Anna Nitschmann

Anna Nitschmann was born in 1715 in Kunewald, in Moravia, which is now part of the Czech Republic. Her family belonged to the descendants of the old Moravian Brethren who had suffered persecution for generations. When she was a child, her family fled with others to the estate of Count Nikolaus von Zinzendorf in Saxony, where they found refuge and founded the community of Herrnhut. She grew up in this tightly knit settlement of refugees, who lived together in daily prayer and common work.

She was a bright, spirited girl with a gift for leadership. At the age of twelve or so, she took part in the great spiritual awakening that came to Herrnhut in August 1727, a time when the whole community experienced a deep reconciliation and a sense of the nearness of God. That event is often called the birth of the Moravian Church in its renewed form. It shaped Anna for life. She was among the young people who were drawn into the prayer watch that began in the same month and that continued for decades, with believers taking turns to pray around the clock.

As she grew, she was given more and more responsibility among the unmarried women of the community, who were organized in a group called the Single Sisters' Choir. By her early twenties, she was one of the leaders of that group, and she helped to guide the spiritual life and daily work of the women. She was a close friend and coworker of the Count, and she often traveled with him. In 1741 she went with him to America, where they spent two years in Pennsylvania, helping to found the Moravian settlement at Bethlehem. She helped to organize the women of the new community and to establish a school.

She was also part of the great missionary work of the Moravians, who were the first Protestants to send missionaries on a large scale. She supported those who went out and kept up the prayer for them. She traveled in Europe, visiting congregations and helping to care for the women in each place. She was known for her bold faith and for her cheerful temper.

After Zinzendorf's wife, Erdmuth, died in 1756, he married Anna in 1757. By then she had worked closely with him for many years, and the marriage was in some sense a recognition of a partnership that already existed. Some in the church were uneasy about it, and the match brought criticism. The Count was an unusual and sometimes controversial man, and the Moravian community in those years was passing through a time of strain, with disputes over its direction and over some of the extravagant forms of devotion that had arisen.

Zinzendorf died on May 9, 1760. Anna, who had been in poor health, died only weeks later, in the same year. She had given her whole life to the community and to the cause of missions.

She left little of her own writing, and her life is known mostly through the records of others. She stands in the history of the church as an example of a woman who held real authority among believers in an age when it was uncommon. She was a mother in the faith to many, and she showed what can be done when a person gives her strength to a company of praying people.