{"id":2648,"date":"2015-07-04T06:29:22","date_gmt":"2015-07-04T10:29:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/jerkshistory\/?p=2648"},"modified":"2019-02-17T15:13:34","modified_gmt":"2019-02-17T20:13:34","slug":"hollister1815-01","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/jerkshistory\/2015\/07\/04\/hollister1815-01\/","title":{"rendered":"Excerpt from a Letter by John Meacham (August 19, 1815)"},"content":{"rendered":"

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During the months following the cessation of hostilities in the War of 1812, the western Shaker communities in Kentucky and Ohio experienced a surge of religious fervor and conversions. As Pleasant Hill elder explains in this letter to a brother in Massachusetts, the Shakers\u2019 powerful revival meetings included an array of unusual somatic phenomena, including the jerks.<\/span><\/p>\n

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From Elder John Meacham to a Brother in Hancock.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Pleasant Hill, Mercer County Ky. August 19, 1815.<\/p>\n

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\u2026For better than four months past, our meetings have been very powerful\u2014abundance of outward exercise, such as turning, shaking, speaking in tongues, loud & solemn exhortations in english\u2014many public confessions, honestly exposing the nature & workings of the flesh\u2014mighty stompings & roarings against the flesh\u2014violent jerking, rolling, & tumbling on the floor\u2014gifts of sorrow with many motions & signs of humiliation\u2014then signs of joy & victory. These exercises have often continued for two hours & more, without a moments cessation\u2014when the floor would be effectually strewed with caps, handkerchiefs, fillets, hair pegs, hair strings, pins, garters, shoes & the like. We might be more particular & give the matter greater sound, but you only want the substance.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Source<\/h3>\n

\u201cFrom Elder John Meacham to a Brother in Hancock,\u201d Aug. 19, 1815, in Alonzo Hollister, \u201cBook of Remembrance,\u201d 73\u201374, VII:B-110, MS 3944, Shaker Manuscripts, 1723\u20131952, Western Reserve Historical Society, Cleveland, Ohio.
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“For better than four months past, our meetings have been very powerful…mighty stompings & roarings against the flesh\u2014violent jerking, rolling, & tumbling on the floor….”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":353,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"on","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[86440,86455,86509,86335,86450,86438,95992],"tags":[95401,94987,95402,86353,86509,86335,93320,86337,86492,93458,95056,93392,95403,95404,86344],"class_list":["post-2648","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-1810-1815","category-correspondence","category-john-meacham","category-kentucky","category-other-bodily-exercises-general-references","category-shakers","category-western-reserve-historical-society","tag-alonzo-hollister","tag-confession-shaker-ritual","tag-hancock-mass","tag-jerking","tag-john-meacham","tag-kentucky","tag-massachusetts","tag-mercer-county-ky","tag-rolling","tag-shaking","tag-shawnee-run-pleasant-hill-ky","tag-speaking-in-tongues","tag-stomping","tag-tumbling","tag-turning"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/jerkshistory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2648","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/jerkshistory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/jerkshistory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/jerkshistory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/353"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/jerkshistory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2648"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/jerkshistory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2648\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/jerkshistory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2648"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/jerkshistory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2648"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/jerkshistory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2648"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}