History & local legend
Shenkel Church and its Free Burial Ground in North Coventry preserve a connection to the Battle-Axes, a nineteenth-century religious movement led by Theophilus Gates. Beginning in the late 1830s, Gates taught that the Second Coming had already occurred and that the Coventry area was a new Garden of Eden. His followers rejected conventional marriage and practiced rituals involving nudity, earning the surrounding area its later nickname, Free Love Valley.
The township's historical account describes a confrontation at Shenkel Church in the spring of 1844. Members entered during Sunday worship without clothing, although the men and women still used separate aisles according to the congregation's custom. Hannah Williamson, who succeeded Gates as leader, also entered local pulpits to preach her beliefs.
The movement's history includes a separate tragedy. On October 25, 1855, Hannah Shingle was murdered in her upstairs bedroom with her own axe. The killer was never identified. Several members were eventually buried in the Shenkel Free Burial Ground.
Sources
- North Coventry Township Historical Commission, sect membership and the unsolved murder of Hannah Shingle
- North Coventry Township, spring 2013, Coventry Woods and the Free Love Valley Movement, church procession in 1844, Williamson, beliefs and burials
- Shenkel United Church of Christ, congregation’s own historic timeline and site
- Chester County regional history, Gates’s publication, Shenkel Church and Williamson
- Shenkel United Church of Christ Cemetery, coordinates recorded with site photograph
