History of Delaware : 1609-1888, Part 40

Author: Scharf, J. Thomas (John Thomas), 1843-1898. cn
Publication date: 1888
Publisher: Philadelphia : L. J. Richards
Number of Pages: 776

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" for I have observed the runs of water have the same color as that which proceeds from the coal mines in Wales." De shows the abundance of game by telling how he had bought of the Indians a whole beck (both sl.in and carcass) for two gills of gunpowder. Land had ad- vanced in twelve years from fifteen or eighteen shillinge to eighty pounds per one hundred acres, over a thousand por cent. (in Philadelphia), and was fetching round prices in the adjacent country.

The Swede had no roads. They followed bridle-paths on foot or on horseback, and carried their freight by water. It was in 1686 that the people of Philadelphia begin to move for better highways. The Schuylkill ferry monopoly was then exciting public attention, and the Council took the whole matter of thoroughfares into eon- cideration. The first control of roads was by the courts, which appointed overseers and fence-view- ers. the grand jury laying out the roads. In 1692 the control of roads was given to the townships, and this lasted until the adoption of a general road law.

Precisely what sort of houses were built by the first settlers may be known with satisfactory exact- Dess from the contemporary records. In Penn's tract of "Information and Direction to such Persons as are inclined to America," we have a description of such houses, and we may assume that the " Welcome's " passengers erected exactly such structures during their probationary period of eave life or hut life in the wilderness. The dimen- sions given are almost those of the house of Pas- torius :

"To build them an House of thirty foot long and eighteen foot broad with a partition near the middle, and another to divale one end of the Ilouse into two small Rooms, there must be right Trees of abont sixteen inches square, and cut off to Posts of about filtern foot long, which the House must stand upon, and four pirees, two of thirty foot long and two of eighteen foot long, for Plates, which minst lie upon the top of these Posts, the whole length and breadth of tho llonse, fur the Gists (joists) to rest upon. There must be ten Gists of twenty foot long to hear the Luft, and two false Plates of thitty foot long to lie upon the ends of the Gists for the Rafters to be fixed upon, twelve pare ot Rafters of about twenty fout to hear the Roof of the House. with several other small peces, as Windbeams, Braces, Study, &c., which are made out of the Waste Timber. For covering the House, Euds and sules, and for the Luft we use Clabboard, which is Rived feather-edged, of five foot and a half long,1 that, well Drawn, lyes close and smooth : The Lodging Room may be lined with the same, and filled up between, which is very Warm. These houses usually endure ten years without repair."

The cost of such a house is given as follows : Carpenter's work (the owner and his servants as- sisting ), $7 ; a barn of the same dimensions, £5; nails and other things to finish both, $3 10s .; total for house and barn, £15 10%. These houses had dirt floors, clapboard floors for garret. Okhuixon copies these directions verbatim in his description of the houses of the first settlers The directions,

1 " Feather-edged," with one side thinner than the other, as shingles are made.

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HISTORY OF DELAWARE.

however, are very incomplete ; no provisions are made for doors, windows or chimneys. Of the latter these houses had but one, built outside the gable of the sitting-room. sometimes of'stone, some- times of clay and sticks, sometimes of wood only. The doors could be made of riven stuff, of course, with deer-skin hinges and wooden latch and bar, and the windows could be closed with clapboard shutters. A large fire-place was needed, with a stone hearth; the table could be made of hewn stuff, resting on puncheons driven into the ground, and blocks, stools and benches would answer for seats Rude wooden bedsteads or berths could be contrived along the walls, and a few bear-kins, with the bedelothes brought over by every emi- grant, would make them warm. The other furni- ture would comprise chiefly kitchen utensils ; pork fat, whale or sturgeou oil, and pine knots or " light wood " would give all the artificial light needed.

Iron articles were most costly and hardest to get. Edward Jones, at Merion, writes in August, 1682, for nails, sixpennies and eightpennies; for mill- iron, an iron kettle for his wife, aud shoes, all of which he says are dear; " Iron is about two and thirty or forty shillings a hundred ; steel about 1s. 5d. per pound." In Penn's .. Directions " he recom- mends colonists to bring out with them, in the way of utensils and goods, " English Woollen and German Linen, or ordinary Broad-Clothes, Ker- eseys, Searges, Norwich-Stuffs, some Duffels, Cot- tons and Stroud-waters for the Natives, and White and Blew Ozenburgs [Osnaburgs], Shoes and Stockings, Buttons, Silk, Thread, Iron Ware, especially Felling Axes. Hows, Indian Hows, Saws, Frows [frowers, for splitting shingles], Drawing Knives, Nails, but of od. and &d. a treble quantity, because they use them in shingling or covering of Houses." For the first year's stock for a farm he advises " three milch cows, with young calves by their sides, £10; yoke of oxen, ES ; Brood mare, £5; two young Sows and a Boar, £1 10%., -in all £24." For first year's provisions: Eight bushels of Indian eorn per capita, and five bushels of English wheat, for five persons, £8 7%. 6d .; two barrels of molasses ( for beer), $3; beef and pork, 120 pounds per head, at 2d. per pound, $5; five gallons spirits at 2s. per gallon, 10s. Three hands, with a little help from the woman and boy, can plant and tend 20,000 hills of corn ( planted four feet each way, there are 2717 hills to an acre, or seven and one third aeres to the whole number of hills), and they may sow eight acres of spring wheat and oats, besides raising peas, potatoes and garden stuff. The expected yield will be 400 bushels of corn, 120 bushels of oats and wheat, etc. These calculations were moderate for a virgin soil, free from vermin. Dr. More, in his letter to Penn in September, 1686, says, " I have had seventy ears of Rye upon one single root, proceeding from one

single eorn ; forty-five of Wheat ; eighty of O; ten, twelve and fourteen of Barley out of one C. . I took the curiosity to tell one of the twelve E. from one Grain, and there was in it forty five grat on that ear ; above three thousand of oats from single corn, and some I had that had much mor but it would seem a Romance rather than a Tri, if I should speak what I have seen in the-, things."

A better class of houses than these elapboar i ones with dirt floors were soon built. Indeed, th. old log houses of the Swedes were more comfort. able, especially when built like that of Sven Sener- at Coaquannoe, with a first story of stone and the superstructure of logs. A well-built log house. on a stone foundation, well filled in with bricks of stone and mortar, and ceiled inside with planking like a ship, makes the dryest, warmest and most durable country-house that can be built. But the settlers immediately began to burn bricks and con- struet houses of them, often with a timber frame. work, in the old Tudor cottage style. This sort of building went on rapidly as soon as limestone began to be quarried and burnt.1

This better class of houses was, of course. more elaborately furuished. It may be noticed that in .John Goodson s directory in Philadelphia, cabinet- makers and other workmen in furniture and in- terior movables are mentioned, but all the first settlers must have brought or imported their furniture from Europe. It was stiff and heavy, scarcely anticipating that slim and spindling style which came in with the next English sovereign. and has recently been revived with an extravagance of pursuit seldom exhibited except in brie-a-brac hunters and opera-bouffe artistes. As yet not much mahogany and rosewood were used by the Northern nations (except the Dutch), but good solid oak, well-carved, and walnut were the favorite woods. There were great chests of drawers, massive buffets, solid tables, with flaps and wings, straight-baek oak chairs, well-carved, leathern-seated chairs, studded with brass nails, and tall Dutch clocks. Much of the table furniture was pewter or common delf- ware; brass and copper served in the kitchen where now tin is used. Wood was the only fuel. and the fire-places, enormously capacious, had great iron dogs in them, to which, in winter-time, the back- log was often dragged by a yoke of oxeu with the log-chain. Cranes and hooks, suspended in these fire-places, held pots for the boiling, and the roast- ing was done on spits or upon " jacks," which dogs had to turn. The bread was baked in a brick oven usually outside the house, and the minor baking in " Dutch ovens," set upon and covered over with beds of red-hot coals. In the family

I " Madam Farmer, " who was the first prison to buin stone hitne it Pintadelphis (Build, in bas, says no stone hme had been discovered , offered, in Idsc-s7, to bell ten thousand bushels of Schuylkill lime af sixpence per bushel at the kin ..

MANNERS AND CUSTOMS

part of the house the brass andirons and tong? and The rivers tesmed with fish, and the Quakers early fender made the fire glow upon the deep hearth learned the virtues and delicious favor of the shad, broiled on a plauk at one side the tireplace, while a johnny-cake browied on another plank at the other side of the fire. Pean grew so fond of these that in 1680 he wrote to Harrison to send him setae "smoakt baunches of venison and pork. Gett them of the Sweeds. Some smoakt shadd and beef. The old priest & Philadelphia ( Fabricius) had rare shadd. Also zone pear and beans of that country." Richard Townshend, in 1682, says that the first year colonists altosi lived on fish, of which great quantities were caught, the winter being an open one. and venison .--- " We could buy a deer for about two shillings, and a large turkey for about one shilling, and Indian corn for about two shillings and sixpence per bushel." Six rockfish or six shad could be bought for a shilling ; oysters two shillings a byshe!, herrings one shilling and sixpence per hundre i. Sturgeon were caught for food, and also for the off they supplied. The Delaware and the WM. PENN'S CLOCK. Schuylkill and adjacent pools and marshes were the resort of myriads of wild-fowl, from swan and geese down to rail and reed-birds. As soon as the settlers became established, the flesh of all domesti- cated animals was cheap in the markets. Every fanuly kept its own cows, made its own butter and look doubly cheerta !. The Quakers did not use stoves until Benjamin Franklin inveigled them into it with that simulacrum of an open fireplace called the Franklin stove. The Swedes scarcely had chim- neys, much less stoves, but the Germans early imported the great porcelain stoves which they were familiar with at home, and which they used until Christopher Saur, the Germantown printer, invented the ten-plate stove, for which lovers of the beautiful will scarcely know how to forgive him. All well to-do families had good store of linen for bed-clothes, blankets, etc. ; the washing was not done often, and the chests of drawers were filled with homespun. Espe- cially was this the ease among the German settlers, who scarcely washed up the soiled honse and person wear more than once in a quarter. It was the pride and test of a good housewife to have more linen made up than she knew what to do with.1 It is noteworthy that the Germans built their houses with one chimney, in the centre of the building, the English with a chimney at each end, and this distinction was so commonly marked as to attract the attention of travelers." In their bedroom furniture the Germans substituted the " feather deck " for the blanket,-more majoram, -and this uncomfortable covering is still retained.

In the honses the floors down-stairs were sanded. There were no carpets as yet, not even home-made ones, and the Germans have not been using these for a hundred years. William Penn bad no carpets in his Pennsbury Manor house. The large, heavy tables in the dining and living rooms of the early homes groaned with plenty, and the great pewter dishes were piled high. The people worked hard, and they did not stint themselves. The Swedes, Germans and Quakers were all of them hearty feeders, and they liked gross tood. No dread of dyspepsia limited their dishes : they had abundance and enjoyed it. Only a few men of English habits and fond of port, brandy and madeira, like Capt. Markham, ever had the gout "

1 In a clever little volume, published in 1873, called " Pennsylvania Dutch and other Essays," we read of one extreme Is provident and fore- handled damsel who had a bure in full of linen shirts and other clothes ready made up for her future husband, whom she was set to meet, and whowe measure she could, of course, only guess at, by assuming that the right man, when he del come, would hoof the size and heure she had in her mind's eye in cutting ont the garments

Schoop's " Reise Durch Pennsylvanen," list, noted by f. D. Rupp, notes to Dr. Bush's pamphlet on " Manuers of the Germans in

" In Governor Fletcher's tuuse the Council adjourned to meet ag.un in

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WILLIAM PENN'S SILVER TEA-SERVICE.

cheese, salted, cured and smoked its own bacon, beef, herring, shad, venison and motton. The smoke-house, dairy and poultry-house were append- ages to all town houses, and most of them had their own vegetable gardens likewise. It was the custom then, and remained so until long after the beginning of the present century, for every house to be provisioned as if to stand a siege. The cellars had great bins for potatoes and other roots and apples; there were tiers of barrels of fresh cider, and casks for vinegar to ripen in, and in a locked recess were usually some easks of madeira, sherry,

Markham's house because the gont prevented him from going out, and Fletcher wanted a full attendance of his ads latis.

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HISTORY OF DELAWARE.

port, rum, brandy, gin, ete., for the master and his guests, with marsala and malaga for the women and children. There was an astonishing amount of drinking going on all the time; all drank some- thing, if it was only ale or small beer. The pantry and store-house of the mistress was for use, not ornament Her barrels of saur-kraut were in the cellar, her firkins of apple-butter occupied the ample garret, along with strings of onions, hampers of dried peaches and apples, and great bundles of dried herbs; but in the store-room the deep- bottomed shelf was ranged around with gray stone jars of large capacity, filled with pickles, the shelf above it marshaled a battalion of glass jars of pre- serves of every sort. and the upper shelves bent under the weight of bottles filled with sauces and srubs, and " bounce" and ketchups, and soys, cordials, lavender, aromatic vinegars, and a hundred deft contrivances to tiekle the palate, and deprave all stomachs but such as those of these hardy toilers in the open air.

The gardens yielded all the common vegetables, and people who ate so largely of salted meats and fish required much vegetable food and many sweets and acids to protect them from scorbutic affections. Onions, turnips, cabbage, potatoes were supplemented with the more delicate vegetables known in Germany. The Indians supplied the colonists with their first peas, beans and squashes, taught them how to boil mush, to pound hominy, to roast the tender ears of corn and prepare the de- lightful succotash. Much pastry was used, many sweetmeats and pickles, but not very high season- ing. At table, until tea and coffee beeame regular articles of diet with all classes, cider and the small beers of domestic brewing were served without stint at every meal. In winter the beers were sweetened, spieed, warmed and drunk for possets. Wines did not appear except upon the tables of the well-to-do, but rum and spirits were in every house, and all took their morning and noon drams in some shape or other. The effects of alcohol were neutralized by the active out-door life all led, and by the quantities of coarse food taken at every Incal. In the journal of William Black, who was in Philadelphia in 1744,1 it is made to appear among the duties of hospitality to be treating to something or other every hour in the day. This young fellow either had a very strong head, or alcohol did not make the same impression upon the strong, healthy frame of the youth of that day which it does upon modern effeminate men. There was bread, cider, and punch for lunch, rum and brandy before din- ner, punch, madeira, port and sherry at dinner, bounce and liqueurs with the ladies, and wine and spirits ad libitum till bedtime. The party are wel-

1 Black was a young Virginian, weretary of the commissioners appointed by Governor Gooch, of Virzima, to unite with those of Penn- sylvania and Muyland to treat with the Six Nations in 1744. His diary has been published in the Penna Magazine, vol. 1.

comed, too, with a bowl of fine lemon punch big enough to have "swimm' half a dozen young geese." After five or six glasses of this " poured down their throats," they rode to the Governor's house, were introduced and taken into another room, " where we was presented with a glass of wine," and it was punch, spirits or "a few glasses of wine" wherever they went during their stay, his friends being, as he says, as liberal with their good wine " as apple-tree of its fruit on a windy day in the month of July."

The dress of the people in the early days of which we write was simple, plain, but not formal as that of the Quakers subsequently became. The country people, for their ordinary wear, made much use of serviceable leather doublets and breeches, woolen waist coats, felt hats, heavy shoes with leather leggings, or else boots. They wore stout flannel next to the skin in winter, rough coats and many woolen wraps about the throat; in summer, coarse Osnaburgs and home-made linens. All wore wigs, and the dress suits of cloth or camlet were brave with buttons, braid and buckles, silk stockings and embroidered waist- coats, gold-laced hats and fine lace ruffles and era- vats. Gentlemen wore their small swords ; workmen and laborers either dressed in leather, druggets, serge, fustian or lockram, or else in Osnaburgs. Common women and servants wore linen and do- mesties, linseys and enlicoes; on their heads a hood or quilted bonnet, heavy shoes, home-knit stockings of thread or yarn, petticoats and short gowns, with a handkerchief pinned about the shoul- ders. The ladies had, of course, more brilliant and varied wardrobes; the hat was high-crowned, the hair much dressed ; stomachers and corsage long and stiff; much cambrie about the neck and bosom, much gimp, ribbon and galloon ; silk or satin petticoats, and dainty shoes and stockings. A friend in 1697 sent Phineas Pemberton's wife " an alamode hood," and the ladies woukl contrive always to have something "à la mode." In the inventory of Christopher Taylor's estate are cnum- erated "a baratine body, stomacher and petticoat. cambrie kerchiets and forehead cloths." In that of John Moom were a " fine Brussels camlet pet- ticoat. a yellow silk mantle, silk band and cash, silk and satin caps, hoods, lute-strings, white silk hoods" William Stanley's store had for sale " frieze, serge, broadcloath, Holland linen, yellow. green and black calicoes, satins, Inte-strings, tabby. silk plush, ribbon, striped petticoat>, phillimot, fer- ret, flowered silks, thread laces, gimps, whalebone -. galloons." Letitia Penn did not disdain to buy finery in Philadelphia, caps, buckles, a watch and other goldsmith's articles. There was not a great amount of luxury, however, nor much plate nor display of fine articles. The people's habits welt simple. They were all industrious, ploddingly so.

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and the laws and sentiment and temper of the in- fluential classes frowned equally upon display and extravagance. The wild youth, the sailors and laborers sometimes broke bounds, but the eurb was in their mouths and they were soon reined up.

The population seemed to realize that they had their fortunes to make, and that good pay and great industrial opportunities made idleness and loose, extravagant living inexcusable. Wages were comparatively high, labor was respectable and respected. In 1689 there were ten vessels sent to the West Indies freighted with produce of the province, and the same year fourteen cargoes of tobacco were exported. In 1698 the river front at Philadelphia abounded with the conveniences and facilities requisite for an extensive commerce, and for building and repairing vessels, as well as loading and unloading them. Ship carpenters earned five and six shillings a day in wages, and on that pay would soon save money. The trade to the West Indies and Brazil consisted of horses and other live-stoek, provisions, staves, etc. The vessels themselves were sold with their eargoes, and every one might have his little venture in a traffic which paid double the investment on each risk. Thus the ship carpenter, who laid by one day's wages a week, could, in a month or two, be trading to the Indies so as to give him £50 or £60 elear money at the end of the year, and that would bny him a farm, build him a house or give him a share in some vessel on the stocks. In ten years he could become a capitalist, as many of his trade did so become. The timber of the Susquehanna and Delaware was sometimes sent across the ocean in huge raft ships, rigged with sails and manned by regular erews. We read of one of these, the " Baron Renfrew," measuring five thousand tons, which arrived safely in the Downs.

Mills were established rapidly under the pro- prietary government. Penn had two on the Schuylkill. Richard Townshend had one at Chester and one on Church Creek in 1683. . The Society of Free Traders had a saw-mill and a glass-house in Philadelphia the same year. The saw-mills still could not meet the demand for lumber, and in 1698 hand-sawyers were paid six and seven shillings per hundred for sawing pine boards; in 1705, ten shillings. Shingles in 1698 sold for ten shillings per thousand ; hemlock " cul- lings," ten shillings per hundred ; timber, six shillings per ton. Printz's grist-mill on the Karakung was soon duplicated after the proprie- tary government took possession. Pastorius says the colony had mills enough ; the Frankford Company had established several as early as 1686. Some of the large mills added to their profits by having bakeries connected, where ship-bread was baked in quantities for sea-going vessels.

We have already spoken of the early manufac- 11}

ture of bricks. The Swedes' Church at Wiearo, still standing, was built of brick in 1700. The first Proprietary Assembly at Upland was held in a brick house, but these bricks were probably imported. The first Quaker meeting-house in Philadelphia was of brick, built in 1684. Penn's brew-house at Pennsbury, still standing, was built before his mansion. Penn, Dr. More and several others of the first settlers made strong efforts to improve native grapes, introduce the exotic grape and manufacture wine. They had wine made of fox-grape juice and fancied it was as good as claret. Penn set out a vineyard at Springettsbury and had a French vigneron to tend it. The experiment failed, however, and was abandoned before Penn's second visit. Pas- torius was deceived also, and wrote to Germany for a supply of wine-barrels, which, however, he never filled, unless with cider or peach-brandy. No wonder Penn wanted to make wine at home, -his province imported four hundred thousand gallons of rum and sixty thousand gallons of wine a year, costing over fifty thousand pounds an- nually

Penn's leading objeet in establishing fairs in Philadelphia and the province was to promote industrial enterprises. At the first fair in 1686 only ten dollars' worth of goods was sold. There was no money in Philadelphia and exchanges could not be made. The fairs were held twice a year, three days each in May and November. Another plan of Penn's was to offer prizes for superior work in manufactures. In 1686, Abra- ham Op den Graaffe, of Germantown, petitioned Council to grant him the Governor's premium for "the first and finest piece of linen cloth." About the same time Wigart Levering, one of the Germantown colonists, . began weaving in Rox- borough. Matthew Houlgate, in 1698, bought property in the same township and began a full- ing-mill on the Wissahickon. The price in 1688 for spinning worsted and linen was two shillings per pound ; knitting heavy yarn stockings, half a crown per pair. Wool-combers received twelve pence per pound ; linen-weavers twelve pence per yard of stuff half a yard wide; journeyman tai- lors were paid twelve shillings a week and "their diet." The domestic manufactures of the day in linen and woolen wear supplied a large part of family wants. Fabrics were coarse but serviee- able; and the women of the household, after the men had broke and backled the flax and sheared the sheep, did all the subsequent work of carding, spinning, weaving, bleaching and dyeing. While wages were good, the clothes of apprentices and laborers were not expensive. Leather shoes with brass buckles and wooden heels lasted as long al- most as leather breeches and aprons. lemp and flax Osnaburgs, dyed blue, cost only a shilling or

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History of Delaware : 1609-1888, Part 40

Author: Scharf, J. Thomas (John Thomas), 1843-1898. cn Publication date: 1888 Publisher: Philadelphia : L. J. Richards Number of Pages: 776

Author: Scharf, J. Thomas (John Thomas), 1843-1898. cn
Publication date: 1888
Publisher: Philadelphia : L. J. Richards
Number of Pages: 776