Homeland Security in the Pennsylvania Backcountry, 1777–1778: The Example of the Reverend Mr. Daniel Batwelle, SPG

Abstract

Throughout the Revolutionary War, the Associated Loyalists of southcentral Pennsylvania conspired either to destroy or to seize weapons from the US arsenals in Carlisle, York, and Lancaster. The names of several residents of Cumberland, York, and Lancaster Counties, some openly known to be Loyalists, others clandestinely working for the British, recur in correspondence, depositions, and other documents of the period. The purpose of this essay, however, is not to rehearse the history of those known to be working against the patriot cause. Rather, it will focus on the Reverend Mr. Daniel Batwelle, Anglican missionary for the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts (SPG), who was accused and imprisoned, but never tried, for allegedly participating in one such plot. Batwelle's case reveals the strenuous efforts by radical patriots in Cumberland and York Counties to enforce ideological conformity on American citizens dwelling "over Susquehanna." As spiritual leader of a religious group whose members generally advocated either reconciliation with Great Britain or resistance to the new nation born of revolution, and as one who knew several Associated Loyalists, Batwelle was identified early on as a potential enemy of the United States precisely because of his importance to the Anglican community in these two counties.