USA > Pennsylvania > Bucks County > The history of Bucks County, Pennsylvania : from the discovery of the Delaware to the present time > Part 19
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19 Reverend William C. Reichel, of Bethlehem.
20 Now owned by the estate of Isaac Hogland.
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HISTORY OF BUCKS COUNTY.
years, and the population was fourteen less in 1870 than in 1850. The area is 8,119 acres. There are three churches in this township, the Southampton Baptist church, the Davisville Baptist church, and the Low Dutch Reformed. The first named stands on the Middle road half a mile below Springville ; was founded in 1731, and was the seventh in the province. It had its origin in the small band of Keithian Friends which commenced their meetings at the house of John Swift forty years before. The first pastor was the Reverend John Potts, since whose time nine others have ministered at its desk.21 Several generations of the inhabitants of the surrounding country lie buried in its grave yard. In the rear of the church is the grave of John Watts, one of the preachers to the Keithian band, on whose tombstone is the following quaint inscription :
" Intered here I be O that you could now see, How unto Jesus for to ffee Not in sin still to be. Warning in time pray take And peace by Jesus make Then at the last when you awake Sure on his right hand you'l partake."
Among the pastors there have been some able and eminent men, and in its time the Southampton Baptist church was one of the most influential of that body.
The Davisville Baptist church, an offshoot of Southampton church, was organized March 31st, 1849, at the house of Jesse L. Booz, in that village. It began with thirty-three members, who left the mother church because of a want of harmony. The seceders were accompanied by the pastor, Alfred Earle, who became the first pas- tor of the new organization, with John Potts and Bernard Vanhorne as deacons. A meeting-house thirty-six by forty-five feet was erected at an expense of $1,500, and was first occupied January 1st, 1850. The pastors from that time to the present have been the Reverends Messrs. F. Kent, Charles Cox, James H. Appleton, and William H. Conrad, who was installed September 1st, 1862, with eighty-four members, and thirty-five children in the Sunday school. Since then the church building has been much enlarged and im- proved, and a handsome parsonage erected. There are now about
21 A further account of the Southampton Baptist church will be found in the chapter on "Historical Churches."
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HISTORY OF BUCKS COUNTY.
two hundred members, with nearly as many scholars in the Sunday school. The money collections in 1873, for all purposes, were $1,436.22. The church is one of the most flourishing of the de- nomination in the county, and exercises a wide influence for good in the surrounding neighborhood.
The Low Dutch Reformed 22 congregation of North and South- ampton, whose place of worship is at Churchville, on the Bristol road, is probably the third, if not the second, oldest denominational organization in the county. It was originally called Neshaminy church, or, as it was written in the old Dutch records, " Sammany," and " Shammony." It is not known just when, nor where, the first church was built, but no doubt near the creek that gave its name, and at an early date churches were erected on the Street road in Southampton, at what is now Feasterville, and at Richborough in Northampton. These churches were necessary to accommodate the Holland settlers in these two townships. Reverend Paulus Van Vleck, who was chosen pastor at Bensalem, May 30th, 1710, offici- ated at " Shammony" until he left his charge in 1712. Jan Banch, a Swedish missionary from Stockholm, visited this church in Janu- ary, July, November and December, 1710, and was there again in April, 1711, and January, 1712. At his second visit he baptised a child of Jacob and Catalinda Welfenstein, the witnesses being Van · Vleck, the pastor, his wife Janett, Rachael Coarson, and Stoffel Van Sand, a deacon.
Samuel Hesselius, one of the pastors at Wicacoa, officiated there in 1719 and 1720, and he afterward preached there in connection with Kalkonhook 23 and Matson's ford on the Schuylkill. He was there in 1721, but how much longer is not known. This congre- gation and Bensalem were probably branches of Wicacoa at first, and the people of " Shammony" had the privilege of burying on the north side of the Wicacoa graveyard. At what time it was given the name of the church of North and Southampton is not known, but probably when a church building was erected in each township.
22 This denomination was formerly known as the " Reformed Protestant Dutch church in North America," but the name was changed a few years ago to "The Reformed church in America." It is Presbyterian in government, and Calvinistic in doctrine. It is the oldest branch of the Presbyterian church in America by nearly an hundred years, being planted on these shores in 1610, when the Hollanders settled at Manhattan. In the petition for the organization of Northampton township, December, 1722, this church is called the " Neshaminy meeting-house."
23 Darby creek.
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HISTORY OF BUCKS COUNTY.
After Mr. Hesselius, there is an interregnum of several years, until the pastorate of Reverend Peter Henry Dortius,24 who came about 1730.25 He preached in both Dutch and German, and frequently traveled a considerable distance to preach to destitute German con- gregations. In September, 1740, he baptised several children of the Egypt church, north of Allentown, in Lehigh county. He was called "Herr Inspector," and probably had a commission to inspect the German churches and report their condition to the authorities in Europe. In the latter year of his pastorate he was involved in troubles with his congregation on account of his falling into dissi- pated habits. The Reverend Michael Schlatter,26 the ruling-elder of the Reformed churches in America, was called upon by the pastor to settle the trouble between him and his congregation. He made several visits to "Northampton, in Schameny," as he calls the place, to allay the strife, but was not successful. Dortius left about 1748, and is supposed to have returned to Holland. During the vacancy Mr. Schlatter preached to the congregation once a month on a week day.
The Reverend Jonathan DuBois 27 was called to succeed Mr. Dor- tius, on recommendation of Mr. Schlatter, November 11th, 1752, and installed the next day. He was to receive £50 a year, a house and seventeen acres in Byberry, a saddle horse, and eight Sundays in each year to himself. In the call the elders and deacons style him "your honor." He was to serve the church in each township
24 His wife was Jane, daughter of Dirck Hogeland; they had three children.
25 An authority states that Mr. Dortius was called January 1st, 1744, to receive £40 a year salary in " gold money," house, land, fire-wood, and saddle horse, to preach twice on Sunday in summer and once in winter. Abraham Van de Grift, and Garret Wynkoop were then elders. The year is wrong, probably because the entry was not made until that year. He was pastor there as early as March, 1739, and no doubt the date given in the text is correct.
26 A native of St. Gall, Switzerland, where he was born July 14th, 1716, and came to America in 1746 to inspect the Reformed churches. At one time he was chaplain in the British army, and was imprisoned because he was a patriot in the Revolution. He died between October 22d and November 23d, 1790. Schlatter says that when he landed in New York he received especial proofs of friendship from Father DuBois, who had labored in the ministry with great success more than fifty years.
27 Jonathan DuBois was the son of Barnet DuBois, and both he and his cousin John, son of Louis, were educated for the ministry by voluntary subscription, the father of Jonathan carrying round the subscription paper, which was drawn by David Evans, pastor of the Pillsgrove church, Salem county, New Jersey. John died at New Lon- don in 1745, while pursuing his studies with Doctor Allison. The wife of Jonathan DuBois is said to have been Amy, sister of Reverend Nehemiah Greenman.
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HISTORY OF BUCKS COUNTY.
on Sunday, when the days were long. It is stated in the life of the Reverend Henry M. Muhlenberg, that he visited the remnant of Dutch Lutherans, at Neshaminy, twenty miles from Philadelphia, in 1754. They had been served some time by Mr. Van Doran, who preached to them in a barn. Mr. Muhlenberg visited them every six weeks in the summer, and preached three sermons each Sunday, in Dutch, German and English. He says the Dutch Reformed had a church. The Lutherans were scattered by death, removals, etc. In the distribution of charities from the classes of Amsterdam, in April, 1755, " Mr. DuBois, of Northampton," received £21. 5s., and Mr. Dortius £5. 8s. In 1759 £20 were given to Mr. DuBois. In 1760 the congregation maintained a school of sixty boys. Mr. Du- Bois officiated for this congregation until his death, December 16th, 1772, a period of nearly twenty-two years.
There is no record of a successor to Mr. DuBois, until 1777, when he was succeeded by Reverend William Schenck, who was driven out of New Jersey by the British. He was born in Monmouth county October 13th, 1740, graduated at Princeton 1767, married 1768, and studied theology with Mr. Tennent. He was chaplain in the army for a time. He came to Southampton the 3d of March, 1777, and moved to the parsonage, then the farm now owned by Stephen Rhoads, on the road to Churchville, a quarter of a mile from the Buck tavern, the 24th of April. It is not known how long he staid, but he was at Pittsgrove in 1783, and probably left South- ampton that year or the year before. Mr. Schenck died at Franklin, Ohio, September 1st, 1827,28 where he had settled in 1817. After- ward, in succession, were Reverends Mathias Leydt, who died No- vember 24th, 1783, aged twenty-nine years, Peter Stryker, in 1788, who resigned in 1790, Jacob Larzelere, who came October 13th, 1798, and resigned in 1828, on account of declining years, A. O. Hal-
28 The Schencks trace their ancestry back to Colve De Witte, the founder of the house, a Hollander who was killed in battle with the Danes in 828. Christian, the first of the name, butler to the Count of Gulic, called by him Schenck in 1225, was a younger son of one of the lords of Tontenburg. The name means cup-bearer, butler, or wine-server. We have seen a copy of the hangman's bill of expenses attending the execution of Sir Martin Schenck, in Holland, about 1589. He had some sort of "on- pleasantness" with the powers that be, and to prevent further trouble he was turned over to the public executioner. The cost of putting him and three of his faithful soldiers out of the way was twenty-five guilders and fifteen stivers. It is a quaint old document. The Reverend William descends from Peter Schenck, who came to Long Island in 1650. While Mr. Schenck was at Southampton his son John Noble was born, January 28th, 1778.
14
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HISTORY OF BUCKS COUNTY.
sey, from 1829 to 1867, an able man and minister, who left his mark on the community, William II. DeHart, from 1868 to 1870, and H. M. Vorhees, the present pastor, in October, 1871.
The church was chartered by the legislature September 20th, 1782, the consistory being then composed of Mr. Leydt, president, Gilliam Cornell and Henry Wynkoop, elders, and William Ben- net, Arthur Lefferts and Daniel Hogeland, deacons. The first parsonage was in Byberry, Philadelphia county, but in 1775 the as- sembly authorized the trustees, Henry Krewson, Gilliam Cornell, John Krewson and William Bennet, to sell it and buy a new one. They bought one hundred and twenty acres 29 of the estate of Thomas Harding, deceased, of Southampton, for £805. 16s.
During the pastorate of Mr. Larzelere, the church buildings at the extreme ends of the parish, Richborough and Feasterville, being out of repair, it was resolved to build a new church at a central point. A lot of three acres was bought of John McNair, at Churchville,30 and the corner-stone was laid June 16th, 1814. The original build- ing has been much enlarged and improved within a few years. The old church at Feasterville stood in the graveyard, about on a line with the front wall, was small, old-fashioned, of stone, and was torn down soon after the new edifice was erected. That at Richborough stood just outside the graveyard, about on the site of the present school-house. In the front wall of the old graveyard in South- ampton we find, among others, the following inscriptions : "G. R., 1738,"31 "D. K.,32 1738." The oldest gravestone in the yard that can give an account of itself, bears the inscription, "A. S., 1760." One stone records that Garret Krewson died in 1767, aged eighty-two years. There is a large number of stones that tell no story of those who sleep beneath. Three-quarters of a century ago the minister preached in Dutch and English, Sunday about. The congregation generally spoke Dutch, and the venerable John Lefferts remembers when he learned to speak English of the black cook in the kitchen. The people went to church in ox teams, and the girls without stock- ings in warm weather. On the Street road, a short distance above the site of the old church, is a burial-ground, free to all, and known as Harding's graveyard. The flourishing Reformed Dutch church
29 Farm of Stephen Rhoads on Churchville road, near the Buck tavern.
30 Then called Smoketown.
31 Garret Krewson.
32 Derrick Krewson.
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HISTORY OF BUCKS COUNTY.
at Richborough is the child of the old church of North and South- ampton.
Southampton lies in the south-west corner of the county, adjoin- ing Philadelphia and Montgomery, is six miles long by two wide, in the shape of a parallelogram, except a ragged corner next to Middle- town and Northampton. The upper part is quite level, with occa- sional gentle swells, but more broken and rolling in the middle and lower end. Edge hill crosses the township about its middle. It is well-watered by the Pennypack, Poquessing, Neshaminy, and numer- ous smaller streams. The soil is fertile and well-cultivated, with but little waste land. It is well provided with roads. The Street road runs through the middle the entire length, the county line bounds it on the south-west, and the Bristol road on the north-east, and nu merous cross-roads cut them at nearly right-angles. In 1709 the inhabitants of the township stated to the court that they had no public road to mill, market, or church. In March of that year they petition for a road "from the Queen's road, 33 in Southampton, down to Joseph Growden's mill," and in September they ask the court to open a road "towards the new milla on the Pennypack, which is likely to be our chief market." As late as 1722 the inhabitants complain that they have no regularly established roads. As early as 1699 a road was laid out from the King's highway "to Peter Web- ster's new dwelling."35 The Buck road to the Philadelphia county line was re-laid fifty feet wide in 1790, and the old road vacated in 1797. The road to Churchville, from the Buck, was laid out in 1795, and that from Davisville to Southampton Baptist church in 1814.
The oldest inhabitant of Southampton that we have any account of was a colored woman, named Heston, who died November 15th, 1821, in her one hundred and fifth year, which carries her birth back to 1716 or 1717.
Sarah Bolton, daughter of Isaac, who was an inhabitant of South- ampton a century and a quarter ago, became a minister among Friends, and preached in Byberry in 1752.
Southampton has six villages, all terminating in ville, the Ameri- can weakness-Davisville, at the Warminster line, where a post-office was established in 1827; Southamptonville, at the intersection of the
33 Old Buck road.
& Probably Gwin's mill, below Hatborough.
35 The location of Mr. Webster's new dwelling has been lost in the lapse of time.
A ROAD GOING INTO MUNTG OMERY.
N.W. 668
NAILER'S
NAILORS
PROPRIETARY'S LAND
M
CHARM OGENNARTS LLAND
PROPRIETARY'S LANE
> TOWNSHIF 0
WH ALEENS LAND
P. MILLERS LAND
G.PRICHILLS LAND
€ 3
JONES'SLANK ANDREW LONG'S LAND
HLUCHLAS
J. PAUL'S LAMIN!
BRANCH LAND &
J.COMLEYS LAND
S. GILBERT'S
LAND
NESHAMEL
N. GILBERT'S LAND
INGARTS
CADWALLADER & WILLIAM LAND
GENNANT
ROAD
TORD'S LAND
WARMINSTER
NOBLE'S SCHOUT LAND LAXD
TOWNSHIP
DUNCAN'S LAND
RUSH'S LAND
THE ROADS GRAVEN
SCHOUT'S LAND
LONGOTRETH'S LAND
LONGSTHETH LAND
SOUT HAMTON
WATT'S
LAND
MORRIS'S LAND
BANES'S LIND
PHILADELPHIA LEDANS LAND
FROM
VAN DIKES LAND.
JACKMANS LAND
JUNE'S'S LAND
D. HOUSLAND
MAP OF
AND WARRINGTON. WARMINSTER. SOUTHAMPTON.
TOWNSHIPS.
1734:
ROAD DUFFIELDE LAND
ROAD FROM ABINGTON PLACE OF
BEGINNING
DIERS
COMPANY
213
HISTORY OF BUCKS COUNTY.
CHAPTER XIV.
WARMINSTER.1
-
1703.
The twin of Southampton .- One of the earliest settled .- John Rush .- John Hart .- Bartholomew Longstreth .- Henry Comly .- The Nobles .- Their family mansion. -Noble burying ground .- Cravens .- The Yerkes family .- Thomas B. Montanye. -John Fitch .- Comes to Bucks county .- Mends clocks -- Goes west and re- turns .- Model of steamboat .- Floats it on Arthur Watts's dam .- Cobe Scout .- Vansant graveyard .- Doctor William Bachelor .- The Log college .- Johnsville. -Hartsville .- Schools .- Public inn .- Horse racing .- No grist-mills .- Roads .- African and Indian school .- Earliest enumeration of inhabitants .- Present population .- First post-office .- Hatborough .- John Dawson .- David Reese .- Battle of Crooked Billet.
WARMINSTER is the twin township of Southampton, of which lies immediately north-west and adjoining. The two elected but one constable and overseer for several years, and they were not en- tirely separated in their municipal administration until about 1712. On the three other sides it is bounded by Northampton, Warwick, Warrington, and Montgomery county, from which it is separated by public roads. It has the same limits as when originally laid out, with an area of six thousand and ninety-nine acres.
1 The name is probably a compound of war and minster, both of Saxon origin, the first meaning a fortress, the latter the church of a monastery.
214
HISTORY OF BUCKS COUNTY.
Warminster was one of the earliest townships settled, and judging from Holme's map the greater part of the land was taken up in 1684, generally in large tracts.2 Some of these land-owners were not actual residents of the township at this time, nor afterward. Of these was John Rush, connected with the early Harts by marriage, who settled in Byberry, where he lived and died. He was the an- cestor of all bearing this name in Pennsylvania. He commanded a troop of horse in Cromwell's army, and after the war married Susannah Lucas, of Oxfordshire, in 1648. In 1660 he embraced the principles of the Friends, and in 1682 he immigrated to Pennsyl- vania with his wife and children. Himself and his whole family became Keithians in 1691, and in 1697 they joined the Baptists. John Rush died in 1699. He owned five hundred acres in Byberry, and the same quantity in Warminster.
John Hart and John Rush were probably neighbors in England, both coming from Oxfordshire, where Mr. Hart was born, at the town of Whitney, November 16th, 1651. Whitney is situated on the Windrush river, five miles above its junction with the Isis, twenty-nine miles from Oxford. There was a town there at the time of the ancient Britains, and the populution is now 3,000. The church dates back to the twelfth century, and is one of the hand- somest of its class in England. For several centuries it has been the seat of extensive blanket manufactories. Mr. Hart came to Pennsylvania in the latter part of the summer, or early fall, of 1682, preceding William Penn a couple of months. The 11th of October, 1681, he purchased one thousand acres of the Proprietary for the consideration of £20, and on his arrival he located five hundred acres in Byberry, and the same quantity in Warminster.3 He settled on the banks of the Poquessing, and in 1683 married Susannah, the daughter of his friend John Rush. Mr. Hart was a distinguished minister among Friends, but went off with George Keith, and sub- sequently became a Baptist. He preached to a small congregation at John Swift's, in Southampton, where he laid the foundation of the Southampton Baptist church. About 1695 Mr. Hart removed from Byberry to his tract in Warminster between the Bristol and Street roads, adjoining Johnsville, where he lived the rest of his
2 Landholders in 1684: William and Mary Bingley, John Rush, sr., John Hart, Nathaniel Allen, George Randall, James Potter, John Jones, Henry Comly, Sarah Woolman, Henry English, and Abel Noble.
3 Return of survey is dated May 2d, 1709.
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HISTORY OF BUCKS COUNTY.
life, and died in 1714. Proud says he was a man "of rank, charac- ter, and reputation, and a great preacher." His eldest son, John Hart, married Eleanor Crispin, of Byberry, in 1708. On the ma- ternal side she was a granddaughter of Thomas Holme, surveyor- general of the province, while her paternal grandfather was William Crispin, a captain under Cromwell, an officer of the fleet of Admiral Penn, his brother-in-law, and the first appointed surveyor-general of the province, but did not live to arrive. John Hart's wife was descended, on the maternal side, from a sister of William Penn's mother. John and Eleanor Hart had a family of ten children, whose descendants now number thousands, and are found in all the states south and west of Pennsylvania. Two of their sons reached positions of distinction, Oliver, who studied theology with William Tennent, of Freehold, New Jersey, and became a famous Baptist minister in South Carolina, and Joseph, of Warminster township, a patriot and officer of the Revolutionary army, who filled many important places in civil life. The committee of safety of South Carolina appointed Oliver Hart, in conjunction with Reverend William Tennent, and Honorable William Drayton, to visit the western part of the state, to try and reconcile the inhabitants to the new order of things. A descendant of John Hart, Samuel Preston Moore, of Richmond, Virginia, was surgeon-general of the Confederate army during the late civil war, and his brother, Stephen West Moore, a graduate of West Point, was inspector-general of Louisiana. They were both officers of the United States army before the war. The Hart home- stead, in Warminster, remained in the family an hundred and seventy years, descending from father to son. John Hart, the elder, was one of the first men of this state to write and publish a book. While living in Byberry, in 1692, he and Thomas Budd published an "Essay on the subject of oaths." We have never seen a copy of this work, and do not know that one is in existence. The Hart tract is now owned by Thomas L. Wynkoop, Margaret Twining, Charles Kirk, Isaac Hobensack, and others.+ Bingley's tract lay in the south-east corner of the township, adjoining John Hart, and contained five hundred acres. It probably extended south-west of the Street road.
Bartholomew Longstreth, a Friend, son of Christopher, born in Longstroth Dale, Yorkshire, England, 1679, immigrated to Penn- sylvania in 1698. The first £400 he saved, he lost in a venture to
4 The author is a descendant of John Hart on the maternal side.
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HISTORY OF BUCKS COUNTY.
the West Indies. In the course of time he purchased three hundred acres on Edge hill, which he began to improve, but soon sold it, with the intention of returning to England. Changing his mind he purchased five hundred acres of Thomas Fairman, in Warminster, for £175, and came into the township to live in 1710. This tract lay in the square bounded by the Bristol, Street, southern line of township, and the Johnsville roads. He added to his acres until at his death he owned one thousand. He immediately built a log house on his tract. In 1727 he married Ann Dawson, of Hat- borough, then the Crooked Billet, and after leading a useful and active life he died suddenly, August 8th, 1749, and was buried at Horsham. His widow married Robert Tompkins, of Warrington, who both ill-used her and wasted her fortune. She died in 1783. Bartholomew Longstreth had eleven children, and at his death left the homestead farm to Daniel, the eldest son living, who was born in 1732. He occupied his father's place in society, and was twice married : to Grace Michener, of Moreland, 5th month, 22d, 1753, who died 4th month, 16th, 1775, and then to Martha Bye, of Buck- ingham, 2d month, 2d, 1779. He had nine children by his first wife, and died in 1803. His son Joseph, born in 1765, inherited the homestead, but learned the hatting business, which he followed several years at Hatborough. He married Sarah Thomas in 1797, had six children, and died in the house where he was born, in 1840. Daniel, the eldest son of Joseph Longstreth, born in 1800 and died in 1846, was a man of intelligence and culture, and a useful citizen. He was twice married : to Elizabeth Lancaster, of Philadelphia, in 1827, and to Hannah Townsend in 1832, and was the father of nine children. In 1840 he opened a boarding-school in his house at Warminster, which he conducted with success for several years. He devoted considerable of his time to surveying and conveyancing, and died in the home of his ancestors March 30th, 1846. Of his five living children, four, John, Samuel, Edward, and Anna reside in Philadelphia. The old homestead was owned by five generations of Longstreths, and only passed out of the family a few years ago. The house was built at three different times, the middle part by Bartholomew, in 1713, the east end by his son Daniel, in 1750, and the west end by the same in 1766. It was built by Philadel- phia workmen, and when finished was considered the finest house in that section. In 1850 it was sold to Isaac Rush Kirk, and is now owned by his widow. In 1873 she had the middle and eastern parts
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