USA > Delaware > Narratives of early Pennsylvania, West New Jersey and Delaware, 1630-1707 > Part 19
USA > New Jersey > Narratives of early Pennsylvania, West New Jersey and Delaware, 1630-1707 > Part 19
USA > Pennsylvania > Narratives of early Pennsylvania, West New Jersey and Delaware, 1630-1707 > Part 19
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The City is so ordered now, by the Governour's Care and Prudence, that it hath a Front to each River, one half at Dela- ware, the other at Skulkill; and though all this cannot make way for small Purchasers to be in the Fronts, yet they are placed in the next Streets, contiguous to each Front, viz. all Purchasers of One Thousand Acres, and upwards, have the Fronts, (and the High-street) and to every five Thousand Acres Purchase, in the Front about an Acre, and the smaller Purchasers about half an Acre in the backward Streets; by which means the least hath room enough for House, Garden and small Orchard, to the great Content and Satisfaction of all here concerned.
The City, (as the Model shews) consists of a large Front- street to each River, and a High-street (near the middle) from Front (or River) to Front, of one hundred Foot broad, and a Broad-street in the middle of the City, from side to side, of the like breadth. In the Center of the City is a Square of ten Acres; at each Angle are to be Houses for publick Affairs, as a Meeting-House, Assembly or State-House, Market-House, School-House, and several other Buildings for Publick Con- cerns. There are also in each Quarter of the City a Square of eight Acres, to be for the like Uses, as the Moore-fields' in London; and eight Streets, (besides the High-street, that run from Front to Front, and twenty Streets, (besides the Broad- street) that run cross the City, from side to side; all these Streets are of fifty Foot breadth.
In each Number in the Draught, in the Fronts and High- street, are placed the Purchasers of One Thousand Acres, and upwards, to make up five Thousand Acres Lot, both in the said Fronts and High-street) and the Numbers direct to each Lot, and where in the City; so that thereby they may know where their Concerns are therein.
1 Moorfields, a moor or fen without the walls of the old city of London to the north. It was first drained in 1527, laid out into walks in 1606, and first built upon late in the reign of Charles II. The name has now been lost in Finsbury Square and adjoining localities.
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[1683
The Front Lots begin at the South-ends of the Fronts, by the Numbers, and so reach to the North-ends, and end at Number 43.
The High-street Lots begin towards the Fronts, at Number 44, and so reach to the Center.
The lesser Purchasers begin at Number 1, in the second Streets, and so proceed by the Numbers, as in the Draught; the biggest of them being first placed, nearest to the Fronts. i
LETTER OF THOMAS PASCHALL, 1683
1
1
INTRODUCTION
A BRISTOL pewterer, Thomas Paschall, is the author of this Letter. He came over to Pennsylvania as a settler in the summer of 1682 and writes from Philadelphia several months after his arrival. Paschall was a native of Bristol, having been baptized in the great church of St. Mary Redcliffe in 1634. His father William Paschall (c. 1608-1670) was also a pewterer by trade and to him the son in 1652, at the age of eighteen, was apprenticed for a term of seven years. In 1661 Thomas Paschall was admitted a freeman of the city, and there he followed his occupation until the time of his migra- tion to America. His account book, containing a number of business transactions in Bristol, along with his copy of Agricola on Metals, is still preserved by Philadelphia descendants.1 Before 1665 he was married to Joanna Sloper, by whom he had at least seven children, as mentioned in the city registers from 1668 to 1682. On May 4 of the latter year his son of the same name was apprenticed to him in Bristol, and on the 22nd of that month the father purchased from William Penn 500 acres of land, to be located in Pennsylvania. Soon after this date Thomas Paschall with his family embarked, probably at the port of Bristol, for the New World, reaching Philadelphia somewhat before early September, 1682.
His land was laid out to him about five miles from the in- fant town of Philadelphia and west of the Schuylkill River, within the county of Philadelphia, near the present Delaware County line; his land warrant was issued by Governor Mark- The family of the late Israel W. Morris, of South Eighth Street.
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ham, September 13, 1682. What are now Angora and Mount Moriah Cemetery mark respectively its approximate northern and southern limits. He lodged his family in a rented dwell- ing for the first winter but erected a small house on his land for his servants. About six acres of his purchase, he informs us, were cleared at the time of his writing. His house with its single chimney at one end is depicted on a survey of 1684 as about one and a quarter miles from the Schuylkill, between Mill or Cobbs Creek and its branch Ameaseka Run. It was in the old Blockley Township. Paschallville, which is a little to the south of the site, commemorates the family name. Peter Yocum and other Swedish neighbors lived between Pas- chall and the river, and it is from them doubtless that he generalizes as to the Swedes.
Thomas Paschall was elected to the provincial assembly of Pennsylvania from Philadelphia County, in 1685 and in 1689. Within a few years after his arrival he had taken up his residence in Philadelphia proper. He is named in the first charter of the city in 1691, as one of the twelve common coun- cillors, and was also holding the same office in 1701, 1704, and 1705. Although he uses the "thee" and "thy" of the Quakers in the first part of the Letter, it is thought that he was not a Friend; his children were baptized in parish churches of Bris- tol and both he and his wife were buried as non-Quakers in the Friends' burial ground in Philadelphia. She died in 1706 and he in 1718. Numerous descendants, some of the name, still remain in and near Philadelphia.
The Letter is, to be sure, the raw production of an unlettered tradesman; nevertheless it conveys a true picture of pioneer- ing in the initial months of Penn's colony. It was addressed to a friend at Chippenham, in Wiltshire, about twenty miles east of Bristol. It was first printed as a two-page folio by the Quaker publisher, John Bringhurst, at the Sign of the Book, in Gracechurch Street, London, in 1683. This text is
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INTRODUCTION
the one here reproduced. Translations appeared in Dutch 1 in Missive van William Penn (i. e., Letter to the Free Society of Traders), (Amsterdam, 1684), pp. 20-23 of one edition, pp. 25- 28 of the other; in German, in Beschreibung der in America neu-erfundenen Provinz Pensylvanien (Hamburg, 1684), pp. 29-32; and in French in the translation of the latter, under the title Recueil de Diverses pieces concernant la Pensylvanie (Hague, 1684). In a translation of the Recueil by Samuel W. Penny- packer in the Pennsylvania Magazine, VI. 311-328 (1882), the Paschall Letter emerges once more into English (pp. 323-328) somewhat smoothed and improved in the order of its arrange- ment but lacking the quaint crudeness of the original edition.
A. C. M.
1 Julius F. Sachse's Letters relating to the Settlement of Germantown (Phila- delphia, 1903; ten copies made) contains a contemporary copy in Low Dutch script, photographically reproduced, pp. 21-24, from the Könneken manuscript in the Ministerial Archives of Lubeck, Germany; a shipping notice, which is not in the original London edition, has been added as a postscript to this version.
1
LETTER OF THOMAS PASCHALL, 1683
An Abstract of a letter from Thomas Paskell of Pennsilvania To his Friend J. J. of Chippenham.
MY kind love remembred unto Thee, and thy wife, and to all the rest of thy Family, hoping that you are all in good health, as through the goodness of God we all are at this present writ- ing, Excepting one of my servants, who was a Carpenter, and a stout young man, he died on board the Ship, on our Voyage. I thank God I, and my Wife, have not been sick at all, but con- tinued rather better than in England; and I do not find but the Country is healthfull, for there was a Ship that came the same day with us into the river, that lost but one Passenger in the Voyage, and that was their Doctor, who was ill when he came on board, and those people that came in since continue well. William Penn and those of the Society' are arrived. W. P. is well approved of, he hath been since at New Yorke, and was extraordinarily entertained, and he behaved himself as Noble. Here is a place called Philadelphia, where is a Mar- ket kept, as also at Upland.' I was at Bridlington'-fair, where I saw most sorts of goods to be sold, and a great resort of people; Where I saw English goods sold at very reasonable rates; The Country is full of goods, Brass and Pewter lieth upon hand, That which sells best, is Linnen cloath, trading Cloath for the Indians; I bought Kersey and it doth not sell, Broad Cloath is wanting, and Perniston,' and Iron-potts; and as for the Swedes, they use but little Iron in Building, for they will build, and hardly use any other toole but an Ax; They will cut down a Tree, and cut him off when down, sooner then two men can saw him, and rend him into planks or what they please; only
1 The Free Society of Traders. See p. 240, n. 1, supra. ª Chester. * Burlington, New Jersey.
" Penistone, a kind of coarse woollen cloth formerly used for garments and the like, made at Penistone, a small town in the West Riding of Yorkshire, England.
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1683]
with the Ax and Wooden wedges, they use no Iron; They are generaly very ingenous people, lives well, they have lived here 40 Years, and have lived much at ease, having great plenty of all sorts of provisions, but then they weer but ordinarily Cloathd; but since the English came, they have gotten fine Cloaths, and are going proud. Let all people know that have any mind to come hither, that they provide Comfortable things for their passage, and also some provitions to serve them here, for although things are to be had at reasonable rates here, yet it is so far to fetch, that it spends much time, so that it's better to come provided for half a Year then to want one day, I thank God we have not wanted, but have , fared well beyond what we did in England.
The River is taken up all along, by the Sweads, and Finns and some Dutch, before the English came, near eight score miles, and the Englishmen some of them, buy their Planta- tions, and get roome by the great River-side, and the rest get into Creeks, and small rivers that run into it, and some go into the Woods seven or eight Miles; Thomas Colborne' is three miles in the Woods, he is well to pass, and hath about fourteen Acres of Corne now growing, and hath gotten between 30 and 40 li. by his Trade, in this short time. I have hired a House for my Family for the Winter, and I have gotten a little House in my Land for my servants, and have cleared Land about six Acres; and this I can say, I never wisht my self at Bristol again since my departure. I live in the Schoolkill Creek, near Phila- delphia, about 100 Miles up the River. Here have been 24 Ships with Passengers within this Year, so that provisions are somewhat hard to come by in some places, though at no dear rate, there is yet enough in the River, but it is far to fetch, and suddainly there will be an Order taken for continuall supply. Now I shall give you an impartial account of the Country as I find it, as followeth. When we came into Delawarebay we saw an infinite number of small fish in sholes, also large fish leaping in the Water; The River is a brave pleasant River as
1 Thomas Coebourn (d. 1698-99), carpenter, Quaker emigrant, from Lamborn Woodlands, Berkshire, England, came over to Pennsylvania early in 1682 and settled on Chester Creek, about three miles northwest of the town of Chester. About 1687 he built a mill-the second on Chester Creek-which gave great offence to the proprietors of the Chester mills farther down the creek.
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can be desired, affording divers sorts of fish in great plenty, it's planted all along the Shoare, and in some Creeks, especialy in Pensilvania side, mostly by Sweads, Finns, and Dutch, and now at last, English throng in among them, and have filed all the Rivers and Creeks a great way in the Woods, and have settled about 160 Miles up the great River; some English that are above the falls, have sowed this Year 30 or 40 bushels of Wheat, and have great stocks of Cattel; Most of the Sweads, and Finns are ingeneous people, they speak English, Swead, Finn, Dutch and the Indian; They plant but little Indian corne, nor Tobacco; their Women make most of the Linnen cloath they wear, they Spinn and Weave it and make fine Lin- nen, and are many of them curious housewives: The people generally eat Rye bread, being approved of best by them, not but that here is good Wheat, for I have eaten as good bread and drank as good drink as ever I did in England, as also very good butter and cheese, as most in England. Here is 3 sorts of Wheat, as Winter, Summer, and Buck Wheat; the Winter Wheat they sow at the fall, the Summer Wheat in March, these two sorts are ripe in June; then having taken in this, they plow the same land, and sow Buck Wheat, which is ripe in September: I have not given above 2s. 6d per skipple,1 (which is 3 English pecks) for the best Wheat and that in goods which cost little more then half so much in England, here is very good Rye at 2s per skipple, also Barly of 2 sorts, as Winter, and Summer, at 4 Guilders per skipple; also Oats, and 3 sorts of Indian Corne, (two of which sorts they can Malt and make good bear of as of Barley,) at four Guilders per Skiple, a Guilder is four pence halfpenney. I have bought good Beef, Porke, and Mutton at two pence per pound and some cheaper, also Turkeys and Wild-geese at the value of two or three Pound of Shot apeice, and Ducks at one Pound of Shot, or the like value, and in great plenty: here is great store of poultry, but for Curlews, Pidgons, and Phesants, they will hardly bestow a shot upon them. I have Venison of the Indians very cheap, although they formerly sold it as cheap again to the Sweads; I have four Dear for two yards of trading cloath, which cost five shillings, and most times I purchase it cheaper: We had Bearsflesh this fall for little or nothing, it is good food, tasting
" The Dutch schepel.
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much like Beef; There have been many Horses sold of late to Barbadoes, and here is plenty of Rum, Sugar, Ginger, and Melasses. I was lately at Bridlington-fair,1 where were a great resort of people, with Cattle and all sorts of Goods, sold at very reasonable rates.
Here are Gardens with all sorts of Herbs, and some more then in England, also Goose-beries and Roasetrees, but what other Flowers I know not yet: Turnips, Parsnips, and Cab- bages, beyond Compare. Here are Peaches in abundance of three sorts I have seen rott on the Ground, and the Hogs eate them, they make good Spirits from them, also from Corne and Cheries, and a sort of wild Plums and Grapes, and most people have Stills of Copper for that use. Here are Apples, and Pears, of several sorts, Cheries both Black and Red, and Plums, and Quinces; in some places Peach Stones grow up to bear in three Years: the Woods are full of Oakes, many very high and streight, many of them about two foot through, and some bigger, but very many less; A Swead will fell twelve of the bigger in a day; Here are brave Poplar, Beach, Ash, Lyme- trees, Gum-trees, Hickary-trees, Sasafras, Wallnuts, and Ches- nuts, Hazel, and Mullberies: Here growes in the Woods abun- dance of Wortle-beries or Whorts, Strawberies and Blackberies, better then in England, as also three sorts of Grapes and Plums; Here is but few Pine-trees, and Ceder; Here is good Firestone' plenty enough in most places: and the Woods are full of runs of water. I have lately seen some Salt, very good to salt meat with, brought by an Indian out of the Woods: they say there is enough of it: but for Minnerals or Mettals, I have not seen any, except it be Marcasite,' such as they make Vitriol or Copperis with in England. Here are Beavers, Rac- koons, Woolves, Bears, a sort of Lyons, Polecatts, Mushratts, Elks, Mincks, Squirills of several sorts and other small Crea- tures, but none of these hurt unless surprised: also Rattle Snakes and black Snakes, but the Rattle Snaks I have not seen, though I have rambled the Woods much these three Months, since the beginning of September. The Indians are very quiet and peaceable, having their understandings, and qualifications, and when abused will seek revenge, they live much better since
" In Marginal note, "New-Jersey."
' Iron pyrites.
"Iron pyrites.
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the English came; getting necessarys as cheap again as for- merly, and many of them begin to speake English, I have heard one say Swead no good, Dutch man no good, but English- man good. William Penn is settling people in Towns. There are Markets kept in two Towns viz. Philadelphia, being Chief- est, Chester, formerly called Upland. To write of the Seasons of the Year I cannot, but since I came it hath been very pleas- ant weather. The Land is generally good and yet there is some but ordinary and barren ground. Here are Swamps which the Sweads prize much, and many people will want: And one thing more I shall tell you, I know a man together with two or three more, that have happened upon a piece of Land of some Hundred Acres, that is all cleare, without Trees, Bushes, stumps, that may be Plowed without let, the farther a man goes in the Country the more such Land they find. There is also good Land, full of Large and small Trees, and some good Land, but few Trees on it. The Winter is sharp and the Cattel are hard to keep. The people that come must work and know Country affairs; They must be provided with some provisions for some time in the Country, and also some to help along on Board the Ship. I have more to write, but am shortned in time. Vale.
Pennsilvania, the last of January, 168}. THOMAS PASKELL.
London, Printed by John Bringhurst, at the Sign of the Book in Grace-Church-Street. 1683.
1
A FURTHER ACCOUNT OF THE PROVINCE OF PENNSYLVANIA, BY WILLIAM PENN, 1685
I
1
INTRODUCTION
AFTER an absence of over two years in America William Penn had reached England in October, 1684. He had been called home for the defence of the boundaries of the province against the aggressions of Lord Baltimore and also for inter- cession on behalf of his persecuted Quaker brethren. The ac- cession of his old friend the Duke of York to the throne of England as James II., in the following February, gave Penn great influence as a courtier and patron at court, and was especially opportune for the furtherance of the two chief ob- jects of his return. These objects he pressed forward most actively. Thus, by October, 1685, only a few days before the writing of A Further Account, he obtained a favorable report regarding the Three Lower Counties to which Baltimore laid claim; and a few months later he secured the release of more than 1,200 Quakers, imprisoned as Dissenters.
Of Penn's Pennsylvania pamphlets A Further Account ranks next in importance to his Letter to the Free Society of Traders, and is really a sequel to the latter. It was written at Worm- inghurst Place, the Proprietor's country-seat in Sussex, in the south of England, and was printed in 1685, in two editions of small quarto, one of twenty pages and the other of sixteen pages, probably from a London press. A Dutch translation entitled Tweede Bericht appeared the same year at Amsterdam. A large portion of the English text was reprinted in Richard Blome's Present State of His Majesties' Isles and Territories in America (London, 1687), pp. 122-134; in Thompson West- cott's History of Philadelphia (Sunday Dispatch, Philadelphia) chapter xxxI., and in William J. Buck's William Penn in Amer-
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ica (Philadelphia, 1888), pp. 174-180. It was reprinted in full from the original English editions in the collection of the Historical Society of Pennsylvania, in the Pennsylvania Maga- zine, IX. 68-81 (1885). It is this text that follows.
A. C. M.
1
A FURTHER ACCOUNT OF THE PROVINCE OF PENNSYLVANIA, BY WILLIAM PENN, 1685
A Further Account of the Province of Pennsylvania and its Improvements, for the Satisfaction of those that are Adven- turers, and enclined to be 80.
Ir has, I know, been much expected from me that I should give some farther Narrative of those parts of America where I am chiefly interested, and have lately been; having con- tinued there above a Year after my former Relation,1 and re- ceiving since my return the freshest and fullest Advices of its Progress and Improvement. But as the reason of my com- ing back was a Difference between the Lord Baltimore and myself, about the Lands of Delaware, in consequence reputed of mighty moment to us, so I wav'd publishing anything that might look in favor of the Country, or inviting to it, whilst it lay under the Discouragement and Disreputation of that Lord's claim and pretences.
But since they are, after many fair and full hearings before the Lords of the Committee for Plantations justly and happily Dismist, and the things agreed; and that the Letters which daily press me from all Parts on the subject of America, are so many and voluminous that to answer them severally were a Task too heavy and repeated to perform, I have thought it most easie to the Enquirer, as well as myself, to make this Account Publick, lest my silence or a more private intimations of things, should disoblige the just inclinations of any to Amer- ica, and at a time too when an extraordinary Providence seems to favour its Plantation and open a door to Europeans to pass thither. That, then, which is my part to do in this Advertise- ment is:
First. To Relate our Progress, especially since my last of the month called August, '83.
Secondly. The Capacity of the Place for further Improve- ment, in order to Trade and Commerce.
' I. .. , Letter to the Free Society of Traders, ante.
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Lastly. Which way those that are Adventurers, or incline to be so, may imploy their Money, to a fair and secure Profit; such as shall equally encourage Poor and Rich, which cannot fail of Advancing the Country in consequence.
I. We have had about Ninety Sayl of Ships with Passen- gers since the beginning of '82, and not one Vessel designed to the Province, through God's mercy, hitherto miscarried.
The Estimate of the People may thus be made: Eighty to each Ship, which comes to Seven Thousand Two Hundred Per- sons. At least a Thousand there before, with such as from other places in our neighbourhood are since come to settle among us; and I presume the Births at least equal to the Burials; For, having made our first Settlements high in the Freshes of the Rivers, we do not find ourselves subject to those Seasonings that affect some other Countries upon the same Coast.
The People are a Collection of divers Nations in Europe: As, French, Dutch, Germans, Sweeds, Danes, Finns, Scotch, Irish and English; and of the last equal to all the rest: And, which is admirable, not a Reflection on that Account: But as they are of one kind, and in one Place and under One Al- legiance, so they live like People of One Country, which Civil Union has had a considerable influence towards the prosperity of that place.
II. Philadelphia, and our intended Metropolis, as I for- merly Writ, is two Miles long, and a Mile broad, and at each end it lies that mile upon a Navigable River. The scituation high and dry, yet replenished with running streams. Besides the High Street, that runs in the middle from River to River, and is an hundred foot broad, it has Eight streets more that run the same course, the least of which is fifty foot in breadth. And besides Broad Street, which crosseth the Town in the middle, and is also an hundred foot wide, there are twenty streets more, that run the same course, and are also fifty foot broad. The names of those Streets are mostly taken from the things that Spontaneously grow in the Country, As Vine Street, Mulberry Street, Chestnut Street, Wallnut Street, Strawberry Street, Cranberry Street, Plumb Street, Hickery Street, Pine Street, Oake Street, Beach Street, Ash Street, Popler Street, Sassafrax Street, and the like. 1
1
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III. I mentioned in my last Account that from my Arrival, in Eighty-two, to the Date thereof, being ten Moneths, we had got up Fourscore Houses at our Town, and that some Villages were settled about it. From that time to my coming away, which was a Year within a few Weeks, the Town advanced to Three hundred and fifty-seven Houses; divers of them large, well built, with good Cellars, three stories, and some with Bal- conies.
IV. There is also a fair Key1 of about three hundred foot square, Built by Samuel Carpenter,2 to which a ship of five hundred Tuns may lay her broadside, and others intend to follow his example. We have also a Ropewalk made by B. Wilcox,' and cordage for shipping already spun at it.
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