Excerpt from Joseph Tarkington’s Autobiography (1811)
“There is something in the jerks unexplainable….”
“There is something in the jerks unexplainable….”
“Here I first saw what was called the jerks, a very strange as well as disgusting exercise….”
“The peopel had the Jirks Shouting and d[a]ncing and…those that atempted to desribe there fealing while ingaged in the above exersize sayed the[y] had the most hevenly fealing that [they] ever felt in the there life….”
“For better than four months past, our meetings have been very powerful…mighty stompings & roarings against the flesh—violent jerking, rolling, & tumbling on the floor….”
“He is a thorough Methodist believes in all of the religious exercises after the straightest of the sect…. I shall not fall out with him for advocating the genuine Jerks….”
“Our informant was present at several of their meetings in Avoca, and describes the scene as very exciting. From fifty to a hundred were jerking at the same time….”