Immanuel Evangelical Lutheran Church, Clay, NY

HISTORIC IMMANUEL

Last week, Al and I went to a three-day symposium on the History of Transportation Along the Mohawk Valley. There were ten speakers and, of course, I became acquainted with the speaker on the Palatine Churches, whose name is Kate Weller*. The following is the introduction to her talk:
“The Palatines of the Mohawk River Valley built several buildings for religious meetings and worship during the eighteenth century. When erected, between 1764 and 1789, the churches that survived into the early twenty-first century resembled each other. They were rectangular, stone of wood from structures, with a meetinghouse style plan, and either a gabled or gambrel roof. An entrance was located on one of the long sides of the building. During the nineteenth century, a transformation in the culture of the Mohawk Valley and in the congregations themselves, brought about modernization to the buildings.
“The Palatines came from the southwestern section of Germany, primarily from one of the principalities within the Rhineland (Palatinate). After years of warfare beginning with the Thirty Years War in 1618, the Palatines began to emigrate from Germany. AT the same time that Germans wanted to leave their homeland, rumors began to circulate that Queen Anne wanted to give land away in America. English officials were attempting to lure new settlers from other countries to populate frontier colonies and provide a much-needed work force. Over three thousand Palatines came to New York in ‘the first large-scale attempt at artificial seeding.’ They helped populate the frontier regions of New York along the Mohawk Valley to create a buffer between the English and Native Americans.”
In 1712, a number of families bought land from the Kanien’Kehake (Mohawks) along the Mohawk River. The Mohawk Valley became a destination for the German settlers. Despite the dangers of frontier life, they saw the Mohawk Valley as a final location for them to own their own land.
“The earliest religious services held by the Palatines in this region were probably inside the houses of different settlers. The impermanent nature of their situation first along the Hudson River and later in Schoharie did not provide time or energy for the construction of religious structures. Local traditions give some ideas to the particulars of the early buildings used for services. They suggest that services were originally situated in the minister’s house, or that of different congregation members. Within a few generations, the construction of a number of churches began. The first churches were probably log structures simple in design and very close to appearance to the houses of these early settlers. The actual appearance of the first churches build in the Mohawk Valley is unknown. Their log construction made them temporary and they did not survive.
“The next generation of religious structures, also built during the eighteenth century, utilized stone construction. The exception, Indian Castle Church, which used timber frame construction, was built as an Anglican mission church rather than a Dutch Reformed or Lutheran Church. These buildings were not churches in the modern sense of the word; they were meetinghouses used for both secular and religious purposes. A number of churches from this group survive into the twenty-first century. Originally, there was probably a church in each of the Palatine Centers. Snells Bush, Stone Arabia, Fonda, Herkimer, German Flats, Indian Castle and Palatine Bridge all originally had meetinghouses. The only buildings to survive into the twenty-first century are at Stone Arabia, Indian Castle, German Flats and Palatine Bridge. Images of the existing churches first appear in the nineteenth century.”
Many of Clay’s and Immanuel’s ancestors worshipped in these churches. Many people at the Symposium had their names. There was such a loyalty of these people to their Great-great grandparents and their lineage. Most of the standing Churches are now museums and Archives of Church History. Remember, after the Revolutionary War, many pioneers moved west and that is how Clay became a Palatine Center with Immanuel as the oldest Church in Clay.
*Although not a direct descendant of Robert Weller, she is related further back from those who lived in Pennsylvania.

Dorothy Heller, Historian