George and Susanne Partsch were and are fine representatives of the early Moravians. Allow me to tell you something about them.
Susanne Luise Eller was born in Budingen, Germany in the year 1722. Her father, Johann, died before she was born.
Susanne’s troubles began when her mother married a violent man, before she turned seven years of age. The court removed her from her mother and step-father to be placed with the Bailiff Schubert and his wife in Meerholz. Susanne remained with the Schuberts until she was eighteen.
Having left home she was employed as a cook for a government official. It was at this time in her life that she came to know the Christian Moravians at nearby Herrnhut. In due course she was received into the congregation in 1744.
Within the year, she married her husband, twenty-five year old George Partsch, a fellow Christian and Moravian. They were joined in wedlock on the same day as were twenty-three other Moravian couples from the congregation.
George and Susanne joined the Second Sea Congregation, which included as passengers the other twenty-three newly married couples. They set sail on the ship “Little Strength” to New York on November 26, 1744. The voyage took eighty-seven days and ended successfully when the ship anchored safely off Staten Island.
The group arrived in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania on December 6, 1744.
In January of the next year, Susanne and George were assigned to the Moravian community in Nazareth.
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