USA > New Jersey > Mercer County > Trenton > History of Trenton, New Jersey : the record of its early settlement and corporate progress. > Part 17
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THE CITY OF TRENTON.
Many soundings were made at various points, with a thirty-foot iron rod, and the mud was found in places to be twenty feet deep. The swamp was covered with wild grass, but this grass had no sustaining power whatever, and it was quite easy for men on a plank to start waves of mud across the surface of the marsh. A platform was constructed and piles of sand bags regularly laid were mounted on it. It was found that the platform held six hundred pounds to the square foot, uniformly distributed, but at nine hundred pounds to the foot the platform sunk at one corner and the sand bags slid off and vanished in the mud. A story was current in the department at the time that a requisition had been sent to Colonel Serrell by some one more of a wit than an officer, in which a detail was called for of "twenty men eighteen feet long to do duty in fifteen feet of mud."
Upon the second of August preparations were begun for cutting the timber and building a trestlework roadway across the marsh. This road, some two and a half miles long, was made dur- ing the following week. Then the diffieult construction of the marslı battery was commeneed under the direct fire of Forts Hascall, Cheves and Simkins and the other smaller Confederate works on James Island. The foundation for the real bat- tery was commenced under the direction of Colonel Serrell, by placing two large platforms upon the surface of the marsh. Sheet piling was driven to surround the gun platform. When this founda- tion of piling had all been pressed down into place, surrounding what was to be the gun deck, a grillage of pine logs was bolted securely together, surrounding three sides of it. On this construction of eross-beams thirteen thousand sand bags, weighing over eight hundred tons, were placed, having been carried from the camp of the Vol- unteer Engineers across the trestle- work, and a parapet with epaule- ment was built upon it.
The streams and inlets of the vicinity were pieketed by armed boats, so that soldiers at work in the marsh should not be surprised. THE "SWAMP ANGEL." On the seventeenth day of August an eight-inch two-hundred- pounder Parrott riffe gun was successfully transported over the marsh and mounted in the battery. It is well to mention that this gun never was used in breaching the walls of Fort Sumter and the great three-hundred-pounder riffe gun which did such execution on that fort never fired into Charleston. When the gun had been mounted in the "Marsh Battery" it was immediately christened by the soldiers in the camp as the "Swamp Angel."
Although on the twenty-first of August General Gillmore sent to General Beauregard a demand for the immediate evacuation of Morris Island and Fort Sumter, no attention was paid to the notice. Upon the night of August 21st General Gillmore ordered Lieutenant Charles Sellmer, Eleventh Maine Volunteers, to take a detachment of his command to the battery and sight the gun just to the left of the steeple of St. Michael's Church, in Charleston. Colonel Serrell, assisted by Lieutenant
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THE CITY OF TRENTON.
Nathan M. Edwards, had in the afternoon laid the line of fire. They were kept in the battery for over three hours under a tremendous fire from the enemy, while putting in range stakes to fire by in the night, as no part of the city could then be seen. The gun was given an elevation of 31° 30'.
At half-past one on the morning of August 22d, the first shell with percussion fuse was fired from the "Swamp Angel." The noise made by bells and whistles in the middle of the night told the Union soldiers that the shell had fallen into the city. Sixteen shells were fired that early morning hour.
General Beauregard wrote General Gillmore, on the morning of August 22d, saying : "Your firing a number of the most destructive missiles ever used in war into the midst of a city taken unawares and filled with sleeping women and children will give you a bad eminence in history." The General replied, and on August 23d twenty more shells filled with the "Greek Fire" were fired from the gun in the marsh. Six of these shells exploded in the gun, doubtless shortening the life of the piece to some extent. On the thirty-sixth discharge of the "Swamp Angel" the brecch of the gun just behind the vent blew out of its jacket, and the gun was thrown forward on the parapet. The gun, as it appeared on the parapet, seemed to the Confederates as if in position for firing, and a large amount of ammunition was expended upon it while they were in ignorance of its having burst. No other guns were mounted in the marsh battery until September 7th, when Fort Wagner surrendered to the Union troops. Then two ten-inch seacoast mortars were placed there to draw off the fire of the batteries on James Island.
The "Swamp Angel" was purchased after the war with some condemned metal and sent to Trenton to be melted, but having been identified was set up on a granite monument in that city on the corner of Perry and Clinton streets. "The gun was cast at the West Point Foundry in 1863, and was of a class numbered 6. It had upon its muzzle, W. P. F., No. 6, 1863, not 16,577 A. M. The regulation weight for such guns was 16,500 pounds, but the exact weight accompanied cach gun. The A. M. means Alfred Mordecai, the inspector. The foundry number of the gun was 585."
Colonel Serrell says that the distinctive features of the marsh battery as a work of engineering were "that the gun platform was placed upon a gun deck resting upon vertical sheet piling, outside and around which there was a grillage of logs. If the gun and the other weights upon the gun deck were heavy enough to tend to sink within the mud, the weight upon the grillage in the form of sand in bags which formed the parapet and epaulement of the battery by being increased counter-poised the gun deck. It was simply a
MCCLELLAN MONUMENT.
force meeting another force of a like amount in an opposite direction. The standard English magazine "Engineering" speaks of the con- struction of this battery in its review of the operations of the Federal and Confederate armies at the close of the war as one of the most import- ant engineer works done by either army.
No one object in Trenton, save the Battle Monument, has been more conspicuous and more interesting to sight-seers than the "Swamp Angel." It is practically Trenton's only sou- venir of the war between the States.
THE MCCLELLAN MONUMENT.
In Riverview Cemetery, standing as a per- petual memorial of Jersey's hero, General George B. McClellan, is erected a granite shaft, forty-six feet high, surmounted by an cagle with partially-spread wings. The idea of thus honoring him whom the soldiery of America yeleped " Little Mac," originated with the Hon.
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Henry C. Kelsey, Secretary of State, who, after years of toil, saw the completion of this work of art. This was in the year 1889. Associated with Mr. Kelsey in this movement were Adjutant-General William S. Stryker, ex-Comptroller Edward J. Anderson, ex-Mayor Garret D. W. Vroom and General Richard A. Donnelly. The following device appears upon the four sides of the base of the shaft : "George Brinton Mcclellan, Born in Pennsylvania, December 3, 1826 ; Died in New Jersey, October 29, 1885; Organizer and Commander of the Army of the Potomac and Commanding General of the Armies of the United States ; Governor of New Jersey, 1878- 1881 ; Erected as a Tribute of Respect and Affection by Personal Friends."
The column, which is fluted for one-half its altitude, is thirty-four inches in diameter. Half way between the fluting and the top is a band of oak leaves and acorns. On the four sides of the capstone of the die, at the base, are fitting ornaments denoting the military rank of the idolized son of New Jersey. The total weight of the monument is seventy-three tons, and cost $8, 000.
The subscriptions to this monument were entirely of a voluntary character, and would have reached $10,000 had not Mr. Kelsey given notice that so much money was not required.
THE WASHINGTON MONUMENT AT CADWALADER PARK.
To the west of Cadwalader Park, overlooking the bluff, is the Italian marble statue of George Washington crossing the Delaware. The statue is fourteen feet in height, which, with its pedestal, gives it a total elevation of twenty-two feet, and weighs seven tons. The statue occupied a promi- nent place in the Centennial Exposition, in Philadelphia, and soon after Cadwalader Park was opened, Common Council of Trenton purchased it. This was with the idea that the statue would be erected in the park. No action was taken until the month of January, 1892, when the various councils of the Junior Order of American Mechanics decided to push the matter.
Consequently a committee of three was appointed by each Council, and a permanent organization formed by the election of the following : President, Charles H. Clayton, of Mereer Council, No. 50; Vice President, George W. MeFarland, of Enterprise Council, No. 6; Secretary, James E. Glenn, of Nathan Hale Council, No. 89 ; Assistant Secretary, Elmer Johns, of Commodore Perry Council, No. 80 ; Financial Secretary, William J. Anderson, of Century Council, No. 100 ; Treasurer, Charles Slee, of Trenton Council, No. 90. The remaining members of the committee are William H. Abbott, William T. Blackford, of No. 6; Andrew Bailey, J. Harry Wolf, of No. 50; Harry Naylor, Mahlon Funk, of No. 80 ; Charles Severns, Edwin P. Wyckoff, of No. 89 ; T. H. Herron, Howard Knight, of No. 90 ; William B. Gibson, Jasper Scott, of No. 100. This committee appeared before the Park Committee of Common Council and asked permission to complete the plan as originally intended. The joint committee secured the District Court rooms in the City Hall, meetings were held, subserip- tions obtained, entertainments given and later a dedication of the statue was the result.
THE VOLUNTEER FIREMEN'S MONUMENT.
In commemoration of the services of the City Volunteer Fire Department, the citizens of Trenton, in the summer of 1892, erected a metal statue upon a handsome base, which stands oppo- site the Broad street entrance of the City Hall. Upon the base is inseribed :
"Trenton Volunteer Fire Department. Organized Feb'y 7, 1747. Disbanded April 4th, 1892." "Erected by the Citizens of Trenton to commemorate the Service of Volunteer Fire Department."
The figure of a fireman, heroic size, in regulation costume, with lantern in hand, bears in his arms the form of a rescued child. A drinking fountain is a portion of the base of this monument.
CHAPTER XX.
THE BEGINNINGS OF THE BRICK AND POTTERY INDUSTRY.
TATHAM'S ESTABLISHMENT, 1685-THE MCCULLYS AND THEIR WORKS-THE EARLY DAYS OF THE INTERESTS WHICH TO-DAY EXIST-BRICKS AND THE MAKING THEREOF-THOSE WHO WERE EARLY INTERESTED.
HE ESTABLISHMENT of the pottery industry at Trenton dates from the earliest settlements in the liberties, precinct; and jurisdiction of Burlington, in West Jersey. To Dr. Daniel Coxe, of London, Proprietor in the Western Division, is to be given the credit of being one of the first to make white ware in the Colonies. Through John Tatham, his agent, whose residence in Burlington city was noteworthy in colonial times, Dr. Coxe, sometime between 1680 and 1685, erected a pottery at Burlington city or in its neighborhood. Although the exact location of this enterprise is unknown, it was probably in the vicinity of an adjacent clay bed, such as is found between Florence and Bordentown. The care and research of Mr. John McCormick, of the Trenton "Potters' Journal," and the patient investigations of Edwin Atlee Barber, of West Chester, Pa., in "The Pottery and Porcelain of the United States," have even yet left this question undecided. In the Bodleian Library, at Oxford, are the Rawlinson manuscripts (c. 128, fol. 39, b.), from which is the following transcription ( Barber, Pottery and Porcelain, &c.) relating to this Coxe pottery. The Proprietor writes : "I have erected a pottery att Burlington for white and chiney ware, a greate quantity to ye value of 1200 li have already been made and vended in ye Country, neighbour Colonies and ye Islands of Barbadoes and Jamaica where they are in great request. I have two houses and kills and all necessary implements, diverse workemen and other servants. Have expended thereon about 2000 li." This was in 1688 or within a year or two thereof. Dr. Coxe soon decided to dispose of his interests in New Jersey, and the "Proposalls" of his sale cited the above facts and the additional information that the "diverse servants * have made a greate progresse in a Pottery of White and China ware." Assurances were made that if the pottery be "well managed will probably bee very Advantageous to ye undertakers." The "pottery house," on the fourth of March, 1691, passed under the control of the " West Jersey Society," a London association of forty-eight persons, who bought nearly all the Coxe interest in the Jerseys. It is probable that little was done with the pottery after this date. In 1686 Dr. Plot published the "Natural History of Staffordshire," wherein, describing Burslem and its manufac- tures, gives a list of clays, which leads to the presumption by Mr. Atlee that the "chiney " of Burlington pottery was either a cream-colored or white stoneware. It is not known that a single specimen of this Coxe pottery product is extant, and no records have come down to us of any marks by which it could be recognized. The quaint " Historical Description of the Province and Country of West New Jersey," printed at London, 1698, by Gabriel Thomas, makes no mention of the pottery, although he describes minutely the "Great and Stately Palace of John Tutcham Esq," Coxe's agent, cataloguing " Roses Tulips July-Flowers, Sun Flowers and Carnations" in the "very fine and delightful Garden and Orchard adjoining to it." If the pottery then existed Thomas would certainly have alluded to it, with his love of detail. However, in his description of Pennsylvania, the historian says : " Potters have Sixteen Pence for an Earthen Pot which may be bought in Eng- land for Four Penee." In Virginia and New York the pottery industry was embryotie, yet hopeful
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THE CITY OF TRENTON.
for investors, and it is not at all improbable that journeymen potters, other than Coxe's "servants," had reached the Delaware Valley. Brick works had already become one of the industries of the city of Philadelphia.
It is of interest to note in passing that during a session of the Legislature of West Jersey, second to fifteenth of May, 1683, there was passed an act (Chapter V., p. 459, Leaming and Spicer's "Grants and Concessions" ) providing that bricks within the Province should be made in iron-shod moulds, 22 inches in thickness, 4% in breadth and 93 inches in length, "well and merchantably burned." Two persons were to be appointed by the court to view bricks. Fines were to be imposed upon brickmakers for violating this act. This shows quite conclusively that brick-making was a recognized industry in West Jersey. This, unfortunately, is the only reference to the pottery industry in the colonial statute-books of West Jersey or New Jersey. Among the few circumstances preserved concerning the Coxe pottery, the "Court Book," in manuscript, is of value. At a session held in Burlington city, 12th month, 20th to 22d days, 1685, a suit was brought concerning which the original entry is quoted verbatim. It demonstrates several interesting facts, among which are that the pottery was in operation as early as 1685 ; that an Edward Randall was a manager, and gives the testimony of two witnesses in relation to this matter.
" James Budd, plaint.
" Edw. Randall, deft.
"Acc' on debt.
"The Jury-Robert Stacy, Jonathan Wood, John Bunting, John Horner, Bernard Devinish, Win. Evans, Rob. Styles, John Boarton, Nathaniel West, John Browne, Richard Heritage, John Hollingshead.
"The deed or Indenture of agreem't betweene Plain't & def't Read & proved, & also ye bond of Two Hundred pounds from ye def't to ye Plain't for p'rformanee, also read & proved.
PHOTO ENG. CO.N.Y.
THE ART OF THE POTTER.
"Mary Budd Attested sayth that shee being at Lon- don before ye Def't came away shee was told by an honest woman there who had some concerne amongst ye Potters at London that she feared ye Pott works here would come to nothing, for that the said def't Randall & ye other p'sons who were to come to manage ye same works had not skill to D'fect it.
" Wm. Winn Attested sayth that hee can finde noe Clay in the Countrey that will make white ware ; And further sayth that Edward Randall, the deft, is as good a workman as James Budd ye plaint ean finde in England.
"The Jury bring in this determination (vizt. ) wee can give noe fynall determination of ye inatter until materialls requisite shall come from England to prove ye skill of ye deft.
"Whereupon the Bench order that the said Edward Randall minde ye Concerne of the said James Budd until fitt materialls be sent for from such place in England as ye said Edward Randall shall appoint."
Mr. John McCormick, of this eity, who has devoted much attention to the history of the ceramic art in America, had the good fortune to interview the late John Stiles McCully, and as a result the recollections of one of Trenton's earliest workers in elay were published in the "Potters' Journal." Mr. McCully, who was born in 1799, gave it as his opinion that a brother-in-law of his
-
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THE CITY OF TRENTON.
uncle rented a part of the Cowell estate, where Petty's run crosses Pennington avenue, and there, in 1783, established the first pottery in Trenton. The year previous, Mr. McCully's father, who was of the McCullys of Newry, Ireland, the family emigrating to America about 1735, had come to Trenton from Mount Holly, where they had settled. The Pennington avenue establishment was subsequently abandoned, and another pottery was erected in the rear of the old Lamb tavern, at the head of Warren street, or on the south side of Monument Park. The builder was Joseph McCully, uncle of John, and the date of construction was 1784. Afterward the elder McCully moved to Lawrence and worked in the small Hunt pottery on the Bainbridge plantation.
It was in 1799 that a pottery was located permanently in the capital. Upon the site of Bishop MeFaul's residence, on Warren street, the elder McCully built the works, and had for his partner Thomas Miner, an ancestor of Counselor Edward W. Evans. Bank street was opened in 1815, and the pottery was moved to where the Parochial School now stands. Here the McCullys carried on the business until 1868, when the late Father Anthony Smith bought the establishment that the Cathedral might be erected. On Humboldt street lived John Davis, Jr., son of an old soldier, who resided in the "yellow house" on Warren street. By a window sash struck with bullets in the battle of Trenton, the elder Davis had a sign, "Dye to live and live to dye." John Davis, Sr., deserted from the British army, and served under Jackson at New Orleans and in Florida. The younger Davis told some interesting reminiscences of early potting in this the Staffordshire of America.
"It must be remembered," said he, "that carly clay-working in this city was extremely primitive, and that the ware produced was of the rudest type. My father, who had a companion, whose name I think was Samuel Calhoun, both potters, used only the Oriental methods, as one reads of in the Bible. Manual labor was the standard, and the red earthenware pie-plates were run on a foot-power wheel, no moulds being as yet employed. Flower-pots were also made. The glazing, when used, was done by salt, and the ware baked by wood. There was no standard price- list, and wages were for piece-work, a dozen glazed pie-plates bringing the employe a shilling, if large, and sixpence if small. In this connection it must be remembered that white glazed-ware of home manufacture was quite unknown, and it was not until immediately before the Rebellion that Trenton potters paid any attention to a higher class of goods."
Trenton was a natural pottery center if the manufacture of pottery consists of making the coarsest class of ware, such as was first made. Abundant common clay is in the vicinity. Such was the case at the McCully pottery. The evolution to the present was very gradual. One of the links that join the present industry to the past was the old City Pottery, located on Perry street, between Canal and Carroll. Until 1856, this establishment was occupied as a porcelain door knob works. In 1859 was commenced for the first time the manufacture of white earthenware, white granite and cream-colored ware.
The Glasgow Pottery, now owned by the Moses family, was started in 1859 as a yellow ware manufactory, whilst as early as 1852 James Taylor and Henry Speeler established the first yellow Rockingham pottery ever built in this city.
Theophile Frey, of Zuric, Switzerland, was the first to introduce the art of decorating with gold and colors in Trenton. He was also the first person who introduced decorating C. C. and granite in this country. Hc first settled in Bennington, Vermont, and in 1859 came to Trenton.
At that time the only potteries here were those of William Young, Speeler & Taylor and Rhodes & Yates, at the latter of which he introduced the art. He continued in the business until about 1865, when he relinquished it.
In recent years, Trenton has amazingly developed her pottery resources, until to-day no less than thirty potteries stand to her credit.
The brick clays, which form much of the banks of the Jersey shore of the lower Delaware Valley, carly attracted the attention of the settlers. It is thought by some that the Swedes and Dutch, before the English conquest of 1664, made crude bricks in the vicinity of Burlington. During the colonial and Revolutionary periods, tradition has it that sporadic attempts were made leading toward brick manufacture. These bricks were sun-dried. Philadelphia, which was early a briek manufacturing center, supplied that necessary article for Trenton's colonial mansions. The Pearson yard, at Attleboro, Bucks county, was a source of supply for this city, particularly during the early part of the present century.
R
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THE CITY OF TRENTON.
Bricks were manufactured by one Emly, who came here from one of the Eastern States about the year 1817. He continued the business several years. About the same time Mr. John Smith manufactured a few bricks each year about six miles north of Trenton, on the Princeton pike. In the year 1824, Morgan Beakes commenced the manufacture of bricks in connection with farming. Beakes continued to manufacture about three hundred thousand bricks per year until about 1842 or 18.13, when he was succeeded by Samuel Mulford, who made about fifteen hundred thousand per year for one or two years, when he failed in business. Beakes again took the yard, for about a year, when Peter Grim and George Kulp took it and carried on the business one year. It again fell into the hands of Beakes. Peter and Daniel Fell then took the yard and carried it on for about six or seven years, making each year about eighteen hundred thousand bricks.
Peter Grim and Joseph Hymer came to Trenton from Philadelphia the year the prison was built, and took the contract for furnishing two million bricks for the building of the State Prison, and commenced to manufacture them on what is known as the Hayden farm. They continued the business there until 1837. The partnership was dissolved by the death of Hymer. Peter Grim then bought the lot at the intersection of Calhoun and Pennington streets, and manufactured bricks there until about the year 1844 or 1845, when Grim & Kulp carried on the business on the Beakes place, and, at the expiration of one year, they dissolved, and Peter Grim commenced the manu- facture of them on what is now known as Wainwright's nursery. He continued there until he concluded that the business was unprofitable. The manufactory then came into the possession of Henry Nice and William King. All of these men, with the exception of Samuel Mulford and Morgan Beakes, were practical brickmakers.
From such a beginning as this, the present brick manufacturing industry has arisen. The honors Trenton has won, not only for the quantity, but for the quality of her bricks, have been well merited, and the conditions of the present bespeak a prosperous future.
CHAPTER XXI.
A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE CITY'S TRANSPORTATION FACILITIES.
How TRENTONIANS TRAVELED BEFORE THE REVOLUTION-THE SHALLOPS AND STAGES BEFORE THE DAYS OF RAILROADS AND THOSE WHO CONDUCTED THEM-THE DELAWARE AND RARITAN CANAL-THE CAMDEN AND AMBOY COMPANY-THE RAILROADS WHICH FORM THE PENNSYL- VANIA SYSTEM-THE PHILADELPHIA AND READING RAILROAD-THE FORMER HORSE RAILWAY AND THE PRESENT ELECTRIC RAILROAD.
RENTON, lying at the head of tide-water upon the Delaware river, and upon the great road between Philadelphia and New York, has from its incipiency been a town conspicuous as a receiving and distributing center. In its colonial river navigation Trenton was accessible for all the smaller craft such as yachts, shallops, sloops and schooners, and even more pretentious vessels of one hundred and fifty to two hundred tons burthen came to Lamberton wharves. Through the Falls the Durham boats ran speedily down the river. The deforesting of the hillsides of the upper headwaters of the Delaware had not then been contemplated and in consequence a greater volume of water and much less detritus passed the city. The channel at Perriwig was more open, making the town freer of access.
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