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. III > Part 53
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Country-Seats.
COUNTRY-SEATS.
Bush Hill and The Woodlands, p. 479 .- This property was grant ed to Andrew Hamilton by warrants in 1726 and 1729 by the Pro- prietaries for legal services done them-by Hannah Penn and John, Richard, and Thomas Penn. Afterward he bought a portion of Springettsbury, and a patent for the whole tract of 153 acres was issued to him in 1734. It included the land north of Vine street to Coates street, and from Twelfth to Nineteenth street. He acquired also a noble property in Lancaster county. The town of Lancaster was laid out on his property in 1728. He also owned The Woodlands. He died in 1741, a year after his splen- did mansion was built, and left the Bush Hill property to his son James, and The Woodlands to his other son, Andrew. His other child, Margaret, married William Allen, Provincial chief- justice, a man of great wealth ; one of their daughters married John Penn, son of Richard Penn, the last Proprietary governor. (See Vol. I. 594.)
James Hamilton, son of Andrew the first, succeeded to the Bush Hill property, and was lieutenant-governor 1747-54, and again 1759-63, and president of the Council in 1771. He was a liberal patron of the arts and sciences, and was president of the American Philosophical Society before its union with the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge under the auspices of Dr. Franklin. He died in New York in 1783.
William Hamilton, son of Andrew the first, died in 1746.
Andrew the second inherited about 300 acres in West Phil- adelphia, which Andrew the first had obtained from Stephen Jackson in 1735. He improved his title through a deed executed by the trustees of the Loan Office. He erected a mansion and added to the number of acres, and called it " The Woodlands." He married a daughter of William Till in 1741. He laid out the portion of West Philadelphia called Hamilton Village, of which the boundaries are extinguished in the city of Philadelphia. He devised his property of 356 acres August 27, 1747, to his son William.
William Hamilton never married. He was one of the earliest patrons of art and collectors of pictures in this country. He cul- tivated the art of ornamental gardening. The present mansion in the Woodlands Cemetery was erected about the time of the Revolution, and is a finer one than the first mansion. William, at first in favor of the Revolutionary cause, was afterward sus- pected as a Tory, and went to New York in 1783. Being a good liver, he became embarrassed and sold the Hamilton Village lots. He owned the Lancaster property also, on which Lancaster was built.
His brother, Andrew the third, married Abigail, daughter of
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David Franks. Their daughter, Ann, married James Lyle ; she was a beautiful woman. Their daughter married Hartman Kuhn.
William Hamilton's nephew, William, succeeded to the estate of The Woodlands. There were two other nephews, James and Andrew, who lived in a fine house at the north-east corner of Seventh and Jayne streets. William died a bachelor, and An- drew the fourth married Eliza Johnson, and died abroad. The names of Hamilton and Allen are extinct, and are only repre- sented by married daughters, connected with some of the best families in Philadelphia and New York.
Mount Pleasant .- This mansion, near the Reading Railroad Bridge on the Schuylkill, now called Washington Retreat, built by Captain John Macpherson before the Revolutionary war, was called Mount Pleasant. He was the father of Captain John Mac- pherson of the Revolutionary army, who was killed at the siege of Quebec, and of General William Macpherson, commander, after the Revolution, of the volunteer organization called Macpherson's Blues. Captain John Macpherson the elder was a privateersman, and made much money by prizes. John Adams, in his diary while he was a member of the First Congress in 1774-75, men- tions a dinner at Macpherson's mansion which he attended, and speaks enthusiastically of the beauty of the house and the rich- ness of the entertainment. In 1777 this house was bought by Benedict Arnold, who was then in command at Philadelphia, and who had made much money by illicit trade with the British at New York. The property was confiscated by the State of Pennsylvania after his treason was discovered, subject to the life- estate of his wife, formerly Peggy Shippen. It afterward became the property of General Jonathan Williams. (See Varlo's map of Philadelphia city and its environs, 1797-98, and John Hill's map, of 1807-08, for the names of the country-seats on the Schuyl- kill between Mount Pleasant and Laurel Hill.)
Belmont, p. 480 .- Belmont, on the west side of the Schuylkill, and now in the Park, was made famous by Richard Peters and the celebrated company which visited there. William Peters, who gave the name to this estate, brother of Rev. Richard Peters, bought in 1742, from the widow of Daniel Jones (afterward Mrs. William Couch), and of the other heirs of Daniel Jones, a tract of 220 acres in Blockley township, including the adjacent island in the river, now called Peters's Island. In 1786, William Peters and his wife transferred this property to their son, Richard Peters. It became eminent as the resort of the most noted men of the time, who assembled to enjoy the wit of their host and admire his excellent farming and the many novel improvements he in- troduced. The judge was a noted man for his witty repartees, and during the Revolution his aid and judgment were invaluable. In the garden were two trees planted by Washington and La
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Fayette; many valuable and rare plants also adorned it. The road passing through this place west of the mansion, leading from Lancaster turnpike to Schuylkill Falls, was called Monument road, on account of a monument about twenty-five feet high erected alongside of it before 1808; its object is the subject of various traditions, but is really unknown.
RELICS OF WASHINGTON.
IN many of the books of Washington in his library he had in- serted his book-plate. It displayed the name and armorial bear- ings of the owner. The family arms were-" Argent, two bars gules in chief, three mullets of the second. Crest, a raven, with wings, indorsed proper, issuing out of a ducal coronet, or." It will be seen by the illustration the shield was white or silver, with two red bars across it, and above them three spur-rowels, the combination appearing like the stripes and stars on our national ensign. The crest was a raven of natural color issu- ing out of a ducal golden coronet. The three mullets or star- figures indicated the filial distinction of the third son. The motto was Exitus acta probat-" The end justifies the means."
The library was large for the time, and contained the best books and best editions of the day, but mostly of a solid, practical character, principally on history, agriculture, law, travels, diction- aries, military science, pamphlets, maps and charts, etc. It be- came the property of John A. Washington, who was on the staff of General Robert E. Lee, and who perished at an early period of the late civil war. His wife being dead, the books were scat- tered among their heirs. A portion of them was sold by one of the heirs through M. Thomas & Son at auction Nov. 28, 1876. The sale, possessing extraordinary interest for book-collectors, as well as lovers of relics and of the Father of his Country, brought bidders from all parts of the country. The books sold compara- tively low, though of course bringing much higher prices than the same books ordinarily would. We were fortunate to secure four volumes containing notes and comments in the clear, bold hand of their former and illustrious owner.
When Washington went to New York as President, he took Mr. McComb's house, lately occupied by the French minister, and purchased part of the latter's furniture. Among the ar- ticles he obtained a writing-desk, or secretary, and also an easy-chair that was used with it. He finally took them to Mount Vernon, and in his will left them thus: "To my com- panion-in-arms and old and intimate friend, Dr. Craik, I give my bureau (or, as cabinet-makers call it, tambour secretary) and the circular chair, an appendage of my study." They are now
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in possession of a grandson of Dr. Craik, the Rev. James Craik of Louisville, Ky.
The illustrations of seals are from his seal-ring, which bore his family arms and motto, and from two watch-seals which he wore together in early life. Upon each of the last two is engraved his monogram, one of them being a fac-simile of his written initials. One of these was lost by Washington himself on the bloody field of Monongahela, where Braddock was defeated in 1755, and the other by his nephew in Virginia more than thirty-five years ago. Both were found in the year 1854, and restored to the Washing- ton family !
Washington's watch was one he ordered from Lepine, " watch- maker to the king." It was smaller and flatter than, and not so bulky as, the old-fashioned English watch. He carried it, with his seal and key, both of carnelian, attached to a ribbon. The dial is of white enamel, the seconds figures carmine red; the case is of gold alloyed with copper, giving it the red appearance of jeweller's gold. The watch, with the key and seals, became the. property of Bushrod Washington, the general's nephew, and was willed by him to Robert Adams of Philadelphia, and at his death to Bushrod Adams. On March 23, 1830, it was forwarded to Mr. Adams by John A. Washington, who inherited Mount Ver- non from his uncle Bushrod. It is now in the possession of Bushrod Washington Adams of Philadelphia, and is preserved with the greatest care.
Washington carried with him to Mount Vernon a pair of ele- gant pistols, which, with equally elegant holsters, had been pre- sented to him by the Count de Moustier, the French minister, as a token of personal regard. These weapons, it is believed, are the ones presented by Washington to Colonel Samuel Hay of the Tenth Pennsylvania regiment, who stood high in the esteem of his general. They bear the well-known cipher of the general, and were purchased at the sale of Colonel Hay's effects after his death, in November, 1803, by John Y. Baldwin of Newark, N. J. His son, J. O. Baldwin, presented one of them to Isaac I. Green- wood of New York in 1825, in whose possession it remained, the other having been lost on the occasion of a fire which destroyed the residence of his mother.
On Christmas Eve, 1783, Washington, a private citizen, arrived at Mount Vernon, and laid aside for ever his military clothes and sword. That sword, with Franklin's staff, now stands in a glass case in the Patent Office. This sword he had worn through- out all the later years of the war, and it was doubtless used by him in the old French war, for upon a silver plate attached to it is en- graved "1757." It hung at Mount Vernon for almost twenty years. It is a kind of hanger, encased in a black leather scabbard with silver mountings. The handle is ivory, colored a pale green and wound with silver wire in spiral grooves. It was manu-
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factured by J. Bailey in Fishkill, New York. Franklin's cane is a long, knotty black cane, bequeathed to Washington by the sage in the following clause in the codicil to his will : " My fine crab-tree walking-stick, with a gold head curiously wrought in the form of a cap of liberty, I give to my friend and the friend of mankind, General Washington. If it were a sceptre, he has merited it, and would become it. It was a present to me from that excellent woman, Madame de Forbach, the dowager-duch- ess of Deuxponts."
" The sword of the Hero ! The staff of the Sage ! Whose valor and wisdom Are stamped on the age ! Time-hallowed mementos Of those who have riven The sceptre from tyrants, The lightning from heaven." MORRIS.
In the same glass case are other interesting relics of Washing- ton, the most conspicuous of which is his camp-chest, an old-fash- ioned hair trunk, twenty-one inches in length, fifteen in width. and ten in depth, filled with the table-furniture used by the com- mander-in-chief during the war. The compartments are so in- geniously arranged that they contain a great number of articles in a small space. These consist of a gridiron ; tea- and coffee- pots ; three tin saucepans ; five small glass flasks, used for honey, salt, coffee, port wine, and vinegar ; three large tin meat-dishes ; sixteen plates ; two knives and five forks; a candlestick and tin- derbox ; tin boxes for tea and sugar ; and five small bottles for pepper and other materials for making soup.
In September, 1757, in apparent expectation of a wife, the care- ful bachelor prepares the mansion for her reception. He wrote to Richard Washington : " Be pleased, over and above what I have wrote for in a letter of the 13th of April, to send me 1 doz. Strong Chairs, of about 15 shillings apiece, the bottoms to be exactly made by the enclosed dimensions, and of three different colors to suit the paper of three of the bed-chambers, also wrote for in my last. I must acquaint you, sir, with the reason of this request. I have one dozen chairs that were made in the country ; neat, but too weak for common sitting. I therefore propose to take the bottoms out of those and put them into these now ordered, while the bottoms which you send will do for the former, and furnish the chambers. For this reason the workmen must be very exact, neither making the bottoms larger nor smaller than the dimensions, otherwise the change can't be made. Be kind enough to give directions that these chairs, equally with the others and the tables, be carefully packed and stored. Without this caution they are liable to infinite damage."
Mrs. Ella B. Washington of Columbia Heights is great-grand VOL. III .- 2 G 42 *
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niece of General Washington, and also of Martha Washington. She is the widow of Lewis W. Washington, a great-grand-nephew of George Washington. They formerly lived in Virginia, and obtained, by virtue of their relationship, a large number of relics of the Washington family. The family suffered great losses by the late war, and at its close Mrs. Washington was obliged to offer some of the relics for sale. She sold some of the relics to the State of New York for $20,000.
There was a bond of union of peculiar strength between Wash- ington and La Fayette, other than that of mere friendship. They were members of the fraternity of Free and Accepted Masons, and both loved the mystic brotherhood sincerely. Madame La Fayette was deeply interested in everything that engaged the at- tention of her husband, and she had learned to reverence Wash- ington with a feeling closely allied to that of devotion. Desiring to present some visible token of her feelings when La Fayette resolved to visit Washington at Mount Vernon, she prepared with her own hands an apron of white satin, upon which she wrought in needlework the various emblems of the Masonic order. This apron La Fayette brought with him and presented to his distin- guished brother. It was kept by Washington as a cherished men orial of a noble woman, and after his death his legatees formally presented it to the Washington Benevolent Society of Philadelphia. When this society was dissolved the precious memento was presented to the Grand Lodge of Pennsylvania, and now occupies a conspicuous position in the Masonic Hall of Philadelphia, under a glass case in a frame. Washington was a Past Master.
For his able attack upon Boston and freeing it from the Brit- ish soldiery Congress decreed a gold medal to the victor. Du- vivier of Paris cut the die ; upon the front in Latin was, "The American Congress to George Washington, commander-in-chief of its armies, the assertors of Freedom," and on the reverse, " The enemy for the first time put to flight-Boston recovered, 17th March, 1776."
Among the numerous portraits of Washington, painted by every painter to whom he would sit, is one painted on copper in medallion form, containing the profiles of Washington and La Fayette in miniature within the same circumference. It was done by an amateur, the Marchioness de Brienne, an accom- plished writer and skilful artist. She also painted from life a miniature profile, of which she made several copies, one of which she gave to Mrs. Bingham. An engraving of it was afterward made in Paris, and several impressions were sent to Washington.
The first portrait painted from life was that by Charles Wilson Peale, about 1769. It represented Washington at the age of forty, life-size, a little more than half-length, and in the costume of a colonel of the Twenty-second regiment of the Virginia militia
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Names of Streets.
NAMES OF STREETS.
P. 492 .- In 1854, Councils ordered finger-boards to be placed at the corners of Arch and Race streets with those names upon them instead of Mulberry and Sassafras, although Mulberry street was commonly called "the Arch street " as early as 1720; and ordered also the north and south streets to be designated numer- ically west of Broad street-Fifteenth street instead of Schuylkill Eighth street, and so on to Twenty-third street. Broad street, though actually Fourteenth, retains the old name.
In 1856-57 a new arrangement was made by ordinance of Council for numbering houses-west of Front street, south side, as 100; west of Second street, 200; of Third street, 300; and so on to the Schuylkill, the odd numbers on the north side; interme- diate numbers to correspond numerically ; old numbers to be removed.
Cable Lane, called so as early as 1701, from the ropewalk of Joseph Wilcox near by, is now called New Market street.
King's street .- " At a meeting of Councils held at Philadelphia 7th of June, 1694, present His Excell. Benj. Fletcher, William Markham, Lt .- Gov., Andrew Robinson, Robt. Turner, William Clark, and William Solway, the petition of sundry inhabitants of Philadelphia, praying that the street upon the Bank in Phil- adelphia of 30 foot breadth, as the same is agreed upon by the inhabitants and possessors under hands and seals by indentures, may be laid out, and surveyed, and cleaned, and afterward held and reputed a street of the said town of Philadelphia, by the name of Delaware street; and it is ordered thereupon that the said street shall be laid out and surveyed forthwith, and after- ward, as soon as possible, may be cleaned according to the said indentures and agreement, to be held, reputed, and taken as a common street of the town of Philadelphia, by the name of King's street."
Eighth or Garden street .- Eighth street before 1802 was called Garden street north of Callowhill street; and as late as 1818 was Garden street, now Delaware Eighth street; and Spring Garden street was called Spring street.
Hazle or Cherry street, in deeds of 1787.
Sixth street, is called Sumach street, in Record A, 1, p. 11, at Harrisburg.
Sugar alley, changed to Farmer street, Dec. 22, 1842, ran from Sixth to Seventh, between Arch and Market.
Greenleaf's court, to Merchant street, Jan. 14, 1841.
Relief alley, to Relief street.
Blackhorse alley, Second above Chestnut street, was originally Ewer's (or Yower's) alley, after Robert Ewer.
Carter's alley, the first street below Chestnut and Third streets,
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after William Carter. At a meeting of Councils in 1854 it was proposed to change the name to "Jayne " street, after Dr. David Jayne, who erected fine buildings on Chestnut and Dock streets, connected by a passage-way across and under Carter's alley. It was negatived out of regard to Carter, but the alley was dignified with the name of street. (This Carter was, I believe, the same who left a small legacy to be dealt out by the Guardians of the Poor one day in every year. He owned an adjoining lot on Second street.) It was opened from Exchange place to Third street within the present century. It originally only extended from Second street to Goforth alley, now Exchange place.
Goforth alley, now Exchange place, running from Chestnut to Dock street, derived its name from Jeremiah Goforth, a silver- smith, who lived adjoining on Chestnut street. About fifty years ago Goforth alley was built over on Chestnut street, from which it was entered through a dark arched passage.
Jones's lane, or alley, was the first above High street, running from Front to Second, adjoining a lot of Griffith Jones. It was afterward called Pewter Platter alley, from a noted tavern with that sign, a real pewter dish of large size, that stood at the corner of Front street. It after that was again called Jones's alley, then Church alley, and now Church street. A slice was taken off Christ Church ground to widen it, and it now extends to Third street.
Hudson's alley, or Whalebone alley, afterward Franklin place, in Chestnut street above Third, was ordered to be laid out by Samuel Hudson in his will dated February 11, 1724. He died in 1726. It was to adjoin his lot, where was already a four-foot alley between his ground and that of John Brientnall on the west, on which stood the house in which Anthony Benezet afterward lived. By Brient- nall's will the alley was widened twelve feet. Though named Hudson's alley, it was popularly called Whalebone alley, from the fact that a large whalebone was fastened upon Brientnall's house. This bone was preserved by Arthur Howell, who kept a leather store there, and afterward by Andrew Scott, printer.
William Hudson, the father of the above Samuel, came in 1682 from Reedness, Fogerbury Manor, Yorkshire. He was a tanner, and acquired considerable property on Third street at and below Chestnut street, and a whole square on Market street between Fifth and Sixth, and extending to Arch street, which was known as Hudson's Square. His tanyard was upon the end of a lot fifty feet wide extending from Chestnut street to Dock Creek, east of Third street. His house, a fine old-fashioned brick, stood back from the street near Chestnut street, and had some large buttonwood trees in the courtyard in front. In 1694 he added to his property the house and lot south-east corner of Third and Chestnut streets. He also owned the tanyard, afterward Ashburner's, on Third street from the Girard Bank to Harmony
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court, and extending back to Hudson's alley ; Dock Creek came up to the property then. He was one of the original Common Councilmen appointed by the charter of 1701; was a member of the Assembly in 1706 and 1724; an alderman in 1715; and mayor in 1725-26. He died in 1742, leaving many de- scendants, among whom are those bearing the names of Hud- son, Howell, Burr, Owen, Emlen, Kinsing, Wharton, Ridg- way, Metcalf, Fisher, Carman, Lewis, Sykes, and Rawle.
THE HISTORICAL SOCIETY.
OWING to the diversity of nations represented by the early people of Pennsylvania, to the early struggles in enlarging the settlements, and to the lack of any history to record, the minds of the citizens were not much turned to thinking of forming an historical society, such as is now common in every new-settled State. For nearly two hundred years time passed without any organized effort to preserve our historical records. True, the American Philosophical Society in 1815 had an Historical and Literary Committee, but its efforts and results were small.
In 1824, George Washington Smith being in New York and intimate with Governor De Witt Clinton, the New York His- torical Society was a subject of public interest, as well as with the governor. Mr. Smith on his return suggested the formation of a similar society, and there met at the residence of Thomas I. Whar- ton, December 2, 1824, Roberts Vaux, T. I. Wharton, Dr. Ben- jamin H. Coates, Stephen Duncan, William Rawle, Jr., Dr. Cas- par Wistar, and George W. Smith, who agreed to organize the Historical Society of Pennsylvania.
At the next meeting, December 27th, the following additional members were enrolled : Joseph Hopkinson, Joseph Reed, Thomas C. James, John Sergeant, Thomas H. White, Gerard Ralston, William Mason Walmsley, William M. Meredith, Daniel B. Smith, Charles J. Ingersoll, Edward Bettle, and Thomas Mckean Pettit.
It was resolved that the constitution and by-laws should be in force from February 25, 1825, when an election was held, and William Rawle elected president. It was incorporated June 2, 1826. The first place of regular meeting of the new association was in the rooms of the American Philosophical Society, in Fifth street below Chestnut. Here for twenty years they quietly ex- isted, and slowly gathered together books and manuscripts, and published a volume of Memoirs.
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