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GEORGIA AND GEORGIANS 95
told by Goethe in the sweetest of his verse narratives, ' Hermann and
Dorothea,' the only poem of his early life which he cared to read
when old.
''Journeying eastward, the main body of exiles passed through
Frankfort-on-the-Main. This was Goethe's native town. The Prussian
king was ready to welcome the whole army of refugees, over 10,000 in
number, but a band of them, conducted by Herr Yon Reck, a Hanoverian
nobleman, sailed down the Rhine and took refuge under the British flag.
They finally landed on the shores of America, where they settled at
Ebenezer, in the new colony of Georgia. None of the settlers were
superior to these excellent Salzburgers, whom George "Whitefield con
sidered the cream of the population for industry and uprightness. The
orphan home, which he afterwards instituted at Bethesda, was based
upon an institution of like character at Ebenezer."
Col. Charles C. Jones, Jr., adds some additional particulars in
regard to the emigration of the Salzburgers to Georgia.* Says he:
"During the four years, commencing in 1729 and ending in 1732, more
than 30,000 Salzburgers, impelled by the fierce persecutions of Leopold,
abandoned their home in the broad valley of the Salza, and sought refuge
in Prussia, Holland, and England, where their past sufferings and pres
ent wants enlisted substantial sympathy from Protestant communities.
Persuaded by the Society for the Propagation of Christian Knowledge
and acting upon the invitation of the Trustees of the Colony of Georgia,
forty-two Salzburgers, with their wives and children—numbering in all
seventy-eight souls—set out for Rotterdam, whence they were to be
transported free of charge to Dover, England. At Rotterdam they were
joined by their chosen religious teachers, the Rev. John Martin Bolzius
and the Rev. Israel Christian Gronau.'' According to the same author
ity, the Georgia Trustees engaged not only to advance the funds neces
sary to defray the expenses of the journey and to purchase the requisite
sea stores, but also to allot to each emigrant on his arrival in Georgia
fifty acres in fee and provisions sufficient for maintenance until such
land could be made available for support.
After taking the oath of loyalty at Dover, the emigrants, on Decem
ber 28, 1733, embarked for the new world in the ship Purisburg, which,
in due season, anchored safely at Charleston, South Carolina. It so
happened that Oglethorpe was in Charleston at this time to meet them
and, without delay, he arranged to take the emigrants to Savannah,
reaching port on March 10, 1734. It was Reminiscere Sunday—accord
ing to the Lutheran calendar—when the boat arrived. By a queer sort
of coincidence the Scripture lesson for the day, so the good Mr. Bolzius
informs us, was the passage which tells how the Saviour, after suffering
persecution in his own country, came to the borders of the heathen. He
then describes the vessel as "Lying in fine and calm weather, under the
shore of our beloved Georgia, where we heard the Birds sing melodi
ously;" and notwithstanding the sacred character of the day and the
gentle disposition of the new arrivals, he adds that the inhabitants of
the town of Savannah "fired off some Cannons."
While the Salzburgers rested from the fatigues of the long trip across
'Dead Towns of Georgia, " p. 11, Savannah, 1878.