By the early Eighteenth Ccentury, southwest Germany had become a collage of ethnically diverse states with all three of the officially sanctioned religions (often all three in the same territory). In addition, there were several smaller, radical groups and a significant Jewish population. The diversity of the region in many matters was partially of the result of the in-migration that had been encouraged by the rulers at the end of The Thirty Years' War. This had brought different nationalities and different religions into the same areas.
In addition to the standard religions of Catholic, Lutheran, and Reformed, new sects developed. Even William Penn, on his recruiting trips to sell land, had urged the formation of German Quaker groups. Alexander Mack (sometimes called Mauck) formed a group that at first was the New Baptists, or Dunkers. Many Anabaptists from Switzerland came to Germany and Alsace. Huguenots were coming in from France also.
[As an aside, in May 2000 Eleanor and I visited Wagenbach, the estate farm where George Utz worked. If we had walked off the back of this farm we would have come very quickly to Unterbiegelhof, the estate farm where Hans Herr, a Mennonite, lived and worked; however, we took the roads, which went a bit farther than this, but we did find Unterbiegelhof, where we were graciously received by the current owner. Both of these farms are about twenty miles southeast of Heidelberg. It is very likely that George Utz knew Hans Herr, even though they did not attend the same church.]
Even before so many of the Germans moved to Pennsylvania, they were becoming familiar with diversity. It was not this diversity that was causing trouble and creating a desire to relocate. The Germans were becoming accustomed to differences of thought. Still, there were problem areas as we saw not too long ago when we were discussing Pastor Henkel, who lived not too far from Utz and Herr. We also have the exiles from Austria who chose to leave Austria rather than give up their Lutheran faith. By the Eighteenth Century, though, they had traded their religious problems for economic problems, which led to their desire to emigrate.
The desire to emigrate was not caused by religious problems, but due far more to the question of economics. The recovery from the wars lead to a population growth which the new agricultural technology could not overcome. After the first few Germans went to America, they started writing letters home. The comparison between Pennsylvania and Germany was tempting and, faced with the knowledge that it could be done and how to do it, a larger number of Germans decided they could do it. The hope was more land, lower taxes, and more freedom.
(29 May 03)
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.