Kendig, Hans Herr, etc., “Switzers” lately arrived in this province,
for ten thousand acres of land twenty miles east of Connystogoe. (This
Connystogoe I cannot locate. The Conestoga Creek empties into the
Susquehanna below Lancaster.)
The supplies of the colonists were at first scanty, until the seed sown
in a fertile soil yielded some thirty-, others forty-fold.[27] Their
nearest mill was at Wilmington, distant, as I estimate, some thirty miles.
One of their number was soon sent to Europe to bring out other emigrants,
and after the accession the colony numbered about thirty families. They
mingled with the Indians in hunting and fishing. These were hospitable
and respectful to the whites.[28]
We are told that the early colonists had strong faith in the fruitfulness
and natural advantages of their choice of lands. “They knew these would
prove to them and their children the home of plenty.” Their anticipations
have never failed.[29]
The harmony existing between the Indians and these men of peace is very
pleasing. Soon after their first settlement here, Lieutenant-Governor
Gookin made a journey to Conestogo (1711), and in a speech to the Indians
tells them that Governor Penn intends to present five belts of wampum
to the Five Nations, “and one to you of Conestogo, and requires your
friendship to the Palatines, settled near Pequea.”[30] About seven years
after this, William Penn died in England, in the year 1718.
* * * * *
Dr. Seidensticker compares the German emigration hither, in its origin,
to the Quaker and Puritan. After the Lutherans and Reformed had succeeded
in gaining a recognition, there were sects in Germany who did not agree
with the three recognized confessions and who were bitterly persecuted.
Against such Christians the indignation of the clergy and the wrath of
the civil authorities was directed in almost every German land.
Says Herzog’s Cyclopædia:
“When the Baptists were oppressed in Switzerland and the Palatinate,
the Mennonites united into one community with the Palatines at Groningen
(Holland), and established in 1726 a fund for the needy abroad, to which
Baptists of all parties richly contributed. About eighty years after this
fund was discontinued, being no longer thought necessary.”
Thus active persecution of the Baptists in those regions had ceased, it
seems, about the year 1800.
The German or Swiss colony in Lancaster County is said to have caused
some alarm, though we can hardly believe it a real fear. Nine years after
the death of William Penn, representation was made to Lieutenant-Governor
Gordon (1727) that “a large number of Germans, peculiar in their dress,
religion, and notions of political government, had settled on Pequea, and
were determined not to obey the lawful authority of government; that they
had resolved to speak their own language, and to acknowledge no sovereign
but the great Creator of the universe.”
Rupp, from whom I quote the above passage, adds: “There was perhaps
never a people who felt less disposed to disobey the lawful authority of
government than the Mennonites against whom these charges were made.”
The charges were doubtless dropped, or answered in a satisfactory manner;
for two years subsequently, or in 1729, a naturalization act was passed
concerning certain Germans who had emigrated into the province between
the years 1700 and 1718. Over one hundred persons are naturalized by this
act (Martin Meylin, Hans Graaf, etc.); and a great part of the people of
the county can find their surnames mentioned therein.[31] All the names,
however, are not necessarily those of Baptist families.
Nearly to the same date as this naturalization act belongs a letter
written from Philadelphia, in 1730, by the Rev. Jedediah Andrews.
Mr. Andrews says, in substance, “There are in this province a vast number
of Palatines; those that have come of late years are mostly Reformed. The
first-comers, though called Palatines, are mostly Switzers, many of whom
are wealthy, having got the best land in the province. They live sixty or
seventy miles off, but come frequently to town with their wagons laden
with skins belonging to the Indian traders, with butter, flour, etc.”[32]
Mr. Andrews, in his letter, while speaking of the Switzers, continues:
“There are many Lutherans and some Reformed mixed among them.... Though
there be so many sorts of religion going on, we don’t quarrel about it.
We not only live peaceably, but seem to love one another.”
This harmony among the multitudinous sects in Pennsylvania must have
been the more remarkable to Mr. Andrews from his having been born and
educated in Massachusetts, where a very different state of affairs
had prevailed; and on this subject Rupp says, “The descendants of the
Puritans boast that their ancestors fled from persecution, willing to
encounter perils in the wilderness, and perils by the heathen, rather
than be deprived of the free exercise of their religion. The descendants
of the Swiss Mennonites in Lancaster County claim that while their
ancestors sought for the same liberty, they did not persecute others who
differed from them in religious opinion.”[33]
The letter of Mr. Andrews, above quoted, bears date 1730. Twelve years
after, or in 1742, a respectable number of the Amish (pronounced Ommish)
of Lancaster County petitioned the General Assembly that a special law of
naturalization might be passed for their benefit. They stated that they
had emigrated from Europe by an invitation from the proprietaries; that
they had been brought up in and were attached to the Amish doctrine, and
were conscientiously scrupulous against taking oaths; “they therefore
cannot be naturalized agreeably to the existing law.” An act was passed
in conformity to their request. (I give this statement as I find it,
although somewhat surprised if the laws of Pennsylvania did not always
allow those to affirm who were conscientiously opposed to oaths.)
The history of our Swiss Exiles is nearly finished. It is chiefly when
a nation is in adversity that its history is interesting to us. What is
there to tell of a well-to-do farming population, who do not participate
in battles, and who live almost entirely secluded from public affairs?[34]
Under the date 1754 it is noted that Governor Pownall, travelling in
Lancaster County, says, “I saw the finest farm one can possibly conceive,
in the highest culture; it belongs to a Switzer.” Thus Gray’s lines
(slightly altered) may be said to comprise most of the external history
of this people for a century and a half:
“Oft did the harvest to their sickle yield,
Their furrow oft the stubborn glebe hath broke;
How early did they drive their team a-field,
How bowed the woods beneath their sturdy stroke!”
Some difficulty had arisen, however, between the Germans of our county
and the “Scotch-Irish.” Thus, Day, in his Historical Collections, says,
“The Presbyterians from the north of Ireland came in at about the same
time with the Germans, and occupied the townships of Donegal and Paxton.”
(Paxton, now Dauphin County.) “Collisions afterwards occurring between
them and the Germans concerning elections, bearing of arms, the treatment
of the Indians, etc., the proprietaries instructed their agents in 1755
that the Germans should be encouraged, and in a manner directed to settle
along the southern boundary of the province, in Lancaster and York
Counties, while the Irish were to be located nearer to the Kittatinny
Mountain, in the region now forming Dauphin and Cumberland Counties.”[35]
In the Revolutionary war, the German Mennonites did not early espouse the
cause of independence. Some of them doubtless felt bound by their promise
of loyalty to the established government, while others were perhaps
influenced by the motive lately attributed to them in the correspondence
of one of our county papers (_Examiner and Herald_, Lancaster, October
27, 1869). The writer tells us that Lancaster County was settled
principally by Mennonites, etc., who are strict non-resistants. They were
peculiarly solicitous to manifest their loyalty to the powers that be,
because they had been accused by their enemies of having been implicated
in rebellion during the unhappy events at Münster, Germany, in 1535.
“When our Revolutionary struggle began, these people were cautious in
resisting the established government.”
During the late rebellion, although very few of our Mennonites bore arms,
yet some were active in raising funds to pay bounties to persons who did
enlist.
* * * * *
It appears to the writer that there can scarcely be a people in our
country among whom the ancient practices are more faithfully maintained
than among the Amish of Lancaster County.[36]
Notwithstanding the great falling off from ancient principles and
practices which we read of among Holland Mennonites (see Herzog’s
Cyclopædia and the Encyclopædia Americana), it seems that there are yet
left in Europe others of the stricter rule. In Friesland, Holland, where
the Mennonites are divided, as here, into three classes, there are found,
by comparison, most traces of the old Mennonism.[37]
And we have lately heard of Amish in France. A letter from that country,
published in the _Herald of Truth_ (Elkhart, Indiana, July, 1871),
alludes to the late European war. The writer says, “The loss we here
sustained is indescribable. Many houses have been entirely shattered
to pieces by the cannon-balls, and others totally destroyed by fire.”
He adds, “As you desire to know what kind of Mennonites there are
residing here in France, I will briefly state that most of them are Amish
Mennonites.” He signs himself Isaac Rich, Etupes, par Audincourt, Doubs,
France.
This department, Doubs, adjoins Switzerland.
The church history of our Mennonites has not been entirely uneventful.
Rupp tells us that they were very numerous about the year 1792, and that
Martin Boehm and others made inroads upon them. A considerable number
seceded and joined the United Brethren, or _Vereinigte Brüder_.
A society of Dunkers was formed near the Susquehanna, many years ago, by
Jacob Engle, who had been a Mennonite. This society is called “The River
Brethren,” and from it has been formed the society of “Brinser Brethren,”
popularly so called.
The Rev. John Herr is generally considered the founder of a sect
popularly called “New Mennists.” They call themselves, however, “Reformed
Mennonites,” and claim that they have only returned to the ancient purity
of doctrine.
In Montgomery County, in 1873, I find the term New Mennonites applied
to another sect, while those of whom I have just spoken are called
“_Herrelite_,”[38] or followers of Herr. The former are followers or
friends of a preacher named Overholtzer,—a man who refused to put on a
coat of a peculiar cut when he became a preacher.
In, or near, the same part of our State certain Mennonites have left
the society, desiring to “defend their country,” and to join oath-bound
societies. They call themselves Trinity Christians.
How far the “Albrechtsleut,” or “Dutch Methodists,”—the Evangelical
Association, as they call themselves,—have made converts among the
Mennonites, I cannot tell.
Mr. Rupp, whose history of Lancaster County is as yet the standard,
speaks of the Mennonites as the prevailing religious denomination in
1843, having about forty-five ministers preaching in German, and over
thirty-five meeting-houses.
The Amish meet in private houses. (In this year 1882, when preparing my
third edition, I hear, however, of their having so far broken through
their old custom as to have built at least one meeting-house in this
State.)
Although I have never heard that our Mennonites as a religious body
passed any rules forbidding slaveholding, as did the Quakers, yet they
are in sentiment strongly anti-slavery, having great faith in those who
are willing to labor with their own hands. Of this strong anti-slavery
sentiment I offer convincing proof in the votes by which they supported
in Congress our late highly distinguished representative, Thaddeus
Stevens.[39]
In the _Columbian Magazine_ for January, 1789, appears an “Account of
the Manners of the German Inhabitants of Pennsylvania.” The writer, Dr.
Rush, would properly have included Friends in the following passage:
“Perhaps those German sects of Christians among us, who refuse to bear
arms for the purpose of shedding human blood, may be preserved by Divine
Providence, as the centre of a circle which shall gradually embrace all
the nations of the earth in a perpetual treaty of friendship and peace.”
* * * * *
Since the first edition of this book was prepared, the public attention
has been much attracted to a great body of Russian Mennonites who have
come to this country, rather than perform military duty in Russia; some
of these are of Swiss origin.[40]
One of my neighbors had before spoken to me in very favorable terms of
Russian Mennonites, but it did not seem probable that such a body of
people were to be found in that empire, and I paid but little attention
to the subject.
The account which seems to me most valuable, among newspaper items
concerning them, was contained in a St. Petersburg letter in the _New
York Tribune_ of May 11, 1872.
The writer tells us that about the time of Menno’s death there was a
large emigration of his flock to East Prussia, where their Dutch neatness
and industry soon made those desolate and swampy regions to flourish
like a garden. In 1730 and 1732 they were threatened with expatriation
for refusing to serve in the army; but the storm passed by, and other
colonists came in. Arbitrary measures, however, were still taken from
time to time, and in 1789 they were forbidden to purchase landed property.
Catherine II. of Russia, while inviting German colonists, also invited
these, and before the year 1800 about three hundred and fifty families
of Mennonites had entered Russia, and settled on the lower Dnieper. They
came on condition of receiving freedom of worship, “the administration
of oaths in their own way” (the writer does not appear to understand
their objection to swearing at all), “and exemption forever from military
service.” They were also to receive one hundred and ninety acres of land
for each family, money for their journey, etc.
The privileges were confirmed by the Emperor Paul, and extended to all
coming after; and although the laws of Prussia had been altered, there
was a continued migration of Mennonites to Russia until 1817. These
settled near their brethren, and not far from the town of Berdiansk.
The Mennonites have prospered until they number about forty thousand.
They settled on a waste steppe, where the land was rich enough, but
suffered much from want of water. They irrigated, and raised agriculture
to a higher point than anywhere else in Russia. They had no wood, and
they planted trees. The introduction of tree culture on the steppes is
entirely owing to them. They have not only large orchards, but productive
forest-trees, and plantations of mulberry-trees, by means of which they
produce silk. They are also large raisers of stock.
Although originally agriculturists, they have endeavored to supply their
own wants in manufactured articles, and in 1854 they had in activity
three hundred and fifty mills and factories, including cloth-mills,
water- and grist-mills, dyeing and printing works, breweries,
distilleries, silk-spinneries, brick and tile works, potteries, etc., and
in their villages there were men exercising nearly every known trade.
There is no drunkenness or gambling among them. Crime is exceedingly
rare. Besides all this, they are educated. Every child knows how to read
and write; and in every village there is a school.
Up to this time they have been loyal subjects to Russia. During the
Crimean war they sent large gifts of grain and provender to the besieged
army. It is only because the privileges granted to them are infringed,
and they will be compelled to enter the army against their conscience,
that they now wish to emigrate.
Their success in tree culture on an arid steppe points naturally to
the Western prairies as their future home. In their petitions to the
American and British governments they asked whether they could obtain
land free, or at low prices, for their whole colony; whether they could
have exemption for themselves and their descendants from military service
of every kind; and whether the government would advance them any money to
defray their travelling expenses. Though the colony is prosperous, and
some of the members rich, yet there are some who either have no land,
or have so little property that a forced sale would leave them almost
destitute.
In addition to the above from the _New York Tribune_, I have found an
extract concerning the Mennonites of South Russia, from _The Friend_
(London), in which it is stated that a deputation was sent to St.
Petersburg in hopes of changing the purpose of the government, but only
obtained a delay of ten years, which expired in 1881, and also the option
of hospital and other non-fighting military service in place of actual
soldiership. Many deputations have since followed. The last attempt was
by a company of “eldest persons” to the emperor, while he was staying at
his country palace in the Crimea. We learn “the emperor did not accept an
audience, but kind words by others were spoken plenty.” Extracts follow
from an original letter, preserving the quaint English: “We greatly see
the need of leaving Russia, not only because of military service, but
also of the curtailing of religious and other liberties, which clearly
shows an intention on the part of the government to take this and our
language from us. Formerly, the administration of all laws connected with
the colonies was in the hands of the colonists themselves; now they are
mixed up with the Russian peasants. The Russ language, hitherto not, or
little, wanted, is introduced into the schools, and Russian teachers are
given to those schools. Prisons, like as in the Russian villages, are by
law commanded to build; before, not at all wanted.”
But while the Russian Mennonites are thus preparing to emigrate, it is
stated that in Prussia there are only a few churches that are not willing
to submit to the new military law.
The editor of the _Herald of Truth_, a Mennonite paper (Elkhart,
Indiana), speaks to the Russians nearly as follows: “I believe I
understand the sad dilemma in which you are placed. You have homes, the
result of honest toil; you love and cherish them; there is a long journey
to make into a strange land; it will cost you a great many anxieties and
trials; all these things seem almost impossible for you to accomplish,
and yet you cherish the principles of your church, you want to abide in
the faith of your fathers.
“In the country where you now are you are called to do that which we
believe Jesus, the Prince of Peace, forbids. Now here is a dilemma. It
will be for you to choose. Shall we stay,—and yield the principles of our
religion? or shall we do as the Saviour said, ‘If they persecute you in
one city, flee into another’?”
* * * * *
In 1881 I visited a few Mennonite communities in Germany; the first
being in the city of Crefeld, in Rhenish Prussia. I sought this town
especially from what I had learned of it in my own country. Crefeld
seems to have been a place of refuge in former times for persecuted
religionists. Here, in the seventeenth century, Huguenot refugees
introduced the manufacture of silk, for which the town is still
distinguished. Here William Penn and others gained adherents to the
Quaker doctrine.[41] And when the Dunkers were persecuted, some of them
took refuge in Crefeld, in the duchy of Cleves.
Although Crefeld was so liberal, and although it now belongs to Prussia,
it is greatly Catholic. The population is thus estimated: Catholics,
56,000; Evangelicals or United Lutherans and Reformed, 18,000; Jews,
1500; Mennonites, 1000. But the attendance at the Mennonite church which
I visited did not indicate so great a number. I cannot express more fully
to our own people of Lancaster County how much this church differs from
their own simple meetings at home than to tell them that the preacher is
paid, that he spoke from a pulpit, wore a black robe, and read a prayer
from a book. Yet it is simple compared with the display of Catholic
churches.
But what my neighbors will probably consider as a more vital difference
between them and the Mennonites of Crefeld is that the latter bear arms.
Since 1868 they have not been exempted from military service. They can,
however, if they desire, take peaceful positions, such as nurses in
military hospitals, or clerks; but while some of their fellow-believers
in Prussia avail themselves of this permission, those in Crefeld do not.
One not a Mennonite said to me that the positions in the army are more
honorable.
Why, then, do they not join the Evangelicals? Two of the chief
differences between them are that Mennonites only baptize those of mature
years and refuse to swear in a court of justice, making instead nearly
the following declaration, “My yes is yes, my no is no, and in testimony
thereto I offer my right hand,”—the _handschlag_.
* * * * *
The next Mennonite settlement which I visited was that at Kuhbörnchenhof,
not far from Kaiserslautern, in the Rhenish Palatinate. Going among
these people with no letters of introduction, I was received with much
hospitality in the small rural settlement. Their ancestors came from
Switzerland in 1715. The first who came to this place seems to have built
himself a log house; the country being nearly covered with wood, with
wild animals therein. Others joined him, until the little settlement
numbered eight families. Counting all in the country round belonging
to this church (or congregation), it is said to number ninety-four
baptized persons. They baptize at the age of thirteen. Until lately this
settlement had an unpaid ministry; but a few years ago they concluded
to employ a minister. However, he is not heavily paid. He preaches by
turns in three different settlements, and receives a salary of about one
hundred and eighty dollars (having a wife and infant). There are larger
communities, which pay as much as two hundred and fifty to four hundred
and fifty dollars.
The Rhenish Palatinate belongs to Bavaria. The Mennonites here are no
longer allowed to purchase exemption from military service; all who are
drawn must serve.
One more effort I made in Germany to visit the Mennonites. I heard
in the city of Speyer that some were living near Zweibrücken, and by
perseverance I found an Amish family not far from the town. It proved
to be that of a wealthy farmer, living in some respects more plainly
than our people here. This farmer, Mr. Stalter, told me that all the
Mennonites in the Palatinate came from Switzerland. When they came many
of them were weavers, but now they have earned money, and all, or almost
all, are farmers. The manner in which the sons of this family avoid
protracted military service seems to be by obtaining a higher degree of
education. I was told that since 1871 every young man in Germany must
perform military service at the age of twenty. If he prefer, he may begin
at sixteen. They usually go into barracks for three years. But the three
years’ service can be shortened to one year, and otherwise lightened,
thus: First, the young man must be three years in a common public
school,—_Volks-schule_. Then he must go six years to a school of higher
grade, a _Real-schule_, where he studies a foreign language (either
French or English), chemistry, physics, mathematics, history, and natural
history. (At the end of six years, if he cannot pass his examination, he
may go back and study another year.) After this he is ready to enter upon
the mitigated military service for one year only. If he does not wish to
live in garrison, he can take a room elsewhere and board himself, but go
through all the military exercises with the other soldiers. In this case
he must furnish himself his uniform and other trappings. Of this manner
of escaping the three years’ service I think that two sons of the Stalter
family had already availed themselves.