5/10/2019 News about Conewago, our Dutch cemetery

Dear Dutch Cousins, I want to share this letter with you, from Donald Lott, whom we have never met although he has faithfully taken care of the Conewago Colony Low Dutch Cemeteries in Pennsylvania for us all these years.  The photos are from our visit to the North cemetery with our group’s Footprints to Dutch New York trip in 2011. We owe Donald Lott (and his father) a big THANK YOU AND HUGS from our cousins for his faithfulness over the decades.
Carolyn

PS. We welcome Alan Weaner, nephew of Arthur Weaner (now deceased) who always kept an eye on our ancestral lands and burials, and was always happy to show us around and share the stories he had grown up with, Welcome Alan! We hope you will come to Kentucky in September so we can show our appreciation! His address is here, so feel free to send a donation to the cemetery care fund.

POST PS we are still hoping to get historical markers up in Pennsylvania for these 2 cemeteries and the Banta Cabin. Malcolm Banta is the current chairman since 2015, and he may be needing some help on this project.  Please hit reply and let us know if you are willing to work on getting these markers done.
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Dear Carolyn (and cousins)
As you know, I have been serving as the Administrator and Treasurer of the Low Dutch Cemeteries Improvement Fund for most of the past 40 years, having taken over for my father in the 1980’s. The Low Dutch Cemeteries, located near Gettysburg in Adams County, Pennsylvania, are the ancestral burial grounds for many of the “Dutch Cousins” among your membership. For most of my tenure, things went rather well for the cemeteries, but after changing jobs in 2007 and commuting from my home in Pennsylvania to my work, 3 hours away in Washington, DC, my ability to handle things in the same capacity as I had been doing was severely diminished. Recognizing the need to have more robust oversight and management of the cemeteries, I have decided to step down as Administrator and Treasurer and turn those responsibilities over to someone who lives much closer to the cemeteries and has strong personal and family ties to the burial grounds. 

I am pleased to announce that Alan Weaner will be taking over as Administrator and Treasurer for the Low Dutch Cemeteries Improvement Fund. If that name sounds somewhat familiar, it should. You and many of your readers may remember Arthur “Art” Weaner who for many years assisted my father, John K. Lott, in managing the Low Dutch Cemeteries Improvement Fund. Art was a well known and well respected local historian who took particular interest in the cemeteries and led many private and public tours through the cemeteries and assisted many persons who had inquiries about their ancestors buried in those cemeteries. Alan is a nephew of Art’s and has a keen interest in maintaining the cemeteries in good condition and preserving the historical and genealogical value of these properties.

I know that Alan intends to start addressing some of the projects I was unable to get started on, such as making repairs to the stone wall fence around the Northern Cemetery, repairing or replacing the wire fence around the Southern Cemetery, painting/repairing entrance gates to both cemeteries, and repairing some broken headstones. To help accomplish these tasks, I’m sure he’d be most appreciative of any donations to the cause that your membership might be willing to make. 

For anyone wishing to make contributions to the Low Dutch Cemeteries Improvement Fund, Alan’s address is:

Low Dutch Cemeteries Improvement Fund
c/o Alan Weaner
145 Weaner Road
Gettysburg, PA 17325

Again, it has been a pleasure to serve in the capacity as Administrator and Treasurer for the Low Dutch Cemeteries for as long as I did and I look forward to the new era of leadership under Alan Weaner’s careful management as he strives to protect and preserve the ancestral heritage so important to all of us.

Respectfully,
Donald J. Lott

(photos from our 2011 Footprints to Dutch New York tour) 1. Mary Park (Pres. of Holland Dames of NY), Arthur Weaner (our guide and forever friend) and Carolyn Leonard. 2. Entrance to the cemetery. 3. Carla Gerding finds a relative. 4. Looking for family inside the cemetery. 5. Carolyn Leonard with the replaced tombstone of Rev. Cornelius Cozine, Many years ago, Arthur Weaner (now deceased) saw the original map (now lost) and placed this marker for Rev. Cozine. 

THE STORY OF CONEWAGO (to be continued):

In 1768 our particular group of the Dutch Reform moved west from “the Jerseys” (New Jersey) in a caravan of 150 families and between 700 and 1000 people, according to family history books. They left their beautiful stone houses and well-tended fields, sold their farmland, gathered at Hackensack, crossed the Passaic, passed New Brunswick and Princeton, crossed the Delaware, and moved on through Pennsylvania to the Conewago valley. Conewago is said to be an Indian word derived from Caughnawaga, meaning the place at the rapids. Distance from Harlingen, NJ to Conewago Colony PA was 150 miles as the crow flies, about three hours in a modern automobile.  In 1768 travel was mostly on foot, carrying a heavy pack.  Fifteen miles a day on foot would get you there in ten days. Rev. Cozine was their first Domine (pastor) of Conewago Colony and served until his death in 1786. The first church at Conewago was apparently on land donated by Hendrick Banta, and the second, larger building before 1783 on Cozine’s Pleasant Plain beside the cemetery.

On Oct 3, 1767, Rev. (Dominee) Cozine was warranted a tract of 208 acres and on June 30, 1773, another tract of 254 acres. His lands were called Pleasant Plain and historical society records show his residence was on the west bank of Swift Run on the north side of the road from York to Nichols’ Gap via Gettysburg. The path is still known as the Low Dutch Road.