In 1683 a group of religious refugees from the Rhineland founded Germantown, near Philadelphia.  Soon other German communities were started in the neighboring counties.  Chief among these German sectarians were the Mennonites, frequently called the German Quakers, so nearly did their religious peculiarities match those of the followers of Penn; the Dunkers, a Baptist sect, who seem to have come from Germany boot and baggage, leaving not one of their number behind; and the Moravians, whose missionary zeal and gentle demeanor have made them beloved in many lands.  The peculiar religious devotions of the sectarians still left them time to cultivate their inclination for literature and music.  There were a few distinguished scholars among them and some of the finest examples of early American books bear the imprint of their presses.

This modest beginning of the German invasion was soon followed by more imposing additions.  The repeated strategic devastations of the Rhenish Palatinate during the French and Spanish wars reduced the peasantry to beggary, and the medieval social stratification of Germany reduced them to virtual serfdom, from which America offered emancipation.  Queen Anne invited the harassed peasants of this region to come to England, whence they could be transferred to America.  Over thirty thousand took advantage of the opportunity in the years 1708 and 1709.[2] Some of them found occupation in England and others in Ireland, but the majority migrated, some to New York, where they settled in the Mohawk Valley, others to the Carolinas, but far more to Pennsylvania, where, with an instinct born of generations of contact with the soil, they sought out the most promising areas in the limestone valleys of the eastern part of that colony, cleared the land, built their solid homes and ample barns, and clung to their language, customs, and religion so tenaciously that to this day their descendants are called “Pennsylvania Dutch.”

After 1717 multitudes of German peasants were lured to America by unscrupulous agents called “new-landers” or “soul-stealers,” who, for a commission paid by the shipmaster, lured the peasant to sell his belongings, scrape together or borrow what he could, and migrate.  The agents and captains then saw to it that few arrived in Philadelphia out of debt.  As a result the immigrants were sold to “soul-drivers,” who took them to the interior and indentured them to farmers, usually of their own race.  These redemptioners, as they were called, served from three to five years and generally received fifty acres of land at the expiration of their service.