USA > Pennsylvania > Bucks County > The history of Bucks County, Pennsylvania : from the discovery of the Delaware to the present time > Part 68
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Land was first fenced on the Delaware, under municipal regu-
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HISTORY OF BUCKS COUNTY.
lations, in 1656, to protect the crops. Goats were to be guarded by a herder, under a penalty, or the owner to pay the damage done. Hogs were to be yoked, or killed by the soldiers. Under the Swedish government no deeds were given for land unless granted by the queen, but the Dutch issued many deeds subsequent to 1656. When the country was first settled land was plenty and cheap, and one could get a farm almost for the asking. Shortly after John Chapman's death, 1694, his widow traded one hundred acres in Wrightstown to William Smith for an old gray mare. There is a tradition that William Penn offered his coachman, whose name is said to have been Moon, the half square on which Lætitia court is situated in Philadelphia, in lieu of a year's wages, £15, but he re- fused this, and accepted a tract of land in Bucks county. As the country was settled up, and the inhabitants increased, land gradu- ally appreciated in value. By 1700 improved land was generally sold by the acre, the nominal price being the value of twenty bushels of wheat, and continued with little variation for several years. When wheat was two shillings six-pence per bushel land was sold at fifty shillings per acre, equivalent to about $12.50, without allowing for the increased value of money. The price, however, depended on the price of wheat, and it fluctuated in a sliding scale. When wheat brought 33 cents land was $6.67, wheat 40 cents land $7, wheat 46 cents land was $9.33, wheat 56 cents land was $13.31, wheat $1 land was $20, and with wheat at $1.12 land sold for $26 62 an acre. As a rule rye sold for a shilling less per bushel, and Indian corn and buckwheat two shillings. At this era of low prices beef sold for two and a half cents per pound, and pork for the same. The books of Richard Mitchel, who kept store in Wrightstown from 1724 to 1735, give these prices, and wheat for the period ranged from ihree shillings to four shillings- forty to fifty-three cents. The land being strong and new produced from fifteen to thirty bushels of wheat to the acre. The crops failed in the summer of 1705, when wheat was under four shillings the bushel, fifty-three cents, and goods of all kinds very dear. This year money was so scarce that Penn asked the passage of an act making bonds assignable and current as money, and he wanted a " land bank" chartered. This was a season of trial to the settlers. Logan writes to Penn on the 17th of May, that it had been the hardest winter, with the deepest snows known to the oldest settlers, and that the Delaware was still closed. There was great sickness,
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HISTORY OF BUCKS COUNTY.
especially among children, in the winter of 1705. Previous to De- cember 27th, 1762, the government price of unseated land was fixed at £15. 10s. per hundred acres, about $40. From that time down to the commonwealth, in 1784, the price fluctuated from $24 to $41.33 per hundred acres. There was no fixed price in the manors or the Proprietary surveys, these being private property. For several years after the county was settled, warrants were issued on credit, and notes and bonds given for the purchase money. The land sold to immigrants by William Penn was charged with a quit- rent of one English shilling to every hundred acres, due him as lord of the soil, made payable at his manor-house, Pennsbury, the 1st day of March, yearly, where James Steele held the office of re- ceiver for many years. James Logan, who went to Bristol to receive the rents in 1705, complained that he went three times into one township to settle with the purchasers, but could not get more than one-half to come in, as they had no money, and were ashamed to appear.
Wages have fluctuated from the settlement of the county, for many years being governed by the price of wheat, and afterward entirely independent of it. From 1699 to 1701 William Penn paid laboring men from 2s. 6d. to 4s. a day. In 1775 the price of labor was 8s. 6d. At, and after, the Revolution, when wheat was 5s. a bushel, the price of labor in the harvest-field was 2s. 6d. for men and 1s. 3d. for boys. The wages of hired men were from £16 to £20 a year, and from £8 to £10 for women. In 1719 wheat flour was 9s. 6d. per cwt .; in 1721, 8s. 6d. to 9s .; 1748, 20s. ; 1757, 12s. 6d. In 1774 flour was 18s. 6d, and wheat 7s. 9d. In 1812 car- penters received but 80 cents a day, with board. Fifty years after the arrival of Penn beef sold at 4 cents per pound. 6 At the Dur- ham furnace, in 1780, sixty Continental dollars were equivalent to one hard dollar, and potatoes were sold at 2s. 6d. per bushel, hard money, or £5 Continental.
6 Pennsylvania currency, 7s. 6d., $1; £1, $2.663 ; 1s., 13} cents, and 1d., 1 1-9 cents.
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HISTORY OF BUCKS COUNTY.
CHAPTER XLVII.
- OUR COURTS; COUNTY-SEAT; DIVISION OF COUNTY ; BUILDING OF ALMS-HOUSE.
Justice under Swedes and Dutch .- Earliest courts at Upland .- First law-suit in Bucks .- Penn's courts .- First court in the county .- Our quarter sessions .- Derrick Jonson .- First execution .- A verdict by lot .- Attorneys -Pleadings .- Seal of county .- Bird Wilson, and successors .- Members of the bar .- Chapman ; Fox; Ross, et al .- A. M. Griffith .- The present bar .- Early court-houses .- County-seat at Bristol .- Removed to Newtown .- The public buildings .- County- seat changed to Doylestown .- The opposition .- Buildings erected .- Division of county .- Erection of alms-house .- Previous keeping of the poor.
UNDER the Swedes and Dutch the administration of justice on the Delaware was a very simple thing. The population was sparse and offenses few, and some of these were punished in a summary way. When the river fell into the hands of the English, in 1664, Governor Lovelace attempted to establish the English system of courts, but he encountered many difficulties, and the machinery of civil adminis- tration was not fairly in operation until 1670. Three judicial dis- tricts were organized, that of Upland extending up the river to the falls, and embracing Bucks county to that point. Down to the ar- rival of William Penn the few inhabitants of this county were obliged to go down to Upland, now Chester, to transact their public busi- ness. Upland is first mentioned as a settlement in 1648, but it was probably settled by the Swedes as early as 1643, and was named after a province in middle Sweden. The earliest court held there
46
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HISTORY OF BUCKS COUNTY.
was in 1672. Sir Edmund Andros remodeled the judicial system of Governor Lovelace, and to him we are really indebted for the in- troduction of English jurisprudence on the Delaware. His courts, held at Upland, New Castle, and Whorekill, had the power of courts of sessions, and could decide all matters under twenty pounds with- out appeal, and under five pounds without a jury. An appeal could be had to the court of assize where the matter in dispute was twenty pounds, and in criminal matters where the punishment extended to loss of life or limb, or banishment. The courts met once a month, or oftener if there were occasion. Constables were chosen annually in each community to preserve the peace, and there was a justice in each vicinity to hear and determine small cases. Previous to Feb- ruary, 1677, all wills had to be proved, and letters of administration granted, at New York. The Upland court now petitioned Governor Andros to clothe it, or the commander on the Delaware, with this power, on the ground that the estates were too small to bear so great expense. The court was allowed to grant letters where the estate was under thirty pounds, but where it was of more value it had to go to New York as formerly.
The first action to recover a debt, brought by an inhabitant of Bucks county, was by James Sanderling, of Bensalem, who sued John Edmunds, of Maryland, November 12th, 1678, for the value of twelve hundred pounds of tobacco, and the scales of justice inclined to the plaintiff's side. In 1679 Duncan Williamson and Edmund Draufton, who likewise lived in Bensalem, were parties to a suit. Draufton, who was something of a schoolmaster, and probably the first of that honorable calling in the county, agreed to teach Wil- liamson's children to read the Bible for two hundred guilders, and was allowed a year to complete the task, if that length of time were required. When the work was done Williamson refused to pay the bill, when Draufton sned him before the Upland court, and recovered his wages. The regulations relating to the ear-marks of cattle were adopted by the courts under Andros's administration, and we find that at the session held at "Kingssesse," June 14th, 1681, Claes Jansen brought in the ear-marks of his cattle, and desired they might be recorded, which was done accordingly.
The "Frame of government," adopted by Penn before he left England, empowered the provincial government and council to erect courts, from time to time, as they might be required. This was changed in 1683, so as to give the governor the right to appoint to
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HISTORY OF BUCKS COUNTY.
office, but at the Proprietary's death it was changed back as it stood at first. The courts were modeled after those of England : a supreme court, with law and equity jurisdiction, courts of common pleas, with the same double authority, and courts of quarter sessions holden by the justices of the peace or any of them. Courts of oyer and terminer, for the trial of capital cases, were frequently held by commissioners specially appointed. The permanent foundation of the colonial judiciary was established by act of 1722, which differed little from the courts as now constituted.
The first court held in this county was an orphans' court at the house of Gilbert Wheeler, who lived just below the falls, March 4th, 1683.1 There were present on the bench, William Penn, James Harrison, John Otter, William Yardley, William Biles, and Thomas Fitzwater, with Phineas Pemberton as clerk, which office he held to his death. Pemberton was clerk of all the courts of the county. His commission was dated at Pennsbury the 5th of second-month, 1686, and issued by Thomas Lloyd, and directed "To my Loveing Friend Phineas Pemberton, near Delaware Falls." The first business trans- acted was the making disposition of the estate of John Spencer, a settler, lately deceased, and binding out his children. The next term of the court, March 3d, 1684, was held " in the court-house for said county." The first court of common pleas was held the 11th day of December, 1684, and the first case called was Robert Lucas against Thomas Bowman, " for withholding seven pounds wages due to the said plaintiff in the third-month last past." The summons was served by Luke Brindley, the deputy sheriff, who was " Ranger" at Pennsbury, and judgment was given in favor of the plaintiff, with costs. The fourth case was that of Ann Wilson, who sues Edward and William Smith for " one pound nine shillings unjustly detained from her," which she recovered. The first court of quarter sessions was held eleventh-month 12th, 1684,2 with the same justices that held the orphans' court, but the business transacted was unimportant. The first punishment inflicted, by virtue of a sentence pronounced the 11th day of the fourth-month, 1685, was on Charles Thomas, who received "twenty lashes upon his bare back well laid on," and after sentence was fined five shillings for behaving rudely to the court. The 10th of twelfth-month, 1685, a special term was held by order of the provincial council to try David Davis, under arrest
1 The records from that day to this are complete in the office at Doylestown.
2 January 12th, 1685, new style.
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HISTORY OF BUCKS COUNTY.
for killing his servant, the first murder trial in the county, but the records do not give the result. The first grand jury was empanneled at the June term, 1685, and consisted of twenty-two men. At the September terin Gilbert Wheeler was presented for " turning of the high road where it was laid out, and fencing it up."
At that early day our infant quarter sessions was hard on negroes guilty of larceny. At the December term, 1688, a runaway from Virginia, named George, indicted for stealing two turkeys, worth six shillings, from Thomas Janney, jr., was found guilty on three indictments, and sentenced to pay the value of the goods, to be sold into servitude, and whipped with forty lashes on his bare back in presence of the court. He was bought by Stephen Howell, and was to serve fourteen years, but if his master should make demand he was to be returned to him at the end of ten years. The first coro- ner's inquest was the 15th of May, 1692, on the body of Elizabeth Chappel, who was drowned by falling off her horse into the Ne- shaminy.
The first judicial execution in this county, and probably in the state, was in the month of July, 1693, when Derrick Jonson, alias Closson, was hanged for murder. On the 8th of May, 1692, the body of an unknown man was found floating in the Neshaminy near its month, which bore evidence of foul play, on which an inquest was held on the 12th, and returned into court on the 8th of June. It appearing from the evidence before the coroner, that a consider- able quantity of blood was found on the wall of Jonson's house, and on his bed, he was arrested. He and his wife Brighta were examined at the August term. He tried to explain the appearance of the blood, saying that it came from a man's nose three years before, and that he had mentioned it about the time. Although there was strong circumstantial evidence that a murder had been committed, the court discharged Jonson on his own recognizance of one hundred pounds, and his wife on security in the same amount, to answer at the next term. A true bill was found against him at April term, 1693, and he was tried and found guilty at the June term, of murder, and sentenced to be hanged. His wife and neighbors petitioned for his pardon, or commutation of sentence, but without avail, and he was executed about the middle of July, by the sheriff, Israel Taylor. 3 A few days afterward Taylor appeared before the provincial council
3 It is believed that Jonson was hanged at Tyburn, in Falls township, which gave the name to the place, after its English namesake.
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HISTORY OF BUCKS COUNTY.
and asked to be relieved from his office, which was done. + The convict was a person of considerable property, and the council looked after his crops, allowing Robert Cole £7. 15s. for securing them, to be paid from the estate. Jonson had been in the courts before, having been bound over at the June term, 1685, for striking his servant, Jasper Lunn. He was a Swede, and no doubt had been in the country several years. 5 There is a tradition, although a cruel one, that he was confined in the old jail at the falls, then in a very dilapidated condition, and that it was hoped he would break ont and run away, but not doing so, the authorities hung him to get rid of him. 6
A case was tried at the September term, 1698, which deserves a passing notice. Francis White sued James Alman to recover the value of a horse, and a verdict was rendered for defendant. On a complaint of illegal proceedings in the jury-room, the jury was bound over to answer at the December term. On examination, the jurors confessed, that being divided in opinion and not able to agree upon a verdict, they concluded to see which way it would go by lot, and so ordered the constable, John Darke, to cast a piece of money into his hat. They afterward agreed upon a verdict, and brought it into
court. The jury said the casting of the lot had given them great trouble, but that they had paid both plaintiff and defendant money enough to satisfy them and all parties concerned. The court fined the jury two pounds ten shillings each, and Constable Darke was let off with ten shillings.
The attorneys who practiced at the Bucks county bar at that early day were not always "learned in the law," but often neighbors and friends, who knew not the crooks and turns of the legal profession. Patrick Robinson was one of the very earliest whose name appears upon the dockets. He lived in Philadelphia, and was clerk to the provincial council, but giving some offense about 1685, he was dis- missed, and then turned his attention to the law. In 1698 Mahlon Stacy, who lived across the Delaware where Trenton stands, and
4 Israel Taylor was the son of Christopher Taylor, and was appointed sheriff April 29th, 1693. A man of this name was the first surgeon mentioned as living in the county.
5 Derrick Jonson was brother of Claus Jonson, who is mentioned in the early annals on the Delaware. Among other employments he was overseer of highways from the Poquessing to Bristol, before the arrival of William Penn.
6 Doctor Buckman thinks the murder was committed in an old house that used to stand on the Neshaminy above Schenck's ferry.
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HISTORY OF BUCKS COUNTY.
Henry Ackerman appeared for the plaintiff's in a suit of ejectment. The same year William Biles appeared as attorney for Thomas Hud son, and likewise Joseph Chorley, Samuel Beakes, and Samuel Car- penter, none of whom were professional men. In 1705 one J. Moore was attorney for Thomas Revel, executor of Tatham, of Bensalem, in a suit of ejectment against Joseph Growden. Then the pleadings were very simple, the English common law system not being in force in this province, and the declaration contained only a concise state- ment of the plaintiff's cause of action. At the settlement of the state, when the court gave judgment contrary to law, it was fined by the council. Among the practicing attorneys in this county was the celebrated James Logan, the friend and confidant of William Penn. In March, 1702, we find him at court when a suit in ejectment be- tween Thomas Revel and Joseph Growden was being tried. He was not a lawyer by profession, but was a man of great learning and ability. How often the county seal has been altered, and by what authority, we know not, but we do know there have been several alterations in it. The first seal, at the organization of the county in 1682, was "a tree and a vine," but we cannot tell when it was super- ceded. In 1738 it consisted of a double circle and shield in the centre, with bars, crescent, etc., as is represented below.
The
County
Se al.
In May, 1703, the coroner held an inquest upon the body of Mary, the daughter of Matthias Harvey, whose verdict was that " being under seven years of age, that she, attempting to go over a narrow foot-bridge, fell into the creek and was drowned. The court was addressed in petitions as "The worshipful justices" as late as 1785.
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HISTORY OF BUCKS COUNTY.
Our county court was not presided over by one " learned in the law" until the early part of the present century, when Bird Wilson was appointed judge, in 1806, and took his seat in April. Bucks was then in the Seventh judicial district, with Delaware, Chester, and Montgomery. Judge Wilson resigned in January, 1818, because of conscientious scruples about trying a man for murder who must necessarily be convicted and hanged. He entered the ministry, and was chosen rector of Saint John's Episcopal church, Norristown, in 1819, where he remained until the autumn of 1821, when he re- moved to New York, and deceased several years ago. He was succeeded on the bench by John Ross, who took his seat January 13th, 1818, who was president-judge of the district until 1830, when he was raised to the supreme bench. A little episode connected with the career of Judge Ross shows the bright side of the human character. When a young man he went up to Durham fur- nace, then owned by Richard Backhouse, and took charge of the school. At the expiration of his time he was about to leave and go south, when Mr. B. persuaded him to study law at Easton, and pledging himself to pay his expenses, and afterward support him until he was able to support himself. The offer was accepted, the poor schoolmaster became a distinguished lawyer and judge, and this little incident no doubt changed the destiny of this branch of the Ross family. Judge Ross was succeeded by John Fox, a mem- ber of the Bucks county bar, who presided over our courts for ten years. The adoption of the new constitution of 1837-8 making the appointment of new judges necessary, Judge Fox was super- seded by Thomas Burnside, of Centre county, who took his seat the 27th of April, 1841. He, too, was raised to the supreme bench, in 1844, when David Krause, of Dauphin county, was appointed liis successor, and took his seat the 3d of February the same year. He was the last of the appointed judges, and went out of office before his commission expired, to make way for Daniel M. Smyser, of Adams county, who was elected in the fall of 1851. Judge Smyser was followed by Henry Chapman, in 1861, who served out his full term of ten years, and declined a re-election. About 1847 Mr. Chapman was appointed president-judge of the Chester and Dela- ware district, and served until the election in 1851, when he de- clined the nomination. He was likewise the recipient of political honors, being elected to the state senate in 1843, and served one term, and to the house of representatives of the United States in
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HISTORY OF BUCKS COUNTY.
1856, to which he declined re-election. In 1869 Henry P. Ross was elected additional-law-judge of the district, and president-judge in 1871 as the successor of Judge Chapman. The promotion of Judge Ross left a vacancy in the office of additional-law-judge, which was filled by the governor appointing O. G. Olmstead, of Potter county. At the October election, 1872, Stokes L. Roberts, of Doylestown, was elected to the office, but resigned shortly after he took his seat, when Richard Watson, of the same place, was appointed to the vacancy, and elected in the fall of 1873 for the term of ten years. Meanwhile each of the two counties of the district, Bucks and Montgomery, was created a separate district, and the president- judge having the right to elect in which he would preside, chose Montgomery, leaving Judge Watson in Bucks. Under the new constitution the office of associate-judge is abolished with the expi- ration of the terms of those now holding commissions.
We regret that we have not the information at hand, nor the space to spare, to give the Bucks county bar the notice it deserves. It has ranked for many years as one of the ablest in the state, and its mem- bers are the equals of their fellows in legal learning. When Fox,. Chapman, DuBois, Ross, and McDowell were in their prime it was hard to find their equals or superiors, while those who have succeeded them maintain the prestige of their fathers. The families of Chap- man and Ross have each produced three generations of lawyers, some of whom still have the harness on. Many now living remem- ber the late venerable Abraham Chapman, admitted March 9th, 1790, for many years the father of the Bucks county bar, a lawyer of the old school, who practiced long at Newtown, and came to Doylestown with the removal of the county-seat. He is the author's earliest recollection of a man "learned in the law," and at that day he was about the close of a long and successful career at the the bar. Of the Rosses, grandfather and grandson have worn the ermine. Several of the name were bred to the law. William Ross was a practicing attorney at Newtown in 1767. George Ross, a son of John, was admitted to the bar in 1819, and Thomas Ross, a brother of John, a fine lawyer in his day, died at Norristown, Octo- ber 20th, 1822, at the age of sixty-six, and his widow in Solebury, aged ninety years. The late Thomas Ross, admitted to the bar in 1829, served two terms in Congress, and died in 1865. Judge Fox has two sons at the bar in neighboring counties, and Charles E. Du- Bois has a son at our bar to keep up the father's reputation. Elea-
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HISTORY OF BUCKS COUNTY.
zar T. McDowell, the contemporary of Fox, DuBois, Chapman, and Ross, an eloquent advocate, and a man of fine social qualities, died early, and fate probably cheated him of the honors that should have been his. The late Abel M. Griffith, well-remembered by some, missed his opportunity by deserting the dignified profession of the law for the noisy arena of politics. He was elected to the legislature, and served one term, in 1841, but that unfitted him for the com- panionship of law-books and clients. Some of the present gener- ation will call to mind his great " peace-maker," which he was wont to flourish around, oftentimes to the alarm of small boys. He read law with Mr. Ross, had good abilities, and should have made a respectable figure in the world, but wrecked his fortunes on the rock that has proved fatal to so many. The moral and professional esprit de corps have been greatly advanced by the organization of the "Legal Association," twenty-five years ago. An annual meeting is held in January, to transact the necessary business of the associ- tion, followed by a supper. Of the present bar we do not purpose to speak, as we could not draw lines between inembers. There is rising talent among them, and we risk nothing in saying that prac- tice in the profession, and study in the quiet of the office, will make them the equals of the generations of lawyers that have passed away. Of the present members of our bar, James Gilkyson has been the longest in continuous practice, having been admitted in 1841, and we suppose is entitled to wear the honors of the father of the bar. Caleb E. Wright was admitted eight years earlier, but was absent over twenty years from the bar and county, and has but lately returned. Edward M. Paxson, a judge of the supreme court, studied law, was admitted and practiced, at Doylestown ; and George Lear, the attorney-general of the state, is the next oldest practicing attor- ney to Mr. Gilkyson. Since 1790 an hundred young men have studied and been admitted to our bar, and many others have practiced in our courts. Four judges have been furnished the supreme court by our bar, court and county.
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