Biography
Michael Schmoyer was a Pennsylvania German participant in Fries’s Rebellion from the Macungie (Millerstown) area of what was then Northampton County. Arrested for his part in the resistance to the 1798 federal direct tax, he was jailed to await trial and, before his case was concluded, contracted yellow fever and died in custody — one of at least three Fries’s Rebellion prisoners who died of the fever in jail rather than living to be tried or pardoned.
Case
Norristown Jail