USA > New Jersey > The New Jersey coast in three centuries; history of the New Jersey coast with genealogical and historic-biographical appendix, Vol. I > Part 27
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In 1890 the population of Atlantic county was 28,836, and this num- ber had increased to 46,402 in 1900-the increase being largely in Atlantic City.
The history of the settlement of Atlantic county is well covered in that of Absecon Island and of various inland towns.
Absecon Island is in all ways similar to the ocean-surrounded lands
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northward and southward from it. It extends from Absecon Inlet south- westwardly for a distance of about ten miles to Great Egg Harbor. Its width is greatest at the northern extremity, on Absecon Inlet, where it is not quite two miles, and is least something more than one mile from its southern termination, where it is less than one-half a mile. It is princi- pally made up of sand dunes and meadow lands, and has an elevation of about six feet above high water mark. Its distance from the mainland is five miles, the intervening space being an expanse of bays, sounds and salt marshes.
The Indian occupation has been well established, and the fact has been perpetuated in the name which the island bears. The true Indian etymology was Absegami, meaning "little sea-water," and this has been from time to time corrupted, appearing as Absecam, Absecum, Abseconi and finally as Absecon. Dr. Thomas K. Reed, of Atlantic City, whose col- lection of Indian relics is unsurpassed by that of any private collector in the country, has in his possession fragments of human remains, many ar- rows, stone knives, stone mills used for cracking corn, and other utensils and implements, taken from in and about the city. These Indians were of the Lenni-Lenape tribe, and they were in possession of the soil until the coming of the English and Scotch from Long Island, in 1645.
The history of the region as told by white men has been carefully studied by Mr. A. M. Heston and rehearsed in his "Hand Book of At- lantic City." This writer shows that it began as early as September 1-2, 1609, when Henry Hudson sailed his Dutch ship, the "Half-Moon," to Absegami and Eyre Haven. The discovery of the inlets above and below Absegami are credited to Captain Cornelius Jacobse Mey, of the ship "Fortuyn," who left New Amsterdam in June, 1614, and cruised down the coast. He called the inlet, now known as Barnegat, by the Dutch name of Barende-gat. Absecon Inlet he also called Barende-gat, these words being used first, not as a name, but merely as a description of the inlet. On Vanderdonck's Dutch map, made in 1656, it is Barndegat, and in his description of the coast, in one place, he calls Absecon "Bear-gat." Gabriel Thomas, who wrote a "History of New Jersey" in 1698, mentions Great Egg Harbor River, "up which a ship of two or three hundred tons may sail." This country, he adds, "is noted for its good store of horses, cows, sheep, hogs, etc., the lands thereabouts being much improved and built upon." On the map which accompanies his book the beach or island, the modern name of which is Absecon Beach, is described as having "some .woodland and some sandy ground." Some of the "wonderful things" found in this part of the country can be described best in the language of the quaint historian last quoted : "There are, among other various sorts
-
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of frogs," he says, "the bull-frog, which makes a roaring noise, hardly to be distinguished from that well known of the beast from which it takes its name. There is another sort of frog that crawls up to the tops of trees, there seeming to imitate the notes of several birds."
Jean Le Barre, a Frenchman, visited the region in 1787, and pub- lished an account of his travels, in which he spoke of the exceptional dry- ness of the atmosphere on Absecon Beach. He added that in all his trav- els (and he was a great traveler) he had only found one other place in the world, on the seacoast, that could be compared with it in the matter of climate.
The original owner of that portion of Absecon Island upon which Atlantic City was built was Thomas Budd, in 1695. The pleasant rela- tions which existed between the first white settlers and the Indians is made to appear in a pamphlet published by Budd, some years later, wherein he says "the Indians have been very serviceable to us," and he quotes a speech made by an Indian :
"We are your brothers and intend to live like brothers with you. We have no mind to war, for when we have war we are only skin and bones ; the meat that we eat doth not do us good; we are always in fear; we have not the benefit of the sun to shine on us; we hide us in holes and corners ; we are minded to live in peace. If we intend at any time to make war on you, we will let you know of it, and the reasons why we make war with' you ; and if you make us satisfaction for the injury done us, for which the war was intended, then we will not make war upon you; and if you intend at any time to make war on us, we would have you let us know of it, and the reason ; and then if we do not make satisfaction for the injury done unto you, then you may make war on us, otherwise you ought not to do it. You are our brothers, and we are willing to live like brothers with you; we are willing to have a broad path for you and us to walk in, and if an Indian is asleep in this path, the Englishman shall pass by, and do him no harm; and if an Englishman is asleep in this path, the Indian shall pass him by, and say, 'He is an Englishman, he is asleep; let him alone, he loves to sleep.' It shall be a plain path; there must not be in this path a stump to hurt our feet."
Budd was not an actual settler, nor did the persons to whom he sold become settlers. It was not until about the time of the Revolutionary War that permanent residents came. Daniel Ireland, William Boice and George Stibbs, and it is uncertain how long they remained. Jeremiah Leeds is credited with being the first permanent settler, in 1804. He owned the entire island, farming a portion of it, and leaving other parts for salt works. At a bank dinner held in Atlantic City in January, 1889. Peter Boice, aged about eighty-four years, of Absecon, gave a description of
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Absecon Beach as he knew it when a young man of eighteen or twenty years, when he came to help Jeremiah Leeds reap and harvest his grain. "In those days," said he, "the greater portion of the island was sand-hills, duck-ponds, swamps, brier thickets and nesting places for the wild fowl. Many of these wild fowl could be killed with clubs, and it is said that they were so numerous at times in lighting upon trees the branches would break. Very few people had guns in those days, consequently they re- sorted to other means of capturing game." Another old resident, as. quoted by Mr. Heston, said that immense flocks of snipe and ducks settled in the ponds, especially in the vicinity of Arctic and North Carolina ave- nues. The district between Maryland and South Carolina avenues, from Atlantic to the meadows, was known as "Squawktown," on account of the large number of squawks which nightly roosted there. The land was low and swampy and was covered with an undergrowth of bushes, vines and briers. About 1835 Jeremiah Leeds fired into a flock of these birds at this point and killed forty-eight. Besides quail, rabbits and foxes, there were, at that time, minks, muskrats, loggerheads, terrapins and snakes- black snakes, garter snakes and adders. Strange to say, there were no lizzards or bull-frogs. The frogs made their appearance after the found- ing of the city.
In 1838 Jeremiah Leeds died and his lands descended to his children : Rubanna Conover, Rachel Steelman, Andrew Leeds, Judith Leeds, after- ward Judith Hackett, Chalkley S. Leeds and Robert B. Leeds. The mother of the Leeds progeny at this time kept the old Atlantic House as a tavern for oystermen and traders, near Baltic and Massachusetts avenues.
The county of Cape May comprises the splendid peninsula which is the southern termination of the State, lying between the Atlantic Ocean on the east and Delaware Bay on the west. Its northern boundary is gen- erally marked by Great Egg Harbor and a line projected thence west- ward. It is nearly thirty-two miles long, and its greatest width is thirteen miles. The soil is alluvial and quite level. Formerly it bore considerable timber, which has all but disappeared. Grasses grow luxuriantly, and pas- turage for domestic animals is abundant.
Paralleling the mainland, on the ocean side, is a succession of sandy beaches named Peck's, Ludlam's, Seven Mile, Five Mile, Two Mile and Poverty, upon which stand numerous handsome little villages and private mansions. Between the beaches and the mainland are expanses of ocean water dotted with miniature islands. Oysters, clams and fish abound in these waters. On the Delaware Bay side the land shelves gradually to the water and finds no obstruction short of the Delaware shore.
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In point of discovery and occupation by whites, Cape May has a proud distinction of priority as compared with many portions of the State of New Jersey. Cornelius Jacobse Mey, whose name figures so conspicu- ously in the maritime annals of his times, explored Delaware Bay in 1621, in the interest of the Dutch West India Company, but he does not seem. to have had more to do with Cape May than to give it his name, which is. preserved euphoniously if not orthographically.
The proprietary rights in the Cape May county have been noted in the chapter on "The Proprietary System." Our only concern in this con- nection is with the actual settlement. Under this head, it is asserted by Benedict, in his "History of the Baptists," that a church of this denomina- tion was established at Cape May in 1675, in which year came a com- pany of immigrants among whom were two Baptists, George Taylor and Philip Hill. But Dr. Beesley, in his "Early History of Cape May County," finds no evidence that Cape May was positively inhabited until 1685, when Caleb Carman and Jonathan Pine were respectively appointed by the leg- islature to the positions of Justice of the Peace and Constable.
Other authorities assert that John Townsend and Jacob Spicer, who came from Long Island in 1680, were the earliest permanent white set- lers, and that Richard, son of the former named, was the first white child born within the limits of the county.
John Townsend was an Englishman and a Quaker, who for the latter offense (such it was then) was fined and imprisoned in New York, and finally banished. He first located in Monmouth county, whence he came to Cape May county. It is related of him that when he was to build his cabin he traveled a considerable distance to find two other settlers to assist him. While engaged in the work, a number of Indians came, and a rivalry as to physical strength arose between them and the whites, whereupon a wrestling match ensued, in which one of the latter overcame his copper- colored antagonist, and ended the struggle by tossing him into a tree. This feat so impressed the Indians that the whites were thenceforth re- garded with respect, if not absolute fear.
Of the early families of Cape May county, none figure so conspicu- ously as do those of Leaming and Spicer, and these names are associated together for all time. Aaron Leaming and Jacob Spicer (of the second generation, namesakes for their fathers) are here particularly referred to.
Christopher Leamyeng (Leaming) came about 1670 from England to Long Island, where he married Esther Burnet. In 1691 he came to Cape May and took up land. Among his children was a son, Aaron, who embraced the Quaker religion. He acquired considerable property, and was a man of influence, serving as Justice of the Peace, Clerk and As-
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semblyman. He married Lydia Shaw, and of the marriage were born four children, of whom the eldest was Aaron.
Aaron Leaming (second), born in 1715, became one of the most important figures of his day. He was splendidly educated for the times, and was a man of great force of character. He carried on business affairs upon a large scale, and was prominent in public life, and a member of the assembly for thirty years. He and Jacob Spicer (second) who was a year his junior, were assigned to the task of compiling for the assembly the grants and concessions made to the Lords Proprietors, and the laws of both the Jersey Provinces. This great task they performed with scrupu- lous care.
Aaron Leaming died August 28, 1780, in the sixty-sixth year of his age. Upon the monument covering his grave in the old family burying ground in Middle township, Cape May county, was chiseled the following inscription :
"Beneath this stone here lies a name That once had titles, honor, wealth and fame. How loved, how honored, now avails thee not, To whom related, or by whom begot ; A heap of dust remains alone of thee.
'Tis all thou art, and all the proud shall be."
It is reasonable to infer that this verse was from his own pen, moved by his own modesty and freedom from personal vanity. Certain it is that his eminently useful and distinguished service in behalf of the people and State would not permit one who had known him to inscribe so belittling a sentiment. For of him Dr. Maurice Beesley wrote: "No man ever re- ceived greater honors from the county, and none, perhaps, better de- served them."
Jacob Spicer (second), the colleague of Leaming, was a son of Jacob Spicer, who came to Cape May about 1691, from Gravesend, Long Island. The senior Spicer was of Puritan parentage. The son was liberally edu- cated, became a busy man of affairs and was for some twenty years a member of the assembly. He was scrupulously methodical in noting all his financial transactions, and his journals are a marvel of minute infor- mation showing the habits of life of the people about him. He was twice married-first to Judith Hughes, and after her death to Deborah Hand Leaming, widow of Christopher Leaming. In his will he dis- played the same great carefulness which marked his everyday life, and this long document of thirty-nine pages is noteworthy as the most elaborate and voluminous testamentary document ever recorded in the State. In
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this he made liberal bequests to all the various religious bodies in the. neighborhood, and it also contained his complaint that he had been unjustly treated, vilely defamed and grossly abused by the populace. This lengthy paper he directed should be read in public in the Baptist meeting house, and he also provided that a sermon-like address should be printed in pamphlet form and distributed. Upon his tombstone was inscribed :
"If aught that's good and great could save, Spicer had never seen the grave."
He left four children, among whom was but one son, and in the male line the family is now extinct.
The reproach in which Spicer was held by some of the people, as re- ferred to in his will, was presumably based upon some of his land transac- tions. For more than sixty years the Coxe lands had been marketed through an agent of the West Jersey Society, and these had been ex- hausted, save what were known as vacant lands with "natural privileges" in the adjacent sounds and bays. Leaming and Spicer were both desirous of possessing these vacant lands, and they were rivals in their effort in this, no matter how cordially they had been allied together in public affairs, but Spicer drove a successful bargain, and became the owner. Concern- ing this transaction, Dr. Beesley says :
"It has been handed down that Spicer obtained the grant for the pro- prietary right in Cape May, of Dr. Johnson, agent of the society at Perth Amboy, at a time when the influence of the wine bottle had usurped the place of reason, or he could not have obtained it for so inconsiderable a sum as three hundred pounds; and that the Doctor, sensible he had be- trayed the trust reposed in him, left the society at his death a thousand pounds as a salvo."
Cape May was created a county, under the Proprietors, in 1685, when its northern boundary was fixed nearly as at present-a line drawn at the most northerly point of Great Harbor. November 12, 1692, the county was constituted by act of assembly ; the bounds were more carefully desig- nated in 1694, when the residents of Egg Harbor were transferred to Gloucester county, and a further adjustment was made in 1709, which did not materially change the boundaries.
The earliest courts under the proprietary government were held in private houses. In 1691 Daniel Coxe, who was then the great landlord and virtual governor, erected what was known as "Coxe's Hall." an ex- tensive edifice for the times, near Town Bank and Cold Spring. The location was designated as Portsmouth (afterward known as Town Bank,
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or Cape May Town), and the building was used as a court house and a house of worship.
In 1745 Cape May Court House became the county seat, and Daniel Hand donated one acre of land as a building site. Upon it now stands a modern edifice. The village is situated on the Winslow Junction and Cape May branch of the Atlantic City Railroad, and on the Camden and Cape May branch of the West Jersey and Sea Shore Railroad. The population in 1900 was 900.
In 1890 the population of Cape May county was 11,268, and in 1900 it was 13,201.
Cumberland should almost be considered a coast county. It has for its south frontage the lower Delaware Bay, and its eastern boundaries are the counties of Cape May and Atlantic. Its principal stream is the Maurice River, which at Millville, in the northern part of the county, expands to the proportion's of a lake, and which, for the last five miles of its length, is similarly expansive.
The county was the early home of a Puritan colony, and it was made a political division in 1747, receiving its name in honor of the Duke of Cumberland. The population in 1890 was 45,438, and in 1900 it was 51,193. The county seat is Bridgeton, which is the seat of large glass manufactories and fruit and vegetable canning establishments.
CHAPTER X.
RELIGIOUS HISTORY AND CONDITIONS.
If there is aught in the history of New Jersey that is so completely established as to be wholly outside the pale of controversy, it is the fact that its early colonists were a deeply religious people. Indeed, had they been less conscientious and less unyielding as religionists, the political structure which they aided in rearing would doubtless have been of other . design. It was decreed in a very early day that the country was to be es- sentially English, and dominated by English thought and policies-the withdrawal of the Dutch fleet and the Dutch Governor settled that matter. Had the Englishmen and Scotchmen then on the ground been time-server's, had they abandoned their meetings and conventicles, they would doubtless have proven as truculent in their political conduct, and-would there have been the Revolution? And this suggests another query : Had the Establish- ed Church of England utilized the Methodism of Wesley in England, and displayed a conciliatory attitude toward the Presbyterians of Scotland, is it not probable that there would have been an Established Church in America, with Trinity Church standing in the new land for what Canter- bury does in the mother country ?.
A fruitful field for speculation this, but there is sufficient of moment- ous interest in what did actually occur. And so, it may be repeated that the early colonists-who did not come, as did many of the New Englanders, to found a theocracy-were a deeply religious people, and this is not the less true if, as was the case, with different standards, their conduct was in many instances somewhat at variance with that expected of professed religionists in the present day. But it may well be questioned if human- ity, as it goes, is any more successful now than it was then in combatting some besetting sin which lies in wait for every one of us.
The early Dutch colonists may be said to have brought their church with them when they settled in New Netherland. To these good, pious wanderers a place of worship was as necessary as a dwelling ; and we never find any settlement without also discovering some arrangement there for
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divine services, either the setting aside of a sufficient amount for a clergy- man's ministrations or for the employment of a teacher and reader, or at least for securing the services of an authorized visitor to the sick, whose duty it also was to read the Scriptures to the people on Sundays. And as this people increased in numbers, and new settlements were formed, and more ministers were needed, they turned to their own youth for their spiritual leaders, and founded their own literary and theological schools.
The first of the Scotch Presbyterians came in 1685 out of their native country, whence they were driven by cruel religious persecution. For re- fusal to engage in prelatic worship and for their attendance upon con- venticles, these poor people were despoiled of their property, thrown into prison, banished and practically sold as slaves. About one hundred men and. women were imprisoned in Dunottar Castle, where they were treated with great severity, stinted for food and water, and cramped for want of room. 'Many were tortured for attempting to escape. Late in the summer these prisoners were marched to the sea-coast, a distance of about sixty- three miles, many with their hands tied behind their backs. They were under sentence of banishment to America, and a number of them were committed to the care of George Scot, laird of Pitlochie, who had chartered a vessel to convey him to New Jersey, in order to escape the persecution to which he had been subjected for the sake of his religion. The voyagers suffered dreadfully from a virulent fever, and to add to the misery of their condi- tion the master of the vessel, a most inhuman creature, visited upon them all sorts of cruelty, even to throwing down upon them large pieces of timber when they were engaged in worship between decks. Three score of peo- ple, among them the laird and his wife, died during the voyage. The sur- vivors disembarked near Perth Amboy, in December, 1685. It is pathetic to read that the vessel which bore these immigrants from their heather- land sank soon after reaching the harbor to which it had conveyed them. And with this goes the story, better authenticated than is usual in tradition- ary narratives, that this same vessel had lain a sunken hulk in the harbor whence they sailed, and was raised to afford them passage. The wonder is that such a craft survived the three months' voyage. It is only to be added that many of the immigrants were obliged by the civil courts to make pay- ment for their enforced passage.
With the particular history of the various denominations in the State at large we are not particularly concerned. The present purpose is to trace the beginnings of religion in the counties on the coast, and this, of necessity, includes some account of a number of individual churches which are recognized as memorial stones in religious history, testifying to events
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as important as were some of those in which figured apostles and saints of old.
The quaint old town of Middletown (and the name, so far as con- cerns the early days, applies at times to the village and again to the town- ship), was the seat of the first settlements in Monmouth county, and here were set up religious lights which shone out to remote places. It was a heterogeneous population-Quakers, Scotch and Dutch Independents, Presbyterians and Baptists, and those of the Established Church of Eng- land.
There has been controversy as to priority in church founding in the historic old village, and even as to the particular shade of faith held by some of the active churchmen of the day. One fact is admitted-that the first minister was John Bowne, but who can say of what sect was he, or what his creed, after reading his "words of advice or council to his children as he lay on his death-bed" January 3, 1683-4 :
"There is no way in the whole world for a man to obtain felicity, in this world or in the world to come, but to take heed in the ways of the Lord, and to put his trust in Him, who deals faithfully and truly with all men ; for He knocks at the door of your hearts, and calls you to come and buy, without money and without price.
"My desire is, that in all actions of Meum and Teum you deal not deceitfully, but plane hearted with all men, and remember that your dying Father left it with you for your instruction, that when trust is with your Honor to preserve it. And in all contracts and bargains that you make, violate not your promise, and you will have praise. Let your Mother be your Counsellor in all matters of difference, and goe not to Lawyers, but ask her councell first. If at any time any of you have an advantage of a poor man at law, O pursue it not, but rather forgive him if he hath done you wrongue, and if you do so, you will have the help of the Law of God and of his people. Give not away to youthful jolities and sports, but im- prove your leisure time in the service of God. Let no good man be dealt churlishly by you, but entertain when they come to your house. But if a vitious, wicked man come, give him meat and drink to refresh him, and let him pass by your doors. It has been many times in my thoughts, that for a man to marry a wife and have children, and never take any care to instruct them, but leave them worse than the Beasts of the Field, that if a man ask concerning the things of God, they know not what it means. O, this is a very sad thing. But if we can season our hearts, so as to de- sire the Lord to assist us, He will help us, and not fly from us."
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