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 4
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George Utie and Richard Wells were ordered to be sum- moned before the provincial court in 1661, " for not sending letters down to the Governor according to the acts of Assem- bly, and for contemptuously nailing up a letter of the sheriff directed to the governor." They probably lived on Spesutia Island, and the former was, no doubt, a relative of Nathaniel Ctic. It seems from his treatment of the sheriff that he was as stubborn and courageous as Nathaniel. He repre- sented Baltimore County in the House of Burgesses in 1661, and was also commissioned sheriff of Baltimore County in 1066.
This meagre sketch contains all the particulars of interest that we have been able to glean from the colonial records of this period of the Utie family.
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HISTORY OF CECIL COUNTY.
The bold stand taken by Utie gave great alarm to the Dutch, and so many of the settlers in consequence removed to Maryland and Virginia that scarcely thirty families re- mained in New Amstel.
Governor Fendall on the receipt of the letter containing the extraordinary demand for the return of the deserters, being anxious to carry out Lord Baltimore's instructions, called a meeting of the council at Anne Arundel (now An- napolis), on the 3d of August, at which meeting it was ' Ordered that Colonel Nathaniel Utie do make his repaire to the pretended Governor of the people seated in Delaware Bay, within his Lordship's Province, and that he do give them to understand that they are seated within this, his Lordship's Province, without notice given to his Lord- ship's Lieutenant here, and to require them to depart this Province." ... "That in case he find opportunity, he insinuate unto the people there seated, that in case they make their application to his Lordship's government here, they shall find good conditions, according to the conditions of plantation granted to all comers into this province, which shall be made good unto them ; and that they shall have protection in their lives, liberty and estates, which they shall bring with them." Whereupon a letter was sent from Governor Fendall to the Dutch on Delaware Bay, in which he acknowledges the receipt of the letter from the Dutch governor there, and recites the fact that the Dutch colony is located south of the fortieth degree of north latitude and within the limits of Lord Baltimore's grant, and requires him (the Dutchman) to depart " or to excuse him (Fendall) if he should use his utmost endeavor to reduce that part of his Lordship's Province unto its due obedience under him."
This letter was intrusted to Utie, who, accompanied by his brother, his cousin, a Major Jacob de Vrintz, and servant, and four fugitives, arrived at New Amstel on the 6th of September, 1659.
It seems that the fugitives went voluntarily, for three of
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HISTORY OF CECIL. COUNTY.
them were arrested by the authorities at New Amstel. The accounts of this visit which have come down to us, warrant the belief that Utie was a cunning and skillful diplomatist, and that he fully carried out the instructions which had been given to him by the council. His actions during the course of the negotiations with the Dutch are said to have been both boisterous and aggressive; so much so that Stuy- vesant censured Governor Beekman and Alrichs for not arresting him. But his efforts to induce the Dutch to ac- knowledge the authority of Lord Baltimore were unsuccess- ful; and this attempt to extend the jurisdiction of the gov- ernment of Maryland to the Delaware River, like many others that were subsequently made, proved to be a failure.
The Dutch were very badly frightened by Utie's behavior, and immediately sent messengers overland to Manhattan, to inform Stuyvesant of the demands he had made. Fear- ing that the messengers might meet with some disaster, the next day they dispatched a vessel for the same purpose. Governor Stuyvesant upon being informed of the condition of affairs on the Delaware, dispatched Augustine Hermen and Resolved (or Rosevelt) Waldron upon a mission to Maryland for the purpose of adjusting the difficulty. They came by the way of New Amstel and left there on the 13th of September, 1659. They kept a journal during their journey, in which they state that they were accompanied by some guides, mostly Indians, and convoyed by a few sol- diers. They traveled by land, taking the first day a course west northwest from New Castle. They continued this course for four and a half Dutch miles (about thirteen and a quarter English miles), when they took a due west course, and after traveling three more Dutch miles, the Indians re- fusing to proceed any further, encamped for the night. On the first of October they continued their journey, going west by south, and then directly south. The country at first was hilly and then low. They soon arrived at a stream, which the Indians informed them flowed into the Bay of
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HISTORY OF CECIL COUNTY.
Virginia-the Chesapeake Bay. They followed this stream until they found a boat hauled upon the shore and almost dried up. Dismissing four of their guides and retaining only a man named Sander Boyer and his Indian, they pushed off, but were soon obliged to land again, as the boat became full of water, whereupon they turned the boat up- side down and caulked the seams with old linen. They thus made it a little tighter, but one was obliged to sit continu- ally and bail out the water. Proceeding down this stream, they soon reached the Ell: River. There must have been great changes in the branches of the Elk River since that time, for none of them are now navigable. The probability is that they reached the North East, which they mistook for the Elk. Here they made a fire and remained till evening, when they proceeded, but with great trouble, as the boat had neither rudder nor oars, but only paddles. Going down the bay they arrived at the Sassafras River, where they stopped at the plantation of a man named John Turner. Here they met a man named Abraham, who was a Finn, and had been a soldier at Fort Altona, and who had run away with a Dutch woman from the settlements on the Delaware and taken refuge in Maryland. They proceeded down the bay and soon reached Kent Island, where they were entertained by a Mr. Wicks for a short time, and soon afterwards had their first interview with the governor and council of Mary- land at Patuxent. At this meeting Herman and Waldron presented the governor and council with a letter and their credentials from Governor Stuyvesant, in Dutch, and which were Englished by Mr. Simon Oversee, by order of the coun- cil. In this letter Stuyvesant speaks of being much aston- ished when he understood that Colonel Utie had served the notice upon the Dutch in Delaware, requiring them to va- cate their settlement there, and argues the case at some length, and takes exception to the instrument, because it was not dated. He calls it "a seditious cartebell, in form of an instruction, without any time or place, or where or from
C
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HISTORY OF CECIL COUNTY.
whom, or in whose name, order or authority it was written," etc. ; and concludes by stating that he sent his agents and ambassadors, Hermen and Waldron, to remonstrate against the proceedings of the governor and council of Maryland. The credentials of the ambassadors were of much greater length and contained a great deal more protestation and argument than the letter. The ambassadors also delivered a paper of considerable length, in which the arguments in favor of the claim of the Dutch on the Delaware are very succinctly set forth.
During the progress of their deliberations, which were protracted for several days, the Dutch ambassadors were shown a copy of Lord Baltimore's charter, whereupon they called the attention of the council to the fact that his lord- ship was invested with a country not before inhabited, only by a certain barbarous people called Indians. And inas- much as the country on the Delaware River was settled be- fore the patent was issued, his Royal Majesty's intention was not to invest him with title to the settlements on the Dela- ware. Upon the ground taken by these ambassadors at this early stage of the dispute between Lord Baltimore and the Dutch, his claims to all the land between the Delaware and Chesapeake bays and as far north as the fortieth degree of north latitude was ultimately defeated. The fact that Her- men and Waldron were the first to call attention to this matter proves them to have been persons of great ability, and shrewd and cunning diplomatists. Col. Nathaniel Utie, who was a member of the council at this time, appears to have shown a great deal of temper. He was probably some- what vexed at the want of success that attended his efforts when at New Castle. This attempt to settle this difficulty, like the one that preceded it, proved to be a failure in its main object ; but was productive of good in this particular, that it caused the English and their neighbors along the Delaware to become better acquainted. It was also the means of bringing Augustine Hermen to settle in this county.
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HISTORY OF CECIL COUNTY.
After the negotiations were over, Waldron returned to New Amsterdam with an account of them, and Hermen went to Virginia, as he expresses it, "to inquire of the governor what is his opinion on the subject, to create a division be- tween them both, and purge ourselves of the slander of stirring up the Indians to murder English at Accomac." It seems from this, that the Dutch had made themselves obnoxious to the Virginians as well as to the Marylanders ; but as the two latter were upon the best of terms at this time, it may have been that the Virginians had espoused the cause of the Marylanders and slandered the Dutch, as Hermen asserts. It is probable that Hermen remained in Virginia for some months on business connected with the map which he afterwards made of that province and Mary- land ; for the authorities at New Amsterdam, on dispatching Captain Newton and Varlett to that colony " on a mission, in February, 1660, instructed them to inquire in Maryland if danger threatened the South River," and to avail them- selves of the "aid and tongue of Augustine Hermen," at that time in Virginia.
The history of this distinguished man, and that of his numerous descendants, is so closely interwoven with that of Cecil County for a quarter of a century after this time that some account of his previous life will be interesting. He was a native of Prague, a city of Bohemia ; but at what time he came to New Netherlands is not precisely known. He was in the employ of the West India Company, and was in company with Arent Corssen in 1633, at the time of the Dutch purchase from the Indians of the lands which in- cluded the site of Philadelphia, on the Schuylkill, near the mouth of which Fort Beversrede was subsequently erected. He probably returned to Holland and came back again to this country under different auspices than those of his first adventure here. In June, 1614, he was with Laurens Cor- nelisson, an agent of Peter Gabry & Sons, and Mr. Broad- head says he " came out under the patronage of the Chamber
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HISTORY OF CECIL COUNTY.
-
of Enekhuysen as agent of the mercantile house of Gabry of Amsterdam." The same year he was established in trade of the general character common at the time, and afterwards made several voyages to Holland in the prosecution of his commercial enterprises. Some years later we find him in- terested in privateering, and one of the owners, in 1649, of the frigate La Garce, engaged in depredations on the Spanish commerce. He was unfortunate in his business enterprises, and in September, 1652, " a fugitive" from his creditors, his affairs in the hands of assignees, who were finally discharged as such March 18th, 1653. In May following he was granted "liberty and freedom " by the council, and excused for having broken the company's seal ; " having settled with his creditors," the same month he was bearer of dispatches from Governor Stuyvesant to the New England authorities at Boston, respecting an alleged . conspiracy of the Dutch and Indians against the English. In December, 1658, he obtained permission to make a voyage, doubtless for trade to the Dutch , and French islands in the West Indies, and arrived at the Island of Curacao, April 18th, 1659. In his public positions he rendered useful and important service to the colony. He was one of the Board of Nine Men then organized, September 25th, 1647, and held the office in 1649 and 1650. One of the ambassadors to Rhode Island in April, 1652." *
Augustine Hermen married Jannetje (Jane) Varlett, a na- tive of Utrecht, in New Amsterdam, December 10th, 1651. They were the parents of five children : Ephraim George, Casparus or Caspar, Anna Margaretta, Judith and Francina, all of whom were baptized in the Dutch Reformed Church at New Amsterdam, of which their parents are believed to have been members. The map generally called Hermen's map of Maryland, in consideration of the making of which he obtained the grant of Bohemia Manor and Middle Neck,
* From Ancient Families of New York, by Edwin R. Purple, in the N. Y. Gen. and Bio. Record, April, 1878, page 54.
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HISTORY OF CECIL COUNTY.
includes all of Delaware and considerable portions of the other States contiguous to Maryland. It was engraved and published by Faithorne, of London, in 1672, and contains a medallion portrait of Hermen, probably the only one extant. The map is very authentic, so far as it represents the western shore of the Chesapeake and the peninsula be- tween the Chesapeake and Delaware bays. A tradition has long been current among the people of Bohemia Manor that upon a certain occasion after Hermen settled in Maryland he went back to New Amsterdam where, for some reason now unknown, he was arrested and confined by order of the authorities there. In order to escape he feigned insanity and requested to be allowed the company of his horse, a splendid gray charger. The favor was granted, and Hermen mounting the horse seized a favorable opportunity, and dash- ing through one of the windows of his prison, which were twenty feet from the ground, started for New Castle, which he reached in safety, though closely pursued by his enemies. His horse is said to have swam the Delaware River and carried his master safely across, and to have died from over- exertion shortly after reaching the shore. There is probably some truth in this story, for Hermen had a painting com- memorative of some adventure of that kind. Two copies of this painting are yet extant, one of which is in the possession of one of his descendants, a member of the Troth family, of Camden, New Jersey. Hemade a will which is dated November 8th, 1665, and though never proved, is recorded among the land records of Baltimore County, in Book I. S., number I. K. Among many other interesting things, it contains the following clause : " I do appoint my burial and sepulcher, if I die in this bay or in Delaware, to be in Bohe- mia Manor, in my garden by my wife Johanna Varlett's, and that a great sepulcher stone shall be erected upon our graves three feet above ground, like unto a table, with engraven letters that I am the first seater and beginner of Bohemia Manor, Anno Domini, 1660, and died," etc. This
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HISTORY OF CECIL COUNTY.
will shows that he had at that time property in New York, which if his children left no heirs he directs shall be applied to the erection of a free school. Hle directs that his sons shall have at eighteen years of age, and his daughters at marriage, six milch cows, six breeding sows, and six breed- ing hens, with a male of each one of those species. His son Ephraim George and his friend John Browning, with whom he afterwards had a bitter quarrel, were to be executors of this will.
Augustine Hermen aforesaid seems to have become enamoured of the rich soil and genial climate of this lati- tude during his visit to Maryland and Virginia, in 1659. His mercantile speculations had not proved as profitable as he expected, and he resolved to leave the barren shores of Manhattan Island and take up his residence on the fertile plains of what was afterwards called Bohemia Manor. His motive was a laudable one, namely, to acquire a princely domain for himself and his children, and thereby to per- petutate his name. With these ends in view he proposed to Lord Baltimore to make the map before mentioned. This was a work of some magnitude, and cost him "no less than the value of about two hundred pounds ster- ling, beside his own labor." It also required much time, and was not finished until the expiration of some years after he had received his first patent, which was dated June 19th, 1662, which was the year after he moved his family from New Amsterdam to Bohemia Manor in Cecil County. This patent is a legal as well as a literary curiosity. After greeting all persons to whom it should come, in the name of the Lord God Everlasting, and referring to the "conditions of planta- tions," which were certain regulations in regard to the terms upon which titles to plantations could be acquired in the province, it " grants unto Augustine Hermen all that tract of land called Bohemia Manor, lying on the east side of Chesa- peake Bay and on the west side of a river 'in the said bay, called Elk River, on the northernmost side of a creek in
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HISTORY OF CECIL COUNTY.
the said river, called Hermen's Creek. Beginning at the easternmost bound tree of the land of Philip Calvert, Esq. (who had previously obtained the grant of a thousand acres at Town Point), and running south by east up the said creek of the length of two thousand perches to a marked oak, standing by a cove called Hermen's Cove, and from the said oak running northeast for the length of three hun- dred and twenty perches until it intersects a parallel line running west for the length of two thousand perches, to the said land of Philip Calvert, Esq. On the west with the said land, on the south with the said creek, on the east with the said line, on the north with the said parallel. Contain- ing and now laid out for four thousand acres, more or less, together with all royalties or privileges thereunto belonging (royal mines excepted)." This manor of Bohemia was to be holden of "Cecilius, Lord Baron of Baltimore, and of his heirs, as of his manor of St. Maries, in free and common socage, by fealty only for all manner of service, yielding and paying therefor yearly unto us and our heirs, at our receipt at St. Maries, at the two most usual feasts in the year, viz., at the feast of the annunciation of the Blessed Virgin Mary, and at the feast of St. Michael, the Archangel, by even and equal portions, the rent of four pounds sterling, in silver or gold, or the full value thereof, in such commo- dities as we or our heirs shall accept in discharge thereof." By patent bearing the same date, and for the same consider- ation mentioned in the other patent (the making of a map of the province), Hermen became the owner and proprietor of Little Bohemia, or Bohemia Middle Neck. The fact that Hermen obtained two patents for two distinct tracts of land, that were only separated from each other by a small stream of water, may seem strange and unusual at this day. People now would have made one patent include the whole tract ; but the manners and customs of that day were quite different from those of the present. Hermen intended Bohemia Manor for an inheritance for his eldest son, and
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HISTORY OF CECIL COUNTY.
in view of this fact there is nothing strange in not in- cluding Little Bohemia in the same patent.
It will be seen, from an inspection of the foregoing quota- tion from the patent for Bohemia Manor, that its boundaries differ very much from what they are at present.
The probability is that neither of the tracts were ever located according to the metes and bounds set forth in the original patents, for Hermen states in his journal that dan- ger from Indians prevented an accurate inspection and sur- vey of his lands, and that he made a treaty with the Indians at Spesutia Island and purchased this land from them. He states in his journal that " there was an imaginary survey recorded the 13th of September, 1659, for Philip Calvert, Esq., of a one thousand acres on the point between Elk River and Oppoquermine River (now Bohemia River), ad- herent or includent to Bohemia Manor, his Honor did let it fall to the said Augustine Hermen, who, having proposed to his Lordship in England the erecting of a town thereon, his Lordship promised all reasonable privileges to him, the said Augustine Hermen, and first undertaking, willing to have the town called Ceciltown and the county Cecil County, sending (to that purpose) in a charter, as a foundation to all other townships- in this province, remaining in the office under the great seal dated January 24th, 1661," which charter above referred to was issued more than a year before Hermen received the first patent for Bohemia Manor. This is the first reference to Cecil County in the early records of the province. It indi- cates that Hermen originated the name. Calvert's land, as the reader will perceive, was located at the junction of the Elk and Bohemia rivers : and though Ceciltown was not built upon it, it still bears the name of Town Point.
This year (1659) a tract of land, containing four hundred acres, was taken up and patented at Frenchtown, on the Elk River, under the name of Thompsontown." At this time there was a fort garrisoned by the English on Watson's Island, and probably one on Spesutia Island. A few years
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HISTORY OF CECIL COUNTY.
after this there is reason to believe the English had a fort or block-house in Sassafras Neck, not very far in a south- westerly direction from the junction of the Great and Little Bohemia River. The Indians also had a fort on Iron Hill and one on the west bank of the Susquehanna River some miles north of the State line, and were in undisputed pos- session of all the country between the head of Chesapeake Bay and the Delaware River, except the places we have named and perhaps a few others along the Elk and North East rivers.
CHAPTER VI.
Council of Maryland meet at Spesutia Island-Examination of persons who had suffered from the depredations of Indians along the Delaware River-Interesting correspondence between the Governor of Maryland and Alexander D'Hinoyossa, Governor of New Amstel-The Council de- clare war against the Susquehannoeks-Instructions to Captain Odber -- Letter from D'Hinoyossa-Augustine Hermen tries to make peace be- tween the Dutch and English-Council meets at Susquehanna Point and are shown the commission of Captain Neals recently arrived from Eng- land-Many of the Swedes from Delaware settle in Sassafras Neck.
Ox account of the troubles with the Indians and Dutch, the council of Maryland frequently met at and near the head of the bay for the purpose of investigating the facts, mak- ing treaties with the Indians, etc. It met at Spesutia for the former purpose on the 13th of May, 1661, when it was or- dered that all persons who have suffered any damage by the Indians, or have engaged with them in an hostile manner, be summoned to appear at that place on the 15th instant. This summons was directed to be sent from house to house as low as Patapsco River. Then follows the information of Peter Meyer touching the death of four Englishmen in their passage between Delaware Bay and the head of Chesapeake Bay by Indians, upon Wednesday, in Easter week last, to the effect that upon Friday, in Easter week, coming at the Sand Hook, there came unto him one Foppo Yanson (called by the Dutch Foppo Jansen Outhout) and told him that he feared some Englishmen were killed by the Indians, because seeking his horse in the woods he saw an Indian pass by with a gray hat with ribbons tied upon a pack at his back ; that a while afterwards the said Foppo Yanson showed him
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HISTORY OF CECIL COUNTY.
the Indian that had the hat at his back ; that by the assist- ance of Mr. William Hollingsworth, of New England, and some others, he did apprehend the said Indian with his companion, whom, upon demand of justice, the governor of the same place committed to prison ; whereupon the rest of the Indians in the town Hled and left one pack behind them, in which pack he found an English red war coat, with a hole in the back, wet, and a canvas bag, all bloody, and an English pair of shoes; that one of the prisoners was re- leased, that he might go and fetch their king; and that the next day the others were released, but upon what ground, he knows not. And the said Peter Meyer further informs the council, that, demanding of the said Indian how he came by that hat, he answered it was given him by another Indian, called Oconittka, who had killed an Englishman ; that he had desired the pack of goods in which the war coat and bloody bag were found to be arrested, which was accord - ingly done; but that coming the next day to inquire for it, the man of the house where it was deposited answered that it was given to the Indian again, and that he was told by the Dutch that the Indians did threaten him as being an Eng- lishman for to kill him. This man Peter Meyer had a quar- rel about this time with Mr. Lears, a Finnish priest, who lived on the Delaware River not far from where Chester now stands. He had struck the reverend gentleman in the face and mutilated him in a shameful manner. For this offence the authorities at New Amstel had attempted to bring him to trial. It also appears that they had fined him for selling liquor to the Indians, and no doubt he was glad of the op- portunity to vent his wrath upon them, by giving the fore- going information to the Marylanders.
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