History of Sussex and Warren counties, New Jersey, with Illustration and Biographical Sketches of its Prominent Men and Pioneers, Part 4

Author: Snell, James P; Clayton, W. W. (W. Woodford)
Publication date: 1881
Publisher: Philadelphia : Everts & Peck
Number of Pages: 1140

USA > New Jersey > Sussex County > History of Sussex and Warren counties, New Jersey, with Illustration and Biographical Sketches of its Prominent Men and Pioneers > Part 4
USA > New Jersey > Warren County > History of Sussex and Warren counties, New Jersey, with Illustration and Biographical Sketches of its Prominent Men and Pioneers > Part 4

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In 1747 an act was passed erecting the southern part of the county of Salem into a separate county, thus altering the bounds of Cumberland County, as follows :

" Beginning in the county of Salem, at the month of Stow Creek, and running up the same unto John Bick's mills, within the county hereby erected; then contioning still up Stow Creek Branch to the house where Hugh Dunn now dwells, leaving tho said Hugh Dunn's within the new

* Robins appears to be the correct spelling, ns in the former act.

INDIAN OCCUPATION-THE ORIGINAL PEOPLE.

county ; und from the sald Hugh Duun's house upon a straight line to Nathan Show's house, within the new county ; and then on the northeast ourse until it Intersects tho Pilesgrove fine, in Salein County ; thenco along the mid line till it Intersects the live which divides the counties of Gloucester and Salem; then running southeast ward down Gloucester line Into the boundary of ''npe May County; then boundel by Cape May Conuty to Delaware Bay; and up the Delaware Bay to the place of beginning."

At the time of fixing the original boundary-line between Morris and Somerset Counties, upon the erection of the latter, the division-line between the said counties was to be from the Falls of Allamatunk to the P'assaie River, but, not mentioning what course or where to fix upon said river, it remained uncertain, very prejudicial to the inhabitants, and a great ob- stacle to the officers of the counties in the discharge of their duties. Hence, to obviate the difficulty, an act was passed, March 28, 1849, beginning the di- vision-line between the said Somerset and Morris Counties at a fall of water commonly called Allama- tunk Falls, as in the previous act, and from thence on a straight line, before recited, in a " course cast and by north, as the compass now points," to the main branch of Passaie River ; and so down the said river as the above-recited act directs.

Itt .- COUNTIES IN NORTHWESTERN NEW JERSEY.

Previous to March 11, 1713, the people of the west- ern division of New Jersey attended the several courts held in Burlington. But, it being very inconvenient for most of the inhabitants, on account of the dis- tanee and difficulties of traveling at that early day and the expense necessarily incurred, therefore, to re- move these inconveniences, an act was passed by the General Assembly. March 11, 1714, in the thirteenth year of the reign of Queen Anne, erecting the county of lIunterdon, to wit :

" That all and singular of the lands and upper parts of the said western division of the province of New Jersey, lying northward or situato above the brook or rivulet commonly called Assanpinck, be erected into a county named, and from henceforth to be called, the County of liunter- don ; and the said brook or rivulet commonly known and called Assan- pinck shall be the boundary-lino between the county of Burlington and the said county of Hunterdon."

The county was to have and enjoy all the jurisdic- tions, rights, liberties, privileges, and immunities whatsoever which any other county or province en- joyed, excepting only the choice of a representative in the General Assembly ; which liberty was sus- pended until Her Majesty's pleasure was further known therein. This suspension lasted until Feb. 10, 1728, when King George, by his instruction to Wil- liam Burnet, the Governor, was pleased to declare his royal pleasure that the county of Hunterdon should for the future have the choice of two representatives to serve in the General Assembly. The right of Salem township was suspended and given to Hunter- don, which elected two representatives in lieu of those from the former municipality.

Morris County was taken from Hunterdon by act of the General Assembly passed March 15, 1738. The boundaries are thus set forth in the act :

" That all nud singular the Jam band upper parts of the enld Hunterlon County, lying to the northward and cantward, situnte and bying to the custward of a well-koown place in the county of Hunterdon, being a fall of water in part of the North Branch of the Raritan River, called in the Indian language, or known by the name of, Allathatunk, to the north- eastward of the northeast ctul or part of the lands known as the New Jersey Swiety lands, along the line thereof crossing the South Branch of the aforesaid Raritan River, and extending westerly to a certain tree marked with the letters L. M. standing on the north side of a brook emptying itself juto the said South Branch, by an old Indian path to the northward of o line to be run northwest from the said tree to a branch of the Delaware River, called Musconetcong. and en down the kuld branch to the Delaware River; all which said lande, being to the east- ward, northwurd, and northwest ward of the above boundaries, bo orectil into a county, and it Is hereby erected Into a county, named, and from henceforth to be called, Murris County ; and the sald bounds shall part and from henceforth separate and divide the same from Hunterdon County."

Up to this time Trenton had been the place for the transaction of all public business by the people living in what are now Hunterdon, Mercer, Morris, Sussex, and Warren Counties, and the expense and inconve- nience of going there to attend courts and for other public purposes led to a petition from the people re- siding in the upper portion of Hunterdon to have the new county of Morris erected. Upon its organization courts were established at Morristown, which con- tinued to be the seat of justice for the people of Northwestern New Jersey till the county was divided and Sussex County organized.

Sussex County was erected from the upper part of Morris County by an act of the General Assembly passed June 8, 1753, with boundaries as follows :

"That all and singular the lands and upper parts of Murris County, northwest of Musconeteong River, beginning at the month of sald river where it empfles itself into the Delaware Ijver, and running up snkd Musconetrong River to the head of the Great Pond; from thence north- cast to the llues that divide the province of New Jersey ; thonce along the sald line to the Delaware River nforesaid ; thence down the same to the mouth of the Musconetcong. the place of beginning, and the said Musconetcong River, so Inr as the county of Hunterdon lamnds it, shall be the boundary-line between that county and the county of Sussex."

Such remained the bounds of Sussex County till it was reduced to its present dimensions by the detach- ment of Warren County in 1824. After the erection of Sussex County, from June, 1753, to Dee. 9, 1770, Hunterdon, Morris, and Sussex united in sending a representative to the General Assembly. At the last- mentioned date an act (passed by the General Assem- bly May 10, 1768) received His Majesty's approval, allowing cach county to send a representative.

CHAPTER III.

INDIAN OCCUPATION-THE ORIGINAL PEOPLE.

1 .- GENERAL TRIBAL DIVISIONS.

WHEN the first white explorers penetrated into the valleys of the Delaware and Hudson Rivers they found these, with all the country lying between them, as well as the entire area now comprised in the States of New York and Pennsylvania, peopled by nborig-

SUSSEX AND WARREN COUNTIES, NEW JERSEY.

inal tribes of the Algonquin stock, and embraced in two nations, or groups of nations, called by Eu- ropeans the Iroquois and the Delawares, the former having been so named by the French and the latter by the English. The language spoken by both these people was the Algonquin, but differed materially in dialect. The nation to which the whites gave the name of Delawares was known in the Indian tongue as the Lenni Lenape, or simply the Lenape; the Iroquois were in the same tongue called the Mengwe, which name became corrupted by the more ignorant white men into Mingoes, which last term was adopted to some extent by the Delawares in its contemptuous application to their Mengwe neighbors, between whom and themselves feelings of detestation and hatred existed to no small degree.

The Mengwe or Iroquois inhabited the territory ex- tending from the shores of Lake Erie to those of Champlain and the Hudson River, and from the head- waters of the Delaware, Susquehanna, and Allegany Rivers northward to Lake Ontario, and they even oc- cupied a large scope of country north of the St. Law- rence, thus holding not only the whole of the State of New York, but a part of Canada, which vast territory they figuratively styled their "long council-house," within which the place of kindling the grand council- fire was Onondaga, not far from the present city of Syra- cuse, and at that place, upon occasion, representatives of all the Mengwe tribes met together in solemn de- liberative council. These tribes consisted of the Mo- hawks, Senecas, Cayugas, Onondagas, and Oneidas, who collectively formed an offensive and defensive con federation, which has usually been known in Eng- lish annals as that of the Five Nations .*

The Mohawks occupied the country nearest the Hudson River, and held the post of honor as the guardians of the eastern entrance of the "long house." The Senecas, who were the most numerous, energetic, and warlike of the five tribes, defended the western portal of the "house," while the Cayugas were the guardians of the southern border of the Iroquois domain,-the frontier of the Susquehanna and Delaware valleys. The Oneida tribe was located along the shores of Oneida Lake, and the Onondagas, occupying a large territory in the central portion of the present State of New York, kept watch over the council-place and fire of the banded Mengwe.

II .- THIE LEAGUE OF THE IROQUOIS.

The league of the Iroquois nations had been formed -at a date which no Indian chronology conld satis- factorily establish-for the purpose of mutual defense against the Lenapè and other tribes contiguous to them; and by means of this confederation, which they kept up in good faith and in perfect mutual ac-

cord, they were not only enabled successfully to repel all encroachments upon their own territory, but after a time to invade that of other nations, and to carry the terror of their arms southward to the Cape Fear and Tennessee Rivers, westward beyond Lake Michi- gan, and eastward to the shores of the Connecticut.

III .- THIE DELAWARES OR LENNI LENAPE.

The Delawares-the Indian people with which this history has principally to deal-occupied a domain extending along the sea-shore from the Chesapeake to the country bordering Long Island Sound. Back from the coast it reached beyond the Susquehanna valley to the foot of the Allegheny Mountains, and on the north it joined the southern frontier of their domi- neering neighbors, the hated aud dreaded Mengwe or Iroquois. This domain, of course, included not only the counties of Sussex and Warren, but all of the State of New Jersey.

The principal tribes composing the Lenni Lenapè or Delaware nation were those of the Unamis or Turtle, the Unalachtgo or Turkey, and the Minsi or Wolf. The latter, which was by far the most powerful and warlike of all these tribes, occupied the most northerly portion of the country of the Lenape and kept gnard along the Iroquois border, from whence their domain extended southward to the Musconetcongt Mountains, about the northern boundary of the present county of Hunterdon. The Unamis and Unalachtgo hranches of the Lenape or Delaware nation (comprising the tribes of Assanpinks, Matas, Shackamaxons, Chiche- quaas, Raritans, Nanticokes, Tuteloes, and many others) inhabited the country between that of the Minsi and the sea-coast, embracing the present coun- ties of Hunterdon and Somerset and all that part of the State of New Jersey south of their northern boundaries. The tribes who occupied and roamed over the counties of Sussex and Warren, then, were those of the Turkey and Wolf branches of the Lenni Lenapè nation, but the possessions and boundaries of cach cannot be clearly defined.

The Indian name of the Delaware nation, Lenni Lenapè, signifies, in their tongue, "the original peo- ple,"-a title which they had adopted under the claim that they were descended from the most ancient

+ "The Wolf, commonly called the Minsi, which we have corrupted into Monseys, had chosen to live back of the other two tribes, and formed a kind of Imlwark for their protection, watching the motions of the Meng- we und being at hand to afford aid in case of n rupture with them. The Minsi were considered the most warlike and active branch of the Lenape. They extended their settlements from the Minisink, a place named after them, where they had their council-sent and fire, quite up to the IIudson on the eust, and to the west and south far beyond the Susquehanna. Their northern boundaries were supposed originally to be the heads of the great rivers Susquehanna and Delaware, and their southern that ridge of hills known in New Jersey by the name of Muskaneenm, and in Pennsylvania by those of Lehigh. Conowago, etc. Within this boundary were their principal settlements ; and even ns Into as the year 1742 they had n town with a peach-orchard on tho tract of land where Nazareth, in Pennsylvania, has since been built, another on the Lehigh, and others beyond the Blue Ridge, besides many family settlements here and there scattered."-History, Manners, and Customs of the Indian Nu- tions who once inhabited Pennsylvania, by Rev. John Heckewelder.

* At a later period-soon after the commencement of the eighteenth century-the Tuscaroras, having been almost entirely subjugated and driven away from their hunting-grounds in the Carolinas, migrated northwird and were received into the Iroquoly confederacy, which from that time became known as the Six Nations.

INDIAN OCCUPATION-THE ORIGINAL PEOPLE.

of all Indian ancestry. This claim was admitted by the Wyandots, Miamis, and more than twenty other aboriginal nations, who accorded to the Lenape the title of grandfathers, or a people whose ancestry ante- dated their own. The Rev. John Heckewelder, in his " History of the Manners and Customs of the Indian Nations," says of the Delaware nation, -

"They will not ndnuit that the whites are superior beings, They say that the hair of their heads, their features, and the varions colors of their eyes evince that they are not, like themselves, Lenni Lenape,-no original people,-a race of men that has existed unchanged from the be- ginuing of time : but that they are a mixed race, and therefore n trouble- some one. Wherever they may be, the Great Spirit, knowing the wick- edness of their disposition, found it necessary to give them a Great Book, and tanght them how to read it that they might know and ob- serve what He wished them to do und what to abstuin from. But they- the Indians-have no need of any such book to let them know the will of their Maker : they find it engraved on their own hearts; they have had sufficient discernment given to them to distinguish goed from evil, and by following that guide they are sure uot to err."

IV .- TRADITIONS AMONG THE DELAWARE TRIBES.

Concerning the origin of the Lenape, numerous and essentially differing traditions were current among the various tribes. One of these traditions is men- tioned by Loskiel in his " History of the Mission of the United Brethren among the North American In- dians," as follows :

" Among the Delawares, those of the Minst or Wolf tribe say that in the beginning they dwelt in the earth under n lake, and were fortu- nately extriented from this nupleasant abo le by the discovery which one of their mon made of a hole, through which he ascended to the surface : on which, as he was walking, he found a deer, which he carried back with him into his subterraneous habitation ; that the deer was enten, atul he and his companions found the ment so good that they unnni- mously determined to Jeuve their dark abode and remove to a place where they could enjoy the light of heaven and have such excellent game in alnadance.

" The two other tribes, the Unamis or Tortoise, and the Unalachtgos or Turkey, have much similar notions, but reject the story of the lake, which seems peculiar to the Miosi tribe."

There was another leading tradition current among the nations of the Lenape, which was to the effect that, ages before, their ancestors had lived in a far-off country to the west, beyond great rivers and moun- tains, and that, in the belief that there existed, away towards the rising sun, a red man's paradise,-a land of deer and beaver and salmon,-they had left their western home and traveled eastward for many moons, until they stood on the western shore of the Namisi Sipu (Mississippi), and there they met a numerous nation, migrating like themselves. They were n stran- ger tribe, of whose very existence the Lenape had been ignorant. They were none other than the Meng- we; and this was the first meeting of those two peo- ples, who afterwards became rivals and enemies, and continued such for centuries. Both were now trav- elers and bound on the same errand. But they found a lion in their path, for beyond the great river lay the domain of a nation called Allegewi, who were not only strong in numbers and brave, but more skilled than themselves in the art of war, who had reared great defenses of earth inelosing their villages and strongholds. In the true spirit of military strategy,

they permitted a part of the emigrants to cross the river, and then, having divided their antagonists, fell upon them with great fury to annihilate them. But when the Lenape saw this they at once formed an al- liance, offensive and defensive, with the Mengwe. The main body crossed the river and attacked the Al- legewi with such desperate energy that they defeated and afterwards drove them into the interior, where they fought from stronghold to stronghold, till finally, after a long and bloody war, the Allegewi were not only humiliated, but exterminated, and their country was occupied by the victors. After this both nations ranged eastward, the Mengwe taking the northern and the Lenape still keeping the more southern route, until, after long journeyings, the former reached the Mohicanittuck (Hudson River) and the latter rested upon the banks of the Lenape Wihittuck,-the beau- tiful river now known as the Delaware,-and here they found that Indian elysium of which they had dreamed before they left their old homes in the land of the setting sun.

These and other similar Indian traditions may or may not have some degree of foundation in fact. There are to-day many enthusiastic searchers through the realms of aboriginal lore who accept them as au- thentie, and who believe that the combined Lenape and Mengwe did destroy a great and comparatively civilized people, and that the unfortunate Allegewi who were thus extinguished were none others than the mysterious Mound-Builders of the Mississippi valley. This, however, is but one of the many profit- less conjectures which have been indulged in with reference to that unknown people, and is in no way pertinent to this history. All Indian tribes were fond of narrating the long journeys and great deeds of their forefathers, and of tracing their ancestry back for centuries, some of them claiming descent from the great Manitou himself. Missionaries and travelers among them who were, or professed to be, familiar with their language and customs have spoken with apparent sineerity of Indian chronology running back to a period before the Christian era, and some of the old enthusiasts claimed that these aborigines were descendants of the lost tribes of Israel .* But all the

* In a small, quaint, and now very rare volume entitled " An Historical Description of the Province and Country of West Now Jersey in America Nover made Publick till now, by Gabriel Thomas, Loomlen, 1698," and derlicated " To the Right Honourable Sir John Moor, sir Thumas Lane, Knights and Aldermen of the City of London, nin to the rest of the Worthy Members of the Wist Jerry Proprietors, " Is found the following, In reference to the aboriginos of this region : " The first Inhabitants of this Country were the Indians, bring sugrmed to be part of the Ten dis- persoal Trilow of formel, for indeal they are very like the Jews in their termins, and something In their Practices and Worship; for they (as the Pensilvania Indiana) observe the New Moons with great devotion nul Novorenre : And their first Fruits they offer, with their Corn and lunt- ing-Game they get in the whole your, to a Fake laity or Sham Gai whom they must please, elso (as they fancy) many misfortune will be- fall them, and grest infurice will be done them. When they bury their Find, they put Into the Ground with them mme House Utensils and wme Money (as tokens of their Love and Affection), with other Things, exjux ting they shall have Occasion for them in the other World,"

SUSSEX AND WARREN COUNTIES, NEW JERSEY.

traditions of the Indians were so clouded and involved in improbability and so interwoven with superstition, and the speculations of antiquarian writers have almost uniformly been so baseless and chimerical, that the whole subject of Indian origin may be dismissed as profitless.

V .- TOTEMS OR TRIBAL BADGES OF THE INDIANS.

The Indians, from the earliest times, considered themselves in a manner connected with certain ani- mals, as is evident from various customs preserved among them, and from the fact that, both collectively and individually, they assumed the names of such animals. Loskieł says,-

"It might indeed be supposed that those animals' names which they have given to their several tribes were mere badges of distinction, nr ' coats-of-arms.' as Pyrlacus calle them; but if we pay attention to the reasons which they give for those denominations, the idea of a supposed family connection is easily discernible. The Tortoise-or, as they are commonly called, the Turtle-tribe, among the Lenape, claim a supe- riority and ascendancy over the others, because their relation, the grent Tortoise, a fabled monster, the Atlas of their mythology, bears, according to their traditions, this great island on his back,* and also because he is amphibious and can live both on land and in the water, which neither of the heads of the other tribes can do. The merits of the Turkey, which gives its name to the second tribe, are that he is stationary and always remaios with or about them. As to the Wolf, after which the third tribe is named, be is a rambler by nature, running from one place to another in quest of his prey ; yet they consider him as their benefactor, as it was by his means that the Indians got out of the interior of the earth. It was he, they believe, who hy the appointment of the Great Spirit killed the deer which the Monsey found who first discovered the way to the surface of the earth, and which allnred them to come out of their damp and dark residence. For that reason the wolf is to he honored and his name to be preserved forever among them.

" These animals' Dames, it is true, they all use as national badges, in order to distinguish their tribes from each other et home and abroad. In this point of view Mr. Pyrlaeus was right in considering them as ' coats- of-arms,' The Turtle warrior draws, either with a coal or with paint, here and there on the trees elong the war-path, the whole animal, car- rying a gun with the muzzle projecting forward ; and if he leaves a mark at the place where he has made a stroke on his enemy, it will be the picture of a Tortoise. Those of the Turkey tribe paint only one foot of a turkey, and the Wolf tribe sometimes a wolf at large with oue fout and leg raised up to serve as a hand, in which the animal also carries a gun with the muzzle forward. They, however, do not generally use the word 'wolf' when speaking of their tribe, but call themselves P'duk-sit, which means round foot, that animal having a round foot, like a dog."

VI .- INDIAN POPULATION IN NEW JERSEY.

It does not appear that the Indians inhabiting New Jersey were very numerous. In an old pub- lication entitled "A Description of New Albion," and dated A.D. 1648, it is found stated that the native people in this section were governed by about twenty kings; but the insignificance of the power of those "kings" may be inferred by the accom- panying statement that there were "twelve hundred [Indians] under the two Raritan kings on the north side, next to Iludson's River, and those came down to the ocean about little Egg-bay and Sandy Barne- gatte; and about the South Cape two small kings of forty men apiece, and a third, reduced to fourteen

men, at Roymont." From which it appears evident that the so-called "kings" were no more than ordi- nary chiefs, and that some of these scarcely had a following. Whitehead, in his "East Jersey under the Proprietary Governments," concludes, from the above-quoted statement, "that there were probably not more than two thousand [Indians] within the province while it was under the domination of the Dutch." And in a publicationt bearing date fifty years later (1698) the statement is made that "the Dutch and Swedes inform us that they [the Indians] are greatly decreased in numbers to what they were when they came first into this country. And the In- dians themselves say that two of them die to every one Christian that comes in here."

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History of Sussex and Warren counties, New Jersey, with Illustration and Biographical Sketches of its Prominent Men and Pioneers, Part 4

Author: Snell, James P; Clayton, W. W. (W. Woodford) Publication date: 1881 Publisher: Philadelphia : Everts & Peck Number of Pages: 1140

Author: Snell, James P; Clayton, W. W. (W. Woodford)
Publication date: 1881
Publisher: Philadelphia : Everts & Peck
Number of Pages: 1140