USA > Maine > Lincoln County > Waldoboro > History of old Broad Bay and Waldoboro, Volume 1 > Part 40
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HISTORY OF OLD BROAD BAY AND WALDOBORO
cluded a revolt from a formal and systematic theology, the evolv- ing of a communal system of social and economic life, and the adoption of the ceremonial feet washing.
In addition to this the whole structure of Moravian religious belief became infiltrated with the extreme sentimentalism charac- teristic of eighteenth-century Germany, which is so cleverly re- vealed by Goethe in his Leiden des Jungen Werthers. The Mora- vians of Pennsylvania and Broad Bay were representatives of this period of ultra emotionalism. The correspondence and communi- cations between Broad Bay and the Mother Church in Bethlehem in these years are of an orgiastic religious character. They con- tain expressions that almost defy meaningful interpretation either in English or German. The sufferings of the Christ, his wounds, his blood, and his passion receive an emphasis that seems irreverent and shocking to the modern reader. Their diction is largely made up of the highly figurative language of love as found in the Song of Songs. The Christ becomes the fiction of morbidly imaginative musings, and his followers fall in love with his image as one feels the sense of love for an earthly sweetheart. In justice to the modern church, it should be said that it has long since repudiated such ex- tremes of emotionalism. In the present day the church greatly re- sembles the Church of England, but the Broad Bay Moravians of the mid eighteenth century manifested in their writings and wor- ship the extremes here briefly elaborated.
The first Moravians reached America in 1734 and founded their great center at Bethlehem in 1741. Here they established their communal system, under which personal property was held by the individual, but the church held title to the land and received and distributed the fruits of the combined labor of the commu- nity, allotting to each individual the necessities of life, education for children and protection in sickness and old age. In 1749 there were thirty thousand Moravians in America, of which number more than a thousand were missionaries. Their activities extended from Maine to Georgia and westward across the mountains to the Indians in the Ohio Valley.
Among the missionaries operating in New England were George Soelle and Samuel Herr, of whom the former was at Broad Bay apparently as early as 1758. In Boston they were wont to stop at the house of the Sehlheims who were of the Unitas Fratrum, and here they received word of the interest at Broad Bay in their missionary activities. Herr and Soelle returned to Boston again in 1760 intent on surveying the territory north of that city for the purpose of singling out and reporting on the more promising cen- ters for missionary labors. On this visit at the house of the Sehl- heims, they met Barbara, the wife of Hans Georg Hahn, and were
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eagerly beseeched by her to pay a visit to Broad Bay in order to minister to the spiritual wants of the group of Moravians in that settlement. There followed a two-week visit by Herr and Soelle, whose report on their stay is preserved in the archives of the Mother Church in Bethlehem and is the earliest firsthand account of the life at this time on the Medomak. In connection with Soelle's visit it should be said that there were a number of families of Moravian leaning in the colony as early as 1742. These included two of the Rominger brothers, the Voglers, and the Schneiders. This number was increased in each of the later migrations and in- cluded the Castners, the Hahns, the Orffs, and others. In reality at this time the soil had already been prepared, the seed sown, and the only thing wanting was the nurturing hand of the husbandman.
On August 22, 1760, Herr and Soelle reached Broad Bay by sloop from Boston. In his Diary1 Soelle describes the place as follows:
It is a place where the sea runs twenty miles up into the land. About twelve miles up the Bay the ocean divides into two arms. The western arm does not extend very far, and the district round about it is called Runpan.2 The eastern arm, however, extends much farther and is about a mile and a half wide; this arm is known in the main as Broad Bay. Here live the High Germans along the water and on both sides of the river. A splendid trade center could be built up here if the country round about were settled. The land in itself is very good and produc- tive. Whatever is planted grows well, but they cannot sow winter wheat because snow is deep and it remains on the ground a long time. Fish they often get in such quantities that they feed their swine on them in winter. Nevertheless the people are still very poor, in part because they have not dwelt there very long, most of them only seven or eight years, and in part because in the present war3 they have been greatly harassed by the Indians.
Soelle put up at the cabin of Georg Hahn, a carpenter, who had helped to build the Single Brethren House at Herrnhaag.4 He found the community without spiritual leadership. There were no preachers who visited the place, and one Englishman5 who came to Soelle's service told him that he had not heard a sermon in seven years. In 1758 Georg Hahn had started to hold meetings every Sunday and to read from Doctor Hartmann's Book of Sermons to the few with Moravian leanings who gathered in his cabin. This number embraced about six families. On the Sunday of August 24th Soelle preached in the morning and Herr in the afternoon. These meetings were attended by the general public, and after- ward a special meeting was held for those with Moravian interests.
1New England Quarterly, Dec., 1939. Trans. and ed. by J. J. Stahl.
2Round Pond.
3The French and Indian War. Final treaty signed at Paris, Feb. 10, 1763.
4A Moravian Center in Germany.
"Moses Robinson from Warren.
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Hahn's great unpopularity in the community was at first something of a handicap to the two brethren. Soelle observes that Hahn had let loose on the people everywhere, "with thunder and lightning," and "in this way he has brought the people to such a pitch of anger that they have really sought to kill him." He had especially incurred the enmity of the leading man in the colony, Captain Charles Christopher Godfrey Leisner, who at first gave vent to dark utterances against the two missionaries. Samuel Herr, however, had a long talk with Captain Leisner and seemingly was able to allay his suspicions. In the meeting of August 27th at the home of John Martin Reiser (Razor), however, Leisner was in attendance and thereafter gave the brethren full support for the duration of their stay, and offered the use of his cabin for future services. Since this was the largest in all Broad Bay, the offer was gladly accepted, a fact which according to Soelle, "gave to the self righteousness of our host6 a terrific shock."
On the following Sunday, August 31, Soelle's account of the services so fully reveals the great hunger and thirst after righteous- ness among the people, that his own words7 are here given:
Today a great many of the Germans and the English from Runpan and Benequith8 come to the service in Captain Leisner's house. Since the house was much too small to hold the people, I was obliged to de- liver the German sermon in the field. I proclaimed to them the death of the Lamb, its reason and its power by using the words from Ephe- sians, Chapter II, verse 10 [For we are his workmanship, etc.] There I stressed mainly the words, "created in Christ Jesus." After the German service was finished, I had the English and as many Germans as un- derstood English go into the house. I took as the text Hebrews 9, 14, "How much more shall the blood of Christ" etc. The dear Saviour blessed his word in both places; especially, however, was the English meeting blessed with visible grace. Many eyes and cheeks were wet. Captain Leisner wept like a child.
After I had finished here at two o'clock, many more people came from the other side of Broad Bay to hear the word. We had no time to eat dinner, to which Captain Leisner had invited us, but went with the people to a fort9 where Brother Samuel delivered a fine sermon, using as his text First Timothy, Chapter I, verse 15 ["Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am chief"]. The people sat upon the square around him and looked at him as fixedly and continuously as if they wanted to eat the words from his mouth.
When we were finished they began to repeat their request that one of us might remain in the settlement. ... Since we intended tomorrow or day after tomorrow to go back to Boston and on that account talked today with a Captain, all the truly awakened came together and wanted us to take a letter of theirs to Bethlehem in order to request a brother of the Church. We told them they should consider the matter a little
6Georg Hahn.
"Kurze Historische Bericht von dem Häuftein in Broad Bay vom Anfang an bis jetzt, Morav. Archives (Bethlehem, Pa.).
8Pemaquid.
Probably the "middle garrison" on Garrison Hill on the old Ludwig Castner farm.
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more carefully and see to what extent the Saviour would reveal his purpose in their heart and feelings, and if he did so, so that they were all united in this matter, they could write. They said they would follow our counsel, but that they could not defer writing beyond late fall as they would like to have a Brother come in the spring. They had after that a brief but blessed quarter of an hour with us, and then very late at night they returned to their homes. It was a day rich in blessings for Broad Bay.
On Thursday, September 4th, Soelle and Samuel Herr left Broad Bay for Boston. In due season the request from the Mora- vian group on the Medomak was drawn up and sent; but accord- ing to Soelle, it fell into hostile hands in transit, an indication of the suspicion in which the little Moravian group at Broad Bay was held. But Soelle's report to the Mother Church was sufficient to create the needed interest, and in August 1762 he returned to Broad Bay under a mandate from his church to establish a mission there.
Much of the groundwork for such a task had already been laid by Georg Hahn. He had come to Broad Bay in 1752 and had found there as Soelle expressed it, rather strongly perhaps, noth- ing but a settlement made up of "atrociously wicked people." There were some spiritually minded ones, and these requested Hahn to read them a sermon each Sunday. This was in the Broad Bay tradition, as one is minded of the similar groups which gath- ered to listen to John Ulmer and Captain Leisner. In this way it is recorded that some of Hahn's group came upon "better thoughts," and started to hold small separate meetings, to read the Bible to- gether, to discuss the meaning of texts, and to conclude their meet- ings with common prayers. Hahn had a vague recollection of the Moravian forms and practices which he had observed at Herrn- haag and sought to mold the group on similar lines. This condition continued for a number of years during which separate meetings were held with prayers, discussion, and communion. It was a flock without a shepherd. Questions were asked which could not be answered, and differences of opinion arose over the meanings of the Word and over the proper course of procedure. The group was conscious of these disintegrating influences and prayed for a brother who would come and serve as their leader. They wrote and they visited Jacob Sehlheim in Boston begging him, if any of the Brethren should come to his place, to send one to them. This, in brief, is the background of the situation which Soelle faced as he entered on his ministry at Broad Bay.
On his return to Broad Bay in the year 1762, Soelle brought to the group a greeting of love and good will from the church in Bethlehem and a statement of his willingness to serve Broad Bay as a missionary preacher. He told the people that it was his in- tent to remain over the winter with them. In consequence they
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HISTORY OF OLD BROAD BAY AND WALDOBORO
at once decided to build a meetinghouse, and the members of seven families started to erect the mission. In the Moravian Archives at Bethlehem is a rough pencil sketch of this structure, made by Bishop John Ettwein during his visit to Broad Bay in 1767, a sketch which has been used by the artist in doing the illustration for this chapter. Among the builders of the mission were certainly car-
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MORAVIAN . MISSION BROAD BAY . MAINE. 1762
Paul Wescott
penters, David and Michael Rominger, Georg Hahn, David Holz- apfel, and the blacksmith, Willibaldus Castner, assisted by Philip Vogler, Nicklaus Orph, and others. It was a rough log structure located on the east bank of the river at the shore of the farm of Philip Christopher Vogler, the present Davis Dairy farm. In early December the work on the mission was completed and Soelle re- cords the dedication and the first meeting in the following para- graph:
On the 12th of December I delivered the first sermon in our new meeting house with the text taken from Ephesians, 3, 17, "That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith," etc. After I had talked to the chil- dren, we dedicated the house to the Saviour upon our knees with many tears. We besought his blessing and gracious presence as often as we came here together to speak and hear of him, and commended ourselves in all our ways to his watchful care. We were keenly sensitive to his presence among us. After the communion we all went quietly home
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with light hearts. On Sunday, the 17th, I moved into the house and on the 20th, I started a little school which continued through the winter for our own and a few outside children.
So it was that the mission house was used as a church, school, and residence for Mr. Soelle. It was then common practice for Moravian missionaries to reside in the mission house.
Following his arrival, Soelle had immediately begun to hold services for all the people at Broad Bay, and from time to time preached to the English at Broad Cove. He visited very generally in Broad Bay homes. In this the faithful Saviour was with him and blessed the word he carried as far as possible. Everything pro- ceeded in a peaceful and friendly manner until November, when the strange and bizarre personage of John Martin Schaeffer ap- peared on the scene to take up the work of resident pastor for the Lutherans. Trouble started with his arrival. First, rumors were spread through the settlement to the effect that Soelle had been stoned out of Philadelphia by the children, and that in Newport he had been escorted out of town by the constables. In order to allay these rumors, Soelle paid a call on the arch-hypocrite in an effort to set him right on his facts. This visit is described by Soelle as follows:
In the face of all this I visited him and found him very friendly. I was of good courage and sustained by the presence of my Lord, told him what my sole object was at Broad Bay and when I had finished I took a friendly leave. He promised to visit me, said we must see some- thing of one another and that he intended to persuade me to be his assistant in the preaching and schoolwork. I replied that I was here only to serve the few people who had asked it of me and that beyond that I was not prepared to go.
This first visit made it clear to Soelle that Schaeffer was no wolf in sheep's clothing, but rather as he termed it, "a wild sow in the vineyard." At the end of 1762 a new family of Moravian sympathizers arrived from Boston. The seven families had become eight, which probably increased Soelle's flock to more than fifty men, women, and children.
The year 1763 started with considerable agitation. Opinions were expressed loudly and freely. They did not want two preach- ers in the settlement, to say nothing of Herrnhüter;10 the Mora- vians should cleave to Schaeffer and help pay his salary. Georg Hahn was held especially responsible for existing conditions since he had written to Bethlehem in the name of six families to secure a Brother. The basic instigator of all this persecution was Schaeffer, and it is doing him no injustice to say that his primary purpose
10 So called from Herrnhut, the settlement made by the Moravians in 1722 on the estate of Count Zinzendorf.
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HISTORY OF OLD BROAD BAY AND WALDOBORO
was mercenary rather than religious, for with two preachers in the colony, there would be fewer to contribute to his salary.
The fire smouldered under the ashes all through the winter. There was a quiet but constant intrigue. Detailed preparations were made and a decision reached to send Soelle and Hahn away to Boston on the first sloop to enter the river after the ice had gone out in the spring. To this end Soelle's passport was demanded of him in February. By April agitation had grown more intense. On May 10th the trouble came to a head. Soelle and Hahn were seized by an escort of from thirty to forty armed men and led away. The abductors could not agree, however, with reference to the disposition of the two prisoners and after a day in custody they were released. Soelle notes: "Our people sat in the meeting house when it happened and did not speak. Then I began my work as before. Joy consoled and quickened me, and I remained of good courage through it all."
In June the agitators took from the Moravians their pasture land. In the economy of Broad Bay this was a heavy blow, but it served only to increase resistance, and they resolved to suffer all rather than "turn their hearts away from the Gospel." It did not even occur to the persecuted to lodge complaint with the authori- ties. The remainder of the year saw no further recourse to force, although there was no abatement in the campaign of defamation. Despite all this opposition on the part of Schaeffer and his sup- porters, Soelle notes: "Now this one, now that one came to listen and not without blessing."
The first break favorable to the Moravians in this period of persecution came in the spring of 1764, when some of Schaeffer's followers discovered things in his way of living which shocked them, and they considered withdrawing their support from him. There was another blow, too, that caught Schaeffer unexpectedly between wind and water, and certainly was not of a purely acci- dental character. Late in the preceding year a copy of Christopher Sauer's German newspaper11 had been sent or brought into the colony. In it Schaeffer's first wife, who had left him, gave an ac- count of his behavior toward her. The paper with this bit of scan- dal in it, set forth by one who had suffered at Schaeffer's hands, came, not by chance perhaps, into the possession of the Moravi- ans. Soelle forbade that the report be given to the public. The temptation, however, was too strong, and malodorous rumors were soon in circulation. Some people gave these credence, and as a con- sequence the Reformed families withdrew from Schaeffer and started holding services under the leadership of one of their Re- formed schoolmasters. To this group the impetuous Georg Hahn,
11The first German language newspaper to be published in the colonies.
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The Moravians
always eager to track Beelzebub to his lair, showed the newspaper story.
The tempo of life at Broad Bay speeded up. The whole settle- ment buzzed like a hive of angry bees. Schaeffer struck back in revenge. He used the arm of the law to have Hahn placed under arrest on the charge that six years before, when there was no preacher in the place, he had baptized children. The subordinate officer making the arrest had, however, acted on his own initiative; and when the news reached Frankfort, the county seat, the High Sheriff came to Broad Bay to investigate conditions. As a result he advised Hahn to place his case in the hands of the King's Attorney for action. This partial solution of the situation had come about by accident and not from any call for aid on the part of the Mora- vians. Schaeffer was checked but he did not cease to howl.
As a result of this turn of affairs Soelle's listeners increased markedly through the winter. The desire for admission to his school also increased. He took as many children as he could, among them those of a man who was one of his principal enemies in the settlement. That winter his flock was increased by eight additions. Soelle also continued to preach to the English in the neighboring settlement, and many came as frequently as they could to his serv- ice at Broad Bay. Through it all Soelle was restless. This was his nature. He never cared to stay very long in one place. He loved the association of kindred spirits and constantly longed for the fel- lowship of the church in Bethlehem. His letters to the Mother Church are ever expressive of the hope that a Brother might be sent to relieve him and yet the pathetic condition of his poor flock at Broad Bay held him like a magnet at his post. "I see clearly," he writes, "that Christ is not weary of this place, but rather doth it please him to have his cross proclaimed here. So I will not tear myself away, but will wait until he himself bids me go."12 As an antidote to his loneliness and isolation, the Church sent Brother Heppner to pay him a visit and to aid him in his work for a brief period during the summers of 1763 and 1764.
In spite of the check which Schaeffer had received, his ac- tivity continued; but now the real character of the man was un- derstood in some quarters, and in consequence, he was not able to act except where a reasonable opening occurred. As Soelle notes: "Satan has up to the present done his best, although he is now per- mitted to act only in his devil's garb and not in his seraphic form." But such an opening did occur in the summer of 1764 which gave "Satan" a pretext for venting his malice. In the spring of this year one of Schaeffer's former followers came to Soelle and asked him
12Letter to Bishop Nathaniel Seidel, Apr. 12, 1764, Morav. Archives (Bethlehem, Pa.).
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HISTORY OF OLD BROAD BAY AND WALDOBORO
to baptize his child. He was of the Reformed group, and the school- master who was his spiritual adviser had no license to perform this rite. Soelle observes:
I promised to serve him since I did not have the right to deny him. When the Sunday came I was standing delivering the prayer before the sermon when a group of men selected by the Pfarrer13 approached. Two of them entered the mission and told me to shut up. They were under Schaeffer's orders to take me out and throw me into the river. I bade the congregation to be quiet. I was not disturbed but rather gazed kindly at them. They left without saying much.
Again in this incident the law intervened and accorded to the Reformed Schoolmaster the right to baptize children until such time as this group should have a regular minister of its own. This was the last serious act of persecution which the Moravians at Broad Bay were compelled to undergo. Thereafter the hostility took a more petty form involving social disapproval and the many other guises by which the majority expresses its dislike and con- tempt for nonconformists.
Among the regular attendants at Soelle's services at the close of the year 1764, he lists the following: Michael Rominger and wife, Katharina, Philip Vogler and wife, Katherina, David Rom- inger and wife Katharina, Matthaus Seitenberger and wife, Su- sanna, Nicholaus Orph and wife, Margaretha, David Holzapfel and wife, Katharina, Heinrich Wagner and wife, Katharina, Michael Seitz and wife, Elizabeth, David Kirbel and wife, Margaretha, Georg Hahn and wife, Barbara, Adam Schumacher, Michael Jung, Willibaldus Kastner and wife, Justina, Peter Kroehn and his wife, Elizabeth. This was a sizable growth considering the handicaps under which the little mission had functioned.
By 1766 religious freedom prevailed outwardly at least at Broad Bay. Soelle had been given a written guarantee to the ef- fect by the "Chief Justice,"14 which had brought the Germans, "slavish in church matters," to their senses and left them in a state of quiescence.15 Such a condition naturally gave rise to the thought of converting the mission at Broad Bay into a permanent Moravian Church. Philip Vogler, on whose land the mission house stood, declared himself ready to deed the land to the church if Soelle would accept it. The latter depended on Bethlehem; and Bethlehem delayed, as a considerable degree of discipline was re- garded as necessary as well as a long probationary period, as a con- dition of admission to church membership. Possibly to secure a firsthand impression of the work in New England, Bishop John
13 Pastor Schaeffer.
14Probably Judge Edward Cushing of Pownalborough and Boston, who was offered by Pres. Washington the appointment of Chief Justice of the U. S. Supreme Court. He declined but accepted appointment as an Associate Justice.
15 Soelle : Letter without address, Sept. 22, 1766, Morav. Archives (Bethlehem, Pa.).
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Ettwein made a tour16 of this area in May and June 1767. He reached Broad Bay on Sunday, May 24th, and went at once to the Mission. In his own words he states: "When I came to the Mission, Brother Soelle was preaching on the text, Ye shall know the truth and the truth will make you free. Some were sitting outside in front of the windows and were weeping freely."
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