History of Delaware County, Pennsylvania, Part 54

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

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1 " Germantown Road and its Associations," Penna. Mag. of Hist., vol. vi. p. 139; Watson'a Annala of Philadelphia, vol. ii. p. 66.

2 Bishop's " History of American Manufacturas."

8 Colonial Records, vol. ix. p. 698,

AGRICULTURE, WITH A BRIEF MENTION OF OUR DOMESTIC ANIMALS.

209

" may go through the middle of the woods between the trees without getting any damage." The rich soil, exposed to the sun through the leafless branches of the dead trees, was prolific, and, as we learn from a writer in 1684, if an emigrant arrived in Pennsyl- vania in September, two men could easily prepare that fall land for corn sufficient to return " in the fol- lowing harvest twenty quarters, which are a hundred and sixty bushels English measure, and this should not cause astonishment when it is considered that a bushel of wheat sown produces forty bushels at har- vest." Wheat, until after the Revolution, was seeded between the rows of corn at its last plowing in August, and the seed was chopped in around the hills with a hoe. During the war of independence the Hessian fly, which is said to have been brought to this country in the provender transported hither for the use of the mercenary soldiers, multiplied so rapidly that they destroyed the early sown wheat, and this circumstance changed the season of planting. Rye was grown largely, for it not only made a favorite whiskey and sold readily, but it supplied almost all the coffee used in the rural districts, and until manufactured goods did away with home spinning every farmer had a patch of flax sown on his place. Many old persons can remember how pretty the sight was when the blue blossom was on the flax and "the bloom was on the rye." The apple- and peach-orchards in early days were always planted near the house, from the fruit of which the family distilled cider, apple-jack, and peach brandy, as well as kept barrels of the former fruit, while large quantities of apples and peaches were always dried for winter use.

When Governor Printz first came to this country, it is reported that the grass even in the woods grew to the height of two feet, but as that statement was made by an aged Swede, whose father came over with the Swedish Governor, to Professor Kalm, in 1748, it may be accepted with some grains of allowance. It has also been claimed that Col. Thomas Leiper, one of the most public-spirited men the State has ever had, introduced clover to the colony, a statement that will not bear investigation, for in 1709, Jonathan Dick- inson, in a letter, speaks of buying red clover-seed, re- marking that "the white clover already tinges the woods as a natural production."1 The old system of husbanding, in vogue until threatened starvation com- pelled the farmers to change the ruinous plan, is set forth in a letter from Squire Thomas Cheyney, of Thornbury, written in 1796 to relatives in England.2 He says,-

"Our land is mostly good, but we have dropt our old method of farming. We used to break up our fields in May, cross or stir them in August, and sow them with wheat and rye in September. This was done once in three or four years in rotation : in the

intermediate spaces between them were pastured. The land would produce from twelve to twenty bushels per acre. This way was followed until the land run out, as we call it. We planted corn, sowed barley, oats, and flax, likewise buckwheat, in small portions of land allotted for that purpose, which took the greatest part of our dung to manure it; our meadows got some, and we had very little left for our Winter grain. We followed this old way until we could scarcely raise our bread and seed."

Dr. Smith records that as early as 1734 silk was made in the colony, the insects being fed on the na- tive mulberry leaves. In 1770 an effort was made to arouse general interest in the culture, and to that end premiums were given to the person sending the greatest weight of cocoons to "a public filature es- tablished in Philadelphia." In 1771 Chester County sent three hundred and thirty-five pounds, the fol- lowing being the names of the contributors :

Pounds. Ounces.

Grace Beale ..

Mary Parker (Chester).

Mary Pearson (Darby).

Abigail Davis (Chester)

Sarah Fordbam (Darby)

Ann Cochran (Darby).

Rachel Hayes (Darby)

James Millhouse.

Ann Davis ..

Elizabeth Bonsall

Mary Davis ..

Sarah Dicks.

Catharine Evans.

Mary Jones.

Jana Davis (Chester).

Jacob Worrall.

Margaret Riley

John Hoppes (Chestar)

Henry Thomas (Chester)

335

Mary Newlin, of Concord, died in 1790, in her one hundred and second year. She was born in Thorn- bury in 1688, and it is stated that she "remembered when her father and others deaded the timber and burned the leaves, and hoed in their wheat by hand, their being few horses and scarce a plow in the settle- ment." 3

Goats we know were early sent to the Delaware River settlement, and we have reason to believe that other domestic animals were transported to New Sweden with the colonists. Horses are spoken of long before the coming of Penn. In 1679 the journal of Sluyter and Danckers mentions them as used for riding, and many other references to these animals occur in our early annals. Penn, when he came in 1682, brought with him "three blooded mares, a fine white horse, not full blooded, and other inferior animals, not for breeding, but for labor," while in 1699, when he returned the second time, intending to remain in the province, he brought with him Tamerlane, a colt by Godolphi Barb, to whom the best horses in England trace their pedigree. But previous to Penn's last coming we have the statement of Gabriel Thomas, that the " horses in Pennsylvania

1 Watson's Annals, vol. ii. p. 485.

2 Fnthay and Copa's " History of Chester County," p. 339. 14

3 Ib.

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HISTORY OF DELAWARE COUNTY, PENNSYLVANIA.

are very hardy, insomuch that being very hot with riding or otherwise, they are turned out into the woods at the same instant and yet receive no harm." Robert Rodney, in a letter written in 1690,1 in speak- ing of the trade of the colony and the articles shipped to the West Indies, mentions horses, " of which we have very good," and also states that " a good breed- ing mare" is sold for five pounds, in the currency of the province. In 1683 the Assembly had forbidden the exportation of horses or mares without permis- sion, under a fine of ten pounds. Under the Duke's law (1676) the owner of horses which were running at large, as was then the custom, was compelled to have a private brand or mark, and the town(ship) was required to have its brand to be burned on the horses owned by persons living within its boundary, while an officer was designated to register the age, color, and natural and artificial marks of the animal. A person buying or selling an unmarked horse was subject to a fine of ten pounds. In 1683 horses in the woods had so multiplied that an act was passed providing that no stallion under thirteen and a half hands should run at large, under a penalty of five pounds, and by act of May 10, 1699, the height was made thirteen hands, and a horse under that size could be taken up and impounded by any freeholder or ranger. While by the act of May 9, 1724, no stallion, unless thirteen hands high from the ground to the withers, reckoning four inches standard measure to one hand, and of a comely proportion, " was permitted to run at large in the woods." Dur- ing all our colonial history an officer, termed ranger, was appointed by the court to enforce the laws re- specting domestic animals, and to impound those found roaming at large unmarked. The office .con- tinned until the beginning of this century, for at the January Court of Quarter Sessions, 1804, Joseph Neide, of the borough and township of Chester, was appointed ranger for the county of Delaware. In a letter written by Robert Park, from Chester town- ship, Tenth month, 1725, to Mary Valentine, in Ire- land, he desired that a saddle and bridle may be brought to him by his sister, who was about emigrat- ing, and states, "Lett the tree be well Plated & In- different Narrow, for the horses here are Large as in Ireland, but the best racers and finest pacers in the World." Horses were not shod until about the middle of the last century.

Rev. Israel Acrelius, in 1758, mentioned the fleet horses owned by the descendants of the Swedish set- tlers on the Delaware. The horses were then broken to pace, that being the favorite gait. It was a pacer which bore Squire Cheyney to Gen. Washington on the morning of Sept. 11, 1777, with the intelligence that the bulk of the British army had crossed the Brandywine at the upper ford, and it was a pacer which Jefferson made fast to the railing of the capitol

at Washington while he went in and took the oath as President of the United States. In June, 1879, the residents of Chester and vicinity had an opportunity of seeing the pair of dappled-gray Arabian stallions which were presented to Gen. Grant by the Sultan of Turkey. By the personal request of Gen. Beale the animals were sent to this city, and the horses, whose pedigree could be traced more than a thousand years, were viewed while here by a large number of people.

In early days, and in fact until the first decade of this century, cattle, as before stated, ran wild in the woods. Capt. Heinricks, of the British army, in 1778, stated that "perhaps the reason why the domestic animals are not half so good as ours is because they are left out winter and summer in the open air." Gabriel Thomas informs us in the infancy of the prov- ince some farmers had "forty, some sixty, and from that number to one or three hundred head of cattle; their oxen usually weigh two hundred pounds a quarter. They are commonly fatter of flesh and yield more tallow (by feeding only on grass) than the cattle in England."

William Worrall stated that before the Revolution the natural meadows and woods were the only pasture for the cattle of Delaware County, "and the butchers from Philadelphia could come out and buy one, two, or three head of cattle from such of the graziers as could spare them, for the supply of the market." To distinguish the cattle of one owner from those belong- ing to others, the early laws required every person to brand his cattle with his individual mark. Under the Duke of York all horned cattle were to be branded on their horns. After Penn acquired possession of the province the act of 1683 compelled owners to brand their cattle when six months old. In 1685 the time was extended to one year, and in 1690 the age of the stock when it must be branded, or deemed strays, was extended to eighteen months. These brands and marks were regularly entered on record on the docket of the Quarter Sessions. At a court held at Chester, Fifth month 1, 1684, we find "George Maris's cattle mark. A slit on the tip of the near ear, his brand mark G. M." On Sixth month 5, 1684, the record sets forth, "The ear mark of John Blunstone, of Darby, a crop in the near ear and a hole in the farr ear, his brand mark I. B." On 3d day of 1st week, Fourth month, 1686, "John Hannum's ear mark, a crop under slit of both ears, his brand I. H. on the near buttock." While at court 3d day of 1st week, Seventh month, 1686, the record is made of "John Harding's ear mark, a crop on the inside of ye far ear, his brand mark I. H. on the farr buttock." That the cattle did not increase as rapidly as was desired at an early period we inferentially learn from the act of First month, 1683, which interdicted the killing of a cow, calf, or ewe lamb for three years under a fine of five pounds, one-half of which was to go to the informer.

In 1876 the Delaware County American published the recollections of William Sheldon, of Upper Provi-

1 Penna. Mag. of Hist., vol. vi. p. 312.

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WILD ANIMALS, FISH, ETC., OF DELAWARE COUNTY.

dence, respecting the price at which cows sold for forty years preceding that date. From it we learn that previous to and including 1835 good cows could be bought from $18 to $24, in 1836 for $20, in 1837 and 1838 for $23. In 1839 and 1840 the price advanced to $39, while the following year (1841) they fell to $19, and continued at those figures for 1841 and 1842. In 1845 the price was $23, in 1846, $25, and fluctuated between $22 and $25 during the next two years. In 1849-53 the average price was $26. In 1854 the price advanced two dollars, and in 1855 and 1856 it had advanced to $30. In 1857, $34, but in 1858 and 1859 it fell to $28. In 1861-62 the price was $35, and during the next three years $65 was the average, and since then the market has been high.

Sheep were early introduced, and we learn from Gabriel Thomas, that previous to 1698 of these useful animals there were "considerable numbers, which are generally free from these infectious diseases which are incident to these creatures in England, as the rot, scab, or maggots. They commonly bring forthi two lambs at once, some twice in one year, and the wool is very fine and thick and is also very white." Capt. Heinricks in 1778 records that "there are plenty of sheep, but as the farmer drives them into the woods he loses the wool; however, he sells the skin for 88. York money."

In the early times hogs were a very important part of the stock of the planters, for in most cases salted swine-flesh comprised the daily animal food consumed during the winter months. Hence it is not surprising that attention was early bad to laws protecting the owner in his property, particularly when the hogs were turned out in the woods to shift for themselves. They must have found abundant food, for we learn that hogs about a year old when killed weighed about two hundred pounds and the flesh was remarkably sweet, which, it was believed, was the result of the animals feeding on fruit which then abounded in a wild state.

Capt. Heinricks, a German officer, who saw almost nothing to praise in Pennsylvania, at least had a good word to say for the swine. "Hogs," he writes, "are quite as good here as the best in Holstein, for there is a good mast for them in the woods, and they feed there the whole year." Under the Duke of York's laws, hogs were required to be branded, and the "theft of swine or other cattle" was punished for the first offense with a fine and the cropping of one ear. Under Penn, by the act of March 10, 1683, the party convicted of this offense was compelled to pay threefold the value of the hog stolen ; for a second offense a like punish- ment and six months' imprisonment, and for the third conviction a fine of twenty-nine lashes and banish- ment, never to return to the colony, under such penalty as the County Conrt saw proper to impose in its dis- cretion. At the December court, 1687, the grand jury presented Ann Neales, widow, of Ridley, for keeping a dog which worried and killed her neighbors' hogs,

and also harboring an Indian boy named Ohato, who was detected in urging the dog to kill the hogs. The widow declared that the dog belonged to Peter Cox, but when the case was called she submitted to the court and "Putts herself upon ye mercy of ye King and Governor," whereupon she was fined ten shillings and costs. The Indian boy was held in twenty pounds to be of good behavior, and Andrew Friend became his surety.

When the meadow-land in Chester borough began to be improved, swine running at large was found to be very objectionable, especially to those who were "Improving the Marshes and Ditches and Drains," and to remedy the evil the Assembly in 1699 forbade nnringed and unyoked hogs and goats from being at large in that town, and all such animals so taken up were forfeited to the county of Chester, while all dam- age done by hogs or goats owned by parties living out- side the boundaries prescribed were to be made good to the party injured by the owner of the animal. The act designated the limits of Chester,-to be south ward by the Delaware River, westward by Chester Creek, northward by the King's road, and eastward by Rid- ley Creek. The act of 1705 declared that no swine without rings or yokes should be permitted to run at large within fourteen miles of the navigable parts of the Delaware River, and that in the towns of Phila- delphia, Chester, or Bristol they should not he allowed to run at large "whether yoked or ringed or not." The fine imposed was to be equally divided between the government and the informer.

The ordinary domestic fowls seem to have been abundant in the province in the early time. Gabriel Thomas tells us that "chickens, hens, geese, ducks, turkeys, &c., are large and very plentiful all over the country," and eighty years after this statement was made Capt. Heinricks records, "There are plenty of Guinea fowls, but not so many as in the Jerseys and Long Island. Turkeys belong to the wild animals, and are in the woods in flocks like partridges. Dncks and geese are common and as good as ours, but no better."

CHAPTER XXIII.

WILD ANIMALS, FISH, ETC., OF DELAWARE COUNTY.

WHEN the first European settlers located in Dela- ware County the territory abounded with wild game, and for more than a hundred years thereafter large animals in a state of nature were common. Gabriel Thomas informs us in his " History of Pennsylvania," that when he lived in the province, previous to 1698, " there are in the woods abundance of red deer- vulgarly called stags-for I have bought of the In- dians a whole buck-both skin and carcass-for two gills of gunpowder. Excellent food-most delicious,

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HISTORY OF DELAWARE COUNTY, PENNSYLVANIA.

far exceeding that in Europe, in the opinion of most that are nice and curious people," while Mahlon Stacey, writing to a friend in England, says, "We have brought home to our houses by the Indians seven or eight fat bucks in a day, and sometimes put by as many, having no occasion for them." 1

Deer seem to have been abundant until after the middle of the last century in the more remote town- ships, for in 1824, William Mode, then living on the west branch of the Brandywine, East Fallowfield township, Chester County, in his eighty-second year, related that as a boy he remembered when deer were so plentiful that their tracks in the wheat-fields in time of snow were as if a flock of sheep had been driven over them, and on one occasion his father returned home, having the carcasses of two, which he had shot, on his sled. Samuel Jefferis, who died at West Ches- ter, Feb. 28, 1823, aged eighty-seven, stated that deer were common in his neighborhood in his early man- hood, while Watson records that in 1730 a woman in Chester County (then including Delaware County) " going to mill spied a deer fast asleep near the road. She hit it on the head with a stone and killed it."

Black bears were frequently slain in the early days, and they generally met their fate because of their par- tiality for swine-flesh. The animal in search of this dainty morsel would approach near the settlement, and when he had selected a hog to his taste, he would spring suddenly upon his victim, grasp it in his fore-legs, and, erecting himself on his hind ones, would walk away with the porker squeaking at his un- happy situation. The cry of the hog usually brought the owner to the rescue of his property; but if he failed in overtaking the bear, he would in all proba- bility capture the animal before many hours, for after eating sufficient to satisfy his appetite, he would re- turn to devour the remainder of the carcass at his leisure. The settlers knowing this weakness, would set a heavy smooth-jawed steel trap, attached to which was a long drag-chain ending with iron claws. The bear once caught in the trap, would drag the chain along the ground, and the claws catching upon the bushes would compel him to such exertion in freeing himself that he would become exhausted, and when overtaken, as his track would be readily followed, he fell a comparatively easy prey to the huntsman.

In 1721 a bear was killed near Darby, and yet ten or fifteen years later, when Nathaniel Newlin, of Con- cord, married Esther Midkiff, of Darby, her parents objected to the marriage, not because they had any disinclination to the suitor, but for the fact that he lived in the backwoods of Concord, and there were bears there; while of Mary Palmer, wife of John Pal- mer, of Concord, one of the first settlers of that town- ship, it is recorded that she drove a bear away from a chestnut-tree with a fire-poker or poking-stick.2

But bears sometimes came closer to the settlement than "the backwoods of Concord." In the winter of 1740-41, so memorable for its extreme cold weather, it is related by Mrs. Deborah Logan that one night an old man, servant of Joseph Parker (then owning and living in the old Logan house, still standing on the north side of Second Street, above Edgmont Avenue, Chester), rose from his bed, and, as he was a constant smoker, he descended to the kitchen to light his pipe. The watch-dog was growling fiercely, and he went to the window to ascertain the cause. The moon was up, but partly obscured by clouds, and by that light the old man saw an animal which he took for "a big black calf" in the yard. He thereupon drove the creature out of the inclosure, when it turned, looked at him, and he then saw it was a black bear. The beast, it is supposed, had been in some way aroused from its winter torpor and had sought shelter from the cold, which may account for its apparent docility. The next morning it was killed in the woods about a half-mile distant from the house. William Worrall stated that when a lad in Marple a large bear made an inroad into the neigh- borhood and escaped with impunity, although great exertions were made to secure it.

The early settlers were much annoyed by the wolves, who preyed on their flocks and herds. In the Duke of York's laws, promulgated on the Delaware, Sept. 22, 1676, it was provided that if any person, " Chris- tian ar Indian," brought the head of a wolf to the constable he was to be paid, "out of the publicque charge, to the value of an Indian coat," and the con- stable was required to nail the head over the door of his house, previous to which he must cut off both the ears, "in token that the head is bought and paid for." In 1672 the amount paid for wolves' heads was found to be burdensome, and it was. ordered that the sum of twenty-five shillings per head should be reduced to twenty shillings, and the several towns were obliged to maintain wolf-pits. This was the law respecting the killing of wolves in force in the province from the date of the promulgation of the Duke's " Book of Laws," until the coming of Penn in the latter part of the year 1682. The eighty-sixth law, enacted by the first Assembly at Chester, provided that if any person, excepting an Indian, should slay a he wolf he should receive ten shillings, and for a she wolf fifteen shil- lings, out of the public fund. The wolf's head must be brought to a justice, who should cause the ears and tongue to be cut out. If an Indiau killed a wolf he was paid five shillings " and the skin for his pains," which latter clause was stricken out of the law May 10, 1690, by the Assembly which met at New Castle, and Indians were placed on a like footing with the whites, receiving the same reward.

The law was more easily enacted than the money could be raised to pay the wolf-head bounty. The court previous to 1700 seemed constantly compelled to take action looking to the collection of taxes

1 Proud's " History of Pennsylvania," vol. i. p. 152.

2 Geneslogical Record of Palmer and Trimble Families, by Lewis Psl- mer, p. 27.

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WILD ANIMALS, FISH, ETC., OF DELAWARE COUNTY.

sufficient to discharge these pressing demands. At the court held at Chester, the 3d day of Ist week, Tenth month, 1687, it was "Ordered that Warrants be Directed to ye respective Constables of each Town- ship in this county for raising of a levy to be used towards ye destroying Wolves and other Hurtful Ver- min, as follows, viz .: For all lands taken up and in- habited one shilling for every hundred acres; for all Lands taken up by non-residents and so remaining un- occupied eighteen pence for every hundred acres ; All freemen from sixteen years of age to sixty, one shil- ling; All servants, soe qualified, six pence." This order did not secure the sum necessary to keep the county and the wolf-hunters square in their accounts, so that on the 6th day of 1st week, Tenth month, 1688, "The Grand Inquest doe alsoe allow of ye Tax for ye wolves' heads and that Power be forthwith Issued forth to Compel those to pay that are behind in their arrears, And that receipts and disbursements thereof be made to ye grand Inquest at ye next County Court." But this action of the grand jury did not result as desired, so that Oct. 2, 1695, the grand inquest reported that the county was in debt, not only on account of the prison, which was not completed, but that " there were several wolves' heads to pay for," and they therefore levied a tax of one pence per pound on personal and real estate and three pence poll-tax. The jury also gave the rule by which the valuation should be made thus : " All cleared land under tillage to be assessed at 20 shillings per acre ; rough lands near river £10 per hundred acres; land in woods" (that is, uncultivated land on which no set- tlement had been made), "£5 per hundred acres; horses aud mares at £3; cows and oxen at 50 shil- lings; sheep 6s .; negro male slaves from sixteen to sixty years of age at £25, and females at £20. Ches- ter Mills (at Upland) £100; Joseph Cochran's mill (where Dutton's now is), £50; Darby Mill, £100; Haverford Mills (on Cobb's Creek), £20; Concord Mills (now Leedom's), £50," and all tavern-keepers were assessed at twenty pounds. This is the last mention I find of wolves as forming the subject of a grand jury's action in our county annals, but many bills are on file in the commissioner's office, in West Chester, for the wolf bounty.

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History of Delaware County, Pennsylvania, Part 54

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