Christmas in America's Middle Colonies

The early history of the Delaware Valley & William Penn’s inclusive policies created an ethnic & religious mix not found in the other twelve colonies.  Swedes, Germans, French Huguenots, & Welsh among others settled & celebrated their traditions. 

Swedish settlement in the Delaware Valley preceded William Penn, & they remained an important part of the colony. They brought over their pre-Christmas festival of St. Lucia, its saffron bun (Lussekatter) & simple woven decorations. They also decorated with boughs of greens, made pretzels (praying hands) & several cookies that have become American traditions 

There were several religious denominations, found in the middle colonies, which were opposed to the celebration, & continued to exclude themselves, among them the Quakers, Baptists, Presbyterians, & Congregationalists, at least at first. Eventually, the prosperity of Pennsylvania led even Quaker families to decorate their homes with greens & dine on the bounty of the colonies.

In 1734, Benjamin Franklin, in Poor Richard’s Almanac, placed between the dates of December 23-29: "If you wou'd have Guests merry with your Cheer / Be so yourself or so at least appear," & for the same time in 1739: "O blessed Season! lov'd by Saints & Sinners / For long Devotions, or for longer Dinners."

Like their English counterparts in the south, Anglicans, Roman Catholics, Lutherans, & Moravians celebrated the traditional Christmas season with both religious & secular observances in cities such as New York & Philadelphia, & the Middle Atlantic colonies of New York, Pennsylvania, & Maryland.

In 1749, Peter Kalm, a Swede visiting Philadelphia, noted in his diary that the Quakers completely dismissed the celebration of Christmas, writing: "Christmas Day. . . .The Quakers did not regard this day any more remarkable than other days. Stores were open, & anyone might sell or purchase what he wanted. . . .There was no more baking of bread for the Christmas festival than for other days; & no Christmas porridge on Christmas Eve! One did not seem to know what it meant to wish anyone a merry Christmas."

He also noted that at “first the Presbyterians did not care much for celebrating Christmas, but when they saw most of their members going to the English church on that day, they also started to have services."

Of Catholic Church he noted: "Nowhere was Christmas Day celebrated with more solemnity than in the Roman Church. Three sermons were preached there, & that which contributed most to the splendor of the ceremony was the beautiful music heard to-day. . . . Pews & altar were decorated with branches of mountain laurel, whose leaves are green in winter time & resemble the (cherry laurel)"

In the Anglican churches, lavender, rose petals, & pungent herbs such as rosemary & bay were scattered throughout the churches, providing a pleasant holiday scent. Scented flowers & herbs, chosen partially because they were aromatic, acted as an alternative form of incense. The Reverend George Herbert, an Anglican clergyman from Maryland, urged "that the church be swept, & kept clean without dust, or cobwebs, & at great festivals strewed, & stuck with boughs, & perfumed with incense."

Robert Herrick 1591-1674 The Christmas Wassail Bowl

The Wassail Bowl an excerpt from "Ah, Posthumus!"

Robert Herrick (1591-1674)

Next I'll cause my hopeful lad,
If a wild apple can be had,
To crown the hearth;
Lar thus conspiring with our mirth;
Then to infuse
Our browner ale into the cruse;
Which, sweetly spiced, we'll first carouse
Unto the Genius of the house.

Then the next health to friends of mine.
Loving the brave Burgundian wine,
High sons of pith,
Whose fortunes I have frolick'd with;
Such as could well
Bear up the magic bough and spell;
And dancing 'bout the mystic Thyrse,
Give up the just applause to verse;

To those, and then again to thee,
We'll drink, my Wickes, until we be
Plump as the cherry,
Though not so fresh, yet full as merry
As the cricket,
The untamed heifer, or the pricket,1
Until our tongues shall tell our ears,
We're younger by a score of years.

Thus, till we see the fire less shine
From th' embers than the kitling's eyne,
We'll still sit up,
Sphering about the wassail cup,
To all those times
Which gave me honour for my rhymes;
The coal once spent, we'll then to bed,
Far more than night bewearied.

Christmas Wassail to Promote Good Health of Britain's Trees & Crops & Animals

1861 'Wassailing apple-trees with hot cider in Devonshire on twelfth eve'

Wassailing Orchards & Crops & Livestock

Now I imagine that only a garden historian would post this particular history. But here goes...

It is difficult to tell when "wassailing" orchards in the Christmas season first began, wishing the trees health and abundant crops in the coming year. Soon hopeful farmers wassailed both crops and animals to encourage fertility. An observer recorded, "They go into the Ox-house to the oxen with the Wassell-bowle and drink to their health."

In the 18C, farmers in the west of Britain toasted the good health of apple trees to promote an abundant crop the next year. Some placed cider-soaked bread in the branches to ward off evil spirits. Others splashed the trees with cider while firing guns or beating pots and pans. Sometimes they sang special songs:
Let every man take off his hat
And shout out to th'old apple tree
Old apple tree we wassail thee
And hoping thou will bear.

It was recorded at Fordwich, Kent, in 1585, and appears in Devon in the 1630s, according to the poem by Robert Herrick:
Wassail the Trees, that they may bear
You many a plum, and many a pear...In the west of Britain the good health of the apple trees was toasted on Twelfth Night. The luck of next year's crop of cider apples was wished. Bread soaked in cider was put into the branches of trees to keep evil spirits away. Ritual songs were sung. It was reported thatcelebrants poured the remains of the cider kegs around trees in an orchard, dancing and singing the Wassailing song to ensure a good crop of apples for the following year.

It appears to feature again in the diary of a Sussex parson in 1670 and is quite frequently recorded thereafter. The fact that traces of it are found in fruit-growing areas of England under Elizabeth and the Stuarts argues for an origin at latest in the early Tudor or medieval periods. Modern guides to English folk-customs have frequently described it as a relic of pre-Christian ritual, and so indeed it may be. It may , nevertheless, also be an extension of the custom of the household wassail, made after the end of the Middle Ages.

In The Book of Days, Chambers describes a celebration on the eve of Epiphany, January 12: "In Herefordshire, at the approach of the evening, the farmers with their friends and servants meet together, and about six o’ clock walk out to a field where wheat is growing. In the highest part of the ground, twelve small fires, and one large one, are lighted up. The attendants, headed by the master of the family, pledge the company in old cider, which circulates freely on these occasions. A circle is formed round the large fire, when a general shout and hallooing takes place, which you hear answered from all the adjacent villages and fields. Sometimes fifty or sixty of these fires may be seen all at once. This being finished, the company return home, where the good housewife and her maids are preparing a good supper. A large cake is always provided, with a hole, in the middle. After supper, the company all attend the bailiff (or head of the oxen) to the wain-house, where the following particulars are observe: The master at the head of his friends, fills the cup (generally of strong ale), and stands opposite the first or finest of the oxen. He then pledges him in a curious toast: the company follow his example, with all the other oxen, and addressing each by his name. This being finished, the large cake is produced, and, with much ceremony, put on the horn of the first ox, through the hole above mentioned. The ox is then tickled, to make him toss his head: if he throw the cake behind, then it is the mistress’s prerequisite; if before (in what is termed the boosy), the bailiff himself claims the prize. The company then return to the house, the doors of which they find locked, nor will they be opened till some joyous songs are sung. On their gaining admittance, a scene of mirth, and jollity ensues, which lasts the greatest part of the night."—

The custom is called in Herefordshire Wassailing. The fires are designed to represent the Saviour and his apostles, and it was customary as to one of them, held as representing Juas Iscariot, to allow it go burn a while and then put it out and kick about the materials.Gentleman’s Magazine, February, 1791.

At Pauntley, in Gloucestershire, the custom has in view of the prevention of the smut in wheat "all the servants of every farmer assemble in one of the fields that has been sown with wheat. At the end of twelve lands, they make twelve fires in a row with straw: around one of which, made larger than the rest, they drink a cheerful glass of cider to their master’s health, and success to the future harvest; then returning home they feast on cakes made with carraways, soaked in cider which they claim as a reward for their past labour in sowing the grain"- Rudge’s Gloucester.

Wassail Song
Here we come a-wassailing
Among the leaves so green,
Here we come a-wand’ring
So fair to be seen.
Love and joy come to you,
And to you your wassail, too,
And God bless you, and send you
A Happy New Year,
And God send you a Happy New Year.

We are not daily beggers
That beg from door to door,
But we are neighbors’ children
Whom you have seen before
Love and joy come to you,
And to you your wassail, too,
And God bless you, and send you
A Happy New Year,
And God send you a Happy New Year.

Good master and good mistress,
As you sit beside the fire,
Pray think of us poor children
Who wander in the mire.
Love and joy come to you,
And to you your wassail, too,
And God bless you, and send you
A Happy New Year,
And God send you a Happy New Year

We have a little purse
Made of ratching leather skin;
We want some of your small change
To line it well within.
Love and joy come to you,
And to you your wassail, too,
And God bless you, and send you
A Happy New Year,
And God send you a Happy New Year.

Bring us out a table
And spread it with a cloth;
Bring us out a cheese,
And of your Christmas loaf.
Love and joy come to you,
And to you your wassail, too,
And God bless you, and send you
A Happy New Year,
And God send you a Happy New Year.

God bless the master of this house,
Likewise the mistress too;
And all the little children
That round the table go.
Love and joy come to you,
And to you your wassail, too,
And God bless you, and send you
A Happy New Year,
And God send you a Happy New Year.

Christmas Before Colonial British America - Tradition of Wassail

William Hogarth (1697-1764) 'The Midnight Conversation', Detail. c 1732

"Wassail" appears in English literature as a salute as early as the 8C poem Beowulf, in references such as "warriors' wassail and words of power" and:
The rider sleepeth,
the hero, far-hidden; no harp resounds,
in the courts no wassail, as once was heard.

An anonymous Anglo-Norman Poet, who witnessed the Saxon toasting cry before the Battle of Hastings in 1066, wrote:
Rejoice and wassail
Pass the bottle and drink healthy
Drink backwards and drink to me
Drink half and drink empty.

In Saxon times the original Wassail was was a greeting meaning: "be in good health." In 12C, it became a toast, the response to the toast became drink hail, or "drink good health." Norman conquerors who arrived in the 11C regarded the toast as distinctive of the English natives.

A story told in Geoffrey of Monmouth's History of the Kings of Britain, written in 1135, purports to explain the origin of the toast:
The story of toasting 'wassail' begins when Renwein presented King Vortigern with a cup of wine and the salute 'Was hail.'
The story of toasting "wassail" begins when Renwein presented King Vortigern with a cup of wine and the salute "Was hail."
While Vortigern was being entertained at a royal banquet, the girl Renwein came out of an inner room carrying a golden goblet full of wine. She walked up to the King, curtsied low, and said "Lavert King, was hail!" When he saw the girl's face, Vortigern was greatly struck by her beauty and was filled with desire for her. He asked his interpreter what it was that the girl had said and what he ought to reply to her. "She called you Lord King and did you honour by drinking your health. What you should reply is 'drinc hail.'" Vortigern immediately said the words "drinc hail" and ordered Renwein to drink. Then he took the goblet from her hand, kissed her and drank in his turn.

Ronald Hutton in his The Rise and Fall of Merry England. Oxford, 1996, reports:"A 14Ctext by Peterd e Langtoft describes in detail the custom involving this vessel, to which the Tudor sources only refer in passing: the leader of a gathering took it and cried "Wassail" Old English for "your health". He was answered "Drink hail," and then passed it to another person with a kiss, so that these actions could be repeated by each. At the early Tudor court it was accompanied into the king's presence by the chief officers of the household, bearing staves. In great families it was made of precious metal- Edmund earl of March, leaving a silver one upon his death in 1382."

Wooden Lignum Vitae Wassail Bowl Owned by Arthur Chichester, Brought from Devon to Ulster in 1599

"The bowl is first mentioned by Matthew Paris in the 13C, as one in which cakes and fine white bread were communally dipped."

"Near the end of the 13C, Robert of Gloucester retold the legend of the marriage of the British king Vortigern with the Saxon princess Rowena, making the latter drink to the former with the words "waes heal."

"When Peter de Lantoft repeated the story in the 1320s, he portrayed people drinking alternately from the same cup with the exchange "wassaille" and "drinkhaille", exactly as in Tudor England. This sequence raises the possibility that the exchange became customary around 1300, but this, again cannot be proved."

English Lead Glazed Earthenware Wassail Bowl from Wilshire Dated 14-12-1682

On the introduction of Christianity, the custom of wassailing was not abolished, but it assumed a religious aspect. The monks called the wassail bowl the poculum caritatis (loving cup), a term still retained in the London companies, but in the universities the term Grace Cup is more general. Immediately after grace the silver cup, filled with sack (spiced wine) is passed round. The master and wardens drink welcome to their guests; the cup is then passed round to all the guests. A loving or grace cup should always have two handles, and some have as many as four. Loving Cup. This ceremony, of drinking from one cup and passing it round, was observed in the Jewish paschal supper, and our Lord refers to the custom in the words, “Drink ye all of it.”“He [the master of the house] laid hold of the yesset with both hands, lifted it up, and said- Blessed be Thou, O Lord our God, thou king of the world, who hast given us the fruit of the vine; and the whole assembly said `Amen.' Then drinking first himself from the cup, he passed it round to the rest."

FromEldad the Pilgrim, chap. ix."

 

English Wooden Lignum Vitae Wassail Bowl and Cover Late 17C

On the Twelfth Day, January 8, & Wassail from Le Neve,The Royalle Book, Henry VII: "As for the void on the Twelfth Night, the king and the queen ought to have it in the hall. And as for the wassail, the steward, the treasurer, and the controller, shall come for it with their staves in their hands; the king's server and the queen's having fair towels about their necks, and dishes in their hands, such as the king and queen shall eat of; the king's carvers and the queen's shall come after with chargers or dishes, such as the king or queen shall eat of, and with towels about their necks. And no man shall bear anything unless sworn for three months. And the steward, treasurer, comptroller, and marshall of the hall shall ordain for all the hall. And, if it be in the great chamber, then shall the chamberlain and ushers ordain, after the above form; and if there be a bishop, his own squire, or else the king's such as the officers choose to assign shall serve him; and so of all the other estates, if they be dukes or earls; and so of duchesses and countesses. And then there must come in the ushers of the chamber, with the pile of cups, the king's cups and the queen's and the bishop's with the butlers and wine to the cupboard, and then a squire for the body to bear the cup, and another for the queen's cup such as is sworn for hire. The singers (of the chapel) may stand at one side of the hall, and when the steward cometh in at the hall-door, with the wassail, he must cry thrice "Wassail," &c, and then shall the chapel answer it aon with a good song, and thus in likewise, if it pleased the king to keep the great chamber. And when the king and queen have done, they will go into the chamber. And there belongeth for the king, two lights with the void, and two lights with the cup; and for the queen as many."

English Lead Glazed Earthenware Wassail Bowl from Wilshire Dated 14-12-1682

Lead Glazed Earthenware Wassail Bowl & Cover from Wiltshire Dated 1702

The Wassail Cup Scottish 1871

Wooden Lignum Vitae Wassail Bowl Dated 1685

English Silver Mounted Lignum Vitae Wassail Bowl c. 1720

1759 George Washington's Christmas Gifts for his 2 new Stepchildren

The Colonial Williamsburg website notes that  George Washington's Christmas list for his young stepchildren was ambitious: in 1759, when Washington gave the following presents to his new wife's young children: "a bird on Bellows; a Cuckoo; a Turnabout Parrot; a Grocers Shop; an Aviary; a Prussian Dragoon; a Man Smoking; a Tunbridge Tea Set; 3 Neat Books, a Tea Chest. A straw parchment box with a glass & a neat dress'd wax baby."

At the time they married, Martha Dandridge Custis was only 27 years old, owned nearly 300 enslaved people, & had more than 17,500 acres of land— worth more than £40,000. At the end of 1758, Washington resigned his military commission. On January 6, 1759, Martha Dandridge Custis married George Washington at her home, White House, in New Kent County.

When she married George Washington, Martha had 2 surving children with Daniel Parke Custis: John Parke Custis (“Jacky”), who was born in 1754, & Martha Parke Custis (“Patsy”), born in 1756.

 John Parke Custis, known as "Jacky" when younger & "Jack" as he got older, was around 4 years old, when his mother Martha married George Washington. As a result, George Washington became Jacky's legal guardian. On February 3, 1774, Custis & Eleanor Calvert, the fifteen-year-old daughter of a prominent Maryland family. were married. Jack & Nelly lived at Abingdon Plantation & had 7 children, 4 of whom would survive, over the next 7 years. On November 5, 1781, just weeks before he turned 27, John Parke Custis, Martha’s sole remaining child, contracted a fever & died.

Martha Parke Custis was Martha Washington & Daniel Parke Custis's youngest child. Known to the family as Patsy, she was only a toddler, when her mother married George Washington. By the time Patsy was 11 or 12, she was plagued with seizures, which grew worse over time. After a particularly violent episode on June 19, 1773, Patsy died at age 17. In his diary, George Washington wrote simply on June 19th, 1773: "At home all day. About 5 oclock poor Patcy Custis Died Suddenly." In a letter to his brother-in-law written the following day, George Washington relayed the news that Patsy, described as his "Sweet Innocent Girl," had been buried earlier in the day & that the situation had "almost reduced my poor Wife to the lowest ebb of Misery."

See:

George Washington to Burwell Bassett, 20 June 1773," The Papers of George Washington, Colonial Series, Vol. 9, eds. W.W. Abbot & Dorothy Twohig (Charlottesville, VA: University Press of Virginia, 1994), 243-244. Eliza Custis, "Self-Portrait: Eliza Custis 1808," Virginia Magazine of History & Biography 53, ed. William D. Hoyt, Jr. (1945): 92. "Nelly Custis Lewis to Jared Sparks, 26 February 1833," ed. Jared Sparks, The Life of George Washington (Boston: Published by Ferdinand Andrews, 1839), 522.

"George Washington to Burwell Bassett, 20 June 1773," The Papers of George Washington, Colonial Series, Vol. 9, 243-4.

Wilstach, Paul. Mount Vernon: Washington's Home & the Nation's Shrine. 1916.

1779 Absent John Jay's Christmas Letter from his Lonely Wife Sarah (1756-1802)

 

Sarah "Sally" Van Brugh Livingston Jay (1756-1802)

Sarah "Sally" Van Brugh Livingston Jay (1756-1802) & her politically ambitious patriot husband John Jay (1745-1829) were apart during the holiday season of 1778-1779. John would be in Philadelphia serving in the Continental Congress, & Sarah in New Jersey with their son Peter Augustus. 

Sally was depressed by the absence of her husband. However, in a letter, she dutifully assured him that “The company of your dear little boy proved a great consolation to me since you’ve been absent.” She ended her letter to him: “Accept the Compts: of the season,” the lovely expression typical of the time, adding to it “& may we repeat the same to each other fifty years hence.” 

Christmas was not widely celebrated in the colonies. Its observance was generally prohibited in New England by Calvinists & other Protestant sects, & by the Quakers in Philadelphia & elsewhere. On the other hand, Anglicans, Roman Catholics, Lutherans & Moravians in the Middle Colonies & the South did celebrate the Christmas season with both religious services & secular festivities. 

1794 John Jay by Gilbert Stuart, National Gallery of Art

Sarah "Sally" Jay was an American socialite & young wife of founding father John Jay, in which capacity she came to serve as the wife of the President of the Continental Congress, the wife of the Chief Justice of the United States, & First Lady of New York.

Sarah was born in 1756. She was the eldest daughter of wealthy landowner William Livingston (1723–1790) & Susannah French (1723–1789).  Her father was an attorney who was a signer of the United States Constitution & later served as the 1st post-colonial Governor of New Jersey during the American Revolutionary War from 1776, until his death in 1790.

At the age of 18 in 1774, Sarah married John Jay (1745–1829), a member of a prominent merchant family in New York City. He was one of 7 surviving children born to Peter Jay & Mary Van Cortlandt, the daughter of mayor Jacobus Van Cortlandt. 

Following her wedding to Jay in 1774, she spent the early years of their marriage at her father's house in Elizabethtown, New Jersey. Her husband would visit her there, when he was not serving as a state official in New York. 

In 1779, he was appointed commissioner to Spain & Sarah finally joined him, moving abroad. In France, she would plan & host the Americans' celebration of the signing of the Treaty of Paris, albeit in absentia, because she had only just given birth (in Benjamin Franklin's house) when the event took place. Participating in Parisian society was part of Franklin's strategy for tightening the bonds of French-American relations.

Sarah Livingston Jay with 2 of her Children by James Sharples (c. 1751-1811)

Together, John & Sarah Jay had 6 children:

Peter Augustus Jay, who was born in Elizabeth, New Jersey, in 1776

Susan Jay, who was born & died in Madrid in 1780

Maria Jay, who was born in Madrid in 1782

Ann Jay, who was born in Paris in 1783

William Jay, who was born in New York City in 1789

Sarah Jay, who was born in New York City in 1792.

In 1801, John Jay & Sarah Livingston Jay moved to a farm near Bedford, New York, where Sarah soon died in 1802. 

 See: Louise North, Janet Wedge, & Landa Freeman. Selected Letters of John Jay & Sarah Livingston Jay

1774 Christmas Celebrations in Alexandria, Virginia

 Nicholas Cresswell (1750-1804) by an unidentified artist, c 1780.  Cresswell was the son of a landowner & sheep farmer in Edale, Derbyshire. At the age of 24, he sailed to the American colonies to visit a native of Edale who was then living in Alexandria, Virginia. For the next 3 years he kept a journal of his experiences, before returning to England.  Cresswell wrote while in Alexandria on December 25, 1774: “Christmas Day but little regarded here.”

However Cresswell did attend a lively ball on Twelfth Night; "There was about 37 Ladys Dressed and Powdered to the like, some of them very handsom, and as much Vanity as is necessary. All of them fond of Dancing. But I do not think they perform it with the greatest elleganse. Betwixt the Country Dances they have What I call everlasting Jiggs. A Couple gets up, and begins to dance a Jig (to some Negro tune) others comes and cuts them out, these dances allways last as long as the Fiddler can play. This is social but I think it looks more like a Bacchanalian dance then one in a polite Assembly. Old Women, Young Wifes with young Children on the Laps, Widows, Maids, and Girls come promsciously to these Assemblys which generally continue til morning. A Cold supper, Punch, Wine, Coffee, and Chocolate, But no Tea. This is a forbidden herb. The men chiefly Scotch and Irish. I went home about Two Oclock, but part of the Company stayd got Drunk and had a fight."