Conceived in Liberty Volume 2 - Ludwig von Mises Institute

Finally, with a new government in Britain reluctant to pour good money
after bad in further subsidy, Governor Hunter was forced to abandon the disastrous
naval-stores program in the fall of 1712. A government program of
artificially stimulated production with the use of forced labor had failed
ignominiously. The governor told the Palatines that they were free to work
where they wished during the winter provided that they reassembled in the
spring. But a large number of Palatines used their newfound freedom to
escape to the Schoharie country in New York, to New Jersey and Pennsylvania,
and to other parts of New York colony. Before long the government abandoned
the whole project and the Palatines were released from bondage to the
Crown. The bulk of the Palatines moved happily during 1713 to the Schoharie
country, where they purchased land from the Mohawk Indians.
But the persecuted Palatines were not yet free. The various land speculators
managed to obtain monopolistic grants from the governor of the very lands
on which the Palatines had settled. The would-be land engrossers of Schoharie,
who included a Livingston and a Schuyler, demanded that the Palatines
take out leases and pay rent to their designated landlords. They were aided and
abetted by Governor Hunter, who, for one thing, was angry at the Palatines'
escape from their servitude.
But while the full force of the government created and tried to sustain the
land monopoly, the doughty Germans, led by Weiser, insisted on defending
their hard-earned land by force. The rebel Palatines drove their would-be
overlords out of the Schoharie settlement and gave Sheriff Adams a thorough
trouncing. Hunter retaliated by ordering the Palatines to submit to the designated
landlords or be removed, and as defiance continued he prohibited all
further cultivation of the land by the Palatines.
Weiser shipped secretly to England to try to win the support of the Crown
for free possession of their land, but the attempt failed. Driven off their land
by monopolistic land grants, half the Palatines left Schoharie and moved westward,
settling along the Mohawk River during the 1720s. But Weiser and his
followers, thoroughly disgusted with New York policies, left for Pennsylvania
and settled there. As a matter of fact, New York's treatment of the Palatines
discouraged all further German immigration into New York, and from
then on Pennsylvania was much more heavily favored.
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