USA > Pennsylvania > Cumberland County > Biographical and Portrait Cyclopedia of the Nineteenth Congressional District, Pennsylvania > Part 11
USA > Pennsylvania > Adams County > Biographical and Portrait Cyclopedia of the Nineteenth Congressional District, Pennsylvania > Part 11
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56 | Part 57 | Part 58 | Part 59 | Part 60 | Part 61 | Part 62 | Part 63 | Part 64 | Part 65 | Part 66 | Part 67 | Part 68 | Part 69 | Part 70
The act erecting the county and provid- ing for the building of the court house by the appointive commission, enacted also that a competent number of court justices be nominated by the Governor which said justices or any three of them were author- ized to hold Courts of General Quarter Ses- sions of the Peace and Gaol Delivery, County Courts of Common Pleas and Or- phans courts with the same powers, rights, jurisdictions and authorities as the justices in the other counties of the Province. An appeal lay to the Supreme Court from the decisions of the justices. A Register's Court for the work of settling and distrib- uting decedent's estates was composed of the Register of Wills and two justices. The county offices of Prothonotary, Recorder of
77
NINETEENTH CONGRESSIONAL DISTRICT.
Deeds, Register of Wills, Clerk of the Or- phan's Court and Clerk of the Court of Quarter Sessions were established in 1749 and were filled by appointment by the Gov- ernor of the Province before and under the Constitution of 1776 while under the Con- stitution of 1790 appointments were made by the Supreme Executive Council or the Governor of the Commonwealth. The Constitution of 1838 again changed the plan to an election by the people.
The court house stood from 1756 to 1840, its most historic period being com- prised within the nine months next preced- ing June, 1778, during which period of na- tional gloom the Continental Congress held sittings within its walls and passed the Ar- ticles of Confederation. The walls around the three enclosed sides of the Court house yard as it is today are built of the bricks of the old court house walls.
The site of the present court house was selected by the County Commissioners af- ter a prolonged controversy, and the build- ing completed in 1840 although the cupola and bell were not added until 1847. In its erection Jacob Dietz was master carpenter and Henry Small assistant, and Charles Ep- pley master mason with George Odenwall assistant. The bricks and wood were ob- tained from the county, the granite mainly from Baltimore county, Maryland, from which point it was hauled to its destination in wagons while the granite pillars dignify- ing the magnificent front were brought from Maryland over the newly-constructed railroad. The cost of nearly One Hundred Thousand Dollars was met by the issuance of county notes of the denomination of Three Dollars and of county bonds.
During the second year after the estab- lishing of county courts several convicts were sentenced to the county jail but in 1768 at the July session of court the County Commissioners requested that "the county
prison be enlarged as it was too small for a work-house and prison and the walls are not safe," whereupon they were ordered by the court to erect a new building. The ar- chitect, designed a building of blue lime- stone from quarries near York, which building stood on the northeast corner of King and George streets until 1855 when the present jail was erected with Edward Haviland as architect.
The first Court of General Quarter Ses- sions of the Peace in York county after its formation from Lancaster county was held at York before John Day, Esq., an English Quaker, and his associates, commencing Oct. 31, 1749. The panel of grand jurors returned for this court by Hance Hamil- ton, the first Sheriff of the county, and this the day of his oath of office, embraced the following seventeen: Michael McCleary, William McClelland, James Agnew, Hugh Bingham, James Hall, William Proctor, William Beatty, John Pope, Nathan Dicks, Thomas Hosack, Thomas Sillick, Samuel Moore, James Smith, Richard Brown, Thomas Niely, Jeremiah Louchbridge and Richard Proctor-only the last named with Nathan Dicks and John Pope qualifying by affirmation.
The first court made appointment of con- stables for the townships as follows: For Newberry, Peter Hughs; Warrington, Rob- ert Vale; Manchester, Christian Lowe; Hel- lam, John Bishop; Chanceford, George Farr; Fawn, James Edger; Dover, Caleb Hendricks; York, George Crepill; Man- heim, Valentine Herr; Monaghan, William Langley; Paradise, John Frankleberry; Shrewsbury, Hugh Low; and Codorus, George Ziegler.
Although taverns had been opened in the county under the authority of the Lancas- ter county courts a few years prior, the first recommendations to the Governor for the keeping of public houses in the county were
6
78
BIOGRAPHICAL AND PORTRAIT CYCLOPEDIA.
made at this session of court and Michael Swope, George Mendenhall, John Edwards, Michael Bardt, George Hoake, Jacob Fak- ler, Samuel Hoake and William Sinkler were recommended as proper persons.
The courts had their full complement of officers now-Hance Hamilton Sheriff; John Day, Thomas Cox, John Wright, Jr., George Schwaabe, Matthew Diel, Hance Hamilton, Patrick Watson and George Stevenson, justices. The latter was a fac- tor in the early days of office-holding, fill- ing the positions of Prothonotary, Clerk of theseveral courts,and Register and Recorder from 1749 until Oct. 30, 1764, when he ten- dered his resignation. At this court, Wil- liam Peters, John Lawrence, George Ross, David Stout, and John Renshaw are named as the practicing lawyers.
The first indictment in the Quarter Ses- sions charged two overseers with neglect- ing their duties to the highways. The de- fendants were discharged upon payment of costs. The second case charged James King with assault but the case was settled. This exhausted the list of the first court. The next day Thomas Cox, John Day and Patrick Watson convened the first Orphans Court, and the court's first act was to bind out an orphan boy, two years old, named George McSweeney to John Witherow of Hamilton's Band, till he comes of age. Witherow covenanting in behalf of the ap- prentice to furnish "sufficient meat, drink, apparel, washing and lodging during the said term, and to teach or cause him to be taught to read and write; and arithmetic as far as the rule of three direct; and at the expiration of the said term to give him two suits of apparel, one whereof shall be new." The first suit in the court of Common Pleas was brought to the January Term, 1750.
The cases in Quarter Sessions at this time are readable more from the character of the punishment inflicted than from the va-
riety or character of the offenses. At the second court of General Quarter Sessions John Proby, from the frequency of whose name in court annals one infers he con- tributed materially to keep the court open, plead guilty to selling liquor by small mea- sure without proper license and was sen- tenced to pay a fine of five pounds English currency, which the Clerk of the Courts was ordered to receive and pay to the Sec- retary of the Province. At the same court one convicted of the larceny of "one linen shirt and one pair of stockings" was sen- tenced "to immediately receive on his bare back at the public whipping post fifteen lashes and to go to the county gaol twelve days for the cost of prosecution, being un- able to pay them." Margaret Wilmoth pleading guilty at the April Sessions, 1750, to the larceny of a silk handkerchief, was sentenced to immediately receive fifteen lashes on the back, and at the same court two grand jurors who refused to be quali- fied according to the court's requirements were fined and discharged from duty. Two years later a grand juror named Chas. Grim was fined twenty shillings "for break- ing the peace and casting a glass of wine in another juror's face." At this court a defendant convicted of an assault with in- tent to rape was sentenced to pay a fine of five pounds, be publicly whipped with twenty-one lashes on the bare back and then placed for one hour in the pillory.
The sale of a "redemptioner" is decreed in 1758, where the keeper of the jail peti- tions the court that Francis Whistle, a pris- oner in the jail, had no money to pay the prison fees and other damages, and pray- ing that he might be adjudged to serve a reasonable time in satisfaction of the costs of support and maintenance in jail where- upon the court decreed his sale to a proper person for one year, the purchaser to fur- nish him sufficient meat, drink, apparel
79
NINETEENTH CONGRESSIONAL DISTRICT.
and lodging during said term. The coin was protected by punishing severely the crime of counterfeiting. In October, 1768, James Pitt, convicted of this offense, re- ceived the following sentence: "That the defendant stand in the pillory in York on the 29th day of November of the year 1768, between the hours of 10 and 12 in the fore- noon, for one hour. That then he shall have both ears cut off, and that they be nailed to the said pillory. That the said defendant shall then be whipped at the publick whipping-post in York with thirty- nine lashes on the bare back well laid on, and then pay a fine of 100 pounds lawful money, the one-half to the Governor of this province for support of the government and the one-half to the discoverer; that the defendant pay the cost of the prosecution, and as he has no lands or tenement, goods or chatels to pay said fine he is hereby ad- judged to be sold for the term of four years to make satisfaction for the said fine of 100 pounds."
The General Assembly of the Province acting on the assumption that the keepers of public houses were charging excessive rates enacted a law on the 31st day of May, 1718, by which the justices of each county could establish rates and prices for food, drink and provender. The York county justices, acting under this power, on the 28th day of January, 1752, fixed the maxi- mum for York county. The court crier, for some years, making proclamation of these rates in open Quarter Session court. Among these were the following: "A bowl of punch made with one quart water with loaf sugar and good Jamaica spirits, I shill- ing and 3 pence; one pint of good Madeira wine I shilling and 3 pence; one quart of Nimbo, made with West India rum and loaf sugar, 10 shillings; a quart of Nimbo made with New England rum and loaf sugar 9 pence; a gill of good West India
rum 4 pence; a gill of good New England rum 3 pence; a gill of good whiskey 2 pence; a quart of good beer 6 pence; a man's dinner 8 pence; a man's supper 6 pence; a horse at hay 24 hours 10 pence; a horse at hay one night 8 pence; half a gallon of good oats 3 pence."
The two sources of greatest annoyance to which the settlers of York county were subjected were probably the "Border Trou- bles" and the questions arising from the title to land.
The "Border Troubles" early caused dis- turbance among the Indians. Sir William Keith, Deputy Governor of the Province of Pennsylvania, by treaty made June 15 and 16, 1722, with the Indians, agreed that the lands on the west side of the Susque- hanna round and north of Conestoga should be for their hunting and planting exclusively, but the boundary line be- tween the Province of Pennsylvania and Maryland being unsettled and undefined the territory held to the use of the Indians was being encroached upon and to coun- teract these encroachments it was the policy of the proprietary agents to encour- age border settlements. This uncertainty respecting the boundary lines soon led to disputes between William Penn and Lord Baltimore, the former contending that Maryland was encroaching upon Pennsyl- vania soil and the latter claiming the terri- tory on the west of the Susquehanna to the fortieth parallel of latitude, to which point he was authorizing settlements to be made. These adverse claims to the same soil gave unlimited inconvenience to the settlers, but as early as February 17, 1724, an agree- ment was made between Lord Baltimore, proprietor of Maryland, and Hannah Penn, widow and executrix of William Penn, late proprietor of Pennsylvania, and other in- terested parties, whereby it was determined that since "both parties are at this time
80
BIOGRAPHICAL AND PORTRAIT CYCLOPEDIA.
sincerely inclined to enter into a treaty in order to take such methods as may be ad- visable for the final determining of the said controversy, by agreeing upon such lines or other marks of distinction to be settled as may remain for a perpetual boundary between the two provinces; it is therefore mutually agreed that, avoiding all manner of contentions or differences between the inhabitants of the said provinces, no per- son or persons shall be disturbed or mo- lested in their possessions on either side, nor any lands be surveyed, taken up or granted in either of the said provinces near the boundaries which have been claimed or pretended to on either side; this agree- ment to continue for the space of eighteen months from the date hereof, in which it is hoped the boundaries will be determined and settled."
A contest arising as to the proprietorship of Pennsylvania a compromise was effected by the Penn family and the Government of the province fell to John Thomas and Richard Penn, surviving sons of the second wife, and in 1732 Thomas Penn arrived in this country and took possession of the province for himself and brothers. On the Ioth of May, 1732, a new agreement was entered into by Lord Baltimore and John Thomas and Richard Penn, proprietaries providing, "that in two calendar months from that date each party shall appoint commissioners .... to act or mark out the boundaries aforesaid, to begin, at the furth- est, sometime in October, 1732, and to be completed on or before December 25, 1733." Two days later commissioners were signed by the proprietors of the two prov- inces fully empowering the commissioners to run, mark and lay out the boundary lines of the two provinces. The commis- sioners appeared at the time and place, but the boundaries were not made in the time limited due to a contention on the part of
Lord Baltimore himself. As the time for establishing the boundary had passed Lord Baltimore petitioned for relief, August 9, 1734, being met by a counter petition from the Penns, December 9, 1734. On the 16th of may, 1735, further consideration was ad- journed to allow the counter petitioners to proceed in equity. The bill was presented to the court of chancery in Great Britain, June 21, 1735, praying the specific per- formance of the articles by Lord Baltimore and for a decree clearing any doubt, but the prayer of the bill was not granted until May 15, 1750. Lord Hardwicke, deliver- ing the opinion of the court said: "I di- rected this cause to stand over for judg- ment not so much from any doubt of what was the justice of the case as by reason of the nature of it. The great consequence and importance ...... being for the deter- mination of the right and boundaries of two great provincial governments and three counties," and the decree was entered "that before the end of three calendar months, from May 15th, two several proper instruments for appointing commissioners .... may run and mark the boundaries, to begin sometime in November next, and to be completed on or before the last day of May, 1752."
About the time of filing the bill in equity a revolt of the German settlers took place. It happened that while the commissioners to fix the boundary between the province of Pennsylvania and of Maryland were ne- gotiating, one Thomas Cressap prominent in his efforts in behalf of Maryland to keep possession of the land squatted upon "by fair promises of grants from the Maryland government, exemption from taxes and by force and threatenings to turn the German settlers out of their settlements and ruin them, prevailed on some to refuse to pay taxes or rates to Pennsylvania, and to de- clare themselves under the jurisdiction and
81
NINETEENTH CONGRESSIONAL DISTRICT.
protection of Maryland. Upon learning of Cressap's deception a number memorial- ized Governor Ogle, of Maryland, that "they had been seduced and made use of first by promises and then by threat and punishment to answer purposes which were unjustifiable and would end in their ruin, wherefore they with many of their neigh- bors did resolve to return to their duty and live under the laws and government of Pennsylvania." (Rupp's History of York County, page 554). Cressap's scheme failing a new one was conceived-to pick up new comers who as yet had no lands of their own and to promise them, if they would lend assistance in driving out the Germans the cleared lands and the build- ings of the latter should be the reward for their services. This policy caused out- breaks between he Germans and the Irish, the latter forming the opposition in the main, until the proprietors to prevent such disturbances gave orders that no lands should be sold to the Irish in York or Lan- caster counties, but held out strong induce- ments to them to settle in Cumberland county, which offers, being liberal, were freely excepted. (Rupp's History of York County, page 576).
One result of the dispute concerning the boundary line between the two provinces was that the laws of neither province were enforced against delinquents. Hanover for somne years prior to 1776 was known as "Rogue's Resort"-refugees from justice flocking there. "If the sheriff of York county could catch the delinquent one-half mile out of town (Hanover) in a northwest- ern direction then he might legally make him his prisoner under the authority of the courts of this county; but in town not nearer than that had he any ministerial power." It is recorded that robbers hav- ing broken into the store of Mr. McAllister in Hanover he seized them and conveyed
them to York for safe keeping; but the sheriff refused to receive them, remarking "You of Hanover wish to be independent, therefore punish your villians yourselves."
While the troubles continued and no defi- nite boundary settlement was in sight, the Maryland authorities rejecting a proposi- tion to run a provisional line, mutual ap- peals for interposition by the King were made by the litigant, and the matter was referred to the Lords of Committee of Council on Plantation Affairs, before whom in 1738 the proprietors entered into an agreement for the preservation of peace and tranquillity on the borders. On the termi- nation of the proceedings in chancery in 1750 whereby specific performances was decreed against Lord Baltimore, both par- ties appointed commissioners. These met November 13, 1750, but a dispute concern- ing the mensuration soon stopped the pro- ceedings, and the matter having been re- opened in court a final agreement between the proprietaries was not executed until July 4, 1760. The commissioners ap- pointed under this final agreement assem- bled at New Castle November 19, 1760, and began their work. They continued until 1763, when Charles Mason and Jeremiah Dixon succeeded the former surveyors, concluding their work December 26, 1767. The proceedings to determine the bound- ary line were ratified by the King's order in council, January II, 1769, and a procla- mation to quiet the settlers on the part of Pennsylvania is dated September 15, 1774. This closed a controversy which for vigor and duration was the most tenacious of the early trials of the settlers.
The other prolonged source of annoy- ance and controversy to the countians was the question of title to land. The settling of "Digges' Choice," one of the earliest lo- cated tracts of land north of the Temporary Line under a Maryland warrant and sur-
82
BIOGRAPHICAL AND PORTRAIT CYCLOPEDIA.
vey, probably occasioning the first ques- tion under the provisions of the Royal Or- der. John Digges obtained a grant of ten thousand acres of land on the 14th of Oc- tober, 1727, from the proprietor of Mary- land, with the right of election of location, on the proprietor's unim- proved lands. By virtue of the grant Digges took up six thousand and eight hundred and twenty-two acres con- tained in the present limits of Heidelberg township, York county, and Conewago and Germany townships, Adams county. A patent was issued October II, 1735. The tract fell four miles north of the Temporary Line. On July 15, 1745, Digges petitioned the land office at Annapolis for a warrant to correct errors in the original survey and to add any vacant contiguous land, in answer to which petition three thousand six hundred and seventy-nine acres were patented to him October 18, 1745. Two years previous he had applied for a warrant to the Pennsylvania land office and it ap- pears that the Germans who had settled around the Conewago creek on lands claimed by him had ascertained that his claim was greater than his patent and that he had sold land beyond that granted to him. In 1745, however, the resurvey un- der the Maryland warrant included the land omitted in the original survey, as well as several tracts for which Pennsylvania war- rants had been granted and some patented, Mr. Digges justifying the resurvey by con- tending that the errors of the surveyors did not prejudice his original right of claim under warrant. The question came up for adjudication before Justices Shippen and Yeates in the case of Thomas Lilly vs. George Kitzmiller (I Yeates, page 28). The court holding that all the land would have been secured to Digges under the Penn- sylvania system of making proprietary sur- veys, but that the Maryland surveys "were
merely ideal, precisely fixed on paper alone," and "that any circumstances shown could not establish a title to lands without the limits of the original survey as re- turned." The judges took pains to make clear that "persons who have bought lands from Messrs. Digges even within the re- survey may have acquired titles by their possessions and improvements," although the resurvey was thus held ineffectual as against the Pennsylvania settlers. The cli- max in this trouble was not reached until the killing of Dudley Digges on the 26th of February, 1752, by Jacob Kitzmiller. The question of jurisdiction was raised by the Maryland authorities, the defendant having been indicted in York county, the former contending that the scene of the murder was a place surveyed under a Maryland warrant prior to the date of the Royal Order of 1738, and that no attone- ment or other defense of any person sub- sequent to the date of said Order could prevent or take away the right of the pro- prietor of Maryland. Exemplified copies of the warrant, surveys and patents granted to John Digges proved the scene of the murder to be in a tract of vacant land to the north of the Temporary Line, granted to Digges in express violation of the Royal Order and therefore the act having been committed without his grant, was cogniz- able in the Pennsylvania court.
The next question of title was taken, ul- timately, to the Supreme Court of the Uni- ted States, and arose in brief, under the following facts: The grant to Penn dated March 4, 1681, provided for the erection of manors, that out of every one hundred thousand acres ten thousand acres were reserved for the proprietary, vesting in him, his heirs and alienees the power to grant the lands of such manors to any person in fee simple. Penn empowered the com- missioners of property to erect manors,
83
NINETEENTH CONGRESSIONAL DISTRICT.
but the latter declined to exercise the power. In pursuance of the original power Penn had issued a warrant dated September 1, 1700, to the Surveyor Gen- eral to set apart for him five hundred acres of every township of five thousand acres. Successive warrants were issued, but the tracts surveyed were short of the full rights of the proprietary and there was therefore surveyed for his use June 19 and 20, 1722, the manor of Springetsbury, in York county, containing about seventy thousand acres. By leave of the proprietor settlers seated themselves on parts of this manor, but as the Indians had not released their claims to the land no absolute title could be given, but licenses were issued promis- ing patents when the purchases should be made from the Indians. The latter exe- cuted a release of claims on the IIth of Oc- tober, 1736, and on the 30th of the same month licenses were issued by Samuel Blumston, under the authority of Thomas Penn, for about twelve thousand acres of land, patents to issue after survey was made. The survey of 1722 was never returned to the land office and Governor Hamilton, of Pennsylvania, on the 21st of May, 1762, issued a warrant for a resurvey of the manor "in order that the bounds and lines thereof may be certainly known and ascer- tained." The survey was made in June, 1768, and returned to the land office July 12, 1768.
A number of ejectments were brought for lands within the Manor of Springets- bury. The general question in these pro- ceedings was whether the land was in- cluded in a tract called and known by the name of a proprietary manor duly surveyed and returned into the land office on or be- fore July 4, 1776? One of these cases can be taken as an example. In Penn's Lessee vs. Klyne, 4 Dallas, page 401, the title of the lessor of the plaintiff to the premises
was regularly deduced from the charter of Charles II to William Penn, provided there was a manor called and known by the name of Springetsbury, duly surveyed and re- turned according to the terms and mean- ing of the Act of November, 1779. The position taken by plaintiff's counsel was: "I. That the land mentioned is a part of a tract called or known by the name of a Pro- prietary Manor. 2. That it was a proprie- tary manor duly surveyed. 3. That the survey was duly made and returned before the 4th of July, 1776." The defendant's counsel contended:
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.