German Soldier, American Rebel: Christopher Ludwick’s Pursuits of Happiness in Revolutionary Pennsylvania

Popular narratives of the American Revolution rank Christopher Ludwick, at best, among the extras in the imperial dramatis personae, a bit player who performed as honest gingerbread baker or amusingly spoke of himself in the third person.[1] Fortunately, his limited historiographical presence more seriously depicts him as superintendent of bakers for the Continental Army and develops his critical role feeding soldiers during the war or risking his life coercing Hessian soldiers to defect to the American side.[2] Yet historians have left unmined a vital element of his story that spells out the universality of the American struggle for liberty. Christopher Ludwick left the Old World to settle in Philadelphia and, during the imperial crisis, became a fierce supporter of the Whig position. The broad objectives that motivated Ludwick to commit his personal blood and treasure to American resistance and, ultimately revolution, lie less in his embrace of colonial identity and more in his opposition to general oppression and hierarchical privilege. Ludwick remained grateful that Pennsylvania had welcomed him, foreigner though he was, and provided space where his personal industriousness and amicability made social mobility possible. In return, he dedicated his life to helping strangers realize their potential while jealously guarding against what he considered political despotism and economic predestination.

* * *

Shortly after Christopher Ludwick died in 1801, his friend, Philadelphia physician Benjamin Rush, wrote the baker’s first biography. Rush opened his short treatise lamenting how history had once been limited to studying “men who occupied the first ranks of society.” But now, and “Happily for the world,” he continued, scholars had expanded their investigative scope to include “successful talents and virtue . . . [in] those classes of people who constitute the majority of mankind.” Rush designed his biographical sketch partly to unveil the positive impact religious instruction had on moral character, a microstudy using Christopher Ludwick to tell a wider story. Rush also aimed to inform contemporary middling men that personal work ethic, frugality and honesty could result in private wealth, independence and happiness. Yet the physician had at least one other motive for writing his account. He hoped “to rescue from the rapid oblivion of the grave, the name of a venerable and excellent citizen.”[3] Benjamin Rush’s work remains the foundation to any modern exploration into Christopher Ludwick.

Heinrich and Catherine (nee Hiffle) Ludwick welcomed a son, Christopher, into their home on October 17, 1720, at Giessen in Hesse-Darmstadt.[4] Heinrich was a prosperous baker and Christopher likely began learning that trade when he became old enough to labor.[5] Sadly, Christopher’s mother died when he was twelve, but his father still managed to send the boy to a free school when he turned fourteen.[6] This suggests Heinrich’s business was profitable enough for the baker to lose much (perhaps even all) of his son’s labor while possibly hiring a journeyman to replace him. At school, two overworked teachers presided over about 300 students to at least a modicum of success: Ludwick advanced his reading, writing and arithmetic under their tutelage. Historian William Ward Condit suggested that Ludwick’s chaotic scholastic experience likely contributed to his future support for educating poor children.[7] Scholars should equally consider that Ludwick recognized the value of his education and appreciated the effort put forth by his grossly outnumbered teachers; this might equally have been the impetus behind his later investment in educating the disadvantaged.

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When Austria joined Russia in its contest against the Ottoman Empire in 1737, Ludwick joined the Austrian Army as a baker. The war proved disastrous for that Germanic state as the 1739 Peace of Belgrade bears out; Austria ceded Belgrade, Serbia, Wallachia and even parts of Bosnia to the Ottomans.[8] This demoralizing agreement prompted Austrian forces to withdraw from the Balkans during the harsh winter of 1739-1740, and Ludwick was among a contingent of soldiers forced to traverse some 350 miles to Vienna.[9] Of the one-hundred men who began this impelled march, only twenty-five lived to see their destination, a skeletal Ludwick among them.[10] According to Benjamin Rush, the men had to walk through “a dreary country, and in extremely cold weather.”[11] Sick, starved and virtually stark naked, Ludwick happened upon some Catholic peasants who selflessly offered the foreigner resuscitative victuals and shelter. He never forgot this act of mercy; in fact, it transformed him.[12]

In 1740, Ludwick took on garrison duties in Vienna, where he witnessed the public execution of the Austrian Army’s commissary general on charges of fraud and theft; this act of retribution haunted Ludwick for the remainder of his days, perhaps even solidifying honesty as one of his fundamental characteristics.[13] He next found himself stationed in Prague among a force about three thousand strong.[14] When the War of Austrian Succession broke out in 1740, France surrounded Prague and settled in for a ruthless seventeen-week siege. When Austrian forces finally surrendered, Ludwick became a prisoner of war. He quickly enlisted in the Prussian Army, however, and served faithfully until 1742. From a Baltic port sometime later that same year, Ludwick traveled west, washing ashore in London.[15]

Historian William Ward Condit contrasted the relative political freedom of metropolitan London “to the continental despotisms under which [Ludwick] had lived.” The Hessian baker, Condit remarked, must certainly have noticed the general absence of the state in ordinary life as opposed to its oppressive ubiquity back home.[16] By early 1743, Ludwick had enlisted in the Royal Navy as a baker on HMS Duke of Cumberland. He served for nearly three years, traveling through China, India and the East Indies. In Canton (Guangzhou, China), Ludwick purchased a bowl with a silver rim and had his name engraved on it. This bowl became something his compatriots would later associate with the intrepid sailor.[17] He returned to his father’s home in 1745 only to discover the old patriarch had passed away, leaving his estate to his son. With a respectable inheritance at his disposal, he next made a series of rare poor decisions; he returned to London and, according to Rush, spent several months “enjoying the pleasures of that great city.”[18] Once again penniless, he joined the British merchant navy, serving from 1745 to 1753. During his tenure, he visited Ireland, Holland, the West Indies and even continental North America while gaining a command of the English language along the way. By 1753, he had landed in Philadelphia, lugging along sixty English-manufactured suits which he promptly sold at a three-hundred percent profit.[19] Recognizing a paucity of pastry shops and bakeries in that city, he returned to London, intent on studying the craft of baking. He planned to return and settle in German-heavy Pennsylvania as a master artisan.[20]

In 1755, Ludwick stepped back into Philadelphia with a baker’s arsenal—from gingerbread molds to pans—all manufactured in England. These articles, as noted by William Condit, represented “basic equipment unobtainable in . . . Pennsylvania.”[21] Not long after arriving, Christopher Ludwick married widow Catharine England. Specializing in confectionary and ornate gingerbread, the artisan opened a high-end bakery in Letitia Court and immediately set about building an honest independence.[22] Financially secure by 1764, he helped found the German Society of Philadelphia, an organization dedicated to aiding impoverished Germans and educating their children.[23] Ludwick had moved from military man to roaming adventurer to skilled craftsman to community leader within a compressed period of time, a remarkable trajectory for anyone.

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Christopher Ludwick’s work ethic and conviviality, over time, brought him impressive wealth, as he acquired nine houses throughout Philadelphia, a farm in nearby Germantown, 123 ½ acres in Lancaster County and a small fortune in specie.[24] He came armed with his craft’s most advanced technology and, for nearly twenty years, built a reputation as an industrious, amiable and community-friendly artisan. Ludwick had seen the world— as a student, as a soldier, as a sailor—and had absorbed both the horrors of war and pleasures of living. He settled half a world away from his birthplace, his health, wealth and happiness intact. Imperial politics, however, were on the verge of reshaping the anglosphere, as a profound constitutional crisis threatened to tear the British empire asunder.

* * *

When news of the Coercive Acts reached Philadelphia in May 1774, Ludwick found himself elected to that city’s Committee of Correspondence, possibly because of his leadership in the German community and fluency in English. At one meeting, local leader Thomas Mifflin urged settlers to contribute to a fund for purchasing arms to defend the city. Ludwick volunteered, “Mr. President, I am but a poor gingerbread baker, but put my name down for two hundred pounds.”[25] This act both endeared Ludwick to the broader political community and revealed his own sense of outrage at Parliament’s perceived tyrannical measures. On June 18 Philadelphians once again held “a very large and respectable Meeting of the Freeholders and Freeman,” chaired by Thomas Willing and John Dickinson. This gathering drafted local resistance resolutions condemning the Boston Port Act as “unconstitutional [and] oppressive” to Bostonians and “dangerous to the liberties of the British Colonies.” The resolutions next declared “our brethren at Boston as suffering in the common cause of America” before calling for a continental congress to speak for British North America and re-establish “peace and harmony” between the colonies and the metropole. Those in attendance elected forty-four individuals to a committee to take up subscriptions for Boston. Among those burdened with this solemn business were Dickinson, Charles Thomson, Thomas Mifflin, Robert Morris and Christopher Ludwick. These were men, according to the resolutions, of “approved integrity, abilities, and sincere affection for the interest of this immense Empire.” They also noted that constituents looked to these individuals for guidance during this moment of great public unrest and calamity.[26]

When the First Continental Congress convened on September 5, 1774, it designed to restore liberty and moral purity to colonial America. In October, it issued the Articles of Association, a code of conduct that asked Whigs to commit to material and social sacrifice. More specifically, the Association asked Americans to refrain from purchasing British and Irish goods, warned merchants and vendors against price gouging and asked butchers to stop slaughtering sheep so as to bolster domestic textile production. Congress also asked Americans to abstain from alleged frivolous and corruptive practices such as horse racing, cockfighting, gambling, theatergoing and wastefully extravagant funereal practices. In order to enforce these resolutions, Congress directed each town and county to elect a Committee of Inspection and Observation, vigilance squads tasked with patrolling their respective zones of austerity. Congress empowered these committees to condemn all those unwilling to commit to self-denial as “enemies of American liberty” in local gazettes.[27] Philadelphians elected Christopher Ludwick to their committee on January 23, 1775.[28]

Philadelphians embraced the Articles of Association as a means to preserve “our Just Rights and Liberties.” They equally sought to inspire frugality and industry among freeman so as to limit wasteful consumption and mitigate colonial America’s industrial dependence on England. John Dickinson and Thomas Mifflin again served alongside Ludwick on this committee.[29] In March, Ludwick attended a meeting at Carpenters’ Hall to discuss a plan to establish “an American Manufactory of Woollens, Linens, and Cottons.” His fellow attendees elected him as one of the managers for this ambitious project.[30] For two years, this successful endeavor provided cloth for the Continental Army, production ceasing only when a British army occupied Philadelphia on September 17, 1777.[31]

On June 3, 1776, Congress resolved that “a flying camp be immediately established in the middle colonies,” drawing 10,000 men collectively from Pennsylvania, Maryland and Delaware (the majority coming from the former).[32] Though Congress never realized this quota, Ludwick volunteered for one of these mobile outfits, refusing both pay and rations for his service. According to Benjamin Rush, the fifty-five-year-old Ludwick looked to inspire his fellow militiamen with a love of liberty, lecturing them on “the degrading nature of slavery” and recounting how his homeland suffered from “poverty and misery” caused by “the rapacious hands of arbitrary kings and princes.” In one instance, Ludwick learned that some militiamen, deeply dissatisfied with their rations, planned on deserting. The artisan approached them and, dramatically falling to his knees, pleaded “Brother soldiers . . . When we hear the cry of fire in Philadelphia, we fly there with our buckets to keep it from our houses.” He then likened invading British forces to a similar crisis, warning that all must pitch in or “the great fire of the British army” will consume American liberty and property.[33] Ludwick’s plea did the trick and, according to Rush’s account, the would-be deserters remained in service.[34] Incredibly, Ludwick not only dissuaded colonists from deserting American forces; he also engaged in psychological warfare to recruit Hessian auxiliaries to join them.

On August 9, 1776, Congress created a committee to encourage “Hessians and other foreigners, employed by the King of Great Britain,” to quit the fight.[35] On August 18, Washington called Ludwick to his Manhattan headquarters to discuss the latter infiltrating a Hessian camp on Staten Island. Shortly afterward, Ludwick, presenting as an American deserter, made his way to enemy lines. As Joseph Reed explained to William Livingston, Christopher Ludwick “puts his Life in his Hand on this Occasion in order to serve the Interests of America” and any discovery of his mission “must prove fatal” to him.[36] The baker failed to convert any Hessians on this particular mission, Washington later lamented to President John Hancock; Ludwick had, however, risked capture and potential execution in support of the so-called glorious cause.[37] When confronted with Hessian prisoners, Ludwick hoped to charm them with the liberty and bounty of the land. “Let us,” he exclaimed, “take them to Philadelphia, and there show them our fine German churches. Let them see how our tradesmen eat good beef [and] drink out of silver cups every day.” He next recommended that Continental forces “send them back to their countrymen, and they will all soon run away . . . and be as good whigs as any of us.”[38] Washington and Hancock agreed, the latter going so far as to recommend that Ludwick “negotiate an exchange of the Hessian prisoners at Elizabethtown.”[39] Ludwick was, of course, living proof of a white equality of opportunity in colonial Pennsylvania.

On May 3, 1777, Congress appointed Ludwick “superintendent of bakers . . . in the grand army of the United States,” granting him, through Washington’s approbation, authority to hire journeymen bakers and regulate their pay. That body also expected Ludwick to alleviate waste and fraud and regularly report back to delegates.[40] In fact, Ludwick had already tried his hand at producing bread for militiamen in 1776. Jonathan Bayard Smith, an officer in a Philadelphia flying camp, divulged to Congressman John Adams that his men complained incessantly about the poor quality of bread until Ludwick provided his services. Bayard favorably described Ludwick as “disinterested, except for the public good” and disserted that if “he had any ambition I believe it is to be found, and known to be, in serving the public.” He closed by claiming everyone in Philadelphia as well as his present military camp testified to Ludwick’s abilities and virtue, adding “Indeed the alterations here in the article of bread is truly great.”[41] John Hancock, already impressed with Ludwick’s veracity, abilities and character, equally expressed to Washington in 1777 that he had “no Doubt [Ludwick] will do to the entire Satisfaction of the Troops, and in such a Manner as to save considerable Sums to the Public.”[42] Ludwick’s probity may have been at least partly inspired by his witnessing the public execution of the unscrupulous Austrian commissary general in 1740.

Washington began to coordinate troop movements around Ludwick’s whereabouts to keep his army tethered to a reliable food source whenever possible, asking the baker in chief to disclose where “you have erected public ovens that I may know where to apply for Bread when wanted.” The general also commanded Ludwick to transport bread by wagon, empowering him to press vehicles into service when necessary. In late 1777, Washington summoned Ludwick to Philadelphia, instructing the German to leave the Morristown encampment under the supervision of capable hands. The general recognized that bread, along with Ludwick’s unique talents, had become “an indispensable necessity.”[43] Ludwick, in turn, kept the commander in chief abreast of the condition, locations and productive capacity of his ovens. In one exchange, Ludwick explained to the general that no flour at any encampment should be wasted, but instead “sent to the nearest Magazine as it will . . . make good Bread.”[44] At Valley Forge, Ludwick constructed and supervised multiple bake houses throughout the military community, the main ovens apparently operating out of the house of Col. William Dewees (now the David Potts House). As noted by William Ward Condit, Ludwick resorted to “his best powers of cajolery” to pressure neighboring German families into supplying flour for the Continental Army.[45] Benjamin Rush recounted how Ludwick frequently dined at General Washington’s Valley Forge Headquarters, mainly discussing the mechanics and logistics of baking for so many for such a prolonged period. Ludwick also became known for his nearly ritualistic toast at dinners, “Health and long life to Christopher Ludwick and his wife,” which he followed by drinking from his Chinese bowl.[46]

The war years ravaged Ludwick’s health and wealth. In a failed resignation attempt in 1781, he noted to Congress how he had “served his country honestly” during the war, “had his property ruined by the enemy,” spent his private fortune supporting independence and saved the public “great sums of money.” He closed by revealing his sincere desire to retire in his sixty-first year “with the loss of his right eye and a ruined constitution.”[47] Congress quietly ignored his plea and, instead, proclaimed Ludwick had acted “with great industry and integrity in the character of principal superintendent of bakers” and was “hereby continued in that employment.” That body also compensated him one-thousand dollars “in new emissions” for past services. Ludwick, ever the good public servant, stayed at his post.[48] He was with Washington’s army at Yorktown and, following that Franco-American victory, provided his talents once again. Washington approached the baker and requested he produce six thousand pounds of bread for the defeated British forces. “Let it be good, old gentleman,” he expressed to Ludwick, “and let there be enough of it, if I should want myself.”[49] Ludwick continued his duties after the crescendo of the war, mostly working out of West Point alongside skilled French bakers.[50]

* * *

Christopher Ludwick suffered staggering private loss supporting independence. He had sold many of his properties to feed the American army, British forces had pillaged others while others still had fallen into a state of disrepair in his absence. Ludwick committed to a Spartan lifestyle for some time after the war, partly to support some in his kin network, partly to rebuild his private fortune. He began selling off what remained of his properties and investing the proceeds into interest-bearing bonds, a decision that steadily began placing the old soldier back on secure financial terrain.[51] He also petitioned Congress for reimbursement based on his “Zeal for the Cause of America,” and reminded that assembly how his “Skill and Knowledge in the Baking Business” and personal honesty had “saved vast Sums” of public money while injuring “his own private Property, as well as his Constitution.”[52] And he came armed with more than just personal grievance for the evidentiary record.

Ludwick had reached out to some major figures who attested to his character as well as his contributions and sacrifices during the war. Arthur St. Clair, William Irvine and Anthony Wayne praised his services and recognized both his public support for the war and his private loss in its pursuit. Timothy Pickering argued Ludwick’s “disinterested Zeal, his indefatigable industry in the duties of his department, his unsullied integrity, the essential Services he rendered to the Army, and the generous Sacrifices he has made in the Course of the late Revolution” entitled him to some form of relief. Thomas Mifflin described the baker as “one of our first and most determined Whigs,” noting his “disinterested Services in the Army and the great Sacrifice” of property he made to support the American Revolution.[53] A calculating Ludwick also reached out to Washington.

Ludwick wrote to the retired commander in chief on March 29, 1785. He warmly addressed Washington as “Your Excellency” and reminded the general of their friendship during the war before revealing he had been reduced to asking Congress for compensation for loss of property and wealth suffered while serving the Continental Army. Ludwick entreated the general to provide a written statement attesting to the baker’s disinterestedness, intrinsic value to the public and crippling private loss; Ludwick hoped Washington would not “refuse me this favor.”[54] The Virginian did not disappoint. He composed the following lines praising Ludwick:

I have known Mr Christr Ludwick from an early period of the War; and have every reason to believe, as well from observation as information, that he has been a true and faithful Friend, and Servant to the public. That he has detected and exposed many impositions which were attempted to be practiced by others in the department over which he presided. That he has been the cause of much saving in many respects. And that his deportment in public life has afforded unquestionable proofs of his integrity and worth.[55]

Congress approved the modest sum of $200 for Ludwick’s dedication to American liberty.[56]

* * *

Ludwick slowly rebuilt his tattered fortune over the next decade, remaining a community leader in Philadelphia and “the Governor of Letitia Court,” as his neighbors affectionately addressed him.[57] Sadly, his wife Catharine died in 1796, Benjamin Rush describing her as the baker’s “faithful companion” and supporter in all of his “patriotic schemes.” Afterward, the aging veteran moved into the home of Frederick Fraley, a former apprentice of his. When yellow fever swept through Philadelphia in 1797, Ludwick and Fraley selflessly remained in that city and, according to Rush, “assist[ed] in making bread for distribution among the poor, in that period of awful distress.”[58] This episode may reflect Ludwick repaying his earlier Vienna experience in 1740, this time acting as provider rather than recipient of mercy. Ludwick married Sophia Binder in 1798, Binder herself suggesting they wed so the extravert Ludwick would not spend his final days alone.[59] During one of those final days, a salesman asked Ludwick to purchase a biography of George Washington. The usually generous Ludwick replied, “No, I will not, I am travelling fast to meet him, I will then hear all about it from his own mouth.” On Wednesday, June 17, 1801, Christopher Ludwick set off to meet Washington.[60] The National Intelligencer and Washington Advertiser simply announced, “Died . . . Christopher Ludwick, baker general in the revolutionary army.”[61] The following month, Benjamin Rush began publishing portions of his short biography in the New Hampshire Gazette.[62] Sometime before Ludwick’s death, however, the old baker had attended to his will and memorial tablet for his grave.

Ludwick revealed his character, philosophy and sapience in his will and gravestone. In the former, he left equal and substantial sums to the German Reformed Church, German Society, Lutheran Church and University of Pennsylvania to educate impoverished children. He bequeathed Pennsylvania Hospital £100 for poor patients and left another £200 to purchase firewood for Philadelphia’s destitute. Ludwick recognized the communal value of education and directed his executors to invest his more than £3,000 of specie into public or private interest-bearing securities or dependable rental properties. They were to next apply the annual interest, his will decreed, to defray the cost of educating the poor, “without any exception to country, extraction [ethnic origin] or religious principles of their friends or parents.” If Philadelphia incorporated a public school, Ludwick asked that his estate be vested into it. If, within five years, no school materialized, he demanded his estate be divided among the German Lutheran, German Reformed, English Episcopal, First and Second Presbyterian, Roman Catholic and African churches of Philadelphia as well as the University of Pennsylvania, “exclusively [for] educating poor children.”[63] The Catholic investment was directly related to the generosity some poor Catholics offered an emaciated Ludwick in Vienna some sixty years earlier.[64] The generosity toward children of African descent expresses a remarkable liberality on the German’s part, another example of his crusade against all forms of oppression. In fact, The Christopher Ludwick Foundation still offers educational grants and support today. For more than two centuries (in one form or another), Ludwick’s fortune has been fighting economic oppression.[65] His grave tablet, the final thoughts Ludwick offered both living and unborn, is worth reprinting in toto.

CHRISTOPHER LUDWICK
In Memory of
CHRISTOHPER LUDWICK
AND HIS WIFE,
CATHARINE,
She died at Germantown the 21^st September, 1796,
Aged eighty years and five months ;
He died at Philadelphia the 17^th June, 1801,
Aged eighty years and nine months.
—
He was born at Giessen in Hesse D’Armstadt in Germany,
And learndt the Bakers trade and business ;
In his early life he was a Soldier and a Sailor, and visited the
East and West Indies ;
In the year 1755, he came to and settled at Philadelphia,
And by his industry and his trade and business,
Acquired a handsome competency, part of which he devoted
To the service of his adopted country in the contest
For the INDEPENDENCE OF AMERICA ;
Was appointed Baker General to the Army,
And for his faithful services received a written testimony
From the Commander in Chief
GENERAL WASHINGTON.
On every occasion his zeal for the relief of the oppressed
Was manifest ; and by his last will
He bequeathed the greater part of his estate for the
Education of the children of the poor of all denominations,
gratis.

He lived and died
Respected for his integrity and public spirit,
By all who knew him.
Reader, such was Ludwick.
Art thou poor, Venerate his character.
Art thou rich, Imitate his example.[66]

Christopher Ludwick’s grave rests in Germantown, Pennsylvania, at Saint Michael’s Lutheran Churchyard, among hundreds of ancient tombs. What stands out today is his stone’s superior craftsmanship. Most of the other markers in the graveyard are either cracked, missing, have fallen over or are weather-worn and virtually devoid of the inscriptions they once bore. Ludwick’s memorial tablet is, by contrast, intact, perfectly legible and unique; it is the only monument in the cemetery elevated and resting on four stone pillars. It is also the only marker to offer visitors a brief account of the unique odyssey and moral principles once attended to by the bones entombed in the ground below. And Ludwick made certain to carve in stone his support for the glorious cause and “zeal for the relief of the oppressed.”

Benjamin Rush wrote An Account of the Life and Character of Christopher Ludwick shortly after that gentlemen’s passing. He sent a copy to Abigail Adams and she responded to the physician in a warm but deeply pessimistic fashion. Adams claimed Rush’s account would be “read with pleasure by all Lovers of Virtue honor and Patriotism,” happily recognizing the biography as “a model for youth.” Yet she warned that few characters with those qualities remained in the current environment of “prosperity Luxery and dissipation.” Adams noticed an unsettling new approach to religion, morals and politics and worried the republic would only last “until heaven in wrath punishes us” for wasting the fruits of “this fair land.”[67] She composed this response, no doubt, in the aftermath of her husband’s electoral defeat to Thomas Jefferson during the bitter presidential election of 1800.[68]

The principles of the American Revolution, at least on the surface, announced a universally appealing message to the global community: Colonists refused to let a perceived reckless and unaccountable body of elites threaten life, liberty and property. At a moment when many western Europeans gloried in their enlightened place in the world and cast Russia and Asia as oppressors of mankind, by late 1774 many British North Americans suddenly began to feel as if the British system had become just as corrupt as the most despotic foreign court. Christopher Ludwick had left one of those foreign courts after fighting for the pride and pomp of princes. He found independence and purpose in Philadelphia and, with his hard-earned wealth, contributed to helping others in need break the socio-economic cycle of poverty leading to failure. He was an opponent of all forms of oppression, advocate of private pursuits of happiness and champion of the downtrodden. When Americans Whigs joined against king and Parliament during the Coercive Acts Crisis, Ludwick stood with the resistance. After all, he had poured his life into Philadelphia; that city repaid him with acceptance, opportunity and security. And when it became clear the empire’s troubles could no longer be resolved with words, the fiery craftsman once again resorted to war. A German soldier transformed into an American rebel, supportive of the common cause and all it had afforded him and all he felt it had yet to offer future generations of citizens.

[1] Many serious websites support this observation, yet they are harmless and still include Christopher Ludwick’s general life trajectory and contributions to the American war effort. And many of the qualities and characteristics typically covered originated from the best source material, Benjamin Rush, An Account of the Life and Character of Christopher Ludwick, Late Citizen of Philadelphia, and Baker-General of the Army of the United States During the Revolutionary War (Philadelphia, PA: Garden and Thompson, 1831).

[2] See for example, E. Wayne Carp, To Starve the Army at Pleasure: Continental Army Administration and American Political Culture, 1775-1783 (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 1984); John Bakeless, Turncoats, Traders and Heroes: Espionage in the American Revolution (New York, NY: De Capo Press, 1959).

[3] Rush, An Account, 5-6, 26.

[4] William Ward Condit, “Christopher Ludwick, Patriotic Gingerbread Baker,” Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography 81, no. 4 (1957): 365-90.

[5] Rush, An Account, 6; “Christopher Ludwig, Baker-General of the Army of the United States during the Revolutionary War,” Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography 16, no. 2 (1892): 343-48.

[6] Condit, “Christopher Ludwick,” 366.

[7] Ibid.

[8] Condit, “Christopher Ludwick,” 366-67.

[9] Ibid., 367.

[10] Rush, An Account, 7.

[11] Ibid., 27; Condit, “Christopher Ludwick,” 367.

[12] Rush, An Account, 7.

[13] Ibid.; 7; Condit, “Christopher Ludwick,” 367.

[14] Condit, “Christopher Ludwick,” 367.

[15] Ibid.

[16] Ibid., 368.

[17] Rush, An Account, 16.

[18] Ibid., 8.

[19] Condit, “Christopher Ludwick,” 369.

[20] Ibid.

[21] Ibid., 365. Both Benjamin Rush and William Ward Condit (the latter probably following Rush’s lead) record 1754 as the year Ludwick arrived and took up permanent residence in Philadelphia. Ludwick’s memorial tablet at his grave, however, clearly states his arrival as 1755. I have followed the date on the grave marker, since Ludwick would have overseen the final words he had to offer to both the living and the unborn.

[22] Rush, An Account, 9.

[23] Condit, “Christopher Ludwick,” 372.

[24] Rush, An Account, 10; Condit, “Christopher Ludwick,” 370.

[25] Rush, An Account, 10-11.

[26] Peter Force, ed., American Archives: Consisting of a Collection of Authentic Records, State Papers, Debates, And Letters And Other Notices of Publick Affairs, the Whole Forming a Documentary History of the Origins and Progress of the North American Colonies; of the Causes and Accomplishments of the American Revolution; and of the Constitution of Government for the United States, to the Final Ratification Thereof: Fourth Series, 6 vols. (Washington, DC, 1837-1853), 1:426-27.

[27] For the text of the Articles of Association, Worthington Chauncy Ford, et al., eds., Journals of the Continental Congress, 34 vols. (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1904-37), 1:75-80; For a contemporary treatment, see Shawn David McGhee, No Longer Subjects of the British King: The Political Transformation of Royal Subjects to Republican Citizens, 1774-1776 (Yardley, PA: Westholme, 2024).

[28] “City and County of Philadelphia Resolutions, January 23, 1775,” in Force, American Archives, 1:1169.

[29] “Proceedings of the Convention for the Province of Pennsylvania, Held at Philadelphia, January 23, 1775,” in ibid, 1:1169-71.

[30] “Philadelphia, March 16, 1775,” in ibid, 2:140.

[31] Condit, “Christopher Ludwick,” 373.

[32] Ford, et al., Journals Congress, 4:412-13; See also Francis E. Devine, “The Pennsylvania Flying Camp, July-November 1776,” Pennsylvania History: A Journal of Mid-Atlantic Studies 46, no. 1 (1979): 59-78.

[33] Rush, An Account, 11-12.

[34] Condit, “Christopher Ludwick,” 374.

[35] August 9, 1776, Ford, et al., Journals of Congress, 5:640.

[36] Joseph Reed to William Livingston, August 19, 1776, in Carl Prince, eds et al., The Papers of William Livingston, 5 vols. (Trenton and New Brunswick, NJ: New Jersey Historical Commission and Rutgers University Press, 1979-1988), 1:119.

[37] George Washington to John Hancock, August 29, 1776 in Philander P. Chase, et al., eds., The Papers of George Washington: Revolutionary War Series, 30 vols. (Charlottesville, VA: University of Virginia Press, 1985-2022), 6:74-75.

[38] Rush, An Account, 12.

[39] Washington to the Board of War, November 16, 1776; Hancock to Washington, November 16, 1776, in Chase, et al., Papers of Washington: Revolutionary War Series, 7:161-62 ,169.

[40] Ford, Journals of Congress, 7:323-24.

[41] Jonathan Bayard Smith to John Adams, August 28, 1776, in Robert J. Taylor, et al., eds., The Papers of John Adams, 20 vols. (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1977-2020), 4:500.

[42] Hancock to Washington, May 3, 1777, in Chase, et al., Papers of Washington: Revolutionary War Series, 9:335-36.

[43] Washington to Christopher Ludwick, September 5, 1777, in ibid., 11:153.

[44] Ludwick to Washington, January, 1780, in ibid., 24:339-40.

[45] Condit, “Christopher Ludwick,” 381.

[46] Rush, An Account, 16.

[47] The Papers of the Continental Congress, as quoted in Condit, “Christopher Ludwick,” 384.

[48] Ford, et al, Journals of Congress, 19:159.

[49] Rush, An Account, 15.

[50] Condit, “Christopher Ludwick,” 385.

[51] Rush, An Account, 17-18.

[52] Christopher Ludwick, as quoted in Condit, “Christopher Ludwick,”386.

[53] Ibid., 386-87.

[54] Ludwick to Washington, March 29, 1785, in W.W. Abbot, ed., The Papers of George Washington: Confederation Series, 6 vols. (Charlottesville, VA: University Press of Virginia, 1992-1997), 2:471-72.

[55] Rush, An Account, 18-19.

[56] Condit, “Christopher Ludwick,” 388.

[57] Rush, An Account, 9.

[58] Ibid., 19; Not unlike the discrepancy between Ludwick’s year of arrival, there is a minor dispute over when his wife passed away. Rush recorded the year as 1795, Ludwick’s grave tablet claims the year as 1796. For the same reasons I listed in n21, this work follows the tomb’s memorial.

[59] John F. Watson, Annals of Philadelphia and Pennsylvania, in the olden Time, Being a Collection of memoirs, Anecdote, and incidents of the City and Its Inhabitants, and the Earliest Settlements of the Inland Part of Pennsylvania, from the Days of the Founders . . ., 2 vols. (Philadelphia, PA: J.B. Lippincott and Company, 1870), 2:56.

[60] Rush, An Account, 20.

[61] The National Intelligencer and Washington Advertiser (Washington, DC), June 22, 1801.

[62] New Hampshire Gazette, July 28, 1901.

[63] Rush, An Account, 24-26.

[64] Ibid., 26.

[65] For more information on the Christopher Ludwick Foundation, see ludwickfoundation.org/.

[66] Christopher Ludwick’s grave memorial at Saint Michael’s Lutheran Churchyard, 6671 Germantown Avenue, Germantown, Pennsylvania.

[67] Abigail Adams to Benjamin Rush, September 21, 1801, in eds., Lyman H. Butterfield, et al., The Adams Papers: Family Correspondence, 15 vols. (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1963-2021), 15:127-28.

[68] See John Ferling, Adams vs. Jefferson: The Tumultuous Election of 1800 (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2004).