Ohio History Journal

THE GERMAN PIONEERS.

ADDRESS BY BERNARD PETERS, OF BROOKLYN, N. Y.

 

LADIES AND GENTLEMEN: By the committee who have

had the arrangements for these centennial exercises in

charge, I have been requested to speak on this occasion of

the German pioneers who settled in this county during the

first half of the present century. The Governor of Ohio,

who has just introduced me as a native of this city, must

stand corrected in this particular. I am not a native of

this city, nor of this State, but a native of Germany. I

was brought here by my parents, into this county and city,

at so early an age that, living among the New England

settlers of Marietta from youth to manhood, they made

me over into quite as much of a Yankee as though I had

been born on the soil of Massachusetts.

According to my understanding of the matter, the first

German settlers of Washington County came from the

Rhine Palatinate. They came to the United States in the

summer of 1833, from the vicinity of Durkheim, a little

city of some 6,000 inhabitants, located in the gap of the

Valley of the Isenach, a small stream flowing through the

Hardt Mountains, and distant, due west, from Heidelberg

about twenty miles. This is indeed an interesting region.

Lord Thomas Babington Macaulay, years ago, while stand-

ing on the Geisberg eminence-a spur of the Black Forest

just south of Heidelberg-and from which vantage he

surveyed this beautiful and interesting landscape, pro-

nounced it "the garden of Europe."

The pioneers to whom this address will be chiefly de-

voted were two brothers, sons of John Peters and his wife

Barbara (nee Wagner), who had reared a family of seven

sons, and whose ancestors, from time immemorial, had

lived and died in this section of Germany. The names of

the pioneers were Jacob and Charles Frederick. I ought,

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56    Ohio Archaeological and Historical Quarterly.

perhaps, to explain that Peters is an Anglicised form of

the name. In German it is Peter. In this country, as in

England, the name invariably takes on the letter s. My

father's name was John Philip Peters, and he was the

youngest of the seven brothers. He followed the pioneer

brothers to this country in 1834.

The emigration of the Peters brothers to the United

States was brought about in this wise. In 1832 there arose

in the Palatinate and through the southern section of Ger-

many a somewhat famous commotion among the peasantry,

by which a demand was made of the then ruling authori-

ties for a larger measure of liberty for the people. It was

doubtless a preliminary symptom of the greater commotion

that took place sixteen years later, in 1848, and which led

to an actual and somewhat remarkable outbreak, but which

was crushed with a relentless hand by Emperor William,

recently deceased, who as Crown Prince made himself

famous as a soldier by the energy and skill with which he

made an end of the movement of '48. That insurrection

furnished the inspiring cause for emigration to the United

States to Carl Schurz and General Franz Sigel-the latter

of whom subsequently distinguished himself in our civil

war in the military service of this country, while the former

became famous, somewhat in the war, but more particu-

larly in the civil service of the country-first, in the United

States Senate, afterwards as a Cabinet officer during the

administration of President Hayes.

The revolt of '32, if it can be dignified by that name,

was led by two professors and many of the students of

Heidelberg, and for a short time it is said to have had an

immense popular following. The professors in question

were Wirt and Siebenpfieffer. The denouement took place

some time in the summer of '32, and came to a culmina-

tion at a popular gathering assembled at Homburg auf

der Hohe, since then a noted watering place. At this

gathering Wirt, the more popular and more eloquent of

the two professors, made a speech in favor of popular

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The German Pioneers.               57

 

rights, in which, in scathing and fitting terms of rebuke,

he denounced the tyranny of the government. At the

conclusion of his speech, by a committee either of the

students or of the citizens present, he was presented with

a magnificent sword. This was ominous, and its signifi-

cance could not be mistaken, and, as the result, either at

once or soon thereafter, the offending professors were ap-

prehended and thrown into prison, and the threatened revolt

was thus summarily and promptly nipped in the bud. The

imprisonment was of short duration. The professors were

never brought to trial, as they soon escaped from prison.

The popular impression was that the escape was connived at

by the authorities in order to get rid of two popular prisoners,

and to avoid the onus of their conviction and the sympathy

which their execution would surely have evoked for them and

their cause from one end of Germany to the other. The

Peters brothers, who subsequently became the pioneers of

Washington county, were constituent parts of that great

Homburg Assembly. They fully sympathized with the spirit

of the occasion, and being animated by the desire for larger

liberty, which actuated the German masses at that time, and

which the gathering in question represented, they were over-

whelmed with chagrin and disappointment when the leaders

of this movement were apprehended and imprisoned, and

when the hopes that inspired their countrymen were thus

promptly suppressed. As the quite natural result they, as

did thousands of others of their countrymen, lost hope of

ever seeing a better day for Germany.

Naturally, and as has been the case in every kindred

event in Europe from that day to this, they instinctively

turned their thoughts toward the New World and to the

then recently established Republic of America, where, nearly

a half century before, the people had secured their inde-

pendence and had succeeded in forming and placing on a

firm foundation one of the most beneficent governments

hitherto known in the history of the world. The younger of

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58     Ohio Archeaological and Historical Quarterly.

the Peters pioneers, Charles Frederick, left his native land

in the spring of '33, a year after the gathering at Homburg.

His brother, Jacob, followed a few weeks later. The third

brother, John Philip, followed in the summer of '34. All

the brothers, and the families who accompanied them, took

shipping at Havre de Grace, in France, at that time the

important port of embarkation for all South German emi-

grants. The first brothers, Charles and Jacob, shipped

in vessels that sailed for Baltimore.   From   Baltimore,

Charles Frederick, with his family, made an overland journey

through the Cumberland Valley and on the National Pike

to Wheeling, Va. This national highway, constructed chiefly

through the influence of Henry Clay, was then in its

glory, and was to that age quite as great a boon and

quite as marvelous a wonder as were at a later period

the transcontinental railways that now link the Atlantic

coast to the Golden Gate.     Charles Frederick left his

family for a time at Wheeling, and proceeded down the

Ohio River as far as Cincinnati on a prospecting tour. The

present Queen City of the West was then little more than a

good-sized village.

During the summer of '32 sickness had extensively pre-

vailed throughout the Ohio Valley. Especially was this

true of Cincinnati.  The effects of the ravages of the

cholera of 1832 were everywhere visible, and the inhabit-

ants all more or less betrayed the signs of the work of this

fell destroyer. In fact, the summer of 1833, when this

visit took place, was not yet free from the seeds of the con-

tagion that prevailed the year before.    In addition to

this, the heat of '33 is said to have been almost unen-

durable. Under these cirsumstances the visit to Cincin-

nati was discouraging, and Charles Peters soon returned to

his family at Wheeling, where he found his brother Jacob

and one or two other families who had crossed the ocean

with Jacob, and who had followed Charles to Wheeling.

Among those in this company, my impression is, were

Theobald Seyler and Daniel Zimmer, with their families.

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The German Pioneers.               59

 

The Peters brothers now resolved to start on a new

prospecting tour to find a place for settlement.  They

left their families at Wheeling with the new comers and

started on foot down the Ohio River. They proceeded on the

Virginia side as far as Benwood. There they crossed the

river to what is now Bellaire, and proceeded down on the

Ohio side, continuing, probably a five or six days' journey,

to Marietta. During this journey they found not a single

family, not a single person, if I am correctly informed,

that could speak a word of German. Luckily the elder of

the two brothers, Jacob, had, in early years, spent some

time in England, and had acquired some little knowledge

of the English language, and he was thus able, in a limited

way, to make their wants known.

When they reached Marietta they put up at the John

Brophy hostelry, the famous hotel of the early days of

Marietta. The wife of Brophy was a French woman,

born on the borders of Germany, and therefore spoke

fluently not only the French and English, but the German

as well. Mrs. Brophy was a shrewd and thrifty business

woman of that period, and it was she that persuaded the

brothers to locate in this county. Charles proceeded to

Salem  township, and purchased a farm on Duck Creek,

in the neighborhood of the Lancasters. This some years

later he sold to Jacob Lauer, and removed to Marietta.

He resided here until 1839. He then sold what possessions

he had and removed to West Point, Iowa, where he lived

until he reached the advanced age of 86. His brother

Jacob, went out some six miles to Fearing township and

purchased a farm on the hills about a mile from Duck

Creek, where he resided for some years. He subsequently

sold this place and removed to Watertown township, be-

coming the first German settler in the Deming-Wolcott

settlement.  There he resided until he reached the ad-

vanced age of eighty-eight, when he was gathered to his

fathers. His son, Charles Frederick, now in his seventy-

first year, and who is present in this assembly, still lives

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60    Ohio Archaeological and Historical Quarterly.

 

upon this old homestead. He was sixteen years of age when

his father moved into Washington county, and it is to him I

am chiefly indebted for those facts that are beyond my

personal knowledge.

In June of 1834, Conrad Bohl, of Wachenheim, also in

the Rhine Palatinate, came into this county. For a time

he owned a farm near Bonn, but a few years thereafter

sold his interest and followed Jacob Peters to Watertown,

where, some years later, his brother Nicholas came. These

were the German pioneers in that section of the county.

Still later these were followed to Watertown by Louis

Cutter, the father of Judge F. J. Cutter, now a resident of

Marietta, and by Carl Wagner, an uncle on the mother's

bide of the Cutter family.

John Philip Peters, Conrad Bissanz (Anglicised, at least

in pronunciation, as Bissant), and Bernard Wagner came

in 1834. Bernard Wagner bought a farm seven miles from

here, on Duck Creek. He lived but a few months. Con-

tracting a fever, he died suddenly in the winter of '35.

The widow, left in a helpless condition, with two children,

and no one to care for the farm, had the sympathy of the

vicinage, and some months later married Christian Schim-

mel, a most conscientious and industrious man, who lived

on the farm for a generation or more, in fact, till his death,

leaving the wife a widow for the second time, but this time

with children of advanced years, and in circumstances that

enable her in old age to live in peace and comfort. She

is living in this city with one of her sons, patiently await-

ing her release from earthly bonds and trials. Conrad Bissanz

bought a homestead a mile nearer Marietta in Fearing town-

ship, in the Chapman neighborhood, just beyond Stanleyville,

where he lived and prospered for a full generation. He sub-

sequently sold and removed to Marietta, where he died at an

advanced age.

At an early period Valentine and Jacob Spies, two

brothers, came into this county and settled on adjoining

farms, on the banks of the Muskingum, just below Lowell

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The German Pioneers.              61

For some years the home of one of the Spies brothers was

quite a center for social and festive gatherings of the Ger-

mans then residing in the county. The occasions are

memorable because they were the first festive gatherings

among the Germans in this county of which I have any

recollection. After the Peters brothers had bought their

farms and had their deeds on record they left for Wheeling

to bring their families to their new homes. While absent

on this trip Rev. Theodore Schriener and one or two other

German families came to Marietta. Schriener married a

daughter of 'Squire Joel Tuttle, and organized the first

German church in this county, of which he remained

pastor for nearly a score of years. He was a very affable

man, and made himself exceedingly useful to the early

German settlers. Of the first settlers in Fearing township

the following names have been furnished to me by Mr.

Christian Best: Theobald Seyler, Christian Scherber, John

Schneider, John H. Best, G. C. Best, and Christian New-

schafer. The date of their arrival here is fixed as 1833.

To these I may add the following names: John and

Henry Smith. The first was the founder of the hardware

store of Rodick Brothers. The other was a carriage

builder, who is yet living. There were also Jacob and

Michael Giddle. The first was wharfmaster for the Halls,

Willis and Ely, for years, when steamboating on the Ohio

river meant something. I may also mention Jacob Thies,

the shoemaker; John and Louis Leonhardt; the Cislers,

who have grown to be an important and prosperous family

among you. I might here refer also to the able, eloquent

and eccentric Dr. Ceolena, who was the first pastor of the

First German Church in Marietta, and who, to the work

of preaching, joined the business of practicing medicine,

and who for a year or two made a great sensation and

gained the good will of some of our best citizens, among

them the family of the historian, Dr. S. P. Hildreth, a

man of mark in those days. There were two others who

deserve mention in this connection. These were Oliver

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62   Ohio Archaeological and Historical Quarterly.

Nelson and Henry Hartwig. They spoke the German,

one of them (Nelson) quite fluently, but they were Danes

and not Germans. Hartwig was a blacksmith; Nelson

was a carriage builder. Nelson married the eldest daugh-

ter of Conrad Bohl, of Watertown. The Hartwig family,

after residing here for many years, removed elsewhere.

It is also claimed, on what authority I cannot say, that

one Casper Schmitz and another German, Casper Schaecht-

elein by name, came into this county in 1817. As far as

my knowledge goes they left no descendants, and per-

chance may have made this county only a temporary

home, removing subsequently into some other locality. I

am sure that very early there were Germans in this county

who came from Pennsylvania, but were natives of that

State, speaking the Pennsylvania Dutch, and were not,

therefore, German settlers directly from the Fatherland.

Others, perhaps, deserve to be mentioned in this con-

nection; but as I have resided away from Marietta and

have only paid an occasional visit here for the period of

more than a generation, I think this will have to suffice.

In conclusion, pardon me for saying this, for truth and

justice demand it: The Germans who came here early

were men of thrift. They have shorn your hilltops of

their wild native forests; they have converted your country

into a land of plenty. They have materially helped to

advance among you the march of civilization, and by their

ready assimilation with those who preceded them to this

Northwest Territory from New England they have helped

to build up a State that ranks first among the honored

States of this Union. I think I may safely and properly

add that these Germans as a class have always appreciated

the blessings of this free government, and have in a prac-

tical way demonstrated the fact that they have understood

the importance of having all safe and good government

founded on law and order, on religion and education.

These Germans - these early Germans - knew nothing

of what is now disturbing this and other governments,

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The German Pioneers.            63

under the form of socialism and anarchy. They did not

forget the lessons of duty and obligation that bound them

to employers, and clamor for rights without qualification.

They were indeed grateful to those who gave them a

chance to earn an honest living, and they were ready early

and late to do an honest day's work for an honest day's

pay. The liberty they came to find, and finding which

they were happy and content, was the liberty that is con-

ditioned on law, on order, on good government--in a

word, the liberty that gave them a fair and an equal chance

in the race of life. Thousands of them, under these inspi-

rations, have became men of property, have honored every

calling and every walk in lite, and have made their mark

in Church and State - thus becoming worthy co-workers

with that patriotic and sturdy Christian stock that came

here from New England, and that planted an infant colony

on this spot one hundred years ago this day, and here

illustrated the wisdom of founding the State on the church

and the school-house, and thus giving to their descendants

a true and an abiding Christian civilization.

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