USA > Pennsylvania > Cumberland County > Biographical and Portrait Cyclopedia of the Nineteenth Congressional District, Pennsylvania > Part 2
USA > Pennsylvania > Adams County > Biographical and Portrait Cyclopedia of the Nineteenth Congressional District, Pennsylvania > Part 2
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Zoology. The fauna of the Nineteenth district has been but partly secured by past writers. In the geographical distribution of animals the district falls in the North Temperate or second of the eight faunal realms into which the world is divided. This realm lies between the isotherms of 32 degrees and 68 degrees, and is partly the home of the fur bearing animals.
No classification of animals of Cumber- land county has ever been made, and Adams county only has its ornithology given by Professor Sheeley, who gives 3 varieties of eagle, six of hawks, six of owls, two of rail, two of sapsuckers, wild turkey, turkey buzzard, turkey crow, pheasant, par- tridge, woodcock, English snipe, 3 varieties of plover, reed bird, wild pigeon, turtle dove, large blue crane, heron, willet, yellow shanks, American bittern, sand piper, king- fisher, wild goose, red head duck, Mallard duck, blue wing teal, spoonbill, sprigtail, wood duck, summer duck, loon, wren, chip- pen, tomtit, English sparrow, indigo, pee- weet, martin, bee martin, blue bird, 3 varie- ties of swallows, cow black bird, crow black bird, bell bird, rain bird, mocking bird, cat bird, thrush, robin, meadow lark, gold- finch, Baltimore oriole, bull finch, cardinal beak, yellow bird, whippoorwill, bull bat, conimon bat, woodpecker and yellow ham- mer.
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NINETEENTH CONGRESSIONAL DISTRICT.
In York county history a few names of its wild mammals have been preserved-the bear, wolf and deer.
An ideal fauna and flora of the Mesozoic era would show the territory of the Nine- teenth district to have been covered with cone bearing and fern like plants, among which reptiles, roamed in large numbers as the representative animals. They were of great size, some walking, some swimming and some flying. It is likely the plant- eating Atlanto-saurus, a hundred feet long and thirty feet high was there with the Ichthyosaurus (fish lizard) and Pterodactyl (winged finger) and a hundred other mons- ter animal forms.
Political Divisions. The Nineteenth Congressional district was formed in 1874 of the counties of Cumberland, Adams and York.
Cumberland county was formed from Lancaster, on January 27, 1750, being the sixth in order of age of the present sixty- seven counties of Pennsylvania, and has an area of 5,540 square miles. Its townships are Pennsborough and Hopewell formed in 1735; East and West Pennsborough, 1745; Middleton, about 1750; Allen, 1766; New- ton, 1767; Southampton, 1783; Shippens- burg, 1784; Dickinson, 1785; Silvers' Spring, 1787; Franklin, 1795; Mifflin, 1797; North and South Middleton, 1810; Monroe 1825; Newville, 1828; Hampden, 1845: Upper and Lower Allen, 1849; Middlesex, 1859; Penn, 1859; Cook, 1872. The bor- ough organizations have been as follows: Carlisle, 1782; Newville, 1817; Shippens- burg, 1819; Mechanicsburg, 1828: New Cumberland, 1831; Newburg, 1861; Mt. Holly Springs, 1873; Shiremanstown, 1874; Camp Hill, 1885.
Adams county was formed from York in 1800, and has an area of 531 square miles, with Gettysburg as its seat of justice. Its townships are Berwick, formed in 1800;
Conewago, 1801; Hamilton, 1810; Free- dom, 1838; Union, 1841; Oxford, 1847; Butler, 1849; and Cumberland, Franklin, Germany, Hamiltonban, Highland, Hunt- ingdon, Latimore, Liberty, Menallen, Mount Joy, Mount Pleasant, Reading, Straban and Tyrone. Its boroughs are: Gettysburg, incorporated in 1806; Abbots- ford, 1835; Littlestown, 1864; York Springs, 1868; New Oxford, 1874; East Berlin, 1879; Fairfield, -; and McSher- rytown, 1882.
York county was formed from Lancas- ter county, August 19, 1749, being the fifth county created in the province of Pennsylvania, and now has an area of 921 square miles. Its 31 townships are Hallam or Hellam, formed in 1739; Chanceford. Fawn, Shrewsbury, Newberry, Dover, Codorus, Manchester, Warrington, Mona- ghan, Paradise and Manheim between 1740 and 1744; Heidelberg, 1750; York, 1753; Windsor, 1758; Hopewell, 1767; West Manchester, 1799; Fairview, 1802; Wash- ington, 1803; Lower Chanceford, 1805; Franklin, 1809; Peach Bottom, 1815; Spring Garden, 1822; Carroll, 1831; Springfield, 1834; Lower Windsor, 1838; North Codorus, 1840; Jackson, 1857; and West Manheim, 1858. Its 21 incorporated boroughs are: York incorporated 1787; Hanover, 1815; Lewisburg, 1832; Dills- burg, 1833; Wrightsville, and Shrewsbury, 1834; Stewartstown and Fawn Grove, 1851; Logansville, 1852; Glen Rock, 1860; Dover 1864; Jefferson, 1866; Dallastown, 1867; Manchester, 1869; Winterstown, ; Railroad, 1871; East Prospect, 1874; New Freedom, 1879; Red Lion and Delta, 1880; Spring Grove, -; and Goldsboro, Hel- lam, New Salem, Peach Bottom and Menges Station since 1885.
Natural Resources. The Nineteenth Congressional district owes its military im- portance in time of war to its geographical
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BIOGRAPHICAL AND PORTRAIT CYCLOPEDIA.
position, but its commercial supremacy and true greatness depend upon the forni of its government, the spirit of its people, and the richness of its natural resources, whose complete development will be attained in the decades of the twentieth century. The natural resources of the district embraces its useful and precious metals; its lime, slate and building rock; and its incompara- ble wealth of pure water, copious rainfall and a health-giving climate, which, com- bined with fertility of soil and nearness to market, gives an assurance of good grain, tobacco and fruit crops and their ready sale at remunerative prices in prosperous times.
In the great South Mountain are im- mense beds of magnetic and hematite iron ores sufficient to supply the larger part of the iron needed in all the manufactures of the United States, and deep beneath these beds are others of vast dimensions, which will likely not be utilized for a century to come. Copper ore exists in different parts of the district, but has never yet been found in paying quantities, while traces of silver and gold are reported. The siluro-Cam- brian limestone is found in almost inex- haustible beds in every county of the dis- trict, and the great belt of the celebrated
Peach Bottom roofing slate passes through the southeastern part of York county, while massive ledges and large beds of granite are in Adams county, besides sand- stone and other building rock found also in York and Cumberland. Small areas of brick, fire, porcelain and pipe clays are to be found while building sand is plenty. Pure water is everywhere abundant and for domestics purposes Adams county is one of the best watered spots on the globe. Clear, pure, sweet, cold granite water in great abundance and at Gettysburg the drill has been sunk through 70 feet of a granite roof into a great subterranean lake of pure water. The rainfall of the district averages from twenty-seven to thirty-eight inches yearly and this in connection with a fertile soil has always given large cereal crops, fine fruit and an abundant yield of tobacco, in which latter product York county is one of the three leading counties of the Middle Atlantic States. The natural resources of the Nineteenth Congressional district-its iron ore, limestone, granite and fertile soil -make it one of the rich mining and agri- cultural regions of the "Keystone State," whose present wealth and growth give promise of a brilliant and successful future.
CHAPTER II.
ABORIGINES-ABORIGINAL TITLES-EARLY SETTLEMENTS-BORDER DIFFICULTIES-
BOUNDARY LINE-MANORS OF SPRINGETSBURY, LOUTHER AND MASKE- PIONEER RACES -- DEVELOPMENT PERIODS-CITIES AND VILLAGES.
T HE Indian empire of the New World was magnificent in extent, and while scant in population and low in civilization, yet possessed won- derful natural resources and north of the equatorial line commanded unrivaled facili- ties for commercial supremacy by means of geographical conformation.
In accurate ethnographical classification the American or so called Red race is a branch of the Yellow Type of mankind formerly called the Mongolian. The In- dian in complexion varies from a ruddy to a pale olive and Naidaillac in his Pre-his- toric America states the term Red arose from Columbus mistaking the color of the Antillian Caribs, who kept themselves well painted with red ochre. Indian life in its lowest type was found in the more or less nomadic tribes of Patagonia and the Rocky Mountains, while its highest civilization was reached in the lands of the Montezu- mas and the Incas of Peru, where cloth was woven, cities built, roads constructed, picture-writing introduced and a calendar used which was more accurate than that of the Greeks and Romans. The Indians although divided into numerous families, all came from one parent stock, and there was no tribe so degraded, but believed in a future state and had an idea of a Mas- ter of Life and an Evil Spirit, which held divided empire over nature. The numer- ous Indian languages are all pervaded by
a remarkable analogy of structure and Humbolt says, "From the county of the Esquimaux to the straits of Magellan mother tongues entirely different in their roots, have, if we may use the expression, the same physiognomy." The Indian lan- guages have a wonderful capacity for ex- pressing several ideas and modifications of ideas in one word; and their idioms while regular and complicated in structure are rich in words. This language capacity of expressing several ideas in one word is illustrated in some of S. G. Boyd's Indian Local Names quoted elsewhere, in this volume.
The aboriginal history of the territory of Pennsylvania would be interesting if it could be presented. But Indian traditions are too dim, as well as to fanciful to give their own origin or the fate of their predecessor, the Mound Builder, whose seat of empire was in the Mississippi and Ohio valleys, where his temple, altar, effigy and tomb mounds, and forts and fort- ifications were numerous. The Indians · were in all probability the aboriginal inhab- itants of the Nineteenth Congressional dis- trict as no ruins of mound or temple has ever been found within its territorial limits to speak of permanent occupation by the Mound-builder or great lost race of the American continent.
The great Algonquin Indian family in 1492 occupied the eastern part of the Uni-
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ted States from the sea-board to the Appa- lachian mountains and encircled the Huron Iriquois family in New York and western Canada. Of the Huron-Iriquois the fierc- est and bravest tribes were the Mohawks, Oneidas, Cayugas, Onondagas and Senecas which constituted the Five Nations until 1713, when they admitted the Tuscaroras from South Carolina and became the cele- brated Six Nations of Colonial and Revolu- tionary history.
The Five Nations were the "Indians of Indians" and the "Romans of the West," and their wonderful confederacy was the re- sult of the "Tribal League of the Hodenos- aunee or People of the Long House." In each of the Five Nations were eight tribes arranged in two divisions and named as fol- lows: Wolf, Bear, Beaver, Turtle, Deer, Snipe, Heron, Hawk.
Each tribe was then divided into five parts, and a part placed in each of the Five Nations. Thus the Cayuga of the Wolf tribe recognized the Mohawk of the Wolf tribe as his brother. This league, the highest effort of Indian legislation, forms a splendid and enduring monument to the haughty and powerful confederacy that was reared under it, and that spread the terror of its name among every Indian tribe from the Great Lakes to the everglades of Florida. The Five Nations utterly de- stroyed the Eries and swept away the Hurons of their own family, and sweeping down over the Catawba Warpath into the Carolinas spread death and ruin among the southern tribes.
From a hundred successful fields of bat- tle, the Five Nations turned to contest with the Delaware nation of the Algonquin family for the ownership of the present ter- ritory of Pennsylvania. The Delawares were divided into three branches-the Turkey, Turtle and Monsey or Wolf tribes. This great contest between the Five Na-
tions and the Delawares, resulted in the defeat of the latter, who then became ten- ants at will in Pennsylvania of the former. The Five Nations reduced the Delawares to the menial state of their women, and the Delawares afterwards by an ingeniously constructed story attempted to explain to the Whites their disarmament by strategem and their acceptance of the position of women from choice and not by force.
The Delawares called themselves the Lenn, Lenape or Original People and claimed to have come from beyond the Mis- sissippi river to Pennsylvania, through the Ohio valley where they stopped long enough to destroy the Mound-builders. The Monsey or Wolf branch of the Dela- wares occupied the territory of the Nine- teenth Congressional district, but neither in record or through tradition do we get the names of the tribes that roamed from the Susquehanna to the North Mountain, spending the fishing season in river camps, and the hunting season in the mountain and valley villages where the women raised their small stock of maize The Delaware tribes in the district were joined by the Tuteloes and Nanticokes, from Maryland and in 1698, by the war-like Shawanes from the Carolina, while they all seemed partly under the dominion of the Conestogoe In- dians of Lancaster county, in whose vil- lages all the grand councils were held. There were also in the district the Manti- cokes, Mingoes and Susquehannas.
Of their villages or towns there is but little record. The Conestogoe Indians had a town on the Susquehanna, in York coun- ty, called Conedoughela, and the Showanes had a village at the mouth of Yellow Breeches creek and another on the Cono- doquinet, while the Mingoes had a town on Letort run and near the site of Carlisle, and tradition credits an Indian village as near the site of Gettysburg.
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NINETEENTH CONGRESSIONAL DISTRICT.
Of the Indian trails of the district but little has been preserved A main north and south trail seems to have passed along the west bank of the Susquehanna, and was joined and also intersected by paths or trails running westward into the mountains and southwestward into Maryland and Vir- ginia. Some of these trails became traders' and missionary routes, and one was event- ually laid out into the old-time Monocacy road which ran from the site of Wrights- ville, past the sites of York and Hanover through York county and southwest in Adams county to the Provincial line. Many minor trails led to favorite hunting grounds and fishing points and were in use by the Indians until they commenced to remove to Ohio, upon the settlement of the white man. The Shawanees removed in 1725 and by 1765 the remainder of the Indians in the district had taken up their westward journey toward the lands of the setting sun.
Aboriginal Titles. The European title of the English to the territory of Pennsyl- vania was by right of Cabot's discovery of North America in 1497 and his voyage along the Atlantic coast in the ensuing year. After Penn acknowledged Indian ownership of the land of his province we find that the first deed in the chain of In- dian title for the soil of the Nineteenthi Dis- trict, is dated January 3, 1692, and made by Ex-Gov. Dongan, of New York, to Penn for the land on both sides of the Susque- hanna river which the former had bought! from the Five Nations. The Susquehanna and other Delaware Indians did not ac- knowledge the right of the Five Nations to sell these lands upon which they resided, treaties were made with these Delaware tribes on September 30, 1700, and April 23, 1701, by which they ratified the sale. The language of all the deeds and treaties was so vague as to how much territory was in-
cluded in the transfer that Penn concluded to effect another purchase with more defi- nite limits before permitting settlements to be made west of the Susquehanna. In or- der to complete his title his heirs held a treaty with the Six Nations on October II, 1736, and received a deed signed by the Sachems of five of Six Nations. Fourteen days later the Penns received a release signed by the sachems of all of the Six Na- tions and the Indian title to the territory of the Nineteenth District was completed.
Early Settlements. The first white men to come into the district were but tem- porary residents. There were French traders as early as 1707 in the Cumberland Valley where James Letort built his first cabin in 1720 and was the first white man to have a temporary residence in Cumber- land county. At some time between 1720 and 1725 Michael Tanner, Edward Parnell, Paul Williams, Jefferey Sumerford and a few others became temporary residents on Kreutz Creek, near the site of Wrights- ville, in York county. They came under Maryland titles, were regarded as squatters and were driven away in 1728 by the Penn- sylvania authorities. A third class of tem- porary residents came into the western part of the district with the Jesuit fathers from Maryland who were led by Josiah Gravton, S. J., frequently called Father Creighton. He came about 1720 and conducted reli- gious services in the wigwams of the Caughnawaga Indians, an Algonquin tribe from Canada, that were residents for some length of time in what is now Conewago township, Adams county. Father Grayton was followed by different priests and a cabin was built for church services.
As temporary residents, about 1720, were in each of the three counties of the present Nineteenth Congressional District, so per- manent settlers came about the same time in each of the counties and also settled at
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BIOGRAPHICAL AND PORTRAIT CYCLOPEDIA.
the same places selected by the trader, squatters and missionaries. These early permanent settlements were made from 1726 or 28 up to 1740, and were planted some years earlier than the Penns intended on account of the Marylanders commenc- ing to settle in the southern part of York and Adams county. The. Penns purposed granting no lands in the district until the Indian title was extinguished, but alarmed by the Maryland attempt to settle they con- ferred with the Indians and gave Samuel Blunston authority to issue licenses to Pennsylvania settlers for lands to be af- terwards granted to the holders when the Indian title was extinguished.
In Cumberland county Letort most pro- bably took out one of these licenses. An- drew Ralston settled in 1728, west of the site of Carlisle, on a Blunston license. In 1730, James Chambers settled near New- ville, and Robert Chambers, close to Ship- pensburg, where in the same year came Alex. Steen, John McCall, Richard and Gavin Morrow, John Culbertson, Huglı and John Rippey, John Strain, Alex. Askey, John McAlister, David Magaw and John Johnston. Among other early settlers were the celebrated Butler and Brady fam- ilies of Revolutionary and frontier fame, Robert Mickey, William Thompson and Andrew McElwain, of Newton, and Mif- flin township, and brothers-in-law; Michael Edge, and the Houcks and Weakleys, of Dickinson township; Richard Parker, of North Middleton, who is said to have set- tled in 1725; and the Acheson family of West Pennsborough township; these set- tlers were principally Scotch-Irish, though often called Irish by the provincial authori- ties, and by 1736 a line of settlements had been made from the Susquehanna along the Yellow Breeches and Conedoguinet creeks through the Cumberland valley to the head waters of the Conochocheaque and the
southwestern boundary line of the county.
In York county John and James Hend- ricks settled on Kreutz Creek, in 1729, and while O'Day says they were English, Fisher thinks they were German. They were the first authorized settlers by the Penns, yet a township writer claims that John Grist, John Powell and other English settlers came about 1721. The English set- tled about the Pigeon Hills, while the Ger- mans spread along Kreutz Creek where only one English family, that of Williamn Morgan remained in 1734. The next two settlement waves were between 1734 and 1736, one being Scotch-Irish, settling in the southeast in the "York Barrens," while the other was English-Quaker and made their homes in the north and northwest in the "Red Lands." These English Quakers were from Chester county, and their loca- tion was selected by Thomas Hull, John McFesson, Joseph Bennet, John Rankin. and Ellis Lewis, who were prominent Friends in the new settlement and also in the county. We also have account of Martin Fry settling near the site of York in 1734, and in the same year John Wright, Jr., was at Wrightsville, while German set- tlers are said to have been at or near Han- over as early as 1731. The first shoemaker was Samuel Landys; the first tailor, Valen- tine Heyer; and the first blacksmith, Peter Gardner, while the first schoolmaster was called "Der Dicke Schulmeister." John and Martin Schultz built the first stone dwelling houses, about 1735, and John Day built the first grist mill before 1740.
In Adams county the first permanent settlers were the founders of the Little Con- ewago and Marsh Creek settlements. An- drew Shriver is credited with being the first permanent settler, and having settled in 1734 about 3 miles north of the site of Littlestown, but the historian of Conewago township states that Samuel Lilly and
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NINETEENTH CONGRESSIONAL DISTRICT.
Robert Owings settled in that locality in 1730, and later came the McSherrys, Mc- Crearys, Marshalls, Sanderses and Reillys from Ireland, and the Sneeringers, Shrivers and others from Holland. These Cone- wago settlers were mainly Catholics, and the latter founded Conewago chapel. Be- tween 1735 and 1741 the Scotch-Irish came to the head waters of Marsh creek, and north of the site of Gettysburg and among the leading families in this emigration werc the Hamiltons, Sweenys, Eddies, Blocks, McClains, McClures, Wilsons, Agnews and Darbys. Bradsby in speaking of Shriver as the first permanent settler says "Here then was the first little fringe of civilization planted deep in the dark old forests of Adams county; sheltered under the wagon cover of Shriver's and Young's wagon, the "avant couriers" of the increasing sweep of that grand race of men who created the grandest empire in the tide of time; ferti- lizing its seed with the spirit of liberty and independence that was to leven the human race all over the world and yield the rich blessings of mental and physical freedom that we now enjoy. Shriver was a typical representative of the American pioneer, the most admirable, the greatest race of men and women that have appeared upon the earth in nineteen hundred years."
Border Difficulties. The southern part of York and Adams county was a border land over whose possession Pennsylvania and Maryland were rival disputants for many years. These border difficulties arose from the dispute of Penn and Lord Balti- more over the boundary line between their provinces, as each claimed this territory to be within his chartered limits. Lord Balti- more as early as 1721 contemplated extend- ing his northern boundary line west side of the Susquehanna up to the meridian of 40 degrees north latitude, and in 1730 Col. Thomas Cresap and some others under
Maryland authority settled at Blue Rock ferry 33 miles south of Wrightsville. Bal- timore never recognized any Indian title and Cresap drove the Indians away which soon led to an angry controversy between the Pennsylvania and Maryland governors The Lancaster authorities soon warned Cresap, Carroll, and other Marylanders off the disputed territory, and John Wright, Jr., called the Marylanders "homing gen- try," a term at which the followers of Bal- timore took offense. In 1734 an unsuc- cessful attempt was made to capture Cresap in which he mortally wounded Knowles Daunt, one of the Pennsylvania posse. The Marylanders made prisoners of John Hendricks and Joshua Minshall and put them in jail at Annapolis, where An- drew Hamilton and Jolin Georges, Penn- sylvania commissioners, appeared in vain to secure their release or obtain a hearing of Penn's claims to the disputed territory. In 1736 a number of Germans, who had settled under Maryland authority, revolted and transferred their allegiance to Penn- sylvania, and later in that year, Colonel Hall, of Baltimore county, came into the disputed territory with an armed force of nearly three hundred men, but left in a short time. During their stay the sheriff of Lancaster county assembled one hund- red and fifty men at John Wright, Jr.'s, but no hostilities occurred. Cresap cursed the Maryland militia for cowards, and was soon joined by Charles Higginbotham, who had plotted in Chester county with forty- nine others to obtain the revolted Ger- mans' land from the Governor of Maryland and upon the discovery of his plot fled to avoid arrest. Cresap was arrested on Sep- tember 25, 1736, and held as a prisoner for some time, and three years later in 1739, a temporary line was run by order of the Royal Council in England and ended the border difficulties by giving Pennsylvania
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BIOGRAPHICAL AND PORTRAIT CYCLOPEDIA.
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