Kugustine Herrman Earl L, W. Heck V to bhe honorable yWda,*Jjl«c^l<l»« ''Wwdaii ^^(Aulu £5; 1356. '^fetoHQl Society r >p 7-/z ^ \AQWpLId a "Metrmai Portrait of Augustine Herrman, drawn by himself and engraved by William Faithorne, 1673. Augustine Werrman BEGINNER of the VIRGINIA TOBACCO TRADE MERCHANT of NEW AMSTERDAM and FIRST LORD of BOHEMIA MANOR in MARYLAND by Ear/ L. W. Heck ENGLEWOOD, OHIO 1941 COPYRIGHT 1941 BY EARL L. W. HECK ENGLEWOOD, OHIO Manufactured in the U. S. A. THE WILLIAM BYRD PRESS, INC. RICHMOND, VIRGINIA PREFACE Few more picturesque or romantic figures have appeared in the early annals of American history than Augustine Herrman, first lord of Bohemia Manor. It is not because of his pictur- esqueness or of the romantic glamor of his career that a detailed biography of Herrman is thought advisable. Little more than fifty years ago few had heard of his name. One day in the North Library of the British Museum his map of Virginia and Maryland was discovered. So accurately had it been plotted and so artistically had it been drawn and engraved that soon scholars wanted to know more about the man who had made it. The colonial archives of Maryland and Virginia revealed Herrman to be a man past the middle age of life seated in state at his baronial manor house in the extreme northeast corner of Maryland. But few who had learned even this much about him were aware that he had had a previous career—the career of the first great American merchant and man of business. Not alone as the beginner of the Virginia tobacco trade, but also for his developing trade in general in New Amsterdam and elsewhere is his career worthy of serious study. The name of Peter Stuyvesant is known to every English-speaking school boy the world over; but the doughty old governor's satellite, "lesser but greater" remains relatively unknown to the public at large. Few men did Stuyvesant hate more than Herrman—a hatred that burned to white heat at times with all the consum­ ing energy of the tempestuous Dutchman's fiery nature; but there was none for whom he had more respect and none whom he could better trust in difficult matters: it is proper that we say this in memory of Peter Stuyvesant. For every difficult and delicate situation that required tact and ability, Herrman in- iii iv PREFACE variably was chosen. Herrman was one of the few, if not the only man in New Amsterdam who was able to read the fate of the province by the signs of the times. He saw that Holland in America was doomed and that England sooner or later would gain control of the country of Henrik Hudson. In preparing this record of Augustine Herrman's life, we have endeavored to keep as closely as possible to the actual facts. The colonial documents of Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, New Jersey, New York, Delaware and Rhode Island have been gone over carefully. In fact, there are few of the original colonial records that do not have something to say about Herrman's extraordinary career. He appears to have traveled widely and was likely known all the way from Boston to Charleston, at least by name and reputation. It may not be an exaggeration to call Herrman "the first great American". He was a fitting antagonist to Peter Stuyvesant, "Our great Moscovy duke (who) keeps on as of old—something like a wolf, the longer he lives, the worse he bites." Herrman, on the other hand, was ever cool and collected, with a quiet sense of humor and a philosophic attitude toward life in general. Al­ though deeply religious and highly intellectual, he was neither a bigot nor a pedant. No man of his day could undergo hard- _ ships more submissively; no one could dispense the hospitalities of a great house with greater ease and more charming grace. Then, too, from being merely a biography of an important historical personage, this account may help to impress a little more on the public mind the importance of New Amsterdam in its relation to America and Europe. In 1650, with the pos­ sible exception of Plymouth and Salem, New Amsterdam was the largest village in what is now the United States; in point of commerce it had no equal; not even Jamestown. The story of the conquest of New Netherlands by the British is the story of PREFACE V English policy retold. How amazing the saga sounds now; that within forty-eight hours after Captain Nichols sailed up before Fort Amsterdam one hundred fifty thousand square miles of the richest territory on the Atlantic Coast were added to the British dominions: all without the firing of one fatal shot. In the preparation of the life of Augustine Herrman I am particularly indebted to Mr. Thomas Capek of New York and to former United States Senator Thomas F. Bayard of Dela­ ware. Mr. Capek has been kind to give me suggestions from time to time, and he himself has made an exhaustive search of the ancestry of Herrman in the archives of Prague. I have made constant reference to the results of his researches that were published in Prague in 1930. As one of the descendants of Augustine Herrman through his second daughter, Judith, Senator Bayard has long had an active interest in Herrman's career. For a number of years he has lived on the site of Bohemia Manor and has gathered much material relating to the original manor house as well as other facts relating to the Maryland life of Herrman. These facts Senator Bayard has been kind enough to place at my disposal. He has also read the manuscript and has made many valuable suggestions. Without his constant aid and criticism this life of Augustine Herrman could not be as complete as it is. E.L.W.H. Englewood, Ohio. May, 1941. CONTENTS CHAPTER PAGE I. INTRODUCTION: BIRTH AND ANCESTRY .... 3 II. A NEW AMSTERDAM MERCHANT AND LANDOWNER 9 III. AUGUSTINE HERRMAN AS ONE OF THE "NINE MEN" AND HIS QUARREL WITH PETER STUYVESANT 32 IV. AUGUSTINE HERRMAN: THE DIPLOMAT ... 47 V. PREPARING THE MAP OF VIRGINIA AND MARYLAND 61 VI. THE LORD OF BOHEMIA MANOR 74 VII. AUGUSTINE HERRMAN AND THE LABADISTS . 85 VIII. THE PERSONAL LIFE OF AUGUSTINE HERRMAN 94 IX. HERRMAN'S HEIRS AND THE DESCENDANTS OF THE ORIGINAL FAMILIES OF BOHEMIA MANOR . 102 X. HERRMAN'S PLACE IN AMERICAN HISTORY . 112 BIBLIOGRAPHY 115 INDEX 119 vii ILLUSTRATIONS PORTRAIT OF AUGUSTINE HERRMAN, DRAWN BY HIMSELF AND ENGRAVED BY WiLLIAM FAITHORNE, 167 3 Frontispiece PAGE LETTERS OF DENIZATION OF AUGUSTINE HERRMAN, MARYLAND HISTORICAL SOCIETY 56 THE MAP OF VIRGINIA ASTD MARYLAND. DRAWN BY AUGUSTINE HERRMAN AND ENGRAVED BY WILLIAM FAITHORNE, LONDON, 1673. FROM THE ORIGINAL IN THE BRITISH MUSEUM 67 GRAVESTONE OF AUGUSTINE HERRMAN, BOHEMIA MANOR, CECIL COUNTY, MARYLAND in IX AUGUSTINE HERRMAN Chapter I INTRODUCTION: BIRTH AND ANCESTRY All we know for certain about the ancestry of Augustine Herrman is that he was born in the city of Prague, the beauti­ ful capital of the ancient kingdom of Bohemia, and that his parents were natives of that city.1 H. A. Rattermann,2 without citing the authority for his statement, contends that Herrman's father, "Augustine Ephraim Herrman was a prominent citizen of Prague and a member of the City Council, who kept a store at the Coal Market (a square in Prague) of the Old Town. His mother Beatrix was the daughter of a patrician, Kasper Redel by name, of whom nothing else is known except that he affili­ ated with the rebellious Estates which met in the Collegium Carolinum (Charles University) May 10-20, 1618. The father, too, was an ardent partisan of the so-called Sub-Utraque (Church of the Hussites believing in and practicing com­ munion in both kinds, that is, bread and wine), he having joined in a Memorial Protest to the Emperor, thereby falling under the ruler's Patent (of expulsion)." Mr. Thomas Capek has spent many years investigating from the original Czech sources the question of Herrman's ante­ cedents.3 Quoting Dr. Milos Lier, assistant archivist of the Central Library of the city of Prague who aided him in his researches, Mr. Capek writes, "If Augustin Ephraim Herrman 1 Upon his application for citizenship in America, Herrman gave Prague as his birthplace. 2 Deutsch-Amerikanisches Magazin, Cincinnati, Ohio. Band I. p. 202. 3 Capek, Thomas, Augustine Herrman of Bohemia Manor, a monograph. Praha, 1930, pp. 6-8. 3 4 AUGUSTINE HERRMAN had been a member of the City Council (and of course, a citi­ zen) in either of the three cities of Prague—the Old Town, or the Small Side—we ought to have a record of it here. I exam­ ined carefully the archives and the registers of the three cities in question (and likewise of the Upper town of Hradcany), but, to my regret, I find no trace of Augustine Herrman; nor, for that matter, of Kaspar Redel..." In 1889 Mr. Capek published an article about Augustine Herrman in an Omaha, Neb. weekly. Soon afterwards he re­ ceived a communication from Mseno, Bohemia regarding an entry in the Memorial Book of that town, "A.D. 1621, the Sunday before Christ's birth, on a cold day, our beloved pastor, Abraham Herzman went into exile with his family to the city of Zitava (Zittau, Saxony). His noble minded and pious wife did not live long enough to see this humiliation, having died of grief a month before his departure...