John Blankenbaker's Germanna History Notes

Note 1578

(continued from Note Nr. 1577)
The book that I used for the last two notes was " Hopeful Journeys " by Aaron Spencer Fogleman, published by the University of Pennsylvania Press in a soft cover in 1996.  Even with 250 pages of packed information in it, the price was still modest.  It furnishes a lot of insight about the region that the Second Germanna Colony came from, even though there is not a perfect geographical overlap.  I have been mentioning Gemmingen (the place), and six families left there in 1717.

What we were witnessing in the Kraichgau in the early Eighteenth Century was the awakening of the peasants and villagers (not exclusive groups).  They were realizing that they had rights and could act together to help each another.  In addition, they were learning to use higher authority as a weapon against the local rulers.

The Herrschafts (Lords) could be very arbitrary, and certainly they felt no need to consult the residents about any course of action.  But they were beginning to learn that they had to show some moderation.  In the first decade of the eighteenth century, the Catholic Prince of Nassau-Siegen executed a man, without a trial, because he was thought to have aided the miners and iron workers in protesting the unfair treatment they were receiving from the Prince.  To show the workers who was boss, the head of the executed man was mounted on a pole so all the citizens could see it.  As a result of this extreme action, the prince was relieved of his duties by the Emperor and the principality was ruled by the Bishops of Cologne, though this seemed to do little to help the citizens.

In the last note, we saw that the knights thought they could steal 160 hogs belonging to the villagers.

But the citizens had hardly come to any sort of democratic state.  They were very much under the heel of the Herrschaft.  During the Eighteenth Century, the growing population created a labor surplus.  One felt lucky to have a job and was not about to disturb this source of income.

There was one way in which the citizens could vote and that was to leave their homes.  After some repressions in a village, one could expect to find that in the next few years there would be increased immigration.  Fogelman cites a number of these.  Sometimes the extent of this alarmed the rulers and they enacted laws and taxes whose object was to prevent people from leaving.

Often the pattern of this immigration was that a few people, perhaps only one, would leave and he would write home about his experiences.  This seemed to encourage increased numbers of people to immigrate.  The letters written back to Germany were powerful influences.
(24 Jan 03)