University of Richmond UR Scholarship Repository Religious Studies Faculty Publications Religious Studies 2018 Shakers and Jerkers: Letters from the "Long Walk," 1805, Part 2 Douglas L. Winiarski University of Richmond,
[email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarship.richmond.edu/religiousstudies-faculty- publications Part of the Cultural History Commons, and the History of Religion Commons Recommended Citation Winiarski, Douglas L. "Shakers and Jerkers: Letters from the 'Long Walk,' 1805, Part 2." Journal of East Tennessee History 90 (2018): 84-105. This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Religious Studies at UR Scholarship Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in Religious Studies Faculty Publications by an authorized administrator of UR Scholarship Repository. For more information, please contact
[email protected]. Shakers and Jerkers: Letters from the “Long Walk,” 1805, Part 2 By Douglas L. Winiarski* a Throughout the bitterly cold month of January 1805, John Meacham (1770-1854), Issachar Bates (1758-1837), and Benjamin Youngs (1774- 1855), struggled through mud and ice, biting winds, blinding snow, and drenching rains, on a 1,200-mile “Long Walk” to the settlements of the trans-Appalachian West. Traveling south toward Cumberland Gap, the three Shaker missionaries from New Lebanon, New York, were tracking a strange new convulsive religious phenomenon that had gripped Scots- Irish Presbyterians during the frontier religious awakening known as the Great Revival (1799-1805). Observers called the puzzling somatic fits “the Jerks.” Ardent supporters of the revivals believed the jerks were a sign of the presence of God’s indwelling Holy Spirit; others derided them as a nervous disorder or evidence of demonic possession.