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THE EMIGRATION SEASON OF 1738-

YEAR OF THE DESTROYING ANGELS

By KLAUS WUST

He let loose on them his fierce anger,

wrath, indignation, and distress, a

company of destroying angels.

Psalm LXXVIII, 49.

"Es ist ein gräulicher Würg-Engel diss Jahr unter den Reysenden gewesen,"

a Germantown resident wrote on November 20th, 1738 to a fellow pietist in the

County of Wittgenstein.¹ "Würg-Engel"—strangulating angel—the Luther

Bible calls the angels of disaster let loose by God on those who angered him by

their conduct. In a collective missive, written five days later, fifteen leading

citizens of Pennsylvania and Jersey, almost all native Germans, also referred

to the 78th psalm. After exempting those whom God bade to leave their home-

land because some had suffered for their faith and others had faced extreme

misery, the pious authors of the Send-Schreiben bore down on all others who

merely sought wealth and an easy life in America. Such people, they wrote,

"will go down with confused and burdened consciences, dispatched by their sins

and by the destroying angels of righteousness." ² What sounds like a harsh

condemnation to modern ears was merely a way of dealing with the seemingly

incomprehensible events of the year 1738 in the pietist terms of the times.

The literature on Central European emigration of the eighteenth century is

replete with horror stories of sufferings and death at sea. Past writers seem to

have focused on occasional disasters and on the mismangement of the emigrant

trade by greedy recruiters, shippers and captains. Certainly even an unevent-

ful Atlantic crossing then was not free of hardships to the unsuspecting lands-

man. The poor standards of cleanliness and the obvious ignorance in matters

of hygiene in those days had adverse effects on mass travel. An objective assess-

ment, however, of the total German and Swiss migration to North America

during that century reveals a rather successful operation of free market forces

that enabled well over one hundred thousand souls to reach the desired destina-

tion, many of them without even having sufficient funds to pay for the ocean

passage.

It can also be stated that the more spectacular instances of considerable loss

of life were related to prolonged waiting periods in temporary quarters on land

and on board of ships detained in ports. This was particularly true with three

projects for which governments or officially sponsored colonization companies

were responsible. One was the half-hearted attempt of the English authorities

to deal with the unexpected, yet not entirely unwanted, arrival of upwards of

twelve thousand Germans in 1709 amidst a war. Although the government

[21]

selected some 3,700 from among the sturdiest emigrants for settlement in New

York and North Carolina, the ensuing ordeal for the people caught the or-

ganizers completely off-guard. Crammed into hastily chartered ships, the people

spent months waiting for a departure which was delayed by the war conditions

at sea. An epidemic began to spread among the passengers which continued

throughout the voyage and lasted well into the first weeks after arrival in

America, Dubbed "the Palatine fever", the epidemic has been variously ex-

plained as typhus or as one or another kind of typhoid fever. The Mississippi

scheme of 1720, when the Company of the West and the French government

recruited more than 4000 people in southwest Germany, Alsace and Switzer-

land, fared even worse. The same type of epidemic disease ravaged the ranks

of the colonists held in the hurriedly created tent city at Lorient in the summer

of 1720, and continued to claim such heavy losses during the transport to the

Louisiana coast that only a few hundred survivors ever reached their assigned

land. An even more tragic end was destined for the Cayenne project of the

French government in 1763 when almost all the emigrants perished from fevers

at sea and after arrival.³

In all three cases the blame for the calamities could easily be laid on authori-

ties inexperienced in handling such large numbers of individuals and families

who were already weakened from spending weeks of traveling toward the ports

of embarkation.

The situation in 1738 was quite different. The well over six thousand emi-

grants heading for North America during that fateful year were not part of a

colonization scheme of any government or proprietor. They belonged to the

many thousands who shared in an individual emigration pattern that had

evolved since 1717 and had become the typical way of reaching English colonies

in America. As individuals they banded together in family and often in village

groups and set out for Rotterdam or Amsterdam where every year a number of

British ships, returning with colonial staples, were available for such transport

on their way back to Philadelphia and Charleston. The redemption system by

which passengers were taken aboard after merely signing a contract to pay their

fares within a designated time after arrival had proven satisfactory to all parties

concerned. Thus payment could be made by the passengers themselves in cash

or from the proceeds of the sale of goods brought along for that purpose, or by

relatives and friends already in America, or, what was becoming increasingly

common, by parties to whom they indentured themselves to work off the cost

of passage.

The groundwork for the 1738 emigration season, as in previous years, was

prepared by solicitation in the preceding fall and winter months. Germans and

Swiss returning for home visits or for purchasing goods needed in the new set-

tlements, soon known under the name "newlanders", were approached by ship-

ping firms and individual captains to serve as recruiters. Handsome head

premiums and the promise of free return passage for themselves and their

goods turned many an incidental traveler into an emissary for shippers and land

[22]

speculators in various colonies. By 1738 the newlander business had not yet

reached the professional stage that characterized it in later years but accord-

ing to a contemporary account, people "receptive to change could scarcely

escape the self-serving solicitation." The effectiveness of these "errand boys"

was moreover supported by "grossly exaggerated letters sent out to relatives

and friends" which they delivered. The account goes on:

"Most of these newlanders, if not all, then make common cause with the Rhine and

Neckar boatsmen. Driven by purely selfish greed, they entice people to crowd unto

the boats down the Rhine in order to receive an even fatter handsel from sea cap-

tains and free transportation for their merchandizes."

4

Late in 1737 there was considerable confusion as to destinations. Some new-

landers were still active on behalf of ship captains involved in the Carolina

trade. South Carolina had enacted a law in 1735 which allocated for the three

years following all duties levied on the importation of African slaves to "poor

Protestants lately arrived in this Province, or who shall come from Europe and

settle in this Majesty's new Townships." These funds were to be used for

"tools, provisions and other necessarys" for such Protestants. The importers,

either Charleston merchants or the captains, as well as the emigrants themselves

were allowed cash bounties. This practice had led to a modest but steady

human cargo business with Ulster Scots, Swiss and Palatines. Then ship cap-

tains returning from Carolina to northern Irish ports and Rotterdam brought

back newspaper accounts with the warning that the "sinking Fund" for bounty

money was practically exhausted and "will expire in August 1738, after which

there is no provision for their support."

5

Rotterdam shipping interests imme-

diately turned away from the Charleston emigrant trade since they were well

aware of the fact that the local market for redemptioners in the Carolinas was

too limited to make runs worthwhile without the bounty money. Indeed, not

a single ship was to bring Swiss and "Palatines" (the common designation for

Germans during much of the eighteenth century) to Carolina. The attempt by

Samuel Wragg of London, brother of the Palatine importer Joseph Wragg in

Charleston, to have the Board of Trade pay for a shipload of Germans to South

Carolina was rebuffed.

6

Although two other southern colonies, Georgia and Virginia, offered prospects,

and, on behalf of land speculators, Governor George Clarke of New York had

leaflets circulated in Germany which promised in "High Dutch" "to give free

500 acres to each of the first two hundred families from the Palatinate,"

7

the

Rotterdam shippers turned their attention for the 1738 season to the surest of

all markets, Pennsylvania. Despite the transports to Carolina and Georgia,

there had been a steady rise of the number of Germans arriving in Philadelphia,

268 in 1735, 736 in 1736, and 1,528 in 1737.

8

Due to increased solicitation, a higher figure for 1738 was anticipated by the

merchants but when the actual movement began, it exceeded all expectations.

Groups of emigrants gathered for departure earlier than in previous years. Some

[23]

set out in March and by the time the first contingents reached the Rotterdam

area, ships were not ready for loading, indeed some of the regular English emi-

grant vessels had not even arrived hi port.

The departure dates of several batches were recorded by pastors and other

chroniclers. According to the Freudenberg parish register in Nassau-Siegen,

fifty-three men, women and children, headed for Virginia, left on March 13th.

In Canton Basel the authorities processed numerous departure petitions in

March, subjecting the applicants to irksome examinations. Emigrants recruited

by the Helvetische Societät for Virginia also gathered in Bern in March with

their leader, surgeon Joachim Lorenz Haeberlin.

9

While some of these groups

were well organized and capable of defraying all travel costs, swarms of emi-

grants from various sections of the Electoral Palatinate and adjacent states,

who began to arrive in the Netherlands in April, were unable to pay for their

ocean transportation.

The transit of thousands of "Palatines and Switzers" through the Nether-

lands had become a major problem for the Dutch authorities ever since the

mass migration of 1709 with the ensuing return of thousands from England

which lasted into late 1711. The main issue was that of destitute and sick

people and of orphans staying behind. The States General of the Netherlands

and the states (legislatures) of the transit provinces had to deal with the prob-

lem at various times. Since the major emigration year of 1722, when no pro-

visions had been made by shipping merchants for the onward transport and the

British government advised its resident in The Hague of its orders not to admit

such transit emigrants to Britain for boarding ships there, the authorities of

the provinces of Holland and Gelderland permitted certain organized groups to

proceed toward the port only if bonded shippers guaranteed their speedy load-

ing and departure. The resolution of June 12, 1722 was renewed in December

1734 "for the prevention of the inconveniences from the influx of a large num-

ber of these people."

10

Although the records are mute about a special privilege extended to the firm

of Alexander, Isaac and Zachary Hope of Rotterdam to transport annually at

least one thousand Palatines, they reveal that on April 15, 1735 the Hopes

received permission to bring some 300 to 400 Swiss from the Dutch border to

their ships lying "at the bounds of the City of Rotterdam." The Hopes agreed

"to give a special obligation of their persons and property until the emigrants

shall depart without expense or injury to the State." Such arrangement was

certainly in the best interest of the Province of Holland. It marks the entry of

the Hope firm into the regular Palatine trade. Since 1719 they had conducted

occasional emigrants transports but according to their own admission it became

a significant part of their far-flung operations only in the mid-thirties.

11

Their

involvement was such general knowledge that a Swiss pamphlet stated in 1738:

". . . all those who do not have the means for the passage will be ... sent over by

Messrs. Hoppen, prominent merchants here."

12

[24]

The mutually convenient understanding between the authorities and the Hope

firm led to the widespread belief that they held a monopoly, or as Robert

Trevor, secretary of the British legation at The Hague wrote in March 1739:

"Till of late there was but one Merchant at Rotterdam, with his associates, who

was allowed to answer for, & transport These Emigrants." ¹³

When the first waves of Palatines reached Dutch territory in April 1738, the

Rotterdam city authorities enforced an order, passed the preceding year, pro-

hibiting Rhine shippers to unload "all Palatines and other foreigners" within

the city limits. Instead they were to take them to a holding area in the vicinity

of the ruins of St. Elbrecht's chapel below Kralingen.

14

Evidently there were no

preparations made for the temporary sojourn and subsequent embarkation of

these early arrivals. On May 13th the bailiff and court of Kralingen petitioned

the States of Holland to either have the Palatines sent back or speedily em-

barked for America. The petition stated:

". . . that some two hundred people, among them aged persons and children, coming

from the Palatinate and Wirttemberg and pretending to go over to Pennsylvania,

are now within the jurisdiction of the petitioners without having made any prepa-

rations to move on from there and without pretext of having money for the con-

tinuation of their travel."

While "these are already a great burden," the petition hinted at more ominous

trouble, namely the outbreak of an epidemic when "in the case of the death of

parents the children will be left behind." The Kralingers also had been in-

formed that "shortly a thousand or more such impecunious persons from the

same land are to follow." On April 28th the merchant Francis Trimble had in-

deed posted bond for the transit of 1,000 persons but the apprehensions of the

Kralingen officials and the estimates of the shipping firms turned out to be far

short of the real situation.

15

In a letter apprising the Amsterdam Mennonite congregation of the immi-

nent arrival in Holland of some of their Pennsylvania-bound brethren from the

Palatinate, Johannes Burckholder wrote on May 13th from Geroltzheim about

the movement down the Rhine. His friend, Henrich Kündtig of Grumbach,

had spoken to a boatsman from Heidelberg who told him that "there are near

3,000 people, children and adults, and that some of them are to be taken to

Amsterdam." This prompted Burckholder to assure the Mennonites there that

they had nothing to fear because "all have friends in the country who wrote

them to come over to them and they would pay the ocean passage for those

unable to do so." For this reason no letters of recommendation were furnished

them by their congregations. If any one of these Palatine Mennonites would

beg Dutch brethren for support, he was a fraud. Aside from this report which

concerned only "a number of households of our brethren among them," the

letter writer provides first-hand observations about the mass of other emigrants.

On May 19th, Burckholder writes, "I saw the sad scene at Worms with my

own eyes and 12 boats had been there already." Two days later he "saw the

[25]

same at Mannheim, the misery, and there must have been 20 boats." As he

inquired about the origin of these people, he found out:

"They are all kinds of people, Anspachers, Wurttembergers, Durlachers, Breisgauers

and from the Upper Palatinate and Alsatians and Zweibrückeners and from the

Westrich and also Swiss."

16

Burckholder's account gives an accurate picture of the composition of the

transports. Recent publications of emigrant lists from Baden, the Western

Palatinate and the Kraichgau (much of it then a part of the Electoral Pala-

tinate), confirm his statement. The solicitations in the winter of 1737/38 also

extended to the duchies of Zweibrücken and Wurttemberg as well as to Protes-

tant communities of the lower Alsace. In Switzerland, the cantons of Basel,

Schaffhausen and Zurich were most affected by the emigration of 1738 with

lesser movements from Bern and the Italian section of Graubünden.

Many emigrants still gave Carolina as their destination which had become

as much a byword for the New World in the 1730's as Pennsylvania. A closer

look at some communities and a few individuals is possible because the emi-

gration is reflected in public records and in chronicles. Some church records

contain occasional entries of events such as this notation by the chronicler of

the congregational register at Lichtenau in Baden:

"About this time (1738) the rumor spread far and wide that people determined

to move to Pennsylvania would be helped along, how the English entertained them

during the voyage and allocated to them over there plenty of land and also promised

freedom from levies for twenty years. Since the good fortunes of the inhabitants

over there were pictured so grandly, many departed from all neighboring lands as

well as from this one, especially from Lichtenau."

17

To which might be added that some of the Lichtenauers who left on April 8th

did not reach Philadelphia until seven months later, among them carpenter

Jacob von der Weyden, who later was to become a notorious newlander

himself.

18

The Alsatian departures had to be clandestine on account of the French

policy of complete interdiction of emigration to foreign colonies, especially Eng-

lish ones. But in lower Alsace French regulations were still felt as mere im-

positions of a foreign rule to be sidetracked with every peasant ruse. An official

report of July 4th, 1738 on secret departures from Niederbronn is most reveal-

ing. The eleven families headed for Pennsylvania were driven away in wagons

by sixteen men of the community after having taken leave on the morning of

May 13th between six and seven o'clock from village mayor Vögelin who had

"regaled with wine" several of his departing citizens the evening before. A few

days earlier the emigrants had successfully bribed French officials. In Strasbourg

they were advised to list their assets as "passive debts." Mr Mayry simply

suggested "they could find their way through the mountains and would soon

be out of the King's land." He also assured them that he would not send the

archers after them. Bailiff Billandet officially seized their homes and extracted

[26]

50 rixdollars from them but two of the emigrants, Christmann Gerber and Peter

Langenecker, went to Billandet at Oberbronn a week before their departure and

gave him one hundres livres whereupon he also advised them to "go up the

mountain and down on the other side—so you shall well be out of the King's

land." Thus the Niederbronners set out on their fateful road to America. Most

of them were to perish on the Charming Nancy. They left with some means

and had declared under oath that each of them would have left with 100 rix-

dollars in cash, some even with more, had their "expenses" in Strasbourg and

elsewhere not been so high.

19

In the Reformed Freudenberg parish of Nassau-Siegen the leave-taking was

different. There was no reason to hide since the authorities had granted per-

mission to emigrate ever since 1712 when a first group of miners had applied to

go to Virginia. There had been a constant trickle of newcomers in the Little

Fork colony in Virginia's Culpeper county where Siegeners had bought exten-

sive lands in 1728. There was also a coming and going between Siegen and

Virginia, with successful settlers going back to fetch others. In 1734 and 1736

new contingents had arrived. Among the 1736 additions was Tillmanus Hirn-

schal of a prominent family who emigrated fifty-five years old. His brother,

Balthasar Hirnschal, was "Commissary of His Royal Majesty of Great Britain

and his Highness the Prince of Nassau-Orange" in The Hague. In the fall of

1737, Tillmanus returned to Siegen to gather a new group which was to include

his son, Georg, and wife Catharina von Bühl. Pastor Göbel invoked the bless-

ings on the fifty-three parishioners in a farewell service on Sunday, March 8th,

and on the following Friday the trek set out for the trip down the Sieg valley

towards Bonn where they boarded the Rhine boats. They knew precisely

where they were going in Virginia, although the pastor, in the common confusion

of American destinations, noted "they left for Georgia, the new island under

the protection of His Majesty the King of England, out of this place and

parish, with the knowledge and consent of the authorities of our land." Only

five of the man listed by him arrived at their destination, all others, including

Tillmanus Hirnschal, died on the Oliver.²

0

Among the Kraichgau emigrants were many individuals and families who

would have been considered comfortable, middle-class citizens. Twenty-one

year old Johann Heinrich Keppele was the son of the chief administrator for

the Baron Gemmingen in Treschklingen. He was to be one of the survivors of

the Charming Nancy, and later rose to become a leading shipping merchant in

Philadelphia and a member of the Pennsylvania Assembly. Numerous others

from his home village and from neighboring towns also left in 1738.

21

In most

cases they would take communion the Sunday preceding the departure of which

pastors frequently entered the date in their registers. Four families of Bonfeld

are listed as emigrants by their ministers but none of them seems to have

reached Pennsylvania. On April 22 the young Lutheran vicar, Wilhelm

Jonathan Moser, married in Bonfeld with the express note in the records:

"nume vocatus pastor Ecclesia ejusdem america Pensilvanesis." Pastor Moser

was never heard of again.

22

[27]

An interesting sidelight is provided by the records of the Surinam Society

in Amsterdam. When the large numbers of Germans were coming down the

Rhine, the directors sent the Reverend Johann Martin Klein, preacher in

Paramaribo and a native of Neu-Wied, who happened to be in Holland on

church business, to Neu-Wied with a supply of pamphlets in High-German

extrolling the advantages of settling in Surinam. Klein recruited not only

people in Neu-Wied but also intercepted a number of Palatines passing through.

In August the Societeit van Suriname requested transit permits for 150 to 160

persons from the border to Amsterdam. Altogether 96 emigrants arrived in

Suriname in February 1739 where no preparations had been made for them.

Two families immediately left again on a ship for Georgia while the others

were decimated by disease and the climate. Several of the survivors tried in

vain to be sent to English colonies where they had originally intended to go.

22a

The Electoral Palatinate west of the Rhine and the Duchy of Zweibriicken

furnished the greatest number of emigrants in 1738. From some villages large

groups joined the exodus. The Zweibriicken "Manumission Protocoll" alone

contains the names of almost one hundred persons, who, mostly with their fam-

ilies, were permitted to go to "Carolina" or America. Together with others from

his home town, a 15 year old lad travelled to America from Ellerstadt. This

Andreas Huber was the grandson of a Swiss from Lenzburg (Aargau) who had

settled in the Palatinate in 1698. Huber's best-known descendant was Herbert

C. Hoover, President of the United States.

23

As the clusters proceeded toward the Dutch border, the British shipping

merchants of Rotterdam made their preparations, summoning vessels from Eng-

lish ports to augment the regular fleet of emigrant ships. By early June the

first ones were ready for loading but this was almost a month after the arrival

of the first Rhine boats with Palatines at Kralingen. Gathered from the reports

of about one hundred eyewitnesses, passengers as well as captains, the subse-

quent events were related as follows:

"Captains and their factors or merchants came up the Maas and Rhine to meet

them at the border. The two principal shippers, the Hopes and the Stedmans,

carefully selected such people who still had some means and belongings, and en-

ticed them into their contracts.

Then the Rhine boats went on, some to Rotterdam and some to' Amsterdam. In

the former place tents were set up to shelter them for a while. There already,

partly due to much immoderation, partly as a result of incessant cold rains fol-

lowed by a heat wave in Holland, the outbreak of dysentery and acute fevers be-

came apparent so that nearly 80 small children died within a short time.

Then the people were assigned to the ships, over 200 in some, in others over 300,

and in some 400 or more. They were packed so tightly that overall at least one

third more were loaded than what is considered normal."

24

The Hope firm readied eight ships for the season, some of their own fleet,

some chartered: Friendship, Winter, Queen Elizabeth, Glasgow, Thistle, Prin-

[28]

cess Augusta, Oliver and Adventure. The two captains Stedman, John and

Charles, cooperated with the Hopes although they owned their ships, St. Andrew

and Charming Nancy. Associated with them as co-owner of the Charming

Nancy was Alexander Andrew who in turn contracted with the captains of the

billender Thistle and the Jamaica to accomodate additional passengers recruited

by him and his agents. Francis Trimble who was responsible for the transit of

one thousand Palatines alone, co-owned the Robert & Alice but he also needed

extra space on other ships. Philip Thomas van Teylingen's ship Nancy was also

in Rotterdam. He had been in the emigrant trade since 1732.

Once the ships became available, they had to be hastily fitted with additional

bedsteads. The previously cited report continued:

"Everywhere there were double bedsteads built, or even three on top of one an-

other. Many passengers had their chests broken up and stored their belongings

•wherever they could (because captains and newlanders themselves had so many

chests and goods and there were simply too many people) or they had to leave them

behind to be sent later by other ships so that many a garment and linen cloth be-

came rotten or moth-eaten." ²

5

According to the Rotterdamse Courant, five of the ships operated for the

Hope firm arrived at Goeree on June 22nd. They were the Queen Elizabeth,

Thistle, Oliver, Winter and Glasgow.

26

From there the fleet proceeded to cross

over to England for the customs clearance required by the Navigation Acts.

The captains of the Queen Elizabeth and the Winter Galley chose the northern

route and headed for Deal, while the others, planning to go to the southward,

sailed for Cowes on the Isle of Wight. A violent storm played havock with the

heavily loaded ships. The report cited earlier mentions that they spent general-

ly 3 to 5 weeks before reaching port in England. Captain William Walker of

the Oliver felt that he could not safely undertake the voyage with his over-

loaded vessel. He returned to Hellevoetsluis and resigned his command. Six

passengers, all Italian-Swiss, fled the ship after two of their children had died

and refused to return aboard. The Hopes assigned Captain William Wright as

the new commander. The Oliver left again early in July and crossed in two days

over to Cowes where she spent almost six weeks, "partly to have our ship in-

spected and found solid and seaworthy, partly to unload and load anew, and

to await favorable winds in order to continue our voyage to Virginia." Soon

after leaving Cowes, the vessels incurred such heavy seas that the Thistle and

the Oliver sought shelter at Plymouth.

27

Meanwhile back in Rotterdam additional merchant ships were fitted for the

overflow of emigrants. Even the departures of John Stedman's St. Andrew and

Charles Stedman's Charming Nancy were delayed by these transformations.

Passengers told that the two Stedmans had deliberately picked the heathiest

and sturdiest people from among the clients of the Hope firm. On July 19th,

the 200 ton, thirteen year old brigantine St. Andrew, a veteran in the Palatine

business since 1725 (she sailed first as Pennsylvania Merchant), was still in

[29]

Rotterdam.

28

The emigrants, many of them sickly by that time, were absolute-

ly at the mercy of the shippers, even as to the final destination. The Hopes, for

instance, had assigned some Palatine redemptioners intending to go to Phila-

delphia, to fill up the Virginia-bound Oliver which was chartered by the Helve-

tian Society. In turn, some 200 passengers were loaded on the small ship Ad-

venture, Captain James Shields, which the Hopes had chartered. Toward the

end of June, the Adventure stopped at s'Gravendeel and then went to London

where the people were disembarked. They were again loaded on the 150 ton,

North Carolina built Two Brothers, Captain William Thomson, who decided

to take them on his own account to Savannah, Georgia.

29

The Princess

Augusta, Captain George Long, left Rotterdam with near 350 passengers in

August. This load was not much more than the 330 persons the same vessel

had landed safely in Philadelphia in September 1736.³

0

The first ship to arrive in Philadelphia was the Winter Galley. Captain

Edward Paynter submitted his account of 252 passengers and qualified on

September 5th. If the news of the dismal situation in Kralingen had not yet

reached Pennsylvania by other vessels, the emigrants themselves now spread

the story. The passengers of the Winter Galley had come from the Electoral

Palatinate east and west of the Rhine, Baden and Ansbach along with thou-

sands of others who were assigned to other ships. As usual during the arrival

season, Germans, some even from remote settlements, crowded the harbor to

greet relatives, friends, or just people from their old home place to hear news

and maybe find mail.

Four days later, the ship Glasgow and the snow Two Sisters arrived. This

time the recently installed new governor, George Thomas, attended the oath-

swearing ceremonies to acquaint himself with the situation. He also was present

when the next three vessels arrived with Palatines, the Robert & Alice, the

Queen Elizabeth and the Thistle.

31

Captain Walter Goodman of the Robert

& Alice sent a letter on October 19th with a returning ship. Excerpts were pub-

lished in the Rotterdamse Courant two months later:

"On the 4th of July last I sailed out of Dover in England and arrived here on this

river on the 9th of September with crew and passengers in good health but on the

way I had many sick people, yet, since not more than 18 died, we lost by far the

least of all the ships arrived to-date. We were the third ship to arrive. I sailed

in company with four of the skippers who together had 425 deaths, one had 140,

one 115, one 90, and one 80, The two captains Stedman have not yet arrived and

I do not doubt that I shall be cleared for departure before they arrive since I begin

loading tomorrow. I have disposed of all my passengers except for 20 families." ³²

Another letter, dated October 18th, was sent by Christoph Sauer of German-

town to friends in Wittgenstein who were eagerly awaiting news of several

emigrants from Elsoff. Sauer wrote:

"The Elsoffers have not yet arrived. Everybody wonders where their ship is, and

besides that vessel, 3 to 4 ships with people are still expected. According to all

reports, they have been at sea now for a quarter of a year."

[30]

As to the vessels that had come in, Sauer remarked:

"The throngs of people who let themselves be seduced this year to come into the

country are raising much lament here. Besides, as so many hundreds died from

sickness aboard ship at sea, the survivors, if there are any left of a family, must

pay or go into service which causes so much indigence and privation among people

which is hard to describe."

33

Almost a month later, on November 16th, another letter from Germantown

(probably written by Johann Adam Gruber) reported the arrival of the Els-

offers and the tragic fate of the Althaus family from Wittgenstein aboard the

St. Andrew. Only the mother and two boys survived. Three of her children

died in England and her husband at sea:

"This ship lost near 160 persons, and another one that arrived the day before,

more than 150, and on one that came in the following day, only 13 healthy people

are said to remain. Still another one arrived meanwhile on which out of 300 freights

only 50 are left. Most of them died from dysentery, head sickness and violent

fever, also some captains and many seamen. Altogether of 15 passenger ships only

2 seem to have arrived with the people tolerably healthy and well."

34

The letter writer then remarks that by moderate estimates about 1,600 people

had died on the fifteen ships arrived so far. On November 20th another letter

from Germantown to the people in Wittgenstein was written. It acknowledges

the receipt four weeks earlier of a letter from Berleburg which was found in

the trunk of Friedrich Moor who himself had died of dysentery on the Davy

like "the captain, helmsman, sailors and more than 160 passengers." The letter

concludes with an upward assessment of the total number of victims: "There

has been a cruel, destroying angel among the travelers this year for the num-

ber of those who died so far on the voyage and here has reached about 2000."

The writer then announces a forthcoming report to be sent over to Germany.

35

Fifteen leading men of various religious backgrounds from Philadelphia, Ger-

mantown and nearby communities came together in the face of the tragedy

which all of them had witnessed when they waited on the wharves for the ar-

rival of friends and loved ones. They agreed to band together for whatever help

they could render and to compile a comprehensive account not only of the re-

cent events but also concerning the general situation for colonists in Pennsyl-

vania, the solicitations by newlanders, and the pitfalls which must be considered

during travel to the seaport and during the voyage itself The participants of

this first collective action on behalf of arriving German emigrants were:

Heinrich Graff, Anwell, New Jersey

Christoph Sauer, Germantown

Johannes Bechtel, Germantown

Johann Adam Gruber, Germantown

Lorentz Schweitzer, Germantown

Johannes Eckstein, Germantown

Jacob Baumann, Germantown

[31 ]

David Deschler, Philadelphia

Johannes Wüster, Philadelphia

Christoph Meng, Germantown

Johann Henrich Kalcklösser, Germantown

Georg Bentzel, Germantown

Blasius Daniel Mackineth, Germantown

Antonius Benezet, Philadelphia

Johann Benedictus Müntz, Falkners Swamp

36

The heart-rending experience of witnessing the arrival of Palatine ships

throughout the autumn of 1738 pervades every part of their Send-Schreiben.

The reader is assured that their description of the events was carefully gathered

from accounts of nearly 100 eyewitnesses. The addressee in Germany is not

known but we may suspect him in the circle of radical pietists with whom

several of the signatories corresponded. It was sent with the express request to

have it published as a guide and as a warning to prospective emigrants. The

Send-Schreiben was subsequently published in Frankfurt by Justus Heinrich

Wiegand. The other letters by Sauer and friends also appeared in print in the

radical pietist periodical Geistliche Fama.

37

Surprisingly no reference to the

events of 1738 has come to light in governmental publications or newspapers

in Germany although they would have suggested themselves as convincing argu-

ments against the widespread willingness to emigrate.

Much of the content of the collective missive, dealing with the situation in

and around Rotterdam and at sea, has been used in the sections above. In the

personal recollections of the signers it was the first time that emigrant transports

of an entire season were affected by disease. They recalled only two singular

cases, the fate of the Love and Unity four years earlier, when two-thirds of the

Palatine passengers died of starvation during a voyage of nine months and a

lively trade in rats and mice among survivors marked the last stage of the trip,

and a ship with Englishmen that was wrecked on the New England coast where

more than one hundred people drowned:

"However, this year the sea has held quite a different harvest, because by moderate

reckoning, more than 1800 died on the 14 ships arrived till now. While there are

still two missing, we have reasons to assume them lost for they have been at sea

for more than 24 weeks."

38

The situation ashore was critical enough. The Send-Schreiben likened it to

outbreaks of the plague:

"Although several houses outside the city were rented by captains for the care

of the sick by order of the authorities, as it happens, it is easy to see that

the burden falls mostly on those Germans who still have some love left for their

countrymen. There have been frequent collections taken, and the charity was then

distributed to these starving, miserable human beings but it is shocking to witness

the envy, the jealously, and the malice among the survivors."

39

[32]

The writers of the letter relate how some ships were prevented from disembark-

ing their human cargoes and ordered to sail back below the city for fear of

spreading contagion:

"Those in town and in the country who took people into their homes contracted

the same disease and several have suddenly died. It looks as if the sickness will

spread throughout the land. The stench alone is so horrible on the ships, and with

the people who came from them, that anyone who is easily disgusted will feel sick

right away. That has made the inhabitants shy away from the diseased people."

40

The Pennsylvania Gazette, which usually reported the arrival of emigrant

ships did not refer to any untoward conditions until late in October. Of course,

the first ships to reach Philadelphia had few casualties. On September 7th it

carried the news of the landing of 360 passengers of the Winter Galley (Captain

Paynter reported only 252 men, women and children on September 5th). The

issue of September 14th registered the Two Sisters, Glasgow and Robert &

Alice with 1,003 people aboard (618 according to the statements of the three

captains) .

41

There is no ready explanation for the discrepancies in numbers be-

cause the discharge of some 500 passengers along the river or at the wharves

would hardly have remained unnoticed. There was, however, a tax of 40

shillings levied on every reported Palatine passenger entering the province which

might possibly explain certain under-reporting by captains.

The authorities became aware of the health hazard at an early stage. Dr.

Thomas Graeme, official health inspector of incoming ships for two decades,

alerted the governor after having examined passengers on four Palatine vessels.

Governor Thomas, in submitting Dr. Graeme's reports to the board on Sep-

tember 14th, singled out the particularly grave situation on the Nancy, Captain

William Wallace, and the Friendship, Captain Henry Beech. Both commanders

had already permitted passengers to go ashore. The governor further an-

nounced since

"it might prove dangerous to the health of the Inhabitants of this Province and

City, It is Ordered that the Masters of said Ships be taken into Custody for

their Contempt of the Governor's Order, signified to them by Thos. Glenworth.

pursuant to a Law of this Province, to remove to the Distance of one Mile from

this City, and that they shall remain in Custody till they shall give security in

the sum of Five Hundred Pounds each, to obey the said Order, and not to land

any of their Passengers, Baggage, or Goods, till the Passengers shall have been

viewed and Examined, and until they shall receive Licence from the Governor

for doing so."

42

Surprisingly, only six days later eighty-seven men of the Friendship and forty-

eight of the Nancy were marched to the courthouse for the oath-taking

ceremony.

43

The snow Fox, Captain Charles Ware, arrived from Rotterdam and Plymouth

in the second October week. According to the Gazette she carried 153 Palatines

but the captain listed only 47 men, 23 women and 6 children. A mere thirty-

one of the men took the oath at the courthouse in the governor's presence.

44

[33 ]

Three Palatine transports are known to have left from Amsterdam. The pink

Amsterdam, Captain Joseph Willson, arrived safely in New York on October

12th with "upwards of 300 Palatines," many of whom were actually from

Wurttemberg. One day later Captain Christopher Ratsey came in with his

Anne Galley. There is no indication of any unusual health problems in the

terse newspaper reports. Willson had carried on regular runs to New York

since 1734, Ratsey had brought 173 German passengers in 1737.

45

In view

of the assertion voiced by several contemporary writers that the epidemic

had its origin in the camp sites at Kralingen, it is surprising that one

of the hardest hit vessels was to have come from Amsterdam. The sickness

might well have existed already on the Rhine boats. The ship Davy qualified

in the port of Philadelphia on October 25th. The next day the Gazette revealed

the horrible story of this voyage. The captain, both mates and 160 passengers

died at sea. It was the ship's carpenter, William Patton, who brought the

ravaged vessel up the Delaware. Patton listed 74 men, 47 women and no chil-

dren as the remaining passengers but only 40 of the men were well enough to

come to the courthouse. In this context, the Gazette commented for the first

time on the general situation: "Most of the Ships which bring Dutch Passengers

this Year have been visited with a Sickness that has carried off great

numbers."

46

Next appeared the long overdue St. Andrew, commanded by the favorite ship

captain of the Germans, John Stedman. Several letters of passengers on

some of his previous five runs between Rotterdam and Philadelphia were full

of praise for him. This time, on a voyage that lasted twelve weeks, almost 120

passengers had died before reaching port on October 27th. The same day,

Lloyd Zachary and Thomas Bond, two physicians recruited by the authorities

to tighten the inspection of the incoming Palatine ships, presented this report

to the colonial council:

"We have carefully examined the State of Health of the Mariners and Passengers on

board the Ship St. Andrew, Captain Steadman, from Rotterdam, and found a

great number labouring under a malignant, eruptive fever, and are of the opinion,

they cannot, for some time, be landed in town without the danger of infecting the

inhabitants."

47

It was the last emigrant transport that John Stedman ever commanded.

After his return to Europe, he settled down in Rotterdam in the shipping

business. There was disbelief in the German community that such fate could

have befallen a ship led by a Stedman. The Send-Schreiben expressed the re-

action as follows:

"The two Stedmans, who had so far been renowned for the transfer of Germans

and wanted to keep this reputation, also had to suffer the plight this time, one of

them lost near 120 before landfall, although he had a party of the Hope's roughest

and sturdiest folks, who had to succumb to sickness and fear of death. And the

other one lost probably five-sixth, of 300 hardly 60 were left. His mates and some

of his sailors he lost and he himself lay near death."

48

[34]

Charles Stedman's Charming Nancy, a new ship built for his brother John in

Philadelphia in 1736, arrived on November 9th from its southward crossing

in a pitiful state. It had passed through the heavy storms which claimed the

loss of more than fifty sails in the West Indies.

49

Johann Heinrich Keppele

recorded in his memorandum book that the Charming Nancy had loaded 312½

freights in Rotterdam of whom 250 souls died at sea. Only 64 men above fifteen

years of age came to the courthouse where the governor himself again con-

ducted the oathtaking.

50

For the 1738 emigration, despite the unusually large crowds having left the

various areas of heavy outflow, and the rumors of sickness and death about

Rotterdam that no doubt must have been brought back by travelers or by the

returning river boatsmen, there was no end to the swarms. Indeed records show

that many people were still departing in June from the western Palatinate but

also from the Swiss canton of Schaffhausen.

In Bern authorities had reason to hail the year 1738 as the first one in which

there was evidence of not much inclination to emigrate. The treasury clerk

recorded on May 5th that the Rabies Carolinae had fortunately disappeared.

51

Other northern cantons of the Swiss Confederacy, however, had quite a dif-

ferent experience. As early as February the Basel authorities began to conduct

examinations of applicants for emigration. They received the usual answer that

the petitioners could not earn a sufficient livelihood at home. The interroga-

tions included the questioning of a newlander, Peter Schwab, who carried with

him letters and commissions on behalf of "Johannes Wiester, a merchant in

Philadelphia." The purpose of the lengthy hearings was to dissuade people

who where considered useful citizens. For this purpose the authorities distributed

in April 690 copies of a negative letter written by the unfortunate widow of

the Reverend Moritz Göttschi in various communities where interest in emi-

gration was evident. Those whom the authorities were glad to see leave, but

also others who could not be deterred, went on their way in April and May.

When they arrived in Rotterdam, most of the vessels had been loaded and

like some of the Baden emigrants, they were taken to London. They boarded

the snow Enterprise which sailed into Philadelphia on December 6th. For some

of them that was seven or eight months after they had left home.

52

In a Schaffhausen chronicle there is reference to many poor folks from rural

districts, notably from the Reyat and the Merishausen valley, who left for

"Carolina" in June. When Hans Göpfert, Thebis Rüger and Jacob and Andreas

Steinimann petitioned the Schaffhausen council for permission to move to the

Provintz Carolinam, and a number of others were getting ready to leave, the

Council forbade emigration "on penalty of the loss of the comburghery rights."

The chroniclers' entry echoes the fatherly concern of the Council for subjects

who "in a thoughtless manner expose themselves to great discomfort and ex-

treme wretchedness" by their "unseasonable resolve." Unseasonable it certain-

ly was to set out so late in the year. But Schaffhauseners were not the only

ones.

53

The most startling movement was underway between the middle of

[35 ]

August and the first two weeks of September from 38 communities of Canton

Zurich. Altogether 526 emigrants have been traced in the official records. The

late frost and storms that afflicted the northeastern part of the canton and

caused considerable damage, might have been a factor but evidence is incon-

clusive. At most, it seems, these natural causes might have provided the final

push.

54

With more than half a thousand people embarking on the trip to

Rotterdam on the heels of what was already the largest emigration from Central

Europe since 1709, the shippers were wholly unprepared. Some of the newly ar-

riving travelers were taken to London together with stragglers from Zwei-

briicken. The small bilander London, Captain Joshua Piper, brought about

fifty people to Philadephia on January 8th, 1738/9. Upwards of 220 people,

mostly Swiss, were loaded on the Jamaica, Captain Robert Harrison, which

Alexander Andrew chartered in Rotterdam for that purpose on October 20th.

On November 5th they sailed from Goeree into the sea. Their voyage amidst

autumn storms and winter conditions lasted ten weeks after departing from the

customs stop at Plymouth. The last stragglers left behind in Holland were

taken aboard the Charming Polly, Captain Edward Bayly early in 1739. This

ship reached New York by the middle of April. On May 15th Bayly was

still advertising "several Palatine and Swiss Passengers, who have not paid

for their Passage. The Captain may be spoke with Daily."

55

Despite the fact that some of the latecomers turned back at Basel, and others

seemingly came back after having gone as far as Rotterdam, most of those un-

accounted for died in Holland or at sea. Jacob and Elisabeth Fröli on the

Enterprise lost one daughter in Rotterdam and the other one at sea. The Re-

formed vicar at the village of Berg reported in 1744 that fifteen persons had

left in September 1738 "but no report of them has ever reached us." Pastor

Korrodi at Marthalen listed 32 men, women and children. Six years later he

stated: "From all those who left Anno 1738 not the slightest reliable report

has reached Marthalen." Jacob and Susan Keller and their seven children went

from Nefftenbach and "no one has been able to find out anything about them

since, although they promised to write." Pastor Hans Jacob Wirtz of Fehraltorff

named the Stutz family, 2 adults and 3 children, as having left on August 29th

and added, "there was a rumor that they suffered shipwreck, and with a great

number wretchedly went to their doom." No evidence of any sunken vessel

that might have left Rotterdam so late has been found but such a loss could

have happened on the transfer of passengers from Holland to England.

56

Those who did return were not received with open arms. A news item, dated

Schaffhausen, September 17th, 1738, told of the plight of returnees:

"The Situation they are in is the more melancholy, because before they set out

from Swisserland, they sold all their Effects but another Circumstance which

renders their Case worse, is, that before they left their Country, the Government

declared to them, that by breaking as they did, selling their Effects, and retiring

out of the Country, they should be entirely stripp'd of the Right of Comburghery

. . . Several of them . . . have presented very Submissive Petitions, in which they

[36]

alledge, that they hare not felt the Effect of the Promises made for inducing them

to go to America; that they have a sensible Regret for heedlessly leaving their

Country...."

57

Returning emigrants from various German principalities, even those who

had only traveled a short way before remorse or fear gripped them enough to

abandon their plans, had the same difficulties with acceptance by their rulers.

Despite the horrors of this particular year, only a few instances of return are

apparent from local records.

The news of the belated Zurich emigration did not reach Philadelphia until

the London arrived in January. Yet there was still much concern about ships

known to have left British ports in summer whose whereabouts were unknown.

In his letter of October 18th, Christoph Sauer wrote to Germany about Georgia

and the distress of earlier emigrants: "Of the Salzburgers who were brought

there, more than half died, likewise the Swiss. . . . The poor people from Hesse

who have been lured to Georgia this year will have a rude awakening for they

do not even have oatmeal bread down there."

58

Sauer could not have known

that the ship Two Brothers had arrived in Savannah on October 7th with many

sick passengers and considerable loss of life during the crossing.

This transport to Georgia was undertaken by the Hope firm and Captain

Thomson without involving the Georgia trustees. In a letter to James Edward

Oglethorpe, Harman Verelst, one of the trustees, clearly stated that Thomson

was bringing them "at his own Risque." Unlike the transport of 1737 on the

Three Sisters, also arranged by the Hopes, and for which Captain Hewitt had

instructions from Oglethorpe as to what was to be done with the passengers,

Thomson hoped to find a ready market for his redemptioners. But the economic

situation in Savannah was such that there were simply not enough freeholders

who needed or could afford servants nor had the community any facilities to

receive the sick.

59

When Pastor Johann Martin Boltzius of the Salzburger settlement visited

Savannah in October, he witnesses the "great distress of the poor people whom

Capt. Thomson brought along as indentured servants for this colony. They are

Palatines, a whole ship full—men, women, and children. These are to be sold

for a period of five years, but the inhabitants of this land have neither money

nor food for this. An adult costs 6£ 5 sh. sterling." After Boltzius preached

for them, "a great crowd of them ran up to me and asked me to take them to

our place, which was, however, not within my power. I asked Mr. Oglethorpe

to free an old widow of fifty, who had lost her husband at sea and had been re-

jected and abandoned because of her age, and I sent her to our orphanage."

60

A number of able-bodied families and single persons were redeemed from

funds of the Georgia trustees and assigned to various tasks. The two Savannah

bailiffs, for example, received the service term of several Palatines "as part of

Payment of their present salaries."

On November 4th Boltzius noted in his Daily Register:

[37]

"The remaining people on Capt. Thomson's ship are said to be very badly off.

The captain no longer willing or able to supply them with food, and the people in

Savannah are not able to buy them or keep them in clothing or food. Especially

the old people with children are having a bad time, for they must let the oldest

children be taken from them while no one wants them themselves."

The reference to "old people" is noteworthy for 18th century assessment of age.

The "old" widow earlier referred to by Boltzius, Catharina Kostenbader, was

merely fifty years old. The number of widows among the arrivals on the Two

Brothers was unusually high. Despite the sickness aboard, there were still many

young children, some orphaned during the trip. By the end of November, as

Boltzius recorded, some of the people had not yet been redeemed. "The other

swollen and sick people have been taken back on board in wheelbarrows, be-

cause the captain can spend nothing for their maintenance and no one else

will take them on." Captain Thomson took them to Frederica before returning

to Savannah and leaving for Europe.

61

News from the two ships referred to as missing, the Oliver, headed for the

James River in Virginia, and the Princess Augusta, consigned to Benjamin

Shoemaker in Philadelphia, finally reached Pennsylvania by the beginning of

February when the Gazette reprinted items from Williamsburg and Boston

newspapers.

62

The Oliver, after the initial problems mentioned earlier, at last cleared Ply-

mouth in the beginning of September and, according to Carlo Toriano, an

Italian Swiss passenger from Soglio, Canton of Graubünden,

"having reached the open sea, we sailed happily and with favorable winds for six

weeks but then the weather changed. We were tormented during more than 10

consecutive weeks by very furious storms and contrary winds which not only threat-

ened us to perish at any moment but we also lost the mast of the ship and at the

same time our poor captain died of a blood flux, and his place was taken by

Francis Sinclair who remeined as captain. Thus after 16 or more weeks of a long,

painful and dangerous voyage since our departure from Plymouth, and having

endured numerous storms, we arrived at long last in sight of Virginia, 7 or 8

leagues from land."

63

Toriano's testimony was given in August 1739 upon request of the Hope firm

after having been assured, no doubt, of their help in returning him home. He

definitely left out many of the salient facts such as overcrowding and lack of

provisions. A ship which had spoken to the Oliver at sea, reported "that they

had lost the Captain, Mate and 50 or 60 passengers, most of them children,

who dy'd; and that they were in great Distress for want of Provisions, occasion'd

by the Tediousness of their Voyage."

64

Toriano did stress, however, that on the following day when favorable winds

led the ship into the Virginia channel to two leagues from Hampton and "after

anchor had been cast, several Palatines mutinied against the captain, and with

pistols and rifles in hand, threatened to kill him if he would not land them with-

out delay. . . ."

65

What happened then was best summarized by the writer of

the Virginia Gazette:

[38]

"That when the Ship came within the Capes, the Wind was so fair, that if they

had kept under Sail, instead of anchoring at Lynnhaven-Bay, they might have been

safe at Hampton in about 2 hours; but the People being almost famished, having

nothing to eat for several Days, insisted on the Captains coming to Anchor there,

and going ashore to get Provisions. Accordingly the Captain and some of the

Passengers went ashore, but it being an Island, and no House upon it, they walk'd

about a long Time in vain; meantime the Wind rose, and blew violently at Nor

West, stove their boat ashore, parted the Ship from one Anchor, and the other

dragg'd, so that she was drove so near ashore, as to strike on the Ground, whereby

her Bottom was so injur'd, that she fill'd with Water in a very short time, and

between 40 and 50 were drowned between Decks; and had it not been for the

Assistance of Two Ships that lay near them at Anchor, who put as many of the

People ashore as they cou'd with Safety to themselves, they must most of them

been drown'd; And after they were put ashore, receiving no Shelter, from the In-

clemency of the Weather, about 70 of them were frozen to Death, some on the

Beach, and others in the Marshes, as they were scattered about, in Search for

Houses. Those who surviv'd, amounting to about 90, were taken Care of by the

Gentlemen and other Inhabitants of that Neighbourhood, and they are all like to

do well."

66

The public response to an appeal by Governor William Gooch to help the sur-

vivors and to safeguard the baggage and cargo was overwhelming. The tragedy

was compounded by the appearance of an imposter, "Colonel Brown," who,

after learning that the leader of the Bernese colonization project, Joachim

Lorenz Haeberlin, and his entourage had frozen to death on the island in Lynn-

haven Bay, called himself the head of the colony. He laid claim to much of the

considerable cargo of the Helvetian Society. Four of his children were indeed

survivors of the shipwreck but his wife had left the Oliver in Plymouth with

their oldest daughter and took a packet ship for Virginia. The self-styled

"colonel," Joseph Braun, had been administrator of the publicly-owned vine-

yards in Bern. Within a short time he embezzled 24,000 Bernese pounds, and

in June 1735 he fled to Holland. His wife and children left Bern on April 16th,

1738 to meet him and proceed to Virginia. Braun himself came on a ship via

Lisbon and arrived in Williamsburg where he found his wife who had also come

before the Oliver reached the Virginia coast. The Norfolk merchant firm of

John Taylor, Campbell & Sproul, to whom the Hopes had consigned the ship,

exposed Braun's artful practices and he promptly disappeared from the scene,

leaving his wife, children and servants to the care of William Byrd II. His

wife, Catharina von Wehrt, died in 1745, and the last we hear of Braun is that

he "supported himself with instrumental music which he understood well" some-

where in Virginia.

67

In a postscript to the tragedy at Lynnhaven Bay, the Gazette writer spoke

of the loss for Virginia "by this Disasters discouraging some Thousands of the

same Country People from coming hither to settle our back Lands."

68

For William Byrd II the fate of the Oliver meant an untimely check for a

grandiose settlement scheme of his Roanoke lands for which he had obtained

[39]

special legislation favoring the importation of foreign Protestants. In a letter

to botanist John Bartram in Pennsylvania he expressed his disappointment:

"We have had the misfortune lately to loose a ship, either by the villany or

stupidity of the master, which had 250 Switzers and Germans on board with effects

to a considerable value. These were to seat on part of my land under the conduct

of several gentlemen of fortune, who came along with them. But these gentlemen

perisht, and most of the people, and very little of their effects are saved. Some few

of these unhappy wretches are gone upon my land to make a beginning, and will

soon be followed by more."

69

The first news story on the loss of the Philadelphia-bound Princess Augusta

appeared in the Pennsylvania Gazette on February 8th, 1738/9, reprinted from

the earliest account of the Boston Weekly News-Letter of January 17th, dated

Newport, Rhode Island, January 12th:

"We are informed by a Letter from Block-Island, dated the first Instant, to the

Hon. John Wanton, Esq., our Governour, That a large ship of about 300 Tons:

was east away on said Island the 26th of December last; she was very Rich,

reckon'd to be worth Twenty Thousand Pounds Sterling; she came from Rotterdam

last August, but last from Cowes in England, having on board 340 Palatine Pass-

engers and Servants bound to Philadelphia; but having a long Passage near 200

of them died while on it; the Remainder came on Shore, and 20 of them are dead

since they came on the Island."

70

The Princess Augusta was registered with 200 tons burthen. It had a crew

of fourteen. The places of origin of the 364 passengers are not known. Many

must have paid at least half of their passage in advance and there was con-

siderable baggage aboard. On her voyage the Princess Augusta was not only hit

by the same storm systems that plagued the Oliver but it was also reported of

the passengers taken in at Rotterdam that "an exceeding bad Fever and Flux

prevail'd among them. The great mortality aboard, which also claimed the life

of Captain George Long and sundry crew members, was further attributed "to

the badness of their Water taken in at Rotterdam in Casks that had before

contained White and Red Wines."

71

Three hundred passengers and most of

the crew were poisoned by the only drinking water aboard. About 250 persons

died as a result and their bodies were thrown into the sea. The command of

the ship fell to the first mate, Andrew Brooks, who believed amidst roaring

storms to have reached the Delaware coast while the land he sighted on Decem-

ber 19th, four months after leaving Cowes, was actually Cape Cod. This land-

fall was of but a short duration. About midnight Brooks ordered the anchor

weighed. Soon the winds increased and the gale battered his vessel so much that

the remaining crew cut away the mizzen mast. Then the "square of the stern"

broke a leak and the ship, taking water, became barely maneuverable. All the

while the temperature was dropping. On the morning of December 26th, after

a succession of "Cold violent Winds, Snowstorms & the Like," Brooks attempted

again a landfall off eastern Long Island but now knowing his bearings, he de-

cided to "endeavor for Rhode Island."

[40]

In his sworn statement before the chief warden of Block Island, Brooks de-

tailed the last hours before striking the shore of Block Island while trying to

steer clear of Long Island. The surviving passengers, assembled on deck, agreed

with him to make a last attempt at reaching Philadelphia. If that should be-

come impossible, then New York and Newport were alternate choices. But at

2 P.M. on December 27th the Princess Augusta struck the shore and stuck

fast.

72

Amidst the confusion on board, with passengers clamoring to get ashore,

Brooks ordered all people to remain on the ship, then left on the small boat for

the shore where he met Head Warden Simon Ray who accompanied him back

to the ship. Despite being entreated by Ray and other Block Islanders, Brooks

absolutely refused "to suffer the Passengers to take their Goods out of the

Ship. . . . tho many of them saved their Silver and Gold: Tho' all possible

means were used to prevent clandestine Actions, many have lost by Extortion

and other ways, a great Part of the little which they saved."

73

When the situa-

tion became known in Newport, Governor Wanton sent two magistrates to the

island to help prevent pilfering of the Palatines' possessions. Though some im-

proprieties were committed, particularly by a local constable, most islanders

rendered an often heroic assistance by carrying the weakened, frost-bitten sur-

vivors through snowdrifts and ice storms to shelters miles away from the beach

and securing some of their chests and other belongings.

74

On March 2nd, Head Warden Ray and members of a specially appointed rescue

committee on Block Island sent a report to the Boston Gazette which was

highly critical of Captain Brooks:

"The Officers aforesaid, with many of the Inhabitants here begg'd of the Captain

to suffer their Chests &c. to be brought on shore (being in great Danger) and also

to supply the Distressed with some Provision for present Sustenance, which he

would not comply with, tho' at the same Time he told he had fifteen thousand

weight of Bread on board, but could not answer breaking of bulk; and he had got

all the Goods belonging to himself and Sailors on shore. But the greatest difficulty

was in transporting those Objects of Pity, carrying some in Blankets, some on Mens

backs, others on Horses (the Snow being deep) to two Cottages, a Mile from the

Ship, the most of the People being sick, froze and almost starved, and two of the

Women were froze to Death on the Beach before our People came to their

Assistance."

The next day Brooks again refused to take part in the rescue, saying

"he could not spare his Boat, nor any of his Men, he having occasion for them in

saving the Tackling of said Ship; he was answered by the Officers &c. if he would

give leave they would get on shore their Goods &e he said he had more regard to

the saving said Tacking &c. than, in saving the Palatines Goods, and little or noth-

ing was done; in the mean time, the Distressed greatly suffered, being obliged to go

4, 5, 6 Miles, to get them Provisions, no Inhabitants being nearer. The Captain

did order to unbend the Cable from the aforesaid Anchor (as his Men and others

whom he had employed testify) and the next Day the Ship was a-drift with all the

[

41 ]

Palatines Goods and Money &c. and by several we are informed with two living

Souls."

75

Some of the islanders managed to bring twenty chests ashore. These goods

recovered from the vessel were sold to pay for the rescue but there was enough

left over to divide it equally among the Palatines. By January 19th, as magis-

trate Peter Bourse stated on his return to Newport, the number of survivors

was reduced to about ninety.

76

On March 11th, some fifty Palatines, men,

women and children, arrived at Newport "who sail for Philadelphia with the

first fair Wind." Six days later thirty of them departed on one ship and on

March 22nd thirty more.

77

By the time they reached their original destination,

almost a year had passed since they had left their home towns. They were not

the last 1738 emigrants to arrive in Philadelphia. A letter written in April 1740

by Peter Faneuil of Boston to Peter Baynton of Philadelphia informs the

latter that "two unfortunate Palatine women" who survived the shipwreck and

recovered, will be on Captain Burgess Hall's ship "to your parts", and he asks

his business partner "to direct them the nearest way to get among their

friends, with such other relief as you may think necessary."

78

When the news from Block Island reached Georgia, some people must have

felt very fortunate. Among them was Michael Schneider with wife and children

who had intended to go to Pennsylvania. They were about to board the Princ-

cess Augusta when the captain insisted on advance payment of half of the fare

for the family. Not having enough cash, they were transferred to the Adventure

and eventually taken on the Two Brothers to Georgia, where they were among

the lucky few who were redeemed for service to the Salzburger settlement. Mean-

while their luggage had remained in the care of friends on the Princess Augusta,

Although all their belongings were lost at Block Island, at least Schneider and

his family were safe.

79

In the aftermath of the tragedies there remained much of the misery and

much work had to be done. One of the saddest tasks was that of writing letters

to the home communities giving the dire news of the fate of countrymen. Peter

Lohrmann and his wife Margareta Diether had come to Philadelphia in 1737 on

Charles Stedman's Charming Nancy with others from Schwaigern. This year

the Schwaigern emigrants had embarked on John Stedman's St. Andrew. Peter

Lohrman was there to welcome them, particularly Bastian Diether and family.

Bastian's brother George then lived on Robinson River in Virginia, too far away

to greet them at the wharves. This is all Lohrmann could tell the family back

in Schwaigern: "First about the Bastian Diethers, they left in an unlucky year,

barely a third of the shipload remained alive. Bastian, his wife and children,

Marcel Schneider with wife and children, Stophel Schaber, Jerg Gebert—of all

those only Jerg Gebert's wife is still living."

80

There were others expecting people from Europe who were luckier. Casper

Wüster (Wistar), prosperous merchant and brass button maker in Philadelphia,

had contracted four glassblowers in the Palatinate, who were to establish glass

manufacture in what was to become Wistarberg, near Salem, New Jersey.

[42]

Johann Wentzel, Casper Halter, Johann Martin Halter and Simeon Kreismayer

arrived safe and sound with their families on the Two Sisters on September 9th.

According to the agreement, Wüster was to furnish all tools and materials. They

were to receive a third of the expected profits in addition to food, shelter and

servants. Wüster paid 58 pounds, 8 shillings passage money for them and their

families to Captain James Marshall. Thanks to their safe arrival, the glass

furnace was built in 1739 and was ready for production in autumn. It was the

first successful glass manufacture in America, furnishing much needed window

glass and bottles which had heretofore been imported.

81

The fate of children whose parents died at sea or after arrival was a special

concern of religious people among the resident German population. The trail of

most is lost in the record. In one instance, owing to the observant and meticul-

ous journal entries of Henry Melchior Muhlenberg, the whole life of one of the

orphans, Barbara Gerber, has been sketched. She was a daughter of Johann

Jacob Gerber who left Niederbronn, Alsace, with the group mentioned earlier.

Her father, mother, grandfather and three brothers and sisters died on the

Charming Nancy, "and thus she arrived as a poor nine year old orphan with a

six year old brother ... an honorable Mennonite in Germantown bought the

two sick children and drove them home in his cart . . . now and then they were

permitted to go to the Lutheran church in Germantown." Barbara Gerber

married at 20 and settled at Shippack. She had ten children, nine of whom were

still alive when she died in October 1777 while taking care of a sick woman

whose dysentery she contracted.

82

Not all orphans fared as well as the Gerber children. In Savannah, the Rev.

George Whitefield confided to his journal on January 9th, 1740, referring to

orphans from the Two Brothers:

"Took in three German orphans, the most pitiful objects, I think I ever saw. No

new Negroes could look more despicable, or required more pains to instruct them.

They have been used to exceedingly hard labor, and though supplied with provi-

sions from the Trustees, were treated in a manner unbecoming even heathens. Were

all the money I have collected, to be spent in freeing these three children from

slavery, it would be well laid out."

83

Two youngsters, the children of Peter and Juliana Heinrich from Wurttemberg,

who had also come on Captain Thomson's ship to Georgia, were "sold" separate-

ly from their parents to a trader near Augusta. This cruel man put them to

work on a remote plantation under two slaves who molested them. One of the

slaves attempted to rape the girl Anna Magdalena and when she cried for help,

her master became so annoyed that he had her stripped and whipped. Although

the governor had the slaves brought to Savannah for punishment, they escaped

to South Carolina. The trader was not taken to justice. This extreme case of

mistreatment of redemptioners was brought to the attention of Pastor Boltzius

who had taken in the parents and two other children for work at Ebenezer, the

Salzburger settlement.

84

Recovering and safeguarding the baggage and other goods of those who had

[43]

died in the course of their emigration was a task that kept many relatives and

friends busy, and for quite a few it was the first time that they had to deal with

legal problems arising from the claims of firms to whom the ships were con-

signed. Such claims involved unpaid passage monies as well as charges for

storage and cartage of baggage. Some people had written wills prior to depar-

ture or, while surrounded by illness and death, during the journey. A potter,

Jacob Kaisermann on the Charming Nancy, left everything to his wife in his

will and named fellow passenger, Johann Vincent Meyer, as executor. All three

died in succession and Meyer's widow, Catherine, and two local blacksmiths,

probably acquaintances from the old country, presented the meagre inventory

of the content of the Kaisermann's two chests, totalling £ 11-05-00.

85

Heinrich Gerber's belongings were also recovered from the Charming Nancy.

They included an iron stove (valued at £ 3) and "old shirts, shifts, rags of dead

children" (3 sh.). Gerber was one of the Alsatians from Niederbronn. His prop-

erty was assessed at £ 25-11-2 by three local men, one of them "Caspar Wister,

button maker."

86

The latter and his brother, John, storekeeper, administered

the possessions found in the two chests of Jacob and Maria Fichter who died

on one of the Stedman ships. It is typical for the gold and silver coins listed

because by the end of the 1730's it had become quite common for emigrants to

carry cash instead of goods that might have been subject to British customs.

Otherwise their baggage consisted of clothing, bedding, cooking utensils and

tools of their trade. Books such as Bibles and inspirational works were also

carried along. Here is the Fichter's inventory:

87

[44]

Names of the men who signed the Send-Schreiben occur time and again

among those who took care of the left-over possessions of the deceased. Bauman,

Wistar, Deschler or Mackinet but also respected craftsmen of the German com-

munities in Germantown and Philadelphia feature as appraisers and executors,

even if the dead people were neither relatives nor former fellow villagers.

The final account of Daniel and Barbara Kissling's estate is an example of

the meticulous manner in which these men proceeded. Blasius Daniel Mackinet

was one of the appraisers. The legacy was handled by John Wistar, David

Deschler, both "shopkeepers", and John Fry, "labourer." They corresponded

four times with Daniel Kissling's father, the elder Daniel in Wattenwyl, and

of the total of £ 240- 2- 5, after paying all debts, including John Stedman for

the passage money and modest sums for administration, inventory and account-

ing (1 sh.), they were able to forward £ 210 to the trusted friend of the Swiss

in London, John Rudolph Ochs, for transfer to the father.

Daniel Kissling and his wife came from the district of Seftingen, Canton Bern.

His intention to emigrate was communicated to the Burgerkammer by the

Seftingen authorities on March 12th, 1738. As late as 1742 the elder Daniel's

mail from "Carolina" was still intercepted by the snooping bureaucracy of

carried along. Here is the Fichters' inventory:

87

1738

Nov.

14

Porteridge off the boat — waterside — house

—       8       9

"

17

21

pd. to Jacob Hochstedter for delivery of effects

Cash for administration

—       6     —

—     14       6

pd. for inventory

—       1     —

"

Dec.

"

Jan.

27

25

26

23

cash for letter sent to his father

cash for another letter sent to his father

pd. to appraisers — fees

pd. Capt. J. Stedman for passage

___     3       ---

—       2     —

1     17     —

12     15       2

1739

Nov.

"

13

17

cash for letter to his father

cash for another letter to his father

_       4     _

__        3      __

1740

Dec.

2

Henry Carpenter pd. him to order of dec'd's

father

13       7     —

1741

July

13

John Rudolph Ochs pd.

150 pistols à 28 sh to order of dec'd's father

Cash filling this acc.

210     —     —

___        1      __

£240   2       5

For months, even years, the events of 1738 remained on the minds of many

people. Except for the passengers of the ships that arrived early in Philadelphia,

and maybe those bound for New York, most others were affected in one

way or another by the illnesses, "protracted feeling of weakness in in the chest,

soft, bloated abdomens, scorbutic boils, or swollen, lame legs were the least of

the relics." It was not only in Savannah that redemptioners could not find local

people to pay their fare and other accumulated costs in exchange for service

indentures: "This time, due to the large numbers, there are older or weakened

folks who cannot be redeemed for it is also a period which finds farmers short

of cash—yet, the captains want to be paid."

89

[45]

Still in April 1739 a German advertisement in Benjamin Franklin's Pennsyl-

vania Gazette called on "sundry Palatines or Germans who gave notes and

bonds which have long been due to come and pay their debts unto Benjamin

Shoemaker." The Winter Galley, Queen Elizabeth, Glasgow and Friendship

were the 1738 ships listed but there were also still delinquent accounts from as

far back as 1734. Shoemaker, a son of German parents, worked closely with

the Hope firm of Rotterdam.

90

Freeing redemptioners on bond, or by merely

having them sign a personal note, was not so much motivated by humanitarian

notions as it was a means of removing the human cargo from the vessels and

thus freeing them for loading with merchandize. Not all skippers were as lucky

as Walter Goodman, sailing for Walter Davy of Dublin and Francis Trimble of

Rotterdam, who began loading again on October 20th. Captain Edward

Paynter's Winter Galley even was ready to sail again on October 5th, James

Marshall's Two Sisters on October 19th. All three, like most Palatine ships,

cleared for Charleston with flour and other supplies needed on the Carolina

market. Later they would return to Europe laden with southern staples. The

earlier the vessels reached Charleston, the better were their chances in this tri-

angular trade. Captain Joseph Willson, who brought Wurttembergers and

others to New York, must have had trouble disposing of his load because he

did not leave for Belfast until Christmas Day.

91

Since the Palatine transport was pure and simple a business for merchants

and for the captains in their service, humanitarian considerations—especially

if seen from the angle of the passengers and concerned members of the German

communities in port cities—played a minor role. So it is obvious that ship

owners, merchants and captains were blamed for much of the misery. On the

other hand it was certainly in the interest of the businessmen and captains to

bring healthy, sturdy people into the market-place for redemptioners. There

were also good arguments against an overload that would threaten the safety

of the vessel.

The situation in 1738 caught the shippers in Rotterdam by surprise since

the number of people streaming down the Rhine exceeded all expectations.

They were caught between the Dutch authorities who inforced their strict

transmigration rules, and their own interests ever mindful of the precarious

balance between profit and disaster. Nature alone, both with the capricious

weather changes along the lower Rhine and Maas, and the devastating autumn

gales and hurricanes on the southern run, would have jeopardized even a less

crowded, orderly transfer.

The epidemics in 1738 were just as threatening to captains and crews as

they were to the Palatine wayfarers. At least three skippers died at sea and

numerous mariners. Others lingered for months in hostels around in Phila-

delphia. There were other dangers for the small crews. After months of being

shaken and rocked on the ocean, with water and food rations running low,

crazed passengers like those on the Oliver forced a captain at gunpoint to com-

ply with their demand to be landed. Once a port or even a shore was in sight,

[46 ]

passengers became balky and captains panicked. Two captains were arrested

in Philadelphia because they let infected people go ashore. The frantic attempts

of the acting commander of the Princess Augusta to secure as much tackle and

rigging of the ship for the owners, whose ire he feared, appears just as irra-

tional as the decision of the prominent travelers of the Oliver to wait out the

night on the beach in freezing temperatures instead of seeking shelter in the

woods. It seems ludicrous to blame "the villany or stupidity of the master" as

William Byrd II did, when considering the circumstances under which Francis

Sinclair brought the ship within sight of her destination, or the carpenter, Wil-

liam Patton, who guided the disabled Davy up the Delaware. In view of the

weather conditions alone it was miraculous that, as far as is known, only two

vessels were wrecked.

The masters of the twenty-four Palatine ships of the 1738 season were a

mixed lot. Only two were veterans of this trade, John Stedman (since 1731)

and Joseph Willson (since 1734). Three others, Christopher Ratsey, James

Marshall and Charles Stedman had done one previous run with Palatines.

All others seemingly transported Central European emigrants for the first time.

Except for Walter Goodman and Edward Paynter, whose crossings had been

uneventful in 1738, and who both brought emigrants the following year, none

of the others appear on any of the rosters of commanders of Palatine ships again.

For at least some of them the experience must have been traumatic enough

to stay away from the Palatine business. Even Charles Stedman did not com-

mand an emigrant ship again until 1741, while his brother John preferred

staying in Rotterdam. Captain William Walker also deserves mention here

because he refused the command of the Oliver after a few days at sea because

she was overloaded. In 1736 he had taken 170 Germans and Swiss to Charles-

ton on the same vessel (then named Eagle). In 1738 the Hopes placed about

300 souls on her.

92

Lastly, the emigrant merchants in Rotterdam, mostly Scottish and English

expatriates, were heaped with reproaches. Notably the Hopes were singled

out for harsh criticism of their practices, ranging from their recruiting tactics

with the help of newlanders to the sparing management of supplies allowed

the captains for their crowded vessels. Fearing serious repercussions from the

wrecking of the Oliver in particular, they coaxed a returning survivor into giv-

ing a favorable deposition that blamed all misfortunes on the vicissitudes of

nature and the villany of mutinous Palatines. Such casual remarks as "we

went aboard a good and spacious ship," or, toward the end," we were not com-

pletely without victuals and everyone still had something left for himself",

were easily refuted by trustworthy reports to the contrary. It was also custom-

ary that consignment merchants were anxious to minimize losses in revenue

by making family members serve additional years to cover the fares of the

dead, and taking over the chests of those who left no survivors. Here the self-

less actions of responsible men of the community prevented much injustice.

The arrival of so many sick and weakened emigrants in Philadelphia caused

[ 47 ]

much uneasiness and spread fear among the inhabitants. The events of 1788

were reflected in the minutes of the Provincial Council for years to come.

There was a long-ranging feud between the Assembly and the governor about

the quality of Dr. Graeme's services. A committee of the Assembly in 1741

still referred to one "Palatine Vessel" in 1738 that was allowed to come up to

the city because the doctor believed that there was "no other than a Common

Ship Distemper . . . but by its spreading it soon appeared Malignant and the

Vessel was Ordered away from the Port." Then the report cited another ex-

ample where "to the Southward of this City, where a Person who received

some of those sick people into his House was with most of his family taken

away by the Distemper." It was also noted that, although Dr. Gaeme charged

the Assembly for his services, they had information that "the Masters of the

Vessels visited have usually made Considerable Allowances to the Doctor

besides."

93

Governor Thomas repeatedly appealed to the Assembly to built a hospital

or "Pest House", an effort that was supported by "several of the most substan-

tial Germans now Inhabitants of this Province."

94

It was not until 1743 that

an island, newly named Province Island, was acquired on which such a recep-

tion facility for incoming foreigners was to be built. Thomas took a consider-

able interest in the plight of the arriving Palatines, many of whom he had per-

sonally observed. "While stressing time and again the importance of the new-

comers for the future of the province, he also urged the Assembly to erect such

a hospital "to prevent the future Importation of Diseases into this City." His

position was eloquently expressed in his introductory address to the Assembly

on January 3rd, 1738/9, even at the risk, as he later remarked, of being criticized

for "saying a little too much of the Industry of the Germans":

"This Province has been for some years the Asylum of the distressed Protestants

of the Palatinate, and other Parts of Germany, and I believe it may with truth

be said that the present flourishing condition of it is in a great measure owing to

the Industry of those People; and should any discouragement divert them from

coming hither, it may well be apprehended that the value of your Lands will fall,

and your Advances to wealth be much slower; for it is not altogether the goodness

of the Soil, but the Number and Industry of the People that make a flourishing

Country. The condition indeed of such as arrived here lately has given a very

just alarm; but had you been provided with a Pest-House or Hospital, in a proper

Situation, the Evils which have been apprehended might, under God, have been

intirely prevented. The Law to Prevent Sickly Vessels from coming into this Gov-

ernment, has been strictly put in Execution by me. A Physician has been appointed

to visit those Vessels, and the Masters obliged to land such of the Passengers as

were sick at a distance from the City, and to convey them, at their own Expence, to

Houses in the Country convenient for their Reception. More could not have been

done without inhumanely exposing great Numbers to perish on board the Ships that

brought them.

This accident, I cannot doubt, will induce you to make a Provision against the

like for the future."

95

[48]

THE SHIPS OF THE PALATINE FLEET IN 1738

The areas of origin for the passengers were gathered from records cited in the NOTES. The designations are as follows:

AL

AN

BA

BE

GR

Alsace

Ansbach

Baden principalities

Canton Bern

Canton Graubünden

HE

KR

NS

PA

SA

Hessen principalities

Kraichgau

Nassau-Siegen

Palatinate (general)

Saarland

sw

WN

wu

zu

zw

Switzerland (general)

Wittgenstein

Württenberg

Canton Zurich

Zweibrücken

The total number of emigrants in 1738 can only be surmised from scanty and

often conflicting figures in a great variety of sources consulted for this project.

When the Rhine boatsmen reported in the second week of May "near 3,000

people" to be transported, they might have had a rather acceptable count be-

cause they had to accomodate them on their boats. At the same time the

Kralingen sheriff counted already "some 200 people" who had arrived in Hol-

land. From departure dates in some local records it is clear that many others

moved down the Rhine late in May and also in June. For August and Septem-

ber 526 emigrants from Canton Zurich alone are documented. All in all the

figure of about 6,500 emigrants seems to be close to the actual numbers.

From all available contemporary reports the following count has been

established:

Arrivals in Philadelphia

"    in other ports

Survivors of shipwrecks

3,350

700

180

4,330

Losses aboard ships arrived in American ports

Losses in ports of departure and clearance

Deaths on Oliver and Princess Augusta

1,500

300

460

2,260

These two totals would account for 6,490 men, women and children who were

on their way to America, not counting an additional number who turned back

while in transit. The mortality rate of this migration year comes then close to

35 percent of those who set out for the New World.

"Thus are the judgments of God over those who went down the Rhine toward

their anticipated paradise to the tune of fiddles and pipes, dancing and jump-

ing, cursing, swearing, indulging in food and drink, with all exuberance and

dreams of high living," was the comment of the writers of the Send-Schreiben

in the face of the horrors they witnessed and the powerlessness they felt.

96

[50 ]

NOTES

This article is a by-product of an overall study of the actual process of

emigration from Central Europe during the eighteenth century, covering all

North American colonies from Nova Scotia to Louisiana. It is intended to

show the great variety of source material upon which the student of early

emigration may draw. Public, church and private records in the United States,

Germany, the Netherlands, Switzerland, the United Kingdom and France were

consulted as indicated in the endnotes.

A great many people have been helpful in the course of the past ten years

while the larger project was in progress, but a few must be singled out for spe-

cial thanks. Professor Harold Jantz made items from his collection available

before it found its present home at Duke University. Annette K. Burgert

opened up her extensive files on European church records at any time without

hesitation. Leo Bijl never tired of checking and re-checking documents in the

Rotterdam City Archives. Among other things he furnished the transcript of

the original Toriano deposition in French. Professor Donald F. Durnbaugh

shared his discovery of the Send-Schreiben without which the 1738 story would

have remained rather lifeless. Finally, there has always been Dr. Marianne S.

Wokeck whose prompt dispatch of her own notes saved tedious digging through

Philadelphia records. They all are not only fellow vintners in the vineyard of

immigration history, as Dieter Cunz liked to call our guild, they have all be-

come valued friends.

In order to simplify some of the endnotes, a number of initials have been

used for frequently appearing items:

SH    —Ralph Beaver Strassburger and William John Hinke, Pennsylvania Ger-

man Pioneers (Norristown, PA, 1934), 3 vols.

FB    —Albert Bernhardt Faust and Gaius Marcus Brumbaugh (eds), Lists of

Swiss Emigrants in the Eighteenth Century to the American Colonies

(Washington, 1920, 1925) 2 vols. This publication contains the work by

Adolph Gerber (Basel) and Gottlieb Kurz (Bern).

PMHB    —Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography

GAR    —Gemeentelijke Archief Rotterdam

KB    —Kirchenbuch (church register).

All dates cited from continental European sources are New Style, those from British and

Colonial sources are Old style.

[

51 ]

1

"Anhang einiger Pennsylvanischer Nachrichten," Geistliche Fama, Stück XXV (1739), 36.

See note # 37 for background on this publication.

2

Glaubhaftes Send=Schreiben aus Pennsylvania in America (Frankfurt, 1739), 30. See note

#36.

3

For the 1709 mass emigration and English governmental involvement see H. T. Dickinson,

"The Poor Palatines and the Parties," English Historical Review LXXXII (1967), 464-85 and

Otto F. Raum, '"Die Hintergründe der Pfälzer Auswanderung im Jahr 1709," Deutsches Archiv

für Landes- und Volksforschung III (1939), 551-67. For recent studies consult Karl Scherer (ed),

Pfälzer—Palatines (Kaiserslautern, 1981), esp. pp. 83-77, articles by Scherer, Rüdiger Renzing

and Henry Z. Jones. The best description of the 1720 Mississippi scheme is given by Marcel

Giraud, Histoire de la Louisiane française Vol. III (Paris, 1966), 277-83; Vol. IV (Paris, 1974),

154-67. The ill-fated Cayenne project is well summarized by Jean Chaïa, "Echec d'une tentative

de colonisation de la Guyane au XVIII

e

siecle," Biologie Médicale XLVII (1958), 1-83. See pp.

58-69 for the typhoid fevers on emigrant ships.

4

Send Schreiben, 10-1.

5

The Council announcement of March 3, 1736/7 appeared in the South Carolina Gazette of

March 5th and in subsequent issues. For the 1735 law see Thomas Cooper (ed), Statutes at

Large of South Carolina (Columbia, SC, 1836) III, 409.

6

Journal of the Commissioners for Trade and Plantations, 1734/5-1741 (VII), (London, 1930),

248.

7

Lt. Gov. George Clarke to Lords of Trade and Plant., April 9, 1737. John R. Broadhead (ed),

Documents Relating to the Colonial History of the State of New York (Albany, 1855) VI, 67-61,

89-90. Solicitations and transports for New York in 1736-40 were handled by Levinius Clarkson,

merchant in Amsterdam. See MS "David Grimm—Notes about His Family," New-York

Historical Society.

8

See p. 260 for arrival statistics in Marianne S. Wokeck, "The Flow and Composition of

German Immigration to Philadelphia, 1727-1775," PMHB CV (1981), 249-78.

9

KB Freudenberg Parish, March 13, 1738, printed in full in English tranl. by Don Yoder in:

Otto Bäumer, "A Siegerland Emigration List of 1738," Pennsylvania Folklife XIX (1969-70)

ii, 46; Staatsarchiv Basel-Stadt, Auswanderung, A—1732-1738. Examples printed in Leo Schelbert,

Einführung in die schweizerische Auswanderungsgeschichte der Neuzeit (Zurich, 1976), 249-51,

and on pp. 12-5 in A. B. Faust, "Unpublished Documents on Emigration from the Archives of

Switzerland," Deutsch-Amerikanische Geschichtsblätter XVIII-XIX (1920), 9-68; Klaus Wust,

"William Byrd II and the Shipwreck of the 'Oliver'," Newsletter, Swiss-American Historical Society

XX (1984) ii, 3-19. For the Haeberlin group see esp. pp. 4-5 and 17.

10

Resolutien van de Heeren Staaten van Hollandt ende West Vrieslandt. . . ., 12-6 (1722),

245; 11-12 (1734), 290. Cited hereafter as St. v. H.

11

The Hope merchant and shipping firm in Rotterdam was founded by Archibald Hope (1664-

1743), a Scottish Quaker. In 1719 he sent his first ship with German emigrants to Philadelphia.

Later joined by his sons Isaac (d. 1767) and Zachary (1711-1770), his firm had a virtual mono-

poly on emigrant transports for many years. As late as 1767 Zachary Hope shipped 1600 Ger-

mans to America.

12

Hans Werhard Trachsler, Kurtzverfasste Reissbeschreibung (Zurich, 1738); Leo Schelbert

and Hedwig Rappolt, Alles ist ganz anders hier (Olten, 1979), 103.

13

Trevor to Benjamin Martin, March 3, 1738/9, Alien D. Chandler (ed), The Colonial Records

of the State of Georgia (Atlanta, 1904-13) XXII, pt. 2, 106-7.

14

H. C. Hazewinkel, Geschiedenis van Rotterdam (Amsterdam, 1940), II, 215-5.

15

St.v.H. 13-5 (1738), 285.

16

Burckholder to Bartholomäus van Löwenig, May 13, 1738, Archives of the Mennonite Con-

gregation at Amsterdam, Gemeentelijke Archifdienst, Amsterdam.

17

KB Lichtenau 1738, 475. See Werner Hacker, Auswanderer aus Baden und dem Breisgau

(Stuttgart, 1980), 158.

[52]

18

Von der Weyden was accused as a newlander to have robbed Alsatian emigrants in 1749.

L. Melchior, Wohlmeynende Nachricht (Frankfurt, 1750). Lichtenauer Pfarrchronik 1749, 9,

quoted by Hacker, Baden, 158.

19

Emigration clandestine de quinze families des baillages d'Oberbronn et de Niederbronn en

Pennsylvanie, liste des émigrants (in German), July 4, 1788. Doc. E 4367, Archives du Bas-

Rhin, Strasbourg.

20

On the Hirnschal family see Siegerland XXVI (Siegen, 1944), 32. For the Siegeners in Vir-

ginia: Klaus Wust, "Palatines and Switzers for Virginia, 1705-1738; Costly Lessons for Promoters

and Emigrants," Year Book of German-American Studies XIX (1984), 43-55.

21

Keppele's Memorandumbuch: Geburtsregister meiner ganzen Familie . . . quoted by Oswald

Seidensticker, Bilder aus der deutsch-pennsylvanischen Geschichte (New York, 1885), 194.

Annette K. Burgert, Eighteenth Century Emigrants, Vol. I, The Northern Kraichgau (Breinigs-

ville, PA, 1983), 184.

22

KB Bonfeld. Thanks are due for this information to Carla Mittelstaedt-Kubaseck, letter of

March 5, 1981.

22a

R. Bijlsma, "Immigratie van Duitschers in Suriname, 1733-1740," De West-Indische Gids I

(1919), part 2, 413-7.

23

The most recent extracts of names of America-bound applicants in the Zweibrücken Manu-

mission Protocoll, containing the 1738 entries, were made from the original by Annette K. Burgert,

transl. by Larry M. Neff. See pp. 361-76 in Annette Kunselman Burgert, Eighteenth Century

Emigrants from German-Speaking Lands, Vol. II The Western Palatinate (Birdsboro, PA, 1985),

hereafter referred to as Burgert, West. Palatinate. For Huber-Hoover see SH I, 210, also Dieter

Cunz, "Herbert Hoovers Ahnen," Washington Journal, June 3, 1960.

24

Send=Schreiben,21-2.

25

Send=Schreiben, 22.

26

Rotterdamse Dingsdaagse Courant, June 24, 1738.

2?

GAR, Notarial Acts # 2415/181, C. A. Cantier; Carlo Toriano deposition, Notarial Acts,

Aug. 4, 1739, C. A. Cantier (not in index). Original in French.

28

For St. Andrew: GAR, Not. Acts # 2328/387 & # 2330/125, Jacob Bremer, July 19, 1738.

For Charming Nancy: "Ship Register of the Port of Philadelphia, 1726-1775," PMHB XXIII

(1917), 382.

29

GAR, Not. Acts # 2332/143, Jacob Bremer, June 23,1738.

30

SH I,162-7.

31

Pennsylvania. Gazette, Sept. 7,14 & 21,1738. SH I,198-225.

32

Rotterdamse Saturdaagse Courant, Dec. 18, 1738.

33

J. Chr. Sauer to . . ., Oct. 18, 1738. Printed in "Anhang einiger Pennsylvanischer Nachrich-

ten," Geistliche Fama, XXV (1739), 74-91.

34

Geistliche Fama XXV, 77-8. This letter and Sauer's of Oct. 18 were published in English

translation by W. Westergood, "Two Germantown Letters of 1738," PMHB LVI (1932), 9-14.

35

Geistliche Fama, XXV, 85-6; Pennsylvania Gazette, Oct. 26,1738.

36

The only known copy of this publication was discovered by Donald F. Durnbaugh during

research for his book, The Brethren in Colonial America (Elgin, IL, 1967) in the private collec-

tion of Dr. Martha Haeberlin, Bad Nauheim. The author is grateful to both for having fur-

nished a reproduction of the original from which the quotes in this article have been translated.

The lengthy German title begins as follows:

Glaubhaftes/ Send=Schreiben/ aus/ Pennsylvania in America/ Worinnen/ Einige gründ-

liche Nachrichten/ (1.) Von der Beschaffenheit des Landes/ (2.) Von dem Zug, Seefahrt

und Überkunfft/ der europäischen Passagire insegemein und/ (3.) Insonderheit einige

gewissenhafte und/ erweisliche Nachricht von dem letzten/ zwar häuffigen, aber auch

elenden und/ Jammervollen Zug des Jahrs 1738/enthalten ist & c./. . .

(Truthful Missive from Pennsylvania in America, wherein is contained some well-founded advice

on 1st the nature of the land; 2nd the departure, voyage and arrival of European passengers in

[ 53 ]

general, and 3rd in particular several scrupulous and reliable reports of the late widespread but

miserable and woeful emgration in the year 1738).

The imprints reads: Frankfurt-upon-Main, 1739. At Just. Heinr. Wiegand's bookbinder on the

market at the three Romans. For an English version of the entire pamphlet see Durnbaugh,

Brethren, 41-53.

37

The periodical Geistliche Fama was published 1730-44 in Berleburg in the county of Wittgen-

stein by the Philadelphians, a group of radical pietists, who corresponded with kindred spirits in

Pennsylvania. Despite the strictly enforced imperial press regulations, the Fama found wide

distribution through the piestist underground. Its early imprint reads "Philadelphia", and later

on "Sarden", thus disguising the real location under the tolerant ruler of Wittgenstein. See the

excellent article by Hans-Jürgen Schrader, "Berleburgs Beitrag zur Geschichte der religiösen und

literarischen Toleranz in Deutschland," Wittgenstein LXIX (1981), Band 45, Heft 3, 117-28.

The Harold Jantz Collection at Duke University has an almost complete set of the Geistliche

Fama, 29 parts in three volumes for 1730-43.

38

Send=Schreiben, 20-1. The reference to the Palatine ship concerned the Love and Unity which

had sailed from Rotterdam in May 1731 and landed the survivors at Martha's Vineyard in

December. They reached Philadelphia on another ship in May 1732. See Pennsylvania Gazette,

Feb. 8 & 22, March 18, 1732; Philadelphia Zeitung, June 24, 1732; Gentlemen's Magazine II

(April 1732), 727.

39

Send=Schreiben, 25-6.

40

Send=Schreiben, 26.

41

Pennsylvania Gazette, Sept. 7 & 14, 1738; South Carolina, Gazette, Feb. 15, 1738/9; SH I,

198-216.

42

Colonial Records of Pennsylvania IV (Minutes of the Provincial Council, 1736-45), 306-7.

Pennsylvania Gazette, Sept. 21,1738.

43

SH I, 229-31.

44

SH I, 231-3; Pennsylvania Gazette, Oct. 19,1738.

45

New-York Weekly Journal, Oct. 10, 1737, Oct. 9 & 16, 1738. It is not known whether other

transports left Amsterdam for New York in 1738. The brigantine Prince Frederick, which had

brought Germans to New York every year from 1734 until 1736 under Captain Joseph Willson,

foundered at sea in the Caribbean in late Summer 1738. Willson, however, was master of the

Amsterdam at that time. For the arrival of Wurttembergers see New York Genealogical and

Biographical Record, XCIII (1962), 129.

46

Send=Schreiben, 23; Pennsylvania Gazette, Oct. 26,1738; SH I, 233-6.

47

See p. 87 of Frank Ried Diffenderfer, "The German Immigration into Pennsylvania," Part

II, The Pennsylvania-German Society, Proceedings and Addresses X   (1900), 5-138, 141-328.

48

Send=Schreiben, 23-4.

49

SH I, 247-8.

50

Seidensticker, Dt. Penns. Geschichte, 194; SH I, 247-8.

51

Säckelschreiber Protokolle Y, Bern, May 5,1738; FB I, 9.

52

Peter Schwab interrogation of Feb. 22, 1738; Staatsarchiv Basel-Stadt, Auswanderung A;

Albert B. Faust, "Documents in Swiss Archives relating to Emigration to American Colonies in

the Eighteenth Century," American Historical Review XXII (1917), 98-132. Schwab item on

pp. 127-8. For the distribution pattern of the printed Göttschi letter see FB II, 113. The

original letter by Esther Werndlin Göttschi is in the Zurich Zentral-Bibliothek, Handschriften Abt.,

Sig. Ms H 16. A copy of the printed version in Staatsarchiv Basel-Stadt, The German text in

Leo Schelbert and Hedwig Rappolt, Alles ist ganz anders hier (Olten, 1977), 117-8.

53

Rathsprotokolle, Basel Sept. 8, 1738. ImThurn and Harder, "Chronik der Stadt Schaff-

hausen, 5. Buch, quoted in FB I, 12 and on p. 336 in Ernst Steinemann, "Die Schaffhauserische

Auswanderung und ihre Ursachen," Zeitschrift für Schweizerische Geschichte XIV (1934), 310-59.

54

Andreas Blocher, Die Eigenart der Zürcher Auswanderung nach America 1734-1744

(Zurich,

1976), especially pp. 31-4,117-8,122 and 141.

55

GAR, Not. Acts # 2332/205, Jacob Bremer Oct. 20, 1738. Rotterdamse Courant, Nov. 6,

1738; SH I, 251-5. New-York Weekly Journal, April 21, May 15, 1739.

[54]

56

FB I, 51, 64, 76, 91; Blocher, Eigenart, 38-9.

57

Virginia Gazette, March 9,1738/9.

58

Geistliche Fama, XXV, 71.

59

Col. Rec. of Georgia XXIX, 579. GAR, Not. Acts # 2332/150, Jacob Bremer, July 18, 17

George F. Jones (ed), Henry Newman's Salzburger Letterbook (Athens, GA, 1966), 491-2.

60

George F. Jones et al. (eds & transls.), Detailed Reports on the Salzburger Emigrants Who

Settled in America, 7 vols. (Athens, GA, 1968ft) V, 248-9.

61

Jones, Detailed Reports, V, 261; VI, 329-34.

62

Pennsylvania Gazette, Feb. 1 & 8, 1738/9 (# 529 & 530).

63

GAR, Not. Acts, C. A. Cantier, Aug. 4, 1739; English translation in Wust, "William Byrd

II," 6-9.

64

Virginia Gazette, Jan. 12,1738/9.

65

Wust, "Wm. Byrd II," 7.

66

Virginia Gazette, Jan. 19,1738/9.

67

For Joseph Braun and his family see Wust, "Wm. Byrd II," 12-4,18-19.

68

Virginia, Gazette, Jan. 19, 1738/9.

69

Byrd to Bartram, March 23, 1739 in Marion Tinling (ed), The Correspondence of the

Three William Byrds of Westover, Virginia 1684-1776 (Charlottesville, 1977) II, 531.

70

Pennsylvania Gazette, Feb. 8,1738/9 (# 530).

71

Boston Weekly News-Letter, Jan. 25,1738/9 (# 1818).

72

Sworn statement of Andrew Brooks to Simon Ray, Head Warden of Block Island, Public

Notary Records IV (1721-1741), 392-4. Archives Division, Office of Secretary of State, Providence,

RI.

73

Boston Weekly News-Letter, Jan. 17, 1738/9 (# 1817); Boston Gazette, Jan. 15, 1738/9

(#991).

74

The rescue efforts are described on p. 37 of Howard M. Chapin, "The Discovery of the

Real Palatine Ship," Rhode Island Historical Society Collections XVI (1923), No. 2, 33-38.

75

Chapin, "The Discovery," 36-7.   The shipwreck at Block Island gave rise to tales and

legends which found their most eloquent and widespread expression in John Greenleaf Whittier's

poem "The Palatine."   The story of mysterious lights appearing year after year at the spot

where the Princess Augusta was wrecked became the subject of much discussion.   The earlier

accounts are summarized in Samuel Green Arnold, History of the State of Rhode Island and

Providence Plantation (New York, 1860) II, 68, 88-91 and Albert Matthews, "The Traditions of

the Palatine Light and of the Shipwreck of a Palatine Vessel at Block Island," Publication

Colonial Society of Massachusetts VIII (Boston, 1906), 217-24.   A brief note by Andrew Mac-

Farland Davis, "The Palatines of Block Island," PMHB XI (1887), 243-4 set off a search for

factual records.   See PMHB XI   (1887), 248; 506-7, XIX   (1895), 274.   While A. B. Faust,

The German Element in the United States (Boston, 1909) I, 80, mistook the legend to refer to

the wreck of the Palatine ship Herbert which sank in 1710 off Long Island, Howard M. Chapin

(see note # 74) presented the actual story based on contemporary press accounts.   The most

comprehensive and best researched account of the facts, and of the sources of the fiction, is found

in the chapter "The Palatine Affair" of Edward Rowe Snow, Strange Tales from Nova Scotia to

Cape Hatteras (New York, 1949) 212-20.

76

Boston Weekly News-Letter, Jan. 25, 1738/9 (# 1818) .

77

Boston Gazette, March 19 & 26,1738/9.

78

Publications, Col. Society of Mass. I (Boston, 1893), 114.

79

Jones, Detailed Reports VII, 277.

80

Original in Schwaigern City Archives. Printed in English translation by author in Henckel

Genealogical Bulletin V (1974), 175.

81

SH I, 201-12; Adeline Pepper, The Glass Gaffers of New Jersey (New York, 1971), 15-21.

Caspar Wistar (1696-1752), who rose from buttonmaker and small shopkeeper to become the

first successful glass manufacturer in North America, was much concerned about fellow German

immigrants. His letter cautioning those planning to come to Pennsylvania written in November

[55]

1782, was first published in Leipzig in May 1733 and subsequently in other parts of Germany

and in Switzerland. In it he encouraged "such as have a good trade, say potters, nailsmiths and

the like" to come, provided they had some means to travel with. See "Casper Wistar's Letter

of December 4, 1732," Perkiomen Region II (1900), 119-20. The letter, actually dated November

8, 1732, appeared in the May 22, 1733 issue of the Leipziger Post-Zeitungen, Stadtarchiv Leipzig,

GDR.

82

"Emigration clandestine . . .," Doc. Serie E 4367, July 4, 1738, Arch. du Bas-Rhin, Strasbourg;

The Journals of Henry Melchior Muhlenberg, ed. by Theodore G. Tappert and John W. Dobertson

(Philadelphia, 1948) III, 89-90.

83

Quoted in George F. Jones, The Salzburger Saga: Religious Exiles and Other Germans along

the Savannah (Athens, GA, 1984), 44.

84

Jones, Detailed Reports VII, 380, 412, 418; Col. Rec. of Gergia, Sup. to IV, 271.

85

Philadelphia Adm. Book D (estate # 122), Nov. 18,1738.

86

Heinrich Gerber—Hendricks Kerewer: Adm. Book D:43 (estate # 113), Nov. 11,1738.

87

Adm. Bk. D:53 (estate # 104), Nov. 28,1738.

88

Adm. Bk. D:48 (estate # 114), Nov. 21, 1738. Additional entry April 14, 1742; FB I, 21;

II, 57. For John Rudolph Ochs (1673-1749) and his involvement in virtually every Swiss emigra-

tion project between 1703 and 1740, see Wust, "William Byrd II," 16.

89

Send=Schreiben, 27.

90

Pennsylvania Gazette, April 26,1739.

91

Pennsylvania Gazette, Oct. 5 & 19, 1738; New-York Weekly Journal, Dec. 25, 1738; April 21

and May 15,1739.

92

GAR, Not. Acts # 2330/105, Jacob Bremer, June 22,1736.

93

"Minutes of the Provincial Council," Col. Rec. of Pa. IV, 516.

94

Col. Ree. of Pa. IV, 507.

95

Col. Rec. of Pa. IV 511. Pennsylvania Archives, 4th Ser. (Papers of the Governors, 1681-

1747) I, 675.

96

Send=Schreiben, 27.

[56]