Page 38
History of Orange County
Town of Montgomery
Page 38
GERMAN REFORMED CHURCH.
This was composed originally of German emigrants, and organized in about 1732, through the agency of William Mancius of Esopus, Ulster county.
From its organization till about 1772, it was served by supplies, who came two or three times during the year, preached, baptized and administered the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper.
In 1772 the Rev. John Michael Keam was settled, who remained till 1778, when he was obliged to resign his charge, on account of difficulties growing out of his political opinions. This town at that time was true Whig, and the inhabitants devoted heart and hand to the cause of American independence.
From 1778 to 1784 the Rev. Rynier Van Nest, the minister of the Reformed Dutch Church in Shawangunk, officiated a part of the time in this church.
In 1788 the Rev. Moses Freligh was settled over the Associate congregation of Shawangunk and Montgomery, in which he continued till 1811, when he resigned the charge of the former, but continued pastor of the latter till his death in 1817.
In that year the Rev. Jesse Fonda was settled and renamed till his death in 1827.
In the year 1829 the Rev. Robert P. Lee, jr. was settled, and remains the present pastor of the congregation.
The first edifice was a log church, and erected, probably, about the time the church was organized. It was situated just east of the present grave yard, and north of the turnpike. Our informant was told by Mr. Henry Crist, deceased, that the building was entered from the outside by a ladder. This, doubtless, was for the safety of the congregation when assembled for worship, and a protection from any sudden Indian assault.
A frame church was built about the year 1760, which stood till the year 1803, when its site was occupied by the present large and substantial brick edifice. This was enlarged and repaired in 1834.
From its organization in 1732 till 1739 the consistory was very small—there being but one elder and one deacon. In the latter year the number was doubled. Johannis Jong Bloet was the first elder, and Jacob Booch Staber the first deacon. In 1734 they were succeeded by Hieronymus Mingis and Johannes Newkirk, and these again in 1736 by Christoffle Maul and Stephanus Crist.
The first baptisms were in 1734, and were as follows:
Stephanus, son of Phillipus Crist and Annatye Mengessin;
Jacob, son of Phillipus Millspach and Maria Hemmer;
Johannes, son of Christian Eboltz and Maria Elizabeth Crist;
Annatje, daughter of Christoffle Maul and Anna Juliana Sevving.
Some of the names found on the early records are Dekker, Terwiliger, Wilson, Velde, Robertson, Krantz, Haywood, Endro, Patterson, Weller, Windviel, Weber, Rockafellow and Clearwater.
The records of the Church were kept in German or Low Dutch till the time of Mr. Freleigh, after which but two or three entries are found of that kind.
The four acres occupied by the church and grave yard north of the turnpike, were a gift from Mr. Beckford, the brother-in-law of Mary Ballard Beckford. She owned large tracts of land in this and the town of Crawford, and Beckford was her agent in New York to sell them. The congregation were to pay for the deed, and the subscription list for the purpose is on the record of the church, dated in 1759. There are fifty-eight names on it, each signing sixpence. This subscription certainly was a small affair, but its Christian beauty and patriot satisfaction are found in its universality. The gift was not procured by one, nor yet by a few; all who loved to enter the temple threw a farthing into the treasury of the Lord, and their children’s children received it back with interest.
We here take occasion to remark that on making our enquiries on various subjects, we were told that such and such a gift was made by Queen Anne—that such and such persons came to the country in her time, etc.; but when the facts came to be compared with and tested by historic records, in a great many instances they turned out to be erroneous.— The Queen was a very clever lady, and did many motherly small offices for her children in the colonies, but we are persuaded she receives a credit for many things which she would not claim if living. The following are some of these erroneous traditions found in this town:
One is, that the Germans who founded this church were a portion of 6,000 Palatines, who retired to England upon their banishment from Germany, and were sent out here by the Queen. We have placed before the reader the names of some of these very men, and we have many others and the time they were naturalized, (1735). Another tradition is, that Queen Anne gave the first bell to this log church. Now, to show the error in these traditions and many others to which we have referred, it is sufficient to state that this church was not organized till 1732, and Queen Anne came to the throne in 1702, and died in 1714, some eighteen or twenty years previous to the times at which she could have done the acts attributed to her. But whether this bell was a gift or a purchase, we are gratified by stating that it is still sound and clamorous as ever; and that in place of calling men to the house of God, it is performing a service, the character of which is but little less interesting and holy, for it is daily calling the children of these early settlers to their educational duties, in the common school at Searsburgh.
This church having been formed and kept up by the Germans and their descendents, the services were in that language probably for the first fifty years. Then they were half the time in German or Dutch, and the other half in English. From our best information, this continued till the time of Mr. Freligh, when they were all performed in English.— Perhaps he may have preached occasionally in German or Dutch. We have heard two sermons since that time in German in this church, when the whole country side were present, down to the oldest man; some of whom might not have been out for years, but still retained a knowledge of the language. The preaching fell upon their consciences like holy oil poured out upon them, and shed a pious glow through their feelings. Doubtless they ran back in imagination to the time when their fathers worshipped in the old log church, strangers in a strange land, and praised God for his providential care over them during their wanderings.
“When forests crowned these verdant hills,
A hundred years ago,
And ringing through these fertile vales
Was heard the axman’s blow;
When Peace and Thrift came hand in hand
These woodland wilds among,
Above the settlers humble cot
A modest Temple sprung.
“In faith our Fathers reared the shrine
To Truth and Knowledge given,
And lifted high a beacon light
To guide the soul to Heaven!
That light, though kindled long ago,
Is burning brightly still;
Its rays are now in beauty shed
O’er valley, plain and hill.”
We cannot forego the obligation to remark here, as connected with this ancient church and early settlement, that those who came from the hills and values of Germany with the Bible in their hands, and erected this primitive and humble temple, have recently, by their own descendents, sent some of their own children back to the Old World, to teach the word of life to heathen nations. In the year 1836, the Rev. William Youngblood and Josephine Millspaugh, his wife, members of this church and natives of this town one a descendent of Johannes Jung Bloet—the other, the daughter of Doct. Peter A. Millspaugh, a descendent of Matthias Miltzpach, two original settlers, previously named in our paper—left the Christian society of friends and kindred, under the direction of this portion of the church, on a mission to foreign lands. We believe their destination was the Island of Borneo, and are now in that field of missionary labor.
We have always thought this one of the most arduous and hazardous employments, all things considered, ever assumed to be discharged in the occupations of human life, and that no inducement, short of the deepest sense of doing God’s will, with heaven as the final reward, could ever induce men to enter that field of missions. But our wonder and admiration are increased ten fold, when we find that frail and dependent woman, with dangers and deaths more numerous still besetting and surrounding her on every side, inherent in the nature of things, can make up her mind to leave these pleasant abodes, the home of her father and mother, sunder the ties of all that seem dear on earth, and dedicate her life, even in such a cause, to a remote and heathen land. We had the pleasure of being acquainted with this lady, and are constrained to say, if courtesy, general intelligence, kind and affectionate teaching are requisite qualifications in this department of human labor, the cause of missions has the benefit of them in the person of this individual. We question not, if her life be spared to any reasonable period, under God, she may be the honored instrument of winning many now dark and benighted souls from heathenism to a knowledge of the one true and living God. May all such missionaries receive their reward in the life to come: we know they can not in the present. They know the Master they serve— that he will pay in eternity what he promises in time. Still, it must be hard and lonely to die in a foreign land, though upheld by the consolations of the gospel and a firm reliance on the then present protection of their heavenly Father. All their earthly consolation in such an hour is found depicted in the following lines:
‘‘Tis sweet to think of that when I die,
There's one will hold my languid head,
And let me on her bosom lie
Till every breath of life is fled.
And when these beaming eyes shall close,
And lose at last their fading ray,
Forever fixed in deep repose
She'll watch beside my lifeless clay.
“Tis sweet to think that when I’m dead,
Her eye will pour its softest tear,
Her hand upon my green turf shed
The sweetest flow’rets of the year.
‘Tis sweet to think we both shall lie
Ere long within one common tomb;
‘Till from death’s bonds released we fly
To the blest realms beyond its gloom.”
We are indebted to the Rev. Mr. Lee, the present pastor of this church, for the facts of this historical notice.