History of Union and Middlesex Counties, New Jersey with Biographical Sketches of many of their Pioneers and Prominent Men, Part 13

Author: W. Woodford Clayton, Ed.
Publication date: 1882
Publisher: Philadelphia: Everts
Number of Pages: 1224

USA > New Jersey > Middlesex County > History of Union and Middlesex Counties, New Jersey with Biographical Sketches of many of their Pioneers and Prominent Men > Part 13
USA > New Jersey > Union County > History of Union and Middlesex Counties, New Jersey with Biographical Sketches of many of their Pioneers and Prominent Men > Part 13

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Thus if the Associates did not take out patents for their lands from Carteret within one year their estates were to be confiscated and sold, with the tenements thereon, to purchasers from the Governor and Coun- cil. The town held a meeting on March 11, 1675, and voted the following :

"We, the inhabitants of Elizabeth Town, are willing to pay the Lord Proprietor the suoi of Twenty Pound« per annum, current pay of this country, in consideration of a Townshipeight miles square, to be divided according to our Agreement of first, second, and third lote, to be con- firmed by Charter to us and our heirs forever, with all such privileges as any other towns in the Province have or shall have; which we do apprehend may be sufficient, in regard of the badness of the soil, which has deceived ns all, and the half or more being Imt waste land. This was voted by all present on the Ilth of March, 1675. V. ted, Isaac Whitehead and George Ross to present the writing to the Governor and his Council.

" ISAAC WHITEHEAD, Clerk."

The Governor and Council, determined not to abate a jot of their exactions, returned the following answer, indorsed upon the back of the petition March 15th :

" There cannot be granted eny variation or alteration from the Proc- lamation dated 11th December, 1674; but, accordingly, the Surveyor is required to attend at the time eppointed, and it's expected that suitable persons be provided for his assistance, according to the said Proclama- tion.

"By order of the Governor nad Council,

"JAMES BOLLEN, Secretary."1

" Finding no prospect of securing their rights, with no means of redress at hand, and threatened by their imperious rulers with a confiscation of their lands and

improvements," one after another of the embarrassed planters applied for surveys, and warrants were given them by the Governor. We give below a list of those who had surveys made to them, with the dates and number of acres surveyed to each, as found upon the records :

ACT(s. 180

May

3. : Robert Vnuquellin and wife.

300

June 30, .. Charles Tucker

= Joseph Bond

= Jacob Melling.

Sept.

12, Robert White, wife, and daughter.

Oct.

Leonard Headley and wife .....

John Parker.

= 22, Nicholas ( arter .....

23. William Pardon and wife

Nov. 5. John Windruff, wife, and three servante.

Jan. 21, 1676, Luke Watson.

March &, = Henry Lyon, rights and purchase. Williamı Lette ..

14,

Charles Tucker (a 2d warrant).

Benjamin Parkıs ..

= Heury Norris, self, and Jubn Wilson, Carpent,

120

€4 W'm. Pardon, right of Wm. Meaker ...

120

Capt. Thomas Young.

.. Capt. John Baker, wife, and 8 others ....

Sir George and Philip t'aiteret, and 18 servants ..

2700 150 480

= Deonis White ..

20,

R chard Beach ...

Robert Moss and wife.

= William Cramer ...

Nathaniel Tutth II

180 120

27, George Ross and wife ..

Bumphry Spinings

1>0 90 120

George Morris ...

Roger Lambert ...

Stephon Crane ..

William Hill

28, William Johnson.

John Little, right of self and Stephen Salsbury

George Pack

Willianı Olliver.

Samuel Marsh, Seur ..

= Samuel Marsh, Junr.

Juhu Pope. ..

John Carter

David Olliver.

= April 8 William Pill+

Benjamin Price, Seur.

Benjamin Price, Jr.

10, 16

Stephen Oshorne ...

Nathaniel Bonnel.

14.

Thomas Moore.

Jeffery Jones.

27, Davul Ogduını ...

May 2, Hur Tomjsou.

9. Jeremiah Peck

Juseph Fraize ..

= John Winons.

Barnaby Wines ..

Richard Michell

Math. Hetfield

Joseph Osborne .. Moses Tompson.

Joseph Meaker.

June 12

Benjamin Menker

150

Isanc Whitehead, Jr.

120

Jonathan Ogdon . .

1:20

Sept. 12,

Aaron Tamsos, right of his father, Thontas.

120

Sept.

John Lambird

100 90

Nov.

23, 4 John Simkins.

80 00

Feb.

1, 1677, Margaret Baker, right of Peter Wolverson

200

July

11, James Hayney and wife,

120

Oct. 26, 1678, Mrs Hanna Hopkins, wife of Samuel Hopkins ..

120

4 29, " Joha Ogden, Sr.

300

These surveys were made under the Governor's warrant, without any intention ou the part of the Associates of abandoning the rightfulness of their title under the Nicolls patent. This act, however, as well

120 60 240 180 120 80 180 100 100 60 60 320 270 90 1×0 180 180 300 180 180

= 25

Joseph Seare ...

Jonas Wood

120 I20 1-0. 120 120 240 120

" 31, “

120 150 180 120 120 144

14, Benjamin Waide

12, 1676, Aaron Tomson, right of self.

Oct

27, Joseph Ogdan ...

Dec.

27,

Sammel Trotter, right of his father, Wml.

360 160 300 180 120 90 360 200 450 400 360 180 180 ING 210

Isaac Whitehead, setr ...

Samuel Moore, right of John Wilson, the Less.

180 90 240 1200

Philip Carteret, right of Abraham Shotwell.

Peter Widversan .....

Benjamin Wade

Peter Moss and wife ..

120 07-L 90 180 180 90

Daniel De Haert, right of Richard Painter.

140

= = Robert Bond.

Juhn Ogden, Jr ..

30,

11.

1 Elizabeth Town Bill, pp. 42, 43.

April 8, 1675, Synion Rows ...

TITLE TO LANDS.

as the petition for the purchase of a township, was so construed by the opposition. We find it asserted that " the Associates, in the year 1675, or soon after, laid aside a pretension by Indian purchase and Nicolls' grant, and continued peaceable and quiet inhabitants until the death of Carteret and until the year 1699, except that in the year 1684 John Baker and some others of the Associates endeavored to impose upon Governor Laurie at his first arrival in the country." This, so far from being true, as Dr. Hatfield has shown, was a matter of as strenuous controversy under the Quaker rule as it had been previously. Barclay said, in 1684, " And we do hereby declare that we will not enter into any treaty on this side with those people who 'claim by Colonel Nicolls Patent,' nor with any others that challenge land by patents from the late Governor Carteret." . . . At this date the same claims were put forth by the town as had been in former days. "The old planters," says Dr. Hatfield, " never wavered in their conviction of the lawfulness and equity of their title, and never shrank from avowing and maintaining it. A second generation were now coming forward, in whom the conviction had 'grown with their growth and strength- ened with their strength.' If possible, they were even more resolute than their fathers."

It is said that Governor Laurie, so far from troubling the settlers about their Indian title on his coming into the country, " he asked old Isaac White- head and Capt. John Baker (divers others of the principal men of Elizabeth Town being present) how they held their lands, who answered him by Nicholl's grant and an Indian Purchase ;" and that then he asked them to show him the bounds of their lands so purchased and granted, " saying he had a Mind to make a Purchase of some Lands Lying Westward of their Purchase." It is further said that Stephen Os- born was sent by the town to call the Indian saga- mores together to mark out the bounds, with whom Laurie and others had a conference at the house of Capt. John Baker; also that a few days afterwards Richard Clarke, Jr., Capt. John Baker, Jonas Wood, Stephen Osborn, Joseph Meeker, and Joseph Wilson, with two lads, Richard Baker and John Cromwell (who went to see the woods), set out with the Indian Wewanapo (cousin of one of the sagamores that sold the land originally) to mark the western bounds of the town.

Instructed by the old Indian chief, they went, “ on or about the 16th day of July, 1684, to a plain back of Piscataway, to a marked tree with some stones about it, and a stake by the tree," and thence "for- ward towards the Green River, near where it comes out of the mountain, and lodged by the river-side that night; and the next day they made a circle or com- pass along the foot of the mountain, by the directions of the Indian, till they came to the Minisink path, and then came down to Elizabeth Town." It was affirmed, however, that it was confessed by the Indian

chief that this compass included only a part of the town lands.

In this conference it is said that " Capt. Baker was the Dutch interpreter, and an Indian interpreted the Indian language into Dutch to said Capt. Baker, who again interpreted into English." It is also said that an Indian who had been at sea and knew the use of the compass was of the exploring party.

This transaction, however, became the source of a serious litigation. Baker was charged with having prevailed on the Indians to include a much larger tract within the bounds than the town had originally purchased, and so with having contravened the act of February, 1683, forbidding private purchases from the Indians; on which charge he was indicted, Aug. 12, 1684, and on the 28th was tried, found guilty, fined ten pounds, and bound to good behavior for a year.

Laurie is also said to have bought, Oct. 30, 1684, of the Indians Seweckroneck, Mindowaskein, Canun- dus, and Wewonapee, a large tract about Green Brook and the Blue Hills, supposed to be to the west of the Elizabeth Town purchase, on which several of the most considerable Scotch immigrants presently were located with their imported Presbyterian servants of humbler condition. This purchase served greatly to complicate in after-days the question of land titles, a portion of the territory thus acquired, if not the whole of it, lying within what were subsequently claimed as the bounds of the original purchase of 1664, and therefore distributed by allotment to the Associates, their heirs or assigns.1

First Litigation of the Land Controversy .- During the long controversy respecting the land titles of the town no regular judicial investigation of the points at issue had been undertaken until 1695. Hamilton having been reinstated in the pro- prietary government had returned 'from England, and the affairs of the province having been settled in favor of the proprietors, they determined to bring the matter in dispute between them and the Associ- ates into the courts, confident that, as the courts were chiefly under their control and the judges and juries mainly their partisans, the case would be decided in their favor, and the planters be compelled to pay the arrearages of quit-rents from 1670 or be dispossessed of their plantations with all the improvements made upon them.

The Fullerton brothers-Thomas, Robert, and James-came to the province in 1684, and settled on Cedar Brook on the plot bought by Governor Laurie of the Indians, but previously claimed by the Elizabeth Town people under the Nicolls grant. Jeffry Jones, one of the Associates, had by conveyance from Lau- rie come into possession of land there on which James Fullerton had settled, " upon which the said Jeffry Jones did enter and oust him." This was in 1693.

1 E. T. Bill, pp. 54-57, 113-16.

HISTORY OF UNION AND MIDDLESEX COUNTIES, NEW JERSEY.

Fullerton, in September of that year, brought an action of trespass and ejectment against Jones, and issue was joined. The case came to trial in the Court of Common Pleas at Perth Amboy in May, 1695. The whole merits of the case were brought out before the judges and jury on both sides. The events were then recent, the documentary evidence was ample and well preserved, the first Elizabeth Town Book was in the hands of Samuel Whitehead, the town clerk, and was perfectly accessible, so that the facts were fully before the court or within their reach.

A special verdict was agreed upon, but the jury gave a general verdict for Jones. The court, how- ever, pronounced judgment, May 14th, on the special verdict against Jones, who thereupon appealed the case to the King in Council. In the court at Ken- sington both parties again were fully heard, William Nicoll, Esq., being attorney for Jones. The Commit tee of the Privy Council-Lord Chief Justice Holt, Sir Philip Williamson, and Sir Henry Goodrich-offered their opinion to his Majesty in Council that the judg- ment be reversed ; and his Majesty in Council, Feb. 25, 1697, reversed and repealed the said judgment, and also declared all issues thereupon null and void. Nicoll afterwards declared on oath that in the Council

"The sole dispute was, Whether Col. Richard Nicholls, as Governor under the King of England in those parte, might not grant License to any of the Subjects of England to purchase Lands from the native Pa- gaus? and if, upon such License and Purchase, the English Subjecte should gain a Property in the Lands so bought? all which was resolved In the Affirmative, and the Judgment given to the Contrary accordingly reversed."

William Nicoll was an eminent lawyer of New York. Shortly after this trial he obtained a third- lot right in Elizabeth Town, but never resided there. As the Associates made common cause with Jones in defense of his title, it is thought that this right was given to Nicoll for his services in defending the suit.

The period immediately subsequent to the decision of the Jones case in 1695 was one of much contusion and excitement. Great indignation of course was manifested by the town party against the proprietors and their anomalous government. Restive as they had been under it from the first, they could no longer restrain the expression of their dissatisfaction. The reversal by the king and his Council in 1697 of the adverse judgment of 1695, confirming as it did un- questionably the validity of their titles, emboldened them still more in their opposition to proprietary rule and in the determination to be rid of it and come under the immediate government of the king, whom they had learned to trust.

The surrender of the right of jurisdiction to the crown on the part of the proprietors in 1702 made no change in respect to the contest growing out of the conflicting titles to lands in the Elizabeth Town grant. No suit at law involving the issue between the proprietors and the Associates occurred for at

least twelve years. In the first year of George I. a series of prosecutions was commenced by the propri- etary interest to test once more the validity of the Nicolls grant, subjecting for a long term of years the Associate settlers to vexatious annoyances, great dis- quietude, and no small expense. We will mention one of these cases, as it has a special bearing on the interests of the whole town and the settlements now composing Union County.

James Emott had obtained in 1686 of the pro- prietors a patent for three hundred acres of land on the west side of Rahway River, and claimed by the Associates as part of their lands in common. In the division of 1699-1700 lot No. 148, containing one hundred acres, surveyed to John Harriman, Jr., and the town committee, was assigned to Joseph Wood- ruff. In 1714 it came into the hands of Rev. Edward Vaughan, rector of St. John's Church, by his mar- riage with Mary Lawrence, the step-daughter first of Governor Carteret, and then of Col. Townley. At the November term of the Supreme Court of New Jersey, Mr. Vaughan brought an action of ejectment against Joseph Woodruff. The cause came to trial in May, 1716, the judges being, as was alleged, in the proprietary interest. A special verdict was found, and for several terms the case was argued at length on both sides, resulting in May, 1718, in a judgment by the court in favor of Vaughan. Thereupon, by writ of error, Woodruff carried the case before the Governor and Council. But the Governor and Council would never be prevailed upon to render a judgment, and after ten or twelve years of great expense the case was dropped without being decided.1

About the time of this judgment and appeal, the old town books, in which the proceedings of the various town-meetings from the beginning of the set- tlement for more than fifty years, and the various surveys ordered by vote of the town, had been regu- larly recorded, to the irreparable loss of the town . history, disappeared, and have never since been re- covered. The earliest statement of the loss is found in the initial entry of Town Book B. (which happily has been preserved), under date of Aug. 2, 1720, and which is as follows :

" Whereus, The Books of Record, Belonging To The sald Elizabeth Town, wherein The Important affairs of The same Towne were Re- corded from the beginning Thereof; have Been privately Taken Away from him unto whose Care and Custody They were Committed; And Are not Likely To be Again Obtained: It is now Therefore, By A free And unanimous Agreement of the freeholdre xforesd Concluded and Re- Sulved ; That This preseut Book Now Is And Shall Be Improved To be, A book of Records, for the use and behoof of the freeholders of Elizabeth Towu Atoresd, And for no Other use what ever."

In a document prepared with much care, and signed Nov. 18, 1729, by one hundred and eleven Associates, with their seals affixed, the story of the lost books is thus recited :

" But it so happened that the sd Books wherein the ad Surveys or the greater Number of them were Entered by Some One or more Designing

1 Elizabeth Town'Bill, pp. 46, 122. Also answer to do., p. 32.

TITLE TO LANDS.

Person or persone were Craftily and Malicionsly Stole and (as there is no Small reason to believe) were burnt or otherwise destroy', So that the benefit thereby intended to the parties afforesd and their Ax-igns breame Wholly ffrustrate and Void ; Yet nut so but the like Good Effort may be hoped for, from something of a Like Nature since the original Surveye attorend are as Yet Existing as appears Not Only by the Oath of the Officer who was Surveyor, but by divers Other concurring Cir- cunstances to the Satisfaction of the Parties afforesd."

The town made common cause with the defendants in these litigations, and appointed annually their committee of seven select men to act and do for them and in their name and behalf, by themselves or their learned counsel, whatever seemed meet and proper in all things touching the settlement of their rights and properties, as they claimed by force of grant and purchase under Governor Richard Nicolls.1 At the May term of the Supreme Court, 1731, actions of ejeetment were brought against John Robinson, Henry Clarke, Andrew Craig, Joshua Marsh, and others, occupants of a tract of land beld under the Nicolls grant west of the Rahway River. The cases came to trial at the May term, 1734, when a general verdict was found by a Middlesex jury for the de- fendants. This gave encouragement to the Associates, and many of them put themselves under bonds to the town committee or trustees to pay (not exceeding ten pounds proclamation money ) such sums as should be duly assessed upon them by the said trustees towards defraying the charges and expeuses of maintaining the title to their common lands. Not only this, but a large majority at a town-meeting convened on July 1, 1734, voted to empower the committee of seven to dispose of

" All that Tract of Land or any part or parcel Thereof Begining nt Collar Brook where Essex Line Croses the said Brook and from Thence Runtug west dix miles and from Thence the Nearest Corse to the monu- tuin from Thence as the wil mountain Runs to the hundred acres Luta formerly ourvead according to the Town order and agreement and from Thence to the first mentioned place to the said Cedar Brook. (Also) To Dispose of what money, shall arise from the Sale of The said Lands, or any part Thereof for the General Iutrust of the said Associates and free- holders. In Defending Them or any of Them In The possession of Their property or In dispossessing any That shall unjustly Intrude upon any part of the aforesaid purchase and Grant."2

In 1741 a tract of three hundred acres of upland lying near Ash Swamp was voted to defray the ex- penses of a suit between William Penn, Thomas Penn, and others vs. Chambers and Alcorn, tried at Amboy, Aug. 14-16, 1741, wherein a verdict was rendered for the plaintiffs, on the ground that the lands in question were not included in the Elizabeth Town purchase. The case of Cooper vs. Moss came to trial in August, 1742, resulting also in a verdict for the plaintiff, brought in by a Morris County jury. Other actions were brought of a similar character, some of which were compromised and withdrawn, others went to trial with like results. To enumerate them all would re- quire more space than we have at command.

A petition signed by three hundred and four pro- prietors, freeholders, and inhabitants of a tract of land called Elizabeth Town, setting forth their rights

under the Nicolls grant, and the difficulties of ob- taining impartial justice in the local and provincial courts, was prepared and forwarded to his Most Ex- cellent Majesty George Il. in 1744, probably by Messrs. Stephen Crane and Matthias Halfield, the committee chosen, which petition was read in coun- eil July 19, 1744, referred to the Lords of the Com- mittee of Council for Plantation Affairs, and by them, August 21st, to the Lords Commissioners for Trade and Plantations. It is not known what final disposition was made of it.

Meantime excitement ran to a high pitch. Parties began to eject proprietary tenants by force. In an affidavit made by Solomon Boyle, May 13, 1747, an account is given of the breaking into the house of Mr. Dalrymple and the expulsion of his wife and children, on the 8th of April, by persons armed with clubs. The affidavit is drawn out at great length, showing that the people of Turkey (New Providence), claiming by the Elizabeth Town right, had taken the law into their own hands, and were determined to drive off all other claimants. This is not so much to be wondered at when their enemies were so l're- quently gaining verdicts against them in the courts, and that in a mauner which seemed to them wholly unjust.

The Bill in Chancery .- For several years prior to the events mentioned above the proprietary party had been busily engaged in preparing, at great pains and expense, a complete and labored argument in defense of their long-litigated pretensions to the soil of the Elizabeth Town patent, based on the grant of the Duke of York to Sir George Carteret. Like most lawyers' documents, the bill had a special purpose to answer, and must, therefore, be taken with some allowance as to the accuracy of its history. It bears the following imposing title :

" A Bill in the Chancery of New Jersey, at the Suit of John Earl of Stair, und others, Proprietors of the Eastern-Division of New-Jersey ; Against Benjamin Bond, and some other Persons of Elizabeth Town, distinguished by the name of the ('linker Lot Right Men. With Three large Maps, done mrotu Copper-Plates. To which is added ; The Puldia- tions of the Council of Proprietors of East New-Jersey, and Mr. Nevill's Speeches to the General Assembly, concerning The Roots committed in New Jersey, and The Pretences of the Roters and their Seditcers. These Pupers will g ve a better Light into the History and Constitution of New-Jersey, than anything hitherto pub ished, the Matters whereuf have bron chiefly collected from Records. Published by Subscription. Printed by Jumee Parker, in New- York, 1647 ; and a few copies ure tu be sold by him and Benjamin Franklin, in Philadelphia ; Price bound, and Maps coloured, Turce Pounds; plain and stitcht only, Fitty Shillings, Prochuuution Muury."

This famous bill purports to have been filed April 13, 1745. The proprietors employed the best lawyers the country could furnish, viz. : James Alexander, previously surveyor-general of New Jersey, then at the head of the New York bar, and Joseph Murray, one of the first lawyers of the land." The bil! was undoubtedly prepared by the former. His familiarity with New Jersey records and with the transactions of the land-offices both of East and West Jersey

I Town Book, B, v. and i.

. 2 ]bid., B. 3.

HISTORY OF UNION AND MIDDLESEX COUNTIES, NEW JERSEY.

gave him great facilities for the work. It was written on about fifteen hundred folios. The printing was finished July 21, 1747, the form of the book being a folio, in double columns, with one hundred and twenty-four pages, besides the maps and an appendix of forty pages. So plausible is the plea that nearly all the historians of the State have relied almost im- plicitly on its statements, and in many cases have thus been led into error. It is a special and one-sided plea, and, as in all such cases, is to be received with caution, and its statements of facts are to be subjected to a rigid scrutiny.1

Answer to the Bill .- The preparation of an an- swer to this formidable bill was intrusted by the town committee to William Livingston and William Smith, Jr., as their counsel. Livingston was the pupil of Alexander, and if employed, as is likely, in 1750, was only in the twenty-seventh year of his age, but he had already acquired a high reputation at the bar in New York. The interest that he took in this case was probably one of the reasons that induced him a few years later to become a resident of Elizabeth Town. Smith was still younger, in his twenty-third year. Yct he was associated that same year, Novem- ber, 1750, with others in preparing the first digest of the colonial laws of New York. He wrote the his- tory of the province, and after the Revolution was made chief justice of Canada.

The answer was read in town-meeting, Aug. 27, 1751, and filed a few days afterwards. It was put in print the following year, 1752, in similar form with the bill itself (but contains only forty-eight pages), with the following title :

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History of Union and Middlesex Counties, New Jersey with Biographical Sketches of many of their Pioneers and Prominent Men, Part 13

Author: W. Woodford Clayton, Ed. Publication date: 1882 Publisher: Philadelphia: Everts Number of Pages: 1224

Author: W. Woodford Clayton, Ed.
Publication date: 1882
Publisher: Philadelphia: Everts
Number of Pages: 1224