Moravian mission at Shekomeko
| Moravian mission at Shekomeko | |
|---|---|
| Mission station | |
 Moravian mission at Shekomeko
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| Coordinates: 41°55′42″N 73°35′56″W / 41.9283358°N 73.5987854°WCoordinates: 41°55′42″N 73°35′56″W / 41.9283358°N 73.5987854°W | |
| Country | United States |
| State | New York |
| Founded | 1740 |
| Disbanded | 1746 |
| Founded by | Christian Henry Rauch |
The Moravian mission at Shekomeko was founded in 1740 by Christian Henry Rauch to convert the Mahican Indians in eastern New York.
In the late 1730s, the Moravian Church established their first missionary efforts in North America near Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. The Moravian Church had been founded during the 15th century in Bohemia and Moravia. Following almost total destruction in the Thirty Years' War and Counter Reformation, it had been revived in the 1720s under the guidance of Nicolas Ludwig Zinzendorf on his Herrnhut estate in Saxony.
Moravian Bishop August Gottlieb Spangenberg sent Christian Henry Rauch to New York City in 1740 on a mission to preach and convert any native peoples he could find. Rauch arrived in New York on July 16, 1740 and met with a delegation of Mahican Indians who had come to the city to settle land issues. The Mahicans were a native Algonquian tribe and branch of the Lenni Lenape or Delaware Nation populated the east bank of the Hudson River in what is today eastern Dutchess County, New York, and western Connecticut. Rauch discovered that he could converse in Dutch with the Mahican, who were somewhat acquainted with the language from their contact with Dutch settlements along the Hudson.
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