USA > Pennsylvania > Bucks County > History of Bucks County, Pennsylvania: From the Discovery of the Delaware to the Present Time (Volume 1 and 2) > Part 32
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5 Israel Taylor, son of Christopher Taylor, was appointed sheriff April 29, 1693. A man of the same name was the first surgeon mentioned as living in this county.
6 Derrick Jonson was brother of Claus Jonson, mentioned in the early annals of the Delaware. Among other employments he was overseer of highways from the Poquessing to Bristol prior to the arrival of William Penn.
7 Doctor Buckman is of opinion the murder was committed in an old house that formerly stood on Neshaminy above Schenck's ferry.
8 An carly capital trial in the county was that of negro Dick, at Bristol, 1709, before Thomas Stephenson and John Rowland, two justices of the peace, appointed special commissioners to try him. The jury was composed of six freeholders. The prisoner was the slave of William Williamson, Bensalem, and his offence burning his master's barn and outbuildings. He was convicted and sentenced to be hanged on a tree, but there is no evidence on record that he was executed.
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cil. Among the practicing attorneys, in this county, was the celebrated James Logan, the friend and confidant of William Penn. In March, 1702, we find him at court when a suit in ejectment between Thomas Revel and Joseph Growden was being tried. He was not always a lawyer, by profession, but a man of great learning and ability.
Much curious learning confronts the student, in his attempt to investigate the history of our county seal or seals." After Penn had divided the settled parts of the province into counties, he authorized a seal for each, and was granted a meeting of council, held at Philadelphia, "ye 23d of ye Ist month, 1683." These were, respectively : The "Anchor" for Philadelphia; "Tree and a vine" for Bucks ;"1º the "Plow" for Chester ; a "Castle" for New Castle; "Three ears of Indian corn" for Kent, and "one wheat sheaf" for Sussex. Charles II con- ferred on William Penn the right to use his own arms on the Proprietary seal, and it formed the basis of the Colonial seal. The Proprietary and his officers had their own seal, using them in executing documents of importance and value. In making treaties with the Indians the latter made use of curious heiroglyph- ics for seals attesting their faith. After a careful examination of old documents, Judge Yerkes came to the conclusion that the Bucks county seal, "A tree and a vine," designated by the executive council, 1683, and ordered by the Assembly, was not in use as such after the outbreak of the Revolution. In this connection he cites two impressions as specimens of "A tree and a vine" seal, one in wax, attached by Jeremiah Landhome to a writ in partition between Thomas Stack- house and Robert Cobbert, dated December 15, 1729; the other to a similar writ, impressed on paper, and attested by Gilbert Hicks, March 17, 1774. Both are clear and distinct. In technical heraldry the seal is thus described : "Argent, on a fesse sable, three plates ; a crescent for difference, above the shield (in posi- tion of a crest) a fruit tree ; in support of a vine ; in exergue, the legend : Wil- liam Penn, Proprietary and Governor, Bucks." The impression of the original county seal, a "Tree and a vine," inserted in this work. vol. i, p. 44, was taken from a cut made by Mr. Charles Young, who has charge of the Heraldry De- partment of Bailey, Bank & Biddle, Philadelphia, and is a very fine specimen.
During our investigation for the first edition of The History of Bucks County we found an impression of a seal attached to a document in the protho- notary's office, as given below. The document, to which it was attached, bore the date of 1738. Bearing the name "The county seal," although not the "Tree and the vine," we had a cut made and an impression inserted in the book, and again present it in the second edition, because it belongs to the history of the . county. Despite the evidence in its favor, some discredit it. As will be noticed. the shield is the same as that of 1683, corresponding with that of the Penn coat-
9 We are indebted to an interesting paper Judge Yerkes read before the Bucks County Historical Society, on the "Original County Seals," at the midsummer meeting, July 16, 1895, for information on this subject.
10 The Tree and the Vine seal is thus described: "The original scal of Bucks county is the size of a silver half dollar, with the escutcheon or shield of the Penn family as the central figure. The background of the shield is white, with a black band and three plates thereon, and above a half moon. A low, broad tree having rather a heavy trunk, surmounts the shield. with thickly clustered branches. From the base of the tree, around the shield, is a distinctly defined vine, resembling the old-fashioned trumpet vine, common about the old homes of Bucks. Within double dotted Fees. on the outer circle, is the inscription, William Penn, Proprietor and Governor, Bucks."
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of-arms. The legend "The county seal," was on the impression as given below. We vouch for nothing but the simple fact that we found the impression of such a seal, and had a cut made of it. Because others have never seen it, among the court papers, is no evidence it never had existence.
The
County
Se al.
During our investigations for this edition of The History of Bucks County an impression of the seal of the register's office came into our possession, on let- ters of administration granted by the register of the county to Sarah Searle, widow of Thomas Searle, husbandman, dated October 14, 1714, and signed by Jer. Langhorne, deputy register, Phineas Pemberton being then register. The seal is the size of an half dollar. Starting at the top of the circle and reading round by the right, we make out: W. P. P. & G., of Pennsylvania-gestry offis, meaning "seal of register's office," etc. The date is 1683. The wax is much broken. In the center is the Penn escutcheon, with a vine on either side; on the face three bolts between chevrons, and above them a plate. The seal is surrounded by a double dotted line. As a matter of fact, Bucks county has no county seal at this time and may not have had one since the "Tree and the vine" passed out of use. Instead of a "county seal" each county office has a seal of its own, six in number. We have them all before us. Each has a facsimile of the Penn escutcheon, surmounted by an eagle; under the eagle, at the top of the escutcheon or shield, is a ship under full sail; at the bottom three sheaves of wheat ; on either side of the shield is what resembles a sprig of a bush and a vine. Between the sheaves of wheat and the ship is a plow. Within the circle, in raised letters, and surrounding the shield. is the name of the respective office. There is nothing like a "tree" on either of these seals. By using the "plow" and the "wheat sheaf" they combine the insignia of Chester county and Sussex. The courts of Bucks county were not presided over by judges "learned in the law" prior to 1790. The first of these was James Biddle, of Philadelphia, appointed 1790, and served until 1797, dying in office. He was succeeded by John Cox, of Philadelphia, same year, and died in 1805; William Tilghman, of Philadelphia, 1805-6; Bird Wilson, Philadelphia, 1806, resigning, 1818, to enter the church, accepting the rectorship of St. John's Episcopal church, of Norris-
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town the following year. He removed to New York, 1821, and died in Connec- ticut. The district, then the Seventh, was composed of the counties of Bucks, Montgomery, Chester and Delaware. Of these four early president judges : Biddle, born February 18, 1731, died June 15, 1797; Cox, born -, died, 1805; Tilghman, born August 12, 1756, died April 30, 1827, and Wilson, born - January 8, 1777, died April 4, 1859. He was a son of James Wilson, signer of the Declaration and member of the convention that framed the Constitution of the United States. Washington styled him the "Father of the Constitution.11 Judge Wilson was succeeded by John Ross, of Bucks, who took his seat January 13, 1818, and served until 1830 when he was appointed to the State Supreme court.
A little episode in Judge Ross's career, shows the bright side of the human character. When a young man he went up to the Durham furnace, then owned by Richard Backhouse, and took charge of the school. At the expiration of his time he was about to leave and go South, but Mr. Backhouse persuaded him to study law at Easton, pledging himself to pay his expenses, and afterward to support him until able to support himself. Young Ross accepted the proposi- tion, and the poor schoolmaster became a distinguished lawyer and judge, this little incident, no doubt, changing his destiny. Judge Ross was succeeded by John Fox, a member of the Bucks County Bar, who was president judge of our courts for ten years. The adoption of the constitution of 1838, making the appointment of new judges necessary, Fox was succeeded by Thomas Burnside, 'Centre county, who took his seat April 27, 1841. He was raised to the Supreme bench, 1844, when David Krause, Dauphin county, was appointed his successor taking his seat in February of the same year. He was the last of the appointed judges to sit on our bench, and went out of office before his commission expired to make way for Daniel M. Smyser, of Adams county, who was elected the fall of 1851. Smyser was followed by Henry Chapman, who served out his full term of ten years from 1861, but declined re-election. Mr. Chapman first went on the bench about 1847, by appointment as president judge of the Chester- Delaware district, and served until the election of 1851, when he declined the nomination. He was likewise the recipient of political honors, being elected a member of the State Senate, 1843, serving one term, and to the House of Rep- resentatives of the United States, 1854, to which he declined re-election, 1856. Judge Chapman was succeeded as president judge, 1871, by Henry P. Ross, who had been elected additional law judge of Bucks, 1869. The promotion of Judge Ross left a vacancy in the office of additional law judge, which the Gov- ernor filled by the appointment of O. G. Olmstead, of Potter county. At the October election, 1872, Stokes L. Roberts, of this bar, was elected to the office, resigning shortly. Richard Watson, Doylestown, was appointed to fill the vacancy, and elected for the full term, 1873. Meanwhile Bucks and Mont- gomery were each created a separate judicial district, and the president judge having the right to elect in which he would preside, Judge Ross chose Mont- gomery, leaving Judge Watson in Bucks. Harman Yerkes succeeded Judge Watson and served two terms.
Between the Revolution and the adoption of the constitution of 1900, our county courts were presided over by "lay justices"-men not learned in the
II In 1734, Dr. Thomas Græme was appointed a "Justice of Oyer and Terminer and General Jail Delivery for Philadelphia. Bucks and Chester counties." At the same time he was one of the three Justices of the Supreme court of the Colony, a posi- tion he occupied for nearly twenty years.
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law-appointed by the Supreme Executive Council of the State, and commis- sioned for seven years or "during good behavior," and associate judges sat with them. The first to be appointed for this county was Henry Wynkoop, of Northampton township, who was commissioned December 2, 1777. He was president, and re-appointed in 1784. Among the other lay judges who sat on our bench were James Benezet, John Long, Joseph Hart, John Chapman. Andrew Long, John Barclay, President Judge, Andrew Long, Richard Back- house. These sat on our county bench, in the long past, but others filled that honorable position who will be remembered by the present generation. Among them are Francis Murry, Samuel Hart, William Watts, John Ruckman, Michael H. Jenks, William S. Hendrie, Stephen N. Bartine, Andrew Apple, John S. Bryan, John Wildman, Joseph Morrison, William Godshalk, and others that could be named. These latter were associate judges. Henry Wynkoop, and a few others named, were really the president judges of the period. It was the practice, at the middle of the eighteenth century, for the outgoing constable to return the names of their successors, but whether there was any law for it we are not informed. At that day the stave carried by the constable of the court was a more significant badge of authority than at present. At the September term, 1784, the court recommended the grand jury to take into consideration "the device on the constables' stave, and the jury said, in their report, that the present 'devize' ought to be obliterated and that the arms of the State of Penn- sylvania, with such additions as the court shall think fit, be placed in the room thereof." The court concurs with the grand jury, with the addition that a "buck be added, by way of a crest, to denote the county." (Signed) Henry Wynkoop, president.
We regret we have not the information at hand to give the Bucks County Bar the notice it deserves. It ranked for many years as one of the ablest in the State, and its members the equals of their fellows in legal learning. When Fox, Chapman, DuBois, Ross and McDowell were in their prime it was hard to find their equals, or superiors, while those who have succeeded them maintain the prestige of their fathers. The families of Chapman and Ross have each produced three generations of lawyers, some of whom still have the harness on.12 Many now living remember the late venerable Abraham Chapman, admitted March 9, 1790, for many years the father of the Bucks County Bar, a lawyer of the old school, who practiced long at Newtown, and came. to Doyles- town with the removal of the county seat. He is the author's earliest recollec- tion of a man "learned in the law," and at that day he was about the close- of a long and successful career at the bar. Of the Rosses, grandfather and grandson have worn the ermine. Several of the name were bred to the law. William Ross was a practicing attorney at Newtown, 1767. George Ross, a son of John, was admitted to the bar, 1819, and Thomas Ross, a brother of John, a fine lawyer in his day, died at Norristown, October 20, 1822, at the age of sixty-six, and his widow in Solebury, aged ninety years. The late Thomas Ross, admitted to the bar in 1829, served two terms in Congress, and died, 1865. Judge Fox had two sons at the bar in neighboring counties, and Charles E. DuBois had a son at our bar to keep up the father's reputation. Eleazar T. McDowell, the contemporary of Fox, DuBois, Chapman and Ross, an eloquent advocate and a man of fine social qualities, died early, and fate probably cheated him of honors that should have been his. The late Abel M.
I? Since the above was written another generation of the Ross family has given two lawyers to our bar.
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Griffith, well remembered by a few of the present generation, missed his opportunity by deserting the dignified profession of the law for the noisy arena of politics. He was elected to the Legislature and served one term, 1841, but that unfitted him for the companionship of law-books and clients. Some may call to mind the cane he walked with, called the "peace- maker," with which he used to frighten unruly boys. He read law with Thomas Ross; had many excellent qualities, and would have made a respectable figure in the world had he not wrecked his fortunes on the rock that has proved fatal to so many.
Ex-Chief Justice Edward M. Paxson read law with Judge Chapman, and was admitted to the bar in 1850. He practiced here some little time prior to set- tling in Philadelphia, which has since been his home. George Lear, born in Warwick township, and admitted to the bar, 1844, had been forty years at the- bar at his death, 1884. He was several years at the head of the Bucks County Bar, and reached the honorable station of attorney general of Pennsylvania. He was an excellent lawyer and eloquent speaker. The present bar, in the main, is composed of young men who have their spurs to win. Of them we do not purpose to speak further than to say there is talent enough among them, if properly directed and cultivated, to enable them to reach distinction. The father of the bar was Elias Carver, admitted 1845, and who practiced until his death in 1904. Since 1790, 151 young men have read law here and been admitted to practice in our courts, while a number, admitted elsewhere, have settled here. Our bar and county have furnished five judges to the State Supreme court, named in a subsequent chapter. The Bucks County Legal Association, organized almost fifty years ago, has done considerable to advance the profes- sional esprit de corps of the bar. Nathan C. James, admitted, 1853, was the next oldest member in active practice, and president of the association at his death.1214
Bucks county has furnished a number of judges to other counties and states besides those mentioned. Charles Huston, born in Plumstead township, State Supreme Court ; J. Pringle Jones, born in Durham, president judge Com- mon Pleas of Berks; Judge Strong, United States Supreme Court, is said to have begun practice here, though his name is not on the roll of admissions. In addition the following may be named : Judges Briggs, Bregy and Biddle, Phila- delphia Common Pleas ; Watson, brother of Judge Watson, of Bucks ; Small, read with Mr. Lear, on bench in Wisconsin ; James R. Slack, born in Newtown town- ship, circuit judge, Indiana; Edward Harvey, Common Pleas, Lehigh county ; Henry W. Scott, born Newtown, Common Pleas, Northampton; Alfred Shaw, born Buckingham, on bench in Louisiana; John Titus, born Solebury, United States District Court, Arizona, and died there, 1877.
Next to our courts, the changes and removals of the county seats are of interest. As the settlements extended into the interior from the Delaware, the county seat sought the center of population. It is difficult to locate the first court house. It was built by Jeremiah Langhorne about 1686, and was prob- ably in Falls township, for, in July of that year, it was proposed to hold Falls meeting for four months in the new court house and pay the county ten shillings.
121/4 Mr. James, born, 1825, was a member of the largest and influential Welsh family of New Britain, and died at Doylestown August 9, 1900, after a long and painful ill- ness, at the age of seventy-five. He read law with the late George HI. Michener, and was in practice forty-seven years. He was the only member of the Bucks County Bar who filled two consecutive terms of the District Attorney's office, both by popular election.
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rent, but it was not done because there was "no convenience of seats and water." Several points claim the honor of the parent court house. Dr. Edward Buck- man places it on the farm, late of Jacob Smith, below Morrisville and near the mouth of a creek that empties into the Delaware at Moon's island, where an old building was lately standing, twenty by thirty feet, two stories high. Tradition 'tells us the first court house stood at the angle of the Newtown and Fallsington roads. Falls meeting was frequently held in William Biles's kitchen, on the river just below Morrisville, and we know that court was held there a few times. On the east end of the new building are "W. B., 1726." . The elections were held at the falls down to 1705, and it was the custom of that day to hold them in the court house. When the first group of townships was organized, 1692, court was held in Friends' meeting house, Middletown. At April term, 1700, the grand jury presented the necessity "of the placing a court house near the middle of the county, which we esteem to be near Neshaminy meeting house," now Langhorne. In 1702 court was held at the house of George Biles, probably in Falls.1212 In 1705 the county seat was changed to Bristol, the new buildings erected being on a lot one hundred feet square on Cedar street, the gift of Samuel Carpenter. Court was first held at "New Bristol," as the place was then called, June 13th, that year, but the buildings were probably not finished at this time. The old court house and jail, wherever situated, were sold at public sale. The new court house, Bristol, was ordered to be a two-story brick, and stood nearly opposite the present Masonic hall, with court room above, prison below, and whipping-post attached to the outside wall. A new house of correction, with whipping-post, was erected 1722.12%
When the removal of the county seat from Bristol to Newtown was agitated, 1723, in the petition presented to the Assembly it is stated Newtown was about the center of the inhabitants of the county. The 24th of March, 1724, an act was passed authorizing Jeremiah Langhorne and others to purchase a piece of land at some convenient place in Newtown township, in trust for the use of the county, and to build thereon a court house and prison, at an expense not to exceed three hundred pounds. They purchased five acres where the vil- lage of Newtown stands, on which the public buildings were erected shortly after. This lot embracing the heart of the town, in the vicinity of the National Bank and on both sides of State street, was purchased of John Walley the 17th of July, 1725. It was part of two hundred acres Israel Taylor located, 1689, and sold the same year to John Coat, thence to his son Samuel, 1699, who sold it to Shadrack Walley, 1702, from whom it descended to John Walley, his son and heir.13 A new prison was erected 1745, when the old one was taken for a
121/2 We doubt if the exact location of the first court house is known. Some say it stood three hundred yards below the line of Morrisville borough, on property cwned by Thomas Van Hart, 1881, that it was a log house, torn down 1860, that the previous owner was Jacob Smith, who bought it of John Carlisle, that the latter had bought it some eighty years ago, and the old wall could be seen in the cellar that had not been filled up.
123% In the early days some branches of the court business were very meagre, especially that pertaining to the sheriff's office. From 1734 to 1750 only six sheriffs' deeds were acknowledged, from 1750 to 1776, one hundred and seventy-six, and but one to, and including, 1784. The number of deeds acknowledged from 1782 to 1882, was three thousand and forty-five.
13 The last court held at Bristol was March 17, 1725, and the first at Newtown, June 16, 1726, both old style.
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workshop for the prisoners, and opened about December, 1746, with Benjamin Field, of Middletown, president of the board of managers. Samuel Smith,. Newtown, was at one time keeper of the workshop. A portion of the lot, over and above that required for public purposes, was disposed of for a yearly rent, to be paid to the trustees named in the act of Assembly, or their successors, "for the public use of the said county forever." Within recent years John Bond. and one other paid ground rent, but it would be well to know who should account to the county in this behalf. The act authorizing the removal of the. county seat provided for holding the elections in the court house, where they were holden for the whole county until 1786. In 1796 the handsome stone build- ing, formerly occupied by the First National Bank, Newtown, was erected for a public record office, and had two rooms for offices on the south and two vaults. on the north side. Down to 1772 the county officers kept the records at their dwellings, where they transacted their official business, but in that year a strong fire-proof building, twelve by sixteen feet, with walls two feet thick and arched with brick, was built near the court house, where the records were to be kept under a penalty of three hundred. pounds. This venerable little building was torn down, May, 1873. The only data about it was the name, "H. Rockhill," cut on a facestone without date. During a portion of the Revolution this little building was occupied as a magazine for powder and other warlike stores. The: last trace of the old jail is the stone wall on the east side of State street, oppo- site the National Bank. The kitchen of D. B. Heilig stood against the end of the jail, and tradition hands it down as the office and bar-room of that institution, where everybody, within and without the jail, could get rum if they had the money to pay for it. Patrick Hunter, a hard case, who was jailor and bar-tender during this laxity of morals, found it difficult to keep the prisoners in jail. At his death Asa Carey, who succeeded him, stopped the sale of rum and the escape of prisoners. He was the last jailor at Newtown and the first at Doyles- town. On his return to Newtown, he married Tamer Worstall and moved to. the Bird-in-hand tavern. When the old Phillips house was torn down. 1877, there was found in the wall a stone that had stood at the corner of the jail wall .. The upper part, only, was left, and on it were the following figures and letters. in the order given below :
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