Pennsylvania Dutch

Pennsylvania German redirects here. This article is about the people. For the language, see Pennsylvania German language.

Pennsylvania Dutch
Pennsilfaanisch Deitsch

Mer schwetze noch die Mudderschprooch "We still speak the mother tongue"
Regions with significant populations
United States, especially Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, West Virginia; Canada, especially Ontario
Languages
English, Pennsylvania Dutch
Religion
Lutheran, Reformed, Evangelical, Moravian, Church of the Brethren, Mennonite, Amish, Schwenkfelder, River Brethren, Yorker Brethren, Urglaawe
Related ethnic groups
Palatine German, Alsatian, Swiss German, Hessian, Württemberger,

Pennsylvania Dutch refers to immigrants and their descendants from southwestern Germany and Switzerland who settled in Pennsylvania in the 17th and 18th centuries. Historically they have spoken the dialect of German known as Pennsylvania Dutch or Pennsylvania German.

The first major emigration of Germans to America resulted in the founding of the Borough of Germantown in northwest Philadelphia County, Pennsylvania on October 6, 1683.. Mass emigration of Palatines began out of Germany in the early 18th century.

The Pennsylvania Dutch maintained numerous religious affiliations, with the greatest number being Lutheran or Reformed, but many Anabaptists as well. The Anabaptist religions promoted a simple lifestyle and their adherents were known as Plain people or Plain Dutch, as opposed to the Fancy Dutch who tended to assimilate more easily into the American mainstream.

Over time, the various dialects spoken by these immigrants fused into a unique dialect known as Pennsylvania Dutch or Pennsylvania German. At one time, over a third of Pennsylvania's population spoke this language, which also had an impact on the local dialect of English.

After the Second World War, use of Pennsylvania German died out in favor of English, except among the more insular and tradition-bound Anabaptists, such as the Old Order Mennonite and Old Order Amish. However, a number of German cultural practices continue to this day, and German Americans remain the largest ancestry group in Pennsylvania.

Etymology

The word Dutch is related to the German endonym "deutsch" and only over time has acquired its distinct English meaning referring to the language and people from the Netherlands that historically were part of the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation and ethnically German. Etymologically, the word dutch originates from the Old High German word "diutisc" (from "diot" "people"), referring to the Germanic "language of the people" as opposed to Latin, the language of the learned (see also theodiscus). Only later did the word come to refer to the people who spoke the language. Other Germanic language variants for "deutsch/deitsch/dutch" are: Dutch "Duits", Yiddish "daytsh", Danish "tysk", Norwegian "tysk", and Swedish "tyska".

The English term Germans is only attested from the mid-16th century, based on the classical Latin term "Germani" used by Julius Caesar and later Tacitus. It gradually replaced the terms "Dutch" and "Almains", the latter becoming mostly obsolete by the early 18th century. 17th and 18th century British and Anglo-America literature commonly drew a distinction between the "High Dutch"—referring to the German language or to German-speakers from the Holy Roman Empire—and the "Low Dutch"—referring to the Dutch language of the Netherlands. Thus, the Pennsylvania Dutch are not the Dutch people from the Netherlands but descendents of people who spoke a type of High Dutch. Therefore, despite urban legend to the contrary, the term Pennsylvania Dutch is not so much a misnomer as it is an anachronism.

Geography

The Pennsylvania Dutch live primarily in Southeastern and South Central Pennsylvania in the area stretching in an arc from Bethlehem and Allentown through Reading, Lebanon, and Lancaster to York and Chambersburg. They can also be found down throughout the Shenandoah Valley (the modern Interstate 81 corridor) in the adjacent states of Maryland, Virginia, West Virginia and North Carolina, and in the large Amish and Mennonite communities in Mifflin County, Pennsylvania, in Ohio north and south of Youngstown and in Indiana around Elkhart.

Pennsylvania Dutch from the Palatinate of the Rhine

Many Pennsylvania Dutch are descendants of refugees from the Palatinate of the German Rhine. For example, some Amish and Mennonites came to the Palatinate and surrounding areas from the German-speaking part of Switzerland, where, as Anabaptists, they were persecuted, and so their stay in the Palatinate was of limited duration. However, for the majority of the Pennsylvania Dutch, their roots go much further back in the Palatinate. During the War of the Grand Alliance (1689–97), French troops pillaged the Palatinate, forcing many Germans to flee. The War of the Palatinate (as it was called in Germany), also called the War of Augsburg, began in 1688 as Louis took claim of the Palatinate, and all major cities of Cologne were devastated. By 1697 the war came to a close with the Treaty of Ryswick, now Rijswijk in the Netherlands, and the Palatinate remained free of French control. However, by 1702, the War of Spanish Succession began, lasting until 1713. French expansionism forced many Palatines to flee as refugees.

The first major emigration of Germans to America resulted in the founding of the Borough of Germantown in northwest Philadelphia County, Pennsylvania on October 6, 1683 by a group of settlers organized by Francis Daniel Pastorius, an agent for a land purchasing company based in Frankfurt am Main, Germany, and was composed largely of Quakers and Mennonites from the Rhineland.

Mass emigration of Palatines began out of Germany in the early 18th century. In the spring of 1709, Queen Anne granted refuge to about 7,000 Palatines who had sailed the Rhine to Rotterdam. From there, about 3,000 were sent to America either directly or through England, bound for William Penn's colony. The remaining refugees were sent to Ireland to strengthen the Protestant presence in that country.

By 1710, large groups of Palatines had sailed from London, the last group of which was bound for New York. There were 3,200 Palatines on 12 ships that sailed for New York and approximately 470 died en route to America. In New York, under the new Governor, Robert Hunter, Palatines lived in camps and worked for British authorities to produce tar and pitch for the Royal Navy in return for their safe passage. They also served as a buffer on the frontier separating the French and Native Americans from the English colonies. In 1723, some 33 Palatine families, dissatisfied under Governor Hunter's rule, migrated from Schoharie, New York, along the Susquehanna River to Tulpehocken, Berks County, Pennsylvania, where other Palatines had settled. They became farmers and used intensive German farming techniques that proved highly productive.

Pictures from Old-Germantown. Shown here is the first log cabin of Pastorius about 1683, Pastorius' later house about 1715, print shop and house of Saurs about 1735, and the market square about 1820.

18th century

The Pennsylvania Dutch composed nearly half the population of Pennsylvania and generally supported the American Revolution. Henry Miller, an immigrant from Germany of Swiss ancestry, published an early German translation of the Declaration of Independence in his newspaper Philadelphische Staatsbote. Miller often wrote about Swiss history and myth, such as the William Tell legend, to provide a context for Patriot support in the conflict with Britain.

Frederick Muhlenberg (1750-1801), a Lutheran pastor, became a major Patriot and politician, rising to Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives.

Religion

The Pennsylvania Dutch are a people of various religious affiliations, most of them Lutheran or Reformed, but many Anabaptists as well. Henry Muhlenberg (1711–1787) founded the Lutheran Church in America. He organized the Ministerium of Pennsylvania in 1748, set out the a standard organizational format for new churches, and helped shape Lutheran liturgy.

Muhlenberg had been sent by the Lutheran bishops in Germany and he always insisted on strict conformity to Lutheran dogma. Muhlenberg's view of church unity was in direct opposition to Nicolaus Ludwig Zinzendorf's Moravian approach with its goal of uniting various Pennsylvania German religious groups under a less rigid "Congregation of God in the Spirit." The differences between the two approaches led to permanent impasse between Lutherans and Moravians, especially after a December 1742 meeting in Philadelphia.

See also

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• Amish
• Mennonite
• Schwenkfeldian
• Old German Baptist Brethren
• Pennsylvania German language
• Hex sign
• Pennsylvania Dutch Country
• Hiwwe wie Driwwe. newspaper
• Pennsylvania Dutch cuisine
• German American
• Helen Reimensnyder Martin, author
• Anna Balmer Myers, author
• Fraktur (Pennsylvania German folk art)
• Kurrent handwriting

Bibliography

• Grubb, Farley. "German Immigration to Pennsylvania, 1709 to 1820," Journal of Interdisciplinary History Vol. 20, No. 3 (Winter, 1990), pp. 417-436 in JSTOR
• McMurry, Sally, and Nancy Van Dolsen, eds. Architecture and Landscape of the Pennsylvania Germans, 1720-1920 (University of Pennsylvania Press; 2011) 250 studies their houses, churches, barns, outbuildings, commercial buildings, and landscapes
• Nolt, Steven, Foreigners in Their Own Land: Pennsylvania Germans in the Early American Republic, Penn State U. Press, 2002 ISBN 0-271-02199-3
• Roeber, A. G. Palatines, Liberty, and Property: German Lutherans in Colonial British America (1998)
• Roeber, A. G. "In German Ways? Problems and Potentials of Eighteenth-Century German Social and Emigration History," William & Mary Quarterly, Oct 1987, Vol. 44 Issue 4, pp 750-774 in JSTOR

External links

• The Pennsylvania German Society
• Lancaster County tourism website
• Overview of Pennsylvania German Culture
• German-American Heritage Foundation of the USA in Washington, DC
• "Why the Pennsylvania German still prevails in the eastern section of the State", by George Mays, M.D.. Reading, Pa., Printed by Daniel Miller, 1904
• The Schwenkfelder Library & Heritage Center
• FamilyHart Pennsylvania Dutch Genealogy Family Pages and Database
• Pennsylvania Dutch Family History, Genealogy, Culture, and Life

In Pennsylvania German

• Deitscherei.org — Fer der Deitsch Wandel
• Hiwwe wie Driwwe — The Pennsylvania German Newspaper
• Pennsylvania German Encyclopedia