History of Delaware County, Pennsylvania, Part 4

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

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The authority of the city of Amsterdam over the entire Delaware River settlements was only of brief duration, and destined in a few months to be wholly overthrown. The crown of Great Britain had never acknowledged the right which the Dutch and Swedes maintained they had acquired by occupancy to the territory, and it was merely due to the intestine dis- cord at home that the former nation had not earlier brought the mooted subject to the arbitrament of arms. Charles II., then firmly seated on the throne of England, on March 12, 1664, granted to his brother James, Duke of York and Albany, the territory now comprising the State of New York and New Jersey, and, by a subsequent grant, that of Delaware. With

unusual promptness the duke fitted out an expedition, consisting of four vessels of war and four hundred and fifty men, including sailors and soldiers, which, under the command of Col. Richard Nicolls, sailed from Portsmouth, England, on May 25, 1664, 5 to reduce and occupy the Dutch possessions in North America. Sir Robert Carr, George Cartwright, and Samuel Maverick, Esquires, accompanied the expedition as commissioners appointed by the king, with power to hear and determine all military, civil, and criminal matters, and to proceed in all things for "settling the peace and security of the country," as also to adjust " boundaries between neighboring colonies and dis- putes between the Indians and the English."" The Governors of New England were instructed by the king " to join and assist them vigorously in recovering our right to those places now possessed by the Dutch, and reducing them to an entire obedience and submis- sion to our government."7 On the 25th of August the frigate "Guinea," the first vessel of the expedition to reach the point of destination, entered the lower bay of New Amsterdam, and a proclamation was issued guaranteeing protection to those persons who should submit to the English authority. The other vessel having arrived, after considerable negotiation, on the 9th of September, the Dutch authorities sur- rendered New Amsterdam to the English, the latter permitting the garrison to march out of the fort with all their arms, drums beating and colors flying. The English commissioners, when they had acquired pos- session of the settlement, changed the name of the place to New York, in honor of the duke. To secure control of the Delaware River territory, on the 3d (13th) of September, 1664, Sir Robert Carr was or- dered to proceed thither with the frigates "Guinea" and " William" and " Nicholas" and " to reduce the same" 8 to an English province. The instructions given him, among other things, required that all planters were to retain their real and personal property un- molested by the conquerors, and Carr was particularly directed to conciliate the Swedes; that all persons were to be permitted liberty of conscience ; the magis- trates were to be continued in office for six months on subscribing to the oath of allegiance ; the settlers were to be protected from violence in persons or estates ; and the system of jurisprudence there is urged not to be disturbed for the present.9 After a long and troublesome passage, the expedition arrived in the Delaware on the last day of September, and passed the fort at New Amstel without an exchange of shot, which was done, as Carr states, " the better to sattisfie the Sweede, who, notwithstanding the Dutches p3-

1 Penna. Archives, 2d series, vol. vii. p. 680.

2 Hazard's Annals, p. 332.

8 Penna. Archives, 2d series, vol. v. p. 470.

+ Ib., vol. vii. p. 716.

& Old style ; England at that time had not accepted the modern com- putation of time.

6 Penna. Archives, 2d series, val. v. pp. 507-512.

7 Ib., 513.

8 Hazard's Register, vol. i. p. 36 ; Penna. Archives, 2d series, vol. v. p. 536.

" Penna. Archives, 2d series, vol. v. pp. 536, 537.

HISTORY OF DELAWARE COUNTY, PENNSYLVANIA.

wasions to ye contrary, were soon our frinds." Carr then summoned the fort to surrender, and for three days negotiations were had between the opposing forces, which resulted in the magistracy of the place agreeing to surrender the town, a conclusion in which D'Hinoyossa and his soldiers declined to concur. " Whereupon," states Carr, in his official report,1 " I landed my soldiers on Sunday morning following, & comanded ye shipps to fall downe before ye Fort withn muskett shott, wth directions to fire two broadesides apeace upon yt Fort, then my soldiers to fall on. Which done, the soldiers neaver stoping untill they stormed ye fort, and soe consequently to plundering ; the seamen, noe less given to that sporte, were quickly wthin, & have gotten good store of booty; so that in such a noise and confusion noe worde of comand could be heard for sometyme; but for as many goods as I could preserve, I still Keepe intire. The loss on our part was none; the Dutch had tenn wounded and 3 killed. The fort is not tenable, although 14 gunns, and without a greate charge weh unevitably must be expended, here wilbee noe staying, we not being able to keepe itt." We learn from Col. Nicolls' report to the Secretary of State2 that the storming-party was commanded by Lieut. Carr and Ensign Hooke; and, notwithstanding the Dutch fired three volleys at them, not a man in their ranks was wounded in the assault. Sir Robert Carr, it seems, stayed aboard the "Guinea" until the fort was captured, when he landed and claimed that the property in the fort, having been won by the sword, was his and his troops. All the soldiers and many of the citizens of New Amstel were sold as slaves to Virginia by the English con- querors, and most of the negroes belonging to the Dutch settlers were distributed among the captors, as were also one hundred sheep, forty horses, sixty cows and oxen.8 Lands and estates were confiscated, and granted by Sir Robert Carr to his officers, as well as the commanders of the vessels which took part in the expedition to the Delaware.

When the standard of Great Britain floated from the flag-staffs over the captured Dutch forts on the Hudson and the Delaware it marked the supremacy of the Anglo-Saxon race on the North American continent, and as authority was then exercised from Maine to Florida, on the Atlantic coast, by a homo- geneous people, it made possible the great nation that was born to the world a century later. It was singu- larly fortunate, at this juncture, that the unbridled executive power in the new province was confided to so prudent and able a man as Col. Richard Nicolls proved to be, whose "administration was so wise and impartial that it enforced universal peace." On the Delaware the Swedes, who had heretofore been held as a subjugated people, were in every respect benefited by the change, and even the Dutch settlers had reason

to be glad that the tyrannical sway of Stuyvesant had ended. In May, 1667, Col. Francis Lovelace suc- ceeded Col. Nicolls, and, as has been said by an able writer, "under Governor Lovelace the work of ad- justing the government of the Delaware, so as to bring it slowly but steadily into conformity with English law, progressed systematically year by year, until it received an unexpected check in 1673 by the total, but temporary, suspension of English authority inci- dent to the second conquest of the country by the Dutch."? 5

Late in the summer of 1671 the Indians had com- mitted several atrocious murders, and it became neces- sary for Governor Lovelace to act cautiously but firmly to check further outrages, and to punish the culprits for the crimes already perpetrated. As pre- liminary to an Indian war he ordered that persons living in the outer settlements should thrash their grain and remove it and the cattle to a place of com- parative safety ; that no person, on pain of death, should sell powder, shot, or liquor to the savages, as also recommending the strengthening of garrisons and fortifications. Lovelace prudently had a confer- ence with the Governor of New Jersey, to secure, if war should result, the co-operation of that province, since the murderers were said to be under that juris- diction, and a meeting was held at New York, Sep- tember 25th, and another at Elizabethtown, N. J., Nov. 7, 1671, when it was determined that it was in- judicious at the then late season to begin an offensive movement against the savages, but that several com- panies of soldiers should be organized on the Dela- ware; that every man capable of bearing arms (be- tween the ages of sixteen and sixty) should always be provided with powder and bullets fit for service, under a penalty ; that block-houses should be erected at sev- eral places on the river ; and also forbidding the ship- ment of grain unless a special license should be granted therefor. In the latter part of November the Indian sachems and William Tom, clerk of the court on the Delaware, held a council at Upland, at the house of Peter Rambo, at which the savages promised to bring the murderers to the whites within six days thereafter that they might be punished for their crimes, and if they could not bring them alive they agreed to deliver their dead bodies, as an earnest of their purpose to prevent a war between the races. It afterwards appeared that one of the guilty men escaped from his people, and could not be delivered as promised, but the other was captured. It is stated by Tom6 that the smaller Indian, learning of the purpose of the sachems, went to the other and advised him to flee. The latter said he would go the next morning. Of the two Indians who had been dis- patched to take the culprits one was a personal friend, and was loath to kill his captive, but when the latter learned that the sachems had determined he must

1 Penna. Archives, 2d series, vol. v. p. 550. 2 Ib., 541.

3 N. Y. Colonial Doc., vol. fii. p. 345; Vincent's Hist. of Del., p. 432.

+ Gordon'a " History of Pennsylvania," p. 30.

6 Appendix B, Duke's Book of Laws, p. 447.

6 Penna. Archives, 2d series, vol. v. p. 610.

EARLY SETTLEMENT.

die he placed his hands on his eyes and said, " Kill me." The other savage, not his friend, thereupon shot two bullets into his breast. The body was taken to Wiccaco and delivered to the whites, who trans- ported it to New Castle, where it was hung in chains. The other murderer escaped by flight. The sachems faithfully notified the tribes that any of their people who should murder a white person would be similarly dealt with, and with this annunciation the cloud drifted by, greatly to the satisfaction of the magis- trates on the Delaware, who were opposed to the war, · because among other things they proposed to "make towns at Passayvncke, Tinnaconck, Upland, Verdrie- ties Hoocks, whereto the out plantacions" must retire in the event of a struggle.1

The proscription on trade, which prevented vessels from ascending the Delaware River beyond the fort at New Castle, remained in force until the latter part of the year 1672, after which date no record re- mains, so far as known, of special licenses being given to trade above that point. On Sept. 29, 1671, Gov- ernor Lovelace authorized Capt. Thomas Lewis, of the sloop " Royal Oak," "to trade and Trafic, as the said masters occasion shall require," on the Delaware above Newcastle, and no other vessel was permitted there to ship corn or provisions for exportation.2 But pre- vious to this Capt. Martin Crieger, who seems to have run a packet-sloop regularly from New York to New Castle, had license to go to the latter point, and Mrs. Susanna Garland was authorized to trade between those places.3 In about three weeks subsequent to the issuing of this license, permission was given the wife of Lawrence Holst to go in Capt. Martiu Crieger's sloop to New Castle, and " from thence to go up the River in some boat or Canoe to the Sweeds Plantations with shoes & such other of her Husband's Trade, & to return again without any maner of Lett, hinderence or molestation whatever."+ March 20, 1672, John Schouten, in the sloop "Hope," was authorized to trade at New Castle and parts adjacent, while the same day John Garland, of New York, and Susanna, his wife, were licensed to "Traffick with the Indyans" on the river above New Castle.3 Mr. Christoph Hoog- land, Sept. 28, 1672, was licensed to go on Criegers' sloop to New Castle, with the privilege to trade on the river. Capt. Crieger, who was a "Dutchman," seems to have run the packet between the places named for more than ten years, for in July, 1682, Deputy Gov- ernor Markham complained that Capt. Crieger at New Castle had permitted Lord Baltimore the use of astronomical instruments, which were shipped by Markham at New York and intended only for him.6

War having been declared in 1672 by England and France against the United Belgic Provinces, on the 30th of July, 1673, the colony of New York, with its

dependencies on the Delaware River settlements, was recaptured by the Dutch fleet under Admiral Evert- sen, and Capt. Anthony Colve was commissioned Governor-General of "New Netherlands with all its Appendencies." Peter Alricks was appointed com- mander on the Delaware, with instructions that the right of private property should not be disturbed, nor should that belonging to persons holding office under the Duke of York be confiscated where the party took the oath of allegiance to the Dutch government. Freedom of conscience was assured to those who were followers of the true Christian religion according to the Synod of Dordrecht, but the new commander was instructed not to permit "any other sects attempting anything contrary thereto."7 By the terms of the treaty of peace, Feb. 9, 1674, the province reverted to the Duke of York, and English authority was re- established on Oct. 1, 1674, when Maj. Edmund An- drosse, as governor, received possession of Fort James at New York, and appointed Capt. Edmund Carr commander on the Delaware. On Sept. 25, 1676, the Duke of York's laws were promulgated as the rule of conduct on the Delaware River, and courts in con- formity therewith were established; one of which was "above att Uplands," where quarterly sessions were directed to be held on the second Tuesday of the month.

Early in the year 1675 the first member of the So- ciety of Friends known to have resided within the boundaries of Delaware County purchased an estate at Upland. Robert Wade, on March 21, 1675, bought the tract of ground known as Printzdorp from "Jus- tina Armguard, alias vpo Papegay," for eighty pounds sterling,8 whereon he subsequently erected the famous " Essex House."

; Penna. Archives, 2d series, vol. v. p. 636.

8 Recital in Deed from Jonathen Dickinson Sargeant and William Rotch Wister, trustees under the will of Albanus C. Logeu, deceased, to John M. Broomall, Deed Book E, No. 2, page 673, etc., Recorder's office, Media, Pa. The date of the conveyance to Wade ie of record, 1673, but that there is a clerical error is evident from the following let- ter, which is published in " A Further Account of New Jersey, in an Abstract of Letters written from thence hy Several Inhabitaute there Resident. London, Printed in the year 1676," pagee 6 and 7 : " DEAR AND LOVING WIFE

"Having now an opportunty to let thee understand of my welfare, through the great mercy of God &c, and as to the other place it ie 88 good or healthful place as man can desire to live in, and here is plenty enough of all provisions, and good English Wheat and Mault, plenty of Fish and Fowl; Indeed here is no want of anything, but honest people to Inhabit it; there is Land enough purchased of the Indians for ten times so many as we were and these Indians here are very quiet and Peacable Indians ; In New Englund they are at Wars with the Indians, and the news is, they have cut off a greut many of them ; but in this place, the Lord is making way to exalt his name and truth; for it is said by those that live here abouts, that within these few years, here were five Indians for one now, and these that be are very willing to sell their land to the English ; and had John Fenwick done wisely, we had not been disperst, but I hope it may all work for the best; And dear Wife, I hope thou will he well satisfied to come and live here, where we may live very quietly and Peacably, where we shall have no vexation, nor tearing nor rending what we have from us ; I have bought a plan- tation by the advice and consent of some Friende, upon which there is a very good house, a great deal of Out-housing, Orcharde, and Gardens rendy planted, and well-fenced; I do inteud (if God permit) after the

1 Penne. Archives, 2d series, vol. vii. p. 756.

2 Ib., vol. v. pp. 605-607.

₴ Ib., pp. 611, 612. 4 Tb., p. 613. 5 Ib., 628.

6 Penna. Mug. of Hist., vol. vi. p. 429.

HISTORY OF DELAWARE COUNTY, PENNSYLVANIA.

The Essex House1 stood on the site of the present brick dwelling at the northwest corner of Second and Penn Streets, Chester. It was a story and a half in height, its southeast gable fronting the river, the rear or southwest side facing Concord Avenue, and its front, with a commodious porch, extended the entire length of the building to Chester Creek. Almost one hundred and ten feet southeastwardly from it stood the noted trees under which Penn landed, seven years after Wade became the owner of the estate. In the journal of the Labadists, Dankers and Sluyter, in 1679, particular mention is made of these trees. "We have nowhere seen," they record, "so many vines together as we saw here, which had been planted for the purpose of shading the walks on the river side in between the trees."" It seems that Wade, after the purchase of the estate from Mrs. Pappegoya, re- turned to Great Britain, whence, accompanied by his wife, Lydia, he sailed in the ship "Griffin," which arrived in the Delaware on the 23d of Ninth month (November), 1675. It was in that year, we are told, that William Edmundson, a public Friend from Ire- land, made a second- visit to America, and while he and his party journeyed, swimming their horses across the river at Trenton and the intermediate creeks, and camping out in the woods at night, when on the way to "Delaware Town, on the west side of the river Delaware," ... "there came up a Finland man, well-horsed, who spoke English. He soon perceived what they were, and gave them an account of several of their friends. His house was as far as they could

Harvest is gotten in, to come to England for thee, and I hope thou wilt be willing to come, seeing here are several of thy Neighbours whom thou knowest well, as Richard Guy and his Wife and William Hancock and his Wife, and many others; and here is an honest Friend with me, that would have a fourth part of the Land &c., And so hoping these lines may find thee in good health, as through the great mercy aud goodness of God I have never been better in health.

" My love to Richard Green, he desired me to send him some account of the Country, which to the best of my knowledge I will do; as to Buildings here is little until more People come over, for the Inhabitants that were here did generally Build their own houses, though after & mean manner, for they fell down Trees, and split them in Parts, and 60 make up a sorry House, &c. But here is Earth enough that will make very good Bricks, and Stone enough of severall sorts, as four that will stroke fire, which may make millstoues, or what a man will put them to; they make their Lime of oyster shells; here is a good Land and & Healthful and Plentiful Country, here is no Tanner in all the River, but some Tann their Hides themselves, after their own manner. Here is good Oak enough, here is Hemp aud Flax, good Water, and the Ground will bear anything that Groweth in England, and with less Pains and trouble ; with my dear Love to thee I rest thy loving Husband.

" ROBERT WADE.

" Delaware River, the place called

Upland, the 2d of the 2d month, 1675."

1 In " A Journal of a Voyage to New York in 1679-80," Memoirs of Long Island Historical Society, vol. i. p. 183, it is recorded : " It was late before we left here and we therefore had time to look around a little and see the remains of the residence of Madame Popegay, who had her dwell- ing here when she left Tinekonk." The diary the preceding day mentions that Robert Wade had bronght the travelers to Upland after dark, and "we went to the house of the Quaker who had brought us down." So that there can be no doubt that the Essex House was never owned by Mrs. Psppegoys.

2 " Journal of a Voyage to New York in 1679-80." Memoirs of Long Ieland Historical Society, vol. i. p. 183.

ride that day; there he conducted them and lodged them kindly. The next morning being the first day of the week, they went to Upland (since named Chester), where a few Friends were met at Robert Wade's house. After meeting was over they took boat and went to Salem, where they met with John Fenwick and several families of Friends, who, with those at Chester, had come from England in that year with John Fenwick."3 It is, however, nowise certain that the Essex House had been built when the first recorded meeting of Friends in Pennsylvania was held at Wade's dwelling at Upland, but that it had been erected before 1679, the statement of the Labadist ministers, already quoted as a note, conclusively estab- lishes.

Governor Andross, on Sept. 25, 1676, promulgated the Duke of York's laws by proclamation, declaring that they "Bee likewise in force and practiced in this River and Precincts," excepting such ordinances as were peculiarly applicable to Long Island. At the same time he ordered courts to be held at three places on the river. That at Upland to be a Court of Quar- ter Sessions, and to begin on the second Tuesday of the month.4

The records of these early courts are historically interesting, for in them is found the story of the gradual growth of the English system of jurispru- dence in the State, which will be related elsewhere in this work.

On March 4, 1681, Charles II. of England signed the great charter which conveyed to William Penn, in lieu of the sum of sixteen thousand pounds, which the king owed to Admiral William Penn, the enor- mous tract of land now known as Pennsylvania, and from that period our early annals become more inter- esting, for from that time we may date the actual founding of this great commonwealth. Almost im- mediately thereafter Penn sent his first cousin, Wil- liam Markham, to the colony as his Deputy Governor. It is presumed that he came over in the ship "John and Sarah," from London, commanded by Henry Smith, which was the first to arrive here after the grant was made to Penn. Certain it is that Markham was in New York about June 15, 1681,5 and previous to the 21st of that month he had presented his com- mission to the authorities at New York, for on that date the Governor and Council issued a proclamation announcing the royal grant and commanding all per- sons to recognize Markham as Governor of Pennsyl- vania. On August 3d following he was at Upland and had assumed the reins of power on the Delaware, for on the date last mentioned his Council took and subscribed to the oath of office. The members of the

3 Smith's " History of the Province of Pennsylvania." Hazard'e Regis- tsr, vol. vi. p. 182.

+ Pennna. Archives, 2d seriee, vol. iii. p. 783.

5 A letter to William Penn from New York, dated June 25, 1681, saye, "This is to acquaint thee thnt about ten daies since here arrived Francis Richardson with thy Deputy."-Penn. Mag. of Hist., vol. vi. p. 175.

THE CIRCULAR BOUNDARY LINE.

Governor's Council were Robert Wade, Morgan Drewt, William Woodmanse, William Warner, Thomas Fairman, James Sandilands, William Clayton, Otto Ernst Cock, and Lasse Cock, almost every one resi- dents of the territory now Delaware County. "The proceedings of their first session were kept secret and little is known, except that the government of the new province was established with the capital at Up- land, where we find Markham holding court on the 30th of November, 1681."1 Markham made his resi- dence at the Essex House,2 and there the first sum- mons from Penn, calling a General Assembly, were written and proclaimed, for, as is well known, the proprietary was Wade's guest on his first coming to the province in 1682.

CHAPTER III.

THE CIRCULAR BOUNDARY LINE BETWEEN DELA- WARE COUNTY AND THE STATE OF DELAWARE.

THAT Lord Baltimore, long before the royal graut to Penn, during the Dutch ascendency on the Dela- ware, had made demand upon the Hollanders for all the land lying to the south of the fortieth degree north latitude is fully attested by the published records, but inasmuch as his representatives never, so far as we have knowledge, personally came to any locality in Pennsylvania, the story of that disputed territorial authority at that time is properly the subject-matter of the history of the State of Delaware, and does not come within the scope of this work.

The controversy respecting the proper adjustment of the boundary line between the territories of Lord Baltimore and William Penn was a long and bitter struggle, which, descending from father to son, cov- ered nearly a century in tedious and expensive litiga- tion before it was finally set at rest by the decree of Lord Chancellor Hardwick and the establishment of the noted Mason and Dixon line in conformity there- with. While the southern boundary of Delaware County presents a circular course extending the State of Delaware several miles at its northern limit beyond the straight line which elsewhere forms the southern boundary of Pennsylvania, that circle constitutes historically no part of the Mason and Dixon survey, which, during the Missouri Compromise debates in 1820, was made so familiar to the nation by John Randolph, who, in his remarks, constantly referred to it as the imaginary geographical line which marked the division between the free and slave States. Nearly four years previous to the grant of the territory to Penn, for the convenience of the then settlers on the

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History of Delaware County, Pennsylvania, Part 4

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