Email From Adrianne kee46@email.msn.com   to  HUNSUCKER-L@rootsweb.com
Email Dated June 13, 2000

By the time my ancestors landed in PA in 1751, there were already a steam of
settlers moving down the colonial road through Maryland, to VA and Carolina.
Just as the word had been initiated to Europe describing the opportunities
in the colonies, so was it getting back to PA of the "better" lands in the
south.

Through natural increase and by the addition of new immigrants coming to PA
from Europe there were thousands of Scotch-Irish and Germans in William
PENN'S colony by 1720.  Only some twenty years later, there was apparently a
scarcity of good land for the migrants, and the price of land was rising. 23
{}  Many newcomers had to serve as indentured servants for three to seven
years, but after this period had been completed, they began to push westward
and to the south.

BILLINGTON noted, "As they moved along this natural highway they found that
the land prices steadily declined: PA charge 15 pounds for each hundred
acres after 1738, Maryland only 5 pounds, and Virginia speculators in the
Shenandoah Valley even less.  This was the magnet that drew the Palatines
steadily southward." 24  It seems that since most of the Germans were poor,
they sought cheaper land in the south.

Just as the war had caused earlier migration of Germans to England and its
colonies in America, so war would also be one of the causes of migration to
the Carolinas.  In 1744, the War of Jenkin's Ear became King George's War
with the entry of France on the side of Spain.  Since the Indians were
allies of the French, this threat of war with France in Canada and the Ohio
Valley probably caused people to leave New Jersey and Pennsylvania.  Males
from NY to VA were expected to fight.  It was likely because of this sort of
"draft," the settlers were streaming into the Yadkin Valley of NC by 1747.
25 {}  Ramsey also states that these early settlers had a mistrust for
authority and did not like the high cost of consumer goods in PA and other
colonies. 26 {}  Gehrke mentions that there was big increase in settlers
into NC in the years 1748-1755. 27 {}

Several sources mention the role of geography in the migration to the
Carolinas from PA.  Word must have passed back to the latter state from some
of the early settlers regarding the salubrious climate in the Carolinas.

The longer growing season, the mild winters and possibly stories of what one
could acquire the way land were reasons for many of the settlers to migrate.
I visited Zweibrucken in the Palatinate in 1956, and I was in Waldorf, Baden
Wurttemberg in 1976.  These parts of Germany along the Rhine are the warmest
areas in Germany.  Near Waldorf one can see tobacco and vegetables growing
with mountains nearby.  Certainly the piedmont section of North Carolina,
where Cabarrus County is located, is more similar to their homeland than PA,
especially in regard to the milder climate.

R.D.W. CONNOR wrote that the German immigrants to Carolina were adventurers,
hunters and trappers, and the others, who had removed for religious reasons,
came looking for cheap land. 28 {}  In the prefect to Carolina Cradle,
Ramsey claims that settlers came to Carolina because of a variety of
considerations:  geography, economic conditions in England and the colonies,
social and religious motivation, the abundance of cheap land and
international conflict. 29 {}

It is not known exactly when or who the first Germans were to settle in what
is now Cabarrus County.  It is believed by some that there were three
families:  BARRINGER {BEHRINGER}, DRY {DERR} and SMITH {SCHMIDT}.  The
earliest estimate of their arrival is about 1745-1761.  31 {}  Because of
the dangers of Indian attacks, there was little migration until the close of
the French and Indian War in 1763.  Gehrke believes that the majority of
Germans emigrated from PA to NC between 1763 and the opening of the
Revolutionary War in 1775. 32 {}

We know that the vast majority of Germans in early Mecklenburg Co. settled
on Dutch Buffalo Creek.  By the end of the 18th century, Cabarrus Co., which
had been formed from Mecklenburg in 1792, was the most German one in NC,
having achieved this distinction through births to Americans of German
descent, migrations of German settlers from PA, and possibly from Hessian
Soldiers who had deserted during the Revolutionary War.  33 {}

In discussing the interior of NC, Bernheim wrote:  "Had a traveler from PA
visited, about forty or fifty years ago (1820-1830), portions of the present
counties of Almance, Guilford, Davidson, Rowan, Cabarrus, Stanley, Iredell,
Catawba, Lincoln, and some others in the state of NC, he might have believed
himself to have unexpectedly come upon some part of the old Keystone State.
34 {}

Many of the family names found in Montgomery, Berks, Lehigh and Northampton
Counties, PA, are also found in NC counties, e.g. KLEIN (CLINE), TREXLER,
SCHLOUGH, SEITZ (SIDES), REINHARDT, BIBERS (BEAVER), KOHLMAN (COLEMAN), DERR
(DRY), BERGER (BARRIER), BEHRINGER (BARRINGER).  A SCHWARTZWAELDER
(BALCKWELDER) family of seven sons had two killed out of four that fought in
the Battle of Camden, SC.  35 {}

  From the records available, it is apparent that most of the Germans came
from PA to what is now Cabarrus CO. because of the threat of war, the better
economic conditions, the good climate and cheap land.  Most of them came to
Carolina overland from PA.

The End....

Footnotes will follow later....

 

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