CHAPTER XXVIII

THE TOWNSHIP OF TINICUM

[Please note that this chapter is heavely footnoted.  The footnotes are indicated by an “*” and “(number*).]

The island of Tinicum, now comprising the township of the same name, is located in the Delaware River, about two-miles from the eastern limit of the city of Chester. At the southwestern end of the island is the mouth of Darby Creek, and, proceeding towards the source of that stream eastwardly two miles and a half, a sinuous estuary, termed Bow Creek, unites with Darby Creek, when from the place of this union the latter changes its course in a northwardly direction, while Bow Creek flowing eastwardly enters the Delaware about three and a half miles from the mouth of Darby Creek; thus forming the island of Big Tinicum, as it is frequently called to distinguish it from the low, narrow, marshy strip of land lying nearly in the middle of the river, extending almost the entire length of Tinicum Island proper, which is known as Little Tinicum Island. At its broadest part Tinicum is about a mile and a half in width, and its circumference is in the neighborhood of nine miles. It contains two thousand seven hundred and fifty acres, two thousand of which are marsh or meadow land, the average level of the ground being four feet below high water-mark. Originally Big Tinicum Island consisted of but five hundred acres, the remainder of the land having been reclaimed from the water by the construction of banks or dikes.

From a description of Tinicum in 1679-80 we learn that then it was about two miles long, or a “little more than a mile and a half wide. . . . The southwest point, which only has been and is still cultivated, is barren, scraggy, and sandy, growing plenty of wild onions, a weed not easily eradicated. On this point three or four houses are standing, built by the Swedes, a little Lutheran Church made of logs, and the remains of the large block-house, which served them in place of a fortress, and the ruins of some log huts. This is the whole of the manor. The best and pleasantest quality it has is the prospect, which is very agreeable.”* The Indian name of this island was Tanakon, Tutacaenung, and Teniko, which, after the Swedes settled there, was changed to Nya Gotheberg,** and subsequently termed by the Dutch the Island of Kattenberg,*** while the English changed the Indian name Tennakong, as it is more usually written, to Tinicum.

The first settlement of Europeans in Pennsylvania of which authentic records exist was made on the island of Tinicum by the Swedish Governor, John Printz, subsequent to Feb. 15, 1643, in exercising the discretion reposed in him by the home government as to the site of his residence. “The convenient situation of the place,” we are told by Acrelius, “suggested its selection.”(4*) Professor Keen declares that “the encroachments of the neighboring Dutch, and the recent repairs of their little Fort Nassau, determined the new Governor to remove to the more commanding post of Tutaeaenugh, or Tinicum.”.(5*) Certain it is, that shortly after Printz reached the province he changed the location of the capital, removing to Tinicum, where he erected a “new fort provided with considerable armament,” which he named Nya Gotheborg, and also caused to be built a mansion for his own residence, surrounded by “a fine orchard, a pleasant house, and other conveniences,” to which he gave the name of Printzhof.(6*) At the same place also “the principal inhabitants had their dwellings and plantations,” but at the conclusion of the year 1645 the settlement in that vicinity was small, and the dwellings few, for Hudde reports that “there are some plantations which are continued nearly a mile, but few houses only at considerable distance one from the other, the farthest is not far from Tinnekonk, which is an island, and is toward the river side secured by creeks and underwood.”(7*) The fort was simply a block-house, for Andrias Hudde describing it states “that it is a pretty strong fort, constructed by laying very heavy hemlock (greenen) logs the one on the other.”(8*) In less than two years after it was erected it was totally destroyed by fire. On Nov. 25, 1645, Swan Wass, a gunner, between ten and eleven o’clock, set the fort on fire, and in a short time all was burned, nothing being saved except the dairy.(9*) Vincent says “that the conflagration was occasioned by the neglect of Swen Wass, who had fallen asleep, and a candle which he had left burning set fire to the structure.”(10*) Printz, however, treated the act as a criminal one. Hence in his report he spoke of Swen Wass as “the above-mentioned incendiary,” and informed the home government that he had caused the man to be tried, that he had been convicted and sentenced, and he had sent him to Sweden, in irons, that the sentence might be executed.” The destruction of the fort was a severe ordeal for the colonists, for winter had set in bitterly cold, the river and creeks were frozen, and, as New Gottenberg was on an island, no one could get to it; and as Printz reports, “the sharpness of winter lasted until the middle of March; so that, if some rye and corn had not been unthreshed, I myself, and the people with me on the island, would have starved to death. But God maintained us with that small quantity of provisions until the new harvest.” Here also Printz had “a commodious church built,” a small log structure, which the Governor reported he had adorned and decorated “according to our Swedish fashion, so far as our limited resources and means would allow,” which sanctuary was appropriately consecrated “for divine services” by Rev. John Campanius, on the 4th of September, 1646. A burial-place was also laid out, and Campanius records that “the first corpse that was buried there was that of Catherine, the daughter of Andrew Hanson. She was buried on the 28th of October, in the said year, being the feast of St. Simon and St. Jude.”(11*)

As with all European colonists, the impression prevailed among the Swedes that precious metals would be found in the New World. Hence, in his report for 1647, Governor Printz says, “Mines of silver and gold may possibly be discovered, but nobody here has any knowledge about such things.”(12*) The report was however current that gold existed in large quantities on the eastern shores of the Delaware in the neighborhood of Trenton. Peter Lindstrom, the Swedish engineer, records that an Indian coming to Tinicum, seeing a gold ring on the hand of Governor Printz’s wife, “inquired of her why she wore such a trifle upon her finger?” The Governor hearing this asked the American whether he could procure such stuff for him? If he could, he would give him a great deal that was good in return. Whereupon the American answered, “I know where there is a mountain full of this!” On this the Governor took an armful of red and blue cloth, also lead, powder, looking-glasses, needles, etc., and showing them to him, said, “See here what I will give you if you will bring me a piece of that in proof of what you have said; but I will send two of my people along with you.” To this he would not agree. He said, “I will first go and bring you the proof; if that satisfies you, then there is time enough for you to send some one with me.” Promising the proof, he thereupon received some pay. A few days thereafter he returned with a piece as large as two fists, which the aforesaid Governor tested, and found that it abounded in good gold, and obtained a considerable quantity from it, from which he afterwards had gold rings and bracelets made. He therefore promised the American a much greater reward if he would show our people, whom he would send with him, where that mountain was situated, which he also promised to do; but said that he had not leisure for it at that time, but would come back again after some days, and then he again received some presents. After the American came to his countrymen and began to boast before them, they compelled him to tell for what he had received his gifts; and when they came to know it they put him to death so that that place might not become known to us, supposing that it might bring some mischief upon them.”(13*) Acrelius believed that this statement was absolutely fictitious, and the representation was made “to bring to the light unknown regions for the purpose of enticing people over the great sea, and to secure settlers.”(14*)

Arnold De Lagrange, as late as 1680, reported that there was an iron-mine on Tinicum, but a visitor there at that date says “that as to there being a mine of iron ore upon it I have not seen any upon that island or elsewhere and if it were so, it is of no great importance for such mines are so common in this country that little account is made of them.”(15*)

At Tinicum the first vessel constructed by Europeans within the present State of Pennsylvania was built, and in his report for 1647, Governor Printz says, “I have caused the barge to be fully constructed, so that the hull is ready and floating on the water; but the completion of the work must be postponed until the arrival of a more skilled carpenter, the young men here declaring they do not know enough to finish it.”(16*) That this vessel was completed we learn from an order issued by Stuyvesant after the capture of New Sweden by the Dutch, dated March 26, 1657, in which he states, respecting the pleasure-boat of the late Governor Printz, which “he is informed” is decaying and nearly rotten where she then laid, that if Peter Meyer would satisfy the attorneys of the late Governor Printz, and discharge Stuyvesant from responsibility under the terms of the Swedish capitulation, he (Meyer) might be permitted to make use of the boat for transporting letters.(17*)

In the little log sanctuary at Tinicum, until May, 1648, officiated Rev. John Campanius, who earnestly strove to instruct the Indians in the tenets of his church. To aid him in the endeavor to Christianize the savages he applied himself to the study of their language, and mastered it sufficiently to translate the Lutheran Catechism into the dialect of the Lenni Lenape family of the great Algonquin tribe. He was the first person to translate a book into the Indian tongue, and although his work was not published until 1696, when it was printed by the royal command at Stockholm, still he antedated a few years Eliot’s labors to impart instruction to the Indians by translating the Bible into the Mohegan dialect, although the latter’s work was put to press thirty years before that of Campanius. The reverend pastor was relieved at the date mentioned by Rev. Lears Carlsson Lock, who appears to have had, after 1656, the exclusive care for twenty-two years of religious affairs in the colony. The Swedes in those early days, we are told by the late Joseph J. Lewis, in his “History of Chester County,”(18*) used to attend church at Tinicum, “to which they came in canoes from New Castle and other places along the Delaware, both above and below the island.”

On the return of Governor Printz to Sweden, his daughter, Armegat, yet remained at and occupied Printzhof at Tinicum, and after the conquest by the Dutch of New Sweden, notwithstanding the recommendation of Stuyvesant to the directors, in 1656, to occupy the fort at that place and garrison it, it seems not to have been done, for in 1680 it was a ruin, and at that date is mentioned as “the remains of the large block house.”(19*) Armegat Printz, for she seems to have clung to her maiden name, was very haughty in her bearing and oppressive toward the poor in her pride of station. Inasmuch as the estate on which the little church was built belonged to her father, whose attorney she was, she claimed that structure as part of her possessions. But the edifice was, nevertheless, used for religious services, and although she sold the church to La Grange, with the island, the Swedes still worshiped therein. On May 24, 1673, to show her contempt for the Swedes, she sold the bell after she was put into possession of the estate in the execution in the ejectment suit, to which reference will be made. The receipt given by her on that occasion is interesting, since it relates to the first church-bell we have record of in our country’s history, although long years before that date mention is made of a bell used by the courts at New Castle to summon the people together. The following is the receipt given by her: (20*)

(Copy) “LAUS DEO, May 24, 1673.
     “I, the undersigned, Armegat Printz, acknowledges to have transferred to the congregation of the adherents of the Augsburg Confession in this place, the bell that has been on Tennakong, that they may do therewith what pleases them, and promise to keep them free from all claims that are made. Before the undersigned witnesses given as above.
     “ARMEGAT PRINTZ.
     “His mark,
     P.K.
     “PETER KOCK.
     “His mark,
     X
     “JONAS NELSSON.”

The Swedish congregation at Tinicum, Acrelius tells us, purchased the bell back again before Armegat left the Delaware finally for Europe, paying therefor two days’ labor in harvest-time. The date of her departure is unknown, but she was at Upland, Chester, on March 3, 1676,(21*) nearly three years after the bell was sold. We also know that at a court held at New Castle by Governor Andross, May 13 and 14, 1675, it was ordered “That church at Tinicon Island Do serve for Upland & pts adjacent.”(22*) In this little log church, for many years, Pastor Lock preached to the Swedish settlers, and when the English conquered the territory, bringing with them their contempt for the clergy,(23*) it was evident the change of rulers was not to his benefit. To be sure, as measured by the standard of this day, the reverend gentleman seems to have worn the cloth with little credit to his profession, but the times were rude, the sports were rude, and if, as stated, his “great infirmity seems to have been an over fondness for intoxicating drinks,” it was the general weakness of that age. Finally, as years crept apace, the old dominie grew infirm, became so lame that he could not help himself, and was compelled to suspend active labor in the ministry. Rev. Jacob Fabritius, of the Wiccaco Church, could be of little use to Tinicum congregation, for while the latter’s flock grew, Lock’s did not; and as Pastor Fabritius was blind, and had to be led when he walked about, the little church on Tinicum languished until, about the beginning of the eighteenth century, it ceased to be used for religious services. In time it fell into ruins, and long before the beginning of the present century had entirely disappeared.

The graveyard mentioned by Campanius has been eaten away by the washing of the tide. It is related by Aubrey H. Smith, late United States district attorney, of Philadelphia, that his father and the latter’s sister, when children, while walking along the river-shore at Tinicum, at the site of the burial-ground, saw coffins projecting from the banks where the earth had been worn away by the water. Printzhof, that noted mansion of the Swedish Governor, stood until the summer of 1822 on the high ground of the island, and “the interior bore evident marks of great antiquity in its structure,” but at the date stated the greater part of the ancient building was destroyed by fire.(24*) Dr. Smith records that “the dilapidated remains of what was said to be the chimney of this mansion were standing within the recollection of the author, and up to this time one of the small foreign-made bricks, of a pale yellow color, of which it was partly constructed, may be occasionally picked up in this vicinity. Its site was a short distance above the present Tinicum Hotel, and on the opposite side of the road.(25*)

The administration of the affairs of the province under Printz must have been exceedingly gratifying to the crown of Sweden, for in less than nine months after Governor Printz landed on the Delaware, Queen Christina, on Nov. 6, 1642, made a grant, “On account of the long and excellent services which the lieutenant-colonel and Governor of New Sweden, our very dear and beloved John Printz, has rendered to us and to the Crown of Sweden, and also on account of those which he is daily rendering to us in the government of the country and which he is engaged to render us as long as he shall live . . . the place called Teneko or New Gottenberg, in New Sweden, to enjoy it, him and his lawful heirs, as a perpetual possession.”(26*) Governor Printz, when he came to the colony, was accompanied by his wife and daughter, Armgart; the latter was subsequently married to Lieutenant John Pappegoya, who, on Printz’s return to Sweden, near the close of the year 1653, was left in charge of the government of the colony, and after the coming of John Rysinge, who superseded him in authority, the latter remained, for in Rysinge’s letter to the ministers of Sweden, July 11, 1654, he recommended Pappegoya as a proper person to be appointed schute or sheriff on the Delaware.(27*) At that time the presumption is Governor Rysinge resided at Tinicum, for on June 17th of that year a council was held by him with the Indian sachems, at Printz Hall, on which occasion some of the Indians complained that the Swedes had brought much evil upon them, for many of the savages had died since the former came to this country. Naaman, one of the chiefs, made a speech, in which he declared the Swedes were a very good people. “Look,” said he, pointing to the presents, “see what they have brought us, for which they desire our friendship.” So saying, he stroked himself three times down the arm, which among the Indians is a token of friendship. Afterwards he thanked the Swedes on behalf of his people for the presents they had received, and said that friendship should be observed more strictly between them than it had been before; that the Swedes and Indians had been in Governor Printz’s time as one body and one heart (striking his breast as he spoke) and thenceforward they should be as one head, in token of which he took hold of his head with both his hands, and made a motion as if he was tying a strong knot, and then he made this comparison, that as the calabash was round without any crack, so they would be a compact body without any fissure, and that if any one should attempt to do any harm to the Indians, the Swedes should immediately inform them of it; and, on the other hand, the Indians would give immediate notice to the Christians of any plot against them, even if it were in the middle of the night.” Several savages, after they had been presented with brandy and wine, followed with similar remarks, and advised the Swedes to settle at Passyunk, where the Indians were numerous, and where, if any of the latter attempted to do the Swedes mischief, they could be punished. Finally, they desired to confirm the title to the land which the Swedes had already purchased from them. This being done, “there were set upon the floor in the great hall, two large kettles and many other vessels filled with sappaun, which is a kind of hasty pudding, made of maize and Indian corn. The sachems sat by themselves; the other Indians all fed heartily and were satisfied. . . The treaty of friendship which was then made between the Swedes and the Indians has ever since been faithfully observed on both sides.”(28*)

Lieut. John Pappegoya is generally believed to have returned to Sweden shortly after the arrival of Rysinge, an impression evidently founded on the statement of Acrelius, that “the Vice-Governor, John Pappegoya, had determined to take his departure from the country, and the government was therefore handed over to the said commissary, John Risinge.”(29*) The latter reached New Sweden, May 23, 1654, and yet on March 30, 1656, John Pappegoya was still in New Sweden, for on the date given he announced to Governor Stuyvesant the arrival there of a Swedish ship, the “Mercury,” and that the Dutch authorities on the Delaware had refused permission to the crew and passengers to land.(30*) This is the last mentioned of John Pappegoya, and inasmuch as it proves that he did not return directly to Sweden after the arrival of Rysinge, as is stated by Acrelius, it is very likely that he never did return to Europe, but died in the province.

After New Sweden had been conquered by the arms of Stuyvesant, in September, 1655, Governor Rysinge states that the Dutch forces “at New Gottenberg robbed Mr. Pappegoya’s wife of all she had, with many others, who had collected their property together there.”(31*) About twelve months after the conquest of the province, “Armgard Papigaay,” as the Dutch record the name (the document, however, is signed “Armgard Prints”), petitioned that letters patent should be issued to her for her father’s land at Printzdorp (Chester) and at “Tinnakunk” (Tinicum Island). Stuyvesant and his Council, in response, accorded her permission, pursuant to the terms of capitulation, “to take possession and cultivate the lands of her Lord and Father at Printzdorp.”(32*) Nothing was said as to Tinicum, but Armgart Pappegoya continued to occupy the lands there, and we learn, from a letter from Vice-Director William Beekman, dated May 12, 1660, that “Miss Printz requests that she may deliver here, for her taxes, a fat ox, fat pigs, and bread corn.” Doubtless when Governor Stuyvesant was at Tinicum, on May 8, 1658, where he had a conference with the Swedish magistrates, he lodged at Printz Hall, for we know that at that time the block-house there was no longer occupied by the armed forces of the government. In the summer of 1657 the Dutch authorities sought to prevail upon the Swedish inhabitants on the river to gather themselves together in villages, and in 1660 the matter was pressed earnestly by the vice-director, under instructions from Stuyvesant, but we learn from Beekman’s official correspondence that the resolute daughter of the former Swedish Governor resisted the order, stating that she could not remove “on account of her heavy buildings, also because the church stands there,” and stating, as an additional reason, that although she had offered her lands “rent free, but nobody as yet shows inclination to live with her.”(33*)

If, as it appears, no one was inclined to live with her, there was one person at least who desired to become the owner of her possession at Tinicum Island. Joost De La Grange, on May 29, 1662, purchased from her as the agent of her father, John Printz, then in Sweden, the estate, “together with the houseing and stock thereupon, for the sum of six thousand guilders, Holland money,” one-half to be paid in cash, two thousand when she reached Holland, and the remaining thousand in one year thereafter.

De La Grange immediately entered into possession of the estate, and Mrs. Pappegoya sailed for Europe, arriving at Holland on the 31st of July of that year.(34*) The bill of exchange being presented and payment refused, it was protested, and the energetic woman must have taken passage for the colony in the first vessel sailing thence for the New World, since, in November following, she had obtained judgment against La Grange, from which final decree the defendant entered an appeal. On November 21st Beekman wrote that he had gone “to Tinneconk at request of Huygens and used every exertion to settle differences respecting the protested bill of exchange, but did not succeed.”(35*) Governor John Printz had died in 1663, and a fresh difficulty was thrown in the way of Armgart Pappegoya’s collecting the money, for her three sisters in Sweden objected to the payment of the three thousand guilders still due from the purchaser until a new power of attorney had been executed by them. Armgart, in the mean while, erected a house at Printzdorp (the estate at Upland afterwards sold to Robert Wade), “who had her dwelling here when she left Tinekonk,”(36*) and it seems that she was in very indigent circumstances, for on Aug. 13, 1672, in her petition to Governor Lovelace, she stated she lived alone and had only one servant-man, who she asked might be excused from “Traynings in the Company in wch he is Inlisted, & also give her Lycence to Distill in her own Distilling Kettle some small Quantitys of Liquors for her own use & her servts & laborers as before mencon’d.”(37*) To add to her discomfiture in prosecuting her suit, Joost De La Grange, several years before, went to Holland to collect the money due him there, so that he might discharge the remainder of the purchase-money, but on the voyage he became ill and died,(38*) leaving a widow, Margaret, and a minor son surviving him. The widow remained in possession of the premises for several years. In the mean while the English had conquered the territory, and accompanying their forces to the Delaware was Andrew Carr, who subsequently married the widow La Grange. Apparently to forestall any action Mrs. Pappegoya might take to secure possession, on Oct. 1, 1669, Governor Lovelace was induced to issue a patent to “Andrew Carr & Margaret his wife, formerly the wife of Joost De La Grange, deceased, to confirm to them a certain Island in Delaware river called by the name of Matiniconck, containing by estimation three hundred acres more or less, the said Island lying about 6 Dutch miles up the river from the town of Newcastle, bounded on the Northwest with the Mill Kill, on the South by the river & on the North, East or North & East with Bow Kill.”(39*) After this patent was granted Andrew Carr and his wife resided at Tinicum for some time without any proceeding being instituted against them, when Margaret Carr, having fallen heir to an estate in Holland, Andrew, his wife, and her young son by the former marriage went to Europe to look after the inheritance, leaving Capt. John Carr, as their attorney, in charge of the Tinicum property. Within a short time after the departure of Andrew Carr’s family Armgart Pappegoya brought suit for the recovery of the island, summoned Capt. John Carr before a special court held at New Castle by Governor Lovelace, and there, by consent, it was removed to the General Court of Assizes, held at New York, in October, 1671. The case began on Wednesday afternoon, the 12th, and continued until Friday afternoon, the 14th, when, on the verdict of the jury, judgment was entered for the plaintiff, with costs and charges.(40*) On Jan. 27, 1672, the Governor and Council, after having consulted with the bench as to the amount “of interest and forbearance of the principal Debt” (three thousand guilders), allowed fifty-five pounds for such interest, leaving the other charges to be determined by law, and appointed Peter Alricks, Capt. Edmund Cantwell, William Tom, and Capt. Walter Wharton to appraise and value the island of Tinicum, and the goods, chattels, or estates of the defendants. On Feb. 20, 1672, an execution was issued to Sheriff Cantwell, directing him “to put the said Jeuffro Prince into possession of the said Island and the Stock thereupon wch if it shall not prove sufficient to satisfy the said Debt you are to Secure and Levy the rest in the hands of whom you can find any of the Estate of the said Andrew Carr & Priscilla his wife whether in the hands of Capt. John Carr their attorney or any other, and if any part of the said Estate hath been disposed of since the beginning of this Process the parties who have done the same are to make it good out of their own estate.”(41*)

The execution seems to have been carried only partially into effect. The following year the Dutch again acquired possession of the province, and during the latter’s rule over the colony the proceedings were held in abeyance. However, after the English authority was again restored, Governor Andross, on Jan. 12, 1675, issued a warrant to Sheriff Cantwell, setting forth that inasmuch as the former execution had not been “fully effected Att the request of the said Jeuffre Armigart Prince als Pappeay, That the former Execution may be renewed,” he was directed to proceed according to the judgment.(42*) The second execution was fully enforced, and the same year, on March 22d, Jeffro Armgart Printz, alias Pappegoya, sold the island to Otto Earnest Cock “for fifteen hundred guilders in zeewaut, as it (the estate) was very much decayed and worn out,”(43*) the deed “reserving ye churchyard as it now stands fenced in with ye said church, with free liberty to the inhabitants in general to repair thither to their devotions or burials.”(44*) Armgart also gave a power of attorney to the purchaser to receive possession of the estate from the sheriff.

In 1678, Arnold De La Grange, the son and heir, who had gone abroad, being now of age, came to the province, and went to Tinicum Island, claiming its possession. Otto Earnest Cock replied that he knew nothing of the matter; and if he, De La Grange, had any lawful claim, he ought to apply to the court, not to him, for his title was founded on its judgment; but if he wished to purchase it, he could have it for three hundred pounds sterling, or at an agreed-upon price. The young man thereupon became angry, and threatened to appeal to London. “That you can do,” said Cock, “if you have money enough. All this affects me not since I have bought and paid for it and have been put in possession of it by the Court.”(45*) In the same year, 1678, Arnold De La Grange, in a lengthy petition to Governor Andross, set out the story of the sale to his father; the suit which was instituted against John Carr during his stepfather’s absence beyond the seas, pleading the misnomer of Percilia for Margaret in the title of the suit, and that the judgment was defective because it was rendered against a man beyond seas, against a femme covert, and affected the vested right of a minor who was not represented in the suit in any wise. Concluding, he asked that the Governor and Council “will please to direct some way for his relief,” either by a hearing in equity or an order requiring Cock to refund the sum paid by his father.(46*) Nothing seems to have been done with this petition; but De La Grange, just before the territory passed into the possession of Penn, began an action against Otto Earnest Cock at the Upland Court on June 14, 1681; but the quaint record states “This action referred till next Court that there’s noe Court without Justice otto whoe is a party.”(47*)

The following is verbatim the record of the case, copied from the docket of the
     “Court held at Chester 22d 6 mo 1683.
     “Arnoldus Delagrange, Plaintiff, Otto Ernest Cock, Defendant. The plaintiff sues and declares as heir to Tynnacu Island and premises: It is acknowledged by Jno White (ye defendt. attorney) that ye plaint’s father was legally possessed of Tinicum Island & premises in ye declaration mentioned by virtue of his purchase from Armgard Prince, but sayth (in regard pte (Part) of the purchase money was only paid) that ye said Lady Armgard Prince had Tryall & execution thereupon & was put into possession of ye same premises and sold ye same premises to ye defendt.
     “The plaint (by Abraham Man his attorney) setts forth that hee ye sayd Plaint (who was Heire to ye sd Island) at ye tyme of se sayd Tryall & Execucon was then und age & in Holland, & therefore could make noe defence, & further yt the said Heire (the Plaint was not menconed in ye said Tryall; the Accon being comenced against one Andrew Carre & Prissilla his wife, mistaken in ye execucon for ye mother of ye Plaint, whose mother’s name was Margaretta.
     “The Testimony of Nicholas More, Secretary in writing and his hand produced on behalf of ye plaint:
     “Shackamackson, ye 20th of ye 5th month al July, 1683.
     “I do solemnly declare that about ye moneth of May last past of this present yeare, Mr. Otto Ornst Cock of Tynnacu Island came to mee at Shackamackson (having before spoken to me of a Tryall yt was to bee at Upland, Between Mr. Lagrange & himselfe, about ye Island of Tynnacu, and told mee among many other things that hee wished hee had never sold mee ye said Island, and said hee. Hee wished he had lost 50£ rather than to have put his hand to eyther my Conveyance or Mr. Lagrange Agreemt, saying that hee was undone. ‘Why?’ said I. ‘Because,’ said hee, ‘I have wronged Lagrange children from their Rights.’ ‘Well,’ said I, ‘Mr. Otto, if you beleeve in yor concience that ye Island is his let him have it. I will not take any advantage of it, either against him or you.’ ‘Yes,’ said hee, ‘it is his, and if you will doe soe & part with it, I shall give you thanks and repay you your charges.’ ‘Well,’ said I, ‘you shall have it, and I will endeavr to make Mr. Lagrange & you ffriends without any wrong.’ This was in ye presence of Major Fenwick, Thomas Fairman & Michael Neelson, all which I attest under my hand.

“N. MORE, Secretary.
“Israell Helme’s Deposition:
     “Israell Helme being required to declare what hee knowes, concerning ye Bargaine between ye sayd Armgard Prince, & ye Plaints ffather for Tynnacu Island & premisses, deposeth That Lagranges ffather was to give ye sayd Armgard for ye same Six Thousand Dutch Guilders, and yt hee knows there was three Hundred Dutch Guilders thereof pd, but knows of ye paymt of noe more; And further sayth that ye Three Thousand Guilders (which is Three Hundred pounds) was to bee paid in this Countrey by agreemt between Jacob Swanson & ye ffather of ye Plaint & further sayth that when the Plaints ffather dyed, hee ye said Plaint was a little child; and further sayth not.
     “ffop Johnson’s deposition:
     “ffop Johnson being required to declare where hee knowes in ye premisses, Deposeth. That hee ye said ffop & ye above mentioned Israell was desired by Mrs. Armgard Prince ats Popinjay, to demand ye remainder of ye sayd Six Thusand Guildes which was Three Hundred pounds of Mrs. Delagrange (ye Plaints mother) And yt shee ye said Mrs. Delagrange (upon ye same demand) sayd shee could not pay it, and further sayth not.
     “To which ye sayd Plaint replyes (by his aforesd attorney) That if the Deft can make it appeare ye sayd money is unpayd, and can shew their Right to receive it, hee is ready to discharge what can be made appeare to remayne due of ye sd Purchace, But denyes yt ye Deft hath any legall right to demand ye same.
     “The Juryes verdict. The Jury finde for ye Plaint and alsoe give him his costs of suite and fforty Shillings damage, the Plaint paying to ye Deft Thirty & Seaven pounds & Tenne Shillings, according to an agreemt betweene ye Plaint and Deft produced & Read in this Cort & alsoe delivering ye Block house & pticulers in ye same agreemt mentioned.
     “Judgmt is thereupon Awarded.”

Execution was issued on this judgment, for at the October court, 1683, “The Sheriff made returne of two executions, one against Henry Reynolds. . . the other against Otto Earnest Cocke att ye suite of Arnoldus Delegrange for ye Island of Tinicum.” The plaintiff having acquired possession of the estate, in less than a year sold the island, for at the September court, 1684, “Christopher Taylor, President (Judge) in Open Court deliver over a Penall Bond of Performance for four hundred pounds unto Arnoldus Delegrange & bearing Date ye 2d day of September, 1684, being for the payment of two hundred pounds att or upon ye 1st day of November, 1685.” Christopher Taylor also in open court “delivered up Arnoldus Delegrange receipt to Robert Turner for one hundred pounds old England money as alsoe the said Christopher Taylor did promise to Save the said Arnoldus Delegrange harmlesse from all Damages that may Accrue thereby.” The same day “Arnoldus Delegrange Past over a deed in open court unto Christopher Taylor for ye Island Commonly known by the name of Mattinnaconcke, bearing Date the 2d of the 12th moneth 1684.”

This Christopher Taylor had been a teacher of a classical school in England, in which country he was imprisoned for his religious opinions, adherence to the society of Friends. In 1682 he emigrated to Pennsylvania, first settling in Bucks County, which he represented in the Assembly held at Chester, Dec. 4, 1682, acting in that body as chairman of the Committee on Election and Privileges, and was also one of the “Committee of Foresight” for preparation of provincial bills. In July, 1684, he was one of the justices of Chester County, and doubtless had then settled at Tinicum, which, after he had acquired title, he termed “College Island,” because, as it is believed, he there had a school in the higher branches of education. The fact that he surrendered to De La Grange a receipt given by the latter to Robert Turner, leads to the impression that the latter had entered into an agreement with De La Grange for the purchase of Tinicum, and that Turner had made the contract for Taylor, or had transferred to him his interest in the agreement of sale. Turner appears to have been an intimate friend of Christopher Taylor, for the latter, dying in 1686, made him his executor of his will. It appears that Taylor in his lifetime had sold the island to Ralph Fretwell, and after his death Turner brought suit as executor against Fretwell for £590 17s. 9d. At the sheriff’s sale the property was purchased by Turner. Isaac Taylor, who was not satisfied with the disposition the testator had made of his property, “putt in Cavett against ye Probate of his father’s will,” but subsequently withdrew it.(48*) As executor, on the 9th of First month, 1697-98, Turner by deed conveyed to Israel and Joseph Taylor, the sons of the decedent, and to John and Marie Busly – the latter a daughter of the testator – the island of Tinicum. At the same court, Joseph Taylor, John and Marie Busly, conveyed their two-thirds interests in the island to their brother, Israel, who was formerly sheriff of Bucks County, and, as it appears, to pay them for their part of the estate, he was compelled to borrow the money on mortgage from, Turner.

As one of the most noted civil cases in the judicial annals of our State, that of Paul B. Carter vs. The Tinicum Fishing Company, which was continued in litigation for over thirty years, grew out of the title thus acquired by Israel Taylor to the island, it is proper in this connection to hastily present the historical side of that noted case. Israel Taylor, who was a physician and practiced his profession at Tinicum, died subsequent to 1709, for, in the address of the General Assembly to Governor Goodkin, in alluding to the injurious effect of the issuing of special marriage licenses by the Governor, the document gives as an instance the case of “Israel Taylor, whose Daughter had liked to have been stolen by Coulour of a Lycense lately granted to one James Barber, of Chester County.”(49*) Israel Taylor died leaving, so far as I have information, four sons and six daughters, as follows: Christopher, Thomas, Benjamin, and Samuel Taylor, Mary (who married Jonas Sandelands), Dianah Cartman, Hannah Lloyd, Eleanor Molloy, Sarah Bailey, and the wife of Enoch Elliott. Christopher, the grandson of the first Christopher Taylor, was married, but his wife dying before him, apparently without leaving children, he made a will Dec. 8, 1748, and died shortly after, for the testament was admitted to probate on the 24th day of the same month. The will contained a clause as follows:
     “I give and devise unto the said David Sanderlin my fishing place to him and his heirs forever and likewise it is my will that he shall have the help and use of my negroes Milford and Harry, one month in each year in fishing time, till they respectively attain to thirty years of age. I give and bequeath to David Sanderlin aforesaid my negro boy Tinnecum till he attain to thirty years of age and then to be set free.”

David Sandelands died intestate within four months after the death of his uncle, Christopher Taylor, and letters of administration on his estate were granted to his sisters, Rebecca Smith and Mary Claxton, with their husbands. Mrs. Claxton died in 1750, but in October, 1752, the jury appointed to partition the lands and tenements of David Sandelands awarded the fishery to the heirs and legal representatives of Mary Claxton, “dividing the said fishery into five equal parts.” The court, in 1754, approved the petition made by the jury.

Between the years 1796 and 1805, Joseph Carter purchased by three deeds the five shares of this fishery allotted to the heirs of Mary Claxton, and in the last deed, that of 1805, the fishery was described as “Beginning at the mouth of Darby creek and extending up the river Delaware as far as necessity may require for the benefit of fishing or that ever was made use of.” Joseph Carter died Feb. 2, 1830, and by his will, dated July 16, 1828, he devised his fishing-place at the Lazaretto to his two sons, Joseph and Cloud, as tenants in common.(50*) In 1832, William Carter purchased Cloud Carter’s interest in the fishery. The following year Joseph Carter died without children, and letters of administration were granted to his brother, William Carter, who, already owner of one-half of the fishery by purchase, began proceedings in partition, and in those proceedings the sheriff, Jan. 12, 1834, advertised the estate to be partitioned as “the right and privilege of fishing in the river Delaware from the point where the road called River road joins said river to the mouth of Darby Creek in township of Tinicum and right and privilege of hauling and drying seines and nets upon shore of said river from line of garden formerly of Capt. Roe to mouth of Darby Creek with privilege of occupying with nets, seines, boats, and cabin, and space of ground as is necessary in fishery.”

For some cause the proceedings seem not to have been pressed to sale, perhaps by reason of the pendency of the suit of Mary Hart against Jacob Hill,(51*) in which the question was raised as to what had passed to David Sandelands under Christopher Taylor’s will, whether it was a fee simple to the riverbank or merely an easement. The Supreme Court in 1835 held it was the latter. The matter thereupon rested, so far as title to the fishery was concerned, until proceedings in partition were pressed, and on Aug. 24, 1847, Sheriff Robert R. Dutton sold eight-fourteenths of the fishery to Paul B. Carter, and by several deeds thereafter the latter acquired title until, Sept. 19, 1852, he was the owner, in fee, of twelve-fourteenths of the fishery. In 1865, Paul B. Carter began proceedings in partition, the jury appointed returning a report to the February term, 1866, that the fishery could not be devised, and valued it at seven thousand five hundred dollars. Sheriff Vanzant, on March 26, 1866, conveyed the whole title to Paul B. Carter, he having become the purchaser of the easement in partition. From that date until within a few years past the case was in constant litigation.(52*) The question in dispute grew out of an alleged erection of a stone sea-wall and pier by the Tinicum Fishing Company, which resulted in rendering the old Taylor fishery valueless. The company had purchased, in 1856, at sheriff’s sale, a tract of about twenty acres, and subsequently they erected a large and commodious house, which was furnished especially for the use of a social club, but the long and tedious lawsuits finally caused the members to lose all interest in the association, the real and personal estates in November, 1879, passing under the sheriff’s hammer, and the Tinicum Fishing Company became thereafter merely a topic for the annalist.

At a court held 3d day 1st week Tenth month, 1687, the grand jury “Presented Thomas Boules of ye Island of Tenecum for killing and converting to his own use divers Hogs and Piggs of Thomas Smith with others belonging to ye King’s Leidge People.” This is the first reference I find to Thomas Smith, who was then settled in Darby, but subsequently his descendants became large owners of real estate on the island; that portion of Tinicum which connected the present with the story of the past being still owned by Aubrey H. Smith, his direct descendant. In the will of Christopher Taylor, dated Dec. 8, 1748, he mentions William Smith, leaving him “one shilling sterling.” This William Smith I presume was the father of the late Thomas Smith, member of Congress from Delaware County. At any rate, the old Taylor mansion-house on the island subsequently became the property of Thomas Smith. It was built of stone, and it is said that while it was building the family resided in an old log hut made of white cedar logs, “cut no doubt in the marshes hard by, though not a tree of that species is now known to grow in Pennsylvania. It was thoroughly repaired some years ago by Aubrey H. Smith, Esq., and bids fair to stand for another century or more.”(53*)

It is stated that about the beginning of this century Tinicum Island “was so unhealthy that farmers were compelled to get their work done before September, as by that period the ague and remittent fever left no body able to work, but by banking and draining the water off the meadows the health of the place gradually improved, and from 1821 it has been considered very salubrious.”(54*) Ferris records that in Printz’s time and later, vessels drawing four or five feet of water could sail from Fort Gottenberg across the meadows to the mouth of the Schuylkill.(55*) About the middle of the last century companies were incorporated by the provincial government and empowered to bank the meadows, while independently of these companies private parties had reclaimed much of the submerged land.

Previous to the Revolution, Little Tinicum Island, heretofore mentioned, was partly reclaimed, twelve acres being banked in and inhabited. When the English fleet ascended the river in 1777, the British naval officers were apprehensive that this tract of land might be utilized by the Continental authorities as a site for defensive works to interrupt their retreat, and to prevent such a use being made of it they cut the banks in many places and overflowed them, since which time the banks have never been restored. In heavy tides it is nearly overflowed, but usually presents a large uncovered surface.(56*) Dr. Smith states one of the earthworks on the Delaware River “was near the mouth of Darby Creek, doubtless on the island of Tinicum.”(57*) Perhaps it was Little Tinicum Island, which may have caused the English to flood that place.

In the early part of this century the island of Tinicum proper was nearly submerged, consequent on the freshets occasioned by sudden thaws of ice and snow in the spring, or breaks in the banks. In 1819 the banks broke, and the water rushed in overflowing the island road for four miles, and on Feb. 22, 1822, the lowlands were almost inundated, boats sailing within four hundred yards of the Lazaretto to Penrose’s Ferry, over the meadows and fences a distance of four miles.(58*) On Sept. 1, 1850, a heavy rain fell which covered with water the meadows of Tinicum to the depth of six feet, and inundated the railroad from a short distance below Gray’s Ferry nearly to the Lazaretto, in some places undermining the cross-ties and in others sweeping them entirely away, so that travel by rail was suspended for more than a week.

Previous to the Revolution, Joseph Galloway, a noted lawyer of Philadelphia, who, when the struggle finally came cast his fortune on the side of the English crown, owned a tract of two hundred and twelve acres of the easterly end of the island, all of it being reclaimed land. The commonwealth of Pennsylvania instituted proceedings against him, and his estates were forfeited. His land on Tinicum was sold by the commissioner of forfeited estates in Chester County, in September, 1779, and on Feb. 19, 1780, the State made a deed for one hundred and eighty-seven and a half acres to James Budden, John Dunlap, Jacob Morgan, John Mease, Thomas Leiper, Joseph Carson, and John Chaloner, but it seemed that Abraham Kentruzer was in possession of the premises as Galloway’s tenant and refused to yield the premises to the purchasers, and on April 28, 1780, the Supreme Council instructed the sheriff to put the latter in possession of the estate. At a later date, May 17, 1780, William Kerlin purchased the remaining part of the tract, containing something over twenty acres.(59*)

The following is the list of the justices of the peace for Tinicum township:

Quarantine Station. – In the last decade of the eighteenth century the city of Philadelphia was scourged with yellow fever, and so great was the alarm at the proximity of the Lazaretto, then located just back of Fort Mifflin, on Providence Island, that it was determined to change the site of that station, hence on Aug. 7, 1799, the Board of Health of Philadelphia purchased from Morris Smith and Reuben Smith ten acres of land on the island of Tinicum, and immediately began the erection of the buildings there which were completed in 1800, and quarantine was established there for the first time in 1801. The old two-story building, the steward’s quarters, was modeled after the Pennsylvania Hospital, at Eighth and Pine Streets, Philadelphia, and although it is now not occupied as a hospital, in early times the wings were used for that purpose. The building is flanked on the right by the physician’s residence and on the left by that of the quarantine master. The present hospital building stands about one hundred yards to the rear of the steward’s quarters. There is also an ancient brick building known as the old custom-house, three stories high, which we learn from a letter written on Jan. 5, 1847, by Joseph Weaver, Jr., United States custom officer, had not been occupied for many years previous to that time for any purpose, and then suffering much from neglect. Hon. R. J. Walker, Secretary of the Treasury, authorized Mr. Weaver to rent it to a person who would take good care of it, the United States reserving the right to store goods therein, if necessary. The building was leased to John Pedrick, a ship-carpenter, at a rental of thirty dollars per annum.

Shortly after the quarantine station was located at Tinicum, at the October session, 1804, the Board of Health endeavored to have John Ferguson, master of the schooner “Monongahela Farmer,” which had come from New Orleans bound to Philadelphia, indicted for a breach of quarantine, the charge being that after the vessel had come to an anchor and was undergoing quarantine, he permitted thirty-two passengers “to go ashore” from his vessel before they had submitted to the required examination. The grand jury, however, ignored the bill.

In June, 1824, a man was landed from an oyster boat at Chester, dangerously ill with smallpox. A meeting of the borough Council was immediately held, but they having no power to act, several of the citizens sent the man in a market wagon to the Lazaretto, and while waiting at that place to be admitted, he asked for a drink of water, which being given him he drank, and immediately fell back in the conveyance dead. The Philadelphia Gazette of that day attacked the borough authorities and citizens for this act, and for a time a sturdy war of words was carried on in the Post Boy at Chester, and the Philadelphia journals.

No serious objection was made to the location of the quarantine until recent years. In the latter part of June, 1870, the brig “Home,” from Jamaica, came to off the Lazaretto. When visiting her the health officers learned that the captain of the vessel had died and was buried at sea four days after the brig had sailed from Black River, Jamaica. She was loaded with logwood, and although at the time there appeared to be no sickness on the vessel, she was in such a filthy condition that she was ordered to be taken to the United States government wharf, adjoining the quarantine grounds. After twenty days, during which she was fumigated, the brig was pronounced clean, and permission given to proceed to her destination. In the interim canal-boats were sent from Philadelphia to remove the logwood, and on one of these boats a woman and boy sickened and died. On Friday, July 15th, a large quantity of filthy rags on the “Home” were taken ashore and burned, the wind blowing strongly from the south. The next day, Saturday, Mrs. Ann Enos and Ann Sharp, at the hotel then kept by Jacob Pepper, were taken sick, and on the following Friday they both died. On Tuesday, July 26th, Mrs. Eva Kugler, wife of the steward of the quarantine, was taken ill, and died on Saturday. Dr. Cardeza, who was in attendance of Mr. Pepper’s family, declared the fever was “a stranger” in this locality, and suggested that unusual care should be taken to prevent contagion. The inference was plain, and when Dr. William B. Ulrich unhesitatingly pronounced it yellow fever the public in the neighborhood, in Chester, and even in Philadelphia, became greatly alarmed lest it might spread. Dr. William S. Thompson, the Lazaretto physician, and Mrs. Gartsell, a nurse who had been attached to the station for fifteen years, were attacked with the disorder. Dr. John F.M. Forwood, of Chester, who twice before had the fever in the Southern States, was summoned to act at the Lazaretto, being appointed temporary physician there. Dr. Thompson and Mrs. Gartsell died on the 11th of August, and on the 13th, Robert Gartside, the quarantine master, fell a victim to the disease. Notwithstanding the fact that Dr. Forwood had had the disease before, he was stricken with the fever, and Dr. Ulrich was called to attend on all the cases there. By the 18th of August the fever had subsided, no new cases having appeared for several days, and all who were then sick of the disorder recovered. About twenty cases of yellow fever occurred. Of these Jacob Pepper, Ann Eliza Enos, Ann Sharp, Dr. Thompson, Robert Gartside, Eva Kugler, Mrs. Gartsell, William H. Dillmore, and the woman and her son on the canal-boat died.

The alarm had subsided, but at the following session of the Legislature a bill was introduced, which was favorably reported, providing for the sale of the quarantine station on Big Tinicum Island, the purchase of Little Tinicum Island, and the erection of buildings there for the Lazaretto. The project was sustained by a petition of a thousand residents of Delaware County, but the bill finally died on the calendar. At the session of 1872 the scheme for removal of the Lazaretto was again presented, the site to which it should be changed being left undetermined in the bill. The Board of Health in Philadelphia at that time memorialized the Senate in opposition to the proposed act, alleging, among other reasons, that the United States in 1871 had rebuilt the long wharf (two hundred and eighty feet), and had completely repaired the large stone government warehouse used for storage of cargoes from infected vessels detained at quarantine. They also declared that Tinicum had but one hundred and twenty-five inhabitants all told, and had remained almost stationary in population for seventy years, while during that time only three dwellings had been erected in the township. The memorial concluded by asserting that the present site was highly eligible and unobjectionable as regards the surrounding neighborhood. The removalists were again defeated.

The following is a list of the physicians and quarantine masters at the Lazaretto since the station was established in 1801:

On July 8, 1872, Governor Geary visited the Lazaretto, the only time, so far as I have knowledge, that the quarantine station was ever visited by the executive officer of the State.

The old fox-hunters of a past generation used to relate a notable chase on Tinicum, which occurred as long ago as Saturday, Feb. 1, 1824. On that morning, about eleven o’clock, John Irwin and James Burns (Chester), George Litzenberg, Philip Rudolph, and others (of Providence), started a fox on the island, and after a warm run the dogs were within fifty yards of him, when he sprang on the roof of an oven, then to a shed adjoining the house of Mr. Horne, jumped in at the second-story window, and neither huntsmen nor hounds had noticed it. A boy looking on told where the fox had gone, and one of the hunters, ascending the shed, entered the room and pushed down the sash. Just as he did this a girl of the family came in the room and shut the door. The fox, finding exit from the apartment by the door closed, ran to the chimney, which he ascended. From its top he sprang to the roof of the house and thence to the ground. He was not captured until near sundown, when he holed at the root of a hollow tree, which he ascended to the forks, whence he was dislodged by a stick being thrust at him, and descending to the roots, he was taken in the usual way and bagged.

Tinicum has been a choice locality for startling sensations from the earliest date. As far back as the 8th of Third month, 1698, Joseph Holt and Isaac Warner were drowned by the ferry-boat from New Castle to Philadelphia being overset in a gust of wind. The evidence showed that Robert White, who was at Isaac Taylor’s house, went to the river to bathe and saw a corpse, whereupon he called Isaac Blawn, and the latter said, “Let us go forward and we shall find more;” and he went, and they did see another, and they called Isaac Taylor and all his household and went down together. When the bodies were recovered Taylor told Isaac Blawn to search them. On Holt they found a piece of eight and some small money, a silver seal, some keys, and four gold rings on his finger. On Warner they found a carpenter’s rule, fourteen pieces of eight and a half, and some other money. Warner had gone aboard the boat at New Castle, much intoxicated, carrying a speckled bag of money. The whole tenor of the evidence taken would seem to indicate that a rumor had gone abroad that the dead men had a considerable sum of money with them, and that those who had found the bodies at Tinicum had appropriated part of it to their own use. Taylor, it appears, had the matter fully investigated and the testimony of a number of witnesses taken at large. The case is an interesting one, inasmuch as it goes into the details of the clothing and other matters of value to the students of history in arriving at a just conception of the customs kind habits of the early settlers.

Almost a hundred and fifty years after this event, on Sunday, Jan. 1, 1843, the good people of Tinicum were astonished to find the dead body of a man hanging from the limb of an apple-tree on the estate of Richard Welling. On examining the clothing of the deceased a carpenter’s rule and a memorandum-book, containing the name of Daniel Barber, was found. No further particulars were ever learned respecting the dead man.

On Sunday, May 12, 1861, the body of a young girl, about fourteen years of age, was found in a ditch on the farm of Jacob Allberger, and, from the appearance of the body, and the fact that tufts of grass had been pulled up by the roots, it was believed that murder had been done in the hope of concealing an infamous outrage. The night previous to the supposed murder a colored man, who lived in the neighborhood, stated that he had heard voices as if some persons were talking, but his dogs were barking at the time so that he could not distinguish what was said. The body was brought to Chester. The next morning the Philadelphia papers contained an advertisement asking information respecting Elizabeth Cox, of Germantown, and the personal description answered to that of the body found at Tinicum. The parents of the missing girl came to Chester, and recognized the corpse as that of their daughter, who was of unsound mind. The case aroused such public indignation that on May 24th the county commissioners offered a reward of two hundred dollars for the arrest and conviction of the person or persons who had committed the murder. Mayor Henry, of Philadelphia, also appointed two detective officers to investigate the facts, and on May 31st they reported that the evidence seemed to establish that the girl, in partial derangement, had wandered from home, was overtaken by night, and had fallen into the ditch; that the banks of the ditch showed that she had struggled to get out, but, as one foot and leg almost to the knee had become fastened in the adhesive mud, she could not extricate herself, but, finally exhausted, had fallen into the water and drowned. The result of the post-mortem examination strongly corroborated this theory. At all events the case ceased at that point, and if murder had been committed, those who did the deed escaped “unwhipped of justice.”

On Friday, March 30, 1877, the body of a man, which subsequently proved to be that of Oliver Saxton, of Philadelphia, was found on the meadow, near the tenant-house on the estate of Aubrey H. Smith, then occupied by James Reid. The circumstances of his death were soon learned. It appeared the deceased, a few days before, had gone to Little Tinicum Island duck-shooting, and when returning in the evening, owing to a heavy storm of rain and snow, was unable to reach his place of destination, and was taken on the yacht of Joseph Woods. The yacht, owing to the storm, was driven ashore on Tinicum, and in the endeavor to get her off the men on her lost their boots in the mud, and finally were compelled to abandon her and seek the fast land in their bare feet. It was night, and the men separated to find shelter. Saxton went to the cabin of Henry Roan, near the bank, but was denied admittance. Woods, who reached the same cabin shortly after Saxton had been there and gone away, was also denied shelter, but on the payment of several dollars was permitted to pass the night there. Saxton attempted to reach Reid’s house, but, being overcome with the cold, he fell to the ground and died. When found the skin was worn from his feet, and his legs were torn by the briers through which he had forced his way.

For almost a century Tinicum was a part of Ridley township, but at the May court, 1780, a petition, signed by twenty-three “inhabitants, owners, and occupiers of land, in the Island of Tinicum,” was presented, which set forth “that the inhabitants of the Island aforesaid, as a part of the township of Ridley, have heretofore paid a great part of the tax for the support of the roads in said township, and also maintained and supported the roads on the Island at their own cost and charge, without the least assistance from the other part of the township. And whereas the dams on said Island, made for the purpose of preventing the tides from overflowing the meadows belonging to your petitioners, were in the year 1777 cut and destroyed, with a view of retarding the progress of the enemy, at that time invading this State, whereby the roads on said Island were greatly damaged, to the very great prejudice of your petitioners, and as it is not in our power to derive any assistance from the inhabitants of the other part of the township, we conceive it to be a hardship to be obliged to support their road.”

The petition concluded with a prayer that the court will, for these reasons, proceed “to divide the Island of Tinicum from the township of Ridley and to make a distinct township of it,” with the like powers exercised by the other townships in the county.

On Aug. 31, 1780, the court allowed the prayer of the petitioners, and from thenceforth the township of Tinicum became a separate district, having all the rights and obligations of other townships. Indeed more, for while the general act of March 20, 1810,(61*) provided that “no person should be compelled to serve as, constable more than once in every fifteen years,” in the same law the township of Tinicum was exempt from the operation of the law, because there was not a sufficient number of persons residing on the island eligible to hold that office, unless within fifteen years a person could be compelled to act in that capacity for more than one year.

Several references in our early Swedish annals lead to the conclusion that a school was established on the island of Tinicum in the primitive days of European settlement there, and that the clergyman of the parish acted in a dual capacity, that of the pedagogue being connected with his ministerial duties. As before mentioned, it is generally maintained by historians that Christopher Taylor had there a school in the higher branches of education previous to 1685. The foregoing statement, however, is inferentially arrived at from collateral evidence purely, and is in no wise the subject of direct proof. Indeed, we have no positive knowledge of a school being kept on Tinicum previous to 1843, about which date Elizabeth Griffiths, a daughter of the then physician in charge at the Lazaretto, had a school in the Dutch house, – the first building on the grounds of the Board of Health, on the left-hand side of the road as you approach the river from Morris’ Ferry. The title Dutch house was given to the building because of its being used to quarantine the crew and passengers of a Dutch vessel in the early days of the Lazaretto. Miss Griffiths was followed by a male teacher, one Culin, but he remained there only for a brief season, when the school was abandoned. About 1847 another school was established in a small frame house, on the site of the primitive Swedish Church, the land now owned by George McLaughlin, but the teacher, whose name was Wilson, became dissatisfied, and he relinquished its care. It also was abandoned, and in time the building itself was removed. In 1854 the first public school on the island, a small brick structure, was erected, the neighbors gratuitously laboring in its building, so that it cost not more than two hundred dollars in actual money expended. For many years it served its purpose, but in time it became dilapidated, the walls spreading, the plaster fallen from the laths in place, and the floors decayed. It was thoroughly inspected, pronounced hopeless of repair, and the directors decided to remove it, and in its place to put up another – the present school-house – on the site, which was done in 1868, at a cost of about four thousand dollars. The schools maintained there are now in good condition, with the average attendance of pupils.

The following persons have been directors of the schools of Tinicum District. On Nov. 28, 1834, the court, under provision of act of 1834, appointed George W. Bartram and Jabez Bunting inspectors of schools for the township:

1840, Dr. Samuel Anderson, Edward B. Smith; 1842, Thomas Jarman, Minshall Eachus, Jacob Roan; 1843, John Elkins, D.J.W. Griffith; 1844, William Hunter, Thomas M. Smith; 1845, James Howell, William Johnson; 1846, William Johnson; 1847, Stephen Smith, J. Weaver; 1848, John Goff, John Pedrick; 1849, John Goff, William Ward, William Johnson, Stephen Smith, William Hunter; 1850, John G Dyer, Alexander H. Smith; 1851, William Ward, Humphrey Drooke; 1852, B.E. Carpenter, George Horne; 1853, no report; 1854, William Ward, Amos Johnson; 1855, John Hart, William Hunter; 1856, William Ward; 1857, Amos Johnson, John Holland, Alexander McKeever; 1858, John Hart, Alexander McKeever; 1859, William Ward, Alexander McKeever; 1860, Amos Johnson, Alexander T. Carr; 1861, John Hart, William West; 1862, William Ward; 1863, Joseph P. Horne, D.A. Middleton; 1864, John Hart; 1865, Charles D. Johnson, John Stewart; 1866, William Glenn, B.F. Miller; 1867, Edward B. Ward, Charles D. Johnson; 1868, no report; 1869, Thomas E. Howard, Thomas 0. Stevens; 1870, Edmund B. Ward, Benjamin F. Miller; 1871, J.W. Ward, F.J. Carey; 1872, William Wood, Daniel Dills; 1873, Edward B Ward, W.H. Wood; 1874, B.F. Miller, James Reed; 1875, William Hiller, Charles H. Horne; 1876, Amos Johnson, Charles D. Johnson; 1877, Richard Wood, Lewis Kugler; 1878, Theodore Lukens, Adam Miller; 1879, Theodore Lukens, J. Miller; 1880, B. Dillmore, Joseph B. Miller; 1881, Charles Horne, Richard P. Ward, William Miller; 1882, B.F. Miller, Charles H. Horne; 1883, George G. Miller, Peter Goff; 1884, William Boyd, William McCall.

The Islands.  – During all our colonial administration the government never claimed authority over the river, the crown holding that it had exclusive jurisdiction therein. So fully was this acquiesced in that as late as January, 1775, the Supreme Council declared that the river Delaware, not being included within the body of any county of the province, the jurisdiction of the courts of Chester County did not extend into the river, and respecting it no legal process was valid issued from such courts. This assertion covered all the islands on the Delaware excepting Big Tinicum Island. Hence, after the termination of the Revolutionary war, it became necessary for the States of Pennsylvania and New Jersey to determine to which of these States the islands should be assigned. In that adjustment Hog Island, Martin’s Bar, Printz’s Island, Maiden Island, and Little Tinicum Island were allotted to Pennsylvania, while Monas’ Island, Chester Island, Chester Island Bar, Tonkin’s Island, and Marcus Hook Bar became part of New Jersey. I have, of course, considered the partition of the islands so far only as relates to those lying in front of the present county of Delaware. The Legislature of Pennsylvania, by act of Sept. 25, 1786, annexed the islands named as allotted to this commonwealth to Chester County, particularly specifying that “the whole of Hog Island, which lies opposite to the said boundary of Philadelphia and Chester, and of the marshes surrounding the said island, is hereby annexed to and shall be deemed to be part of the said county of Chester and of the nearest township of the said county.”(62*)

Under the provisions of this act Hog Island became part of Tinicum township, as, in fact, did all the islands facing Delaware County, the title to which Pennsylvania had acquired by the terms of its treaty with New Jersey. Very early in our history we find mention of Hog Island, for at the last court held under the authority of the Duke of York, June 14, 1681, it appears that “Justice Otto Earnest Cock acquaints the Court that hee has bought and paid of ye Indian proprietors a certain swampy or marshy Island, called by ye Indians Quistconck, Lying att the upper End of Tinnachkonck Island in ye river opposite Andrews Boones Creeke, and desires ye Corts approbation. The Cort, haveing well informed themselves about ye premisses, doe allow thereof.”(63*) Armstrong tells us that this swampy island, now known as Hog Island, on Lindstrom’s manuscript map appears under the high-sounding title of “Keyser Eyland, Ile des Empereurs.”(64*)

This island has played no insignificant part in the story of our county. Previous to the Revolution it had become the property of Joseph Galloway, to whom allusion has already been made. On July 29, 1775, when the Council of Safety was laying the obstructions in the Delaware River, it was decided to sink the frames opposite the upper end of Hog Island in preference to Billingsport,(65*) and on June 19, 1776, when an attack by the British fleet on Philadelphia seemed imminent, Abraham Kinsey, the tenant under Galloway on Hog Island, was notified that the committee deemed it necessary to overflow the island with water on the near approach of the enemy, and all injuries he would sustain by that act should be made good to him by the public.(66*) There is no evidence, however, to show that the land was then intentionally submerged. In 1780 the real estate of Joseph Galloway had been confiscated to the State, and on December 15th of that year, complaint having been made to the Supreme Council that Benjamin Rue, Francis Proctor, Joseph Ogden, William Eckhart, and Mark McCall “had taken forcible possession of Hog Island,” the parties were brought before Council and compelled to enter bonds for their appearnce at the next Court of General Sessions for the county of Chester, to answer the trespass.(67*) The defendants, appearing to have taken possession under color of title adverse to that acquired by the State under the confiscation laws, maintained their position during a bitter and constant litigation extending over nearly ten years, and were several times after the instance mentioned arrested and held in recognizance to answer at court, but the threatened criminal proceedings were never pressed. In December, 1780, the island was sold as confiscated estate to James Mease, Hugh Shiell, and Samuel Caldwell, of Philadelphia, and on the 4th of January following Council instructed the sheriff of Chester County to put the purchasers in possession, “they paying the incidental expenses;” and in the mean while, Abraham Kintzing was required to retain possession of the island in behalf of the State, and the sheriffs of Philadelphia and Chester Counties were directed, if necessary, to “assist him in holding possession against all intruders.” At the same time the attorney-general was instructed “to support the claim of the State against sundry persons who have lately attempted to take possession under some pretended rights, and take proper steps to cause the persons who are witnesses to the late forcible entry to attend at the next Chester court, in order to lay the complaint therein before the grand jury.”(68*)

On Feb. 16, 1781, Council ordered the island to be surveyed, and the following day a committee, consisting of Dr. Gardner, Gen. Potter, and William Van Campen, was appointed to confer with a similar committee, which the Assembly was requested to name, “touching a valuable island in the Delaware called Hog Island, seized by the agents for confiscated estates in the county of Philadelphia, on the property of Joseph Galloway, an attainted traytor, and which Col. Proctor and others are attempting to take into their possession.”(69*) The committees seem to have conferred,, and it was decided to retain Jonathan D. Sergeant to appear in behalf of the commonwealth, a retaining fee of fifteen pounds to appear “in a cause depending respecting Hog Island.”(70*) The controversy continued, and on July 14, 1781, another sale of land on the island was made by the agents of the State in Chester County, in which some special order of the Council was violated; hence the agents were directed to receive no part of the purchase money, but were commanded to attend the meeting of Council to “account for their proceedings.”(71*) The State, on May 9, 1782, acknowledged a deed to Samuel Caldwell (the other purchaser seems to have abandoned all claim to the estate) for one hundred and five acres of banked meadow at Hog Island, the consideration being one hundred and seventy-five thousand pounds Continental money and a yearly rent of seven bushels and a half of “good merchantable wheat, payable to the Trustees of the University of Pennsylvania.”(72*) However, Council seemed unable to put the purchaser in possession of the estate, notwithstanding repeated orders to the sheriff of Philadelphia to assist Caldwell with whatever force was necessary to effect that end. The litigation was continued, for on June 3, 1782, Jared Ingersoll received nine pounds in specie, and on the 7th of the same month Mr. Sergeant received a like sum as fees in the case. During the summer of 1783 the remaining part of the island not already purchased by Caldwell was sold to several officers of the Pennsylvania line, the agents of the State receiving the certificates of money due to those soldiers in payment, but on August 30th of that year Council ordered the certificates to be returned to the officers, and that the island should remain the property of the State until otherwise disposed of.(73*) Caldwell, however, seemed not disposed to reconvey his land to the State, whereupon, on Jan. 8, 1784, the attorney-general was instructed to institute suit against him for the recovery of the estate. Late in the year 1786 the commonwealth was still in 1itigation, for it retained William Bradford, Jr., Jonathan Dickinson Sergeant, and Edward Tilghman in the suit brought against it by Thomas Proctor, “respecting the right to Hog Island.”(74*) The case seems to have continued until May 5, 1789, when it was tried, for on the 2d of that month, Mr. Kennedy, the secretary of the land-office, was directed to deliver certain papers in his possession to Caldwell, they being “necessary on the tryall of Hogg Island.”(75*) The commonwealth was finally beaten in the suit, the title of Thomas Proctor and his associate owners beings recognized as valid. In the Pennsylvania Packet for March 6, 1790, appears the following advertisement:
     “HOG ISLAND. – To let on a lease for years, situate on the River Delaware, ten miles from the city of Philadelphia and seven miles by land, containing 200 acres of the richest maddow and may be immediately entered upon. For terms apply to the subscribers.
     THOMAS PROCTOR.
     JOSEPH OGDEN.
     WILLIAM ECHART.
     PHILADELPHIA, May 3d.”

The island subsequently became the property of Samuel Murdock, Isaac Reeves, and John Black, who, in 1840, petitioned the court of Delaware County to connect the island to the main land by a bridge, and were authorized themselves to erect “a free bridge on posts or abutments, provided that an aperture of not less than 25 feet wide and of height not less than 8 feet above high-water mark, should be left, which aperture should at all times be kept free from obstruction, so as to admit of passage of shallops.” The bridge was erected, but the connection with the main land was made in Philadelphia County, and the petition to the court of Delaware County was simply, it would appear, to prevent any trouble with the county authorities for interrupting the public (water) highway. The island, owned by Edgar N. and John Black, is now a marvel of fertility, and so complete is the manner of banking and diking that breaks in the embankments are now as uncommon as they were common years ago. The last serious break occurred during the storm of Nov. 1, 1861, when the island was submerged, and the loss of property was great, three hundred head of sheep drowned being only one item in the list of damages. On Jan. 20, 1882, in an unused barn on the island, the body of a man was found. He had hung, himself, and as the remains were not discovered for several weeks after the act, the rats had mutilated the arms and legs. The remains were identified as those of Charles J. Deacon, an insurance agent, of Philadelphia.

Martin’s Bar, which formerly lay between Hog Island and Big Tinicum Island, and by the banking and diking of the river front has within recent years almost disappeared as a separate piece of earth, remained in the ownership of the State until within a comparatively recent period, although, in December, 1789, John Lockart petitioned “for the right of pre-emption of a small island in the river Delaware, between Tinicum and Hogg Island containing about ten or fifteen acres;” but on the second reading of his petition, December 12th, Council decided “the request of the said John Lockart cannot be complied with.”(76*) The bar had considerably increased in thirty years, for in the patent granted to Thomas K. Wallace by the State, March 28, 1821, Martin’s Bar was found to contain sixty-seven acres and forty perches.(77*)

On Jan, 3, 1881, the court of Delaware County confirmed the port warden’s line, above Little Tinicum Island. Towards the eastern end of Little Tinicum Island lie the two small islands known as Printz and Maiden Islands. The former was patented to Thomas H. and Aubrey H. Smith, Feb. 13, 1841, and contained fourteen acres and eighty-one perches. It is now owned by Aubrey H. Smith. Maiden Island – said to have derived its name from a young girl who was overset in a boat managing to get to this place, where for two days she remained before rescued – is owned by a company of Philadelphians, who propose to erect coal-oil works there and on Little Tinicum Island.

Licensed Houses. – In Tinicum, although it is the oldest settlement in our county, and probably in the State, license to keep a house of public entertainment does not appear until after the yellow fever epidemic of 1798, when the authorities of Philadelphia had determined to locate the Lazaretto, or quarantine, thereon.

On July 27, 1799, Thomas Smith filed his petition, setting forth “that a Public Lazaretto is about to be established upon the Island of Tinicum, that will cause considerable intercourse between the city of Philadelphia, and the said Lazaretto, that a house of entertainment will be necessary at or near the same. That your petitioner is about to erect suitable buildings to accommodate the public on the road near to said Lazaretto, which he will have ready on or before the 1st day of October next,” and requested license for the same. The signers of his petition certify that they are well acquainted with the situation, as also with Charles Lloyd, the person to occupy the house, and recommend him as a person suitable “to run a hotel.”

Shortly afterwards the health authorities took action in Smith’s behalf, as will be seen by the following communication sent to the court and filed with the petition:
     “HEALTH OFFICE, 7th Mo. 22, 1799.
    
To the Judges of the Court of Quarter Sessions for the County of Delaware:
     “The Board of Health considering the propriety of establishing a well-regulated inn in the vicinity of the intended Lazaretto, now building on Tinicum Island, are of the judgment the place fixed on by Thomas Smith as the most suitable, in their view, and do recommend the said Thomas Smith to the court to obtain a license for his house near the said Lazaretto.
     “By order of the Board of Health.

“EDWARD GARRIGUES, President.
“PAXHALL HOLLINGSWORTH, Secretary.
“JAMES HALL, Resident Physician of Port.
“THOMAS EGGOR, Quarantine Master.
“HEART NORBERRY, Steward of the Lazaretto.”

The court granted license to Charles Lloyd for the year 1800.

At the same time that Thomas Smith’s petition was presented, Benjamin Rue desired to be permitted to keep a public-house in the dwelling he then occupied. He sets forth that “as the Board of Health of the City of Philadelphia are about to erect buildings there for the reception of imported goods, to prevent, if possible, a return of the dreadful calamity which has so frequently desolated Philadelphia, the concourse of people necessarily attending on a business of such importance, your petitioner conceives will make an Inn indispensably necessary.”

The court seemed to think very much in the same way, for instead of one inn they permitted two to be established, and Rue’s application was favorably considered for the year 1800. His expectation of “the concourse of people” who would visit Tinicum seems not to have been realized, for after license was awarded him, in 1802, his name disappears from the records, so far as licenses in this neighborhood are concerned.

Charles Lloyd seems to have moved to Benjamin Rue’s house, where he had licenses until 1807, when Elizabeth Harrison was granted license for the house formerly kept by Lloyd, and continued there until 1811, when Esther Taylor became the landlady for that year. Who kept it during 1812 can only be gathered from the petition of John Hart, in 1813, in which he desires license for the house “lately Mary Taylor’s.” This John Hart was the great-grandson of Edward Hart, who (with Tobias Preak, both being officers in the town of Flushing, on Long Island) for refusal to carry out Governor Stuyvesant’s cruel orders against Quakers, was thrown into prison. John Hart, like Rue, it seems, was disappointed in the amount of business for a public-house at Tinicum, for the next year he made no application for license, and in John Ward’s petition, in 1815, he alludes to the place as “house lately occupied by John Shreen,” who owned the property. In 1817, however, he appears once more as “Mine Host” of the Tinicum Tavern, and continued thereat until 1829, when his widow, Mary Hart, followed him, the hotel having been left by John Shreen to his daughter, Mary Hart, until 1834, at which time the license was granted to John L. Fryberg.

In 1838, George Bastian, Jr., was the proprietor, to be followed the next year by William Nugent. Samuel L. Ferman succeeded Nugent in 1843, to give place, in 1844, to R.M. Rutter, and he in turn, in 1845, to John Hall. In 1848, John Goff procured the license, and remained there until 1850, when, having rented the Steamboat Hotel, in Chester (which he purchased the following year), the Lazaretto Hotel was again kept by R.M. Rutter, who, in 1853, was succeeded by Henry Pepper. John Hart, the younger, in 1855 followed Pepper, and continued to receive the court’s approval until 1863, when his petition was rejected because it was filed too late. However, he was on time the following year, as well as in 1855, after which Amos Johnson, Jr., had license granted him, which the same year he transferred to Henry Goff, who remained there until 1869, when Jacob Pepper made application for hotel license, which was denied him, but he was authorized to keep an eating-house. In 1870, Pepper again made application, his petition being warmly indorsed by John Hickman and Sketchley Morton in personal letters to the judges. Judge Morton in his letter states that in consequence of the old hotel (Rue’s building) being abandoned as a public-house for two years, Tinicum was without a tavern, and it was necessary to have a public-house there. He recommended Pepper warmly, and stated that he (Pepper) “had just erected a large house containing twenty-two apartments, sixteen of which were

sleeping-rooms.” Pepper at last succeeded in procuring a restaurant license, but in the fall of that year the yellow fever as an epidemic prevailed at the Lazaretto, he was stricken with the disease and died. His widow, Annie E. Pepper, kept the house the following year, and John T. Huddell in 1872. In 1873 and 1874 license was prohibited outside of Chester, but on the repeal of the local option law, David Wells was licensed in 1875 and 1876.

In 1876, William Miller made application for a hotel license at the Riverview Hotel, the new house Pepper built, which was granted him, and annually thereafter until the present time at the same house.

In 1877, David Wells obtained license for that year at the old Tinicum Hotel, and in 1878 he was succeeded by C.H. Newhall, and he in turn, in 1879, by Daniel Birmingham. William H. Reed kept the old tavern in 1880-81, to give place to James E. Ford in 1882. Ford kept the house one year, and in 1883, Peter Goff, the present landlord of the old Tinicum Tavern, succeeded to the business.

* Journal of a Voyage to New York in 1679-80; Memoirs of the Long Island Historical Society, vol. i. p. 177.

** Acrelius, “History of New Sweden,” p. 69.

*** Penna. Archives, 2d series, vol. vii. p. 496.

(4*) History of New Sweden, p. 42.

(5*) Penna. Mag. of Hist., vol. ii. p. 327.

(6*) Campanius, p. 79.

(7*) Penna. Archives, 2d series, vol. v. p. 104.

(8*) Ib.

(9*) Report of Governor Printz for 1647, Mag. of Hist., vol. vii. p. 273.

(10*) History of Delaware, p. 196; Hazard’s Annals, p. 84; Massachusetts Historical Collections, vol. vi. (N.S.) p. 434; Winthrop, vol. ii. p. 254.

(11*) Campanius’ “New Sweden,” pp.79,80.

(12*) Penna. Mag. of Hist., vol. vii. p., 272.

(13*) Acrelius, “History of New Sweden,” p. 66 (note); Gordon’s “History of Pennsylvania,” pp. 596-97 (note D); Lindstrom’s “Manuscript Journal,” in possession of American Philosophical Society, Philadelphia.

(14*) Acrelius, p. 66.

(15*) Memoirs of Long Island Historical Society, vol. i. p. 177.

(16*) Hazard’s Annals, p. 231.

(17*) Penna. Mag. of History, vol. vii. p. 276.

(18*) Published in 1824 in the Village Record, at West Chester.

(19*) Memoirs of Long Island Historical Society, vol. i. p. 178.

(20*) Acrelius, “History of New Sweden,” p. 86.

(21*) Penna. Mag. of History, vol. ii. p. 467.

(22*) N.Y. Colonial Documents, vol. xii. p. 526; Hazard’s Annals, p. 417.

(23*) Macaulay’s “History of England” (Am. Book Exchange ed.), vol. i. pp. 210, 212.

(24*) “Topographical and Medical Sketch of Tinicum Island,” by George F. Lehman, M.D., published in Journal of Medical and Physical Science, Philadelphia, 1833.

(25*) History of Delaware County, p. 31.

(26*) Penna. Archives, 2d series, vol. v. p. 776.

(27*) Hazard’s Annals, p.155.

(28*) Campanius, pp. 76-78.

(29*) History of New Sweden, p. 63.

(30*) Hazard’s Annals, p. 212.

(31*) Penna. Archives, 2d series, vol. v. p. 227.

(32*) Ib., vol. vii. p. 494.

(33*) Ib., p. 628.

(34*) Penna. Archives, 2d series, vol. vii. p. 799.

(35*) Hazard’s Annals, p. 342.

(36*) Memoirs of Long Island Historical Society, vol. i. p. 183.

(37*) Hazard’s Annals, p. 399; Penna. Archives, 2d series, vol. vii. p. 623.

(38*) Memoirs of Long Island Historical Society, vol. i. p. 179.

(39*) Smith’s “History of Delaware County,” Appendix C, p. 520.

(40*) Hazard’s Annals, pp. 400-1.

(41*) Penna. Archives, 2d series, vol. vi. pp. 626-28.

(42*) Ib., p. 666.

(43*) Memoirs of Long Island Historical Society, vol. i. p. 189.

(44*) Book of Patents, Harrisburg, cited in Smith’s “Atlas of Delaware County,” p. 11.

(45*) Memoirs of Long Island Historical Society, vol. i. p. 179.

(46*) Penna. Archives, 2d series, vol. vii. pp. 799-81.

(47*) Records of Upland Court, p. 189.

(48*) Colonial Records, vol. i. p. 195.

(49*) Ib., vol. ii. p. 455.

(50*) Thomas Maxwell Pott’s “History of the Carter Family,” p. 66.

(51*) Wheaton’s (Pa. Sup. Ct.) Reports, vol. i. p. 124.

(52*) See case reported in 11 Smith (Pa. State) Reports, p. 34; 27th Smith, p.

310, and 9 Norris (Pa. State) Reports, p. 86.

(53*) Martin’s “History of Chester,” p. 154.

(54*) Topographical Sketch of Tinicum Island, already quoted.

(55*) Ferris’ “Original Settlements on the Delaware,” p. 70.

(56*) Ib., p. 71.

(57*) History of Delaware County, p. 299.

(58*) Smith’s “History of Delaware County,” p. 299.

(59*) Colonial Records, vol. vii. pp. 256, 331, 352; Penna. Archives, 1st series, vol. viii. p. 208.

(60*) Mr. McKean resigned in May, 1853.

(61*) Bliss’ “Delaware County Digest,” p. 17.

(62*) Bliss’ “Delaware County Digest,” pp. 38,39.

(63*) Record of Upland Court, p. 190.

(64*) Ib., p. 191.

(65*) Colonial Records, vol. x. p. 294.

(66*) Ib., p. 607.

(67*) Ib., vol. xii. p. 570.

(68*) Ib., p. 592.

(69*) Ib., p. 631.

(70*) Ib., p. 634.

(71*) Colonial Records, vol. xiii. p. 11.

(72*) Ib., p. 279.

(73*) Ib., p. 280.

(74*) Ib., vol. xv. p. 117.

(75*) Ib., p. 472.

(76*) Ib., vol. xvi. p.230.

(77*) Smith’s “Atlas of Early Land Grants in Delaware County,” map 16.

Source:  Page(s) 274-290, History of Delaware County, Pennsylvania, by Henry Graham Ashmead, Philadelphia: L.H. Everts & Co. 1884

About Author

admin

See author's posts