USA > Pennsylvania > Bucks County > History of Bucks County, Pennsylvania: From the Discovery of the Delaware to the Present Time (Volume 1 and 2) > Part 12
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Springfield is one of the most fertile and beautiful townships in the upper end of the county. It is exceedingly well-watered by the affluents of the To- hickon, Haycock and Durham creeks, which meander through nearly all parts of it, abounds in numerous fine springs, and some of its valleys are not excelled by any in the county. The surface is often hilly, but many of the slopes are as fertile and well cultivated as the more level lands at their feet. A spur of the South Mountain enters the northeast corner, and extends some way along the Northampton border. Flint hill, a rocky eminence, about midway of its northern boundary, lies partly in the two Saucons and partly in Springfield, with a broken spur straggling off into the western part of the township. A con- siderable hill in the southeastern part, with a swamp on the top, and without a name, is said to have been called "Buckwampum,"s a swamp on a hill, by the Indians. A number of fine springs take their rise around its base. Near Stony Point is a piece of ground, from twenty to forty feet above the adjacent meadows, thought to have been the site of an Indian settlement, as a great number of arrow-heads and Indian implements are found there. Rocky Valley, in the western part of the township, on a cross-road from the Hellertown to the Beth- lehem road, is a formation very similar to the Ringing rocks, Nockamixon.º In its day Springfield had probably the largest barn in the county, built by Jacob Fulmer on the farm afterward owned by Enos Beihn, about 1800 or 1810, one hundred feet long, with two threshing floors The Germans are celebrated for their large barns, and, at the present day, there may be some that excel it, but, when built, it stood at the head of large barns in the county.
8 This name has been applied to the hill from the earliest settlement. The "Buck- wampum Historical and Literary Society" held its first meeting on the summit of the hill, 1887, and takes its name from it.
9. This tract was patented about 1735. The first owner. Robert Ware, then Dennis Pursell, Melchoir Landsyl, Joseph Fulmer, 1793. and Jacob Sleifer to Enos Beihn. It lay between Bursonville and Stony Point.
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Springfield is not only one of the largest, but one of the most populous, townships in the county In 1784 it contained 979 inhabitants, and 160 dwell- ings ; in 1810, 1,287 ; 1820, 1,580: 1830, 2,078, and 429 taxables ; 1840, 2,072; 1850, 2,259; 1860, 2,700; 1870, 2,551, of which 45 were foreign-born; 1880, 2,525 ; 1890, 2,351. The census of 1870 is evidently wrong, for there had been a steady increase in her population since the first census, 1784, and there is , no reason for a decrease in that decade. The area is seventeen thousand and thirty acres.
The Bursons, from which Bursonville took its name, were Friends, origin- ally settled at Abington, but removed to Springfield, 1760. There was a "Bur- sontown" postoffice, 1804, and Archibald Davidson was postmaster. The Bur- sons were enterprising and owned considerable real estate. The family left the county about 1850. Isaac Burson, of Springfield, was of the same family, and he is said to have founded the village.
Isaac Burson, of Springfield, introduced the cultivation of red clover into the upper end of the county, three-quarters of a century ago, and for which he is entitled to the thanks of every farmer. He sent his son John, then a boy, down to John Stapler, in Lower Makefield, of whom he bought a bushel, at forty dollars. This he sowed on ten acres of wheat, and, from the second crop, got nine bushels of seed, which he sold at forty dollars per bushel, mostly in small quantities, and among others, Michael Fackenthall, of Durham, bought a bushel. After Mr. Burson's field was in bloom it attracted great attention, and people came for miles to look at it, some days the fence around the field being lined with spectators.
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CHAPTER VII.
SMITHFIELD: ALLEN: MOUNT BETHEL: MOORE: EASTON.
1746 TO 1750.
The Minisink Flats .- Question of settlement .- Copper discovered .- First visit of white men .- Earliest settlers .- The Mine road .- Nicholas Scull .- Samuel De Pui .- Condi- tion of settlements .- John Lukens .- What he' saw .- Minisink in county records .- Daniel Brodhead .- Smithfield church .- Dutch churches .- Attempt to organize town- ships .- Petitioners .- Indian graveyard .- Township divided .- Forks of Delaware .- Nathaniel Irish, Craig and Hunter .- ALLEN : First land owner .- Presbyterian settle- ment .- Petition for township .- Wagon roads wanted .- Residence of the Craigs .- MOUNT BETHEL: Hunter's Colony .- Petition for township .- The Brainards .- MOORE : Settled early .- Petersville church .- Township organized .- EASTON : First owner of site .- David Martin .- Grant of ferry .- Town laid out .- William Parsons .- First house .- Population .- Louis Gordon .- Phillipsburg .- The Arndts .- The Wageners.
The earliest settlement in Bucks county, north of the Lehigh, was in Smithfield township, now in Monroe county.
It is an unsettled question whether the Upper or Lower Delaware was first settled by Europeans, and it is even claimed the flats of Minisink were peopled before the fertile meadows of Falls. In 1694, and possibly carlier, adven- turous Hollanders penetrated the wilderness, south-west of the Hudson, as far as the Delaware. where copper was discovered, and some of it shipped to Holland. Thomas Budd, in his account of Pennsylvania and New Jersey, pub- lished in London, in 1684, says the Indians go up the Delaware in canoes from the falls. to the Indian town called "Minisinks." The first recorded visit of a white man to this region is that of Captain Arent Schuyler, 1694, who came as far south as Port Jervis, but does not mention meeting settlers. He speaks of it in his journal as "the Minisink country." The first settlers were Hol- landers, who came across the wilderness from Esopus,1 on the Hudson, and Stickney believes they were on the Delaware prior to 1664.2
I Romeyn Brodhead states, in his history of New York, that Europeans were not settled at Esopus before 1652. In 1691 there were five villages there, with a population of three thousand.
2. It is the opinion of Mr. Hazzard that when Andres Hudde attempted to ascend the Delaware above the falls, 1646, but was stopped by the Indians, he was trying to reach the mines at the Minisink where, he believes, there was already a Dutch colony. 6-2
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From the evidence it would appear Hollanders were drawn to the Mini- sink country in search of metals, whose existence had been made known by the Indians, and that the rich flats were not settled until the mines had been abandoned. It is possible this region was first made known to. Europeans by the two Hollanders who traversed the country from the Hudson to the Dela- ware, and down that river and across to the Schuylkill, where they were made prisoners by the Indians, 1616, and rescued at the mouth of the river. The wagon road from the Hudson to the Delaware was opened, no doubt, first to the mines and then to the Minisink, to accommodate the settlers; but was abandoned when it was discovered the settlements were not in New Nether- lands, and communication was opened with the lower Delaware. This road is thought to have been the first good wagon road of any extent made in the United States. As late as 1800 John Adams, on his way to Congress sitting at Philadelphia, traveled the "Mine road" from the Hudson to the Delaware, as the best route from Boston. The road was east of the Delaware. General James Clinton and Christopher Tappan, both old men, 1789, believed the Mine road was the work of Hollanders before New York fell into the hands of the English, 1664, and the change of government probably stopped mining. The earliest settlement of this region is involved in so much doubt it is impossible to fix the exact period, and the most thorough investigation leads but to rea- sonable theories.
The Minisink settlements were on both sides of the Delaware, on the rich flats between the foot hills and the river. A portion of this population on the Pennsylvania side, was within the present limits of Smithfield township, Mon- roe county, but then in Bucks. The Provincial government of Pennsylvania had no knowledge of these settlements before 1725. In 1729 an act was passed declaring the Indian titles there null and void, and 1730 Surveyor-General Nicholas Scull, accompanied by John Lukens, his apprentice, afterward Sur- veyor-General, the last of the Province and first of the Commonwealth, was sent into that region to investigate the facts. They had great difficulty in making their way on horseback through the wilderness. They found the flats for forty miles on both sides of the river settled by Hollanders, and with many of them they could only converse through Indian interpreters. They stopped at the house of Samuel De Pui, an immigrant from Holland, 1697. The inhab- itants did not know when the country was first settled, but, from what he saw, Mr. Scull gave it as his opinion that the settlements there were older than Penn's charter of Pennsylvania. Apple trees, larger than any about Philadel- phia, were seen growing and the inhabitants knew nothing of Penn's colony of Philadelphia, nor where the Delaware emptied. All communication with the outside world was over the Mine road to the Hudson, whither they trans- ported their surplus produce, in winter, on sleds. Although such was the report of Mr. Scull, it is highly improbable the inhabitants of the Minisink heard nothing, through the Indians, of the growing colony on the Delaware, or by way of the Hudson with which they traded. Budd, in 1664, speaks of "exceeding rich open lands" of the Minisink, but he gained no reliable infor- mation of the first settlement of this region.
In 1787, almost sixty years after his visit, John Lukens, then Surveyor- General, sent his deputy, Samuel Preston, to the Minisink region to get addi- tional information. The effort was fruitless as before. He visited Nicholas De Pui, son of Samuel, now about sixty years of age. The old men with whom he conversed appeared to be the grandchildren of the first settlers, but he could obtain nothing more than tradition without dates. They agree, in
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substance, that, many years before, miners from Holland penetrated that wild- erness, worked the mines and built the road over which they hauled the ore ; that the miners were followed by other Hollanders fleeing from religious per- secution, who, following the Mine road, reached the Delaware, and, being pleased with the flats bought the improvements of the Indians, and settled there. This is all the knowledge of the early settlement of the Minisink ob- tained at the second official visit.
The earliest mention of the Minisink in our county records is in 1733. Nicholas De Pui, a Huguenot refugee, settled there, 1725, and, 1727, pur- chased a tract of land from the Minsi Indians, with two islands in the Dela- ware. In September, 1733, William Allen, who meanwhile had purchased this land of the Penns, confirmed the title to De Pui. There were six tracts in all, containing six hundred and forty-seven acres, and in addition, the three islands in the river containing three hundred and three acres. These islands were Maw Wallamink, one hundred and twenty-six acres, Great Shawna, one hundred and forty-six, and a third, formed by some creeks which emptied into the Del- aware, and lately held by John Smith, containing thirty-one acres. Abraham Van Campen settled at the Minisink about the same time-on the New Jersey side of the river, five miles above De Pui. The only surviving representative of this family was Robert Reading De Pui, living at Stroudsburg a quarter of a century ago.
Among the earliest settlers in this region was Daniel Brodhead, grandson of Captain. Daniel Brodhead, of the British army, who accompanied Colonel Richard Nicolls to America, 1664, and assisted in the capture of Manhattan. He was born in Ulster county, New York, April 20, 1693, removed to Penn- sylvania, 1738, and settled where East Stroudsburg stands. He was on friendly terms with the Proprietaries, and a warm friend of the Moravians, dying at Bethlehem, July 22, 1755, while there under treatment for disease by Doctor Otto. His son, Daniel, the immediate ancestor of the Brodheads of Pennsyl- vania, became a distinguished man in the State. He served through the Revo- lutionary war as Lieutenant-Colonel and Colonel and enjoyed the confidence of Washington, and, after its close was Surveyor-General of the State. His first wife was Elizabeth De Pui, daughter of Nicholas De Pui of the Minisink. He died at Milford, Pike county, Pennsylvania, November 9, 1809, in his sev- enty-third year, and a monument was erected to his memory in the Milford cemetery, October 2. 1872.
The family of Desha, Huguenot refugees from France soon after 1685, found a home on the Minisink flats. Here Governor Desha, of Kentucky, was born in 1768, to which state he removed, 1784. The Overfields, whose de- scendants are still found along the upper Delaware, were there early. Paul Overfield married Rebecca, a sister of Edward Marshall, about 1745-6. The Reverend Robert D. Morris, late pastor of the Newtown Presbyterian church, was a descendant of the Deshas on the mother's side. Among the early set-, tlers was Peter LaBar, grandfather of George LaBar, who died at the age of; one hundred and twelve years. He came to America in 1730, accompanied by his two brothers, Charles and Abraham, locating in the wilderness below De Pui's settlement near the river. He afterward bought a tract of the Indians, southwest of where Stroudsburg stands, where George LaBar was born, 1763. Jacobus Kirkendall was a settler there, 1741. De Pui's grist-mill was the first in all that region of country.
About 1725 a log church was built at the "Mine holes," opposite Tock's island, near the present village of Shawnee, but a church organization was
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not effected until 1737. This was the beginning of the Smithfield church, grafted on the Low Dutch Reformed. In 1750, or thereabouts, William Allen gave a lot of five acres to what he denominated the "Presbyterian meeting- house," on which a new stone church was erected. Service was continued in the Dutch language for several years, owing to the difficulty of procuring those who could preach in English. The Reverend Azariah Horton, the first-set- tled pastor, is thought to have preached the first English sermon there, 1741, and the Reverends Messrs. Wales and Rhoads preached there between 1750 and 1776. When the new house was erected the church withdrew from the Dutch Reformed organization, but before that it was one of the Walpach churches. The stone church was torn down in 1854. When Zinzendorf visited this region, 1742, there were five Dutch churches along the Delaware, only one on the Pennsylvania side, the Smithfield church. The four churches on the New. Jersey side were on the old Mine road, which started from De Pui's and followed the river several miles. In 1742 John Casper Freymuth returned from Holland, whither he had been sent to study for the ministry, and took charge of four of these churches, including Smithfield.
The first attempt to organize Smithfield was in 1746. In June, the inhab- itants petitioned for a township "to begin at the gap" in the mountains where the river Delaware runs through, and from thence five or six miles, a north and by west course, and from thence to the north corner of Christoffel Denmark's plantation, and from thence with a straight line to the river Dela- ware, and thence the several courses thereof to the place of beginning." On the back of the petition is endorsed the words, "Plan next court." The fol- lowing names were signed to the petition : Patrick Kerr, Christoffel Denmark, Bernard Stroud, Valentine Snyder, William Clark, John Pierce, Robert Han- uch, Nathan Greimby, D. Westbrook, Nicholas De Pui, Daniel De Pui, James Hyndshaw, Aaron De Pui, Isaac Tak, Richard Howell, Redolphus Schoon- over, John Houay, John Courtright, Thomas Heson, Henry Huber, William McNab, Samuel Vanaman, Brinman, Scoumaker. It is doubtful if the town- ship was laid out under this petition, for we find that in June, 1748, the in- habitants of Dansbury' and Smithfield petitioned the court for a township "to extend from the river Delaware along the mountains to a gap in the same through which the road from McMichael's to Nazareth goes, from thence northerly to a large creek, commonly called Bushkill, down the same to the Delaware, to the place of beginning." Among the petitioners were Daniel Brodhead, Edward Scull, Solomon Jennings and Moses and Aaron De Pui. The township was ordered to be laid out, but, if it were done, it was not embraced in the boundaries mentioned in the petition. Two years later, De- cember, 1750, Daniel Brodhead, Edward Scull, John Michael, John Price, John Van Etten and others petitioned for "a township to be bounded by Bush- kill on the south, to which creek there is the grant of a township," by Delaware on the east, and by lands belonging to the honorable Proprietaries on the north and west." The petitioners represent themselves as "the remotest livers from the honorable court." This application was held under advisement. A mile above Delaware Water Gap, on a bluff bank of the river, is an old Indian burial-ground. The spot was a favorite place with the Indians, and here they
3 Delaware Water Gap.
4 Original name of Stroudsburg.
5 From this reference it appears the township here referred to extended down to the Bushkill in Northampton county and including the two Bethels and Forks township.
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buried their dead many years. The ground is entirely overgrown with trees, and but few of the mounds are visible. In 1744 a road was laid out from John Michael's plantation, Smithfield, and two years after, it was extended to Naz- areth. The territory that was originally Smithfield has been subdivided, and no doubt not only included Smithfield and Middle Smithfield, in Monroe county, but all the townships in Northampton county north of the Bushkill. Henry says Smithfield was settled by Europeans as early as 1710. In a report made to the Legislature August 20, 1752, on paper currency, it is stated there were settlements above Durham, in 1723; probably a few Mennonites and Dunkers who had strayed across from about Falkner's swamp, between 1708 and 1730, and settled near the Lehigh.
When the country was settled all the region between the Delaware and Lehigh, and extending back to the Blue Mountains, was called the "Forks of the Delaware," by which name it was known for many years. It is difficult to fix the date when the first white man penetrated the wilderness in the Forks, for the earliest settlers lived alone in their solitary cabins in the woods. In 1735 the Penns projected a lottery to dispose of one hundred thousand acres in the upper end of Bucks county, but, as it was never drawn, the holders of tickets were allowed to locate the land they called for. Among them was Nathaniel Irish," who held three tickets, and under these, located three five hundred acre tracts on the Lehigh, two on the south, and one on the north bank. He built a mill at the mouth of Saucon creek before 1740, the first in that region, and afterward sold this tract to a Mr. Cruikshank, Philadelphia. The other two tracts, one on each side of the river, he sold to the Moravians, and on one of them Bethlehem was afterward built. Mr. Irish probably never lived north of the Lehigh, his house stood on the site of William Shimer's dwelling, Shimersville, and was removed, 1816. The ruins of the mill were still to be seen on the premises of John Knecht a few years ago. As early as 1733 whites had surveyed and located unpurchased land, and, by 1735, the im- migrants began to crowd the Delawares. Captain John, a brother of Teedyus- cung, and other Indians were expelled from their corn-fields and peach or- chards, in 1742. The first permanent settlements in the Forks of Delaware were made by that persistent and bold race, the Scotch-Irish Presbyterians, under Thomas and William Craig and Alexander Hunter. The former lo- cated near the Lehigh, the latter near the Delaware. There was an accession to the settlers from New York and New Jersey, but the Scotch-Irish were the backbone of the settlement.
ALLEN TOWNSHIP .- William Allen owned eighteen hundred acres in this township, 1740, in the forks of the Hockendauqua, and from him it gets its name. On Eastburn's map of the Forks of Delaware, drawn the same year. two other surveys besides Allen's are marked on it, one of fourteen hundred and twenty-six, and another of fifteen hundred, to John Page, on the Hock-
6 Nathaniel Irish was born on the island of Montserrat, West Indies, and died at Union Furnace, Hunterdon Co., N. J., 1748. He was commissioned a justice of the peace for Bucks county, 1741. His son, Nathaniel, who commanded a company in the corps of artillery of Col. Benjamin Flowers, was born at Saucon, now Northampton county, but then in Bucks, May 8, 1737. He removed to Pittsburg, Pa., of which he was elected first assistant burgess, died there Sept. 11, 1816, and was buried in the First Pres- byterian churchyard. In 1758 he married Elizabeth, daughter of John Thomas, born in 1735, and died August, 1795, near the mouth of Plumb creek, Pitt township, Allegheny county, Pennsylvania.
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endauqua, a corruption of Hackundochwe, which signifies searching for lands. These surveys were made prior to 1737 at the time Lappawinzoe was king of Hockendauqua, whose village was between Howell's grist-mill and the mouth of the creek." In 1750 a part or the whole of Allen's tract was conveyed to William Parsons, and, 1770, one hundred and fifty acres were conveyed to Anthony Lerch. Between 1730 and 1735 Thomas and William Craig intro- duced a number of families from the north of Ireland into what is now Allen township, then on the north-west frontier of Bucks county. They went reso- lutely to work to clear the forest and build homes, for they had come to stay. Being Presbyterians, almost without exception, they were not long in organizing a congregation for worship and building a church. In 1734 the Reverend Mr. Wales, their pastor, resigned. In April, 1739, this congre- gation, and probably the one at Hunter's settlement, asked the New Brunswick Presbytery for pastors, and Gilbert Tennent was directed to supply them in the fall. The Reverends Messrs. Campbell and Robinson were sent soon after, and, in May, the settlements gave Mr. Dean a call which he declined. This settlement was known for several years as "Craig's settlement," as that in Mount Bethel township was called "Hunter's settlement," but they were often called the "Irish settlements." Among the early settlers, in the "Irish. settlement," was James King, who died April 30, 1745, aged thirty-eight. In 1750, a grant of land was made to his widow, Mary King, lying on the Cata- sauqua creek, a part of which she sold to her son-in-law, John Hays, 1763. Hays became prominent in Northampton county and held office under the Provincial government. Tradition says he took part in the battle of Trenton, as captain of a company of militia.
The Scotch-Irish settlers in Allen moved in the organization of a town- ship, in 1746. At the June term "the inhabitants living on the west branch of the Delaware" petitioned the court to fix the boundary of a township, which they describe as follows: "From the mouth of Monokosey," up the middle branch of said creek to the Blue Mountains, and thence by said mountains to the west branch of the river, and thence down said branch to the mouth of said Monokosey." They state, among other things, that they labor under great inconvenience for want of roads to go to mills, market and the county court ; that the paths are yearly altered, so that they can not travel without endangering their lives and going far out of their way, etc. The petitioners were ordered to produce a draft of the proposed township at the next court. The pioneers of the Lehigh, who petitioned for the township, were Hugh Wil- son, James Carruthers, George Gray, James Ralston, Francis Linfield, John Riddle, William Young, James Horner, Jonathan McNeely, Thomas
Boyd, Samuel Barron, Christopher Armbrest, Michael Favion, Joseph Latti- more, William Clendinnen, Thomas Craig, John Walker, James McAlex- ander, Thomas Hutchinson, Joseph Kerr, Robert Clendinnen. William Detur. James Allison, Arthur Lattimore, William Boyde, John Rausberry, Henry Deck, Peter Doll, Joseph Pelly. Robert Lattimore, William Craig, John McNair, James Craig, Jonathan Kerr, Samuel Brown, Joseph Wright, Jona- than Delur, James Gray, William McConnell, Thomas Thompson, Christian
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