A controversial leader in the German Pietist movement, a founding father of modern missions, and a leader of the Moravian denomination, Count Nicholas Ludwig von Zinzendorf of Bohemia negotiated a deal with the Earl of Granville, owner of the northern part of North Carolina, so Moravians could settle in North Carolina during the mid-1700s.
Count Zinzendorf promoted an emotional religious expression that contrasted with the intellectual and liturgical practices of the Lutheran Church. He also preached a religion of personal piety. After meeting a converted slave, he expressed a burden to share Christianity across the globe. In particular, he desired to witness and send missionaries to Native American tribes. Zinzendorf is the only known European noble who traveled the American colonies specifically to meet Indian chiefs. He did not, however, visit North Carolina.
Zinzendorf funded several Moravian communities in Europe and the New World (and almost went bankrupt doing so). America offered the count opportunities to establish model communities that could not only earn profits but also be separated from the religious enemies and sinful temptations of the Old World. This dream found fruition in an agreement with the Earl of Granville, who owned large tracts of North Carolina land. The earl was seeking industrious, solid settlers for his North Carolina land. He made an offer to the Moravians after the British Parliament passed a law in 1749 recognizing the Moravian Church as “an ancient Protestant Episcopal Church.” This agreement allowed Moravians to live on 100,000 acres of the North Carolina province.
Led by Bishop August Gottlieb Spangenberg, a survey party set out from Edenton, N.C., in August 1752 and, after a difficult expedition lasting several months, they finally came across land which Spangenberg deemed to have been “reserved by the Lord for the Brethren.” The chosen site, located in the three forks of Muddy Creek, a tributary of the Yadkin, with its waterways, rolling hills, and meadows reminded Spangenberg of an ancestral estate of the Zinzendorfs in Austria named Wachau. That name was chosen for the Moravian land in North Carolina and was later latinized to Wachovia.
Although he never made it to North Carolina, Zinzendorf remained keenly invested in the progress of Wachovia, even offering a rendering of his vision for the central town of Salem. Sadly, he would not live to see Salem. Zinzendorf died at his home in Herrnhut 9 May 1760.
Count Zinzendorf’s philanthropy and the establishment of Wachovia comprised part of a larger migration of religious free thinkers to North Carolina. From 1730–1770, many, if not most, dissenters came from Pennsylvania. Their religious practices and ideas helped form a cultural divide between the colonial East and West.