Settling Berne's History
"Our Heritage," the history of Berne produced by the Town of Berne
Bicentennial Commission in 1977, begins: "As nearly as can be determined. it
was 1750 when Jacob Weidman led a small band of settlers along an old Indian
trail through the Helderbergs. Weidman, Ball, Bassler, Deitz, Hochstrasser,
Knieskern, and Zeh - where or how did they meet? Probably we shall never
know."
This story of the settlement of Berne was basically taken from "The History
of Albany County, NY," written by Howell and Tenny in 1886. One difference
between the two versions is that Howell and Tenny also listed a Shultes
family as traveling with these earliest arrivals. "Our Heritage" left the
family off the list because they knew that Mathias Shultes, the patriarch of
the family, was only ten years old at the time. Interestingly enough, as
explained below, he is the only one on the Howell and Tenny list that
actually arrived with Jacob Weidman!
A careful study of the genealogy of these early Berne families reveals that
these early settlers arrived individually over a period of more than two
decades. The purpose of this article is to cite one or two records for each
family that led to this conclusion, and to provide more precise information,
if possible, about when each of these families actually arrived in what is
now Berne.
In 1710 the British brought hundreds of Palatine refugees from Germany to
settle their New World colonies. They were initially confined to work camps
along the Hudson River, and made to produce pitch pine tar to make
watertight the ships of the British Navy. When this project failed in 1712,
many of these families moved to the Schoharie Valley, where they were
welcomed by the local Mohawks. Among these first European settlers in
Schoharie were the Knieskerns and Zehs, some of whose children or
grandchildren later moved a few miles east to Berne; so these two families
were already in the general area long before Jacob Weidman arrived in 1750.
William Barker, in his "Early Families of Schoharie," says that Jacob
Weidman was undoubtedly the Hans Jacob Weidman, born in Switzerland 22
October 1720, son of Felix, who was unmarried when he emigrated from Bachs,
Switzerland to America circa 1738-43. Jacob's marriage record to Elisabetha
(Dietz) Shultes was recorded in 1743 in Greene County. Their first three
children were born before 1750 in the Catskill area, whereas the baptism of
their fourth child was recorded in Schoharie in 1751. With them when they
moved to Berne was Jacob's 10 year old stepson, Mathias Shultes. A deed
drawn up and signed by Jacob Weidman refers to Mathias as the son of his
wife, Elisabetha.
Jacob Weidman built a milldam above the falls on Fox Creek in what is now
the hamlet of Berne. This powered a sawmill he constructed below the falls.
His son Peter added a gristmill. The 1787 survey map shows the house in
which he and the family of his son Peter lived as being on the bank of the
millpond. The house built by Jacob Weidman Jr. on Tabor Road is still lived
in by his descendants.
Weidman may have moved from Greene County to be nearer his wife's family. As
evidenced by numerous marriage and baptism records in the Schoharie
churches, some of her brothers and sisters had moved to the area from the
Catskill region as early as 1740. I believe that the Dietz brothers
initially settled on land on the east side of a small knoll half way between
the present hamlets of Berne and West Berne, where a Van Rensselaer survey
map shows Johan Jost Deitz living in 1787. On the west side was a large
beaver pond formed by a dam on Fox Creek. Its prominence caused the area to
be called "the Beaverdam." About 1765 a small log church was built on the
knoll. This was "The Reformed Protestant Dutch [German] Church of the
Beaverdam." Today it is the site of the Berne and Beaverdam Cemetery.
A study of baptism, marriage records, and the 1787 map leads me to conclude
that between Weidman's mills and the Dietzes lived Peter Ball. Peter was
eleven years old in 1710 when he and his parents immigrated with the other
Palatine refugees brought by the British. His father died of disease on the
sea journey. Young Peter and his widowed mother are not listed in the 1716
census of the early settlers of Schoharie. Because of the intermarriages
between the Ball and Dietz families, and the baptisms sponsors of their
children, it suggests that by 1740 Ball had settled on the flats below Berne
next to the Dietz family. Two of his children married his Dietz neighbors.
Peter's son Johannes, born 1724 in Princetown, Schenectady County, married
Maria Dietz in 1747, showing conclusively he was in the area before Weidman
arrived in 1750. Since there was no church in the Beaverdam, the marriage
was recorded in Schoharie.
Although based on my research I have concluded that the Ball and Dietz /
Deitz families were living in the Berne area by 1740, undoubtedly no records
will ever be produced to prove this, or to show where they actually built
their homesteads. In this short article it is impossible to present all of
documentation to support my conclusions. That will have to await the
publication of a detailed presentation, and lengthy interpretation, of the
supporting baptismal and marriage records.
Frederick Bassler immigrated from Basil, Switzerland in 1749 and settled
first in Philadelphia. There, he took as his second wife the widow Margaret
Leip, who had two sons by her first husband. Since the 1753 birth of
Frederick Bassler Jr. was recorded in Philadelphia, the Bassler family could
not have arrived at the Beaverdam with the Weidman family in 1750. In 1758
the Frederick Bassler family settled in what is now the Town of Knox. With
them were her two sons, John and George Leip / Leib who later settled on an
adjoining farm.
Jacob Hochstrasser was born in Germany about 1730. When in 1775 one of his
daughters married a son of Jacob Weidman, the family was likely living just
east of the Weidman's lands, between what are now the hamlets of Berne and
East Berne. Still, the only Hochstrassers shown on the 1787 Van Rensselaer
survey map are Jacob's son's Paul and Balthazar living near what is now East
Township, in the Town of Knox. Balthazar's 1786 Schenectady marriage record
to Catherine Achenbach, says he was born in Germany. Since he was born in
1764 his father could not have come to Berne with Jacob Weidman in 1750.
Balthazar's brother Paul was baptized in 1765 in the Reformed Church in
Albany. Other baptism records show they lived in Albany and Guilderland for
several years before moving to Berne.
The first known map to show the location of the Beaverdam community is dated
1757. Thompson's Lake is to the east of the settlement. Houses are indicated
to have existed between Jacob Weidman's house on his Millpond and where West
Berne is now located, as well as in Schoharie and below the Helderberg
escarpment. The lack of houses elsewhere on the Helderberg plateau confirms
that the first settlers in Berne homesteaded the desirable flatlands below
the present hamlet, rather than along the top of the escarpment.
For the first fifty years or more the community was called the
Beaverdam. When the Town was organized in 1795 it was named Bern; there are
no earlier records with this name. Assuming Jacob Weidman was still alive at
the time, at age 75 he would have been one of the oldest and most prominent
citizens. He may well have suggested naming the new town after the capital
of his homeland, Switzerland.
In summary, the story of Jacob Weidman leading a small group of weary
settlers to Berne is apocryphal. We will never know which family was the
earliest arrival. It well could have been one of the other early Berne
settlers, such as Johannes Fischer, Anthony Engle, or Nicholas Ecker, all of
whom also squatted on land owned by the Van Rensselaer family on the flats
between Berne and West Berne.
Euretha W. Stapleton, the Historian for the Town of Berne at the time of the
publication of Our Heritage, wrote in the Foreword: "The editors and authors
of this volume recognize that a history such as this is never complete or
perfectly accurate. It is our hope that in time other sources and documents
will be discovered and the material added to our archives so that future
generations will benefit."
Now that additional information is known about when various early settlers
arrived, the teaching of the history of Berne in the public school should be
revised to reflect this.
For the genealogy of the early settlers of Berne, Knox and other Hilltown
families, see the Berne Families Genealogy posted on the Berne History
Project web site at www.Bernehistory.org
Harold Miller
Berne History Project
******************************************
Published in the Altamont Enterprise - Summer 2004
|