USA > Pennsylvania > Philadelphia County > Philadelphia > Annals of Philadelphia, and Pennsylvania in the olden time; being a collection of the memoirs, anecdotes, and incidents of the earliest settlements of the inland part of Pennsylvania, Vol. I > Part 17
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The aged Mrs. Preston, who was present on that occasion, used to say, she admired the affability and condescension of the Governor, especially his manner of entering into the spirit and feeling of the Indians; he walked with them, sat down on the ground with them, ate with them of their roasted acorns and hominy. When they got up to exercise and express their joy by hopping and jumping, he finally sprang up, and beat them all. I will not pretend to vouch for this story ; we give it as we received it from honest informants, who certainly believed it themselves. It was a measure harmless in the abstract ; and as a courtesy to the Indians may have been a fine stroke of policy in winning their regard. He was young enough to have been gay; being then only 38 years of age. And one of the old Journalists has left on record, that he was naturally too prone to
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The Landing of Penn at the Blue Anchor Tavern.
cheerfulness for a grave public Friend, especially in the eye of those of them who held " religion harsh, intolerant, austere."
Penn was so pleased with the site of "the low sandy beach," as a landing place, (the rest of the river side being high precipitous banks,) that he made it a public landing place for ever in his original city charter; and the little haven at the creek's mouth so pleased him, as a fit place for a harbour for vessels in the winter, and a se- curity from the driving ice, that he also appropriated so much of it as lay eastward of the Little Dock Creek to be a great dock for ever, to be deepened by digging when needful. The waters there were much deeper at first than in after years, as the place got filled up by the negligence of the citizens. Charles Thomson, Esq., told me of his often seeing such vessels as sloops and schooners lading their flour for the West Indies on the sides of the Dock Creek near to Second Street; and a very aged informant (Mrs. Powell) had seen a schooner once as high as Girard's bank. Charles Thomson also told me of one family of the first settlers whose vessel wintered at the mouth of the creek.
This original tavern, from its location, was at first of first-rate con- sequence as a place of business. It was the proper key of the city, to which all new-comers resorted, and where all small vessels, coming with building timber from Jersey, &c., or with traffic from New Eng- land, made their ready landing. The house was also used as a public ferry, whence people were to cross over Dock Creek to So- ciety Hill, before the causeway and bridge over Front Street were formed, and also to convey persons over to Windmill Island, where was a windmill for grinding their grain, or to cross persons and horses over to Jersey. It was, in short, the busy mart for a few years of almost all the business the little town required.
This landing house, called the Blue Anchor, was the southern- most of ten houses of like dimensions, began about the same time, and called " Budd's Long Row." They had to the eye the appear- ance of brick houses, although they were actually framed with wood, and filled in with small bricks, bearing the appearance of having been imported. J. P. Norris, Esq., has told me that he always un- derstood from his ancestors and others that parts of the buildings, of most labour and most convenient transportations, were brought out in the first vessels, so as to insure greater despatch in finishing a few houses at least for indispensable purposes. Proud's history informs us, that the house of Guest was the most finished house in the city when Penn arrived; and all tradition has designated the Blue An- chor as the first house built in Philadelphia; from this cause, when it was " pulled down to build greater," I preserved some of its timber as appropriate relic-wood. This little house, although sufficiently large in its day, was but about twelve feet front on Front Street, and about twenty-two feet on Dock Street, having a ceiling of about eight and a half feet in height.
" The spring," in a line due west from this house, on the opposite
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The Landing of Penn at the Blue Anchor Tavern.
bank of the creek, was long after a great resort for taking in water for vessels going to sea, and had been seen in actual use by some aged persons still alive in my time, who described it as a place of great rural beauty, shaded with shrubbery and surrounded with rude sylvan seats.
Little Dock Creek, diverging to the southwest had an open pas- sage for canoes and batteaux as high as St. Peter's church, through a region long lying in commons, natural shrubbery, and occasional forest trees, left so standing, long after the city, northward of Dock Creek was in a state of improvement.
The cottage of the Drinker family, seen up the main or north- western Dock Creek, located near the south west corner of Walnut and Second Streets, was the real primitive house of Philadelphia. The father of the celebrated aged Edward Drinker had settled there some years before Penn's colonists came, and Edward himself was born there two years before that time; he lived till after the war of Independence, and used to delight himself often in referring to localities where Swedes and Indians occasionally hutted, and also where Penn and his friends remained at their first landing.
It fully accords with my theories, from observations on the case, that the creek water once overflowed the whole of Spruce Street, from Second Street to the river, and that its outlet extended in a southeastwardly direction along the base of Society Hill, till its south- ernmost extremity joined the Delaware nearly as far south as Union Street. I think these ideas are supported by the fact, which I have ascertained, that all the houses on the southern side of Spruce Street, have occasionally water in their cellars, and also those on the east side of Front Street some distance below Spruce Street. Mr. Samuel Richards told me it was the tradition of his father and other aged persons about the Blue Anchor Tavern, that the creek water in- clined originally much farther southward than Spruce Street. There was doubtless much width of watery surface once there, as it gave the idea to Penn of making it a great winter dock for vessels. We know, indeed, that Captain Loxley, many years ago, was allowed to use the public square, now on the site of the intended dock, in con- bideration of his filling up the whortleberry swamp, before there.
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The Treaty Tree an. Fairman's Mansion.
THE TREATY TREE,
AND
FAIRMAN'S MANSION.
" But thou, broad Elm ! Canst thou tell us nought Of forest Chieftains, and their vanish'd tribes ? -Hast thou no record left Of perish'd generations, o'er whose heads Thy foliage droop'd ?- thou who shadowed once The rever'd Founders of our honour'd State."
THE site of this venerable tree is filled with local impressions The tree itself, of great magnitude and great age, was of most im- pressive grandeur. Other cities of our Union have had their con. secrated trees ; and history abounds with those which spread in ar. borescent glory, and claimed their renown both from the pencil and the historic muse. Such have been " the royal oak," Shakspeare's " mulberry tree," &c.
"From his touch-wood trunk the mulberry tree Supplied such relics as devotion holds Still sacred, and preserves with pious care."
In their state of lofty and silent grandeur they impress a soothing influence on the soul, and lead out the meditative mind to enlarge- ment of conception and thought. On such a spot, Penn, with appropriate acumen, selected his treaty ground. There long stood the stately witness of the solemn covenant-a lasting emblem of the unbroken faith, "pledged without an oath, and never broken!"
Nothing could surpass the amenity of the whole scene as it once stood, before " improvement," that effacive name of every thing rural or picturesque, destroyed its former charms, cut down its sloping verdant bank, razed the tasteful Fairman mansion, and turned all into the levelled uniformity of a city street. Once re- mote from city bustle, and blest in its own silent shades amid many lofty trees, it looked out upon the distant city, "saw the stir of the great Babel, nor felt the crowd ;" long, therefore, it was the favourite walk of the citizen. There he sought his seat and rest. Beneath the wide spread branches of the impending Elm gathered in sum mer whole congregations to hymn their anthems and to hearken to the preacher, beseeching them, "in Christ's stead, to be recon- ciled unto God." Those days are gone, " but sweet's their memory still !'
TREATY TREE AND FAIRMAN'S MANSION .- Page 134.
THE SWEDES' CHURCH AND HOUSE OF SVEN SENER .- Page 146.
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The Treaty Tree and Fairman's Mansion.
Not to further dilate on the picture which the imagination fondly draws of scenes no longer there, we shall proceed to state such facts as the former history of the place affords, to wit :
The fact of the treaty being held under the Elm, depends more upon the general tenor of tradition, than upon any direct facts now in our possession. When all men knew it to be so, they felt little occasion to lay up evidences for posterity. Lest any should here- after doubt it, the following corroborative facts are furnished, to wit :
The late aged Judge Peters said he had no doubt of its being the place of the treaty. He and David H. Conyngham (lately alive) had been familiar with the place from their youth as their swimming place, and both had always heard and always believed it designated the treaty ground. Judge Peters remarked too, that Benjamin Lay, the hermit, who came to this country in 1731, used to visit it and speak of it as the place of the treaty ; of course he had his opinion from those who preceded him. Mr. Thomas Hopkins, who died lately at the age of 93, had lived there upwards of fifty years, and told me he never heard the subject questioned in his time. James Reed, Esq., a nephew of James Logan's wife, who died in 1793, at the age of 71, (a great observer of passing events) used to say of West's paintings of the treaty, that the English characters severally present were all intended to be resemblances, and were so far true, .hat he (Mr. Reed) could name them all. He fully believed the treaty was held at the Elm; and Mrs. Logan has heard him ex- press his regret (in which others will join him) that Benjamin West should have neglected truth so far as to have omitted the river scenery.
Proud says, " the proprietary being now returned from Mary- land to Coaquannock, the place. so called by the Indians, where Philadelphia now stands, began to purchase lands of the natives. It was at this time (says he) when William Penn first entered personally into that lasting friendship with the Indians, [meaning the treaty, it is presumed,] which ever after continued between them."
Clarkson, who had access to all the Penn papers in England, and who had possession of the blue sash of silk with which Penn was girt at the aforesaid famous treaty, gives the following facts, strongly coincident with the fact of the locality of the treaty tree,-saying, " It appears [meaning, I presume, it was in evidence, as he was too remote to be led to the inference by our traditions,] that though the parties were to assemble at Coaquannock, the treaty was made a little higher up, at Shackamaxon." We can readily assign a good reason for the change of place ; the latter had a kind of village near there of Friends, and it had been besides the residence of Indians, and probably had some remains of their families still there.
Benjamin West, who lived here sufficiently early to have neard the direct traditions in favour of the treaty, has left us his deep sense of that historical fact, by giving it the best efforts of his pencil,
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The Treaty Tree and Fairman's Mansion.
and has tnerein drawn the portrait of his grandfather as one of the group of Friends attendant on Penn in that early national act. His picture, indeed, has given no appearance of that tree, but this is of no weight ; as painters, like poets, are indulged to make their own drapery and effect. Nothing can be said against the absence of the tree, which may not be equally urged against the character and po- sition of the range of houses in his back ground, which were cer- tainly never exactly found either at Shackamaxon, Coaquannock, or Upland. But we may rest assured that Mr. West, although he did not use the image of the treaty tree as any part of his picture,* he nevertheless regarded it as the true locality; because he has left a fact from his own pen to countenance it. This he did in relating what he learnt from Colonel Simcoe respecting his protection of that tree during the time of the stay of the British army at and near Philadelphia. It shows so much generous and good feeling from all the parties concerned, that Mr. West's words may be worthy of preservation in this connection, to wit : "This tree, which was held in the highest veneration by the original inhabitants of my native country, by the first settlers, and by their descendants, and to which I well remember, about the year 1755, when a boy, often resorting with my school-fellows, was in some danger during the American war, when the British possessed the country, from parties sent out in search of wood for firing ; but the late General Simcoe, who had the command of the district where it grew, (from a regard for the character of William Penn, and the interest he took in the history connected with the tree,) ordered a guard of British soldiers to protect it from the axe. This circumstance the General related to me, in answer to my inquiries, after his return to England." If we consider the lively interest thus manifested by Mr. West in the tree, connected with the facts that he could have known from his grandfather, who was present and must have left a correct tradition in the family, (thus inducing him to become the painter of the subject) we cannot but be convinced how amply he corroborates the locality above stated.
We have been thus particular because the archives at Harrisburg, which have been searched, in illustration and confirmation of the said treaty, have hitherto been to little effect ; one paper found barely mentions that, " after the treaty was held, William Penn and the Friends went into the house of Lacy Cock."; And Mr. Gordon, the author of the late History of Pennsylvania, informed me that he could only find at Harrisburg the original envelope relating to the treaty papers ; on which was endorsed " Papers relative to the Indian treaty under the great Elm."
In regard to the form and manner of the treaty as held, we think
* Possibly because he could have no picture of it in England, where he painted.
t There is a deed from Governor Henoyon of New York, of the year 1664. granting unto Peter Cock his tract, then called Shackamaxon.
137
The Treaty Tree and Fairman's Mansion.
William Penn has given us ideas, in addition to West's painting, which we think must one day provide material for a new painting of this interesting national subject. Penn's letters of 1683, to the Free Society of Traders, and to the Earl of Sunderland, both de- scribe an Indian treaty to this effect, to wit : To the Society he says, " I have had occasion to be in council with them upon treaties for land, and to adjust the terms of trade. Their order is thus-the king sits in the middle of an half moon and hath his council, the old and wise on each hand. Behind them or at a little distance sit the younger fry in the same figure. Having consulted and resolved their business, the king ordered one of them to speak to me; he stood up, came to me, and in the name of his king saluted me ; then took me by the hand and told me 'he was ordered by his king to speak to me, and that what he should say was the king's mind,' &c. While he spoke not a man of them was observed to whisper or smile. When the purchase was made great promises passed between us of kindness and good neighbourhood, and that we must live in love so long as the sun gave light. This done, another made a speech to the Indians in the name of all the Sachamachers or kings,-first, to tell what was done; next, to charge and com- mand them to love the Christians, and particularly to live in peace with me and my people. At every sentence they shouted, and, in their way, said Amen."
To the Earl of Sunderland, Penn says : " In selling me their land they ordered themselves-the old in a half moon upon the ground; the middle aged in a like figure at a little distance behind them ; and the young fry in the same manner behind them. None speak but the aged,-they having consulted the rest before hand."
We have thus, it may be perceived, a graphic picture of Penn's treaty, as painted by himself ; and, to my mind, the sloping green bank presented a ready amphitheatre for the display of the succes. sive semicircles of Indians.
Fishbourne's MS. Narrative of 1739, says, Penn established a friendly correspondence by way of treaty with the Indians, at least twice a year.
The only mark of distinction used by Penn at the treaty was that of a blue silk net-work sash girt around his waist. This sash is still in existence in England; it was once in possession of Thomas Clarkson, Esq., who bestowed it to his friend as a valuable relic. John Cook, Esq., our townsman, was told this by Clarkson himself in the year 1801,-such a relic should be owned by the Penn Society.
The tree thus memorable was blown over on the 3d of March, 1810; the blow was not deemed generally prevalent, nor strong. In its case, the root was wrenched and the trunk broken off; it fell on Saturday night, and on Sunday many hundreds of people visited it. In its form it was remarkably wide spread, but not lofty; its main branch inclining towards the river measured 150 feet in length; its VOL. I .- S 12*
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The Treaty Tree and Fairman's Mansion.
girth around the trunk was 24 feet, and its age, as it was counted by the inspection of its circles of annual growth, was 283 years. The tree, such as it was in 1800, was very accurately drawn on the spot by Thomas Birch, and the large engraving, executed from it by Seymour, gives the true appearance of every visible limb, &c. While it stood, the Methodists and Baptists often held their summer meetings under its shade. When it had fallen, several took their measures to secure some of the wood as relics. An arm-chair was made from it and presented to Doctor Rush ; a part of it is constructed into something memorable and enduring at Penn's Park, in England. I have some remains of it myself.
But the fallen tree finely revived, in a sucker from it, was flou- rishing in the amplitude of an actual tree on the premises of the Pennsylvania Hospital, in the centre of the western vacant lot, since turned into Linden Street, where it stood a while in the paved street and was cut down in 1841. Messrs. Coates and Brown, managers, placed it there some 25 or 26 years ago. I had myself seen another sucker growing on the original spot, a dozen years ago, amid the lumber of the ship yard. It was then about 15 feet high, and might have been still larger but for neglect and abuse. I was aiding to have it boxed in for protection; but, whether from pre- vious barking of the trunk, or from injuring the roots by settling the box, it did not long survive the intended kindness. Had it lived, it would have been an appropriate shade to the marble monu- ment, since erected near the site of the original tree to perpetuate its memory, with the following four inscriptions on its four sides, to wit:
Treaty ground of
William Penn, and the Indian Nations, 1682, Unbroken faith.
William Penn, Born 1644, Died 1718.
Placed by the Penn Society, A. D. 1827, to mark the site of the Great Elm Tree.
Pennsylvania, Founded, 1681, by Deeds of Peace.
As it is possible, with nourishing earth and due watering, to raise small cuttings from another Elm, I recommend that a successor may yet be placed over the monument!
We come now next in order to speak of the
Fairman Mansion .- This respectable and venerable looking brick edifice was constructed in 1702, for the use of Thomas Fairman, the deputy of Thomas Holme, the Surveyor General, and was taken down in April 1825, chiefly because it encroached on the range of the present street. A brick was found in the wall, on which was marked " Thomas Fairman, September, 1702."
It had been the abode of many respectable inmates, and was once desired as the country seat of William Penn himself,-a place highly appropriate for him who made his treaty there. Governor Evans,
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The Treaty Tree and Fairman's Mansion.
after leaving his office as Governor, dwelt there some time. It was afterwards the residence of Governor Palmer ; and these two names were sufficient to give it the character of the " Governor's House,"- a name which it long retained after the cause had been forgotten. After them the aged and respectable Mr. Thomas Hopkins occupied it for fifty years.
Penn's conception of this beautiful place is well expressed in his letter of 1708, to James Logan, saying, " If John Evans (the late Governor) leaves your place, then try to secure his plantation ; for I think, from above Shackamaxon to the town is one of the plea- santest situations upon the river for a Governor; where one sees and hears what one will and when one will, and yet have a good deal of the sweetness and quiet of the country. And I do assure thee, if the country would settle upon me six hundred pounds per annum, I would hasten over the following summer.# Cultivate this amongst the best Friends." The next year, (1709) his mind being intent on the same thing, he says : " Pray get Daniel Pegg's, or such a remote place, (then on Front near to Green Street) in good order for me and family."
A letter of Robert Fairman, brother of Thomas, the surveyor, dated, London, 10th of 2d mo. 1711, to Jonathan Dickinson, which I have seen in MS., claims to be the proper owner of the estate at Shackamaxon, and saying, "I have been lately in company with William Penn; and, there speaking to him of thy proposing to buy for a friend that plantation at Coxon Creek, (i. e. the Cohocksinc) he says it is a pleasant place for situation, out of the noise of Phila- delphia, but in sight of it,-a place he would choose for his dwelling if he should return there,-says he asks £600 for it." In another letter of the 30th of 8 mo. 1711, he marks its location in front by saying, " The river Delaware joining to said land makes it more valuable than back land, and besides, it is so near the town." He states also, that his brother writes him that thirteen acres of the said land next the creek (Coxon) may ere long be worth £1000. He expressly speaks of the place as situated in "Shackamaxon." In another letter dated the 12th of 3 mo. 1715, which I have preserved, on page 252 of my MS. Annals in the Historical Society, as a sin- gularity for its peculiar hand-writing in text character, he speaks therein of his place near Coxon Creek as having woods and stumps; says the trees have been cut there to form the new bridge on the new road across the creek; speaks of Thomas Fairman's death, and that the widow then on the premises complains of hard usage from Captain Palmer,-the same, it is probable, who afterwards came to be President of the Council, and for a short time, in 1747, Governor, ex-officio.
* We may here see how absolutely determined, and pledged too, Penn once was to return and settle his family forever among us, by his request in next year to engage Pegg's house. I presume, E'vans' house could not then be had, and that he was actually encouraged to come over at the £600 a year; but after circumstances in England pre vented his return here.
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The Treaty Tree and Fairman's Mansion.
" Governor Anthony Palmer," so called in his latter years, was a wealthy gentleman who came from the West Indies about the year 1709, and lived in a style suited to his circumstances, keeping a coach, then a great luxury, and a pleasure barge, by which he readily made his visits from Shackamaxon to the city. He was said to have had 21 children by his first wife, all of whom died of consumptions; some of his descendants by a second wife are now residents of Phila- delphia. The present aged colonel A. J. Morris told me that he heard old Mr. Tatnal say, that Governor Palmer offered him a great extent of Kensington lots on the River Street at six pence a foot ground-rent forever,-a small sum for our present conceptions of its value, changing as the whole scene now is to a city form, filling with houses, cutting down eminences, and filling up some lower places* to the general level,-a change, on the whole, not unlike what must have been the superficial change originally effected at Philadelphia.
Old Edward Duffield, the executor of Dr. Franklin's will, who used to own land in Kensington and had been curious to enquire the meaning of Shackamaxon, told his son that he learnt that it meant the " field of blood," in reference to a great Indian battle once sus- tained there; I must remark, however, that the Delaware missionary, Mr. Luckenbach, informed me that if it was a Delaware word, al- lowing for a little variation in spelling, it meant " a child not able to feed itself." In general he deemed our Indian names of Shawnese origin .- Another and most probable sense, is, the place of Eels .- Vide Heckewelder.
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