May 25 , 2023 The Beacon • 29

By Larry Stahl

The area that became Coshocton County played an important part in the War for Freedom from England , in what is commonly known as the Revolutionary War . There is much documentation from the area , thanks to the Delaware Nation of Native Americans capital Goschachgunk , now known as Coshocton , located at the forks of the Muskingum and the Moravian mission town of Lichtenau , located about 2 miles below the aforementioned Delaware town . Unfortunately , much of it has not been easily available to read until recently .

Probably the greatest source of local history is the diaries kept by the Moravian missionaries . These were written in German and kept at the Moravian Archives in Nazareth . These were finally translated into English and published in 2005 . It is from Moravian diaries written at Lichtenau in 1778 we have the full story of John Nash , a Revolutionary soldier who lost his life in a skirmish near Goschachgunk and lies in an unknown grave within our current county borders .

Lichtenau was the third Moravian mission town established in the Tuscarawas and Muskingum river valleys . The first was Schoenbrunn , then Gnadenhutten . The powerful and respected old Delaware Chief Netawatwees had requested Moravian missionary David Zeisberger to establish a town near his residence in the Delaware Nation ’ s capital of Goschachgunk . Zeisberger and a group of his Christian Indians accepted the invitation , and the town of Lichtenau , which means pastures of light , was founded in April 1776 .

For a while all was good . The town flourished and grew . Zeisberger was respected by most of the Delaware Nation , and he was adding to his congregation of followers . People can speculate today how this may have turned out had it not been for several unfortunate incidents that would eventually doom Lichtenau and eventually end the Moravian villages .

Three months after the founding of Lichtenau , the American Colonies declared war on England . England still had a strong presence on the western frontier , especially in what became Canada . The British took every opportunity they could to work with the different native tribes to get them to side with them and attack the colonists . Several of the Indian nations did indeed align themselves with the British , the Wyandots being one of them , which would have a large impact in the future of the Moravian mission towns and the Delaware Nation .

The next adverse event was the death on Aug . 31 , 1776 , of Netawatwees . His successor Gelelemend was in favor of the Moravian mission towns , but he was not as strong a chief as Netawatwees was . The Delaware chief known as White Eyes also was a powerful chief and was

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