USA > Pennsylvania > Chronicles of Pennsylvania from the English revolution to the peace of Aix-la-Chapelle, 1688-1748, Vol. I > Part 7
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The estates of the Society of Traders were sold by trustees appointed by an Act of Assembly of March 2, 1722-3. The tract of 7700 acres in Chester County, com- prising the present township of Newlin, was bought by Nathaniel Newlin, who, although an agriculturist,
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had apparently no intention of keeping so much after opportunities to sell at sufficient profit. He reduced the tract somewhat, and, dying in 1729, left the balance to be divided among a number of children. The re- membrance of a baronial court seems involved in the notion of residents of the locality some generations later that the Newlins would "some day come back and take away our liberties."
After Penn's return to England from his first visit to America, he made some large sales. Through some of these, Joseph Pike, a prominent Quaker of Cork, Ireland, who never resided in the Province, became owner of more than 25,000 acres, most of which he and his heirs kept throughout the period of this history. In 1699, four Londoners, probably all Quakers, viz: Tobias Collett, citizen and haberdasher, Michael Rus- sell, citizen, mercer, and weaver, Daniel Quare, watch- maker, and Henry Gouldney, linen draper, who with their associates were commonly known afterwards as the London Company, bought from Penn nine lots in the City of Philadelphia and certain tracts and also 60,000 acres to be laid out as they might desire, 5000 acres however to be in each of the three manors of Highlands, Gilberts, and Rockland, and a single tract to be in the vacant land of each township, together with the proportion of liberty lots, if any vacant, to which they would have been entitled had they been purchasers under the first Concessions. Most of this great acreage was soon surveyed. None of the owners came to Penn- sylvania, although the sales did not dispose of every- thing until very late in the Colonial period.
By the Conditions and Concessions agreed upon between Penn and his first purchasers, and dated July 11, 1681, he was to retain for his own use 10,000 acres out of every 100,000. The great feature of these tracts, or, as they were called, "tenths" or "manors," was that they were withdrawn from sale at the current
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price; and afforded the Proprietary the opportunity to reap, like the neighbouring purchasers, a profit from the appreciation of real estate in the particular dis- trict. William Penn at first did not take his full num- ber of "tenths"; but, particularly as new regions were opened to settlers, Proprietary manors continued to be laid off until about the beginning of the American Revolution.
Upon the assumption that one acre of wild land was as valuable as another, Penn made all the sales in the earlier years at the rate of £100 principal for 5000 acres clear of Indian claim, subject to the quit rent of 1s. for every 100 acres. Such ground as differed much from the rest could, if poorer, by William Penn's fair- ness, or, if better, by his successors' shrewdness, or that of his or their agents, be excepted by survey as Proprietary manors. Outside of the manors, the price for frontier land asked by the Proprietaries or their agents seems to have been always uniform, although raised from time to time.
Penn's first method of disposing of land was to con- vey, on receipt of the purchase money, a certain quan- tity of unlocated acres by a lease for a year, and a release in fee dated the next day after the lease, and to have those acres laid out and surveyed under the direction of his Surveyor-General, and then to grant by letters patent the located land according to metes and bounds.
The releases, probably executed at the same time as the lease, expressed the tenure, from William Penn his heirs and assigns as of the seigniory of Windsor, and reserved a quit rent to them, and contained a covenant that they, at times appointed in and by certain con- stitutions or concessions, would clear and discharge the land from all Indian title or claim, and that Penn or his heirs or assigns would execute all other acts and con- veyances provided for in such concessions. The pur-
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chasers covenanted to have the release enrolled within six months after the establishment of a registry in the Province.
As a rule, in the releases dated prior to Penn's first visit to America, and in some dated while he remained there, it was stipulated that the land should be laid out according to the Conditions and Concesssions under date of J: ly 11, 1681, agreed upon between Penn and "the adventurers and purchasers." The latter, includ- ing those who by Penn's releases were made parties to said agreement, are known as "the first purchasers." The Conditions and Concessions required the establish- ment of public highways and streets before the allot- ment of particular lands to the respective purchasers, and provided that in the allotment two per cent of each purchase, if the ground permitted, should be within the great town or city contemplated as a capital, and ninety-eight per cent in the rural district. When such a city was decided to be impracticable, a district was set apart as the city's "liberties" to contain the two per cent, and the city proper took the small dimensions which it kept until 1854, viz: from the north side of Vine to the south side of South street, and from the Delaware to the Schuylkill. Penn gave to the holders of liberty land city lots proportionate in value and in addition thereto; but he did not divide the whole city of even nine tenths of it among these purchasers. The lots conveyed to them, like those sold later were sub- jected to a quit rent of appropriate amount, which thus increased what the first purchasers had agreed to pay for land partly in the great town and partly in the country. By some general assent like that obtained in "the sense of the meeting," this was arranged after Penn had made the city lots larger than he laid them out at first.
The name Philadelphia, which Penn gave to the city, had been rather a usual one for certain religious soci-
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eties or an ideal community from its signification, "brotherly love": and the fashion, rather than Penn's being struck by the name in reading the Bible, probably induced his choice. Penn's city was laid out before Aug. 16, 1683, the plan being described in the Short Advertisement or Account printed with Penn's letter of that date. Along the top of the bank on each river was the Front Street, called either Delaware Front or Schuylkill Front and from river to river was a street one hundred feet wide called High, while at right angles with it, and midway between the two rivers, was an- other street one hundred feet wide. Streets fifty feet wide were projected parallel with one or other of the aforesaid wide streets. Upon the intersection of the wide streets was placed a public square, described as ten acres, for public buildings, while four other pieces of ground were left open as public parks like the Moor- fields of London. The great difference from the present arrangement of the principal streets was in there being twenty-three streets running north and south instead of the present twenty-two in the same space, and in the Broad Street of those running north and south being the twelfth from either river. The lots on each of said Front Streets ran back to the second street from the river, but the lots on High Street did not run as far as the next street north or south. All these lots or an undivided share therein were given to the purchasers of 1000 acres or more. The Society of Traders took a strip from Delaware Front to Schuylkill Front, causing the elevated ground over which it extended about Delaware 2nd and Pine to be known as "Society Hill." Along the back streets were the lots for those who had purchased less than 1000 acres. Hardly had the scheme of streets and parks been adopted, and Holme's map of the province showing this been published, before the width of Delaware 12th street was changed. The patent dated Aug. 3, 1692, to the Society of Traders,
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reciting a resurvey, gives the property from Delaware Front, on which it extended from Spruce to Pine, thence along Spruce and Pine 320 ft., and, narrowing on the north to the width of 366 ft., and of that width, to Schuylkill Front, bounded on the south by Pine, and this patent described the block between the 2nd and 3rd streets from each river as 495 ft., and all the other blocks as 396 ft., except that between Delaware 13th and Broad, which block was 520 ft., the west side of Broad being 396 ft. from the east side of Schuylkill 8th. Probably the moving of the northwestern and south- western parks about two blocks westward was contem- poraneous with the aforesaid rearrangement of streets.
The bank of the Delaware from high water mark to Front Street was intended to be left unoccupied except by wharves, Penn leasing in 1684 for fifty years a lot to Samuel Carpenter for the latter purpose. However, some of the caves had been extended and roofed, and it took some time to make the cave-dwellers go away; after one or two had made terms to retain the better specimens of such structures, "bank lots," as they were called, began to be granted in fee, the buildings thereon being restricted to a height not obstructing the view from the western side of Front Street. The quit rent for a bank lot was not, like the other quit rents, to re- main fixed, but was to be increased at the end of every period of fifty-one years to one third of the rental value as then ascertained by an appraisement.
A large part of the city remained unsold until the divesting of the Penn estates, when the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania began disposing of the lots not taken up, in many cases whole blocks. The quit rents on city lots, like those on rural property not within the Pro- prietary manors, were abolished by the Divesting Act, as will be mentioned.
In the rural district of the Province, according to the aforesaid Conditions of 1681, any persons whose
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combined purchases amounted to 5000 or 10,000 acres could have their plantations placed side by side as a township, and if possible on harbors or navigable rivers, and the list dated 3, 22, 1682, arranged the purchasers in groups of 10,000 acres; but the map of the lots as placed, probably with the consent of the purchasers who had arrived, does not correspond with this, although showing a division into townships.
A general warrant was issued by Penn under the date, 3, 22, 1682, to Thomas Holme, the Surveyor-Gen- eral, to survey the lots for the purchasers in the list of that date. He accordingly cut up the available land outside of the city and Liberties, so as to place the tracts containing ninety-eight per cent of every pur- chase. The location was adhered to when these first purchasers or their representatives came to seat them- selves, except as they exchanged their locations, or incurred forfeiture under the Conditions, or the bound- aries were altered after ascertainment that they gave too many acres. Holme's map of Pennsylvania, after he had inserted tracts not in the first list given to him, but sold since, was printed in 1687.
In 1690, Penn issued a circular for the sale of the region along the eastern side of the Susquehanna, free of Indian title, and with a proportionate lot in a city to be built on that river. The project, although once or twice revived, never was carried through.
Except for the lots in the first list given to Holme, Markham, who was authorized to set out, survey, rent, or sell lands, and the Commissioners who were in- trusted with laying out the city, and afterwards Penn himself and his successors and his or their authorized agents issued a special warrant to the Surveyor-Gen- eral, or, if there was none, to a county surveyor, to survey in a particular place each lot agreed for. This warrant, which was as to many lots the second docu- ment necessary for a good title, was in many cases the
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first, the later Penns and their agents not executing deeds of lease and release. The warrant was duly re- turned with a description as ascertained by survey.
The patent, or deed poll of confirmation made letters patent, was signed in the absence of the Proprietary by Commissioners duly appointed by him, or, when there were none, then usually by the Lieutenant-Gov- ernor under a general letter of attorney authorizing him to make grants on the terms, methods, rents, and reservations used in the Land Office. The necessity for delivery of possession, or "livery of seisin," had been obviated. The patent otherwise followed feudal forms. The land was to be held of the Proprietary and his heirs and assigns as of a certain manor; what was within or adjoining Philadelphia or its Liberties, for instance, being granted to be held as of the manor of Springettsbury. The tenure was to be by fealty. The quit rent was expressed.
When William Penn departed from Pennsylvania, at the end of his first visit, he commissioned Thomas Lloyd, Robert Turner, and James Claypoole to grant warrants, and issue patents. Lloyd and Turner will be often mentioned in this book. James Claypoole had been a merchant in London. He was brother of the John Claypoole who married Oliver Cromwell's daughter. On 11mo. 21, 1686, Markham, then Secretary of the Province and Proprietary's secretary, was com- missioned with Thomas Ellis and John Goodson to exercise those powers. An order, dated three days later, required any two of them to dispose of any tracts in Pennsylvania already taken up, but lying vacant and unseated, and most likely to give cause of discourage- ment to those ready to seat the same. Certain excep- tions and time of grace were allowed in executing this.
A very annoying right was retained by the Proprie- tary so long as a patent had not been issued, viz: that of correcting wrong measurements; and this was de-
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puted to these early Commissioners. They could re- survey lands back of five miles from the navigable rivers, and were to keep for the Proprietary's use and disposal all overplus found by resurvey, where there had not been a final grant or a patent.
Under date of 2mo. 16, 1689, Penn appointed Mark- ham, Turner, Goodson, and Samuel Carpenter as "Commissioners of Propriety (sic)," and to act in the nature of a court of exchequer for collecting rents, and auditing the Receiver's accounts. James Harrison, as steward, had collected the rents, but Blackwell, the Governor, was made Receiver. Besides the forfeiture for not putting people on the land, and that for wrong measurement, there was, until the passage in 1693 of an act of confirmation, a forfeiture for not recording deeds. There was little complaint against these Com- missioners or Penn, who superseded them by his second visit, either as to the distribution of lots or the for- feitures; but the alteration of metes and bounds by resurvey, even when fairly conducted, was deemed a hardship. In 1700, Penn and his freemen in Assembly agreed upon a law not only for quiet enjoyment of lands seated by virtue of patents and warrants under the Crown of England before Penn's charters, but also that all lands duly taken up by warrants pursuant to pur- chases from the Proprietary, or issued under any com- mission or power granted by him, except when obtained by fraud or deceit, or when interfering with others' just claims, were to be enjoyed by the possessor and his heirs and assigns according to the warrants, and that, even where no patent had been granted, peaceable pos- session for seven years after peaceable entry under the warrant was to give a title to such lands in such quan- tity as they had been taken up for. It was also enacted that future grants from the Proprietary were to be under the great seal, and to give an absolute title not to be shifted by resurvey : former grants under broad
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or lesser seal were to be good for the quantity of land named therein, but the land could be resurveyed within two years after the publication of the law, and the excess over the stipulated number of acres, after allow- ing four per cent for difference of surveys, and six per cent for roads, should belong to the Proprietary, the possessor having the refusal at reasonable rates, to be agreed upon by two arbitrators chosen by each side, any three fixing the price, or saying where the excess should be taken off, and any deficiency should be made up by the Proprietary according as he re- ceived overplus land.
The legislation, again passed in 1701, was not suffi- cient to satisfy the people. When the last Assembly chosen during Penn's second visit had convened, and he, in his speech, had offered to join in some suitable provision for the safety of the people in privileges and property, a number of citizens of Philadelphia pre- sented a petition calling attention to grievances, and in a few days the House appeared before him with a re- quest that twenty-one items be embodied in a charter. He protested that some of these concerned matters not cognizable by an Assembly, being matters between him and the individuals with whom he had dealt; and, standing on his rights, he explained that he must avoid making a precedent for control of his property by the law-making power, lest there be a Governor distinct from and independent of the Proprietary, as was threat- ened by a bill in Parliament.
However, he substantially satisfied the Assembly on some points ; for instance, he allowed hunting and fish- ing on one's own land, and on that of the Proprietary not taken up, and that fees, if such as would relieve the Proprietary of the support of the Surveyor, Secretary, and other officers, be fixed by law, or left to an action of quantum meruit. On his promise to allow the ten acres in one hundred only for the purposes mentioned
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in the law, the Assembly pressed for a clearing up of misunderstanding, so that the allowance for roads and highways be made whether the lands had been already or were yet to be taken up. In a Bill of Property subsequently sent up by the Assembly, there was a clause making him supply deficiencies found on resur- vey. He objected that he had never intended to be debtor where the ground was not to be had; but, as it was thought unfair that those who had ten per cent more than the deeds called for could keep it, while those who had only two per cent overplus might have to be content with that, he was willing to make up six per cent overplus to all. This the House rejected; and the law of 1700 and 1701 on the subject was not amended. He ultimately included in the charter which established a new Frame of Government the 5th item requested, viz: that no person be liable to answer in any matter of property before the Governor and Council, or else- where than in the ordinary courts. In one of the messages on this subject, the Proprietary said that he alone was to decide disputes about unconfirmed prop- erties. The 8th item of the request, reciting that he had given the purchasers to expect their lots in the city of Philadelphia as a free gift, asked that they be cleared of the rents and reservations. To this he replied that the first purchasers present at the allotment seemed readily to agree to what was done, and had received more than double the frontage first promised: if those who had signed the petition to the Assembly would return the difference between 50 ft. and 102 ft., he would "be easy in the quit rents." The 9th item was that the city back of the built up portion remain open as common until the respective owners be ready to build, and the islands and flats near the city be left for the inhabitants to gather winter fodder. He said that it was a mistake to think the fourth part of the city reserved for such as were not first purchasers belonged
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to anybody but himself, but he was willing temporarily to lay out some land for the accommodation of the resi- dents; yet the islands and flats had nothing to do with the city. Similarly he agreed that the bay marshes be as common until disposed of; this being in answer to the 16th item, that such marshes be commons, which proposal he took as "a high imposition," and which the Assembly did not press : whereas the Assembly adhered to the 8th and 9th items. The 13th item went so far as to ask that the land not taken up in the Lower Counties be disposed of at the old rent of a bushel of wheat a hundred. He justly replied that it was un- reasonable to limit him in what was his own, or deprive him of the benefit of an advance in value which time would give to other men's property. Yet the Assembly- men thereupon voted that they "humbly move the Pro- prietor would further consider it as proposed." To the 20th item, that the quit rents be redeemable, he said : "If it should be my lot to lose a public support, I must depend upon my rents for a supply, and therefore must not easily part with them; and many years are elapsed since I made that offer that was not accepted." The Assemblymen unanimously adopted a retort that they humbly moved that "he would further consider it in regard to his former promises and their dependence thereon." On all these points, notwithstanding some conferences, he did not yield: the power being in his hands, the disposing of land was not changed.
On leaving the Province, at the end of that visit, Penn commissioned Edward Shippen, Griffith Owen, Thomas Story, and James Logan or any three of them to grant lots, and make titles &ct.
The law of 1701 was repealed by the Queen in Council on February 7, 1705-6, before the business of resurvey- ing and settling for errors could be finished. Another act on the subject, passed in 1712, was repealed at the close of the following year. Very little more legislation
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followed, and the disposal of all unsold land was prac- tically in the hands of the Commissioners appointed by the Penns until the oversight was taken by one of the family coming to Pennsylvania. Except when those managing the Proprietaries' property were acting under letters of attorney from the mortgagees or under the powers conferred by William Penn's will, a regular course of procedure was followed, and rules precluding favoritism were observed. In later times, the Lieu- tenant-Governor presided over the Board of Property, exercising any discretion usually according to the ad- vice of the Secretary. Under that title, the chief man- agers from 1701 until the American Revolution were successively James Logan, Rev. Richard Peters, William Peters, and James Tilghman. As the business increased, the various executive duties were divided among a Secretary, Surveyor-General, Receiver-Gen- eral, Auditor-General, and Keeper of the Great Seal, and the deputies or clerks of one or more of them, all being known as the Land Office.
The holding by one or two men of not merely the quit rents on land sold, but of the entire unsold land within the boundaries of Pennsylvania was perceived to conflict with or threaten the government of the people, for the people, and by the people inaugurated for the State at the American Revolution. So, on Nov. 27, 1779, the legislature of the new Commonwealth passed what is known as the Divesting Act, taking away or transferring to the State from the Proprietaries all unsold land except what had been acquired by them otherwise than as Proprietaries, and except what had been surveyed to them as manors or parts of manors prior to July 4, 1776; and also abolishing all quit rents except those reserved out of land within the manors. The Assembly had a free hand to confiscate or destroy. The treaty of peace with Great Britain had not been made: it prohibited for the future confiscations of the
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property of the Tories. The Assembly in the Act showed after all a kindly spirit. It was impossible to compensate the Penns with any equivalent: but, lest John Penn, son of Thomas, and John Penn, son of Richard, reduced to the position of well-to-do gentlemen, were not sufficiently provided for, there was voted to the heirs and representatives of Thomas and Richard Penn, deceased Proprietaries, the sum of £130,000 stg., payable after the end of the war. The money was duly paid and accepted. In consideration of the loss not thereby covered, the British government for over one hundred years paid to the representative of the Pro- prietaries an annuity of £4000, and then commuted it for a principal sum.
CHAPTER IV.
THE RED NEIGHBOURS.
The Lenni Lenape, or Delawares, and early pur- chases from them-Penn's Great Treaty: time, place, and some of the participants-Subsequent deeds-Further account of the Delawares until 1701-The Iroquoian Five Nations-The Minquas, or Susquehannocks; or Andaste-Dealings to ac- quire for Penn the Susquehanna Valley-Recog- nition of the Five Nations as Subjects of England -The Pascatoways, or Ganawese, or Conoys- The Shawnees-Treaty of 1701 with Minquas, Shawnees, Ganawese, and Emperor of Onondagas -New York Treaty with Five Nations for peace with all the English colonies-The Nanticokes- The Tuscaroras-Small expense of intercourse with Indians.
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