Gnadenhutten: Ohio's Oldest European Settlement

The village of Gnadenhutten was founded in October of seventeen seventy-two by the Moravian Brethren, a pietist Christian denomination from central Europe conducting missionary work among the Lenape. It is the oldest surviving European settlement in Ohio. German Moravian missionary David Zeisberger established the community with Lenape converts who farmed and worshipped in a structured village with a church, a schoolhouse, and common fields.

The first white child known to be born in Ohio Territory arrived here in July of seventeen seventy-three. A decade later, in seventeen eighty-two, ninety-six Christian Lenape residents were killed here by a Pennsylvania militia during the Revolutionary War. The modern village, named for that mission, carries the German phrase meaning huts of grace.