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THE PALATINES
The "Palatines" as they were commonly known are those German speaking people who inhabited many parts of modern day Germany, Switzerland, Austria, and France. Named from the "Pfalz Graf", or Count Palatinate in English, originally a judicial position for the territories along the upper Rhine River region in south western Germany, the "Pfalz" or Palatinate was the seat of the protestant movement during the Reformation, and the territory gained many immigrants and refugees seeking religious expression or fleeing religious persecution from many parts of Germany and Europe.
Below is a series of articles dealing specifically with the Palatine Germans who came to America in 1710. Beginning with an introductory essay written by Eileen Lasher Powers in 1982, in her book "Lasher Lineage"; an extensive and detailed compilation of Lasher genealogy, and the foremost reference work for sources of Lasher genealogy to date. She gives an heartfelt and accurate description of the Palatines, their struggles and accomplishments, and of the Lashers who were among them.
"-- There is a vast amount of information
available on these people who fled Germany. This is not an attempt to write a
formal history, but rather to share some of the background of a historical event
- the migration of the Palatines from Germany and their immigration eventually
into the United States.
Sitting here in an "average" middle-class
American home, it is difficult to imagine what life was like in Germany over two
hundred years ago. My life is an insulated one. There has always been ample
food, adequate clothing and a comfortable home, so it stretches ones imagination
to understand the strength and endurance through the hardships and heartaches of
those Palatine people.
Included in "Ecclesiastical Records of the
State of New York" Vol. 111, are some extracts from a House of Commons
investigator of the "Poor Palatines now living in London" which conveys much
interesting data and from which I have further extracted the following:
"From whence did they come? From Alsace, part
of Lorain and Swabia, part of Archikishopric or Treves and Nanty."
"The Lower Palatinate area has been coveted
by neighboring princes in all ages. The hills are covered with vines which yield
the well known Rehnish wines, plains and valleys abound with corn and fruits.
Forests are stocked with deer and other game. The Rhine passing through the
middle of the country provides fish and improved commerce. Mountains abound with
minerals; agate, jasper and gold."
"They have endured one hundred years of war -
King Gustavus Adolphus burned the city of Spiers in 1633 (have read elsewhere
that the Swedes took hostages back to Sweden as slaves, which may account for
Swedish Lashers today..ed.). Invaded by Imperialists in 1644, by Germany in 1676
and by the Dauphin in 1688. Restored to the German Empire by the Treaty of
Reswish, then destroyed by the French in 1693 who made a desert of 2,000 cities,
towns and villages; destroying their vines with design to make so fatal a waste
that the country might never be peopled or inhabited again. (Doesn't this sound
like Atomic Bomb mentality?..ed). Vast numbers of Palatines perished in the
woods and caves, among the wild beasts, through hunger, cold and
nakedness."
"The poor refugees, in a short interval of
peace, built cottages and cultivated the land, but again, the French invaded,
carried away their cattle and robbed them of the fruits of their labor."
Together with the above difficulties,
intricately woven throughout was the religious turmoil. Roman Catholics sought to wipe out
Protestantism and religious liberty. There was also dissention and rivalry
between the Reformed and Lutheran Churches.
There is also special irony in the fact that
the last devastation promulgated by Louis XIV,
was in
fact, destroying part of his own empire.
To compound problems, in this once
agriculturally prolific countryside, now laid to ruin, came the worst
winter in a hundred years. During the winter of 1708, even the sea froze, so
that carts and horses could travel on the ice. The most dedicated farmer must
have been discouraged and desperate.
At this time, there was a young Lutheran
Minister in the Palatinate. He was Joshua Kocherthal. Appalled at the plight of
the farmers whose crops and lands were so pillaged, he went to England to plead
the cause of the Palatines with the London Board of Trade and with Queen
Anne.
Queen Anne's Consort, Prince George, had died
in 1708. He was of German descent, so perhaps her grief and desire to lend
assistance to his countrymen motivated her to listen and act favorably on behalf
of the Palatines. For whatever reason, Kocherthal was successful in persuading
the Queen that these industrious Germans would be valuable assets in
establishing her colonies.
There is some reason
to suspect Kocherthal 's motives. In
today's vernacular, he acted as a "press agent". It was suspected that he
acquired personal gain for his efforts. No matter, for it is the result of his
work which brought us here. He was successful in England and he returned to the
Palatinate. There, he wrote and distributed pamphlets throughout the Rhine
Valley, praising the climate and opportunities awaiting those willing to go to
the New World.
In 1709 and 1710, some 30,000 people fled from the Palatinate. It took from six to eight weeks to travel down the river to Rotterdam, scrounging and begging for food as they went.
On the Rotterdam Lists, there is a Bastien
Lesier and his wife, with Johan Jacob, Anna Margaret, Anna Lys, Anna Barbara,
Hans
Jury and
five other children. They were on Capt. Brouwel's ship, in the second party to
Holland, 1709.
Queen Anne sent some of her ships to Holland
to transport these refugees. Sebastian
Lescher and his family are among the second arrivals in England,
later in 1709. The voyage from Rotterdam to England took about eight days.
Religious and political climates were
changing in England too, and in 1709, Lord Marlborough decreed there would be no
Papists allowed to emigrate and that some 6,000 Catholics already there must
return to Germany. (An interesting aside is that they were first given an
"opportunity" to join the British Army. Apparently, even Catholics would be
acceptably useful in helping England accumulate colonies, wealth and prestige.)
The Catholic exodus to some small extent, eased conditions for the remaining
Protestants. Encampments were set up in a number of parishes and suburbs:
Walworth, Kensington, St. Catherine's, St. Olave's, Stockwell, etc. The British
Government provided tents and warehouses for shelter and a bread and meat
ration. This greatly disturbed the poor people of London who weren't being given
like consideration, and who feared the Palatines would flood the job market,
causing widespread unemployment and greater poverty. Included in the House of Commons
investigation are some insights to life in these encampments ............. "Some
are employed by making toys of small value. They eat brown bread and flesh meat
of the coarsest and cheapest kind, and roots and herbs .... Many of the younger
are married each week - women wear Rosemary and men wear Laurel by their hair at
the time of marriage. Adultery and fornication are abhorred by them...... When
they are buried, the attendants go singing after the corpse and when they come
to the grave, the coffin is opened for all to see the body - after that it is
laid in the ground. They sing for sometime and then they depart. They carry
grown people on a bier and children on their head."
There were several plans for dispersing these
refugees "for the good of the Crown". They were invited to come to Ireland, with
promises of housing and subsistence but none of the promises were kept and,
though three thousand were thought to have gone there, hundreds returned to
England, more destitute and in poorer health than before.
(When on the 1900 Soundex in New York City,
there were Irish Lashers, born in Ireland, it seemed to indicate that some
Loscher family stayed in Ireland in 1709 or 1710, and these were descended from
that time. This is a wide area of research requiring further
investigation.)
- [This last statement, above in parenthesis, is a presumption of the author's. However, the name "Lasher" is found quite commonly in the British Isles well before 1710, and has nothing to do with our German Lescher/Lasher family. It is these British "Lashers" who's family crest we have erroneously borrowed until recently.] -
Other plans for the Palatines were that they
could establish a Colony in the British West Indies, or settle the area which is
now North Carolina, or they could help William Penn develop his territory. The
final decision, at least for the group, from which Sebastian Loscher came, was
none of the above. Instead, it was decided to send these vinters, architects,
and farmers to New York, settle them upstate, and have them make tar from pine
pitch to be used by the Royal Navy.
Sebastian's family embarked aboard the ship
"Medford", one of a fleet of ten ships, in January 1710. The ships were held
offshore for sometime and finally they arrived in New York in June. In Rev.
Kocherthal's records, there is a daughter, Maria Elisabeth, born to
Bastian
Loscher
and wife, Maria Elisabeth, who was baptized on board the Medford on June 10,
1710. If this baptism was performed according to the German Lutheran custom of
baptizing children four to six weeks after birth,
Palatine orphans were apprenticed to
"respectable citizens". The demand for this inexpensive labor was so great that
many other children were arbitrarily taken from their refugee parents and
apprenticed also.
In the Fall of 1710, Governor Hunter, Queen
Anne's appointee, established these immigrants in camps on both sides of the
Hudson River, approximately one hundred miles north of New York City.
Picture, if you will, these families arriving
in this Catskill Mountain wilderness area, facing winter. All were duty-bound to
live by the "Grace of the Queen" and in her service. They were furnished tents,
the inadequacy of which is testified to by the immediate occupation of erecting
cabins. In fact, some families lived in caves that first winter. They settled in
"dorfs" (villages) at West Camp (near the present day Saugerties) and at East
Camp (later the Germantown, Livingston and Clermont area).
Rations again were provided by Queen Anne and
distributed under Governor Hunter's supervision. His records indicate that
Bastian
Lescher's
family, in 1710, consisted of 5 adults and
The land on which these Palatines were
settled, was a small portion of Robert Livingston's 256,000 acres which extended
from the Massachusetts border to central New York State, on both sides of the
Hudson River.
When spring came in 1711, the pitch and tar
operation for the Naval Stores enterprise was set up. It was doomed to failure
for many reasons; while hemlock trees were abundant, the trunks did not yield
pitch in quantities to fulfill the requirements for the project, and as trees
were cut the workmen had to move farther and farther from the camps making
progress slow and arduous. Perhaps too, the least understood reason of all might
have been that these German farmers felt the basis for sustaining life was to
grow things, not to destroy whole forests.
On May 30, 1711, the Palatines by armed
rebellion, expressed dissatisfaction with their situation, claiming their
contracts with Queen Anne were being violated, and that they were being cheated
out of lands supposedly offered to them. However, they were quickly disarmed and
the tar making operation continued.
Some of the Palatine men were recruited to
participate in the Expedition to Canada in 1711. It appears they were promised
land grants for their service. In traveling north, they were undoubtedly
impressed at the vast amount of unsettled land, and when they returned they were
restless to own land of their own.
Near the end of summer, 1712, Governor Hunter
was having a difficult time raising the money to pay for the rations, and when
it became an impossible task, he gave the Palatines permission to seek work
elsewhere. However, they were to "return for service to the Queen when needed."
It was at that time that many of the refugees left the Hudson Valley for the
Schoharie Valley.
Also in "Ecclesiastical Records of New York"
Volume 111, there are many letters from Rev. J.
F. Hager.
He
was a Palatine who, while still in London, began preaching at the encampments.
He was then ordained by the English "Society for Propagating the Gospel" as
Society Missionary and was sent to America on one of the ships. His mission was
to convert the Palatines to the Church of England. His adversities began
immediately upon landing in New York. On July 15, 1710, he wrote back to the
Society that "upon landing, he found the Lutheran Minister had already made a
separation persuading the Palatines, they ought to stick to that in which they
were born and bred, and while Rev. Kocherthal confirmed when he arrived." Then
members of the Reformed Church said, "If the Lutherans don't have to conform (to
the Church of England) then why should we?" "They wanted liturgies in the German
tongue that each family may be provided with one to answer according to custom."
Then he said he had made 34 converts to the Church of England, and that his
books were water spoiled on the trip.
On Oct. 25, 1710, Rev. Hager
again
wrote...."Many people died at sea and here through fever, survivors number about
2,000 - all except sick ones have been shipped upriver.
On Jan. 18, 1711 he wrote that they had
gotten approval for a Palatine schoolhouse and they had received from Robert
Livingston 40 boards for a schoolhouse in Queensbury, and would require 30 more
board to complete.
On July 11, 1712, he wrote that in the
Expedition to Canada
In a letter written July 6, 1713, he says
there is "great famine among the Palatines, and does hold on still, as they boil
grass and children eat the leaves of trees."
Rev. Johann
Fredrich
Hager
died
between November 17, 1721 and July 20, 1722. His records have never been
located, which is most unfortunate, as they would provide a great deal of
missing data, especially Palatine births and marriages. His letters indicate
many hardships, endured by both he and his family, during his ministry in
upstate New York.
In a Society letter written August 17, 1722
there was mentioned, "more Palatines are on their way to New York, and a German
Minister is to follow them."
By 1850 there were Lashers in at least 23
counties of New York on the Federal Census Index. By 1900, they are in 47
counties and the boroughs of New York City. Also, by 1850, they are in several
Midwestern states, and there were many in Pennsylvania.
The abundant good health and longevity of
these Palatine ancestors is impressive. Many lived to eighty and ninety years of
age. Infant mortality was high, but if a child lived to school age, barring
accident or epidemic, the chances were good for a long life.
Excellent health has now been passed down through ten generations to my grandchildren. Through observation and experience, I have concluded that we Lashers, are endowed with a yen for adventure and an extraordinary energy with which to pursue it. ---"
The Lasher Family
(By Annie Scott
Baxter, 1937 as extracted from a
series of articles printed in the Entertprise and News of St. Johnsville,
NY)
The
Palatinate is the name applied to the two German states, which were united
previously to the year 1620. They were called the Upper and Lower Palatinate and
the inhabitants designated as Palatines.
Perhaps in all the world there is not s more favored region, nor an
unhappier one, and the pages of its history are drenched with the blood of
those who sought to make their homes there. Following persecution before the
year 1709, thousands of these unhappy Palatines made their way to England, where
King William and Queen Anne welcomed them.
From
the list of "Palatine Emigrants into England to June 20, 1709”; in the British
Museum (original lists are in C. O. 388:76, D. 57-70) from which lists were
taken as follows:
1st list taken at St. Catherines, May 8,
1709, 852 persons.
2nd list taken at Walworth, May 27, 1709,
1193 persons.
3rd
list taken at St. Catherines, June
2, 1709, 1745 persons.
4th
lint taken at St. Catherines, and Deftford, June 15, 11, 1709, 1745 persons.
We find the following notation:
Sebastian Lescher
Husbandman and Vinedresser, age 40, sons (ages only are given, 20, 14,
10, 8, 6, daughters 15, 12, 4, 1 and designated by the letter L indicating that
the family were of the Lutheran faith.
The
family name underwent many changes during the years that have intervened, due
perhaps most of all to the fact that officials and clergy used the phonetic
method of spelling names. The original record in the Simmerdinger Register
spells the name Lescher,
and to that must be added the
popular way of spelling it today, Lasher. And also the following: Leycher,
Lisser, Lisjer, Litzert, Lygher, Lacher,
Lazer, Lazier, Litcher,
Lascher, Lesher, Lesser, Leisure, Lecher, Liser,
Losser, Lyser and several more.
The
story of the Palatines who eventually came into England in the reign of Queen
Anne or before is a tale of suffering and persecution, but this good queen tried
to find a solution to help them. She finally decided to try shipping some of
them to America, and in 1709 the first immigrations were started. The historical
chronicles of the time give us a good picture. “A large body of Palatines had
been sent by Queen Anne to New York to engage in furnishing the English with
naval stores, in consideration whereof, after the expense, should have been
repaid £5 and 40 acres per family on Schoharie Creek.
They
Arrived in New York through May, June, and July of 1710. The majority were
placed on Robert Livingston’s Manor on the Hudson [Germantown, NY], but became
discontented and over seven hundred removed to the Schoharie in 1712. From the
land which they were occupied, they were mostly being evicted. From 1713 – 1725
many of these Palatines removed to Pennsylvania, and some to Palatine, Stone
Arabia, New York on the Mohawk River.
From "The Conditions, grievances, and
oppressions of the Germans in His
Majestys province of New York in America 1720”:
"In the year 1709 was her late Majesty Queen
Anne most graciously pleased to send a body of between 3000 and 4000 Germans to
New York under the Inspection and Care of Robert Hunter then Governor there with
particular orders and instructions to settle them on lands belonging to the
Crown, and such as were most proper for raising pitch, tar, and other naval
stores. Before they left England they were promised 5 pounds in money per head
of which they have received nothing at all. It was likewise promised that on
their arrival there, each of them should receive clothes, utensils, tools, and
other Conveniency's belonging to Husbandry, all which were sent with them from
England for their use, but of these they received but very little. They were
moreover to have a Grant of 40 acres of land to each person, but it was never
performed.
On their landing at New York they were
quartered in tents on the Common and divided in six companies over each of which
was a Captain appointed to command them (of which number John Conrad Weiser arriv'd here in London 1718)
with an allowance of 15f per annum each, but not one farthing has been hither
paid them about the same time the said Govern'r without and against their
consent took many children from them, bound them to several of the Inhabitants
of that province till they should arrive to the age of 21 years. Particularly
two Sons from Capt. Weiser one of the
twelve and another of 13 years of age, by which means they were deprived of the
Comfort of their Children's company and education as well as the assistance and
Support they might in a small time have reasonably expected from them. In the
fall of that year those that were living (then It must be observed that a great
number of them were dead,) were removed to a tract of land belonging to one Mr.
Livingston, where they lived in houses erected by themselves till the spring
following when they were order'd to the woods to make pitch and tar and
continued there near two years but as the land was improper to raise any sort o!
naval stores in any Considerable quantity, their labours terra to a different
account and the profits of building and improving the lands fell to a private
person, they being not able to make more than near 200 barrels of pitch and tar.
The small prospect they had of being on a capacity to serge the nation and the
Impossibility there was of raising Corn, Cattell and other provisions for their
subsistence on such ordinary and almost barren land oblig'd them to petition the
aforesaid Governor that they might be put in possession, and settle on .the land
Call'd Schorie which Indians had given to the late Queen Anne for their use he
answer'd that the the land was theirs, he could nor would no take it from them,
neither could he settle them there
because it would oblige him to maintain to many Garrisons.
The said Governor thought well some time
after to visit all the Villages where they were settled and view the people
there who with one consent apply'd to him again, humbly praying they might go
and inhabit the above promised land, upon which he in a passion stamped upon the ground
and said, here is your land (meaning the almost barren Rocks) where you must
live and die.
The second year (in the woods) were orders
sent to detach 300 able men to serve on expedition against Canada which they did
and on their return, their arms were taken from them, they were put on the
Establishment of New York and New Jersey and the money received by the said
Gouvernor they marched home, where they found their familys almost starv'd, no
provision having been given them during their absence.
They petitioned (Coll.) Gove. Hunter for full
allowance of provisions. He promised to send some, about 8 days after came
message from him that he had not received any subsistence for them from England
and therefore every one of them must shift for himself, but not out of the
Province.
This was the latter end of the year and winter just at hand, no provision
to be had, and the people bare of Cloaths. So they sought relief from the
Indians and the Indians gave them permission to settle on tract of Land called
Schoharie, which the Indians had
given to Queen Anne for this very purpose. All fell to work and in two weeks
cleared a way through woods 15 tulles
long tho nearly starving and 50 Families went to Schoharie. When almost settled,
Gov. Hunter sent orders that Whoever settled on that land should be declared a
Rebel. However, the remainder traveling in sledges through three feet of snow,
cold, and hunger, joined the 50 first families. They made other contracts, which
the people of Albany tried to break. Then Gov. Hunter called in Adam Vrooman to
persuade the Indians to break the agreement. In 1717 Gov. Hunter called a
meeting of these German's. He declared he would hang John Conrad Weiser ordered they
must agree with “the gentlemen of Albany to whom he had sold the Land for 1500
pistoles and become their tenants or leave."
From Histories, etc. Dauphin, Cumberland,
Franklin Bedford Adams and ferry Counties, Pa. by Israel
Daniel Rupp, 1846 page 39:
“From 1700 to 1720 the Palatines endured many
privations before they reached the western continent. In 1708 and 1709 upwards
of ten thousand arrived in England and were there for some time in a starving
miserable, sickly condition, lodged in warehouses; who had no subsistence but
what they could get by their wives begging for them in the streets till some
sort of provision was made for them by Queen Anne and then some were shipped to
Ireland, others to America.
In the month of August,
pursuant to an address to her majesty Queen Anne from the Lord Lieutenant and
Council in Ireland, desiring as many as her majesty should think fit to send
thither, three thousand were sent to Ireland, many of whom returned
again to England, on account of the hard usage they received from the
Commissary Who did not Pay them their subsistence (Journal House of Commons,
England, Vol. XVI 594-98.) In the summer of 1710 several thousand Palatines who
had been maintained at the Queen's expense in England were shipped to New York,
some of whom afterwards came to Pennsylvania."
From Hudson and Mohawk p. 1617:
"The history of this branch of the Lasher family begins in West Camp, Columbia county (N. Y.) in 1710 with Sebastian Lasher of who little is known or proven...
...To continue the
Hudson record a little farther, "The first positive record is the birth of his
daughter Maria Elizabeth and her baptism in the church of West Camp, 1710. He
Was among those willing to remain in West Camp 1724 if lands Were conveyed to
him."