It is generally but incorrectly believed that Georgia was a debtor colony. To be sure, among its other goals the colony aimed to help the down-and-out of England; yet, on the first ship to Georgia, the Ann, whose passengers were well recorded, there were no debtors. The Trustees, the benevolent founders of the colony, had paid off the debts of the few who owed any. What is not generally known is that for some time the English in Georgia were a minority, outnumbered by German-speaking colonists.
Today, two and a half centuries after their ancestors settled in Georgia, the following families are listed in the Savannah telephone directory: Arnsdorf, Blackwelder (Schwarzwälder), Burckhalter, Burgstiner, Dasher, Densler, Exley, Geiger, Gnann, Griner, Groover, Grovenstine, Grover, Gruber, Gugel, Geidt, Gelmly, Hinely, Kessler, Kieffer, Meyer, Mingeldorf, Nease, Neidlinger, Nongasser, Rahn, Reiter, Rentz, Rieser, Schubdrine, Seckinger, Shearouse, Snyder, Stine, Swiger, Walthour, Wannamaker, Whitenour, Wideman, Winkler, Wisenbaker, Youngblood, Zeagler, Zettler, Ziegler, Zipperer, and Zittrauer. Nearly all of these families are descended from ancestors who came to Georgia before 1752, traveling from Austria and the immediately surrounding parts of Switzerland and the Germany princedoms. Many other families are also descended from settlers from the same area, but their surnames have been so anglicized that they are unrecognizable as originally German. These German surnames are also borne by some black families whose ancestors may have belonged to German settlers.
The surprising thing is that histories of Georgia make little mention of these German-speaking colonists even though for a while they were the most numerous and most successful element of the colonial population. One reason for this neglect was the colonial officials' ignorance of the Germans and their language. Another is that many of the historical documents are written in German—in an ancient and difficult script—and are housed in the archives of the Francke Foundation, a missionary and educational institution in Halle in East Germany. Since an avowed purpose of the Georgia Trustees was to establish a haven for persecuted Protestants, it is understandable that so many Austrian, Swiss, and other German-speaking settlers came to Georgia.
Religious persecution and invitation to Georgia
The persecuted Protestants in question were chiefly Lutherans, who were being expelled from their Alpine homeland in Salzburg. This province, now in the republic of Austria, was then a sovereign realm ruled by Archbishop Leopold Anton Eleutherius von Firmian. Like most of his predecessors, he was a worldly minded prelate who had paid dearly for his archbishopric and was determined to regain his outlay at the expense of this downtrodden farmers, cattle raisers, lumbermen, and salt and silver miners. Unlike his predecessors, he was also determined to rid himself of his heretical subjects.
When Luther broke from the Church of Rome in 1521, his followers carried the Reformation into all corners of German-speaking Europe. They were warmly received in Salzburg. In time a majority of the Salzburgers were Protestant, but only until the reigning archbishop realized the threat to his rule and eradicated the heresy from the city of Salzburg and its surrounding areas. Despite constant persecution, the Lutherans high up in the mountains, particularly in the Pongau, continued to practice
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