Until well into the 20th century, German dialect was the everyday language of most everyone in New Hanover and the surrounding townships. The New Hanover region was settled in the early 18th century (which is the 1700s) by Germanic immigrants from areas around the upper watershed of the Rhine River. Thousands risked everything, even their lives in perilous sea voyages, to find refuge in Penn’s “Holy Experiment.” They were drawn here by the promise of relief from centuries of religious and civil wars and oppressive taxation.
Local Historian Arthur Lawton writes: “The widespread destruction [from endless wars] set in motion the thousands that fled destruction and death across the war-savaged area. The tradesmen and craftsmen made desolate by the standstill in commerce throughout the countryside the farmers and vintners whose animals were commandeered and crops, vines, meadows, fields and woodlots destroyed, all found themselves in an era characterized by the collapse of established social and economic structures.” But there was a way out.
On March 23, 1709, a bill was signed in Great Britain under Queen Anne that provided for the naturalization of emigrants provided that they took the oath of allegiance to the British crown. The intent was not to settle them on the British Isles, but to encourage them on to the vast “emptiness” of New York and Pennsylvania.
There were a variety of printed sources widely circulated throughout the Rhineland which encouraged emigration. One of the most popular was a question and answer booklet written by Daniel Falckner entitled Curieuse Nachricht from Pennsylvania (True Report from Pennsylvania). The book was published in 1702 and widely distributed in parts of Germany. It consisted of 103 questions and answers about life in the new world with answers by Daniel Falckner himself as an eyewitness to what the immigrant should expect on the journey and upon arrival. It was a how-to book on packing and traveling to the port of Philadelphia.
Of course, Daniel Falckner, the namesake of New Hanover – Falckners Schwamm – (Falckner’s Meadows), was the Germantown agent charged with the development of the Frankfort Tract (now Pottstown, the Pottsgroves, New Hanover and Upper Hanover Townships). So the immigrant might, in the end, have found his rosy descriptions and breezy answers little more than salesman’s talk.
In any case, all immigrants to the British colonies were required to pass through British customs (and pay required tariffs). London, Cowes, Liverpool and sometimes Deal are most frequently mentioned as the ports of embarkation.
At that time, British ships did not come straight across the Atlantic since they would have battled prevailing headwinds the whole way. Lawton writes: “The Atlantic crossing was determined by the pattern of air-flow over the Atlantic Ocean. The trade winds, the Gulf stream and the west to east flow of air across the North Atlantic determined shipping patterns.”
Upon leaving England, ships sailed southwards toward the equator. Having left the British Isles behind, a stop was made at the Azores or Madeira (islands off the west coast of Africa) particularly to refill water barrels. They then drifted with the prevailing east to west winds just above the equator until reaching the Gulf Stream. One early traveler observed, “A certain sign of the gulf stream is an alteration in the color of the water. At certain points, one hundred and twenty miles out (from the N. American coast) in deep water, it changes successively from a deep blue shade to a most tender light green. The indications are strengthened by the appearance of many birds not seen up to now.” The ship’s master could then drift northward with the Gulf Stream until he reached the latitude of his desired port.
The trip was always dangerous, occurring as it did during hurricane season, but, ironically, as time passed toward the middle of the 18th century it became much more dangerous. The transport ships often became death traps as unscrupulous German agents of the shipping companies coaxed penniless Germans to trust their futures to ship’s masters who promised to transport them free of charge, the expenses to be paid by someone in Philadelphia to whom they were then indentured in servitude for five, six or seven years.
This was when the shippers packed three or four hundred onto ships with inadequate food and water. It is widely written that in any year thousands of corpses were thrown from the ships into the sea, while the survivors were greeted with what amounted to a slave auction.
In response to these abuses, the first Pennsylvania German Society was founded in Philadelphia about 1755 to lobby, successfully, for laws regulating conditions aboard ships transporting passengers and desiring to dock in Philadelphia.
In any case, by the time of the Revolutionary War at least 65,000 Germans had entered Pennsylvania through the Port of Philadelphia.
The Historian is produced by the New Hanover Township Historical Society. Contact Robert Wood at 610-326-4165 with questions or comments.
