SENN AND FESSMAN FAMILIES
Paper read by Joseph D.
Senn at the First Annual Reunion of the Senn-Fessman families
at the home of S. Gee in the Town of Verona, Oneida County, N.Y., on May 30th,
1904.
At the foot of the Alps, along the
banks of the Rhine, under sunny skies, lie the vine clad hills of Alsace. The
inhabitants are of German blood and many years ago this territory comprised
one of the numerous principalities of Germany. Its soil is, all things
considered, the most productive in the world. It is commonly known as
the garden spot of Europe. Lying as it does between Germany and France
it has always been coveted and often fiercely fought for by these rival nations. Most
of the battles between France and Germany have been fought on this soil and
one of the grim jokes current in Alsace is that the extreme productiveness
of its soil is due to the amount of blood with which it has been drenched. About
two hundred years ago Alsace was ceded to France and remained a French Province
until 1870 when at the end of the Franco-Prussian War it was wrested from France
and against the wishes of its people became a part of the German Empire.
During the period of the French
rule the people of Alsace, in spite of the traditional hatred between the Germans
and the French, gradually became greatly attached to France and latterly were
said to be more radically anti-German in their sympathies than the French themselves.
Never was the magnanimity of the
French Nation more graciously displayed than in its treatment of the Alsatians. They
were never treated as conquered subjects, but rather as specially favored children. No
attempt was made to coerce them into the use of the French language and they
were allowed to retain their own institutions of learning and religion, both
greatly at variance with those of France. Nothing was exacted
from them except their fair proportion of the taxes for the support of the
nation and army. This was gladly and freely furnished by the Alsatians
and the French greatly appreciated the brave and sturdy stock which they were
always able to draw from the Province. Through the dark days of the Bourbon
rule, in the darker days of the French Revolution, during the brilliant career
of Napoleon and the splendor of the Empire, continuing on through the Restoration
until the end of the last war with Germany, the Alsatians steadfastly remained
loyal, true and favored children of the French Nation. In every one of
the many wars waged by France the sons of Alsace fought side by side with those
of France and performed many signal deeds of valor on many fields of battle. Two
of Napoleon’s staff were Alsatians as was a large proportion of the Imperial
Guard. On the plains of Austerlitz, on the retreat from Moscow, and when
the sun of the Austerlitz went down forever at Waterloo; at the siege and capture
of Sebastopol, at Sedan and at Metz many thousands of Alsatians attested with
their lives their devotion to their good and indulgent foster mother, the French
Nation. With reluctance and bitterness and yielding to a force which
they were unable to resist, they were compelled to sever this relation and
submit themselves to the harsh rule and extreme exactions of their German conquerors. With
deep sorrow, humiliated and helpless, France consented to the separation, but
she only awaits her opportunity. In a public square in Paris is a beautiful
and costly statue. It is the figure of a weeping maiden, representing
Alsace. This figure is continually draped in mourning and will so remain
until Alsace is again restored to France.
At
the time of the American Revolution France had not yet begun to decline. It
was the foremost nation in the world in matters of education, civilization,
and general progress. The sublime
courage of the American colonies in their seemingly hopeless struggle against
the giant power of Great Britain had enlisted the sympathies of many high-minded
Frenchmen conspicuous among who was the young Marquis LaFayette, who raised
an army and came to America and rendered distinguished services to the American
cause. Among the soldiers who enlisted under him were many Alsatians. One
of them, George Senn, served with the French forces operating with the Americans
against the British, until the close of the war. But when his comrades
returned to France, he remained with the idea of seeking his fortune in this
country.
It would be more flattering to family
pride to assume that he had come here entirely on account of his sympathies
with the Americans ,but due regard to the truth compels the admission that
love of adventure and a vague idea that a fortune could be made, had much to
do with his decision to come to this country. Concerning his career in
this country after the war little is definitely known. He was in Philadelphia
for a time and then went South, having last been heard from in South Carolina. His
letters to the people at home were at first regular, but they gradually became
irregular and less frequent until finally they ceased altogether. After
this his family lost all trace of him.
But this was in the time when fabulous
and marvelous stories were being told of great fortunes to be made in the New
World, and hence extravagant stories reached his family concerning the marvelous
wealth which he was supposed to have accumulated. Whether these stories were
the product of the optimistic vagaries of the day, sincerely told and naturally
enlarged, or whether they were the inventions of some practical joker, we may
never know and can only surmise. At any rate the belief that he
had a fortune was to a certain extent shared by his children and handed down
to his grandchildren.
Among these grandchildren were three young
men, Martin Senn, Jacob Senn and Frederick Senn. They were the sons of
George Senn, a saddler by trade, a man of iron will, of strict morality, highly
religious, a Calvinist by profession and a zealous defender of his faith. While
he was a strict, and in some respects, a harsh disciplinarian, he was, nevertheless,
in the highest degree devoted to his family and labored earnestly and hard
for their welfare. In the year 1830 he was a man of advanced age. He
had lived through the reigns of several kings and had seen the rise and fall
of several political dynasties, including that of Napoleon and the Empire.
He had become a man of hard common sense and had long since outgrown and disclaimed
the delusion about his father’s fortune, a delusion, by the way, which
never lasted any of the Senns who entertained it, beyond the period of youthful
adolescence.
In addition to the three sons named, and
with whom this history has chiefly to do, George Senn had other
sons and daughters comprising a large family; Frederick the youngest being
20 years of age and Jacob being a few years older. Martin, still older
brother, had already gone to America after having served a regular term in
the French army. At this time 2/5 of all able bodied Frenchmen were required
to serve in the army and they were drawn by lot. Jacob had drawn a blank
and Frederick had not yet been required to draw. The two latter were
still in the age of romance and fond delusion. They wanted to go
to America and seek for traces of their grandfather. They doubtless
had other reasons but this was one of them. They earnestly urged
their father to advance to them a portion of their patrimony so as to enable
them to undertake this journey. Their father was very reluctant to do
so but still he could see that his farm was too small to furnish employment
for all his sons and after much debating and hesitation he consented. To
go upon such an undertaking was no small matter and it required resolution
as well as money. After all arrangements had been made and their aged
parents bowed with grief at the prospect of their departure they suddenly decided
not to go and so announced to their father, an announcement that greatly pleased
their parents and it is said that for several days the old farmer went about
with such buoyant, sprightly steps that it seemed as if he had grown young
again. But after a time the spirit of unrest again seized upon the young men
and this time their determination could not be shaken. On a bright spring day
they sailed from the port of Havre and after a stormy voyage, lasting 73 days,
they reached the city of Philadelphia. Here they made inquiries of persons
they had known or been referred to in the old country concerning their grandfather.
They could only learn that he had gone south, some said to South Carolina,
but nothing more definite could be learned and they soon realized the utter
hopelessness of pursuing the inquiry.
They then decided to journey to the Town
of Verona in the County of Oneida and State of New York where several of their
relatives and many of their countrymen had already gone and found a home. They
made most of their journey on foot. Their money, which was in coin, they
carried in round hollow belts securely strapped about their bodies. After
a few days’ journey, during which they several times narrowly escaped
being robbed, they reached the agriculture districts of Pennsylvania in the
midst of the grain harvest. Here they easily secured employment at good
wages and good board in return for hard work. The rapid strenuous work and
long hours seriously told upon their power of endurance, being in strong contrast
to the slow and steady gait to which they had been accustomed on their Alsatian
farm.
In the place of the simple diet
to which they had been accustomed, there was everything that could tempt the
palate. In the place of their mildly stimulating and invigorating Rhine wine
they were furnished with a jug of whiskey to which all were told to help themselves.
The result was that many laborers suffered sunstroke and others were carried
from the field from exhaustion and from other causes which may be guessed. Neither
of the two brothers suffered from this cause, for while they had been brought
up in the belief that wine was one of God’s best gifts to his children,
they had nevertheless been instructed in lessons of temperance and they wisely
abstained from the fiery beverage which was offered them by the Pennsylvania
farmers and so it came about that before the end of the harvest their employers
saw that they made up in reliability what they lacked in swiftness.
After the harvest they resumed their
journey, traveling on foot by day and stopping at wayside taverns at night. They
used to give their money to landlords for safe keeping. One morning when they
called for their money the landlord, a tough looking citizen, looked at them
blankly saying that they had not left any money with him. At first they
thought he was joking but soon the landlord became angry and threatened them
with arrest if they did not instantly settle their bills and leave his house. They
were in a strange land far from home and with no other money. Realizing
their desperate plight they began by coaxing and ended up with threats. The
perspiration of despair began to break from them and when they were almost
frenzied with anger and fear the landlord gave them their money and said he
had done this to teach them never again to be so foolish as to give their money
to entire strangers. After this they wore their belts about them in bed.
One night they slept in a village
where there was only one tavern. There was only one bedroom and in this
there were a large number of beds. They occupied a bed together, and
the other beds were occupied by the roughest appearing lot of men they had
ever seen. In the morning Jacob found that his belt had been worn through
and his money was all in the bed. To pick it up in the presence of those
forbidding strangers seemed a dangerous thing, for in those days coin was scarce
to this country. But they were not assaulted or robbed. They had always
looked with disfavor upon the American paper currency, which did not seem like
money, but now they saw its advantage and at the first opportunity had their
coin changed into paper money.
They stopped at Geneva for a time and
worked at their saddler trade and finally reached Verona with more money than
they had when they left Philadelphia. They made a journey to Peterboro,
going one day and returning the next, and there they met the great abolitionist
and philanthropist, Gerrit Smith, and purchased their land of him.
On this land, on which we are now assembled,
they settled, first living in a log house which was after a time replaced by
a frame dwelling. Jacob was married to Margaretha Schneider and Frederick
to Mary Fessman, and for a time the families lived together in one house and
worked the farm in common. Afterwards it was decided to divide the farm
and the house as well. The farm was cut into two halves and a partition
was built through the center of the house at right angles with the highway
upon which the house fronted. This so remained until after the decease
of Frederick Senn when the premises were sold to George Senn, a son of Jacob
Senn, and the original farm with other parcels which had been purchased by
both parties, was again united.
Martin Senn also purchased land in the
Town of Verona and erected a log house which he occupied as long as he remained
on the farm. He was married soon after settling here to AnnaFessman,a
sister of Mary Fessman. All three Senn brothers who came here
lived to ripe old age and left numerous descendants. They were men of
character, and if any of us are lacking in that regard it cannot be attributed
to our ancestry.
The Senns and the Fessmans were so interwoven in marriage that a history of the one is incomplete without a history of the other.
In the Village of Geithertheim near the historic
city of Strassburg in Alsace there lived about seventy years ago a cabinet
maker, Michael Fessman, who was noted far and wide for his peculiar sense of
humor and for his skillful workmanship. He was also the village undertaker
and thought it great fun to put one of the children to bed in one of the coffins
which he had made. If he had a fault it was that he sometimes carried
a joke too far. In his country he was considered to be well to do. In
addition to his cabinet business, which was considered lucrative, he had a
small farm and a very valuable vineyard. An idea of the value of lands
in Alsace may be derived from the fact that he sold his land, being about 17
acres, for 35000 francs or about $7500.
He had no delusions about ancestors, but from what
I can learn he was deluded in the belief that he could do better financially
in this country than in his own. At any rate he was taken with the American
fever, sold all his belongings and brought his family to this Country.
From New York they made the journey up the Hudson
River as far as Albany and thence by packet boat to New London in the Town
of Verona. There he and his family consisting of his wife and five children
were installed in the tavern, which I believe was then owned by L.D. Smith,
and boarded there while he negotiated for the purchase of land. This
was consummated in a short time, he buying a farm and paying in gold and silver
coin which he carried in a ponderous bag. While staying at the tavern
their meals were served in their rooms. On a Sunday afternoon
the landlord came to their room with smiling face and carrying a large pan
of sweet corn with a plate of nice sweet butter, saying he had brought them
something good. Grandfather Fessman was not quite sure whether the landlord’s
intentions were really benevolent or whether he thought that he and his family,
being foreigners, should be fed on hogs feed, which he considered the corn
to be. At any rate he did not want the hogs feed and accordingly he set one
of the girls out of the window and had her carry the corn to the pigs. The
butter was retained.
After purchasing a farm he also purchased
farming implements, horses, cows, and all the necessary equipments of a farm. If
the farm was less fertile than the one he had left in the old country it was
certainly many times larger and he no doubt felt himself a considerable land
proprietor. Among other things, he bought a fine pair of spirited
colts, and he was very proud of their speed, especially their running qualities. This
was in the days of horseback riding. When he had been in this country
about three months, after he had filed the necessary declaration of intention,
preliminary to naturalization, which was necessary to enable him to hold the
land,he was visited at his farm by Martin Ullrich, an Alsatian who had been
in the country for a few years. Ullrich was, like him, a man very fond
of a joke, especially the practical kind. Ullrich was on horseback and,
he too, had a colt of which he was very proud. The consequence was that
each claimed to have the better colt and a race was decided upon to see which
could first reach a given point. Away they went at a breakneck rate and
with the recklessness characteristic of both riders. Grandfather Fessman
rode his horse close to a rock which was at the side of the road. Suddenly
his colt shied and he, being a large portly man, was thrown from his horse,
his neck broken and he died almost instantly. His wife was left with
five small children, a widow in a strange land. She is the only grandparent
I have ever personally known. She has long since gone to her eternal
rest, but looking back over a long lapse of years, I will say that I am proud
of her.
With the courage of a Spartan she undertook
the task of caring for her property and bringing up her family. Before
she had time to recover from the shock of her husband’s death, her fortitude
was put to a new trial. A neighbor, whose farm adjoined hers in
the rear claimed that the fence, which was a stone wall, was not on the line
and that a strip about a rod in width occupied by her belonged to him. From
the character of the neighbor in question it is but just to believe that he
was sincere in his contention. But that his method of asserting
his claim was harsh and arbitrary under the circumstances cannot be denied.
The first knowledge that she had that he really
intended to enforce his claim was when he set a force of men at work moving
the fence. What would most any widow, even of American birth, have done? In
19 cases out of 20 they would have yielded. But this widow was not constructed
upon that plan. Unable to state her case to a lawyer in person she did
so through a local justice of the peace, who could speak both German and English,
an injunction was obtained, and after a time the matter was tried in the Courts
and decided in her favor. Most anyone in her place would have said that
it would be cheaper to submit than to fight. She reasoned that if she
gave this strip, her neighbor would take another. After this litigation
this same neighbor was always courteous and obliging. He was an honest man,
but perhaps too exacting.
Grandmother Fessman’s children were
the following: Catherine Fessman, afterwards and at present Catherine
Walter; Anna Fessman, afterwards Anna Senn; Christian Fessman,
late of Rome, N.Y.; Mary Fessman, later Mary Senn; and Philip Fessman. All
except Catherine have joined the silent majority. She is the oldest of
them all and has survived by more than a score of years the allotted three
score and ten.
Time will not permit me to particularize
any further. Most of the descendants of both of the ancestors
named have had good health and few of them after reaching maturity have died
a natural death at an early age. It is through no feeling of partiality
that I mention them instead of others. It is because I knew more about
them than the others.
One of them was the companion of my childhood. Born
in the City of New York he was brought here in childhood to restore his health. The
country air seemed to revive him. By some attraction neither of us could
explain we were drawn together. We often quarreled, but the
quarrel never lasted. Together we built castles in the air and planned
the future. If I am a judge of men, there was never a nobler one than
Christian W.Henches. When he grew to manhood his business demanded
his return to the City. He had long had a foreboding that he had inherited
from his father, who died young, a sickly constitution and predisposition to
a short life. His forebodings were only too true and altogether
too soon his noble life was brought to a close. He has joined the long
procession which all ‘the youth in life’s green spring, and he
who goes in the full strength of years; matron and maid; the bowed with age
and the infant in the smiles of beauty and its innocent age cut off” must
join at last.
The other was one who to me and to many
others had been a mighty tower of strength. None could make so clear
to me my most flagrant faults and none so ready to suggest ways and means out
of a difficulty. I know scores of whom he has helped by his advice
and otherwise, making their difficulties his own. Almost daily
I meet some new person who tells of some pleasure or profit he has derived
from association with Samuel G. Senn. I would never have believed
it possible for any human being to transact so much business of his own and
still find so much time to take a friendly interest in that of others. He
had faults, many of them, but in the light of his virtues they disappear like
the dew before the morning sun. He had known the bitterness of failure, and
what it means to see your fondest hopes turn to ashes. But by hard exertion
and a genius all his own he had wrested that which men call success from the
unwilling hand of adversity. But an over-strenuous business life
had sapped his nerve force and left him an easy victim to disease. Life
had just begun to look bright to him when his physician pronounced the hard
verdict that he must die. The companion who had shared his joys
and hardships and never wavered in her loyality heard the inexpressible agony
of that verdict. Stunned by the blow, her wonted smile extinguished
forever, she soon followed him. They had prominent traits in common but
their devotion to each other was the most prominent one. Together they
had climbed the steep incline of life. Near together they fell by the
wayside. “After life’s fitful fever”, at the foot of
life’s hill, on the breast of the common mother, they are sleeping together
in peace.
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