USA > New Jersey > Monmouth County > A history of Monmouth and Ocean counties : embracing a genealogical record of earliest settlers in Monmouth and Ocean Counties and their descendants, the Indians, their language, manners and customs, important historical events. > Part 35
USA > New Jersey > Ocean County > A history of Monmouth and Ocean counties : embracing a genealogical record of earliest settlers in Monmouth and Ocean Counties and their descendants, the Indians, their language, manners and customs, important historical events. > Part 35
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JOEL PARKER.
The following is an abstract of the memorial of ex- Governor and Judge Joel Parker prepared at the re- quest of the New Jersey Historical Society by Maj. James S. Yard, Editor of the Monmouth Democrat, Free- hold, and read at a meeting of the Society at Newark, May 17, 1888 :
It so came about, under the guidance of Divine Providence, that Joel Parker became Governor of New Jersey at the most critical period in the history of the War of the Rebellion. He was then forty-six years old, and in the prime of his intellectual and physical strength and vigor. In 1847 he was elected to the Assembly, and in 1852 he was appointed as Prosecutor of the Pleas for Monmouth. In both of these positions he discharged his publie duties with signal ability. In the Assembly, although the youngest member of that body, he distin- guished himself throughout the State by introducing a measure, which afterwards became a law. to equalize taxation by taxing personal as well as real property.
In December, 1857, at a meeting of the Regimental Officers, he was elected Brigadier General of the Mon- mouth and Ocean Brigade of State Militia, and proceeded to thoroughly organize the corps. At the outbreak of the war Maj. Gen. Moore, Commander of the Third Division of the State Militia, resigned on account of age and infirmity, and on the 7th of May, 1861, General Parker was nominated by Gov. OLDEN, and unanimously confirmed by the Senate as his successor. This appoint- ment was made for the purpose of promoting volunteering for the suppression of the rebellion. Party strife at this time was rife and bitter, but Gen. Parker's patriotic efforts were generally recognized and commended alike by party friends and foes, and put New Jersey in the front rank of the loyal States.
In the Fall of 1862, after the defeat of the operations against Richmond, and the famous seven days' fight on the Peninsula, and when the fate of our national existence
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HISTORY OF MONMOUTH AND OCEAN COUNTIES.
seemed to tremble in the balance, Gen. Parker was nominated for Governor and was elected by a majority three times greater than had ever before been given in the State for any candidate for that position. His elec- tion gave a new impetus to the national cause, and his administration, which in all respects was eminently a successful one, was especially distinguished for its efficiency in promoting enlistments in the army, and for successfully keeping up volunteering for this purpose for a year after all other states had been obliged to resort to the draft to fill their regiments.
Through these efforts New Jersey is enabled to boast that no man was ever taken unwillingly from the State to fill the quota of troops demanded by the general government.
His action during the invasion of Pennsylvania by the rebel forces is still fresh in the public mind. Before the people of that State had recovered from the panic caused by this invasion, he had rallied regiments of Jerseymen to the standard and was marching them to their defence, for which service he was publicly compli- mented by President Lincoln and Gov. Curtin. In 1864, when Maryland was invaded and the National Capitol was threatened, he did not wait to hear from the authorities at Washington, but immediately set about the raising of reinforcements to drive the invaders back. These are but instances of the foresight, vigor and patriotism which characterized his efforts throughout his administration down to the close of the war.
In 1863, after the Battle of Gettysburg, and without waiting for the action of the Legislature, Governor Par- ker dispatched an agent to the battle-field to personally superintend, with great care, the removal of the remains of the New Jersey dead. A plot of ground was secured on the field, the bodies were carefully re-interred, and the ground was set apart for this sacred purpose, with appro- priate ceremonies, in the presence of a vast concourse of people assembled to witness them.
But his efforts did not stop at the operations in the
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JOEL PARKER.
field. They extended also to the care of the Jersey soldiers in their camps and hospitals and of their families at home. One of his first acts as Governor was to establish an Agency at Washington to look after the welfare of the New Jersey troops, to facilitate transfers and discharges in deserving cases, and to alleviate the sufferings of the sick and wounded. The agency also received money from the soldiers in the field and transmitted it to their families without expense to them. Hundreds of thousands of dollars were thus received and transmitted, and thousands of soldiers and soldiers' families remember with gratitude, to-day, his efforts to promote their welfare, and bless him for his kindly sympathy. He also instituted inquiries into the con- dition of the disabled soldiers and their families, and appointed a commission to report what legislation was necessary to relieve them. In his second annual message he recommended the establishment of a Soldiers' Home, or Retreat, out of which grew the present admirable provision made by the State for that purpose.
Under most, if not all of the State Constitutions, during the first years of the war there was no provision for taking the votes of soldiers in the field. This omis- sion was not discovered in time to provide in New Jersey for the election of 1864, it requiring two years to amend the Constitution ; but the Legislature of that year adopt- ed resolutions requesting the military authorities to furlough the soldiers entitled to vote, so far as it could be done without detriment to the service, to go home and vote. Gov. Parker, in transmitting these resolutions to the President, expressed the wish that all New Jersey soldiers, without distinction of party, who could be spared, should be allowed to come home on election day, and particularly desired that soldiers in hospitals who were able to travel, be allowed to visit their homes for that purpose. He also wrote to the State Agent at Washington, instructing him to assist the soldiers in getting furloughs. The Constitution on this point was afterwards amended.
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HISTORY OF MONMOUTH AND OCEAN COUNTIES.
Gov. Parker was always frank and outspoken in his views in regard to the conduct of the war, as he was on all other matters of public policy, and while frequently differing in opinion with the administration at Washing- ton, he never faltered in the discharge of his duty to sustain by all means in his power the effort to restore the Union, or in his belief in the ultimate success of the National cause. He was a man of strong convictions, and necessarily and essentially a party man, neglecting no honest and fair opportunity to advance the interests of his party, yet his first consideration was always the public interests. In all of his appointments, military and civil, he carefully scrutinized the character and qualifications of the candidate. No question of party ever entered into any of his appointments to the military service, while in his appointments to the civil service the fitness of the appointee generally silenced the clamor of the friends of the disappointed candidates; and while this is the rock upon which the popularity of the executive is usually wrecked, and while he made more appointments than any other man who has ever filled the executive chair of our State, yet he returned at the close of both his terms of office with his popularity unimpaired.
Joel Parker was innately and thoroughly a Jersey- man, proud of his State and of its history. He neglected no opportunity to eulogize it, and warmly resented any indignity aimed at it. But his patriotism was greater than his State pride-it embraced our whole country. In his love for its institutions and in his faith in its future glory he never wavered. He was beyond dispute the foremost man of his generation in his native State in all those qualities that go to make a man useful to and beloved by his fellow-men. In his private life he was pure and above reproach. He was not a brilliant man, as the world reckons it, but he was a great man, broad, liberal, conscientious, faithful and true, and deserves to be conspicuously honored by the generation that he served so long and so well.
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JOEL PARKER.
BIRTH, PARENTAGE AND EDUCATION.
Joel Parker was born in Freehold township on the 24th of November, 1816, in a house still standing on the Mount Holly road about four miles west of Freehold, in what is now Millstone township. A small village known as Smithburg has grown up around it recently. His father was Charles Parker, who was born in the same neighborhood, and who was Sheriff of the county, mem- ber of the Assembly, and for thirteen years State Treasurer and at the same time State Librarian. His mother, who was also a native of the county as it was then constituted, was a daughter of Capt. Joseph Coward, of the Continental Army. He received his primary edu- vation at the old Trenton Academy, and was prepared for college at the Lawrenceville High School. In the meantime he spent two years as manager on a farm which his father then owned near Colts Neck. He was graduated at Princeton in 1839, and immediately com- menced the study of law in the office of the Hon. Henry W. Green, at Trenton, and was admitted to the Bar in 1842, when he located at Freehold and commenced the practice of his profession.
HIS EARLY CAREER.
In 1840 he cast his first Presidential vote for Martin Van Buren, the nominee of the Democratic party. In 1844 he entered the political arena in support of the election of James K. Polk as President, and distinguished himself in that campaign as a public speaker.
HIS SOCIAL RELATIONS, MARRIAGE AND DEATH.
Although his long and busy life was crowded with great public cares, he did not forget the minor public duties nor the obligations of social life. He was one of the original members of the lodge of Odd Fellows of his town and always retained an interest in its welfare ; in his earlier years he took an active part in its affairs, filling the different official positions and representing it in the State Grand Lodge. He was also a member of the Ma- sonic lodge of his town. In both of these organizations
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HISTORY OF MONMOUTH AND OCEAN COUNTIES.
he remained an honored member up to the time of his death. He was for many years a member of the Union Fire Company of Trenton, and of the Fire Department of Freehold, aiding both with his counsels and his purse. He was also a member of the Commandery of the State of Pennsylvania of the Military Order of the Loyal Legion of the United States ; a member of the Tammany Society of New York City, and an honorary member of the Society of the Cincinnati of the State of New Jersey. In 1881 he united with the Presbyterian Church of Free- hold, on confession of faith, and afterwards remained an acceptable member and communicant of that church. In 1843 he was married to Maria M., eldest daughter of Samuel R. Gummere, Clerk in Chancery of New Jersey, who survives him, with two sons, Charles and Frederick, both practicing lawyers of some years' standing at the Bar of Monmouth County, and a daughter, Bessie. On Saturday, the 31st day of December, 1887, after holding a special session of the Burlington County Courts, he went to Philadelphia, and feeling unwell he called at the house of a friend, where, in a few minutes, he received a stroke of paralysis. He died on the following Monday, shortly after midnight, surrounded by the immediate members of his family. He rallied sufficiently on Satur- day evening to recognize his wife, but afterwards never regained consciousness.
PERSONAL APPEARANCE AND GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS.
His personal appearance was imposing. He was slightly over six feet high, with a massive frame admira- bly proportioned, a head well poised, manly and dignified in his bearing, easy and attractive in his manner; in public, free and self-possessed, easily approached by the humblest member of the community, but never conde- scending to unseemly familiarity. He was persistent in the pursuit of the object in which he was interested, and in support of the cause which he had espoused ; never domineering, but persuasive and conciliating ; avoiding personal antagonisms he skilfully laid his course between
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JOEL PARKER.
contending factions and reached the goal while others were wrangling by the way. Conservative in all his views and sometimes considered so almost to a fault, he was always a safe leader in public affairs and reliable as a personal adviser.
When he died his fellow citizens throughout the State-all ranks and conditions of men-alike pressed forward to lay their tribute of affection and regard upon his bier. The Governor issued a proclamation reciting the eminent services he had rendered the State, and caused public honors to be paid to his memory ; the bus- iness of the courts was suspended while eulogies were pronounced and resolutions of respect and condolence were placed upon their records ; organizations, public and social, vied with each other in manifestations of friendship and esteem, and the press united in one com- mon expression of high appreciation of his life and public services.
At the session of the Legislature of 1888 a joint resolution was passed by both Houses providing for the purchase of a portrait of Gov. Parker. This portrait was afterwards painted by Julian Scott, and hung with appropriate ceremonies in the Assembly Chamber on the 4th of February, 1889.
"STRONG, 'mid the perils that beset his time, STRONG, in the chair of State he honored long, STRONG, in devotion to his home and friends, Wherever fortune found or placed him, STRONG.
"KIND, with a kindness words cannot express, KIND, with a sweetness born of noble mind, KIND, let the tear-drop pathos started, speak; To youth and age, to poor and sorrowing, KIND.
"GREAT, in the virtues that adorned his life. GREAT, in the annals of his native State, GREAT, in his fearless championship of right, In every trust and station, truly GREAT."*
*Frank P. McDermott, Freehold, in the Monmouth Democrat, Jan. 12, 1888.
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HISTORY OF MONMOUTH AND OCEAN COUNTIES.
PERSECUTION OF QUAKERS.
Edward Wharton was one of the most zealons Quakers of his time, and lived at Salem, Mass. In 1669 he gave an order to John Hance to hold and enjoy his lot of land.
George Wharton and John Harwood, of London, appointed John Hance, of Shrewsbury, as their attorney.
Edward Wharton was a noted man in the history of the Society of Friends. He was in Salem as early as 1655 and was called " glazier." His business or "out- ward occasions," as Bishop's "New England Judged" terms it, required him to make frequent journeys to Rhode Island and other places, and he frequently accompanied Quaker preachers on their visits to various places, sometimes as far as Long Island. He first began to suffer for his faith in 1658. In 1659 he was given twenty-four lashes and fined £20, which a friend paid, as he would not pay it. In 1661 the stripes were again given to him and to John Chamberlain, supposed ances- tor of the first Chamberlains of Monmouth, for protesting against the brutal hanging of William Leddra, who was hanged on Boston Common for preaching his faith. It is not stated that Chamberlain was then a Quaker, but his feelings of humanity prompted him to protest against the act. Wharton, despite all threats, remained with Leddra until he was executed. In 1662 he accom- panied two Quaker women, preachers, named Alice Ambrose and Mary Tomkins, to Long Island. Here the Dutch authorities arrested all three of them, and also John Tilton and Mary, his wife, William Reape, of New- port, who was with them, and others, and kept them prisoners for ten days, and then put them all, except John Tilton and wife, on a ship and sent them out of their jurisdiction.
In 1664 Alice Ambrose and Mary Tomkins came to Boston from Virginia, where they had been pilloried and then " given thirty-two stripes with a whip of nine cords and every cord three knots."
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PERSECUTION OF QUAKERS.
Mary Tomkins, while in Boston, was taken so sick she thought she would die. Edward Wharton and an- other Quaker named Wenloek Christian, went from Salem to see her. The constables took her to jail and both women and the two men were ordered to be whipped. Colonel Temple interceded and got three clear, but they vented their wrath on Edward Wharton against whom they had no charge but that of leaving his home in Salem and coming to Boston to see a sick friend. Gov. Endicott issued his warrant to have Wharton given thirty stripes on his naked body, "convicted of being a vaga- bond from his own dwelling place." This warrant was dated June 30, 1664. Wharton was taken to the market place and stripped, and his arms bound to the wheels of a cannon. Constable John Lowell bade the hangman to whip, which was so cruelly done that it was testified that peas might be put in the holes made by the knots in the whip, on his flesh, arms and back. Wharton was not cowed by his cruel treatment, but after it was over he said, "I think I shall be here to-morrow, again !" He was well off and next day he said to Lieut. Governor Bellingham : " How is it that I should be a vagabond yesterday and not to-day ?" Wharton had been in this country some twenty years and had supplied Governor Endicott with necessaries of life when he was in humble and suffering circumstances. A lengthy letter is given in Bishop's " New England Judged," complaining of Gov. Endicott's ingratitude and of his injustice. This letter was written by John Smith, possibly the one subsequently in Mon- mouth, whose wife Margaret had been imprisoned all winter by Endicott's orders. Smith upbraided him for his "hard hartedness to neighbors to whom thou hadst formerly been beholden to and helped in a time of want when thou hadst no bread !" Wharton was punished at other times, but the foregoing statements are sufficient to show why he aided in establishing the settlement in Monmouth where religious toleration should be insured.
The persistence of Wharton in travelling with Qua- ker preachers, visiting them in prison and aiding them
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HISTORY OF MONMOUTH AND OCEAN COUNTIES.
in every way to the best of his ability, despite stripes and imprisonment, show an unselfish heroism rarely wit- nessed. He was highly esteemed by his Puritan neigh- bors for everything except his Quakerism.
Eliakim Wardell. who was first named in Monmouth, was a son of Thomas Wardell, who came to this country and was made a freeman at Boston, 1634. He had four sons. The father was disarmed in 1637, for being an Antinomian, as the followers of Ann Hutchinson were called. Some years later, when the Quakers began preaching their views, Eliakim harbored one of them named Wenlock Christison, for which the Court in 1659 fined him, and, as Wardell would not pay the fine, the officer levied " on a pretty beast for the saddle (says "Bishop's New England Judged") worth £14, which was taken for the fine, which was less than the value of the horse, the overplus, to make up to him, some of the offi- cers plundered old William Marston of a vessel of green ginger, which for some fine was taken from him and forced it into Eliakim's house, where he let it be and touched it not. In process of time Eliakim came to be fined again, and whereas, according to law, he should have the overplus of the beast restored to him, yet the executors came and took the ginger away as aforesaid, which was all the satisfaction that was made to him. And notwithstanding, he came not to your invented worship, but was fined ten shillings for his absence and his wife's, vet he was often rated for priest's hire. And the priest, Seaborn Cotton (old John Cotton's son), to obtain his end, sold his rate to a man almost as bad as himself, who is named Nathaniel Boulton, who came on pretence of borrowing a little corn for himself, which the harmless, honest man, willingly lent him. And he, find- ing thereby that he had the corn, which was his design, Judas-like, he went and bought the rate of the priest and came and measured as he pleased. Another time he had a heifer taken from him for priest's rates, and then almost all his marsh and meadow ground taken from him, which was to keep his cattle in winter."
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TALES OF FOREST AND SE.A.
Eliakim Wardell was at one time sentenced to be whipped with fifteen lashes at the cart's tail, for alleged disrespectful remarks of Simon Bradstreet, which re- marks he made because Bradstreet had spoken disre- spectfully of his (Wardell's) wife. His wife's name previous to her marriage was Lydia Perkins. In 1662 Wardell and a man named William Fourbish witnessed the whipping of two Quaker women named Mary Tomp- kins and Alice Ambrose, at Newburyport, and for pro- testing against the punishment, both men were put in stocks. His wife Lydia had been a member of the church, but when the Quakers promulgated their doc- trines she joined them. She was also a victim of the lash of the Puritans.
Eliakim Wardell and wife Lydia, at this time lived at " Hampton, fourteen miles from Dover." There is but little doubt that Wardell and wife, and Edward Wharton of Salem, and James Heard, all Quakers, were induced to aid in the settlement of Monmouth by the energetic Quaker merchant of Newport, William Reape, whose business led him to various places.
TALES OF FOREST AND SEA.
The extensive forests in Ocean county have been witness of many exciting scenes occasioned by fires in the woods, children lost, etc. Fires in the woods have been too numerous to attempt to particularize. Often hun- dreds of acres are swept over and tens of thousands of dollars worth of timber are burned in a short time. With a high wind, the roar of the fire in the woods, the appearance of the sky, etc., are appalling. "Fighting fire " is familiar to hundreds of citizens of Ocean county. Occasionally life is thus lost as in the following instance :
About fifty years ago, many persons were fighting fire near Forked River. A sudden shift of wind brought the flames with such speed down upon the men that they had to run for their lives to a mill pond not far off; but one man named Collins missed the road to the pond and was
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HISTORY OF MONMOUTH AND OCEAN COUNTIES.
overtaken by the flames and burned to death. The fol- lowing is a case of a child lost in the woods :
About thirty years ago a little boy named Warren Conklin of some six or seven years of age, living at Bar- negat, started to take his father's dinner to him in the woods, a mile or so from home. The boy got lost and search was made next day and for weeks after, and by hundreds of people, but of no avail until three months after, his body was found, partly decayed, close to where persons had been many times. The search was so gen- eral that it was estimated that it would have taken one man seventeen years to have gone over as much ground as the number did in searching for the boy. The feelings of the agonized parents of the lost child at snel a time may bet- ter be imagined than described.
Tales of shipwrecks not only of foreign vessels on our coast but of shipwreck of our citizens, loss of life, etc. are so numerous as to be impossible to attempt to give particulars here.
Some of our citizens like Forman Grant, John F. Jones, and John Parker have lost their lives in nobly en- deavoring to save the lives of shipwrecked persons, and many have received gold and silver medals for risking life to save life.
GENEALOGICAL RECORD
OF THE
FIRST SETTLERS OF MONMOUTH AND OCEAN COUNTIES
AND THEIR DESCENDANTS.
ABRAHAM-James Abraham, b. Northamptonshire, Eng., d. Sept. 13, 1765, a. 69 yrs., 6 m. 18 d .; wife Janet, d. April 3, 1747, a. 43 yrs ; daughter Elizabeth, m. Enoch D. Thomas, and d. 1762, a. 34 yrs. ; then Mr. Charles Abraham d. 1760, a. about 40 yrs.
ADAM, ADAMS -- Alexander Adam is named 1700. He may have been a Scotch emigrant. Robert Adam was a Scotch emigrant, named in White- head's history of Perth Amboy. The will of Thomas Adams of Freehold, dated Jan. 12, 1732, and proved Jan. 26. 1732; names wife Margery; speaks of four eldest children, but does not mention their names. Members of the Adams family early settled in Burlington county and branches have lived in Ocean. The will of John Adams of Chester, Burlington, dated March 16, 1699, names wife Elizabeth and seven children. Executors, Samuel Jennings and Francis Davenport and wife. The will of one John Adams of Burlington, dated March 4, 1704, names wife Elizabeth as executor. Alexander Adam bought land 1694 of John Reid; was grand juror 1700. John Adams of Woodbridge, had 97 acres 1670 granted by Gov. Carteret. John Adams and w Elizabeth of Woodbridge, N. J., m. June 1, 1671; son John, 1676. Thomas Adams of Middlesex made will 1695; filed at Tren- ton. Thomas Adams, yeoman, had 224 acres in 1724, and Jedediah Adams had 113 acres same year, whose grandfather, John Adams, bought said land 1691 of John Rodman. Joseph Adams m. Ann Newton in Burlington county 1801. In Moorestown, Burlington county, John Adams was one of the first settlers; daughter Deborah in. Judah Allen. In 1692 Elizabeth Adams, dan. of John, m. William, son of John Hollingshead. At Shrews- bury Friends' meeting, 1695-7 mo. 2d, James Adams of Burlington county, was m. to Esther Allen, Shrewsbury. The first of the name of Adams who came to America were : John, Plymouth, Mass., 1621-2; Henry, with eight sons, Braintree, Mass., 1634; William, Cambridge, Mass., 1635; Robert, Ipswich, Mass., 1635; Richard, Weymouth, Mass., 1635; Richard, Salem, Mass., 1635, Jeremy Braintree, Mass., 1637; Fer- dinande, Dedham, Mass., 1637; George, Watertown, Mass., 1645; Christo- pher, Braintree, Mass., 1645; Ralph, Elizabeth City, Va., 1623; Robert, Martin Hundreds, Va., 1624; Richard, embarked for Va. 1635. The name Adams is of Welsh origin, signifying "Son of Adam."
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