USA > New Jersey > Warren County > History of Warren County, New Jersey > Part 6
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45
Most of the things we use now are made so far away that we never know the people who produce them, and each is produced by a specialist in his line. A hundred years ago we knew the history of every piece of cloth from the sheep or flax-field to the finished garment; of every piece of leather from the cow that furnished the hide to the top boots made by the village shoemaker; and of every piece of furniture from the tree in the forest to the finest specimen of work turned out by the local cabinet maker.
The steam engine made an important change in the development of Warren county towns. In the early days a water power was the most valuable asset that a community could have. Without it no im- portant industry could thrive, nor any considerable town develop. Water courses, too, were invaluable in the transportation of freight. With the advent of steam and cheap coal to produce it, sites with water power lost some of their prestige, and it was possible for industries to thrive and towns to develop at any place to which coal could be shipped. But water powers are coming into their own again, and as coal becomes progressively dearer, as it surely will, we shall have to look to our water powers for our future prosperity. They now lend themselves to present conditions because electricity produced by water power will dis- tribute its energy economically wherever it is needed, even miles away.
The carrying of heavy freight to and from Warren county was almost entirely by water before 1800. The necessities of travel on the Delaware early developed a special type of boat called, from its designer,
62
WARREN COUNTY.
the Durham boat. The first Durham boat was built by Robert Dur- ham, at Durham Furnace, about 1740. The boats were flat-bottomed, sharp at both ends, sixty-six feet long, six feet wide, three feet deep,. and of fifteen tons burden. The crew of six men propelled and steered them by oars or by poles. At their height there were several hundred of these boats on the river, employing over two thousand men. The opening of the Morris Canal in 1831 and of the Delaware canal in 1832, caused the Durham boats gradually to fall into disuse.
The Durham boat and its boat horn and song inspired Dr. John Watson to produce his "Ode to Spring," written in 1777 and published in Asher Miner's Correspondent in 1805. A part of it is given below :
" The jolly boatman down the ebbing stream, By the clear moonlight, plies his easy way, With prosp'rous fortune to inspire his theme, Sings a sweet farewell to the parting day.
" His rustic music measures even time, As in the crystal wave he dips his oar, And echo pleas'd, returns the tuneful chime, Mixed with soft murmurs from the listening shore."
Smith, in 1765, speaks of "the long flat boats," "some carrying 500 or 600 bushels of wheat." "These boats seldom come down but with freshets, especially from the Minisink; the freight thence to Phila- delphia is eight pence a bushel for wheat and three shillings a barrel for flour. From the forks and other places below, twenty shillings a ton for pig iron, seven pence a bushel for wheat, and six pence a barrel for flour." The Apollo, on March 8, 1825, said: "There are gen- erally three freshets a year, each of which continues from two to three weeks and sometimes three months; during which time the river is navigable for full loads; and in very high water a boat goes from Belvidere to Philadelphia in one day; during all the rest of the year part of a load can be taken, but it is not necessary ever to go with part
63
WARREN COUNTY.
of a load, as there is high water enough every year to take off three times as much produce as is raised in both Sussex and Warren."
Matthias Cummins told Rev. Mr. Young that before the railroad came here (in 1855) "we shipped our grain to Philadelphia by the Durham boats, which were made here in Delaware at the Hartung saw mill. The boats we tried to sell at Philadelphia, but if we could not we poled them back, getting them through foul rift by the help of rings in the rocks (which are still there). If the boats came back they brought sugar and molasses mainly. Our pigs, turkeys, chickens, etc., we took. overland to Newark or New York. Our first stop for the night was at Morristown. In the city we sold our produce and bought salt, molasses, sugar and the like for our return trip."
The advances in artificial illumination have been no less marked than those in mechanical locomotion. During the first hundred years or more of Warren County's history, the almost universal illuminant was the tallow dip. This was a tallow candle made by dipping a cotton wick a number of times into melted tallow until it was large enough to suit one's fancy. They usually measured about eight inches long by three-quarters of an inch in diameter. Sometimes, if candles were not forthcoming, the most primitive lamp was used, and this in Belvidere in the eighteen thirties! It consisted of a flat earthern dish containing lard, and reaching from this to the edge of the dish was a bit of twisted cotton cloth for a wick. This was lighted, and gave about as much light as a tallow dip. Connoisseurs will recognize in this the Eskimo lamp of today, which has to do duty also as a cook stove.
Something like the modern oil lamp was used here as early as 1825. It burned sperm oil, and had three round wicks that gave at least as much light as three candles burning at once. Later, a number of burning fluids, mostly highly explosive, were used in a lamp of the same style. One of these was camphene, which was replaced by kero-
64
WARREN COUNTY.
sene in the sixties. The kerosene of those days was often highly explosive.
Matches were invented within the memory of people now living. Before their advent every effort was made to keep a live coal in the fireplace at all times. If that fire went out my mother, for instance, had to go to the nearest neighbors, the Axfords, a quarter mile away to get a redhot piece of charcoal, which she brought back, covered with ashes, to start the fire again. Others would strike a spark with flint and steel with which to ignite a bit of punk and so start a fire. Mr. Samuel J. Hixson remembers gathering punk for this purpose, which was the dry rotten center of a hickory knot. This was always watched for in cutting up hickory, as it was highly prized. Others would use dry tow in place of punk, and yet others would use a flintlock gun with plenty of powder in the pan, whose flash would set fire to some tow.
The Indians used still another method of starting a fire. This was by the rapid revolution of a hard-wood stick, weighted down and resting on a piece of softer wood. The stick was often made to revolve by a bow string. The friction produced enough heat to fire some punk placed around the bottom of the revolving stick. This method is still in use among the Alaskan Indians.
A forerunner of the match was a fire kindler of wood somewhat larger than a match, tipped with sulphur. Many of them were on one piece of wood, the whole looking like a comb. They were ignited by touching the sulphur end to a live coal. The writer does not hear of ' the use of the Dobereiner self-lighting lamp or of the sun glass to produce fire in our county.
The great feature of all the diversions of a century ago was their utility. The community was dependent in its amusements, as in every- thing else, entirely on itself. It lost no opportunity, therefore, to gain entertainment from the commonest affairs of life, so that every gather- ing, for any purpose, was distinctly a social event.
One of these was a quilting party, at which the ladies worked all
.
65
WARREN COUNTY.
day quilting one of those matchless creations containing thousands of pieces, while the men appeared in time for supper, which was followed by a social evening.
A "Stone Frolic" gathered all the men of the neighborhood to pick- ing the loose stones from a new-ground while the ladies were preparing a feast for them at the house. A "Raising" socially was about the same thing, but the work consisted in raising the frame of a new building. Husking bees, plowing frolics, and the like were usually to aid some neighbor who, owing to sickness, was behind with his work. Apple cuts were a form of useful diversion at which apples were peeled, cored and quartered in preparation for drying on scaffolds erected for the purpose. After eleven o'clock the apple paring gave way to games, such as "Steal the partners," "Candid," "Top," in most of which kiss- ing entered somewhere, or to dancing to the music of a violin, which was the common musical instrument before 1850.
The first piano mentioned in the county was played by Mrs. Rober- deau, in the Shippen mansion, at Oxford, in 1804.
"The first lady who kept her carriage" in this part of New Jersey was Mrs. Benjamin Mccullough, of Greenwich Township.
The first organ the writer finds mentioned in Warren County was the one in the Moravian Church, at Hope, which General du Chastel- lux, of General La Fayette's staff, visited in 1778, and of which he says in his journal, it "resembles the Presbyterian meeting houses, with the difference that there is an organ and some religious pictures."
A hundred years ago everybody went barefoot from April until the snow flew in November. The men often made their feet stand the hard wear better by applying tar to their soles, and then stepping on sand. Elijah Lanning made shoes for the people in Buttzville. He would come and take the measure of all the family once a year, and make for each member one pair of shoes for the women, or of boots for the men.
One clock was the only time piece in a whole family, and a tin
66
WARREN COUNTY.
dinner horn summoned the men from the fields. Women rarely worked in the fields in the early days, as they had so many duties around the house to attend to.
Before broom corn came into use, about 1840, brooms were made of a hickory stick cut into splints.
Raising a Barrack Roof.
One new suit a year was all that could be obtained for each person of a family, and this was all made in the neighborhood. For instance, as late as 1847, Cornelius Carhart would take his wool to a Mr. Ross, at Buttzville, who carded it and made it into rolls. It was then spun by Sally Ann Shafer, at the Carhart home, after which it was taken to Effie Axford to be woven into blankets or linsey-woolsey for men's winter trousers, and the finest of it into cloth for the women's dresses, some of which was dyed blue, some left tow color, and some with the warp undyed and the woof dyed blue. Or he raised flax and. let it lie in the field until rotten, then broke it and hetcheled it. The fine flax was spun by Sally Ann Shafer into sewing thread, and the coarser tow into thread for trousers, the cloth for which was made just wide enough to allow a selvage at the bottom and top of the garment. The linen was dyed with indigo by dipping three times and laying in the sun for a day each time.
67
WARREN COUNTY.
The following advertisement appears in the Belvidere Apollo for October 23, 1827 :
OXFORD FULLING MILLS.
Fulling, dressing and dying of cloth. The subscriber begs leave to inform the public that he has in operation the Fulling Mills formerly conducted by Zachariah Flumerfelt on the Pequest Creek, about one mile above Benjamin T. Hunt's Tavern, where he conducts the business in all its various branches. His prices are as follows :
On men's wear I shilling 6 pence per yard for Common Bottle Greens, Blacks, all shades of Brown, all shades of Snuff, Patent Blue, Crow's Blue and Navy Blue, all other dark colors and drab.
For fulling, shearing and pressing, a shilling and six pence, and for fulling and pressing, six pence a yard.
On women's wear, a shilling and six pence per yard for Madder Red; a shilling two pence for other reds; a shilling three pence for greens of all shades; a shilling for all other dark colors and browns of all shades; four pence for scouring and eight pence for scouring and napping for blankets. JACOB DODDER.
Crude as seem to us the accommodations and conveniences that the early settlers enjoyed, we must not forget that they were fully as good as they were accustomed to in their former homes, and became shortly very much better for the average citizen. For instance, in Scotland and the North of Ireland, from whence so many settlers came to our country, there was not a single wagon in 1720, and it was not till 1749 that the first coach ran between Edinburgh and Glasgow. In 1783 Loudon McAdam went from America to England and there built macadamized roads. The best road builders in the world follow the general principles laid down by McAdam. Before his arrival in England roads were scarcely better than the American ones.
.
"Scotch inns were as bad as the roads, mean hovels with dirty rooms, dirty food, dirty attendants, servants without shoes and stock- ings, greasy tables with no cloths, butter thick with cow's hairs, no knives and forks, a single drinking cup for all at the table, filthy smells and sights were universal; and this when English inns were the pleas- antest places on earth."
68
WARREN COUNTY.
The education of the young people a hundred years ago was usually restricted to what could be gained in a term at a private school each year, between November and April. The school houses were log buildings about sixteen feet square, built by subscription. Here a school master, often a minister, was supported by small payments made by his patrons, while usually poor children received no schooling whatever.
The first act authorizing the raising of money for school purposes was passed in 1829. In that year the first State aid, amounting to $20,000, was distributed among the counties, which was increased by 1838 to $30,000, and by 1867 to $100,000. In 1837 our county received her share of a fund from the Federal government arising from the sale of public lands, to be used in support of schools. The present public school law was passed in 1867, and amended in 1871, so as to make the schools entirely free.
There are at present in the county 1 1 5 school houses, most of them . of fine construction. Mr. Frank T. Atwood has been superintendent of public instruction in the county for many years.
According to Judge Swayze, "the war with England, which began in 1812, had little effect in this county. Troops were not readily obtained. In 1814 the board of freeholders appointed a committee to make terms with the United States recruiting officer for the enlistment of two prisoners confined in the jail, thus at the same time attempting to discharge their obligation to the National government and to save the county the expense of maintaining the prisoners. It had become so difficult to secure soldiers that a draft was necessary, and in Septem- ber; 1814, the drafted men began their march to Paulus Hook, now Jersey City."
Dr. Samuel W. Fell, of Johnsonsburg, was an officer in command of the "Washington Greens" at Sandy Hook, in the war of 1812. Among those from this county who served in this war were Christopher Fitts and Samuel Carhart, of Washington; Isaac Little, James Fisher,
69
WARREN COUNTY.
David Robertson, William Andrews, Jacob Andrews and Jacob Hazen, of Mansfield; Dr. Samuel W. Fell and Dr. Hampton.
One effect of the war of 1812 was a considerable advance in the price of commodities. Brown sugar cost thirty-five cents a pound, and coffee forty cents. But, in compensation, wheat brought three dollars a bushel, corn a dollar and a half, and oats eighty cents. Since our county produced nearly everything it needed excepting salt, tea, coffee, sugar and molasses, we did not feel the distress resulting from the war so much as the cities, in which there were many mercantile failures. The inflation of prices extended until the great financial crisis in 1817 came, and brought ruin to many.
A speculation known as the "Merino sheep fever" reached New Jersey, in common with the neighboring States. It raged for a few years before 1814, and during its progress hundreds of dollars were paid for a single sheep which sold for a few dollars after the fever died out.
1 1
1
The first boatload of anthracite coal to go down the Delaware was a cargo of 250 bushels taken by William Turnbull in 1806, down the Lehigh to Easton, and thence to Philadelphia. But it was not until 1820 that permanent traffic in coal began with the shipment of 365 tons of Lehigh coal by White & Hazard.
In 1820 Sussex County was the most populous in the State. Warren County reached, in the country districts, its greatest population within twenty years of that time, and since then the agricultural districts have been steadily losing to the towns their natural growth of popu- lation.
Agitation for the division of Sussex County began as early as 1800. In 1813 a proposition was made to divide the county by the East and West Jersey line, which would have made Warren County somewhat larger than at present. In 1818 and 1819 it was sought to have the courts held alternately in Newton and either Oxford or Mans- field (now Washington). Finally, on November 20, 1824, the Legis-
70
WARREN COUNTY.
lature passed an act establishing Warren and Sussex counties with their present boundaries. The boundary was a straight line running from the mouth of Flatbrook to the northeast corner of the Yellow Frame Church, and on to the Musconetcong. The line divided the Hardwick or Yellow Frame Church, so that the pastor stood in Sussex and preached to his congregation in Warren.
An act was passed by the Legislature in 1856 to form a new county from the southern part of Warren, to be called Musconetcong County, but Major Sitgreaves, of Phillipsburg, then in the Senate, find- ing that Phillipsburg was not to be the county seat, as he had expected, caused the act to be repealed.
The question of the location of the county seat was decided by a vote taken on April 19 and 20, 1825. Belvidere received 1,320 votes out of a total of 2,561, Hope being second, and Washington third. General G. D. Wall, of Trenton, gave the land for the county buildings and the park adjoining the latter, "for the use of the citizens and the health and beauty of the town forever." The Court House was erected in 1826, being built of brick, forty by sixty feet, and, as then erected, is a part of the building as it now stands.
1
Warren County Court House, Belvidere.
71
WARREN COUNTY.
The clerk's office and surrogate's office are models of their kind, containing records easy of reference, kept in fireproof vaults.
An energetic effort made in 1910 to change the county seat to Phillipsburg failed, owing to irregularities in the petition for that purpose.
CHAPTER VII.
THE PEOPLE OF WARREN COUNTY.
Warren County was settled by four distinct races of people, which, named in the order of their coming, were the Hollanders, the English, mostly Quakers; the Scotch-Irish, always Presbyterians, and the Ger- man Lutherans, or Reformed. To these might be added a few from Wales, usually Baptists.
The first to arrive were Hollanders, who operated the mines in Pahaquarry and left before 1664. Others came before 1730 and set- tled in the Minnisink, and at about the same time the English Quakers began to come in from Hunterdon and Bucks counties.
The next race to arrive were the Scotch-Irish, as they are called. They are really Scotch, who emigrated to the north of Ireland and did not remain long enough to become intermarried with the Irish. They were exclusively Presbyterians. They came to Philadelphia about 1729, and thereafter in surprising numbers, as many as twelve thousand a year, some of whom found their way after a time up the Delaware to Warren and Northampton counties. They were the founders of all the early Presbyterian churches in the county. "There was no class of immigrants that excelled them in energy, enterprise and intelligence." They had fled from Scotland to Ireland between 1613 and 1689, to avoid the established Church of England, and later, when English persecution followed them to Ireland, they again fled, this time to America. For many years a Scotchman and Presbyterian could not hold any office under the British crown, either in Great Britain or America. Is it any wonder that the Scotch-Irish element was foremost in our country in the war for independence ?
The last race to arrive were the Germans, who settled along the
73
WARREN COUNTY.
Delaware and in the valleys of the Musconetcong and Paulins Kill, be- tween 1735 and 1770, in such numbers as to cause preaching to be given in the German tongue, even in the Presbyterian churches at Knowlton and Stillwater. The Germans who came to America before 1800 were mainly from the southern part of the country. "The most of them came to the shores of the New World as refugees from a bitter and remorseless persecution. The Palatines and Salzburgers stand high on the pages of history as confessors of Christ who were driven from country, home and friends, because they would not renounce their faith."-Chambers.
Many of the Germans proved to be Tory sympathizers in the Revolution. This is better understood when we read the oath of allegiance they had to sign on their arrival at Philadelphia not many years before that great struggle. It was as follows :
"We subscribers, natives and late inhabitants of the Palatinate upon the Rhine and places adjacent, having transported ourselves. and families into this Province of Pennsylvania, a colony subject to the crown of Great Britain, in hopes and expectation of finding a retreat and peaceable settlement therein, do solemnly promise and engage that we will be faithful and bear true allegiance to his present MAJESTY KING GEORGE THE SECOND and His successors Kings of Great Britain, and will be faithful to the proprietor of this province, and that we will demean ourselves peaceably to all His said Majesty's subjects and strictly observe and conform to the laws of England and this province to the utmost of our power and the best of our understanding."
The French and Indian war had an important effect on the charac- ter of the population of Warren and Northampton counties. The population of Northampton up to that time was prevailingly Irish. Mt. Bethel was known preferably as Hunter's Settlement, and Allen Township was known as Craig's Settlement,-both mainly Irish. When the Indians drove out nearly all the inhabitants from the country above Easton, these fled mostly to Warren County, and many stayed here permanently. This served to increase the English speaking element in
74
WARREN COUNTY.
Warren County, which till then had been overshadowed by the German. After the French and Indian war, the tide of immigration to this country was mainly German, and so it happened that there was not enough of an English element in Northampton County for many years to prevent "Pennsylvania Dutch" from developing at its own sweet will. Besides this, a strong antipathy grew up in Pennsylvania between the German and the Irish races, so that any Irish who went back soon moved to more congenial fields.
Of the language known as "Pennsylvania Dutch," Davis says:
"In so far as this is a language at all, it is mosaic in its character, and the result of circumstances. The early immigrants from the Ger- man principalities and Switzerland became welded into one mass by intermarriage and similarily of religion, customs and language. This, with subsequent admixture with the English-speaking portion of the population, gradually gave rise to a newly-spoken, and to some extent, a newly-written dialect known as 'Pennsylvania Dutch,' which is used to a considerable extent throughout eastern Pennsylvania."
In a general way we may say that Pahaquarry was settled by Hol- landers; the Paulins Kill valley, comprising Knowlton, Blairstown, Hardwick, part of Frelinghuysen and Stillwater, by Germans; the Pequest Valley, including Oxford, Belvidere, Hope, Independence, Allamuchy and part of Frelinghuysen, by English and Scotch-Irish; the upper Musconetcong Valley, including Hackettstown, Mansfield and Washington, also by English and Scotch-Irish, while in Harmony and the lower Musconetcong Valley, including Franklin, Greenwich, Pohat- cong, Lopatcong and Phillipsburg, the Scotch-Irish who came first were followed and soon outnumbered by the Germans. In two or three generations there was a complete mingling of the four races in Warren County, in which the German strain predominated.
After the terrible famine years in Ireland immigration from the south of that country set in about 1850, and then, for the first time, Warren County had a Catholic population.
75 -
WARREN COUNTY.
A few Italians after 1875 remained here as permanent residents, separating from the throngs of that nationality who for twenty years formed the great body of laborers employed in building railroads, and in quarries and about furnaces. Hungarians have been coming in great numbers since 1885, mainly employed as laborers, and some will doubt- less become permanent residents. But few Jews, Spaniards, Russians and Turks have ever become permanent residents of this county. Of late years a considerable number of Swedes, Finns, Poles and Hol- landers have been added to our permanent population. From the earliest times, Africans have formed a small percentage of our popu- lation.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.