Quaker Studies Volume 9 | Issue 1 Article 4 2005 In Search of a new Jerusalem: A Preliminary Investigation into the Causes and Impact of Welsh Quaker Emigration to Pennsylvania, c.1660 - 1750 Richard C. Allen University of Newcastle and University of Northumbria, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: http://digitalcommons.georgefox.edu/quakerstudies Part of the Christian Denominations and Sects Commons, and the History of Christianity Commons Recommended Citation Allen, Richard C. (2005) "In Search of a new Jerusalem: A Preliminary Investigation into the Causes and Impact of Welsh Quaker Emigration to Pennsylvania, c.1660 - 1750," Quaker Studies: Vol. 9: Iss. 1, Article 4. Available at: http://digitalcommons.georgefox.edu/quakerstudies/vol9/iss1/4 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by Digital Commons @ George Fox University. It has been accepted for inclusion in Quaker Studies by an authorized administrator of Digital Commons @ George Fox University. For more information, please contact [email protected]. 30 QUAKER ST UDIES QUAKER STUDIES 911 (2004) [31-53] ISSN 1363-0 13X 47 Gargill, A Vlilrning, p. 4. 48 For the Portuguese mission see Cadbury, H. J., 'Friends at the Inquisition at Malta ',Journa/ o( the Friends' Historical Society !JFHS), 53:3 (1974), pp. 219-225 (p. 224). See also Hull,W. I., The Rise ofQuakerism in Amsterdam 165 5-65, Philadelphia: Patterson and White, 1938, pp. 272-78. 49 LSF,SM MSS, IV 28,William Caton to Margaret Fell, spring 1657, and cited in Hull, The Rise, pp. 276-77. 50 Blackborrow, S., A Visit to the Sp irit in Prison, London: Thomas Simmonds, 1658, p. 5. Blackborrow's text is in Garman, M., et a/, Hidden ill Plain Sight: Quaker women's writings 1650- 1700,Wallingford, Pennsylvania: Penclle Hill, 1996, pp. 47-57 (p. 49). IN SEARCH OF A NEW jERUSALEM: 51 Peters, M. K., 'Quaker Pamphleteering and the Development of the Quaker Movement 1652- A PRELIMINARY INVESTIGATION INTO THE CAUSES AND IMPACT OF 1656', unpublished University of Cambridge Ph.D. thesis, 1996, p. 209. 52 Nuttall, 'EQL',p. 65. WELSH QUAKER EMIGRATION TO PENNSYLVANIA, c.1660 - 1750 53 Nuttall, 'E QL', p. 65. 54 LSF, SM MSS, transcripts II. 593. Richard Hubberthorne to George Fox , London, 1656, Richard C. Allen 55 See Darnrosch, The Sorrows; Bittle,W. G.,James Nayler 1618-1660,York:William Sessions, repr. 1986; Crawford, P., Wo men and Religion in England 1500-1720, London: Routledge, 1996, pp. University of Newcastle and University of Northumbria, England 160-82; Carroll, K. L., 'Martha Simmonds, a Quaker Enigma',JFHS, 54:2 (1977), pp. 70-84. 56 Simmonds, M., 'W hen the Lord Jesus came', n.pl.: n.pr., n.d., p. 1. This text is part of the Thomason collection, 669. f.l9 (76), dated 25 April 1655. The text is also reprinted in Martha Simmonds, A Lamentationfo r the Lost Sheep, London: Giles Calvert, repr. 1656, pp. 5-6. 57 Simmonds,M., A Lamentation fo r the Lost Sheep, 1655, p. 2. ABSTRACT 58 Phyllis Mack argues this at length in Visionary Wo men. 59 Cited in Farmer, R., Sathan [sic] Enthron'd, London: Edward Thomas, 1657, pp. 10-11. Farmer was a vocal critic of the Quakers, so the text must be carefully assessed. This quotation is appar­ The establishment of the North American Association for the Study of Welsh Culture ently a transcription of the answers that Martha Simmonds gave to Bristol magistrates follow­ and History (NAASW CH) in the mid 1990s has informed the work of historians on ing the accusation that she was a witch. both sides of the Atlantic, and yet the important early history of Welsh emigration to 60 LSF, Caton MS 3/116, pp. 364-68. Richard Hubberthorne to Margaret Fell, 26.6 [August] America and reverse migration has still to be fully addressed. Research on Welsh migra­ 1656. 61 LSF, Caton MS 3/116, pp. 364-68. tory patterns and the impact of America on Wales in the late-eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, notably by Gwyn AlfWilliams, Barry Levy, and Bill Jones, has made an impor­ tant contribution to our understanding of the experiences of Welsh-Americans.' However, further research is needed if we are ever to achieve a full understanding of the AUTHOR DETAILS causes of emigration, and the migratory and settlement patterns of these communities in Pennsylvania and elsewhere in America, notably in New England and at Nantucket for Catie Gill lectures in English at Loughborough University, is an Honorary an example of reverse migration. Since the mid 1950s there has been but a handful of Lecturer at the Univesity of Birmingham and is the Reviews Editor of Quaker research articles written. The significance of early modern Welsh pioneers has received Studies. Her book, !MJmen in the Seventeenth Century Quaker Community: a liter­ some attention in the works of Elwyn Ashton and C. W Holt,2 but a more systematic 1650-1700, ary study <ifpolitical identities, will be published by Ashgate early in investigation of the origins of Welsh emigration and communities from the seventeenth 2005. century onwards has not been attempted. Scholars have hitherto been left to search the pioneering works of the Welsh historian Thomas Mardy Rees,' and British and American Mailing address: 30 Deverdun Avenue, Loughborough, LE2 9TY, England. E­ scholars from the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, notably J. J. Levick, T. A. mail: C.J.Gill @lboro.ac. uk Glenn, and C. S. Browning.' The publication of Marcella Biro Barton's recent survey on Welsh/ American emigration and settlement has provided a scholarly foundation upon which studies that are more extensive can be built.' My early work on Welsh Quakerism, especially my doctorate, addressed some key aspects of their migration. New post­ doctoral research has developed some of these themes, including the experiences of Welsh Friends emigrants to Pennsylvania and the reverse migration of Nantucket Quaker-whalers to Milford Haven in the 1790s.' The purpose of this research paper (and the wider project to which it relates) is to build upon the work already undertaken, and to explore the causes of emigration, the patterns of settlement, and some of the early experiences of these Welsh emigrants. 32 QUAKER STUDIES ALLEN IN SEARCH OF A NEW jERUSALEM 33 KEYWORDS Tintern who initially settled in Barbados before joining his Quaker co­ religionists in Pennsylvania. 11 The first great wave of Welsh immigration into America occurred in 1682 after William Penn was granted a charter to colonise America, emigration, persecution, Pennsylvania, Wales, parts of north-east America. As Paul Wallace has observed, 'hundreds of ruddy­ faced thick set and bright-eyed Welshmen came in hope of planting a new Wales The Rev. Thomas Mardy Rees began his investigation into the decline of under the aegis of William Penn.'1 2 Consequently, between 1682 and 1722 over Quakerism in Wales by noting that, by the end of the 1690s, most of the early 2000 Welsh people had settled in Pennsylvania alone, and 'whole communities Friends had died and that the next generation lacked the tenacity and dynamism braved the horrible Atlantic crossings to create their pioneer settlements in a of the pioneers of the Commonwealth and Restoration years.' In spite of the new world.'13 dogged determination of many early members to uphold their religious beliefs So, what had caused Welsh people to seek a new life in this British colony? and endure harsh treatment at the hands of church and state authorities, the The religious fervour of the civil war years and the millenarian expectations of combination of years of oppression, imprisonment and crippling fines had taken the imminent second coming of Christ were accompanied by a desire to evan­ its toll. The Quaker ministry was handicapped by the incarceration of its spokes­ gelise the 'dark corners of the land' and to establish a godly community. The men and women, from the death of leading Friends, and because of the impov­ propagation of the gospel in Wales in the early 1650s was not as successful as the erishment of Welsh Quaker families who suffered sequestration after refusing to planners hoped, and it had largely failed as an experiment by 1653.1 4 In this year, pay tithes and church rates." millenarian hopes were shattered when Cromwell assumed power, and through­ Although many of these families remained steadfast, it was difficult for Friends to be sure of the continuing loyalty of all their members, while threats out the remainder of the 1650s Cromwellian magistrates and clergymen of harassment, distraint of property and imprisonment continued. It was even hounded religious radicals. It was nevertheless during this latter period that the more difficult to recruit new members while the Clarendon Code remained in Quaker message was first brought to Wales by John ap John, a member of existence, especially when it was rigidly enforced. For many Welsh Quakers Morgan Llwyd's Congregationalists, and assisted by missionary visits of Quaker their persecution was relieved only by emigration to the American colonies, but preachers, particularly Thomas Holme and his wife Elizabeth Leavens-Holme.15 ultimately the decision to leave their Welsh communities was a decisive factor The savage persecution of the Welsh Quaker communities in the 1650s was in the decline of the Society in Wales. As Geraint Jenkins has pointed out: repeated in the years after the restoration of the monarchy in 1660 as Friends were classified as social or religious 'deviants'. For many dissenters their only If persecution effectively thinned out Quaker ranks in Wales, from 1682 hope of salvation was to relocate to the American colonies. It is worth noting onwards their numbers were further depleted when groups of virile, that between 1681 and 1695, 42 per cent of Friends who emigrated from North independent, Welsh-speaking Friends chose to leave the major Quaker Wales had been fined or imprisoned.1' The low cost of transportation to bastions in Wales to establish a holy Christian community, under the America must also be borne in mind.