Fredericka Lentz is one of the women we only knew through her husband and children, as of two weeks ago. Last week, we expanded Fredericka’s life through German church records, and this week…well…you won’t believe what we found. I don’t want to spoil this absolutely incredible, almost unbelievable story, so you’ll just have to follow along. Consider this your “get a cup of tea” warning:)
Not one story remains about Fredericka individually, and were it not for stories about her husband, written by their grandson as a tribute to her husband Jacob, we would have known almost nothing about Fredericka, nor would we have had tidbits to take our research further. I was incredibly grateful that her surname, Mosselman, was provided in that document.
The tribute written about Jacob Lentz, Fredericka’s husband, includes the following sentence about Fredericka, and that was it:
“He married Frederica Mosselman who was born in Wuertemburg, Germany March 8, 1788. She died March 22, 1863.”
Of course, the story of Jacob’s tribute applies to Fredericka too, by proxy. You can read the tribute letter in full here, in Jacob’s first article.
Not Mosselman
As grateful as I was for the tribute letter, recent research by a retired genealogist specializing in German records (thanks Thomas) has revealed that Fredericka’s surname wasn’t Mosselman, Moselman, Musselman or anything similar. In fact, her surname was Ruhle, also spelled Reuhle.
Of course, researchers searched for a Lentz – Mosselman marriage for decades – all to no avail – because it never happened. In the meantime, the marriage of Jacob, also spelled Jakob, and Fredericka, also spelled Fridrica, along with the births of their children had been indexed in the Buetelsbach church records where both of their families lived for centuries. Jacob’s last name there was spelled Lenz. You can read the article about how the brick wall fell here. While it’s an article about Jacob, it certainly applies equally to Fredericka too.
Thomas, who broke through that brick wall, sent this information:
Jacob Lenz, bapt 15 March 1783 in Beutelsbach, Schorndorf, Wuerttemberg, son of Jacob Lenz & Maria Margaretha Grubler. Jacob was a vinedresser.
Fridrica Ruhler, bapt 14 March 1788 in Beutelsbach, d/o Johann Adam Ruhler, vinedresser & Dorothea Katharina ?
Had the following children together without the benefit of marriage:
Jacob Friedrich Lenz, born 28 Nov 1806 in Beutelsbach.
Johannes, born 9 Dec 1811 in Beutelsbach; died 9 May 1814 in Beutelsbach.
Elisabetha Katharina born 28 March 1813 in Beutelsbach.
Maria Barbara, born 22 August 1816.
This information, while not yet complete, certainly was very compelling and got the proverbial ball rolling.
Of course, the surname Reuhle is spelled Ruhle, Ruhler and other variant ways. Spelling was not standardized and neither was penmanship.
Our Fredericka was born and baptized a Lutheran. Below, her baptism record. Her entry is the last one on the second page.
Here’s a closeup.
Can you read that German script? Me either. Thank goodness for people like Thomas who can and do for those of us who cannot.
According to the church records, Fredericka, as her name was spelled in America and how I’m spelling it for consistency, was listed in one church record as Johanna Fredericka, which probably accounts for why the 1850 census in Montgomery County, Ohio lists her first name as Hannah. Obviously the census taker wasn’t German and didn’t understand German naming conventions where the middle name is used as the given name.
We next find Fredericka in the church records in 1806.
A Bit of Scandal
Last week’s 52 Ancestor’s story was part two of Jacob’s story, which it so happens needed to be told before Fredericka’s story.
German church records revealed a great deal – who stood up with the child being baptized, sometimes the birth date along with the baptismal date, sometimes the father’s profession and always if the parents were or were not married.
Jacob and Fredericka were not married when their first child was born on November 28, 1806, and the church dutifully recorded that detail. Jacob, however, claimed the child, named after himself, and he and Fredericka were subsequently married on May 25, 1808.
According to “Understanding Your Ancestors” by Leslie Albrecht Huber in an article which first appeared in the Germanic Genealogy Journal:
Illegitimacy in the 1700 and 1800s took on a much different appearance than illegitimacy today. Although it was common for couples who weren’t married to have children, it was uncommon for these couples not to marry eventually. In essence, many illegitimate children were born into family units, although their families lacked the official blessing of the state church. These couples often lived together and considered themselves families at the time of the child’s birth.
Couples delayed marriages for several reasons. Sometimes, they didn’t have the money to pay the marriage fee. Other times, the church was far away or the pastor wasn’t easily accessible. Some German states, in an effort to control the booming population, placed legal restrictions on marriage, making it more difficult. And sometimes, the couple simply didn’t feel that much concern about whether marriage or children came first. Peasant society had its own marriage customs apart from the customs of the state church. In earlier times, the community had viewed living together, making a commitment to one another, and especially having children as basically equivalent to getting married. Despite valiant efforts by churches, stamping out traditions and convincing people to first perform the ceremony in a church proved difficult.
At that time in Germany, a male had to prove he could support a family before the couple was allowed to marry, so a good many children were born before their parents married. Jacob was a vinedresser in a vineyard, so he clearly wasn’t wealthy. Like most of the other people who lived there, he was a peasant. Their second child, named after Fredericka, came along in1809, a little over a year after their marriage.
A second son, Johannes, arrived in December 1811 and died on March 9, 1814, probably buried in the churchyard in Buetelsbach, shown in the vintage postcard below.
Just 19 days after her son’s death, Fredericka gave birth to Elizabeth Katharina who would die on the way to America and was buried at sea.
Two years later, their last child to be born in Germany, Barbara, arrived in August of 1816 and was reported in the tribute letter to be a baby when Jacob and Fredericka left for America in 1817.
The church records tell us that Jacob and Fredericka obtained permission to immigrate on February 12, 1817. They probably left shortly thereafter, because they had to travel from Beutelbach to a port city where they would board a ship destined for America.
I have to wonder if Fredericka made one last trip to the cemetery, perhaps to say goodbye to her grandparents, siblings who had perished, and her child. It’s very difficult for a mother to leave a child behind, even one who is buried. I’m sure leaving was a mixture of sorrow and anticipation mixed with a touch of fear, dread and excited expectation for what the future held. I wonder if Fredericka had any type of foreboding about the trip.
Jacob and Fredericka probably sold most of whatever they had. Peasants didn’t own land, so their holdings might have been a cow, furniture and some tools. They turned whatever they had into money to pay their passage, probably took one trunk of belongings for the entire family, or maybe two, and set out with in essence what they could carry for the new world sometime in the spring of 1817.
Of course, they couldn’t have anticipated the extreme danger and high seas adventure they would endure for the next 2 years. Their lives turned into an episode of “Survivor” with no “out” for them. Their lives not only took a tragic turn, it also took one that had the potential to change the permanent course of their future, derailing their dreams, and along with them, the lives of everyone in America who descends from them today. They almost didn’t make it to America. One of their children, Elizabeth, didn’t.
However, Jacob and Fredericka didn’t set sail alone.
Fredericka’s Parents
Fredericka’s parents are shown on the Family Search site, along with her siblings, based on church records.
Furthermore, it looks like Fredericka’s grandmother was also a Lenz. According to church records these same families lived in Beutelsbach and the neighboring village, Schnait, for as long as memory served, beyond the reach of church records, and they were inter-related over and over again. The very definition of endogamy.
Fredericka’s siblings were:
Johann Ludwig who was born June 3, 1790 and died in the same village where he was born on April, 17, 1847. He married Sabine Mayerle in 1830 and then Maria Magdalena Vollmer in 1846. They had one male child, Johann Ludwig Ruhle, born in October 22, 1846 and died in Stuttgart on August 13, 1893.
Johanna Dorothea born March 18, 1793, below.
Johann George born April 25, 1794
Catharine Margarethe born March 20, 1797, her birth recorded below, marked with the cross which means that she died as an infant, perhaps not long after her birth. The Beutelsbach heritage site shows her death as October 23, 1797.
Johanna Margarethe born January 20, 1800, her birth recorded in the church records below.
There’s one more piece of information here for us. According to the tribute to Jacob, one of Fredericka’s sisters immigrated with the couple. Johanna Margaretha is the sister who immigrated with Fredericka. The word immigrated, in German of course, auswandern, is written under Johanna Margaretha’s name. She would have been just 17 when they left.
According to church records utilized to create a tree and assemble families at Family Search, Fredericka’s parents were married on June 5, 1787, with Fredericka being the oldest child born the following March.
Beutelsbach has assembled a wonderful heritage book and put the family information online. This is a very rare and blessed event.
According to this information, Fredericka’s father, Johann Adam Ruhle was born January 30, 1764 in Schnait and left for America. Her mother, Dorothea Katherina Wolfin was born August 10, 1755 in Beutelsbach and left for America as well. At least now we know that Fredericka wasn’t also saying goodbye to her parents in the graveyard on that cold late-winter day in 1817.
Fredericka’s parents were married on June 5, 1787 in Beutelsbach.
The church record, shown below, is somewhat unusual because the date of the event is shown below the records, not above the record.
When I first saw the birth records of Fredericka’s siblings, I wondered why there were only children born from 1788 to 1800, a span of 12 years. I wondered Fredericka’s mother had died young. At that time, I didn’t yet have her mother’s birth record, so I didn’t know her age at marriage. The fact that her mother didn’t marry until she was 32 years old reduced her reproductive years to about 12. Few children doesn’t always mean the wife died young. I do wonder why she waited until age 32 to marry. There must surely be a story there that we’ll never know.
The most surprising piece of information in these records is that Fredericka’s parents also immigrated to America. In addition to Fredericka’s youngest sister, her brother Johann George Ruhle born in 1794 immigrated as well, but her brother Johann Ludwig who was born in 1790 did not. He died in 1847, a “weingartner” in Beutelsbach at age 57 of a brain injury. I wonder how he felt being the only family member left behind?
In Germany, you didn’t just pack your bags and set off for America. You had to apply for permission to leave.
Permission to Leave
This book, “Königlich-Württembergisches Staats- und Regierungsblatt: vom Jahr … 1817,” in English, the “Royal Württemberg State and Official Gazette: by the year… 1817,” copied at Google, has the actual German records of who was authorized to leave.
On page 199, you’ll note in the text (9 lines from the bottom) that Jacob Lenz and Johann Adam Ruhle are listed one after the other. The date of the publication of this group is on the following page, given as March 1718.
I asked Thomas about this list, and he indicated that it wasn’t at all a social listing, but official legal notices of people about to depart so that their debtors, if they had any, were aware they were about to emigrate and could settle up outstanding accounts. Those practical Germans.
I utilized one of the online translators to translate this and it says:
“Young Jakob Lenz under representation of old Jakob Lenz. Johann Adam Ruhle under representation of the shoemaker, Wilhelm Schweizer.”
How the heck did Thomas find this? He Googled in German. In this case, “Jacob Lenz auswandern 1817.” Practical Thomas!
Thanks again to Thomas, we have the published list of who applied and was granted permission to leave in Wurttemberg between 1816 and 1822.
On this list, we find the following Lenz men. The first date is the date of application and the second is the date of approval to leave. Keep in mind that this includes their family, wife and children, even adult children if they are still living at home.
Lenz, Daniel Beutelsbach Schorndorf November 14, 1816 November 18, 1816 Weingaertner
Lenz, Daniel Schnait Schorn Dorf 19 Apr 1817 1 May 1817
Lenz, Gottfried Beutelsbach Schorndorf 29 Mar 1817 April 7, 1817 single
Lenz, Jakob Lenz young Beutelsbach Schorndorf 19 Mar 1817 28 Mar 1817
All of these Lenz men were from either Beutelsbach or Schnait, so they would be family members of some description. Those two towns are about two miles apart.
The Reuhle men were listed as follows:
Ruehl (in), Katharina Plieningen Stuttgart February 24, 1817 2 Mar 1817 to America or to Russia
Ruehle, Johann Adam Beutelsbach Schorndorf 19 Mar 1817 28 Mar 1817
Ruehle, Matthaeus Calw April 10, 1817 April 14, 1817 Nadler to Russia
The only Reuhle from Beutelsbach is Johann Adam, Fredericka’s father.
Their application date and their approval dates for the Lentz and Reuhle families are the same. These people emigrated as a family group. So it wasn’t just Fredericka’s sister who came to America, but her parents and brother as well.
It must have been very difficult for Fredericka and her family to say goodbye to her one sibling left behind. Her brother Johann George was 27 when they left, but he wasn’t married, so there was nothing really to hold him to Beutelsbach. I wonder why he stayed. Maybe he was the one with the foreboding.
The Journey
The tribute to Jacob tells us a somewhat incredulous story of the journey to America. While this story is very unusual, it’s so unusual that there must surely be a grain of truth someplace. No one would just make this up. Here is what the tribute says:
Finally all arrangements were completed and bidding farewell to all their relations he and his family with his wife’s sister began their journey in 1817 (the words “in 1817” are omitted in the second version) to the land of his dreams. Thus they left Wuertemburg, Germany to return no more.
Ships were very different then than what they are now, and as their finances were limited. They did not have the best accommodations that were furnished to the more favored, even in that early day. But they were willing to endure the hardships of an ocean voyage that they might come to the land about which they had heard so much. Strange as it may seem to us now, they were to spend about 3 months on the ocean before landing on American soil (the words “on American soil” are omitted from the second version). But now comes a very strange and trying part of their experience.
They experienced much of the ocean storm and the time seemed long. As the time came that they could reasonably expect to end their journey and set foot on the new world, everyone was making preparation to quit their ocean home.
But many days passed by and no land came in sight. Everyone became restless and there were many misgivings. They sought explanations from the captain of the ship but his explanations were not satisfactory. One part of their diet was a large kettle of soup or hash of which they all partook. Some actions on the part of the captain as he was about where this food was being prepared at a certain time aroused suspicions of those in charge of preparing the food and instead of serving this food it caused the arrest of the captain of the ship.
A sample of the food was preserved and found to contain poison enough to kill many more than were on board this vessel. The captain’s purpose was to poison the crew and turn the ship over to pirates. He was later executed for this.
The ship without a captain wandered around in the northern waters for some time and finally landed (shipwrecked) way up on (the western coast of) Norway where they have six months of day and six months of night; thus were your (my) early ancestors brought to a disappointment in life that they were never able to find words to express. Landing in Norway where conditions were very unfavorable and where but few people live, instead of in America. Their money all gone, strangers in a strange land, unable to speak the language, without (a) home (and) friends or prospects (“or prospects” omitted from second copy), a sad condition.
Fishing and weaving were the only things in sight and this they did, thus managing to get along for a few months. It was not possible for them to save anything out of the meager rewards for their work, but they still kept their steadfast purpose, to finally in some way reach America. (Second copy says “It was not possible for them to kept their steadfast purpose, to finally in someway, reach America.”)
After 6 months of weary waiting in that northern climate, an opportunity came their way. A certain ship was to leave their port for the new world and proposed to enter (so they entered) into a contract, stipulating that they should be bound out to services to anyone that would pay their passage and food expense. The time of service was to be determined by the bidding of interested employers after landing in America. They would be indentured servants. (Previous sentence not in second copy.) It was stipulated that the family was not to be separated.
With this contract they set sail the second time for the land beyond the sea, not knowing what would befall them or how they would be dealt with in the future (rest of sentence not in second copy) that was veiled with clouds that seemed to be very dark. All they knew was to commit their all into the hands of the overruling Providence “That doeth all things well, patiently labor, and wait for the future to unroll whatever was in store for them.”
(The passage was $30 each for mother and father and $15 each for Jacob and Fredericka. Elizabeth died on the ocean and Barberry was a baby.)
They landed in New York on the 1st day of January 1819 (rest of sentence omitted in second copy) some 18 months or more after leaving Germany.
Additionally, another family line said that Jacob and family wound up in Bergen, Norway and that they were in the hospital there for several weeks.
Truthfully, I discounted the hospital part, figuring there were no such things at that time, and I questioned the Bergen information. However, who would just pull the town of Bergen, Norway out of their hat? That too was so specific that it seemed their might be grains of truth there too.
Thomas and I discussed this scenario and both of us agreed, and Thomas set about googling and searching once more.
Start Writing Part 3
A few hours later, I received an e-mail from Thomas, quite late one night, that was titled, “You may have to start writing part 3.” I laughed when I saw that, figuring he was pulling my leg since I had to write two stories about Jacob, but I stopped laughing very quickly when I saw the contents of that e-mail.
Thomas had found confirmation that at least the shipwreck had happened, at the Norwegian archives along with a translated, a list of people who had been on the ship and who had died after arrival in Bergen. Holy chimloda!
“Emigrants from the Zee Plough who died before, during or after arrival in Bergen and was buried from Korskirken.”
Kirskirken translates as “The Church of the Cross,” shown below.
By Thomasg74 – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0 no, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=21771328
The list of burials includes their age and location of birth, in addition to their death date and burial date.
There were 3 individuals from Beutelsbach and 4 from Schneit, spelled Schnejdt.
This strongly suggests that indeed, this was the ship that Jacob’s tribute recants. None of our family members are among the list of those who died while in Bergen, but there is a Ruhl child born after arrival in Bergen who died. However, that doesn’t mean our family members didn’t die on the way, and we know that Elizabeth, Fredericka’s daughter, died at some time during the voyage.
Furthermore, based on this record, we now have the name of the ship, the Zee Plough which is Dutch and translates to Sea Plow.
For me, and I think for Thomas too, this was like throwing gasoline on a fire and resulted in frantic Googling on both his part and mine. E-mails were flying back and forth like a house afire very late into the night, or more accurately stated, into the early morning. At one point, Thomas said, “I feel like I’m in the Twilight Zone” and I knew exactly what he meant. The best description I can give of this experience is “intensely surreal.” I have never experienced anything like this in my 35+ years of genealogy research and neither had Thomas.
The question remained, though, whether this just happened to be ship with German passengers that shipwrecked near Bergen, or whether this was the ship Jacob and Fredericka were on. Were her parents on this ship too? Did they survive? Her siblings?
This scrap of information introduced so many questions.
This is a drawing of the Zee Plough.
Now, googling in both German and Norwegian, Thomas found the Norwedian Wikipedia page about the Zee Plough.
The Sea Plow
The Zee Ploeg was a Dutch emigrant ship which sank off Bergen in the autumn 1817 on its way from Amsterdam to Philadelphia with around 560 emigrants from Württemberg onboard. The passengers were farmers and craftsmen who were members of a religious movement (separatists) inspired by Württembergeren Johann George Rapp (1757-1847). He had established the society “Harmony” in Pennsylvania in 1805.
Even though the Wikipedia page says that the ship sank, it didn’t, but was disabled when its masts broke.
The year 1816 had been difficult, with poor harvests and a very cold winter. At this time over seventeen thousand emigrated from Wurttemberg.
The Zee Plough was 136 feet long, 32 feet wide and almost 16 feet tall, with 3 masts. In September 1815 conducted a trial voyage to Suriname with Jan Poul Manzelmann as captain and they returned on July 4, 1816. On behalf of the Handelshuis Zwichler & Comp, the ship now carrying 560 emigrants to the United States.
The boarding was scheduled for 30 March 1817, but was first carried out a month later. Not until late in August, the captaincy from Amsterdam with Hendrich Christopher Manzelmann from Lübeck as Captain with his 21-man crew. The ship had to return after 11 to 12 days due to the storm in the English Channel , and a minor casualty. At the next attempt the Captain went up North and High North Scotland, but fell again in a storm. This time the masts broke and the ship ended after a time by Skjellanger, northwest of Bergen, on September 25. The ship was towed to the port of Bergen on September 29, and was anchored.
Before the accident 100 passengers died of famine and disease, including all of the thirty who were born aboard. The passengers did not disembark, and while the ship lay at anchor at Sandvik Flaket (a marine channel, shown below) an additional sixteen died.
This channel is truly far north in Norway.
Possibly due to these deaths Lars Monrad (1762-1836) believed that the ship had to be quarantined because of the outbreak.
The ship was towed to Elsesro, just north of Bergen, shown on the map above.
The painting of Elsesro, below, from about 1807, would have been much like Fredericka would have seen.
Fredericka must have been extremely grateful to see terra firma and to know that they weren’t all going to die on that ship, floundering in the sea. It was a long way from Sandvik Flaket to Elsesro.
A few days later, the ship was towed to Bergen and anchored and the survivors were allowed to debark. I’m sure they couldn’t get off that ship quickly enough. Food, any food, was most welcome I’m sure, as was solid ground.
Bishop Claus Pavels (1769-1822) expressed concern about how the penniless town of Bergen should be able to accept these refugees. Many of the sick were eventually lodged in a farm in Kong Oscars gate 22 (St. Jorgen’s Hospital, now the Leprosy Museum, shown below), which was at that time a military hospital.
Ironically, there is mention in the Lentz oral history of the group staying in a hospital in Norway for several weeks. The oral history seems to have been accurate. This hospital is where Fredericka and her family would have lived for some time.
In Bergen an additional 40 passengers died and were buried in peace at the Church of the Cross in Bergen.
By Thomasg74 – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0 no, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=21771343
Fredericka would have seen this tower of the ancient church as she attended those 40 or so burials.
By Thomasg74 – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0 no, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=21771343
Were some of her distant family among those who died? Had her family members been buried at sea? Her daughter? Her parents, brother and sister?
Graveyards in Europe are not treated with the same reverence as they are in the US. Graves are routinely reused in Europe. The graveyard beside the church is now a park, but still referred to as “Grave.”
The interior of the church, where I’m sure Fredericka prayed fervently for deliverance of her family. They couldn’t stay in Bergen, they couldn’t go back, so they had to go on. More danger lay in front of them.
The ship Sea Plow could not be repaired and was sold at auction in December 1817.
In October 1817, the Norwegian government compiled one of two lists of the names of the surviving passengers. This list was published in an article by Dr. W. Weintraud. I’m attempting to obtain a copy of this list, hoping that it will confirm that Jacob and Fredericka were on this ship, and that perhaps her parents survived as well.
Oh, and just as an aside, the Western Reserve Historical Society claims the journal is not in the Ward collection, although I wonder if they looked elsewhere. The Allen County Public library lists this document in their catalog and you can order the film from the Mormon Church, so I haven’t struck out yet!
During this time, while the German families were stranded in Bergen, some Norwegian families of a similar religious persuasion (Rappites) began to consider emigration as well, and were soundly discouraged from that line of thinking. A Norwegian government official said about a visit when they came to speak with him about the possibility: “I advised them against the thought. I recounted the misfortunes the Germany emigrants had been exposed to and explained that the easy and inactive life the emigrants were leading at the moment – it was perhaps this which had misled these peasants – would come to an end as soon as the season allowed us to send them back to their homeland.” The Norwegians did immigrate beginning in the 1820s, despite being soundly discouraged from doing so.
The Germans, however, from Wurttemberg could not go back. That was one of the stipulations of leaving. The Duke of Wurttemberg had officially warned his subjects that the door operated only in one direction. Other parts of Germany did allow a return, but only after posting a bond, something none of these people could do.
They also couldn’t stay in Bergen where they were unable to support themselves and unwelcome, so finding a way to America was their only option. Life must have seemed very bleak at that time for the Jacob and Fredericka, with no good options. I wonder if they second-guessed their decision to leave.
After a few months most of the passengers departed for Philadelphia. Around 80 of them rented sailing ship “Susanne Cathrine” which sailed August 13, 1818.
The rest (273) went on the ship “Prima” of Larvik, owned by H. Falkenberg and Captained by Jacob Woxvold. Prima was hired by the Norwegian government, and arrived after a redirect to Baltimore in January 1819. Around 100 Germans returned to Germany. Some of the passengers filed afterwards lawsuit against Captain Mantzelmann to recover freight and other costs.
Who Was Johann George Rapp?
Have we discovered perhaps the reason behind Jacob and Fredericka’s emigration? Was religion behind this exodus, rather than weather or economic opportunity?
In the article titled, “George Rapp’s Harmonists and the beginnings of Norwegian Migration to America,” Karl Arndt tells us more about George Rapp, his son Frederick and his religious sect called the Harmonists and also known as Rappites. At the time of the sailing, George and Frederick Rapp had established the town of New Harmony, Indiana, land on the frontier of a newly formed state. The Rapps recruited heavily in Wurttemberg, holding out the lure of free land from the government and paid passage for those who would come and settle.
For Germans who spent their entire lives, for generations, tending vines on someone else’s lands, the allure of land was irresistible. In addition, the Rapps ordered a large selection of grape vines and fruit trees. The families who came along knew just how to tend those vines. In one of the letters to Germany, the Rapps stated:
“There are no poor people here who must suffer need or who could not feed themselves. Much less would they have to worry that their sons would be taken away as soldiers, the laws of the land here are exactly the opposite of a monarchy. Everyone has the freedom to express himself freely. Also complete freedom of conscience is introduced in all America so that every person according to the conviction of his own conscience can perform unhindered his Divine service.”
Those are powerful words to families who have just suffered famine in Germany in 1816.
In order to encourage immigration and migration to New Harmony, Indiana, the Harmonites invested in money to pay passage for many Germans, several of whom disappeared after they disembarked here in the US after their passage was paid. The Harmonites continued to try. Initially, about 150 people of the nearly 600 who embarked on the Sea Plow were believed to be Harmonites. About 60 wanted to take them up on their offer of paid passage from Norway after the shipwreck. In the end, about 15 wound up in New Harmony, Indiana. Not a very good investment for the Harmonites. The supreme irony is that the Harmonites eventually said of these Germans that “they are too wild for our community.” Of course, “wild” is very much a matter of perspective.
There was one detrimental factor that many people just couldn’t get past, relative to the Harmonites or Rappites as they were known. As Arndt stated, “George Rapp’s most effective substitute of self-disciplined celibacy lacked the essential mass appeal.” I do wonder, if George was celibate, how was his son Frederick was born. But, I digress.
The Harmonites had trouble recruiting and keeping people. Few want to commit to a life of celibacy. Eventually they were so successful with the recruits that stayed that there was no one left in future generations to perpetuate their cause. Recruiting for a celibate religion is a difficult task indeed.
It’s very doubtful that Jacob Lenz and Fredericka here Harmonites. It’s very clear from looking at the births of their children that they were not celibate. They are also not noted by name, nor are her parents or siblings, in any Harmonite correspondence.
Fortunately, some of the Harmonite letters still exist, and contain valuable information about what happened.
On February 24, 1818 Christian Friedrich Schnable wrote from Bergen stating that the emigrants had already sacrificed their worldly estate and they found themselves in a land where they could not remain. He states:
“On September 5th, we lost all masts, also we were very badly treated by our disloyal captain. He did not give us the food which he was obligated to give us according to contract. This brought about great sickness so that over 200 souls died.”
We know that a total of 353 Germans sailed for America in 1818, and we know that between 560 and 600 people sailed initially in 1817 on the Sea Plow, so the difference would indeed be between 207 and 247 people. Starving yourself and watching others die of starvation intentionally at the hands of the cruel captain must have been a horrific ordeal.
Bergen
After floundering at sea for weeks, starving, being towed to Elsesro and finally to Bergen where the surviving passengers were allowed to disembark, I wouldn’t blame Fredericka if she dropped to her knees, kissed the ground and gave praise. Surely, as she watched fellow passengers die, she knew that she and her family may have been next. Did her daughter die during the voyage? Her parents, brother and sister?
By Gerd A.T. Mueller – User:Gatm – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=318458
These reconstructed buildings on the Bergen waterfront are very similar to what Fredericka would have seen. Norwegian cities cling to the waterfront as the mountains rise behind them, as you can see in the photo of Bergen, below.
By Espt123 – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=9776642
In Norway Jacob and Fredericka worked, fishing and weaving fishing nets, until they could arrange passage again, except the second time, they had no funds and had to agree to become indentured servants upon arrival to pay for their passage.
According to the tribute letter, their daughter, Elizabeth died at sea, although it is unclear whether it was during their first unsuccessful attempt to arrive in America or the second, successful, attempt.
Regardless, that must have been a very, very sad time for Fredericka. I can only imagine the agony of dealing with a child growing ever-increasingly ill, then realizing they were going to die, then watching them die, probably while holding them. The mother, I’m sure, prepared the child’s body for burial, such as it was, at sea.
Bodies buried at sea were typically wrapped in some type of cloth and weighted so they didn’t float. The only thing worse, I think, than watching your child disappear beneath the waves would be to watch it float as the ship sailed away in the distance – or worse yet, floating alongside for days.
Elizabeth would only have been 4 or 5 years old when she died.
Fredericka must have asked herself if the seemingly cursed voyages to America were really worth all of this trouble and heartache. After all, coming to America was Jacob’s dream, not Fredericka’s.
On To America
In the summer of 1818, 80 of the more well-to-do passengers chartered the ship Susannah Catharina and arrived in Philadelphia two months later, on October 23rd.
Arndt tells us that once in port, the Germans were not allowed to go ashore unless they could prove they would not be a public burden. “Since most of them could not show proof, they were sold or had to permit themselves to be sold at public auction.” The Harmonite offer of redemption was only valid of course for those who would follow their ways and join them in New Harmony. Even so, the Harmonites had problems converting “Indiana” money and debts into something a ship captain from Europe docked in Philadelphia would accept as payment to allow the passengers with unpaid passage to depart.
Arndt reports that Rapp had suggested that the passengers with unpaid passage be indentured with a special clause stating that the liberated person should be free again within 6 to 9 months in return for the repayment of the money for their passage. This would buy Rapp time to deal with his monetary conversion issues and not obligate the passengers after their debt was paid. Typical indentures lasted roughly 5-7 years. The Jacob tribute story indicates their indenture was for 3+ years.
Clearly Jacob and Fredericka were not on this ship, as they didn’t have any money and they report their arrival in January of 1819, but Rapp’s suggestion for the October passengers, still on board that ship in mid-November, may well have applied to the next group that arrived in January as well. It’s known that the ship Susanna Catharina was still anchored in the harbor will into the spring of 1819, likely with Germans still aboard who could not pay their passage and who were waiting for Rapp to redeem them.
Furthermore, the information above regarding a reduced period of indenture correlates with another part of the Jacob Lentz tribute story, as follows:
A certain ship was to leave their port for the new world and proposed to enter (so they entered) into a contract, stipulating that they should be bound out to services to anyone that would pay their passage and food expense. The time of service was to be determined by the bidding of interested employers after landing in America. They would be indentured servants. (Previous sentence not in second copy.) It was stipulated that the family was not to be separated.
With this contract they set sail the second time for the land beyond the sea, not knowing what would befall them or how they would be dealt with in the future (rest of sentence not in second copy) that was veiled with clouds that seemed to be very dark. All they knew was to commit their all into the hands of the overruling Providence “That doeth all things well, patiently labor, and wait for the future to unroll whatever was in store for them.”
(The passage was $30 each for mother and father and $15 each for Jacob and Fredericka. Elizabeth died on the ocean and Barbery was a baby.)
They landed in New York on the 1st day of January 1819 (rest of sentence omitted in second copy) some 18 months or more after leaving Germany. Very soon after landing advertisements were sent out giving contract notice, description of the family, amount of money to be paid and setting the date when they would be bound out to the one that would pay the money for the least period of service.
The momentous day soon came. They were placed on a platform before the crowd, the contract read, the amount of money to be paid was stated and the bidding began. Of course anyone had the privilege to talk with them beforehand. The bidding was in time of service. One bidder would offer to pay their fare for 10 years services, another for nine, another for 8, another for 7, and so the bidding continued until finally their service was declared to the successful bidder for 3 years and 6 months. They went with him to his home at Shippensburg, Pennsylvania, wondering, wondering, wondering what it all meant to them.
They worked with a will and did their best to please their employer so he would have no just cause to hold them for service longer than the specified time.
They soon found that their employer and his wife were very good people asking reasonable work and supplying them with a comfortable home and an abundance of food. Contrasting this kindness with what they had to meet in the two preceding years, they were content and the future looked brighter to them, as they were now sure that in a few years of time they would be free to start life over again in this land where they had longed (long hoped) to be.
After they had worked about 8 months their employer invited them into his parlor one morning and kindly explained to them that according to customary wages, they had earned enough to pay their fare across the ocean and that was all he wanted, that he appreciated very much their faithful service. There were at the liberty to do for themselves and to work for who or where they would and their wages would be theirs to do with as they wished.
Freeing them of over two and a half years of service was so unthought-of on their part that they could never thank those people enough for their great kindness. So he often told it to his children and asked them to tell it to their children – that they might know and appreciate this kindness that was shown to them at the time it meant so much.
The Ship Prima
The last ship to leave Norway with the shipwrecked Germans was the Prima. On May 4th, 1819, a few months after the Prima’s arrival earlier that year in January, another Harmonite letter tells of the near catastrophy. These ships carrying Jacob and Fredericka seem jinxed. I can only imagine their horrific fear as they once again were endangered on the sea, seemingly sure to perish.
This letter reports that the group passed through a violent hurricane that threatened to capsize their ship.
We find additional information about this journey in a paper written by Ingrid Semmingsen titled “Haugeans, Rappites and the Immigration of 1825,” published in “Norwegian-American Studies, Volume 29” in 1983. This immigration is referring to the Norwegian immigration to the US.
Semmingsen states that aboard the Zee Plough were:
“About 500 emigrants – all from Wurttemberg, petty farmers and craftsmen who had resolved after the unusually severe winter of 1816 to leave for America. 1816 was the year “when summer never came.” Some of the immigrants, probably about 150, called themselves separatists. They were religious dissenters and political malcontents who stoutly resisted any attempts by the Norwegian authorities to induce them to return to Germany. They maintained they would be subject to persecution there. They were followers of Johann George Rapp, gone to America in 1803.
Some of the Germans had paid all or part of the passage due the Dutch shipping company and they brought legal action against the skipper in an attempt to regain their money. Several of the emigrants still had some funds left, but most of them were poor. A certain percentage were “nonpaying passengers” who had entered into an agreement with the skipper that they would raise the necessary funds on arrival in America by enlisting as indentured servants or laborers.
The whole group of emigrants was in miserable condition after floundering in the North Sea storm for nearly 2 months, during which time a number of them had perished. As a result, there were orphans among them and some 40 of the passenger were so feeble that they were sent to a hospital.
Fortunately the Norwegian doctor who was put in charge of them found nothing contagious. Nevertheless some deaths did occur after arrival in Bergen.
As events would have it, the entire group had to spend the whole winter in Bergen. The sailing season was past and the city authorities in cooperation with the Norwegian government had to take measures to provide them with housing and other necessities. The years 1817-1818 were the worst Norway had to endure after gaining independence in 1814. Crown Prince Carl Johann who would become king in 1818 even gave assistance from his own private funds. Finances were desperate and political unrest was smoldering.
Even under more normal circumstances, it would have been a formidable task for a city with fewer than 15,000 inhabitants to improvise charitable organizations to assume responsibility for 500 practically helpless foreigners, many of them political refugees. In 1817 it must have seemed an event of catastrophic proportions. Not until the summer and fall of 1818 did the immigrants leave Bergen. The first group left in August and docked in Philadelphia in late October and the second on the vessel Prima did not arrive in Baltimore until shortly after New Year’s, 1819.
Semmingsen goes on to say a few pages later that:
The Norwegian government had advanced 1,300 pounds toward their transportation which it hoped would be refunded when the ship reached an American port. The full cost of transportation ran to 2,200 pounds and the difference was arranged for by a naturalized German in Kristiana named Grunning. More is known about this second crossing.
One of the crew of the Prima, presumably one of the officers if not the captain himself, wrote an account of the journey which was published in a Norwegian newspaper in 1826. He reported that there were 2 Catholic families among the passengers and the rest were Lutherans.
The people were described as religiously-minded, virtuous, and, considering their social class, well-bred. All of them had prayer books. Every morning and evening they prayed to God in a solemn and touching manner and sang hymns in clear, pure voices.
Before retiring they entertained themselves with song, dance, music, and games. On occasion they also passed the cup of friendship among themselves.
Skipper Woxland chose the southern route. This was undoubtedly wise considering the lateness of the season when he set sail. He took the Prima south to the coast of Portugal so as to utilize the trade winds, and it paid off “With the never-failing dominance of this wind” they reached the West Indies, but there they ran into trouble. They had to fight a raging storm, the shipowner reported to the government, and they had to dock in Baltimore instead of in Philadelphia, which was their real destination.
But according to the report the ship, crew, and passengers were well received. A committee was appointed by the citizens, which consisted partly of fellow-countrymen of the newcomers. They brought food aboard the ship and also raised money to help defray travel expenses.
Furthermore, arrangements were made to secure employment or land for the emigrants. Everything was managed “in the best of order” to everyone’s satisfaction.
Only the leave-taking with the skipper and the crew was a sad experience for the emigrants. Many of them had learned to speak Norwegian during the long stay in Bergen, and they promised that they would never forget dear Norway or “the kindly disposed citizens of Bergen.”
Not all the passengers were as favorably impressed by their reception in America as this report would imply — at least not four persons who were bound for Harmony and who, a few months later, sent a letter from Philadelphia to “Dearly beloved brothers and sisters in God’s congregation in Bergen.”
To be sure, they praised the skipper and crew who, with God’s help, exerted themselves to the uttermost in order to save ship and passengers when a “terrible storm” almost caused the ship to capsize; but they were dissatisfied with Harmony, which had not “given orders to redeem us.” They also had encountered trouble with getting their passage paid for, and they were forced to seek release from paying the big bill “charged against us for the care we received in Bergen.” Clearly, the emigrants also had to work as indentured servants. “Then we were sold for the passage money: one down south, another up north; only four of us are here together, the others are scattered.”
However, they continue, “America is a good country. Poor people live better here than the wealthy ones in Bergen and Germany. Wages are good. While we are in service, we are given good food and clothing and we have many free periods. We hope that we will soon earn our freedom and then be gathered together as one congregation.”
The Lawsuit
Apparently, there was indeed a lawsuit, although the outcome is questionable. The Jacob Lentz tribute says that the Captain was hung.
According to this information from the Norwegian archives website, and auto-translated, it looks like the Captain may have been in jail and the suit may have been dismissed. However, look who filed the suit.
Carl O Gram Gjesdal mention proceedings against Zee Plogs captain in jail in the new year 1818. The occasion will, according to Gjesdal, have been that two passengers, Jacob Lentz and John Fiedler, had appealed to the authorities and received a licence to ‘ on ustemplet paper for the person in question under the law that let make the cases that they find themselves occasioned that grow toward the bemeldte captain, kapt. Poul Jan Manzelmann ‘. Do you know where this thing is located? It should have been accusations of drunkenness, poor seamanship, embezzlement, brutality, abuse, and murderer tampering attempts. He was also of some of the responsibility for that small children died during the crossing due to malnutrition. It was difficult with the evidence, and DOM’s formulation, according to have been Gjesdal,: ‘ the captain should replace them to citanterne for erholdt forlite provisions after unwilling men’s discretion … B