USA > Pennsylvania > Pennsylvania, colonial and federal : a history, 1608-1903, Volume One > Part 27
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43
Charging Logan with an unauthorized entry upon his min- utes as secretary of the Council, Keith removed Logan from that office. Logan was mayor of Philadelphia in 1723, and at the close of his term, went abroad to consult with Hannah Penn, and, sug- gesting to tie Keith's hands rather than remove him, obtained instructions from her to Keith to reinstate Logan as secretary,
1-24
369
Pennsylvania Colonial and Federal
and, as has been said, "to be ruled by him." The Lieutenant-Gov- ernor was to obey the Council in his messages and speeches to the Assembly and in his legislative acts. Highly indignant, and feel- ing safe in his tenure of office-because, at that time, no branch of the family could confer on a new Lieutenant-Governor an undis- puted commission-Keith refused to be trammelled. He sent Hannah Penn a reply, reminding her how the Council, in Evans's time, had unanimously decided that a clause in the Lieutenant- Governor's commission. forbidding him to pass any law without the consent of the Proprietary, was void, the charter vesting leg- islation in the acting Governor and Assembly; if, therefore, the Proprietary could not exercise control directly, he could not do so by means of a Council not recognized by the fundamental law. Keith also contended that he had a right to appoint a clerk of his Council in whom he had confidence, and he declined to reappoint Logan. More than this, Keith, to make a party for himself, vio- lated his confidential relations with the Penns by communicating to the Assembly both the instructions and his reasons for disre- garding them. He received the thanks of the House, David Lloyd appearing as his strong supporter; and there followed a pamphlet, or broadside, war concerning the Assembly's powers; meanwhile, the Penns abroad resolved upon Keith's removal. For a time, Keith seemed able to have wrested the government from them; but as rumors reached the colony of the appointment of a successor, the Assembly deserted him.
William Penn Jr. having died in 1720, his heir was his son, Springett Penn.
Patrick Gordon, major in the army, then in the 62d year of his age, arrived in June, 1726, with a commission from Springett Penn, in which Hannah Penn concurred, and which the Crown confirmed. Pursuant to instructions, Gordon in a few days re- stored Logan to the secretaryship. Keith, who had a country seat in Horsham township (now in Montgomery county), then in Philadelphia county, which was afterwards known as Græme
370
Claim of the Heir-at-Law
Park, was chosen a member of the Assembly that fall, and can- vassed for the speakership, but David Lloyd allowed himself to be the candidate of Keith's enemies, and was elected, Sir William getting only three votes. Sir William was reelected to the Assem- bly in 1727, but before his term was out, after much talk about the abolition of all proprietary governments, and boldly declar- ing it his object to force the Penn family to sell the government to the Crown, whence he expected to be reappointed, he suddenly left the colony to avoid his private creditors. He passed the rest of. his life in Great Britain, some of it in the debtor's prison, wrote many essays, and suggested the imposition on Americans of stamp duties by act of parliament, to provide a military force for the defense of the colonies. As a means of livelihood, he designed writing a history of the various colonies, but published one of Vir- ginia only. He died in the Old Bailey in 1749. His wife, in con- siderable want, died in Philadelphia in 1741, and was buried in Christ Church yard.
At the accession of Gordon, who served until his death, there was a flourishing iron industry, great quantities of hemp were grown, and silk was raised "as fine and good," he was credibly in- formed, "as most of the world affords." To that means of employ- ing "even the mean and weak" he urged the representatives of the people, about three years later, when, from competition by the cheaper labor of Russia, the English market for American iron was impaired. In 1729 the exchange between the paper money of the province and sterling was about 50 per cent. The Assembly, in addressing the Proprietaries, agreed unanimously to declare that as the quit rents were to be paid in English money or the value thereof in coin current, it must always be understood that an Eng- lish shilling, the common quit rent for 100 acres, could only be discharged by such a shilling or its real value in the coin then passing. Under this straightforward and respectable official, pol- itics became tranquil. He agreed to more than one act to issue paper money, some of which was applied to the building of the
371
Pennsylvania Colonial and Federal
State House in Philadelphia, finished about 1734, largely under the direction of Andrew Hamilton, member and long Speaker of the Assembly and Attorney-General. Hamilton's design was adopted in preference to that of Dr. John Kearsley, who was instrumental in the building of Christ Church, started some years before. Hamilton, who is not known to have been a relation or connection, but only a friend, of the former Lieutenant-Governor of the same name, was the great lawyer of the province at this time, and was long celebrated for his defense of the liberty of the press in the person of the printer Zenger, tried for libel in New York in 1735. Gordon also agreed to an act for the purpose, long contended for, of enabling religious societies of Protestants to purchase land for burying grounds, churches, houses of worship, schools, etc., which confirmed the trusts for such religious socie- ties as should, on June 1, 1730, have been in possession for twen- ty-one years. At his suggestion Ferdinand John Paris was ap- pointed the province's agent in London, chiefly for securing the King's allowance of the laws.
About 1729 a large number of the Shawanees left their settle- ment on the west side of the Susquehanna. near Paxtang. or Pax- ton, and moved to the Allegheny, then called the Ohio, where they had more room to rove, but where, unhappily, they were accessible to the French.
Lancaster county was set apart from Chester in 1729, and per- mitted to elect four members of the Assembly. Richard Hill died in 1730, and David Lloyd, after being Chief Justice a number of years, in 1731. For some years afterwards there was no lawyer on the supreme bench. Isaac Norris declining the chief justice- ship, Logan held it from Lloyd's death until 1739, although between Lieutenant-Governor Gordon's death and Lieutenant- Governor Thomas's arrival, the second and third justices, Jere- miah Langhorne and Dr. Thomas Græme, held the sessions.
In Gordon's time the Penn family adjusted the differences between the branches. Young Dennis Penn having died at the
372
Claim of the Heir-at-Law
close of 1722, Hannah Penn made another deed of appointment January 7, 1725, giving 500 acres, in addition to some charges on John's share, to her daughter Margaret, and one-half of the pro- prietary rights to John in fee, and the other half to Thomas and Richard jointly in fee. The widow of the first Proprietary died on December 20 following the commissioning of Gordon. In July of the next year a decree was obtained in the Court of Ex- chequer confirming William Penn's will. The mortgage of 1708 was gradually paid off ; by April, 1724, only one-fourth remained due; on January 14, 1729, it was finally released, as paid in full. Springett Penn died February 8, 1731, leaving as his heir his brother William, the ancestor of the Penn-Gaskell and Hall families now ( 1903) extant. This William, with his mother and sister and aunt, uniting the entire claim of the descendants of the first Proprietary by his first wife, granted and released in fee the soil, except particular properties, and the government to John Penn, Thomas Penn, and Richard Penn, John taking one-half, according to his mother's appointment, Thomas taking one-fourth, and John and Thomas taking Richard's one-fourth in trust for him. The release was dated September 23, 1731, and the con- sideration to William was £5,500, and Earl Powlett, surviving trustee to sell the government, was directed to convey his legal title to the new Proprietaries. The cloud on the title was removed by a deed of the earl's son and successor in 1743.
373
-
CHAPTER XII.
THE TIME OF JOHN PENN "THE AMERICAN"
J OHN PENN, the eldest son of the founder of Pennsylvania by his second wife, Hannah Callowhill, has been called "the American," because he alone of all the Penn family, except possibly some child of his nephew Richard, was born in the New World. He was born in the "slate-roof house" in Second street (covered by the present Corn Exchange), Philadelphia, on Jan. 29, 1699-1700. For fifteen years, counting from the release executed by his step-nephew, he was recognized as the head of the Govern- ors-in-chief of Pennsylvania, being older than his colleagues, Thomas and Richard, and having twice as much interest as either of them in the property. Before the more active brother, Thomas Penn, made his visit to Pennsylvania, an agreement was entered into by the three Proprietaries to preserve the estate to their heirs male. They covenanted, by articles dated May 8, 1732, that on the death of any one of them leaving male issue under age, the survivors could sell land during the minority, and that none of the three would dispose of his share, except to create charges upon it, otherwise than to his eldest son in tail male, with remainder to his other sons successively in order of birth in tail male, and if any of the three should die without male issue, his estate, subject to charges, should go to the survivors, as he might appoint. At this time only Richard was married, his wife being Hannah, daughter of John Lardner, a physician; and only one son had yet appeared to gratify the desire for establishing a family. In less than fifty
374
John Penn the American
years the lordship over Pennsylvania was gone; and the name died out with the last breath of a lunatic clergyman in 1869.
Thomas Penn arrived at Chester, Pa., on August II, 1732, and the next day Gordon and all his councillors who could stand the trip, and a large number of gentlemen, went down to meet him. After dinner they escorted him to Philadelphia, the members of the city corporation meeting him with a congratulatory speech by the recorder. Thomas Penn brought from England six japanned and gilt guns for the respective chiefs of the Six Nations, pre- senting them at a treaty held in the month he arrived, when the Six Nations were asked to take the Shawanees under their protection, and induce them to return from the Ohio. He gave another gun to the Shawanee chief, who came to renew friendship in October, but announced that those on the Ohio would stay where they were. Thomas Penn took precedence at the council board over the Lieu- tenant-Governor, but left the administration of the government to the latter, concerning himself chiefly with the care of property, including Indian affairs. In the course of time he established him- self in a manor house on what was left of the old manor of Spring- ettsbury in the Northern Liberties of Philadelphia. In 1734 John Penn came to the country of his birth, but remained only a year, and the Assembly made him an address, September 20, 1735, in anticipation of his departure, saying: "That humility, justice, and benevolence which has appeared in thy conduct since thy arri- val here has very deservedly gained thee the esteem and affection of the people."
Pennsylvania began to be the field for missionary labors like Whitefield's, and the scene of various religious movements like that of the New Side among Presbyterians, etc. The Schwenkfelders arrived in Philadelphia from Bethelsdorf and Goerlitz in the fall of 1734, settling in Bucks and Philadelphia counties. With them was the first Moravian evangelist who came to America, George Böhnisch, sent by Count Ludwig Zinzendorf, who himself, after several colonists belonging to that Unitas had arrived, spent a
375
Pennsylvania Colonial and Federal
short time here in 1742 and 1743. The settlement of Bethlehem was begun in 1742.
During Gordon's time only two cases, and those by consent of the parties, had been brought to a decree before the Court of Chancery, but in 1735 the people, at the instigation it was said of Hamilton, were stirred up against it, as requiring heavy fees and attendance of persons in Philadelphia, and as making the Proprie- taries' deputy and friends in the Council possible judges of cases in which the Proprietaries might be a party ; whereas the charter of 1701 had stipulated that no person should be obliged to answer in any matter relating to property before the Governor and Coun- cil. or in any other place but in the ordinary courts of justice, un- less appeals thereunto should be appointed by law. So the As- sembly. during that winter, resolved that the court as then con- stituted was contrary to the charter. During an adjournment, leaving a bill for a court of equity undisposed of, Patrick Gordon (lied. August 5, 1736, and was buried the next day in Christ Church, near his wife, who had died less than two years before.
The Council succeeded to the Lieutenant-Governor's powers, except those of legislation, Logan, on account of his lameness and residence out of town at Stenton ( Twenty-second Ward, Philadel- phia), offering to decline his share as eldest councillor if the other members should think of some one of themselves more proper, but they requested that he would act as President. In October, 1736, a larger number of Indians than had ever before appeared at a treaty-Senecas, Onondagas, Cayugas, Oneidas, and Tusca- roras-after being entertained three nights at Stenton, held a treaty in the great meeting house at Fifth and Arch streets, with Thomas Penn and the Council, and reported that they had made alliance with six other nations, who now acknowledged them as elder brothers. Then a sale was made to the Proprietaries of all right to the land embraced in the present counties of York, Adams, and Cumberland, and in that part of Franklin, Dauphin, and Leba- non southeast of the Kittatinny, or Blue, Mountains, and in that
376
John Penn the American
part of Berks, Lehigh, and Northampton not already possessed. The goods which served as a consideration for so much of the pur- chase as lay east of the Susquehanna were delivered at the time, but those for the land on the other side of the river were retained at the Indians' desire, and were finally delivered in 1742. This purchase as to the lands of the Delawares and other tributaries of the Six Nations was rather in the nature of the release of a feudal
1
Ralston or Brown Fort, Northampton County
Built about 1755. From a sketch made espe- cially for this work
lordship, concomitant with the buying out of the vassal's interest. Although the Six Nations said the Delawares had no lands to sell, the Proprietaries depended for quiet enjoyment upon the old deeds from these earlier owners. Among them, apparently, was one made in 1686, of which Thomas Penn had found a copy calling for a dimension "as far as a man can go in a day and a half" and thence to the river and down the courses thereof. In anticipa- tion of completing the lines, the Proprietaries' agents hunted out the fastest woodsmen, to make the day and a half's journey, and had them as a preliminary taken over the ground, spending nine
377
Pennsylvania Colonial and Federal
days while the trees were duly blazed. Some Indians did not wish the line measured, but others had a treaty with Thomas Penn on August 25. 1737, and agreed that it should be by a walk, for which, as we see, he was prepared. On September 12, in presence of some Indians and some whites on horseback, three young men started at sunrise from the line near the Wrightstown Meeting House in Bucks County to walk northwestwardly, and proceeded at such a pace that one gave out in a few hours, never afterwards recovering his health. The other two by nightfall reached the north side of the Blue Mountains. At sunrise they resumed. One of them fell into a creek, was taken up blind, and died in three days. The last at noon threw himself at full length on the ground and grasped a sapling, which was then declared to mark the distance called for by the purchase, viz. : how far a man could go in a day and a half. Yet Scull, the surveyor-general in 1757, swore that he, with Eastburn, the surveyor-general at the time, was present, and the men did not run, but walked fairly. Those who defended the transaction rather scoffed at the notion of the Indians that the journey was to be made naturally, taking a shot at game, or sitting down to smoke a pipe. Let the reader say whether sixty miles is the distance a man can go on foot in a day and a half? That one man out of three did it, and lived, was the evidence for the side of a triangle of which the northern point was between the present towns of Milford and Shohola in Pike county. Other objections were made by the Indians in 1757, viz. : that the original deed was fictitious, that the walk should have been along the Delaware river, and that, even if the walk was in the right direction, and not too long, then the line from it should not have been at right angles to it, but to the near- est point of the river. These objections, however, were held to be groundless, but there seems to have been another, which probably was sufficient to reprobate this long notorious "Walking Pur- chase;" the chiefs who could dispose of a reasonable distance around Wrightstown had no ownership across the Lehigh.
378
John Penn the American
Perhaps it would have been better for the United States of America if Lord Baltimore's largest claim had been acceded to by the Crown of England; in other words if, instead of the small strip now called Delaware being independent of the circumscribed region finally allowed to Maryland, there had been one large col- ony, eventually a state, extending from Virginia to the 40th par- allel of latitude and from Delaware bay and river to the longi- tude of the head of the Potomac. In the Colonial and Revolu- tionary period, Delaware afforded another set of offices for Penn- sylvania's public men; afterwards it was in political sympathy with Maryland. On American principles, neither of the adjoin- ing States should have had the additional votes in the United
States Senate. Had the 40th parallel been Pennsylvania's south- ern boundary, and so the greater part of the land covered by Philidelphia county, nearly all that of Delaware, and half that of the counties of Chester, Lancaster and York, etc., been given to Maryland; yes, and even at the same time had the claim of Con- necticut over the region north of the 4Ist parallel been allowed, there still would have been sufficient land for the descendants of Admiral Penn to satisfy his pecuniary claim against the British government, and as a reward for his naval victories, and the more hemmed in the Quaker colony, and the stronger that of Maryland, the less would the non-resistant population of the former have been harassed to take measures for defence. But Philadelphia would have been where Pennsbury was. Charles II and his brother James believed that the grant by "the Royal Martyr," their father, to Cecilius Calvert, had not operated upon that coun- try which the Dutch were occupying when they surrendered New York and its dependencies ; and this was the important question in the mind of every Lord Baltimore, for, while it left him a con- tention as to how far south that occupation extended, yet, if the view of these monarchs was correct, there was no room for him on the Delaware river. As to the back country, James II gave him "to the 40th degree," making an order in Council Nov. 13.
379
Pennsylvania Colonial and Federal
1685. upon report to that effect of the Lords of Committee for Trade and Plantations, that the Peninsula between Delaware and Chesapeake Bay be divided equally by a line extending north- wardly to the 40th degree, and all west of it be adjudged to Lord Baltimore, and all east of it to the King. Penn having appeared before the Council as the King's agent, it was claimed afterwards
George Croghan
Indian trader; settled near the site of Harris- burg as early as 1746; captain in Braddock's expedition 1755; settled near Pittsburgh after the French evacuation; became a large land owner, and subsequently took a prominent part in public affairs. Photographed especially for this work from a print in posession of Dr. W. J. Holland
that James's intention was to take the land east of the line in trust for the confirmation of his deeds when Duke of York to Penn ; but no patent followed. The Proprietary of Pennsylvania, with no muniment of title to the Lower Counties except the deeds of 1682, conveying the Duke of York's rights, royalty, etc., along with the soil thereof, was recognized by William and Mary as having the government of those territories as well as of the Province up the river ; but Lord Baltimore several times tried to have the order of 1685 rescinded, and every time the Proprietary of Pennsylvania applied for the confirmation of his appointment
380
John Penn the American
of a Lieutenant-Governor, a declaration was made that such con- firmation as to the Territories, or Lower Counties, should not be construed as establishing any right thereto in the applicant. and the order of approval was often made to read "and of said three Counties of New Castle, Kent and Sussex during His Majesty's royal will and pleasure only." After Gordon was approved of, Lord Baltimore on one side and the Earl of Sunderland on the other, made application for a royal grant of the government. The terms of the decree of 1685. recognized Penn's title to the soil at least of the Lower Counties, and to the soil and government of what is now Delaware county and the lower part of Philadelphia county. As to the back country, if the line of the Maryland patent ran to the 40th parallel of latitude, the northeastern cor- ner of that colony and state would have been fixed by accurate mathematicians at a point northeast of the present Coatesville, so that York, Hanover, Gettysburg, Chambersburg, McConnells- burg, etc., would never have been Pennsylvania towns. But con-
trary to what we would suppose, the expression "the fortieth de- gree" appears to have meant the beginning of that degree, in other words, the 39th parallel. Evidently the officials of King Charles II. so understood it, for they passed the charter to Penn calling for the beginning of the 40th degree as his southern boundary, meaning that that was the northern boundary of Mary- land. So when Penn received also his feoffment from the Duke of York he had a title to the northern part of Delaware with the pres- ent Maryland counties of Cecil, Harford, etc., while Lord Balti- more's charter included Lewes and the adjoining country as far up as a few miles above the mouth of Mispillion Creek. Yet it will be seen on a modern map that the 39th parallel, which runs about three miles north of Annapolis, would have cut off Mary- land from any land at the headwaters of the Potomac. The third Lord Baltimore ran a line from the Susquehanna at the mouth of Octoraro Creek in rather a northeasterly direction towards the Delaware; but about the time of William Penn's death. Mary-
381
Pennsylvania Colonial and Federal
landers, with the 40th parallel in mind, began creeping up the west side of the river; and in 1729 Thomas Cresap established himself at Conejohela on land from which two years before the settlers under Pennsylvania had been withdrawn at the request of the Conestoga Indians. The exact location of the 40th par- allel, like every other question of boundary, was so uncertain that he and his companions could claim alternate allegiance, as the au- thority of either Province was about to be exercised over them; so they burned Indian cabins, destroyed the Indians' goods and took away their guns, and killed the horses of the traders. On May 10, 1732, Charles, fifth Lord Baltimore, executed an agree- ment with John, Thomas, and Richard Penn, joining William Penn the heir-at-law, that the boundary line should be run by commissioners from each side as follows : starting from the mid- dle point of a line due west from Cape Henlopen to Chesapeake bay, the line should run until as a tangent it touched the peri- phery of a circle drawn at twelve miles distance from New Castle, thence due north until it came to the latitude of fifteen miles due south of the southernmost point of the city of Philadelphia, i. e., of the point where the southerly line of South street strikes the river Delaware, and from the junction of that line and that lati- tude, as the northeast corner of Maryland, a line should be run due west to the extent of Pennsylvania, but for the present 25 miles west of the Susquehanna should suffice. Baltimore's commis- sioners interposed every pretence to prevent the running of the line according to its plain meaning, and yet to relieve him from paying the £5,000 stipulated in the agreement to be forfeited by the party failing to carry it out. Lord Baltimore alleged that after arriving in Maryland in November, 1732, after the joint commissioners had begun their fruitless parleys, he found out that he had been deceived by false maps into an agreement which was wholly one-sided, in which, finally surrendering New Castle, Kent, and Sussex, he had agreed to a limit on the north which took from him about 2,500,000 acres south of the 40th parallel.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.