USA > Pennsylvania > Delaware County > Chester > Historical sketch of Chester, on Delaware > Part 26
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As far as we know he was the first to suggest the settlement of national disputes by arbitration. In an essay entitled the "Present and Future Peace of Europe," he proposed that Europe should have its Congress, as has already been stated, to which all disputes among the various nations should be sub- mitted for final arbitration. He spoke of a time when individual disputes were settled by fighting, and argued that as all that had changed with ad- vancing civilization, so that almost all such disputes are now settled by peace- ful means, nations also if they would set about it in real earnest, might pro- vide a tribunal that would settle peaceably nine cases of war out of every ten. It would have gladdened his heart if he could have foreseen that his native England within two centuries would adopt his plan substantially, and would settle all her disputes with equal nations by arbitration; though the effect might have been weakened if he could also have foreseen that England still reserves war as a means of bringing a weaker people to her way of thinking.
William Penn was born on the fourteenth day of October, 1644. His fa- ther, who afterwards became Sir William Penn, a few days before the birth of the child had accepted the command of a man-of- war destined to cruise in the Irish seas, in the interests of the Parliament, then engaged in its struggles with the king-a struggle which terminated by the deposition and judicial murder of that unfortunate monarch. The elder Penn certainly had no hostility to the Stuarts, for he was suspected with good reason of intriguing with the second Charles long before his restoration; and he became after- wards personally attached to both Charles and James, and appointed the lat- ter guardian of his son. He probably thought with reason that the navy, to be efficient, should be on the side of the government de facto. Hence, when the Parliament had triumphed over the king, he sided with the Parliament. When the Protector had dispersed the Parliament he took employment un- der the Protector, and when the signs of the times began to point toward a restoration of the Stuart dynasty he was among the earliest to take upon him- self the allegiance of Charles II. For his services in this regard he was knighted and created "Great Captain Commander," a title which was invent- ed for him, which died with him and was never revived.
The services rendered by the gallant Captain to the Commonwealth were invaluable, he being a most efficient naval officer. They continued for about . eleven years, when they were abruptly brought to a close by his arrest and commitment to the Tower. This was not for the offence of which he was really guilty, his correspondence with the exiled royal family, an offence known to the Protector and overlooked on account of the valuable services of the offender, but for the failure of an attack on Hispaniola, for which he was in no way responsible. On being released, which was done without a trial, he took his family to his estates in Ireland, where his son William re- ceived instruction preparatory to his entering at Oxford, which he did in 1659.
In the meantime the Protector died, his son, after a short term of power, was set aside and Charles Stuart restored to the throne. The services ren- dered by the elder Penn in the restoration were gratefully acknowledged by
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the gay and fickle monarch and by his more serious, but less fortunate bro- ther, who succeeded him to the throne; and a friendship sprang up between the Stuarts and the Penns which greatly aided the younger Penn in carrying out, at least for a time, his favorite political dogma of universal toleration.
While at Oxford the idea of founding a Commonwealth, where rights should be equal and religion free, first entered Penn's mind. The New World seemed to invite such an undertaking. His position at college was far from" being agreeable. Simple in his tastes and habits, and impatient of arbitrary restraint, the dress, the ceremonies and observances, forced upon the students by the State church, were exceedingly irksome to him, and he at last refused to conform to its requirements. This resulted in his expulsion at the age of eighteen, and he returned home to meet the angry frowns of his father, who could neither appreciate nor understand the fact that a mere boy should be governed by a sense of duty other than the duty imposed by parents and teachers. Finally the boy was beaten and turned out of doors.
Through the intercession of his mother, however, he was soon brought home and forgiven; and after a time he was sent to Paris, where he com- pleted his education and acquired graces and accomplishments of mind and manners for which he was ever afterwards distinguished. At the age of twenty he returned to London, where his father then resided, and remained there with the family until the plague broke out in 1665. This devastating scourge cast a gloom over the whole city. Terror and despair marked every countenance; and to a mind like Penn's it was no wonder that the awful solemnity took the shape of an inquiry into the state of his conscience. What ought he to do? What duty did he owe to his Maker and his fellow-men?
Having been sent to Ireland to attend to the family estates there, he met with Thomas Loe, an eminent minister of the Society of Friends. The prin- ciples of that Society, as expounded by the preacher, seemed to be in accord- ance with his own convictions. Their love of peace, their advocacy of bu- man rights, their hatred of State religions, their denial of the divine right of kings and priests, met answering responses in the heart of the young philan- thropist. They stimulated his hatred of rituals and priestly requirements and his dreams of republican equality among men. In short, Penn became a Quaker, and his father recalled him, expostulated with him angrily, but vainly, and turned him out of doors a second time. This defection of his son was the more severe upon the Admiral from the fact that he had the offer of the Peerage under the title of Lord Weymouth. But his son refused to be the heir apparent to a title of nobility, and the Admiral, deeply mortified, felt constrained to decline the proffered honor.
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It is said that we are what we are very much by reason of our antecedents and surroundings. If this be true, it would be curious to inquire how much of Penn's mental constitution came to him by inheritance. His love of Peace hardly descended from his father who spent half a life time in the naval service of Great Britain, nor from his grandfather a captain in the merchant service, then almost as warlike as the navy; and his love of justice and fair- ness and honor was not likely to come in the blood of the man who, while ·enjoying the confidence of the Protector and receiving his pay, proposed to surrender the royal navy to Charles Stuart, and was only prevented from doing so by that fugitive Prince having no port or harbor to shelter it.
Possibly his gentleness and kindness of heart, as well as other attributes of higher and better life were inherited from his mother, Margaret Jasper, who was the daughter of a merchant of Rotterdam. However this may be, she seems to have understood her son better than his father did and to have frequently softened the asperities which their exceedingly discordant mental constitutions caused by their paternal and filial intercourse. But from the fact that he transmitted so little of himself to his descendants it is not unlikely that he owed as little to his antecedents.
His surroundings were such as to develop, for good or evil, all the force of
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character he had. Coming to the age of thought when England was in a state of peculiar ferment from theological controversies, and being himself drawn into the vortex, his sufferings which failed to crush him, modified and shaped his whole career. A man of less moral and religious convictions 'and less force of will, under the treatment he received, would have sunk into the criminal. Cruelty and oppression are powerful elements in the formation of character; and whether they make the subject a saint or a fiend depends upon whether or not he has sufficient mental and moral force to rise above the demoralizing influences. It is well it
Like some tall cliff that rears its awful form. Swells from the vale and mid way leaves the storm, Though round its base the rolling clouds are spread, Eternal sunshine settles on its head.
But suppose there should not be enough in the head to rise above the rolling clouds? Society is responsible for the downfall of many a man whom it might have saved. Penn, however, was not at the mercy of circumstances. Injustice and persecution could not debase him or make him cruel; almost unlimited power in his province could not make him a tyrant, and the seductive flatteries of court life could not destroy bis republican simplicity.
The severe ordeal through which Penn passed and which contributed largely to make him what he was, is an interesting historical study. The Church of England, occupying a position midway between the Catholics and advanced Protestants, looked with a jealous eye upon both. Having control of the civil power, it determined to hold its advantage against both extremes. The royal family was suspected of leaning toward Popery; and the State Church, instead of combining all Protestantism against Rome, affected to be- lieve that the Dissenters were in league with the Pope; and that every meeting in the name of religion, unless under the authority of the civil law and supported by tythes collected by legal machinery was in the interest of the Babylonish harlot.
In 1664, these reverend zealots compelled the Parliament to pass the Con- venticle Act and to renew it again in 1670. This act made it a penal offense for more than five persons, exclusive of the family to meet for religious wor- ship, unless conducted by a person in holy orders and according to the State ritual. The punishment for the first offense was a fine of five pounds or three month's imprisonment. For the second offense the punishment was doubled, and for the third offense the culprit was subjected to a fine of a hundred pounds or to banishment for seven years, and every subsequent offense added a hundred pounds to the fine.
Of course such a law could not have been generally enforced, otherwise it would have depopulat-d the kingdom. But from religious bigotry or a desire to reap a portion of the fine or to wreak vengeance upon a real or fancied enemy, men were found ready to report violations of the law; and the Quakers and other Dissenters suffered terribly for some years. Among other instances, Penn was arrested in 1667 and confined in the Tower for more than eight months, when he was set at liberty by the King. In 1670 he was again arrested under the same act and after some months he was brought to trial. But so ably did he and his fellow prisoner, William Mead, defend themselves that the jury refused to convict though they were sent back with a severe reprimand again and again, and were finally imprisoned themselves because they would not let the Court make their verdict.
James, who had then succeeded his brother, was slow in enforcing this in- iquitous act. He interfered frequently by means of his royal prerogative, to mitigate its horrors, and the State Church was displeased with his clem- ency. It is believed with good reason that his leading object was to protect his Catholic friends; and vet it refused to relieve the dissenters. It is some satis- faction to read that William of Orange, whom the advocates of religious in- tolerance invited over in order to secure the more rigid enforcement of the
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Conventicle Act, no sooner found himself firmly seated on the British throne than he caused the repeal of that odious law and granted universal toleration. But before its repeal that law had worked great injury to England and great corresponding benefit to the American colonies. A few words will explain this.
It is always the most energetic who voluntarily emigrate. The degraded, the debased, the ignorant the imbecile may be banished but they never vol- untarily expatriate themselves. Emigration therefore always lessens the energy of the parent stock for the benefit of the new country. This alone would have given the population of America a great advantage in mental efficiency and enterprise over that of the mother country. But the intolerant legislation of the mother country increased this advantage many fold. As a rule the Dissenters of England were neither the very high nor the very low.
They belonged to that great middle class that contains almost all the use- fulness of every population. The very low were content to let the State Church do their thinking, and the very high held their position by the combination of Church and State, and their interests r. quired them to support both.
It was impossible to enforce the law against all Dissenters. Indeed it was not every Dissenter that was worth the trouble of a prosecution. But the pro- minent ones, the leaders, those the prosecution of whom would pay, these were fair and profitable game. A wealthy man, a man of influence among his neigh- bors, a man who had sufficient mental force and obstinate convictions to make enemies, was sure to be informed against and fined or imprisoned. The consequence was that such men flocked to the new country very rapidly. This built up Puritan New England, Quaker Pennsylvania and Episcopal Virginia. For the State Church was under a cloud during the Protectorate occupying, though in a much less degree, the position of the Dissenters under Charles and James. The master minds that controlled the destinies of Ameri- ca in 1776 were the sons and grandsons of the men whom religious in- tolerance had driven from England to seek freedom of thought, freedom of speech and freedom of religion in the New World. Indeed it is quite within the bounds of possibility that if it had not been for the Conventicle Act and other similar despotic laws, our country might to-day have been as Canada is, a dependency of Great Britain. So true is it that nations like individuals cannot afford to do a wrong. Retributive justice may be slow, but it is sure. The day of reckoning may be put off, but it cannot be evaded.
For some years Penn had been talking with Algernon Sidney and others of advanced opinions, of a possible Utopia in America. He had been dreaming of a country where kings and priests should be unknown, where rights should be equal, and thought and speech free. He had brooded in prison and out of it over his own wrongs and the wrongs of his fellow Dissenters. As early as 1675 he became interested, partly as owner and partly as agent, in the settlement of western New Jersey. He had counseled and aided emi- gration there, and the colonists were mostly Quakers who had fled from religious persecution at home. In the meantime the death of his father left him with a large claim against the Crown. The profligate and dissolute Charles, always in want of money, was glad to exchange wild lands three thousand miles away for freedom from this troublesome debt at home. Be- side this he knew and esteemed Penn, and had no bad feeling against the Quakers, except such feeling as every monarch who wishes to be absolute, may be presumed to enter against men who do their own thinking. And so the bargain was made and Pennsylvania sprang into being-upon paper. This event occurred on March 4th, 1681.
Charles, or his advisers, seemed to have had a correct appreciation of Penn's mental characteristics; for the charter speaks of his laudable desire to "reduce the savage natives, by just and gentle manners, to the love of civil society and the Christian religion." No words could have better charac-
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" terized the new proprietary. He was a man of gentle and just manners. The other laudable desire, to provide a place of refuge from the iron heel of the hybred monster, Church and the State, charter carefully omits to mention.
It is a satisfaction to know that Admiral Penn, long before his death, be- came reconciled to his son. Though he never left the State Church, he had no sympathy with the persecution of Dissenters, and the more he saw of it, especially in the person of his son, the more his kindly feelings went out to- ward the oppressed. He especially admired the patience of the Quakers and their forbearance under persecution. He unconsciously adopted their opin- ions and testimoni-s, and he looked forward hopefully to the time when they should have their reward in the downfall of priests and kings.
A year and a half from the date of the charter elapsed before Penn was enabled to take possession of his new domain. Many preparations were need- ed. A frame of government had to be fixed upon. Full access to the bay and ocean had to be seeured to the colony. This was done by a grant from the Duke of York, on August 24, 1651, by which he ceded to Penn the town of New Castle and a district of country of twelve miles radius around it, with the islands opposite, north of its lower boundary. The death of his mother, in the meantime, to whom he was tenderly attached, delayed these prepara- tions.
At length, on September 1, 1692, the Welcome, a ship of three hundred tons burden, containing Penn and about one hundred of his followers, weighed anchor at Deal; and the colonists bade adieu to the land they still loved through all the wrongs it had inflicted upon them. On the 27th of October, the Welcome anchored off New Castle, and the next day the Founder of Penn- sylvania landed on the spot in front of us, and took possession of a province nearly as large as England, and assumed control of the only American colony that was established without bloodshed.
It requires some effort of the imagination to conceive what this vicinity was two hundred years ago. Where there are now miles of brick walls and paved streets, a city in all directions, then was the dense wild, interspersed only occasionally with clearings and cabins, mostly along the river shore. A few miles west of us was the "back woods," a term which has travelled toward the setting sun with each generation until it has become lost to the nomenclature of America in the Pacific ocean. Where now the bustle of business, the puffing of steam engines, the thundering of passing railroad trains, and the hum and clatter of the shuttle and spindle confuse the ear with constantly mingling and changing sounds, then were heard the roar, the howl and the shriek of beasts and birds long since extinct in this locality.
All around where we now are was the gorgeous autumn foliage of the oak, the chestnut, the maple, the gum and the dogwood, which are now banished to the streams and hillsides inaccessible to the cupidity of civilized man, or to spots where his good taste or carelessness have left the soil unturned. There were neither streets nor roads, in the proper sense of those terms, in the Province. The first street laid out by legal authority was in 1686. It was on or near the site of Edgmont Avenue, its southern terminus being about Second street. But there were cattle paths, Indian trails and tracks worn by the settlers. Among the chief of these was a tract running parallel to the river and crossing the tributary streams at the head of tide, Chester creek at Upland, Ridley creek at Sharpless' mills, and Crum creek and Darby creek, near where the turnpike road now crosses them. It was called the "King's road" in 16SS.
As settlements came to be made at the months of the streams, bridges were built there, and the road was changed from time to time to suit the bridges, being called the King's highway or the Queen's highway, according to the sex of the British monarch at the time of the change.
The Delaware was then a much more convenient highway for small boats than now, and much of the travel was done upon it. The western shore was
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bold and many of the settlers' huts were built near high-water mark. Each family had its canoe or other small boat moored near the door, ready for all occasions of business or pleasure.
On the south west bank of Chester creek stood the residence of Robert Wade. It occupied nearly the site of the northwest corner of Penn and Front streets, and its remains were found in digging the foundation of the dwelling house now standing there. It was then, or afterwards, called the Essex House; and what is now Concord Avenue was doubtless Wade's lane, leading in from the woods and probably from the track that crossed the streams at the head of tide. Its course was that of the avenue above Third street, crossing di- agonally to the south west side of Wade's dwelling. It was afterwards opened to public travel and called Essex street, and it is so cited in the early deeds and marked on the early maps. But it had been abandoned and closed long before the Innovators of 1850 awakened Chester from its long slumber.
Chester creek at that time was a noble stream, three or four hundred feet wide at its month, admitting vessels of considerable size to land their cargoes a little east of the crossing of Penn and Front streets. The plow and the axe, the turning of the soil, and the destruction of the timber, have loaded the tributaries of the Delaware with earth, sand and gravel which have been largely deposited along its western shore; and the building of wharves and banks has increased and retained the deposit. By this means Chester creek has shrunk to a fraction of its former dimensions, and a wide strip of banked meadow and out-lying marsh skirt the river shore where then vessels of from twelve to twenty feet draft could ride comfortably at anchor at low water. The settler could not now step from his front door to his canoe, but would have a long wade through the mud after crossing hundreds of yards of bank- ed meadow before he could reach sufficient water to float his craft.
Judging from the nature and extent of the deposits, the mouth of Chester creek, on the south west side, was at that time about the southeast corner of Penn and Front streets. From that point the shore rounded inwards and passed up nearly parallel with Penn street, and from seventy to a hundred feet from it. The actual place of landing was probably about the southeast corner of Penn and Front streets. As late as 1850 the spring tides covered the spot now occupied by the southeast corner of the dwelling house of Dr. J. L. Forwood, and the bottom of the recent deposits sloped rapidly into deep water. The shore was abrupt and vessels of the usual draft could approach within a short distance of it.
Penn was the guest of Robert Wade, and we can easily imagine him, with his friends, being met at the landing by their host and welcomed as the Ruler of the Province. We can also imagine the presence of Indians, to whom the · character of Penn was well known, partly through his management of the colony of West Jersey and partly through his cousin and agent, William Markham, who had preceded him by some months, and had communicated to the natives the pacific disposition and kindly intentions of the new Gov- ernor. Naturally they would desire to see the white man who would neither kill them nor steal their land.
Penn had provided in his conditions imposed upon the colonists and his concessions to them that an injury done to an Indian should be punished as if it had been done to a white man; and that offences committed by a native should not be avenged by the sufferer, but should be reported to the civil authorities, who should communicate with the offender's king or chief with the view of obtaining satisfaction peaceably.
He provided also equal rights for all inen, and secured to the Indians the same privilege to improve their land and provide sustenance for their fami- lies which his colonists were to enjoy. He provided that all disputes and differences between men of the different races should be submitted to a jury composed one-half of Indians. In all respects the natives were to be treated as friends and brothers. All paths were to be free and the firesides of each
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race were to be open to the friendly visits of the other; and finally the child- ren of each race were to be told of the friendship between the parents, that the chain might grow stronger and stronger and be kept bright and clean as long as the waters run and the sun and moon endure.
What a contrast this affords with the treatment of the natives of the New World by the European invaders of the fifteenth century! The history of the conquest of Mexico and Peru is not fit to be read by any one who wishes - to think well of his fellowmen. But may we not look nearer home! The settlement of Virginia and New England was made upon precisely the same principle, though the actors were less brutal and less atrocious. This prinsi- ple was that the country belonged to the invaders, and that the natives were only tenants by suif-rance. The process may be explained in a single para- graph. When a colonist wanted land he took it. If the native resisted he was driven off by force. If he avenged the wrong he was killed; when his tribe took up the quarrel, as was natural, an Indian war ensued, in which blood was shed and deeds of horror perpetrated on both sides. The final result was always in favor of the colonist, who got more land and drove the Indians still farther from the settlements.
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