USA > Pennsylvania > Dauphin County > History of Dauphin County, Pennsylvania > Part 4
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Nothing seems as uninteresting to the average reader as a list of names and dates, but the list of land warrants is given in the appendix to this work because of their historic value, and many per- sons can through this trace back to their forefathers in Dauphin county.
"SCOTCH-IRISH" AND THEIR PERSECUTION.
There are some matters connected with these persecutions which may not be uninteresting. From 1660 to 1688 no less than eighteen thousand Scotch Presbyterians were put to death in various ways in defense of the solemn league and covenant and Christ's headship over the Church. In looking over the list of names one is forcibly struck with the fact that among them are the very surnames of the Scotch-Irish emigrants to this section of Pennsylvania,-Allison, Stewart, Gray, Thompson, Murray, Robinson, Rutherford, McCor- mick, Mitchell, Kerr, Todd, Beatty, Johnston, Hamilton, Finley, McCord, McEwen, Hall, Boyd, Clark, Sloan, Elder, Forster, Mont- gomery, Robertson, and others. It would thus seem that we have here the lineal descendants of those who loved not their lives unto the death, but were drowned, hanged, shot, beheaded, and their heads stuck upon poles, their bodies chopped in pieces and scattered about, in the days of that human monster, Claverhouse. Through their blood shed in defense of religious liberty we enjoy many and great privileges.
Worn out with the unequal contest, these persistent and endur- ing Presbyterians took refuge from persecution-abandoned the land of their birth-and sought an asylum among their countrymen who had preceded them in the secure retreats of Ulster, and thither they
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HISTORY OF DAUPHIN COUNTY
escaped as best they could, some crossing the narrow sea in open boats. They carried their household goods with them, and their religious peculiarities became more dear in their land of exile for the dangers and sorrows through which they had borne them.
This is the race which furnished the population in the north of Ireland, familiarly known as the Scotch-Irish. This term-Ameri- can in its origin, and unknown in Ireland-does not denote an admixture of the Scotch and Irish races. The one did not inter- marry with the other. The Scotch were principally Saxon in blood and Presbyterian in religion; the native Irish, Celtic in blood and Roman Catholic in religion; and these were elements which could not very readily coalesce. Hence the races are as distinct in Ireland at the present day as when the Scotch first took up their abode in that island. They were called Scotch-Irish simply from the cir- cumstance that they were the descendants of Scots who had taken up their residence in the North of Ireland.
MANNERS OF THE GERMAN INHABITANTS OF PENNSYLVANIA.
(From the Columbian Magazine, 1789, p. 22.)
The State of Pennsylvania is so much indebted for her pros- perity and reputation to the German part of her citizens, that a short account of their manners may, perhaps, be useful and agree- able to their fellow-citizens in every part of the United States.
The aged Germans and the ancestors of those who are young, migrated chiefly from the Palatinate; from Alsace, Swabia, Saxony, and Switzerland; but natives of every principality and dukedom in Germany are to be found in different parts of the state. They brought but little property with them. A few pieces of gold or a silver coin, a chest filled with clothes, a bible, and a prayer or an hymn book, constituted the whole stock of most of them. Many of them bound themselves, or one or more of their children, to mas- ters, after their arrival, for four, five, or seven years, in order to pay for their passage across the ocean. A clergyman always ac- companied them when they came in large bodies.
The principal part of them were farmers; but there were many mechanics, who brought with them a knowledge of those arts which are necessary and useful in all countries. These mechanics were chiefly weavers, tailors, tanners, shoemakers, combmakers, smiths of all kinds, butchers, bakers, papermakers, watchmakers, and sugarbakers. I shall begin this account of the German inhabitants of Pennsylvania, by describing the manners of the German farmers.
This body of citizens are not only industrious and frugal, but skillful cultivators of the earth. I shall enumerate a few of the
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HISTORY OF DAUPHIN COUNTY
particulars, in which they differ from most of the other farmers of Pennsylvania.
Ist. In settling a tract of land, they always provide large and suitable accommodations for their horses and cattle before they lay out much money in building a house for themselves. The barn and the stables are generally under one roof, and contrived in such a manner as to enable them to feed their horses and cattle and to re- move their dung with as little trouble as possible. The first dwel- ling-house upon this farm is small, and built of logs. It generally lasts the lifetime of the first settler of a tract of land; and hence they have a saying that "a son should always begin his improve- ments where his father left off,"-that is, by building a large and convenient stone house.
2nd. They always prefer good land, or that land on which there is a large quantity of meadow ground. From an attention to the cultivation of grass, they often double the value of an old farm in a few years, and grow rich on farms on which their prede- cessors of whom they purchased them have nearly starved. They prefer purchasing farms with some improvements to settling on a new tract of land.
3rd. In clearing new land they do not girdle trees simply, and leave them to perish in the ground, as is the custom of their English or Irish neighbors; but they generally cut them down and burn them. In destroying underwood and bushes they generally grub them out of the ground, by which means a field is as fit for cul- tivation the second year after it is cleared, as it is twenty years afterwards. The advantages of this mode of clearing consists in the immediate product of the field, and in the greater facility with which it is plowed, harrowed and reaped. The expense of repair- ing a plow, which is often broken two or three times a year by small stumps concealed in the ground, is often greater than the extraordi- nary expense of grubbing the same field completely, in clearing it.
4th. They feed their horses and cows of which they keep only a small number, in such a manner that the former perform twice the labor of those horses, and the latter yield twice the quantity of milk of those cows that are less plentifully fed. There is great econ- omy in this practice, especially in a country where so much of the labor of a farmer is necessary to the support of his domestic animals. A German horse is known in every part of the state; indeed, he seems to "feel with his lord the pleasure and the pride" of his ex- traordinary size or fat.
5th. The fences of a German farm are generally high and well built, so that his fields seldom suffer from the inroads of his own or his neighbor's horses, cattle, hogs, or sheep.
6th. The German farmers are great economists of their wood. Hence they burn it only in stoves, in which they consume but a fourth or fifth part of what is commonly burnt in ordinary
3I
HISTORY OF DAUPHIN COUNTY
open fire places. Besides, their horses are saved by the means of this economy, from that immense labor in hauling wood in the mid- dle of winter, which frequently unfits the horses of their neighbors for the toils of the ensuing spring. Their houses are, moreover, rendered so comfortable at all times, by large close stoves, that twice the business is done by every branch of the family in knitting, spinning, and mending family utensils, that is done in houses where every member of the family crowds near to a common fireplace, or shivers at a distance from it,-with hands and fingers that move, by reason of the cold, with only half their usual quickness.
They discover economy in the preservation and increase of their wood in several ways. They sometimes defend it by high fences from their cattle, by which means the young forest trees are suffered to grow to replace those that are cut down for the neces- sary use of the farm. But where this cannot be conveniently done, they surround the stump of that tree, which is most useful for fences, viz., the chestnut, with a small triangular fence. From this stump a number of suckers shoot out in a few years, two or three of which, in the course of five and twenty years, grow into trees of the same size as the tree from whose roots they derive their origin. 7th. They keep their horses and cattle as warm as possible in winter, by which means they save a great deal of their hay and grain; for those animals, when cold, eat much more than when they are in a more comfortable situation.
8th. The German farmers live frugally in their families, with respect to diet, furniture and apparel. They sell their most profitable grain, which is wheat; and eat that which is less profit- able, but more nourishing, that is, rye or Indian corn. The profit to a farmer from this single article of economy is equal in the course of a lifetime, to the price of a farm for one of his children. They eat sparingly of boiled animal food, with large quantities of vege- tables, particularly with salad, turnips, onions, and cabbage, the last of which they make into sauerkraut. They likewise use a large quantity of milk and cheese in their diet. Perhaps the Germans do not proportion the quantity of their animal food to the degrees of their labor; hence it has been thought by some people that they de- cline in strength sooner than their English or Irish neighbors. Very few of them ever use distilled spirits in their families; their common drinks are cider, beer, wine and simple water. The furniture of their house is plain and useful. They cover themselves in winter with light feather beds instead of blankets, and they are made by themselves. The apparel of the German farmers is usually home- spun. When they use European articles of dress they prefer those which are of the best quality and of the highest price. They are afraid of debt, and seldom purchase anything without paying cash for it.
9th. The German farmers have large or profitable gardens
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HISTORY OF DAUPHIN COUNTY
near their houses. These contain little else but useful vegetables. Pennsylvania is indebted to the Germans for the principal part of her knowledge in horticulture. There was a time when turnips and cabbage were the principal vegetables that were used in diet by the citizens of Philadelphia. This will not surprise those persons who know that the first English settlers in Pennsylvania left England while horticulture was in its infancy in that country. It was not 'till the reign of William III. that this useful and agreeable art was cultivated by the English nation. Since the settlement of a num- ber of German gardeners in the neighborhood of Philadelphia, the tables of all classes of citizens have been covered with a variety of vegetables, in every season of the year; and to the use of these vegetables, in diet, may be ascribed the general exemption of the citizens of Philadelphia from diseases of the skin.
Ioth. The Germans seldom hire men to work upon their farms. The feebleness of that authority which masters possess over hired servants, is such that their wages are very seldom pro- cured from their labor, except in harvest, when they work in the presence of their masters. The wives and daughters of the Ger- man farmers frequently forsake for a while their dairy and spin- ning-wheel, and join their husbands and brothers in the labor of cutting down, collecting and bringing home the fruits of their fields and orchards. The work of the gardens is generally done by the women of the family.
I Ith. A large and strong wagon, covered with linen cloth, is. an essential part of the furniture of a German farm. In this wagon, drawn by four or five large horses of a peculiar breed, they convey to market over the roughest roads, between two or three thousand pounds weight of the produce of their farms. In the months of September and October, it is no uncommon thing on the Lancaster and Reading roads, to meet in one day from fifty to an hundred of these wagons on their way to Philadelphia, most of which belong to German farmers.
12th. The favorable influence of agriculture as conducted by the Germans in extending human happiness, is manifested by the joy they express upon the birth of a child. No dread of poverty nor distrust of Providence from an increasing family, depress the spirits of these industrious and frugal people. Upon the birth of a son they exult in the gift of a plowman or a wagoner; and upon the birth of a daughter they rejoice in the addition of another spinster or milk-maid to their family. Happy state of human so- ciety ! what blessings can civilization confer that can atone for the extinction of the ancient and patriarchal pleasure of raising up a numerous and healthy family of children to labor for their parents, for themselves, and for their country; and finally to partake of the knowledge and happiness which are annexed to existence! The joy of parents upon the birth of a child is the grateful echo of cre-
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HISTORY OF DAUPHIN COUNTY
ating goodness. May the mountains of Pennsylvania be forever vocal with songs of joy upon these occasions! They will be the infallible signs of innocence, industry, wealth and happiness in the state.
13th. The Germans take great pains to produce, in their children, not only habits of labor, but a love of it. In this they submit to the irreversible sentence inflicted upon them, in such a manner as to convert the wrath of heaven into private and public happiness. "To fear God, and to fear work," are the first lessons they teach their children. They prefer industry to money itself ; hence, when a young man asks the consent of his father to marry the girl of his choice, he does not inquire whether she be rich or poor, or whether she possess any personal or mental accomplish- ments, but whether she be industrious, and acquainted with the duties of a good housewife ?
14th. The Germans set a great value upon patrimonial prop- erty. This useful principle in human nature prevents much folly and vice in young people. It moreover leads to lasting and exten- sive advantages, in the improvement of a farm; for what induce- ment can be stronger in a parent to plant an orchard, to preserve forest trees, or to build a commodious and durable house, than the idea that they will all be possessed by succession of generations who shall inherit his blood and name.
15th. The German farmers are very influenced in planting and pruning trees, also in sowing and reaping, by the age and ap- pearances of the moon. This attention to the state of the moon has been ascribed to superstition; but if the facts related by Mr. Wilson in his observations upon climates are true, part of their suc- cess in agriculture must be ascribed to their being so much influ- enced by it.
1 6th. From the history that has been given of German agri- culture, it will hardly be necessary to add that a German farm may be distinguished from the farms of other citizens of the state by the superior size of their barns; the plain, but compact of their houses; the height of their enclosures ; the extent of their orchards ; the fertility of their fields; the luxuriance of their meadows, and a general appearance of plenty and neatness in everything that be- longs to them. The German mechanic possesses some of the traits of the character that has been drawn of the German farmer. His first object is to become a freeholder; and hence we find few of them live in rented houses. The highest compliment that can be paid to them on entering their houses, is to ask them, "is your house your own?" They are industrious, frugal, punctual and just. Since their settlement in Pennsylvania many of them have acquired a knowledge of those mechanical arts which are more immediately necessary and useful in a new country; while they continue, at the same time, to carry on the arts they imported from Germany, with
3
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HISTORY OF DAUPHIN COUNTY
vigor and success. But the genius of the Germans in Pennsylvania is not confined to agriculture and the mechanical arts. Many of them have acquired great wealth by foreign and domestic com- merce. As merchants, they are candid and punctual. The Bank of North America has witnessed from its first institution, their fidelity to their pecuniary engagements.
VALUE OF PRODUCE IN 1740.
Barley, per bus
2 6
Wheat,
3 0
Corn,
2 6
Bacon, per lb.
0 6
One Sheep
7 6
Butter, per lb
6
Flax, per lb.
0 6
Salt, per bus.
5 6
"Stilling," per bus.
I 8
"One Buck-skin'
18 0
Beef, per lb.
I 3-4
Rice, per lb.
0 2
The prices of wearing material at the same period give our readers some idea of the "ways of the world" in the days of our forefathers, and the following may interest many of our readers, especially as the prices refer to ladies' wear:
£ s. d.
For making a gown
O 3 0
For a Bonnet.
0 II II
Shalloon, for a petticoat.
O
9 4
Linen, 2 3-4 yds.
3 6
Cloak Dressing O
3
0
One pair of Shoes O
5
6
2 1-2 yds. of Linsey at 2s. 8d. per yd. 0
6
8
Footing a pair of Stockings. O
I O
2 Handkerchiefs O
6
3 yds. of Flan'l at 2s. IOd. 0
8
6
5 3-4 yds. Coarse Cloth at Is. 6d. per yd . 8 O 7 1-2
Making 2 shifts and I petticoat and 2 Aprons. O
I
6
For taffety & a ribon and sowing silk. 0
7
0
I-2 paper of pins at 9d. O
O
4 1-2
I I-2 yds. Calico at 3s. 3d. per yd. O 4 10 1-2
For a pattern of a Gown I 2 0
Check for Apron O 4 O
A Comb O O 6
I yd. of Lawn at 8s. od .. O 8 0
s. d.
6 4 One stick of Bobbin 0 0
35
HISTORY OF DAUPHIN COUNTY
AN INVASION OF THE FRENCH AND INDIANS FEARED.
In 1747 there were great fears of an invasion of the frontiers of Pennsylvania by the French and their Indian allies. The inhabi- tants mustered for their defense, and two associated regiments were formed in Lancaster county, one on the east, the other on the west side of the Susquehanna. Of the regiment organized east of the river, fifteen of the eighteen companies were raised within the pres- ent limits of Dauphin and Lebanon counties. They were in truth "a fighting people," were strong in defense of their rights, and in true loyalty and patriotism were not equaled by any settlement in the colonies of America. The officers were:
1128616
Lieutenant-Colonel - James Gal- Lieutenant-James Sample. Ensign-John Harris, to captain Aug.
braith, of Derry.
Major-Robert Baker, of Paxtang. Captain-Hugh Patrick.
Captain-John Smith.
Lieutenant-Thomas McDowell.
Lieutenant-William Crum.
Ensign-Thomas Grubb.
Ensign-Joseph C- -.
Captains-James Gillespie,-to lieu- tenant-colonel of regi-
Captain-Adam Reed.
Lieutenant-John Crawford.
Ensign-John Young.
Captain-John McEwen.
Lieutenant-James Anderson.
Lieutenant-James Gilchrist.
Ensign-Samuel Jemison.
Ensign-Andrew Boggs.
Captain-Gabriel Davis.
Lieutenant-Robert Ellis.
Lieutenant-Alexander Armstrong.
Ensign-Edward Davis, Jr.
Ensign-John Dougherty. Captain-Thomas McKee.
Captain-Samuel Crawford.
Lieutenant-William Rowland.
Lieutenant-Robert Smith.
Ensign-Richard McDonald.
Ensign-William Baskins.
Captain-Andrew Gregg. Lieutenant-William Crawford.
Captain-James Graham. Lieutenant-John Purrins.
Ensign-Samuel Simpson.
Ensign-William McMullin.
Captain-James Snodgrass. Lieutenant-John Alexander.
Captain-Robert Baker.
Lieutenant-William Mitchell.
Ensign-John Snodgrass. Captain-James Galbraith, Jr.
Ensign-Henry Rennick.
4, 1748.
ment for West End (Cumberland Valley) of Lancaster County. John Harris, from Ensign Aug. 4, 1748.
Ensign-James Finney. Captain-David McClure. Lieutenant-Thomas Foster.
Captain-James Armstrong.
In the years 1751 and 1752 the cereal crops were very abund- ant, as we find by the following from the Chronicon Ephratensis. These years were followed by a season of scarceness from 1753 to 1755, and upon this came the Indian war. The Ephrata Chroni- cle says :
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HISTORY OF DAUPHIN COUNTY
"The years 1751 and 1752, have been so fruitful in wheat and other grain that men in wanton carelessness sought to waste the supply; for the precious wheat, which might have supported many poor, they used to fatten hogs which afterwards they consumed in their sumptuousness. Besides, distilleries were erected everywhere, and thus this great blessing was turned into strong drink, which gave rise to much disorder."
Emigration to Pennsylvania was continually on the increase, and by reference to the early warrantees and such assessment-lists as have come down to us, it will be seen that there was a continual stream of Scotch-Irish settlers, who halted a while among their friends and former neighbors in Paxtang, Hanover, and Derry, from whence they followed the tide of migration into the beautiful and fertile valleys to the southward. Homes-permanent homes -were being built, and the hardy pioneer was beginning to look for his reward from the broad acres which began to delight his eye, and the dreams of years were about to be realized when, like a de- mon of desolation, came the atrocious border wars from 1754 to 1764.
MURDER OF JOHN ARMSTRONG BY THE INDIANS.
Some time in the year 1744, John Armstrong, a trader among the Indians residing on the Susquehanna above Peter's mountain, on the east side of the river, with two of his servants or men, namely James Smith and Woodworth Arnold, was murdered by an Indian of the Delaware tribe named Musemeelin, on the Juniata river. Seven white men and five Indians went in search of the bodies of those murdered; after some search found and buried them. The murderer was afterwards apprenhended, and delivered up by his own nation, and imprisoned at Lancaster, whence he was removed to Philadelphia, lest he should escape, or his trial and execution pro- duce an unfavorable impression on his countrymen about to assem- ble for a conference with the whites at Lancaster. The Governor directed or required that the property of Armstrong should be re- turned to his family. He also invited a deputation to attend the trial of Musemeelin, and his execution, if found guilty. The fol- lowing deposition of the men who went in search of the remains of the murdered, was certified to before James Armstrong, one of his majesty's justices of the peace for the county of Lancaster, dated at Paxtang, 19th day of April, 1744:
"The deposition of the subscribers testifieth and saith, that the sub- scribers having a suspicion that John Armstrong, trader, together with two
37
HISTORY OF DAUPHIN COUNTY
men, James Smith and Woodworth Arnold, were murdered by the Indians. They met at the house of Joseph Chambers, in Paxtang, and there consulted to go to Shamokin, to consult with the Delaware King and Shickcalimy, and there council what they should do concerning the affair, whereupon the King and Council ordered eight of their men to go with the deponents to the house of James Berry, in order to go in quest of the murdered persons, but that night they came to the said Berry's house, three of the eight Indians ran away, and the next morning these deponents, with the five Indians that remained, set out on their journey peaceably to the last supposed sleeping place of the deceased, and upon their arrival these deponents dispersed them- selves in order to find out the corpse of the deceased, and one of the deponents named James Berry, a small distance from the aforesaid sleeping-place, came to a white-oak tree, which had three notches on it, and close by said tree he found a shoulder-bone, which the deponent does suppose to be John Arm- strong's, and that he himself was eating by the Indians, which he carried to the aforesaid sleeping-place, and showed it to his companions, one of whom handed it to the said five Indians to know what bone it was, and they, after passing different sentiments upon it, handed it to a Delaware Indian who was suspected by the deponents, and they testify and say that as soon as the Indian took the bone in his hand, his nose gushed out with blood, and directly handed it to another. From whence these deponents steered along a path about three or four miles to the Narrows of Juniata, where they suspected the murder to have been committed, and where the Allegheny road crosses the creek, these deponents sat down, in order to consult on what measures to take in order to proceed ori a discovery.
"Whereupon most of the white men, these deponents, crossed the creek again, and went down the creek, and crossed into an island, where these deponents had intelligence the corpse had been thrown; and there they met the rest of the white men and Indians, who were in company, and there con- sulted to go further down the creek in quest of the corpse, and these de- ponents further say, they ordered the Indians to go down the creek on the other side; but they all followed these deponents at a small distance, except one Indian who crossed the creek again; and soon after these deponents seeing some Bald eagles and other fowls, suspected the corpse to be thereabouts; and then lost sight of the Indians, and immediately found one of the corpses, which the deponents say was the corpse of James Smith, one of said Armstrong's men; and directly upon finding the corpse these deponents heard three shots of guns, which they had great reason to think were the Indians, their com- panions, who had deserted from them; and in order to let them know that they had found the corpse these deponents fired three guns, but to no purpose, for they never saw the Indians any more. And about a quarter of a mile further down the creek, they saw more Bald eagles, whereupon they made down towards the place, where they found another corpse (being the corpse of Woodworth Arnold, the other servant of said Armstrong) lying on a rock, and then went to the former sleeping-place, where they had appointed to meet the Indians, but saw no Indians, only that the Indians had been there and cooked some victuals for themselves and had gone off.
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