USA > Pennsylvania > Schuylkill County > History of Schuylkill County, Pa. with illustrations and biographical sketches of some of its prominent men and pioneers > Part 5
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The ravaging of the shores of Chesapeake bay, and the burning of Washington, in 1813 and 1814, and the threatening attitude of the enemy after these depreda- tions, induced Governor Snyder to issue another call for troops to defend the State against the peril which men- aced it. In compliance with this a force of five thousand established a rendezvous on the Delaware, and although the soil of Pennsylvania was not invaded this force did good service in marching to the relief of Baltimore when it was attacked, and aiding to repel the enemy. It is worthy of note, as showing the difference in the patriotism of men from different sections of the country, that four thousand New York troops under General Van Rennsse- laer refused to cross the line into Canada, but that, soon afterward, a brigade of Pennsylvanians, consisting of two thousand, under General Tannehill, crossed without the slightest hesitation, glad to be able to meet the enemy on his own soil and do battle for their country. A treaty of peace between the two nations was ratified on the 17th of February, 1815.
ment, and thus that system in this State came to exceed in magnitude that of any other.
It was not possible, however, for the wisest of those who projected and promoted this system of improvements to foresee the rise and rapid progress of another system, which was to take the place of and wholly supersede that which, at such an enormous expense, they inaugurated and carried forward.
In 1827 a railroad, nine miles in length, the longest then in existence in America, was constructed from Mauch Chunk to some coal mines. Only two had pre- ceded this-one, with a wooden track, at a stone quarry in the county of Delaware, Penn., and another, having a length of three miles, at a quarry in Quincy, Mass. Since that time the railroad system of this country has devel- oped to its present magnitude. A majority of the canals are dry, many have been converted into railroad beds, and even the rivers and lakes of the country have dwin- dled into comparative insignificance as avenues of travel or transportation. In 1857 the principal line of public works between Pittsburg and Philadelphia was sold to the Pennsylvania Railroad Company for a fraction of its cost, and measures were at once taken for the sale of the other works belonging to the State Thus do systems, one after another, develop and pass away, and no prevision can point out what is to come.
While it is true that in some of the States of the Union the present system of internal improvements, which has been fostered and encouraged by those States, has proved to be almost the ruin of their best interests, the reverse is true in Pennsylvania. The development of the im- mense mineral resources of the State required the con- struction of these avenues of transportation, and the cost of those built by the State, though they were afterward sold for only a part of that cost, was returned many fold in the increase of wealth which was the direct result of their construction. When the first canal was projected the use of anthracite coal was hardly known, and the cost of its transportation to market was so great as to preclude the possibility of its profitable use. With every increase in the facilities for the transportation of this important mineral it has been cheapened to the consumer, and its production has been rendered more profitable; and now large areas which have no value for any other purpose are sources of immense and constantly increasing wealth.
The extensive system of internal improvements which has swallowed so many millions of money in this State Previous to the year 1834 many acts were passed by the Legislature pertaining in some way to the subject of edu- cation. Some of these were local in their application, and some were little more than resolutions in favor of education. Isolated schools were established in various localities, in most of which provision was made for the education of the children of the poor. The people of the different religious denominations made provision for the education of their children, often establishing paro- chial schools. This was the case with the Quakers, the Scotch-Irish Presbyterians, the German Lutherans, the Mennonists, the Moravians, the Dunkards, etc. Nothing having the semblance of a public school system was was commenced about the year 1790. The first efforts were directed to the improvement of navigation in the rivers of the State; then, as time went on, the construc- tion of a system of canals and turnpikes was entered on, and prosecuted beyond that of any other State in the Union. The grand project of securing the trade of the "West, through a connection between Philadelphia and the waters of the Ohio at Pittsburg, by a line of public works, was realized in 1831. In order to secure the in- fluence and votes necessary to authorize this it had been found necessary to construct other canals in various parts of the State, the inhabitants of which desired to par- ticipate in the benefits of the system of internal improve- established previous to the adoption of the constitution
2.4
OUTLINE HISTORY OF PENNSYLVANIA.
of 1790, which required that provision should be made by law for the general establishment of schools wherein gratuitons instruction should be given to the children of the poor. From that time till 1827 efforts were from time to time made to establish a system in accordance with this requirement, but with only partial success, the radical defect in all being the distinction between the children of the rich and poor. In 1827 earnest and sys- tematic efforts began to be put forth for the establish- ment of free schools for all, and in 1834 the foundation of the present common school system was laid, in the enactment of a law for the maintenance of schools by a tax on all taxable property. This law, which was at first imperfect, was revised and amended in 1836, 1849, 1854 and 1857, in which last year the present system of nor- mal schools was established.
In 1863 the Pennsylvania Railroad Company donated to the State $50,000 for the education of soldiers' or- phans. In 1865 the Legislature added to this an appro- priation of $75,000. Schools and homes were established for these wards of the State, and during several years an annual expenditure was made for this purpose of half a million of dollars. At these homes and schools soldiers' orphans were boarded, clothed, educated and taught habits of industry, and at a proper age were placed in situations to acquire trades or professions.
In 1749 an academy was established by subscription in Philadelphia "for instruction in the Latin and English languages and mathematics." This was the foundation of the University of Pennsylvania. This and Dickinson College, at Carlisle, which was founded in 1783, were the only colleges in the State previous to the commencement of the nineteenth century. There are now twenty-seven, of which five are purely secular or non-sectarian. There are also seventeen theological institutions, ten medical schools and one law school.
CHAPTER IX.
PATRIOTIC ACTION IN THE MEXICAN AND CIVIL WARS- GOVERNORS OF PENNSYLVANIA.
N 1846 war was declared by this government against Mexico, and by virtue of authority vested in him by Congress, the President called on Pennsylvania for six volunteer regiments of infantry, to hold themselves in readiness for service during one year, or to the end of the war. Such was the alacrity with which the citizens responded to this call, that within thirty days a sufficient number of volunteers had offered their ser- vices to constitute nine full regiments. Of these, be- tween two and three regiments were sent into the country of the enemy, and their conduct at Vera Cruz, Cerro Gordo, Chepultepec and the city of Mexico was highly
creditable to themselves as well as to the State which they represented.
The promptitude with which Pennsylvania responded to the call of the federal government in 1812 and 1846 was fully equaled by the readiness with which her citi- zens flew to arms at the breaking out of the great Southern rebellion. In anticipation of that event the citizens of Pittsburg had refused to allow arms to be taken from their arsenal and sent south by traitorous government officials ; and, when the storm of war burst upon the country, the patriotism of the citizens of this State was aroused to such a pitch that, in response to the call for Pennsylvania's quota of the 75,000 first called for, fourteen regiments, enough for twenty-five, offered themselves.
A place of rendezvous, called, in honor of the gover- nor of the State, Camp Curtin, was established at Harris- burg, and on the morning of April 18th, 1861, six days after the attack on Fort Sumter and three days after the proclamation calling for 75,000 men was issued, five companies of volunteers left Harrisburg for Washing- ton. They passed through Baltimore amid the jeers and imprecations of the mob, that followed them and hurled bricks, clubs and other missiles at them as they boarded the cars, and arrived at Washington on the evening of the same day. They were the first troops that reached the national capital, and for this prompt response to the call of their country, and for their coolness and courage in passing through the mob, they were afterward thanked, in a resolution, by the House of Representatives. Within twelve days, or before the first of May, twenty-five reg- iments, amounting to more than twenty thousand men, were sent from this State to the field. The expense of clothing, subsisting, arming, equiping and transporting these troops was sustained by the State.
By the advance of General Lee toward the southern border of the State in September, 1862, an invasion of its territory was evidently threatened, and Governor Curtin, by proclamation, called for fifty thousand men to meet the emergency. These not only marched to the border, which they covered, but most of them crossed into the State of Maryland, and by their presence assisted in preventing the advance northward of the rebel army.
Another emergency arose in June, 1863, to meet which Governor Curtin issued a proclamation calling out the entire militia of the State. By reason of a lack of con - cert in the action of the State and national authorities, only a portion of this force was brought into service pre- vious to the battle of Gettysburg. Of that battle the limits of this sketch will not permit a detailed account. It was the result of the second attempt to invade northern territory, and it was a disaster to the rebels from which they never recovered.
The territory of the State was again invaded in July, 1864, and all the available troops in the State were sent forward to repel the invasion. The inhabitants along the southern border were considerably annoyed and injured by this invasion, and the town of Chambersburg was burned. More than two hundred and fifty houses were
25
WAR OF THE REBELLION-GOVERNORS OF PENNSYLVANIA.
fired by the rebels and the town was entirely destroyed involving a loss of about $2,000,000. It was an act o wanton vandalism.
Of Camp Curtin, that was established at the commence ment of the war, it may be said that it was not only : place of rendezvous for soldiers and of deposit for mil itary stores, but a depot for prisoners and a hospita for the sick and for the wounded after some of the great battles, especially the battles of Gettysburg and Antietam. It was early placed under the control of the federal government, and so continued till the close o' the war.
A brief mention should be made of the part which the loyal women of the State bore in this conflict. Not only did they part with their husbands, sons and brothers, who went forth to do battle for their country and the pres- ervations of its institutions, and in many cases to lay down their lives, but they put forth their efforts to pro- vide and send forward to those who languished in distant hospitals those comforts which the government could not furnish; and many a sick or wounded soldier had occa- sion to bless his unknown benefactress for some delicacy or comfort of which he was the recipient.
During the continuance of this war the State of Penn- sylvania furnished for the army two hundred and seventy regiments and many detached companies, amounting in all to 387,284 men. The following quotation from a special message of Governor Curtin, at the close of the war, is a well deserved tribute to the self-sacrificing pa- triotism of the people of this State:
" Proceeding in the strict line of duty, the resources of Pennsylvania, whether in men or money, have neither been withheld or squandered. The history of the con- duct of our people in the field is illuminated with inci- dents of heroism worthy of conspicuous notice; but it would be impossible to mention them in the proper limits of this message, without doing injustice or perhaps mak- ing invidious distinctions. It would be alike impossible to furnish a history of the associated benevolence, and of the large individual contributions to the comfort of our people in the field and hospital; or of the names and ser- vices at all times of our volunteer surgeons, when called to assist in the hospital or on the battle field. Nor is it possible to do justice to the many patriotic and Christian men who were always ready when summoned to the exercise of acts of humanity and benevolence. Our armies were sustained and strengthened in the field by the patriotic devotion of their friends at home; and we can never render full justice to the heaven-directed, pa-
triotic, Christian benevolence of the women of the State."
The following is a list of the governors of the colony, province and State of Pennsylvania, with the year of the appointment or election of each:
Under the Swedes: 1638, Peter Minuit; 1641, Peter Hollandare; 1643, John Printz; 1653, John Pappegoya; 1654, Johan Claudius Rysingh.
Under the Dutch: 1655, Peter Stuyvesant |Deryck Schmidt pro tem. ; 1655, John Paul Jaquet; 1657, Jacob Alrichs; 1659, Alexander D. Hinyossa; 1652, William Beekman; 1663, Alexander D. Hinyossa; 1673, Anthony Colve (Peter Alrich's deputy).
Under the Duke of York: 1664, Colonel Richard Nichols (Robert Carr, deputy); 1667, Colonel Francis Lovelace.
Under the English: 1674, Sir Edmund Andross:
Under the proprietary government: 1681, William Markham, deputy; 1682, William Penn; 1684, Thomas Lloyd, president of the council; 1688, five commissioners appointed by the proprietor-Thomas Lloyd, Robert Tur- ner, Arthur Cook, John Symcock, John Eckley; 1688, John Blackwell, deputy; 1690, Thomas Lloyd, president of council; 1691, Thomas Lloyd, deputy governor; 1693, Benjamin Fletcher, William Markham lieutenant gov- ernor; 1695, William Markham, deputy; 1699, William Penn; 1701, Andrew Hamilton, deputy; 1703, Edward Shippen, president of the council; 1704, John Evans, deputy; 1709, Charles Gookin, deputy; 1717, Sir William Keith, deputy; 1726, Patrick Gordon, deputy; 1736, James Logan, president of the council; 1738, George Thomas, deputy; 1747, Anthony Palmer, president of the council; 1748, James Hamilton, lieutenant governor; 1754, Robert H. Morris, deputy; 1756, William Denny, deputy; 1759, James Hamilton, deputy; 1763, John Penn; 1771, James Hamilton, president of the council; 1771, Richard Penn; 1773, John Penn.
Under the constitution of 1776 (presidents of the supreme council): 1777, Thomas Wharton; 1778, Joseph Reed; 1781, William Moore; 1782, John Dickinson; 1785, Benjamin Franklin; 1788, Thomas Mifflin.
Under subsequent constitutions: 1790, Thomas Mif- flin; 1799, Thomas McKean; 1808, Simon Snyder; 1817; William Findlay; 1820, Joseph Heister; 1823, John An- drew Schultze; 1829, George Wolf; 1835, Joseph Ritner; 1839, David R. Porter; 1845, Francis R. Shunk; 1848, William F. Johnston; 1852, William Bigler; 1855, James Pollock; 1858, William F. Packer; 1861, Andrew G. Cur- tin; 1867, John W. Geary; 1873, John F. Hartranft; 1878, Henry M. Hoyt.
HISTORY OF SCHUYLKILL COUNTY.
CHAPTER I.
ANCIENT INHABITANTS-BERKS COUNTY.
HE Indians that inhabited eastern Pennsylva- nia at the time of its settlement by the whites were the Lenni Lenapes, or Lenapes as they termed themselves. They were called by the whites Delawares, after the name given to the river which forms the eastern boundary of the State. Of their traditions concerning their origin and migrations hither from the west, it is not necessary here to speak. When found here by the first settlers they were under the domination of the Mingoes or Iroquois, the warlike Six Nations, whose remarkable confederation had enabled them to conquer and reduce to subjection the tribes inhabiting a large extent of ter- ritory. They had, to use their form of expression, made women of the Lenapes. The latter were not permitted to engage in war, they could not sell their lands withont the consent of their conquerors, nor could they even oc- cupy them except by permission of their masters.
The almost fanatical admiration of Heckewelder for the Lenapes led him to credit the statement that they were not conquered, but that their submission was vol- untary, or rather the result of intrigue on the part of the Six Nations. Other historians insist that the subjuga- tion of the Lenapes was the result of conquest and was complete. When the Six Nations were called on in 1742 to remove the Delawares from lands that had been purchased, the chief, Canassatiago, in his celebrated speech at Philadelphia, said: "We conquered you, we made women of you; you know you are women; we charge you to remove instantly; we don't give you liberty to think about it." The noted Delaware chief Teedyus- cung many years afterward said : "I was styled by my uncles the Six Nations a woman in former years and had no hatchet in my hand, but a pestle or hominy pounder."
piece of tobacco, and said to them : "Remember that the English have unjustly deprived you of much of your land, which they took from you by force. Your cause is just; therefore smoke of this tobacco and arise; join with us and our fathers, the French, and take your revenge. You are women it is true, but we will shorten your petti- coats, and though you may appear by your dress to be women, yet by your conduct and language you will convince your enemies that you are determined not tamely to suffer the wrongs and injuries inflicted on you."
The Revolutionary war put an end to the power of the Iroquois, and terminated the relation of master and vassal which had subsisted between them and the Dela- wales.
Probably this region was never the permanent habitat of any Indian tribes. The Delaware on the east and the Susquehanna on the west afforded greater attractions for the savages. They were plentifully stocked with fish, and their broad bosoms were thoroughfares over which parties in their canoes could easily move from place to place. Their valleys also gave facilities for the rude agriculture of these, that the narrow valleys of the Schuylkill and its tributaries, in which flourished a thick undergrowth of laurel, did not afford. Though the re- gion was visited by straggling parties of hunters, because of the abundance of game with which the mountain for- ests were filled, no evidences are left here of any perma- nent settlements or even camping places. Tradition says that there was an ancient Indian village on or near Sculp Hill, in the vicinity of Orwigsburg, but no trace of its former existence now remains. The plough rarely turns up a trinket, and seldoni is an arrow point or spear head found on the mountain side.
Schuylkill county was included in what was originally Chester, then Lancaster, then Berks, from which it was mostly taken. Chester was established in 1682; Lan- caster in 1729, and Berks in 1752, from parts of Phila- delphia county on the east of the Schuylkill river, and of Chester and Lancaster on the west side of the same. In 1772 a portion of its extreme northern part was annexed
At the commencement of the French war, about 1755, the Iroquois brought to the Delawares a war belt and a | to Northumberland county.
28
HISTORY OF SCHUYLKILL COUNTY.
The first settlements in what is now Berks county were made during the first decade of the eighteenth century, by some English Quakers, French Huguenots and German Palatines, who settled at Wahlink or Oley. About 1715 a few Swedes settled at Amity. In 1723 about fifty families of Palatines from Schoharie, in New York, settled on Indian lands at the head of Tulpehocken creek; followed soon afterward by fifty other families from the same region, and in 1729 by another consider- able accession, among whom was the historic Conrad Weiser.
Although Berks county was mainly settled by Germans, other nationalities were represented in it. Swiss immi- grants settled in Berne; Welsh in Brecknock, Carnarvon and Cumri; English and Welsh Quakers in Maiden Creek and Robeson; Dutch (from whom the Potts des- cended) in Pike, and a colony in Hereford township known as Schwenkfelders, from Casper von Schwenkfeld, a Silesian, who founded the sect, of whom about three hundred families still remain.
From 1744 till 1778, when the Indians were finally driven from the region, and especially between 1744 and 1764, the inhabitants of Berks suffered much from the incursions of marauding bands of these savages, who came oftenest from the direction of the Blue mountain. To protect themselves against these the inhabitants con- structed forts along the Blue mountain at a distance of fifteen or twenty miles from each other, so that rangers from one could easily reach the other by a march of a day
One of these, which is known as Fort Franklin, was erected in 1756 on Lizard creek, an affluent of the Le- high. Fort Lebanon, otherwise called Fort Bohundy or Fort William, was built in 1754 on a branch of the Schuylkill. Both these were north from the Blue moun- tain chain, in what is now Schuylkill county. A stockade called Fort at Snyders was on the present line between Berks and Schuylkill counties, west from Schuylkill river; another, named Sichtes or Sixes fort, was south of the Blue mountain, in the western part of Berks; and still another, Fort Henry, south from the mountain chain, on an affluent of Swatara creek, in Lebanon county. Traces of some of these forts are still discern- ible.
The antecedents of the immigrants and their descend- ants in Berks county were such as to incline them with great unanimity to the side of the colonists in the Revo- lutionary struggle. The Quakers, of course, because of their religious scruples, maintained an apparent neutral- ity, and doubtless here as elsewhere the royalty of many tories was concealed under broad brimmed hats and shad bellied coats. It is said that Berks, at the end of the year 1776, numbered about four thousand effective men.
The historian Sherman Day says : " The desolating track of the Revolutionary war did not reach Berks county, although many of her sons were engaged in the struggle. Since that event the history of the county pos- sesses interest. Farms have been cleared and improved; large stone houses and larger stone barns have been
built; sons and daughters have been reared and in their turn have reared others ; the annual crops have been gathered; roads and turnpikes and canals and railroads and bridges have been constructed ; banks have been es- tablished and have failed, and manufactories have been put in operation ; churches and school houses have been erected (but not enough of either), and the country has immensely increased in wealth and population."
CHAPTER II.
-
FIRST SETTLEMENTS AND PIONEER LIFE IN SCHUYLKILL COUNTY.
BY R. A. WILDER.
HE outward movement of the frontier wave line of civilization is always attended by traditions of a phenomenal nature from which it is nearly impossible to deduce any- thing like historical facts. There is a remarkable likeness in the impelling causes of these move- ments in all ages, and among the people of all nations, but the individualism that exists among early settlers in any particular locality, the absence of family records, and the long period of time that elapses before the constituted authorities reach them, prevent the colla- tion of reliable data, and leave the means of tracing persons and events in the mists of uncertainty.
The proneness of posterity to make heroes of ancestors who have shouldered the knapsack, the ax, and deadly rifle, and gone alone into the depths of the forests to hew out and guard a home for themselves and their progeny is common to every rank of life. The story of individual prowess is transmitted from parents to children by the winter fireside, when storms howl around the lonely cot- tage, and the winds sweep down from the hills with mournful cadence, as the sorrowful tale of fire and carn- age, involving the death of the innocents as well as those of maturer age by the tomahawk and scalping knife, comes down from the hills of time. Every green spot by sheltering hill and bubbling spring and sunny stream, where the ruin of the first settler's hut is shown, becomes in these winter tales a " dark and bloody ground." Unfortunately for the pioneers in this country, in their westward progress they have paid the penalty for their en- croachments upon aboriginal claims, in constant warfare with the savage tribes, all the way from the shores of the Atlantic to the Pacific slopes. Many a one who entered the forest to secure his future home was seen no more, but the curling hair, which was the pride of a mother or some dearer relation, was made a trophy to ornament the lodge of some dusky warrior. Where the grass wears a darker green, and the wild flowers bloom
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