Hans Meyli, Sr., and his Son's Wife

In the Knonow Bailiwick the persecution broke out at this time with great violence. At one time about thirty thief catchers** stormed the houses of the Anabaptists and defenseless Christians, made many watch fires, raged and stormed, broke open doors and windows, ran through the houses with bare swords, and afterward drank and rioted worse than soldiers. [n1232-2]

Among the others, the house of an old man named Hans Meyli, a minister of the church, was also violently attacked. He himself had been imprisoned in the year 1637; but now they took away his son Martin's wife as well, even though she had an infant at the breast.

She was bound tightly and confined in the convent prison called Othenbach, fed for a long time on bread and water, and treated very severely, in order to make her apostatize. But she remained steadfast in all her temptations, and was finally, through the grace of God, wonderfully delivered from her bonds. Afterward, being pregnant, she was arrested again and taken to the council house at Zurich, from there to Othenbach, and finally into the hospital, and there fastened to a chain, until her labor pains came upon her. Then she was loosed from her bonds, and seeing an opportunity to get away, she once more escaped the persecutors' hands. See the Tract of the year 1645, by Jer. M., folio 4, B, and folio 5, A.

NOTE. The authorities laid their hands on the old man's property as well, movable as well as immovable, and realized fourteen thousand guilders from the sale of it, all of which they kept for themselves, without making any restitution.

NOTE. On the 3rd of May in the year 1639, the two sons of the Hans Meyli named above, namely, Hans Meyli, Jr., and Martin Meyli, together with the wife of this Hans Meyli, were arrested and imprisoned at Zurich. There much misery, vexation and harm was inflicted on them, especially on the men, with fetters and handcuffs, as well as iron shackles, which were put on them twice, in order to make them apostatize from their faith.

Their children, as poor, forsaken orphans, were placed among strangers, which, as anyone may easily suppose, must have caused no small sorrow and anxiety to the hearts of these imprisoned parents. Nevertheless they remained unchanged in their faith, refusing to fall away from it, in spite of their love for their afflicted children, whom they could not reach, until on the Friday before Easter in the year 1641, after three years of imprisonment, they were delivered from their bonds in an unexpected manner, together with others of their fellow brothers, keeping a good conscience. See the Tract of the year 1645, by Jer. Mang., folio 5, A and B.