USA > Pennsylvania > Bucks County > The history of Bucks County, Pennsylvania : from the discovery of the Delaware to the present time > Part 42
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Our knowledge of the early settlement of Milford is neither ex- tensive nor as accurate as we could desire, for we have found it exceedingly difficult to obtain information of this and other German townships. Originally the territory, included in this township and Upper Milford in Lehigh, was one district for municipal purposes, but was never embraced in one organized township. These divi- sions bore the distinctive names of Upper and Lower Milford down to the close of the last century. The new county line of North- ampton, in 1752, ran through the middle of this district, or there- abouts, leaving each county to fall heir to a Milford 1 township. Its first settlers were Germans, who came over the border from Philadelphia county, having found their way up the valley of the Perkiomen.
It is not known who was the first land-holder, but Joseph Grow-
1 There are a seaport and borough in Pembrokeshire, Wales, and a village and parish in England of this name.
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HISTORY OF BUCKS COUNTY.
den owned a large tract there at an early day. Martin Morris, who was there among the first, took up five hundred acres, which he conveyed to Jacob Shelly, May 5th, 1725, part of which is now owned by Joseph S. Shelly. In 1749 Abraham Shelly was a peti- tioner for a road. William Allen likewise owned land in Milford among the first. The 17th of November, 1724, Nicholas Austin, of Abington, Philadelphia county, purchased two hundred and sev- enty acres of Joseph Growden, the patent for which was not issued . by the Penns until 1739. It passed through two generations of Austins to John Haldeman, the ancestor of the Haldemans of New Britain.
No doubt the agitation for a township organization in Richland, whose inhabitants were moving in this direction, stimulated the people of Milford to set up for themselves. On the 13th of June, 1734, those living between the county line and the section then about to be laid out as Richland, petitioned the court to erect the country they inhabit into a township, with the boundaries they specify. They state in the petition that heretofore they had been united with Richland for municipal purposes, but now wish to be separated, because the territory is so large that the constable and collector cannot attend to their duties. That section of the county must have been pretty well peopled at this early day, for the petition has sixty-two names upon it, nearly all German, among which we find those of Cline, Clymer, Musselman, Jamison, Nixon, Jones, Lawer, Wies, Ditter, Hone, Sane, and others equally well-known at this day. The court doubtless granted the prayer of the peti- tioners, for the township was laid out and established soon after. It was twice surveyed, both times by John Chapman, the second sur- vey only differing from the first on its south-east boundary. The first was returned into court the 13th of September, 1734, and the last was made the 22d of October. On the first plat of survey are given the names of the following real estate owners : Robert Gould, Michael Atkinson, John Edwards, Thomas Roberts, David Jenkins, Edwin Phillips, Peter Evins, Michael Lightfoot, Arthur Jones, Morris Morris, John Lander, Jacob Musselman, John Yoder, Peter Lock, Abraham Heston, John Dodsel, and "Joseph Growden's great tract, sold mostly to Dutchmen." On the back of the draft is en- dorsed " Bulla," the name the petitioners desired their township called. Whether it was ever called by this name we are unable to say, but however this may be, it was soon after changed to Lower
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HISTORY OF BUCKS COUNTY.
Milford, and afterward to Milford. The survey fixes the area at fifteen thousand six hundred and forty-six acres. Some of the land- owners did not live in the township, but only owned land as an investment. In the sessions docket, 1734, we find the following entry : "Ordered, that some part of the township of Richland, now and for the future to be called Balla (or Bulla) be recorded accord- ing to a certain draft of the said township, now brought into court." This has reference to the formation of Milford.
Among those who came into the township after it had been or- ganized was George Wonsidler, the ancestor of the family of this name. He immigrated from Germany in 1743, at the age of twen- ty-two, and settled in Milford, where he spent his life, and died in 1805, at eighty-four. He left two sons, George and John Adams. George remained in Milford, where he died in 1858, at the age of eighty-four, leaving three sons and one daughter, John, George and Jacob, and the daughter's name not known. John died in 1869, at the age of seventy-seven, leaving three daughters. George lives in Milford, at the age of eiglity, and Jacob in Springfield, who have sons and daughters married, with families ; there are only seven de- scendants of the second George living. John Adams, the second son of George Wonsidler, born in 1770, and died in 1854, aged eighty-four years, settled in Hanover township, Montgomery county, where he passed his life. He had eight sons and two daughters, and fourteen of his descendants, bearing his name, are now living. The name is but seldom met with, and probably all who bear it in this section of the United States can. trace their descent back to the Mil- ford immigrant of 1743. Charles H. Wonsidler, of Trumbauers- ville, is a descendant of George, eldest son of the first George.
The great-grandfather of Michael Musselman came into the town- ship with a son, fifteen years old, in 1743, and bought land of Wil- liam Allen, on which he built a log house, still standing, and used as a dwelling, near the Mennonite meeting-house, not far from the Milford and Steinsburg turnpike. The great-grandson, Michael Musselman, over eighty years of age, now lives in the old house where, probably, three generations of the family were born. An adjoining tract then owned by William Roberts, now belongs to Jacob W. Shelly. Probably the oldest stone house, in the north- west section of the county, stands in the south-east corner of Milford, a mile from Trumbauersville, near the road from Bunker Hill to Sumneytown. It was built in 1740 or 1742, by Thomas Roberts,
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HISTORY OF BUCKS COUNTY.
and now belongs to the estate of John Wonsidler. The stone house of Daniel H. Kline was built in 1756. Among the early inhabitants of Milford and remembered by some of the present generation, was a land turtle, who was there probably as early as 1750. It was picked up in May, 1821, and found to be marked "J. B. 1769," and "Ditlow, 1814." As it was found between, and within a mile of the dwellings of J. Bleyser, and Mr. Ditlow, it was probably marked by them. It had been a known inhabitant of that vicinity for fifty- two years, but how much longer no one can tell.
Before 1750 Milford had practically become a German township. Of forty-nine names signed to a petition for a road in 1749, every one is German, and many of them are familiar names of residents of this and adjoining townships at this time, viz : Abraham Zaln, John Drissell, Johannes Funk, George Clark, Paul Samsel, Ludwig Cut- ting, Philip Hager, Christian Cassel, Ulrich Wimmer, William La- bar, Christian Willcox, Adam Schneider, Andrew Wichschuttz, David Mueckley, Heinrich Hitz, Michael Eberhart, Philip Liber, Henry Bach, Rudi Frick, Kasper Hayser, Christian Sitzmar, Jacob Hecock, George Ackermann, Peter Kreiling, Jacob Zweifuss, Nickol Mumbauer, Andreas Trumbauer, Theobold Branchlar, Jacob Beitt- ler, John Stell, Heinrich Huber, Johannes Frick, Lorentz Esbach, Charolus Olinger, Rudolph Reigert, Abraham Shelly, jr., Abraham Dittlo, Johannes Huber, Jacob Martin, Jacob Musselman, Samuel Lauder, Abraham Kreider, Andreas Hochbein, Johannes Wombol, Johannes Reb, George Rodi, Johannes Clymer, John Peter Krei- der and Michael Schenk.
Ulrich Spinner, or Spinor, the great-grandfather of Edwin D. Spinner, of Milford, immigrated from Basle, in Switzerland, in 1739. His wife, Ursula Frick, came from the same place, and prob- ably he was married at his arrival. He settled in Milford the same year. In 1753 he bought two hundred and three acres in the "Great swamp," lying about Spinnerstown, in the western part of Milford, and died in 1782, at the age of sixty-five, leaving two sons and two daughters. The youngest son, David, received the real estate, the other children getting their share in money. The eldest son settled in Salisbury, Lehigh county, and the daughters married a Mumbauer and a Deal, Mrs. Reuben F. Scheetz, of Doylestown, be- ing a descendant of the latter. David Spinner, the son, died on the homestead in 1811, at the age of fifty-three, following the trade of potter, besides conducting his large farm, to his death. He was
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HISTORY OF BUCKS COUNTY.
justice of the peace, and held other local offices, among them col- lector of taxes, about the close of the war of independence. He ad- vanced the entire amount on his duplicate to the county in gold, which was afterward paid in in Continental money, by which he lost a large sum. He left two children, the late David Spinner, who died about 1867, at the age of seventy-six, and one daughter, who married a Weaver, and had one child. David Spinner's widow is still living, at the age of eighty-one. The latter left two children, Edwin D., who married, and has one child, also married, and a daughter, Elvina, who married Doctor Dickenshied, and has one son. The homestead is still in the hands of the family. The widow of the late David Spinner is the only daughter of John Eckel, of Bedminster.
The Hubers immigrated from Switzerland between 1750 and 1760, and settled in Milford. The father's name we do not know, but the mother's was Ann, born in 1722, died in 1775, and was buried in the Trumbauersville church. They had a family of eight children, of which Henry was born in 1756, and John Jacob in 1758. The former made powder for the Pennsylvania committee of safety in 1776, at a mill he built on Swamp creek, on the road from Trumbauersville to Sumneytown, the remains of which are still to be seen. Part of the property is in the possession of Jesse Won- sidler. The children of the first settler married into the families of Hillig, Trumbauer, Weidner, Hartzel, James, and others. There are said to have been several powder-mills on Swamp creek, below Dannehower's mill, during the Revolution, and that one was in operation eighty years ago.
We know but little of the opening of roads in Milford, but there were but few of them for several years, and the inhabitants appear to have been disinclined to increasing the number. In 1749, when there was a movement for a new road, the inhabitants complained that there were four highroads in the township already to be kept in repair, and they opposed the opening of the fifth, because to repair it would be such a charge upon them.
The "Milford rebellion," as it is known in history, an insurrec- tionary movement against the house-tax of 1798, and other direct taxes, broke out in this township in the fall of that year. The head and front of it were John Fries, Frederick Heany and John Get- man, all residents of Milford. Fries was born in Hatfield township, Montgomery county, about 1750, married Mary Brunner, of White- marsh, at twenty, and five years afterward removed to Milford,
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HISTORY OF BUCKS COUNTY.
where he built a house on land of Joseph Galloway, at Boggy creek. At the time of the outbreak he lived in a log house on a lot that be- longed to William Edwards, on the Sumneytown road, two miles from Trumbauersville. He was a man of good mind, but had re- ceived only the rudiments of an education ; he talked well, and pos- sessed a rude eloquence that swayed the multitude. His character was good, and he was popular among his neighbors. He learned the cooper's trade, but followed the occupation of vendue-crier, tra- versing the country attended by a little dog, named "Whiskey," to which he was much attached. Heany and Getman were Fries's two most active lieutenants. The former, born at Stover's mill, in Rock- hill, and at one time kept the tavern at Hagersville, died in North- ampton county. Getman is supposed to have been born in the same township, but this is not certain, and his brother George died near Sellersville in 1855, at the age of ninety-two. The opposition of Fries and his friends to the tax prevented all assessments in that township, and they were given up. It also extended into Northamp- ton county, where several of the insurgents were arrested and confined in the Sun tavern, at Bethlehem, in March, 1799. Fries headed about one hundred and forty of the malcontents in Milford, includ- ing two companies in martial array, and marched to Bethlehem, where he took possession of the tavern, and by threats and intimi- dation obliged the officers to surrender the prisoners to him. The President sent an armed force to put down the "rebellion," and in April, 1799, Fries was captured in a swamp near Bunker Hill, on the farm of John Keichline, betrayed by his little dog. He was tried, convicted, sentenced to be hanged, but was pardoned by President Adams. Heany and Getman were likewise tried and con- victed, but received much lighter sentences. After his pardon John Fries returned to his humble home in Milford, and pursued his for- mer occupation, he and his little dog "Whiskey " traversing the upper end of the county attending vendues as before. He died about 1820. Fries was a patriot during the Revolutionary struggle, and was twice in the military service. On one occasion, while the British held Philadelphia, he headed a party of his neighbors, gave pursuit to the light-horse that were driving stolen cattle to the city, and rescued them about the Spring house tavern.
Among the authors of Bucks county birth, was John Simmons, son of Henry Simmons, born on his father's farm in Milford. He commenced life as a school teacher, and removed to Horsham where
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HISTORY OF BUCKS COUNTY.
he taught. He first published the " Pennsylvania Primer" in 1794, but subsequently went to Philadelphia, where he published "A Treatise on Farriery," and died there in 1843. Within the past sixty years efforts were made to annex Milford township to Lehigh county, the last attempt of the kind in January, 1823, when petitions were presented to the legislature. The proposition, of course, was not favorably entertained. What the cause of complaint was we have not been able to learn.
The villages of Milford township are Trumbauersville, Spinners- ville, near the Lehigh county line, Steinsburg, and Milford Square. The largest and most populous is Trumbauersville, formerly called Charlestown, a place of some sixty families, built half a mile along both sides of the road from Philadelphia to Allentown. Half a century ago it contained about a dozen houses. The Eagle hotel, which claims to be the patriarch house of the village, has stood an hun- dred years, but from appearances that of George Wonsidler is nearly as old. Several of the dwellings are at least fifty years old. For several years Trumbauersville has been the seat of extensive cigar manufacturing, turning out two millions of cigars a year ; a single maker, Mr. Croman, employing thirty-seven hands, and making one million six hundred thousand annually. There are ten shops and sixty hands engaged in this work. In the village there are two stores and the customary mechanics. The oldest inhabitants, in 1874, were George Heist, eighty-three, Frederick Heist and John Jacob Smith, of about the same age, and Joseph Reiter, seventy-five, all of whom had lived there half a century. There is but little room for diversity of political opinion, even if allowed, for the inhabitants all vote the same ticket. Trumbauers- ville has a handsome union church, built of stone, at a cost of $15,000. The datestone tells us that it was "founded 1769; re-built 1805; re-built 1868." The ceiling of the audience chamber is handsomely painted in frescoe; a fine pipe organ stands in the gallery, and a shapely spire points heavenward. The size of the building is sixty-two by forty-six feet, and it was originally called the Lower Milford church.
The congregation was probably organized several years before the first church was erected, for we find that Adam Rudolph and wife presented it with a Bible, June 24th, 1762, and a communion service was presented by George Seibert, September 30th, 1769. The Reverend Philip Henry Kapp took charge in 1769, and Chris-
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HISTORY OF BUCKS COUNTY.
tian Robrecht was Reformed pastor about this time, although we are told that the church was wholly Lutheran until 1805. The first child baptised was George Peter, son of George Michael and Anna Eve Koll, January 23, 1770. Running through six years we find the following among the names of the baptised : Lohaus, Heist, Miller, Zangmeister, (Singmaster.) Schuetz, (Scheetz,) Sax, Maurer, Cugler, Weber, Schantz, Leister, Bartholomew, Stachr, and Frederick. Christian Espick was pastor in 1792, who was suc- ceeded by Frederick W. Geisenhaimer in 1793, George Ræeller in 1798, Frederick Waage in 1822, who, after a successful pastorate of forty-four years, was succeeded by his son, Oswin T. Waage, the present pastor, in 1864. In 1809 there was great prosperity in the church, and forty-three persons were confirmed. Abraham R. Smith led the singing in 1815, and filled the office for seventeen years at five dollars a year, but the Swamp church paid him forty dollars for the same service. There was a lottery for the benefit of the church in 1818. We know but little of the Reformed pastors. Mr. Senn was there in 1823, and served many years for a salary of $98 a year. Reverend F. A. Strassberger was also Reformed pastor, but we do not know his length of service. The oldest stone in the graveyard bears date 1769, and the next oldest, that of Anna Huber, born 1722, died November, 1773. Among those who preached in the church at Trumbauersville, was Reverend John Theobold Taber, jr., of Montgomery county, in 1773, but we do not know whether he was Lutheran or Reformed. He was an excellent man, and died suddenly, in 1788, from an apoplectic stroke while preaching in the New Goshenhoppen church. He was succeeded by his son, who died of the same disease, while preaching a funeral sermon in the same pulpit.
There is nothing worthy of special note to be said of the other three villages of Milford township. They consist of a few dwellings each, Spinnersville having a tavern and a store, and Milford Square a printing office, where the organ of the Mennonite denomination is published.
Schuetz's Lutheran church, known as Saint John's, is on the road from Spinnersville to Pennsburg, in the north-west part of the township. It has been the site of a church for over a century, and the new building erected in 1874, and the third house, faces south and overlooks the valley of Molasses creek. The oldest stone in the graveyard bears date 1759, but the inscription is effaced. Head
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HISTORY OF BUCKS COUNTY.
and foot stones of primitive rock, without inscription, show that persons were buried there at an early day.
The Mennonites, the most numerous religious denomination in Milford, have three churches. The "war of the schools" has divided them, and two of the churches are known as the New School and one as the Old. The earliest church was built in 1735, but some years afterward the congregation divided by mutual consent, and a new church was erected. There have been four buildings on the site of the first church, the last erected in 1873, sixty by forty- five feet, at a cost of $7,000, and will seat four hundred and fifty persons, and three on the site of the second church, one having been destroyed by fire. The present building was erected in 1850. In 1847 there was another division in the society, the Old schoolites in the two congregations withdrawing and building a new church. Two of the churches are brick and one of stone. The first Men- nonite minister in the township was Valentine Slemmer, and after him we find the names of Nold, Blien, three Musselmans, father, son, and grandson-the latter dying in 1847 at the age of ninety- Zetty, and father H. Oberholtzer, a bishop, still living in Philadel- phia. The Reverend A. B. Shelly has been pastor of churches known as numbers one and two, or New School, for several years. He organized the first Mennonite Sunday school, in 1857, which now numbers one hundred and fifty scholars. Two of these churches have large pipe organs, and the congregations are noted for the general prevalence of music, both vocal and instrumental, among the members. They have a denominational newspaper, the Men- nonitische Friedensbote, published semi-monthly at Milford Square, and edited by Mr. Shelly, who has lately published a new Mennonite hymn-book.
In the north-west corner of the township is a burial-ground known as "Strickler's graveyard," established by Henry Strickler about fifty years ago, where about twenty persons have been buried. Wheeled carriages were in use in this section of the county as early as 1739. In a petition to the court that year, on the subject of re- pairing a road "leading toward the county line near Joseph Nailer's," it is stated that many of the "back inhabitance, with waggons, goes down to Shaver's mill on Tohickon creek." In 1758 there were two public houses in the north-west corner of Milford, on the old road leading to Philadelphia, one being kept by a Pitting, or Bit- ting, probably the same who petitioned for naturalization in 1734,
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HISTORY OF BUCKS COUNTY.
and the other by a man named Smith. Christian Clymer was ap- pointed constable for Milford in 1737.
Milford is a fine agricultural region, and the careful tillage of the German farmers for a century and a half has brought the land to a high state of cultivation. The majority of the real estate has passed from father to son since its first settlement. It is well- watered by Swamp creek, a branch of the Perkiomen and its nu- merous tributaries, which enters at the south-west corner and spreads in every direction. The stream affords a number of good mill sites, where flour and other mills were erected at an early day. The township is densely populated, and almost exclusively by Germans. In 1784 it contained a population of 861, with 156 dwellings. We have no enumeration from that period down to 1810, when it was 1,334 ; 1820, 1,195; 1830, 1,970 inhabitants and 402 taxables ; 1840, 2,203 ; 1850, 2,527 ; 1860, 2,708 ; 1870, 2,900, of which only 64 were foreign-born. Milford has four post-offices, Trumbauers- ville being the elder, established in 1822, with Joseph Weaver for postmaster. The others are, at Spinnerstown, established in 1825, Henry Haring postmaster, Steinsburg, 1852, George Steinman, and Milford Square, in 1872, Charles Himmelwright postmaster.
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HISTORY OF BUCKS COUNTY.
CHAPTER XXVIII.
RICHLAND.
1734.
The Great swamp .- "Rich lands."-English Friends first settlers .- Griffith Jones .- Manor of Richland .- Peter Lester .- Edward Foulke .- Morris Morris .- Edward Roberts .- Thomas Lancaster .- Growden's tract .- Settlers of 1733 .- Benjamin Gilbert .- Randall Iden .- Earliest mention of Richland .- Sucking creek .- Peti- tioners for road .- Movement to organize township .- Friends' meeting .- Land- owners .- The Matts family .- Andrew Snyder .- Population .- Poor-tax .- Quak- ertown .- Its situation .- Nucleus of town .- McCook's tavern .- Public library .- Industrial establishments .- State Normal school .- Richland Centre .- Its popu- lation .- Richlandtown .- Saint John's church .- Oldest house .- Bunker Hill .- Lottery land .- Opening of roads .- A German township.
IN the early day a large scope of country in the north-west cor- ner of the county, including Richland and Milford, with Quakertown for the centre, was known as the "Great swamp." The origin of the name is not known, but probably because the surface is flat, and before it was cleared and cultivated water stood upon it at certain seasons of the year. It bore this name for three-quarters of a cen- tury, and those who were not familiar with the country believed it to be a veritable swamp. But the true character of this section was soon ascertained by those in search of new homes, for shortly after 1720 it began to be called "Rich lands," no doubt from the fertility of the soil, and in the course of time this designation gave the name
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HISTORY OF BUCKS COUNTY.
to the township. Tradition tells us that this section was heavily timbered, with a luxurious growth of grass under the great trees in- stead of bushes, with occasional small clearings, or "oak-openings," called by the early settlers "Indian fields." It abounded in wild animals, bears, wolves, panthers, etc., and rattlesnakes were so plenty that the early mowers had to wrap their legs to the knee to protect them from their poisonous fangs. The Indian wigwams were built along the Swamp, Tohickon and other creeks, which then - swarmed with shad. They lived on good terms with the early set- tlers, and lingered about their favorite hunting grounds after white men had become quite numerous. There were deer licks on some of the streams, whither this beautiful animal resorted, and where they were watched and shot by the hunter. An Indian path, the line of communication between distant tribes, ran nearly north and south through the Great swamp.
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