United States or Georgia ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
All the city was in a tumult and ferment; but when the news came that a settlement only sixty miles away, Tulpehocken by name, had been destroyed and its inhabitants massacred, even the advocates of peace grew white with fear, and the House began to draw up a militia law the most futile and foolish perhaps that had ever been suggested even by lovers of peace in the vain hope of appeasing the people.
Butterwick is not a good judge of horses, but a brief while ago he thought he would like to own a good horse, and so he went to a sale at a farm over in Tulpehocken township, and for some reason that has not yet been revealed he bid upon the forlornest wreck of a horse that ever retained vitality.
The declaration of the Tulpehocken Church, when it applied for reception, is given in full in Halle Records, new edition, pp. 139-141, and shows the conditions on which congregations were received, because the paper had been prepared for that purpose and exhibits "the steadfast adherence of the united ministers to the confession and doctrine of the unaltered Augsburg confession, which had here been attacked by false brethren, by fanatical sects, by epicureans and by divers others, in which assaults they had not only themselves continued steadfast, but had held firm the Evangelical Lutheran Church members, and had gathered them and increased their number, be it said to the glory of God, who had stood by them."
They must consider it a special favor that we had come to them first." Graebner comments on this as follows: "One can safely say that there could be found to-day in all America not a single Lutheran pastor or congregation who would consent to concede to a synod such powers as Pastor Kurtz and the congregation at Tulpehocken yielded to the 'United Pastors' in 1748."
Nicholas Kurtz had arrived in order to be ordained as pastor for the congregation at Tulpehocken. The dedication of St. Michael's Church in Philadelphia brought other representative Lutherans to the city. Before the public services, Pastors Brunnholtz, Handschuh, and Hartwick met to examine Kurtz. His answers were approved of in Halle as creditable even to candidates in Germany.
On his way he was plundered by pirates; in England he was thrown into a sponging house on account of debts. After regaining his liberty, he was compelled to return to Schoharie broken in health and without accomplishing his purpose. The result was that 33 families left Schoharie and settled in Tulpehocken, Pa., in 1723. Among those who remained in West Camp was Pastor Kocherthal.
But no written constitution is now known in Tulpehocken earlier than that introduced by Muehlenberg. In all the old congregations the case is the same, so far as any known evidence proves. In all the German congregations in Pennsylvania, however, an organization was found when Muehlenberg came, which had arisen out of the necessities of the case, and in all of them it had the same character.
From the very beginning Muhlenberg's three original congregations were called "The United Congregations." This name was extended also to the congregations subsequently organized or served by Muhlenberg and his colaborers at Germantown, Lancaster, Tulpehocken, York, etc. The year 1748 was most opportune and suggestive for such an organization. Pastor Hartwick of Rhinebeck had come to Philadelphia.
New Hanover had a fair school, Jacob Loeser being teacher. Though a teacher could be had for the filials Saccum and Upper Milford, there were no schools there. When the elders hereupon explained that the distances were too great, Synod advised to change off monthly with the teacher, and demanded an answer in this matter in the near future. Kurtz promised to begin a school at Tulpehocken in winter.
The Tulpehocken congregations were established by Palatinates from the Hudson and Mohawk, who came to Pennsylvania in 1723 and 1729.
Word Of The Day