A history of Wilkes-Barre, Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, from its first beginnings to the present time; including chapters of newly-discovered, Vol. I, Part 73

Author: Harvey, Oscar Jewell, 1851-1922; Smith, Ernest Gray
Publication date: 1909-1930
Publisher: Wilkes-Barre : Raeder Press
Number of Pages: 734

USA > Pennsylvania > Luzerne County > Wilkes-Barre > A history of Wilkes-Barre, Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, from its first beginnings to the present time; including chapters of newly-discovered, Vol. I > Part 73

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Early in October, 1764, Colonel Dyer returned home (as mentioned on page 393) from his mission to England in behalf of The Susquehanna Company and The Delaware Company. During his stay in London he had worked faithfully and earnestly in behalf of his clients. Stone, in his "Poetry and History of Wyoming" (note, page 143), says that he "obtained a collection of Colonel Dyer's correspondence while he was abroad upon this mission. His letters prove his diligence and his per- severance in prosecuting his business." During nearly all the time that Colonel Dyer was in London Maj. Gen. Phineas Lyman (men-

* See page 150.

t Evidently the Western Senecas, in the Genesee region previously referred to.

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tioned on page 281) and Capt. Joseph Trumbull* of Connecticut were there-both of them capable lawyers, and shareholders in The Susque- hanna Company-and they rendered Colonel Dyer all the assistance possible. A case stated was prepared and presented, for an opinion, to four English lawyers of high authority, viz. : Edward Thurlow, then King's Counsel and later, as Baron Thurlow, Lord Chancelor of Eng- land ; Alexander Wedderburn, f Richard Jacksont and John Dunning- the last two then eminent as Crown lawyers.

The opinion given (in writing) to Colonel Dyer and his associates in London, early in 1764, by the learned counsel abovementioned, was as follows :

"We are of opinion that the words 'actually possessed and enjoyed' do not extend to lands on the west side of the Dutch settlements which were at the time of the grant of James I in a wilderness state, though divided from the English settlements by the actual possession of the Dutch. And that the grant to the Council of Plymouth did not mean to except in favor of any one anything to the westward of such Plantations. The agree- ment between the Colony of Connecticut and the Province of New York|| can extend no further than to settle the boundaries between the respective parties, and has no effect upon other claims that either of them had in other parts ; and as the Charter to Connecticut was granted but eighteen years before that to William Penn, there is no ground to contend that the Crown could, at that period, make an effectual grant to him of that country which had been so recently granted to others. But, if the country had been actually settled under the latter [the Penn] grant, it would now be a matter of considerable doubt whether the right of the occupiers, or the title under which they hold, could be impeached by a prior grant without settlement.

"In case the Governor and Company [of Connecticut] shall, in point of prudence, think it expedient to make their claim and support it, it will be proper-either amicably and in concurrence with the Proprietaries of Pennsylvania, or, in case of the refusal of those Proprietaries, without them-to apply to the King in Council, praying His Majesty to appoint Commissioners in America to decide the question."

After a delay of some months a carefully-drawn document (endorsed "Petition of Eliphalet Dyer, Esq., and others, praying His Majesty will

* See a subsequent chapter for a sketch of his life.

+ ALEXANDER WEDDERBURN was born at Edinburgh February 13, 1733, the son of a Scottishi Judge. He was called to the English Bar in 1757, and in 1762 entered Parliament. Having distinguished himself as a lawyer he was appointed Solicitor General in 1771, when he left the opposition to become a strenuous supporter of Lord North. In April, 1774, Edmund Burke delivered in the House of Commons his cele- brated speech on American taxation. Wedderburn spoke in reply to Burke, and, among other things, said : "I feel the warmest zeal to vindicate the motives and the conduct of that great Minister [George Grenville] who first planned the measures with regard to America [see the succeeding foot-note], to which, unjustly, so much mischief has been imputed." About this same time Wedderburn, as Solicitor General, took the chief part in the famous examination of Benjamin Franklin before His Majesty's Privy Council, during which he abused and insulted Franklin-for which he was hanged and burned in effigy at Phila- delphia in May, 1774.

Wedderburn supported the American war policy of the Government, and in 1780 was made Chief Justice as Lord Loughborough. He joined the administration under Pitt in 1793, and succeeded Lord Thurlow as Lord Chancelor-from which office he retired in 1801 with the title of Earl of Rosslyn. He was the author of a work on the management of prisons. He died January 3, 1805, whereupon George III made the not very complimentary remark : "He has not left a greater knave behind him in my dominions !"

Į RICHARD JACKSON, of London, England, was a son of Richard Jackson of Dublin, Ireland. Novem- ber 22, 1751, he was admitted to the Inner Temple, and became a Bencher in 1770. In March, 1760, he was appointed by the Governor and Company of the Colony of Connecticut Agent and Attorney for the Colony, "with power to receive all money granted by Parliament and ordered to be paid to the Colony of Connecticut." He still held this office in 1764, in which year he was also created Standing Counsel for the South Sea Company. In 1765 he was a Member of Parliament, and in that year warned the House of Commons against applying the Stamp Act to the American Colonies. About that time he was appointed private secretary to the Hon. George Grenville-Chancelor of the Exchequer and First Lord of the Treasury-the famous statesman who passed the Stamp Act (mentioned above, as well as in the preced- ing note), which first drove the American Colonies to resistance. In 1767 a Bill was introduced in the House of Commons providing for the establishing of a general civil list in all the American Colonies. Jackson opposed this, claiming that its object was to render all the public officers and magistrates in America independent of the people. The royal Governors sent to America, he observed, were often needy, unprincipled men, and always dependent for the duration of their functions on the pleasure of the Crown. Only one other member of the House supported Jackson in his opposition, and the Bill was passed.

In October, 1765, Richard Jackson gave £100 towards paying the expense of finishing the Chapel of Yale College. Dr. Johnson, in speaking of him, called him "All-knowing" Jackson. He died in London May 6, 1787.

§ See "Connecticut Colonial Records," XIV : 447.

| November 30, 1664, His Majesty's Commissioners, appointed "to decide the bounds betwixt His High- ness the Duke of York and the Connecticut Charter," fixed, with the approbation and assent of the Agents of Connecticut, a line east of the Hudson River to be the western bounds of the said Colony. In 1683 the Commissioners of Connecticut, with the Governor of New York, fixed upon a new line, which, it was declared, "shall be the western bounds of the said Colony of Connecticut." This constituted the New York-Connecticut boundary-line in 1764.

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be pleased to grant to them sundry lands purchased by them from the Indians near the Rivers Susquehanna and Delaware in America") was presented to the King in Council July 11, 1764, and having been read was duly referred to a committee. Five days later an authenticated copy of the petition was served upon the Hon. Thomas Penn, in London. That copy is now preserved (MS. No. 67) among the "Penn Manu- scripts," mentioned on page 30, ante ; and as no part of the petition has heretofore been printed, we give the following extracts from it.

"The humble petition of ELIPHALET DYER, Esq., on behalf of himself and of sundry other persons, purchasers of several large tracts of land on or near the Rivers Susquehannah and Delaware in North America, commonly called by the names of Sus- quehannah and Delaware Companies-amounting to the number of 2,000 persons, or thereabouts-

"SHEWETH : That your petitioner's constituents did, in the years 1754 and 1755, for a full and valuable consideration, and without any the least imposition, fraud or deceit, purchase from the sachems of sundry Indian tribes, in the form and according to the usage constantly practised by the said Indian tribes, considerable tracts of land lying between the 41° and 43° of North Latitude, near to the said Rivers Susquehannah and Delaware-as the same lands are more particularly described and set forth in the said purchase deeds in your petitioner's custody. That the principal view and intent of mak- ing such purchases was to cement and fix the Indians in those parts in friendship with Your Majesty's subjects, and to further the security as well as cultivation of those parts of Your Majesty's dominions. And, in order to carry this plan into execution, it was intended and proposed that an humble application should be made to Your Majesty's late royal Grandfather, King George II, for his royal Charter for erecting and settling a new Colony upon the said purchased lands-in such form and under such regulations as should seeni most expedient to His Majesty's royal wisdom. * * *

"That the breaking out of the war soon after, both in Europe and America, put a stop to the abovementioned intended application by your petitioner's constituents to his said late Majesty ; but soon after the conclusion of the late Peace the said Companies resumed the consideration of their respective purchases and of the means of establishing themselves therein. In consequence thereof great numbers of The Delaware Company repaired unto, and for some time continued upon, that tract purchased of the Delaware Indians, with whom they lived in the most perfect peace and harmony ; and The Sus- quehannah Company were moving forward to take possession of and settle on their said purchased lands, when a letter was received by the Governor of Connecticut from the Right Hon. the Lord Egremont, then one of Your Majesty's Principal Secretaries of State, dated January 26, 1763, importing that it was Your Majesty's pleasure that the said Governor should exert every legal authority * * to prevent the prosecution of any such settlements. * * That the Governor of Connecticut having immediately communicated to the said Companies Your Majesty's said orders, they, in testimony of their entire submission and acquiescence therein, unanimously agreed that no person whatsoever belonging to the said Companies should enter or make any settlement upon any of the said purchased lands, until the state of their case should be laid before Your Majesty and Your Majesty's royal pleasure should be further known therein.

"That the several purchases made by the said two Companies lying very near and contiguous to each other, they have agreed to unite in their humble suit and applica- tion to Your Majesty, and have deputed your petitioner their Agent to lay a state of their case at Your Majesty's feet. Your petitioner, therefore, most humbly beseeches Your Majesty, on the behalf of the said two Companies, his constituents, that he may be per- mitted to lay before Your Majesty in Council, or in any other manner as to Your Majesty's wisdom shall seem meet, the fullest proof of the validity, justice and fairness of the said several purchases, and the perfect satisfaction and acquiescence therein by the Indians from whom the same was made.

"And your petitioner also most humbly beseeches Your Majesty that, upon the renunciation of the Assembly of the Colony of Connecticut of all right and title to the said purchased lands as lying within the limits of their Charter, Your Majesty will be most graciously pleased to grant the said purchased lands to your petitioner's said con- stituents, and to constitute and erect them into A NEW COLONY, or Settlement, by such name, in such form and under such regulations and restrictions as to Your Majesty in your royal wisdom shall seem most fitting and convenient." * *

From this petition we learn that the ostensible object, or project, of the two Connecticut land companies was to have their contiguous territories, comprehended in the respective purchases made by the com- panies, combined and erected into a new Colony. This was in line with the resolution adopted by The Susquehanna Company in May,

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1755 (see page 306, ante), and which, it is presumed, was duly laid before the General Assembly of Connecticut and became the basis for its action as recorded on page 307. The resolution of the Assembly at that time, however, referred only to The Susquehanna Company. The Delaware Company had then been organized but a short while, and beyond its own proprietors its existence was scarcely known ; besides, its purchase of the lands along the Delaware was not effected until just about the time the Assembly acted on the memorial of The Susque- hanna Company. (See page 293.) It will be seen, by a glance at the "Map of a Part of Pennsylvania," in Chapter XI, that the combined area of the Delaware and Susquehanna Purchases would have made a very respectable Colony-territorially considered ; considerably larger, in fact, than either the State of Connecticut or the State of Massachu- setts to-day, and very much larger than Rhode Island or Delaware or Maryland or some of the other States that inight be named.

The petition of Colonel Dyer lay buried and, evidently, forgotten- among the documents of the committee of the Privy Council to which it had been referred-up to the time of the Colonel's departure from London for Connecticut. How much longer it lay in that condition we are unable to state. January 16, 1765, a meeting of The Susquehanna Company was held at Hartford (the first meeting that had taken place since May 18, 1763-according to the records of the Company), when Colonel Dyer made a full report of his efforts in behalf of the Company during his eleven months' stay in England. Thereupon John Gardiner, Esq., of the Inner Temple, London, was appointed by the Company its agent in Great Britain, "to appear at Court to prosecute the Company's case;" etc. ; and the next month the sum of £200 was transmitted to him "to be improved in forwarding the cause of the Company." Some months later Gardiner reported to the Company that, in connection with his strenuous efforts to forward its cause, the following-named persons had been by him "admitted as proprietors of the Company," to wit : "Sir Herbert Lloyd, Baronet ; Howell Gwynne, of Garth, Esquire ; Mr. John Augustine Leavy, Attorney at Law; George Wingfield, of the Inner Temple, Esquire ; Mr. William Powell, Attorney at Law"- and others.

In April, 1765, Papoonhank and the Moravian Indians at Province Island (see page 435) were removed to Bethlehem, whence Zeisberger conducted them to Wyalusing and founded the town of Friedenshütten -as described in the note on page 220. Heckewelder, in the unpub- lished letter mentioned on page 279, states :

"In 1763 a new war broke out, when from that time the place [Wyoming] was not visited [by the Moravian Brethren] until the Spring of 1765, after a peace having been concluded with the hostile Indians. Christian Indians then [1765] removed from Phila- delphia * * in a body to Wyalusing. *

* * When the Christian Indians removed to Wyalusing there were no Indians living at Wyoming, nor any other place lower down the River than Sheshequanni ;* nor were any white people settled there."

At Philadelphia, September 25, 1766, Governor Penn hield a con- ference with "Jemmy Nanticoke," "John Toby," "Anthony Turkey" and other Indians of the Nanticoke-Conoy and Mohegan tribes living at Chenango, or Otsiningo-mentioned in the notes on pages 219 and

* Sheshequin, in the present Bradford County, Pennsylvania, on the left bank of the Susquehanna. north-west from Wyalusing about twenty miles in a bee-line. In the Moravian diaries of 1768 Sheshequin is called "Schechschiquanink" ; and in February, 1768, it is recorded that James Davis, or Davies, the Chief of the village-who had formerly been Chief at Matchasaung (see page 359) and later at a village in New York lying between Assinnissink and Passekawkung (see page 389)-"made application at Friedenshütten for stated preaching of the gospel" at Sheshequin.

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239. The three Indians named-and, undoubtedly, all the others then present-had formerly lived in Wyoming, and subsequently "Anthony Turkey" and "Toby" returned here-the last-named living for some time-on friendly terms with the white settlers-near the mouth of the creek which for many years now has borne his name. (See page 53.) After the usual preliminaries observed at Indian conferences "Jemmy Nanticoke" produced a belt of black wampum, and, speaking for all the Indians present, said *:

"Brother, it is now proper for us to mention to you that there has been a great deal of wickedness of late, which hangs like a cloud in the air and hinders us from see- ing each other and from transacting or settling such business as we may have with one another. By this belt, therefore, we remove these clouds, and we now present it to you to show our joy that the great God of Heaven has brought us again together to see one another with the same brotherly affection we used formerly to do. *

* * As we came down from our country we stopped at Wyoming, where we had a mine in two places, and we discovered that some white people had been at work in the mine and had filled three canoes with the ore ; and we saw their tools with which they had dug it out of the ground, where they had made a hole at least forty feet long and five or six feet deep. It happened formerly that some white people did now and then take only a small bit and carried it away, but these people have been working at the mine and have filled their canoes.

"You know, Brother, that by our ancient treaties we are obliged to acquaint each other when anything hurtful shall happen to either of us. According to this we now inform you of this injury done to us, which is a very bad thing, and may produce mis- chief between us. *

* We also inform you that there is one John Anderson, a trader, now living at Wyoming, and we suspect that either he or somebody employed by him has robbed our mine. This man has a store of goods there, and it may happen, when the Indians see their mine robbed, they will come and take away his goods."

In reply to this speech Governor Penn said, among other things :

"We have heard what you say about the mine at Wyoming, and we assure you that we know nothing of this matter ; and if Anderson has settled there he has been guilty of a breach of our general order. * * If any of our people should attempt to take away any ore from your mine you will endeavor to learn their names, and give the Governor early information."

We have heretofore referred (on pages 180, 210 and 279) to the belief of the Indians respecting the existence of mines of valuable minerals in Wyoming Valley. In the circumstances, then, there is no doubt that the "mine" from which "ore" was taken in 1766, as reported to Governor Penn by the Indians, was the coal-bed mentioned in the note on page 210, and that the supposed "ore" was "stone-coal" (as it was then called), or anthracite. On "A Plot of the Manor of Sunbury," on page 454, the location of the beforementioned coal-bed is noted by the words "stone coal." Where the second mine, to which the Indians referred, was situated, we do not know; but it was probably within the present limits of Wilkes-Barré. However, the subject of coal-mines and the earliest mining and use of coal in Wyoming Valley is fully dealt with in Chapter LI.

As to John Anderson, the trader, referred to by the Indians : Early in 1765 Sir William Johnson, as well as the Commissioners of Indian Affairs for Pennsylvania, granted to Capt. Amnos Ogden of New Jersey the right to establish and carry on a trading-post at Wyoming. Asso- ciated with Ogden in this enterprise were Capt. John Dick and John Anderson, and in the Summer of 1765 they repaired to the valley and erected, near the site of Teedyuscung's former town, a substantial log building for their use as a store- and dwelling-house.} Heckewelder says that John Anderson was called by the Indians "the honest Quaker

* See "Pennsylvania Colonial Records," IX : 329.

t See "Pennsylvania Archives," First Series, IV : 401.

# See "Transactions of the Moravian Historical Society," I : 202.

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VIEW OF SOLOMON'S GAP ( MENTIONED ON PAGE 445) FROM ASHLEY CEMETERY. From a photograph taken in 1901.

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44.

trader"; and that between May, 1765, and June, 1769, he went twice a year from Wyoming up the Susquehanna to Friedenshütten, Sheshequin, Tioga Point and other Indian towns on trading expeditions. In Novem- ber, 1765, John Jennings, of Northampton County, accompanied Ander- son from Wyoming to Friedenshütten.

Dr. F. C. Johnson, in his paper mentioned on page 204, says :

"Bishop Jolin Ettwein, who several times passed through Wyoming on his way from Bethlehem to Wyalusing, states in his journal of 1767 : 'On descending the Wyo- ming Mountain* into the valley, my Indian guide pointed out a pile of stones, said to in- dicate the number of Indians who had already climbed the mountain-it being the custom for each one to add one [stone] to the heap on passing that way. At 2 P. M. I reached Mr. Ogden's, where I was hospitably entertained. The Shawanese have all left thie valley, and the only traces of them are their places of burial, in crevices and caves in lhe rocks, at whose entrances stand large stones, painted. * Continued iny journey to Wyalusing. Rode up the east bank of the Susquehanna, through a large flat nine [sic] miles to Lechawah-hanneck [Lackawanna River], where there was an Indian townt up to 1755, and where our missionaries occasionally preached. It is now totally deserted by the Indians. Alongside of the path is a grave-yard,¿ and upwards of thirty graves call be seen."

Heckewelder, in his letter mentioned on page 279, says: "In 1768, when I again traveled through that country [Wyoming Valley], § a Mr. Ogden had a store where the old Indian path struck the river path, about 80 or 100 yards from the river."

The "river path", abovementioned, started in at Teedyuscung's town and ran thence up along the Susquehanna, on or near the left bank of the river, while the "old Indian path" branched off from the "river path" near the intersection of the present Ross and West River Streets, || and, following very closely the course which Ross Street and Hazle Avenne now take, passed through Solomon's Gap (see pages 47 and 56), on over the mountains and through the intervening valleys to and through the Wind Gap (see page 45), and thence onward to Easton. After Teedyuscung's town was established this path through Solomon's Gap (the nearest of all the mountain gaps to the site of the town) was marked out by the Indians and traveled by them in their frequent journeys to and from Easton and points beyond. It soon became the most traveled trail connecting Wyoming with the "Forks of the Dela- ware"; the older trail, leading from Hanover township to Fort Allen on the Lehigh (see page 237), being thenceforth seldom used. On the reproduction of "A Plot of the Manor of Stoke" (see page 455) the loca- tion of Ogden's "store" and the course of the "path to the Wind Gap" are indicated ; and, judging by this plot and the paragraph quoted from Heckewelder's letter, the site of the store-house was undoubtedly near where the north-east corner of Ross and West River Streets is now situ- ated. On the reproduction of the "Sketch of the Encampment at Wyoming," drawn by Lieutenant Colonel Hubley in 1779 (see Chapter XVIII), the dotted lines intersecting each other, opposite the "redoubt" south-west of the "Fort" on the river bank, represent the two Indian paths, or trails, abovementioned.

Beginning with 1766, and continuing for several years, the Indians at Friedenshütten, Sheshequin, Tioga and other points on the Susque-

* What is now known as "Wilkes-Barre Mountain." See page 44.

+ Asserughney, mentioned on page 187, etc.

# Undoubtedly at or near the site of the former village of Matchasaung, mentioned on page 213. See, also, the last paragraph on page 174.

§ With David Zeisberger, Bishop John Ettwein and Gottlieb Sensemann, en route to Friedenshütten.

I See "Map of Wilkes-Barre and its Suburbs in 1872," in Chapter XXVIII.

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hanna to the northward, came down to Wyoming on their Winter hunt- ing expeditions ; and, according to the Moravian diarist* at Friedens- hütten, Papoonhank established "a hunting-lodge at Menachningk" (Monocanock Island, described on page 50, ante) in 1767.

About the 20th of March, 1767, two Tuscaroras arrived at Wyo- ming, avant-couriers of a band of their tribe numbering upwards of seventy men, women and children whom they had left behind at Sha- mokin. These were the last of the Tuscaroras from North Carolina (see page 116), and the two messengers who came to Wyoming proceeded onward, after a short stop, to Friedenshütten to collect corn and request its transportation to Shamokin, without delay, for the use of the Tuscarora emigrants. One of these messengers, a few days later, set out from Friedenshütten for the country of the Cayugas, his object being to ask of those Indians-who, in conjunction with the Oneidas, claimed a special proprietorship in the Wyoming lands (see page 268) -permission for the Tuscaroras "to settle and plant at Lackawanna"; presumably on the site of the old Monsey town, Asserughney. About the 1st of May another messenger from Shamokin passed through Wyo- ming on his way to Friedenshütten, carrying the information that the Tuscaroras had broken camp and were moving up the river. Two days afterwards twenty of the emigrants passed through the valley north- ward, and a few days later upwards of forty. Most of these Tuscaroras went on to Otsiningo, but a few remained at Friedenshütten through the Summer and ensuing Winter.

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A history of Wilkes-Barre, Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, from its first beginnings to the present time; including chapters of newly-discovered, Vol. I, Part 73

Author: Harvey, Oscar Jewell, 1851-1922; Smith, Ernest Gray Publication date: 1909-1930 Publisher: Wilkes-Barre : Raeder Press Number of Pages: 734

Author: Harvey, Oscar Jewell, 1851-1922; Smith, Ernest Gray
Publication date: 1909-1930
Publisher: Wilkes-Barre : Raeder Press
Number of Pages: 734