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 32
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9 75
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11 00
10 00
9 50
1814
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1815
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8 00
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7 75
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9 00
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13 50
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1818
10 00
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1819
9 00
8 75
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1820
6 00
5 50
5 00
1821
4 00
4 00
3 75
1822
6 25
6 25
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1823
7 00
6 75
7 00
1824
6 00
6 00
6 12
1825
4 87
5 12
5 12
1826
4 75
4 62
50
1827
5 75
6 00
5 75
1828
5 00
4 87
4 75
1829
8 50
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1830
4 62
4 50
4 50
1831
6 12
6 25
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1832
5 50
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1833
5 75
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1834
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1835
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1836
6 50
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11 00
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1802
113
Changes in Prices of Diet, g.c.
At and after the period of the Revolution, when wheat was 5s. a bushel, the price of labour in the harvest time was 2s. 6d., and for boys, 1s. 3d. a day. I have seen wealthy men, in Chester county who had, in their boyhood, worked many days at reaping for 1s. 3d a day, and afterwards, in manhood, at 2s. 6d. The sons of such men won't now labour at all !
There were no two prices in stores and markets in Philadelphia, until after the introduction of the French from St. Domingo ;- they would insist, in all cases, upon abatement, and they and the public generally, in time, found themselves accommodated accordingly !
Changes in Prices of Land .- In such a growing city it was to be expected that the occasional changes in the value of lots and pro- perty would be very great.
To begin with Gabriel Thomas' account of 1698, he says, within the compass of twelve years that which might have been bought for 15 or 18 shillings, is now sold for £80 in ready silver, and some other lots, that might have been purchased for £3, within the space of two years were sold for £100 a piece, and likewise some land that lies near the city, that sixteen years ago might have been pur- chased for 6 or £8 the hundred acres, cannot now be bought under 150 or £200.
The ancient Mrs. Shoemaker, told me that her grandfather, James Lownes, was offered for £20, the whole square from High street to Arch street, and from Front to Second street, by William Penn himself. He declined it, saying, how long shall I wait to see my money returned in profit.
The aged Owen Jones, Esq., informed me that he had heard at several times that William Penn offered his hired man, a coachman, &c., the whole of the square of ground included between Chestnut and Walnut, and Front and Second streets, in lieu of one year's wages-probably of £15.
Mr. Abel James. the father of the late Doctor James, used to tell him that one Moon, of Bucks county, a Friend, was the person above alluded to, and that he used to visit Mr. James' family, and told him he had chosen a moderate tract of land in Bucks county in preference to the above mentioned square .*
The same Mr. Owen Jones said the greatest rise of city plots he had ever known, were the sales of proprietaries' city lots after the sales of their estate. They rising, in hundreds of instances, he said. to have ground rents at more than double the price of the first purchase.
He related to me what he heard from the grandson of the first or second Samuel Powell, that he bought the two whole squares in-
* I might mention, that I used to hear a tradition that Penn's coachman had been offered the square on which Lætitia court is located ; as that was but half a square it is the most probable story. And possibly the offer to Lownes was the same square also, and mistold in a lapse of years. The other squares were soon out of Penn's disposal, as belonging to purchasers and drawn by lot.
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cluded between Spruce and Pine streets, and Fifth and Seventh streets, for £50 each-a rise of more than one thousand for one! Even when he gave those prices he bought reluctantly and at two or three several times-for he afterwards, I believe, added, at the same terms, the square from Fourth to Third street. This was originally the property of the " Free Society of Traders," and is certainly one evidence how ill they managed their interests for their eventual good. Powell, on the contrary, by holding on, realized a great for tune for his posterity from such slender occasion.
The aged Colonel Morris informed me that he heard old Tratnal say, that Governor Palmer offered him a great extent of Kensington lots, fronting on the river street, at six pence per foot ground rent forever.
Anthony Duché, a respectable Protestant refugee from France, ancestor of the well known Parson Duché, came with his wife over to Pennsylvania in the same ship with William Penn, who had bor- rowed a small sum of about £30 from him. After the arrival Penn offered him, in lieu of the return of the money, " a good bargain," as he said-a square between Third and Fourth streets, with only the exception of the burial ground occupied by Friends on Mulberry and Fourth streets,* the proprietor observing that he knew the lot was cheap, but that he had a mind to favour him, in return for his kindness. Mr. Duché replied, " You are very good, Mr. Penn, and the offer might prove advantageous, but the money would suit me better." " Blockhead !" (rejoined the proprietor, provoked at his overlooking the intended benefit,) " Well, well, thou shalt have thy money, but canst thou not see that this will be a very great city in a very short time ?" "So I was paid," said Duche, who told this story, " and have ever since repented my own folly !" The above anecdote was told by Charles Thomson, Esq., to Mrs. D. Logan, . and to her brother, J. P. Norris, at different times, saying he had received it from the son of Duché.
During the whole time of the carrying trade in the Revolutionary war of France, our city and landed property near it constantly rose in value-as men got rich in trade and desired to invest funds in buildings, &c. In this state of things, John Kearney con- tracted with Mr. Lyle to buy the estate called Hamilton's wharf and stores, near the Drawbridge, for $50,000. He gave $20,000 in part payment, built $11,000 additional buildings thereon, and after al. chose to forfeit the whole rather than pay the remaining $20,000! This was, indeed, an extraordinary case ; but it shows the great re- duction of value after the peace.
The same James Lyle, as agent, sold the Bush hill estate of two hundred acres to General Cadwallader and associates, for the laying out of a town. They were to give a perpetual ground rent of nearly $100 daily-say $36,000 per annum, and after actually pay- ing in $200,000 they surrendered back the whole!
* It was first offered to Thomas Lloyd, whose wife was the first person interred there.
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Superstitions and Popular Credulity.
SUPERSTITIONS AND POPULAR CREDULITY.
" Well attested, and as well believ'd, Heard solemn, goes the goblin story round, Till superstitious horror creeps o'er all !"
OUR forefathers (the ruder part) brought with them much of the superstition of their " father land," and here it found much to cherish and sustain it, in the credulity of the Dutch and Swedes, nor less from the Indians, who always abounded in marvellous relations, much incited by their conjurers and pow-wows. Facts which have come down to our more enlightened times, can now no longer terrify ; but may often amuse, as Cowper says,
" There's something in that ancient superstition, Which, erring as it is, our fancy loves !"
From the provincial executive minutes, preserved at Harrisburg, we learn the curious fact of an actual trial for witchcraft. On the 27th of 12 mo., 1683, Margaret Mattson and Yeshro Hendrickson, (Swedish women) who had been accused as witches on the 7th inst. were cited to their trial ; on which occasion there were present, as their judges, Governor William Penn and his council, James Harrison, William Biles, Lasse Cock, William Haigne, C. Taylor, William Clayton and Thomas Holmes. The Governor having given the Grand Jury their charge, they found the bill ! The testimony of the witnesses before the Petit Jury is recorded. Such of the Jury as were absent were fined forty shillings each.
Margaret Mattson being arraigned, " she pleads not guilty, and will be tried by the country." Sundry witnesses were sworn, and many vague stories told-as that she bewitched calves, geese, &c., &c .- that oxen were rather above her malignant powers, but which reached all other cattle.
The daughter of Margaret Mattson was said to have expressed her convictions of her mother being a witch. And the reported say-so's of the daughter were given in evidence. The dame Mattson " denieth Charles Ashcom's attestation at her soul, and saith where is my daughter ? let her come and say so," ___ " the prisoner denieth all things, and saith that the witness speaks only by hear say." Go- vernor Penn finally charged the Jury, who brought in a verdict sufficiently ambiguous and ineffective for such a dubious offence, saying they find her "guilty of having the common fame of a witch, but not guilty in the manner and form as she stands indicted." They, however, take care to defend the good people from their future inalfaisance by exacting from each of them security for good be- VOL. I .- 2 I 23
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haviour for six months. A decision infinitely more wise than hang- ing or drowning! They had each of them husbands, and Lasse Cock served as interpreter for Mrs. Mattson. The whole of this trial may be seen in detail in my MS. Annals, page 506, in the Historical Society.
By this judicious verdict we as Pennsylvanians have probably escaped the odium of Salem. It is not, however, to be concealed that we had a law standing against witches; and it may possibly exone- rate us in part, and give some plea for the trial itself, to say it was from a precedent by statute of King James I. That act was held to be part of our law by an act of our provincial Assembly, entitled "an act against conjuration, witchcraft and dealing with evil and wicked spirits." It says therein, that the act of King James I. " shall be put in execution in this province, and be of like force and effect as if the same were here repeated and enacted !" So solemnly and gravely sanctioned as was that act of the king, what could we as colonists do ! Our act as above was confirmed in all its parts, by the dignified council of George II., in the next year after its passage here, in the presence of eighteen peers, including the great duke of Marlborough himself !*
The superstition, such as it was, may have been deemed the com- mon sin of the day. The enlightened Judge Hale himself fell into its belief. Our sister city, New York, had also her troubles with her witches. Soon after the English began to rule there, in 1664, a man and wife were arraigned as such, and a verdict found by the Jury against one of them ; and in 1672, the people of West Chester complained to the British governor, of a witch among them. A similar complaint, made next year to the Dutch governor, Colve, was dismissed as groundless. The Virginians too, lax as we may have deemed them then in religious sentiments, had also their trial of Grace Sherwood, in Princess Ann county-as the records still there may show. The populace also seconded the court, by sub- jecting her to the trial of water, and the place at Walks' farm, near the ferry, is still called "witch duck !" The Bible, it must be con- ceded, always countenanced these credences ; but now, " a genera. tion more refined" think it their boast to say " we have no hoofs nor horns in our religion !"
An old record of the province, of 1695, states the case of Robert Reman, presented at Chester for practising geomanty, and divining by a stick. The Grand Jury also presented the following books as vicious, to wit :- Hidson's Temple of Wisdom, which teaches geo- manty. Stott's Discovery of Witchcraft, and Cornelius Agrippa's Teaching Negromancy-another name probably for necromancy.
* Nor was the dread of witchcraft an English failing only. We may find enough of it in France also; for six hundred persons were executed there for that alleged crime in 1609! In 1634, Grandiere, a priest of Loudun, was burnt for bewitching a whole convent of nuns! In 1654, twenty women were executed in Bretagne for their witchenes !
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The latter latinized name forcibly reminds one of those curious similar books of great value, (even of fifty thousand pieces of suver,) destroyed before Paul at Ephesus-" multi autum curiosa agentium, onferentes libros combusserunt eoram omnibus."
Superstition has been called the "seminal principle of religion," because it undoubtedly has its origin in the dread of a spiritual world of which God is the supreme. The more vague and unde- fined our thoughts about these metaphysical mysteries, the more our minds are disposed to the legends of the nursery. As the man who walks in the dark, not seeing nor knowing his way, must feel increase of fear at possible dangers he cannot define, so he who goes abroad in the broad light of day proceeds fearlessly, because he sees and knows as harmless all the objects which surround him. Where- fore we infer, that if we have less terror of imagination now, it is ascribable to our superior light and general diffusion of intelligence, thereby setting the mind at rest in many of these things. In the mean time there is a class who will cherish their own distresses. They intend religious dread, but from misconceptions of its real beneficence and " good will to men," they,-
"Draw a wrong copy of the Christian face Without the smile, the sweetness, or the grace."
We suppose some such views possessed the mind of the discrimi- nating Burke, when he incidentally gave in his suffrage in their favour, saying, "Superstition is the religion of feeble minds, and they must be tolerated in an intermixture of it in some shape or other, else you deprive weak minds of a resource, found necessary to the strongest." Dean Swift has called it " the spleen of the soul."
Doctor Christopher Witt, born in England in 1675, came to this country in 1704, and died at Germantown in 1765, at the age of 90. He was a skilful physician, and a learned religious man. He was reputed a magus or diviner, or in grosser terms, a conjurer. He was a student and a believer in all the learned absurdities and marvellous pretensions of the Rosicrucian philosophy. The Germans of that day, and many of the English, practised the casting of nativities. As this required mathematical and astronomical learning, it often followed that such a competent scholar was called a "fortuneteller." Doctor Witt cast nativities for reward, and was called a conjurer, while his friend Christopher Lehman, who could do the same, and actually cast the nativities of his own children, (which I have seen,) was called a scholar and a gentleman.
Germantown was certainly very fruitful in credulity, and gave support to some three regular professors in the mysterious arts of hocus pocus and divination. Besides the Doctor before named, there was his disciple and once his inmate, Mr. Fraily-sometimes dubbed doctor also, though not possessed of learning. He was, however, pretty skilful in several diseases. When the cows and horses, and even persons, got strange diseases, such as baffled ordinary medi
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cines, it was often a dernier resort to consult either of these persons for relief, and their prescriptions, without seeing the patients, were often given under the idea of witchcraft somehow, and the cure was effected !
" Old Shrunk," as he was called, lived to the age of 80, and was also a great conjurer. Numerous persons from Philadelphia and elsewhere, some even from Jersey, went often to him to find out stolen goods and to get their fortunes told. They used to consult him, to learn where to go and dig for money. Several persons, whose names I suppress, used to go and dig for hidden treasures of nights. On such occasions, if any one " spoke" while digging, or ran from terror without " the magic ring," previously made with incantation round the place, the whole influence of the spell was lost.
An idea was once very prevalent, especially near to the Delaware and Schuylkill rivers, that the pirates of Blackbeard's day had de- posited treasure in the earth. The conceit was, that sometimes they killed a prisoner, and interred him with it, to make his ghost keep his vigils there as a guard "walking his weary round." Hence it was not rare to hear of persons having seen a shpook or ghost, or of having dreamed of it a plurality of times; thus creating a sufficient incentive to dig on the spot.
"Dream after dream ensues: And still they dream that they shall succeed, And still are disappointed !"
To procure the aid of a professor in the black art was called hexing; and Shrunk in particular had great fame therein. He affected to use a diviner's rod, (a hazel switch) with a peculiar angle in it, which was to be self-turned while held in the two hands when approached to any subterrane minerals. Some still use the same kind of hazel rods to feel for hidden waters, so as thereby to dig in right places for wells.
Colonel Thomas Forrest, who died in 1828, at the age of 83, had been in his early days a youth of much frolic and fun, always well disposed to give time and application to forward a joke. He found much to amuse himself in the credulity of some of the German families. I have heard him relate some of his anecdotes of the prestigious kind with much humour. When he was about 21 years of age, a tailor who was measuring him for a suit of clothes, hap- pened to say, "Ah! Thomas, if you and I could only find some of the money of the sea robbers, (the pirates) we might drive our coach for life !" The sincerity and simplicity with which he uttered this, caught the attention of young Forrest, and when he went home he began to devise some scheme to be amused with his credulity and superstition. There was a prevailing belief that the pirates had hidden many sums of money and much of treasure about the banks of the Delaware. Forrest got an old parchment, on which he wrote the dying testimony of one John Hendricks, executed at Tyburn for
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piracy, in which he stated that he had deposited a chest and pot of money at Cooper's Point in the Jerseys. This parchment he smoked, and gave to it the appearance of antiquity ; and calling on his Ger- man tailor, he told him he had found it among his father's papers, who had got it in England from the prisoner, whom he visited in pri- son. This he showed to the tailor as a precious paper which he could by no means lend out of his hand. This operated the desired effect.
Soon after the tailor called on Forrest with one Ambruster, a printer, whom he introduced as capable of "printing any spirit out of hell," by his knowledge of the black art. He asked to show him the parchment; he was delighted with it, and confidently said he could conjure Hendricks to give up the money. A time was ap- pointed to meet in an upper room of a public house in Philadelphia, by night, and the innkeeper was let into the secret by Forrest. By the night appointed, they had prepared by a closet, a communication with a room above their sitting room, so as to lower down by a pulley, the invoked ghost, who was represented by a young man entirely sewed up in a close white dress on which were painted black eyed sockets, mouth, and bare ribs with dashes of black between them, the outside and inside of the legs and thighs blackened, so as to make white bones conspicuous there. About twelve persons met in all, seated around a table. Ambruster shuffled and read out cards, on which were inscribed the names of the New Testament saints, telling them he should bring Hendricks to encompass the table, visible or invisible he could not tell. At the words "John Hendricks, du verfluchter cum heraus," the pulley was heard to reel, the closet door to fly open, and John Hendricks with ghastly appearance to stand forth. The whole were dismayed and fled, save Forrest the brave. After this, Ambruster, on whom they all depended, declared that he had by spells got permission to take up the money. A day was therefore appointed to visit the Jersey shore and to dig there by night. The parchment said it lay between two great stones. For- rest, therefore, prepared two black men to be entirely naked except white petticoat breeches ; and these were to jump each on the stone whenever they came to the pot, which had been previously put there. These frightened off the company for a little. When they next essayed they were assailed by cats tied two and two, to whose tails were spiral papers of gunpowder, which illuminated and whizzed, while the cats whawled. The pot was at length got up, and brought in great triumph to Philadelphia wharf : but oh, sad disaster! while helping it out of the boat, Forrest, who managed it, and was hand- ing it up to the tailor, trod upon the gunnel and filled the boat, and holding on to the pot, dragged the tailor into the river-it was lost! For years afterwards they reproached Forrest for that loss, and de- clared he had got the chest himself and was enriched thereby. He favoured the conceit, until at last they actually sued him on a writ of treasure trove ; but their lawyer was persuaded to give it up as idle. Some years afterwards Mr. Forrest wrote a very humorous
23*
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play, (which I have seen printed)* which contained many incidents of this kind of superstition. It gave such offence to the parties re- presented, that it could not be exhibited on the stage. I remember some lines in it, for it had much of broken English and German English verses, to wit :
" My dearest wife, in all my life Ich neber was so frighten'd, De spirit come and I did run, "T'was juste like tunder mit lightning."
For many years he had great reputation for hexing, [conjuring.] He always kept a hazel rod, scraped and smoked, with which to divine where money was hid. Once he lent it to a man, who for its use gave a cart load of potatoes to the poor house. A decent storekeeper once got him to hex for his wife, who had conceited that an old Mrs. Wiggand had bewitched her, and made her to swallow a piece of linsey woolsey. He cured her by strong emetics, and a piece of woolsey, which he showed dripping wet came out of her stomach ! He made his Dutch girl give up some stolen money, by touching her with cow itch, and after laying down on his couch and groaning, &c., till she began to itch and scratch, he seemed to be enraged, and said, now I am putting fire into your flesh, and if you do not immediately tell how and when you took my money, I'll burn you up by conjuration, and make your ghost to be pained and tell it out before your face. She made full confession, and the cir- cumstance got abroad, and added still more to his fame. He has told me he has been gravely told many times where ghosts have been seen, and invited to come with his hazel rod and feel if the money was not there. All this superstition has now subsided, and can be laughed at by the present generation as harmless and amusing anec- dotes of the ancient day.
Timothy Matlack, Esq., when 95 years of age, a close observer of passing events in his youth, has assured me there was much more of superstition prevalent in olden time than now : wherefore, fortune- telling, conjuration, and money digging, were frequent in his youth. He declared it was a fact, before his time, that a young man, a stranger of decent appearance from the south, (the rogues lived there in the ancient days, in the transport colonies of Maryland and Vir- ginia) gave out he was sold to the devil! and that unless the price was raised for his redemption by the pious, he would be borne off at midday by the purchaser in person! He took his lodgings at the inn in Lætitia court, and at the eventful day he was surrounded, and the house too, by the people, among whom were several clergymen. Prayers and pious services of worship were performed, and as the moment approached for execution, when all were on tiptoe, some expecting the verification, and several discrediting it, a murmur ran
* A copy is now in the Atheneum, called " The Disappointment, or Force of Credu lity, 2d edition, 1796."
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through the crowd of " there he comes ! he comes !" This instantly generated a general panic-all fled, from fear, or from the rush of the crowd. When their fears a little subsided, and a calmer inqui- sition ensued, sure enough, the young man was actually gone, money and all! I should have stated that the money was collected to pay the price ; and it lay upon the table in the event of the demand ! Mr. Matlack assured me he fully believed these transactions occurred. The story was as popular a tale as the story of the "Paxtang boys."
In confirmation he told me a fact which he witnessed. Michael H-, Esq., well known in public life, who lived in Second street above Arch street, gave out (in a mental delirium it is hoped,) that he had sold himself to the devil, and would be carried away at a certain time. At that time crowds actually assembled near the pre- mises to witness the denouement and catastrophe! There must have been truth in this relation, because I now see by the Gazette of 1749, a public notice of this public gathering as an offensive act to the family. I see that M. H. is vindicated from some malicious reports, which said he was distracted, &c., and witnesses appear before Judge Allen, and testify that he was then sane, &c. It was certainly on every side a strange affair!
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