Volume two of the Hebron Register includes lists of communicants, confirmations, minutes of meetings and some financial records. Confirmation was the process whereby young persons who had been baptized as infants were educated and trained in the meaning of the church and in their duties. The culmination of this process was the confirmation ceremony at church. The names of the individuals, and sometimes their age, were recorded at this ceremony.
In 1782 these were some of the ages:
For the boys, 19, 16, 16, 18, 18, 21, 17, 22.
For the girls, 17, 17, 17, 16, 16, 17, 16, 17.
On the average, the girls were younger. Since confirmation involved training and classes, there may have a problem in the men finding the time. It was probably desirable to be confirmed and a member of the church before marriage, so this may have influenced the timing of confirmation. On rare occasions, marriage seems to have preceded confirmation but it was probably the result of an unusual situation.
Lists of communicants are the names of people who partook of communion. Others may have been present in church, but only confirmed members partook of the communion and are in the lists. At the time, the church was a rectangular structure with the pulpit in the middle of one of the longer walls. On the floor below or around the pulpit, the married couples sat. At the ends of the room there were two balconies. One of these appears to have been used for women and the other for men. A person whose marriage partner had died, or was there without their spouse, sat with the singles of the same sex.
Individuals filed from their pews to the front to take the communion. There is every appearance that this was done in a very orderly fashion by having the people in the front pew come up first, then the people in the second row, and so. Thus, the list of communicants is the approximate order of seating in the church. Not very surprisingly, people most likely sat with their relatives, especially in the front pews. Toward the rear, attachments become weaker. Very often there is the appearance that a family agreed to come on a particular Sunday. Thus there may be a Sunday with a high representation of Carpenters, usually all sitting close together. Another Sunday, there may not be any members of a family. Of course, there was always the problem that a man and his wife usually represented two different families and being in two places at the same time was not easy.
Let's look at the communicants on the first Sunday after Easter in 1778. The first couple is Adam Wayland and Mary. Adam had married Elizabeth Blankenbaker who died, whereupon he married Mary Finks. Next Christopher Blankenbaker and Christina (Finks). Thus, the first two couples have Blankenbaker and Finks ties. The third couple was Adam Fisher and his wife Elizabeth (Garr). Adam's mother was Anna Barbara Blankenbaker, and Adam Wayland was the uncle by marriage of Adam Fisher. The fourth couple was Michael Blankenbaker and his wife Elisabetha (Garr). The fifth couple was John Fleshman and Elizabeth (Blankenbaker). John and Elizabeth were also related as they shared a common ancestor in Anna Barbara Schöne.
Sorting through and identifying the people in the communicant list is fun. The process raises good questions, though the answers may not always be obvious. What one can accomplish is a confirmation of family relationships. One gains confidence in the genealogies to see people doing what one would expect.
We gratefully acknowledge the work of John Blankenbaker who published over 2,500 Germanna History Notes via the Germanna-L@rootsweb.com email list from 1997 to 2008. We are equally thankful to George Durman (Sgt. George) for hosting the list and republishing the notes via rootsweb.com.