USA > Pennsylvania > Northampton County > History of Northampton County [Pennsylvania] and the grand valley of the Lehigh, Volume I > Part 7
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SCOTCH-IRISH SETTLEMENTS
eminent divine and missionary, David Brainerd, justly styled "the man of God," who had taken up his abode at Mount Bethel. His untimely death in 1746 caused the cessation of his fruitful work amongst the Indians and white settlers of Northampton county. There was erected in 1746 on the south side of the road in Craig's meadow, near what is now Weaversville, a rude log structure for a house of worship. This was succeeded by a second log building on the north side of the road, and these two structures served the people until 1813. From 1743 to 1752, Rev. Daniel Lawrence was pastor. He was a pupil of the Rev. William Tennant, and was educated at the Log College, and licensed May 28, 1745, to supply the two Scotch-Irish settlements in Northampton county. His health failing him in 1751, he was obliged to relinquish his charge. For the next decade there was no settled minister, but in 1762 the name of Rev. John Clark, the second pastor, appears on the church records. He was a graduate of New Jersey College, 1759, and the same year was taken under the care of New Brunswick Presbytery, being installed over the two congregations in the Forks of the Delaware, October 13, 1762. Troubles in the congregations, however, arose, and a conflict took place between the parishioners and their minister, which culminated in 1766 with the withdrawal of Rev. Mr. Clark, and the charge was without a per- manent spiritual adviser until 1772, when Rev. John Rosbrough accepted the call, and was installed October 28, 1772. He was a graduate of New Jersey College in 1761, and after studying divinity with Rev. John Blair, was licensed to preach by the New Brunswick Presbytery, March 22, 1762. He was a devoted patriot, and in 1776 joined a company of infantry as chaplain, and on Washington's march through New Jersey he was barbarously murdered at Trenton by the Hessians.
The church, after the death of Rev. John Rosbrough, was supplied by ministers from the First Philadelphia Presbytery, under whose charge, at the request of the congregation, it had been placed. In 1783 the Rev. Francis Peppard became its permanent minister. He was a native of Ireland, a graduate of the New Jersey College, class of 1762, and joined the New Brunswick Presbytery in 1773. The Forks had, in October, 1780, requested leave of the First Philadelphia Presbytery to seek supplies from New Bruns- wick Presbytery. This was granted, and Mr. Peppard was installed in August, 1783. The erection of a building for an academy, afterwards known as the Wolf Academy, soon after his installation was viewed by Mr. Pep- pard as preparatory to setting up altar against altar, thereby dividing the congregation. This became a matter of contention, and in August, 1794, he asked to be dismissed from his charge, alleging as a cause the nonpayment of his salary. Thus again the church was to be supplied by itinerant minis- ters. The congregation was incorporated in 1797, and the following year Rev. Robert Russell became pastor. Mr. Russell was a native of Fagg's Manor, and had married the daughter of Thomas Armstrong, formerly an elder in the Settlement. Early in the nineteenth century the congregation was materially weakened by the removal of many of their prominent members to other sections of Pennsylvania and Ohio.
The site for a church was purchased in 1813 on which a stone house was built, and it was enclosed in weatherboards in 1870. Mr. Russell died Decem-
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ber 16, 1827, a worthy minister of Jesus Christ. He was succeeded by the Rev. Alexander Heberton, who remained five or six years; to him is given the credit of having opened a sessional record and preparing a history of the congregation. His labors were not without fruit, nor were those of Rev. Brogan Huff, who remained a short time. The Rev. William McJimpsey was the stated supply for one or two years. In 1835 the Rev. Leslie Irwin began to labor in the Settlement, and was ordained December 25, 1835. He was for over thirty years in charge of the parish and resigned in 1868, being succeeded by the Rev. David M. James. For the period of sixty-three years the church had only two pastors. The Rev. David M. James was born in Deerfield township, New Jersey. He graduated from Lafayette College in 1852, studied two years in the Theological Seminary at Princeton, New Jersey. He was licensed by the Presbytery of Passaic at Morristown, New Jersey, July 3, 1854, and on October 4th following was ordained and installed pastor of the Mount Olivet Church, near Schooley's Mountain Springs, New Jersey, where he remained until 1869, when he removed to the Irish Settlement, where he was installed pastor of the Allen Township Church, November 9, 1869. During his charge of the congregation the fourth church edifice was erected in the borough of Bath. The degree of doctor of divinity was con- ferred on him by Whitworth College in September, 1892. He resigned his pastorate in the spring of 1898, and shortly afterwards removed to Easton, Pennsylvania. He was succeeded by Rev. Thomas Clews Sterling, born in Darvel, Ayrshire, Scotland, February 16, 1864. His rudimentary education was acquired in the public schools of his birthplace. He then studied under Professor John Kelligan. tutor for Ayr Academy ; also prepared himself for his entrance examination in medicine under Dr. Matthew G. Easton. After studying medicine four years he received an M.D. diploma from the Physico- Medical College. Having great desire for the gospel ministry, he studied seven years more at Glasgow University, under the eminent scientists and philosophers, Professors Lord Kelvin and Edwards Caird, and received diplomas of Ph.D. and M.S. He graduated from Auburn Divinity Hall, Auburn, New York, and was licensed to preach by the Presbytery of Otsego, June 6, 1895. He preached as missionary and evangelist for. seven years at Glasgow and Edinburgh, Scotland, and was student supply in the Presbyte- rian church at Dresden, New York. He was installed October, 1898, this being his second pastorate. Dr. Sterling was succeeded in 1905 by the Rev. Seth P. Downie; his successor in 1910 was Rev. H. H. Henry, who was in charge of the congregation until 1917, when Rev. Raymond Hittenger, the present incumbent, was installed.
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A DELAWARE INDIAN
CHAPTER IV
THE INDIAN WALK
William Penn, when he met representatives of the Indians of the neigh- boring tribes under that famous wide-spreading elm, concluded a treaty with them for the purchase of their lands. There is no written record of this treaty extant ; it seems to be an ineradicable tradition among both races. It was, however, to be an everlasting covenant of peace between the whites and the Indians. Penn says: "We meet on the broad pathway of good faith and good will; no advantage shall be taken on either side, but all shall be openness and love. I will not call you children, for parents sometimes chide their children too severely ; not brothers only, for brothers differ. The friend- ship between me and you I will not compare to a chain, for the rains might rust, or a falling tree break. We are the same as if one man's body was to be divided into two parts; we are all one flesh and blood." He then dis- tributed to their chiefs presents, and received from their hands a belt of wampum, an official pledge of their fidelity. The Indians, in replying to Penn's speech, said: "We will live in love with William Penn and his children as long as the sun and moon shall endure."
Unfortunately, William Penn could not live for all time; the last years of his life were embittered by financial troubles and ill health, and in the early part of the eighteenth century he transferred his proprietary rights to the Crown, and other men lacking his humanitarian principles were to con- trol the destinies of Pennsylvania. Other treaties were made with the Indians in which graft, selfishness and avarice predominated. One of the most questionable acts was called the "Walking Purchase." Penn, in his pur- chases, not being familiar with the topography of the country, boundaries were described by water courses and hill ranges; the Indian deeds, however, gave only vague descriptions of the lands conveyed ; in some instances the boundaries were accepted "running northwardly as far as a horse can travel in two days," and other similar obscure terms. These discrepancies were the cause in 1737 of a new deed made by Thomas Penn to strengthen the titles of the lands previous to its execution. A preliminary trial was made by the proprietaries of a day and a half travel for two men, who were accompanied by two others on horseback with supplies. This test proving satisfactory to the proprietaries, two years and four months after this, an experimental walk was made, the leading object of which was to ascertain how far the walk might extend into the country. A deed was executed by the Indians at Philadelphia in August, 1737, in the presence of Thomas Penn. There were present at this meeting a number of Indians, among whom were Lapawinzo, Nutimus and Tiscohan. The proprietaries in the trial walk desired that it should extend far enough so by drawing a line at right angle it would embrace all the desirable lands above the Delaware river, even as far as the mouth of the Lackawanna, as the Penns had sold as early as 1728 to William Allen and others thousands of acres of land without any regard to honor,
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justice or the rights of the Indians, and even without their knowledge and consent. There were no records of affidavits to indicate the proper direction of the walkers, nor were there any roads and paths; the trees were blazed seven or eight miles beyond the Lehigh Gap, and without doubt to a distance beyond.
By the terms of the treaty with the Indians the decisive walk was to commence September 12, 1737, but the date was afterwards changed that it should take place between the twelfth and nineteenth of that month. The starting point was a large chestnut tree that stood in the corner of a field where the road from Pennsville joined the Durham road at a short distance from the Wrightstown meeting-house. The walkers engaged were Edward Marshall, James Yeates and Solomon Jennings, who were accompanied by several whites on horseback and three Delaware Indians. The walkers had been selected for their athletic and healthy condition ; they were noted woods- men and hunters. The course was guided by the compass, the first direction being north thirty-four degrees west, thence on a straight line, when it was possible to do so, regardless of all minor obstructions. The party crossed the Lehigh river a mile below the present site of Bethlehem, the Indians having been led to believe that the walk would not extend beyond this point; here Solomon Jennings retired from the party. From the Lehigh they passed in the same direction between the river and the mountain gap. Their Indian companions had dropped out from fatigue, but at the gap now in Moore township they were met by a party of Indians who were amazed at the progress made by the whites in one day, as they expected that this point would be the terminus of the day and a half walk. They expected the whites would rest there, and also declare it to be the end of the walk and the boundary of the purchase. This was, however, far from the minds of the white men ; they passed through the gap and slept for the night at the north base of the mountain. The Indians at the gap, with their yells and howls of rage on account of their great dissatisfaction, made the night hideous. The following morning at sunrise the walk was resumed. Yeates, after going a little distance, fell in a creek in a state of complete prostration and quite blind. Marshall continued the walk with apparent strength and vigor until noon, when Timothy Smith, the authorized agent of the Penns, struck his hatchet in a small sapling, one of a cluster of oak trees, which marked the northwesterly bounds of the famous walking purchase. The distance from the starting point is said to have been sixty and one-quarter miles, though the Indians claimed it was fully eighty miles.
This established the northwestern boundary of the purchase; there was still, however, the running of the line to the Delaware river. The Indians insisted that it should strike the river at the nearest point, which would have been somewhere in the township of Mount Bethel, but the proprietaries' agents claimed it should be run at a right angle, and this was done by Ben- jamin Eastman, the Surveyor General. It passed through a barren and uninviting country, but included the rich lands of the Minisinks. The Indians were loud in their denunciations of the rascality of the whites, and were encouraged and supported by the Quakers, who professed to think that the natives had been shamefully swindled; they were not backward in expressing
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THE INDIAN WALK
their sentiments, which inflamed the passions of the red men, and led them to believe that the Quakers were the only white men who were not their enemies. The Quakers were not, however, wholly free from the tincture of selfishness; they were antagonistic to the proprietaries' interests, and wished to establish the reputation of disinterested champions of right and justice to the savages, and their special guardians against fraud and wrong.
There is no doubt the Indians honestly believed they had been betrayed, but the facts lead us to believe that there was no intention on the part of the whites to demand only what their deed called for. The blaze path made in 1735 was opened for inspection for either the Indians or the whites for over two years before the deed was given confirming the walking purchase. That the Indians did not avail themselves of the opportunity thus offered is no reflection on the whites. The proprietaries' surveyor had his way in running the line at right angle to the Delaware river instead of an acute angle which the Indians desired, and in nourishing their dissatisfaction the latter became convinced that a deadly outrage and wrong had been perpe- trated on them. The proprietaries who had received the benefit of whatever wrong was done did not take any means to pacify the ignorant warriors, and whether their wrongs were real or fancied the Indians' discontent broke out into the consuming fire of hatred and revenge which in some degree became accessory to the atrocities which, in 1755 and later, spread woe and terror throughout Northampton county.
The result of the famous Indian Walk is briefly summarized. It was the fortune of William Penn, in the formation of his colony, to have dealings with the gentlest natives and endowed with the noblest traits of all those found inhabiting the eastern portion of the present United States. Without peace, Penn well knew that his interests must suffer and seriously interefere in the disposal of lands to actual settlers and the peopling of his colony. He knew the power he possessed and he meant to keep it; consequently he purchased land in his own manner as best suited himself. This accounts for the vagueness of the deeds and the trivial nature of the many articles paid as purchase money. There is no evidence that during William Penn's day there was any dissatisfaction on the part of the Indians in regard to these purchases; they werc easy to deal with and entertained every confi- dence. To substantiate other purchases, walks had been made, the Indians' and Penn's representatives proceeding in a leisure manner, chatting, resting for refreshments, and to smoke, generally covering from twenty to thirty miles a day.
The Indians did not value the lands south of the Blue Mountains very highly. Their favorite hunting grounds at that time were in the Minisink country, or the valley north of that mountain, extending from the Wind Gap into the province of New York near the Hudson river. In taking the rectangular line to the Delaware river from the terminus of the walk, the favorite hunting grounds of the Indians were swooped into the Penn colony. A straight line would have reached the river at the Water Gap in less than a day's travel, while the rectangular line terminated at Lackawaxen, now in Pike county, which took four days to reach. Previous to the walk the settlers of Penn's colony had dwelt together in peace with the Indians. The
NORTH .- 1-4.
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kindness of William Penn created a corresponding spirit in them which lasted through many years; but after the father of the colony was gone, the white man's treachery revealed itself, stirred up the savage nature of the red man, and many an innocent mother and child paid the penalty with their lives.
CHAPTER V
THE GERMAN PIONEERS By Rev. JOHN BAER STOUDT
It is not my purpose to take the part of a eulogist, an apologist or a satirist, in the discussion of this subject. A plain unvarnished tale of their character, conflicts and achievements is the best vindication of a people. Of the Germans in Pennsylvania, Hildreth, the historian, has said: "The result of their labors is eulogy enough; their best apology is to tell their story exactly at it was."
To define the character of the German pioneers and their relation to the State of Pennsylvania, and the county of Northampton as a part of the Com- monwealth, we shall briefly answer three questions, viz: Why did they come? What did they bring? What have they done?
We are told that colonies are planted by the uneasy. In a general way poverty and financial reverses, political changes and religious troubles, a thirst for novelty and a love for adventure, all these combined, are the causes for the great migrations in history. The motives in individuals and groups vary according to circumstances. Now the dominant cause may be religious persecutions, again political tyranny, and then economic distress. The gen- eral unrest and discontent in Germany were the cumulative product of centuries. Since the Reformation, Europe was in a state of religious, political, and social ferment. The Protestant was arrayed against the Catholic, the Lutheran against the Calvinist, Protestant and Catholic against the Ana- baptist, the Humanist against the Reformer, and the peasant against the noble. The reason for it all was that the principles of Protestantism, which had been discerned in a German monastery and practiced in a Swiss pas- torate, had to be fought on fields of blood before they could become the common possession of mankind.
In the name of religion, though for anything but for the good of religion, Germany was the seat of devastating wars. For thirty years hostile armies, some foreign and some native, ravaged the provinces, turned the Rhinelands into a desert, and decimated the population. At the close of that inhuman struggle two-thirds of the German nation had perished. The Palatinate was reduced from 500,000 citizens to 50,000. University halls became army bar- racks. Fields ripening for harvest, blossoming orchards, vineclad hills, towering castles, happy hamlets and busy cities, fell before the ruthless in- vaders. It is said that "the Elector Palatine beheld from his castle at Man- heim six cities and twenty-five towns in flames where lust and rapine walked hand in hand with fire and sword." The treaty of Westphalia, in 1648, was only a temporary respite from the desolation of armies. Scarcely had the industrious peasants and burghers of the Rhine healed some of the wounds of a generation of war and recovered some of the former glory of their country, when the armies of Louis XIV began their work of destruction.
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NORTHAMPTON COUNTY
He said to his marshal, Melac, "Ravage the Palatinate!" In obedience to orders, 1,200 towns and villages went up in smoke and fell in ashes. The former scenes of horror and crime were re-enacted, and with an occasional intermission they continued through the war of the Spanish succession, end- ing with the peace of Utrecht in 1713.
The effect of these disasters was not only to impoverish the resources of the Rhine country, but also manhood. Peasants in their desperation became robbers, murderers, cannibals. "Freemen became serfs; rich burghers be- came narrow-minded shop-keepers; noblemen, servile courtiers; princes, shameless oppressors." The provinces were full of misgovernment and of sectarianism, filled with tiny principalities, old religious foundations, secu- larized or still remaining, free cities of the moribund empire, and even free villages ; courts, princes and lords of all kinds, who caricatured Louis XIV, sometimes by the dozen to the square mile, and kept the fruitful land in an artificial condition of perpetual exhaustion."
The general conditions were at hand for the operation of specific causes which brought about a German exodus into America. To understand the immediate reasons for early German immigration, it is necessary to study the history of the several groups which composed it. For our purpose the popular division into sects and church people is most satisfactory. We might add a third class and call it the nondescripts. In each of these groups there was a dominant motive, not, however, to the exclusion of the other motives mentioned above.
The sects who came to Pennsylvania were the Mennonites, the Tunkers, the Schwenkfelders, and a number of lesser bodies, such as the solitaries at Ephrata, and the Woman in the Wilderness on the banks of the Wissahickon, and the Labadists.
Their relation to the Church and the State in Europe was one of dissent. They were the oppressed people of Christ. By the provisions of the people of Westphalia, 1648, Roman Catholics, Lutherans, and Reformed were given legal recognition. They were known as the churches by law established. But the Anabaptistic and Quietistic were equally obnoxious to Catholics and Protestants. Princes and bishops, priests and preachers, united in destroying these supposed children of perdition. They were accordingly driven from one country to another, finding a temporary asylum here and there until they had to flee elsewhere from the wrath of a capricious prince. A company of Mennonites had settled in peace in Crefeld, Germany, where they were em- ployed as linen-weavers. They welcomed the offer of an asylum beyond the seas, where they might worship God without further molestation. On the ship Concord, October 6, 1683, came thirteen Mennonite families who be- came the founders not only of Germantown, but of German colonization in Pennsylvania. Until 1710 the German immigrants came as individuals or in small groups; "partly for conscience sake and partly for temporal interests."
The second period of German immigration began with the arrival of the Lutherans and the Reformed, who were accompanied by a third class, the nondescripts. The chief reason for their discontent at home was the economic distress resulting from continuous wars, from a desolating winter, and financial reverses. The first company of Palatines came by way of London,
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THE GERMAN PIONEERS
whither they went in large multitudes. They reached Pennsylvania after sore hardships and cruel treatment by way of the Schoharie Valley in New York. In an address to the English people in 1710, the Palatines pleaded their own case. They say: "We, the poor, distressed Palatines, whose utter ruin was occasioned by the merciless cruelty of a bloody enemy, whose prevailing power, some years past, like a torrent, rushed into our country and over- whelmed us at once; and being not content with money and food necessary for their occasions, not only dispossessed us of all support, but inhumanly burnt our houses to the ground, whereby being deprived of all shelter, we were turned into open fields, there with our families to seek what shelter we could find, were obliged to make the earth our repository for rest and the clouds the canopy for covering." These were the conditions not only of the Palatines who came to London, but doubtless of a large proportion of those who went directly to Pennsylvania. The winter of 1708-09 was so severe throughout Europe that hundreds died of cold and starvation. Birds froze in mid-air, beasts in their lairs, and men fell dead on their way. Of their financial troubles, an eye-witness wrote: "Nobody could pay any more because nobody was paid. The people of the country, in consequence of exactions, had to become insolvent. Commerce dried up and brought no returns. Good faith and confidence were abolished."
Thus gradually the ties of home, country and society were loosened, and the newly established colony of Penn became a refuge for the distressed Germans, Swiss, Alsatians, French Huguenots and Hollanders, and were all called, regardless of their provincial origin, Palatines.
Historians differ widely respecting the number of Germans in Pennsyl- vania at different stages of the eighteenth century. So far as figures are concerned, we can do no better than to accept the careful estimates of Diefenderfer. He concludes that in 1727 there were about 15,000 Germans in the province; in 1750, 47,000; and in 1776, 90,000. If Dr. Franklin was not exact in his figures he was probably correct in the proportions which he assigned to the Germans. In 1776 he claimed that there were 160,000 colonists, of whom one-third were Germans, one-third Quakers, and the rest of other nationalities.
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