Daily new dominion. [volume] (Morgantown, W. Va.) 1897-1906, 1903-11-20
IT WAS THE DUTCH"
President Will Open Anpiver-
sary Celebration of Found
ing of Germantown, Pa.
GERMANS IN NATIONAL HISTORY
Address Delivered by Chief Executive
to Delegates - immigration from
FatherIand Powerful Element in
Formation of United States.

Washington, Nov 2o.-President
Roosevelt received in the East room Of
the White House about $50 represent
atives of the-Eerman societies of
Washington, to whom he delivered a
brief address. The delegates called
ion the president formally to announce
TO him the opening next Monday even
ing of their celebration of the 250th
anniversary of the founding of Ger
mantown, Pa, and to ask him to par
ticipate in it. The president will press
an electric button at the White House,
which will flash in electric lights the
opening of the celebration in Conven-
ton hall.
After short address by Mr.. Voelck-
ner, Of the societies, President Roose-
welt addressed the delegates as fol-
lows:
1T gives me peculiar pleasure to
greet you, and it is a matter of real
regret to me that | cannot attend for
mally your celebration.
You are quite right, Mr.. Chairman.
when you speak of the stand that The
German element in our citizenship has
always taken in all crises of our ma
tional life. In the first place, from the
beginning of our colonial history ID
this day, the German strain has been
constantly increasing in importance
among the many strains that go to
W, a1ya ,,p 0,,r oor,vOri+o nofiopal ahar.
acter. do not have to repeat to you
the story of the early German immi-
grafton to this countryside German
immigration that began in mass to-
ward the end of the seventeenth cen
fury, but before that time had been
represented among the very first SCI
tiers.
Some Ancestral History.
ALLOW me to give you one bit Of
ancestral experience of mine. The
first head of the New York city gov
eminent, who was of German BIRTH,
was Leisler in about the year 1880.
He was the representative of the pop
ular faction in the New York colony
of that day, and among the Leislerian
alderman was forbear of pline,
named Roosevelt You are entirely
familiar, of course. with the German
immigration that went to the forma-
ton of Pennsylvania from the begin
ming That element was equally
strong in the Mohawk valley in New
York; 1t was equally strong in middle
;,c CT
in the Revolutionary war one of the
distinguished figures contributed by
New York to the cause of independ-
ence was that of the German, Her
kimer, whose fight in the Mohawk
valley represented one of the turning
points in the struggle for independ-
ence; and one of the New York coun-
ties is named after him.
The other day l went out to the
battlefield of Antietam in Maryland.
There the memorial church is the
German Lutheran church, which was
founded in 1868, the settlement in the
neighborhood of Antietam being orig
inally exclusively a German settle
ment. There is a list of it's pastors,
and curiously enough a series of me-
mortal windows of men with German
names-men who belonged to the
Maryland regiment recruited largely
from that region for the Civil war,
which Maryland regiment was mainly
composed of men of German extrac-
ton.
Germans In Civil War.
I'm the Civil war it would be diff
cult to paint in too strong coIors what
I may we'll nigh call the all import
anca of the attitude of the American
citizens of German birth and extrac-
ton toward the cause of union and
liberty. especially in what were then
known as the border states. 1t would
have been out of the question to have
kept Missouri loyal had 1t not been
for the German element therein. Il
was the German portion of the city OF
St Louis which formed the core Of
the union cause in Missouri. And but
little less important was the part
played by the Germans in Maryland,
and also in Louisville and other por.
tons OF Kentucky.
IF 1t were proper in addressing a
body representing various creeds and
shades of religious belief | should ask
you all TO attend service next Sunday
Mt my church. which happens to be
the German Reformed church. They
have not a Dutch Reformed church
here, SO ! go TO the nearest to it.
Each body of immigrants, each ele-
ment that has thus been added to our
national strain, has contributed some
thing OF value to the national eharaa.
ter; and to no element do we owe
more than we owe to that element
represented by those whom | have tho
honor this day of addressing"
At the confusion f the address
he president extended cordial per
sonal greetings TO each one OF the
delegates
INDIAN Princess" Dead.
New York, Nov. 20.--Mrs. Harriet