USA > Maryland > Cecil County > History of Cecil County, Maryland, and the early settlements around the head of Chesapeake Bay and on the Delaware River, with sketches of some of the old families of Cecil County > Part 2
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* Vincent's History of Delaware, page 66.
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HISTORY OF CECIL COUNTY.
At the beginning of the last century the Chauhannauks lived on the banks of the Susquehanna about fifty miles above its mouth, and numbered about forty men. The Sus- quehannocks once had a fort at the mouth of the Octoraro Creek and are believed to have had at an early day a town near the mouth of the Cor estoga Creek, in Lancaster County. Smith, on his map of the bay, locates a fort of the Togh- woghs a few miles above the mouth of the Sassafras River. The Shawanese originally lived in the south, but being threatened with extermination by the surrounding tribes, left their original location, migrated northward, and appear to have been finally absorbed by the more powerful tribes near which they settled. Some of them stopped in Elk Neck, and for a long time after it was settled by the Euro- peans that part of it along the North East River was called "Shawnah." Many of the tribe that settled there are said to have been industrious basket-makers and successful fisher- men. They had a village a short distance south of Arundel Creek, which was the name once applied to the run in the southern part of North East. There is a tradition of a bat- tle having been fought between these Indians and another tribe, probably the Susquehannocks, a short distance from the site of their village. Some of them remained in this part of the county for many years after it was settled by the whites, as is shown by the fact that a few of them were bap- tized as members of the Episcopal church at North East. There is also reason to believe that at least one of them was employed by the Principio Iron Company; the name of Indian Jumes being found upon the books of that company for the year 1726. There was also, as is shown by an old petition on record in the clerk's office at Elkton, an Indian village called Poppemetto, not far from the mouth of Rock Run and probably near the Indian Spring, which is not far from the site of the old chapel east of Port Deposit. But they were a wandering people and frequently migrated from one place to another, and their villages being composed of. rude huts and their forts of poles or stockades set in the
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HISTORY OF CECIL COUNTY.
ground, soon rotted away and left no trace of their existence. The Susquehannocks retained possession of the country between the North East and Susquehanna for many years after they had ceded the land west and south of those rivers to the English. They probably did this in order to enjoy the privilege of fishing in the head of the bay. That part of the county between the two last-named rivers is very rich in the remains of their weapons and utensils; many thou- sand of them having been found within the last few years. Their darts and spear-heads vary from less than an inch to five and six inches in length; some of them are made of flint, others of a finer stone resembling cornelian. They are found to some extent in all parts of the county, but are more plentiful along the branches of the Elk, North East, the Octoraro and its tributaries. In a few cases as many as a hundred of them have been found together, indicating that they had been buried in the ground and remained undis- turbed perhaps for centuries. Occasionally flint implements have also been found of a few inches in length, and not un- like a rude knife-blade, which were probably lashed to a wooden handle and used for cutting. Many implements designed for grinding corn have leen found along the head of the bay and in the Eighth District. These are made of a grayish stone which is somewhat harder than soapstone, but easily worked. Some of these implements are about four inches in diameter and in shape similar to an oblate sphe- roid ; that is, a globe much flattened at the poles. Others are from ten to fifteen inches in length, cylindrical in form, and from an inch and a half to two inches in diameter in the middle, and tapering towards the ends. They are not un- like an ordinary rolling-pin, and were probably used for pestles to mash or grind corn. Many stone axes have also been found in the county. They are made of the same kind of materials as the pestles, and are generally about eight inches in length and not often more than three or three and a half inches in width on the edge, of an oval shape, and grooved near the other end so as to retain the handle, which
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HISTORY OF CECIL. COUNTY.
was split, and to which the axe was lashed with rawhide thongs or the sinews of animals which they used for that purpose. A few curiously-shaped implements or weapons, for it is hard to tell to which class they belonged, have been found in the northwestern part of the county. Some of them are made of a whitish stone that is not found in that part of the country. They were evidently intended to be used on a handle, for they are perforated in a very skillful manner with a round hole a half or three-quarters of an inch in diameter. They slightly resemble a double-bitted axe, which has led to the belief that they were used in battle. Though somewhat like the other stone axes, they were not de- signed for cutting, but were admirably adapted for breaking a man's skull. The Eighth District is particularly rich in the remains of their culinary utensils, which consisted of rude pans, cups and dishes, made of the soapstone which abounds in that part of the county. Some of these are well finished and nicely shaped and give evidence of much artistic skill, but many of them are unfinished and others have evidently been broken while in course of construction.
Not the least curious of their works are the sculptured rocks, which are to be found in the Susquehanna River a short distance above the mouth of the Conowingo. These rocks contain a large number of hieroglyphics and a few pictures of animals of the cat kind, the signification of which are known only to those who placed them there. Their manner of making darts or arrow heads has been a matter of much inquiry and curiosity. For this purpose they wrapped their left hand with buckskin and used a rib bone of some of the animals they killed, holding it between the thumb and fingers of the left hand-in which they also held the arrow head-and used it as a lever, applying the power to the other end with their right hand. This statement may be controverted ; but such is the method now in use by the Indians on the Western plains who make arrow heads simi- lar in shape to those found in this county from pieces of glass bottles.
CHAPTER II.
First English settlement on Watson's Island-Edward Palmer-Wm. Clayborne establishes a trading post on Watson's Island.
HISTORIANS are unanimously of the opinion that the first settlement of the English, within the present limits of Cecil County, was upon Palmer's Island (now called Watson's Island), near the mouth of the Susquehanna River, and just above the railroad bridge at that place. There certainly was a trading post on that island before the arrival of the Pilgrims of Maryland under Leonard Calvert, brother of the second Lord Baltimore, in 1634. To William Clayborne, who was a member of the Council of Virginia, and who there is reason to believe had established a trading post on Kent Island as early as 1627, is accorded the credit of estab- lishing this trading post; but investigations recently made by Mr. Neil, and published in his book entitled "The Found- ers of Maryland," seem to indicate very clearly that there may have been a settlement or trading post on that island before Clayborne established himself upon Kent Island. Mr. Neil says, "the letters of John Pory, secretary of the Virginia Company, which are yet extant in London, and which are dated anterior to the time of Clayborne's settlement on Kent Island, inform the Company of a discovery made by him and others into the great Bay northward, where we left set- tled very happily nearly a hundred Englishmen with hope of a good trade in furs."
The island was called Palmer's Island after Edward Pal- mer,* a nephew of the unfortunate Sir Thomas Overbury,
* When and by whom it was so named has not been ascertained. But it bore that name as early as 1652.
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HISTORY OF CECIL COUNTY.
who was poisoned by the malicious arrangements of the wanton wife of the Earl of Somerset some time between the years 1612 and 1616. Palmer was a man of learning and culture, and contemplated the establishment of an academy in Virginia. One writer of the time in which he lived. says Mr. Neil, connects the purchase of the island with this enterprise, from which it may be inferred that he engaged in the fur trade, which was very lucrative at that time, with a view of getting the means to carry out his laudable enter- prise. It is said to have failed on account of some of the agents he employed. When Palmer's Island was first taken possession of by Lord Baltimore's agents in 1637 four ser- vants were found there, and some books as follows: a statute book, five or six little books and one great book. The find- ing of these books at a trading post away in the wilderness indicates that Palmer resided there at one time. for only a gentleman and scholar would have been likely to have had them.
The fact that Clayborne had a trading post on Palmer's Island is established upon a firmer basis. Clayborne was an ambitious man, and some time after the arrival of the Pilgrims in the Ark and Dore, who, soon after their arrival, took pains to dispossess him of Kent Island. presented a petition to the King of England, in which petition he refers to the fact that "he and his partners, while acting under a commission from under his Majesty's hand divers years past (which divers years Bozman believed were the years 1627, 28, and 29), discovered and planted the island of Kent in the Chesapeake, which island they bought of the kings of that country; that great hopes for trade of beavers and other commodities were likely to ensue by the petitioner's dis- coveries," etc. It is further stated in the petition that the petitioners "had discovered and settled a plantation and factory upon a small island in the mouth of a river, at the bottom of the said bay (at the head of the bay was what they meant), in the Susquehannocks' country, at the Indians' de-
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HISTORY OF CECIL COUNTY.
sire, and purchased the same of them; by means whereof they were in great hopes to draw thither the trade of beavers and furs which the French then wholly enjoyed 'in the Grand Lake of Canada.' The petitioners then propose to pay to his Majesty the annual sum of £100, viz., £50 for the isle of Kent and £50 for the said plantation in the Susque- hannoeks' country; and they further pray to have there twelve leagues of land from the mouth of the said river on each side thereof down the said bay southerly to the sea- ward, and so to the head of the said river and to the Grand Lake of Canada."* From these facts it is plain that the set- tlement on Watson's Island was a place of importance before the arrival of Lord Baltimore and his colonists, and that it was made about twenty-five or thirty years after the bay was first explored by the adventurous Smith. It was no doubt the first settlement made within the present limits of Cecil County. Although Cecil County was not erected into a county till 1674, its history commences at the time of the establishment of the "Plantation" on Watson's Island by Clayborne, which is probably about two hundred and forty- four years ago. It is the intention of the writer to trace its history as well as the scanty data the ravages of time have left will afford him the means to do; to tell of the bold and daring men whose courage and enterprise led them to these shores, and whose industry and perseverance have made our county one of the foremost in the State; to recount as well as circumstances will permit their early struggles and the hardships they met with ; to speak of their manners and customs, and note the changes that education and refine- ment from time to time wrought in them.
The configuration of the country at the time of the first settlement so far as the hills and streams are considered, was much the same as it is at present. But the primeval forests that then covered it have disappeared; and owing to
* Bozman's Hist. Md., Vol. II., p. 69.
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HISTORY OF CECIL COUNTY.
this the surface of the country has changed very much- large swamps and morasses have dried up, and the channels of the streams have changed; indeed some of them have entirely disappeared. Deer, bear, wolves, opossums, hares, squirrels, wild turkeys, pheasants, wild pigeons, and many other kinds of animals abounded in the forests, and the creeks and rivers were well stocked with beavers, otters, muskrats, and all kinds of water fowl.
CHAPTER III.
George Calvert, the first Lord Baltimore-He is a member of the Vir- ginia Company -Plants a colony in Newfoundland-Obtains a charter for a colony in Maryland-Is succeeded by his son Cecil, who obtains another charter-Extracts from the charter-The first colony under Leonard Calvert settles at St. Maries-War with the Susquehannocks- Treaty witlı tliem.
GEORGE CALVERT, the first Baron of Baltimore, was the founder of Maryland. He was a Catholic and distinguished for piety and learning, and filled many important offices under the government in the reign of James the First. Like many of the public men of that time, he saw the im- portance of the Western continent and the facilities it afforded for the acquisition of wealth. In 1609 he was a member of the Virginia Company of planters .* IIe after- wards became interested in Newfoundland, and planted a colony there in 1621. He subsequently obtained a patent from King James I. for a territory in that island which he called Avalon. His reason for calling his grant by that name, as given by Scharf in his History of Maryland, is as follows: "Tradition reports that Joseph of Arimathea, having come to Britain, received from King Arviragus twelve hydes of land at Avalon as a dwelling-place for himself and his companions, and here he preached the gospel for the first time to the Britons, and built an abbey, in which he was afterwards buried, and which long re- mained the most renowned and venerated monastic estab- ment in the island. As Avalon had been the starting point of Christianity for ancient Britain, in pious legend at all
Scharf's Hist. Md., Vol I., p. 31.
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HISTORY OF CECIL COUNTY.
events, so Calvert hoped that his own settlement might be a similar starting point, from which the gospel should spread to the heathen of the Western World; and he spared neither labor nor expense in his efforts to carry out this noble and devout purpose."
The climate of Newfoundland was found to be entirely different from what might have been anticipated ; and after spending some time and much money in the vain effort to sustain his colony by developing the resources of the country, he was forced to abandon the enterprise. He sub- sequently visited Virginia in search of some more desirable situation for his colony, and no doubt would have settled there; but upon being required to take the oath of supremacy and allegiance, he, as a conscientious Catholic, refused to do so, and had to look elsewhere for an eligible location for his colony. He therefore returned to England, and applied to his Majesty Charles the First for a grant of land lying to the southward of James River, in Virginia, between that river and the bounds of Carolana,* now called Carolina. A charter for a large territory south of the James River was actually made out and signed, in February, 1631. But some of the prominent men of Virginia, among whom was William Clayborne, before mentioned, who has very aptly been called the "evil genius of Maryland," were in England in the spring of that year, and so violently opposed the planting of the new colony within the limits of Virginia, that Calvert besought his Majesty to grant him, in lieu of the other, some part of the continent to the northward, which was accordingly done.
Lord Baltimore, it is said, drew up the charter of Mary- land with his own hand, and left a blank in it for the name, which he designed should be Crescentia, or, the land of Creseence, but leaving it to his Majesty to insert. The King, before he signed the charter, asked his lordship what
* Scharf's Hist. Md., Vol. I., p. 50.
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HISTORY OF CECIL COUNTY.
he should call it, who replied that he desired to have it called something in honor of his Majesty's name, but that he was deprived of that happiness, there being already a province in those parts called Carolina. "Let us, there- fore," says the King, "give it a name in honor of the Queen ; what think you of Mariana ?" To this his lordship expressed his dissent, it being the name of a Jesuit who had written against monarchy. Whereupon the King pro- posed Tera Maria, in English, Maryland; which was mutually agreed upon and inserted in the charter. And thus the proposed colony, or rather the land it was expected to settle upon, was named in honor of Henrietta Maria, daughter of Henry IV., King of France and Navarre, and sister of Louis XIII., usually called Queen Mary by writers of that day.
The charter of Maryland was different from any other granted for a similar purpose in this: that it was more liberal than they, as were also the laws made under it, and the policy pursued by the illustrious men who received it.
Before the charter had been finally adjusted and sealed, Lord Baltimore fell sick and died, in London, in the fifty- third year of hisage. His eldest son, Cecil Calvert, succeeded his father, and inherited his titles as well as his fortune and spirit. Another charter, differing in no essential particular from the first one, was made out, published and confirmed, on June 20th, 1632, investing him with all the rights and privileges which his Majesty had intended to confer upon his father.
The preamble to the charter of Maryland, after reciting the fact that George Calvert, " treading in the footsteps of his father, being animated with a laudable and pious zeal for extending the Christian religion, and also the territories of our Empire, hath humbly besought leave of us, that he may transport by his own industry and expense a numerous colony of the English nation, to a certain region, hereinafter described, in a country hitherto uncultivated in the parts of
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HISTORY OF CECIL COUNTY.
America, and partly occupied by savages having no knowledge of the Divine Being, and that all that region, with some certain privileges and jurisdictions appertaining unto the whole- some government and state of his colony and region afore- said, may by our Royal Highness be given, granted and confirmed unto him and his heirs." The language used in the sentence which we have italicised was most unfortu- nate, and was used many years afterwards with powerful effect in circumscribing the territory of Maryland. The metes and bounds of the province as set forth in the charter, were as follows: All that part of the Peninsula or Chersonese, lying in the parts of America between the ocean on the east and the bay of Chesapeake on the west; divided from the residue thereof by a right line drawn from the promontory or headland called Watkin's Point, situated upon the bay aforesaid, near the river Wighco on the west, unto the main ocean on the east; and between that boundary on the south, unto that part of the bay of Delaware on the north, which lyeth under the fortieth degree of north latitude from the equinoctial, where New England is terminated ; and all the tract of that land within the metes underwritten (that is to say), passing from the said bay, called Delaware Bay, in a right line by the degree aforesaid, unto the true meridian of the first fountain of the river Pattowmack, thence verging towards the south, unto the further bank of the said river, and following the same on the west and south, unto a certain place called Cinquack, situate near the mouth of the said river, where it disembogues into the aforesaid bay of Chesapeake, and thence by the shortest line unto the afore- said promontory or place called Watkin's Point."
Cecil or Cæcillius Calvert, for he was baptized by the first name and confirmed by the second one, intrusted the com- mand of the first expedition he sent to Maryland to his brothers Leonard and George, constituting the former lieu- tenant-governor or general. This expedition, which con- sisted of two vessels, the Ark and the Dove, and nearly two
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HISTORY OF CECIL COUNTY.
hundred persons, reached Virginia safely, and after spend- ing a short time there proceeded to the Chesapeake Bay, and ascending the Potomac River landed at Saint Maries, where the first town in the State was founded on the 27th of March, 1634. It is not within the scope of this work to give the history of that settlement in extenso ; we shall therefore only refer briefly to such parts of it as are calculated to throw some light upon the history of this county.
The Pilgrims found the Indians (Yoacomacoes), from whom they purchased the site of their town, in great dread of the Susquehannocks, who were their mortal enemies and who never ceased to make war upon them and ravage their country. The Yoacomacoes for this reason received and treated the Pilgrims kindly at first, but in a short time be- gan to show symptoms of hostility, being, as is alleged, insti- gated to do so by William Clayborne, who, as before stated, had possession of Kent Island and had established a trading post on Palmer's Island, at the mouth of the Susquehanna River. This hostile act on the part of Clayborne was the commencement of a protracted struggle between him and Lord Baltimore, which lasted till 1637, when his property was confiscated and he was attainted of high treason. A few years afterwards (in 1642) this man Clayborne and one Richard Ingle, who is called a pirate and rebel, and some others from Virginia and elsewhere, engaged in a conspiracy to overthrow the authority of Lord Baltimore. They seized Kent Island and invaded the western shore and forced the lord proprietary to seek refuge in Virginia. The causes of this rebellion as well as its history, owing to the destruction of the records of the colony during that period, are very imperfectly understood ; but there is no doubt that Clayborne took advantage of the political and religious trouble which then agitated the mother country to avenge himself upon Lord Baltimore for the loss of his possessions and prospec- tive trade in the Chesapeake Bay. Owing to this rebellion and also to the hostile attitude of the natives which was
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HISTORY OF CECIL COUNTY.
occasioned by it, the growth of the colony was slow. The Susquehannocks gave the colonists much trouble in the early days of the settlement at St. Maries, and in May, 1639, the Council resolved to invade their country, and to that end passed the following order, which shows the condition of society and the mode of warfare at that time: "Whereas, it is found necessary forthwith to make an expedition upon the Indians of the Eastern Shore upon the public charge of the province ; it is to that end thought fit that a shallop be sent to Virginia for to provide twenty corslets (steel plates for the covering and protection of the chest), a barrel of powder, four roundlets of shot, a barrel of oat meal, three firkins of butter, and four cases of hot waters ; and that five able persons be pressed to go with the said shallop and necessary provisions of victuals be made for them, and that a pinnace be pressed to go to Kent (Kent Island) sufficiently victualed and manned, and there provide four hogsheads of meal ; and likewise that a pinnace be sent to the Susquehan- nocks sufficiently vietu led and manned, and thirty or more good shott, with necessary officers, be pressed out of the province, and that each of the shott be allowed after the rate of 100 pounds of tobacco per month," etc., etc. The colonists appear to have spent the summer in making preparations for this warlike expedition against their foes, but their courage was not equal to the task of invading their country amid the storms and snows of the following winter, and the enterprise was abandoned. There appears to have been many hostile incursions of the Indians into the terri- tory occupied by the early settlers about this time and many rumors of wars that no doubt kept them in a state of almost constant excitement and alarm.
Some of the writers of that period assert that the Swedes then settled on the Christiana, where Wilmington now stands, sold firearms to the Susquehannocks, and hired some of their soldiers to them to instruct them in the art of war as practiced by the Europeans; but the evidence of this
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HISTORY OF CECIL COUNTY.
is not conclusive, and it is quite as likely, if the Indians had firearms at all, that they got them from the French in Canada, or the Dutch at Manhattan, or from some of the tribes of the Five Nations, who may have obtained then from the French or Dutch, with whom they traded.
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