History of York County, Pennsylvania : from the earliest period to the present time, divided into general, special, township and borough histories, with a biographical department appended, Part 9

Author: Gibson, John, Editor
Publication date: 1886
Publisher: F.A. Battey Publishing Co., Chicago
Number of Pages: 1104

USA > Pennsylvania > York County > History of York County, Pennsylvania : from the earliest period to the present time, divided into general, special, township and borough histories, with a biographical department appended > Part 9

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It was at the time of William Penn's sec- ond visit to the province, and after his resto- ration to the government of it in 1693, that the purchase through Gov. Dougan, of New York, was effected from the Indians.

This was done in 1696. After the proprieta- ry's return home, the treachery of a trusted friend of his own sect threw him into finan- cial embarrassments, occasioned his impris- onment and the rest of his life was a series of trials and sufferings, mental and physical, until his death, in 1718. His eldest son, by his first wife, died a year or two after his father, leaving a son, Springet Penn. This grandson was the heir at law. The grand- father, however, had made a will by which the government of the province was devised in trust to dispose of to the crown or other- wise. The soil, rents or other profits of Pennsylvania he beqneathed to trustees, to lay out 40,000 acres for Guli Springet's descendants (his first wife's family), and to sell as much land as would pay of the whole of his debts, and then divide the re- mainder among the children of his second wife, with a pension to his widow out of the profits, making his wife sole executrix. The rights of the devisees were disputed and a tedious suit in the Exchequer Court resulted. He had made his will six years before his death, and after it was made, he had agreed to sell the province to the crown and had re- ceived a part of the money. Before the making of his will he had mortgaged the province to secure some borrowed money, with power to sell. This mortgage was un- satisfied at the time of his death.

It will be remembered that, at this time. (1723) the intention of Gov. Calvert, communi- cated to Gov. Keith, was to take an observation on the west side of the Susquehanna to as- certain the fortieth degree of northerly lati- tude from the equinoctial. Thus commenced the troubles regarding the boundary line under the claim of Lord Baltimore to the lands west of the Susquehanna, and which, if sustained, to the fortieth degree of lati- tude, would have placed the territory we now occupy in the State of Maryland. It will be remembered, too, that Gov. Keith, in his letter to Gov. Calvert, objects to the ex- tension of the northern boundary of Mary- land beyond the Octararoe line, established above forty years before. With regard to this, Gov. Gordon made subsequently the following statement: "King Charles the First, granted to Lord Baltimore the province of Maryland, extending northward to the fortieth degree of northern latitude, in the manner expressed in his patent, at a time when the true latitude of those parts was not well understood, but it can be incontest- ably made to appear that the grantee him- self claimed by his grant no higher than the head of Chesapeake Bay. In the year 1680,

*Hildreth.

+Hist. of Maryland.

HISTORY OF YORK COUNTY.

Charles II granted to Mr. Penn, the province of Pensylvania, bounded southward by a cir- cle of twelve miles round Newcastle and to the westward of that circle by the same fortieth degree. Mr. Penn, coming over in 1682 with great numbers of people to settle this province, the then Lord Baltimore, son to the first grantee, being at the same time in Maryland, and willing to fix his northeru boundary, came up not long after, in person, to the mouth of the Octoraroe Creek, on Susquehanna, causing Col. Talbot to begin there and run a line from thence east- ward to Delaware; after this was done he, in 1683, sent the same gentleman, Col. Talbot, at two different times, with two several com- missioners to this government, to demand the possession of all the lands lying on the west side of the Delaware to the southward of that line, leaving both times authentic copies of his commissions, and no further settlement being then made, from that time the mouth of Octoraroe was reputed by the inhabitants of those parts on both sides to give the northern limits of the one and the southern limits of the other province."*

The Maryland encroachments, as they were called by the Pennsylvanians, were founded upon this claim of Lord Baltimore to the ter- ritory wherein he authorized settlements to be made. It does not appear that there were any difficulties between the two provinces, from the city of Philadelphia to the Susque- hanna River. But west of the Susquehanna River Lord Baltimore issued his warrants under his claims to the fortieth parallel of latitude, even pending the litigation between him and the Penns, evidently surmising that the right to it under his grant might be ulti- mately acknowledged.

On the 17th day of February, 1724, there was an agreement made between the right honor- able Charles, Lord Baltimore, proprietor of Maryland, and Hannah Penn, widow and exec- utrix of William Penn, Esq., late proprietor of Pennsylvania, and Joshua Gee and Henry Gouldney, of London, in behalf of them- selves and the rest of the mortgagees of the province of Pennsylvania, as follows: "Whereas there are disputes depending be- tween the respective proprietors of the pro- vinces of Maryland and Pennsylvania touch- ing the limits or boundaries of the said pro- vinces where they are contiguous to each other. And whereas both parties are at this time sincerely inclined to enter into a treaty in order to take such methode as may be ad visable for the final determining of the said controversy, by agreeing upon such lines or

other marks of distinction to be settled as may remain for a perpetual boundary be- tween the two provinces; it is therefore mu- tually agreed . .. . That, avoiding all man- ner of contentions or differences between the inhabitants of the said provinces, no person or persons shall be disturbed or molested in their possessions on either side, nor any lands be surveyed, taken up or granted in either of the said provinces near the boun- daries which have been claimed or pretended to on either side. This agreement to con- tinue for the space of eighteen months from the date hereof, in which time it is hoped the boundaries will be determined and set- tled. And it is mutually agreed on by the said parties, that proclamations be issued out in the said provinces signifying this agree- ment, for the better quieting of the people."* There was litigation as to the proprietorship, and after some years a compromise was effected in the family, and the government of the province fell to John, Thomas and Rich- ard Penn, the surviving sons of the second wife. By a letter of August 17, 1727. from John and Thomas Penn to the trustees, it was announced that the long depending dispute was at last determined with respect to the propriety of the province. The court established the will, but in relation to the powers of government the Barons would not take upon them to decide anything until the Attorney-General should have orders to answer whether his Majesty would be pleased to in- sist upon the performance of the contract made with the late queen, or quit it; but this they had not yet, by all the solicitation they could make, been able to obtain, but hoped to get it against the next term. How. ever, they were now authorized to execute the trust.+ In 1732, after the mortgage debt. and all other claims had been settled, Thomas Penn arrived in this country, and for himself and brothers took possession of the province. In that same year, on the 10th of May, ar. ticles of agreement were made between Charles, Lord Baltimore, proprietary of Maryland, and John, Thomas and Richard Penn, proprietaries of Pennsylvania. Among other things it provided, "that in two calendar months from that date, each party should appoint Commissioners, not more than seven, whereof three or more of each side may act, or mark out the boundaries afore- said, to begin, at the furthest, sometime in October, 1732, and to be completed on or be- fore December 25, 1733, and when so done a plan thereof shall be signed, sealed and

*I Archives, 482.

*III Col. Rec., 232.

+I Penn. Archives, 203.

EUROPEAN TITLE.

delivered by the Commissioners and their principals, and shall be entered in all the public offices in the several provinces and counties, and to recommend to the respective Legislatures to pass an act for perambulating these boundaries, at least once in three years. The party defaulting, to pay the other party on demand 6,000 pounds sterling."

On the 12th of May, John, Thomas and Richard Penn signed a commission directed to Patrick Gordon, Isaac Norris, Samuel Preston, James Logan and Andrew Hamilton, esquires and to James Steel and Robert Charles, gentlemen, appointing them or any three or more of them Commissioners with full power, on the part of the said proprie- taries, for the actual running, marking and laying out the boundary lines, between both the province and territories of Pennsylvania and Maryland, according to the articles of agreement. And an instrument of the same tenor and date was executed by Lord Balti- more, directed to Samuel Ogle, Charles Calvert, Philemon Lloyd, Michael Howard, Richard Bennet, Benjamin Tasker, and Matthew Tilghman Ward, Esquires, appoint- ing them, or any six, five, four or three of them, Commissioners, for the same purposes on the part of the said Charles, Lord Balti- more. At a meeting of the Provincial Coun- cil on the 31st of September, 1732, Thomas Penn, proprietary, being present, Gov. Gordon acquainted the Board that the differ- ences between our honorable proprietary family and the Lord Baltimore, touching the disputed boundaries of their respective gov- ernments, being now happily accommodated, an agreement had been concluded between them, which, by the direction of the pro- prietor, he was now to lay before the Board. That it had been as yet only communicated to the Commissioners, and those gentlemen were in a few days to set out to meet Mr. Ogle, Governor of Maryland, and those named on the part of that government. The mem- bers of the Council expressed their satis- faction and pleasure that the differences and uneasinesses, which had formerly so much disquieted the government, were in so fair a way of being settled, and as execution of the agreement was entrusted to persons of such good abilities it was to be hoped the same would be speedily brought to a happy issue ;* and on the 3d of October, 1732, the Governor notified them that pursuant to an appointment made between the Lieutenant- Governor of Maryland and himself for the meeting of the Commissioners, he was to set out to-morrow for Newtown in Maryland.

The Commissioners respectively appeared at the time and place fixed, but upon some differences of opinion, the boundaries were not made in the time limited. The failure was on the side of Lord Baltimore, who alleged, in respect of the agreement, that he had been deceived in fixing Cape Henlopen twenty-five miles southwesterly of the western cape of Delaware Bay, whereas Cape Hen- lopen is the western cape itself. The Penns affirmed that the western cape is Cape Cor- nelius, and Cape Henlopen some miles south- wardly of it, according to the Dutch maps and descriptions published, about the time when Lord Baltimore obtained his grant. The chart by which the boundaries were given named the cape opposite to Cape May, at the mouth of Delaware Bay, Cape Cornelius, and the point at Fenwick's Island, Cape Henlopen. The charts now transpose that order. Lord Baltimore endeavored to avoid this agreement to settle the boundaries, and the time having expired for completing the articles, Charles, Lord Baltimore, petitioned the King in Coun- cil for relief on the 9th of August, 1734, which was opposed by a counter petition by John, Thomas and Richard Penn on the 9th of December, 1734, and upon references and report thereon, the King on the 16th of May, 1735, ordered the consideration of the report to be adjourned, that the Messrs. Penn might proceed in equity. On the 21st of June, 1735, they exhibited their bill in the court of Chancery of Great Britain against Lord Baltimore, praying that the said articles may be deemed to subsist and be carried into exe- cution, and that any doubts arisen may be cleared by the decree. After tedious delays they obtained a decree on the 15th of May, 1750, for the specific performance of the agreement .*

The opinion of Lord Hardwicke, the great- est of the British Chancellors, puts the merits of the controversy in a clear light. "Lord Chancellor .- I directed this cause to stand over for judgment, not so much from any doubt of what was the justice of the case, as by reason of the nature of it, the great consequence and importance, and the great labor and ability of the argument on both sides; it being for the determination of the right and boundaries of two great prov- incial governments and three counties; of a nature worthy the judicature of a Roman Senate rather than of a single judge-and my consolation is, that if I should err in my judgment, there is a judicature equal in dignity to a Roman Senate that will correct it. The settling and fixing these

*Penns vs. Lord Baltimore, I Vesey's Reports, 441.

*III Col. Rec. 464.

HISTORY OF YORK COUNTY.

boundaries in peace, to prevent the dis- order and mischief which in remote countries, distant from the seat of government, are most likely to happen, and most mischiev- ous. This has subsisted above

seventy years. Though nothing valuable is given on the face of articles as a consideration, the settling boundaries, and peace, and quiet, is a mutual consideration on each side, and in all cases make a con- sideration to support a suit in this court for performance of the agreement for settling the boundaries. It appears that the agreement was originally proposed by the defendant himself ; he himself produced the plan or map afterward annexed to the articles; he himself reduced the heads of it into writing, and was very well assisted in making it; and farther that there was a great length of time taken for consideration and reducing it to form. . The defendant and his ancestors were conversant in this dispute about fifty years before this agree- ment was entered into. . It is insisted the whole fortieth degree of north latitude is included; and if so that it is not to be lim- ited by any recital in the preamble. There is great foundation to say, the computations of latitude at the time of the grant vary much from what they are at present, and that they were set much lower anciently than what they are now. . . . In these countries it has been always taken that that European country which has just set up marks of pos. session, has gained the right though not formed into a regular colony. . . . Next consider the dispute on Penn's charter, which grants to him all that tract of land in America from twelve miles distant from New- castle to the 43rd degree of north latitude. . . . Upon the charter it is clear by the proof that the true situation of Cape Hen- lopen is as it is marked in the plan, and not where Cape Cornelius is, as the defendant insists; which would leave out a great part of what was intended to be included in the grant, and there is a strong evidence of seiz- ure and possession by Penn, of that spot of Cape Henlopen, and all acts of ownership. But the result of all the evidence, taking it in the most favorable light for the defendant, amounts to make the boundaries of these countries and rights of the parties doubtful. Senex, who was a good geographer, says that the degrees of latitude cannot be computed with the exactness of two or three miles, and another geographer says that with the best instrument it is impossible to fix the degrees of latitude without the uncertainty of seven- teen miles, which is near the whole extent

between the capes. . .. . The objection of uncertainty arises principally on the question concerning the circle of twelve miles to be drawn about Newcastle. It was insisted on in the answer and greatly relied on in Ame- rica, but is the clearest part of the cause. As to the centre it is said that Newcastle is a long town, and therefore it not being fixed by the articles, it is impossible that the court can decree it; but there is no difficulty in it; the centre of a circle must be a mathe- matical point (otherwise it is indefinite) and no town can be so. I take all these sorts of expressions and such agreements to imply a negative ; to be a circle at such a dis- tance from Newcastle, and in no part to be further. Then it must be no further dis- tant from any part of Newcastle. Thus, to fix a center, the middle of New- castle, as near as can be computed can be found; and a circle described around that town, which is the fairest way, for otherwise it might be fourteen miles in some parts of it, if it is a long town. Then what must be the extent of the circle? It is given up at the bar, though not in the answer. It cannot be twelve miles distant from Newcastle, unless it has a semi-diame- ter of twelve miles; but there is one argu- ment decisive without entering into nice mathematical questions; the line to be the dividing line, and to be drawn north from Henlopen, was either to be a tangent or inter- secting from that circle, and if the radius was to be of two miles only, it would neither touch nor intersect it, but go wide. There is no difference as to the place or running of the line from south to north, though there is at the cape from which it is to commence. . In America the defendant's com- missioners behaved with great chicane in the point they insisted on, as the want of a center of a circle, and the extent of that circle, viz .: whether a diameter of two or twelve miles; the endeavoring to take advan- tage of one of plaintiffs' commissioners com- ing too late to make the plaintiffs incur the penalty. The defendant has been misled by his commissioners and agents in America, to make their objections his defense." It was ordered "that before the end of three calen- dar months from May 15th, two several proper instruments for appointing commissioners, not more than seven on a side, may run and mark the boundaries, to begin some time in November next, and to be completed on or before the last day of May, 1752."

BORDER TROUBLES.

T THE history of York County, by reason of the disputed proprietary claims, was in- augurated by disturbances which involved its first settlers in serious difficulties. They had settled themselves in one of those unfortunate sections of country known to all history as border land. The persons who came west of the Susquehanna in quest of new homes, as citizens of the province of Pennsylvania, soon found that there were other claimants of the soil upon which they had planted themselves, coming here under the authority of the gov- ernment of the province of Maryland. The broils and riots which followed in the wake of those who had first cleared the forests and sowed their crops on this side of the river, filled the annals of that period with protests and remonstrances, criminations and recriminations, affidavits and counter affida- vits, unparalleled in the archives of any other government. While it is our duty, as Pennsylvanians, to maintain the rights of the founder of this commonwealth, it is equally our duty to examine fairly the grounds upon which his rival proprietor on the south disputed these rights, and made claims of his own. The people who are em- broiled in differences of the character exhib- ited in the documents and traditions of that period, are not, as a general rule, to blame, especially in an age when the sentiment of loyalty to rulers made them regardless of the rights of others, in behalf of those who were/ ready and willing to protect them in their outrages. The blame must rest with those in authority, who could have no cause for encouraging unlawful claims, much less for the assertion of them by violent measures. In all frontier settlements there are fierce and reckless men who are eager to carry out,. by any means, what they conceive to be the will of those in power, of whom they are the partisans. It is a remarkable feature in the details of those early disturbances, in which the interests of the rival proprietaries clashed, that the Governors of each province for the time being apparently believed and relied on the ex parte statements of their partisans on the one side or the other. It is not the Cressaps, and the Higgenbothams, whom we are accustomed to consider as marauders and disturbers of the peace, or the Wrights or Blunstons, whom, on the other hand, we consider the conservators of the peace, but those to whom was committed the government of the respective colonies, and

the welfare of his Majesty's subjects therein, who are properly to be made the subject of animadversion, if they failed to use all the means in their power to restrain the evils existing, or from a spirit of partisanship closed their eyes to the real causes of those evils. The details of these disturbances and the mutual grounds of contention between the proprietaries are too tedious to relate. But a narrative of such incidents as led the respective provincial governments into the bitter controversy, may not be without inter- est to our people; especially to those who dwell in the locality where the occurrences took place. The first complaint as to in- trusions on the west side of the Susquehanna, after the agreement of 1724, appears in a letter from Gov. Gordon to Gov. Calvert, on the 14th of September, 1731:

Gov. Gordon :- I am further creditably informed that some persons of Maryland, having obtained grants of land from your offices, have pretended to lay them out over the river Susquehanna, where our Commissioners would never allow any survey to be made, not only on account of our agreement with the Indians, but also of that made with Maryland. Yet some of your people have pretended to large tracts thereof, which some, 'tis affirmed, lie many miles further north than this city of Philadelphia, and have further had assurance even to offer them to sale to some of our inhabitants, without making, on their parts, any scruple of the situation. 'Tis now some months since I heard the rumor of this, but very lately I have had a much fuller confirma- tion of it.

To which complaint there was the follow- ing reply from the Governor of Marylan:

Gov. Calvert-" As to what you mention of our people taking up lands high up the river Susque- hanna, I shall endeavor to enquire into it as soon as possible, till when I must beg leave to defer any further answer on that head."*

It would appear from this that whatever settlers there were over the river at that period in the territory, now the county of York, were ostensibly there without the knowl- edge or consent of either government. The sequel will not bear this out. The complaint came first from the Indians to the government of Pennsylvania. A letter from Samuel Blunston, of the 3d of October, 1731, con- tains a message from Capt. Civility to Gov. Gordon, that "the Conestogoe Indians had always lived in good friendship with the Christian inhabitants of Pennsylvania, and have behaved themselves agreeable to their treaties with them. That William Penn had promised them they should not be dis- turbed by any settlers on the west side of the Susquehanna, but now, contrary thereto, sev- eral Marylanders are settled by the river on that side, at Conejohela. And one Crissop, particularly, is very abusive to them when

*I Archives, 294.

HISTORY OF YORK COUNTY,

they pass that way. And had beat and wounded one of their women, who went to get apples from their own trees. And took away her apples. And further said, that as they shall always take care their people do us no hurt, so they also expect we shall pro- tect them." * This incident, trivial as it

may seem, introduces and exposes the char- acter of the principal participant, on the side of Maryland, in our border troubles. In this same letter it is said, in a postscript, "that James Logan had said he should be glad if Crissop could be taken," and Mr. Blunston writes, " we have now just cause to appre- hend him for a breach of the law in enter- taining and protecting a bound servant, be- longing to one of our people, and threaten- ing to shoot any person who shall offer to take away said servant. If you think it will be of any service to the government to have him taken, he believed it may be done." According to an affidavit of Thomas Cressap, made by him on the 29th of Janu- ary, 1732, he had lived on the west side of the Susquehanna River since the 10th of March, as tenant of Lord Baltimore, by vir- tue of his Lordship's grant and patent. He was the owner of a ferry opposite a point on the river called Blue Rock. The incident which occasioned his affidavit requires men- tion, because it first drew the governors of the rival provinces into angry controversy. He made oath that one day, about the last of October, he heard the report of three guns at the Blue Rock, the signal usually made by people who want to come over the river. That he and Samuel Chance, who was a laborer with him, went over the river, and that he saw two men and a negro whom he took into his boat. He then details an as- sault upon him, that after a struggle they threw him into the river, out of his depth, and went away with his boat and his ser- vant, and that he was rescued from an island after night by an Indian. He complained to a magistrate in Pennsylvania, Mr. Cornish, against the men, and when he demanded a warrant the magistrate enquired where he lived. He said he was an inhabitant of Maryland, a tenant of Lord Baltimore, upon which the magistrate told him he knew no reason he had to expect any justice there since he was a liver in Maryland. It appears, however, that the magistrate granted Cres- sap his warrant, and that the men were ap- prehended and bound over to court, and were indicted, convicted and fined for the assault. This deposition was sent to the Governor of Maryland, and a full account of the matter

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History of York County, Pennsylvania : from the earliest period to the present time, divided into general, special, township and borough histories, with a biographical department appended, Part 9

Author: Gibson, John, Editor Publication date: 1886 Publisher: F.A. Battey Publishing Co., Chicago Number of Pages: 1104

Author: Gibson, John, Editor
Publication date: 1886
Publisher: F.A. Battey Publishing Co., Chicago
Number of Pages: 1104