Evening Republican, Volume 19, Number 246, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 16 October 1915 — ANCIENT CHURCH BELL [ARTICLE]

ANCIENT CHURCH BELL

ONE IN PHILADELPHIA OLDER THAN FAMOUS “LIBERTY." ;| Goes Back to tho Timea When the Early Swede* Settled on the Banka of the Delaware—Still In Good Condition. Comparatively few persons among the 1,500 or 2,000 who attended the funeral of Rev. Snyder B. Sime* at Gloria Dei (Oud Swedes’) church knew that the bell which tolled with measured strokes ss the body of the beloved minister was carried to its last resting place In the churchyard is the oldest church bell in Philadelphia, says the Public Ledger. This bell antedates the appearance of William Penn upon Pennsylvania soil. It has its origin in the days of the early Swedes who settled on the banks of the Delaware. In fact, the Gloria Del bell is so old that it makes the famous Liberty Bell appear like a youngster in swaddling clothes. Moreover, this Gloria Dei bell is still in good condition, sound and serviceable. “Cast for the Swedish church in Philad’a, stiled Gloria Dei—G. Hedderly Fecit—lßo6—partly from the old bell dated 1643,” is the inscription on the bell. Thomas Bleyeler, one of the vestrymen of Gloria Dei church has in his possession interesting data bearing upon the history of this fir mous church bell. As indicated in the inscription, the bell was recast and enlarged in 1806. But it is substantially the same bell which called the Swedes to prayer back in the earlier years. Israel Acrelius, provost of the Swedish churches in America and rector of Old Swedes’ church in Wilmington, Del., in one of his historical studies of the early Swedes relates an anecdote of this Gloria Dei bell and one of Governor Prints’s daughters. It appears that after her father’s death the Swedes on the Delaware offended this good woman, whereupon, writes Acrelius, “out of contempt for the Swedes she sold with her farm the church (at Tinicum) which was built upon it, as also a bell to a Hollander.” We learn from the same historian that the congregation “had to buy their bell back again by two days’ reaping in harvest time after Mme. Arm egot had gone away. It is gratifying to know that even in those early times Philadelphia had at least one “working church.” They were not the pew warmers. Mr. Bleyler’s documents inform us that the “old bell, dated 1643, came from Tinicum (now called Essington), on the west side of the Delaware river, north of Darby creek, which was the principal settlement of the third Swedish governor, John Prints, who arrived February 15, 1643. “The bell is supposed to have been first used by the Tinicum church in 1646, unless an earlier church was in existence at that place, and continued to be in use at that church until 1700, when, it is said, the Swedish congregation left Tinicum and united with Gloria Dei church. At that date, it is supposed, the bell was removed from Tinicum to Philadelphia.