Page:Early western travels, 1748-1846 (Vol 1 1904).djvu/183



Christian Frederick Post, author of the following journals, was a simple, uneducated missionary of the Moravian Church. His chief qualifications for the perilous journeys herein detailed, were his intimate acquaintance with Indian life and character, the belief of the tribesmen in his truthfulness and honesty, and his own steadfast courage and trust in the protection of a higher power. Born in Polish Prussia in 1710, Post early came under the influence of the Moravians, whose remarkable missionary movement was just beginning to germinate.

The first attempt of this church to christianize the American Indians in Georgia having failed because of Spanish hostility, the Moravian disciples removed to Pennsylvania (1739), and were granted land on which to establish their colony at Bethlehem. Thither in 1742 came Post, eager to join in evangelizing the Indians; for which purpose he was sent the following year to assist Henry Rauch in his mission to the Mohegans and Wampanoags. This mission had been established about 1740, Count Zinzendorf, the great Moravian bishop, having visited its site at Shekomeko (Pine Plains, Dutchess County, New York) and baptized three Indians as its first fruits. The work spread to the neighboring Indian villages of Connecticut, and Post was assigned to a circuit in Sharon Township, Litchfield County, consisting of the villages of Pachgatgoch and Wechquadnach. Here, in his zeal for the service, he married a con