History of Bradford County, Pennsylvania, with biographical selections, Part 11

Author: Bradsby, H. C. (Henry C.)
Publication date: 1891
Publisher: Chicago, S. B. Nelson
Number of Pages: 1340

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Maj. Zephan Flower's memory merits a paragraph among the heroes of the Revolution. The son of Ithuriel Flower, a genuine specimen of the Old-World Puritans that came of the stormy times of 1620, in the very beginnings of this continent, a generation praying and fighting and reading their old black-letter Bibles in order, we boys used to think, to find old scriptural names for their many children. The name Zephan, it is said, occurs but once in the Bible, but it could not escape the devotional readings of Father Ithuriel, and the bearer of that name was born November 30, 1765, and died April 16, 1855, on his farm across the river from Athens, now the property of his rela- tive and adopted son, Z. F. Walker, and is buried near the old family residence on the roadside in the Franklin cemetery. He enlisted. in the Continental army in 1778, when not yet quite thirteen years old, and served seven years. and at the age, therefore, of twenty-one, when the modern young man tears himself away from his mama's apron, he was an old Revolutionary soldier, who could tell of the war and battles and sieges and marches with bare feet orer frozen ground; of how he was captured and re-captured ; how he captured a Tory, and the Tory turned and captured him, when his overcoat caught in crossing a fence, and his prisoner took his gun and about-faced him, and finally took the flint from his gun and returned it to him with the injunction : "Go your way in peace and I will go mine. " How he too quickly found a secret flint, and put it in his gun and ordered the retiring man to halt or he would fire, but the fellow only quickened his pace, and although

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he could have shot him dead, yet he had not the heart to do it, and the man went in safety. Or how, when a sentinel, he challenged Gen. Washington, whom he knew very well, but refused to let him pass until he gave the countersign ; this was given, and the great soldier threw the lad a silver half dollar to show his appreciation of the act. Or how, in storming a fort, he was at the head of the storming party, and on the impulse jumped to the port-hole to crawl in, when the can- noneer attempted to fire the gun with the boy right at its mouth, when he was killed almost in the act of applying the torch. In 1791, he came to Sheshequin, and then to Spalding's creek, and built a distillery. Then, though with very scant book education, he became a surveyor, and to this day his notes and surveys are among the most reliable rec- ords of the early times on the Susquehanna. In April, 1795, he sur- veyed for the Susquehanna Company the old town of Flowersburg, and in 1798 the township of Litchfield, as it is now, and Windsor, now Sheshequin.

While a resident of Sheshequin he was made a major of the militia. In 1803 he went to Athens and located on the present Michael Cole- man farm, and was here when the great flood came, and his family was taken from the house in boats and landed at the foot of the hill of Col. Franklin's residence, and from there by boats or rafts across the flats to the door of Col. Satterlee's house; the women holding their skirts for sails as propelling power. His next move was to the Julius Tozer farm; then to the borough of Athens in the house now Widow Seward's. In 1834 he moved into the Col. Franklin house, and occupied this with his son Nathaniel, who had purchased the place.

An incident in the life of this old soldier and surveyor was the ill- will he encountered among the settlers because he was surveying the land. They shaved his horse's mane and tail, and threatened him with violence time and again. He was ambushed and fired at several times, but fortunately was never hurt.

Among his reminiscences was the "starving summer" of 1791, in this locality, when the people were brought to the verge of starvation by a frost that had ruined the previous year's crops ; breadstuff had all gone and none obtainable, and only such meat as could be captured in the forests. The only market was Wilkes-Barre. The suffering people wandered through the woods, digging roots and devonring the scant eatable herbs they could find, and one who was there has said : " The best meal I ever ate was when finally we gathered rye that was just out of the milk, kiln-dried, and pounded it out with a flail, dried it again in kettles and then pounded it Indian fashion with a stone, and made Graham short-cake, and with our invited neighbors partook of the royal feast." Thus the hungry-eyed children were brought back to plenty and happiness, and the whole population were rejoiced, and the dreadful ordeal passed away.

Zephan Flower and Mary Patrick were married March 28, 1785; she was a native of Hartford, born December 25, 1765-a princely "Christmas gift," indeed. Her brothers, Shepard and Jacob, were among the early prominent pioneers of Wysox.

The children of Maj. Flower were, Heloisa, Mary, Nathaniel,

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Ithuriel, Huldah, Philomela, Zulimma (mother of Z. F. Walker, of Athens), George, Alfred, Albert, Almore and Zephan. Mrs. Flower died March 5, 1848, and is buried in the Col. Franklin burying-ground, now on the farm of her grandson, Z. F. Walker.

Mrs. John Cole, née Catharine Letts, mother of Dr. C. H. Cole, of Sheshequin, who died in 1846, aged seventy-five, has often related her experiences at the battle of Wyoming. She was then but six or seven years old, and her father swam the river with his three small children clinging to his clothes, and made his escape and fled through, then called, the " Wilderness of Death," to the Delaware river, subsisting, on the terrible journey, upon roots and berries.

But few of the families of the Revolution on this border but had some such experiences as this old lady could tell of her young girlhood, and now to look back and hear it told as it came in later years from their lips, we wonder how it was possible that any survived to put in words the dreadful tale. We speak of our brave Revolutionary sires ; and honor them above all men, and are liable to forget that the women and weak children were by their side in every ordeal-in the fiercest battles, the bloodiest massacres and in the flights through the wilder- ness, in the storms and hunger, when the very air was laden with death, and often with horrors far worse than death. One is now sometimes incredulous in trying to realize that one of our modern bug-squealing, corsetted girls could ever come of such a stock as the race of women and children that helped plant our civilization, and maintained it against every foe. Surely, the Lord tempereth the wind to the shorn lamb.

Soon after the establishment of the Union occurred the episode in history of the attempt by Col. John Franklin and others to establish a new State here. "Wirt Arland" (A. S. Hooken) in the Athens News March 5, 1889, communicated the following:

In the latter years of the last century this was the great unorganized territory of north- ern Pennsylvania. At the same time Col. Franklin and his followers were organizing to form a new State. John Sevier was carving a new State out of Tennessee, Carolina and Georgia. The move was to drive off the Connecticut settlers. Ethan Allen came and joined Franklin, and they resolved to make a new State with Tioga Point, now Athens, the capital. Gen. Allen said he had made one State and could make another.

The new State was to extend into the unorganized portions of Southern N. Y. The Independent Gazetteer of October 5, 1787, says: "A few days since Capts. Craig, Brady, Stephenson, Begs, Pim and Erb went to the camp of Luzerne and there, by or- der of the Supreme Executive Council, apprehended John Franklin, and yesterday brought him to this city. This man has been very active in fomenting disturbances in the camp, has great address and resolution, as was shown by the gentlemen em- ployed in conducting this business; they were all officers of the Continental Army, who distinguished themselves by their bravery during the late war-it is to be hoped they will receive sufficient compensation for thelr services."

Gen. Franklin's long imprisonment without trial-he was refused any, even enor. mous, bail that was offered, the trial postponed and he was kept in chains in a dismal fetid cell, is a most sickening chapter in Pennsylvania history. Prickering fled after Franklin's arrest. He returned, however, in 1788 to Bradford county. June 28, 1778, Pickering was seized and carried to the woods and kept secreted twenty days, but was finally set at liberty.

Ashburn Towner's novel, Chendayne of Kotono, gives an interesting description of this event. The real hero of those days was Col. Franklin. Franklin, the wilderness hero, lay in jail while the National Constitutional Convention assembled to form our wonderful constitution. When after in prison a year or more Franklin was brought before the court, the court said: "There was evidence that he and the people had assembled for the purpose of opposing the authority and law of the Commonwealth, and that a paper subscribed by him had been posted inviting the people to throw off allegiance to the State of Pennsylvania and to erect themselves into an independent

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State, also it appeared that the Insurgents had appointed a court of three judges, vested with jurisdiction in all cases criminal and civil."

This was sufficient treason, but the Commonwealth in its abundance of mercy had concluded to charge it to misprison of treason." Then bail was asked when the Chief Justice said that "yesterday we might have allowed it, but to day's news of the arrest of Pickering shut out all such idet, and the charge was reverted back to 'treason.'"

The new State project lingered after the arrest of Franklin, November 5, 1787, Dr. Ben Franklin then Secretary of the Commonwealth sent the following to the council.

"Gentlemen : Since the last session, there has been a renewal of the disturbances at Wyoming, some restless spirits there having imagined a prospect of withdrawing the inhabitants of that part of the State and some of the State of New York from their allegiance, aod of forming them into a new State. to be carried into effect by an armed force io defiance of the laws of the two States. Having intelligence of this, we caused one of the principal conspirators to be apprehended and secured in the goal of this city -and auother, who resides in the State of New York, at our request has been taken up ' by the authorities of that Government. The papers found on this occasion fully dis- covers the designs of these turbulent people, and some of their letters are herewith laid before you. To protect the civil officers of our new Court of Luzerne in the exercise of their respective functions, we have ordered a body of Militia to hold them- selves in readiness to march thither, which will be done unless some future circum- stances and information from those points may make it appear unnecessary." [Signed] B. FRANKLIN, President Supreme Ex. Council.

Session of Gen assembly, October 31, 1787, mostly taken up with the Luzerne troubles, a resolution was passed to raise troops. Benj. Franklin sent another mes- sage to the assembly recommending the adoption of effectual measures to suppress rebellion and enforce the laws.

The people drove the Commissioners from Luzerne Court, and at the November election following, Timothy Pickering was elected to the Legislature from Luzerne. He was afterward Washington's Secretary of State.

CHAPTER VIII.

THE SEVENTEEN TOWNSHIPS.

JOHN WINTHROP, UNDER WHOM WAS THE BEGINNING OF GREAT THINGS-THE FIRST AND THE SECOND PENNAMITE AND YANKEE WARS-AN ATTEMPT TO FORM A NEW STATE.

N O local subject in the history, not only of Pennsylvania, but also of Connecticut, has excited a more general interest than the one commonly known as the "Connecticut Claims." or the " Pennamite and Yankee Wars." Bradford county lies within that disputed land, and the statement of the facts in the long dispute is the history of the early settlement of this portion of the State along the Susquehanna river-a contention that was bitter as it was long, and concerning which there were reprisals and bloodshed and flagrant wrongs on all sides ; the innocent often the greatest sufferers. It is now more than one hundred years since its inception, and if, unfortunely, there are yet heart-burnings and evil feelings over these old questions that have been transmitted from sire to son, it is to be regretted. The bearing of this question and its final results have had a national influence ; had it been settled differently from what it was, one more State would

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have added its star to the original cluster of thirteen that typified the original Union of States. Pennsylvania would have presented a very different face on the maps to what it now does. The boundaries of that possible State would have been: "Beginning ten miles east of the east branch of the Susquehanna river, on the one-and-fortieth degree of north, thence with a northward line ten miles distant from the said river to the end of the forty-second degree and to extend westward throughout the whole breadth thereof, through two degrees of longitude, one hundred and twenty miles." This includes all of Bradford county except a little wedge of the northeast corner, as the east line bows to conform to the general bend of the river. The other three boundary lines are straight, the north line being the State line, and the south line being the south line of 41º. The other entire counties and parts of counties, as now formed, included in this described boundary, are as follows: Part of Susquehanna, Wyoming, Luzerne, Columbia, Montour, Northumberland, Union, Centre, Clinton, Clearfield, Elk, Cameron and McKean, and the whole of Potter, Tioga, Lycoming and Sullivan. What a solid little State this would have made-about the size of Connecticut! This would have been Connecticut's first-born Territory, and eventually a State.

What we may now regard as a close of this tremendous contro- versy is the address of Ex-Gov. Henry M. Hoyt, delivered before the Historical Society of Pennsylvania, November 10, 1879. Gov. Hoyt was then in office ; he had been a citizen of Towanda, and in his law practice had been drawn into a careful study of the legal ques- tions involved, and fortunately the society requested him to make an address on the subject. To the data he had professionally accumu- lated, he added such materials as the records and history gave, and delivered his able and eloquent address, and it may be now accepted as a full, complete and final summing up of the points involved, and dramatic as was that chapter in our country's history, the Governor's " Brief " or " Syllabus," as he terms it, of the " Seventeen Townships," reads like the learned and impartial decision of the upright judge.

The English discovered and possessed North America from latitude 34 ° to 48 °, and called the Provinces South Virginia, and North Vir- ginia, or New England. James I., April 10, 1606, granted the London Company the right to plant a colony anywhere between 34 ° and 41 º north latitude. Out of this grant came Virginia and the Southern States. The same year the king granted similar right to Thomas Hanhaw, et al., between. 38° and 45 -. All these rights or grants extended entirely across the continent. America at that time was a kind of king's grao-bag.

On November 3, 1620, the King incorporated the council of Ply- mouth " for the planting, ruling, ordering and governing of New Eng- land," and giving to their care from 40° to 48º .- " Provided any portion herein named be not actually possessed or inhabited by any other Christian Prince, or State."

On March 19, 1628, the Council of Plymouth granted to Sir Henry Roswell, et al., all that part of New England between the Merrimac river and Charles river on Massachusetts Bay. The southern boundary

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of this grant, as all of them in that day was, " from ocean to ocean," and it ran along the 42 º 2' latitude. [The north line of Pennsylvania runs on 42 ° .] This was conferred by King Charles, March 4, 1629.

March 19, 1631, the Council of Plymouth granted to Lord Say, et al., " All that part of New England which lies and . extends, itself, from the Narragansett river, the space of forty leagues upon a straight line near the shore, toward the southwest, west and by south or west, as the coast lieth, toward Virginia, accounting three English miles to the league." As usual it ran west to the sea.

Upon the wording of this grant arose the most of the controversy. President Clap describes it thus : " All that part of New England which lies west from Narragansett river 120 miles on the sea coast, and from thence in latitude and breadth aforesaid to the South Sea. This grant extends from Point Judith to New York, and from thence west to the South Sea; and if we take Narragansett river in its whole length this tract will extend as far north as Worcester. It comprehends the whole colony of Connecticut and much more." The grantees appointed John Winthrop their agent, who planted a colony at the mouth of the Connecticut river, and named it "Saybrook."

On April 20, 1662, Charles II. incorporated the Connecticut Colony, and by letters patent made practically a new grant, the material or descriptive part of which is as follows : East by Narragansett river, commonly called Narragansett Bay where the said river falleth into the sea ; and on the north by the line of Massachusetts as usual running "from sea to sea." In 1635, the Plymouth Colony came to an end.

The import of this charter has not escaped the great American his- torian, Bancroft, who says, Vol. II., pp. 51, 54, 55 :

"It would be a serious blunder to belittle this charter by viewing it simply as a link in this chain of title. Under John Winthrop it became " the beginning of the great things" on this continent. "They had purchased their lands of the assigns of the Earl of Warwick, and from Uncas they had bought the territory of the Mohegans; and the news of the restoration awakened a desire for a patent. But the little colony proceeded warily ; they draughted among themselves the instruments which they desired the King to ratify ; and they could plead for their possessions their rights by purchase, by con- quest from the Pequods, and by their own labor which had redeemed the wilderness.

"The courtiers of King Charles, who themselves had an eye to possessions in Amer- ica, suggested no limitations ; and perhaps it was believed, that Connecticut would serve to balance the power of Massachusetts.

"The charter, disregarding the hesitancy of New Haven, the rights of the colony of New Belgium, and the claims of Spain on the Pacific, connected New Haven with Hartford in one colony, of which the limits were extended from the Narragansett rivel to the Pacific ocean. How strange is the connection of events ! Winthrop not only secured to his State a peaceful century of colonial existence, but prepared the claim for western lands.

" With regard to powers of government, the charter was still more extraordinary. It conferred on the colonists unqualified power to govern themselves.

"Connecticut was independent, except in name. Charles II. and Clarendon thought they had created a close corporation, and they had rcally sanctioned a democ- racy."

On July 11, 1754, an interval of nearly one hundred years, the next line in the Connecticut chain of title, was the purchase of the eighteen chiefs, or sachems, of the Five Nations, for £2,000, by the Susquehanna Company, of the lands described above as the " Seventeen Townships."

In May, 1755, the Assembly of Connecticut, after stating that these lands were within the limits of their charter, resolved, that "we are of

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the opinion that the peaceable and orderly erecting and carrying on some new and well regulated colony or plantation on the lands above men- tioned would greatly tend to fix and secure said Indian nations in alle- giance to his Majesty, and accordingly hereby manifest their ready acquiescence therein."

Miss Larned in her valuable history of Windham county, Conn., says :

"The marvellous richness and beauty of the Susquehanna valley were already celebrated, and now it was proposed to plant a colony in this beautiful region, and thus incorporate it into the jurisdiction of Connecticut."

In the Colonial records is found a petition to the Assembly of Con- nectieut, dated March 29, 1753, describing these lands, and "as we suppose lying within the charter of Connecticut," and among other matters they say that they desire permission to possess "a quantity sixteen miles square to lie on both sides of the Susquehanna river," to which they would purchase the Indian right " honorably," etc.

This constitutes the Connecticut chain of title to the "Seventeen Sections."

The Penns' Side .- William Penn's charter from Charles II., bears date March 4, 1681, the metes and bounds as are nearly now the boundary lines of Pennsylvania, except one degree south on the north line; whereupon, in taking possession of his domain, he issued the following proclamation :

MY FRIENDS: I wish you all happiness here and hereafter. These are to lett you know that it hath pleased God in his Providence to cast you within my Lott and Care. It is a business, that though I never undertook before, yet God has given me an understanding of my duty, and an honest minde to doe it uprightly. I hope you will not be troubled at your chainge and the King's choice; for you are now fixt, at the mercy of no Governour that comes to make his fortune. You shall be governed by laws of your own making, and live a free, and if you will, a sober and industrious People. I shall not usurp the rights of any or oppress his person. God has furnished me with a better resolution, and has given me His grace to keep it. In short, whatever sober and free men can reasonably desire for the security and improvement of their own happiness, I shall heartily comply with. I beseech God to direct you in the way of righteousness, etc. I am your true Friend,

[signed] WM. PENN.

On October 11 and October 25,1736, the Six Nations sold to William Penn the "entire country of Pennsylvania." Additional deeds were made to the Penns July 6 and July 9, 1754, and finally November 5, 1768, a deed to the Penns by the Six Nations conveys " all that part of the Province of Pennsylvania not heretofore purchased of the Indians."

Up to 1768, there is no evidence that any settler under Pennsylva- nia had set foot in the disputed territory. In 1768, as we have seen, the Penns had completed their purchase of these lands at Fort Stan- wix. The General Council, held then, had made treaties which prom- ised relief from Indian troubles. We have now come to the miserable contest, known in the common parlance of the country as-

The First Pennamite and Yankee War .- It was a fair, and beautiful. and valuable prize, this valley of Wyoming, and all the valley of the upper Susquehanna. Both sides prepared for the fray.

In 1768, at Hartford, the Susquehanna Company resolved "that five townships, five miles square, should be surveyed and granted, each to forty settlers, being proprietors, on condition that those settlers

John A. Coding.

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should remain upon the ground; man their rights, and defend them- selves and each other, from the intrusion of all rival claimants." Five townships in the heart of the valley were assigned to these first adventurers: Wilkes-Barre, Hanover, Kingston, Plymouth, and Pitts- ton. Kingston, the first township occupied, was allotted to "Forty" settlers. The lands were divided into rights of 400 acres each, "re- serving and apportioning three whole rights, or shares, in each town- ship for the public use of a gospel ministry and schools in each of said towns." " A stockade was erected on the river bank in Kingston, called " Forty Fort." It became the central point of much of the his- tory of the region. With these settlers came Capts. Butler, Ransom and Durkee, some of whom had seen honorable service in the French war, and had shared in the campaign at Ticonderoga and Crown Point. They were not without the aid of bold adherents obtained in Pennsylvania-the Shoemakers and McDowells, from the settlements on the Delaware, above the Blue Hills; and Lazarus Stewart and others, from Hanover, in Lancaster (now Dauphin) county, reinforced by some excellent Quakers from Rhode Island.

The designated leaders of the Proprietaries of Pennsylvania were Charles Stewart, Capt. Amos Ogden and Sheriff Jennings, of North- ampton county. They had able assistants in Capts. Clayton, Francis and Craig.

The Penns had leased to Stewart, Ogden and Jennings one hun- dred acres for seven years, on condition of "defending the lands from the Connecticut claimants." This lease was the flag they hoisted as the badge of title and possession. They arrived first upon the ground. This was in January, 1769. They took possession of the block-house and huts at Mill creek (about one mile above the present city of Wilkes-Barre) which had been left by the massacred settlers of 1763. They laid out for the Proprietaries two extensive manors: "Stoke," on the east bank, and "Sunbury," on the west bank of the Susque- hanna, embracing the heart of the Wyoming valley.

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History of Bradford County, Pennsylvania, with biographical selections, Part 11

Author: Bradsby, H. C. (Henry C.) Publication date: 1891 Publisher: Chicago, S. B. Nelson Number of Pages: 1340

Author: Bradsby, H. C. (Henry C.)
Publication date: 1891
Publisher: Chicago, S. B. Nelson
Number of Pages: 1340