History of Delaware County, Pennsylvania, Part 21

Author: Ashmead, Henry Graham, 1838-1920
Publication date: 1884
Publisher: Philadelphia, Pa. : L.H. Everts
Number of Pages: 1150

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as frequently as those living at a distance, while the deputy register, in the discharge of the duties of his office, had no connection with the courts of justice at all.

The war caused an absolute cessation of the mnove- ment until fourteen years had elapsed, when the in- habitants of the ancient shire-town stood aghast, in the face of an act of Assembly, passed March 20, 1780, which authorized William Clingan, Thomas Bull, John Kinhead, Roger Kirk, John Sellers, John Wil- son, and Joseph Davis, or any four or more of them to build a new court-house and prison in the county of Chester, and when the proposed buildings should be ready for public use to sell the old court-house and prison in the borough of Chester. It is believed that the majority of the commissioners named were ad- verse to the proposed change,-hence the law re- mained a dead letter on the statute-book. But in 1784, the representatives in Assembly from Chester County being largely composed of removalists, a sup- plement to the former act was passed on March 22, 1784, which empowered John Hannum, Esq., Isaac Taylor, Esq., and John Jacobs, or any two of them, to put the law into execution. As all of the persons named were uncompromising removalists, they imme- diately set about enforcing its provisions. By the wording of the act they were restrained from erecting the new county buildings at a greater distance than one mile and a half from the Turk's Head Tavern in the township of Goshen. This location tradition as- serts-a statement which Judge Futhey and Gilbert Cope say may reasonably be questioned-was inserted in this bill through the influence of Col. John Han- num, an adroit politician who, with an eye to his personal advantage, desired to bring a tract of land he owned within the site designated. In this, how- ever, he made an error, for his premises subsequently proved to be more than two miles from the Turk's Head. The commissioners, notwithstanding Han- num's mistake, diligently began the erection of a court-house and prison adjacent, connected by a jail- yard. After the buildings had progressed until the walls were nearly completed, and while work was suspended thereon by reason of the severe winter and before the spring permitted its resumption, the people of old Chester succeeded, March 30, 1785, in having an act passed suspending the supplemental act under which the new structures were being erected.

To render themselves absolutely assured of retain- ing the county-seat in the ancient borough, a number of the anti-removalists gathered in Chester under command of Maj. John Harper, then landlord of the present City Hotel, and provided with arms, a field- piece, a barrel of whiskey, and other necessary muni- tions of war, took up the line of march for the Turk's Head, intent on razing the walls of the proposed court-house and jail to the earth. In the mean while Col. Hannum, learning of the hostile designs of the Chester people, dispatched couriers in all directions,

THE ERECTION OF DELAWARE COUNTY.

calling on the friends of removal to rally to the pro- The old court-house and county buildings in Ches- ter were sold on the 18th of March, 1788, to William Kerlin for four hundred and fifteen pounds. tection of the half-completed buildings, and Thomas Beaumont is said to have ridden all night from farm- house to farmhouse in Goshen and Bradford town- A struggle which had arrayed in bitter feeling one culminated in the erection of the eastern townships into the new county of Delaware, naturally drew forth many sarcastic articles on both sides of the contro- versy. The press of that day, however, did not fur- nish the same facilities for epistolary discussion as the present, hence the following address to the Legis- lature written by David Bevan,2 an acrimonious anti- removalist, for the first time is given to the public : ships, summoning the clan. The forces under com- | section of the county of Chester against the other, and mand of Maj. Harper marched toward the Turk's Head, and at night were camped at the General Greene Tavern, a few miles east of West Chester, when Col. Hannum was first apprised of their approach. The latter collected his men within the building, the win- dows boarded on the out as well as the inside and the space between filled in with stones, loop-holes being arranged at convenient intervals through which the defenders could thrust their muskets, and each man " To the Honor Representatives of the freemen of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania : had his place assigned him where, under designated officers, they remained awaiting the approach of the enemy. The next morning the Chester people came in sight of the fortification, when Maj. Harper planted his artillery on an eminence known as Quaker Hill, commanding the court-house. The absurdity of the matter dawning on the minds of some of the men in the ranks of Harper's troops, they contrived to bring about a cessation of hostilities, and the whole affair ended in a jollification, during which the cannon was repeatedly discharged in rejoicing over peace restored. The invaders were thereupon invited to inspect the unfinished structure. During the time the troops from old Chester were in the building, one of the lat- ter, seeing the banner of the removalists floating from the flag-staff, struck it down, which so angered the defenders that it was with much difficulty their officers could restrain them from resenting the insult by im- | mediately opening fire on their opponents.

Peace, however, was maintained. The armistice was based on the agreement of the removalists that they would desist from further work on the building until the Legislature should take action in the mat- ter. Although the removalists suspended labor only until the anti-removalists were out of hearing,1 they would not, had they preserved faith, been long de- layed, for, at the next session, March 18, 1786, the following curiously-entitled act became a law : " An act to repeal an act entitled an act to suspend an act of the General Assembly of this Commonwealth, eu- titled an act to enable Wm. Clingan, etc.," and under its provisions the buildings at the new county-seat were finished. On the 25th of September, 1786, Wil- liam Gibbon, the then sheriff of Chester County, by law was empowered to remove the "prisoners from the old jail in the town of Chester to the new jail in Goshen township, in the said county, and to indemnify him for the same."

"Through the chanell of the press I make free to address your honor body, not choosing to petition in the usual mode, as I am too well ac- quainted with the manner pursued by some parts of Chester county, mustering scribes and getting poor-rate duplicates, and inserting names without asking consent. You, gentlemen, will no doubt receive a num- ber of petitions from those who have already got every request they waoted from the Legislature, the removal of the seat of Justice or Court of Jurisprudence from the ancient borough of Chester to that elegant and notorione place called the Turk's Head (by some called West Ches- ter), a place as unfit for the general convenience, and much more so, that any one spot that might be pointed out within ten miles square of the above-described place, except towards New Castle lina.

" We have no doubt of patitions fabricated for this purpose, that Mr. T-8, the greatest advocate for this spot of any member of Chester county, might vociferate, as he often does, in the house, more for the dieplay of his Talents than any universal good. Let us, therefore, beg, if we have sent one noisey member, that he may be heard, and, altho"he does stammer sometimes, perhaps, with the assistance of a few pebble- stones, he may become a prodigae of the age, and (may he) exceed Da- mothenes to convince you of his superior abilities. I have a petition of hie fabricating for the purpose of the Township of Edgmont, which shall he handed to the publick for their perusal as a pattern that any body politic corporate, &c., may have a form to fabricata petitions for anch purposea, if ever any such may be neaded."

On the other side the removalists were not deficient in scribes who presented the ludicrous aspect of the contest in rude derisive jests wherein their adversa- ries were burlesqued in sarcastic jingling verses, many of which in lapse of years have been entirely forgot- ten. One, however, has been preserved by Dr. Wil- liam Darlington, in a sketch of West Chester prepared by him for the Directory of that borough, published in 1857. The author of the " Pasquinade" was Joseph Hickman, and, as we are told by Dr. Darlington, an old English wool-comber, Marmaduke Wyvil, about the beginning of this century " used to ramble about the country like an ancient Troubadour," and a glass of cider or whiskey "would at any time procure its recital with emphatic intonation and peculiar unc- tion."

The ditty was known as "Chester's Mother," and designed to give expression to the woe of the promi- nent anti-removalists, who were dependent on the public for a livelihood at the county-seat, and their

1 Dr. Smith's " History of Delaware County," p. 342, says, " It has come to the author traditionally that the attack of the Chester people was instigated by the removalists proceeding with the building after the passage of the Suspension Act. . . . The fact thet they were allowad to escape with impunity is rather corroborative of the idea that the attack was not altogether unprovoked, and rendered it probable thet the canee for it assigned by tradition is the true one."

% In the receipt-book of David Bevan, In the Delaware County Inati- Inte of Science at Media, will be found the draft of the above address. If it ever, as a whole, was published before ite insertion in this work, I fail to find it in the files of the newspapers of that period.

HISTORY OF DELAWARE COUNTY, PENNSYLVANIA.

lamentation consequent on the prospective loss of " a : nursing mother."

"LAMENT OVER CHESTER'S MOTHER.

"Poor Chester's Mother's very sick ; Her breath is almost gone; Her children throng around her thick, And bitterly de moan.

" Cries little 'Lishal the first bern- ' What will become ef 1, A little orphan, held in score, If Mamma she should die ?

" Not only I will be epprest ;- I yeunger brothers have Who cannot do without the breast When Mama's in her grave.'

" And then peer helpless Billy2 cries- 'Oh ! how shall I be fed ? What shall I do, if Mama dies? I cannot werk fer bread.

"' These little hands have never wrought Oh ! how I am opprest ! For 1 have never yet done aught But hang on Mama's hresst.'

" Little Davis 3 he comes next A poling, silly boy; Hie countenance appeared perplex'd And destitute of joy.

"* How is our dear Mama ?' he cried : 'Think you we can her save ? How is the wound that's in her side Which cursed Hantum+ gave ?'

1 Elisha Price, a nephew of Elisha Gatchell, whe becanie so noted in the controversy between Pean and Lord Baltimere, was a lawyer of prominence in the last ceutnry, having been a student in the office of Joseph Parker. He frequently represented Chester County in the Colo- nial Legislature, and in the troublous times preceding the active ont- break ef hostilities in the war of Independence, he was an unflinching Whig. When the merchants of Philadelphia and New York adopted their noted non-importation agreement and asked the support thereis of the people in the outlying districts, he wus one of three to whom was addressed the circular sent to Chester County, und was one of the com- mittee selected by the Convention, July 15, 1774, held in this borough to consider the matter. The following day he, with his associates, met similar committees from the other conpties in Philadelphia. In 1775 he was appointed ene of the committeemen of correspondence from Chester County. After the erection ef Delaware County be was ap- peinted an associate judge. He was an earnest Episcopalian, and from 1767 te 1798 his name appenre among the vestrymen and wardens of St. Paul's Church. His wife was descended from James Barten, a minister of Friende, and " an early settler," says Deborah Legan, "a gentleman and a person of excellent character." Elisha Price died in 1798, a victim of the yellow fever. His two sons who enrvived him both lost their lives in the service of the government, Maj. Price being one of the American invaders of Canada, during the war ef 1812, and died there.

2 William Kerlin, then owner and landlord of the Washington House, Chester, a strong anti-removalist.

8 Davis Bevan, captain of the schoener " Polly," captured by the " Roe- buck" man-of-war ; appointed mustering-master of Chester Connty, was captain of marines on privateer "Holker," and afterwards a retail mer- chant in Chester. He, of course, was a strong anti-removalist.

4 Col. John Hannnm, a militia officer of the Revolution. He was a native of Concord township, but purchasing a large farm in Enst Brad- ford, he became an earnest removalist. During the Revolutionary war he was one of the Committee of Seventy, appointed at the county meet- ing held at Cheeter Dec. 20, 1774. Col. Hannum wae present with Wayne during the latter part of the day of Brandywine battle, And during the winter of 1777 was captured one night asleep in his bed by some British light-boree, who were conducted to his house by a loyal- ist neighbor. He was taken to Philadelphia, where he was retained as a prisoner of war until the following spring, when he made hin escape. In 1778 he was appointed one of the five commissioners of Chester

" Says little Ned,5-' Upon my word, Poor Mama will be slain ;- Thengh cursed Hannnm lost bis sword G He's got it back again.

"' What shall I de, if Mama dies? What will become of Ned?'

The tears came trickling from his eyes And straight he took his bed.

" Then Caley," he came next in view,- His mouth was all awry ; Says he-' Oh ! what will Caley do, If dear Mama should die?

"" She might have liv'd for many a year, And all her children fed,

If Hannum hadn't poisoned her- Curse on his frizzled head !'

"Cries little Jehn,8 the youngest son, Who just began to crawl-

' If Mama lives, 1 soon shall run ; If not, I soon shall fall.

"' Oh ! may Jack Haennm quickly die- And die in grievous pain ;- Be sent into eternity That Mama may remain.

"' May all his projects fail, likewise- That we may live again !' Then, every one roll'd up his eyes And cried alond, 'Amen !'"

The ancient borough of Chester had been shorn of its chief glory ; the little hamlet of sixty houses9 was

County under the act of attainder. He was one of the justices of the peace, but resigned that office as well as commissioner of forfeited es- tates when, in 1781, he was elected to the General Assembly. He was a member of that bedy notil and including 1785, during which time he steadily fenght the battle ef removal to a successful conclusion. He was very active in bringing about the repeal of the test law, and after the erection of the connty of Delaware he filled many important offices in the county of Chester. Cel. Hannum died Feb. 7, 1799.

5 This reference, the late Dr. Darlington, of West Chester, stated, is either to Edward Vernon or to Edward Richards, but which is now un- certain.

6 This allusion is te the capture of Col. Hannum, as beretofere men- tioned.

7 Caleb Davis, wbe was prethonotary frem 1777 to 1789, when Dela- ware County was erected, and was & streng oppenent ef remeval.

8 Mayer John Harper was a stanch Whig and a brave soldier. On Feb. 9, 1776, he was appointed quartermaster of the Fourth Pennsylva- nia Battalien, commanded by Col. Aotheny Wayne; on Oct. 12, 1776, he was commissioned ensign in Capt. Taylor's company of the same battalion; Jan. 1, 1777, he was appointed first lieutenant of the Fifth Pennsylvania Line, and was brigade majer of Second Brigade at battle of Brandywine. A few days subsequent to that engagement Maj. Har- per, in company with Lieut .- Col. Persifor Frazer, was en a reconneis- sance, when the whole party was captured by some ef Gen. Grant's com- mand, and taken te Philadelphia. Cel. Frazer succeeded in making bis escape, but Harper, after the evacnation of the fermer city, was sent to the prison bulk at New York, where he was detained as a prisener fer over three years. He was exchanged Nev. 4, 1780. Towards the end er after the Revolution Maj. Harper took the tavern now known as the City Hotel, and became mine bost of the inn. Of course he was opposed to removal. On March 5, 1785, Harper, who was then coroner of the county, purchased the tavern property, doubtless well knowing that the Snepension Act of March 30, 1785, would be passed. His action when the forces of old Chester moved against those at West Chester has been narrated in the text. After the county-seat was removed to the latter place, Maj. Harper, believing that the sun of Chester's prosperity had Bet never to rise again, emigrated to the new local capital, and became the landlord of the Turk's Head Inn there. He died at Dilworthtown shortly after the beginning of this century, and was buried at the grave- yard at Cheyney Shops, Thornbury.

9 Article "Chester, borough of," in Joseph Scott's " United States Gaz- etteer," first gazetteer published in the United States (Philadelphia) 1795.

THE ERECTION OF DELAWARE COUNTY.

no longer the place where the weary suitor waited on the law's delays, or the culprit cringed in the dock ; no longer did the court-house ring to the eloquent sentences of Wilson, Bradford, Chew, Levy, Sergeant, Reed, Rush, Laurence, and a score or more of noted lawyers, who, in that early day, rode circuit with the Supreme Justices, nor yet of Elisha Price and Henry Hale Graham, who made the old town their place of residence. The staff's of office had fallen from the tip- staves' clutch, the crier's often repeated admonition of " Silence in the court-room !" had become a verity ; the jangling bell ceased to announce that the justices had taken their places on the bench, and theinnkeepers would no longer mark with anxious longings the time for holding the quarterly courts, when their hos- pitalities should be taxed to the utmost, and money flow to their coffers. Now the vacant jail stared at the occasional passer-by with its barred windows, and the empty building returned a hollow echo to the blow of the reckless urchin who could summon courage to rap on its iron-bossed door. The very town seemed to stagnate, and the twinkle of triumph in the eyes of the Goshen and Western township peo- ple when in the spring of the year they journeyed hither to buy fish, was aggravating to the people of Chester beyond endurance. It was too much for the residents of the eclipsed county-seat to bear, hence they earnestly hestirred themselves in manufacturing public opinion looking to the erection of a new county, and so earnestly did they labor to that end that on Sept. 26, 1789, the following act was approved, au- thorizing a division of the county of Chester and the erection of a part thereof into a new county :

" WHEREAS, The inhabitants of the borough of Chester, and the sontli- eastern part of the county of Chester, having by their petitions set forth to the General Assembly of the State, that they labor under many and grent inconveniences from the seat of justice being removed to a great distance from them, and have prayed that they may be relieved from the said inconveniences by erecting the said borengh and sontheastern parts of the esid county into a separate conoty ; and as it appears but jnat and reasonable that they should be relieved in the premises,

"2. Be it enacted, etc., That all that part of Chester County lying withio tbe bonnds and limits hereinafter described shall be, and the asme is hereby erected into a separate county, that is to say, Beginning in the middle of Brandywine River, where the same crosses the circular line of New Castle Connty ; thence np the middle of the said river to the line dividing the lands of Elizabeth Chads and Caleb Brinton, at or near the ford commonly known or called by the name of Chads' Ford; and from theace on a line, na nearly straight as may be, so 86 not to split or divida plantationa, to the great road leading from Goshen to Chester, where the Westown line intersects or crosses the said road; and from thenca along the line of Edgmout, Newtown, and Radoor, so as to in- cinde these townships, to the line of Montgomery County, and along the same to Philadelphia County line, and along the same to the river Dela- ware, and down the same to the circular line aforessid, and along the same to the place of beginning, to be henceforth known and called by the name of ' Delaware Connty.'

"3. All that part of the township of Birminghamn, which, by the line of division aforesaid, shall fall within the county of Chester, shell be ona township, and retain the name of Birmingham ; and all that part of the said township, which, by the division-line aforesaid, shall fall

Israel Acrelins, however, in his "History of New Sweden," published in 1758, telle us that " Chester, the County-town on the Delaware, is sixteen miles below Philadelphia and has one hundred and twenty honeea." Reynolds' Translation, p. 143.

within the county of Delaware, shall be one township, and shall retain the name of Birmingham; and all ench part of the township of Thorn- bnry, which, by the division-line aforesaid, shall fall within the county of Chester, shall be one township, and shall retain the name of Thorn- bury, until the same shall be altered by the Courts of General Querter Sessions of the aaid counties respectively.

"4. The inhabitants of the said county of Delaware shell, at all times hereafter, enjoy all and singular the jurisdictions, powers, rights, liber- ties, and privileges, whatsoever, which the inhabitants of any other county of this State do, may, or onght to enjoy by the constitution and Jawa of this State.

"5. The elections for the said connty of Delaware shall be held at the old court-house, in the borongh of Chester, where the Freemen of the said county shall elect, at the timea and under the regulations directed by the constitution and laws of this State, a councillor, representativea to serve them in General Assembly, ceasora, sheriffa, coroners, and com- missioners, which said officers, when dnly elected and qualified, shall have and enjoy, all and singular, such powera, anthorities, and privileges, with respect to their county, As Buch officers elected in and for any other county may, can, or ought to have, and the said elections shall be con- dncted in the same manner and form, and agreeably to the same rules and regulations as now are or hereafter may be in forco in the other counties of this State.

" The jnetices of the Courts of Quarter Sessions and Common Pleas, Dow commissioned within the limita of the county of Delaware, and those that may hereafter be commissioned, or any three of them, shall and may hold Courts of General Quarter Sessions of the Peace and Gael Delivory, and County Courts of Common Pleas, for the said county of Delaware, and aball have all and aingnlar such powers, rights, jurisdic- tiona, and anthorities, to all intents and purposes, as other justices of the Courts of General Quarter Sessions and justices of the County Court of Common Pleas, in the other counties of this State, may, can, or onght to have in their respective connties.

"The sheriffs, coroners, treasurers, sud collectors of excise hereafter to be appointed or elected in the said county of Delaware, before they, or any of them, shall euter upon the execution of their respective offices, shall give security for the faithful execution of their respective offices.'"

By the provisions of the act, John Sellers, Thomas Tucker, and Charles Dilworth were appointed com- missioners "to run and mark the line dividing the counties of Chester and Delaware," and they scrupu- lously performed their duty. The act, probably hastily drawn, provided that the western boundary of Delaware County should begin in the middle of Brandywine River, where it crosses the circular line of New Castle County. Strictly following this direc- tion, the result was a severing of a fraction of territory from the rest of the county of Chester. An exami- nation of the map1 shows that a short distance above Smith's bridge the circular line separating Pennsyl- vania from Delaware is crossed by the Brandywine, and that stream then makes a bend northward, and returning touches the circular line about half a mile northwest of the point where the river first enters the State. Delaware being erected out of Chester County, only that territory expressly coming within the designated lines of the new county could be in- cluded within it, hence this small tract of land lying between the circular line and the bend of the river remained a part of Chester County. The commis- sioners were directed to run the "line as nearly straight as may be, so as not to split or divide planta- tions," and while they fully carried out the latter

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History of Delaware County, Pennsylvania, Part 21

Author: Ashmead, Henry Graham, 1838-1920 Publication date: 1884 Publisher: Philadelphia, Pa. : L.H. Everts Number of Pages: 1150

Author: Ashmead, Henry Graham, 1838-1920
Publication date: 1884
Publisher: Philadelphia, Pa. : L.H. Everts
Number of Pages: 1150