USA > Pennsylvania > Luzerne County > Families of the Wyoming Valley: biographical, genealogical and historical. Sketches of the bench and bar of Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, vol. II > Part 18
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Liddon Flick, eldest son of Reuben Jay Flick, was born in Wilkes- Barre October 28, 1859. His early education was at the public schools of this city. After two years spent at private school in preparation for college, he entered the freshman class at Prince- ton in September, 1878, graduating therefrom in June, 1882, receiving the degree of B. A. Having determined upon the study of law, he took the prescribed course at the law school of Columbia college, New York city. From here he graduated in June, 1884, receiving the degree of LL. B., cum laude. After a year spent in the office of ex-Judge Lucien Birdseye he was admitted to the New York city bar in January, 1885. Later he returned to Wilkes-Barre to look somewhat after his father's interests and to practice his profession. After spending the required six months in the office of Alexander Farnham, Esq., he was, on June 2, 1886, admitted to practice in the courts of Luzerne county.
Mr. Flick is bright, painstaking, and conscientious-three qualities or attributes that generally win for their possessor the best fruits of any undertaking. His collegiate successes, as will be observed, have been of an unusual order. They are them- selves something to be proud of, but their greatest significance
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JOHN QUINCY CREVELING.
arises from the fact that they indicate his superior fitness for the profession he has chosen. He is a great reader of books of all good kinds, and a student of the fine arts, and while these things have no necessary relation to the practice of the law, they are no small aid to lawyers, of whom this can be said: of two men each equally well read in the law and equally able in expounding it, the one whose general knowledge is the most extensive and varied has decidedly the advantage.
JOHN QUINCY CREVELING.
John Quincy Creveling, of Plymouth, was born in Fishing Creek township, Columbia county, Pa., June 6, 1861. He is a son of Alfred Tubbs Creveling, also a native of Fishing Creek, but at present a resident of Plymouth, Pa. John Creveling, father of Alfred Tubbs Creveling, was born near the town of Espy, Columbia county, in 1808, and in 1810, in company with the family of his father, Samuel Creveling, a native of the state of New Jersey, removed to Fishing Creek township. Isaiah Creveling, of Fairmount township, Luzerne county, so long and favorably known in this county, was a brother of John Creveling. The wife of John Creveling was Lowley Tubbs, a daughter of Nathan Tubbs, jr., a son of Nathan Tubbs, sr., who became a resident of Huntington in 1789. The wife of Nathan Tubbs, jr., was Sarah, daughter of Timothy Hopkins, who took the one hundred and fifty acres surveyed as a mill lot whereon he and Stephen Harrison built the first flouring mill in Huntington town- ship in 1795, or the year following, on Mill creek, near the head of Hopkins' Glen.
The mother of John Quincy Creveling, and wife of Alfred T. Creveling, is Susan B. Rhone, a daughter of the late George Rhone, who died in this city in 1881. Mrs. Creveling is a sister of Judge Rhone, of this city. We have given a sketch of the ancestors of Mrs. Creveling in these pages under the head of Daniel La Porte Rhone, but we will herewith give some addi-
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tional facts relating to the Bowman family. Mary Bowman Stevens, the mother of Mrs. Creveling, is the great-grand-daugh- ter of George Christopher Bauman, who came to this country "November 22, 1752, in the ship Phoenix-Reuben Honor, cap- tain-from Rotterdam, last from Cowes." After his arrival in this country he used the name of Christopher Bowman. He made his home in Bucks county, Pa., and was sufficiently success- ful in his business within a few years to make a return to his father- land on a visit. After a few years they removed to Mount Bethel, in Northampton county, on the west side of the Delaware river, about four miles from the point where the Delaware, Lack- awanna and Western railroad crosses the river, about five miles below, or east, of the Delaware Water Gap. Here they remained and wrought apparently for thirty years, improving their prop- erty, planting and sowing, cultivating the land and reaping the harvests.
In 1793 Christopher Bowman, with his son Thomas Bowman with his wife and five children, moved from Mount Bethel to Briar Creek township, Columbia county, locating about five or six miles from Berwick. They were soon after followed by other members of the family. After having lived for some years at Briar Creek, Christopher Bowman went upon a visit to some friends at Queenshockeny Valley, about seven miles north of Williamsport, Pa., where in 1806 he became sick and died. He was buried in the cemetery of Newberry, and a tombstone without inscription marks his resting place. The identity of his grave is lost.
In Bishop Asbury's journal, Vol. 3, p. 228, may be found the following memorandum : "Pennsylvania, Sunday, 19 July, 1807. I went to the woods and preached and ordained Thomas and Christian Bowman deacons. Before I got through with my dis- course the rain came on, and I made a brief finish ; the people were attentive. In the afternoon the preachers and many of the people went to a barn ; there were showers of rain and thunder whilst the services were first performing. My first visit to Wyo- ming was in great toil." This was on the site of the old Forty Fort church, which was completed the same year. The two Bowmans above mentioned were sons of Christopher Bowman. Rev. Thomas Bowman, senior bishop of the Methodist Episcopal
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JAMES BUCHANAN SHAVER.
church, is a grandson of Rev. Thomas Bowman, son of Christo- pher Bowman. John Bowman, sr., was born at Mount Bethel April 2, 1772, and died February 8, 1848. His daughter, Perme- lia Bowman, was born in Huntington in 1798, and married Zebulon Stevens. Mary Bowman Stevens, mother of Mrs. A. T. Creveling, was the daughter of Zebulon Stevens.
John Quincey Creveling was educated in the public schools and at the New Columbus academy. He taught school in Ply- mouth in 1879, 1880, 1881, 1882 and 1883, and was one of the school directors of that borough during the years 1884 and 1885. He studied law with C. W. McAlarney, and was admitted to the bar of Luzerne county June 19, 1886. He is an unmarried man and a democrat in politics. He is prominent in Methodist Epis- copal church circles, and is superintendent of the Methodist Episcopal Sabbath school of Plymouth.
Mr. Creveling is a young man of good mental parts, and has an energetic way of doing things that gives the on-looker faith to believe that he has a decided fitness for the profession he has chosen. He is a relative of Judge D. L. Rhone, of the Orphans' Court of Luzerne county, and not wholly unlike that gentleman in his leading characteristics. He has read and is still reading to good purpose and will succeed.
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JAMES BUCHANAN SHAVER.
James Buchanan Shaver, of Plymouth, was born in Dallas, Pa., January 24, 1859. He is a descendant of Philip Shaver. We are indebted to William. P. Ryman, of the Luzerne bar, for the following in relation to the Shaver family of Dallas :
"The Shaver family appears (in Dallas township) as an early and, like the Honeywells, a numerous settler. The name was at first spelled indifferently S-h-a-v-e-r, S-h-a-f-e-r and S-h-a-f-f-e-r. Adam Shaffer, Peter Shafer and Frederick Shaver were residents of Kingston township as early as 1796. Adam was a shoemaker by trade, but in 1806 he started and for several years ran an oil mill in Mill Hollow (now Luzerne borough), at the place now
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JAMES BUCHANAN SHAVER.
occupied by Schooley's chop and plaster mill. Adam Shaffer was also certified grantee of the northwestern half of lot five in certified Bedford township, now principally owned and occupied by John Ferguson, Esq. The exact date when they first settled in Dallas cannot now be determined with certainty. They were of German descent, and most of them came immediately from New Jersey.
"About the year 1812-13 Philip Shaver and his sons John and William became the owners of large bodies of land in the south- easterly portion of what is now Dallas township and in adjacent portions of present Kingston township. For a long time, and even to this day, the settlement is locally known as and called 'Shavertown.' Philip Shaver was a progressive man. He was born and spent his early boyhood in the valley of the Danube river, near Vienna, Austria. It was a cardinal principle with him that a man was not really running in debt when he bought and owed for good real estate at a reasonable price. One of his earliest purchases was in 1813, of the whole of lot three (over three hundred acres) of certified Bedford, from William Trucks. The same year he sold a portion from the northwest half to Jonah McLellan, also a Jerseyman (from Knowlton township, Warren county). On that portion bought by Mclellan the present vil- lage of Dallas (or McLellansville, as it was originally named) was built.
"Philip Shaver settled and built his house, a log house, on the hill about a quarter mile south of the cross roads, near late resi- .dence of James Shaver, dec'd, and on the ground afterwards occu- pied and owned by Asa Shaver, now deceased. Philip Shaver was generous and public spirited to a marked degree for the time and place. He gave the land for the public burying ground on the hill just south of Dallas village. He also gave the land for what is known as the Shaver burying ground, which lies about half a mile southeast of the former. The land upon which the first school-house in Dallas township was built was likewise a gift from him. This land lies partly in the cross road just south of and adjacent to the present school lot in Dallas borough."
Philip Shaver had a son Philip, who had a son William, who was born in Newton, Sussex county, N. J. Andrew Jackson Shaver, son of William Shaver, was born in Dallas. During the administration of Samuel Van Loon as sheriff A. J. Shaver acted as a deputy sheriff. He died in Dallas. The wife of Andrew J. Shaver was Clarissa Davenport, a daughter of Oliver Davenport, of Plymouth, a son of Thomas Davenport, jr., and a grandson of
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ANTHONY CHARLES CAMPBELL.
Thomas Davenport, sr. A history of the Davenports was given in the sketch of George W. Shonk, that has appeared in these pages. The wife of Oliver Davenport was Lyvia Ransom, daughter of Col. George Palmer Ransom. A sketch of Col. Ransom has already been given in these pages in the biogra- phy of George Steele Ferris.
James Buchanan Shaver, son of Andrew Jackson Shaver, was educated at Wyoming Seminary and at the Wesleyan University, Middletown, Conn., graduating from the latter institution in the class of 1881. He read law with John A. Opp, in Plymouth, and was admitted to the Luzerne county bar June 21, 1886. He is an unmarried man, and a democrat in politics.
Mr. Shaver has already tried several cases, and exhibited in the conduct of them an understanding of the law and a wisdom of judgment that augur well for his future. Plymouth has come of recent years to be a very important town. It has extensive coal interests and is the centre of general supplies for a popula- tion greater than that of many quite ambitious cities. Up to very recently one or two lawyers found it easy to do all its legal busi- ness, but their number is multiplying, and the fact that all of them are succeeding in a financial way is sufficient proof that the multiplication has as yet not been in excess of the need. Mr. Shaver will get his share of it, however, whether in the hereafter. it be much or little, for what he undertakes to do he does well and thoroughly, and that kind of a man succeeds in the law and in everything else.
ANTHONY CHARLES CAMPBELL.
Anthony Charles Campbell was born in Wilkes-Barre, Pa., June 7, 1862. He is the eldest son of James Campbell, a native of Enver, Donegal county, Ireland, and who came to this coun- try in 1847, when he was a lad about eighteen years of age. His father's name was Anthony Campbell, and the family is of Scot- tish descent. James Campbell landed in Boston, Massachusetts,
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ANTHONY CHARLES CAMPBELL.
and remained there for about a year, when he removed to Buck Mountain, Pa., and from there to White Haven. About 1851 he removed to Pittston, in this county. From 1855 to 1858 he ran a stage route from Pittston to Wilkes-Barre. He then removed to Wilkes-Barre, where he has since resided, and from 1861 to 1876 he kept an hotel in the latter place. In 1869 he was the dem- ocratic candidate for county treasurer, but was defeated by Gar- rick M. Miller, republican, the vote standing-Miller, 9537 ; Campbell, 8045. In 1875 he was again a candidate for the same office, but was defeated by John McNeish, jr., the vote standing -Campbell, 9231 ; McNeish, 9491. In 1871 Mr. Campbell, in company with his son Anthony C., paid a visit to the land of his nativity. He took a practical view of the affair, as he purchased a buggy and harness in this country, and when he arrived in Ireland he bought a horse, and in this manner he made a tour of Ireland. For the past six years he has been the court deputy of the sheriff of Luzerne county. Mr. Campbell married, in 1858, Ann McGourty, a daughter of Thomas McGourty, a native and resident of Manorhamilton, in the county of Leitrim, Ireland.
Anthony C. Campbell was educated in the public schools of Wilkes-Barre and at Lafayette college, graduating from the latter institution in the class of 1884. After graduating from the pub- lic schools he taught school for one year in the Morgantown school building, in the recently erected borough of Edwards- ville. Mr. Campbell is president of the alumni association of the Third school district of this city. He read law with Henry W. Palmer, and was admitted to the bar of Luzerne county October 18, 1886. During the latter year he was secretary of the democratic county committee.
Mr Campbell is one of the most promising young men at the Luzerne bar. His educational advantages have been the best to be had in the state, and he not only studied but learned, winning high position in his classes in all the institutions he attended. He was prepared for the profession under one who was deemed a good enough lawyer to serve the commonwealth as its attorney general, and he has secured both the esteem and the confidence of his mentor. In addition to these advantages he has a natural aptitude for the practice of the law, being a careful and acute
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CHARLES EDMUND KECK.
reasoner, a modest but attractive talker, and having industry, which always makes other good qualities yield to the full, while without it they become dormant and rusty. Many of the most conspicuous members of the Luzerne bar are reaching that age when, if they are not meanwhile called to the other world, ina- bility longer to withstand the strains of arduous practice will compel them to retire for needful rest: Mr. Campbell is one of the few of the younger men who are expected, from indications of their talent already given, to step into the places thus made vacant.
CHARLES EDMUND KECK.
Charles Edmund Keck was born in White Haven, Luzerne county, Pa., September 2, 1861. He is a descendant of Henry Geck, a native of Upper Pfalls, Bavaria, who left his native coun- try with his wife (Peterson), of Holland, on board the English ship Pink John and William, of Sunderland-Constable Tym- perton, master-from Rotterdam, last from Dover, and arrived in Philadelphia October 17, 1732. When he reached there he and his wife were sold as redemptioners for their passage money to a man in Chester county, and served the time agreed upon- about three or four years. As very little is known at this time about the redemptioners, we insert the following :
From the early settlement of Pennsylvania a considerable business was carried on, chiefly by ship owners and captains of vessels, in importing from Europe persons who were desirous of emigrating to this country, and were too poor to pay for their passage, or have a competency for an outfit for so long a journey. With this class, who generally came from England, Ireland and Germany, arrangements would be made, through agents, to con- tract and bring them over, furnish them with food during the voyage, and perhaps some other necessaries, on condition that on their arrival in an American port they have the right to sell their time for a certain number of years, to repay the cost thus
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necessarily incurred, and be of some profit to those engaged in such ventures. With the growth and settlement of the country this business greatly increased, through the demand for laborers, and, perhaps, just before the Revolution attained its greatest height. However, on the return of peace it did not slacken much, even to the commencement of this century. Such a mat- ter, of course, would also receive some attention from the gov- ernment, and we give the special legislation thereon, upon which as yet but little has been written.
In the Charter of Laws agreed upon in England, and confirmed April 25, 1682, by Penn, we find this mention in the twenty-third article: "That there shall be a register for all servants, where their name, time, wages and days of payment shall be registered." In the laws prepared on the fifth of the following month, the propri- etary wisely remarks : "That all children within this Province of the age of twelve years shall be taught some useful trade or skill, to the end that none may be idle, but the Poor may work to live, and the Rich, if they have become poor, may not want. That servants be not kept longer than their time, and such as are careful be both justly and kindly used in their service, and put in fitting equipage at the expiration thereof, according to custom." Penn, for the justice here displayed, certainly deserves credit. "The Great Law," passed at Chester December 7, contains this clause : "That no master or mistress or freeman of this Province, or territories thereunto belonging, shall presume to sell or dis- pose of any servant or servants into any other province, that is or are bound to serve his or her time in the Province of Pennsyl- vania, or territories thereof, under the penalty that every person so offending shall for every such servant so sold forfeit ten pounds, to be levied by way of distress and sale of their goods." Strange to say, the aforesaid excellent enactments, on William and Mary reaching the throne, were abrogated in 1693. In the beginning of 1683 "A bill to hinder the selling of servants into other Provinces, and to prevent runaways," was passed by the Council. On August 29 the Governor, William Penn, "put ye question whether a proclamation were not convenient to be put forth to empower masters to chastise their servants, and to pun- ish any that shall inveigle any servant to goe from his master .?
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They unanimously agreed and ordered it accordingly. The Assembly passed an "Act for the better Regulation of Servants in this Province and Territories," in 1700, which provided
"That no servant shall be sold or disposed of to any Person residing in any other Province or Government without the con- sent of the said Servant and two Justices of the Peace of the county wherein he lives or is sold, under the penalty of Ten Pounds, to be forfeited by the seller. That no servant shall be assigned over to another person by any in this Province or Ter- ritories but in Presence of one Justice of the Peace under penalty of Ten Pounds. And whoever shall apprehend or take up any runaway servant and shall bring him or her to the Sheriff of the County, such person shall, for every such servant, if taken up within ten miles of the Servant's abode, receive Ten Shillings, and if ten miles or upwards, Twenty Shillings reward of the said Sheriff, who is hereby required to pay the same, and forthwith to send notice to the Master or owner, of whom he shall receive Five Shillings, Prison fees, upon delivery of the said Servant, together with all disbursements and reasonable charges for and upon the same. Whoever shall conceal any Servant of this Province or Territories, or entertain him or her twenty-four hours without his or her Master's or owner's knowledge and consent, and shall not within the said time give an account to some Justice of the Peace of the County, every such person shall forfeit Twenty Shillings for every Day's concealment. That every servant who shall faithfully serve four years or more shall, at the expiration of their servitude, have a discharge, and shall be duly clothed with two complete suits of apparel, whereof one shall be new, and shall also be furnished with one new axe, one grubbing hoe and one weeding hoe, at the charge of their Master or Mis- tress."
This latter clause was abolished in 1791. The object of this undoubtedly was to encourage the removal of timber that the land might sooner come into cultivation. An Act was passed May io, 1729, "laying a duty on foreigners and Irish servants inported into this province." Masters of servants were regarded for the time being as holding property subject to taxation. The rate in 1776 was fixed at one and a half pounds each, which was increased in 1786 to ten pounds. The state passed an Act March 12, 1778, making compensation to those masters whose servants or apprentices had enlisted in the army. . "The labor of the plan- tations," says the Historical Review (attributed to Franklin, 1759),
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"is performed chiefly by indented servants, brought from Great Britain, Ireland and Germany ; because of the high price it bears, can it be performed any other way? These servants are pur- chased of the captains who bring them; the purchaser, by a positive law, has a legal property in them, and, like other chat- tels, they are liable to be seized for debts." Servants from the Palatinate were disposed of in 1722 at ten pounds each for five years' servitude. Prior to 1727 most of the Germans who emi- grated were persons of means. In the years 1728, 1729, 1737, 1741, 1750 and 1751 great numbers were brought hither. A shipper advertises in 1729: "Lately imported, and to be sold cheap, a parcel of likely men and women servants." They brought but little property with them, says Dr. Rush, in his account of the "Manners of the German Inhabitants in Pennsyl- vania," written in 1789. A few pieces of silver coin, a chest with clothes, a bible, a prayer or hymn book, constituted the chief property of most of them. Many bound themselves, or one or more of their children, to masters after their arrival for four, five or seven years to pay for their passage across the ocean. The usual terms of sale depended somewhat on the age, strength, health and ability of the persons sold. Boys and girls had to serve from five to ten years, or until they attained the age of twenty-one. Many parents were necessitated, as they had been wont to do at home with their cattle, to sell their own children. Children under five years of age could not be sold. They were disposed of gratuitously to such persons as agreed to raise them, to be free on attaining the age of twenty-one. It was an humble position that redemptioners occupied. "Yet from this class," says Gordon in his "History of Pennsylvania," "have sprung some of the most respectable and wealthy inhabitants of the state." A law was passed February 8, 1819, "that no female shall be arrested or imprisoned for or by reason of any debt con- tracted after the passage of this act." With the final abolition of imprisonment for debts, the institution had necessarily to die out without any special enactment or repeal, so slow has ever been the advancement and regard for popular rights, even in this great commonwealth and enlightened age.
The late Joseph J. Lewis, of West Chester, in 1828 wrote an
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amusing account of the "soul-drivers," the name given to those men that drove redemptioners through the country with a view of disposing of them to farmers. They generally purchased them in lots of fifty or more from captains of ships, to whom the redemp- tioners were bound for three or more years of service in payment of their passage. For a while the trade was brisk, but at last was relinquished by reason of the numbers that ran away from those dealers or drivers. These ignominious gangs disappeared about the year 1785. A story is told how one of them was tricked by one of his men. This fellow, by a little management, contrived to be the last of the flock that remained unsold, and traveled about with his master. One night they lodged at a tavern, and in the morning the young fellow, who was an Irishman, rose early, sold his master to the landlord, pocketed the money and hastened off. Previously, however, to his going, he took the precaution to tell the purchaser that, though tolerably clever in other respects, he was rather saucy and a little given to lying ; that he had even been presumptuous enough at times to en- deavor to pass for master, and that he might possibly represent himself as such to him.
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