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From: "Merle Rummel" <>
Subject: Re: [BRE] Brethren "significance" and national significance
Date: Tue, 28 Jun 2011 06:01:11 -0400


The Whiskey Rebellion was prominent in this county. Is there a way I
could
talk about Brethren intolerance of alcohol but as well, whiskey was
cheaper
to ship east than was the grain? Or did Brethren report stills to the
authorties?

Brethren, including ministers and Elders, had whiskey stills. Those that
did, normally had flour mills. The frontier miller would take half of the
grain as payment for milling, but since almost all families had farms and
grew their own grain, there was little sale for the excess grain (flour).
The common solution was to make it into whiskey, which had a large sale.

There was little "shipping" of the whiskey, it was sold locally. Few
Brethren drank whiskey, they did believe in "Temperance" (which in that
time meant "not too much" - not total prohibition as it is now interpreted
as). The Brethren did use several Wines (Apple, Peach, etc) and hard Cider
(2% alcohol - in order to preserve it for use over a whole year - otherwise
it turned to Apple Cider Vinegar - I have found it normal for families to
use 10 barrels of Hard Cider a year). The "temperance movement" came some
years later -about 1850). The Brethren decided to eliminate wine from the
Communion Service some 30 years later.

Migration to far western Pennsylvania (became Washington Co) began
following the French and Indian War. You would need to check the families
(cemetery names) to find when they "came west". I have a number of
families who came on to Kentucky. I will now need to check the Wise name.
I did not include that family in my original research. I only recorded the
marriage of Elizabeth Miller, daughter of Jacob Miller and Catherine
Minnick, to Henry Wise. They came to the Bullskin area of Clermont Co OH.
I did not check on the parentage of Henry. Could you give me some of the
other names?

It was 1751 when the Eckerlin brothers moved from Dunker Bottom, on the New
River, Virginia, and went to the Monongahela River (Dunker's Creek) on the
Virginia (West Virginia)-Pennsylvania border. They were taken captive to
Quebec. They were Ephrata Brethren, who objected to the Superintendant
Conrad Beisel, and traveled "400 miles toward the setting sun" in 1745,
moving on about the time of a Shawnee Indian incursion on the New River.

.Merle C Rummel


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