SECTION II 1798 - 1898

"The highest evidence of a sound faith being the practical life of the Christian, I have felt a far greater interest in the moral movements of our age than in any "theological discussion." Lucretia Mott


The 19th century has been described as the "Quiet Period" of Quakerism. After the national upheaval of the Revolutionary War, Friends, as other Americans, returned to their plows and spinning wheels. Quakers may have suffered from the suspicions of neighbors who never understood their pacifist stance, and Friends who chose to fight now had to decide if they wanted to live “in the world” or within the embrace of the Meeting.

The Monthly Meeting Minutes of this period become somewhat dry. A reader of them may wonder if recording clerks sought to increase unity by choosing not to give detailed accounts of the issues and concerns of business meetings. For a fuller picture of the lives of the 19th century Gwynedd Quakers, we turn to details of the larger Society of Friends during this period and examine building records, as well as review Meeting minutes and memorials.


The Quaker World

The withdrawal from the Quaker Assembly was the first retreat away from the larger world. As the 19th century dawned, most Quakers were snug within a comfortable circle of Friends; they lived near other Quakers, they usually married Quakers, and their social life revolved around Monthly, Quarterly, and Yearly Meetings. They came into contact with non-Quakers in the course of business and in school, but they had quite definitely carved out a niche for themselves, emphasized to outsiders by their plain dress and speech.

This poem gives us a taste of the time. While perhaps a bit exaggerated for effect, the details are priceless. It explains, with dry humor, the feelings of “country” Friends, such as those from Gwynedd, upon leaving Philadelphia Yearly Meeting, with its fine meals and gracious city hosts.

THE LAST DAY OF THE YEARLY MEETING, 1813.

At length the dreaded day has come,

When country-friends must all go home

And leave their feasting here;

Must quit the richly loaded board,

With luscious pies and puddings stor'd,

And sparkling wine or beer.

Farewell, dear hearts; they moaning cry,

Still thinking on the dearer pie

Or sav'ry joint of meat;

Indeed 'tis very hard to part

From you - --cranberry pie or tart,

Our homely fare to eat.

To leave your coffee, amber clear,

To drink skim'd milk, or beer

And bread not worth a rush;

To leave your beds of softest down,

Exchange for linsey frock the gown,

And lie on beds of straw;

To rise to milking with the light

And go to rest before 'tis night,

Or wash our fingers raw;

Indeed we think it nation queer

That city folks should have such cheer

And not a thing to do.

But yet it's wicked to complain,

For your excess is still our gain,

And you're so very kind,

You give us any price we ask

Whilst we put on the humble mask

And say, "we have not dined."

But now the much lov'd week is o'er.

We from the town in numbers pour

And seek our vacant farms;

Reflecting all the way we go,

On the dear place where pleasures flow

And every object charms.

When Hodge tho' clad in russet grey,

And gaping round has lost his way

Soon finds a kind friend's home,

Who asks him in, takes off his coat,

And feeds him well without a groat:

He need no further roam.

Now Hodge cleans off his thrice-fill'd plate,

And fixing on his beaver, strait

Pursues the way to meeting.

And marching in with vacant stare

Secures a corner bench or chair,

His country brothers greeting.

And when the Clerk proclaims "adjourn,"

The brother clods together turn,

Says, "Josey where's he dine?"

"Why I don't know - but this here friend

"Has ax'd me home, the day to spend--

"But thy wife's gone with mine."

"Let's go to Jesse Kersey's lodging,

"There many friends are always dodging,

"But Tommy keeps the table."

He came from Lunnun people say

"And dines on roast-beef every day;

"Indeed he's very able."

This most important subject known

The meeting business all is flown,

They briskly walk the street;

At length arrived at Tommy's door,

Where drabs and sages inward pour,

The gazing throng they greet.

But Tommy's table is too small

To hold his guests - --so some, not all,

Must wait a second course;

But now such sauces, so much meat,

Each bounding to the nearest seat

Secures't by friendly force.

Well now suppose the meal is o'er;

Each bids farewell; then seeks the door,

Where horses ready gear'd

Await their master's well known voice,

And take him home against his choice,

Who this great change had fear'd.

First lumbers on, a waggon strong;

And next a sulkey creaks along,

And then a well worn chair;

The waggon's number is but ten,

Eight bounding girls, and two young men,

Their horses black and fair.

The sulkey carries only two;

The driver is obscur'd from view,

With trunks and boxes hid,

And bags and bundles pil'd so high

You scarcely can the whip descry

Slow moving as it did.

And next a chair comes rattling on

With nearly all the harness gone,

But Dapple moves sedate.

Three rosy nymphs fill up the seat,

With each a band-box at her feet,

In Yearly Meeting state.

And now to guard these maidens fair,

Three country beaux keep near the chair,

On plowing coursers sitting,

Each has an oil cloth o'er his hat,

And folded up his white cravat,

To keep for First--day meeting.

And while they move to'ards Schuylkill's banks,

They meet the Jersey-going ranks,

Those noted money makers,

Where boats perfum'd await the tide

With glittering scales on either side

First filli'd with fish - --then Quakers.

Another War with England

In 1811, Gwynedd appointed a committee to visit members “who are likely to be affected by the Militia Law, and collect accounts in what way the fines have been paid…”

The fines which most refused to pay all related to the military. Gwynedd members refused military service, would not attend militia training days, and refused to perform “military tour” days spent as a soldier.

By January of 1812, six months before President Madison formally declared war, the committee reported that Gwynedd members had been forced to relinquish money, corn, a cow, oats, wheat, fine flour, a watch, a side saddle, and a mahogany table. One member was thrown in the Norristown jail and was bailed out by Friends.

A few Gwynedd Quakers chose some type of active military involvement, but the numbers do not seem to have been so great as during the Revolutionary War. One man, Jonathan Spencer, joined the army as a surgeon.

This pattern of confiscations and arrests continued through the end of the war in 1815 and escalated in 1817. By 1820, Gwynedd Friends were doing jail time for sticking to their pacifist principals. In Third Month 1820, Thomas Adamson was arrested for “non-performance of Military Service.” He was forced to pay a fine of $30.00 plus $6.00 for the court costs. Adamson was sentenced to six months in jail, and was released after twenty-four weeks.

More Space for Carriages and Horses

The Chestnut Hill Turnpike was built in 1804 and the Springhouse Turnpike in 1805, part of an expansion spreading throughout the Delaware Valley. Eight years later, the Bethlehem Pike was completed. Gwynedd was quickly becoming the center of a network of roadways connecting small towns and outlying farms. As prosperity increased, fewer members walked and more rode. People came from a surprisingly great distance to Meeting, travelling by horse and carriage in warm months, and by sleigh when snow and ice covered the ground.

It was time to build shelter for the horses and carriages that brought Friends to Meeting. By 1821 enough carriage sheds had been erected to shelter 42 carriages and 9 horses. A pipe fence to hitch horses was later added.

More Space for Friends

After the successful fundraising for and construction of the carriage sheds, Gwynedd members felt prepared to expand their own house.

New meeting house was constructed in 1823. There were problems in taking apart the woodwork of the 1712 roof, because it was constructed so well.

There is debate about the location of the original meeting house.

Old photos show the graveyard set off from the meeting house by a wooden fence. The rear doors had steps leading to the graveyard.

School Days

A variety of schools existed at Gwynedd, or were funded by Gwynedd members, during the 19th century. The existence of a school seems to have waxed and waned depending on the availability of a good teacher and the number of students who needed to be educated. The school was busiest in 1833 when 61 students attended. The average size of the school in the 1800s was 21 students. It should be noted that only about one-third of the pupils were Quaker.

Efforts were made to provide the students with Quaker teachers. This was easier in the second half of the century than in the first. In 1823 a teacher was paid 2 ½ cents per student per day, which was regarded as a low wage. In 1844, a teacher’s monthly salary was $20.00, raised to $24.00 ten years later.

In 1814, an addition was built onto a school house located to the northeast of the Meeting House. The addition had a cellar and was two stories high, running the full 16-feet width of the original building.

Milcah Martha Moore left a bequest in 1829 and directed the Trustees of the Meeting “to the schooling of poor girls either belonging to the Society of Friends or such other poor girls of that neighborhood as the Meeting should judge proper.” The fund was still active in 1889. There are scant records of how this money was spent. It may have paid for the tuition of poor girls at the Gwynedd School.

The first public school in Gwynedd Township opened in 1840, the year that education was first mandated by the state. By 1844, there were 4 schools in the township, educating 255 boys and 197 girls. Thirteen of those pupils were instructed in German. One of the four schools was at Gwynedd Meeting House and was partially subsidized by Meeting funds.

The 1814 school had outgrown its usefulness by 1857, when $509.07 was spent to build the new schoolhouse, the one known today as the 1857 School House.


The 1857 School House

The 1857 School House was under the care of the Meeting, but records are scarce. To raise the money to build the school, the Meeting sold a ¾ acre lot to Jacob Acuff, a hotelkeeper, in 1855. Arthur H. Jenkins, who attended the school, related his memories of it:

“It is my recollection that the Friends School had been closed for several years (by 1886), but a revival of interest caused it to be reopened about that time, and the Meeting’s ambitious plans called for extension in plant and teaching staff. In other words, the school was enlarged from one room to two rooms, and the number of teachers correspondingly increased from one to two. Our drinking water was brought in buckets from the well of the caretaker’s house …

“Prisoner’s Base (the game) was occasionally attempted, but this game invariably broke up in a dispute as to who captured who, on the basis of which was ‘freshest.’ No Prisoner’s Base game that I remember was ever concluded in a agreement as to which team won…

“Occasionally in the winter we had what was called skating. This was when a puddle of water about as large as a dinner table would collect at the Meeting House … and freeze over.

“Pupils were not permitted to leave the school grounds, but the older boys, anxious to show their daring and independence, would sometimes sneak down to the blacksmith shop … where lean, elderly Harry Lowry hammered on white-hot horseshoes, and brawny Jake White chewed tobacco and swore horribly at restless horses …”

More students enrolled around this time and it became clear that the expansion had not been large enough. The Meeting decided to solve two problems at once and built a wooden addition onto the back of the Meeting House in 1900. This would provide more school space during the week and be a suitable facility for Quarterly Meeting meals. (Until then, Quarterly Meeting meals were taken in a large tent managed by the Tent Committee. The tent later found a home at Camp Onas where it sheltered campers during meals.) The 1857 School House was sold to a neighbor, William H. Staake. It was repurchased by the Meeting in 1966.

The Gwynedd Boarding School for Boys 1818 - 1860

With improved access throughout the area, Joseph Foulke decided the time had come to open a boarding school for boys. A variety of teachers, Quaker and not Quaker, had passed through the area, but Joseph wanted a school that would provide more than the basics. Here is some of his advertising:

“Gwynedd Boarding School for Boys, situated 18 ¼ miles from Philadelphia, on the Turnpike leading from thence to Bethlehem.

“Branches taught at this institution are Reading, Writing, Arithmetic, English Grammar, Geography, Astronomy, use of Globes and Maps, and the various branches of the Mathematics. Also, Natural Philosophy, and Practical Illustrations on Surveying & etc.

“Public Stages pass the door twice a day, to and from Philadelphia. Springhouse Post-Office, Montgomery County, Penn., one mile below the institution.

“Terms of admission - Thirty Dollars per quarter, payable half in advance, including boarding, washing, mending, & etc. Stationary and Books furnished at the usual prices.

Joseph Foulke, Principal of the Institution”


Occasionally, advertisements also listed how much various students weighed, perhaps as a sign that they were well-fed and cared for.

Joseph Foulke

Joseph Foulke was a man of many accomplishments. Howard Jenkins summarized a few of them. “In 1817 he appeared in the ministry and continued to the end of his life. He made numerous visits to distant meetings, New York, Canada, Indiana. He had learned the trade of wheelwright, but his inclination turned to teaching. He taught at Plymouth Meeting, Upper Dublin, and then established his Boarding School. He conducted for many years the publication of the “Friends Almanac,” furnishing for it the astronomical calculations. In 1836 he visited Washington as one of a Committee of Philadelphia Yearly Meeting to influence Congress against the admission of Arkansas as a slave state.”


Concerns of the Meeting

In the 19th century, Quakers took care of Quakers, as well as extending their concerns to others. Funds were raised annually to help Meeting members who had fallen on hard times. Friends gathered to repair burned barns. Money was raised so that all the Meeting’s children could be educated. Concerns that we may think of as modern issues were addressed as well. There is an interesting Minute from 3rd month, 1814:

“This meeting considering the proposal for erecting an Hospital for the relief of such of our members as have or may be deprived of their reason, now conclude to take a share and direct the Preparative meetings to raise their proportions thereof and forward the same to our next monthly meeting.

Evidently, Gwynedd Friends saw a need to provide for Friends with mental or emotional problems. In 4th month, they appoint Jonathan Shoemaker to head up the project to build and run an “Assylum.” By 12th month, $200 had been collected “for the relief of persons deprived of the use of their reason.” (At the time, $200 was also the amount annually raised to provide for the poor.) There is no record of what happened to the plan - it is never again mentioned in the Minutes. These concerns may have been connected to the founding of Friends’ Hospital, the nation’s first private psychiatric hospital, in 1813.

There is some evidence of the traditional Quaker concern for prisoners. In 1815, Samuel Livezy was granted a minute to visit the Prison & Alms House in Philadelphia.

A few Friends, including John Evans, took a stand against “ardent spirits” after the turn of the century, working to convince others not to distribute alcohol to field hands during the harvest, a tradition of the region. He ran into tremendous resistance both within the Meeting House and without, but he pursued his goal until his death. Temperance concerns continued for years with periods of success alternating with periods of neglect.

With their Meeting House paid for and schools established for their children, the Quakers of Gwynedd turned their concerns outward. Along with donations to help Meeting families in need, they raised funds to help Native Americans, African-American slaves, the mentally ill, the poor, and the homeless.

The Split

In the early 1800s, Quakerism was rocked by a schism often called the Hicksite - Orthodox Split. Scholars still debate the root causes of the division. There was strong disagreement within Philadelphia Yearly Meeting about the need to evangelize, and the degree of activism to which Quakers were called. This was further impacted by differences in geography, wealth, and family connections.

Historian David Murray-Rust connects the rise of Evangelical Quakers to the influence of evangelical Methodism which swept the nation in a froth of Revivalism in the 1820s. Murray-Rust describes the two groups of Quakers, “one with an emphasis on evangelism, concerned for the preaching of the Christian doctrine, and welcoming outreach in social activity; the other based on the quiet of the inward life and fearful that insistence on doctrine and on Biblical authority would undermine the truly mystical basis of Quakerism. In fact, each of them had much of the best of true Quakerism, but their differences drew them apart, culminating in America in the serious split of 1827-8.

Not all Yearly Meetings were severely impacted by the schism, but in Philadelphia, the results were devastating. Generally speaking, most of the Meetings in the city declared themselves Orthodox, while most in the country sided with the Hicksites; some approximate that 30% of PYM declared themselves Orthodox and 70% were Hicksite. Orthodox Friends later subdivided themselves into those who agreed with the teachings of Joseph John Gurney (Gurneyites) and John Wilber (Wilburites). London Yearly Meeting only communicated with Orthodox Meetings, which in turn developed improved relations with Presbyterians and Methodists. Hicksites found allies among the Transcendentalists and Unitarians.

Within each Monthly Meeting, there was heartbreak and ill-will as Meetings fractured, with each side claiming to be the "true" Quakers and disownments flying left and right. Some people gave up attending Business Meetings because the rancor was so bitter. Generally, Hicksites tended to pull away from the world and involvement in either doctrinal discussions or social activism. They frequently disowned members who married out of the faith, and cautioned against taking part in non-Quaker activities. Orthodox tended to focus on Bible teachings and seek to implement their teachings through social activism. They frowned on the growing Hicksite idea of following the individual conscience.

The Split of Gwynedd Meeting

There was an early rumble of the growing tensions at Gwynedd in 1823, when Ezra Comfort was charged with "propagating and spreading a report of unsound doctrine against a minister of our religious society "without first informing him of his uneasiness therewith when in company with him." Ezra, and another man, Isaiah Bell, were disowned for their behavior, and their lack of repentance, a few months later. They appealed the disownment to Quarterly Meeting, which confirmed it. Ezra took the matter to Yearly Meeting, which was then run by men who would soon call themselves Orthodox, and who were in sympathy with Ezra and Isaiah's opinions and actions. The Yearly Meeting reversed the disownments.

When the spilt came in 1827, the majority of Gwynedd Friends felt themselves to be Hicksite. The Orthodox minority first tried to use the new Meeting House for their worship and business. According to the eyewitness recollections of George Evans, on the day of the "Separation" Isaiah Bell and Ezra Comfort demanded the use of the meeting house "to hold Gwynedd Monthly Meeting in." Evan Jones told them that the business of Gwynedd Monthly Meeting had already taken place that day, meaning that the Hicksites had gathered and conducted their business in good order. For his part, Evan Jones was unwilling to let them use the building, but he said if they went home with him, he would give them their dinners and they could use a private room in his house to transact any business they wanted. Bell and Comfort declined the offer.

The Orthodox Friends of Gwynedd met formally for the first time at the house of Jesse Spencer in October 1827. From the Minutes of that Meeting:

"Whereas a number of the Members heretofore belonging to our meetings have withdrawn themselves from the Established Order of our Society and joined themselves to a New Yearly Meeting held in the present month and appointed representatives to attend there to, contrary to the Established Order of our Yearly Meeting held in Philadelphia in the 4th month annually and inconsistent with the Order and subordination of its discipline." The Orthodox Friends of Gwynedd then declared themselves the true Quakers.

In the beginning, 20 adults and 23 children withdrew from the Hicksite Gwynedd Meeting. Over the next several years, they visited with the Hicksites and tried to persuade them to join the Orthodox. Anyone who declined the invitation was disowned and the action was recorded in minutes like this: “Ellis Cleaver, Ezekial Cleaver, Solomon Cleaver, John Scotten, and Silas Walton have been severally spoken to for having withdrawn themselves from us and attached themselves to an Association who holds meetings contrary to Discipline and subversive of the good Order and Harmony of our Religious Society.”

Month after month, the list of Friends who sided with the Hicksites grew. The theological split divided families as well as the Meeting. One man, Warder Crefson, left to join the Shakers.

The recorded minutes of Gwynedd Orthodox Friends supply few details about the theological issues which motivated the schism. They supply us with few details of anything. Other than noting the names of those who remained stubbornly Hicksite, the Minutes largely concern themselves with firewood; who would supply it and how it would be paid for.

In 1831, the Orthodox Friends planned to use Jesse Spencer's house for an Orthodox school as Hicksite and Orthodox children were not to be educated together. Two years later, Orthodox Friends changed their mid-week Meeting for Worship from Third to Fifth Day.

Some fresh energy was infused early in 1838 during discussions of fundraising for the Boarding School at Westtown and the possibility of erecting an Orthodox Meeting House with its own burial ground, now that it was clear the Hicksites would not relinquish the building where they worshipped. In Third Month, Trustees were appointed: Edward Foulke, Israel Scott, Jeremiah Walton, Jonathan Roberts, and Jesse Foulke. Two months later, they bought, for $70, “one acre and 26 perches more or less” for property on what was called Penllyn-Norristown Road, not far from Pennlyn Station. By Seventh Month, they bought benches for their new Meeting House.

An indication of what was to come can be seen in the Minutes ten years after the Split. By 1837, Orthodox Friends were no longer recording answers to the Queries. There is no mention of any Orthodox marriages, though we do read of Friends disowned for being married by a Magistrate. In Fifth Month 1844, it was noted that the Clerk had been absent for several months. A committee was appointed “to visit with him and ensure if he can continue to serve.” The Minutes begin to record month after month in which little or no business is conducted.

Then, out of the blue, on 1st month, 1st day, 1852:

"The following report from the Monthly Meeting was received and read in this meeting. The committee appointed to consider the propriety of uniting Gwynedd Preparative Meeting of men and women friends, all having met (except one friend) and deliberately considered the subject do report that way does not open to unite with the proposition of the Quarterly Meeting's committee but in room thereof were united in proposing that the Preparatory Meeting of Gwynedd should be discontinued and the members thereof attached to and be considered members of Plymouth Preparatory Meeting."

The Orthodox Friends of Gwynedd had concluded that their numbers were not sufficient enough to continue. By Fifth Month, 1852, they approved the Minute and formally laid down the Meeting. Those remaining joined with Plymouth Orthodox Meeting. According to Eliza Foulke, a few continued to worship in the Orthodox Meeting house until 1856, when only two old ladies attended.

1834 Philadelphia Yearly Meeting Queries

1st Are all our religious meetings for Worship and Discipline duly attended in the hour observed; are Friends clear of sleeping, and of all other unbecoming behavior therein?

2nd Are love and unity maintained among you? Are tale-bearing and detraction discouraged? And where any differences arise, are endeavors used to speedily end them?

3rd Are friends careful to bring up those under their direction, in plainness of speech, behavior and apparel; in frequently reading the Holy Scriptures; and to restrain them from reading pernicious books, and from the corrupt conversation of the world? And are they good examples in these respects themselves?

4th Are Friends careful to discourage the unnecessary distillation and use of spiritous liquors, and the frequently of taverns; to avoid places of diversion and to keep in true moderation and temperance on the account of marriages, burials, and all other occasions?

5th Are poor Friends necessities duly inspected, and they relieved or assisted in such business as they are capable of? Do their children freely partake of learning to fit them for business; and are they and other Friends' children placed among Friends?

6th Do you maintain a faithful testimony against oaths; an hireling ministry; bearing arms, training, and other military services; being concerned in any fraudulent or clandestine trade; buying or vending goods so imported, or prize goods; and against encouraging lotteries of any kind?

7th Are Friends careful to live within the bounds of their circumstances, and to keep to moderation in their trade or business? Are they punctual to their promises, and just in the payment of their debts; and are such as give reasonable grounds for fear on these accounts, timely labored with for their preservation and recovery?

8th Do you take due care regularly to deal with all offenders in the spirit of meekness, without partiality or unnecessary delay, in order for their help; and where such labor is ineffectual, to place judgment upon them, in the authority of Truth?

Quietism

Friends felt it important to preserve a tradition of distinctness from "the world". Such distinctions included plainness of dress, amounting almost to a uniform, and "plainness of speech", especially illustrated by the use of "thee" and "thou" instead of "you". (This continued in some Friends’ families well into the 20th century.) Orthodox Quakers, often called "plain Quakers", persisted in their opposition to music.

While friends became more insular, the world around them picked up pace. In 1855, The North Penn Railroad opened Gwynedd Station. Three trains ran daily. From Gwynedd Station, stages ran to Doylestown, Bethlehem and Kulpsville.

Underground Railroad

It has proved impossible to document any role Gwynedd played in the freeing of slaves. This does not prove there was no involvement. Aiding escaped slaves was a personal decision often done without telling friends or family. If we look to Gwynedd's sister meetings, we get a sense of the region's activity, and by examining a few of the lives of Gwynedd’s members, we learn a bit more.

Historian Charles Blockson described Plymouth Meeting as "a predominantly Quaker village” where Quaker families "operated a fugitive slave station. "Along with several Underground Railroad stations in Plymouth Meeting, there was built in 1858 the Abolition Hall where Lucretia Mott, among others, spoke. In those days, Plymouth was a Preparatory Meeting whose members conducted business with members of Gwynedd, with Business Meeting alternating between the two meeting houses. It seems likely that the documented Underground Railroad activity of Plymouth extended to undocumented stations in Gwynedd.

Norristown was another Preparatory Meeting joined under the care of Gwynedd Monthly Meeting for Business, and its members enjoyed a great deal of fellowship with Gwynedd. Norristown became a station on the Underground Railroad in 1839 when the first meeting of the Anti-Slavery Society was held there. This branch of the Railroad was said to have 15 - 20 slaves in transit at any one time.

Ezra Comfort and his friend Peter Dager, a well-known Plymouth Meeting member of the Underground Railroad, rushed to Norristown in 1829 to buy the freedom of two slaves who had been captured in Dager's stable. We know that Joseph Foulke, principal of the boarding school, had strong abolitionist sentiments from reading his 1841 tract. Bartholomew Fussell, raised at Gwynedd, was one of the signers of the famous Declaration of Sentiments of the American Anti-Slavery Society on December 6, 1833.

A house in the Eureka region of Montgomery Township owned by the Roberts family for several generations was recently found to have a hidden, second cellar like those used by other houses on the Underground Railroad. And finally, Eliza Foulke recalls her grandmother's stories that the large mound next to the Orthodox Meeting House was in fact a cave used to hide slaves.

[additional comments on this section by James Quinn, 2006, Gwynedd Historian -- The home of George Lukens (1768-1849) in Towamencin was an important stop on the Underground Railroad perhaps earlier than 1820. Hundreds of escaped slaves were helped on their way north at this home. After his death, his son Seth Lukens carried on the work of his father with the help of two of his brother in laws, Charles Todd Jenkins (married to Lukens' sister) of Hatfield and Dr. James Hamer (brother of Lukens' wife) of Skippack up until the Civil War.

Here is one story found in Ellwood Roberts' biographies: as related by William Taylor of Upper Providence: JOHN AND JANE FRENCH. -"John and Jane French, with their little boy two years old, were slaves in Maryland. Like many others they had heard of a place in the north where they might be free if they could get there, and they resolved to make the effort. They had been told there were people in Pennsylvania who would help them. They came to Oxford and then by the Underground Railroad through Downingtown, Lionville and Kimberton, from William Fussell and to my place. I saw at once that it was a very important case and one that required prompt action. We put them in a room, no one but my wife knowing they were in the house. I went to see Edwin H. Coates, told him what I had in charge, and asked him to accompany me that night on our journey, which he readily agreed to. I directed my hired man to have the horses so they might be used if needed, and when Edwin arrived after all had one to bed we started for George Lukens', Kulpsville. We arrived just at dawn and were very kindly received. We returned about noon, our absence having excited some remark. None suspected where we had been except a fugitive slave who was living with me at the time. As soon as we left George Lukens took his charge to William H. Johnson's, Bucks County. They arrived in the evening, when Jane told them she could go no further. They fixed up a room for her and made her as comfortable as possible. The next morning she had a fine baby boy, which she named William Taylor. To part with these people and receive their simple expressions of thanks is more precious than silver or gold."

Considering that almost everyone in the upper reaches of Gwynedd meeting (Towamencin, Hatfield, Upper Gwynedd) was related to the Lukens and Jenkins family at this time, its hard to believe that they would have proceeded without a lot of support and the community, both Quaker and non-Quaker would have had to at least have turned a blind eye to what was going on.

Just across the Schuylkill River in the Phoenixville area lived Benjamin Fussell, one of the best known abolitionists in Pennsylvania. Near him lived the three Lewis sisters (one of whom was married to Edward Fussell above) who ran another major stop on the underground railroad. The Lukens farm was about midway between the Lewis farm and the stops in Bucks County - Richard Moore's at Quakertown or earlier, William Johnson in Buckingham. The Fussells were related in various ways to the Foulke family, as were the Corsons in Plymouth and Richard Moore in Quakertown. This interconnected network made the underground railroad a family affair in central Montgomery County and Richland.

Given what Laurie Anderson wrote above about activity in Plymouth plus what I have added here about Gwynedd Prepatory Meeting, it is safe to say that Gwynedd Monthly Meeting, which at that time included Plymouth and Providence meetings was a hotbed of abolitionists and underground railroad activity. George and Seth Lukens and Charles Todd Jenkins today sleep in the Gwynedd Friends Burial Ground.]

Civil War

The Society of Friends never completely agreed about the best way to end slavery. While all acknowledged the evil of slavery, responses ranged from soft-spoken attempts to convince slaveholders of the evil of their ways, to economic boycotts, to active participation in the Underground Railroad.

As the Civil War started, Friends were forced to weigh the Peace Testimony against their individual opposition to slavery. Some Quakers volunteered for the Union Army. After Congress passed the Conscription Act of 1863, Friends were required to pay a $300 commutation fee, or hire a substitute to fight for them. This was not well received. A revision to the law in 1864 allowed religious objectors to serve in hospitals or with freedmen, or to direct payment of their commutation fee to medical work. Some saw this compromise as ideal; others were troubled by any cooperation with the War Department.

Friends viewed military service in the Civil War differently than they had the Revolutionary War. The reasons for this were several. The great evil of slavery was, for some, a justification strong enough for the breaching of the Peace Testimony. Within the Hicksite branch, there was a growing understanding that individuals should be governed by conscience, not other or outside authority. If a Friend felt compelled to take up arms, there were those who would sanction that. While there are no hard figures on number of Quakers who served, more of them came from the Hicksite than from the Orthodox branch.

As with the issue of aiding slaves, there is little official recorded in Meeting Minutes about the Civil War. Towards the end, there was mention of a Friend who had gone to war, but who was now home and wanted to be reconciled with Friends. In 1869, four years after the end of the war, the subject is suddenly broached with dignified language. One is tempted to speculate that the issue had been discussed for a great while until the Meeting could unify in support of this Minute:

“Under a deep sense of gratitude to the Giver of every good and perfect gift that the desolating scourge of war has been staid, that peace has been restored to our land, that human slavery has been abolished, and the oppressed of this class set free, and that our liberties as a people remain unimpaired; and being deeply solicitous that all within our borders may be brought near to each other in feeling, that love and unity may abound and Christian charity be manifested in our social and religious intercourse sympathizing with each other in the many and varied difficulties, trials and temptations that have surrounded us, incident to the past condition of our Country involving many in a greater or less degree, in a violation of our discipline and testimonies, and that so far as there exists any offence or offences against any or our members growing out of the condition of things referred to, that the mantle of forgiveness be spread over them and that they be remembered no more. Trusting that in future there may be a greater faithfulness manifested in the maintenance of our testimony to peace, that by precept and example we may convincingly demonstrate that we are subjects of the Messiah’s peaceful reign.” (italics added)

Without naming names or pointing fingers, the Meeting forgave any member of involvement in the War and turned its eyes to the future.

[Additional comments by James Quinn, Gwynedd Historian, 2006: It's probably a good thing that they forgave, since from the number of Civil War veterans buried at Quaker cemeteries in Abington Quarter, I suspect many if not most men of fighting age in Hicksite meetings in Montgomery County and at Richland volunteered to fight in that war in 1861.]

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