Journey to America Notes

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Foreword	Chapter 1	Chapter 2	Chapter 3
Chapter 4	Chapter 5	Chapter 6	Chapter 7
Chapter 8	Notes	Biography	Downloads

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Notes for Journey to America:

¹ The original of the conversation which follows is:

Schroder: Alter! aus welchem Kanigreich pischt tu tenn?
Ich: Aus dem Herzogthum Braunschweig.
Sch: Was pischt to tenn to kewese?
I.: Schullehrer.
Sch.: )auf meine Frau zeigend) Ischt tos tein Mensch?
Sch: Ob tos alt Weibel, tos tu pei tir hoscht, tein ischt?
I.: Ja, es ist meine Frau.
Sch.: Hockt euch.

^2 Justus Henry Christian Hellmuth (1745-1825) was pastor of St. Michael's and Zion Lutheran congregation in Philadelphia, 1779-1820. He was a native of Helmstedt, Germany, educated at Halle University, and emigrated in 1769. The only other parish he served was Holy Trinity Church, Lancaster, 1766-1779. He received the doctor of divinity degree from the University of Pennsylvania in 1785. He was the most prominent Lutheran clergyman in America for many years.

³ Muller was schoolmaster at St. Michael's and Zion Church.

^4 Johann Gottfried Schmauck, schoolmaster at St. Michael's and Zion Church from 1819 to 1842, was a native Württemberg. His Deutsche Harmonie, a music book containing anthems, first appeared in 1833 and was quite popular in German congregations. His Sammlung religioser deutscher Gesaenge, a tunebook, appeared in 1824. He died in 1849.

⁵ Carl Rudolph Demme (1795-1863), studied at the University of Göttingen and fought in the Battle of Waterloo, before his immigration to America in 1819. After a few years at congregations in and around Hummelstown, Dauphin County, he became pastor at St. Michael's and Zion, from which position he retired in 1859. Throughout this time he ministered exclusively in the German language.

^6 Gudehus here includes the body of the text of the hymns sung on the occasion of Pastor Demme's inaugural sermon:

⁷ John Christopher Baker (Becker) was born in Philadelphia in 1792 and died there in 1859. He was ordained by the Pennsylvania Ministerium in 1820 and served St. Michael's Church in Germantown from 1812-1828.

^8 Jacob Miller (1788-1850), was a native of Montgomery County, ordained in 1816, had studies under several pastors in eastern Pennsylvania. He was pastor of Falkner Swamp and nearby congregations until 1829 when he went to Reading and adjacent congregations. He received an honorary D.D. from the University of Pennsylvania in 1838.

^9 Conrad Miller (1798-1852), Jacob's brother (note 8), studied under his brother. He was pastor of various congregations in eastern Berks County until he succeeded his brother at Falkner Swamp where he served until his death. His son George Frederick Miller entered the ministry.

^10 Lebrecht Frederick Hermann (1761-1848), was the Reformed pastor at Falkner Swamp, 1800-1833. He studied at Halle, emigrated in 1786, and served a variety of congregations in the course of his ministry. Five of his sons entered the clergy.

^11 Jacob William Dechant (1784-1832), a Reformed pastor at Oley, immigrated in 1805. He studied with Christian Lewis Becker, was ordained in 1808, and, except for four years he was in Ohio, he served congregations in Bucks, Lehigh and Montgomery Counties until his death.

¹² Antiken's identity is uncertain. He was never admitted to the German Reformed ministry in Pennsylvania.

^13 The Reformed Congregations (Salem United Church of Christ near Spangsville) was established as early as 1736, although its land was deeded for a church already in 1734. Although the Lutherans worshipped in the Reformed Church, it was not actually a union church. The Lutherans organized formally in 1821. The congregation is now Christ Lutheran Church near Spangsville. The two stand side by side.

¹⁴ Heinrich Auge and wife Maria Sophia arrived on the Three Sisters, 5 January 1808. Among their sons were J. Valentin, who is said to have taught at Belleman's Church and at Moselem, and Heinrich.

^15 The organ mentioned here is still in existence and in use at the Moselem Church. It was built in 1770 and is now the oldest existing organ made by the famous builder Tannenberg. It was rebuilt in 1894 and restored in 1974. See William H. Armstrong, Organs for America (Philadelphia, 1967), p. 91.

^16 The word in German is Zwischenspiel, which denoted the practice of playing a variation of the measure preceeding between each line of a hymn.

¹⁷ Gudehus first writes Chrischt-Monat, which is the way the Pennsylvania German farmers would say it. He then explains in parentheses that is is Christmonat, or December.

¹⁸Christian Deininger (d. 1830) became schoolmaster and organist of Trinity Lutheran Church in Reading in 1820. He was succeeded by sons E. Jonathan Deininger, 1830-1834, and J. Constantine, 1834-1861.

¹⁹Gudehus here refers to the town of Wrightsville in York County across the Susquehanna from Columbia. Apparently he tried to make out the name of the place from what he heard a native tell him in English.

²⁰New Holland, eight miles from the point at which Gudehus read the road marker, is a community in York County, not to be confused with one of similar name in Lancaster County.

²¹Little York, is a designation for York, Pennsylvania, contrived to distinguish it from New York, no doubt.

²²Gudehus refers here to Abbottstown, Adams County. He must have misunderstood the name from a native who gave him information in English.

²³John Herbst, pastor of St. James Lutheran Church in Gettysburg, became a candidate for the ministry in 1812 and served congregations in York County. He was ordained in 1820 and served at Gettysburg between 1819 and 1830, when he was deposed for all practical purposes from the ministry. He drowned July 4, 1834, in Ohio on board a steamboat on his way home from Cincinnati.

²⁴John William Runkel (1749-1832) immigrated in 1764 and became a schoolmaster, presently entering the German Reformed ministry. He was ordained in 1778. He served in many places, finally the Gettysburg charge from 1812 to 1822. He died in Gettysburg.

²⁵Henry Wasmus (c. 1772-1854), barber in Gettysburg, is mentioned in an enumeration of taxables in 1814 and again in 1821. He was sheriffed in 1825; in October 1827 Charles Wrede advertised in Gettysburg that he opened a barber's shop "in a room lately occupied by Henry Wasmus, in Baltimore-street," and that he would also "attend the the Extraction of Teeth, and Bleeding."

²⁶Wasmus's children by his first wife, a daughter who died at age 16 and a son who became a baker in Baltimore. The first wife was Henrietta who died May 12, 1816, aged 45. His son Charles (c. 1797-1880) married Eva Ann Pein, daughter of Frederick Pein, in Baltimore May 21, 1822. Wasmus's second wife Anna Mary died in Gettysburg April 15, 1870, ages 89.

²⁷The town to which Gudefus refers is now Mountville, Lancaster County.

²⁸This seems to be as far as Gudehus ever came in his familiarity with the English language. What he is trying to convey in the German equivalent sound system is: "I am hungry; cold eats." In other words, he would like a cold supper to satisfy his hunger.

²⁹Again using German sound values, Gudehus tries to express the English for "can you not talk English well?" Then he asks the woman for water and bread and she asks him "do you not drink cider?" And he says, "Ah! Cider, cider! Yes. yes!"

³⁰Here Gudehus uses the German Latwerge which consists of cooked plums in Germany. This necessitates his explanation that in Pennsylvania Latwerge consists of cooked apples, or as he explains it, similar to the consistency or apple sauce.

³¹Gudehus refers to the Goschenhoppen Catholic parish, now the Church of the Most Sacred Heart at Bally. This would have been the distance he specifies from where he was teaching.

³² John Knoske (1779-1859) was born at Herrenstadt near Breslau in Silesia, now part of Poland, and died at Reading. He was ordained in 1810. His entire ministerial career was spent in Schuykill and Berks Counties.

³³ This is Gudehus's spelling of Kutztown, which he described as being two hours distant from the Moselem Churh, obviously by foot.

³⁴ The German is "Nun lasst uns den Leib begraben." It is a hymn based in part on a Latin original from about the year 375, rewritten by Michael Weisse in 1531. Martin Luther added a stanza. The melody was published by Georg Rhau at Wittenberg in 1544. The text may be found in the Evangelishe Kirchen-Gesangbuch (EKG), the standard German Protestant hymnal, number 174. The hymn enjoyed widepread use among Pennsylvania Germans into this century.

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Source: Edited by Bryan Wright

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