History of Monmouth county, New Jersey, Part 67

Author: Ellis, Franklin, 1828-1885; Swan, Norma Lippincott. [from old catalog]
Publication date: 1885
Publisher: Philadelphia, R. T. Peck & co.
Number of Pages: 1148

USA > New Jersey > Monmouth County > History of Monmouth county, New Jersey > Part 67

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For almost fifty years prior to the time men- tioned, the courts of the county had been held at Portland Point (the Highlands) and in the "meeting houses" of Middletown and Shrews- bury; but the population had in that time in- creased, and had become spread out and ex- tended so much towards the south and south-

1 Including village.

4,187

Ocean township.

620

Ocean Grove village

385

THE TOWN OF FREEHOLD.

west, that when in 1713, it was decided that a . court-house should be erected, they demanded that it should be located "in Freehold [town- ship], somewhere near John Okeson's, the nearest of all to the middle of the good land and whole inhabitants of the county." An act of Assembly was passed at the session of 1713, fixing the location in accordance with this

The references to " the house of John Okeson of Frechold " (township), found in the act re- ferred to, and in the records of the county, demand, and on the site established, (the land : induce the belief that his was a public-house or having been conveyed to the county for the purpose by John Reid, August 26, 1714), the court-house was built, as will be more fully | routes of travel. Such a route was the Bur- mentioned elsewhere in this history.

tavern, such as in early days were frequently found, remote from villages, on the principal lington Path, which is found mentioned in the The act referred to, shows that John Okeson was an inhabitant of the immediate vicinity of the court-house site ; and it is also certain, from the description given in the deed by which - road records of the county before the year 1700 as a " King's Highway," running from Cross- wieks, "by way of ye Leonards," to Tinton Falls. Whether Okeson's was a tavern or not, it John Reid conveyed the lot, that his dwelling stood within three or four rods (westerly) of must have been located on the southeast side of what is now the main street of Freehold, as the present court-house. In that deed (a copy . the lands on the other side, as far each way of which is given in full elsewhere) he recites from the court-house as the business part of the that the land had been conveyed to him, with | town extends to-day, were owned by Reid.

other tracts, in March of the same year, by Thomas Combs; and by reference to the Combs deed it is found that the tract mentioned as having been conveyed by him to Reid (in- cluding the court-house site) is described there as beginning at the head of Spottswood Middle Brook, near the Burlington Path, and running along the path south westerly twenty-one chains ; thence running back from the path northerly and westerly by various courses to the starting- point. The Burlington Path at this point was along what is now the main street of Freehold, and it is therefore elear that in 1714, John Reid was the owner of that part of the site of the present village which lies on the north- westerly side of the main street, from about where the railroad track now erosses it north- easterly to the ravine (then much deeper and more clearly marked than now), from the northern end of which, at the gas-works, flows the tiny stream which is one of the head-waters of Spottswood Middle Brook.

Nothing has been found in the ancient records or elsewhere to show that any other dwellings than those of John Reid and John Okeson were standing, in 1714, on the lands now embraced in the corporate limits of Free-

hold, though it is by no means improbable that there may have been other inhabitants then living there, and among them the Thomas Combs from whom Reid purchased his land on the Burlington Path.

This John Reid, the grantor, who is styled in his deed of conveyanee as "yeoman," and " son of James Reid, deceased," was doubtless a nephew or other relative of the John Reid, Esq., to whom and others named he conveyed the court-house lot, as trustees, for the county of Monmouth ; the last-named John Reid be- ing the same one who came over from Scotland, about 1683, as an employe of the Scotch pro- prietors, and who, after residing a few years at Perth Amboy, removed to a large tract of land called " Hortensia," located on Hop Brook, in Monmouth County, where he lived during the remainder of his life, and became a prominent and influential man, holding various important offices, among which was that of surveyor-gen- eral of the province. The John Reid, " veo- man," who conveyed the court-house site, and whose dwelling adjoined it, was evidently quite an enterprising man, as is shown by the fact that within a few weeks after the passage of the act determining the place where the court-house should be located he bought from Thomas Combs (in March, 1714) the large traet of land lying ou the Burlington Path, a part of which, I only five months later, he, in fact, donated to the county (the nominal consideration being only

386

HISTORY OF MONMOUTH COUNTY, NEW JERSEY.

thirty shillings) as the court-house lot, for the purpose of increasing the value of his lands by reason of the location of the county-seat and the growth of a prospective village around it. Thus, it seems proper to mention John Reid, the son of James, as the founder of the village of Freehold.

What additional settlers, if any, came to locate around Monmouth Court-House within the first few years after its erection, cannot be told; and there is very little now known con- cerning the few inhabitants of the place during the first sixty years of its existence as the county-seat. The first name found as that of a resident (other than those already mentioned) anywhere in the vicinity is that of Cornelius Thomson, who, as early as 1702, built the stone house now occupied by Mrs. Achsah Hen- driekson, about four miles southwest of Free- hold village, on the Mount Holly road, at which honse a " private term " of court was held in January, 1722-23. At that time William Nichols, Esq., (otherwise named in the records as " Doct" Nichols, Esq."), was high sheriff of the county, and afterwards (if not at that time) had his residence in or near the little hamlet, as it is found that in January, 1728, a few weeks after the destruction of the court-house by fire, the court met on the spot where the building had stood, and immediately adjourned to the house of William Nichols, where the business of the term was transacted.

In 1733 one of the residents in the vicinity of the court-house was Jacob Scudder, whose son. Dr. Nathaniel Scudder,1 was born here in that year.

1 Dr. Nathaniel Scudder, born in Freehold township on the 10th of May, 1733, graduated at Princeton College in 1751. and was afterwards one of the board of trustees of that college. He became a physician and settled at Mon- month Court-house. lle was an ardent patriot, and wrote many articles, which were published in the public prints of that day, against the tyranny of the mother-country, and which served to arouse his countrymen to engage in the conflict of the Revolution. When the war began he gave up a lucrative professional business and went to the field. The Legislature at once appointed him lieutenant-colonel of the First Regiment of Monmouth, and he soon became the colonel of that regiment. He was also a member of the Committee of Safety. He was a member of the Legis- lature for several years. and in 1776 was Speaker of the

Soon after the middle of the eighteenth cen- tury the place that is now the town of Free- hold, had gained some little importance, as is indicated by the removal to it of St. Peter's Episcopal Church, which had previously been located at Topanenms. The date of its erection

House. In 1777 he was chosen a member of Congress and served for two years. He signed the Articles of Confeder- ation. In June, 1778, Congress had a short recess, during which Colonel Scudder came home and was present at the battle of Monmouth. In a letter to John Hart, then Speaker of the House, in July, 1778, he alludes to the battle and the destruction of property by the British army, as follows : " 1 congratulate you upon the signal success of our arms in this neighbourhood on the 28th of June. Great plunder and devastation have been committed among my friends in this quarter, but, through the distinguishing goodness of Providence, my family and property escaped, and that in almost a miraculous manner."

After his term in Congress expired, Colonel Scudder. with General David Forman, was engaged in repelling fre- quent incursions of the enemy. On the 16th of October, 178I, at Black l'oint, near Shrewsbury, while operating against a large force of the British, Colonel Sendder was in- stanily killed by a shot from the enemy.

Colonel Scudder was much more than an ordinary man. He stood very high in his profession, and was a fine classical scholar. He was a devoted Christian, elder for a long time in Tennent Church, and a man of great influence, both in church and state. He was buried with the honors of war in the Tennent Churchyard. His funeral sermon was preached by Rev. John Woodhull, D.D.

The wife of Colonel Scudder was Isabella Anderson, daughter of Colonel Kenneth Anderson, who was a son of John Anderson, who was Acting Governor of the province of New Jersey for a short time, and who died in 1736, and was buried in the old Topanemus burying-ground, near Marlborough.

One of Colonel Scudder's sons was Dr. John Anderson Scudder, who removed to Kentucky : another was Joseph Scudder, who became a lawyer at Freehold. lle was the father of Daniel B. Ryall's second wife, and grandfather of Mrs. Louisa Vought, who recently died at Freehold ; and also of Thomas W. Ryall, of Colt's Neck. Ex-Gover- nor Joel l'arker is connected with the Scudder family on his mother's side. Mrs. Sarah Scudder Coward, the mother of Governor Parker, was a daughter of Captain Joseph Coward, of Upper Freehold, who was a soldier in the Continental army in the Revolutionary war. Captain Coward was the son of Lucretia Scudder, the sister of Colonel Scudder.

Joseph Scudder was the father of John Scudder, com- monly called " Missionary John," because he was the pio- neer of missionaries in India early in the present century. John was born at Freehold. He had eight sons, all of whom were in the ministry, and seven of them mission- aries. His two daughters were also missionaries until their marriage.

387

THE TOWN OF FREEHOLD.

is not known, but the fact that it was still at hold, but that on the way the prisoners had Topanemus in 1751 is proved by the journal of knocked his comrade down, seized his musket the Rev. Thomas Thompson, missionary ; and that it was creeted near the court-house prior to 1763 is clearly shown in the history of the church, elsewhere given. This old church edi- fice, which stood through all the years of the great struggle between America and Britain, and was at different times occupied by troops of the Royal and patriot armies, is now the oldest build- ing in Freehold village.

After an existence of more than sixty years as the county-seat, the little settlement at Mon- mouth Court-House was still but an insignifi- cant hamlet, containing less than a hundred inhabitants of both sexes and all ages, at the opening of the Revolution; but during the progress of that great conflict its relative impor- tance was considerably increased, and it received some additions to its population, though it is impossible, at the present day, to name more than a very few of its inhabitants at that time. Among them, besides Dr. Scudder and Dr. Thomas Henderson, were two cousins, both named David Forman. Both of them, how- ever, as also Dr. Henderson, lived a short dis- tance outside the present corporation limits ; the residence of "Black David," who became the general (already mentioned in the Revolu- tionary history), being the house now owned and occupied by Mr. Henry Brinkerhoff, and that of "Sheriff David " being located on the Jonathan T. Forman farm, a little more than a mile southeast of the court-house.

Tunis Forman, a son of Sheriff David For- man, was the hero of a Revolutionary adven- ture which made him famous. In May, 1780, while the family were at breakfast, a soldier entered the room in great haste, and informed the sheriff that he (the soldier) and a comrade had that morning been sent as a guard to con- duct two prisoners1 from Colt's Neck to Free-

1 These prisoners had been taken the night before by John Statesir, then a youth of about eighteen years of age, who belonged to a company or detachment of soldiers who were quartered in Jacob Fleming's barn, one and a half miles below Colt's Neck. At the time referred to he was on his way to join his detachment at the barn, and seeing two men approaching, he advanced his musket and demanded the countersign. They could not give it, and

and escaped. The sheriff at once mounted his horse and galloped to the court-house to order out the guard stationed there to pursue the fugitives. Meanwhile, young Tunis Forman, then only seventeen years old, seized his gm (which was only loaded with small shot for blackbirds) and started out alone on the pursuit. He soon overtook the two men, sitting on a fence, and having with them the musket taken from the soldier. On seeing him, they took to a swamp, but the boy followed, and finally found them perehed in a tree top. One of them fired on him, but missed. Tunis then presented his piece, and ordered the man to throw down his empty gun, or he would certainly shoot him. The order was obeyed. The boy then loaded the gun, and forced the two desperadoes to come down from the tree, and march in front of him to the court-house, where he de- livered them to the guard. While on his way to the court-house, driving the captured men before him, young Forman heard his father, with a mounted posse, pass in the other direc- tion on a road near him, but out of sight, and he shouted to him, but the noise of the horses' hoofs prevented his voice from being heard, and he was obliged to proceed alone with his pris- oners. They proved to be John and Robert Smith, two desperadoes who had recently robbed and murdered Mr. Boyd, the collector of Chester County, Pa. Sheriff Forman and his son Tunis took them to Philadelphia, for delivery to the officers there. On their arrival in the city, when the circumstances of the capture became known, Tunis Forman became the hero of the day, and the soldiers stationed there carried him in triumph through the streets on their

as they also acted in a suspicions manner, he took them prisoners, they being unarmed, and marched them before him to the barn, where he delivered them to the officer in command. Each one had a bridle with him, and it was evident that they were out on a horse-stealing expedition. They were kept at the barn till morning, then placed in charge of two soldiers, named respectively Buck and Lake, to be taken to the jail at Freehold, and on the way they escaped, as narrated. The musket which young Statesir carried on that night is now in possession of his son, Wil- liam Statesir, president of the Freehold Banking Company.

388

HISTORY OF MONMOUTH COUNTY, NEW JERSEY.

shoulders. He lived to an advanced age, resid- ing on the old Forman farm, southeast of the court-house. Another son of Sheriff David Forman was Dr. Samuel Forman, who, at the opening of the Revolution, was a lad of eleven years of age. A more extended mention of him will be found in the history of the Mon- mouth Medical Society and elsewhere in this chapter.

It is related of the burning of this house, that " as the lurid flames swept high and fierce, "a voice was heard above the rest, shouting "Oh, do save brother John !" upon which the efforts were redoubled, and resulted in the saving of "Brother John," which was no more nor less than an excellent portrait, exeented by the famed painter, Benjamin West. The owner of the house, JJacob Wikoff, served ereditably in the war, and lived nearly thirty years after its close, dying in 1812. His son, William, was also a soldier in the Revolution, and was pres- ent in the battle of June 28, 1778. Peter Wi- koff, brother of Jacob, served under Washing- ton, and was one of the guides of the commander- in-chief at the battle of Monmouth.

James Wall was the keeper of a tavern at In 1780 certain sales of property were ad- vertised to be held at the house of Daniel Ran- dolph, at Freehold. It is supposed that this was the same Daniel Randolph, Esq., who was captured two years later with Captain Huddy. A very prominent man at Tom's River in the early part of the war was James Randolph, extensively engaged in saw-mills and other business. He died about 1781, and Daniel Ran- dolph's appearance then at Tom's River sug- Monmonth Court-House in 1778, and William Snyder was an inn-keeper there in the following year. The house of Captain James Green, which stood in the immediate vicinity of the court-house, is found frequently mentioned in records and elsewhere, in a way that shows it to have been, at one time during the Revolution, one of the principal places where meetings were held for the transaction of publie business. number of trials were held there, notably of gests he might have gone there to manage the estate. The place where he lived in Freehold in 1780, cannot now be designated.

cases in Admiralty, to try claims on prizes cap- tured by the American privateers. One of these trials was held at Green's house, a week before the final capture of Captain Joshua Huddy, at the Tom's River block-house. It was held by Abiel Akin, Esq., of Tom's River, to try the claims for the prize " Luey," of which William

Dillon had been master. Dillon was one of the eight men in Freehold jail under sentence of death to whom the Rev. Abel Morgan preached in June, 1778, but he somehow escaped death. The next week after Esquire Akin had the ex- amination at Captain Green's house, at Free- hold, for claims against this vessel, Dillon piloted the British expedition into Tom's River, which destroyed the black-house, captured Huddy and others and burned the village, and Esquire Akin's house among the rest. Less than three weeks afterwards the corpse of Cap-

Jacob Wikoff (son of William Wikoff, of Shrewsbury) was also a resident in the vicinity of the village in the time of the Revolution, and his house was one of those burned by the tain Huddy was brought from the place where British troops during their occupation of the he had been murdered by Captain Lippincott place, from the 26th to the 28th of June, 1778. 'and his Refugee followers, and laid in the house of Captain Green, preparatory to the funeral, which was held in the court-honse, where the Rev. John Woodhull preached the funeral ser- mon to a very large audience of people, who had gathered there from all parts of the county.

It is not shown, however, that Captain Green was an inn-keeper. at that time, but it appears probable that he was not, from the fact that in some of the notices of meetings, sales and courts held at his residence, it is mentioned as "the dwelling-house of James Green." It appears likely that he had been or was a seafaring man, as it is found that at one time, in a Court of Ad- miralty, he was prosecuting a prize elaim on a captured vessel called the " Betty." His subse- quent career is not known.

In 1788 John Anderson and Samuel P. For- man (the last named of whom became sheriff of the county in 1799) were inn-keepers at Mon- mouth Court-House village. In May of that year the Board of Freeholders met at Ander-

389

THE TOWN OF FREEHOLD.

son's, and adjourned to meet at Forman's in the following June. The location of their houses is not known, but it is supposed that they were the stands since known as the " Washington " and " Union." Lewis MeKnight was an inn- keeper at Monmouth village in 1789. Meet- ings of the freeholders were held at his house in that year.

There can be no doubt that there were stores and country merchants at Monmouth Court- House many years before the Revolution, for although the village itself is insignificant, yet : business for a few years, but was ruined finan- the surrounding country had become tolerably well settled and prosperous, and its natural trading-point would be the county-seat, located, as it was, on a principal highway from Burling- ton to Raritan Bay. Yet the writer has been unable to learn the name of any merchant or the location of any store in the village prior to the year 1793, when William Lloyd, who had been a soldier in the Revolution,1 and who,

1 In an affidavit made by William Lloyd, in 1832, for the purpose of obtaining a pension, he said -

". . . That his first service rendered was at an early period of the Revolution. and thinks at the second monthly call of the Monmouth militia, but cannot recollect the pre- cise time. Ile distinctly remembers serving in the Foot, four monthly tours of duty at different times in the vil- Iage of Freehold, at Monmouth Court-llouse, and one month in the vicinity thereof as a, light-horseman, but cannot recollect the company officers sufficiently certain to make oath to; the first he believes aud feels sure was under the command of Colonel Samuel Forman, and the latter under the immediate command of General David Forman, who kept his headquarters in said village, and had also the command of some companies of enlisted soldiers. He performed one month's service at Shoal Har- hour, in Middletown, under Captain Nathaniel Polhemus, Lieutenants John Conover and Jonathan Pitman ; also served three monthly tours of service in the township of Shrewsbury, the frontier of the county at different times, under command of the following officers : one under Cap- tain Baird (subalterns not recolleeted) : that he com- menced another monthly tour at Freehold while the British army lay in Brunswiek, and was ordered to march to General Washington's headquarters after a few days' ser- vice : that he marched with the militia then on duty at Freehold to Princeton ; from there to Sourland Mountain ; there met with General Sullivan, and marched under his command nearly all night to Steel's Mountain, the head- quarters of General Washington ; that after being a few days there I turned out as a volunteer with a considerable body of men, said to be commanded by General Heard, to reeonnoitre the enemy, who had retired from Somerset Court-House, and was on their retreat to Amboy; . .1

having suceceded Elisha Walton a> sheriff of the county, came from Upper Freehold to the court-house, and opened a small merchandising business in a low wooden building that stood on the northwest side of the main street, near the place now occupied by the store of E. B. Bedle. From this humble building he afterwards re- moved to a store on the same side of the street, on or near the site of the present post-office, where, with his brothers, Corlies and James Lloyd, he carried on a very large and profitable

was also on duty at Freehold about a week before the bat- tle of Trenton ; the whole on duty were discharged by Colonel Oke [Auke] Wikoff, who commanded at the time on the apprehension that British and Refugees would make an attack on us. On the march of the British army from Philadelphia, in the year 1778, I went as a volunteer to General Maxwell's headquarters at Crosswicks; went with a reconnoitering party under Major David Rhen, near to a place called the Clark house, in Burlington County ; next day I took a letter from General Maxwell to Colonel Nelson, who commanded the Middlesex militia at Allen : attached myself to Captain Alexander Montgomery's com- pany of horse and did service ; was sent to procure wag- ons for the army ; continued doing what I could till the battle of Monmouth : was in the midst of the same. and at the first retreat of the enemy, after their commander, Colonel Monckton fell, pursued and collected as many of the enemy's guns (with bayonets fixed ou them) as I could conveniently carry on my horse, and gave them all to the soldiers of the regular army as they stood in rank on the field of battle: this service occupied the day. I performed about a week's service under Major Elisha Lawrence by marching to Egg Harbour, a distance of sixty miles, as a volunteer, with about a hundred others, to protect the inhabitants of that place from the ravages of two or three companies of Refugees. I would further remark that I never missed going out when called upon, to my knowledge (exeept once ; that was the time of the battle of Germantown or Brandywine, I do not recollect which, and then I was eonfiued to my bed with siekness), during the war from 1776 to the end of the war. During the period of my services I was never drafted ; served when called upon by regular ealls ; my services were con- fined to the county of Monmouth, except when called to headquarters. as above stated, and services rendered in the county of Burlington previous to the battle of Mon- mouth. I was acquainted with many of the militia officers during the war, namely, General David Forman, Captain David Hay, Captain James Brewer, Captain Nathaniel Polhemus, Captain David Baird, Colonel Asher Holmes, Colonel Oke [Auke] Wikoff, Colonel Samuel Forman, Colo- nel John Smock and a great many others ; and served with a number of them at different times. When I entered the service I lived in Upper Freehold ; was born there in April, 1757, and served there during the war."

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History of Monmouth county, New Jersey, Part 67

Author: Ellis, Franklin, 1828-1885; Swan, Norma Lippincott. [from old catalog] Publication date: 1885 Publisher: Philadelphia, R. T. Peck & co. Number of Pages: 1148

Author: Ellis, Franklin, 1828-1885; Swan, Norma Lippincott. [from old catalog]
Publication date: 1885
Publisher: Philadelphia, R. T. Peck & co.
Number of Pages: 1148