USA > Pennsylvania > Colonial and revolutionary families of Pennsylvania; genealogical and personal memoirs, Vol. I > Part 5
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James Logan, at the time he settled at "Stenton", had acquired a fortune
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in commerce, in trade with the Indians, and by the purchase and sale of desir- able tracts of land in all parts of the Colony, which his position as Surveyor General gave him opportunity of securing. He was therefore able to live in princely style, and entertain with a free-hearted hospitality. For more than a cen- tury "Stenton" as the home of the Logan family was the resort of notable and dis- tinguished persons of the Colonies and from abroad, and its mistresses were among the most accomplished women of their time.
James Logan voluntarily retired from the Provincial Council, May 29, 1747, having taken little part in its deliberations for several years previously. He died at "Stenton", December 31, 1751, and was buried at the Friends' Bury- ing Ground, in Philadelphia.
James Logan married, at Friends' Meeting, Philadelphia, December 9, 1714, Sarah Read, daughter of Charles Read, a prominent merchant of Philadelphia, by his second wife, Amy (Child) Stanton, widow of Edward Stanton, and a half-sister of Charles Read, the Provincial Councillor.
Amy Child, "of Hertford, in the County of Hertford, Spinster", by lease and release, dated January 24 and 25, 1681, purchased of William Penn five hundred acres of land to be laid out in Pennsylvania. After her purchase she married Edward Stanton, who obtained a warrant of survey for the said five hundred acres of land, dated 9mo. (November) 1686, and it was surveyed in Solebury township, Bucks county, Pennsylvania. Edward Stanton died, and Amy was married to her second husband, Charles Read, at Middletown Monthly Meeting, in Bucks county, September 23, 1690. He joined her in a conveyance of the Solebury plantation to John Scarborough, December 19, 1698, and the resurvey to Scarborough, with the information above noted, is mentioned in the Minutes of the Commissioners of Property, under date of May 19, 1702. Amy Child was probably of the same family as Henry Child, of Coleshill, Amer- sham, county Hertford, who purchased one thousand five hundred acres of William Penn, at about the same date, and came to Pennsylvania, but later returned to England, leaving here a son, Cephas Child, who has numerous descendants in Bucks county, Philadelphia, and elsewhere in Pennsylvania.
Charles Read, father of Mrs. Logan, was a member of the Board of Alder- men of Philadelphia, under the Charter of 1701, and represented Philadelphia in the Assembly in 1704. Charles Read, the Councillor, is said to have been a son of a former marriage, while Sarah Logan and Rachel Pemberton were the daughters of Amy (Child) Stanton, the second wife.
James Logan had many years prior to his marriage been an ardent suitor for the hand of Anne Shippen, the beautiful daughter of Edward Shippen, but she rejected his suit and married Thomas Story, Logan's colleague in the Board of Property, with whom he seems to have had considerable contro- versy, as evidenced by his correspondence with Penn, probably owing largely to their rivalry for the hand of Anne Shippen. Under date of IImo. 16, 1704-5, Penn writes Logan, "I am anxiously grieved for thy unhappy love for thy sake and my own, for T. S., and thy discord has been for no service here any more than there; and some say that come thence that thy amours have so altered or influenced thee that thou art grown touchy and apt to give rough and short answers, which many call haughty. I make no judgment, but caution thee, as in former letters, to let truth preside and bear impertinence as patiently as
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thou canst." Logan in his reply 3mo. 17, 1705, represents himself as very much abused and maligned by Thomas Story, whom he says, "in the middle of a pleasant discourse broke out into such a Thunder as if he carried ye whole magazine of anathemas in his breast, and so continued for 5months his blow at Meetings." After further explanation of their differences he concludes, "I am sorry I spent so much paper on it & therefore shall close ye subject when I have added that I wish he had some more Honour to season his religion, it would keep much ye sweeter."
Issue of James and Sarah (Reed) Logan :-
Sarah; b. Dec. 9, 1715, d. Dec. 13, 1744; m. Isaac Norris; James ;
WILLIAM, b. July 14, 1718, of whom presently;
HANNAH, b. Feb. 21, 1719-20, d. Dec. 18, 1761; m. John Smith, of whom later; Rachel, d. young ;
Charles, d. young ;
James Logan Jr., b. Dec., 1728, d. Sept. 25, 1803; resided in Philadelphia; was sur- viving trustee of Loganian Library, and as such agreed with directors of Library Company of Philadelphia, for union of the two collections, and in 1792 secured an Act of Assembly vesting the collections of the Loganian Library in the directors of the Library Company and in himself and two associates to be by him appointed, who with said directors were to hold the same in trust for the uses and purposes of the Library. At the death of the said James Logan Jr. the next heir male of his father, resident within seven miles of Philadelphia was to succeed him as trustee, always preferring issue of eldest son in male line to that of the female line; with power to fill vacancies, etc. Under date of Dec. 5, 1743, Richard Hockley writes :- "Mr. Logan has given the Corporation (of Philadelphia City) his lot opposite the Governor's Garden & books to the value of 1000f & intends a building 60 feet front to put the books in, for the use of the city." The Library then placed at the service of the public was the beginning of the Loganian Library. The building referred to by Mr. Hockley was constructed, but the deed therefore was afterwards withdrawn and cancelled by the elder Logan, who contemplated placing the trust on different terms, but he died before accomplishing his object. Under his will certain funds were set apart for the permanent support of the Library, among which were the proceeds of a permanent ground rent secured on 500 acres of land in Solebury township, Bucks county, known as the Great Spring Tract which the Library still receives. He m. Sarah Armitt, but left no issue.
WILLIAM LOGAN, second son of James Logan, born in Philadelphia, July 14, 1718, at the age of twelve years was sent to England to be educated under the care of his uncle and namesake, Dr. William Logan, a prominent and wealthy physician of Bristol, England, and remained there until he arrived at manhood. On his return to Philadelphia, he engaged in the mercantile trade with his father, and was made attorney of the Penn family on the death of Andrew Hamilton in 1741. He was actively engaged in trade until the death of his father in 1751, when becoming the owner of "Stenton" he took up his resi- dence there and devoted himself to agriculture.
He was elected to the Common Council of Philadelphia, October 4, 1743, and remained a member of that body until the municipal government of the city was suspended by the Revolution in 1776. When his father on May 29, 1747, sent word to the Governor's Council that he no longer considered himself a member of that body, William Logan was immediately called to take his place, and he continued a member of Council until his death on October 28, 1776. He was a far stricter Quaker than his father, and was always actively opposed to war on any pretext. He voted against the proposition to Council
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to pay for Indian scalps, on April 6, 1756, and against the declaration of war four days later.
With his cousin, Israel Pemberton, and others, he formed the Peace Asso- ciation, and offered to go at his own expense to the Delaware Indians to per- suade them to lay down their arms and enter into a treaty of peace. Sir Wil- liam Johnston, Governor of New York, being already negotiating a peace with them, the argument of the Peace Association carried considerable weight, and William Logan was one of the delegates to the Conference with the Indians at Easton, when peace was declared.
William Logan cared less for literary and scientific pursuits than his father. He was an extensive traveller and left a Journal of some of his rambles, nota- bly that of a visit to Georgia. With his brother James and sister, Hannah Smith, he on August 28, 1754, deeded library property, designed by his father for the use of the people of Philadelphia, to a board of trustees, consisting of himself, his brother James, Israel Pemberton Jr., his first cousin, William Allen, Richard Peters and Benjamin Franklin; William Logan acting as librarian until his death. He also bequeathed to the library thirteen hundred volumes bequeathed to him by his uncle, Dr. William Logan, of Bristol, England, with the provision that such as were duplicates of what the library already contained, should be given to the Philadelphia Library.
Conscientiously opposed to war, and deeply attached to the Penn family whom he had long represented in America, William Logan naturally held aloof from active part in the revolutionary struggle, and like many others of his ilk, was often an object of suspicion, and had he lived until the British threatened Philadelphia, would doubtless have been arrested and subjected to considerable annoyance as were many other wealthy and influential men of his class. He lived quietly at "Stenton" during the inception of the national struggle, and attended the meetings of Provincial Council long after the battle of Lexington.
Like his father, he was a great friend of the Indians, travelled among them frequently without an armed escort, even in days when Indian atrocities had alarmed the whole frontier; and frequently entertained large delegations of the aborigines at "Stenton". He lived a life of activity and good deeds, thor- oughly consistent with his religious belief. He died at "Stenton", October 29, 1776, and was buried at the Friends' Burying Ground. He married, March 24, 1740, Hannah Emlen, daughter of George Emlen, born in Philadelphia, June I, 1722, died at "Stenton", January 30, 1777.
Issue of William and Hannah (Emlen) Logan :-
Sarah, d. young ;
James, d. young ;
William, b. 1747; studied medicine, graduating at Univ. Edinburgh, 1770; d. in Philadel- phia, January 17, 1772, in his twenty-fifth year; m. Sarah, dau. of Dr. Portsmouth, who d. March, 1797;
Sarah, b. Jan. 6, 1751; m. Thomas Fisher ;
GEORGE, b. Sept. 9, 1753, m. Deborah Norris (See Norris Family) ; of whom presently;
Charles, d. in Virginia, 1794; married at Friends' Meeting, Philadelphia, July 8, 1779, Mary Pleasants, and had issue :-
James Logan, merchant of Philadelphia; lost at sea; will probated April 29, 1805; d. s. p .;
Sarah Pleasants Logan, m. Dr. James Carter, of Prince Edward county, Va .; Maria Virginia Logan, m. (first) Robert Woodson, a Virginia lawyer; (second) William F. Carter, of Virginia ;
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Harriet M. Logan, m. (first) John St. John, of Virginia; (second) David Howard;
Juliana Logan, m. Neil McCloud, merchant, of Virginia ;
Charles Franklin, b. Jan. 3, 1793; m. Sarah W. Robeson, daughter of Jonathan Robeson, of Philadelphia, and had issue :-
James Logan, d. s. p. Dec. 19, 1866;
Charles ;
Sally Robeson Logan, d. April 6, 1877; m. James S. Newbold, of Philadel- phia, broker.
GEORGE LOGAN, son of William and Hannah (Emlen) Logan, and who survived his parents, was born at "Stenton", September 9, 1753. He is said to have been the last Pennsylvania Quaker to attain eminence in public life, and the only strict member of the Society of Friends that ever sat in the United States Senate.
When a boy George Logan was sent to school in Worcester, England. His father destined him for a mercantile career, and on his return from abroad he was placed in the counting house of John Reynolds, an eminent merchant and shipper of foreign goods in Philadelphia. He, however, soon decided to study medicine, and after the death of his father, entered the University of Edin- burgh, from which he graduated in 1779, and then crossing to the continent, spent some time perfecting himself for his profession in Paris, where he was kindly received and introduced by Dr. Benjamin Franklin, then Minister to the French Court. From the distinguished philosopher and patriot he possibly imbibed the democratic principles that marked his subsequent career, and which he certainly did not inherit from his austere and aristocratic grandsire. He returned to Philadelphia in the autumn of 1780, and finding the old family home, "Stenton", laid waste by the Revolutionary war, bought the interest therein of his brother and sister, and turning his attention to its restoration and improvement, took up his home there and devoted himself for some years to agriculture. He became a member of the American Philosophical Society, and two contributions to their "Transactions" published in 1797, on "Experiments in Gypsum" and "Rotation of Crops", show that he had become a scientific and practical farmer. He was elected to the Pennsylvania Assembly in 1785, and regularly re-elected for the next three years. He was an intimate friend of Thomas Jefferson, and warmly espoused the cause and doctrines of the Democratic party. He was again elected to the Pennsylvania Legislature as the nominee of that party in 1795, and re-elected the following year. Like his father, an ardent advocate of peace, he went to France in June, 1798, in an effort, on his own responsibility, to prevent a war between that country and the United States. Landing at Hamburg, he met Lafayette, who enabled him to make his way to Paris, where he arrived on August 7, 1798. Learning from the United States Consul General, that President Adams' Commissioners had left without accomplishing their mission, and that all negotiations were at an end, and that an embargo had been laid on all American shipping in the ports of France, and many American seamen confined as prisoners, he presented to Tallyrand his letter of introduction from Thomas Jefferson, and made a strenuous effort for the relief of his countrymen. Finding the minister obdur- ate, he obtained an introduction to Citizen Merlin, one of the Directory, and securing a footing of warm friendship with him was able through him to save
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the property of a number of persons from confiscation, and secured the release of a number of the imprisoned seamen. His interference was resented by the Federalist officials, and on his return in 1799, as the bearer of despatches from the Consul General, he found them duplicated before his arrival, and the Federalist majority in Congress passed in that year an act later known as the "Logan Act", forbidding any private citizen to take any part in diplomacy, or to treat with a foreign country, without the authority of the government. He was re-elected to the Pennsylvania Assembly in 1799, and in 1801 was appointed to the United States Senate to fill a vacancy caused by the resignation of Peter Muhlenberg, serving out the full term which expired March 4, 1807. In 1810 he again went abroad on a mission of peace, this time in an effort to prevent the second war with Great Britain, which followed in 1812. He died at "Sten- ton", April 9, 1821, in his sixty-eighth year.
George Logan married, September 6, 1781, Deborah Norris, born October 19, 1761, died at "Stenton", February 2, 1839. She was the second child and eldest daughter of Charles and Mary (Parker) Norris and was the "Debby Norris" to whom Sally Wister indited her "Journal". She was an exceedingly hand- some and gifted woman, and as the mistress of "Stenton" "drew around her the most eminent and illustrious men and women of the then leading city of the young Republic," as well as distinguished visitors and diplomats from abroad. President George Washington was frequently entertained there while Philadel- phia was the seat of the national government, and here Citizen Genet met and dined with the prominent men of this country, and intrigued to secure their sup- port of the struggling French Republic.
Issue of Dr. George and Deborah (Norris) Logan :-
ALBANUS CHARLES, of whom presently ; Gustavus George, b. Oct. 6, 1786, d. Aug. 20, 1800; Algernon Sydney, d. s. p. at "Stenton", Dec. 10, 1835.
ALBANUS CHARLES LOGAN, eldest son of Dr. George and Deborah (Debby) (Norris) Logan, born at "Stenton", November 22, 1783, was also a physician. He succeeded his father as Trustee of the Loganian Library. He died Febru- ary 10, 1854. He married his second cousin, Maria Dickinson, born November 6, 1783, died 1854, daughter of John and Mary (Norris) Dickinson, and grand- daughter of Isaac Norris, and his wife Sarah Logan, daughter of James Logan, the famous secretary. Her paternal ancestry, as well as that of her husband's mother, "Debby" Norris, is given elsewhere in these volumes, under the title of the "Norris Family."
Issue of Albanus Charles and Maria (Dickinson) Logan :-
Mary Norris Logan, d. unm. October 3, 1886.
Sarah Elizabeth Logan, b. Nov. 6, 1812, d. March 18, 1859; m. Oct. 10, 1833, Thomas Forrest Betton, M. D., of Germantown, d. May 24, 1875.
GUSTAVUS GEORGE LOGAN, b. May 15, 1815; of whom presently.
JOHN DICKINSON LOGAN, b. June 21, 1817; of whom presently.
GUSTAVUS GEORGE LOGAN, eldest son of Albanus Charles and Maria (Dick- inson) Logan, born at "Stenton", May 15, 1815, as eldest male representative of James Logan, the Provincial Councillor, was Trustee of the Loganian Library 3
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until his death, December 17, 1876. He married, October 29, 1846, Anna Armi- att, daughter of William and Jane Caroline Armatt, of "Loudon," Philadelphia county.
Issue of Gustavus George and Anna (Armatt) Logan :-
Dickinson Norris Logan, b. Oct. 5, 1848, d. Jan. 28, 1851.
Albanus Charles Logan, b. Sept. 19, 1850, the present owner of "Stenton" with his sister Maria Dickinson Logan, and eldest male representative of the great secretary. William Armatt Logan, b. Dec. I, 1852, d. March 31, 1859.
Fannie Armatt Logan, b. Oct. 14, 1854.
Maria Dickinson Logan, b. May 30, 1854.
Jane Caroline Armatt Logan, b. Sept. 22, 1859.
JOHN DICKINSON LOGAN, second son of Albanus Charles and Maria (Dick- inson) Logan, born at "Stenton", June 21, 1817, graduated from Medical De- partment of the University of Pennsylvania, and lived first at "Somerville", later at Baltimore, Maryland, where he died April 25, 1881. He married, April 28, 1846, Susan Wister, of the well-known Wister family of Germantown, an account of which is given elsewhere in these volumes, three or four members of which intermarried with the Logan family.
ALGERNON SYDNEY LOGAN, son of John Dickinson and Susan (Wister) Logan, born May 17, 1747, married, November 4, 1873, Mary Wynne Wister, born Feb- ruary 2, 1847, daughter of William Wynne and Hannah (Lewis) Wister, and they reside at "Somerville". They had issue, one son,
Robert Restalrigg Logan, b. Dec. 3, 1874, who m. June 6, 1898, Sara Wetherill, and had issue :
Deborah Logan Wetherill, b. Feb. 16, 1900.
HANNAH LOGAN, second daughter of James Logan, the distinguished Pro- vincial Secretary, born February 21, 1719-20, and named in honor of Hannah Penn, the second wife of her father's honored patron, married, December 7, 1748, John Smith, then a wealthy and prominent young merchant of Philadel- phia, and a member of the Pennsylvania Assembly. Their courtship as gleaned from the diary of John Smith, is the subject of a delightful book, entitled "Han- nah Logan's Courtship", recently published, which gives us the best picture of Colonial life in Philadelphia to be found in our later day literature. The intro- duction to the diary opens with an account of the visit to "Stenton", June I, 1744, of the Indian Commissioners from Virginia, on their way to meet the Iroquois chieftans at Lancaster to negotiate a treaty, and quotes from the Jour- nal of William Black, the Secretary of the Commission, published in the Penn- sylvania Magasine; and the merry young Secretary thus describes his impres- sions of Hannah Logan, "At last the Tea Table was set and one of his daugh- ters presented herself in Order to fill out the Fashionable Warm Water; I was really very much surprised at the appearance of so Charming a Woman, in a place where the seeming moroseness and Goutified Father's Appearance Prom- ised no such Beauty, tho' it must be allowed the Man seem'd to have some Re- mains of a handsome enough person, and a Complection beyond his years.
"But to return to the Lady, I declare I burnt my Lips more than once, being quite thoughtless of the warmness of my Tea, entirely lost in Contemplating her Beauties. She was tall and slender, but Exactly well shap'd, her Features Per-
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1317989
fect and Complection, tho' a little the whitest, yet her countenance had some- thing in it extremely Sweet. Her eyes press'd a very great softness, denoting a compos'd Temper and Serenity of Mind. Her Manner was Grave and Resev'd and to be short, she had a Sort of Majesty in her Person and Agreeableness in her Behavior, which at once Surprised and Charmed the Beholders."
On her removal to Burlington, New Jersey, with her husband in the year 1756, Hannah (Logan) Smith, entered the ministry of the Society of Friends and conformed to the "meek and lowly" habits she conceived to be consistent with her professions, refusing to ride as formerly in her "four wheeled Chaise, with Driver & horses," and travelled to and from the meetings where she min- istered on horseback. She died at Burlington, January 15, 1762, at the age of forty-two years. Her husband writes of her: "In the relation of Child, Wife and Mother, she was tenderly and anxiously careful to fill her place."
John Smith was born at Burlington, New Jersey, March 20, 1722, and was the second son of the Honourable Richard Smith Jr. by his wife Abigail Rapier or Raper, daughter of Thomas Raper, who was born at Sindersby, near Thursk, Yorkshire, and came to New Jersey in 1681, where he married Abigail Perkins, daughter of William and Mary Perkins, who in 1677 came from Seilby, in one of the first English vessels that came up the river Delaware; the father dying at sea, and the mother settling with her family at Burlington.
The "Burlington Smiths" from whom John Smith descended were of a Quaker family of the name that had been residents of Bramham, in the West Riding of Yorkshire, since the sixteenth century. Richard Smith, the great- grandfather of John, was baptized at Bramham in 1626, and was a son of Rich- ard Smith of Bramham, born 1593, died 1647, the first ancestor of the family of whom we have any record. Richard (2) was educated for the Law. He joined the Friends when a young man, and in 1660 was with five hundred other Quakers imprisoned in York Castle. He was the author of a tract called "A Christian Directory." He was married in 1653, before Alderman Paul Peale, of York, to Anne Yeates, daughter of William Yeates, a Quaker resident of Albrough. She was also imprisoned in York Castle in 1688, the year of her husband's decease. Richard Smith was one of the first purchasers with William Penn and Edward Byllinge of the West Jersey lands, and his eldest son John came over in 1677 to look after it. The other sons, Daniel, Joseph, Emanuel, Samuel and Richard following later.
Samuel Smith, the grandfather of John Smith, first above mentioned, was a son of Richard and Anne (Yeates) Smith, and was born at Bramham, York- shire, in 1672, and in 1694 emigrated to New Jersey and settled at Burlington, where he became prominent in local and Provincial affairs, serving in the Pro- vincial Assembly. He married Elizabeth Lovett, daughter of Edmond Lovett, of Bucks county, Pennsylvania, and had one son Richard Smith Jr. and a daugh- ter Mary, who married Joseph Noble, a son of Abel Noble of Bucks county, Pennsylvania.
Richard Smith Jr., born in Burlington in 1699, was a prominent member of Burlington Friends' Meeting, and a prosperous merchant, being extensively en- gaged in the West India trade, and owning a number of vessels, some of which were built at his own shipyard at Burlington. His extensive wharves were at Green Bank, where he received grain, lumber, and other products of New Jer-
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sey for shipment to the West Indies in exchange for sugar, rum, molasses and other products of those isles. He erected in 1720, shortly after his marriage to Abigail Raper, a spacious town house, on Main street, Burlington, not far from the river, and also owned a country seat, near Green Hill, once the seat of Gov- ernor Samuel Jennings. He was for nearly twenty years a member of New Jersey Assembly, and was held in high respect by the prominent men of the Province. According to James Alexander, one of the Councillors of New Jer- sey, Governor Belcher relied chiefly on his counsel in state affairs, and he was "by much the Man of the best Sense and Interest in the Assembly." His eldest son was Samuel Smith, ( 1720-1776) the historian, member of Provincial Assem- bly and Council, and with his brother John, and Charles Read the Custodian of the seal and acting Governor during the absence in England of Governor Wil- liam Franklin, and subsequently Provincial Treasurer. His "History of New Jersey", issued in 1765, is still the standard history of the state during Colonial times. He was also in a sense the first historian of Pennsylvania, as the final compiler of the "History of the Quakers in Pennsylvania", authorized by Phil- adelphia yearly meeting from which Proude and later historians drew largely in compiling their works. He was further associated with Pennsylvania by his marriage with Jane Kirkbride, in 1741, daughter of Joseph Kirkbride, one of the largest land owners and most prominent men of Bucks county.
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