USA > Pennsylvania > Historic background and annals of the Swiss and German pioneer settlers of southeastern Pennsylvania, and of their remote ancestors, from the middle of the Dark Ages, down to the time of the Revolutionary War > Part 1
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GC 974.8 Es3h 165724.7
IVI. L.
REYNOLDS HISTORICAL GENEALOGY COLLECTION
ALLEN COUNTY PUBLIC LIBRARY 3 1833 01145 2957
HISTORIC BACKGROUND AND ANNALS
OF THE SWISS AND GERMAN PIONEER SETTLERS OF SOUTH- EASTERN PENNSYLVANIA, AND OF THEIR RE- MOTE ANCESTORS, FROM THE MIDDLE OF THE DARK AGES, DOWN TO THE TIME OF THE REVO- LUTIONARY WAR
An Authentic History, From Original Sources, Of Their Suffering During Several Centuries Before and Especially During The Two Cen- turies Following The Protestant Reformation, And of their Slow Migration. Moved by Those Causes, During the Last Montioned Two Hundred Years, Westward in Quest Of Religious Freedom and Their Happy Relief, in the Susquehanna and Schuylkill Valleys In the New World; With Particular Reference to the German-Swiss Mennonites or Anabaptists, The Amish and Other Non-Resistant Sects.
BY
H. FRANK ESHLEMAN, B. E., M. E., LL. B.
Member of the Lancaster Bar; Member of the Lancaster County Historical Society; Member of the Historical Society of Pennsylvania at Philadelphia ; and Member of the Pennsylvania History Club of Philadelphia.
$
1917
LANCASTER, PENNA.
9.95
F854.27
HISTORIC BACKGROUND AND ANNALS OF THE SWISS AND GERMAN PIONEER SETTLERS OF SOUTH- EASTERN PENNSYLVANIA, AND OF THEIR RE- MOTE ANCESTORS, FROM THE MIDDLE OF THE DARK AGES, DOWN TO THE TIME OF THE REVO- LUTIONARY WAR
1657241
An Authentic History, From Original Sources, Of Their Suffering During Several Centuries Before and Especially During The Two Cen- turies Following The Protestant Reformation, And of Their Slow Migration, Moved By Those Causes, During the Last Mentioned Two Hundred Years, Westward in Quest Of Religious Freedom and Their Happy Relief in the Susquehanna and Schuylkill Valleys In the New World: With Particular Reference to the German-Swiss Mennonites or Anabaptists, The Amish and Other Non-Resistant Sects.
H. FRANK ESHLEMAN, B. E., M. E., LL. B.
Member of the Lancaster Bar; Member of the Lancaster County Historical Society; Member of the Historical Society of Pennsylvania at Philadelphia; and Member of the Pennsylvania History Club of Philadelphia.
1917
LANCASTER, PENNA.
PREFACE
Southeastern Pennsylvania, during our colonial, period was the prolific hive from which the swarms of Swiss and German settlers of America almost exclusively came, who, during the latter years of that period and during the first several decades of our national existence, migrated westward and planted the seed of the Teutonic element of our population in the middle west. the southwest, the northwest and the far west, and whose descendants in our later decades have sprung from them by millions and have largely moulded the character of that vast empire, down to this day.
The valleys of the Susquehanna and Schuylkill Rivers being thus, the mother-land of so powerful and populous an influence, in our state and na- tional existence, it was deemed by the compiler a matter of sufficient impor- tance, to gather up the historical events in chronological order, leading up to the German-Swiss settlement here, from the time of remote ages. It was also thought equally important to set out in like chronological form, the first six decades or more of the growth and development of those same peoples here after their initial settlement about the beginning of the eighteenth cen- tury and to show their wonderful growth in power, in numbers, and their vigor in pushing the frontier line of our wealth and settlement westward.
These Annals record the outlines of a history of religious fervor and of tenacity of noble purpose stretching across a thousand years, as glorious as anything else that ever happened in the history of the world. As early as the year 900, strong men began to stand out as champions of religious lib- erty and the simple Gospel. against the great Romish Church, the only Chris- tian Church of note then on the earth. They held fast to the faith, through fire and against sword. About the year 1150, Peter Waldo renounced the Romish Church and led the Evangelical Christians; and by hundreds of thou- sands they adhered to him. They held the faith nearly four hundred years more and went like lambs to slaughter. Then came the Reformation. Luther, Zwingli. Calvin, and Menno Simon, led the movement in the heart of Europe.
Menno held to the Waldenseon beliefs (and especially to the doctrine of non-resistance) and his followers became the prey of the militant faiths botlı Romish and Reformed. But neither fire, nor sword, nor drowning, nor prison, nor the galleys could turn them from their conviction; and while Zurich and Berne and other cities exterminated. imprisoned and deported them, they multiplied; and they were found by thousands everywhere. They obtained governmental favor in Holland by the year 1575 and thus they beheld that golden glow in the west and gravitated there at the close of nearly 200 years of suffering, holding on to their faith in all its simple purity.
Then they learned of America and in the next half century not less than fifty thousand embarked to reach the glorious land of Penn. Nearly twenty thousand who thus embarked died at sea; the remainder reached their happy goal.
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They filled the valleys of Susquehanna and Schuylkill and of all their tributaries. Before the Revolution they flocked down the Shenandoah. They soon crossed the Alleghenies and filled the Cumberland. They multiplied and drifted into the Ohio Valley and by the beginning of the nineteenth century they settled in lower Canada. They opened up the Indiana and Illinois region, the Kansas section, the Dakotas and the Northwest. Their descend- ing generations in all the vast empire of middle-western and far-western America as well as in eastern America, are sons and citizens of power and wealth and influence in the forces that are moving and making our great nation. Results such as these, make worthy of preservation, the origin and early struggles and gradual steps-the long, the arduous and ever conquer- ing march-to such a goal.
H. FRANK ESHLEMAN.
ANNALS OF THE PIONEER SWISS AND PALATINE MENNONITES OF LANCASTER COUNTY, AND OTHER EARLY GERMANS OF EASTERN PENNSYLVANIA
Introduction and Background.
It is the purpose of the narration which shall follow to set out in an easy and attractive style, some of the leading events in the life of the early Swiss and Palatine Mennonites and other Germans of eastern Pennsylva- nia, and particularly of Lancaster County. This is a subject upon which much is known traditionally but not very much, accurately and authorita- tively.
It is believed that the noble life and struggles of these pioneers who were the very backbone of early industrial Lancaster County and of other eastern Pennsylvania sections, should be pub- licly and familiarly known. And we feel that if they are truly known, a character will be shown to the public in every way the equal of that of the Puritans down east, upon whose early noble acts and life all generations of America have been taught to look with awe and reverence, as if all the good that was ever done for America in primitive days was done by those godly New Englanders. This, of course, is not the fact. It may be very truthfully said that the pioneer Swiss, and Germans and kindred nationali- ties who originally settled certain large portions of eastern Pennsylva- nia, have done as much for America and have lived as nobly, and have up- held the pure religion and gospel, of our nation as faithfully as the "witch- burning" Puritans ever did.
These Swiss and Germans of whom I shall write labored under many problems and difficulties, which our people of today will find it hard to believe. They were foreigners and held in disfavor for a time by the English government of this province, though Penn gave them a special invitation to come and settle here. They were looked upon with jealousy by other people settled among them because, these Swiss and Germans, early in the country districts at least, began making money and progress by their thrift, etc.
It is not our purpose to give a com- plete history of these peoples; but rather only a series of "Annals" de- picting the most striking events of their life and progress here.
In order to understand fully the life, feeling and ideals of these peoples it will be necessary to go back many hundred years and supply the European historical background, and trace up the long train of relig- ious causes which brought them to Pennsylvania. This foundation or early history of their troubles, etc., will be necessarily quite lengthy and go back to the time of Caesar. But in- asmuch as familiar Lancaster County and other eastern Pennsylvania names will continually appear in it, we hope that it will not become tire- some.
2
THE EUROPEAN BACKGROUND
The European Background - The | the non-combatant Christians of Causes Which Forced the Swiss Into Pennsylvania. Hamburg, Brandenburg and other parts of Germany. And, indeed, in Altenburg, Switzerland, he directed his fury against all Christians, but chiefly against Romanists. Then in 991 the Pagan Danish hordes again poured into Germany and vexed the Christians during 40 years there, (Do., p. 249).
Switzerland has passed through centuries of bloodshed, civil convul- sion, war and religious persecution. Before Christ, Caesar fought the Hel- vetian War, partly on its soil. The objects were conquest and empire. The Romans held it four centuries; then the Allemani, in the German in- vasion, took possession; and in turn the Franks overthrew the Allemani, and the Burgundians. £ The Franks
started a new civilization under Christianity, (Lippincott Gaz.). Perse- these separatists were convicted of cutions against the Christians first reached Northern Italy and the bor- ders of Switzerland and Germany about the year 600 A. D. Up to this time the fiercest persecution in other parts of Europe was that by the heathen Longabards upon the Christians for their refusal to honor idols, (Martyrs' Mirror, Elkart Edition of 1886, p. 1009-Earliest Authentic Appearance of the Herrs. 210). But the Roman Church now began the same, and punished Bishop In the year 1009 we find the first trace in Switzerland, of any name common among us today in Lancas- ter county and Eastern Pennsylvania. It is one of the two most prominent and numerous names of the county- Herr. Miller is the other. The county directory shows us indeed that there are nearly twice as many Millers as Herrs in the county today. Adrian in 606 as a criminal for refus- ing to baptize infants, (Do.). About 850 there was a butchery of non-con- formant Christians by the Franks, (Do., p. 233). At the opening of the 10th century persecutions were still raging in different parts of Europe on the question of baptism, of which the learned Giselbert writes, (Do., p. 245). But most of the religious per- secutions during this century were those inflicted by Pagans upon Chris- tians generally, all along the Medi- terranean coast, (Do.). In 926 King Worm of Denmark persecuted the non-resisting Christians in and sur- rounding Denmark, (Do., p. 246). By 950 the current which the Danish King started reached Slavonia, whose un- godly tyrant King persecuted de- fenseless Christians there; and by the end of the century religious war was in progress by the Vandals, against
In the 11th century the question of infant baptism and transubstantiation gave rise to furious persecution by the main Christian Church upon the separatists who refused to adhere to either of those doctrines. Many of heresy and executed, (Do., p. 255). The Berengarians of Netherlands and Germany suffered in this persecution, (Do., p. 260). By the middle of this century the Holy Roman (German) Empire ~ rolled Switzerland, (Lip- pinc
In the year just stated the Herrs appear in Northern Switzerland, in the person of the Swabish Knight Hugo, the Herr or Lord of Bilried, (Vien in Herr Genealogy, p. 1). The race anciently lived in Swabia says the same author. Swabia was one of the districts into which Maximilian II divided ancient Germany, then in- cluding Switzerland. Prof. Rhoddy tells us that Swabia included near- ly the whole of Northern Switzerland, and a large tract of Germany east of the Rhine, at one time called Aleman-
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3
ORIGIN OF THE WALDENSES
ia. Therefore the foundation Lancaster county, was not only Swiss in 1710; but the pioneers in 1710 were descendants of a Swiss stock during a prior period of over seven hundred years.
1050-The Great Eby or Eaby Family Moved to Switzerland.
We will not vouch for the truth of the statement announced in the title to this paragraph. Ezra E. Eby late of Berlin, Ontario, author of the "Eby Family" states that the Ebys lived in Italy known as the Ebees and were heathen until the Waldenses in the 12th century or later brought them into Christianity. The Ebys were sup- posed to have come into Switzerland during the 11th century.
1050-The Reformed Spirit in Roman Chur
the
Müller, page 57, reduces . letter from the Papal legate Peter Damian to Adelaide Susa showing that the Reformed Spirit existed in the Church of Rome from 1050 at least. And it is added that the old Evangelical con- gregations to whom the Waldenses belonged existed from time immemor- ial. The diocese where the Wal- denses lived maintained its independ- ence of the Church of Rome until the 12th century says Müller. And as early as this time began the marriage and expulsion of priests. In this re- sistence against Rome Bishop Clau- dius of Turrene distinguished himself earlier than all others from 815 to 835-a true reformer says Müller, (Ernst Müller's Geschichte der Bern- ischen Taüfer, p. 57).
1160-Origin of the Waldenses.
In the middle of the 12th century at Utrecht and other places they were burning the Berengarians alive, (Do. M. Mirror, p. 281). About 1159 those who opposed the doctrines of the Holy Church which we have mentioned, be- gan to have strong and able suporters
of in deposed Roman bishops and others. One of these was Peter Waldo of Lyons, who separated in 1160, (Do., p. 265). His adherents were first nu- merous in the province of Albi, (Do., p. 266). They were called Lyonites, Albigenes and finally nearly all Wal- denses. They spread into every prov- ince and were objects of persecution during four centuries and more. The Roman Church began to call them Anabaptists, (Do., p. 267); and by that name their descendants in faith were called down to 1710 at least, as we shall show later. Their doctrine was essentially the same as that of the pioneers who in 1710 first settled Lancaster county. Their creed con- tained the following principles among others-opposition to infant baptism -to transubstantiation-to war-to participation in government-to oaths, etc., (Do., pp. 265-277). They early reached Northern Italy and the bor- der of Switzerland, (Do., p. 279).
1150 to 1200-Troubles of Non-Re- sistants In Latter Half of the 12th Century.
In 1161, in the eighth year of Henry II, about 30 German men and women sailed over to England to es- cape Papal tortures. They were Ber- engarians or Lyonites and separated because of their views on infant bap- tism, etc. They were illiterate and led by a German of some learning called Gerard. They were appre- hended in England. (M. Mirror, p. 283). Abram Millinus shows that their doctrine was similar to the Mennonite tenets of faith. They were scourged and banished and allowed to freeze to death. In 1163 six Wald- enses were discovered in a barn near Cologne, in Prussia and were burned to death, (Do., p. 284).
Ernst Müller tells us (p. 64) that the Abbe of Steinfelden named Ever- vin wrote in 1164 to the Holy Bernard
GROWTH AND SLAUGHTER OF WALDENSEANS
that an untold number are every- where prepared to oppose priests and monks in their midst, and that this heresy has grown secretly ever since the time of the martyrs.
In 1191 the City Basle, Switzerland, was founded. It has today a popula- tion of 70,000 and was the scene of a like persecution and refuge.
During all this time the Waldesean doctrine was spreading rapidly. And by 1199 one of their enemies said a thousand cities were filled with them. They filled Southwestern Eu- rope, England, Germany, Hungary and Northern Italy, (Do., p. 279), Ja- cob Mehring says these people who did not believe in infant baptism, transubstantiation, force, war or political affairs were contemptuously called Anabaptists, Waldenses, Ber- engarians. Mennonites, etc., by the papists, Lutherans and Calvanists (Do., p. 267). As far as the German, Swiss and Dutch are concerned the 12th century closed with the expul- sion of many of these Waldesean Christians from Metz and the burn- ing of their books, which books they had translated from the Latin into their native language.
1201 to 1800-The Thirteenth Century Religious Struggles
As far as religious persecution in this century affects the Dutch, Ger- mans and Swiss we may notice that persecution about 1212 began to rage in Holland, (Do. p. 298); and at that time 108 Waldenses were burned to death in Strasburg, Germany; 39 at Bingen and 18 at Metz, (Do.). In
1214 Conrad of Marpurg was ap- pointed by Pope Innocent III, the grand inquisitor of Germany to exter- minate all who had strayed from the Roman faith. In 19 years he killed hundreds. He gave them red hot irons to hold and destroyed all who were burnt by it as heretics. They
were burned to death. Another test was that of cold water, the accused being thrown into a canal and if they sank in it they were heretics, but if they floated they were not.
By 1203 these Waldenses or Anabap- tists had the Holy Scriptures trans- lated into their own language, (Mül- ler, p. 59); and they did not practice any other doctrine. The parts of the Bible most carefully followed by them were the commandments and the sermon on the Mount.
Müller tells us that in 1212 in and about Strasburg, Germany there were more than 500 of these Waldenses (the parent faith of the Mennonites) and that they were made up of Swiss, Italians, Germans and Bohemians; and that in the early part of this cen- tury they had spread far and wide, (p. 64.) And about 1215, there were 80 more of them burned at Strasburg and more in other parts of Germany, (M. Mirror, pp. 300 and 304). And in 1231 throughout Germany many more of these Anabaptists - Waldenseans suffered martyrdom, (Do., p. 306). By 1250 there was scarcely a land where the Waldensean sect had not found its way; and everywhere, where they ex- isted they were known by their plain dress, moral life, their temperate liv- ing and their refusal to take part in government and oaths, (says Müller, p. 58).
In the year 1277 in Berne, (Müller, p. 64) the opponents of the Catholics from Schwarzenburg through the Bishop of Lousanne in Switzerland were brought before the Dominican Humbert and the inquisition plied against them: whereupon many of them were burned.
This shows how the Anabaptists- Waldenseans, as they were called, (the parent Church of the Mennonites) grew through the 13th century and how they were persecuted and tor- tured throughout that century in Ger- many, Switzerland and elsewhere.
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5
MENNINITES, DESCENDANTS OF WALDENSEANS
Bracht says that about 1305, the | light of the evangelical doctrine be- gan to arise on the Alps, through a pious man and his wife who had ac- cepted the Waldensean faith. Many followed his teaching but in 1308 he and his wife were torn limb from limb and 140 of his followers burnt alive (M. Mirror, p. 317). Throughout Austria also the persecution raged.
In 1315 a Waldensean teacher call- ed Lölhard at his trial in Austria said he could find 80,000 persons who believed in his religion (Do., 318).
In 1330 we find that a man named Eckart or Eckert (who formerly had been a Dominican monk and had left the papists, because he became non-resistant and opposed the doc- trine of infant baptisni and transub- statiation) was publicly burned in Germany for those reasons and be- cause he embraced the whole doctrine of the Waldenses; and also many more were likewise tortured for sim- ilar doctrines in Bohemia and Poland, (Do., p. 319). This Eckert may have been an ancestral connection of the widely known Eckert family of Lan- caster county.
In the year 1340 among the Martyrs, appears a name, now well known in Lancaster county,-Hager. This year Conrad Hager was martyred for hav- ing taught for 24 years the Walden- sean faith. Many had followed his teaching, (Do.).
Ten years later John de Landuno of Ghent, a highly learned man broke away from the reigning church and embraced Anabaptism and was tor- tured, (Do.). "Landuno" may have been the Dutch form of "Landis".
Now about this time (1350) says Cassel, p. 378 the Keiser of Bavaria interposed and compelled the princi- pal papal church in his dominions to cease its persecution upon the de- fenseless separatists.
In 1360 the name John de Rupe (Scissa) appears among the Martyrs. Three years later he was burned at Avignon, (Martyr's Mirror).
In 1374 a separatist named Löffler from Bremgarden was burnt on ac- count of his belief in opposition to the established church-for being a free spirit says Müller, (page 64).
During the last decade of this cen- tury the torch of persecution was flaming against the Anabaptists-the Waldensean lambs-called hereitcs by the church of Rome, in Germany and Switzerland particularly.
From the year 1382 to the year 1393 Müller tells us (p. 64) that by order of Pope Clement VII the Min- orite Franz Borell burned about a hundred of these Waldenses, or ante- cedents of the Mennonites round about Lake Geneva in Switzerland on account of their religion, the papal church declaring them heretics worthy of death.
In 1390 not less than 36 persons called Waldenses were burnt for their faith at Bingen on the Rhine. Germany. These martyrs were all citizens of Mentz, (M. Mirror, p. 320). Almost the same time on the borders of the Baltic sea 400 were destroyed.
Ernst Müller also tells us that in the old books the doctrines of the Waldenses are set out, as those doc- trines were in the 12th century, and there can be no doubt that these Ana- baptists that the church of Rome call- ed heretics in the 14th century are the same in religious principle as the early Waldenses. He says those per- secuted at Bern Freyburg (Switzerland) had exactly the same religious belief of those who were tortured in 1398.
Thus we show that during the 14th century the persecutions against the separatists were very largeiy carried on in the heart of Europe to which places it spread northward from Rome. It crossed the Alps into Ger-
6
PERSECUTIONS OF THE 15TH CENTURY
.
many, Switzerland and Austria. Those who most fiercely felt its fire were, as in the previous century, the non-re- sistants or Anabaptists as they were called, the successors in faith of the old Waldenses, and the antecedents of the Mennonites.
Persecution of the Non - Resistant Christians in the Fifteenth Century
The Beghienen in 1403 through the Dominican, Maulberger of Basel were the instigators of the expulsion of de- fenseless Christians from Berne, but they staid in Switzerland until the re- formation, (Müller, 65).
It was contended that John Wick- liffe embraced a part of the Wald- ensean doctrine and that John Huss became a disciple and believer in the Wickliffe teachings (M. Mirror, pp. 323-24). In 1415 John Huss having examined and studied Wickliffe's book against the papal tenets and es- pecially against war, oaths and infant baptism accepted nearly all of these Wickliffe teachings or principles, (Do.).
John Huss gained many of the Waldenses in Bohemia, when he be- gan to preach. For want of a leader they had greatly diminished in the last 30 years; but he revived trem. Both Huss and Jerome were burned on the shores of Lake Constance, part of the Northeastern boundary of Switzerland, by the Roman Church. Then the Hussites began a war on the German electors and after the war having largely given up the mild Waldesean faith went back to the Church of Rome again. But they turned again from them and became the Grubenheimers or cave-dwellers.
In the Freyburg district (Switzer- land) in 1429 Haris Michel of Wallace and Anna Grause from Erlaugh were burned, and the following year Peter Seager too, (Müller, p. 64).
Through imprisonment and torture during the early part of this century the congregations of Waldenses of Freyburg were entirely destroyed. Through this destruction it was found out that Swartzenberg was full of Waldenses too; and that the Frey- burg brethren had communication with Zolathurn in Switzerland and in Germany and Bohemia, (Müller, p. 64).
In the year 1430 several Walden- sean teachers from Germany came to Freyburg and settled there to counsel and strengthen the congregations, (Do., p. 65).
The benevolent converts of Beghar- den and Beghinen, says a papal au- thority were nurseries of Waldensean heretics and were polluted with Wald- ensean proceedings. The Zurich of- ficer or chief police Felix Hammerlin wrote in 1440 a pamphlet opposing these "heretics" as he called them, and in it he tells of the great growth and spread of them up to that time. He says every year they came from Bohemia and preached in Switzerland and Germany, which induced a great number of people to accept their be- lief, in the cities of Bern, Zolathurn and many Swiss villages, (Müller, p. 65). About this time there were per- secutions in Basle, Switzerland, and the so-called "heretics" burned, (M. Mirror, p. 335).
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