USA > Pennsylvania > Washington County > History of Washington County : from its first settlement to the present time, first under Virginia as Yohogania, Ohio, or Augusta County until 1781, and subsequently under Pennsylvania > Part 45
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This agreement, with conditions annexed, was adopted by resolution of the legislature of Pennsylvania, September 23, 1780, and trans- mitted to the State of Virginia for their confirmation.
While the negotiations were pending, Congress passed the follow- ing preamble and resolution, on December 27, 1779.
WHEREAS, It appears to Congress from the representation of the delegates from the State of Pennsylvania, that disputes had arisen between the States of Pennsylvania and Virginia, relative to the extent of their boundaries, which may probably be productive of serious evils to both States, and tend to lesson their exertions in the common defence, therefore
Resolved, That it be recommended to the contending parties not to grant any part of the disputed lands or to disturb the possession of any person living thereon, and to avoid every appearance of force, until the dispute can be amicably adjusted by both States, or brought to a just decision by the intervention of Congress. That possessions forcibly taken be restored to the original possessors, and things be placed in the situation in which they were at the commencement of the present war, without prejudice to the claims of either party.
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In March, 1780, the Supreme Executive Council of Pennsylvania addressed Congress on the disputed line between Virginia and itself, complimented Congress upon the foregoing recommendatory resolu- tions, but claimed that Virginia still harasses the innocent and unfor- tunate settlers of Pennsylvania ; that as the representatives of the people they will not consent to see their State insulted, and that if Pennsylvania must arm for her internal defence, she must necessarily withdraw her forces from the continental line, and trust they shall stand acquitted before them and the world.
This earnest protest to Congress had a salutary effect upon the State of Virginia, for on the 7th day of August, 1784, a letter was received from Patrick Henry, Governor of said State, inclosing a resolution confirming the line agreed upon by the commissioners in August, 1779, as above recited.
The General Assembly of Pennsylvania, on the 23d of Septem- ber, 1780, authorized the President and Executive Council to ap- point two commissioners on the part of this State, in conjunction with the commissioners of Virginia, to extend the line commonly called Mason and Dixon's line, five degrees of longitude from the Delaware River, and from the western termination of the line so extended to run and mark, as soon as may be, a meridian line to the Ohio river, the remainder of the line to be run as soon as the coun- cil, taking into consideration the disposition of the Indians, shall think it prudent.
February 21, 1781, Alexander McClean, of Pennsylvania, and Jos. Neville, of Youghiogheny County, Virginia, were appointed by their respective States to run a temporary line. They met on the 10th of May following and proceeded with their business, to mark a temporary boundary line between Pennsylvania and Virginia, according to the agreement of the commissioners at Baltimore on the 31st of August, 1780. The commissioners in marking the line were instructed to have cleared out at least fifteen feet in width, and on large trees, or other suitable objects, cause the letters P and V to be marked on the different sides. Each commissioner was allowed twenty shillings per day, exclusive of all necessary contingent ex- penses.
President Reed writes to Colonel James Marshall, Lieutenant of Washington County, in 1781 :-
It was much our wish, and equally our intention, to run the line this spring, but the State of Virginia being invaded, and the affairs of the Go- vernment in great confusion, there has not been the time or opportunity for that purpose which was necessary. Besides that, upon inquiry, we found the season was too far advanced for those astronomical observations which were necessary to run the line with exactness. We have therefore POST- PONED THE GRAND OPERATION to next spring. But as we knew it was highly necessary to have a partition of territory and jurisdiction, we proposed to Virginia to run a TEMPORARY LINE, beginning at the end of Mason and Dixon's line, and measuring twenty-three miles, what is by common compu-
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tation the five degrees of longitude called for in the charter of King Charles II. This has been agreed to, and the State of Virginia has sent orders to the Surveyor of Youghiogheny County to join with one to be appointed by us. We have appointed Alexander McClean, Esq. Should he have occa- sion for a guard, or any other assistance from you, we make no doubt he will receive it. As soon as they have run the line and reported their pro- ceedings, we shall send up proclamations calling upon all those who fall into this State to conform to its laws and government.
The temporary boundary line run by Alexander McClean, of Pennsylvania, and Joseph Neville, of Virginia, was to be recognized as such until the end of the Revolutionary war, or until the States might be in more tranquillity. A resolution was unanimously adopted by the legislature of Pennsylvania, on the 22d of March, 1783, approving of the line lately run between Virginia and Penn- sylvania, and the resolution directed to be sent to the legislature of Virginia. This being accomplished, it only became necessary for the President of the Supreme Executive Council to issue a procla- mation, to quiet the minds of the people, which he did, in the fol- lowing language :-
WHEREAS, The General Assembly of this Commonwealth, by their reso- lution of the twenty-second day of the present month, did approve and confirm the line lately run by Messrs. McClean and Neville as the boundary between this State and that of Virginia, until the final settlement thereof be obtained, we have thought fit to make known the same, and we do hereby charge, enjoin, and require all persons whatsoever, residing within that tract of country situate between the meridian line run by Messrs. Sinclair and McClean, and that lately run by Messrs. Neville and Mc- Clean, bounded southward by the extension of Mason and Dixon's line, and northward by the Ohio River, and also all others residing eastward of the said line run by Messrs. Sinclair and McClean, who heretofore may have supposed themselves to be there settled within the State of Virginia, to take notice of the proceedings aforesaid, and to pay due obedience to the laws of this Commonwealth.
Given in Council at Philadelphia, this 26th day of March, 1783. JOHN DICKINSON, President
Attest : JOHN ARMSTRONG, JR., Secretary.
Thus was temporarily settled the boundary line between these two States, which was afterwards finally and fully adjusted by the adoption, extension, and approval of the Mason and Dixon's line, a history of which we reserve for another chapter. But the student of history cannot fail to observe that when Virginia ceded this part of Pennsylvania, formerly claimed by it, to the State of Pennsylvania, there was a necessity for erecting a new county, hence Washington County was erected in 1781, comprising all the State west of the Monongahela, and southwest of the Ohio.
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.
CHAPTER II.
THE MASON AND DIXON'S LINE.
Its full history-the line run by Charles Mason and Jeremiah Dixon-the claim of Pennsylvania-the claim of Lord Baltimore-the appointment of commissioners-the labors of Mason and Dixon ended in 1767-new commissioners appointed in 1783 by the States of Virginia and Pennsyl- vania-letter from Joseph Reed on the scientific apparatus to be used- report of the joint-commissioners-report of the Pennsylvania commis- sioners-cost of running the line-the western line of Pennsylvania run by commissioners appointed by both States, and the report of the com- missioners thereupon-the origin of the Pan Handle in West Virginia.
IN tracing the history of the Virginia and Pennsylvania contro- versy in the preceding chapter, we were necessarily required to ad- vert to the Mason and Dixon's line, which was extended twenty- three miles, and finally adjusted by the commissioners of the two States. We propose in the present chapter to give a history of this celebrated line, which is the southern boundary of our State, and for want of which there was so much trouble, perplexity, and con- troversial discussions, until its final adjustment and the erection of Washington County, Pennsylvania.
This line was fixed by the distinguished mathematicians and as- tronomers, CHARLES MASON and JEREMIAH DIXON, during the years 1763-4-5-6-7, and afterwards extended, by authority and consent of the States of Virginia and Pennsylvania, temporarily, but finally adjusted in 1784. We may add, the line properly begins at the northeast corner of Maryland, and runs due west. The Indians (as we will show) were troublesome to the surveyors, but by treaties they permitted them to proceed as far west as the old war path, within thirty-six miles of the whole distance to be run, when the Indian escort informed them that it was the will of the Six Nations the surveyors should cease their labors; there was no alternative. The surveyors stopped, and hence arose the difficulties which we have narrated in our preceding chapter.
By reference to the charter granted by King Charles II. to William Penn, his heirs and assigns, on the 4th of March, 1681, we find the following described land: "All that tract or part of land in America, with all the islands therein contained, as the same is bounded on the east by Delaware River, from twelve miles distant northwards of New Castletown unto the three and fortieth degree of northern latitude, if the said river doth extend so
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HISTORY OF WASHINGTON COUNTY.
far northward; but if the said river shall not extend so far north- ward, then by the said river so far as it doth extend ; and from the head of the said river the eastern bounds are to be determined by a meridian line to be drawn from the head of the said river unto the said three and fortieth degrec. The said land to extend westwards five degrees in longitude to be computed from the said eastern bounds ; and the said lands to be bounded on the north by the beginning of the three and fortieth degree of northern latitude, and on the south by a circle drawn at twelve miles distance from New Castle northwards, and westwards unto the beginning of the fortieth degree of northern latitude, and then by a straight line westwards to the limits of longitude above mentioned."
It is evident that Penn's grant of land from King Charles was to lie west of the Delaware River, and north of Maryland, because the charter by Lord Baltimore for Maryland included all the land to the Delaware Bay, "which lieth under the fortieth degree of north latitude, where New England terminates;" hence the only mode by which the form and extent of Pennsylvania could be determined was by the two natural landmarks, viz., New Castletown and the River Delaware. This river being her eastern boundary, New Castle was to be used as the centre of a circle of twelve miles radius, whose northwestern segment was to connect the river with the beginning of the fortieth degree, while the province was to extend westward five degrees in longitude, to be computed from said eastern bounds.
The Penns claimed for the western boundary a line beginning at thirty-nine degrees, at the distance of five degrees of longitude from the Delaware ; thence at the same distance from that river in every point to north latitude forty-two degrees, which would take into the province of Pennsylvania some fifty miles square of Northwestern: Virginia, west of the west line of Maryland. Lord Dunmore, how- ever, scouted this claim, and insisted that it would be difficult to ascertain such a line with mathematical exactness, and that the western boundary of Pennsylvania should be a meridian line run south from the end of five degrees of longitude from the Delaware, on the line of forty-two degrees. This claim, on the other hand,. would have thrown the western line of Pennsylvania fifty miles east of Pittsburg.
The foundation of the Mason and Dixon's line was based upon an agreement entered into on the 4th of July, 1760, between Lord Baltimore, of the province of Maryland, and Thomas and Richard Penn, of the province of Pennsylvania, and the three lower coun- ties of Newcastle, Kent, and Sussex on the Delaware-on account of the very long litigations and contests which had subsisted between- these provinces from the year 1683. These parties mutually agreed among other things to appoint, a sufficient number of discreet and proper persons, not more than seven on each side, to be their re- spective commissioners, with full power to the said seven persons ;. or any three or more of them, for the actual running, marking, and
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laying out the said part of the circle (as mentioned in the charter from Charles II. to William Penn), and the said before-mentioned lines. The commissioners were to fix upon their time of commene- ing said line not later than the following October, and proceed with all fairness, candor, and dispatch ; marking said line with stones and posts on both sides, and complete the same before the 25th of De- cember, 1763, so that no disputes may hereafter arise concerning the same.
James Hamilton (Governor), Richard Peters, Rev. Dr. John Ew- ing, William Allen (Chief Justice), William Coleman, Thomas Wil- ling, and Benjamin Chew were appointed commissioners on the part of the Penns.
Horatio Sharpe (Governor), J. Ridout, John Leeds, John Barclay, 1 George Stewart, Dan of St. Thomas Jenifer, and J. Beale Boardley on behalf of Lord Baltimore.
The Board of Commissioners met at New Castle, in November, 1760, and each province selected its own surveyors. The Penn- sylvania surveyors were John Lukens and Archibald McClain. Those of Maryland were John F. A. Priggs and Jonathan Hall.
The commissioners and surveyors agreed that the peninsular lines from Henlopen to the Chesapeake, made under a decree of Lord Hardwicke in 1750, was correct, hence they fixed the court-house at New Castle as the centre of the circle, and the surveyors proceeded on this data to measure and mark the lines. James Veech, Esq., in his history of Mason and Dixon's line, says :-
" Three years were diligently devoted to finding the bearing of the west- ern line of Delaware, so as to make it a tangent to the circle, at the end of a twelve mile radius. The instruments and appliances employed seem to have been those commonly used by surveyors. The proprietors residing in or near London, grew weary of this slow progress, which perhaps they set down to the incompetency of the artists. To this groundless suspicion we owe their supersedure and the introduction of the men Mason and Dixon, who have immortalized their memory in the name of the principal line which had yet to be run."
In August, 1763, Charles Mason and Jeremiah Dixon, of London, England, were selected by Lord Baltimore and the Penns, to com- plete their lines, as per agreement, made on the fourth of July, 1760, and arrived at Philadelphia in November, for that purpose, furnish- ed, says Mr. Veech, with instructions and the most approved instru- ments, among them a four foot zenith sector. They go to work at once, erect an observatory on Cedar Street, Philadelphia, to facili- tate the ascertainment of its latitude, which building they use by January, 1764, and it has been pronounced the first building erected in America for astronomical observations. They then go to New Castle, adopt the radius as measured by their predecessors, and after numerous tracings of the tangent line, adopt also their tangent point, from which they say they could not make the tangent line pass .one inch to the eastward or westward. They therefore cause that
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line and point to be marked, and adjourn to Philadelphia to find its southern limit on Cedar or South Street. This they make to be 39º 56' 29", while the latitude of the State has been marked as 39º 56' 29". They then proceed to extend that latitude sufficiently far to the west to be due north of the tangent point. Thence they measure down south fifteen miles to the latitude of the great due west line, and run its parallel for a short distance. Then they go to the tangent point and run due north to that latitude, and at the point of inter- section, in a deep ravine, near a spring, they cause to be planted the corner-stone, at which begins the celebrated "Mason and Dixon's line."
We shall continue the graphic description of our learned friend James Veech, Esq. Having ascertained the latitude of this line to be 39º 43' 32" (although more accurate observations make it 39º 43' 26"".8, consequently it is a little over nineteen miles south of 40° as now located) they, under instructions, run its parallel to the Sus- quehanna, twenty-three miles; and having verified the latitude there, they return to the tangent point, from which they run the due north line to the fifteen mile corner and that part of the circle which it cuts off to the west, and which by agreement was to go to New Castle County. (This little bow or arc is about a mile and a half long and its middle width one hundred and sixteen feet. From its upper end where the three States join, to the fifteen mile point where the great Mason and Dixon's line begins, is a little over three and a half miles, and from the fifteen mile corner due east to the circle is a little over three-quarters of a mile. This was the only part of the circle which Mason and Dixon run, Lord Baltimore having no con- cern in the residue ; Penn, however, had it run and marked with " four good notches" by Isaac Taylor and Thomas Pierson in 1700-1.) Where it cuts the circle is the corner of three dominions, an im- portant point, and therefore they cause it to be well ascertained and well marked. This brings them to the end of 1764.
They resume their labors in June, 1765. If to extend this parallel did not require so great skill as did the nice adjustments of the other lines and intersections, it summoned its performers to greater endur- ance. A tented army penetrates the forest, but their purposes are peaceful and they move merrily. Besides the surveyors and their assistants, there were chain bearers, rod men, axe men, commission- ers, cooks, and baggage carriers, with numerous servants and labor- ers. By the 27th of October, they come to the North (Cove or Kittatinny) Mountain, ninety-five miles from the Susquehanna, and where the temporary line of 1739 terminated. After taking Captain Shelby with them to its summit to show them the course of the Po- tomac, and point out the Allegheny Mountain, the surveyors and their attendants return to the settlements to pass the winter and to get their appointment renewed.
Early in 1766 they are again at their posts, and by the 4th of June they are on the top of the little Allegheny Mountain; the first
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west of Wills' Creek. They have now carried the line about one hundred and sixty miles from its beginning. The Indians into whose ungranted territory they had deeply penetrated, grow restive and. threatening. They forbid any further advance, and they had to be obeyed. The agents of the proprietors now find that there are other lords of the soil whose favor must be propitiated. The six Indian nations were the lords paramount of the territory yet to be traversed. To obtain their consent to the consummation of the line, the Govern- ors of Pennsylvania and Maryland, in the winter of 1766-7, at an expense of more than £500, procured, under the agency of Sir Wil- liam Johnston, a grand convocation of the tribes of that powerful confederacy. The application was successful, and early in June, 1767, an escort of fourteen warriors, with an interpreter and chief, deputed by the Iroquois council, met the surveyors and their camp at the summit of the great Allegheny to escort them down into the valley of the Ohio, whose tributaries they were soon to cross.
Safety being thus secured, the extension of the line was pushed on vigorously in the summer of 1767. Soon the host of red and white men led by the London surveyors, came to the western limit of Maryland, "the meridian of the first fountain of the Potomac," and why they did not stop there is a mystery, for there their functions terminated. But they pass by it unheeded, because unknown, resolved to reach the utmost limit of Penn's "five degrees of longitude" from the Delaware, for so were they instructed. By the 24th of August they came to the crossing of Braddock's road. The escort now became restless. The Mohawk chief and his nephew leave. The Shawnese and Delaware, tenants of the hunting grounds, begin to grow terrific. On the 27th of September, when encamped on the Monongahela River, two hundred and thirty-three miles from the Delaware River, twenty-six of the laborers desert, and but fifteen axe-men are left. Being so near the goal, the surveyors (for none of the commissioners were with them) evince their courage by coolly sending back to Fort Cumberland for aid, and in the mean time they push on. At length they came to where the line crosses the Warrior branch of the old Catawba war path, at the second crossing of Dunkard Creek, a little west of Mount Morris, in Greene County, and there the Indian escort say to them, " that they were instructed by their chiefs in council, not to let the line be run westward of that path." Their commands are peremptory, and there for fifteen years MASON AND DIXON'S LINE IS STAYED.
Mason and Dixon, with their pack-horse train and attendants, return to the east without molestation and report to the commis- sioners, who approved their conduct, and on the 27th of December, 1767, grant to them an honorable discharge, and agreed to pay them an additional price for a map or plan of their work.
The commissioners caused stones to be erected upon the lines and at the corners and intersections around and near the three counties
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of Delaware. On the 9th day of November, 1768, they made their final report to the proprietors.
It would be well to remark that along the line and at the end of every fifth mile, a stone was planted on which were graven the arms of the proprietors on the side facing their possessions respectively, while the intermediate miles were noted by a stone bearing the initials of the respective State thereon. The line opened was of the breadth of twenty-four feet, made by felling all the large trees, which were left to rot upon the ground ; the stones were crected along the middle of this pathway.
The instruments used by Mason and Dixon were an ordinary surveyor's compass to find their bearings generally, a quadrant, and the four feet zenith seetor, for absolute accuracy, and which enabled them to be guided by the unerring luminaries of the heavens.
The measurements were made with a four pole chain of one hun- dred links each, except that on hills and mountains, one of two poles and sometimes a one pole measure was used. These were frequent- ly tested by a statute chain carried along for that purpose. Great care was enjoined as to the plumbings on uneven ground, and so far as they have been since tested, the measurements seem to have been very true.
The width of a degree of longitude varies according to the lati- tude it traverses, expanding towards the equator, and contracting towards the pole. In the latitude of our line, Mason and Dixon computed it at fifty-three miles and one hundred and sixty-seven and one-tenth perches. They consequently made Penn's five degrees of longitude from the Delaware, to be two hundred and sixty-seven miles and one hundred and ninety-five and one-sixteenth perches. To their stopping place at the war-path on Dunkard, they say was two hundred and forty-four miles, one hundred and thirteen perches and seven and one fourth feet. Hence they left, as they computed it, twenty-three miles and eighty-three perches to be run. It was sub- sequently ascertained that this was about a mile and a half too much. as the surveyors of 1784 made it two hundred and sixty-six miles, ninety-nine and one-fifth perches.
After a long controversy with Virginia, which we have narrated in the preceding chapter, and up to September 4, 1783, and after the erection of Washington County, Pennsylvania, the General Assem- bly resolved that as many of the objections which have hitherto prevented the determination of the boundary line are now removed, it becomes necessary to close that business with all possible accuracy and dispatch, whereupon Pennsylvania and Virginia therefore ap- pointed the Rev. Dr. John Ewing, David Rittenhouse, John Lukens, and Thomas Hutchins, on behalf of Pennsylvania, while Virginia appointed Right Reverend James Madison, Bishop of Virginia, Rev. Robert Andrews, John Page, and Andrew Elliott, of Mary- land, their respective commissioners, to provide the necessary instru- ments and make all necessary preparations for running the line.
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