered that a considerable

number

Dunkards, Mennonites, and Moravians, refused on religious

grounds to hold

of the people,

political ofifice.^

Can we wonder then

that

Pennsylvania were a long time active in

and enthusiastic exercise

in

Germans coming

We

of

to an

of their privileges

the matter of political intrigues and

hokling? all

the

ofifice-

do not mean to say that they were

indifferent to the political questions of the

day, or that they had

no

interest in public afifairs,

but only that in the eighteenth century, at least, * "Die Bewohner der Landschaften waren bis Ende des achtzehnten Jahrhunderts thatsachlich von der Staatsleitung ausgeschlossen." (Dandliker, n. p. 632.) Freytag, speaking of the Thirty Years' Wan says: "Noch hundert Jahre Sf)llten die

Nachkommen

der Uberlebenden die mannlichste Empfin-

dung entbehren, politische Begeisterung." (Vol. lu. p. * Germantown was incorporated as a borough town in but about 1704 lost accept the various

its

charter because no one

was

13.)

1689,

willincj to

offices. The records of this short-lived read like an extract from "Diedrich Knickermunicipality bocker." In 1795 the Moravian Bishop Ettwein deplored the

dereliction of

"some

of the bretliren in Lancaster

who had

joined a political body called the Democrats and even accepted office therein." (Ritter, p. 98.)

IN

PEACE AND IN

IVAR.

197

eagerness for office was not a marked

trait

of

their character.

Since the Revolution, however, they have been

more and more prominent poHtics. tional

in State

Dr. Egle says that

Convention of 1789-90

it

that insured the passage of the

Not only was from

in

and county

tlie

was

new

Constitu-

their votes

Constitution.

the local magistracy largely drav/n

their ranks/' but in the larger field of State

politics they

have furnished a number of

The names

guished men.

lenberg, Hiester, Graff,

of

etc.,

Kuhl, Antes,

distin-

Muh-

are familiar to the

student of early Pennsylvania history, while no fewer than nme of the governors of the common-

German descent." It was Governor George Wolf who finally introduced the wealth were of

public-school system, and Joseph Ritner's manly protest against the usurpations of the slave States called forth from Whittier a tribute to the

sturdiness of Pennsylvania-German character.^ ^

In 1777

all

but one of the officers of Lancaster were Ger-

mans. ^

Snyder, Hiester, Schulze, Wolf, Ritner, Shunk, Hartranft, In this connection may be mentioned GovBigler, Beaver.

New

—

York, Ramsey of Minnesota, Lebanon County German on the maternal side, Schley of Georgia, John Bigler of California, and Geo. L. Shoup of Idaho.

ernors

"

Bouck

of

—

Thank God for the token one lip is still free, One spirit untrammelled, unbending one knee," I

(Works,

etc.

vol. III. p. 47.)

IN

10^

PEACE AND

IN IVAR.

In national politics their prominence is not so apparent, since here they come in competition with

all

the rest of the country.

Yet we must

record the names of Frederick A. Muhlenberg, president of the convention which ratified the Constitution of the United States,^ i\Iichael Hillegass,

Treasurer of the

Continental

Con-

and such men as Simon Cameron, Colonel John W. Forney, John Wanamaker, and others. Of course it would be inappropriate here to give gress,

a catalogue of men in public life, or even a statisYet I have carefully gone tical view of the same.

over the first

files

issue

of the Congressional Record

down

to the present,

and

from

its

find in every

Congress from five to ten typical PennsylvaniaGerman names, representing the Keystone State ^^

other States, especially in th.c Washington; West, have often been represented by men who

at

trace their origin to the early

German

settlements

of Pennsylvania.

Mie was also first Speaker of the House of Representatives under Washington's administration. 1" Among these names arc Hiester, Muhlenberg, Krebs, Wolf, Bucher, Wagener, Fry, Uublcy, Sheffer. Kcim, Yost, Ritter, Erdman, Leib, Strohm, Everhart, Kuhns, Trout. Kurtz, Kunkel, Leidy, Longnecker, Lehman, Coftroth, Glassbrenner,

Frick,

Koontz, Hakleman, Albright, Neglej-, Shoemaker. ShellenIn Berks berger, Yocum, Klutz. Beltzhoover, Ermentrout.

County out of twenty United States congressmen from 17891885, fifteen were of German descent.

PEACE AND IN

!N

Such

a brief glance at the

is

Germans

sylvania

IVAR.

in

pubHc politics and

i99 Hfe of in

Penn-

times of

remains to give a similar brief view of their services in the various wars through which peace.

It

the country has passed during the last turies.

Here

it

may

two cen-

be stated without fear of

contradiction that they have shown themselves as ready as any of their fellow countrymen to sacrifice life

When

and fortune the

for their country's good.

Germans began

to

come

vania the troubles with the Indians in

to Pennsyl-

land and

New York

were over.

New Eng-

In the former

colony the terrible prowess of the Puritan warriors had crushed the Pequots and Narragansetts

;

Dutch and English had permanently attached the Five Na-

in

New York

the wise conduct of the

England, in spite of all the intrigues of the French to win them over. The attitude of Pennsylvania toward the Intions to the interests of

dians from the

first

had been one of conciliation

and kindness; the example set by Penn, of dealin ing with them with strict honesty, had been

The relageneral followed by his successors. tions between the Germans and the Indians had always been friendly, and the former had shown a deep Interest in the spiritual welfare of the latAs early as 1694 Kelpius declared his deter. sire

to preach

the Gospel to them, while the

IN PBACF. /IND IN IVA R.

200

Indian missions of the Moravians form one of the noblest chapters of State history.

For man}' years Pennsylvania was entirely free from the dread and terror that had been the inseparable companion of the early settlers of

New

England.

that part of the

The Delawares, who occupied country before the coming of

Penn, gradually and peaceably receded before the onward march of white settlers, till about the middle of the century they had retired be-

yond

Mountains and

the Blue

left

all

practically

the territory to the east and south to the whites.

Soon

after,

an end.

however,

this state of affairs

came

—

and discontent, " largely on account of the famous Walking the of the French, and esPurchase," intrigues to

Dissatisfaction

—

the

pecially

I755>

disastrous

loose

let

Pennsylvania

upon the

all

defeat

of

Braddock

frontier settlements of

the horrors of Indian warfare.

the greatest sufferers were the

Among

in

German

Berks and Northampton Hundreds were slain and scalped,

especially in

settlers,

counties.

houses, barns, and crops went up in flames, chil-

dren and letters

women were

of

others give

Conrad

carried into captivity.

The

Muhlenberg,

and

^^'"eiser,

many harrowing

details

of scenes

which were then of almost daily occurrence.^ ^*

Some

of these descriptions are very dramatic,

^

— sucli

as

PEACE AND IN IVA R.

IN

The what

attitude of the

Germans was

201

at first

some-

owing chiefly to the non-combatant doctrines of Mennonites and Moravians, and to the fact that in poHtics they in general followed the lead of the Quakers. Yet when the danger became more acute many ofrered their lives indifferent,

commonwealth.

in the service of the

says:

"Much

unanimity prevailed

Franklin

in all ranks;

eight hundred persons signed at the outset.

Dutch were

as hearty

and one

lish,

Dutch."

The

m this

measure as the Engcompany was formed of

entire

12

man with his two daughters, who had loaded their and were wagon prepared to escape the next day, and the prethe ceding night girls, being '-angst und bange urns Herz, sie sagten zum Vater es ware ihnen so traurig zu Muthe, als ob sie bald sterben sollten, und verlangten das Lied zu singen: Wer weiss, wie nahe mir mein Ende,' etc., sungen es audi that of the

'

vom Anfange bis ans Ende, thaten ihr Abendund The next day the Indians gebet, legten sich zur Ruhe." came and both the girls were killed. (See Muhlenberg, in mit einandor

Hall. Nach., vol. n. p. 465.) 12

Watson,

(Penn. Mag.,

273.

p.

Cf. p. 11

vol. in.

also ff.)

:

letter

of

Daniel Dulaney

'-The Germans complained

had been taken to avert the calamity, demanded arms, and signed an application for a militia law." It was not strange that they should be willing thus to fight to save their homes. Many had been soldiers in Germany and Switzerland. In the forces mustered in Albany in that no measures

.

.

be sent

.

.

.

.

to Canada, one thousand were Palatines. (GorOut of a whole population of 356 Palatines in don, p. 163.) Queensbury, N. Y., 40 men joined the expedition against

17H

to

202

Ihl

As

PEACE AND

IN IVA R.

numbers engaged

to actual

in hostilities

it

hard to give complete figures. In the Pennsylvania Archives we find a list of provincial officers in 1754; out of 33, 8 are German. In 1756, is

in

Conrad Weiser's

battalion, 22 out of 38 are

German.

The

we have

other reasons for believing that they

rolls of privates are

were practically

all

of the

same

not given, but

nationality.

Thus

chaplain was appointed; Gordon says (p. 342) that Weiser's battalion consisted of Germans, and in the list of Captain Nicholas Wetter-

a

German

regiment every name

holt's

the other

two battalions

Even in many Germans were is

German.

enlisted.

So much for actual warfare. The services of the Germans in other respects are just as imMost distinguished of all was Conrad portant. Weiser, who for many years was the official Indian interpreter and agent of Pennsylvania. Before the war he did all he could to pacify the Indians;

he was frequently sent by the govern-

and successfully carried out many dangerous missions. When war broke t)ut he raised a battalion and was everywhere active. His name occurs in these events more frequently

ment

to them,

Canada; ami lation of 250.

pp. 571, 2.)

in Amesliury 52 volunteered out of a total popu(See O'Callaghan, Doc. Ilist. ofN. V., vol. ni.

IN

PEACE AND

IN JVAR..

203

than that of ahiiost any other at this time,

—he was

constantly making reports, indorsing petitions, explaining the condition of the inhabitants, giving

orders and suggestions.

It

was he more than

man who

kept the Five Nations faithful to the English at that time. The value of that service can hardly be overestimated.^^ The spirit

any other

of this heroic

man may

words written by him " 4,

1757:

my

family

be seen in the following

to Richard Peters,

I

think meselfe unhappy; to

I

can't do.

I

must

stay

if

October fly

with

they

all

In the very forefront of the French and Indian War were the Moravians. No group of people suffered more, did

more

service, or

showed more

heroism than these messengers of the gospel of peace.

came

At the

first

mutterings of war they be-

objects of suspicion to their fellow country-

men.

Their intimate relations with the Indians, their settlements at Gnadenhiitten and elsewhere, their frequent journeys

through the wilderness,

often extending as far as

New

York,

—

all

this

tended to raise suspicions. peculiar customs, their

Then, too, their early communistic life,

1^

Weiser says liimself that the council of the Six Nations always looked on him as a friend and as one of their own nation, 1*

(See Penn. Arch., ist Series, Penn. Arch., ist Sen, vol. in.

vol.

I.

p. 283.

p. 672.)

2 04

IN

PEACE AND IN

IVA R.

elaborate ritual, and peculiar dress seemed es-

smack

how tics,

the

to

pecially

Scotch-Irish

Romanism.

of

Presbyterians to \\q have already seen

the fear of the Catholics, together with polihad led to the establishment of English

schools for the Germans.

suspicion of the

only another symptom of the same Even the French themselves seemed to be-

Moravians fear.

The

is

Moravians would go over

lieve that the

to their

whenever they should approach. This suspicion was unfounded, and the whole country' awoke from their error when, on November 24,

side

1756, the massacre of Gnadenhiitten occurred, in

which not only the Indian converts, but Martin Nitschman, his wife, and several other Moravians perished.

Although non-combatants, the Moravians were reasonable; they fortified Bethlehem, brought together a large quantity of provisions, and even armed themselves in case of last extremity;

in

many ways

they

assistance to the cause. ^^

manifest

in

wnv^X

Vv'ere

of invaluable

Their heroism was

and deed.

"The

country,"

In 1755 Timfjthy Ilorsfield writes: "At moderate computation the Brethren liave lost ^1500. and tlie expense they are daily at in victualling the people, witli their horses, who '^

pass and repass through Bethlehem, and supply them with

powder and

ball."

(renn. Arch., 1st Series, vol. n. p. 523.)

IN

PEACE AND

IN IVAR.

205 "

is full of wrote Spangenberg to Zinzendorf, In our churches there is fear and tribulation.

We

light.

live in

the Saviour."

The

peace and

feel

the presence of

8th of September, 1755, which

witnessed the defeat of Count Dieskau, was distinguished at Bethlehem "by an enthusiastic missionary conference, composed of four bishops, sixteen missionaries, and eighteen female assistants,

who covenanted anew

to be faithful to the

Lord, and to press forward into the Indian country as long as it was possible, in spite of wars and

rumors

The

of wars." ^^

services in general of the

Moravians

to

the country were great.

Missionaries like Spangenberg and Post were of the utmost value in keeping the Indians quiet for many years, and

many important embassies were

intrusted

to

their care.^" ^®

"

De

Schweinitz, Life of Zeisberger, p. 222. "During the late bloody war, all commerce between the

white people and Indians being suspended, he [Post] was intrusted first by this government, and then by Brig. -Gen. Forbes, with negotiations to secure the Indian nations ; and although such commission might seem out of the way of a

minister of the Gospel, yet he yielded thereto on its being argued that the bringing of peace with the Indians would open the

way

for future harvests," etc.

vol. III. p. 579.)

(Penn. Arch., 1st Series, set on the head

Although a large price was

was fearless. "I am not afraid," he wrote, '-of the Indians nor the devil himself; I fear my great Creator of Post, he

God."

{/dici., p.

542.)

2o6

PEACE AND

IN

However in the

IN IVAR.

Germans may have been French and Indian War, there can be no active the

doubt about their enthusiasm and patriotism during the Revolution. Those who have traced

banks

their history to the

mountains of Switzerland

Rhine and the

of the will

not be surprised

during these trying times, A love for independence and a hatred of tyranny at their patriotism

has ever been a distinguishing

and Swiss.i^

Palatine

trait of

faithful to the

Although

English crown before the war, they had no reason to be particularly attached to it. As far back as 1748 the Swedish traveller Professor

distinctly

they had no particular feeling for

that

states

Kalm

England, and

tells,

words that seem

in

to

be

prophetic in the light of subsequent events, how one of them declared that the colonies would be within thirty or

in condition

a state for *8

fifty

independent of England.^

itself

make

years to '^

When

" Die Freiheit

ment

in

dem

ist die Luft in dcr Ihr geboren, das EleIhr erwachsen, der Lebensgeist der den Ilelve-

tischen Kiirper uiiterhalt."

(Dandliker, vol.

I.

p. i8.)

same "Drang nach personlicher Unabhangiglceit teristic

andem Knecht

soil is

mannic blood. " Montcalm letter to

is

The

charac-

;

the motto of every native in

said to have

a "cousin in France."

XV. p. 128.)

is

Riehl says that the words. •' Eines Niemand sein, der fur sich selbst kann

of the Palatinate

bleiben allein,"

"

made

whom

is

Ale.

a similar prophecy in a (See Eng. Hist. Review, vol.

IN

PEACE AND IN

IVAR.

207

the Strain on the relations between the colonies

and the mother country came, none were more ardent in expressing their sympathies than the Germans. On February 25, 1775, Pastor Hel-

muth, of the Lutheran church in Lancaster, writes that the whole land was preparing for war, nearly every

man was armed, and

was indescribable.

If

the enthusiasm

one hundred men were

he says, far more offered themselves and were angry if they were not taken. Even the

asked

for,

Quakers and Mennonites took part in the exercises, and in large numbers renounced their religious principles.-^ of this testimony for our pres-

The importance ent discussion

lies,

of course, in the fact that

Lan-

County was almost entirely inhabited by Germans. The same spirit manifested itself in Berks County, where practically the entire population was German. When news of the Tea Duty came to Reading there was great excitement, and caster

meetings were held condemning the English. After the battle of Lexington in

township resolved to raise and

drill

1775,

every

a company.21

A

Mennonite preacher, Henry Funck, took oath to the and did good military service in consequence of which vol. he was read out of the Church. (Penn. Arch., 2d Ser., ''°

State

;

ni. p. 463.)

"

Montgomery says

panies

were ready

that

for

by

July, 1775, at least forty

active

warfare.

com-

In a letter from a

2o8

At

IM PE/fCE

AND

IN IVAR.

the various conventions held in Philadelphia

from 1775 on, a large proportion of delegates from Berks, Lancaster, York, Northampton, and other counties were Germans.

We may

take as

example the convention of 1776, of which Franklin was president. Out of 96 delegates 22 were Germans 4 of the 8 sent by Lana

single

;

and 3

caster

of the 8 sent

by Berks were Ger-

mans.

Northampton sent 6.^2 Such was the spirit among tliem. With the exception of the Mennonites and Moravians, who were opposed to war on religious grounds, the feeling

patriotic

Even

was

unanimous.

practically

the sects rendered assistance;

nonites gladly furnished

money and

the

Men-

provisions,

while the Moravians were of service in

many

ways.23

member read

:

of Congress to Gen. Lee,

"The

militia of Pennsylvania

dated July 23, 1776, we seem to be actuated with

a spirit more than Roman,'' and again, "the Spirit of reigns triumphant

in

Pennsylvania.

5th Ser.. I. p. 532.) In Richard Penn's Examination before the

mons, Nov. to bear

10, 1775,

arms

lilierty

(Force's Amor. Arch.,

House of Com-

he said that there were 60,000 men fit and that he believed all would

in Pennsylvania,

willingly take part in the present contest,

{/bid., 4th

Sen,

VI. p. 126.)

" Among them were Muhlenberg, ley.

lion.

Hub-

Hartzell. Levan. Hiestand, William Ellery of Rhode Island writes in his

Kuhn, Arndt.

" The

Ilillegass, Slagle, etc.

PEACE AND

IN

These

facts

tend to show the

who were equahy

mans,

IN IVAR.

209

spirit of the

Ger-

earnest in putting their

We

have seen above patriotism in operation. how companies of mihtia were formed at the

news from Lexington. the

first

It is a significant fact that

force to arrive at

Cambridge

in

1775 was

company from York County, under Lieut. Henry Miller,"-* which had marched five hundred

a

miles

to

reach

destination.

its

Colonel Wil-

liam Thompson's battalion of rifiemen, so styled

Washington's general orders, was enlisted

in

the latter part of June, 1775

;

eight of these

in

com-

panies of expert riflemen were raised in Pennsylvania. Among the captains were Michael DouDiary

in 1777 that the Moravians,

"like the Quakers, are

but are unlike them in this principled against bearing arms taxes as the Govrespect, they are not against paying such ernment may order them to pay toward carrying on the war," etc. (Penn. Mag., vol. xi. p. 318 ff.) In a petition to Congress the Moravians themselves say: ;

('We hold no

anyway dangerous

principle

or

inconsistent

We

willingly help and assist to good government. bear public burdens and never had any distress made for witli

.

.

.

taxes," etc.

Reed

of Philadelphia in a letter to Zeisberger thanked him, in the name of tlie whole country, for his services among the Indians, and particularly for his Christian

President

humanity to

in turning

back so many war parties on

rapine and massacre.

(De

p. 481.) 2*

Judge Pennypacker,

their

way

Schweinitz, Life of Zeisberger,

in Penn.

Mag.,

vol. xxil.

2IO

AND

IN PE/iCE

IN lVy4R.

York County, George Nagel of Berks, and Abraham ]\Iiller of Northampton; the com-

del of

panies of Captains Ross and Smith of Lancaster were also largely made up of Germans. As the editors of the Pennsylvania Archives say,

"

The

patriotism of Pennsylvania was evinced in the haste

which

with

companies of Colonel Thompson's battalion were filled to overflowing, and the promptitude with which they took uj) tlieir

march

the

^^'

for Boston."

All three companies of

Baron von Ottendorf's

corps were raised in Pennsylvania;

man Regiment formed

in

Sullivan's

in

of the

Ger-

— 1776 which took part — against the Indians

campaign five companies were raised in the same State; among the captains were George and Bernard ^^ of

In

other regiments enlisted in Lancaster, Berks, York, and other

Hubley

counties the

Lancaster.

all

Germans formed

a

good proportion.

These companies attracted much attention in the country Thacher in his "Military Jourthrougli which they passed. nal of the Revolution," under date of August, 1775, ^ays " They are remarkably stout and hardy men many of them '^

:

;

exceeding

six feet in height.

They

or rifle-shirts and round hats. the accuracy of their tainty at

aim

;

are dressed in white frocks

These men are remarkable striking a

mark with

two hundred yards' distance."

(Penn.

for

great cer-

Arch., 2d

Ser., vol. X. p. 5.)

" Author

of one of the earliest histories

t>f

the Revolution.

PEACE AND

IN

Even

211

IN IVAR.

in the city of Philadelphia the oldest

Ger-

formed a company of armed veterans, whose commander was over one hundred

man

colonists

Unfortunately many of the rolls of Pennsylvania in the Revolution have been lost, old.^'^

years

and

impossible to give complete statistics. know, however, that the Quaker colony ocis

We

it

cupied a front rank

Any one who

v/ar.28

Archives

will

War

of

carefully goes over the ex-

the

in

Pennsylvania

share of soldiers to the

fair

Independence.

Naturally enough

German

ofificers

we

find a smaller proportion

than men, especially

in

the

from captain the companies formed of Germans were

higher ranks.

down

that pertains to the

convince himself that the Germans

contributed their

27

all

records as recorded

tant

of

in

in

]\Iost of the officers

Hist, of the United States, vol. n. p. 531.

Graham,

'• We In 1779 President Reed wrote to Washington have twelve We line. hold a respectable place in the military regiments equally filled with any other State and much superior

28

:

to

some

;

we have

a greater proportion raised for the

.

.

.

war than

have been by far the greatest sufferers on the any other frontiers, have had more killed, more country desolated," etc. (Penn. Arch., 1st Sen, vol. VII. p. 378.) Alexander Graydon .

.

.

(Memoirs of a Life Chiefly Passed

in

Pennsylvania, p. 128)

"Against the expected hostilities Pennsylvania had Had all the other provinces done made immense exertions. as much in proportion to their ability, and the men been enlisted for the war. we might have avoided the hairbreadth says:

.

escapes which ensued."

.

.

212

IN

PEACE AND same

of course of the

IN IVAR.

nalionalily,

rising afterwards in the ranks.-'^

many

This

is

of

them

true, for

instance, of thefour Hiester brothers, their cousin

]\Iajor-General Joseph

Hiester,

Colonels Lutz,

Kichlein, Hubley, Spyker, Nagle, Eckert, Gloningcr, Antes, Weitzel, Zantzinger, and l"hc

others.

the

only

most

two

distinguished

great

of

many

all,

furnished

generals

and by

Germans, were Gen. Nicholas Herkimer ^^ and Gen. Peter Muhlenberg, the friend of Washy\t tlie outbreak of the war the latter ington. the

was pastor of the German church at Blue Ridge, Va., and the story is well known how one Sunday he preached on the wrongs

of the colonies,

then putting off his gown, showing his uniform beneath, ordered the drums beat at the church

door for

recruits.^^

" According

Troceedings of the Penn. Ger. Soc, vol. V. p. i8, in Northampton County 26 c:ipt.iins and 26 lieutenout of 2357 volunteers 2000 were Gerants were German to the

;

mans.

The hero of Oriskany was a descendant of the New York Berks Palatines, a number of whom went to Tulpehocken. of De here made is mention no course Of County, in 1723. Pennot Kalb and Steuben, who do not come under the rubric so

sylvania Germans. ^' This stf)ry has been rendered into verse by arian

Read

:

" Then from his patriot tongue of flame The startling words of freedom came,"

etc.

Thomas Buch-

IN

Not only

PEACE AND

IN IVA R.

213

in actual fighting did the

Germans

help the cause, but likewise in furnishing the

necessary material of war, provisions, horses, wagons, etc. Lancaster, Berks, and other coun-

were

ties

time the most prosperous agri-

at that

cultural districts in the country.

passed through them

all

Travellers

who

speak of the comfortable

houses, the stately barns, and the rich fields of It

grain.

starving

had

was

would be

army

of

difficult to

conceive what the

Washington would have done

not been for these flourishing farms. It especially here that the non-combatant

it

Mennonites proved

their loyalty;

they never de-

nied requests for provisions. It is interesting to note how uniformly the committees appointed by

Congress

to look after these things

were com-

posed largely of Germans. Lancaster County seems to have done the most in this respect, then

York, Berks, Northampton, and finally the English counties of Chester and Bucks.-^^ \Ye find '-

We

give one extract out of many which could be given In the call for troops on August i,

from the Penn. Archives. 1780,

York furnished

500, Lancaster 1200, Berks 600, North-

ampton 500, Chester 800, Bucks 500, Philadelphia County 200, and City 300 of wagons Cumberland furnished 25, York 25, Lancaster 50, Berks 20, Northampton 15, Bucks 15, Philadelphia County 20, and Chester 45. (See Penn. Arch., 2d Ser., ;

vol. in. p. 371.

317, 605; vol

Cf. also Archives, ist Ser., vol. VI. p.

327;

vol. VII. p. 567.)

v.

pp. 301,

2

IN

14

PEACE AND

ample recognition

IN

WAR.

of these services in the records

In Morse's American Geography pubHshed at Elizabethtown, N. J., in 1789,23 we " It was from farms cultivated by these read of the time.

:

men

that the

American and French armies were

chiefly fed with

bread during the

late rebellion,

was from the produce of these farms that those millions of dollars were obtained which and

it

foundation of the

laid the

and which

ica,

army '^

New ^*

till

fed

Bank

of

North Amer-

and clothed the x^merican

the glorious Peace of Paris." ^^

Quoted by Barber, History of New England, New York, Jersey, and Pennsylvania, p. 551. Cf. also Letter of Prcs. Reed to Col. Brodhead in 1779 :

"The erous

gratitude of the officers of Pennsylvania for the gensupplies afforded by the State does themselves and

State great honor." (Penn. Arch., ist Sen, vol. vn. p. 570.) One of the well-known characters of Philadelphia during the

Revolution was Christopher Ludwig, Baker-General of the Continental army. At one of the provincial conventions to

which he was delegate. General

Mifflin

proposed

to

open

pri-

vate subscriptions for the purchase of firearms. There was much opposition to this, when Ludwig thus addressed the

chair: "Mr. President, I am but a poor gingerbread-baker, but you may put my name down for 200 pounds." When in

l;e

1777

was appointed by Congress Baker-General

of the

army, the proposition was that of bread for a pound of flour.

"I do

not wish to

enough.

I

grow

135 pounds of bread for every 100 put into my hands." (See Penn. Mag., vol.

will furnish

pounds of flour you XVI. pp. 343 ff.)

rich

he should furnish a pound "No, gentlemen," he said, by the war; I have money

IN

Such

PEACE AND

IN IVA R.

215

a

meagre outline of the part played by the Pennsylvania Germans in the Revolution. The same spirit manifests itself in all subsequent is

wars down to the

main discussion

last

As

great rebellion.

of this

book

is

the

confined to the

eighteenth century, we must content ourselves here with a few brief remarks. It is an interest-

ing fact that just as we have already said, the first company to reach Washington at Cambridge

was

from

York

County,

Pennsylvania,

so,

nearly one hundred years later, the first force to reach Lincoln at Washington in 1861 was a regi-

ment composed Allentown, entirely

of five

Pottsville,

composed

companies from Reading, and Lewiston, almost

of the descendants of the Ger-

man patriots of Revolutionary As to the numbers engaged it is

—

days. in the Civil

not necessary here to go into

facts

will

suffice.

details.

The population

of

War,

A

few

Berks

County in the sixties was about nine-tenths German; the rolls of the eight thousand soldiers furnished by this county to the Rebellion show by actual calculation about the same proportion, or,

more

German names; this leaves out of account English names, many of which are variations of a German A original. accurately, 80 per cent of

similar computation of the rolls given in Evans' History of Lancaster County show the

proportion

2i6

IN

to be

IN IVA R.

PEACE AND

somewhat

about 60 per cent; the ex-

less,

planation of which, of course,

lies in

the fact that

a larger proportion of English-speaking people

inhabit that county.

Although

I

have not ex-

tended this somewhat laborious method of ascertaining such facts to Lehigh, York, and other counties, a casual inspection of the rolls given in

the various county histories leads

would be found

a similar percentage

When we

me

to believe

there.^'^"

turn from the scenes of war and ask

what have the Pennsylvania Germans done for the business, artistic, scientific, and literary development of the country, we ^'

Following are some

captain in the Civil

German and

of

the

officers

War who were

.Swiss settlers

find ourselves con-

above the rank of

descendants of the

of Pennsylvania

and,

in

early-

a few

Marjland and Virginia Generals Beaver, Dechert, Gobin, Halderman, Hartranft, Heckman, Heintzelman, Keifer, Pennypacker, Raum, Wister, Zook, Custer, Rodenbough, cases, of

:

Small, Sweitzer, Zeilin

;

Colonels Frederick, Ilaiipt. Levering,

Shoup, Spangler, Barnitz,

Runkle, Schwenk Majors Appel, Rittenhouse Sur;

Kress. Wilhelm,

Diller, Reinoehl, Yoder, geons Egle, Kemper. Foltz, Oberly, Sternberg; Rear- Admirals Ammen, Schley Chaplain Ritner Chief Engineer Schock. For short biographies of the above see " Officers of the Army and Navy who served in the Civil War," ed. by Powell and ;

;

Sliijipen.

;

Mention ought perhaps

— the Frietchic,

to

bo

made

here of Barbara

—

who heroine of Whittier's legendary poem, was born at Lancaster, Pa., Dec. 3, 1766, and died at Frederick,

Md., Dec.

18, 1862.

lor the true

see White's National Cyclopedia

(if

facts

concerning her,

American Biography.

fji '3

PEACE AND

IN

IN IVAR.

217

more difficult task. In the poHtics and war we have more or less

fronted with a far case of

complete

and the

statistics as to the

difficulty

men engaged

therein,

chiefly that of selecting

is

such In

facts as will give a fair picture of the truth.

we can only note who have made a national

names

the present case

the

those

reputation in

the various departments of

life,

of

leaving out of

account the vast body of the middle

class,

makes up the national life. have seen that the Germans were

which

after all

We

farmers, and their

dustry have

Yet even certain

skill,

thoroughness, and in-

made them pre-eminent

in the eighteenth

number

of

chiefly iofj^ ^k>iuJcmJ{'

in this line.

century there was a

mechanics

among

them, and

these carried on their trade after reaching the

New World; country, before

—

for

1750,

most part in the there were few towns and villages living for the

—and

carrying on farming at the

Benjamin Rush says that the first object of the German mechanic was to become a freeholder, and that few Hved in rented houses.

same time

He

soon acquired the knowledge of mechanical arts which were more immediately necessary and useful to a new counalso says that they

try.^^ S6

This adaptability has shown who

the

a surprising fact that young were born in this land are very clever, docile, and

Cf. also Mittelberger

people

"It

itself in

:

is

2i8

PEACE AND IN

IN

IVAR.

development of those manufactures and inventions which have made Pennsylvania so famous.

One hundred and

fifty

years ago a glass-foundry

was established by the eccentric Baron

who

also

Stiegel,

manufactured the once almost univer-

used ten-plate stoves; 3" the first papermill in the United States was built in 1690 by

sally

William Rittenhouse, a Mennonite preacher; and we already have seen how early the Germantown weavers became famous.

many

At the present time and

of the vast iron-foundries

which are found

steel plants

Reading, Bedilchem, Allentown, and elsewhere have been established and arc to-day

of

in

owned and operated

largely by

men

Swiss-German descent.^^

The Germans

in the last

century and up to

comparatively recent times seem to have had ^^ little interest in trade; yet they have given to skilful; for

many

a one looks at a work of

few times and imitates

skill

or art only a

etc.

it

immediately," were jamb-stoves, walled into the jamb of the kitchen fireplace, with the back projecting into the adjoin^'

The

first

ing room.

stoves

They bore

the naive inscription

:

" Baron Stiegel ist der Mann, Der die Ofengiessen kann." '^

"

may be mentioned II. C. Frick, Hon. John Fritz of Bethlehem, Hon. C. C. Kauft'maa of Lan-

Among these

''iron kings

caster Co. '*

Proud says

:

"

The Germans seem more adapted for agri-

PEACE AND

IN

who

the world one

is

IN IVAR.

219

known

the most widely

merchant-prince in the country to-day. In the field of learning, the Pennsylvania Ger-

mans have produced

number of men of wideand the names of David Rita

spread reputation, tenhouse in astronomy, Joseph Leidy and Caspar Wistar in medicine, Muhlenberg in botany, Hal-

deman

and zoology, show that they have not been entirely unfruitful in the domain in philology

of scientific investigation.^^

jg

mention here the

inappropriate to

two

]^qj-

largest telescopes in the world

jj-

perhaps

fact that the

were given by

James Lick, of a prominent family of Lebanon County, and Charles Yerkes, whose ancestors were among the

first

German

settlers of

Mont-

gomery County.

we have not much to chronicle we note a number of Pennsyl-

In the fine arts in recent times

vania names tors,

may

;

among well-known

book-illustra-

but no one great name. So, too, in what be called national literature, in contradis-

—

tinction to that of a purely local nature, discussed

elsewhere, culture

in recent times the

names

of several

and the improvement of a wilderness, and the

trade," etc. *"

—

(Vol.

II.

Irish for

p. 274.)

The well-known naturalist and secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, the late Spencer F. Baird, who was born in Reading, Berks Co., was of English. Scotch, and German descent.

220

IN

of the

PEACE AND

younger American writers should

place in the present

discussion.-*^

however, Bayard Taylor claimed, being

German *'

IN IVA R.

About

in

two

find a

In poetry,

may

be

at least partly

lines

of

Pennsylvania-

blood. tlie

only writer

who

has touched the

field

for fic-

by life among the Pennsylvania farmers is John Luther Long, who, in the Century Magazine for March, 1898, published a short story entitled "Ein Nix-Nutz." The young

tion presented

Canadian

poet.

of Pennsylvania

Archibald

German

Lampman, who

ancestry.

recently died,

was

CHAPTER

VIII.

CONCLUSION.

The

Pennsylvania Germans and their descendants have in round numbers been in Amer-

two hundred years; they have shared in prosperity, have borne their part in peace and

ica for its

war, and have contributed in no shght degree to its

success.

They

American in them are com-

are thoroughly

thought, word, and deed. Most of

Anglo-Saxon element and are scattered far and

pletely assimilated to the

American stock, wide over the whole country. And yet in those communities where they are massed together they of the

still

form a more or

less distinct ethnical entity,

—

a wedge, so to speak, thrust into the very heart of the United States, having their their

own

peculiar

cases, like the

where

in

even their

Dunkards, not

the world,

own

religious

—

their

own

language,

forms, —

to be

own

in

found

some else-

customs, and

type of figure and countenance.^

In reading the present chapter we must bear in mind that the descendants of the early Swiss and German settlers of ^

221

CONCLUSION.

222

Of course

the

German

not so striking

traits are

to-day as they were one hundred years ago; most of the superstitions and unfortunately

some

of the earnest piety of our grandfathers

have passed away, while various

traits of

in their place

have come

American character, some good,

Yet even to-day the type is a distinct one and strikes at once every observant traveller

some bad.

who

visits the State.

When we come people,

we

to analyze the origin of these

find that they are

great ethnical stems.

composed

As we have

of

two

already seen,

they came almost entirely from South Germany, especially

from

and Switzerland.

the

Palatinate,

The two

Wiirtemberg,

latter countries are

Alcmannic, while the Palatinate is of Prankish basis with a more or less strong ad-

purely

mixture of Alemannic, especially in those parts nearest the French frontiers. The Pennsylvania

Germans, then, are composed

of almost equal

parts of both these great stems.

Many

of the

—

Pennsylvania form two distinct groups, those who have remained on the ancestral farms, and those who have gone to the the larger cities and to the States to the South and West ;

two groups are probably equal in numbers. The latter group has been far more completely assimilated by tlieir English neighbors, they have intermarried, Anglicized their names, and there are probably thousands who are unaware of their Pennsylvania-German descent.

CONCLUSION.

223

—

given by Riehl and Dandliker, the Prankish spirit of independence, the Schwabentrotz of the Alemanni, the indomitable industry traits

and

their joy in labor, their extraordi-

skill in

agriculture, their frugality, honesty,

of both

nary

and serious view of the

responsibilities of

life,

these are not only cited in the works of

all

—

men

Rush, Muhlenberg, and others, but are observable even to this day in the rural districts of like

Pennsylvania.

compare the character, traits, habits, customs, and ideals of the early settlers of Pennsylvania as they were in the FatherIt

is

interesting

to

land with those of their descendants in the years that have elapsed since their coming.

Indeed

in

no other way can we get a true conception of the real genius of a people. No one would think of studying the character of New-Englanders without some knowledge of their Puritan ancestors as they

were

in

Such a comparative

England.

study as this shows us the Pennsylvania Germans not as an isolated phenomenon in the midst of English settlements, but the bearers to the

New World with their

of

own

another

civilization,

character and customs brought

from the Fatherland.

We

common

traits

some more

of the

striking

marked

is

the

have given above of character;

resemblance

in

still

customs.

2

CONCLUSION.

24

such as methods of farming, style of houses, love flowers and music, affection and

for

horses and

cattle, religious toleration,

haps more than anything

else,

care

for

and, per-

the identity of

superstitious customs and beUefs.

One

—

has persisted down to the present the strong spirit of conservatism. This has from trait

the very beginning been blamed by their

lish-speaking neighbors, half

called

ago

who

them stubborn and headstrong;

and even to-day the State historian attention to the fact that the to

Engand a

a century

is

apt to call

Germans

are slow

move along

Saxon has

is

its

those lines in which the Anglorushing forward. This conservatism

good and

would be better

its

sides.

No

doubt

it

some

for

have more of the

bad

"

village communities to " hustle of the West, or of

the education and refinement of certain aristocratic

communities

other hand,

it

great weakness

ohne Rast

of

New

England.

On

the

certain that lack of repose is a " in our national life; Ohne Hast,

is

"

an excellent motto, but Americans in general have cut theGoethean proverb into two parts, and thrown away the first. Students of ethis

and Freytag have constantly emphasized the enormous value to a nation of a nology

like Riehl

strong body of farmers.^ '

Thus

the former says (Biirgerliche Gesellschaft,

p. 41):

CONCLUSION. It is

not meant here that

it

225 better for any

is

it particular individual to be a farmer, although would seem that an independent life of comfort,

even though one of toil, such as the Pennsylvania farmer enjoys, would be preferable to the half-slavery of shop, factory, or counting-house which, for the majority of city people, is the only

prospect in life. It certainly is, however, good for a country to have a substantial, prosperous

substratum of farmers, for to-day, even as yester-

day and forever, the basis of national prosperity I for is and must remain in the tilling of the soil.

one do not wish to see the day when the sons of the old Pennsylvania-German stock shall, like

New

England, be fired with ambition to migrate en masse to the city and to desert the homesteads of their ancestors, those of the Puritans of

and especially traordinary

to

skill

throw away as useless the exin farming which has come

Macht in der deutschen Nation, ein fester, trotz allem Wechsel beharrender Der Bauer ist die Kern und das sind unsere Bauern. erfrischt Volksleben Unser Nation. deutschen der Zukunft die Bauern." und verjlingt sich fort und fort durch Freytag ''Es ruht eine unliberwindliche konservative

—

(vol.

letzte

.

.

.

Abth., p. 170) says: '-Audi deshalb liegt die Grundlage fur das Gedeihen der Volker in der einfachen

II.,

2.

reichlicher Thatigkeit des Landmannes,"etc. and again: "Je und ungehinderter neue Kraft aus den untem Schichten in die ;

und eneranspruchsvolleren Kreise aufsteigt, desto kriiftiger sein des Volkes kcinnen." gischer wird das politische Leben

2

26

CONCLUSION.

down

to

them

as the inheritance of thirty genera-

tions of ancestors,

who have made

Eastern Penn-

—and before that the banks of the Upper Rhine —a veritable garden.

sylvania

Not them.

no changes should be welcomed by

that

The farmer should share

in

whatever

is

improvements of modern life. Books and pictures and music and flowers charof service in the

acterize the

day;

may

homes

of

many

they increase

of our farmers to-

more and more!

Those

who have had an

opportunity of observing the

conditions of

in

life

the rural districts for the

twenty-five years, cannot help noticing great In some parts of Lancaster County changes.

last

German even

is

in the

being rapidly replaced by English, home life, and in the most remote

communities.

This

not so true of Lehigh, Berks, and Northampton counties, but it seems is

hardly to be doubted that the time tant

when

is

not far dis-

the Pennsylvania-German dialect will

be a thing of the past. Railroads, telegraphs, and trolley-cars are constantly levelling the differences between town

and country, and making the inhabitants of Eastern Pennsylvania a more and more homo-

genous mass. the

constant

and

their

A

potent factor of this process

intermarrying

between

English-speaking neighbors.

is

Germans In no

CONCLUSION. State in the

minghng

Union

is

there a

of nationahties

227

more thorough

than here.

There

is

hardly one of the old families of Philadelphia, for instance, in which does not run English, Welsh, Scotch-Irish, Dutch, French, and German blood.

This fact constantly meets the student of PennAway back in the eighsylvania genealogy.

Muhlenberg frequently speaks of the mixed marriages which he was called on teenth century

to perform,

and from that time down

ent the process has

too

much

gone on,

to the pres-

until to-day

it is

not

to say that nearly every old family with

an English or Scotch-Irish name has some strain of German blood in it, and vice versa?

There are some who are impatient '

This

Wistar,

at the

sug-

true of the Morris, Shoemaker, Levering, Keen, Keim, Ross, Evans, and many other v/ell-known is

Pennsylvania families. As being of more than mere genealogThe ical interest, a few individual examples are here given.

mother of Senator Simon Cameron was a Pfautz, his wife was a Brua; Judge Jeremiah Black, who has been called "in some

man

Pennsylvania has produced since the Revolution," was partly of German descent; we have already mentioned in other connections Spencer F. Baird, Bayard Taylor, and Archibald Lampman. The late Governor Russell respects the ablest

of Massachusetts

ham Witmer, who

is

said to have been a descendant of Abra-

built in 1799 the fine old stone bridge over

the Conestoga near Lancaster (see Papers of Lane. Co. Hist. Soc, Oct. 1898). Finally, the wife of Lord Curzon, viceroy of India,

belongs to

German

stock.

the

Maryland branch

of

Pennsylvania-

22 8

CONCLUSION.

gestion that an infusion of English blood can add anything to the old-fashioned Pennsylvania-

German

stock; and yet, perhaps, there

son for

this feeling.

is

rea-

its

own

strength

and

Each nation has

own

no

characteristic

features,

weakness.

seems to be universally acknowl-

It

its

edged that the German character

is

marked by

honesty, industry, deep religious spirit, and many other minor yet noble traits. It is this deep in-

wardness, as Dr. Schaflf

German that has

calls

it,

made

that has

the

race the founders of Protestantism, and

produced

midst deep thinkers The Anglo-Saxons have

in their

and great scholars.

other attributes in greater measure, perhaps,

—

energy, individual initiative, power of self-government, attributes which have made them the

—

Surely the Penn-

empire-builders of the world. sylvania

Germans should be glad

peculiarly English traits engrafted

stock;

to see these

on

their

own

and the Anglo-Saxon American may on

his side be glad to see the elements of steadiness,

and even conservatism mingle with the ever-increasing forward movement of American

probity,

years ago a wise German observer of American life ^ saw the advantage civilization.

Some

to be derived

from

*

Francis Lieber,

fifty

He

this union.

The Stranger

in

says:

America,

"Could

p. 199.

CONCLUSION. but a

little

229

of this quickness in practical percep-

and boldness

embarking in the most daring enterprises be engrafted on German steadiness and thoroughness, it would produce fine

tion

fruit indeed."

in

And we

cannot close

this brief

survey of an interesting subject more appropriately than Vv'ith the words of Dr. Philip Schafif,

who, speaking of the great mission of Germans in

America, declares that they should

ically

"

energet-

appropriate the Anglo-Saxon American

nature and penetrate

it

temper and

its

excellencies,

and as

far as possible

with the wealth of their life."

own German

APPENDIX.

PENNSYLVANIA-GERMAN FAMILY NAMES.

A

KNOWLEDGE

great value for historian.

names is often of the genealogist and even for the

This

of family

especially true

when, owing to change in environment, such names have undergone great variations of form. For this reais

son a brief outline of the subject is given here, so far as it concerns the group of people discussed in this book. Pennsylvania-German family names, like

all

other

German names, may

be divided into three distinct classes:

first,

those

derived from personal names; second, those derived from occupation; and third, those derived

from the place where the individual lived (includIn this ing house-signs) or whence he came. last

class

may

likewise

be properly included

nicknames, or those due to personal peculiarities, physical or mental.

The names forming

the

first class

are by far

the oldest, often running back to the early cen231

APPENDIX.

232

case

the

of

turies

arc

Christian

in

every

and dignified meaning,

noble

of

and

era,

which the old German love

for war,

in

belief

the northern mythology, and ideals of

life,

in

are

These personal names exist toPennsylvania, some of them but little

clearly seen.^ in

day

such are Albrecht = of distinguished

changed;

race (P. G. Albright);

Arnwald = one who

Bernhard — strong as a bear; Con-

as the eagle;

rad = bold in council;

Dietrich

Eberhart = strong

ple;

= strong

a

as

= ruler

of

peo-

Eckert =

boar;

Garman = spearman;

strong sword;

generous

rules

Gebhard =

Gerhard Kephart); Gottschalk = servant of God;

giver

G.

(P.

spear;

Hartman = strong

man;

Heidrich = of

noble

rank; Hildebrandt=battle-sword; Hubert=bright of intellect;

Thrudr

(P.

Irmintraut= friend of the Walkyrie G.

Ermentrout);

Reinhard = strong

ple;

ruler

of

council;

Luhr = war-peo-

in counsel;

Reinhold =

Trautman = follower

of

the

Walkyrie Thrudr. In most cases, however, these double-stem names were shortened by dropping the second stem, whence such

names

as

Kuhn

(from

Kun-

For the meaning of German names see Heintze, Die Deutschen Familicnnamen; Tobler-Meyer, Deutsche Familicnnamen (Swiss); Steiib, Oberdeutsche Familiennamen. In the '

above

list

of

names

P. G.

=

Pennsylvania German.

APPENDIX.

233

Hein (from Heinrich), Ott (from Ottmann),

rat),

Traut (from Trautmann), Bar, Barr (from BerTo these stems diminutive sufifixes were liard). thus from

added; (from

Burkhard),

(from

Agilbrecht),

we have

/

the forms Biirki

Ebi (from Ebarhard),

Hagi

(from

EgH

Haginbert),

Lichti (from Ludger: P. G. Light), StaheH (from Stahal),

Gisalhart

and

Wehi :

P.

Wahher), Geissle (from G. Yeissley) from izo we get Boss (from

;

Bodomar), Dietz (from Dietrich), Fritz and Fritschi (from Friedrich: cf. Barbara Blitz (from

Frietchie), Heintz (from Heinrich),

Kuntz (from

Kunrat: P. G. Koons and Kuhns), Landis, Lentz, and Lantz (from Landfrid), Liitz (from Ludwig), Seitz (fromSiegfrid: P. G. Sides), Tietz (from Diet-

(fromWalther) from iko we get Frick (from Friedrich), lUig and the genitive Hilleges rich), Waltz

;

(from Hildebrand), Kiindig (from Gundobert), Leidig (from Luithart)

;

from

ilo

we

get Ebli and

Eberh (from Ebarhard), Bechtel (from BerchBickel (from Botger), Diehl (from Dietrich), Hirzel (from Hinizleip: P. G. Hartzell), told),

Hubeli (from Hugiibert), Markel and MarkH

Meih

(from Maganhard), NageH (from Nagalrich), Rubli (from Hrodebert = Robert), Schnabeli (from root Sneo = (from

Markwald),

snow: P. G. Snavely)

;

from s plus / we get Kiinzel

APPENDIX.

234

= (from Kunrat), Reitzcl (from Ricohard Richand Tietzcl (from Dietrich). From all the above forms patronymics in mann, inger, and Icr are formed: Bailsman,

ard),

Beidleman,

Denlinger,

Dietzinger,

Gehringer,

Grissinger, Heintzelman, Hirtzler, Hollinger.

In addition to the purely

names we have

also

characters

Biblical

German

personal

many names taken from and from the lives of

Bartholomaeus), Klause (Nicholas), Martin, Theiss, and Theissen (I\Iatthias), Peters, Hensel (Johannes), Jiiggi and saints:

Bartel

Jackli

(Jacobus:

(from

P.

G.

Yeagy and Yackley),

Jorges (George: P. G. Yerrick and Yerkes), Brosius (Ambrosius), Bastian (Sebastian), Flory (Florus), Johst (Justus: P. G. Yost),

Jorg,

The second class of Pennsylvania-German family names are derived from the occupation of the individual; among the best known are Becker Baumgartner (orchard-grower), Brenneisen (blacksmith), Brunncr (well-digger), Drcher, (baker),

Trachsel,Trechsler (turner), Fischer, Gerber (tanner, currier: P. G. Garver), Glockner (bell-ringer: P. G. Klackner),

Heilman

who owns

= small

Karcher P.

G.

a /nr&^

(carter),

Kaler,

(doctor),

Huber (one

farm), Jager (hunter),

Kohler, Koehler (coal-burner:

Cayler),

Kaufman

(merchant),

Kiifer, Kiifner (cooper), Kiister (sexton),

Maurer

APPENDIX.

235

(mason), Metzger (butcher), Lehmann (one under feudal tenure), Leineweber (linen-weaver), Miiller,

Probst

(provost),

Reifschneider,

Rie-

menschneider

(harness-maker), Sauter, Suter (shoemaker), Schaffner (steward), Schenck (cupbearer), Scherer (barber), Schlegel (one who hammers), Schmidt (smith), Schneider (tailor), Schreiber (writer), Schreiner (joiner), Schiitz (shooter, archer: P. G. Sheets), Schultz (mayor), Siegrist (sexton), Spengler (tin-smith), Steinmetz (stonecutter),

Tschudi (judge: Swiss), Vogt

(bailiff),

Wagner (wagoner), Wannemaker (basket-maker), Weber (weaver), Wirtz (landlord), Widmeyer Widmer (one who has land from church or monastery), Ziegler (brick-maker), Zimmerman (carpenter).

The

first

subdivision of

names

in the third class

comprises those which denote the place where one lives or whence one comes; such are Al-

gauer (from the Allgau

in Switzerland), Alten-

dorfer (from village in St. Gall, Switz.), Amweg (beside the road), Amend (at end of village),

Bach, Bacher, Bachman (who live near a brook), Berner (from Berne, Switz.), Basler (from Basel),

Berger

(lives

on mountain), Beyer

(a Bavarian),

Biemensdorfer, Blickensdorfer (from village in Canton Zurich), Boehm (a Bohemian), Brechbiihl

(unploughed

hill:

P.

G.

Brightbill

and

APPENDIX.

236 Brackbill),

Brubacher

Switz.), kofifer

Breitenbach

(from

in

in

Solothurn,

(village in Zurich),

Biittikofen,

village

weiler (village

(village

Biittig-

Berne),

Det-

Canton Zurich), Diefenbach Canton Uri, Switz.), Diffen-

(Tiefenbach, in dorfer (from Tiefendorf), Fliickiger (village in

Canton Berne), Fahrni Aargau,

(in

Halden,

Switz.),

(village in Berne), Prick

Haldi,

common name

Haldeman (from

for village

in

Switzer-

Hofstetter (name of several villages

land),

in

Zurich, St. Gall, and Berne), Eschelman (from

Aeschi, village in Canton Berne),

hollow land), Imboden farm-yard),

(in

(in

Imgrund (in bottom-lands), Imhof

Kollicker (village in Aargau),

(village in Berne), Mellinger (vil-

Longenecker

Aargau), Neuenschwander (village in Berne), Oberholtzer (sever?! villages in Berne),

lage

in

Riiegsegger (Berne: P. G. Ricksecker), Schollenberger (castle and village, Zurich), Schwab (a Swabian: P. G. Swope), Urner (from Canton Zug), Ziircher (from ZiJrich).^ During the Middle Ages the houses were not numbered as now, but had signs painted on

Uri),

Zug (Canton

them, something after the manner of hotels at the '

present

Some

time.

of these

in the Palatinate

From

these

many names

names may come from homonymous places almost all the Lancaster County family-

;

names, however, which are derived from places, are of Swiss origin.

APPENDIX.

Bar

were derived:

237

Baum

(bear),

(tree),

Bieber

(beaver), Bischof (bishop),

Engel (angel), Fasnacht (Slirove-Tuesday), Faust (fist), Fuchs(fox), Fiinfrock (five-coats), Haas (hare), Hahn (rooster), Hehii (helmet), Hertzog (duke: P. G. Hartsook),

Holtzapfel (wild-apple), Kalb Gulp), Kaiser (emperor),

Konig

Miinch (monk), Oechsli

(crab),

Pfaff

Exley), (bird),

(calf:

Ritter

(priest),

Voegli

(little

P. G. Kulp,

(king),

(little

ox: P. G.

(knight),

Finally

bird: P. G. Feagley), Wiir-

we have names given from Such

peculiarities.

personal

are: Braun, Diirr (dry, thin),

Frohlich (cheerful: P. G. Frailey), Frei

Freytag

(Friday),

liver:

Reich

Krause

Hiibschmann Jiing (young), Kahl

(curly),

Lang

(short),

Rothaermel

Roth

(small

Krumbein (crooked (long),

(red),

serlegs),

Lebengut (good-

P. G. Livingood), Rau, (rich),

(free),

Gut (good),

(handsome), Hoch (tall), (bald), Klein (small), Kleindienst

Kurtz

Vogel

cube). Wolf.

fel (die,

vice),

Krebs

Ranch

Rothrock

(rough),

(red-coat),

Schwartz (black), SelWeiss (white) .^

(red-sleeve),

tenreich (seldom rich),

Such were some of the names brought by the Pennsylvania Germans from the Palatinate and Switzerland to the New World. It was but nat'

The author has

ject,

which

is

written an extended treatment of this sub-

soon to appear in the Americana Germanica.

APPENDIX.

238

names should undergo certain their new environments changes

ural that these

—

changes in which took place from the very beginning. An interesting illustration of the way in which

many names

received an English form

is

seen in

the Pennsylvania Archives, Second Series, vol, XVII., which contains a list of the German and

Swiss

settlers in

Pennsylvania during the eigh-

teenth century, the

names

of the vessels in

which

they came, and the dates of their naturalization. Often there are two lists given, one called the " original

list,"

which apparently was made by

an English-speaking person, who took down the names as they were given to him orally, and who spelt

them

phonetically.

throw a great deal

of light

These duplicate lists on the pronunciation

names by the immigrants themselves. We find the same person's name spelled Kuntz and Coones, Kuhle and Keeley, Ruber and Hufifer,

of the

Gaul and Kool, Vogelin and Fagley, Krautz and Grauce, Froehlich and Frailick. Often there are

some marvellous examples

of phonetic spelling.

Thus, Albrecht Graf^ is written Albrake Grove, Georg Heinrich Mertz is called Jurig Henrich

metamorphosed into Yerrick Burry. Thus even before the immigrant landed the impulse toward a change of name was March, and Georg Born

given.

is

APPENDIX.

239

Sometimes the change was gradual, and we may trace many intermediate steps between the

name and its present form. Thus, for Krehbiel we have Krehbill, Grebill, Grabill, and So Krumbein gives us Krumfinally Graybill. original

Grumbein, and Grumbine, and Kuehbortz Often members gives Kieportz and Keeports. of the same family spelled their names differently. bine,

In Lancaster there once lived two brothers, one

named we are

Carpenter, the other Zimmermann, and told by Francis Lieber (The Stranger in

America), that one family in Pennsylvania had the three forms, Klein, Small and Little.

—

In some cases the changes were

owing

slight,

between the English and the Baker (Becker), Miller (Mueller),

to the similarity

German,

Brown ber),

as in

(Braun),

Pepper

came almost

Weaver (Weber), Beaver

(Pfeffer); at

of course

once Smith.

differences are so great that

cover the original

(Bie-

Schmidt be-

In other cases the it

is difficult

German form, and

to dis-

it is

only by searching public documents and church records that the truth is found. Who, for instance, could

any connection between Seldomridge and Seltenreich, or between Rhoades and Roth? Yet see

nothing

names

is

surer than that in

are one and the same.

true that

cases these

many It is

undoubtedly

most Pennsylvania Germans

of

modern

240

yIPPENDIX.

times have no conception of the changes that have taken place. The remark of a farmer who

name Minich

spelled his "

nounced),

Oh,

that INIinnick

name with

spells his

(with the guttural pro-

a

A',"

is

an Irishman; he

illustrates the igno-

rance of the people in regard to their own names; for Minich arid Minnick both come from the

Muench.

original

In the present discussion

we must bear in the names of those

mind that we are speaking of Germans who came to America before

the

Revo-

and who were subject to an entirely ferent set of influences from the German of

lution,

who changes

cent times,

and bodily

into English.

Pennsylvania sciously

had is

to do.

like that

re-

consciously of the early

Germans were changed unconwhich they The difference between the two

and according

little

name The names his

dif-

to forces with

between the mots savants and the mots

populaircs of

French philology.

These German names almost Palatinate and Switzerland. trace the Swiss origin of

Urner (from

all

came from the

Even to-day we can

many,

as, for instance,

Johns (Tschantz), Neagley (Naegeli), Bossier (Baseler). Some are of French Huguenot origin, which by combined German arid

Uri),

English influence have often received a not

very elegant or euphonious

forfii:

examples are

APPENDIX.

Lemon

241

(Le Mon), Bushong (Beauchamp), and

Shunk (Jean); the original Fierre was changed to German Faehre, and later became anglicized into Ferree.*

The number of different ways of spelling even the simplest names is often surprisingly large: thus, for the original Graf we find to-day Graaf, So Baer Graff, Groff, Groft, Graft, and Grove. gives us Bear, Bare, Bair. Of course the vagaries of English orthography are largely responsible for this.

tion

is

An

interesting fact to note in this connec-

the difference yet to be seen between the

same names

in

town and country.

The farmers

of Pennsylvania are a conservative people,

and

even to-day, after nearly two hundred years of settlement in America, the people dialect.

Naturally the

to English influence,

cities

and

it is

still

speak their

were most subject there that

we

find

the greatest changes in names. Take as an example of this the name of Kuntz (with the later forms of

Kuhns and Koons)

of Allentown.

in the

town and environs

In the town proper there are

recorded in the directory twenty-two Koonses, Other Huguenot names in Pennsylvania are Fortune (Fordney), Correll, Flory, De Frehn, Farny, Ruby, Salade, Bene*

Broe (Brua), Lefevre, Levan, Erny be (See Keiper, Swiss), Gobain, Hubert. (this name may Franzosische Familiennamen in der Pfalz, and Geschichts-

tum, Bevier,

Bertalot,

blatter des deutschen Huguenotten-Vereins.)

APPENDIX.

242

twelve Kuntzes, and fourteen Kuhnses; while in the smaller villages around Allentown

sixty-two

Kuhnses,

few

a

Kuntzes,

we

find

no

and

Koonses.

There were three ways

names took

which the change

in

of

by translation; second, by spelling German sounds according to English methods; and third, ])y analogy. The former is place:

first,

the most natural in cases where English equivalents exist for the

mann we have

German; hence for

Carpenter;

for

Zimmer-

Steinbrenner,

Stoneburner; for Schumacher, Shoemaker;

for

Lebengut, Livingood; for Fuchs, Fox; for Hoch, High; and so Often only half the name is translated, forth. for

Seidensticker, Silkknitter;

while the other half

is

changed phonetically, as

Slaymaker (for Schleiermacher), Wanamaker (for Wannemacher). But the true field for the philologist is found in

in the

second

class, that of

English spelling of

German sounds. The a in Pennsylvania German was

pro-

nounced broadly, like English aic, and this sound is represented in such names as Groflf and

Grove (from

Aughey nounced

Graff),

(Ache), and like

names Staley

Swope (Schwab), Ault

Rawn

English (Stehli),

a.

(Rahn).

and

this

E

(Alt),

was pro-

gives us the

Gable (Gebel),

Amwake

APPENDIX.

(Amweg).

/,

pronounced

ce,

243 gives

Reed

Sheeleigh (Schillig), also written Shelley.

(Rith),

U

in

German has two sounds, one long and one short. The long sound is represented by 00 in the names

Hoon (Huhn), Fooks

(Fuchs), Booker (Bucher), The short sound, being un-

Hoover (Huber).

was lengthened, as Kootz (Kutz), Zook (Zug). Sometimes an h was added to indicate the lengthening of the

familiar

to

English

ears,

vowel, as in Johns (Tschantz), is

Kuhns

(Kuntz).

usually retained, although sometimes spelled

Hoak

(Hoch), Boats (Botz). Of the diphthongs, an naturally is spelled otv or on, as in Bowman (Bauman), Foust (Faust),

oa, as in

Mowrer More

(Maurer).

above

the change in the diphthong

ular

is

interesting

and complicated than, the

German pronunciation

sented by English

i

or y:

of

ci.

this

The is

reg-

repre-

hence such names as

Hines (Heinz), Smyser (Schmeiser), Whitesel

Snyder (Schneider), Tice

(Weitzel),

(Theiss),

Rice (Reis), Knipe (Kneipe). In the names Heil-

man, Weiser, and Beiler the German spelling and sound are both retained. The Pennsylvania Germans, however, pronounced ci as English a, and thus

we

find the

(Kreidig),

names

Sailor (Seller), Graty

Hailman (Heilman), Espenshade (Es-

penscheid).

APPENDIX.

244

The mixed vowels were c in

ing

Derr (Doerr), Sener (Soehner), Kelker

(Koellicker),

(Oehrle),

becom-

simplified, o

Mellick

ca

(Moehlich),

in

Early

Hake (Boehm), and long and short in German. The

Beam

in

a

(Hoeck). Ue is former gives ce, as in Keeney (Kuehne), Keeley (Kuehle); the latter usually gives i, as in Bitner (Buettner), Kindig (Kuendig), Bixler (BuechsIn Sheets ler), Tliss (Huess), Miller (Mueller). (Schuetz), however, short ue is lengthened to ee. In the following names the umlaut is ignored:

Stover (Stoever), Shroder (Schroeder), Shober (Schoeber). Of course the

changes undergone by con-

sonants are not so great as in the case of vowels, yet

we have some

interesting

naturally changed to

Yost

(Johst).

3-;

Z becomes

phenomena.

hence .y

Curts (Kurtz), Butts (Butz).

in

K

/

is

Young (Jung), many names, as and

c,

and often

interchangeable, as in Cofifman (Kauff-

g, are

man), Cline (Kline), Capehart (Kephart hard), Grider (Kreider), Givler (Kubler).

= GebAt

the

end of a word, ig usually becomes y, as in Leiby T is changed to d in (Leibig), Leidy (Leidig). Sides

(Seitz),

Road

(Roth),

Widmayer (Wit-

meyer).

H

is

omitted

in

Sener (Soehner), Cole (Kohl),

Fraley (Froehlich),

Lcman (Lehman).

Pf

be-

APPENDIX.

comes in

simplified to

Kopp

in

/"

B was

(Kopf).

Pennsylvania Germans to a large

number

of

Foutz (Pfautz), or to p often

like v,

pronounced by the and this gives rise

new names, among them Everly (Eberle), Hoover

being the following: (Huber), Garver (Gerber),

—Whitescarver

245

—also written Carver,

(Weissgerber), Lively (Leibly),

Suavely (Schnaebele), Beaver (Bieber). The change of cli into gli has also brought large

number

bright

of

names, as

in

in a

Light (Licht), Al-

Hambright

(Hambrecht), and the numerous class Slaughter (Schlachter), of

(Albrecht),

names

in

baugh

(bach), as

Baugher (Bacher), Harbaugh (Herbach), Brightenbaugh (Breiten-

bach),

Rodenbough (Rothenbach).

becomes k

Cli

in the suffix

maker; probably Of course sch largely due to translation. plified to sh or

.y

in the

names Slagle

usually this is is

sim-

(Schlegel),

Slatter (Schlatter), Shriner (Schreiner).

One changes

of is

the

most interesting

of

all

these

that of cr to ar, thus illustrating a

phenomenon common

to

all

languages.

As

the

Latin mercantein becomes French marcJiand, as the English

Derby

Clark, and so forth,

comes

pronounced Darby, Clerk so the German Gerber be-

is

Herbach becomes Harbaugh, Berger becomes Barger, Werfel becomes Warfel, Merkley becomes Markley, Hertzell becomes Garver,

/IPPENDIX.

246 Hartzell,

and Herzog becomes Hartsook.

lar to this is the

Simi-

change of Spengler to Spangler.

Interesting also

is

the tendency to introduce

an extra syllable between certain consonants, as Minich for Muench, Sherrick for Sherk, Widener for

Waidner, Keneagy for Gnege, Yerrick

for

Jorg.

As

in all

language-changes, so here, analogy

exerted more or less influence.

When

the simple

spelling of foreign sounds did not produce an

English-looking name, often a name which resembled the German in sound or appearance was substrtuted, as, for example, Rush for Roesch.

probably the explanation of the inorganic Rhoades (for Roth), Richards (for Reichert).

This ^ in

is

Probably the spelling baugh for hack may be more or less influenced by such names as Laughlin,

Gough, or by American names

origin.

of

Dutch

BIBLIOGRAPHY.' The

following

contains the chief works which

list

treat of the various topics discussed in this book. It is here given as a guide to those who wish to pursue the

subject further.

GENERAL. The

Colonial Records of Pennsylvania. Pennsylvania Archives, Phila. and Harrisburg, 1852-1900. Three Series.

The

Statutes

at

Large

of

Pennsylvania, vols. 2-5.

1896-

1898.

Americana Germanica.

Pub. by M. D. Learned of the

University of Pennsylvania.

American

Historical

Association,

Annual

Reports of, Washington, 1889-1899. Hazard, Samuel. The Register of Pennsylvania. Phila. 1828-32.

Hallesche Nachrichten. Ed. by W. J. Mann and B. M. Schmucker. Allentown and Philadelphia, 1886, 1895. Notes and Queries, Historical and Genealogical. Chiefly relating to interior Pennsylvania. From 1879 on. Harrisburg.

The Pennsylvania German. Rev. P. C. Croll.

Ed. by

W. H.

Issued quarterly,

Egle.

Ed. by

Lebanon, Pa., 1900.

* This Bibliography contains only part of the sources used in the preparation of this book, sources which include not only printed material, but church and town records, traditions, and personal obser-

vation.

247

BIBLIOGRAPHY.

248

The Pennsylvania Magazine

of

History and Biography.

Pub. by the Historical Society of Pennsylvania. adelphia.

The Perkiomen Region, appeared.

Past and Present. Vols,

Issued periodically.

S. Dotterer.

Eckhoff, A.

Phil-

Vols. 1-22.

Philadelphia. In der neuen Heimath.

2.

i

Ed. by H. and 2 have

Ausgabe.

New

York, 1885.

Loher, Franz. Amcrika. Baer, Geo. F.

Geschichte und Zusiiinde der Deutschen in 2.

Ausgabe.

Gottingen, 1885.

The Pennsylvania Germans.

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