Their founder was a Silesian noble and contemporary of Luther, Caspar Schwenkfeld von Ossing, counselor to the Duke of Liegnitz, a man of liberal education, well read in the Latin and Greek classics, and active in various ways in the service of his country. The movements of the Reformation early attracted his attention but, differing in some points from Luther and other friends of the Reformation, he began a controversy with Luther about the doctrine of the Holy Communion, which so irritated the latter that, in 1543, he wrote 1543, he wrote a maledictory letter to Schwenkfeld, breaking off all connection with him. Nevertheless Schwenkfeld gained many adherents among the higher classes, had an extensive correspondence all over the empire with persons of every rank and description, and wrote many learned treatises and pamphlets, in German and Latin. After many trials and hardships he died at Ulm in 1562, in the seventysecond year of his age. Schwenkfeld's followers, of whom the greater number lived in Silesia, were repeatedly persecuted by the Lutheran clergy, in the most cruel manner, especially in 1590 and 1650. But still greater were the hardships to which they were exposed by the Jesuit missionaries of the Roman Catholic Church, in 1719. Thus pressed In from two sides, many desired to leave their country. In 1723 they became acquainted with Count Zinzendorf who, while on a journey through Silesia, interceded with the government for them, though without success. 1726 many families left their homes; some sought shelter under the protection of the Senate of Görlitz (a city of Lusatia in Saxony) and others of Count Zinzendorf. The latter lived for awhile in Herrnhut, and then removed to Upper Berthelsdorf, where they remained unmolested for some years, until in 1733 the Saxon Government withdrew its protection. Zinzendorf now endeav ored to procure for them free transportation to Georgia, which was to be colonized by German Protestants, but succeeded only in procuring for them a grant of land. On May 26, 1734, forty families, numbering one hundred and eighty souls, left Berthelsdorf, led by George Wiegner. Spangenberg was to follow them and be their minister in Georgia. In Altona (Denmark) and Harlem (Holland) Christian friends took an interest in them, and promised free transportation to Pennsylvania, in consequence of which the Georgia plan was dropped. Sailing from Rotterdam on June 28, they arrived in Philadelphia on September 2, 1734, after a long and tedious voyage. They settled principally on the Skippack and Perkiomen (in Montgomery, Berks, Bucks and Lehigh Counties), and the large barns with tile-covered roofs show at the present day where their descendants live, distinguished alike by their wealth and the simplicity of their manners. They are most numerous in Goshenhoppen, formerly called "Schlesisch Warte;" they are connected in two congregations, with three hundred families, and five churches or school-houses. Their first minister was George Weiss, who died in 1760. In 1736 Bro. Spangenberg paid a visit to the Schwenkfelders, scattered in the forest-wilds of Pennsylvania, and for a time assisted Christopher Wiegner in his farm labors. At the same time he made use of every opportunity to preach the Word of Reconciliation in the blood of Christ, and to warn against self-righteousness. Many heard him willingly, but there were no lasting fruits of his endeavors. In 1738, when visiting the Schwenkfelders for the third time, he complained of their exclusive sectarian spirit, by which the consciences are burdened; but it is more than likely that Spangenberg himself, "still too learned to be an apostle" (as Zinzendorf expressed it), and lacking experience, did not always meet them, and especially their minister, George Weiss, with that Christian candor and liberality, which alone awakens confidence, and which in later years was the brightest ornament of Bro. Spangenberg's character. Nevertheless his protracted sojourn among the Schwenkfelders was of great importance, as he was thereby enabled to gather correct information concerning the moral and religious state of the Germans in Pennsylvania and the many heathen Indian tribes. IO. THE INDIANS. THE first reliable accounts of the Indians which Bro. Spangenberg received, were given to him in 1737 by Conrad Weiser, who by request of Governor Gooch, of Virginia, and under regular instructions from James Logan, Esq., at that time President of the Provincial Government of Pennsylvania, had undertaken a very tedious journey 55 through the wilderness of Northern Pennsylvania to Onondaga in New York. Onondaga was at that time the place of the great war council, or the headquarters of the Aquanuschioni or the allied Six Nations, by the French called Iroquois (Mingoes by others, and Maquas by the Dutch). This very powerful Indian Confederacy consisted at that time of the following six nations: 56 55 Narrative of a Journey made in the year 1737, by Conrad Weiser, Indian Agent and Provincial Interpreter, from Tulpehoken to Onondaga. Collections of Historical Society of Pennsylvania. Vol. I., No. 1, p. 6. 56 The relative position of the different Indian tribes is best seen on a map published in Philadelphia in 1755, by Lewis Evans, containing the Middle British Colonies of America, the country of the Confederate Indians, Aquanishuonigy and the Lakes Erie, Ontario and Champlain and parts of New France. 1. The Maquas or Mohocks living between the Hudson and the Susquehanna, near the Kaatskill Mountains, 57 2. The Oneidas or Onoycets, and 3. The Tuscaroras (who formerly lived in Virginia and North Carolina and had joined the Confederacy quite lately, in 1713), lived westward of the north branch of the Susquehanna and around Onoydas Lake. 4. The Onondagas, more to the South and on the Onondaga River. 5. The Cayugas and 6. The Senecas, near the Lakes, which still bear their names. By these six powerful nations some weaker tribes were overthrown and absorbed, as, for instance, the Susquehannocks, 58 who, before 1680 possessed the whole present Lancaster County.. Settlements were gradually planted by the conquerors along both branches of the Susquehanna, and especially at Conestoga, which subsequently became the chief place of council of the Indians seated on the Susquehanna, below the fork. The residents there were chiefly of the Seneca tribe, mixed, however, with Oneidas, Cayugas and Tuscaroras, and were generally called Mingoes or Conestogas by the white settlers. About the year 1698 some Shawanos from the South applied to the Conestogas, and through them to William Penn's government, for permission to settle near Conestoga. This being granted, they established themselves upon Pequea Creek, under Opessah, their 57 Whether the Mohiccons (Mahicander of Loskiel) were a separate nation, is not quite certain. Proud, in his History of Pennsylvania, II, p. 297, distinguishes the Mohocks belonging to the Six Nations from the Mohiccons, who were confederates of the Delawares. 58 Notes Respecting the Indians of Lancaster County, by W. P. Foulke. 'Memoirs of Historical Society of Pennsylvania, Vol. II, Part II, p. 212. principal chief, and gradually extended their settlements to the North and West, until in the first part of the eighteenth century they all removed to the wilds of Ohio. In a similar manner, about 1700, some Ganawese from the Potomac and Nanticokes and Conoys from Maryland appeared and settled in the same vicinity, under the protection of the Six Nations. While thus the power of the Six Nations on the North was constantly increasing, the influx of European immigrants was pressing more and more upon the original owners of the soil in Pennsylvania -the Delawares. These were, according to their own traditions, direct descendants of the Algonkins, one of the most powerful nations of antiquity, and called themselves Lenni Lenape, that is, "Indian Men," or Woapnachky, that is, "a people living towards the rising of the sun," having formerly inhabited the eastern coast of North America. They were divided into three tribes; the Unami, the Wunalachtikos, and the Monsys. Many other tribes, like the Shawanos and Nanticokes, called the Delawares "Grandfathers," 60 and never ventured to wage war against them, for they were alike celebrated for their courage, peaceful disposition, and powerful alliances. They were at one time the undisputed masters of all middle America, and extended their wars against the Alligewi as far as the Mississippi and maintained a determined hostility with the Mengwi. On the arrival of Penn their number in Pennsylvania was computed at thirty or forty thousand souls.61 Their history spoke only of conquest. They were a brave, proud and warlike race, who gloried in the preser 59 History of the Mission of the United Brethren among the Indians in North America, by G. H. Loskiel, translated by Christian Ignatius La Trobe, 1794. 60 Loskiel, I, 128, 136. 61 Discourse on the Surviving Remnant of the Indian Race, by J. R. Tyson. |