The Settlement of Germantown, Pennsylvania, and the Beginning of German Emigration to North America

UNIVERSITY^ PENNSYLVANIA UBRARIES ^^AniMMpr OF?{|r JOmv/' W. icmAUjpaxJiily Settlement of (3ermantown anD tbe !l6eoinnino of (3crnian lEmiaration to Bortb Hmerica BY HON. SAMUEL WHITAKER PENNYPACKER, LL.D. President Judge of the Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas, No. 2, and senior Vice-President of the Historical Society op Pennsylvania. WILLIAM J. CAMPBELL, THILADELPHIA. 1899. p THREE HUNDRED COPIES PRINTED FROM TYPE. COPYRIGHT BY SAMUEL W. PENNYPACKER 1899 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED PRESS OF The new Eba Printing Company LANCASTER, Pa PREFACE. S it seemed to be a duty which could not be avoided, I have w^ritten the fol- lowing history of the settlement of one of the most interesting of the Amer- ican burghs. A descendant of Hen- drick Pannebecker, Abraham Op den Graeff , Paul Kuster, Cornelius Tyson, Peter Conrad, Hendrick Sellen, Hans Peter Umstat and probably of William Rittenhouse, all of them among the early residents of Germantown, for thirty years I have been gradually gathering the original materials from over the world. The task was one of great difficulty, presenting ob- stacles not encountered elsewhere and requiring the examination of almost inaccessible books and papers in the Dutch, German, French and Latin, as well as the English languages. An article written by me in 1880, since copied en masse as to facts, language and notes, in Cassel's History of the Mennonites, and used by other authors, has here been reconstructed. The careful and thorough investigations of the late Dr. Oswald Seidensticker, the work of Julius F. Sachse upon the German Pietists, the papers of the late Horatio Gates Jones and the article of H. P. G. Quack, of Amsterdam, upon Plockhoy's Sociale Plannen have been used freely. I am indebted likewise to Mr. Sachse for the production of the illustrations. Note—Initial from Plockhoy's Kort en Klaer Ontwerp. iii LIST OF ORIGINAL ILLUSTRATIONS. 1 Portrait of the Author Frontispiece. 2 Coat-of-Arms of the Pennypacker family Preface. *' 3 Letter from Plockhoy's Kort en Klaer Ontwerp .... 4 Coat-of-Arms of German Society i 5 Arms of Crefeld i 6 Autograph of William Penn 3 7 Menno Simons 8 8 Caspar Schwenckfeld 13 9 Autograph of Thomas Story 14 ID Arms of the Netherlands 20 11 Arms of Frankfort 21 12 Johanna Eleanora von Merlau . 22 13 Arms and Autograph of Jacob Van de Wall 22 14 Arms and Autograph of Daniel Behagel '22 15 Seal and Autograph of Dr. Johann Wilhelm Petersen . 24 16 Dr. Johann Wilhelm Petersen 24 17 Title page of the Hertzens-Gesprach 25 18 Title page of the OfTenbahrung Jesu Christi .... 26 19 Arms and Autograph of Johannes Kemler 27 * ' 20 Arms and Autograph of Thomas von Wylich . 28 21 Seal and Autograph of Johann Jacob Schiitz 29 22 Arms and Autograph of Balthasar Jawert 32 23 Agreement of the Frankfort Land Company 32 24 Arms and Autograph of Gerhard von Mastricht .... 34 25 Arms and Autograph of Johan Le Brun / 36 26 Letter of Attorney from the Frankfort Land Company to Johannes Kelpius 39 27 Autograph of John Henry Sprogell 44 28 Arms of London 50 29 Page from the Bee Hive of Pastorius 50 30 Arms of Pastorius 51 31 Autograph of Francis Daniel Pastorius 52 32 Title page of the Disputatio Inauguralis of Pastorius . 55 33 Title page of the Beschreibung der Pennsylvaniae, 1700. 65 34 Page from the Beschreibung 67 35 Title page of the Beschreibung, 1704 68 36 Title page of the Vier Kleine Tractatlein 69 vi Illustrations. 37 Title page of the Beschreibung des Windsheim .... 70 38 Title page of Ein Send Brieff 71 39 Title page of Four Boasting Disputers 72 40 Seal of Pastorius 74 41 Letter of Pastorius 80 42 Arms of William Penn 81 43 Arms of the Jacquet family 89 44 Title page of Missive van Cornelis Bom 103 45 Seal of William Penn iic 46 Arms of the Palatinate iii 47 Shoes of the Palatines 112 48 Title page of Croese's Quaker Historic 113 49 Title page of Croese's Historia Quakeriana 115 50 Title page of Croese's History of the Quakers . 117 51 Autograph of Peter Shoemaker 118 52 Autograph of Hendrick Pannebecker 122 53 Flomborn 122 54 Seal of Germantown 123 55 Letter of Pieter Hendricks 127 56 Comet of 1680 126 57 Bible of Hans Peter Umstat 128 58 Copper plate of Dirck Kej'ser 130 59 Tobias Govertz Van den Wyngaert 132 60 Title page of works of Meuno Simons 132 61 Title page of Some Letters from Pennsylvania .... 135 62 Imprint of Reynier Jansen 136 63 Autograph of Benjamin Furly 137 64 Imprint of Reynier Jansen 138 65 Tombstone of Cornelius Tyson . 140 66 Erasmus by Albert Durer 142 67 Arms of the Holy Roman Empire 143 68 Arms of Amsterdam 144 69 Autograph of Hermann op den GraeflF 1 50 70 Rittenhouse Paper Mill 162 71 Arms of Miihlheim 162 72 Title Page of Frame's Description of Pennsylvania . 163 73 Water Mark of Rittenhouse paper . 166 74 Mennonite Meeting House . 16S 75 Title page of The Christian Confession 1712 171 76 Title page of The Christian Confession 1727 .... 172 77 Title page of Appendix to the Confession of Faith of the Mennonites 173 78 Autograph of Hendrick Sellen 174 Illustrations. vii 79 Mennonite Meeting House 175 80 Vignette from Plockhoy's Kort en Klaer Ontwerp . 177 81 Letter written by Matthias Van Bebber 182 82 Title Page of the Kort en Klaer Ontwerp 196 83 Page from the Kort en Klaer Ontwerp . 209 84 Kelpius' Arms .... 212 85 Book plate of Benjamin Furly 214 86 Cave of Kelpius 222 87 Autograph of Johannes Kelpius 223 88 Diploma of Christopher Witt 224 89 Title page of Hymns of Kelpius 225 90 Portrait of Kelpius 226 91 Page from Journal of Kelpius 229 92 Autograph of Daniel Falckner - 230 93 Title page of Sprogell's Tractatlein 232 94 Autograph of Justus Falckner . 233 95 Penn Arms .... 234 96 Title page of Falckner's Curieuse Nachricht 242 97 Title page of the Continuation of the Beschreibung der Pennsylvanise 243 98 Germantown Colonial Doorway 253 99 Arms of Rotterdam 254 100 Title page of Book of Laws 254 10 r Autograph of Matthias Van Bebber 255 102 Title of Laws and Ordinances 266 103 John of Leyden 10 104 Map of Germantown, 168S 278 105 Page from Book of Laws 280 106 Mill on Cresheim Creek 288 107 Seal of Philadelphia 293 THE SETTLEMENT OF GERMANTOWN, PA., AND THE BEGINNING OF GERMAN EMI- GRATION TO NORTH AMERICA. CHAPTER I. Crefeld and the Mennonites. 'HE settlement of German- town in 1683, was the initial step in the great movement of people from the regions bordering on the historic and beautiful Rhine, ex- tending from its source in the mountains of Switzerland to its mouth in the lowlands of Holland, which has done so much to give Pennsylvania her rapid growth as a colony, her almost unexampled prosperity, and her foremost rank country. The in the development of the institutions of the of emigration, first impulse, followed by the first wave came from Crefeld, a city of the lower Rhine within a few miles of the borders of Holland. This city has in re- 2 The Settlement of Germantoivn. cent years grown greatly in wealth and population, through the evolution of extensive manufactories of silk and other woven goods from the weaving industries established there centuries ago by the Mennonites. On the loth of March, 1682, William Penn conveyed to Jacob Telner, of Crefeld, doing business as a merchant in Amsterdam, Jan Streypers, a merchant of Kaldkirchen, a village in the vicinity, still nearer to Holland, and Dirck Sipman, of Crefeld, each five thousand acres of land to be laid out in Pennsylvania. As the deeds were executed upon that day,^ the design must have been in contempla- 1 Mr. Lawrence Lewis has suggested that under the system of double dating between January ist and March 25th, which then prevailed, it is probable that the date was March 10, 1682-83. The evidence pro and con is strong and conflicting. The facts in favor of 1682-3 ^^^^ mainly : 1. It is manifest from an examination of the patents that the cus- tom was, whenever a single date, as 1682, was mentioned within those limits, the latter date, 1682-83, was meant. 2. A deed to Telner, dated June 2, 1683 (Ex. Rec, S, p. 655), recites " as follows : Whereas, the said William Penn by indentures of lease and release, bearing date the ninth and tenth days of the month called March for the consideration therein mentioned, etc." The presumption is that the March referred to is the one immediately preceding. 3. The lease and release to Telner March 9th and loth, 1682, and sev- eral deeds of June, 16S3, are all recited to have been in the 35th year of the reign of Charles II. It is evident that March 10, 16S1-82, and June, 1683, could not both have been within the same year. This would be enough to decide the matter if the facts in favor of 1681-82 were not equally conclusive. They are : 1. It is probable, a priori, and from the German names of the wit- nesses that the deeds to the Crefelders, except that to Telner, were dated and delivered by Benj. Furly, Penn's agent at Rotterdam, for the sale of lands. In both Holland and Germany the present system of dating had been in use for over a century. " 2. A patent (Ex. Rec, Vol.

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