Ohio History Journal

LUTHERANISM IN PERRY COUNTY, OHIO.

 

BY PROFESSOR C. L. MARTZOLFF,

Ohio University, Athens, Ohio

 

It was only a narrow trail. It followed the moccasined

footprints of the Shawnee brave, as he had journeyed back

and forth on his mission of war or the chase, from the Penn-

sylvania frontier to his home on the plains of the Scioto. It cut

its blazed way through the virgin forest of Ohio from the Fort

of the Quaker, Zane, at Wheeling to where it again crossed the

river at Limestone, into Kentucky. This first public highway

in Ohio had been projected by Ebenezer Zane, the commandant

at Fort Henry, under the authority of the United States gov-

ernment in 1796.

Now that the Indian wars, which for several years had

disturbed the first Ohioans, were happily over, due to the sig-

nal victory of Wayne on the Maumee in 1794, this pioneer

thoroughfare, known in history as Zane's Trace, was soon des-

tined to become the artery through which would pour the stream

of emigration, as it spilled itself over the Alleghenies, to fructify

the virgin Ohio land which lay ready for the axe, the plow, and

the sickle. Along with this procession of home-seeking humanity

as it pushed its way along the blazed path, there came to Perry

County, Ohio, its first settler and its first Lutheran in the per-

son of Christian Binckley.

It was in April, 18O1, that this hardy pioneer came into

what is now Reading township, Perry County, though at that

time it was part of Richland township, Fairfield County. He

was one of the many Marylanders to make his home in this

section, having moved from Frankstown, near that center of

Lutheranism, Hagerstown, Washington County, Maryland.

Born in 1737, he was a middle-aged man at the time of

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376      Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

the American Revolution, and when he emigrated to Perry

County, he was sixty-four years of age and a widower, his

wife having died near Hagerstown a few years previously. With

him he brought his family of six children, most of them grown

and married. There were three sons and three daughters, who

became the ancestors of a most numerous progeny in Perry and

Allen Counties.

In addition to his family, we do not know what other pos-

sessions he brought with him to his new home in the forest.

But we are sure of a few things, and if we should have looked

among the parcels carefully adjusted to the pack-saddles, we

would undoubtedly have found among other articles the Ger-

man Bible, with which was found Luther's House Postil, a copy

of Arndt's True Christianity, bearing the imprint of "Chris-

topher Sauer, Germantown," that printer to the German colonists

of America, and, the Hagerstown Almanac.

The German Lutheran settler regarded these things as

among the essentials for pioneering, and he would no more have

thought of leaving these behind than he would his wife, his gun,

or his axe. The writer has seen in many a Perry County Lu-

theran home these relics, now held as heirlooms in the family.

As for the Hagerstown Almanac, it is still sold in country stores

in northern Perry, and many a housewife would not think of

planting her beans or making soft-soap without first consulting

the Hagerstown oracle.

Of one other thing we may be confident: that the establish-

ment of Lutheranism in Perry County did not await the com-

ing of the preacher. It established itself on the very day that

Christian Binckley took up his abode in the woods of Reading

township.

Our first settler had not long to live without neighbors.

When he landed in Perry County, a family from Northumber-

land County, Pennsylvania, had already started on its emi-

grant journey and but for an accident, it would have joined

Mr. Binckley during the same year. The family referred to

was no other than that of John Peter Overmeyer, born near

Harrisburg, now Dauphin County, Pennsylvania, February 5,

1761. With his wife, Eve Henig, and their ten children, they

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Lutheranism In Perry County, Ohio.               377

 

had started for Ohio. In June of 1801, while crossing the

Ohio River at Wheeling on a ferry boat, the frail vessel cap-

sized, drowning their wheel horses while the rear end of the

wagon, with the bed and contents, floated down the river. The

front horses and the family had fortunately been landed on a

previous trip of the boat. The household goods were swept

away and Peter himself narrowly escaped drowning. He was

obliged to remain in Belmont County with a brother-in-law,

Peter Whitmore, until the spring of 1802, when he, too, began

his journey along the blazed trail of Zane, locating only a short

distance from  its route. Here he was joined by his brother-in-

law and together they purchased the land which is yet, or until

recently has been, in the ownership of the families. Both families

were Lutherans. Especially could Mr. Overmeyer produce evi-

dence of his Lutheran ancestry, for he had in his possession

an heirloom in the form of a "passport" which his father, John

George Overmeyer, had used in coming from Germany to the

United States in 1751.

We can not refrain from reproducing it, as well as a short

extract from the diary of the first American Overmeyer:

"Passport of John George Obermayer.-In Blankenloch, of the

Magistracy of Durlach, lying within the bounds of the highly exalted

dominion, the Nagraviate of Baden, was born, on October 27, 1727, and

baptized on the day following, October 28, John George, legitimate son of

his father, John George Obermayer, citizen and weaver, and of his mother,

Anna.

"Witnesses of his baptism were John George Bane, citizen and

weaver; Henry Bane, citizen of Buechig; also, Susanna, wife of Jacob

Werners, citizen and weaver; also, Anna Mary, wife of John Storken,

citizen of Hagsfeld.  This has been copied from   the 'Register of

Baptisms' and the 'Church Record,' of this parish.

"In testimony of his honest service and praiseworthy conduct while

in our midst, especially of his knowledge and confession of the Evan-

gelical Religion (Lutheran), I cheerfully subscribe with my own hand,

and stamp with official seal.

"JOHN CHRISTIAN EBERSOLD,

"Pastor of Blankenloch and Buechig.

OFFICIAL

SEAL

"Blanklenloch, May 4th, 1751.

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"Inasmuch as the above-mentioned John George Obermayer, native

of Blankenloch, has resolved, by the Grace of God, to leave this province

to go to the New Country, the Colony of Pennsylvania, and has most

respectfully besought and petitioned us, as the representatives of this

Court, for an honorable dismissal and certificate of good character, and

we cannot justly refuse, but, on the other hand, we cheerfully testify,

upon the ground of truth, that he has, in his service in our midst, con-

ducted himself as a Christian, honest, trustworthy, and industrious. We,

therefore, wish Mr. Obermayer not only all temporal, but, also, all eternal

blessings. We, therefore, beseech all respective persons, whether of high

or low estate, with this charge of duty, not only to permit him to pass

free and unmolested wherever he may choose to go, but, also, without

suspicion, kindly to receive and entertain said Obermayer, in whatsoever

place or locality he may announce himself, for which we shall ever be

the indebtors.

"In the name of this Court of Justice, we still remain the humble

servants.

"JUDGE BIERICH,

"Attorney, Kimtzma.

"SCHOOL SUP'T FIEGLER,

"Clerk of the Court.

"Blankenloch, May 12th, 1751."

What follows is from the personal diary of John George

Overmeyer, in his own handwriting:

"On May 9th, 1751, we went for the last time to church in Blanken-

loch. There we sang once more: 'There are none whom God has for-

saken,' 'Bless the Lord, 0, my soul, and all that is within me bless His

holy name,' and 'Lord Jesus Christ to us attend.' It was the fourth

Sunday after Easter, 'Cantate,' when we heard the Gospel lesson for the

day, John xvi: 5-15, which begins: 'But now I go my way to Him that

sent me; and none of you ask me "Whither goest thou?"'

"On May 14, we left Blankenloch, for Rheinhausen. On the 19th,

we sailed from Rheinhausen, toward Mannheim. On the 20th we went

to Worms, where we sang, 'O, Holy Ghost, descend, we pray.' On the

4th of June, at two o'clock, we passed through the Bingerlock, and at

seven o'clock we passed through the bay of St. Gwier, where we en-

countered great danger.

"Our voyage upon the Rhine, from Rheinhausen to Amsterdam,

was of four weeks' duration. On the 20th of June we embarked from

Rotterdam, and from thence to Old England. On the 22d, we sailed in

upon the vast ocean."

Such was the father of the man who came to Perry County

in 1802 and gave the name Reading to the township in which

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Lutheranism In Perry County, Ohio.         379

 

he was to live and to make it a center of Lutheranism for years

to follow.

The Peter Whitmore was of Swiss descent and had been

a soldier of the Revolutionary War.

These three families, Binckley, Overmeyer and Whitmore,

formed the nucleus about which Perry County Lutheranism was

to collect. The families were large and in themselves would

make a respectable sized congregation. Nor would they wait

long until steps were taken to provide themselves with the preach-

ing of the Word. But even a short period would seem long

to these zealous folk who were without their customary church

services. Tradition tells us that the neighbors would gather to-

gether on Sundays when the lessons for the day were read, to-

gether with the appropriate prayers and songs. Nor would we

be trespassing on the truth if we made the statement that these

pious laymen would take turns in reading from a book of sermons

which undoubtedly some of them possessed.

The Spring 1803, the year Ohio became a state, brought to

our Perry Countians their first Lutheran pastor in the person

of Rev. Eierman, (or Euerman), who came from Pennsylvania

and spent several weeks visiting the Lutheran families which

were now rapidly increasing. His coming was certainly long to

be remembered. This forest preacher, riding down the Zane

trail, alone, with his books in his saddle-bags, inquired at the

occasional houses if they knew of any German settlers! Some-

times he overtook the slow-moving emigrant van as it painfully

made its way across the steep hills of eastern Ohio or struggled

with the flood in crossing the stream. Often he found brethren

of his own faith and so he halted with them, shared their frugal

meals or partook of their hospitality at their night encampment.

Here in these "first temples" beneath the mighty trees, with the

wild beasts glaring upon them from their coverts with glassy

eyes, this Man of God, standing by the camp-fire, raised his

hands toward heaven and invoked the blessings of the Most High

upon that people as it took up its new life in this western land.

And in the hush that falls after the benediction, there would

come into the souls of that little company, that peace which

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"passeth all understanding," but which no one knows except he

who has been in close communion with the Father of all.

We know not at whose pioneer hut this preacher was first

entertained, but we can well believe that it must have been in

the humble abode of Father Overmeyer, for his house was quite

near the "trail." We hope we are not deviating too much from

the historian's field if we indulge our imaginations to the extent

of visioning that first visit. How the good home frau busied

herself by putting on a clean cap and kerchief; how the children

were given an extra scrubbing even if it was in the middle of

the week and incidentally reminded of their manners by telling

them that children were to be seen and not heard; how the larder

was drawn upon for little extras in honor of the parson; how

the master put on the same suit which he had worn to church

on Sundays in Northumberland County; and how the older chil-

dren were sent along the winding wood-paths to the neighbors,

some living four or five miles away, to inform them that a min-

ister of their own Faith had come and to invite them to the Over-

meyer home for the evening.

We know well how the hours were spent; there was sing-

ing and prayer and reading from the Word, and much of the

conversation related to the desire of the people that the reverend

visitor remain for a short period in their midst, baptizing the

new-born babes and preaching for them as often as possible.

The following Sunday would be the appointed day.

In the meantime, they would carry the news over on

Jonathan's Creek and to the shores of the Great Swamp and

down the hills of Rush Creek, that a goodly congregation might

be on hand. Then they sang another song and together repeated

"Vater Unser," bade each other "Gute Nacht" and the men tak-

ing the long cat-tails, gathered in the lowlands and soaked in

bear's grease, for torches, took the various paths homeward.

The intervening days must have dragged themselves along

very slowly. But at last Sunday came, and with it along the

forest lanes came the Binckleys, Poormans, Pughs, Parkinsons,

Whitmores, Anspachs, Shriders, Bowmans, Humbergers, Neals,

Zartmans, Emricks, Fishers, Ridenours, Swinehearts, Cooper-

riders, Mechlings, Rousculps, and all the rest of them.

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Lutheranism In Perry County, Ohio.         381

 

It was the first assemblage ever held in Perry County.

Whole families came. The men walking with the older children

while the women with the younger ones rode horse-back. Some-

times if the family were small and the horse large, father, mother

and several children would all mount old Dobbin at once. Some

of the men carried guns and others clubs, for there were wild

beasts a-plenty and they were not too sure about wandering

bands of Indians who might attack them from ambush.

Some of these people had never met before, and we can

imagine the young folk making some interesting acquaintances

as they journeyed through the wood. For Cupid takes the right

of way, even in a religious service; and on that day, one hun-

dred and sixteen years ago, there began that process which re-

sulted in the marrying, cross-marrying, and inter-marrying which

has never ceased from then, and not even now, until everybody's

family-tree in Reading, Hopewell or Thorn townships looks like

everybody's else, until consanguinity has become so inextricably

complicated that a person does not know whether he is himself

or just a relation to himself.

Traditions do not agree as to where this first Lutheran ser-

vice in Ohio was held. Some claim that it was in the barn of

Peter Overmeyer and others that it was in the woods, which

later became the Overmeyer orchard. The latter is the probable

site. Neither does authentic history nor tradition relate to us

the events of that day. We do not know what the lesson for the

Sunday was, the text for the sermon, nor the hymns they sang.

The nearest we can come to it is to quote the words of a

descendant of Peter Overmeyer:

"When the people would be gathered together before divine

service they would hold sweet, fraternal converse, then cry, pat-

ting each other and kissing; they would seat themselves, and

silence supreme would rule; how they all took heartfelt, soul-

stirring part in the service. Singing, praying, hearing the sermon

was soulfully enjoyed. Many of the hearers could give the

abridged contents of the entire service. Like the first congrega-

tion, they were close listeners. Food for their souls, they longed

for and the assimilation of this food, spiritual, developed itself

in their daily walk.

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382      Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

"After the benediction, the farewell greetings were exchanged

by kissing, hugging and crying, 'God be with you and preserve

you,' they then separated until such time as the next sermon

might be given them. Pride, arrogance, self-conceit was not

cherished. Brotherly love held sway. The magnetic needle is no

truer to the pole than were those early Lutherans in Perry

County."

Rev. Eierman remained several weeks among this people

preaching to them and baptizing their children and then went his

way, perhaps to other settlements, as the advance courier of Lu-

theranism in the Ohio Valley.

About the same time a Rev. Schromm made his appearance

in the settlements, remained a short while and, like his contem-

porary, disappeared into the forest world.

Just what authority these itinerant preachers had in distrib-

uting spiritual comforts, the chronicler does not inform us. In

all probability they acted on their own initiative; but the history

of Lutheranism in Perry County remains incomplete without a

generous reference to them and their efforts. The value attached

to such labors is not so much as to what they did, but it shows

the deep longing of the pioneers for the Bread of Life.

Our next step in Perry County Lutheranism was made when

the Rev. Johannes Stauch, that persevering traveling preacher

who ever kept in the van of the western moving immigrant,

reached Perry County some time during the year 1804. His mis-

sion seems to have been, in addition to supplying the wants of

the people, to spy out the land and ascertain what the prospects

were. His report must have been gratifying, for at a meeting

of the Pennsylvania Ministerium in 180₅ it was deemed wise

to select a permanent traveling minister for the district called

New Pennsylvania (now Ohio). That body thereupon selected

the Rev. William Foster as the proper person to take up the

work. He had already earned his title to a preacher of merit

in the Shenandoah Valley, where for more than half a dozen

years he had served various congregations.

At once this missionary made a visit to his new field to

view the prospects. It was on this journey that he organized the

New Reading congregation which became the mother church of

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Lutheranism   In Perry County, Ohio.             383

Perry County Lutheranism. The year following, at a meeting

of the Ministerium, he reported the result of his visit and pre-

pared to return to Ohio to become its first resident pastor, where

he was destined to labor until his death in 1815.

The three Perry County congregations credited to Rev. Fos-

ter are New Reading (1805); Zion, near Thornville, (1806);

and Somerset (1812).

The New Reading congregation did not erect a building at

once. In all probability the Zion people, since their first structure

was built in 1808, had that distinction. It was a two-story log

building 34x36 feet. I quote from Pastor Beck's monograph of

Zion's Church, published in 1911:

"This building had two entrances, one on the southeast side for

the women and the other on the northeast side for the men. The pulpit

was to the northwest. From the ladies' entrance there was an aisle lead-

ing direct to the altar. The younger women occupied the seats to the

right and left of this aisle. At the sides of the pulpit the seats stood

lengthwise. The older women occupied those to the right. The church

officers occupied the first seats on the left, and those in the rear of them

were occupied by the older men. At the men's entrance, immediately

to the left, was the stairway to the gallery. This gallery was on three

sides of the building. It was occupied by the younger men and the

choir. The stove stood nearly in the center, or at the end of the aisle

of the ladies' entrance.

"At first it had no floor nor pews. The worshippers sat on the

sleepers, with their feet on the ground, while a carpenter's work-bench

served as the pulpit."

 

The New Reading church was also a two-story hewed-log

building and must have been very substantially constructed,

since it served the people for many years, in fact until the

present brick edifice was erected.

Our interest naturally centers about the congregation and

church at Somerset. Though only a few miles distant from New

Reading, that society was but little more than a half-dozen years

old when it was found necessary to provide services in the new

hamlet that was destined to be Perry County's first capital, the

scene of the early development of organized Ohio Lutheranism

and the home of one of America's great generals--Phil. H.

Sheridan.

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Before the organization of the congregation, 1812, preach-

ing services had frequently been held in private homes and in

the first school house-a log building-of which Somerset

boasted. The church structure, thirty feet square, constructed

of hewn logs, later weather-boarded, had a gallery on three

sides. The choir occupied one of these galleries; there was a

good organ, made by Henry Humberger, one of the members,

and for a number of years the congregation was noted for its

excellent singing.

This old log edifice was used until 1844, when it was

vacated; but for twenty years longer it stood, growing more

dilapidated with the passing days, a home for owls and bats,

standing alone in the midst of the God's acre, where the pioneers

lay in the encampment of the dead, a monument to the un-

quenchable spirits of brave men and women, who in the stren-

uous struggle of forest life had not forgotten to erect sanctuaries

and dedicate them to the honor and glory of their Creator.

Men in their admiration for the Father of all have erected

massive piles of stone; they have surmounted them with the

huge dome, with Gothic spire, or the minareted roof; they have

reared high ceilings upon which the artist has brushed with

matchless skill the strength of Hebrew Prophet, or the glorified

beauty of the Madonna; while God's sunshine through paneled

glass brings out the beauty of the lilies, and the tender look in

the face of the Good Shepherd who carried the lambs in His

bosom or called the little children to His knees.

But never did men rear massive wall or vaulted roof with

greater consecration than did these horny handed sons of toil

when they felled the forest oak, hewed its rough surface to

smoothness, and put in proper place joist and rafter. No illus-

trious artist adorned the walls with his masterpieces, but in the

souls of these pious folk they visioned and re-lived the scenes

enacted by men who had once walked close to God; within the

rude walls of this temple, they, like the Hebrew of old who

felt the divine Presence in the fragrance of burning incense,

knew, too, God was there the same as did the worshippers when

Aaron lighted the lamps on the altar. And we believe their

prayers were as acceptable at the throne of the Most High as

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Lutheranism In Perry County, Ohio.        385

though they had been carried on the odor of sweet incense from

swinging censer in the hands of cowled priest.

The old church that mothered Ohio Lutheranism can now

hardly be called even a memory. Few who walk the streets

of Somerset recall the ancient building. Its site is marked only

by the presence of its corner stone which resists the ravages

of rains, frosts and snows, emblematic of the Church Universal

and its chief cornerstone, the Christ.

To the Somerset congregation in 1815 came the Rev. An-

drew Henkel, of the famous Henkel family of Lutheran

preachers. The father and five sons should be as highly re-

garded in our denominational history as are "The Fighting

McCooks" in Ohio's military annals.

From the Shenandoah   Valley this remarkable family car-

ried the seeds of Lutheranism throughout the valley of the Ohio

and the mountains of Tennessee. From their publishing house

at New Market were issued countless pages of sound religious

literature. Preachers and writers and missionaries were they,

until the Henkel name became a household word among Lu-

therans throughout the Central West.

It was the good fortune of the writer to be permitted to

edit the translated copy of the Journal of Paul Henkel record-

ing his experiences on that famous journey from his Virginia

home across the Alleghenies to the valley of the Miami in 1806.

Would that the Father of Perry County Lutheranism, the

Rev. Foster, had kept a record of his labors, in his great field

in the Muskingum, the Scioto and the Hocking valleys. But

these men of God were more concerned in gathering together

the children of the church than in recording the events of their

labors.

It was during the ministration of Rev. Henkel, in the Somer-

set parish that, what had been a special conference in the Ohio

Country, a branch of the Pennsylvania Ministerium, resolved

itself into an Independent Synodical body, now known as the

Joint Synod of Ohio.

The events of those four September days in 1818 have been

specifically set down in the recent "History of the Joint Synod

of Ohio" and they need no further comment from this pen.

Vol. XXVIII-25.

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386      Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

But we can not get away from the consecrated fervor of

these Lutheran pastors and their lay delegates, who had traveled

through the hot September woods for many miles, submitting

to discomforts, yet keen and enthusiastic, sustained by that "un-

faltering trust," from which martyrs have been made, firm in

the belief that they were about their Father's business.

Heading the list was the Rev. Stauch from New Lisbon,

Columbiana County. In spite of his long service spent as travel-

ing pastor, he was only fifty-six years of age and he had before

him many days in which to work before he passed away, a verit-

able saint, in his Crawford County home. But what a trivial

journey by horseback was 125 miles to him who had lived in the

saddle, and who by the end of his labors would multiply that

distance 800 times.

He and his companion no doubt followed the old Moravian

trail along which David Zeisberger had once led his Brown

Brethren. On the shore of the Tuscarawas, where the "Tents

of Grace," Gnadenhuetten, had once stood, they could have seen

the mound above the massacred Christian red-men.

At the forks of the Muskingum they passed the site where

the first Protestant Christmas service in Ohio had been cele-

brated. When they reached the falls of that stream, they struck

the Zane Trace, now developed into a respectable highway, and

they knew they were on the direct route to Somerset.

The celebrated Paul Henkel, the Shenandoah traveler, had

made his way across the hills of southeastern Ohio from Point

Pleasant, Va., where a dozen years before he had found a few

Lutheran families. From Germantown, Montgomery County,

rode the finely educated Caspar Dill, graduated from the Lu-

theran University of Giessen, Hessen Darmstadt, but whose

splendid work was soon to end because of its arduous duties.

Weygandt, a protege of Stauch, thought it not too far to journey

from Washington County, Pennsylvania, to meet with his

brethren; not the finished scholar that Dill was, yet a preacher of

power, who knew western people and perhaps could reach them

better than one more highly cultivated.

Jacob Leist had not so far to come. He lived on the Zane

Trace where Tarlton now is. He had been contemporary with

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Lutheranism In Perry County, Ohio.         387

 

Rev. Foster, but for fifty-nine years after the latter had lain in

his grave in the Foster cemetery near Thornville, Father Leist

was to live on, carrying with him an honored name. He was

the last of the Joint Synod founders to go to his reward.

From Jefferson County came John Reinhard, also a protege

of Stauch's, who Rev. Sheatsley says first sent the Macedonian

cry to the Ministerium to come over and help us in Ohio.

Faraway Trumbull County sent Huet. He found time to get

away from his extensive parish of fourteen congregations to join

with the brethren. Then there was the pastor loci, Andrew

Henkel, a young man yet under thirty who six years later would

become the successor of Dill at Germantown. Here he was to

lead a career of forty-four years, an unusual preacher of power,

militant in his attitude, engaging in business, called to public

position, a writer of books and pamphlets and a composer of

poetry of no mean merit, and a splendid engraver, having learned

the art in his father's print shop at New Market.

John Michael Steck, "a faithful and useful laborer in the

vineyard", rode over from Lancaster, while Rev. Schneider jour-

neyed from New Philadelphia. Nor should we omit the young

brother of the two Henkels, Carolus, who had come with his

brother Paul from Point Pleasant. At this organization meet-

ing, he received his license as a catechist. Nine years later he

was to become the successor of his oldest brother in the historic

church at Somerset, where in the labors of a circuit rider he wore

out his young life in his parish of nine congregations.

Somehow the name of Charles Henkel holds a sacred niche

in the hearts of Perry County Lutherans. Whether because of

his untiring labors while battling with disease, his power as a

preacher, his genial personality, or his untimely death, or all of

these elements, we know not.

Perhaps in our own early life we knew and came into con-

tact with people who yet remembered Charles Henkel. We

might designate him as the last of the forest itinerants, whose

field of labor was so extensive, thus coming into contact with

vast numbers. For Rev. Henkel did not confine himself to his

nine congregations. He served the scattered Lutheran families

in southern Perry and northern Hocking Counties, preaching in

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388       Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

barns and houses, baptizing the new born, instructing the youth,

comforting the sick, and burying the dead.

To attest this, there hangs on my mother's bed-room wall

a baptismal certificate with the date 1838 and bearing the name

of Charles Henkel. My mother's family did not live within the

bounds of his parish.

There is an appropriateness in that he should lie near to

the church in which he was first called to proclaim the Gospel

and where he had served so faithfully. The most conspicuous

monument in the old cemetery stands above the graves of this

loved pastor and his young wife, who preceded him in death by

nine years. On the front of the monument made of free stone,

is this inscription:

 

 

In Memory

of

REV. CHARLES HENKEL

Pastor of the Ev. Luth. Church,

and his consort

MARIA A. HENKEL

Erected

by the Ev. Lutheran Congregation in

and about Somerset, Ohio.

 

 

Here sleeps the faithful pastor in the midst of his flock,

faithful in death as he was in life-still their pastor.

When the Synod was organized in 1818, there had been

established in Perry County four congregations: New Reading,

Zion, Somerset, and Lebanon, Junction City. The Lebanon

congregation had been organized the year previous by Rev. An-

drew Henkel. It was a union church with the Reformed Com-

munion, but dissolved that relation in 1840. Two years later

the present structure was erected thus making it the oldest

Lutheran church in the county. St. Paul's and Good Hope in

Hopewell township were added to the list in 1818, by Andrew

Henkel. Thornville came along in 1837, under the ministrations

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Lutheranism In Perry County, Ohio.        389

 

of Charles Henkel. St. John's, Mondaycreek, was organized by

Rev. Frankenberg 1841; St. Paul's Mondaycreek, in the late

fifties by Jacob Weimer, a son of St. Paul's, Glenford, who had

the distinction of being the first student to enter the Columbus

Seminary from Perry County; Trinity, New Lexington, 1867,

by Rev. George Yung; St. Mark's, Saltlick township, faithfully

served for years by Rev. W. A. Weisman; Shawnee, by Rev.

Dietrich. Then there is the Drum church in Reading township.

There have been fourteen well established congregations in

Perry County, beside several sporadic attempts in the mining

towns of Corning, Buckingham and New Straitsville. St. Paul's,

Mondaycreek, St. Mark's and Shawnee are among those which

have been abandoned.

Three of the Perry County churches were jointly con-

structed by the Lutherans and the Reformed. They are Zion's,

in Thorn township; St. Paul's, Glenford; and Lebanon, Junction

City. The cemeteries were also of joint ownership. The con-

stitution usually provided for the joint election of the church

officers, and in the case of Zion church, according to Rev. Beck,

if both pastors appeared at one and the same time to conduct

services, and failed to agree which one was to preach, then one

of the church officers was to cast lots. Our authority fails to

state if this game of hazard was ever resorted to.

From what we are able to learn, these two peoples got along

together reasonably well. The fact that the arrangement in two

of the churches continued until the present century is evidence

to our conclusion. While there were two pastors, it would take

a sharp eye to detect any other visible signs of differences. They

all went to the same church, buried their dead in the same grave-

yard, with Dan Cupid getting in his work and mixing them all

up until you could not tell "neither from t'other." The husband

frequently would belong to the one communion and the wife

to the other; sometimes the children would go with the father

and sometimes with the mother; but they all went to church to-

gether. When I attended services at St. Paul's, Glenford, I

used to wonder in my own mind whether it was "Reformed

Sunday" or "our Sunday."

The only difference I could see was that on one Sunday

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390      Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

certain people sat on the front seats, while the next Sunday,

these same folks "Went away back and sat down." Before I

knew which was which, I would have to await the coming of

the preacher to find out if I were going to hear a Lutheran or

a Reformed sermon. Then when "Jerry" Lautenschlager would

loom up in the doorway, I knew it was not going to be Reformed.

The situation at St. Paul's always reminded me of the story

of the old German who went to market each week with a jar

of applebutter and one of cottage cheese, classically known as

"schmier kase." But he possessed only one spoon, a wooden

one. So he used it in both jars promiscuously, and after he had

served a half dozen customers it made little difference which

you asked for, since you could not tell which one you were get-

ting in spite of the label on the jar.

This close union of the two churches would lead one to

naturally think that in the course of time there would develop

a gradual amalgamation, but in spite of the relationship that

existed between the communions, the doctrinal differences could

not be bridged, and at the end each side adhered as tenaciously

to its belief as did their respective champions nearly four cen-

turies ago at the Marburg colloquy.

In point of time, perhaps the St. John's congregation in

Mondaycreek township might be omitted in the consideration

of early Lutheranism in Perry County. For more than a third

of a century had gone since Peter Overmeyer first came to the

woods of Reading township before St. John's was organized.

But there is one feature about its beginnings distinct from all

others in this region, and for that reason it deserves especial

mention. Besides, it is the home congregation of your speaker

and therefore he may be pardoned if he attributes more impor-

tance to its history than would an unbiased outsider.

The pioneer congregations of central and northern Perry

had for their membership the Pennsylvania brand of American

Germans.   (Note that I do not use the hyphen.)  This Pala-

tinate German who came to the land of Penn to escape the per-

secutions at home, attracted by the rich soils of Maryland and

the beautiful Shenandoah, soon pushed his way into the Pied-

mont belts of Virginia and the Carolinas. The opening of the

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Lutheranism In Perry County, Ohio.        391

new century found the lure of the upper Muskingum, the upper

Hocking, the upper Scioto, and the Miamis calling him to enter

and possess this land. It was a part of this movement that

brought the influx into northern Perry.

But the St. John's neighborhood was settled by people

directly from across the water. From France, politically; from

Germany, ethnically. In a word they were Alsatians. People

from that ill-fated region of the upper Rhine that have been

the shuttle-cock between Teuton and Frank for centuries. They

were all admirers of the Great Napoleon. The best soldiers he

had came from Alsace. His famous old guard, headed by Mar-

shal Ney, the noblest of them all, were Alsatians. They had

enjoyed with him the victories of Jena and Austerlitz; they

had been humiliated in the defeat of Leipzig and had stood

valiantly by him at Waterloo.

The reactionary forces gaining control of France as well

as the rest of Europe caused the Alsatians to begin an exodus

to America. Thousands came to the state of Ohio between 1825

and 1840.

The St. John's Alsatians arrived after 1830. My grand-

parents came in 1834. The families constituting this settlement

were the Wolfes, the Martzolffs, Kochenspargers, Naders,

Buchmans, Wohllebes, now Anglicised into Goodlive, and others.

These, however, were not the first Lutherans in the town-

ship. The story is extant that the first settler, a Mr. Terrell, a

Virginian, discovering his hogs had gone astray, trailed them

through the wild-pea vines, until he reached an open clearing

containing a settler's cabin. This was his first knowledge of

having a neighbor, though they had lived for several months only

about two miles distant from one another. The newcomer was

one Charles Manning and family which had come from Dover,

Delaware. The family was of English origin and belonged to the

Anglican church. Feeling the need of a church home, fellow-

ship was sought with the congregation at Somerset under An-

drew Henkel, who afterward frequently visited the home of

Manning and preached there for the neighbors.

This Charles Manning was the father of the Rev. James

Manning, who for sixty-three years was a faithful pastor of

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392      Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

the Ohio Synod, and was the first Perry County boy to enter

the Lutheran ministry, having been ordained in 1825.

Until the coming of the Alsatians, the Lutherans in Mon-

daycreek were few and far between. Most of the settlers were

Virginians and hence were Baptists or Methodists. A Lutheran

church had been organized just across the line in Hocking

County. Some of the people attended here. The rest were

divided between Lebanon and Somerset, the latter being fifteen

miles away.

In a word, the Alsatian settlement which in later years be-

came known by the less euphonious title of Dutch Ridge, might

be said never to have been without religious services.

The pastors of the nearby charges frequently visited the

neighborhood, preaching in the barns and houses. There was

Rev. Bartholomew from Muskingum County who baptized my

father; Charles Henkel from Somerset, and at times young

James Manning returned to his boyhood home and taught the

people. In passing, it might be interesting to say that of this

Alsatian company, but one remains that was baptized in the old

land. She is my father's sister, Mrs. Magdalene Cotterman, of

Logan, Ohio, now in her ninety-second year. She belonged to

the first confirmation class in the newly established St. John's.

It was in 1841, under the ministration of Rev. Frankenburg,

that St. John's was organized. In its three quarters of a cen-

tury's history it has been a strong congregation. It reached

its zenith, however, so far as members are concerned, during

the pastorates of Revs. W. A. Weisman and W. E. Harsh, who

served it for thirty-one fruitful years. This period marks the

era when the second generation was in the full flush of man-

hood and before the third generation had grown up and scat-

tered.

As an earnest of the sincerity of these people, perhaps no

congregation in more recent years gathered its people from a

wider range of territory than St. John's. In my own time I

recall some members driving six and seven miles to services

in the, now, antiquated express wagon drawn by the horses

which had pulled the plow during the week. The future of St.

John's is not bright. The fathers have passed on and the sons

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Lutheranism In Perry County, Ohio.         393

have scattered, and the big Sunday crowds that used to assemble

beneath the oaks are known no longer. Yet I am sure that

scores of her sons and daughters who may have traveled far

from these early scenes have not wandered a great way from

the spiritual paths laid off for them in the pulpit of old St.

John's, and they, like myself, love to revisit these scenes in fact

or in memory, for

 

"The. hills are dearest,

Where our childhood's feet

Have climbed the earliest;

And the streams most sweet

Ever are those at which

Our young lips drank,

Stooped to the waters o'er the mossy brink."

Perry County Lutheranism has of course its anecdotal side,

which in itself would perhaps make another paper of equal

length to this one. Only one happening in Hopewell need be

mentioned. It is related how one Sunday, when Rev. Andrew

Henkel was in the act of pronouncing the benediction to his

congregation which had assembled at the home of Lewis Cooper-

rider for worship, he was interrupted by Jacob Strawn, after-

wards renowned as the Illinois cattle king, that he had trapped

a large wolf and perhaps the congregation would enjoy seeing

it. The pastor gladly made the announcement, but tradition does

not inform us if the reverend gentleman went with his congre-

gation to see his wolfship dispatched by the dogs of the neigh-

borhood. The dog belonging to Jacob Mechling won the red

ribbon as a wolf catcher, and no doubt enjoyed the distinction

quite as well as his master took pride in his prowess; in com-

parison, all the other neighborhood dogs were only mongrel

"curs of low degree."

It is impossible within the compass of a paper, even one

as lengthy as this has proven to be, to set down all the interest-

ing things, historical and traditional, which belong to Perry

County Lutheranism. My notebooks tell me that I have only

touched on the subject. My purpose has been to stress the

loyalty to their church, the deep, sincere desire to have the means

of grace within their midst, the sacrifices and consecrations which

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394      Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.

these God-fearing men and women underwent to satisfy their

needs; and, to emphasize the unfaltering labors, the faithfulness,

the unselfishness of that hardy band of pioneer forest preachers,

who gave of themselves without stint to the upbuilding of Christ's

Kingdom. Of such stuff are heroes made.

It was the Boston Dr. Holmes, philosopher and humorist,

who facetiously remarked, "That no doubt God could have

made a better fruit than the peach, but it was quite evident, in

his opinion, that He never had."

By analogy, I would say that God never made better folks

than the Perry County Lutherans. They or their ancestors had

fled from the land of Luther, where religious freedom had first

lit its torch, but where medieval tradition had later all but ex-

tinguished it; they knew what repression and oppression were.

They came to America and they knew what freedom was.

Here in the woods of Perry County, they built their humble

cottages; they cut down the forests; they drove the wild beasts

from their lairs; they built their churches and schoolhouses. In

the century and more during which they have lived here, they

have transformed the wild land into as fruitful a region as the

sun shines upon. And whether they lived in the rude pioneer

hut or in the more pretentious dwellings later erected, or in

the commodious homes which now frequently grace the home

acres, there has ever dwelt a whole-souled, generous-hearted,

open-handed yeomanry. If I were to characterize Perry County

Lutherans, in addition to their faithfulness to their church, I

would have to say it is hospitality. The latch-string hung with-

out the door in that elder day; figuratively speaking it is still

hanging there and very low. In that time they shared as gener-

ously with the wayfarer their bear's meat and hominy as they

do today their strawberry shortcake, their honey or smoked

ham. If I were hungry and had no money, I would go to

northern Perry County, for I know I would get more square

meals, for nothing, there than anywhere else on this mundane

sphere. As the poet expresses it, surely they have builded

their "houses by the side of the road" where they can be "a

friend to man."

This land of ours never had and does not have now more

• 20
 

Lutheranism In Perry County, Ohio.        395 loyal, patriotic citizens than these same folk. In the Civil War the boys marched away to defend the Union, and in the recent struggle, which made it hard for many of German descent, Perry County Lutheranism stood four-square and so far as I have been able to learn, not a shadow of suspicion ever attached to one of them. It was unfortunate that when our Quadri-Lutheran Cen- tenary came and when the one hundreth mile post of Ohio Lutheranism had been reached, our land should have been in an awful strife, especially with that people among whom Lu- theranism had its origin. Those events were worthy of more extended and elaborate celebration. In my opinion there would be nothing finer than to make a pilgrimage back to old Somerset; there Ohio Lutheranism, with pageant, with speech and music, could re-inspire itself amid the scenes where the Fathers wrought. That soil holds a sacredness beyond that of any other region in our fair state; there we could take new courage and renew our fealty to those principles, which to us have become such a glorious heritage.

• 21