USA > Pennsylvania > Bucks County > The history of Bucks County, Pennsylvania : from the discovery of the Delaware to the present time > Part 55
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The Minisink settlements were on both sides of the Delaware,
1 Romeyn Brodhead states, in his history of New York, that Europeans were not settled at Esopus before 1652. In 1691 there were five villages there, with a popu- lation of three thousand.
It is the opinion of Mr. Hazzard that when Andres Hudde attempted to ascend the Delaware above the falls in 1646, but was stopped by the Indians, he was trying to reach the mines at the Minisink, where he believes there was already a Dutch colony.
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on the rich flats between the foot hills and the river. A portion of this population on the Pennsylvania side was within the present limits of Smithfield township, Monroe county, but then in Bucks. The provincial government of Pennsylvania had no knowledge of these settlements before 1725. In 1729 an act was passed declaring the Indian titles there null and void, and in 1730 Surveyor-general Nicholas Scull, accompanied by John Lukens, his apprentice, after- ward surveyor-general, the last of the province and first of the com- monwealth, was sent into that region to investigate the facts. They had great difficulty in making their way on horseback through the wilderness. They found the flats for forty miles on both sides of the river settled by Hollanders, and with many of them they could only converse through Indian interpreters. They stopped at the house of Samuel De Pui, an immigrant from Holland, in 1697. The inhabitants did not know when the country was first settled, but from what he saw Mr. Scull gave it as his opinion that the settle- ments there were older than Penn's charter of Pennsylvania. Apple trees, larger than any about Philadelphia, were seen growing, and the inhabitants knew nothing of Penn's colony, of Philadelphia, nor where the Delaware emptied. All communication with the outside world was over the Mine road to the Hudson, whither they trans- ported their surplus produce, in winter, on sleds. Although such was the report of Mr. Scull, it is highly improbable that the inhab- itants of the Minisink heard nothing, through the Indians, of the growing colony on the Delaware, or by way of the Hudson, with which they traded. Budd, in 1684, speaks of "exceeding rich open lands" of the Minisink, but he gained no reliable information of the first settlement of this region.
In 1787, almost sixty years after his visit, John Lukens, now surveyor-general, sent his deputy, Samuel Preston, to the Minisink region to get additional information. The effort was fruitless as before. He visited Nicholas De Pui, son of Samuel, now about sixty years of age. The old men with whom he conversed appeared to be the grandchildren of the first settlers, but he could obtain nothing more reliable than tradition without dates. They agreed in substance, that, many years before, miners from Holland pene- trated that wilderness, worked the mines, and built the road over which they hauled the ore; that the miners were followed by other Hollanders fleeing from religious persecution, who, following the Mine road, reached the Delaware, and being pleased with the flats
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bought the improvements of the Indians, and settled there. This is all the knowledge of the early settlement of the Minisink obtained at the second official visit.
The earliest mention of the Minisink in our county records is in 1733. Nicholas De Pui, a Huguenot refugee, settled there in 1725, and in 1727 he purchased a tract of land from the Minsi Indians, with two islands in the Delaware. In September, 1733, William Allen, who meanwhile had purchased this land of the Penns, con- firmed the title to De Pui. There were six tracts in all, containing six hundred and forty-seven acres, and in addition the three islands in the river contained three hundred and three acres. These islands were Maw Wallamink, one hundred and twenty-six acres, Great Shawna, one hundred and forty-six, and a third, formed by some creeks which emptied into the Delaware, and lately held by John Smith, containing thirty-one acres. Abraham Van Campen settled at the Minisink about the same time-on the New Jersey side of the river, five miles above De Pui. The only surviving representative of this family is Robert Reading De Pui, of Strouds- burg.
Among the earliest settlers in this region was Daniel Brodhead, grandson of Captain Daniel Brodhead, of the British army, who accompanied Colonel Richard Nichols to America in 1664, and assisted in the capture of Manhattan. He was born in Ulster county, New York, April 20th, 1693, removed to Pennsylvania in 1738, and settled where East Stroudsburg stands. He was on friendly terms with the Proprietaries, and a warm friend of the Moravians. He died at Bethlehem, July 22d, 1755, while there under treatment for disease by Doctor Otto. His son Daniel, the immediate ancestor of the Brodheads of Pennsylvania, became a dis- tinguished man in the state. He served through the Revolutionary war as lieutenant-colonel and colonel, and enjoyed the confidence of Washington, and after its close was surveyor-general of the state. His first wife was Elizabeth De Pui, a daughter of Nicholas De Pui, of the Minisink. He died at Milford, Pike county, Pennsylvania, November 9th, 1809, in his seventy-third year. A monument was erected to his memory in the Milford cemetery October 2d, 1872.
The family of Decha, Huguenot refugees from France soon after 1685, found a home on the Minisink flats. Here Governor Decha, of Kentucky, was born in 1768, to which state he removed in 1784.
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HISTORY OF BUCKS COUNTY.
The Overfields, whose descendants are still found along the upper Delaware, were there early. Paul Overfield married a sister of Ed- ward Marshall. The Reverend Robert D. Morris, late pastor of the Newtown Presbyterian church, is a descendant of the Deshas on the mother's side. Among the early settlers was Peter LaBar, grand- father of George LaBar, who died lately at the age of one hundred and twelve years. He came to America in 1730, accompanied by his two brothers, Charles and Abraham, and located in the wilder- ness below De Pui's settlement, near the river. He afterward bought a tract of the Indians, south-west of where Stroudsburg stands, where George LaBar was born in 1763. Jacobus Kirken- dall was a settler there in 1741. De Pui's grist-mill was the first in all that region of country.
About 1725 a log church was built at the "Mine holes," opposite Tock's island, near the present village of Shawnee, but a church or- ganization was not effected until 1737. This was the beginning of the Smithfield church, grafted on the Low Dutch Reformed. In 1750, or thereabonts, William Allen gave a lot of five acres to what he denominated the "Presbyterian meeting-house," on which a new stone church was erected. Service was continued in the Dutch language for several years, owing to the difficulty of procuring those who could preach in English. The Reverend Azariah Horton, the first-settled pastor, is thought to have preached the first English sermon there in 1741, and the Reverends Messrs. Wales and Rhoads preached there between 1750 and 1776. When the new house was erected the church withdrew from the Dutch Reformed organization. but before that it was one of the Walpach churches. The stone church was torn down in 1854. When Zinzendorf visited this region, in 1742, there were five Dutch churches along the Delaware, only one of which stood on the Pennsylvania side, the Smithfield church. The four churches on the New Jersey side were on the old Mine road, which started from De Pui's and followed the river several miles. In 1742 John Casper Freymuth returned from Holland, whither he had been sent to study for the ministry, and took charge of four of these churches, including Smithfield.
The first attempt to organize Smithfield was in 1746. In June of that year the inhabitants petitioned for a township " to begin at the gaps in the mountains where the river Delaware runs through, and from thence five or six miles a north and be west course, and
3 Delaware Water Gap.
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HISTORY OF BUCKS COUNTY.
from thence to the north corner of Christoffel Denmark's planta- tion, and from thence with a straight line to the river Delaware, and thence the several courses thereof to the place of beginning." On the back of the petition is endorsed the words, "Plan next court." The following names were signed to the petition : Patrick Kerr, Christoffel Denmark, Bernard Stroud, Valentine Snyder, William Clark, John Pierce, Robert Hanuch, Nathan Greimby, D. Westbrook, Nicholas De Pui, Daniel De Pui, James Hyndshaw, Aaron De Pui, Isaac Tak, Richard Howell, Redolphus Schoonover, John Houay, John Courtright, Thomas Heson, Henry Huber, William McNab, Samuel Vanaman, Brinman Scoumaker. It is doubtful whether the township was laid out under this petition, for we find that in June, 1748, the inhabitants of Dansbury + and Smithfield petitioned the court for a township "to extend from the river Del- aware along the mountains to a gap in the same through which the road from McMickle's to Nazareth goes, from thence northerly to a large creek commonly called Bushkill, down the same to the Delaware, to the place of beginning." Among the petitioners were Daniel Brodhead, Edward Scull, Solomon Jennings, and Moses and Aaron De Pui. The township was ordered to be laid out, but if it were done it was not embraced in the boundaries mentioned in the petition. Two years afterward, December, 1750, Daniel Brodhead, Edward Scull, John McMickle, John Price, John Van Etten, and others petitioned for "a township to be bounded by Bushkill on the south, to which creek there is the grant of a township, 5 by Delaware on the east, and by lands belonging to the Honorable Proprietaries on the north and west." The petitioners represent themselves as " the remotest livers from the honorable court." This application was held under advisement. A mile above Delaware Water Gap, on a bluff bank of the river, is an old Indian burial-ground. The spot was a favorite place with the Indians, and here they buried their dead many years. The ground is entirely overgrown with trees, and but few of the mounds are visible. In 1744 a road was laid out from John McMickle's plantation in Smithfield, and two years afterward it was extended to Nazareth. The territory that was originally Smithfield has been subdivided, and no doubt not
4 Original name of Stroudsburg.
5 From this reference it appears that the township here referred to extended down to the Bushkill in Northampton countyand, included the two Bethels and Forks township.
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HISTORY OF BUCKS COUNTY.
only included Smithfield and Middle Smithfield in Monroe county, but all the townships in Northampton county north of the Bushkill. Henry says Smithfield was settled by Europeans as early as 1710. In a report made to the legislature August 20th, 1752, on paper currency, it is stated that there were settlements above Durham in 1723 ; probably a few Mennonites and Dunkers who had strayed across from about Falkner's swamp, between 1708 and 1730, and settled near the Lehigh.
When the country was settled all the region between the Del- aware and Lehigh, and extending back to the Blue mountains, was called the "Forks of the Delaware," by which name it was known for many years. It is difficult to fix the date when the first white man penetrated the wilderness in the Forks, for the earliest settlers lived alone in their solitary cabins in the woods. In 1735 the Penns projected a lottery to dispose of one hundred thousand acres in the upper end of Bucks county, but as it was never drawn, the holders of tickets were allowed to locate the land they called for. Among them was Nathaniel Irish, who held three tickets, and under these he located three five hundred-acre tracts on the Lehigh, two on the south, and one on the north, bank. He built a mill at the mouth of Sancon creek before 1740, the first in that region, and afterward sold this tract to a Mr. Cruikshank, of Philadelphia. The other two tracts, one on each side of the river, he sold to the Mora- vians, on one of which Bethlehem was afterward built. Mr. Irish probably never lived north of the Lehigh, for his house stood on the site of William Shimer's dwelling, at Shimersville, and was removed in 1816. The ruins of the mill are still to be seen on the premises of John Knecht. As early as 1733 whites had surveyed and located unpurchased land, and by 1735 the immigrants began to crowd the Delawares. Captain John, a brother of Teedyuscung, and other Indians were expelled from their corn-fields and peach-orchards in 1742. The first permanent settlements in the Forks of Dela- ware were made by that persistent and bold race, Scotch-Irish Presbyterians, under Thomas and William Craig and Alexander Hunter. The former located near the Lehigh, the latter near the Delaware. There was an accession to the settlers from New York and New Jersey, but the Scotch-Irish were the backbone of the settlement.
ALLEN TOWNSHIP .- William Allen owned eighteen hundred acres in this township in 1740 in theforks of the Hockendauque, and from
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HISTORY OF BUCKS COUNTY.
him it gets its name. On Eastburn's map of the Forks of Dela- ware, drawn the same year, two other surveys besides Allen's are marked on it, one of fourteen hundred and twenty-six, and another of fifteen hundred, to John Page, on the Hockendauqua, a corruption of Hackundochwe, which signifies searching for lands. These sur- veys were made prior to 1737, at the time Lappawinzoe was king of Hockendanqua, whose village was between Howell's grist-mill and the mouth of the creek. In 1750 a part or the whole of Allen's tract was conveyed to William Parsons, and in 1770 one hundred and fifty acres were conveyed to Anthony Lerch. Between 1730 and 1735 Thomas and William Craig introduced a number of families, from the north of Ireland, into what is now Allen township, then on the north-west frontier of Bucks county. They went resolutely to work to clear the forest and build homes, for they had come to stay. Being Presbyterians, almost without an exception, they were not long in organizing a congregation for worship and building a church. In 1734 the Reverend Mr. Wales, their pastor, resigned. In April, 1739, this congregation, and probably the one at Hunter's settle- ment, asked the New Brunswick Presbytery for pastors, and Gilbert Tennent was directed to supply them in the fall. The Reverends Messrs. Campbell and Robinson were sent soon afterward, and in May the settlements gave Mr. Dean a call, which he declined. This settlement was known for several years as "Craig's settlement," as that in Mount Bethel township was called "Hunter's settlement," but they were often called the Irish settlements.
The Scotch-Irish settlers in Allen moved in the organization of a township in 1746. At the June term " the inhabitants living on the west branch of the Delaware" petitioned the court to fix the boundary of a township, which they describe as follows: "From the mouth of Monokosey 6 up the middle branch of said creek to the Blue mountains, and thence by said mountains to the west branch of the river, and thence down said branch to the mouth of said Monokosey." They state, among other things, that they labor under great inconvenience for want of roads to go to mills, market, and the county court ; that the paths are yearly altered, so that they cannot travel without endangering their lives and going far out of their way, etc. The petitioners were ordered to produce a draft of the proposed township at the next court. The pioneers of the Lehigh who petitioned for the township were Hugh Wilson, James
6 From Me-na-gas-si, or Me-na-kes-si-a crooked stream.
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HISTORY OF BUCKS COUNTY.
Carruthers, George Gray, James Ralstone, Francis Limfield, Jona- than Riddle, William Young, James Horner, Jonathan McNeely, Thomas Boyd, Samuel Barron, Christopher Armbrest, Michael Favion, Joseph Lattimore, William Clendinnen, Thomas Craig, Jonathan Walker, James McAlexander, Thomas Hutchinson, Joseph Kerr, Robert Clendinnen, William Detur, James Allison, Arthur Lattimore, William Boyde, Jonathan Rausberry, Henry Deck, Peter Doll, Joseph Pelly, Robert Lattimore, William Craig, Jona- than MeNair, James Craig, Jonathan Kerr, Samuel Brown, Joseph Wright, Jonathan Delur, James Gray, William McConnell, Thomas Thompson, Christian Doll, Roland Smith, Frederick Aldimus, Tho- mas Biers, Jonathan Kennedy, William McCaa, Jonathan Cock, David Kerr, James Kerr, Robert Dobbin, Jonathan Boyd, Thomas Armstrong, Jonathan Clendinnen, Jonathan, McCartney, Michael Clide, James Kennedy, Simeon Drom, Christian Miller, Joseph Biers, Frederick Miller, Joseph Brown.
We find conflicting records concerning the laying out of this township. One account states that it was confirmed and recorded June 25th, 1747, another, that it was confirmed in June, 1748, and still another, that the petition was dated June 10th, 1748, and was signed by thirty-seven inhabitants of "the south branch of the Delaware," and accompanied by a map drawn by Edward Scull. Without stopping to reconcile the discrepance in the records, it is only necessary to state that the township was granted under the petition of June, 1746, and that when first laid out it was called " Mill creek," with an area of twenty-nine thousand acres. When the name was changed to Allen, we are not informed. We find an old record that states that in June, 1748, "sundry of the inhabitants of the south-west branch of Delaware " petitioned for their settle- ments to be included in a township to be called " Allen's Town township," which was confirmed and recorded September 23d, 1749. In September, 1750, the inhabitants of Allen township stated, in a petition to the court, that they " are distressed upon account of not having a road to Philadelphia from James Craig's to where Solomon Jennings lives," which was returned endorsed, " said petitioners better express their request if they persist in de- siring this road." The residence of William and Thomas Craig, the fathers of the township, is said to have been about four miles from Batlı. General Thomas Craig, a son of Thomas, a soldier and
7 By some called Allegheny creek.
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HISTORY OF BUCKS COUNTY.
officer of the Revolution, died in 1832, at the age of ninety-two years.
MOUNT BETHEL .- Alexander Hunter, a Presbyterian from the north of Ireland, arrived in the Forks of Delaware with about thirty families, in 1730. He took up three hundred acres of land on the North Branch, near the month of Hunter'sz creek, where he estab- lished a ferry. " Hunter's settlement," as then called, was planted at three points, near Martin's creek ;8 at Richmond, on the road from Easton to the Water Gap, and at Williamsburg, on the same road. These locations were all in Mount Bethel township, afterward divided into Upper and Lower Mount Bethel, which names they still bear. Hunter became an influential man in the " Forks," and was appointed justice of the peace in 1748. A Presbyterian church was probably built in Mount Bethel as early as 1747, and the present congregation of that name is the child of the Bethel church founded by Brainard, the Indian missionary. Near Hunter's settlement, was the Indian village of Sockhamvotung, where David Brainard often preached, and where he built a cabin in 1744.
On the 8th of June, 1746, the inhabitants living on the " north branch " of the Delaware, embracing the Hunter settlement, and other immigrants who had settled there subsequently, namely : Peter Schurs, Jonathan Miller, Arthur Coveandell, Thomas Roady, Joseph Woodside, George Bogard, James Anderson, David Allen, James Simpson, Peter Mumbower, Jonathan Garlinghous, Jonathan Cart- michal, Richard Quick, Joseph Funston, Thomas Silleman, Law- rence Coveandell, Jeremiah Best, Manus Decher, Joseph Jones, Alexander Hunter, James Bownons, Jacob Server, Joseph Coler, James Miller, Joseph Quick, Joseph Ruckman, Thomas McCracan, Thomas Silleman, Coleus Quick, Joseph Corson, Edward Moody, Conard Doll, Thomas Clark, Jonathan Rickey, James Quick, Pat- rick Vence, and Robert Liles, petitioned the court of quarter ses- sions, to lay off into a township a district of country with the following boundaries : "From the mouth of Tunam's creek up north branch of said creek upon the west side of Jeremiah Best's to the Blue mountains ; and thence by said mountains to ye north branch of said river ; and thence by said branch to the month of said Tunam's creek again." The same petition asked the court to lay out and open a road from Martin's mill to the Delaware. The
8 Probably then called Hunter's creek.
9 No doubt Martin's creek ; Tunam possibly being the Indian name for it.
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HISTORY OF BUCKS COUNTY.
court ordered the petitioners to produce a draft of the township at the next term. This movement led to the organization of Mount Bethel, within a year or so, although the records are silent on the subject. The two townships into which it has been since divided are generally hilly, with a productive limestone soil. The creeks afford numerous mill-seats, and a number of slate and stone-quarries have been developed.
In Mount Bethel was the home and the scene of many of the labors of David and John Brainard, missionaries among the Indians. David, the first upon this field of usefulness and hardship, was born at Haddam, Connecticut, April 20th, 1718, was educated at Yale, studied divinity, and was licensed to preach July 20th, 1742, and the following year was appointed missionary to the Indians at the Forks of Delaware by the "Society for Propagating Christian knowl- edge." He traveled through a howling wilderness from the Hudson to the Delaware, striking the river twenty miles above Stroudsburg, and arriving at the Forks the 15th of May, 1743, where he estab- lished himself in a cabin that was built for him on Martin's creek. Here he gathered about him a congregation of converted Indians, and spent his life traversing that region and administering to the spiritual and temporal wants of the savages. In the summer of 1745 Mr. Brainard rode down to Neshaminy to assist Mr. Beatty in the great revival then going on in that congregation. He remained five days, during which he preached several times, and on Sunday to not less than three or four thousand people. Hundreds were moved to tears under his effective preaching. Tatemy was Brain- ard's interpreter, and was baptised by him. He died, with the har- ness on, October 9th, 1747, and was succeeded by his younger brother, John Brainard, who arrived at the field of his labors in Au- gust, 1749, and occupied David's cabin. He was anxious to estab- lish a school for Indian girls, and bought spinning-wheels for several of the women, but as he was unable to purchase flax, the enterprise failed. John followed in the footsteps of his brother David in most things, made a visit to the Susquehanna, ran down to see Mr. Beatty at Neshaminy, and was on social terms with the Moravians at Bethlehem. He was chaplain in the army in the war of 1759, and had charge of Indian schools at Bethel, and Brother- ton, New Jersey, and died March 15th, 1781.
MOORE TOWNSHIP .- Settlers pushed their way up among the hills of Moore township, in Northampton, soon after crossing the Lehigh.
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HISTORY OF BUCKS COUNTY.
We are told that a log church was built, near where the new edifice stands at Petersville, in 1723.10 This building is said to have been standing in 1773, but was destroyed soon after. As the congre- gation did not own the fee of the land it was many years before a new church building was erected. The only names that have come down to us, associated with the building of the log church, are those of Bartholomew and Kleppinger. The first Reformed pastor was John Egiduis Hecker. It is not known at what time he became pastor, or how long he served, but he has been dead " over an hundred years, and his remains repose under the altar. A handsome new edifice was built in 1873, and is now made a union church with two flourishing congregations. Near the church are the remains of a school-house. The earliest interment, marked by a stone, is that of Nicholas Heil, February 14th, 1760. Plainfield township, adjoining Moore, had a few settlers in its limits as early as about 1730, but it was not organized until after 1752. We regret that we have not been able to obtain further knowledge of the settlement of these two frontier townships of Bucks county.
EASTON .- The land on which Easton stands, at the confluence of the Delaware and Lehigh, was owned by Thomas Penn, son of William. The site of the town is supposed to have been the bed of a great whirlpool in some past age, into which debris from the neighboring forests and hills were precipitated, for in digging wells, rocks and trees have been found several feet under ground. David Martin was the first settler at this point whose name has come down to us. In 1739 he obtained a grant and patent for ferrying at the Forks of Delaware, his privileges extending about thirteen miles along the New Jersey side of the river, from the upper end of Tini- cum island to Marble mountain, a mile above the mouth of the Lehigh. He had the exclusive right "to ferry over horses, cows, sheep, mules, etc., etc. Martin's heirs owned a portion of the land upon which the town of Phillipsburg was laid out.
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