tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7792918375234343392024-03-13T19:04:48.430-04:00History—Now and ThenA Cornucopia of Historical Miscellany Primarily Dealing with, but not Limited to, West New Jersey——— by JerseymanUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger15125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-779291837523434339.post-71805174713569778342011-08-03T11:17:00.010-04:002011-08-05T09:27:44.897-04:00Settlements of Friends’ Meetings in New Jerseyby Jerseyman ©2011<br />
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I have extracted the following article on New Jersey Friends’ Meetings from the weekly journal, <em>The Friend. </em>This publication serially ran the text of this historical account in several issues during 1889, but listed no author. To illustrate many of the meetings discussed, I have interspersed historic post card and photographic views. <br />
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<em>Nota Bene</em>: while the text below provides some interesting reading, the author fails to discuss Friends Meetings in Gloucester, Salem, and Cumberland counties.<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-uSuACNJfA54/Tji9CU6mBPI/AAAAAAAAAMw/NAEnvxxpqJg/s1600/The+Friend+Masthead.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="95px" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-uSuACNJfA54/Tji9CU6mBPI/AAAAAAAAAMw/NAEnvxxpqJg/s400/The+Friend+Masthead.jpg" t$="true" width="400px" /></a></div><br />
<span style="color: orange;">The Province of New Jersey being largely settled by Friends, their meetings were generally the first places of worship established in their neighborhoods, and in many of the Towns and Hamlets so settled, “the meeting-house” was the only public building for many years, (except the school-house) and served a variety of purposes beside a place of worship, such as Town Hall, Court of Justice, and Legislative Hall, &c., or as the poet has expressed, </span><br />
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<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: orange;">“One house sufficed for gospel and for law.”</span></div><br />
<span style="color: orange;">Around some of these, many historic facts and precious memories linger. In order to preserve these, and some account of the early establishment of meetings, in a somewhat connected form, the following compilations and extracts have been made, in the hope that they may possess some interest for the readers of “THE FRIEND.”</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">The history and early settlement of the Society of Friends in New Jersey and Pennsylvania, and the establishment of their meetings, is so intimately connected with both Provinces, that it is not easy to separate them, although that of New Jersey preceded the latter by several years.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">The first settlement made by Friends south of Long Island was at Shrewsbury, in 1664, or thereabout. One account says, “About 1670 a meeting was settled at Shrewsbury, being the <em>first</em> settled meeting in these Provinces. Near the same time a Monthly and General Meeting was also held there, and they were soon regularly established. It is probable that meetings for worship were held at private dwellings prior to this date.</span><br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-YqqpEnOZg5I/TjljcJOPauI/AAAAAAAAAO0/FRQ7GmXbYm8/s1600/shrwsbryfrndmtghs+copy.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="257px" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-YqqpEnOZg5I/TjljcJOPauI/AAAAAAAAAO0/FRQ7GmXbYm8/s400/shrwsbryfrndmtghs+copy.jpg" t$="true" width="400px" /></a></div> <br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><span style="color: orange;">The first meeting-house was built in 1672, which was replaced by another in 1719.</span> <br />
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<span style="color: orange;">The first settlement of Friends in West New Jersey, was undoubtedly that made by John Fenwicks colony at Salem, in 1675; theirs being the first English ship to come so far up the Delaware River, or that landed passengers upon its shores.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">They first held their meetings for worship at each others’ dwellings, and a meeting was established at the house of Samuel Nicholson, which was continued for some years; they sometimes joined with a few Friends at Upland, (now Chester, Pa.,) meeting at the house of Robert Wade, at or near that place.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">The first meeting-house of Friends in West Jersey was at Salem. In 1681, Samuel Nicholson and Ann his wife, conveyed to the Trustees of Salem Meeting his sixteen acre lot, whereon stood his dwelling-house, for the purpose of a meeting place for Friends; an addition was built to this house, making it when completed, 40 feet in length by 16 feet in depth,—partly of brick, and partly frame,—it was provided with a large open fire-place at each end, windows with 4 panes of thick “bulls eye” glass, 7 by 9 inches in size, benches or forms without backs, and “a good clay floor.” It was thus used until about the year 1700.</span><br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-TCVQ0htOksA/TjjMdJm8WCI/AAAAAAAAANw/cEHOfvsTVU0/s1600/Salem+Meeting.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="256px" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-TCVQ0htOksA/TjjMdJm8WCI/AAAAAAAAANw/cEHOfvsTVU0/s400/Salem+Meeting.jpg" t$="true" width="400px" /></a></div><br />
<span style="color: orange;">In the early part of the year 1677, many Friends who had become proprietors in West Jersey, left the shores of old England to settle on their newly acquired possessions.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">“The ship ‘Kent’ sailed from London with 230 passengers, consisting of two companies of Friends, one from Yorkshire, and the other from London; after a tedious passage the ship anchored safely in the waters of the Delaware, in the Sixth Month, 1677.”</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">The Commissioners who were on board, and were also Friends, proceeded up the river to the place where the city of Burlington now stands, in order to treat with the Indians about the land; for, be it known, that not one foot of the soil of the State of New Jersey was ever taken from the Indians, except by purchase.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">The number of Friends who emigrated to the new colony during this year and the following one, are said to be about 800; and up to the year 1681, at least 1400 persons had found their way to the Province.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">Although the country was a wilderness, they did not forget the assembling of themselves together as was their wont in the land of their nativity, in order to worship the Almighty, whose protecting hand had followed them in the perils of the deep, and now delivered them from the savage people among whom their lot was cast.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">The first account that we have of a place of public worship of Friends at Burlington, was of a tent made of the sails taken from the ship in which they had crossed the ocean. Under it they assembled for at least a year after their arrival, or until the house of Thomas Gardiner was built, which was the first dwelling house erected within the town limits, and although built of logs, it was more commodious than those of his neighbors. Meetings were regularly held here, and at the house of John Woolston and others, until the building of the meeting-house in 1685, when the meeting had outgrown the capacity of any private house.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">The first Yearly Meeting of Friends in New Jersey which sat four days, was held Sixth Mo. 28th, 1681, at the house of Thomas Gardiner, aforesaid, as was also the Monthly Meeting. By a minute of that meeting, held 5th of Twelfth Month, 1682, we find “It is ordered that a meeting-house be built according to a draught of six square building, of forty foot square from out to out.” This building was completed in 1685, and was called the “great meeting-house,” which must have been very singular in appearance, being as indicated, hexagonal in form, with a roof of steep pitch, surmounted by a sort of cupola, corresponding in shape with the main building. It was a frame structure, and found to be too cold for use in the severe winters to which the settlers were subjected.</span><br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ucX-9CMn020/TjjV5pX6ljI/AAAAAAAAAOQ/yIxty8b4bI4/s1600/Burlington+Hexagon.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="246px" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ucX-9CMn020/TjjV5pX6ljI/AAAAAAAAAOQ/yIxty8b4bI4/s400/Burlington+Hexagon.jpg" t$="true" width="400px" /></a></div><br />
<span style="color: orange;">In 1696, an addition was made to it for a winter house, built of brick, 30 feet long, and of equal width and height with the other; provided with a large open fire place, and a “double wooden floor,” wainscoted and plastered walls. This house stood for a century, and was replaced by the present substantial brick structure.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">The house known as the “new meeting-house” was built for the better accommodation of the Yearly Meeting, in 1716, on ground given by Thomas Wetherill for that purpose.</span><br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-CPOxJwu7tpI/TjjEdCrEEII/AAAAAAAAANQ/TSk1yyBa1-s/s1600/Burlington+Meeting.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="257px" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-CPOxJwu7tpI/TjjEdCrEEII/AAAAAAAAANQ/TSk1yyBa1-s/s400/Burlington+Meeting.jpg" t$="true" width="400px" /></a></div><br />
<span style="color: orange;">Burlington Monthly Meeting was first organized “ye 15th of ye Fifth Month, 1678,” and consisted of “Friends settled about the Falls (near Trenton, &c.,) and the Particular Meetings of Ancocas, Shackamaxon and Upland (Chester, Pa.); also the Hoarkills and New Castle, Del.,” and the Friends on Long Island, who, in 1681, desired to be considered members of this Monthly Meeting.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">In 1680, it issued an epistle to London Yearly Meeting, on the subject of certificates being furnished to the Friends who emigrated, &c. It was the first official communication received by that meeting from any body of Friends in America. </span><br />
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(<em>The Friend</em> 1889:220-221; Vol. LXII, No. 28, Seventh-Day, Second Month 9, 1889, John S. Stokes, Publisher, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.)<br />
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<div align="center">———— o0o ————</div><br />
<span style="color: orange;">The Friends settled on the Rancocas or “Northampton River,” very soon set up meetings for worship at their dwellings, as follows, viz: “A six weeks meeting was held at Joshua Paine’s on Northampton River; a meeting was also held at the house of Daniel Wills in the forks of said river. Another was very early settled at the house of Daniel Wills, (‘not that in the forks’ of the river.”)</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">“Meetings for worship on First and Fourth-days, were also settled at Northampton, to be held at the house of Thomas Harding,” &c, as is shown by the following minutes of Burlington Monthly Meeting. “It is agreed that the meetings on Ancocas (or Ankokas) be held at the house of Thomas Harding.”—1681.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">“The meeting that used to be kept at Thomas Cline’s, and John Woolman’s, is now ordered to be kept at Daniel Wills’ house, weekly.”—1687.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">In 1703, a meeting-house was built upon ground given by John Wills, called Northampton Meeting-house; the meetings before alluded to were then discontinued. This house, which stood quite near the present burial ground, was replaced by another upon nearly the same site, in 1722, which continued until the new brick house was erected in 1772, about half a mile north of it, which was enlarged as it now stands in the village of Rancocas. </span><br />
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<div style="text-align: center;"> <a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-XuQbYfJNrWc/TjjXNDNO3fI/AAAAAAAAAOU/SH4tPHXHD4E/s1600/Rancocas+Friends+Burial+Ground+copy.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="251px" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-XuQbYfJNrWc/TjjXNDNO3fI/AAAAAAAAAOU/SH4tPHXHD4E/s400/Rancocas+Friends+Burial+Ground+copy.jpg" t$="true" width="400px" /></a></div> <br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-qHQIwid1N-I/TjjFGdcnAxI/AAAAAAAAANU/vaowYQ5Ho50/s1600/Rancocas+Meeting.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="253px" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-qHQIwid1N-I/TjjFGdcnAxI/AAAAAAAAANU/vaowYQ5Ho50/s400/Rancocas+Meeting.jpg" t$="true" width="400px" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><div align="right"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Rancocas Friends Meeting</span></div></td></tr>
</tbody></table><div style="text-align: center;"><br />
<span style="color: orange;">CHESTERFIELD.</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-prPCoEOeJPk/TjjOpadXBjI/AAAAAAAAAN8/Qz3FTcKbKjw/s1600/Chesterfield+Meeting.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="258px" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-prPCoEOeJPk/TjjOpadXBjI/AAAAAAAAAN8/Qz3FTcKbKjw/s400/Chesterfield+Meeting.jpg" t$="true" width="400px" /></a></div><br />
<span style="color: orange;">A meeting for worship, held on First-days, was continued from the first settlement by the English (1677) at the house of Thomas Lambert, until the building of the meeting-house and settlement of the Meeting at Chesterfield, about 1680, at which time the Monthly Meeting was established, but it was not always held there as is shown by the following minute:</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">“At our Monthly Meeting at Francis Davenport’s house, near Crosswicks Creek, the place now called Chesterfield, ye 2nd of ye 8th month, 1684. It is agreed that a week day meeting be kept every 4th day of ye week at ye house of Matthew Watson.”</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">The meeting-house at Crosswicks was built in 1692, and the first Monthly Meeting held in it 6th of Eighth Month, 1693. Meetings were held here until 1706, at which time a new and more commodious house was erected near the former one. This house was of brick, and enlarged in 1753. Another account says, “About 1738-9, it was found desirable to have a larger meetinghouse, and a large brick building was built upon land given by Samuel Bunting; this house was enlarged in 1773.” This building was occupied as barracks by the American troops in 1778, and a cannon-ball was lodged in its walls. On First-days, however, the benches were arranged and meetings held in it as usual.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">In 1831, a frame meeting-house was built near this, which was occupied until 1853, when a brick structure succeeded it.</span><br />
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<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: orange;">OLD SPRINGFIELD.</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"> <br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-cAnJDg8IVrM/TjjBR8UCNaI/AAAAAAAAAM8/KqNEz8iRcio/s1600/LowerSpringfield+Copany.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="268px" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-cAnJDg8IVrM/TjjBR8UCNaI/AAAAAAAAAM8/KqNEz8iRcio/s400/LowerSpringfield+Copany.jpg" t$="true" width="400px" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><div align="right"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Lower Springfield (Copany) Friends Meeting</span></div></td></tr>
</tbody></table></div><br />
<span style="color: orange;">1682.—“It is ordered that Friends at Esiskunk Creek have a meeting at the house of Thos. Barton, on First-days, for the winter season.”</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">1687.—“A meeting for worship was set up at Esiskunk Creek, and held by turns at the houses of Thomas Barton, John Day, and John Curtis.”</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">“A three weeks meeting for worship was established to be held circularly at Old Springfield and at Burr on the Rankokas.”</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">1694.—“It is agreed that the meeting-house of Springfield be built on the hither side of Mattacopany bridge.”</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">The meeting-house was built in 1698, on ground given by Richard Ridgway.</span><br />
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<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: orange;">MANSFIELD.</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-gNzmcqAZ8hw/TjjNz8On8LI/AAAAAAAAAN0/ap6mA4BuWlM/s1600/Mansfield+Meeting.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="260px" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-gNzmcqAZ8hw/TjjNz8On8LI/AAAAAAAAAN0/ap6mA4BuWlM/s400/Mansfield+Meeting.jpg" t$="true" width="400px" /></a></div><br />
<span style="color: orange;">1731.—Mansfield Meeting was settled in 1731, and a meeting-house built the same year on ground of Francis Gibbs. It was a long narrow frame building, and was replaced by a more modern brick structure, upon the same site, in 1812.</span><br />
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<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: orange;">MANSFIELD NECK.</span></div><br />
<span style="color: orange;">1753.—A meeting was allowed to be held near William Folwell’s on First-days, once in three weeks during the winter. In 1783, it was established with the privilege of a Preparative Meeting.</span><br />
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<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: orange;">UPPER SPRINGFIELD.</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"> </div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-pN-GLWmj7s8/TjjHfiweRLI/AAAAAAAAANc/GkWKsUJcSDc/s1600/Upper+Springfield.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="251px" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-pN-GLWmj7s8/TjjHfiweRLI/AAAAAAAAANc/GkWKsUJcSDc/s400/Upper+Springfield.jpg" t$="true" width="400px" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><div align="right"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Upper Springfield Friends Meeting</span></div></td></tr>
</tbody></table><br />
<span style="color: orange;">As respects the origin of this meeting we find the following minute:</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">“A meeting for the winter season hath been for several years past, held in part of Upper Springfield, at a house provided for the purpose, nigh Shreeve’s Mount.” In 1728, the meeting of Upper Springfield was established, and their meeting-house built the same year upon ground of Joshua Shreeve.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">In 1783, the Monthly Meeting was organized, being parts of Burlington and Chesterfield Monthly Meetings, and was composed of the Meetings of Mansfield, Arneytown, Upper Freehold and Upper Springfield.</span><br />
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<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: orange;">MOUNT HOLLY (or Shreeve’s Mount.)</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-eTt63r9tOuk/TjjLhS3cpKI/AAAAAAAAANs/WeZoHt-iDbs/s1600/Mount+Holly+Meeting.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="256px" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-eTt63r9tOuk/TjjLhS3cpKI/AAAAAAAAANs/WeZoHt-iDbs/s400/Mount+Holly+Meeting.jpg" t$="true" width="400px" /></a></div><br />
<span style="color: orange;">In 1704, a Meeting was settled at Restow Lipincoats (Restore Lippincott’s) to be held for the winter season, which was discontinued as the following minute of Burlington Monthly Meeting shows.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">1716.—“Whereas there was one little meeting kept at two places, one at Restore Lippincott’s, and one at Daniel Wills’, which hath been for a considerable time; but now there is a meetinghouse built at Mount Holly for the accommodation of those two meetings.”</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">The Mount Holly meeting-house was built upon ground given by Nathan Cripps, on the northern slope of the mount, and on the site of the Cemetery on Wood Lane. It was standing in 1776, and used by the British troops as a stable.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">1742. —“The Friends at Mount Holly, alias Bridgeton, requested of this meeting to hold a First-day evening meeting in Bridgeton, for the winter season, which is allowed by this meeting.” (Burlington M.M.)</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">1743. —“The Meeting having considered the application of sundry Friends belonging to the upper part of Mount Holly Meeting, do consent that they hold a meeting according to their request.” (B. Mo. Meeting.)</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">In 1762, a new meeting-house was built in the more central part of the town, for an afternoon meeting. It was used by the British during the Revolutionary war, as the head-quarters of their Commissary department, and the benches for cutting meat upon; the hacks and marks of both cleaver and knife are still to be seen upon them, as well as the marks of the British musket barrels upon the floor.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">Mount Holly Monthly Meeting was constituted in 1776, by a division of Burlington Monthly Meeting, and was composed of the Meetings of Mount Holly, Shreeve’s Mount, Old Springfield and Upper Springfield.</span><br />
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<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: orange;">VINCENT TOWN.</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"> </div><div style="text-align: center;"><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-6JGHbg5I1o0/TjlUuRhqDwI/AAAAAAAAAOo/nC7Kr7g7Qtw/s1600/vincentownfriendsmeetinghouse.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="250px" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-6JGHbg5I1o0/TjlUuRhqDwI/AAAAAAAAAOo/nC7Kr7g7Qtw/s400/vincentownfriendsmeetinghouse.jpg" t$="true" width="400px" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><div align="right"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Vincentown Meeting</span></div></td></tr>
</tbody></table></div><br />
<span style="color: orange;">1765.—“A written proposal from sundry Friends, for keeping an afternoon meeting during the summer at a school-house lately erected near William Bishop’s, was now read and agreed to.” (Min. Burlington Monthly Meeting.)</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">A meeting was afterwards established at Vincent Town, and a meeting-house built; but the meeting has been discontinued some years.</span><br />
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(<em>The Friend</em> 1889:227-228; Vol. LXII, No. 29, Seventh-Day, Second Month 16, 1889, John S. Stokes, Publisher, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.)<br />
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<div style="text-align: center;">———— o0o ————</div><br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: orange;">STONY BROOK.</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-mtN99C3o5vs/TjlNjqMJDFI/AAAAAAAAAOk/83uUI7eJjvI/s1600/stoneybrook.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="292px" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-mtN99C3o5vs/TjlNjqMJDFI/AAAAAAAAAOk/83uUI7eJjvI/s400/stoneybrook.jpg" t$="true" width="400px" /></a></div><br />
<span style="color: orange;">1710.—This was a meeting indulged by Chesterfield Monthly Meeting, to be held once in three months, and it was afterwards at the house of Joseph Worth and others.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">In 1724, a committee for the purpose, reported that “a (meeting) house may be built of stone, 34 by 30 feet.”</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">In 1726, the meeting-house was built on ground given by Benjamin Clark for the use of Friends, and the Meeting was established there the same year.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">The Preparative Meeting was laid down in 1878, and the members joined to Trenton Meeting.</span><br />
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<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: orange;">“TRENT TOWN.”</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Mrli2alISRw/TjjbEUe50jI/AAAAAAAAAOY/Tqg8xUnuWYQ/s1600/Trenton+Meeting.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="253px" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Mrli2alISRw/TjjbEUe50jI/AAAAAAAAAOY/Tqg8xUnuWYQ/s400/Trenton+Meeting.jpg" t$="true" width="400px" /></a></div><br />
<span style="color: orange;">1734.—We find the following minute of Chesterfield Monthly Meeting: “Our Friend Isaac Hannam, with other Friends, requested liberty to keep a meeting for worship at Trent Town on First-days,” which was granted.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">In 1740, the meeting-house at Trenton was built, and a meeting for worship settled there. The week-day meetings were established in 1756, and the Preparative Meeting opened in 1786, but was closed for some time, and re-opened in 1797, and again laid down in 1836, and reestablished in 1848.</span><br />
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<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: orange;">BORDENTOWN.</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-cosxaev911E/Tji9ud4dIDI/AAAAAAAAAM0/e1SJcp6cyJ4/s1600/Bordentown+Meeting.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="253px" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-cosxaev911E/Tji9ud4dIDI/AAAAAAAAAM0/e1SJcp6cyJ4/s400/Bordentown+Meeting.jpg" t$="true" width="400px" /></a></div><br />
<span style="color: orange;">The Meeting at “Bordens Town” was settled in 1740, and a meeting-house built the same year on ground given by Joseph Borden.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">The week-day meetings were established in 1759, and the Preparative Meeting set up in 1804.</span><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: orange;">AMWELL.</span></div><br />
<span style="color: orange;">In 1727, a meeting was allowed to be kept every First-day, at the house of John Stephenson, at Amwell, which appears to have been discontinued in 1786.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">About this time (1727) there was also a meeting held at Allentown, under the direction of Chesterfield Monthly Meeting. The Preparative was opened in 1797, and called “Robins’ Meeting.” In 1804, it appears in the Minutes of the Monthly Meeting as “East Branch.” It was laid down in 1833, and the members joined to Crosswicks Meeting.</span><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: orange;">ARNEY’S MOUNT.</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-SVRnFx5uZZY/TjjN-UqCTyI/AAAAAAAAAN4/MO2BejABSrw/s1600/Arneys+Mount+Meeting.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="258px" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-SVRnFx5uZZY/TjjN-UqCTyI/AAAAAAAAAN4/MO2BejABSrw/s400/Arneys+Mount+Meeting.jpg" t$="true" width="400px" /></a></div><br />
<span style="color: orange;">1739.—From the minutes of Chesterfield Monthly Meeting we learn that “Isaac Foreman, Joseph Arney and others, requested liberty of this Meeting to keep a meeting every First-day at Joseph Arney’s house, and this meeting gave consent that they have liberty to keep a meeting for one year.”</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">1740.—“This Meeting gives liberty to the inhabitants near Thomas Woodward’s to make application to the Quarterly Meeting for a meeting-house, according to their request.”</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">The Meeting at “Woodward’s,” held at Joseph Arney’s house was settled in 1742, and the meeting-house built the same year on ground given by Joseph Arney.</span><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: orange;">BETHLEHEM.</span></div><br />
<span style="color: orange;">In 1746, the meeting-house at Bethlehem was built, but a meeting for worship was settled there some years before, and the Monthly Meeting was first held in 1744. The meeting-house being accidentally burned; it was rebuilt in 1752.</span><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: orange;">GREAT MEADOWS.</span></div><br />
<span style="color: orange;">The meeting-house at the Great Meadows was built in 1751; but their meetings for worship were held at each others’ houses from the time of Friends first settling there, about 1740.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">A meeting for worship was held at Amboy from 1680 to 1689, during which time a Monthly Meeting was established there.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">A meeting was held at Woodbridge, and alternated with that at Amboy, every third First-day, until 1704, when, by direction of the General Meeting at Shrewsbury, it was ordered to be held at Woodbridge, where the meeting-house was built in 1709.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">A Meeting was early settled at Manasquan; Friends met at each others’ houses until 1730, when their meeting-house was built: it was of frame with shingled sides, and stood until about 1885.</span><br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-YCFj6yG6oMQ/Tjvun0TU8zI/AAAAAAAAAO8/5RjgIZPvXHA/s1600/Old+Squan+Friends+Meeting.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="311px" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-YCFj6yG6oMQ/Tjvun0TU8zI/AAAAAAAAAO8/5RjgIZPvXHA/s400/Old+Squan+Friends+Meeting.jpg" t$="true" width="400px" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><div align="right"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Old Squan Friends Meeting</span></div></td></tr>
</tbody></table><br />
<span style="color: orange;">A meeting-house was built at Freehold about the year 1683; but the meeting being chiefly established through the influence of George Keith, who then resided there, by the same influence it ceased upon his defection from Friends.</span><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: orange;">UPPER FREEHOLD.</span></div><br />
<span style="color: orange;">“In 1739-40, a small number of Friends being seated together in Upper Freehold, built a meeting-house nigh Moses Robins, where a meeting was sometimes held.”</span><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: orange;">PLAINFIELD</span>.</div><div style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-h1GSdXowpKc/TjlmCrHcV5I/AAAAAAAAAO4/Guaky8dSSKk/s1600/Plainfield+Meeting+III.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="255px" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-h1GSdXowpKc/TjlmCrHcV5I/AAAAAAAAAO4/Guaky8dSSKk/s400/Plainfield+Meeting+III.jpg" t$="true" width="400px" /></a></div><br />
<span style="color: orange;">“A meeting was held at the house of Nathaniel Fitz Randolph, in Woodbridge, Ninth Month 16th, 1704, and continued to be held there until 1713, when reference is made to a meetinghouse.”</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">In 1721, John Laing of Plainfield, on behalf of himself and the Friends settled near him, requested leave of the Monthly Meeting of Woodbridge to hold a meeting for worship among themselves at his house, which was granted them for three months.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">In 1725 they had liberty to hold a meeting weekly, which was thence continued till 1731, when they built their meeting-house on land given by the said John Laing. “Said house not to exceed 24 foot square and 14 foot between joynts.” Which was occupied until 1788, when the house was replaced by another, which is still standing.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">About 1750, the Monthly Meeting was transferred from Woodbridge, and held alternately at Rahway and Plainfield.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">Meetings were held at Rahway, at the house of William Robertson, in 1707, and in 1742 at the request of Friends of Rahway, leave was given by the said Monthly Meeting (Woodbridge) to hold a meeting for worship on the first days of the week, at the house of Joseph Shotwell, for three months in the year, which was continued till 1745, when it was ordered that a meeting should be held on First and Fourth-days for the winter season.</span><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: orange;">LITTLE EGG HARBOR.</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"> </div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-LhzRMiOalyg/TjlM8TT1aUI/AAAAAAAAAOg/AR5hIhABNdg/s1600/Tuckerton+Meeting+II.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="313px" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-LhzRMiOalyg/TjlM8TT1aUI/AAAAAAAAAOg/AR5hIhABNdg/s400/Tuckerton+Meeting+II.jpg" t$="true" width="400px" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><div align="right"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Little Egg Harbor (Tuckerton) Meeting</span></div></td></tr>
</tbody></table><br />
<span style="color: orange;">Little Egg Harbor Meeting was first settled in 1704, at Tuckerton. In 1708, Edward Andrews conveyed to Friends two acres of land, on which a meeting-house was built, and completed the following year (1709), and stood for over 150 years; it was hip roofed, with shingled sides, there were four windows about four feet square with nine panes of glass 7 by 9 inches. The original windows were imported from England, the panes were small, and diamond shaped, and the sash was of lead; during the Revolutionary war the windows were concealed to prevent their appropriation by the army, and the lead being run into musket balls. This venerable structure was taken down in 1863, and replaced by a more modern building. It was believed to have been the first-meeting-house along the Jersey coast, and was known far and near as “the Egg Harbor Meeting-house.”</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">In 1714, the Preparative Meeting was opened, and in 1715, the Monthly Meeting was established.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">The Yearly Meeting was first held there in 1729, and continued for some years. John Churchman, in his journal, speaks of attending it in 1772, where he says there was a large concourse of people.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">A Meeting was settled at Barnegat in 1767, and a meeting-house built the same year.</span><br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-MeBWH0Sqe8c/TjjIHd-IWXI/AAAAAAAAANg/tA2Wn7s77_U/s1600/Barnegat+Meeting.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="258px" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-MeBWH0Sqe8c/TjjIHd-IWXI/AAAAAAAAANg/tA2Wn7s77_U/s400/Barnegat+Meeting.jpg" t$="true" width="400px" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><div align="right"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Barnegat Friends Meeting</span></div></td></tr>
</tbody></table><br />
<span style="color: orange;">At an early date Friends built a meetinghouse in Bass River Neck.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">Burlington Quarterly Meeting was established Ninth Month 29th, 1681-2. The first meeting was held at the house of William Biddle at “Mount Hope” on the Delaware River, opposite Biddle’s Island, and near what is now Kinkora. It continued to be held there until 1712, when it was removed to Burlington, and after a few years held alternately at Burlington and Chesterfield (now Crosswicks). In time it was settled permanently at Burlington.</span><br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ou5XsANgzdI/TjlYT7JMInI/AAAAAAAAAOw/MekLqxa-efg/s1600/Mount+Hope+II.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="272px" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ou5XsANgzdI/TjlYT7JMInI/AAAAAAAAAOw/MekLqxa-efg/s400/Mount+Hope+II.jpg" t$="true" width="400px" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><div align="right"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Mount Hope, Biddle Homestead</span></div></td></tr>
</tbody></table><br />
<span style="color: orange;">In 1681-2, Shrewsbury Monthly Meeting, which had previously belonged to Long Island, was annexed to Burlington Quarter.</span><br />
<br />
(<em>The Friend</em> 1889:235-236; Vol. LXII, No. 30, Seventh-Day, Second Month 23, 1889, John S. Stokes, Publisher, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.)<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">———— o0o ————</div><br />
<span style="color: orange;">In 1681, a number of Friends settled on Newton Creek, in Gloucester County, near Arwamus, or what has since become Gloucester City.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">In the same year, a meeting was allowed by the Burlington Friends, to be held at Pine Point on the Delaware, (now the City of Camden), as appears by the following minute: </span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">“At a Monthly Meeting held at the house of Thomas Gardiner, the 5th of Seventh Month, 1681,—It is ordered that Friends at Pine Point have a meeting on every Fourth-day, to begin at the fourth hour, at Richard Arnold's house.”</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">In 1682, there was a meeting set up, and kept at the house of Mark Newbie, on Newton Creek, which soon increased so much that a meetinghouse (of logs) was built in 1684. In 1715-16, a meeting-house was built at Gloucester.</span><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: orange;">NEWTON.</span></div><br />
<span style="color: orange;">In 1801, Friends removed from the old meeting-house on Newton Creek to the present location; the brick house was built upon land given by Joseph Kaighn. The old Newton Meetinghouse was burned in 1817.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">“At a General Meeting held at Salem in the Province of West Jersey, the 11th of Second Month, 1682, it was ordered that Friends at Arwamus and those' at Shackamaxon do meet together once a month; the first meeting to be at William Cooper’s at Pine Point, at Arwamus,” to which were joined the Friends settled on Woodbury and Cooper’s Creeks.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">The Friends of Salem and Newton Monthly Meetings constituted a Quarterly Meeting in 1686, as is shown by the following minute:</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">“At a Yearly Meeting held in Burlington the 8th of Seventh Month, 1686—Friends of this meeting ordered that the Monthly Meeting of Salem, and the Monthly Meeting of Newton make up one Quarterly Meeting, called Gloucester and Salem Quarterly Meeting, to be held at Gloucester and Salem, alternately.”</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">The Monthly Meeting of Gloucester or Newton, was held alternately at Newton, and at the house of Thomas Shackle, (near Haddonfield) from 1695 to 1721. In that year Elizabeth (Haddon) Eastaugh, procured from her father John Haddon, (in England) a deed for one acre of ground for the use of Friends, on which the meeting-house was built in the early part of that year. It was of logs, and stood near the King’s Road.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">In 1732, John and Elizabeth Estaugh conveyed one and a-half acres of land adjoining the meeting-house lot to Friends.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">In 1760, a brick meeting-house was erected upon the same site, and the old log house removed across the “Ferry road,” and used as a stable.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">After nearly a century of service, that house was taken down, and the bricks used to enclose the burial ground. It was very inconveniently arranged, especially so for holding a large Quarterly Meeting. It had probably been built at two different times.</span><br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-7a9UsjwQ2Os/Tji98a-E-dI/AAAAAAAAAM4/6YTqtX9A9fE/s1600/Haddonfield+Meeting.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="266px" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-7a9UsjwQ2Os/Tji98a-E-dI/AAAAAAAAAM4/6YTqtX9A9fE/s400/Haddonfield+Meeting.jpg" t$="true" width="400px" /></a></div><br />
<span style="color: orange;">The present commodious meeting-house at Haddonfield was erected upon an adjoining lot, in 1851.</span><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: orange;">CHESTER.</span></div><br />
<span style="color: orange;">In 1685, a meeting was established with the consent of Burlington Friends, at the house of Timothy Hancock, at “Penisauken,” which was held on alternate First-days with one at the house of John Kay, on the north branch of Cooper’s Creek, for the accommodation of Friends at Penisauken and Evesham, and those on Cooper’s Creek.</span><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: orange;">CHESTER, (at Moorestown.)</span></div><br />
<span style="color: orange;">About the year 1700, the Meeting at Chester was established, and was called the Adams’ Meeting from its being located upon their land.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">By a deed of James and Esther Adams, dated 9th of Fourth Mo. 1700, we learn that a meeting-house already stood there, viz: “To the Trustees of the Religious Society of Friends, for one acre of land lying and being on the west side of the King’s highway, with all that house or building now erected, and being upon said acre of land, called the Quaker Meeting-house.” It was of logs, and was destroyed by fire. In 1721, a house built of stone succeeded it, and was located in what is now the burial ground near the large buttonwood tree on the north side of Main Street, in Moorestown, (or Chester Town, as the place was formerly called.)</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">The present substantial brick structure, on the south side of the street, was built in 1802.</span><br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-CEMlZaVn5Pc/TjjSzsyIt5I/AAAAAAAAAOI/EWIAu8EVW2M/s1600/Moorestown+Meeting.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="267px" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-CEMlZaVn5Pc/TjjSzsyIt5I/AAAAAAAAAOI/EWIAu8EVW2M/s400/Moorestown+Meeting.jpg" t$="true" width="400px" /></a></div><br />
<span style="color: orange;">The frame building in the same yard, built in 1837, and enlarged in 1884.</span><br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-eGieU6RaHUE/TjjTLzk3tkI/AAAAAAAAAOM/XN2yUZ7aPFE/s1600/MoorestownBW.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="275px" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-eGieU6RaHUE/TjjTLzk3tkI/AAAAAAAAAOM/XN2yUZ7aPFE/s400/MoorestownBW.jpg" t$="true" width="400px" /></a></div><br />
<span style="color: orange;">Chester Monthly Meeting was established with the consent of Haddonfield Quarterly Meeting, First Mo. 1st, 1804, composed of Chester and Westfield Preparative Meetings.</span><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: orange;">WESTFIELD.</span></div><br />
<span style="color: orange;">This was an indulged meeting for some years, and held in a school-house from 1794 to 1801, at which time the large stone meeting-house was built, which was destroyed by fire in 1859, it has been succeeded by a substantial brick building.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">The frame building standing about half a mile south of the above, and occupied by our Friends, was built in 1848.</span><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: orange;">EVESHAM.</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ZMbRW64iLGU/TjjLSDmsXZI/AAAAAAAAANo/TGrMoC4FShg/s1600/Mount+Laurel+Meeting.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="262px" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ZMbRW64iLGU/TjjLSDmsXZI/AAAAAAAAANo/TGrMoC4FShg/s400/Mount+Laurel+Meeting.jpg" t$="true" width="400px" /></a></div><br />
<span style="color: orange;">The first account we have of meetings at Evesham, is of one held at the dwelling of William Evans, in 1694—his wife Elizabeth was a minister.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">A meeting-house was built in 1698, which was replaced by another, in 1760, of stone, this was enlarged in 1798, and formed the present venerable-looking structure, which stands as a monument to the liberality of Friends of that day.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">The Preparative and Monthly Meetings were established in 1760, as appears by the following minute: “Agreeable to ye direction of ye Quarterly Meeting held ye 3rd day of ye 9th month, 1760. Friends of Evesham and Chester held their meeting at Evesham on ye 9th of 10th month, 1760.” Evesham and Chester composed one Monthly Meeting until 1804.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">In the Third Month, 1793, the Monthly Meeting of Evesham proposed to the Quarterly Meeting held at Salem, that there be a division of that Monthly Meeting, viz: that Friends of Upper Evesham and Cropwell Particular Meetings become a Monthly Meeting, which was united with, and the Monthly Meeting of Upper Evesham organized First Mo. 1794.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">Upper Evesham was an indulged meeting from 1760 until 1774. In 1775, the meeting place was enlarged, which was built in 1759. The present commodious brick structure was erected in 1814, to replace the small frame building above alluded to.</span><br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-_Thhm7Z6MpY/TjlVycYrW0I/AAAAAAAAAOs/HTqwCLT8bRU/s1600/mdfrdfrndsmtgblt1814.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="255px" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-_Thhm7Z6MpY/TjlVycYrW0I/AAAAAAAAAOs/HTqwCLT8bRU/s400/mdfrdfrndsmtgblt1814.jpg" t$="true" width="400px" /></a></div><br />
<span style="color: orange;">The Preparative Meeting was established in 1783.</span><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: orange;">CROPWELL.</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-D9HtqaS5K8o/TjjG7kbEr1I/AAAAAAAAANY/3lY3OmEMGv8/s1600/Cropwell+Meeting.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="257px" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-D9HtqaS5K8o/TjjG7kbEr1I/AAAAAAAAANY/3lY3OmEMGv8/s400/Cropwell+Meeting.jpg" t$="true" width="400px" /></a></div><br />
<span style="color: orange;">The Meeting at Cropwell was first established in 1786, as appears by the following minute of that year:</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">“A request by direction of the Preparative Meeting of Evesham in favor of holding a meeting for worship in a school-house lately erected near Cropwell Creek, was united with.” The present brick meeting-house was built in 1812.</span><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: orange;">EASTON.</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"> </div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-MQCnftDofnE/TjjBm4CYlGI/AAAAAAAAANE/tGKg0b1gRw8/s1600/EastonBW.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="271px" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-MQCnftDofnE/TjjBm4CYlGI/AAAAAAAAANE/tGKg0b1gRw8/s400/EastonBW.jpg" t$="true" width="400px" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><div align="right"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">Easton Meeting, Mount Laurel Township</span></div></td></tr>
</tbody></table><br />
<span style="color: orange;">1803.—“Friends who live in the vicinity of Easton school-house request that two meetings a month be held at that place, which is allowed.” The Meeting was regularly established; and the Preparative Meeting organized in 1810, and the meeting-house built the same year. It is a branch of Evesham Monthly Meeting.</span><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: orange;">GREAT EGG HARBOR.</span></div><br />
<span style="color: orange;">“The first convincement of Friends about Great Egg Harbor was about 1702. Since which time Meetings have been settled and houses built.” Egg Harbor Monthly Meeting established.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">The first Yearly Meeting held at Egg Harbor was in 1754.</span><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: orange;">HADDONFIELD QUARTER.</span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><span style="color: orange;">In 1794, Gloucester and Salem Quarterly Meeting proposed to the Yearly Meeting to constitute two Quarterly Meetings in their limits: one of Evesham and Haddonfield, Great Egg Harbor, and Cape May, called Haddonfield Quarterly Meeting; to be held at Haddonfield and Evesham alternately, which was approved, and meetings held accordingly from that time until 1831, when the meeting circulated more generally, and was held once a year at Haddonfield, Evesham, Upper Evesham, (Medford) and Chester, (Moorestown) as at present. </span><br />
<br />
(<em>The Friend</em> 1889:243-244; Vol. LXII, No. 31, Seventh-Day, Third Month 2, 1889, John S. Stokes, Publisher, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.)<br />
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<div style="text-align: center;">———— o0o ————</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-779291837523434339.post-73057446711217002662011-07-31T16:55:00.001-04:002018-01-17T11:00:57.875-05:00“And Wait to Watch the Water Clear, I May”<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">[from Robert Frost, <em>The Pasture</em> (1914)]</span><br />
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<strong>The City of Burlington’s Insatiable Need for a Clean and Dependable Water Supply</strong><br />
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by Jerseyman ©2011<br />
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Like many urban centers, the history of public water distribution in Burlington, New Jersey, is a fascinating historical subject. Prior to 1804, all Burlingtonians obtained their domestic water supply from individual wells behind each resident’s house or place of business. The wells were often shallow and presented a very real threat of contamination and disease from runoff and from nearby outhouses and domestic garbage middens. In an early effort to counteract the growing contaminant problem, the city constructed public wells along High Street, including one near the Burlington County Courthouse at the intersection of High and Broad streets. In October 1804, the state legislature approved an act to incorporate the Burlington Aqueduct Company:<br />
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;"><em>NJPL</em> 1805:363-367</span></div>
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Beginning in 1803, the City of Philadelphia contracted to replace its wooden water-pipe system with cast-iron pipe. The new aqueduct company in Burlington acquired the cast-off wooden piping from the Quaker City with plans to reinstall it as a water distribution system in the streets of Burlington. Workmen excavated a long trench beginning at the High Street wharf and extending all the way out High Street to the springs that create Sylvan Lake, located in today’s Burlington Township. East Broad Street also received a portion of the wooden conduit.<br />
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-OyRqG5AHxUA/TiN5X-9HX9I/AAAAAAAAAJI/tpxnMoWn2_k/s1600/Sylvan+Lakes+I.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="416" m="" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-OyRqG5AHxUA/TiN5X-9HX9I/AAAAAAAAAJI/tpxnMoWn2_k/s640/Sylvan+Lakes+I.jpg" true="" width="640" /></a><br />
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When the aqueduct company completed its work, only little more than a trickle of water moved through the pipes, since the system relied on a gravity-feed arrangement without the benefit of pumps to enhance water pressure. The supply provided neither enough water for livestock nor for fighting fires. Despite the initial failures, the aqueduct company continued delivering what water it could from the lake, which had an elevation of more than 30 feet above the city, but stood approximately two miles south from the High Street wharf. Writing about the what service the aqueduct company provided, Major E. M.Woodward stated, <br />
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<span style="color: orange;">The supply obtained was insufficient for anything beyond the merest domestic service, and such a measure as fire protection therefore would be entirely out of the question, but nevertheless a few fire-hydrants of a rude pattern were placed on these lines.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">Baths were a luxury few could enjoy. Those even who had means to pay and leisure to wait for a flow into bath-tubs, must be sufficiently lowly-minded to content themselves with bathing in the lower stories of their houses, while some found it expedient to use their basements for that purpose.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">The rules of the Aqueduct Company were necessarily rigid regarding the use and waste of water; and so exclusive were the privileges given, and so stringent their regulations, that great care was required to avoid a violation of them, and once a prominent citizen, an inn-keeper, was fined five dollars for giving drink to a horse from a pail. </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: white;">(Woodward 1883:138)</span><br />
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Competition arose in <em>circa</em> 1843 when the aqueduct company could not supply Thomas Dugdale, owner of a steam-powered grist and saw mill on the banks of the Delaware River, with water to his dwelling on Pearl Street. This failure provided Dugdale with the impetus to establish his own system of piping. He acquired a pumping engine for his mill complex and began drawing water from the river. He distributed the water through small-bore iron pipe, which, similar to the aqueduct company, could not deliver a high-pressure supply. Nonetheless, it was better than the trickle found in the wooden pipe. The aqueduct company protested Dugdale’s actions, but his improved water supply met with great public approval. City council passed an ordinance to permit Dugdale to lay piping along other streets with the caveat that he furnish 25 fire hydrants <em>gratis </em>to the city. No sooner did Dugdale begin to distribute water to his customers then his mill burned during December 1844. Reconstruction occurred early in 1845, including a tall brick tower containing seven iron reservoir tanks, which added pressure to the distribution system. In 1847, Burlington artist John Collins (grandson of Burlington printer Isaac Collins) published a portfolio of lithographs depicting city scenes, including one of the “Burlington Steam Mills and Water Works.” Here is a colorized version of that artwork, which clearly depicts the tower containing the iron reservoir tanks: <br />
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-uSv9_xwi4Es/TiN0GBOqTjI/AAAAAAAAAHs/aEWXzmJ-jrM/s1600/Dugdale+Water+Works.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="476" m="" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-uSv9_xwi4Es/TiN0GBOqTjI/AAAAAAAAAHs/aEWXzmJ-jrM/s640/Dugdale+Water+Works.jpg" true="" width="640" /></a></div>
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By 1848, the public's demand for a reliable water supply had exponentially increased. After turning a profit in his water business, Dugdale approached the Burlington Aqueduct Company with an offer to purchase all of it property and coveted franchises for pipe routes. Writing in his 1883 history, Woodward notes, <span style="color: orange;">“[Dugdale]…succeeded in making such terms as led to his sole proprietorship of the same”</span> (Woodward 1883:138). In his history of Burlington published in 1927, William E. Schermerhorn states, <span style="color: orange;">“A few years later Mr. Dugdale acquired the Aqueduct Company’s franchise”</span> (Schermerhorn 1927:339). Dugdale took control of the aqueduct company and worked with the city to improve operations. On 5 June 1855, the Burlington City Council approved an ordinance titled, “An Ordinance empowering the President of the Burlington Aqueduct Company to raise by Loan, Money to be applied to the payment of the liabilities of the Company and the purchase of such materials and real or personal estate in, or near, the City of Burlington, N.J., as shall be requisite for their use.”<span style="font-size: xx-small;"></span> As a result of this loan authorization, Dugdale, acting in his capacity as company president, issued bonds like as the one below:<br />
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">Courtesy of the Absecon Historical Society</span></div>
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In 1858, Liscomb R. Titus, one of the major bondholders in the Burlington Aqueduct Company, brought suit in the New Jersey Court of Chancery against the company for default on interest payment. Most likely the national financial panic of 1857 played a major role in the company’s lack of cash flow. In December of the same year, Barker Gummere, attorney for Titus, published a legal notice that the court had issued a subpoena for Thomas Ridgway, Samuel Grant, Charles Lennig, Christopher Fallon, and John Fallon, all holders of mortgage bonds in the water company that lived outside of New Jersey, to appear in court to answer questions concerning their investments:<br />
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;"><em>Trenton State Gazette</em> 28 December 1858:4</span></div>
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Titus held a $100,000 bond and the company failed in its responsibility to pay the requisite installments on that bond. Although the case file for this proceeding remains unexamined, it appears the chancellor appointed Robert Pitman as a trustee for the Burlington Aqueduct Company to handle its financial affairs and to sell <span style="color: orange;">“…all their real and personal estate, franchises and works…”</span> (NJPL 1859:532). <br />
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To facilitate the court-directed sale, the state legislature approved an act to reincorporate the aqueduct company as the Burlington Water Company in March 1859 (<em>ibid</em>.):<br />
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;"><em>NJPL</em> 1859:532-533</span></div>
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Under a writ from the Court of Chancery, the Burlington County Sheriff advertised a sale of the aqueduct property and franchies. The sale occurred on 11 June 1860: <br />
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<em>Trenton State Gazette</em> 8 June 1860:3</div>
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The sale occurred, but no report could be found on the results. Likewise, no information could be located on the management of the new Burlington Water Company, except that Burlingtonian George Albert Allinson, an architect and builder by trade, served as the firm’s superintendent and treasurer (Lee Vol. II, 1910:506-507).<br />
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As early as February 1873, the state legislature considered a bill to authorize the city to purchase the Burlington Water Company and its holdings:<br />
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;"><em>NJPL</em> 1873:332-336</span></div>
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The city failed to take advantage of this state act, and the Burlington water supply remained in private hands. In April 1876, state lawmakers passed a more general act concerning municipal water works and the legislature amended the act in March 1877:<br />
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">City of Burlington Common Council 1879:40-52</span></div>
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Early Sunday morning on 11 December 1876, a bad fire struck Burlington and a lack of pressure and adequate supply of water caused great peril to the city and those fighting the fire:<br />
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;"><em>Trenton State Gazette</em> 13 December 1876:2</span></div>
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This was not the only fire endured during the Burlington Water Company’s tenure, but it was certainly the worse blaze the city ever suffered. Writing about the water supply situation in his 1883 history, Major Woodward notes,<br />
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<span style="color: orange;">As the growth of the city demanded a greater supply of water, the inadequacy of that furnished by the old system became more and more apparent and embarrassing. Complaints became common against the company, until, after a succession of losses by fire, due mainly to the want of water with which to extinguish them, culminating in the disastrous conflagration of Dec. 10, 1876, the spirit of the citizens became sufficiently aroused to take such action….</span> <span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: white;">(Woodward 1883:138)</span><br />
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The December 1876 conflagration convinced city council to move forward with expediency in acquiring the assets of the water corporation. Rather than use the terms of the 1873 act, the city fathers applied the provisions contained with the more general 1876-1877 acts. Schermerhorn indicates the sale took place under a new state law passed to enable <span style="color: orange;">“…cities to obtain ‘a supply of pure and wholesome water,’” </span><span style="color: black;">a direct quote from the legislative act</span> (Schermerhorn 1927:339-340). Within two months of the fire, council members established its new water commission and authorized it to construct a new water works and modernize the distribution system, based on an ordinance approved on 7 February 1877:<br />
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">City of Burlington Common Council 1879:203-208</span></div>
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Following the approval of this ordinance and the appointment of the city’s water commission, the Burlington Water Company sold their facilities to the city for $25,000 in March 1877. The first board consisted of Alexander Martin, James O’Neill, Henry S. Haines, Richard F. Mott, and Caleb G. Ridgway. Mr. Haines served as board secretary and as the superintendent at the water works. Woodward states, <br />
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<span style="color: orange;">…after several public meetings, [the city adopted]…the provisions of the act which the Legislature had passed, enabling cities to obtain a supply of pure and wholesome water. Several plans for the accomplishment of this end were devised, but it was finally thought expedient to purchase from the Burlington Water Company all their property and rights, and to improve and extend their works in such a manner as to meet the wants of the town. This was accordingly done, and March 22, 1877, a deed was executed and delivered to the city treasurer, granting all the possessions held by said company under their charter, inclusive of the rights and leases in the lands furnishing the spring water from the hills, for the sum of $25,000, the issue of bonds to the amount of $65,000 having been previously authorized for these purposes by a popular vote.</span> <span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: white;">(Woodward 1883:138)</span><br />
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The new commission wasted no time in planning a more modern water pumping and distribution system. Major Woodward writes:<br />
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<span style="color: orange;">During the first year of the public administration it became apparent that steps must be taken at once for obtaining a greater flow of water through the public mains, and after delays and difficulties it was determined to lay new mains through most of the streets, and to purchase a new engine and pump, which was done, and the new engine began its regular duty on the 2d day of March, 1878. The completion of the new building and the new machinery made possible the demolition of the unsightly structure formerly containing the old boiler, and enabled the commissioners to erect a neat little building about the stack, and to improve that part of the grounds formerly covered by the old building. Notwithstanding this improvement in the appearance of the property, its narrowness on the front next to Pearl Street, and the obliquity of the west line, adjoining the African Methodist Episcopal Church, lessened its beauty and utility to such an extent that it was thought proper to recommend to Council the purchase of a strip of ground from the church. This was done at a cost of three hundred and twenty-five dollars, after which a neat iron fence was built along the entire front. Substantial and sightly fences of wood were built on either side, the lawn was laid in grass, the front was paved, and young shade-trees were planted in front and on the side next to the river. On the river front, the proximity of the cemetery belonging to the church mentioned, and the dilapidation of its inclosures, led the commissioners to erect a substantial stone wall around the north and east sides thereof; and a dock owned by Mr. Joseph Vandegrift in immediate contact with the wharf property belonging to the works was purchased, at a cost of four hundred dollars, and measures were taken to strengthen the reservoir building.</span> (Woodward 1883:138)<br />
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To prepare for the upgraded piping and appurtenances, city council passed a supplement on 3 September 1878 to the original February 1877 ordinance, providing the Board of Water Commissioners with regulatory powers:<br />
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">City of Burlington Common Council 1879:208-209</span></div>
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The old mill buildings and engine house came down during 1880-1881 and the board replaced them with a new brick building. The commission ordered boilers to be installed during construction of the new building and contracted with the Holly-Gaskill Company, of Lockport, New York, for high duty pumping engines at a cost of $6,000. Invented by Harvey F. Gaskill in 1881, the type of engine became a fixture in many water works. As designed, the engine mounts horizontally and was a rotative beam non-receiver compound type. Here are some engravings to illustrate the appearance of the engine: <br />
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A post card view depicts the Holly-Gaskill engine and the attending engineer at the water works:</div>
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After the Holly-Gaskill Company completed the installation, the renowned hydraulic engineer Henry P.M. Birkinbine ran the engine trials at Burlington to ascertain contract compliancy. He then published a report detailing his findings. Here is the initial portion of the text, which firmly expresses Birkinbine’s opinion that the Board of Water Commissioners ordered an engine too small for its purpose:<br />
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<span style="color: orange;">BURLINGTON, N. J.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">OCTOBER, 1884.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">REPORT OF HENRY P. M. BIRKINBINE, C. E.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><br />
</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">The engine on which the following test was made was of the Gaskill Compound type, but of the smallest size built, and with unjacketed steam cylinders; and the duty obtained is considered by the builders as all that could be expected from so small a machine operating at so slow a piston speed. The shortness of the trials was due to the fact that at the time they were made the supply of water was not sufficient to allow of a longer continuous run. This the engineer states to be the case in his report.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">The pumping engine furnished by The Holly Manufacturing Company, of Lockport, N. Y., for the Burlington Water Works, was submitted to a test for duty and capacity October 28th and 29th, 1884.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">The manner of proceeding was not as precise and accurate in every detail as could have been pursued, yet the results may be taken as sufficiently correct to enable a practical decision as to the ability of the pumping apparatus to fulfill the contract.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><br />
</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">At the commencement of the test the engine was in operation, steam up to working pressure and the fire in a fair condition. This, the engineer of the works, Mr. John Crook, was directed to observe carefully, and also to so conduct the firing as to leave it in as near the same condition as practicable when the tests were concluded.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><br />
</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">While there may have been a possibility of error in the judgment of your engineer as to the condition of the fire, at the beginning and close of the test, yet from his long experience as an engineer it may be accepted as practically correct.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><br />
</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">All the coal supplied to the fire during the test was carefully weighed, the height of the water in the boiler marked on the gauge, and the water pumped into it was passed through a meter and the quantity measured.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><br />
</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">The test could not be continued as long as it was desired, on account of the new connection with the river not being completed. The supply of water for the pumps had to be taken from the old pump-well, and this was several times interrupted by reason of the screen becoming choked by floating matter.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><br />
</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">The results, however, are so far above the contract guarantee that these matters of possible error may be dismissed. By the terms of the contract the Commissioners could demand a continuous test of six days. This was not thought advisable, as it would have made it necessary to allow at least 1,250,000 gallons to be wasted each day, and would have required a corresponding waste of coal. If there were any doubt of the ability of the machinery to fulfill the demands of the contract, this long test might be insisted upon, but with the large margin in favor of the engine it was not deemed necessary. </span><span style="color: black;">(Birkinbine 1884:65)</span><br />
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As the contractor built the new water works, gangs of workmen opened city streets and begin the long task of running new mains and laterals, a project finally completed in 1885, but not before a battle in city council and the pointing of a revolver at a councilman. Here is that story, as Henry Bisbee told it in 1978:<br />
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<span style="color: orange;">The new commission decided to lay new water mains. A contract was awarded (too quickly, some said) to Andrew McNeal to furnish and lay our larger mains. Some on City Council didn’t like the appointment.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><br />
</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">Andrew McNeal [owner of the pipe foundry in East Burlington] had made his bid under the name of the McNeal Pipe Laying Company. Offices were on West Union street. There was no evidence that such a concern existed. William E. Schermerhorn, in his History of Burlington, implies that the Water Commissioners “had not come with clean hands.” Many decided that there was something “fishy” about the whole deal. Half of City Council agreed as they were divided six to six on the question of accepting McNeal’s bid. Hot debates flew in Council chambers.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><br />
</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">The controversy continued for months. McNeal’s people contended that he had properly filed his bid and that the contract had been awarded fairly to the lowest bidder. His opponents claimed he intended to “farm out” the contract, that he was an irresponsible middleman and that the award had been illegal. They claimed that not enough public notice had been given. Angry debates continued in Council as charges and countercharges were hurled by Council.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><br />
</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">As members of Council were leaving City Hall after a particularly hectic session, Andrew McNeal blocked the way of Councilman William H. Kimball. The infuriated contractor pointed a revolver at Kimball. A quick-witted bystander grabbed the revolver while others closed in on McNeal. No shot was fired. The situation would have been amusing if it had not been so serious. In the crowded corridor of City Hall the revolver was tossed from hand to hand like a hot potato. Someone finally pocketed the revolver. McNeal was arrested. When the defendant was brought before the Justice of the Peace the judge was forced to free the contractor. No weapon could be found. The evidence had disappeared.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><br />
</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">For several weeks after the revolver incident, Council remained dead-locked six to six. Neither side would budge. Then the opposition discovered that one of the Councilmen had moved his residence to Philadelphia, but still kept his seat. Joseph R. Flanigan had supported McNeal. The opposition group had a writ served demanding that Flanigan show cause for keeping his seat. This broke the dead-lock. The case was taken to court, which ordered the contract to McNeal be voided. New bids were then advertised. R.D. Wood Company of Florence was the successful bidder.</span> (Bisbee 1978:3-4)<br />
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The Sanborn Map Company depicted the water works in its January 1886 atlas of fire insurance maps for Burlington:<br />
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">Sanborn Map Publishing Company 1886:2</span></div>
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By 1891, the commission had ordered a plate-iron standpipe reservoir from Morris, Tasker & Company of Philadelphia and had it erected on the water works property to increase system pressure. The 129-foot-high vertical reservoir had a maximum capacity of 286,000 gallons of water. It is shown on the 1891 Sanborn map:<br />
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">Sanborn-Perris Map Company 1891:5</span></div>
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This early twentieth-century post card provides context for the standpipe's placement:<br />
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The water works continued to derive its water from the Delaware, but the river became increasingly polluted with industrial waste and raw sewage from upriver communities like Trenton. The Board of Water Commissioners tried repeatedly to stop the state capital from dumping its raw sewage into the Delaware, but the commissioners finally gave up as no convening authority could stop Trenton from its routine river dumping (<em>The Philadelphia Inquirer</em> 26 April 1891:1).<br />
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In preparation for an addition to the existing water works building, the water commission ordered the unused tank house removed, which was the portion of the building closest to Pearl Street. The 1896 Sanborn depicts the boiler room and pump house shorn of the tank house:<br />
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">Sanborn-Perris Map Company 1896:5</span></div>
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This map detail shows the small office structure, once attached to the tank house, now freestanding on the water works property. The yellow building depicted at the bottom left-hand corner of this map detail is the coal shed for the works. This first appears on this 1896 map.<br />
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A reconstruction of the main water works occurred in 1897, including a major addition to the extant pumping station, complete with decorative terra cotta friezes featuring <em>bas relief</em> hydrants and the date “1897” above the windows on the gambrel dormer and the words “Water Works” across the front over the entrance door. The work included installation of a modern filtration bed in an attempt to deal with increasing contamination in the Delaware River. The 1897 edition of <em>The Manual of American Water-Works</em> published the following information about the Burlington water facilities:<br />
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<span style="color: orange;">BURLINGTON, Burlington Co. (7,264.) Now owned by city; built In ’04 by an aqueduct co.; In ’43 Thos. Dugdale laid pipe and in ’48 bought aqueduct co.’s works; In ’60 works passed Into hands of Burlington Water-Works Co., and In ’77 were bought by city. SUPPLY.—Delaware River, pumping to stand-pipe. PUMPS.—Cap., 2,000,000 galls.; 1,500,000 Holly-Gaskill hor. high duty and 500,000 Worthington comp. cond. Anthracite pea coal used; av. cost, $2.35 per short ton. STAND-PIPE.—Cap., 282,000 galls.; 20 x 120 ft., on stone. FISCAL YEAR CLOSED Mar. 1. DISTRIBUTION.—Mains, 11½ miles; cost extensions met by consumers. Taps, 1,780; made by city for $1.50. Services, lead and Iron; paid for by consumer. Hydrants, 115. CONSUMPTION.—(Galls.) av., 450.000; max., 550,000; mln., 350,000. PRESSURE.—Ordinary, 56 lbs. Steam fire engines are sometimes used. FINANCIAL.—Cost, $115,000. Bonded debt, $53,500, at 4%, due 1906. Expenses, $6,040: Operating, $4,000; Int., $2,040. Op. exp. and Int. consumes 40% of revenue, new construction 10%, balance goes for redemption of bonds. Revenue, $10,000. MANAGEMENT.—Chn., Jno. A. Vandegrift; Secy., Geo. Womsley; Treas. and Supt. Geo. A. Allison. Rept. by Treas., July 11. SEWERS.—None. REFERENCE.— Eng. News, Jan. 21, ’82. </span><span style="color: black;">(Baker 1897:149)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><br />
</span><br />
The 1902 Sanborn illustrates the recently completed addition to the waterworks:<br />
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">Sanborn Map Company 1902:4</span></div>
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The little office building disappeared during construction, but the addition now housed two offices: probably one for the commission and one for the works’ engineer. A post card depicts the finely finished handsome addition with its terra cotta detailing:<br />
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This view shows the chimney projecting vertically from the boiler room:<br />
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A wider view of the building illustrates the grounds surrounding the water works:<br />
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The grove of trees to the left of the building featured benches and picnic tables as amenities on the grounds for local residents. The view from the riverbank and the stone fountains added to the pleasant experience for those visiting the water works property:<br />
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-oCOggal9trw/Ti7D3qQVgoI/AAAAAAAAALc/kLfMkqnZp7Q/s1600/Delaware+River+fron+Water+Works.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="410" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-oCOggal9trw/Ti7D3qQVgoI/AAAAAAAAALc/kLfMkqnZp7Q/s640/Delaware+River+fron+Water+Works.jpg" t="" true="" width="640" /></a></div>
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In the 1909 <em>Burlington City Year Book</em>, the Board of Water Commissioners published their 32nd Annual Report for the year ending 31 December 1908:<br />
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">City of Burlington Common Council 1909:23-25</span></div>
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A wide variety of pollutants continued to foul the Delaware River in an ever-increasing quantity, causing great concern to the citizenry of Burlington about their water quality. Many municipalities turned to drilling artesian wells as an answer to the need for fresh water. The city engaged the services of New Jersey State Geologist Cornelius Vermeule to investigate the question of artesian wells for Burlington. Even before Vermeule turned in his preliminary report, however, the Burlington City Council rejected such an undertaking, presumably due to the cost. In March 1908, the council voted to disapprove drilling wells and instructed the Board of Water Commissioners to issue an Request For Proposals to construct filter beds to remove the pollutants from the river water prior to distribution in the city: <br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-TeCiEmMQNd8/TjVXr_DCtqI/AAAAAAAAAL4/u6A157EgEHQ/s1600/Trenton+Evening+Times%252C+5+March+1905%252C+Page+5+copy.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-TeCiEmMQNd8/TjVXr_DCtqI/AAAAAAAAAL4/u6A157EgEHQ/s1600/Trenton+Evening+Times%252C+5+March+1905%252C+Page+5+copy.jpg" t="" true="" /></a></td></tr>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;"><em>Trenton Evening Times</em>, 5 March 1908:5</span></div>
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Despite city council’s plans to employ filter beds, the residents still maintained a sense of uneasiness about their water supply. In his annual message delivered 1 January 1909, Mayor C. Taylor Rue echoed these concerns: <br />
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<span style="color: orange;">I presume that no one subject has engaged the thought and attention of our citizens during the year just closed more than that of the water supply. There is nothing more necessary than water and no effort should be spared in getting an adequate supply of the best that can be had, and with least delay. Cost alone should not be the controlling element in determining the nature of the supply. I have followed your proceedings with great interest and beg leave to express my satisfaction with what appears to be an approach to a solution of this important matter. I believe that the large majority of our people are convinced that the time has passed when the water of the Delaware River can be safely used without some form of purification. The increase of population above us and the continued contamination of the water renders it unfit for use. Even some of our own citizens persist in draining into the River, and in some cases not far from the present intake.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">A careful examination of the reports of Hazen and Whipple, and of Henry S. Haines City Engineer, published in the City Year Book for 1908, as well as the preliminary reports since presented by Mr. Cornelius C. Vermeule, C.E., appear to show a unanimous conclusion that “it is better for the City of Burlington to get ground water rather than to filter the water of the Delaware River or of the Assiscunk Creek.” These gentlemen are all among the most eminent in hydraulic engineering in this Country, and in view of their opinions, supplemented by the data submitted by them, it would seem idle for us as laymen to differ with them. I await with interest the expected final report of Mr. Vermeule, and I sincerely trust that he may propose a plan which will meet with approval, and that immediate steps be taken to accomplish the result desired. Certainly, the time has arrived when this subject can be determined, wholly on its merits, and public officials who have any duties or responsibilities in the matter should be allowed to exercise a sound discretion, based on the advice of competent engineers, and without the constant reproach and criticism which characterized the discussion in its earlier stages. </span><span style="color: black;">(City of Burlington Common Council 1909:5-6)</span><br />
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As noted in the mayor’s address above, the City of Burlington engaged the services of Civil Engineer C.C. Vermeule during 1908. Here are scans of Vermeule’s reports: <br />
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(City of Burlington Common Council 1909:73-93)</span></div>
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In September 1909, the New Jersey State Board of Health approved the filtration plans for the Burlington Water Works: </div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-5X23Vf5MUes/TjWomQZbjII/AAAAAAAAAMM/3kjMA40ppCc/s1600/Trenton+Evening+Times%252C+9+September+1909%252C+Page+5+copy.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="210" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-5X23Vf5MUes/TjWomQZbjII/AAAAAAAAAMM/3kjMA40ppCc/s400/Trenton+Evening+Times%252C+9+September+1909%252C+Page+5+copy.jpg" t="" true="" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
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<em>Trenton Evening Times</em>, 9 September 1909:5</div>
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As the years passed by and technology advanced, the Board of Water Commissioners made improvements to their system. In 1927, these changes included new boilers, rebuilt pumps, new redundant electric pumps, and calibrated chlorination equipment:<br />
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;"><em>Trenton Evening Times</em>, 17 April 1927:8</span></div>
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During he same year, the Burlington Township community of Springside expressed the desire to receive water service from the City of Burlington, providing an expansion of the distribution system:<br />
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;"><em>Sunday Times Advertiser</em>, 11 December 1927:38</span></div>
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The Board of Water Commissioners finally determined it would move ahead with drilling its first artesian well in 1943, a mere 35 years after Cornelius Vermeule first recommended it:<br />
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<em>Trenton Evening Times</em>, 8 April 1943:7</div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;"><em>Trenton Evening Times</em>, 5 August 1943:6</span></div>
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Still, the water works continued to derive the majority of the water pumped into the distribution system from the Delaware River. </div>
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One and one-half years after the Second World War ended, the city’s water distribution system expanded again eastward into Burlington Township to the Stevens Station section:</div>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;"><em>Sunday Times Advertiser</em>, 30 March 1947:8</span></div>
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In 1952, consultants finally identified a new source of water for the city—artesian wells drilled on Burlington Island:<br />
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;"><em>Trenton Evening Times</em>, 18 July 1952:2</span></div>
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The work to drill the five artesian wells on the island and change over the water source to just these wells required two years and the expenditure of almost $500,000. The new water supply arrived at the water works in a 20-inch main laid between the island and water works across the back channel. When the new wells came on line in 1954, the steam pumping engine fell silent as the entire water works used electricity to power the pumps and other equipment. The boilers reportedly remained on standby for a time, in case a large fire demanded a boost in pressure, but the electric pumps soon proved their adequacy and the engineer banked the fires in the boilers for the last time. As a young man, I visited the old water works building several times during 1966. Through the fog of memory, I think I recall the old steam pumps and boilers still in place, but I cannot be certain. To demonstrate all of the modernization to the city’s residents, the Board of Water Commissioners held an open house at the main building:<br />
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;"><em>Trenton Evening Times,</em> 19 November 1959:10</span></div>
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In an effort to streamline operations at the water works and make the system more accountable to city council, the elected officials voted to abolish the city’s Board of Water Commissioners:<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-X71F87zCwjo/TjW-R54lQXI/AAAAAAAAAMs/gCDbhXBV-8M/s1600/Trenton+Evening+Times%252C+19+December+1962%252C+Page+20+copy.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-X71F87zCwjo/TjW-R54lQXI/AAAAAAAAAMs/gCDbhXBV-8M/s640/Trenton+Evening+Times%252C+19+December+1962%252C+Page+20+copy.jpg" t="" true="" width="484" /></a></td></tr>
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<span style="font-size: xx-small;"><em>Trenton Evening Times</em>, 19 December 1962:20</span></div>
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By the 1970s, the old water works had outlived its usefulness and could no longer accommodate the rapid advancements in water treatment and distribution technology. The city made plans to develop a new water works facility closer to the island and its artesian wells. Construction of the new water works just west of the old McNeal Pipe Foundry began in 1977-1978. Upon its completion, the old city water works building closed. In more recent years, several entrepreneurs have sought to open a restaurant there, but finances and/or remonstrances from the adjacent Bethlehem AME Church have prevented any further progress on such activities, far removed from the water works building’s original purpose. <br />
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-CYxmBYiONl8/Ti73sK_ObuI/AAAAAAAAALs/XpfdWsn4rKA/s1600/Stand+Pipe+Color.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-CYxmBYiONl8/Ti73sK_ObuI/AAAAAAAAALs/XpfdWsn4rKA/s640/Stand+Pipe+Color.jpg" t="" true="" width="404" /></a></div>
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As the sun sets over the standpipe and the pumping station in this vintage view, hopes are high that an appropriate adaptive reuse plan can be formulated for this lasting monument to the City of Burlington’s need for clean water.<br />
<br />
References:<br />
<br />
Baker, M.N., editor<br />
1897 <em>The Manual of American Water-Works.</em> Fourth edition. The Engineering News Publishing Company, New York City, New York.<br />
<br />
Birkinbine, Henry<br />
1884 “Burlington, N.J. October, 1884. Report of Henry P.M. Birkinbine, C.E.” Published in <em>Official Reports of Various Duty Trials of the Gaskill Pumping Engines.</em> Holly Manufacturing Company, Lockport, New York.<br />
<br />
Bisbee, Henry H.<br />
1978 “Burlington’s Water System.” Published in <em>The Burlington Story.</em> Vol. 8, No. One. [The Colonial Burlington Foundation], Burlington, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
City of Burlington Common Council<br />
1879 <em>Charter of the City of Burlington, with the Ordinances; Revised and Printed by Order of the Common Council. </em>S.S. Murphey, Printer, Burlington, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
1909 <em>Burlington City Year Book for 1909.</em> n.p., Burlington, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
<em>N.J.P.L.</em> (<em>New Jersey Pamphlet Laws</em>)<br />
1804 <em>Acts of the Twenty-Ninth General Assembly of the State of New Jersey.</em> James J. Wilson, Trenton, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
1859 <em>Acts of the Eighty-Third Legislature of the State of New Jersey, and Fifteenth under the New Constitution.</em> Tunis & Stout, Freehold, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
1873 <em>Acts of the Ninety-Seventh Legislature of the State of New Jersey, and Twenty-Ninth under the New Constitution.</em> Vance & Stiles, Steam Power Book and Job Printers, Morristown, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
Sanborn Map Company<br />
1902 <em>Insurance Maps of Burlington, Burlington Co., New Jersey.</em> Sanborn Map Company, New York City, New York.<br />
<br />
Sanborn Map Publishing Company<br />
1886 <em>Burlington, New Jersey.</em> Sanborn Map Publishing Company, New York City, New York.<br />
<br />
Sanborn-Perris Map Company<br />
1891 <em>Burlington, Burlington County, New Jersey.</em> Sanborn-Perris Map Company, New York City, New York.<br />
<br />
1896 <em>Insurance Maps of Burlington, Burlington County, New Jersey.</em> Sanborn-Perris Map Company, New York City, New York.<br />
<br />
Schermerhorn, William E.<br />
1927 <em>The History of Burlington, New Jersey.</em> Enterprise Publishing Company, Burlington, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
<em>The Philadelphia Inquirer</em><br />
1891 “Little Ones from Jersey.” Published in the 26 April edition of <em>The Philadelphia Inquirer</em>. Microform edition. <em>The Philadelphia Inquirer</em>, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.<br />
<br />
Woodward, Major E.M.<br />
1883 <em>History of Burlington County, New Jersey, with Biographical Sketches of Many of Its Pioneers and Prominent Men.</em> Everts & Peck, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.<br />
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-779291837523434339.post-37508234688896291022011-02-06T21:04:00.028-05:002011-02-07T12:58:03.809-05:00“I am in your hands; you may revenge yourselves.”<span style="font-size: x-small;">Carl Emil Kurt von Donop, 1777.</span><br />
<br />
<strong>The Battle for Fort Mercer at Red Bank, Gloucester County, New Jersey </strong><br />
<br />
by Jerseyman ©2011<br />
<br />
In my article titled, “The Plantation Yclept Bromley,” I detailed the Hessian march to Fort Mercer. This article will provide more detail about the events leading up to the Hessian attack, the actual battle, and its aftermath. I hope these two separate articles will be read together for a more complete picture of what occurred on that fateful day in October 1777.<br />
<br />
<u>The Battle for Fort Mercer: A Contextual Summary</u> <br />
<br />
As America entered the second year of its rebellion against the Crown, the British sailed south from New York and landed General William Howe and his army on the shores of the Chesapeake Bay at Elkton, Maryland, after rejecting a more dangerous landing on the lower Delaware River. As the army marched north towards Philadelphia, sailors of the Pennsylvania Navy prepared themselves for the upcoming riverine battle. The river bottom already bristled with clusters of <em>chevaux-de-frise</em>, iron-tipped wooden spears anchored in stone-filled wooden cribs, ready to impale any British vessel which dared to sail up the Delaware. Only a handful of colonial river pilots knew the safe passage route through these river obstacles. American laborers worked on the New Jersey side to finish the forts at Billingsport and Red Bank while other crews made final preparations to the fort on Mud Island (Fort Mifflin). However, the continentals soon found Billingsport to be indefensible, and withdrew four miles upstream to concentrate on completing a much smaller fortification within the rather large Red Bank defensive position. Only a small garrison remained at Billingsport to guard the lower set of <em>chevaux-de-frise</em>. After withdrawing from the Brandywine battlefield, the British army continued its march towards Philadelphia. On the city’s outskirts, Washington launched a surprise attack at Germantown, which proved disastrous for the American troops and Howe’s forces moved in to Philadelphia during the second part of October (Jackson 1977:1-15).<br />
<br />
Washington favored defending Philadelphia and the Delaware River primarily from Fort Mifflin, and as the British advanced on the city ordered Colonel Joseph Penrose <span style="color: orange;">“…to overflow the Ground upon Province Island, which will render it impossible for the Enemy to approach the Fort [Mifflin] in the rear and raise batteries against it”</span> (Washington Letterbook 2 1777:152). The purposely broken dikes surrounding Province and Carpenter islands permitted waist-deep water to wash over the formerly dry ground in an attempt to prevent a British land attack against the fort. Historian John W. Jackson, writing in his 1986 work, Fort Mifflin: Valiant Defender of the Delaware, states, <br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">At that time Hog Island, downstream from the fort, has also been flooded. Originally, Carpenters’ and Province Islands [sic] had been low marshy ground, intersected or bordered by Darby, Mingo, and Bow Creeks [sic] and the back channel of the Delaware River. They had been diked with earthen embankments to convert them to rich meadow land for local farmers.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">The order to Penrose had been made by Washington with imperfect knowledge of the terrain along the Delaware’s banks. As early as July 9, he had pleaded with Thomas Wharton, President of the Pennsylvania Assembly, to have surveys made of the entire area; entreaties that were frequently repeated, and as often ignored. If these requests had been complied with, maps could have been prepared which would have disclosed slight elevations that remained above the flooded areas. On these knolls and dikes the British could, and later would, raise redoubts and batteries that would threaten the survival of Fort Mifflin.</span> (Jackson 1986:25-26)<br />
<br />
Upon achieving his primary objective—conquering Philadelphia—General Howe directed his military commanders to vanquish the American troops, destroy the Pennsylvania Navy, and open the Delaware River to British shipping under the control of Howe’s brother, Lord Admiral Richard Howe. During the entire British invasion period, from 2 October to 9 November, Commodore Hazelwood’s Pennsylvania Navy patrolled the Delaware River. His small fleet of row galleys, floating batteries and fire boats harassed the British naval fleet, provided protective fire for the forts and defended the <em>chevaux-de-frise</em> from removal. Howe realized that eliminating the forts guarding the river would be the key to a successful fight for the Delaware.<br />
<br />
Preparatory to eliminating Fort Mifflin as a threat to British shipping, on 29 September 1777, General Howe ordered Lord Cornwallis and Lieutenant General Archibald Robertson of the Royal Engineers to conduct a preliminary survey of the fort and the surrounding lands from the east bank of the Schuylkill River. The men observed the fortification’s relatively weak northern palisaded wooden wall. Four days later, British Captain John Montrésor of the Royal Engineers led another reconnaissance foray. During the early 1770s, Montrésor designed and began construction of the fort on Mud Island as a defensive position to protect Philadelphia from French attacks, so the engineer had intimate knowledge of the stronghold and its location. Montrésor found enough dry land on Province Island to establish artillery batteries and construct a roadway to transport supplies and equipment. During Montrésor’s survey, the grenadiers accompanying him drove off a small American force from the Pest House (Dorwart 1998:36). <br />
<br />
Subsequent to the survey, British forces began erecting artillery emplacements on Province Island and Carpenter’s Island. The guns arrived in wagons from Chester and from Philadelphia on 6 October 1777 and included two eight-inch mortars and two eight-inch howitzers (Montrésor 1881:462). Montrésor established two batteries to house these guns, including a large emplacement west of Mingo Creek which contained one 8-inch howitzer, one 8-inch mortar and six 24-Pounders. The second battery stood at the south end of Blakely’s road to the Delaware River and possessed just one 8-inch mortar and one 8-inch Howitzer. Montrésor placed two captured iron 18-pounders in an emplacement south of the Pest House on the lane to the hospital’s wharf. Up the lane from the 18-pounders, another emplacement held two 32-pounders (Montrésor 1881:452-463). A small artillery crew manned a single 32-pounder on a pier at the mouth of Mingo Creek. On the 20 October 1777, John Montrésor noted the arrival of a 13-inch mortar at the Blakely House the previous night and crews proceeded to move it from the house down to a new emplacement south of the battery at the end of Blakely’s road to the river (Montrésor 1881:468-469). In addition to all of these offensive artillery positions, the British also constructed three defensive redoubts: one northwest of the Blakely House; one southwest of the Blakely House; and one at the Province House Tavern, north of the Pest House, near Webb’s Ferry over the Schuylkill River. <br />
<br />
During the construction and installation phase of these British gun emplacements and redoubts, the Pennsylvania Navy did its best to harass the English forces while they worked. The American troops at Fort Mifflin also fired artillery volleys at the enemy’s increasingly threatening positions on Carpenter’s and Province Island. Montrésor found the working conditions insufferable and noted in his diary that four days of heavy rains and the flooded meadows greatly hampered the army’s efforts to complete the gun emplacements. He also stated his resentment of the “rebels” for destroying the dams and dikes that formerly kept the marshlands and meadows on the island dry. After commenting on the swift and sudden attacks from the American row galleys, Montrésor wrote:<br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">The Nights as well as the situations very unfavorable as the moon during the whole time rose early and clear & subject to discover us. After wading along the Causeways, through Cuts in the Meadows and Bog Holes and reaching the spot to work on–we had to fill the Ditch in the rear of a small Dyke with fascines even to get a footing to work. This Season, the fall of the year, the Waters are in general higher & the spaces they leave slippery and miry.</span> (as quoted in Jackson 1986:33)<br />
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Upon observing the emplacement constructed on the night of 10 October, Hazelwood ordered three galleys and floating battery to attack the British position. The offensive action lasted for two hours before the English troops surrendered. Although likely overstated, Montrésor records that the “Rebels fired 3000 Cannon Shot at this battery” (as quoted in Jackson 1986:34). Fort Mifflin Commandant Colonel Samuel Smith finally realized the threat posed by these British gun positions and began to take action. He erected a two-gun emplacement on Mud Island north of the fort at a location opposite Province Island. He also stretched an iron chain just below the water’s surface on the back channel to prevent surprise attacks. Hazelwood came against the enemy’s land positions again on 12 October with an ensuing fierce fire-fight lasting 45 minutes or so. Eventually, Hazelwood withdrew his fleet, fearful of the larger British presence and of a possible flanking action (Jackson 1986:34).<br />
<br />
With all emplacements nearly completed, Montrésor opened fire against the fort on Mud Island the morning of 15 October. The cannonade continued on 16 October, but then ended due to a shortage of ordnance. As British forces fired from its artillery positions on the Delaware’s Pennsylvania shore in an aerial bombardment on Fort Mifflin, Hessian Colonel Carl Emil Kurt von Donop requested the honor to crush the continental forces at Red Bank. On 22 October 1777, von Donop marched his large army of mercenaries to attack the fort, where a small and inferior force of Americans waited. The Hessians suffered a resounding defeat, losing many soldiers on the battlefield, including von Donop himself, during the 40-minute battle. The British dispatched warships to provide artillery support for the Hessians, but in maneuvering around the shallow water in front of the fort, the 64-gun ship AUGUSTA and the sloop-of-war MERLIN ran aground, representing a great military loss to the British, since both exploded and burned. During the Hessian attack on Fort Mercer, Lord Howe dispatched two ships to warp through the weakened <em>chevaux-de-frise</em> defenses and bombard Fort Mifflin. The riverine attack began about daybreak and continued until noon, destroying the fort’s northeast blockhouse and overturning some of the fort’s cannons. One incoming shell destroyed a quantity of ammunition and a section of the wooden palisades burned (Jackson 1986:50-51). Von Donop’s defeat at Red Bank temporarily thwarted Howe’s plans for river domination. Howe had ordered a large detachment of his troops stationed at the Province Island wharf, staged to invade Fort Mifflin, but withdrew the force upon the Hessian rout (Jackson 1977:15-18). <br />
<br />
Howe became increasingly alarmed about the onset of winter and the lack of navigation on the Delaware. He knew that he must quickly eliminate Fort Mifflin as a threat to his combined naval and land forces. On 9 November 1777, Howe prepared his land batteries for saturation cannonading of the fort, particularly hammering the weak north palisade. Lord Richard Howe commanded his large warships to pound the fort’s western stone wall. Continual bombardment began on 10 November and persisted uninterrupted for the ensuing five days. The Pennsylvania Navy did what it could to harass the British, but the Americans failed to close off the fort’s back channel, allowing the enemy to move floating batteries into position for additional salvos against the embattled Mifflin. The British breached the wall and continued firing, leveling the fort in places. In its harassment campaign, the Americans broke the dikes along Carpenter and Province islands, allowing waist-deep water to encompass the enemy as it loaded and reloaded its artillery. Finally, during the night of 15 November, the continentals abandoned the fort and fled under the cover of darkness to the shelter offered at Fort Mercer, setting fire to what remained of Mifflin. With the main fortress gone, Red Bank became indefensible and Washington ordered it abandoned on 21 November 1777. <br />
<br />
According to the William Faden map of the fight for the Delaware, at some point during the campaign against Fort Mifflin, a ship sank just west of Mud Island and the fort. Unfortunately, a careful review of primary and secondary source material failed to reveal any information about this vessel. Faden labeling the vessel as a “ship sunk” seems to imply that it had more size than a mere row galley. The failure of the cartographer to assign a name to the ship may indicate it was a vessel from the Pennsylvania Navy, which sank either during a naval engagement with the enemy or deliberately scuttled to prevent the British from sailing too close to the island or landing troops there (Faden 1778).<br />
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The Pennsylvania Navy sailed part of its fleet upriver to Crosswicks Creek in Bordentown in an attempt to save its vessels, but the British destroyed virtually all of them. Hazelwood ordered the row galleys and other smaller craft set afire and, according to Faden’s battle map, the collection of burning boats drifted with the tide until they became beached north of Gloucester Town. British shipping could, at last, reach Philadelphia and replenish the waning foodstuffs of the half-starved King’s army (Jackson 1977:19-23). The Americans wintered at Valley Forge and British General Clinton relieved General Howe in the spring of 1778. In a move to consolidate the British and Hessian armies back in New York, Clinton ordered the evacuation of Philadelphia and marched his forces overland in New Jersey to Sandy Hook and waiting marine transport, fighting the Battle of Monmouth along the way. As a closing chapter to the Revolutionary activity along the Delaware River, the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania removed the primary ranks of <em>chevaux-de-frise</em> in 1784 at the behest of merchants who feared a continued interference and loss to shipping (Jackson 1977:22). Evidently the state did not remove all of the<em> chevaux-de-frise</em>, for dredging operations conducted during the mid-twentieth century removed additional barbed iron points from the original installation. <br />
<br />
The ensuing quoted passages serve to place you, the reader, in the middle of the action to capture and to defend Fort Mercer. Whenever possible, primary-source documentation is preferred for a given historical event, rather than secondary, tertiary, and even quadruciary texts, which normally comprise little more than derivative accounts dependant on similar, but previously written, accounts. The summary provided above is a good example, in part, of derivative history, although it contains numerous references to primary sources. Furthermore, I carefully selected the secondary and tertiary sources cited as being reliable due to their own sources, recounted in endnotes and a full bibliography. I have provided the summary above to set the long quotes below in their proper context.<br />
<br />
<u>The Battle for Fort Mercer: The Hessian Aggressors</u><br />
<br />
Below extracted from <em>Diary of the American War: A Hessian Journal [by] Captain Johann Ewald, Field Jäger Corps</em>, 1979:97-104.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Captain Johann Ewald</td></tr>
</tbody></table><span style="color: orange;">The 21st of October. About three o’clock in the morning the Jäger Corps marched to Cooper’s Ferry on the Delaware. The Corps crossed the Delaware in flatboats with the three Hessian grenadier battalions, Linsing, Minnigerode, and Lengerke, along with the Mirbach Regiment under Colonel Schieck, and landed about eight o’clock in the Province of Jersey. </span><br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TU9TxzzXMOI/AAAAAAAAAGg/-oeb-3P7BIU/s1600/Coopers+Point.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" h5="true" height="500" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TU9TxzzXMOI/AAAAAAAAAGg/-oeb-3P7BIU/s640/Coopers+Point.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br />
<span style="color: orange;">I had the advanced guard with sixty jägers, followed by the Corps, the Minnigerode battalion, the Mirbach Regiment, two 6-pounders, two howitzers, the Lengerke and Linsing battalions, and Captain Lorey with twenty mounted jägers. This corps, under Colonel Donop, was ordered to seize by force Fort Red Bank, through which the garrison on Mud Island maintained its communication with the mainland. Colonel Donop volunteered for this expedition.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">This corps was still less than a half an hour away from the Delaware when it ran into an enemy party in the vicinity of Newton Township, which withdrew over Cooper’s Bridge toward Burlington. I pursued it up to the end of a wood, where I discovered several hundred men on both sides of Cooper’s Creek, with whom I skirmished until about four o’clock in the afternoon, after which time they withdrew. The colonel, who continued his march with the corps, had ordered me to occupy myself with the enemy until nightfall, and then to follow the corps to Haddonfield. He wanted to mislead the enemy and conceal his march. At eight o’clock in the evening I arrived at Haddonfield, where I found the corps encamped in a quadrangle on the heights.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">On the morning of the 22d, about four o’clock, the corps marched toward Red Bank in the same formation as yesterday, with the slight difference that I formed the rear guard with my company. </span><br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TU9UU2X9FtI/AAAAAAAAAGo/gFQSawLeDu0/s1600/Hessian+Map+copy.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" h5="true" height="524" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TU9UU2X9FtI/AAAAAAAAAGo/gFQSawLeDu0/s640/Hessian+Map+copy.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br />
<span style="color: orange;">About nine o’clock we crossed the pass over Timber Creek, which has very marshy banks. A dam of several hundred paces extends across the creek, on which there are two wooden bridges. Two small plantations are situated on this and the other side. I was surprised that we did not leave here at least one jäger company to retain the mastery of this pass, since, after all, the success of our expedition was not yet assured. To be sure, there were the two battalions of light infantry ready for the Jersey post at Cooper’s Ferry, but they could not help much if Washington had gotten wind of this expedition, passed a strong corps across the Delaware, and stationed it at Timber Creek.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">Our march went past Strawberry Bank. About one o’clock in the afternoon the corps arrived in a wood which encircled the left side of the fort at rifle-shot distance to the left bank of the Delaware. In this wood a captain and six men from the garrison of the fort fell into the hands of Captain Wreden, who had the advanced guard. They had been ordered to get fresh meat at a plantation and knew nothing of our approach.</span><br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TU9UlRviOLI/AAAAAAAAAGs/rt0zwKGM_C0/s1600/RedBankFortEtc.%252C+Hessian+I.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" h5="true" height="386" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TU9UlRviOLI/AAAAAAAAAGs/rt0zwKGM_C0/s640/RedBankFortEtc.%252C+Hessian+I.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br />
<span style="color: orange;">The entire corps remained in column on the road in the wood. The men were permitted to sit down and told to eat, but since this day was not bread and provision day, very few had any bread to break or bite. The officers, especially, were not provided with anything. I had to march with the rear guard to the head of the corps.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">During this time Colonel Donop, along with Colonel Stuart (who accompanied this expedition as a volunteer), Major Pauli, and Captain Krug of the Hessian artillery, had already reconnoitered the fort when I reached the corps. As soon as I arrived, the colonel ordered me to inspect the fort and to give him my opinion.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">I approached the fort up to rifle-shot range and found that it was provided with a breastwork twelve feet high, palisaded and dressed with assault stakes. </span><br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TU9UxniECeI/AAAAAAAAAGw/CMZDH9zKTxQ/s1600/Plan+of+Attack+on+the+Fort+at+Red+Bank%252C+21+October+1777.+Ewald.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" h5="true" height="640" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TU9UxniECeI/AAAAAAAAAGw/CMZDH9zKTxQ/s640/Plan+of+Attack+on+the+Fort+at+Red+Bank%252C+21+October+1777.+Ewald.jpg" width="508" /></a></div><br />
<span style="color: orange;">On my way back, I met Colonel Stuart with a drummer who was to summon the fort, and right behind them I met Major Pauli, Captain Krug, and both adjutants of the colonel. All these gentlemen regarded the affair with levity. The only man who had any real knowledge, and looked upon the business as serious, was worthy old Captain Krug. I took this man aside and asked him what he thought of the undertaking, whereupon he answered: “He who has seen forts or fortified places captured with sword in hand will not regard this affair as a small matter, if the garrison puts up a fight and has a resolute commandant. We have let luck slip through our fingers. We should not have summoned the fort, but immediately taken it by surprise, for no one knew of our arrival. But now they will make themselves ready, and if our preparations are not being made better than I hear, we will get a good beating.”</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">Ater a lapse of a half an hour, Colonel Stuart returned with the following reply: “Colonel Greene, who commands the fort, sends his compliments and he shall await Colonel Donop.”</span><br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TU9U9FUwh0I/AAAAAAAAAG0/8pe8VLUh5SI/s1600/Colonel+Christopher+Greene.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" h5="true" height="640" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TU9U9FUwh0I/AAAAAAAAAG0/8pe8VLUh5SI/s640/Colonel+Christopher+Greene.jpg" width="452" /></a></div><br />
<span style="color: orange;">After this news, which the colonel did not expect, a hundred fascines were made at once by the battalions, and a battery of six regimental pieces [3-pounders], two 6-pounders, and the howitzers were mounted in the wood at rifle-shot distance from the fort. The Linsing Battalion under Captain Stamford (for Colonel Linsing had stomach pains at this time) was to make the attack against the left, the Regiment von Mirbach against the center, and the Minnigerode Battalion on the bastion to the left at the Delaware. The Lengerke Battalion was stationed at the Delaware to cover the rear against an enemy landing. One hundred men from each battalion were to carry the fascines, and march in a line at a distance of two hundred paces in front of the battalion. With these the ditch was to be filled, crossed, and the fort scaled with sword in hand. I placed sixteen good marksmen at the edge of the wood in the vicinity of the battery, who were to shoot at those men who showed themselves on the parapet.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">This was the order which was given, and no one thought about axes or saws with which the obstructions and palisades could be cut down.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">The battery began to play, and the three battalions advanced against the fort with indescribable courage. But they were received so hotly by the garrison, and by the vessels which had moved into position during the summons to rake the fort’s flank, that they were repelled with great loss, although several officers and a number of grenadiers scaled the breastwork. Colonel Donop himself and his adjutant, Captain Wagner, were mortally wounded at the edge of the ditch. Captain Stamford, who commanded the Linsing Battalion, was shot through the chest; Minnigerode through both legs; and the gallant Colonel Schieck, who commanded the Regiment von Mirbach, was shot dead at the barred gate. Night ended the battle, and the attacking corps reassembled at the spot from which it had departed for the attack.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">Colonel Wurmb immediately ordered the Jäger Corps to move up to the edge of the wood to cover the retreat. He personally took the Grenadier Battalion Lengerke, which had protected the rear in case an enemy party had landed from the ships, and hurried with the battalion to the pass of the Timber Creek bridge to occupy it.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">Since we had flattered ourselves in advance with a successful surrender, no retreat then was thought of, and no wagons brought to transport the wounded. The seriously wounded officers were carried on the guns and horses, and all the privates who could not drag themselves away on their wounded limbs fell into enemy hands. But since the enemy took the retreat for a trap, and had expected a new attack during the night, the men had to remain on the battlefield a whole night in the most deplorable condition without the slightest care, whereby the majority died of their wounds.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">About midnight the entire corps arrived on the other side of Timber Creek, where arrangements were made at once to obtain wagons for transporting the wounded officers to Philadelphia. At eight o’clock in the morning the corps set out again, and crossed the Delaware during the night. The three grenadier battalions moved into cantonment quarters on the outskirts of Philadelphia; the Mirbach Regiment joined the line of the army; and the Jäger Corps returned to its post at the Morris house, where it arrived after midnight.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">The loss in dead consisted of</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">Regiment von Mirbach</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">1. Colonel Schieck</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">2. Captain Bogatsky</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">3. Lieutenant Riemann</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">4. Lieutenant Wurmb</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">Grenadier Battalion Linsing</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">5. Lieutenant du Puy</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">6. Lieutenant Groening</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">Grenadier Battalion Minnigerode</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">7. Lieutenant Hille</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">8. Lieutenant Offenbach</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">and 143 noncommissioned officers and privates</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">The wounded consisted of:</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">1. Colonel Donop, right leg shot apart; captured.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">2. Captain and Adjutant Wagner, both legs shot to pieces; captured.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">3. Colonel Minnigerode, shot through both legs.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">4. Captain Stamford, shot through the chest and right leg.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">5. Captain Wachs, through the right leg, von Minnigerode.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">6. Captain Hendorff, in the arm, von Minnigerode.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">7. Captain Schotten, right arm shot off, von Mirbach.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">8. Lieutenant Rodemann, through the left leg, von Linsing.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">9. Lieutenant Waitz, through the neck and in the head, von Linsing.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">10. Lieutenant Rieffer, left foot smashed, von Mirbach.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">11. Lieutenant Berner, right leg shot to pieces, von Mirbach.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">12. Lieutenant Gottschall, right knee smashed; captured; von Linsing.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">13. Lieutenant Heymel, in the left knee; captured; von Minnigerode.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">And 253 noncommissioned officers and privates, of whom not thirty men are convalescing. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">Moreover, within eight days Colonel Donop, Captain Wagner, and Lieutenants Berner and Gottschall died of their wounds.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">This day was especially sad for me. I lost five of my oldest friends, among whom was a relative, and four of my best friends were severely wounded. As long as I have served, I have not yet left a battlefield in such deep sorrow.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">The principal mistakes of the attack were as follows:</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">1. We should not have summoned the fort, but attacked as soon as we arrived. Through this mistake the garrison was alerted, and the armed vessels gained time to draw near for the defense.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">2. The plan of attack itself was faulty. We ought to have made the feint attack where the Linsing Battalion attacked, and the real attack in full strength there where the Minnigerode Battalion attacked, because we were covered on this side by the wood up to musket-shot range.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">Moreover, the men who carried the fascines in a line should have marched in column around to one spot to fill up the ditch; as it was, the men merely threw the fascines in the ditch and no purpose was served. From my experience, the attack ought to have been made in the following manner:</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">An officer with twenty men, dispersed, should try to gain the outer edge of the ditch, where they continue to advance as well as fire upon those who are defending the breastwork.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">At a distance of one hundred and fifty paces, an officer and fifty men must follow in column, who carry the fascines on their heads, and of whom ten to twenty men are provided with axes. These men carry their weapons over their shoulders. As soon as they arrive at the outer edge of the ditch, they through their fascines into the ditch so that it is filled in to a breadth of four to six feet. As soon as this happens, they jump into the ditch and those supplied with axes cut down the palisades and obstructions and attempt to climb up the breastwork, but remain on the berm.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">A battalion follows at a distance of two hundred paces, which likewise approaches the ditch at quick step, crosses the bridge of fascines, and spreads out in the ditch. As soon as they have done this, they climb up the breastwork. The two wing companies remain on the berm and try to drive the enemy away from the parapet by their fire. The two middlemost companies scale the parapet, jump into the work, and attempt to overcome the garrison with the bayonet.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">The second battalion follows at a distance of three hundred paces, which, if the first should be repulsed, then repeats the attack.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">An attack in this manner surely would be successful, since it has vigor; and the Americans could not repel it as cheaply as they did, for they are said to have lost less than fifty men.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">On the whole, this attack belongs to the quixotic variety, which occurs in wars at times. For it was impossible to capture this work without the aid of armed ships, which it had to be assigned to drive away the enemy vessels. But this was impossible, because the Americans had constructed very skillful <em>chevaux-de-frise</em> below Mud Island in the Delaware, where the entrance was blocked with a very thick chain.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">In fact, the colonel was supposed to postpone his attack until the next day, the 23d, if he could not take the fort by surprise. On that day, two warships were to approach the <em>chevaux-de-frise</em> as closely as possible to drive away the enemy vessels by their fire. This occurred according to plan. The ships were the AUGUSTA, 64 guns, and the sloop MERLIN, 18 guns. But to magnify the misfortune, the Augusta ran into a sunken <em>chevaux-de-frise</em> and her captain had to blow up the ship, whereby an officer and twenty-six men perished in a boat that was sunk by the enemy.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">And I suppose, too, that had we captured the fort, we would not have dared show ourselves in it because it was exposed to the water, and the enemy frigates and galleys could bombard it. We could, of course, mount batteries to drive away the ships, but heavy guns were necessary for this, and the heavy artillery of the army was already employed. But the attack took place to cut off the enemy’s communication with the Province of Jersey, which could also be done by a blockade.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">In a word, Colonel Donop was a man of action. He had compared the siege of Mud Island with those of Bergen op Zoom and Olmütz, and had offered to capture Fort Red Bank with one grenadier battalion, which offended the pride of the English. They led him into danger and he fell, where so many men—indeed, so many really brave men—had to bit the dust.</span><br />
<br />
<u><span style="color: white;">The Battle for Fort Mercer: The American Defenders</span></u><br />
<br />
<span style="color: white;">Text below extracted from the Diary of Colonel Israel Angell, Commanding Officer, 2nd Rhode Island Regiment, Continental Army.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">18 this Day we arrived at Red Banks about Seven oClock in the Evening after marching Sixty miles without Sleeping. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">19 Rested this Day after Pitching our tents untill ten oClock in the Evening. Then both officers and Soldiers went to work and workt all night on our fort, as we Expected an attack that night or in the morning. This Day there was a heavy Cannonading on fort mifflin. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">20th this morning the Cannonading Ceast untill the afternoon when the Cannon and mortars begun to play very brisk. more So than they had any time before. The greatest part of my Regt was in the fort as they Relieved Col Greens Regt. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">21st Last Evening we had one man brought from fort Mifflin Dead and three more wounded, one mortal wounded, this accident happened by a Shell Coming into one of the portholes in the Block house, the Row[?] Gallie last Evening run down and attackt a Ship and a galley of the Enemys, and obliged them to tow off. This Cannonade was very Smart, the Enemy had landed on Log Island and was Endeavouring to Errect a battery but Could not effect it. This Evening we Recd Certain intelligence that the Enemy was a Coming to attack us, which oblig’d us to work all the night long. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">22nd this day we Continued Dilligent on our works untill the after Noon about one oClock, when the Enemy Arrived within musket Shoot of our fort. we fired a Cannon or two at them on which they Retired, and kept Sculking in the woods untill half After four oClock, when they Sent in a flagg Demanding the fort but was answered that the fort was not to be Given up on any terms, in Reply to this, they answered that if we Still remain’d obstinate, our blood might be upon our own heads, for we s</span><span style="color: orange;">hould have no Mercy Shone us. our Answer was we asked for none and Expect none. So granted and in about ten minuts after then begun as Smart a fire as Ever I heard from Eight field pieces and two hoets[?] they had placed against us, at the Same time advanced in two Colems to attack our fort by Storm, when there begun an incesant fire Musketry which Continued forty minuts, when the hessians Retreated in the most Prescipited manner leaving 200 kill’d and wounded in the field, we Spent the greatest part of the Night in bringing in the wounded. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">23rd This Day was Spent the Greatest part in bringing in the Slain and burying them and taking proper Care of the wounded, what time we had to Spair was Spent on our works, prepairing them for the Second attack, as we had inteligence of them Coming the Second time, but it only proved to be a Covering party for their Retreat, the Galleys made an Attack on the Agusta man of war as She had gotten aground and by Some Accident She took fire and blew up with a most terrible Explotion another twenty Gun Ship of the Enemys got a ground and they Set her on fire which also blew up, one fifty gun Ship got off Clear. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">24th This Morning I was taken very Sick with a Violent pain In my head, but taking a puke I Soon grew better this Day we Spent in prepairing our works, at night I being Some poorily went out of Camp to Mr Joseph Lows there tarried. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">25th This day Continued Peasible and Quiet between our forces and the brittish, one Malincully Accident happened this day in the after noon. Mr. James Haden a worthy young Gentleman belonging to my Regt. was Shott through his Bowels and Expired the night following. this accident happened by overhalling Some hessian Guns that was loded. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">26 Nothing Remarkable happened. There was a movement on the west Side of the River of the Enemy Capt Coggeshal Olney and Lt. Sayles Come to Camp this day, and brought the news of our people Agoing upon Rhode Island as they came from that place. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">27 this Day was an Exceeding Stormy day we Recd the news of the Enemys taking possession of Billingsport three hundred in Number, and that two hundred waggon loads of fasshins [fascines] Crossed Schuylkill </span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">28th The Storm Still Continues or rather increases by the abundance of rain and an Excessive high tide all the low Country was Laid under water, our people was all Drownded out of the fort. no intelligence from the Enemy this Day. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">29th Remains Stormy and Uncomfortable, about on oClock it began to break away, but Soon thickened up and begun to Storm again. Nothing Remarkable happen’d this day. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">30th Col Donop Died last Evening half past Eight oClock in the Evening and was Desently Entered This evening Attended with all the honours of war. This Day it Cleared off and was a fine plesant Day. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">31st This Day being a plesant day the Hessian Officers that was wounded was removed to philadelphia from Mr Joseph Lows where they had ben Carried after the Action. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">November the 1st 1777 This Day about ten oClock in the morning, one Mucklewain a butcher from Philadelphia, and one Dick Ellis a Negrow man were both hanged here for being trators and Spies. And for guiding the Enemy to red Banks, we Recd. news this afternoon from General Varnum that the Enemy had Sent two thousand men to attack fort Mifflin, which occationed an Allarm among us. </span><br />
<br />
<u>The Battle for Fort Mercer: Defender Jeremiah Greenman’s Account</u><br />
<br />
Below text extracted from <em>Diary of a Common Soldier in the American Revolution, 1775-1783</em>, 1978:81-83.<br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">W 22. this morning are informed that a party of the Enemy crossed Cooper fery last Evening and was on their way through Haddonfield for this fort / Came a crost this morn from Fort Mifflin / had scarce an opportunity to git into the Fort, before a Flad came to Colo. Green, who commanded the Fort threatening to put the Garrison to [death ?] if he did not surrender it immediately, Colo. Green answered with disdain, that he would defend it ‘till the last drop of his Blood—as soon as the Flag had returned they opined 7 field peaces & 2 howitzers on the fort and played very smartly for about ten moments then rushed on very Rash that even Success could not justify its temerity / they attached on the North & South Sides, the North Side was a breast work within a nother which we cut off and made the Fort small as we had but few men to man it especially the Bigness it was wen we first arrived, the Parapet was high the Dikes deep / a row of strong pallesaids sallied out from the parapet on the gate on the South Side / we had a small place big enough for eight men to fight in which overlooked all the ground round the Fort which was surrounded with double abates / Both of the attacks where such as was expected / the artillery & Musquetry of the fort Great Slawter / they left their command’g officer dying on the Ground in his glacis, and retreated with hurry & Confusion / they raillied in the woods an dleaving thear Dead wounded & a few prisoners (which was under the walls of the Fort that could not handely retreat) in all amounting to about three hundred in our hands they returned to Philadelphia that Night—we feched in to the fort all the Wounded & dressed them shewing as [much] humanity as posable. Colo. Donop was attended with care / in the attack we lost 7 of our Regiment killed & 14 Wounded / [One] of the Killed proved to be my Capn. Shaw who was shot thro the Neck / in all Killed and Wounded it amounted to 31—</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">T 23. the fore part of this day implying ourselves in burying the dead 73 buried in one grave 4 or 5 in [an]other & C / about 9 o’clock the Ships Eagle, Summersit, Isis, agusta, Pearl Leverpool & several Fregates with a Galley, came up to the Chevaux de frize 500 yards from the fort, at the same time the Land Batteries & our gallies, & the British Squadron engaged and one of the Most Solumest Actions commenced, that may be seen by a soldiers eye, the Spectacle was magnificent, to se at once, the river covered with Ships, four great gire ships, in a blasé, floating on the Water / the Island & Main covered with Smoak & fire / </span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">…F. 31. this day buried the Hasan Colo. [von Donop] who said previous to his Death I fall a Victim to my own ambition & to the averice of my prince; but, full of thankfulness for the good treatment I have received from my generous Enemy, he was buried with the Honours of War.</span><br />
<br />
<u>The Battle for Fort Mercer: The Americans Abandon the Fort and the Crown’s Forces March In</u><br />
<br />
Text below extracted from <em>A Hessian Diary of the American Revolution,</em> Döhla, 1990:56, 59-61.<br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">22 October 1777: Today the artificer [Wolfgang] Lippert, of our Artillery, died at Vauxhall in New York. After the battle at Brandywine Hill, General Howe captured Philadelphia. During the remainder of the summer nothing more of consequence happened, and Howe remained in his fortified camp at Philadelphia. The enemy, four miles below the city, between the city and Chester, had a strong fort on Mud Island, which had 24- and 32-pound cannon and a large complement of men. Also, the Delaware River was blocked by sunken ships and <em>chevaux-de-frise</em>. Also, not far from these forts, lay seventeen enemy ships, which in an emergency could support both forts. Already, in the middle of October, General Howe had detached Colonel von Donop with all the Hessian grenadier battalions, one regiment of light infantry, and two hundred Hessian jaegers to the province of Jersey in order to take Fort Red Bank by storm.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">Colonel Donop and his troops attacked with the greatest bravery and ardor, because Donop said the fort should be named after him or he did not want to remain alive. However, the strong garrison, which was made up of the elite of the American army, and the heavy cannon in Fort Mercer on Red Bank, and the enemy fleet of seventeen ships that supported the fort with their fire power, killed so many Hessian grenadiers that the planned conquest of Fort Mercer was prevented. </span><br />
<br />
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TU9VQkZxBII/AAAAAAAAAG4/JySZBtm0ztU/s1600/DelRvrFrtMercrMfflnBritFleet%252C+Hessian+II.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" h5="true" height="490" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TU9VQkZxBII/AAAAAAAAAG4/JySZBtm0ztU/s640/DelRvrFrtMercrMfflnBritFleet%252C+Hessian+II.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
<span style="color: orange;">Colonel Donop was driven back and fatally wounded, falling into the hands of the enemy; and he died of his wounds. He was, however, buried by the enemy with full military honors. All together, 22 Hessian grenadier officers, including 1 lieutenant colonel, 2 majors, and 7 captains, died on the spot, as well as 385 noncommissioned officers and privates from the four grenadier battalions; and more than 200 men were wounded. The Light Infantry had 170 men killed or wounded, and the Jaegers counted 49 dead or wounded. In order to carry out the plan and open the passage on the Delaware, a reinforcement was needed, and this included our two regiments…. [The Hessian reinforcements arrived on the Delaware during 10 November 1777]</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">16 November 1777: Now the warships that lay at Mud Island used their crews to clear from the river the <em>chevaux-de-frise</em> that had hindered the passage on the Delaware to Philadelphia. However, this could not be accomplished before the capture of Fort Red Bank.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">18 November 1777: We were debarked in the Jerseys at Billingsport, which a short time previously had been taken from the Americans and wherein six thousand rebels would have had their winter quarters because it was large and had many barracks. Here, in severe cold, we had to camp in tents.</span><br />
<br />
<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TU9WCyiRGXI/AAAAAAAAAHA/dGq8KTdpzcQ/s1600/Redoubt+at+Billingsport.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" h5="true" height="440" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TU9WCyiRGXI/AAAAAAAAAHA/dGq8KTdpzcQ/s640/Redoubt+at+Billingsport.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
<span style="color: orange;">19 November 1777: General Cornwallis joined our troops with a Hessian grenadier battalion, the English Thirty-third Regiment, and one hundred Hessian jägers and twelve of ours, and assumed command. He came over at Chester from Howe’s army.</span><br />
<div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><br />
<span style="color: orange;">20 November 1777: We remained at Billingsport. Red Bank, the conquest of which was the purpose for the above troop movement, could be seen very clearly from here, and the enemy’s retreat cannon could easily be heard.</span></div><br />
<span style="color: orange;">21 November 1777: We broke camp early, and Lord Cornwallis, with the entire army, marched eight miles to Kothtown.</span><br />
<br />
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TU9VosrjimI/AAAAAAAAAG8/jmCWn0bOfCw/s1600/March+from+Billingsport.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" h5="true" height="388" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TU9VosrjimI/AAAAAAAAAG8/jmCWn0bOfCw/s640/March+from+Billingsport.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
<div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><span style="color: orange;">22 November 1777: Our troops were to attack Red Bank. All preparations therefore had already been made, and it was to be taken by storm. However, the enemy vacated the fort during the previous night, despite their earlier determined resistance, tore down the barracks, tents, and warehouses, and set fire to the remaining fleet. Some ships bravely fired their cannon as they were engulfed in flames. When the troops entered, the fort and defensive positions of Red Bank were completely torn down and demolished. By the dismantling of this huge fort, which was provided with complete underground passages, a hidden magazine of flour, bread, meat and rum was found. The enemy also abandoned an indescribably large amount of cannon, munitions, and also other war equipment that were hidden therein. The fort was completely demolished and leveled. The cannon, which could not be taken because of their size and weight, were spiked and thrown into the Delaware.</span></div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><br />
<span style="color: orange;">Our troops remained not far from the fort for a few days, and after as much of the discovered supplies as possible were taken away in wagons and ships, they marched to Gutbod, drove the opposing rebels back from that place across an arm of the Delaware River, and again remained there a few days until the cavalry and baggage were shipped. Three hundred of the largest sloops from the warships took on board the army of Lord Cornwallis, so that only six or eight regiments remained there. On the same day, 22 November, toward evening, we entered Woodbury. This is a large, long, and wide spread, but beautifully laid-out village that is at the same time almost a city. It lies in a pleasant and fertile region and is populated for the most part by Quakers, who are very rich people. Here we built huts because the weather was exceptionally cold. We also caught pigs and cattle and slaughtered them. In this way we obtained meat, but seldom had bread. Now the English sailors were busily engaged raising the <em>chevaux-de-frise</em> at Mud Island and Red Bank and soon made a passage through which the ships, with the greatest caution, could sail, and where one ran aground. Only after some weeks was the passage completely open.</span></div><br />
<span style="color: orange;">24 November 1777: We broke camp at Woodbury and moved forward some miles to Timber Creek.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">25 November 1777: We continued our march to Gloucester, where we halted. This place lies on the bank of the Delaware River, is not very big nor symmetrical, but it does have an imposing town hall [Gloucester County Courthouse!]. This evening the Jägers, which were the rear guard and were posted on a bridge one-half hour from Gloucester, were attacked and surrounded by the enemy. However, two companies of light infantry hurried to their assistance and saved them from captivity. Lieutenant [Georg Hermann] Heppe was killed, and Lieutenant Hagen and a few jägers wounded, in the affair. This same evening the sailors set fire to a house. Through the day people were engaged loading the baggage, horses, and wagons. We encountered few residents in this region because most were, and fought as rebels, generally, the regular troops, as well as the militia, from the provinces of Old and New Jersey were the strongest of all the provinces engaged in this war.</span><br />
<br />
<u>The Battle for Fort Mercer in Memoriam: An After-Action Recollection Three Years Later</u><br />
<br />
Text below extracted from <em>Travels in North America in the Years 1780-1781-1782 by the Marquis de Chastellux</em>, 1827:121-127.<br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">We rose at six in the morning, and assembled in the dining-room, where a good breakfast was prepared for us by candle light. At seven we embarked, and crossing the Delaware, obliquely a little higher up, we landed at Billingsport. This is a fort constructed in 1776, to support the left of the first barrier of the <em>chevaux de frise</em>, destined to block the passage of the river. This post was of no use, for the fortifications having been commenced on too extensive a plan for the number troops which could be spared, it was thought proper to abandon it. They have since been reduced, which is the better, as they are now removed from some points which commanded the fort. The present situation of affairs, not drawing the attention of Government to this quarter, the fortifications are rather neglected. All the battery there was, consisted of one pretty good brass mortar, and five eighteen pounders, (English twenty-fours) which Major Armstrong, who commands on the river, and came to receive me, fired on my arrival. When America had more money, and leisure, she will do well not to neglect this post, as well as all those for the defence of the river. For this war once terminated, she will see no more European armies on the Continent, and all she can have to fear from England, in case of a rupture with her, will be a few maritime expeditions, the sole object of which can be to destroy shipping, to ravage the country, and even to burn the towns within reach of the sea. Unfortunately Billingsport belongs to the state of Jersey, which can reap on advantage from it; and that of Pennsylvania, whose safety it would constitute, has no other means to employ towards fortifying it than its own request, and the recommendations of Congress, which are not always attended to. However this may be, Philadelphia took other precautions for her defence, which depended only on the state of Pennsylvania, and to this advantage is united that of an excellent position, which will soon be made impregnable; I mean Fort Mifflin, whither we went on leaving Billingsport, still ascending the river The isle on which it is built, and that called Mud-Island, support the right of a second barrier of <em>chevaux de frise</em>, the left of which is defended by the fort of Red Bank; but it must be observed that the barrier only blocked the main channel of the river, the only passage by which it was thought that vessels could pass. Near the right bank is Hog-Island, about two miles long, the surface of which, like that of most of the islands in the Delaware is so low, that at high water, nothing is to be seen but the tops of the reeds with which it is covered. Between this island, and the main land, a small passage remained open, but the American s were persuaded that there was not water enough for any ship with guns to pass it. At the extremity of this channel, and in remounting it, we leave on the left a marshy ground, so surrounded by creeks, and inlets, as to form a real island, called Province-Island. This post was in the possession of the enemy; who established batteries there, which incommoded those of Fort Mifflin, but not sufficiently to make the Americans abandon it.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">The English army were at that time in a singular situation: they had purchased and maintained possession of Philadelphia the price of two bloody battles; but they were still shut up between the Schuylkill and the Delaware, having in their front Washington’s army, which kept them in awe, and behind them several forts occupied by the Americans, which shut the passage of the Delaware. A large city, however, and a whole army must have subsistence; it became necessary therefore to open the communication by sea, and to secure the navigation of the river. When one recollects the innumerable obstacles the English had to surmount in the present war, it is difficult to assign the cause of their successes; but if we turn our eyes on all the unforeseen events which have deceived the expectation of the Americans, and frustrated their between concerted measures, one cannot but be persuaded that they were devoted to destruction, and that the alliance with France alone proved the means of their preservation. In this voyage, in particular, I saw fresh proofs of it every instant. When the place was pointed out to me where the Augusta, of sixty-four guns, took fire, and blew up in attempting to force the <em>chevaux de frise</em>, and farther,, on the remains of the Merlin, of two and twenty, which ran ashore in the same action, and was burnt by the English themselves, whilst the Hessians were vainly sacrificing five or six hundred men before the fort of Redbank, I figured to myself the English army starved in Philadelphia, retreating with disgrace and difficulty through the Jersey, and my imagination already enjoyed the triumph of America. But of a sudden the scene changed, and I saw nothing but the fatality which collected towards the channel of Hog-Island the waters long confined by the <em>chevaux de frise</em>, and recollected with pain, that on the 15th of November, three weeks after the fruitless attempts I have mentioned, the English succeeded in passing over the bar of this channel, the Vigilant, and another small ship of war; that they thus got up the river, and turned Fort Mifflin, the batteries of which they took from behind, and left the Americans no other resource but to abandon the defence of the <em>chevaux de frise</em> in all parts, and make a precipitate retreat by the left shore of the Delaware.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">Taught by sad experience, the Americans have provided in future against the misfortunes which cost them so dear. I saw them with pleasure extending the fortifications of Mifflin’s-Island, so as to enclose the fort on every side, which will be surrounded also by the Delaware in place of a ditch; and as the garrison will have a safe asylum in souterrains, bomb-proof, this fort may henceforth be deemed impregnable. The plan of these works was given by M. du Portail; Major Armstrong showed me them upon the spot, and I found them correspond perfectly with the just reputation of their author.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">We now had to visit Redbank; for which purpose we had again to cross the Delaware, which in this place is a mile wide. The gentlemen who was to do the honour there, was impatient to arrive. We had amused ourselves by telling him that the morning being far spent, and the tide about to turn, we should be obliged to omit Redbank, and return directly to Philadelphia. This conductor, whom we diverted ourselves in tormenting, was M. du Plessis Mauduit, who in the double capacity of engineer, and officer of artillery, had the charge of arranging and defending this post, under the orders of Colonel Green. On landing from our boat, he proposed conducting us to a Quaker’s, whose house is half a musket shot from the fort, or rather the ruins of the fort; for it is now destroyed, and there are scarcely any reliefs of it remaining. “This man, said M. de Mauduit, is a little or a tory; I was obliged to knock down his barn, and fell his fruit trees; but he will be glad to see M. de la Fayette, and will receive us well.” WE took him at his word, but never was expectation more completely deceived. We found our Quaker seated in the chimney corner, busied in cleaning herbs: he recollected M. de Mauduit, who named M. de la Fayette, and me, to him; but he did not deign to lift his eyes, nor to answer any of our introducer’s discourse, which at first was complimentary, and at length jocose. Except Dido’s silence, I know nothing more severe, but we had no difficulty in accommodating ourselves to this bad reception, and made our way to the fort. We had not gone a hundred yards before we came to a small elevation, on which a stone was vertically placed, with this short epitaph: here lies buried Colonel Donop. M. de Mauduit could not refrain from expressing his regret for this brave man, who died in his arms two days after the action; he assured us that we could not make a step without treading on the remains of some Hessians; for near three hundred were buried in the front of the ditch.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">The fort of Redbank was designed, as I have said above, to support the left of the <em>chevaux de frise</em>. The bank of the Delaware at this place is steep; but even this steepness allowed the enemy to approach the fort, under cover, and without being exposed to the fires of the batteries. To remedy this inconvenience, several gallies armed with cannon, and destined to defend the <em>chevaux de frise</em>, were posted the whole length of the escarpement, and took it in reverse. The American, little practiced in the art of fortifications, and always disposed to take works beyond their strength, had made those of Redbank too extensive. When M. de Mauduit obtained permission to be sent thither with Colonel Green, he immediately set about reducing the fortifications, by intersecting them from east to west, which transformed them into a sort of large redoubt nearly of a pentagonal form. A good earthen rampart, raised to the height of the cordon, a fosse, and an abates in front of the fosse, constituted the whole strength of this post, in which were placed three hundred men, and fourteen pieces of cannon. The 22d of October, in the morning, they received intelligence that a detachment of two thousand five hundred Hessians were advancing; who were soon after perceived on the edge of a wood to the north of Redbank, nearly within cannon shot. Preparations were making for the defence, when a Hessian officer advanced, preceded by a drum; he was suffered to approach, but his harangue was so insolent that it only served to irritate the garrison, and inspire them with more resolution. “The King of England,” said he, “orders his rebellious subjects to lay down their arms, and they are warned that if they stand the battle, no quarters will be given.” The answer was, that they accepted the challenge, and that there should be no quarter on either side. At four o’clock in the afternoon, the Hessians made a very brisk fire from a battery of cannon, and soon after they opened, and marched to the first entrenchment, from which, finding it abandoned, but not destroyed, they imagined they had driven the Americans. They then shouted Victoria, waved their hats in the air, and advanced towards the redoubt. The same drummer, who a few hours before had come to summon the garrison, and had appeared as insolent as his officer, was at their head beating the march; both he, and that officer were knocked on the head by the first fire. The Hessians, however, still kept advancing within the first entrenchment, leaving the river on their right: they had already reached the abates, and were endeavoring to tear up, or cut away the branches, when they were overwhelmed with a shower of musket shot, which took them in front, and in flank; for as chance would have it, a part of the courtine of the old entrenchment, which had not been destroyed, formed a projection at this very part of the intersection. M. de Mauduit had contrived to form it into a sort or caponiere, (or trench with loop-holes) into which he threw some men, who flanked the enemy’s left, and fired on them at close shot. Officers were seen every moment rallying their men, marching back to the abattis, and falling amidst the branches they were endeavoring to cut. Colonel Donop was particularly distinguished by the marks of the order he wore, by his handsome figure, and by his courage; he was also seen to fall like the rest. The Hessians, repulsed by the fire of the redoubt, attempted to secure themselves from it by attacking on the side of the escarpement, but the fire from the gallies sent them back with a great loss of men. At length they relinquished the attack, and regained the wood in disorder. </span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">While this was passing on the north side, another column made an attack on the south, and, more fortunate than the other, passed the abates, traversed the fosse, and mounted the berm; but they were stopped by the fraises, and M. de Mauduit running to this post as soon as he saw the first assailants give way, the others were obliged to follow their example. They still did not dare however to stir out of the fort, fearing surprise; but M. de Mauduit wishing to replace some palisades which had been torn up; he sallied out with a few men, and was surprised to find about twenty hessians standing on the berm, and stuck up against the shelving of the parapet. These soldiers who had been bold enough to advance thus far, sensible that there was more risk in returning, and not thinking proper to expose themselves, were taken and brought into the fort. M. de Mauduit, after fixing the palisades, employed himself in repairing the abattis; he again sallied out with a detachment, and it was then he beheld the deplorable spectacle of the dead and dying, heaped one upon another. A voice arose from amidst these carcases, and said in English, “whoever you are, draw me hence.” It was the voice of Colonel Donop: M. de Mauduit made the soldiers lift him up, and carry him into the fort, where he was soon known. He had his hip broken; but whether they did not consider his wound as mortal, or that they were heated by the battle, and still irritated at the menaces thrown out against them a few hours before, the Americans could not help saying, aloud: “Well! is it determined to give no quarter?” “I am in your hands,” replied the colonel, “you may revenge yourselves.” M. de Mauduit had no difficulty in imposing silence, and employed himself only in taking care of the wounded officer. The latter, perceiving he spoke bad English, said to him: “you appear to me a foreigner, Sir, who are you?” “A French officer,” replied the other. “<em>Je suis content</em>,” said Donop, making use of our language, “j<em>e meurs entre les mains de l’honneur meme</em>.” [Translated “I am content; I die in the hands of honour itself.”] The next day he was removed to the quaker’s house, where he lived three days, during which he conversed frequently with M. de Mauduit. He told him that he had been long in friendship with M. de Saint Germain, that he wished in dying to recommend to him his vanquisher, and benefactor. He asked for paper, and wrote a letter, which he delivered to M. de Mauduit, requiring of him, as the last favour, to acquaint him when he was about to die: the latter was soon under the necessity of acquitting himself of this sad duty: “it is finishing a noble career early,” said the colonel; “But I die the victim of my ambition, and of the avarice of my sovereign.” Fifteen wounded officers were found, like him, upon the field of battle; M. de Mauduit had the satisfaction to conduct them himself to Philadelphia, where he was very well received by General Howe. By singular accident, it happened that the English that very day received indirect intelligence of the capitulation of Burgoyne, of which he knew more than they. They pretended to give no credit to it: “you who are a Frenchman,” said they, “speak freely, do you think it possible?” “I know,” replied he, “that the fact is so; explain it as you think proper.”</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">Perhaps I have dwelt too long on this event; but I shall not have to apologize to those who will partake of the pleasing satisfaction I experience, in fixing my eyes upon the triumphs of America, and in discovering my countrymen among those who have reaped her laurels.</span><br />
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<u>The Battle for Fort Mercer: Isaac Mickle’s Account in <em>Reminiscences</em>, 1845:68-71.</u><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">RED BANK.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">…But Red Bank derives little of its celebrity from the fact of its being a decayed capital! Its name has not rung throughout Christendom for any judicial antics of which it might have been the scene in the seventeenth century, but for one of the most brilliant battles—we say it without fear of contradiction’—in our whole Revolution.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">Fort Mercer which had been erected here to support the left of the upper <em>chevaux-de-frize</em>, sunk in 1776, to prevent the ascension of the British fleet, was originally designed for a garrison of twelve or fifteen hundred men. When Greene took possession of the works, having but three hundred men, he adopted the suggestion of M. de Manduit, an experienced French engineer, and threw out a large part of the fortification on the north, reducing it to a pentagonal redoubt of convenient size. A rampart of earth raised to the height of the cordon, a fosse and an abattis in front of the fosse constituted the whole strength of the post. The battery numbered fourteen pieces of artillery of small calibre.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">Late in the afternoon of the twenty-first of October, 1777, Count Donop with a detachment of about twenty-five hundred Hessians crossed the Delaware at Cooper’s Point to dislodge Greene and the little handfull of republicans who defended this rodoubt. Owing to the precaution of the Americans in destroying the lower bridges on the intervening streams, the Count passed through Haddonfield and down the Clement’s Bridge road to the attack. He pressed several persons whom he found along the route into his service as pilot, among whom was a negro belonging to the Cooper family, called Old Mitch, who was at work by the Cooper’s Creek Bridge. A negro named Dick, belonging to the gallant Col. Ellis, and an infamous white scoundrel named Mcllvaine volunteered their assistance as guides. At the bar of the Haddonfield tavern, these two loyal fellows were very loud in their abuse of the American cause; but their insolence as we shall see was soon repaid.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">On the morning of the twenty-second, the Hessians appeared at the edge of a forest north of the fort, almost within cannon shot thereof. Halting here to rest from the march, Donop sent an officer with a drummer to command Greene to surrender. “King George,” said the officer, “directs his rebellious subjects to lay down their arms, and promises no quarter if a battle is risked.” At which Greene deputized a man to mount the parapet and return the laconic reply: “We'll see King George damned first—we want no quarter!” The interview here terminated, and the officer returned to the Hessian camp.*</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">At four o’clock in the afternoon Donop opened a heavy cannonade from a battery which he had erected to the north-eastward; and at the same time the British ships from below the <em>chevaux-de-frize</em> began to thunder upon the little fort. Most of the balls from the latter fell too low, and entered the bluff beneath the works. After cannonading for a short time, the Hessians advanced to the first entrenchment. Finding this abandoned, they shouted Victoria!—waved their hats, and rushed into the deserted area before the redoubt; the little drummer before mentioned, heading the onslaught with a lively march. </span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">When the first of the assailants had come up to the very abattis and were endeavoring to cut away the branches, the Americans opened a terrible fire of musketry in front and flank. Death rode in every volley. So near were the Hessians to the caponiere or looped trench which flanked the enemy when they set upon the main fort, that the wads were blown entirely through their bodies. The officers leading the attack, fought bravely. Again and again they rallied their men and brought them to the charge. They were mowed down like grass, and fell in heaps among the boughs of the abattis and into the fosse. In the thickest of the fight Donop was easily distinguished by the marks of his order and his handsome figure; but even his example availed nothing. His men repulsed from the redoubt in front, made an attack upon the escarpment on the west, but the fire from the American gallies drove them back here also with great loss; and at last, they flew in much disorder to the wood, leaving among many other slain the saucy drummer and his officer.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">Another column made a simultaneous attack upon the south, and in the technical language of a soldier, passed the abattis, traversed the fosse and mounted the berm but they were repulsed at the fraises, and all retreated save twenty, who were standing on the berm against the shelvings of the parapet, under and out of the way of the guns, whence they were afraid to move. These were captured by M. de Manduit, who had sallied from the fort to repair some palisades. This brave Frenchman making another sortie in a few minutes, afterwards to repair the southern abattis, heard a voice from among the heaps of the dead and dying, exclaim in English, “Whoever you are, draw me hence.” This was Count Donop. M. de Manduit caused him to be carried into the fort. His hip was broken, but the wound was not at first considered as mortal. The victorious Americans, remembering the insolent message which their captive had sent them a few hours before; could not withhold marks of exultation.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">“Well—is it determined,” they asked aloud, “to give no quarter?”</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">“l am in your hands,” replied Donop; “you may revenge yourselves.”</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">M. de Manduit enjoining the men in broken English to be generous towards their bleeding and humbled prisoner, the latter said to him, “You appear to be a foreigner, sir; who are you?”</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">“A French officer,” answered Manduit.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">“<em>Je suis content</em>,” exclaimed the Count in French, “<em>je meurs entre les mains de I'honneur meme</em>.” [Or, “I am satisfied—I die in the very hands of Honor!”]</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">Donop was taken first to the Whitall house, just below the fort, but was afterwards removed to the residence of the Lowes, south of Woodbury Creek. He died three days after the battle, saying to M. de Manduit in his last moments, “It is finishing a noble career early; but I die the victim of my ambition and of the avarice of my sovereign.” To Col. Clymer he made the remarkable remark: “See here Colonel, see in me the vanity of all human pride! I have shone in all the courts of Europe, and now 1 am dying here on the banks of the Delaware in the house of an obscure Quaker.”</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">The Hessians retreated hastily towards Cooper’s Ferry. The main body went by way of Clement’s Bridge, some by way of Blackwoodtown, and some it is said by Chew’s Landing, near where they were met by a company of farmer’s boys and held at bay for some time. This detachment had with them a brass cannon which they are supposed to have thrown into the creek somewhere near the Landing. </span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">Dick and Mcllvaine, the guides, having been taken prisoners by the Americans, were immediately hung within the fort for divers outrages which they had committed. Old Mitch, the other pilot, lived until recently to tell to groups of admiring Camden boys how terribly he was scared in this memorable fight. Resolved not to bear arms against his country, and being afraid to run away, he got behind a hay-rick when the battle began, and lay there flat on his belly until it was over. “But Lord, massa!” he used to exclaim in narrating the circumstance, “I gues I shuk, as de dam cannon ball came plowin’ along de ground and flingin’ de san’ in my face; and arter de Auguster blow’d up I tought for half an hour I was dead weder or no!”</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">The respected friend to whose MSS. notes we have before acknowledged our indebtedness, tells us that of the men under Col. Greene in this action many were blacks and mulattos. He was in the fort on the morning of the twenty-third of October, while the garrison were burying the slain, and cannot be mistaken as to the point. His account of the loss agrees with that contained in Ward’s letter to Washington, to wit: upon the American side, from Greene’s regiment, two sergeants, one fifer and four privates killed, one sergeant and two privates wounded, and one captain who was reconnoitering, taken prisoner; from Angel’s regiment, one captain, three sergeants, three rank and file killed, and one ensign, one sergeant and fifteen privates wounded; and from Capt. Duplessis’ company, two privates wounded. The Hessians lost lieutenant Col. Minigerode, three captains, four lieutenants, and near seventy privates killed, and Baron Donop, his Brigade Major, a captain, lieutenant and upwards of seventy non-commissioned officers and privates wounded and prisoners. Other accounts make the loss of the Hessians much greater; but as the action only lasted forty minutes, it is probable that this is not far from the truth. Several of the Americans were killed by the bursting of one of their cannon, the fragments of which are yet in the neighborhood.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">The Hessian slain were buried in front of the fosse, south of the fort. The wounded were carried to Philadelphia by Manduit, and exchanged. Count Donop was interred near the spot where he fell, and a stone placed over him with the inscription “Here lies buried Count Donop.” [Mickle states: The last time we were at Red Bank, Donop’s head-stone was between two cart-ruts and almost overgrown with grass. The inscription on the stone is now entirely worn away.] The epitaph has ceased to be true—all that was left of the poor Hessian having been dug up and scattered about as relics. We doubt not that the Philadelphians who resort to this place in great numbers in the summer, began this outrage; but candor compels us to own that some Jerseymen have been guilty of exhibiting canes, the heads of which are set with teeth taken from the Count’s jaw!</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">The anecdote of dame Ann Whitall, which the compiler of the Collections [Barber & Howe, 1844] seems inclined to doubt, is so well authenticated that we cannot but believe it. The attack upon the fort commenced while this woman, the mistress of the first house on the river bank below Donop's grave, was busied in spinning. Presently, a shot from the Augusta or Merlin, whizzing through the hall, admonished her of her danger. She thereupon took her wheel into the cellar and actually continued her spinning throughout the afternoon. The house was used as a hospital after the action, and its floors are said still to show traces of the pools of blood which flowed from the wounded soldiers. This anecdote is certainly much more credible than one which Com. Barney mentions in connection with this action. One of the enemy’s gallies had a brass eighteen pounder, which told at every fire. The Americans on board the gun boats “soon became so well acquainted with the short sharp sound of her explosion,” says the Commodore, “that whenever it was heard, some one would cry out, Galley-shot! and this served as a kind of watch-word, at which all hands would lie down.” Dodging a cannon-ball—especially after the report— is by no means an ordinary feat!</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">As soon as the British had forced the <em>chevaux-de-frize</em>, Fort Mercer was abandoned and began to fall into decay. On the anniversary of the battle in 1829 a neat monument was erected upon the spot by a number of the New Jersey and Pennsylvania volunteers, which the Philadelphians have characteristically mutilated, by striking out the name of New Jersey from the inscription. The legend upon the monument modestly gives Greene one hundred men more than he seems to have had, and makes the number of Hessians five hundred too low.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">The following notice of a visit to Red Bank by one whom the Reminiscent is proud in being able to call his friend, is too eloquent to be omitted: “The line of the embankment at Fort Mercer is yet plainly seen; and the place is now, as in the hour of our country’s peril, covered with a gloomy pine forest through whose branches the wind sighs dismally as if chanting a requiem for the spirits of the departed brave. Towards the close of a fine afternoon I visited the battle-ground. Here and there a sail dotted the Delaware, which lay calmly before me. A few solitary fishermen were pursuing their accustomed avocations upon the shore below the bank, and it seemed as if this secluded spot had ever been the abode of peace. </span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">“I lingered until the shades of evening began to darken the distant landscape and enshroud the forest in gloom. The fishermen had gathered their nets and retired to their humble homes; and I was left alone, with no companion but my thoughts, and nothing to disturb save the gentle rippling of the waves upon the smooth pebbly beach. With reflections suggested by the occasion, I was slowly departing when the distant roll of a drum from Fort Mifflin, summoning the soldiers to evening parade, reminded me that war’s dreadful trade was not yet over—that the time had not yet come ‘when the lion and the lamb should lie down together,’ and all nations dwell in peace.”</span><br />
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<br />
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<br />
Werker, T.W.<br />
1778 Expedition wif Hesse Fort Redbanck d 21 du 22 Oct. 1777. Manuscript Map. Staatsarchiv, Marburg, Germany.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-779291837523434339.post-5657798011385463452010-12-28T20:35:00.019-05:002011-06-15T08:34:50.933-04:00The Prospect Hill Association<div align="justify"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">by Jerseyman ©2010</span></div><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;"><em>Researched and written at the request of a true friend to New Jersey history.</em></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Beginning in the early nineteenth century, a variety of gentlemen societies established clubhouses along the New Jersey side of the Delaware River. Founded primarily by Philadelphians, these organizations normally formed around sporting activities such as fishing and gunning and their origins can be traced to the Colony in Schuylkill Fishing Company, which changed its name to State in Schuylkill Fishing Company after the colonies won the American War for Independence (Smith 1986:106). Writing about one these clubs—the Tammany Pea Shore Fishing Company—Isaac Mickle noted, <span style="color: orange;">“…the club had its origin in that old English social feeling which so strongly marked the generation of our grandfathers”</span> (Mickle 1845:46). The Colony in Schuylkill Fishing Company, founded in 1732, is the earliest gentlemen’s club established in the English New World. Other similar associations along the New Jersey shore that existed during the nineteenth century and into the twentieth century included the Beideman Club, the Sparks Club, the Mozart Club, the Mohican Club, and the Riverton Gun Club.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">On the shores of the Delaware at Gloucestertown (now Gloucester City), Quaker City residents sought a variety of entertainment venues down through the years. Anglican pastor Nathaniel Evans, who held services in Gloucestertown during the mid-1760s, wrote a poem titled, “The Morning Invitation, to Two Young Ladies at the Gloucester Spring.” Evans died prematurely at age 26 and William Smith, a friend and admirer of Evans, published a collection of his poems, including the one just referenced, posthumously in 1772 by the subscription method (Evans 1772). Another early entertainment offered to an elite membership was the Gloucester Fox-Hunting Club. Belonging to this hunt association provided a certain cachet to its members, many of whom constituted the social elite of Philadelphia. The club operated between 1766 and 1818 before disbanding (Milnor 1889:405-429). Hunts usually ended at the “Death of the Fox” Tavern, a building that still stands in East Greenwich Township, Gloucester County, next to the railroad. Twenty years after foxhunting ceased, another group of Philadelphians, led by Izaak Walton devotee and sail-maker Jesse Williamson, formed a fishing club, which met below Gloucester Point. The broad, sloping Gloucester river shore had hosted fisheries since the early eighteenth century. Names associated with the fisheries there include Harrison, Ellis, Hugg, Shivers, and Clark. Beginning in the mid-nineteenth century, shad hauls at Gloucester became legendary, particularly once the hotels offered a delicacy known as “Planked Shad” (Prowell 1886:604-606).</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Prowell suggests that Williamson and his colleagues may have organized their club in 1828, but more contemporaneous evidence presented below appears to refute that earlier date, which earlier date Prowell provides with uncertainty. Initially, the members referred to their society as the Fish-House Company or the Williamson Fishing Club, as an homage to Jesse and his abilities <span style="color: orange;">“…in handling the rod and frying-pan”</span> (Prowell 1886:604). The members, <span style="color: orange;">“…during the summer months, met semi-weekly under the large sycamore trees that once lined the shore of the Delaware, from Newton Creek to Timber Creek”</span> (<em>ibid</em>.). </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In October 1839, club members John B. Rice, William J. Young, and William F. Hughes, all Philadelphia residents, leased some of the Clark fishery lands from Joseph Howell and William Hugg. The lease agreement covered the ensuing nine years at a cost of $40 per annum. The club also received permission to construct an ice house and a clubhouse, which they did south of Gloucester Point along the beach below Charles Street (Llewellyn 1976:127). At some point subsequent to finishing the clubhouse, the membership restyled their organization “The Prospect Hill Association.” The meeting and dining hall stood on <span style="color: orange;">“…Prospect Hill, a high bluff overlooking the mouth of Timber Creek to the south”</span> (Prowell 1886:604). In all likelihood, this same prominence once held the seventeenth-century Dutch trading post known as Fort Nassau. Concerning Fort Nassau and this hill, Isaac Mickle notes, </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: orange;">The precise locality of Fort Nassau is…a matter of much debate among antiquarians. The best opinion seems to be that it was situated immediately upon the river at the southern extremity of the high land butting upon the meadows north of the mouth of Timber Creek. That position would have struck the eye of an engineer; inasmuch as a fortress thus situated could have commanded both the river and creek, while it would have been greatly secured from the attacks of the Indians by the low marshy land which surrounded it upon all sides by the north.</span> (Mickle 1845:58, 60)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The 1842 United States Coast and Geodetic Survey chart that shows a portion of the Delaware River includes the location of the new clubhouse:</span><br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TRqPLsL7E5I/AAAAAAAAAGE/QW6kl2ZNKlA/s1600/T-165+BIS+detail%252C+1841-42.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" n4="true" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TRqPLsL7E5I/AAAAAAAAAGE/QW6kl2ZNKlA/s640/T-165+BIS+detail%252C+1841-42.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A previously unknown painting that recently came to auction depicts the clubhouse soon after its completion:</span><br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TRqPXrE0nEI/AAAAAAAAAGI/q8u_fq4ykPM/s1600/IMG_0453.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="360" n4="true" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TRqPXrE0nEI/AAAAAAAAAGI/q8u_fq4ykPM/s640/IMG_0453.JPG" width="640" /></a></div><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Today this painting is in a private collection. Notice the old fish cabin featured on the left side of the painting, a long-standing fixture on the South Gloucester waterfront.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The spacious new frame clubhouse featured two primary floors, along with a garret and a basement. The members met here twice a month between May and October. The officers assessed and exacted penalties for those members who failed to attend each meeting. The attendees feasted on gastronomical offerings of their own making, often, but not always limited to, a serving of fish as the main course. The first mention of the new clubhouse appeared in two Philadelphia newspapers during June 1840. <em>The Philadelphia Inquirer</em> noted,</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Southwark Public Schools.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: orange;">On Wednesday and Friday of last week, the Reed and Catharine street Female Schools took a pleasure excursion to the fish-house below Gloucester Point. They were accompanied by their teachers and some of the directors. The children all looked remarkably well, and their happy, joyous faces gave great pleasure to all who beheld the, On Friday, as we viewed them, now at the swings and now moving about in the dance, and then running like fawns along the ground, other thoughts and associations came over us, and we were children again. The greatest care and attention was paid them by their teachers, Miss Nagle, Mrs. Craycroft, Miss M. Martin and Miss Flanagan, who joined in all their festivities and were active participants in all their amusements. Too much praise cannot be bestowed upon these ladies for their active and untiring efforts to render the children happy, and they were indeed so. While upon this subject, we may say that this school was never in a better condition than it now is. The pupils are strongly attached to their teachers, which feeling they increase by devotedly performing every duty incumbent on them. Today the Female department of the Catharine street School will take a similar excursion, and on Wednesday next the male department of the Reed street School.</span> (<em>The Philadelphia Inquirer</em> 22 June 1840:2)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The Philadelphia newspaper, <em>Public Ledger</em>, for 25 June 1840, contained a description of the male students attending the fish house at Gloucester:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: orange;">SCHOOL ENTERTAINMENT.—For a week past, the new and commodious station house of the Fishing Club, in New Jersey, below Gloucester Point, near Timber Creek, has been the scene of a succession of most interesting galas, in which the chief participants were the 1200 children of the Public Schools of Southwark, with their teachers, the school directors, and a number of invited guests. On Monday last, the principal one of the district, the male school of Catharine street, numbering near 300 children, under the direction of their veteran and gentlemanly teacher, Mr. Watson, with his four lady assistant teachers, marked from the school-house to Almond street wharf, and there took the steamboat, which conveyed them to the theatre of the day’s entertainments. The appearance of the long line of men in miniature, containing, perhaps many who are destined to be the support, the pride, and the boast of their country by their ability in councils of peace or amid the rude shocks and contentions of war struck us as peculiarly pleasing. Many of them were dressed in a uniform of white pantaloons, blue roundabouts and light summer hats; all of them were neat and clean, and marched in regular order, keeping in line and step with the utmost exactness. Arrived at the Fish House, the boys divided off into parties for various amusements—bathing, swimming, diving, swinging, shouting, tumbling, climbing, running, leaping, and finally dancing, in which they had the inspiring aid of a small, but extremely good orchestra. In this the female teachers, the school directors, and all took part. Several of the ladies allowed themselves to be led out with their larger pupils, for partners, but the boys generally engaged indiscriminately in the dance, known as <em>la grande hop</em>, and seemed to enjoy themselves in it even more than if participators in the more regular and graceful figures of their elders. The dancing was relieved by singing. Some of the gentlemen sang, and the boys huzzaed their applause; then one of the ladies sang, and the children shouted and shouted again with delight, until they made the welkin ring—and no wonder, for the vocalists would have elicited applause from older and more critical minds. Excursions were made into the neighboring woods, and ‘’neath the shade of the greenwood tree’ the merry song, the light laugh and the cheerful shout went up, mingled with more instrumental music. At proper intervals during the day, refreshments of different kinds—hot coffee, cakes, lemonade, ice creams, &c.—were handed around. One of the young lady teachers, who appeared to be acknowledged mistress of ceremonies, wore upon her head a beautiful wreath, which had been presented to her by her scholars. Throughout the fete, the whole aim of the adults present, male and female, was devoted to rendering the children pleased and happy, in which aim they appeared to have been eminently successful. At 8 o’clock the party returned to the city. Yesterday, the male department of the Reed street school united with the Carpenter street school, and, numbering a party of more than 400, departed on the same excursion, and enjoyed themselves in much the same manner as described above.</span> (<em>Public Ledger</em> 25 June 1840:2)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In an article that appeared in the 21 May 1849 edition of <em>The Philadelphia Inquirer</em>, is the first use of the name “Prospect Hill” in connection with the association:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: orange;">Presentation of a Skiff.—A number of our most respectable citizens gave a handsome entertainment at the Prospect Hill Fishing House, below Gloucester, on Thursday last, upon the occasion of the presentation of a superb gunning skiff to Mr. John Stierley, of South Second street. The skiff is one of the prettiest things of the kind we have ever seen, and it was made by David Donaldson, of Southwark. It is called the “Sarah Ann.” This beautiful testimonial of friendship and esteem was presented to Mr. Stierley by Gen. George M. Keim, on behalf of his fellow citizens, in an exceedingly neat speech, and was received for the recipient by James Hanna, Esq. After the presentation was over, the company, numbering about eighty persons, sat down to a splendid dinner, and from the testimony of our friend, Major Copple, did ample justice to the same. On the removal of the cloth, wit, sentiment, and song occupied the time of the company until sunset, when all returned to the city, much pleased with the day’s enjoyment.</span> (<em>The Philadelphia Inquirer</em> 21 May 1849:1)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A similar article appeared on the first page of <em>The North American and United States Gazette</em>, even date.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Based on the constitution and bylaws of the Prospect Hill Association, the membership rolls could not exceed 30 individuals. The group of men elected as officers to oversee the affairs of the association apparently served without term limits, or at least were easily reelected to office, based on a notice that appeared in a December issue of <em>The Philadelphia Inquirer</em>:</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: orange;"></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: orange;">PROSPECT HILL ASSOCIATION.—This Association yesterday met to receive the resignation of their President, William Young, Esq., and Vice President, Louis Pelouze, Esq., two gentlemen who have long and faithfully presided over the interests of the Association. Their resignations were accepted with regret by the members, and a ballot being taken Samuel Haines, Esq., was elected President; Aaron V. Gibbes, Esq., Vice President, and William Simes, Esq., Treasurer. The Association, which is composed of Philadelphia gentlemen, have their headquarters near Gloucester, N.J., and for thirty years past have been noted for their intelligence, their skill in gunning and fishing, and their hospitality.</span> (<em>The Philadelphia Inquirer</em> 8 December 1868:3)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Notice the phrase <span style="color: orange;">“…for thirty years past…,”</span> which strongly supports the 1838 formation date for the fishing club. To provide its membership with clear information on its functionality, the association published its governance documents in 1856. The Historical Society of Pennsylvania holds a copy of this 12mo, 11-page pamphlet in its collections. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The association survived the national calamity known today as the Civil War. The membership continued to meet on the prescribed days and continued to use its clubhouse. During his productive years, local Philadelphia artist David Johnson Kennedy rendered the Prospect Hill Association headquarters in watercolors:</span><br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-xi9v-igq3SE/TfQ2OcpMeLI/AAAAAAAAAHo/RGHNXt6XOHM/s1600/Kennedy+View%252C+Color.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="600" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-xi9v-igq3SE/TfQ2OcpMeLI/AAAAAAAAAHo/RGHNXt6XOHM/s640/Kennedy+View%252C+Color.jpg" t8="true" width="640" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The original painting can be found in the David J. Kennedy Collection at the Historical Society of Pennsylvania.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Individual members held their membership in high esteem and obituaries often invited the association membership to attend:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: orange;">GAW.—On the 25th inst., CHARLES C. GAW. The relatives and friends of the family, also Solomon’s Lodge, No. 114, F. and A.M., and Prospect Hill Association, are respectfully invited to attend the funeral, on Saturday afternoon, at 3 o’clock, from his late residence, No. 309 Spruce street.</span> (<em>The Philadelphia Inquirer</em> 26 September 1884:5)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: orange;">MORONEY.—On the 20th inst., James Moroney. The relatives and friends of the family, also Hibernian Society and Prospect Hill Association, are respectfully invited to attend the funeral, on Tuesday morning at 8½ o’clock, from his late residence, 1228 Wharton street. Solemn mass of requiem at the Annunciation Church. Interment at Cathedral Cemetery. Please omit flowers.</span> (<em>The North American</em> 21 July 1894:4)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">With its membership growing old or dying off and with increased industrialization in Gloucester City and its attendant riverine pollution, the end for the Prospect Hill Association came in October 1897, when the members met for the its final dinner:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: orange;">** The Prospect Hill Fishing Club, of Gloucester, N.J., all of whose members are Philadelphians, will give their closing dinner to-day. A number of prominent citizens have been invited and a band of music will enliven the occasion.</span> (<em>The Philadelphia Inquirer</em> 5 October 1897:6)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Prowell’s history of Camden County provides a partial list of the association's membership through 1886:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: orange;">Among well-known names on the list of past and present members are these,— President and Captain, E.J. Hinchen, of the <em>Philadelphia Sunday Dispatch</em>, who, for thirty-two years, did not miss an opening-day; James B. Stevenson, Charles W. Bender, William F. Hughes, Benjamin Franklin; Peter Glasgow, George W. Wharton, William Richardson, Peleg B. Savery, Peter Lyle, Chapman Freeman, George J. Weaver, Louis Pelouze, Mahlon Williamson, Jacob Faunce, B.J. Williams, George Bockius, Thomas F. Bradley, Joseph B. Lyndall, S. Gross Fry, Benjamin Allen, John Krider, George P. Little, Peter Lane, Samuel Collins, William Patterson, J.W. Swain, Samuel Simes, Jesse Williamson (one of the originators), and others. The membership is limited to thirty, and, as they are long-lived, the entire roll of members during the fifty-eight years of its existence contains but few over one hundred names.</span> (Prowell 1886:604)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The clubhouse remained standing after the association ceased meeting. Its subsequent use, if any, is currently unknown. A little over five years after the last dinner in October 1897, notice of the building again appeared in the press:</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">CLUB HOUSE CLEANED OUT AT GLOUCESTER</span><br />
<span style="color: orange; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Special to the Inquirer.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">GLOUCESTER CITY, N.J., Dec. 15.—</span><br />
<span style="color: orange; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">George Harvey, Walter Sterling, Joseph Fitzer and Chester Sterling, boys under 20 years of age, after a hearing before Mayor Boylan to-night, were committed to the Camden county jail on the charge of robbing the Prospect Hill Club House, near the old race track. The building was ransacked from top to bottom and among the articles taken were chairs, cutlery, liquors, spoons, clocks, spigots, dishes, looking glasses, pictures, shuffleboard weights, groceries, tubs, a meat block, and in fact everything movable. The plunder was removed to a boat house along the river and was offered to a second hand dealer who became suspicious and notified the police.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: orange;">The boys at the hearing, it is said, admitted taking the goods but denied breaking into the building, claiming to have found the door open.</span> (<em>The Philadelphia Inquirer </em>16 December 1902:3)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">With the clubhouse becoming a convenient nuisance for local miscreants, an advertisement for selling the building appeared in March and April 1903:</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Gloucester</span><br />
<span style="color: orange; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">FOR SALE—Prospect Hill Club House, situated on the Delaware River, below Gloucester, N.J.; will be sold cheap.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: orange;">WILLIAM H. PRICE, 209 S. 10th st. </span>(<em>The Philadelphia Inquirer</em> 25 March 1903:15)</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">NEW JERSEY</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: orange;">FOR SALE—PROSPECT HILL CLUB HOUSE, on the Delaware River below Gloucester, N.J.; easily reached by trolley; dining room will seat 60; lawn and trees around the house; kitchen arranged for planking shad. WM. H. PRICE, 209 South Tenth street.</span> (<em>The Philadelphia Inquirer</em> 5 April 1903:10)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">William J. Thompson, the so-called Duke of Gloucester, acquired the property as an expansion of his riverfront entertainment empire (Hopkins 1907:3). Here is a plan of the association grounds from the 1907 Hopkins atlas, showing the orientation of the buildings relative to the shoreline:</span><br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TRqPoXj5ouI/AAAAAAAAAGQ/lM0EB9Bc6nw/s1600/1907+Hopkins+Detail.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="390" n4="true" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TRqPoXj5ouI/AAAAAAAAAGQ/lM0EB9Bc6nw/s640/1907+Hopkins+Detail.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Thompson already owned the surrounding former Clark fishery and continued the tradition of fishing along the shoreline and served the shad in his hotels. When Thompson suffered financial reverses and became a bankrupt, protracted litigation ensued, with trial activity extending from April 1911 to June 1916 (<em>The Philadelphia Inquirer</em> 23 June 1916:3). Former Camden County Sheriff Henry J. West served as trustee in the bankruptcy proceedings and sold much of Thompson’s land holdings to satisfy the creditors, including the former Prospect Hill Association clubhouse and outbuildings. Michael Haggerty and James McNally purchased the clubhouse property and received the fishery rights as part of the transaction. McNally intended to operate a large fishing net there in 1916, but the Pennsylvania Shipbuilding Company purchased the land from Haggerty’s estate and from McNally to build a shipyard in South Gloucester. A consequence of the shipbuilding firm’s acquisition of this property was a <em>de facto</em> extinction of commercial shad fishing in Gloucester (<em>Woodbury Daily Times</em> 14 March 1916:3). Construction of the shipyard and associated buildings, along with regrading the land for such industrial pursuits brought about the demolition of the once proud Prospect Hill Association clubhouse and its existence is hardly known today. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><strong><u>Bibliography:</u></strong></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Boyce, W.M.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial;">1842 Vicinity of Philadelphia PA. & N.J. Manuscript chart, T-165bis. United States Coast and Geodetic Survey, Washington, D.C. Original held at the National Archives and Records Administration, Washington, D.C.</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Evans, Nathaniel</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">1772 <em>Poems on Several Occasions with Some Other Compositions</em>. John Dunlap, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Hopkins, Griffith Morgan</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">1907 <em>Atlas of the Vicinity of Camden, New Jersey.</em> G.M. Hopkins and Company, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Llewellyn, Louisa W.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">1976 <em>First Settlement on the Delaware River: A History of Gloucester City, New Jersey.</em> Gloucester City American Revolution Bicentennial Committee, Gloucester City, New Jersey.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Mickle, Isaac</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">1845 <em>Reminiscences of Old Gloucester or Incidents in the History of the Counties of Gloucester, Atlantic and Camden, New Jersey.</em> Townsend Ward, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Milnor Jr., William</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">1889 “Memoirs of the Gloucester Fox Hunting Club.” Published as an appendix in <em>History of the Schuylkill Fishing Company of the State in Schuylkill, 1732-1888</em>. By the Members of the State in Schuylkill, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Prowell, George R.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">1886 <em>The History of Camden County, New Jersey</em>. L.J. Richards & Company, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Smith, Philip Chadwick Foster</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">1986 <em>Philadelphia on the River</em>. Philadelphia Maritime Museum, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.</span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-779291837523434339.post-76512078643008688202010-12-24T07:24:00.005-05:002010-12-24T07:37:20.605-05:00Merry Christmas 2010Written on Christmas Eve, 1513<br />
<br />
<em>I salute you. I am your friend, and my love for you goes deep. </em><br />
<em>There is nothing I can give you which you have not. But there is much,</em><br />
<em>very much, that, while I cannot give it, you can take. No heaven can</em><br />
<em>come to us unless our hearts find rest in it today. Take heaven! </em><br />
<em>No peace lies in the future which is not hidden in this present little instant.</em><br />
<em>Take peace! The gloom of the world is but a shadow. Behind it, yet within</em><br />
<em>our reach, is joy. There is radiance and glory in darkness, could we but see. </em><br />
<em>And to see, we have only to look. I beseech you to look!</em><br />
<br />
<em>Life is so generous a giver. But we, judging its gifts by their covering, </em><br />
<em>cast them away as ugly or heavy or hard. Remove the covering, and you</em><br />
<em>will find beneath it a living splendor, woven of love by wisdom, with power. </em><br />
<em>Welcome it, grasp it, and you touch the angel's hand that brings it to you. </em><br />
<em>Everything we call a trial, a sorrow or a duty, believe me, that angel's hand is there. </em><em>The gift is there and the wonder of an overshadowing presence. Your joys, too, </em><em>be not content with them as joys. They, too, conceal diviner gifts.</em><br />
<br />
<em>Life is so full of meaning and purpose, so full of beauty beneath its covering,</em><br />
<em>that you will find earth but cloaks your heaven. Courage then to claim it; that is all! </em><br />
<em>But courage you have, and the knowledge that we are pilgrims together, </em><br />
<em>wending through unknown country home.</em><br />
<br />
<em>And so, at this time, I greet you, not quite as the world sends greetings,</em><br />
<em>but with profound esteem and with the prayer that for you, now and </em><br />
<em>forever, the day breaks and shadows flee away.</em><br />
<br />
~ Fra Giovanni ~<br />
<br />
I wish all of my friends, followers, and readers a most blessed Christmas Season and a <br />
New Year filled with history and wonder!<br />
<br />
JerseymanUnknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-779291837523434339.post-55747124201920264522010-12-02T16:22:00.003-05:002010-12-02T18:56:09.117-05:00Tetamekon, now Grenloch, Gloucester Township, Camden County<strong><em><span style="color: orange;">Local Gleanings.</span></em></strong><br />
<br />
<em><span style="color: orange;">Up the County, August 1, 1850</span></em><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">I went to Spring Mills and Tetamakin [<em>sic, et seq.</em>] Works, under the proprietorship of Wm. H. Carr, of Philadelphia, and driven by the power of that noted stream called the south branch of Timber creek. Tetamakin lying on the Gloucester county side of the stream, and Spring Mills in Camden County. Mr. Carr was not there to-day to give me all the information respecting the various manufactures that have at different times been carried on here, but his gentlemanly and intelligent superintendent, Mr. T. Loring, gave me much insight into the present business of the place, some of which you shall have to use as you please.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">The manufacture of forks, hoes, and rakes, is carried on extensively at Spring Mills; and that of sad-irons at Tetamakin—the making of butt-hinges having been relinquished some time back. About a ton and a half of sad-irons are finished here daily; the casting, grinding, handling, packing &c. &c. of which occupies a number of workmen at good wages. The sad-irons vary in weight from four to ten pounds—but where on earth they find people enough to use so many smoothing irons is a mystery to me, when it is considered that a good sad-iron, well taken care of, can be used by at least three generations of “ironers.” But, perhaps, they are making most of these for coming generations; and as we have no tariff on the increase of population, nor any “compromise” as to color, there may be a good time coming when there will be juveniles enough to work all the four pound irons, and adults plenty to shove the ten pounders—if so, what a universal smoothing of plaited bosoms, and flounced skirts there will be about that time! They are also making castings for Crossdale’s Patent Seed Drill, an excellent implement for agriculturists, lately patented—also, a superior kind of mole-trap.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">A lime-stone quarry is opened just below Spring Mills, and kilns erected, at which a considerable quantity of lime has already been burned. The lime from these kilns is said to be superior to the Pennsylvania lime for agricultural purposes, only—it costs, at the kilns, ten cents per bushel slaked, and fourteen cents a bushel fresh; and is considered much superior to marl in its effects on all other crops except potatoes. There is a very handsome and productive farm connected with the Spring Mills, and the dwellings belonging to the whole premises are good, and kept very neat. Mr. Carr is now having a very large and convenient hoggery or hog-pen built, with a furnace and large caldron under the same roof, in which it is intended to prepare potatoes, corn-meal &c. for hog-feed. Some of Mr. Carr’s hogs were shown me, and their appearance did no credit to their species; although they appeared to have been well-fed—but they were of a red color, shallow built before and narrow behind, and better formed for creeping through fences, and rooting up sod, than for growing into large hams and shoulders, and filling the lard firkin. I was told that Mr. C. intends improving his breed of hogs by introducing some of a superior race from Chester county. Glad of it.</span><br />
<br />
Extracted from <em>The West Jerseyman</em> (Camden, New Jersey), 14 August 1850, p. 2.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-779291837523434339.post-78334299743277596802010-11-07T01:36:00.020-04:002012-02-08T10:33:20.462-05:00The Plantation Yclept BromleyIn present-day Borough of Mount Ephraim, Camden County, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
by Jerseyman ©2010<br />
<br />
The Harrison family of Gloucester Town began its West New Jersey experience with émigré Samuel Harrison, the mariner, who resided for some years on land north of the Gloucester Town bounds upon arriving. On 1 September 1697, Harrison purchased 500 acres from John Reading (West New Jersey Deed Liber Gl A:29). He married Sarah Hunt and a number of children came from this union, including Samuel, Joseph, and William, along with at least two daughters: Ann, who married Jacob Clement; and Abigail, who became the wife of Jacob Hinchman (Clement 1877:243, 273). Samuel Harrison, the mariner, also signed a partnership agreement with John Reading in 1697 to construct a brewery somewhere on John Reading’s town lots. The partners agreed to hire Anthony Blany for a period of seven years to produce “<span style="color: orange;">good sweet merchantable malt</span>” and “<span style="color: orange;">shall likewise Brew into good and merchantable Beer [in] such quantity as shall be by ye sd Samuel or John or b[oth] of them be delivered at ye malthouse be brought</span>” (Gloucester County Document Collection, Agreement 2). Harrison then began to build an addition to the extant malt house, which was probably a brew house. <br />
<br />
The first batch of product was anything but good, so the partners confronted Blany, demanding to know what went wrong. Taking the interrogation as a personal affront, Blany retaliated by burning down the brewery and John Reading’s house burned along with it (Miller 1939:143-144). Harrison and Reading filed a suit against Blany to recover their costs. At the trial, John Reading testified in part:<br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">On ye twenty first Day of May, Ano 1698 the Malthouse abovesaid, Designed by and on purpose; Did set on fire or through Ignorance, carelessness or negligence, ye same be suffered ye Malt Killne to take ffire; whereby not only ye said Malt house with about 700 Bushels of malt and Barly; But ye Brewhouse thereto adjoining; Beer therein, Mill vessels, Utensils and Materialls; so ye arts of Malting and Brewing apertain and allso a Dwelling House of ye said John Reading; with my Goods. and many Deeds, Books, evidences, Rolls and writeing of Publick concern; and belonging to ye province of West Jersey were incinerated, Destroyed, Burnt down and Totally Consumed....</span> (<em>ibid</em>.)<br />
<br />
While there is no direct documentation to confirm the partners quickly rebuilt their fire-ravaged brewery, subsequent probate documents suggest that they did so. <br />
<br />
Tracking the identity of the malsters at the reconstructed brewery after Blany cannot be done with absolute certainty, but it appears that a Richard Bromley may have arrived about the time the partners completed rebuilding the facility. On 1 January 1697 (n.s.), Richard Bromley Sr., a malster, of Stratford on Avon, County of Warwick, England, purchased a one-twentieth share of West New Jersey (West New Jersey Deed Liber Gl 3:229, 231). Five days later, he sold his interest to his son and heir, Richard Bromley Jr., a glover of London (West New Jersey Deed Liber Gl 3:236, 237). Sometime during the ensuing two years, it appears Bromley left his wife and family and sailed for the New World, arriving in Gloucester Town to operate the brewery.<br />
<br />
Samuel Harrison, the mariner, died intestate sometime during the month of February 1703/04. The courts granted Sarah, Samuel’s wife, letters of administration for the estate on 1 March 1703/04 (Nelson 1901:213-214). At some point in time after 1707, Samuel Harrison’s widow, Sarah, remarried to Richard Bull of Gloucester Town, son of Thomas Bull Sr. of Pipe Hill, County of Stafford, England. Thomas Sr. purchased one-eighth of a full share of West New Jersey in concert with Thomas Rudyard, who acquired one-half of a share; Henry Beadle, a malster, who bought one-eighth of a share; and John Reading, who obtained one-quarter of a share, making a sum total of one full propriety share of the colony split among the four men (Pomfret 1956:286). <br />
<br />
It appears Richard Bull leased a plantation he owned, located out in the Gloucester Town Liberties along Little Timber Creek, to Richard Bromley, the malster operating the brewery, even before Bull married Sarah Harrison. During March 1708 (n.s.), Richard Bull visited Bromley at the plantation and drew the brewer’s Will, suggesting that the man had contracted an illness. He died within a couple of months as Bromley’s executor entered his Will into probate on 11 May 1708 (Unrecorded Wills, Vol. 7:293-298). The plantation where Bromley lived then returned to Richard and Sarah Bull. The plantation became known as “Bromley” when the malster first took up residence there and the name remained with the property long after Bromley died. Richard and Sarah removed from Gloucester Town after Bromley died and took up residence on the plantation.<br />
<br />
Sarah Harrison Bull outlived her second husband and the courts granted her administration of Richard’s intestate estate in November 1723. Richard’s brother, Thomas (Jr.), assented to her administration (Nelson 1901:72). She retained much of Richard’s land after his death and passed it on to her Harrison children through her own Will, dated 6 January 1742 and probated 20 August 1744. William Harrison, the son of Samuel the Mariner and Sarah Harrison Bull, received the Bromley plantation, situated between Little Timber Creek and the Kings Highway, as a devisee of his mother’s Will, which read in part, <span style="color: orange;">“</span><span style="color: orange;">Son,</span> <span style="color: orange;">William Harrison, to have the rest of lands, meadows and buildings</span>” (Honeyman 1918:74). <br />
<br />
Subsequent to his mother’s death and attaining ownership of Bromley according to her Will, he erected a milldam above the tide on Little Timber Creek and constructed a gristmill. The dam certainly existed by November 1760, when the colonial legislature passed an act <br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">to enable the Owners and Possessors of the Meadows lying on Little Timber Creek…to support and maintain a certain Bank, Dam and other Water-Works, lately erected across the said Creek in order to prevent the Tide from overflowing the same, and the keep the former Water-Course of said Creek open and clear.</span> (Bush 1982:55-57)<br />
<br />
This act permitted a dam to be erected, thereby preventing tidal flow and allowing landowners adjacent to the creek to cultivate meadowlands. The act in part reads: <br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">Be it enacted by the Governor, Council and General Assembly, and it is hereby Enacted by the Authority of the same, That from and after the Publication hereof, the said Bank, Dam, and all other Water-Works already erected, or that shall or may at any Time or Times hereafter, be found necessary to be erected, for the more effectual preventing the Tide from overflowing the Meadow lying on the aforesaid Creek, shall be erected, supported and maintained at the equal Expence [sic] of all the Owners and Possessors of the same, in Proportion to the Quantity of Meadow that each of the said Owners or possessors now or hereafter may hold on the said Creek, between the aforesaid Dam, and a Dam called <strong><u>William Harrison’s Dam</u></strong>, near the Head of the aforesaid Creek.</span> (Bush 1982:56 [underlining and bolding added for emphasis])<br />
<br />
This portion of the act indicates that Harrison’s milldam already existed. His dam must have stood above the tidal flow as Harrison required no legislative act to block the stream, considered a public thoroughfare under colonial law. At some point subsequent to building this mill, William Harrison removed his family to Greenwich Township, Gloucester County, where he established a new plantation and constructed another gristmill along with a sawmill. Sometime prior to 1 November 1762, William Harrison died and devised to his son William (Jr.) the <span style="color: orange;"><span style="color: black;">“</span>…plantation where I formerly lived, and where he now lives, to him and his heirs…</span>” (New Jersey Wills 795H). The devised plantation included the gristmill along Little Timber Creek. <br />
<br />
In November 1776, William Harrison Junior heard the call of his revolutionary countrymen and mortgaged his land and gristmill to raise a company of New Jersey militia. According to the written testimony of his grandson, Philadelphia locomotive builder Joseph Harrison, William clothed and armed the men who served in his company. As America entered the second year of its rebellion against the Crown, the British sailed south from New York and landed General William Howe and his army on the shores of the Chesapeake Bay at Elkton, Maryland, after rejecting a more dangerous landing on the lower Delaware River. The army marched north towards Philadelphia, engaging in the Battle of Brandywine along the way. Meanwhile, sailors of the Pennsylvania Navy prepared themselves for the upcoming river battle. The river bottom already bristled with clusters of chevaux-de-frise, iron-tipped wooden spears anchored in stone-filled wooden cribs, ready to impale any British vessel which dared to sail up the Delaware. Only a handful of colonial river pilots knew the safe passage route through these river obstacles. American laborers worked on the New Jersey side to finish defensive forts at Billingsport and Red Bank and other workers made final preparations to the fort on Mud Island (Fort Mifflin), located on the Philadelphia side of the Delaware River (Jackson 1977:1-15; Jackson 1986:1-127).<br />
<br />
First designed by British military engineer John Montressor, the Pennsylvania colonial legislature sought the construction of what would become Fort Mifflin as a defensive position for Philadelphia against Privateers. Work began on this fortification in 1772 but the workmen, lacking clear supervision, had not yet completed the facility in 1775. About the time colonial delegates signed the Declaration of Independence, American colonists gained possession of the fort (Jackson 1977:1-15; Jackson 1986:1-127). After partially completed the Billingsport fortification, the continentals determined the location to be indefensible, and withdrew four miles upstream to concentrate on completing a much smaller fortification within the rather large Red Bank defensive position. Only a small garrison remained at Billingsport to guard the lower set of chevaux-de-frise. After withdrawing from the Brandywine battlefield, the British army continued its march towards Philadelphia. On the city’s outskirts, Washington launched a surprise attack at Germantown, which proved disastrous for the American troops and Howe’s forces moved in to Philadelphia during the second part of October (Jackson 1977:1-15).<br />
<br />
Upon achieving his primary objective—winning and occupying Philadelphia—General Howe commanded his military commanders to vanquish the American troops, destroy the Pennsylvania Navy, and open the Delaware River to British shipping under the control of Howe’s brother, Lord Admiral Richard Howe. Hessian mercenary officer Colonel Carl Emil Kurt von Donop requested the honor to crush the continental forces at Red Bank and capture the fort (Smith 1970:18). The Hessians crossed the Delaware River at Cooper’s Ferry, located at today’s Coopers Point, Camden, and marched out today’s Haddon Avenue to Haddonfield where they bivouacked for the night. The next morning, 22 October 1777, the German soldiers began their march to the fort. According to an anonymous map presumably drawn in 1777 or 1778, the Hessians moved southwest out of Haddonfield along the old Kings Highway into Mount Ephraim, where they turned more southerly and crossed William Harrison Jr.’s milldam (Anon. ca. 1778). <br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TNZEn0jFoeI/AAAAAAAAAFM/Ea4GBJK6HbU/s1600/Hessian+Map+copy.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="524" px="true" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TNZEn0jFoeI/AAAAAAAAAFM/Ea4GBJK6HbU/s640/Hessian+Map+copy.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br />
Old Gloucester County never established the shortcut across Harrison’s dam between Kings Highway and today’s Browning Road as an official highway, but it provided a very convenient crossing point over Little Timber Creek. The Hessians originally intended to cross Big Timber Creek on the bridge between present-day Brooklawn and Westville, but an advance scout party evidently found that the Americans had rendered the bridge impassable. <br />
<br />
Hence, von Donop’s army turned south off of Kings Highway, crossed William Harrison Junior’s dam, and traveled east along Browning Road (a.k.a. the Irish Road or Sandy Lane) to its junction with the “Good and Convenient Road of 1768,” whereupon the Hessians turned on to that road and traveled over it until they reached Clement’s Bridge Road, which provided the force with access to the next crossing over Big Timber Creek. After moving across the bridge, von Donop marched his large army of mercenaries to attack the fort, where a small and inferior force of Americans waited within the fortifications (Leap 1981:53-55). The Hessians suffered a resounding defeat, losing many soldiers on the battlefield, including von Donop himself. The British dispatched warships to provide artillery support for the Hessians, but in maneuvering around the shallow water in front of the fort, the 64-gun ship AUGUSTA and the sloop-of-war MERLIN ran aground, representing a great military loss to the British, since both exploded and burned. Those Hessians who survived the battle uninjured assisted the wounded and dying back to Philadelphia, staying overnight in Glendora at Ashbrook’s Burial Ground, where those who had expired during the return trip were buried (Smith 1970:20-25). <br />
<br />
During the entire British invasion period, from 2 October to 9 November, Commodore John Hazelwood’s Pennsylvania Navy patrolled the Delaware River. His small fleet of row galleys, floating batteries and fire boats harassed the British naval fleet, provided protective fire for the forts and defended the chevaux-de-frise from removal. The British had already established shore batteries on Carpenter and Province islands to cannonade Fort Mifflin, but von Donop’s defeat at Red Bank temporarily thwarted Howe’s plans for river domination. Howe ordered a large detachment of his troops stationed at the Province Island wharf, staged to invade Fort Mifflin, but withdrew the force upon the Hessian rout (Jackson 1977:15-18). <br />
<br />
Howe became increasingly alarmed about the onset of winter and the lack of navigation on the Delaware. He knew that he must quickly eliminate Fort Mifflin as a threat to his combined naval and land forces. On 9 November 1777, Howe prepared his land batteries for saturation cannonading of the fort, particularly hammering the weak western palisade. Lord Richard Howe commanded his large warships to pound the eastern fort wall. Bombardment began on 10 November and continued for five days. The Pennsylvania Navy did what it could to harass the British, but the Americans failed to close off the fort’s back channel, allowing the enemy to move floating batteries into position for additional salvos against Mifflin. The British breached the wall and continued firing, leveling the fort in places. In its harassment campaign, the Americans broke the dikes along Carpenter and Province islands, allowing waist-deep water to encompass the enemy as it loaded and reloaded its artillery. Finally, during the night of 15 November, the continentals abandoned the fort and fled in the darkness to the shelter of the fort at Red Bank, setting fire to what remained of Mifflin. With the main fortress gone, Red Bank became indefensible and Washington ordered it abandoned on 21 November. The Pennsylvania Navy sailed upriver in an attempt to save its vessels, but the British destroyed virtually all of them. British shipping could, at last, reach Philadelphia and replenish the waning foodstuff of the Crown’s half-starved army (Jackson 1977:19-23). <br />
<br />
Beginning on 18 November 1777, a major British force numbering some 7,000 soldiers under the command of Lieutenant General Lord Cornwallis landed at Billingsport with the intent of capturing the fort at Red Bank. Intelligence about the landing rippled through the American military and the garrison at Red Bank prepared for evacuation by spreading gunpowder across the fort grounds. The British remained close to their initial position in Billingsport on 19 November as they assembled a wagon train for the march north towards Red Bank. The Americans abandoned the fort at Red Bank on the nineteenth, based on rumor, but the garrison returned the following day with wagons to take away supplies. However, on 21 November, with the British closing in, the Americans touched off explosions at the fort as they withdrew (Smith 1970:38-40). Cornwallis and his forces descended upon the fort expecting a battle, but found it deserted and on fire. The British and Hessians completed the destruction, tearing down the walls and leveling all emplacements. On 22 November, the combined forces departed from the fort and marched to Woodbury, where they began foraging for food and livestock, including horses, from farms along their route. They broke camp on the twenty-fourth and moved towards Timber Creek until the Crown’s forces arrived at the bridge that the Americans had destroyed before von Donop marched to the fort at Red Bank. In one of wagons, the British had a portable bridge fabricated from hinged copper plates that folded when not in use. Using ropes and tackle, the English military engineers placed the bridge across the creek, allowing the entire army, wagon train and foraged livestock to cross (Döhla 1913[1990]:59-60; Stewart, ed. 1937:80). <br />
<br />
By the morning of 25 November, Cornwallis had entered Gloucester Town, where he set-up his headquarters in the home of American militia Colonel Joseph Ellis while Hessian pickets guarded the approaches to Gloucester Town. During almost the entire day, the Marquis de Lafayette reconnoitered the British and Hessian forces in Gloucester Town as they loaded the cattle, horses, and soldiers for transport back to Philadelphia. Lafayette’s forces included ten light horsemen, 150 riflemen from Morgan’s rifles and some militiamen, including men under Colonel Ellis, containing Captain Harrison’s company—a total force of less than 300. During the late afternoon, Lafayette and his escort entered upon the Gloucester Road (today’s Kings Highway) and rode towards Gloucester Town. At about 2.5 miles from Gloucester Town (about where Kings Highway crosses Kings Run on the border between Haddon Heights and Mount Ephraim), the Americans encountered a Hessian outpost containing 350 soldiers and several field pieces. <br />
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Lafayette led a charge against the mercenaries, driving the Germans back more than one-half mile, making them run double-time to avoid being attacked. British reinforcements arrived twice, all the while the Americans, under Lafayette, drove them further back towards Gloucester Town. Only the descent of darkness prevented the Americans from pushing closer to Cornwallis and his shipments (Idzerda, ed. 1977:156-57). Lafayette’s gallantry at the Battle of Gloucester directly resulted in the Continental Congress commissioning the Marquis as a Major General and given command of an entire army division, a decision crucial to the war’s ultimate outcome (<em>ibid</em>., 158-165). When the Congress ordered a ceremonial presentation sword during 1779 for Lafayette, the guard featured engraved scenes of four critical battles in which the Marquis participated; one of these four was Gloucester (Idzerda, ed. 1979:201). <br />
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During this action, William Harrison’s Gloucester Town Company of the New Jersey militia had the opportunity to engage the enemy on Harrison’s own farmland, located between Little Timber Creek and King’s Highway west of today’s Black Horse Pike. John Zane, a member of Harrison’s Company, testified the battle <br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">…was a smart skirmish on Little Timber Creek at Gloucester Town at Brick’s Old Field. The Battle was between Colonel Ellis’s Regiment and the British and close by Captain Harrison’s farm. Captain Harrison had about that time a House in Gloucester burnt by the British for the part he took against them. </span>(National Archives and Records Administration, Record Group 15)<br />
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The Döhla’s diary echoes the loss of Harrison’s house in Gloucester Town proper, when the Hessian writes, “<span style="color: orange;">This same evening the sailors set fire to a house</span>” (Döhla 1990:60). Harrison’s company had gained combat experience through action in December 1776 at Petticoat Bridge (near today’s Jacksonville, Burlington County) and in Mount Holly at Iron Mill Hill. In August 1777, under orders from George Washington, Harrison led his company in removing ferry boats and flats along the Delaware River after the British landed at Head of Elk to begin its Philadelphia campaign (National Archives and Records Administration, Record Group 15). Not knowing the true size of the force that attacked his outer guards, Lafayette’s action unnerved Cornwallis, forcing him to accelerate loading the livestock and other baggage and moving back across the river to Philadelphia. The journal of His Majesty’s Armed Schooner VIPER confirms Cornwallis’s sudden haste after the attack when Lieutenant Edward Pakenham wrote: <br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">November 1777 Red Bank SSE 1 mile</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">Tuesdy. 25</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">AM Empd. Assisting the Flat Boats bringing Troops from the Jerseys.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">Off Gloucester</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">…½ pt. 5 Weigh’d & ran over to Gloucester to Cover the Retreat of our Troops from the Jerseys.</span> (Crawford 1996:595)<br />
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With Cornwallis’s retreat, the British largely withdrew from New Jersey to Philadelphia for the winter, although foraging and interdiction patrols traveled fairly regularly between Salem, Haddonfield and points north. Often these British patrols, along with American foraging units, would drive livestock and other baggage through the current project area (Stewart 1929). The Americans wintered at Valley Forge and British General Clinton relieved General Howe in Philadelphia during the spring of 1778. In a move to consolidate the British and Hessian armies back in New York, Clinton ordered the evacuation of Philadelphia and marched his forces overland through New Jersey to Sandy Hook and waiting marine transport, fighting the Battle of Monmouth on the way (Jackson 1977:22).<br />
<br />
The mortgage that Harrison presented to mortgagee Joseph Fox to fund his military activities had a term of three years and a penalty of twice the document’s face value. With Harrison constantly on the go with military action, however, he greatly neglected his personal affairs. The due date for the mortgage, stated on the document as 1779, came and went with no payment. Fox, along with a group of other creditors, waited another three years, until 1782, before beginning foreclosure proceedings. The court action resulted in Thomas Denny,the Gloucester County sheriff, receiving a writ from the New Jersey Supreme Court to attach all of William’s property after the creditors successfully won suits against Harrison for unpaid indebtedness. No one came to Harrison’s rescue or defense and all of his holdings became the subject of a Sheriff’s Sale in September 1783. Placed in the Independent Gazetteer, published in Philadelphia, the sheriff’s advertisement read:<br />
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<span style="color: orange;">For sale a tract of land within the bounds of the town of Gloucester, the property of William Harrison seized at the suit of William Smith, the executors of Joseph Fox, deceased, Thomas Leaman and others. It is bounded by lands of Samuel Hugg Esq., Daniel Smith, John Glover, Jacob Albertson, lands late of Joseph Harrison, deceased, and others. It lies on the main branch of Little Timber Creek, which runs through the tract, and contains 613 acres and three-quarters, being divided as follows: a plantation of 155 acres and three-quarters with a brick house; a plantation adjoining containing 287 acres and one quarter with a brick house; a plantation of 70 acres and three quarters with a frame house and a grist mill built with stone; and three tenements adjoining the latter of 35 acres each. To view the premises and to see a map of the whole, apply to Mr. William Eldridge living on the first mentioned farm. Sale will be by vendue on 22d September at the house of William Hugg, innkeeper, in the town of Gloucester.</span> (Wilson 1988:417-418). <br />
<br />
The sale occurred at the time and place stated in the advertisement, but Sheriff Denny did not draft two deeds of sale for a portion of Harrison’s property until April 1784. One deed acknowledged Samuel Hugg’s purchase of a 35-acre tenement parcel for £126 (Gloucester County Deeds D:182). The second deed transferred title of the 155.75-acre plantation to William Eldridge in exchange for a winning bid of £935. The Hugg and the Eldridge bid represent the only two successful partial purchases of William Harrison’s land, so Sheriff Denny scheduled a second Sheriff’s Sale, which occurred 26 March 1785, presumably at Hugg’s Tavern (Gloucester County Deeds L:504). Ephraim Tomlinson placed the winning bid of £960 for the 287.25-acre plantation described in the advertisement (above) as possessing a brick house. Denny drafted the deed for this sale during April 1785 and Ephraim Tomlinson became the titleholder for Joseph Harrison’s former “Little Plantation” (<em>ibid</em>.). Of the three remaining parcels—two 35-acre tenement lots and the 70.75-acre plantation containing a gristmill and a frame house—only a deed for the gristmill property could be located; William Eldridge acquired this tract in August 1792 (Gloucester County Deeds K:473). A review of extant tax ratable lists revealed no tax was levied for the mill in 1790, indicating that no one was leasing or operating the mill. However, prior tax years, including 1773, 1780, 1781, 1782, 1783, 1784, 1786 and 1788, William Harrison paid a tax for owning or operating a gristmill (New Jersey Tax Ratables). <br />
<br />
Following William Eldridge purchasing the gristmill, it appears he leased out the mill to a number of operators, based on the tax ratable lists available between 1791 and 1802 (New Jersey Tax Ratables). Meanwhile, at some point subsequent to his purchase of the gristmill, Eldridge constructed a fulling mill on the south side of Little Timber Creek, opposite the gristmill. He used the same millpond and dam and probably excavated only a new millrace for the fulling mill (Clement, Maps and Draughts, Vol. 6:81). Based on an inference in the road return for what today is the Black Horse Pike, it appears Eldridge constructed the fulling mill prior to 1795 (Gloucester County Road Return, Book A:190). In March 1805, Eldridge sold the gristmill and possibly the fulling mill to Abraham Fenimore, along with 115 acres on both sides of Little Timber Creek, with a right to enlarge the millpond by overflowing other Eldridge land (Gloucester County Deeds I:267). Fenimore retained the mills and millpond for three years before selling the complex with 46 acres of land to John T. Glover in March 1808 (Gloucester County Deeds Y:441). Since Glover already owned a fulling mill he had inherited from his father, located on Kings Run in Haddon Heights, he reportedly discontinued operations at the former Eldridge fulling mill (Boyer 1962:44). Although it is unknown when the gristmill ceased operations, it is probable this occurred simultaneously with the fulling mill discontinuance, thereby allowing the millpond to be drained and the cessation of maintenance on the milldam. It is unclear when Glover drained the millpond, but it appears that the John Hills’s 1808 map, A Plan of the City of Philadelphia and Environs, corrected through December 1814, shows only a stream flowing under what, today, is the Black Horse Pike and the map does not indicate a millpond: <br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TNZGArRQ79I/AAAAAAAAAFU/F26ndsSONbE/s1600/Hills+1808+Detail+copy.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" px="true" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TNZGArRQ79I/AAAAAAAAAFU/F26ndsSONbE/s640/Hills+1808+Detail+copy.jpg" width="504" /></a></div><br />
Based on a recent visual observation, the former Atlantic City Railroad’s Grenloch Branch still uses a small section of the milldam on the Mount Ephraim side of Little Timber Creek for its right-of-way, but the remainder of the dam is gone.<br />
<br />
The gristmill disappeared sometime in the late nineteenth century and there is only one photograph that survives of the mill after the roof had collapsed: <br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TNZGKaOvXPI/AAAAAAAAAFY/cjljsyfhpxM/s1600/Harrison+Gristmill.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="368" px="true" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TNZGKaOvXPI/AAAAAAAAAFY/cjljsyfhpxM/s640/Harrison+Gristmill.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br />
A number of large stones still scattered around the site denote the mill’s location, along with what, today, passes for Little Timber Creek. When the New Jersey State Highway Department constructed Interstate 295 through the Bellmawr area, they located the new freeway in the Little Timber Creek valley, pushing a portion of the stream’s water flow into what had been the tail race for the mill. The dwelling house associated with the Bromley plantation passed into the hands of the Kiker family during the twentieth century and is shown in this historic image:<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TNZGTf4HxbI/AAAAAAAAAFc/wL4eMWo_fLM/s1600/Kiker+House,+Bromley.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="406" px="true" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TNZGTf4HxbI/AAAAAAAAAFc/wL4eMWo_fLM/s640/Kiker+House,+Bromley.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br />
In 2002, the owner of the dwelling that had once served as the main house for Bromley demolished the structure, located on the south side of Rudderow Avenue in Mount Ephraim, hoping to replace it with a modern residential subdivision. These photographs depict the house just prior to its razing: <br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TNZGg8qhNMI/AAAAAAAAAFs/vJBJSQc1fss/s1600/Bromley,+facade.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" px="true" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TNZGg8qhNMI/AAAAAAAAAFs/vJBJSQc1fss/s640/Bromley,+facade.jpg" width="432" /></a></div><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TNZGkvel1FI/AAAAAAAAAFw/donZVe8b0yM/s1600/Bromley,+facade+and+west+elevation.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="420" px="true" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TNZGkvel1FI/AAAAAAAAAFw/donZVe8b0yM/s640/Bromley,+facade+and+west+elevation.jpg" width="640" /></a><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TNZGnbTU-lI/AAAAAAAAAF0/nmAQCOxhtjw/s1600/Bromley,+south+elevation.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="414" px="true" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TNZGnbTU-lI/AAAAAAAAAF0/nmAQCOxhtjw/s640/Bromley,+south+elevation.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TNZGfF88QdI/AAAAAAAAAFo/4z4dYIrHgxM/s1600/Bromley,+east+elevation.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="436" px="true" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TNZGfF88QdI/AAAAAAAAAFo/4z4dYIrHgxM/s640/Bromley,+east+elevation.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TNZGdbbmnVI/AAAAAAAAAFk/PSTl-yMI0nk/s1600/Bromley+Date+Stone+in+context.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="410" px="true" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TNZGdbbmnVI/AAAAAAAAAFk/PSTl-yMI0nk/s640/Bromley+Date+Stone+in+context.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TNZGcFnqsBI/AAAAAAAAAFg/3Ukzpn2m9v8/s1600/Bromley+Date+Stone.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="274" px="true" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TNZGcFnqsBI/AAAAAAAAAFg/3Ukzpn2m9v8/s640/Bromley+Date+Stone.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br />
A post-demolition visit allowed this author to view the remaining foundation, including the earliest portion of the house—a small cellar that originally supported a one-over-one-room house—where Richard Bromley and the Bulls had once resided. No development actually occurred on the land, so it is disappointing that area residents lost such an early and important dwelling to at the hands of someone who failed to recognize the historical significance of the property.<br />
<br />
Across the creek in Bellmawr, at the crest of Summit Avenue, stands another important house, shrouded in vinyl siding:<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TNZGrMa4HMI/AAAAAAAAAF4/QCxphtgxnpg/s1600/Hugg+House+1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="442" px="true" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TNZGrMa4HMI/AAAAAAAAAF4/QCxphtgxnpg/s640/Hugg+House+1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TNZGtnAcBSI/AAAAAAAAAF8/l_-eTxd6MDk/s1600/Hugg+House+2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="438" px="true" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TNZGtnAcBSI/AAAAAAAAAF8/l_-eTxd6MDk/s640/Hugg+House+2.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>This dwelling is a forgotten remnant of the Hugg plantation, but that is a story for another day!<br />
<br />
<br />
<strong><u>Bibliography:</u></strong><br />
Anonymous<br />
1778 Draft of Roads in New Jersey. Manuscript map. Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.<br />
<br />
Boyer, Charles S.<br />
1962 <em>Old Mills of Camden County</em>. Camden County Historical Society, Camden, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
Bush, Bernard, compiler<br />
1982 <em>Laws of the Royal Colony of New Jersey: 1760-1745</em>. New Jersey Archives, Third Series, Vol. IV. New Jersey State Library, Bureau of Archives and History, Trenton, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
Clement, John<br />
n.d. Maps & Draughts. Vol. Sixth. Manuscript. Historical Society of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.<br />
<br />
1877 <em>Sketches of the First Emigrant Settlers, Newton Township, Old Gloucester County, West New Jersey</em>. John Clement, Haddonfield, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
Crawford, Michael J. <br />
1996 <em>Naval Documents of The American Revolution</em>. Vol. 10. Naval Historical Center, Department of the Navy, Washington, D.C.<br />
<br />
Döhla, Johann Conrad<br />
1990 <em>A Hessian Diary of the American Revolution</em>. Translated and edited by Bruce E. Burgoyne. University of Oklahoma Press, Norman, Oklahoma.<br />
<br />
Du Chesnoy, Michel Capitaine<br />
1778 Carte de L’Action de Gloucester Entre un Parti Americaine D’Environs 250 Hommes Sous le Gl Lafayette et un Parti des Troupes de Lord Cornwallis Commande Par le Gel Apre Son Sorties Dans le Jersey le 25 9bre 1777. Manuscript map. Sparks Collection, Cornell University, Cornell, New York.<br />
<br />
Gloucester County Deeds<br />
Gloucester County Clerk’s Office, Woodbury, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
Gloucester County Road Return Books.<br />
Gloucester County Clerk’s Office, Woodbury, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
Hills, John<br />
1808/1814 <em>A Plan of the City of Philadelphia and Environs</em>. Annotated through December 1814. John Hills, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Map located at the Camden County Historical Society, Camden, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
Honeyman, A. Van Doren, editor<br />
1918 <em>Documents Relating to the Colonial History of the State of New Jersey. First Series, Vol. XXX. Calendar of New Jersey Wills, Administrations, etc. Vol. II : 1730-1750</em>. [New Jersey Historical Society, Newark, New Jersey].<br />
<br />
Idzerda, Stanley I., editor<br />
1977 <em>Lafayette in the Age of the American Revolution. Vol. I : December 7, 1776-March 30, 1778</em>. Cornell University Press, Ithaca, New York.<br />
<br />
1979 <em>Lafayette in the Age of the American Revolution.</em> Vol. II : April 10, 1778-March 20, 1780. Cornell University Press, Ithaca, New York.<br />
<br />
Jackson, John W.<br />
1977 <em>The Delaware Bay and River Defenses of Philadelphia : 1775-1777</em>. The Philadelphia Maritime Museum, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.<br />
<br />
1986 <em>Fort Mifflin : Valiant Defender of the Delaware</em>. Olde Fort Mifflin Historical Society, Incorporated, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.<br />
<br />
Leap, William W.<br />
1981 <em>The History of Runnemede, New Jersey: 1626-1976</em>. Borough of Runnemede, Runnemede, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
Miller, Cedric V., Project Supervisor<br />
1939 Transcriptions of the First Quarter Century Documents of Old Gloucester County, New Jersey. Volume One. Typescript. Works Project Administration, Washington, D.C.<br />
<br />
National Archives and Records Administration<br />
Record Group 15. Revolutionary War Pension and Bounty Land Warrant Application Files, Records of the Veterans Administration. National Archives Microform Publication M804. National Archives and Records Administration, Washington, D.C.<br />
<br />
Nelson, William, editor<br />
1901 <em>Documents Relating to the Colonial History of the State of New Jersey. Vol. XXIII. Calendar of New Jersey Wills, Vol. I. 1670-1730</em>. [New Jersey Historical Society, Newark, New Jersey].<br />
<br />
New Jersey Tax Ratables<br />
New Jersey tax ratables duplicates. Microform edition. New Jersey State Archives, Trenton, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
New Jersey Wills<br />
New Jersey Wills, Secretary of State records. New Jersey State Archives, Trenton, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
Pomfret, John E.<br />
1956 <em>The Province of West New Jersey: 1609-1702</em>. Princeton University Press, Princeton, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
Smith, Samuel Stelle<br />
1970 <em>Fight for the Delaware 1777</em>. Philip Freneau Press, Monmouth Beach, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
Stewart, Frank H.<br />
1929 <em>Foraging….</em> Gloucester County Historical Society, Woodbury, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
1937 <em>Notes on Old Gloucester County New Jersey</em>. Vol. 3. Frank H. Stewart, Woodbury, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
SGO (Surveyor General’s Office), Burlington, New Jersey<br />
Survey Books, microform edition. New Jersey State Archives, Trenton, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
Unrecorded Wills<br />
Unrecorded Wills, Vol. 7. New Jersey State Archives, Trenton, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
West New Jersey Deed Liber<br />
West New Jersey Deed libers. Microform Edition. New Jersey State Archives, Trenton, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
Whitehead, William A., editor<br />
1880 <em>Documents Relating to the Colonial History of the State of New Jersey. New Jersey Archives, First Series, Vol. 1.</em> [New Jersey Historical Society, Newark, New Jersey].<br />
<br />
Wilson, Thomas B.<br />
1988 <em>Notices from New Jersey Newspapers: 1781-1790</em>. Hunterdon House, Lambertville, New Jersey.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-779291837523434339.post-45867436783698645652010-10-31T17:20:00.003-04:002010-10-31T18:18:29.460-04:00Grist for the Mill: An Operational Guideby Jerseyman ©2010<br />
<br />
A gristmill exists to grind a variety of grains into flour, meal, or feedstock. While some mills derived their power from the wind, the water-powered mill ground the largest quantity of grain in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Wind could not generate the horsepower available to water-powered operations. An economy of scale existed with watermills located on never-failing streams, which remained profitable for generations, while windmills could only grind during ideal wind conditions and often suffered great damage at the mercy of the elements.<br />
<br />
Three types of waterwheels could be used at water-powered mills, depending on the topography and location. These included:<br />
<br />
1. Undershot wheel—water would strike the waterwheel at the bottom, forcing it to rotate clockwise; this method generated the least amount of horsepower and offered approximately 30% efficiency;<br />
<br />
2. Breast wheels—water arrived at the wheel through a penstock, striking the wheel just above the center-point between the top and bottom, turning the wheel clockwise; this generated more horsepower and offered an efficiency of circa 65%;<br />
<br />
3. Overshot wheels—again, water arrived to the wheel via a penstock and then dropped just beyond the top of the wheel, turning it counter-clockwise; this type of wheel generated the most horsepower available at a water-powered mill, offering an efficiency of 75%.<br />
<br />
By damming a stream and forming a millpond, the water was directed to the waterwheel through a headrace and/or a penstock-a wooden trough or iron pipe that channeled the flowing water to strike the wheel. The water would then enter the wheel “buckets” or chambers and the weight of the water would force the wheel to turn. The greater the water velocity, the faster the wheel would turn, although water traveling at a high rate of speed, such as during a freshet, would be counterproductive and could wreak major damage to the wheel and the mill. This principle applied to any and all of the three types of waterwheels outlined above.<br />
<br />
With the wheel brake released and the clutch engaged, the wheel began turning, generating horizontal power. That is, the wheel and its axle rotated on a horizontal plane. However, gristmills required power on a vertical plane to operate the grindstones. This perpendicular change in power was achieved through gearing. In early mills, these gears comprised all wood components.<br />
<br />
When grain first arrived at the mill, the miller weighed it and either stored it for future grinding or dumped it into a rolling screen that removed chaff and other impurities prior to grinding. Some mills would also run the grain through a set of stones specifically arranged to remove sand and other foreign matter before the actual grinding process occurred.<br />
<br />
The grindstones used to transform grain into flour, meal, or feedstock, were dressed with long furrows running from the inner hole to the outer edge at a set angle. These furrows would allow friction-generated heat to escape during the grinding process. They also provided a channel in which to move the finished product to the edge of the stone, into the surrounding casing or vat and out of the grinding area. Two dressed grindstones, when assembled, were known as a run of stone. The top stone, called the runner, would turn while the bottom one, called the nether or bed-stone, remained stationary. The miller would pour the grain in a hopper suspended above the run of stones. When the miller set the runner stone in motion, the grain would feed out of the hopper, onto a “shoe” and into the center of the stone assembly. The actual grinding process took place on the flat sections (called “land”) of the stone between the cut furrows. A set gap between the two stones allowed just enough room for the grain to run between them and be ground. The ground grain would drop below the grinding floor level and enter moving elevators or conveyors for transport to other processing. After the flour has moved through the grinding process, it remained warm and moist. It was necessary to cool and dry the product by spreading and raking it.<br />
<br />
The horizontal power generated by the waterwheel also powered a series of shafts and belts to operation other equipment. Once the flour or other product had been ground, it required sifting and would be placed into a bolting chest. In this machine, three or more grades or fineness of bolting fabric wrapped around a cylindrical frame sifted the ground grain into finished flour. The bolting chest was mounted at an angle to permit gravity feed of the product. The flour entered the bolting chest and passed through the fabric, trapping any oversized clumps or other impurities in the surrounding “chest.” The flour that passed through the finest cloth the miller considered finished and it could be marketed. The flour passing through the medium grade of cloth—called “middlings”—was normally reground to make it finer. The product passing through the coarsest cloth usually included the bran and other impurities and the miller either threw it away or mixed it with animal feed. After completion of this sifting or bolting process, the miller stored the finished flour in hoppers for future distribution. It could also be bagged or placed in barrels and weighed immediately preparatory to ship the finished product to market. <br />
<br />
Many improvements occurred in the milling industry over the centuries. In the United States, inventor Oliver Evans made a major contribution to mill design and construction. In 1795, Evans published his first edition of <em>The Young Mill-Wright & Miller’s Guide</em>. The Evans Mill became a standard of mill construction for many years. For those of you who do not have this work in their library, you can view a digital copy here: <br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.archive.org/stream/youngmillwrightm00evan#page/n5/mode/2up">http://www.archive.org/stream/youngmillwrightm00evan#page/n5/mode/2up</a><br />
<br />
The book is reproduced complete with all of the engraved illustrative plates, which will aid you in gaining a better understanding of what I have written here. In the 1850s, water turbines began being applied to the milling business. Supplanting the waterwheel, turbines had the capacity of generating higher horsepower ratings through greater efficiency and gearing. <br />
<br />
The nineteenth century also produced other improvements, most notably the introduction of roller mills to grind the grains into flour. Manufacturers fabricated roller mills from cast iron and the equipment consisted of corrugated rollers that ground the grain into middlings, or coarse flour. The same type of rollers without corrugation then produced the finished flour. The first roller mill in the United States began operations in 1878 and, by 1890, roller mill use grew in an ever increasing proportion. The roller mill caused many small, rural mills to close, leaving flour production to large industrial establishments. <br />
<br />
Mills used other equipment, too. Mechanical corn shellers could pull dried kernels off the husks very quickly. The miller then ground the corn either coarsely into millet, used as fowl feed, or finely ground into meal for human consumption. Over the years, millers made a concerted effort to decrease dust generated during the manufacturing process. This need resulted in the invention of numerous “dustless” machines. Dustless separators and scourers, used to further refine the ground flour, dustless sifters, dustless baggers—manufacturers produced all of this equipment to decrease the health and explosion hazards associated with any type of fine dust. As machinery became more sophisticated, it also became larger and much more expensive, providing yet another reason to create large industrial milling establishments, which displaced the smaller, rural water-powered gristmill. <br />
<br />
<u><strong>Bibliography:</strong></u><br />
<br />
Evans, Oliver <br />
1795 <em>The Young Mill-Wright & Miller’s Guide</em>. Printed for and sold by the author, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.<br />
<br />
Weiss, Harry and Robert J. Sim<br />
1957 <em>The Early Grist and Flouring Mills of New Jersey</em>. New Jersey Agricultural Society, Trenton, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
Zimiles, Martha and Murray Zimiles <br />
1973 <em>Early American Mills</em>. C.N. Potter, New York City, New York.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-779291837523434339.post-34820735231978992092010-10-17T14:47:00.023-04:002011-07-12T07:40:29.734-04:00“The Best Laid Schemes o’ Mice an’ Men, Gang aft Agley”<span style="font-size: xx-small;">(From “To A Mouse” by Robert Burns, 1785)</span><br />
<br />
by Jerseyman ©2010<br />
<br />
<em>Evidence of the London and Yorkshire Friends’ erstwhile settlement plans for the Eastern Shore of the Delaware River below the Falls and why they quickly came to naught</em><br />
<br />
<em>The Period from 1664 to 1675</em><br />
After England won New Netherland, including the Zuydt or Delaware River, from the Dutch without firing a shot in 1664, James, the Duke of York, gifted the land comprising present-day New Jersey to Lord Berkeley and Sir George Carteret. The name “New Jersey” or <em>Nova Caesarea</em> pays homage to Carteret’s governorship of the Isle of Jersey in 1649, a location he successfully defended for the Royalists (Smith 1765 [1877]:35-51). Following the rout of the Dutch, the English sought to develop settlements along the eastern shore of the Delaware River. In February 1666 (n.s.), New Jersey Governor Philip Carteret wrote from New York to “<span style="color: orange;">Mr. Wm. Jones and the rest of the undertakers of the Plantation upon Delaware bay or River</span>” (Whitehead 1880:51-54). No further records have been found regarding this “plantation” and it is unknown whether settlement actually occurred. The proposed plan does suggest, however, an English determination to quickly establish farms and communities within the new territory won from the Dutch. In July 1673 the Dutch reclaimed New Netherland, albeit temporarily, when warships from Holland sailed into New York Harbor during the third Anglo-Dutch War. In February 1674 the Hollanders surrendered all of its New Netherland lands in finality to the English under terms provided in the Treaty of Westminster, which ended the war. With the territory back in British control, King Charles II issued a new patent for New Jersey to his brother, the Duke of York. James, in turn, executed a new deed of conveyance to Carteret for the same (Prowell 1886:23). <br />
<br />
With the Dutch governmental presence permanently removed from the territory, English settlers began arriving in earnest along the Delaware River seven years prior to William Penn establishing Pennsylvania, and occupied either new settlements or, in some cases, lands taken from the Dutch, Finns, and Swedes. The westward movement from Great Britain for settling the eastern shore of the Delaware River began with John Fenwick arriving and establishing his colony in Salem, New Jersey during 1675. Fenwick acquired title to one-half of New Jersey from Lord Berkeley in 1674 under Berkeley’s original deed of 1664. Edward Byllynge, a bankrupt London merchant and brewmaster, acted as a silent partner in the transaction. Byllynge’s creditors protested Fenwick’s acquisition of this large expanse of land, suspecting that Byllynge paid for it with money that rightfully belonged to them. Most of the creditors were members of the Society of Friends from London and Yorkshire, so, to resolve the disagreement, they collectively prevailed upon William Penn, Gawen Laurie, and Nicholas Lucas to act as trustees and mediators in deference to formal public court action. After due consideration and some rancorous negotiations, the three trustees granted one-tenth of the one-half of New Jersey to Fenwick in a tripartite deed and viewed him as a partner or tenant in common in the undivided land. However, Fenwick, always desirous of establishing his own colony, wasted no time in gathering a group of Friends to settle Salem, Fenwick’s Colony. The group of “adventurers” sailed for the New World in June 1675, an action that incensed Penn, Laurie, and Lucas as Fenwick had signed an agreement to participate in the division of the entire landmass, receiving one-tenth of the each 10,000-acre block. Instead, Fenwick chose to take his land in one block, selling 148,000 acres to fifty investors and settlers (Pomfret 1956:62-75). <br />
<br />
<em>William Penn,</em> et al<em>., Commission James Wasse, Richard Guy, and Richard Hartshorne as Agents</em><br />
In an effort to counteract Fenwick’s territorial usurpation, William Penn and company requested that James Wasse, a London Churgeon (surgeon) who was planning to travel to Maryland to purchase a tobacco plantation during August 1676, serve as an agent in settling matters in West New Jersey. Penn and the other trustees provided Wasse with a set of 15 itemized instructions for directing his actions and that of Richard Hartshorne and Richard Guy in their roles as agents. Hartshorne had emigrated to New Jersey in 1669; Richard Guy had acquired 10,000 acres and James Wasse had purchased 5,000 acres from Fenwick while still in London. Guy then sailed with Fenwick to the New World in 1675. Wasse also carried a draft copy of the West New Jersey Concessions and Agreements to the New World for Penn, <em>et al.</em> The instruction document read as follows:<br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">London, the 18th of 6th month called August, 1676 (o.s.).</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">We whose names are hereunder subscribed, do give full power, commission and authority, unto James Wasse, Richard Hartshorne and Richard Guy, or any two of them, to act and do for us according to the following instructions; and we do engage to ratify and confirm whatsoever they shall do in prosecution of the same.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">1. We desire you to get a meeting with John Fenwick, and the people that went with him, (but we would not have you tell your business,) until you get them together; then show and read the deed of partition with George Carteret; also the transactions between William Penn, Nicholas Lucas, Gawen Lawrie, John Edridge and Edmond Warner, and then read our letter to John Fenwick and the rest, and shew John Fenwick he hath no power to sell any land there, without the consent of John Edridge and Edmond Warner. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">2. Know of John Fenwick, if he will be willing peaceably to let the land he hath taken up of the natives be divided into one hundred parts, according to our and his agreement in England, casting lots for the same, we being willing that those who being settled and have cultivated ground now with him, shall enjoy the same, without being turned out, although they fall into our lots: Always provided, that we be reimbursed the like value and quantity in goodness out of John Fenwick’s lots: And we are also content to pay our ninetieth parts of what is paid to the natives for the same, and for what James Wasse hath purchased of John Fenwick, and he setting out the same unto him, not being in a place to be allotted for a town upon a river, but at a distance, and the said John Fenwick allowing us the like value in goodness in some other of his lots; we are willing he shall possess the same from any claiming by or under us; and for the town lots we are willing he enjoy the same as freely as any purchaser buying of us.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">3. Take information from some that knows the soundings of the river and creeks, and that is acquainted in the country, and when James Wasse is in Maryland, he may enquire for one Agustine, who as we hear did found most part of Delaware river and the creeks: He is an able surveyor; see to agree with him to go with you up the river as far as over against New-Castle, or further if you can, so far as a vessel of a hundred tun can go; for we intend to have a way cut cross the country to Sandy-Hook; so the further up the way, the shorter: and there, upon some creek or bay, in some healthy ground, find out a place fit to make a settlement for a town; and then go to the Indians, and agree with them for a tract of land about the said place, of twenty or thirty miles long, more or less, as you see meet, and as broad as you see meet. If it be to the middle, we care not; only enquire if George Carteret, have not purchased some there already, that so you may not buy it over again.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">4. Then lay out four or five thousand acres for a town; and if Agustin will undertake to do it reasonably, let him do it; for he is the fittest man; and if he think he cannot survey so much, being in the winter time, then let him lay out the less for a town at present, if it be but two thousand acres, and let him divide it in a hundred parts; and when it is done, let John Fenwick, if he please, be there; however, let him have notice: But however, let some of you be there, to see the lots cast fairly by one person that is not concerned, The lots are from number one to a hundred, and put the same numbers of the lots on the partition trees for distinction.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">5. If John Fenwick, and those concerned with him, be willing to join with you in those things as above, which is just and fair, then he or any of them, may go along with you in your business; and let them pay their proportion of what is paid to the natives, with other charges: And so he and they may dispose of their lots with consent of John Edridge and Edmund Warner; which lots are, 20, 21, 26, 27, 36, 47, 50, 57, 63, 72.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">6. If John Fenwick and his people, refuse to let the land they have taken up of the natives be divided, and refuse to join with you; you may let the country know in what capacity John Fenwick stands, that he hath no power over the persons or estates of any man or woman more than any other person. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">7. What land you take of the natives, let it be taken, viz. ninety parts for the use of William Penn, Gawen Lawrie and Nicholas Lucas, and ten parts for John Edridge and Edmond Warner.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">8. After you have taken the land as above, and divided for a town or settlement, and cast lots for the same as above; then if any have a mind to buy one or more proprieties, sell them at two hundred pound specie; they taking their lots as theirs do; paying to you in hand the value of fifty pounds in part of a propriety, and the rest on sealing their conveyance in London; and so they may presently settle. When any of the lots fall to us, that is to say, he that buyeth a propriety may settle on any one lot of ninety parts; which said persons that buys, and what lots falls to them, there they may settle, and acquaint us what numbers they are; and if any will take land to them and their heirs forever, for every acre taken up in a place laid out for a town, according to the concessions, they are not to have above what shall fall by lot to a propriety in a town.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">9. What charges James Wasse is at, by taking up the land of the natives, we do oblige to pay the same unto him again, with what profits is usual there upon English goods; and he may pitch upon two lots, one in each town; if they be taken up before he comes away, to his own proper use, for his trouble and pains: And we do also engage to allow and pay what charges any of our commissioners shall disburse in executing these our instructions, to them or their assigns.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">10. Let us be advised by the first ship that cometh for England, of all proceedings hereupon, and write to the friends at Sandy-Hook, letting them know how things are, and that we have divided with George Carteret, and that our division is all along on Delaware river; and that we have made concessions by ourselves, which we hope will satisfy friends there. If John Fenwick, or any of the people with him, desire a copy of the deed of partition, let them have it.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">11. We desire that our original deed may be kept in your own custody, that it may be ready to shew unto the rest of the commissioners, which we intend to send over in the spring, with full power for settling things, and to lay out land, and dispose upon it, and for the settling some method of government according to the concessions.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">12. If you cannot get Agustine to go with you or that he be unreasonable in his demands; then send a man to Thomas Bushroods, at Essex lodge, in York river, for William Elliot, who writes to Gawin Lawrie this year, and offered himself to be surveyor, and tell him you had orders from said Lawrie to send for him, and take him with you. He will be willing to be there all winter, and will survey and do other things. He had a good character in Virginia, but was not able to keep it; he is a fair conditioned sober man: Let him stay there all winter, and order him something to live upon.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">13. If the said Elliot go with you, give him directions what to do. If you cannot stay ’till a place for a town be surveyed, yet we think you may stay until you have not only pitched upon a place for a town, but also upon a place for a second town and settlement, and have marked out the place round about there, and let William Elliot divide both, which no doubt but he may do before the spring, that we send over more commissioners and people; and if John Fenwick be willing to go on jointly with you there, his surveyor may go along and help ours, and the charges shall be brought in for both proportionably on all. Mind this, and speak to Richard Guy, or Richard Hartshorne, and leave orders with them to let William Elliot have provisions for himself ’till spring, and we shall order them satisfaction for the same; and if there be no house near the place you take up for the surveyors to lodge in, then let there be a cottage built for them on the place, and we will allow the charges.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">14. And whereas there is tackling there already, for fitting of a sloop, as we judge, in the custody of Richard Guy: We also give you power if you see meet, and that it be of necessary use and advantage for the whole concern, you may order these ship-carpenters to build a sloop suitable for these materials, and appoint them some provision for their food, and for the rest of their wages they shall either have it in a part of the sloop, or be otherwise satisfied in the spring of the year; the said sloop to be ordered and disposed upon by you until more commissioners come over with further instructions.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">15. For the goods we have sent over with James Wasse are to be disposed of for purchasing land from the natives or otherwise as need is, giving us account thereof.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">NICHOLAS LUCAS</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">WILLIAM PENN</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">EDMOND WARNER</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">GAWIN LAWRIE</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">E. BYLLINGE</span><br />
(Dunn and Dunn 1981:411-414)<br />
<br />
Eight days after Penn and the other London Friends drafted the instructions for Wasse, Hartshorne, and Guy, the same five men, along with John Edridge (Eldridge), penned a letter to Richard Hartshorne, who resided on his estate named “Portland,” located near present-day Middletown in Monmouth County. The Londoners desired to clarify their instructions to Hartshorne, whom they trusted and knew would come to no harm from Fenwick and his influences. <br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">Richard Hartshorne.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">London, 26th of the 6th month, 1676 (o.s.).</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">We have made use of thy name in a commission and instructions, which we have sent by James Wasse, who is gone in Samuel Groome’s ship for Maryland; a copy of which is here inclosed, and also a copy of a letter we have sent to John Fenwick, to be read to him in presence of as many of the people that went with him as may be; and because we both expect, and also entreat, and desire thy assistance in the same we will a little shew things to thee, that thou may inform not only thyself; but friends there; which in short is as follows</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">1st. We have divided with George Carteret, and have sealed deeds of partition, each to the other; and we have all that side on Delaware river from one end to the other; the line of partition is from the east side of little Egg Harbour, straight North, through the country, to the utmost branch of Delaware river; with all powers, privileges, and immunities whatsoever: ours is called New West-Jersey, his is called New East-Jersey.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">2d. We have made concessions by ourselves, being such as friends here and there (we question not) will approve of; having sent a copy of them by James Wasse; there we lay a foundation for after ages to understand their liberty as men and christians, that they may not be brought in bondage, but by their own consent; for we put the power in the people, that is to say, they to meet and choose one honest man for each propriety, who hath subscribed to the concessions; all these men to meet as an assembly there, to make and repeal laws, to choose a governor, or a commissioner, and twelve assistants, to execute the laws during their pleasure; so every man is capable to choose or be chosen: No man to be arrested, condemned, imprisoned, or molested in his estate or liberty, but by twelve men of the neighbourhood: No man to lie in prison for debt, but that his estate satisfy as far as it will go, and be set at liberty to work: No person to be called in question or molested for his conscience, or for worshipping according to his conscience; with many more things mentioned in the said concessions.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">3. We have sent over by James Wasse, a commission under our hands and seals, wherein we impower thyself; James Wasse and Richard Guy, or any two of you, to act and do according to the instructions, of which here is a copy; having also sent some goods, to buy and purchase some land of the natives.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">4. We intend in the spring to send over some more commissioners, with the friends and people that cometh there, because James Wasse is to return in Samuel Groom’s ship for England: for Richard Guy, we judge him to be an honest man, yet we are afraid that John Fenwick will hurt him, and get him to condescend to things that may not be for the good of the whole; so we hope thou wilt ballance him to what is just and fair; that John Fenwick betray him not, that things may go on easy without hurt or jar; which is the desire of all friends; and we hope West Jersey will be soon planted; it being in the minds of many friends to prepare for their going against the spring.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">5. Having thus far given thee a sketch of things, we come now to desire thy assistance, and the assistance of other friends in your parts; and we hope it will be at length an advantage to you there, both upon truth’s account, and other ways; and in regard many families more may come over in the spring to Delaware side, to settle and plant, and will be assigned by us to take possession of their particular lots; we do entreat and desire, that thou, knowing the country, and how to deal with the natives; we say, that thee, and some other friends, would go over to Delaware side, as soon as this comes to your hands, or as soon as you can conveniently; and James Wasse is to come to a place called New-Castle, on the other side of Delaware river, to stay for thee, and any that will go with him; and you all to advise together, and find out a fit place to take up for a town, and agree with the natives for a tract of land; and then let it be surveyed and divided in one hundred parts; for that is the method we have agreed to take, and we cannot alter it; and if you set men to work to clear some of the ground, we would be at the charges; and we do intend to satisfy thee for any charge thou art at, and for thy pains: This we would not have neglected; for we know, and you that are there know, that if the land be not taken up before the spring, that many people come over there, the natives will insist on high demands, and so we shall suffer by buying at dear rates, and our friends that cometh over, be at great trouble and charges until a place be bought and divided; for we do not like the tract of land John Fenwick hath bought, so as to make it our first settlement; but we would have thee and friends there, to provide and take up a place on some creek or river, that may lie nearer you, and such a place as you may like; for may be it may come in your minds to come over to our side, when you see the hand of the Lord with us; and so we can say no more, but leave the thing with you, believing that friends there will have a regard to friends settling, that it may be done in that way and method, that may be for the good of the whole; rest thy friends,</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">GAWEN LAURIE,</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">WILLIAM PENN,</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">NICHOLAS LUCAS,</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">E. BYLLINGE,</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">JOHN EDRIDGE,</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">EDMOND WARNER.</span><br />
(Dunn and Dunn 1981:416-418)<br />
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Based on the instructional document quoted above, Penn and the other trustees designated Wasse to negotiate with John Fenwick concerning land title issues and his disregard of the signed agreement. The first two paragraphs of the instructions describe how Wasse and the other agents should deal with Fenwick and his settlers, as did various other sections in the instructional document. Penn, <em>et al</em>., then directed Wasse to meet with Fenwick and as many of his followers as possible, and inform them that the title to their land might be unfounded. Fenwick’s continuing capricious actions finally led to his arrest and imprisonment in New York under Governor Andros. He returned to Salem under probation in October 1677 and continued to create problems for Penn and the other trustees (Whitehead 1880:220-224; Pomfret 1956:76-79). <br />
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<em>James Wasse and the Settlement of Lands above Fenwick’s Colony</em><br />
Dealing with the Fenwick problem was not Wasse’s only assignment. In an effort to leapfrog around the issues surrounding Fenwick and his Salem colony, paragraph three of the commissioning document orders Wasse to locate land for a Town: <br />
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<span style="color: orange;">…thereupon some Creek or bay in some halthy Ground find out a Place fitt to make a Setlment for a Towne and then goe to the Indians and agree wth Them for a Track of Land about the said place of Tuenty or Therty myles long more or less as yee see met, and as broad as yow see meet…</span>. (Dunn and Dunn 1981:412) <br />
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In paragraph four, Penn commissions Wasse to layout the town:<br />
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<span style="color: orange;">…Then Lay out four—or five Thousand Akers for a Towne and if Agustine will undertake to doe it reasonably lett him doe it for He is the fittest Man and if He think he cannot Survey soe much being in the winter time then let him lay out the less for a Towne at present If it be but two Thousand Akers and let him devide it in a hundred parts…</span><span style="color: black;">.</span> (<em>ibid</em>.)<br />
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Paragraph 13 of the instructions states that Wasse should <span style="color: orange;">“…not only pitched upon a place for a town, but also upon a place for a second town and settlement, and have marked out a place round about there…</span>” (Dunn and Dunn 1981:414). Wasse carried out his orders concerning settlements with all due diligence. He did fail in obtaining the services of the surveyors suggested in the instructions, so Wasse likely employed Fenwick’s surveyor, Richard Hancock, who worked with Wasse without Fenwick’s knowledge or approval. During the period when Wasse used Hancock’s surveying abilities, Fenwick was languishing in the New York gaol following his arrest by Governor Andros. He later complained bitterly, “<span style="color: orange;">James Wasse and Richard Guy began vigorously to seize upon my said colony causing the same to be survey by Richard Hancock (my sworn surveyor-general) without my knowledge</span>” (Stewart 1939:34). Upon completing his work under the terms of the instructions, Wasse most certainly provided the London Friends with a full written report, but that report has never been found, although many have searched. We only have one evidentiary exhibit that clearly delineates what Dr. James Wasse has accomplished: the John Thornton and Robert Greene undated publication, <em>A Mapp of Virginia Mary-land, New-Jarsey, New-York, & New England</em>.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TLtCOpIsKLI/AAAAAAAAAFI/7wVF25T3t5c/s1600/Thornton-Greene+Map+Detail+copy.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" ex="true" height="640" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TLtCOpIsKLI/AAAAAAAAAFI/7wVF25T3t5c/s640/Thornton-Greene+Map+Detail+copy.jpg" width="458" /></a></div><br />
Despite the lack of a stated publication date, we can be safe in stating that Thornton and Greene published this map in late 1677 or in early 1678, due to the depiction of both Wasse’s proposed settlements and the label “Bridlington” appearing on the map together. Whether other states of this map exists or did exist is unknown to this author.<br />
<br />
<em>The 1677 arrival of the London and Yorkshire Settlers</em><br />
Gregory Marlow’s good ship KENT carried the first group of Quaker adventurers to West New Jersey since Fenwick departed England in June 1675. The KENT arrived in New Castle, Delaware, on 16 September 1677 and then proceeded up the Delaware to the Swedish settlement centered on Raccoon Creek, where they established temporary quarters. Meanwhile, the appointed commissioners left the remaining pioneers while still at New Castle and traveled up the Delaware to a location known as Chygoes Island. The island’s name, formerly thought to be the name of an Indian chief, is actually a corruption of Peter Jegou’s surname. Jegou, a Frenchman, had arrived on the Delaware prior to 1663 and taken up land, probably as a squatter, in present-day East Burlington near the confluence of the Assiscunk Creek and the Delaware, where he established a tavern at Lassa Point (DeCou 1945:3-4). The group of commissioners carried a number of Swedish interpreters for negotiations with the indigenous people concerning the lands the Friends desired to purchase. The commissioners departed the meeting with three transactions: all the land from Oldman’s Creek to Timber Creek; all the land from Timber Creek to Rancocas Creek; and all the land from Rancocas Creek to the Assunpink Creek near the Falls. The Yorkshire Friends chose the Falls as their settlement location and the commissioners declared the purchase of land between the Rancocas Creek and the Assunpink Creek as the First Tenth. The Londoners selected Wasse’s town location at <em>Arawames</em> for their settlement and the commissioners labeled the land between the Rancocas Creek and Timber Creek as the Second Tenth. The land between Timber Creek and Oldman’s Creek then became the original Third Tenth (Smith 1765 [1877]:92-98). <br />
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Based on information appearing on the Thornton and Greene map, Wasse’s Bethlem Township, a.k.a. <em>Arawames</em>, an old aboriginal name, would serve as the new home for the initial settlers who arrived on the Delaware from London. Historian Samuel Smith writes, “<span style="color: orange;">To begin a settlement there, [Thomas] Olive [of London] sent up servants to cut hay for cattle he had bought…</span><span style="color: black;">”</span> from the Swedes (Smith 1765 [1877]:98). The Yorkshire Friends assumed control of Wasse’s second planned settlement, a 5,000-acre reserve at the Falls of the Delaware—the present site of Trenton. When the Yorkshire pioneers realized the distance that separated their settlement from that of the Londoners, however, they quickly told those at <em>Arawames </em>“<span style="color: orange;">…</span><span style="color: orange;">if they would agree to fix by them, they would join in settling a town, and that they should have the largest share, in consideration that they (the Yorkshire commissioners) had the best land in the woods: Being few, and the Indians numerous, they [the Londoners] agreed to it</span>” (<em>ibid</em>.). <br />
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When the two groups agreed to settle together, they selected a location approximately halfway between the Falls and <em>Arawames</em>: Chygoes Island, where the land negotiations with the Indians had occurred just a couple of weeks before. Richard Noble, who had arrived with Fenwick, laid out the new town for the two groups of Friends (Smith 1765 [1877]:98). Initially, the nascent settlement carried several names, including “New Beverley” and “Bridlington,” before the founders agreed on “Burlington.” With the change in settlement patterns, the boundary lines for the Tenths underwent revision, with the First Tenth now extending from the Falls to the center of High Street, Burlington. The Second Tenth included the land between the center of High Street to the Pennsauken Creek, while the Third Tenth now covered the land between the Pennsauken Creek and Big Timber Creek. The new Fourth Tenth extended between Big Timber Creek and Oldman’s Creek (Snyder 1969:12, 29). <br />
<br />
The third identified location on the Thornton and Greene map associated with James Wasse is Antioch Township, which Wasse based on the 5,000 acres he had purchased from Fenwick while still in London. It is only this toponym that appears in the early land records of West New Jersey as Wasse sold off portions of the tract (Nelson 1899:, 397, 513, 550). Notice that Antioch Township appears on the map to wrap around Salem, as if Wasse, either consciously or even subconsciously, attempted to contain Fenwick’s ambitions through the barrier of owning the land immediately outside the boundaries of the Salem colony. When the London settlers abandoned <em>Arawames</em> and most of the Yorkshire pioneers left the Falls and relocated to Burlington within a month after arriving, Wasse’s proposed and surveyed settlements at the Falls and Bethlem Township quietly evaporated into the fog of history and they remain missing from much of the documentary historical record. The name “Bethlem Township” quickly fell into disuse, but settlements occurred within the land it comprised beginning in 1681 with the Newton Colony. Gloucester Town followed three years later, initially under the name “<em>Arawames</em>” (Mickle 1845:34, 48).<br />
<br />
It seems painfully obvious that John Pomfret and other historians who sought to provide us with substantive and factual early histories of West New Jersey never viewed the Thornton and Greene map. If they had viewed it, these scholars would have reached the same conclusions that I have discussed above.<br />
<br />
<strong><u>Bibliography:</u></strong><br />
<br />
De Cou, George<br />
1945 <em>Burlington: A Provincial Capital.</em> Library Company of Burlington, Burlington, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
Dunn, Mary Maples and Richard S. Dunn, editors<br />
1981 <em>The Papers of William Penn. Volume One : 1644-1679</em>. University of Pennsylvania Press, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.<br />
<br />
Mickle, Isaac<br />
1845 <em>Reminiscences of Old Gloucester:….</em> Townsend Ward, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.<br />
<br />
Nelson, William, editor<br />
1899 <em>Documents Relating to the Colonial History of the State of New Jersey, Volume XXI, Calendar of Records in the Office of the Secretary of State, 1664-1703.</em> [The New Jersey Historical Society, Newark, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
Prowell, George R.<br />
1886 <em>The History of Camden County, New Jersey</em>. L.J. Richards & Company, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.<br />
<br />
Pomfret, John E.<br />
1956 <em>The Province of West New Jersey : 1609-1702</em>. Princeton University Press, Princeton, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
Smith, Samuel<br />
1765[1877] <em>The History of the Colony of Nova-Cæsaria, or New-Jersey….</em> Second Edition. William S. Sharp, Trenton, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
Snyder, John P. <br />
1969 <em>The Story of New Jersey’s Civil Boundaries.</em> Bureau of Geology and Topography, Trenton, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
Stewart, Frank<br />
1939 <em>Major John Fenwick</em>. Salem Standard and Jerseyman, Salem, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
Thornton, John and Robert Greene<br />
[c. 1678] <em>A Mapp of Virginia Mary-land, New-Jarsey, New-York, & New England. John Thornton at the Sundyall in the Minories and Robert Greene at ye Rose and Crowne, in Budg-rowe, London, England.</em><br />
<br />
Whitehead, William A., editor<br />
1880 <em>Documents Relating to the Colonial History of the State of New Jersey. New Jersey Archives, First Series, Vol. 1</em>. [New Jersey Historical Society, Newark, New Jersey].Unknownnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-779291837523434339.post-35774992020146249892010-09-26T20:20:00.016-04:002010-09-29T19:30:40.339-04:00JERSEYISMSby Jerseyman ©2010<br />
<br />
While conducting some etymological research on local colloquialisms and idioms a year or two ago, I came across the incredible source provided below, which I have completely reformatted for blog posting. Since the publication of this material first occurred in 1896, it serves as a bridge between our modern twenty-first century age and the language employed by nineteenth- and even eighteenth-century New Jersey citizens. I hope you enjoy this information as much as I did. If you are aware of any historic Jerseyisms that do not appear below, please submit them in the form of a comment to this page.<br />
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The following text extracted from <em>Dialect Notes</em>, Vol. 1, 1896, pages 327-337, 382-383:<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="color: orange; font-size: large;"><strong>JERSEYISMS.</strong></span></div><br />
<span style="color: orange;">Mr. F. B. Lee, of Trenton, assisted by various persons throughout the state, has collected the following list. He writes: “It will be understood that these are mostly to be found in Cape May and other lower counties. I have not gone far from the coast. In the preparation of the collection (which will doubtless be found incomplete), I have included words not distinctly local with those which are undoubtedly provincial. To many friends in various parts of the state I am indebted for words which appear in these pages. Those who have materially aided me are —</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">Benjamin F. Lee, Trenton, </span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">Hannah L. Townsend, Dennisville, </span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">William E. Trout, Dennisville, </span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">Mary L. Townsend, Trenton, </span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">Marie Bryan Eayre, Vincentown, </span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">Dr. J. S. Brown, Vincentown, </span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">Charles G. Garrison, Merchantville, </span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">William Garrison, Camden.” </span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">Jersey is the form used by the natives, instead of the New Jersey of the geographies. We have followed the usage in editing the list; our abbreviations, N.J., C.J., and S.J., mean, therefore, North, Central, and South Jersey respectively.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>afeared</strong>: afraid. Common in all parts of the state.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>afore</strong>: common in all parts of the state.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>ague</strong>: pron. <em>eigar</em>.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>alluz</strong> (ol<em>ǝ</em>z): common pron. of <em>always</em>.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>anen, anend, anan, nan</strong>: interrogative word used to a limited extent in S.J. Halliwell says it implies “How ? What did you say?” In this he is correct. Cooper uses the word, and undoubtedly learned it in his old home at Burlington. Cf. DeVere.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>anxious seat, anxious bench</strong>: the seat or bench near the altar where persons concerned for their spiritual welfare may sit during revivals. Preserved by the Methodist and Baptist communities in S.J. and C.J. Fast falling out of use. </span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>apple palsy</strong>: “plain drunk” caused by too much “jack” (<em>q.v.</em>). (Burlington County)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>aside</strong>: used in an expression “Are you aside?” meaning, “Have you your household goods in order after moving ?” (C.J.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>asparagus</strong>: pron. <em>spærǝgrǝs</em>.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>ax</strong>: old form of <em>ask</em>. Retained in N.J. as well as in the South. Cf. DeVere.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>back-load</strong>: maximum quantity of game which a man can carry on his back; as, “a back-load of ducks.” (Coast.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>bag o’ guts</strong>: a useless individual; a “bum.” (S. and C.J.) Also implies a big man with little brains.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>barnacle</strong>: in Cape May used incorrectly for limpet found on oysters.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>bateau</strong>: used only by oystermen. A small, flat-bottomed boat.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>be</strong>: used for both <em>am</em> and <em>are</em>; as, “I be going,” “we be going.” </span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>beant</strong>: negative form of above; used for both <em>am not</em> and <em>are not</em>. </span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>beach</strong>: sand islands on Jersey coast. “Young” or “little beach” is new-made beach containing younger timber; “old beach,” parallel ridges crowned by old timber.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>beard</strong>: the byssus of mussels or the fringe on an oyster’s mouth. (S.J.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>belly-wax</strong>: molasses candy. (S.J.) Often pron. <em>Bailey-wax</em>.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>belly-whistle</strong>: a drink made of molasses, vinegar, water, and nutmeg, used by harvesters at the daily nooning.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>bender</strong>: common in N.J. </span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>blatherskite</strong>: common in N.J. Cf. DeVere.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>blicky</strong> <strong>(blickie, blickey)</strong>: a small bucket or pail. Said to be Dutch in its origin, but used extensively in S.J., where there are no Dutch.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>blister</strong>: an oyster smaller than a quarter dollar. Used from Barnegat south to Cape May.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>blocks</strong>: used in North Jersey for <em>streets</em> or <em>squares</em> (<em>q.v.</em>). [Influence of New York City, where the “block” is the regular unit of distance — 20 blocks = a mile.]</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>bloomeries</strong>: iron forges in S.J. (Law of 1779.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>blowhard</strong>: a noisy, demonstrative, self-important person.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>board-bank</strong>: floor of boards, placed on the bed of a creek near the shore, on which oysters are laid to “fatten.” See floats.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>boom-pole</strong>: pole used to hold a load of hay on a wagon. [<em>Binding-pole</em> is used in this sense in Connecticut. — E. H. B.]</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>boughten</strong>: that which has been bought, as distinguished from what has been given. DeVere confines it to New York, but it is very common in N. J. <em>E.g.</em> “Were those melons boughten or guv to you?” [Known in N. E., but generally used in distinction from <em>home-made</em>.]</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>boyzee</strong>: boy ; as, “when I was a boyzee.”</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>brackwater</strong>: salt water of bay or river, near shore, modified by flow of fresh water. The adjective “brackish” is more commonly used.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>braes</strong>: burned and charred wood in a charcoal pit.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>buck</strong>: a fop. Used contemptuously; “he’s a pretty buck, now ain’t he?” Also <em>bucle-a-dandy</em>, with the same meaning.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>back-darting</strong>: a zigzag method of sailing employed on tide-water creeks.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>bull</strong>: terrapin 3 or 4 inches across the belly. Five are required for a “count,” or 60 to a dozen. (S.J.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>bull nose</strong>: a useless hard clam. (Cape May County.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>bulldoze</strong>: common in Jersey. [See Century Diet, and Murray.]</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>bullrag, bullyrag</strong>: to tease, domineer over. (S.J.) [See Murray, <em>s.v</em>.]</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>butterfingered</strong>: an adjective used to describe a person whose powers of retaining an article in his grasp are not great. (C. and S.J.) [Known elsewhere, but generally confined to base-ball.]</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>by-and-by</strong>: pron. <em>baim bai</em>.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>calk</strong>: pron. <em>kork</em>.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>careful</strong>: pron. <em>karfl</em>.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>chaw</strong>: common pron. for <em>chew</em>.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>chinkin</strong>: boards, sticks, or clay used to fill spaces between logs in cabin building.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>chunker</strong>: coal boat used on the canal. (N.J.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>cions, scions</strong>: pron. <em>science</em> (<em>saiǝns</em>) in S.J. Young growth of oak timber. Pines and cedars have no scions. To “science” (verb) is to cut off these sprouts.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>clink</strong>: used of two chairs which are tilted so as partially to support each other, each having two legs on the floor.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>clucker</strong>: frozen oysters. (S.J.) See <strong>rattlers</strong>.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>cluttert</strong>: for <em>cluttered. E.g</em>. “cluttert into heaps.”</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>coal</strong>: charcoal. (S.J.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>collier</strong>: charcoal-burner. (S.J.) A place in Ocean County is named “Collier's Mill.”</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>coon oyster</strong>: small oyster attached to the sedge rather than to the usual more solid supports.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>count</strong>: terrapin six inches across belly, fit for market. (S.J.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>count clams</strong>: quahaugs, 800 to the barrel. </span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">c<strong>ow</strong>: six-inch female terrapin. (S.J.) (One “count.”)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>cowcumber</strong>: for cucumber</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>crib</strong>: horizontal sticks piled triangularly around the “fergen” (<em>q.v</em>.) in charcoal burning. (S.J.) Sticks of cord-wood placed at right angles (usually in fours) to form a column against which cord-wood may be piled in “ranks.”</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>crock</strong>: earthenware vessel. (Common in S.J.) </span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>cubby</strong>: a little hollow-square cabin. (Charcoal industry.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>cubby-hole</strong>: place in a garret where refuse is stored. [The word is familiar to some New Englanders in the sense of a little cosey place, behind furniture, or in a hay-mow, for instance, where one or two children might hide.]</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>cull</strong>: to assort (oysters). Poor oysters are <em>cullins</em>.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>culls</strong>: the grade next to the poorest.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>cullinteens</strong>: bushel oysters ; like <em>callings</em> or <em>cullens</em>.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>curricle</strong>: two-horse chaise. (Law of March 20, 1778.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>damnify</strong>: to injure. Law of 1677 (referring to hogs running loose) “in damnifying meadows by rooting.”</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>daubin</strong>: mud between the logs in a log house.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>dicked</strong>: arrayed. Possible corruption of “decked.” Not very common.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>dod (dod blasted, dod slammed, etc.)</strong>: for “God” in quasi-profanity. [p. 84.]</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>dominies</strong>: common in Jersey in an adjective sense. <em>E.g</em>. “a dominie-lookin’ feller."</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>double up</strong>: to marry.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>downcome</strong>: a fall or attendant disaster. Used with reference to politics.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>down felowyers</strong>: used in Cape May County to indicate people from the southern part of the county. (Corruption of <em>down belowyers</em>.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>dreg, drudge</strong>: pronunciations for <em>dredge</em> among the oystermen.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>drugged</strong>: pret. of <em>drag</em>.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>dubersome</strong>: doubtful. (C.J.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>durgen</strong>: old horse, worn out by use. (S.J.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>Durham boat</strong>: used on Delaware River till 1835. Washington probably used them in crossing before the battle of Trenton. They were sharp-pointed, flat-bottomed scows, built to run the rapids in the hill country. They were common in the colonial period between the “Forks” at Easton and Burlington City.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>earnest</strong>: pron. <em>aerrast.</em></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>errand</strong>: pron. <em>erant</em>. [Known also in N. E.]</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>extra meetins</strong> : certain periods devoted, in Baptist and Methodist circles, to special religious services of the nature of revivals.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>eye opener</strong>: big drink of liquor; say, “four fingers.”</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>fag eend:</strong> the end piece of anything.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>fast land</strong>: upland near coast. (S. J.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>faze</strong>: to injure. As noun in “he went through and nary a faze.” (S. and C.J.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>fellies</strong>: pl. of <em>felloe</em>. (Law of 1766.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>fergen</strong>: centre pole in a charcoal pit, forming the central part of the “crib” (<em>q.v</em>.). (S. J.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>field</strong>: deserted farm overgrown with pine, scrub oak, and brambles. Some of these <em>fields</em> — the term is equivalent to<em> plantation</em> —are from a century to a century and a half old. Distinguishing names are Broomstick Ridge Field, Lawrence Field, etc. (Cape May County names).</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>firing place</strong>: spot suitable for charcoal burning.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>fist</strong>: “to make a bad fist of it”; to make mistakes or do work incorrectly.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>flirch</strong>: abundant. (S. J.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>floats</strong>: (charcoal industry) irregular sods laid on “four-foot lengths,” over which sand is placed. (Oyster industry) pens of boards placed in fresh water, upon which oysters fatten during one tide. They are then marketable by the thousand.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>folks</strong>: immediate family. [Also N. E. In Connecticut I have heard men say “my folks,” meaning strictly “my wife,” though there were others in the family. —E. H. B.]</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>footy</strong>: small, insignificant. [Professor Sheldon knows the word in Maine as a noun = <em>simpleton</em>. There is also a N. E. expression “footin’ around” (û) = fussing, busying one’s self uselessly.]</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>funeral</strong>: “his funeral was preached” = “his funeral sermon,” etc. (S. J.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>gad</strong>: small whip used to drive cows to pasture. (S. J.) [Known in N. E. in sense of <em>whip</em>.]</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>garvey</strong>: a small scow. (Barnegat region.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>glommox, glummlcks</strong>: a muss, or a conglomeration of matter. (S. and C.J.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>go by water</strong>: to follow the sea as a calling. (Coast.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>golly keeser</strong>: oath heard in S. J.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>goodies</strong>: a fish of peculiar delicacy, much eaten on the coast. The “spot fish” of Virginia. (Atlantic and Cape May.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>goody-goody</strong>: contemptuously applied to an over-fastidious person. (S. J.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>gorramity </strong>(<em>gorǝmaiti</em>): for God Almighty. (S. J.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>goster</strong>: to domineer.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>gosterer</strong>: one who boasts or brags.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>grass</strong>: spring of the year. “I'll move out o’ here next grass.”</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>gravel</strong>: to steal sweet potatoes (the act identified by the newly turned earth).</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>green head</strong>: a fly common in the coast district.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>ground oak</strong>: to inflict injury on the person, or threaten to do so ; a sort of <em>duress per minas</em>. (A ground oak is a small oak of little value.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>gulf weather</strong>: warm, moist, cloudy weather, attributed on the Jersey coast to the influence of the Gulf Stream. It is felt as far west as Trenton.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>heifers</strong>: young cow terrapins. Two or three to “counts.” (S. J.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>hether</strong>: equivalent to <em>peddy whoa</em>,<em> q.v.</em></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>hike</strong>: of clothing, to be uneven or not to “set well.” [p. 61.]</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>holdfast</strong>: a sore, eating to the bone, which may come from various causes.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>honey-fogle</strong>: to allure by traps.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>horse coursers</strong> : defined as <em>drovers </em>in law of 1682.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>horse-proud</strong>: adjective used of a man who has pride in his blooded stock. Similar words are used made up with names of other animals; <em>e.g. hog-proud</em>.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>housen</strong>: plural of house.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>hyper</strong>: to hurry about; to bustle at work. (Little used.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>Indian bread</strong>: fungus found underground in the pine woods. The <em>Tuckahoe</em>. (S. J.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>jack (apple)</strong>: in Salem, Sussex, and Burlington counties, where apple whiskey is made, it is commonly called “jack.” “Jersey Lightning” is hardly used by natives for this article. [How widely is the word “apple whiskey” used ? “Cider brandy” is the natural word to New Englanders.]</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>jag</strong>: a small load. In S. J. a load of hay. Not used among the country people in its present slang sense. [Century Dict. See p. 216.]</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>Jersey blue</strong>: color of uniform worn by Jersey troops in the French and Indian War.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>Jimminy crickets</strong>: common in Jersey, [p. 49.]</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>kerf</strong>: [see Webster] word not used in North Jersey. When employed in the Supreme Court it was not understood by the judges.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>ketchy</strong>: changeable (weather).</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>kettereen</strong>: a kind of carriage. (Law of 1779.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>killick</strong>: small anchor. (Very common on coast.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>kink</strong>: used in N. J. for <em>kinky</em>. Used as noun = idiosyncrasy.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>lap</strong>: a “hank” of thread.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>lashin(g)s</strong>: plenty; abundance. “Lashins o’ money.”</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>lenter</strong>: for “lean to” = an addition to a house. Pron. <strong>lentr, lintr, and lintr</strong>.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>lift the collection</strong>: take up the collection. In common use in some localities.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>lug</strong>: bark. “The dog lugs at the waggin.”</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>main, mom, mae</strong>: for mamma or mother.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>marsh</strong> : pron. <em>mœʃ. </em>[Also in N. E.]</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>meadow</strong>: salt marshy tract used for grazing and “shingling” (v. <em>infra</em>) in S. J.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>menhaden</strong>: called “moss bunkers,” “mossy bunkers,” “green tails,” “Sam Days,” and “bony fish,” in Cape May County, and “mud shad” in Cumberland County.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>milchy </strong>: adjective applied to oysters “in milk” —just before or during spawning.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>molasses</strong>: pron. <em>merlassers, merlasses, millasses</em>.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>mosey</strong>: to leave suddenly, generally under doubt or suspicion.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>mought (maut)</strong>: for <em>might.</em></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>mudwallop</strong>: to soil one’s self with mud. To play in the mud when fishing.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>my</strong>: pron. <em>mi</em>.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>nary</strong>: never.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>nothing</strong>: pron. <em>nəƿin</em>.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>nubbin</strong>: imperfect ear of corn.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>nutmeg</strong>: muskmelon (generic). (S. J.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>O be joyful</strong>: hilariously drunk. (Common.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>ordinary</strong>: innkeeper, in laws of Lord Proprietors. Now out of use.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>ornery</strong>: common in use. </span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>overly</strong>: used in speaking of health, etc.; <em>e.g.</em> “not overly good.” Generally in negative use. [Known in Maine. — E. S. S.]</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>oyster grass</strong>: kelp found in oyster-beds. (Cape May.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>oyster knockers</strong>: culling tools. Double-headed hammer used to separate bunches of oysters.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>pap, pop, poppy</strong>: for <em>papa or father</em>.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>patent thread</strong>: linen thread. (S. J.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>peddy whoa</strong>: teamster’s word = <em>haw</em>; go to the left.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>perianger</strong>: oyster boat. Law of 1719 (DeVere, p. 137).</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>petty chapman</strong>: itinerant vender. (Law of 1730.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>pile, piling, pile driver</strong>: often pron. <em>spile</em>, etc., in N. J.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>piners</strong>: those who live in the Jersey pines, — the “ridge” sections (eastern and southern) of the state.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>pit</strong>: wood stacked for charcoal burning.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>platform</strong>: planked floor where oysters are freshened. (Atlantic County.) See <strong>board-bank</strong> and <strong>floats</strong>.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>pool holes</strong>: holes, two to six feet deep, full of “mucky” water, found on meadows. (See Shingle Industry below.) Often <em>spool holes</em>.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>pretty</strong>: pron. <em>pərti, puti</em>.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>pretty middlin’ smart (smcert)</strong>: indicates a fair state of health. Common in N. J.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>progue</strong>: pron. <em>prog</em>. To search for anything imbedded in the mud, as clams, terrapins, or cedar logs, by means of a sounding rod.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>quiler</strong>: holdback strap (see Webster). [<em>Side-strap</em> is used in Connecticut. — E. H. B.]</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>quite</strong>: not a common word in S. J. Common in C. J. in such expressions as “quite some.”</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>rattlers</strong>: oysters in poorest condition. So called because they rattle in their shells. See <strong>clucker</strong>.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>reach</strong>: that portion of a circuitous creek in the tide-water district between two sharp turns. Reaches are from 200 feet to a mile or more in length.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>salt holes</strong>: pool holes of small size filled with salt water. Frequent in marshes.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>scions</strong>. See <strong>cions</strong>.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>scoot, scoat, skeet</strong>: to leave suddenly.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>scrub oak</strong>: a low-growing species, usually the first timber growth on a burned district. As soon as the larger timber grows above it, the scrub oak dies out.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>set offs</strong>: sugar and cream in coffee; “trimmings.”</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>shacklin’</strong>: shiftless; lazy; going from one job to another.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>shell bed</strong>: collection of oyster shells in S. J., where Indians made wampum, or dried bivalves for food.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>shelters</strong>: those who open clams for market.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>shenanigan</strong>: fooling or playfulness. Also expressed by “monkey business.” [Known in N. E.]</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>sherk</strong>: for <em>shark</em>. [ Also reported from coast of Virginia. ]</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>shoots</strong>: spaces between concentric rings of oyster shells, showing years of growth.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>shuck, shock</strong>: to open oysters. To husk corn.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>singing sand</strong>: sand found on Long Beach, Ocean County, which emits a peculiar musical tone when the wind passes over it rapidly. It is found on a portion of beach made since 1818.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>sistern</strong>: pl. of <em>sister</em>. Used in Baptist and Methodist churches.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>skeins</strong>: for <em>skene.</em> A dagger (see Webster). (Law of 1686.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>skift</strong>: for <em>skiff</em>. A yawl used in E.J.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>sky scraper</strong>: one who reaches high ; one who is exalted in his own estimation.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>slash</strong>: swale filled with water. (Cape May.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>slews</strong>: (corruption of <em>sluice</em>) a thoroughfare (<em>q.v.</em>)<em>. </em>(Coast.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>slug</strong>: a big drink of whiskey.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>snag gag</strong>: to quarrel or have an irritating controversy.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>snail bore</strong>: a mollusk, also called “drill,“ “borer,” etc.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>sneathe</strong>: snath of a scythe (see Webster).</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>snew</strong>: pret. of snow. (N. J.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>snoop</strong>: to pry into another’s affairs; to sneak.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>snub</strong>: to “canal it” on a boat. (C. J.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>Snubbin’ post</strong>: post around which rope of boat is fastened in lock.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>soft shells</strong>: crabs with soft shells.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>spoom</strong>: to run before the wind. [See Webster.] (Coast.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>spung</strong>: piece of low ground at the head of a stream in the tide-water district.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>squares, streets</strong>: used generally in S. and C. J. as unit of distance in cities, like <em>blocks</em> (<em>q.v</em>.) in N. J. Philadelphia influence.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>stepmother</strong>: a ragged nail or a roughness of the skin.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>stick up</strong>: a long, thin oyster; so called in Cape May from the fact that it “stickups,” as oystermen say, in the mud.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>stone horses</strong>: stallions. (Law of 1709.) [Used in this sense in <em>Robinson Crusoe</em>.]</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>stuffy</strong>: close and sultry, like a “Gulf weather” day (<em>q.v</em>.).</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>sun down</strong> : sunset; very common.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>sun up</strong>: sunrise ; not common, but still in use.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>swale</strong>: low land between sand ridges on the coast beaches.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>sward</strong>: prou. <em>sôrd</em>.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>swing seat</strong>: a seat used in a wood wagon, hung from the sides. Used after unloading.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>tacker</strong>: small child. The adjective little generally precedes the noun.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>tar kiln</strong>: place where tar is tried out of pine knots.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>ten fingers</strong>: oystermans slang for thief. Not very common.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>thawt</strong>: for thwart; rower’s seat. Used to a limited extent.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>thill horse</strong>: shaft horse. Not very common.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>thoroughfare, throughfare</strong> (see also <strong>slews</strong>): long, narrow body of water connecting the bays which separate the sandy islands of the southern coast from the mainland. [Reported as proper name for such passages from Maine and Virginia.] In law of 1695 a “thoroughfare” was a wagon road.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>three-square</strong>: a kind of grass found on S. J. meadows.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>thunder-heads</strong> : cumulus clouds piled above the black mass of the storm. [In Connecticut, heavy cumulus clouds which appear before a shower.— E. H. B.]</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>tickly (tickely, ticklish) bender</strong>: running on yielding ice. </span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>ticky</strong> : Rio coffee. (S. J. traders).</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>tittavating</strong> (v = w): repairing; <em>e.g</em>. “The housens need tittavating.”</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>tongs</strong>: oyster tongs.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>toxicatious</strong>: for <em>intoxicating.</em> (Law of 1679.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>traipse</strong>: final <em>e</em> pronounced. The word has a good use in Jersey; no idea of “slackness” is attached to it, as Webster would imply.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>truck</strong>: to barter or to trade. (Law of 1688.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>upheader</strong>: horse that holds his head high. Applied figuratively to men.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>v</strong> is often pronounced like w by the older people in S. J. A Gloucester County saying is,“Weal and winegar are good wittles to take aboard a wessel.”</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>wain</strong>: wagon. (S. J.) Not much used.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>wherries</strong>: for <em>ferries</em>. (Law of 1716.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>wind breaker</strong>: a screen or the like used to break the force of the wind.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>winders</strong>: an instrument used on the oyster boats for winding the dredge line.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>The Glass Industry</strong>.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">Mr. William Marks, of Millville, and Mr. Charles Simmerman, chief of the State Bureau of Labor and Statistics, furnish the following list of words. Some of them are used only in the flint glass houses, others in the green glass works as well.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>all aboard</strong>: used in flint glass works as order to begin and quit work.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>batch</strong>: the mixture of soda and sand of which the glass is made.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>bench stones</strong>: resting-place for pots inside the furnace.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>blast</strong>: the ten months of the year when fire is in the furnaces.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>blower</strong>: one who forms or “blows” molten glass.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>blowover</strong>: bottle finished by grinding its mouth on a stone. Fruit jars are usually finished in this way.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>bounty jumper</strong>: a cylindrical mould.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>breast stones</strong>: sides of the furnace.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>bull</strong>: glass unfit for use after the melt.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>cap</strong>: top of the melting furnace.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>carrier in</strong>: one who takes bottles to the annealing oven.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>cordy glass</strong>: bottle glass containing strips resembling fine cords, caused by glass not being thoroughly melted, or being kept too long in pot.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>cullet</strong>: waste glass.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>draw pickle</strong>: wooden stick used in pot setting. (Flint glass manufacture.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>fiddle</strong>: a fulcrum for the “sheen” (<em>q.v. </em>below) in pot setting.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>fire out</strong>: end of the ten months’ blast. Factories close during July and August.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>fire over</strong>: cessation of work for the day.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>flip flop</strong>: bladder of thin glass used as a toy.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>flip up</strong>: an old-fashioned style of mould.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>foot bench</strong>: bench around the furnace, upon which the workmen stand.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>furnace</strong>: where the glass is melted in the pots.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>gaffer</strong>: one who finishes bottle by putting mouth upon it.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>gatherer</strong>: one who takes the glass from the pots.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>get-up</strong>: one day of labor; <em>e.g.</em> “Ten get-ups (ten days) before fire out.”</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>glory hole</strong>: small furnace where bottles are finished.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>goat</strong>: two-wheeled wagon used to carry the pot to the furnace from where it is first tempered.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>heel-tapped</strong>: unevenly blown (bottle).</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>Henry</strong>: a lie (in Millville glass houses). Perhaps the name of some notorious liar.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>lamp workers</strong>: Bohemian blowers who work glass by a lamp.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>lazybones</strong>: iron machine used for resting iron bars when the furnace is being cleaned or repaired.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>leer</strong>: annealing oven, where glass is tempered for 24 hours.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>mauer</strong>: iron plate where blower rolls his glass.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>melt</strong>: process of reducing the “batch” (<em>q.v.</em>) to molten glass.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>mill hands</strong>: those who make the clay stone.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>monkey</strong>: small pot used in flint factories.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>necktie</strong>: imperfect bottle wrinkled in the neck.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>pot</strong>: the clay jar where the batch is placed during the melt. The pot is from 32 to 64 inches in diameter, and 2½ feet high; from five to ten of them go in one furnace.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>pot shells</strong>: pieces of broken pots which are ground up for the making of new pots.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>presser</strong>: one who presses glass in the mould.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>presto</strong>: an exclamation which implies “Be careful of your language, as visitors are in the works.”</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>puntey</strong>: iron rod with holder used to finish bottles. [<em>Pontee</em> in Webster.]</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>rack on</strong>: term used to imply the blower’s loss of ware through imperfect work.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>ring hole</strong>: hole in furnace where blower gets his glass for bottle work.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>ring stone</strong>: stone to close the ring hole.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>salt water</strong>: salts in soda which rise to surface of molten glass, and after being skimmed off, harden into cakes.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>sandy glass</strong>: glass poorly melted.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>shears</strong>: cutting tool used in glass making.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>shear hole</strong>: hole where fire is “set.”</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>shear to</strong>: to heat up the furnace.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>shearer</strong>: the “master shearer” has charge of the furnace during the melt. His assistant is the “shearer.”</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>sheen</strong>: long iron bar used to set pots on edge of furnace.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>slocker</strong>: refuse glass.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>slow fire</strong>: commence work.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>snap</strong>: iron rod used to finish bottles. See<strong> puntey</strong>.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>snapper up</strong>: boy employed in glass works.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>stone</strong>: clay. There is no stone in S. J., and clay takes its place.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>tap</strong>: to open tone of furnace to take away refuse glass, which when it cools becomes <em>slocker</em> (<em>q.v</em>.).</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>tempo</strong> : a cry implying cessation of work.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>tone</strong>: central space of furnace around which pots are set The flame melting the batch circulates therein.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>tube blower</strong>: one who makes tubes for lamp works. (Flint works only.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>tuck stone</strong>: stone (clay) sustaining arch over furnace grate.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>yink yank</strong>: equivalent to <em>necktie</em>, <em>q.v</em>.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>The Shingle Industry. Carried on in the cedar swamps of South Jersey.</strong></span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>bolt</strong>: piece of cedar, 2 feet long, 6 inches wide, 2 inches thick.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>break down</strong> and <strong>windfall </strong>are terms describing conditions in which cedar logs are found beneath the surface. The log is chipped and its condition is indicated by the odor of the chip.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>butting</strong>: the process of levelling shingles.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>dug ups</strong>: shingles made from logs fallen and covered with soil. Called also <em>mud</em>, <em>rove</em>, and <em>split</em>.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>froe</strong>: instrument, used to rive cedar into bolts. A blade 16 inches long and 3 inches wide, with a handle 6 inches long at right angles to one end.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>horse</strong>: contrivance for holding shingles while they are being shaved.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>pool holes</strong> (<em>q.v</em>.) are caused by removing cedar logs.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>progueing iron or progue</strong>: iron rod 4½ to 7 feet long used to progue (<em>q.v</em>.) for cedar logs.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>rive</strong>: to cut cedar bolts into pieces ½ inches thick.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>shave</strong>: to prepare rived bolts for use on roof.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>shingling</strong>: the process of taking cedar logs from the meadows or swamps and converting them into shingles.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>straight rift</strong> and <strong>twisted </strong>are two conditions (as to grain of wood) in which cedar logs are found.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>tap</strong> or<strong> cut</strong>: a piece sawed from the log beneath the surface.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>wind shakes</strong>: trees which have been twisted by the wind so that the effect is shown by the twisted grain of the wood.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>FRANCIS B. LEE.</strong></span><br />
<span style="color: orange; font-size: xx-small;"><strong>Trenton, March, 1898.</strong></span><br />
<br />
<strong><span style="color: orange;">JERSEYISMS.—ADDITIONS AND CORRECTIONS.</span></strong><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">This list contains a few more items from Mr. Lee, which have been sent since his list went to press, some words collected by Rev. W. J. Skillman of Philadelphia, who is a native of New Jersey, and a few from miscellaneous sources.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>age</strong>: to take one’s age = to come to a birthday.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>anxious seat</strong>: <em>dele</em> “Methodist and.” (The Methodists use the term “mourner’s bench.ֹ”)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>bay truck</strong>: used “along shore” for food from the bays which indent the coast; in distinction from “garden truck.”</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>blickey</strong>: the variety is distinguished by an adjective, as “wooden” or “tin” blickey. In Vincentown and vicinity this word is used for a coat or “juniper,” such as workmen wear with overalls — a Garibaldi jacket of jean.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>bounder</strong>: to scrub or wash thoroughly (the person).</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>braes</strong>: the definition given should have stood, “imperfectly burned,” etc., and applies to the word <em>brands</em>, which was omitted. <em>Braes</em> is to be defined as “bark partially charred that slips from the wood in a charcoal pit.”</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>cooster</strong>: to “potter around,” fuss. “What you been coosterin’ at all day?” Also to caress, coddle.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>dike</strong> (cf. <em>dicked</em>): “on a dike” = showing one’s finery in public.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>dip</strong>: pudding-sauce.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>do-ups</strong>: preserves.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>down country</strong>: New York City and vicinity (Sussex Co.).</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>dubersome</strong>: also in form <em>jubersome</em>.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>Dutch cuss</strong>: term of contempt. Metuchen.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>footlin’</strong>: an adjective with meaning similar to <em>footy</em>.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>gooseberry fool</strong>: an old-time dish of gooseberries and eggs; eaten with cream.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>gravel</strong>: also <em>grabble</em>: definition should read, “to steal potatoes without disturbing the hill.”</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>Halifax</strong>. Mr. Skillman thinks that the common enough expression, “Go to Halifax!” is a survival from Revolutionary times, and meant originally “You are a Tory; go where you belong!” This, because he has heard “Go to Nova Scotia !” in the same way (and also, “Go to Haverty-grass (Havre-de-grace), which he cannot explain historically. Can any one account for this, or for “go to grass,” which suggests a connection?)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>hetchel</strong>: to tease, to call to account. Metaphor from the days of the domestic flax industry.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>homebringen</strong>: first coming of newly married to the house of the groom’s parents, where a feast was prepared and guests were invited. “Volunteers” (uninvited but not always unwelcome guests) often came. There was music and dancing and rather free hospitality, but no drunkenness. (See <em>infare</em>, below.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>hull</strong>: to gad about, wander, roam. “He went a-<em>hullen</em> all over the country.” [v. Cent. Dict, <em>hull</em>, II.]</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>Infare</strong>: bridegroom’s party (see <em>homebringen</em>, above). A somewhat later word than <em>homebringen</em> for the same festivity.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>jagger-wagon</strong>: light, open farm-wagon used on the roads for light work, such as carting small truck and going for the mails. Central Burlington Co.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>kink</strong>: also in sense of pain, “a kink in the back” = lumbago.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>kip</strong>: young chicken. (Used also as call — “kip, kip.”)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>lay-overs for meddlers</strong>: answer to prying, curious children. “What’s that, ma? Do tell, won’t you?” “Why, didn’t I say it’s lay-overs for meddlers?” [v. Cent. Dict, <em>layer-over</em>.]</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>lobscouse</strong>: an awkward, hulking fellow.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>loper</strong>: a worthless, intrusive fellow.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>noggin</strong>: a wooden dipper.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>noodeljees</strong> (<em>nûdltʃîz</em>): “noodles,” — thin strips of dough like macaroni, used in soup. [Bartlett.]</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>passel</strong> (for parcel): number, quantity in general. “They acted like a passel o’ hogs.”</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>perfect love</strong>: an old-fashioned intoxicating drink.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>perianger</strong>: should read “periauger ” (pirogue).</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>pick</strong> (pique?): a spite, grudge “He's had a pick at him for months.”</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>pinxter</strong>: Whitsuntide.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>pinxter-blossoms</strong>: azalea (Albany Co.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>riz bread</strong>: yeast bread (not raised with soda).</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>rollejees</strong> (<em>rolitʃîz</em>): chopped meat, stuffed in “sausage-skins” to be sliced and cooked. [See De Vere, p. 64.]</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>side up</strong>: to clean up, put in order (a room). (Cf. <strong>aside</strong>) [Also N. B. — W. M. T.]</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>slank</strong>: low place at side of river, bay, or cove, filled with water at freshet.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>slummock</strong>: a dirty, untidy woman.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>souse</strong>: slangy for ears. “Bounder your souse well” = wash your ears well.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>spack</strong>: pork.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>springers</strong>: cows about to calve. (C. J.)</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>stirrup</strong> (n. and v.), <strong>stirrup oil</strong> (n.): shoemaker’s term for a whipping, or punishment administered with the stirrup, or knee-strap.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>strull</strong>: female tramp. <em>Strulling</em> is used of women, not in the worst, but generally in no favorable sense. “She’s gone <em>strulling </em>to town to-day.” Sometimes used of children, without regard to sex.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><strong>winklehawk</strong>: triangular tear in cloth. [Cent. Dict, and Bartlett.] <em>Barn-door</em> is reported from Massachusetts in the same sense. [Cf. <strong>trappatch</strong>]</span><br />
<br />
I look forward to receiving any additions to this lexicon, so feel free to comment.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-779291837523434339.post-63405105278418558722010-09-25T22:29:00.036-04:002011-02-24T17:08:44.117-05:00The Hugg/Harrison/Glover House (New Saint Mary’s Cemetery), Borough of Bellmawr, Camden County, New Jerseyby Jerseyman ©2010<br />
<br />
<strong><em>History</em></strong><br />
<br />
In April 1677, Robert Turner, Robert Zane, Thomas Thackara, William Bates, and Joseph Sleigh, all Quakers and residents of Ireland, purchased one whole share of proprietary (one tenth of West Jersey) from Edward Byllynge and his trustees. These proprietors chose to locate their settlement in the third tenth, located between Pennsauken and Big Timber Creek—today’s Camden County—which became known early on as the Irish Tenth (Prowell 1886:30). This group of Quakers had originally fled from England to Ireland to escape religious persecution, but nonetheless they soon became known as Irish Quakers. During 1681, the group arranged to sail to West Jersey on board YE OWNERS ADVENTURE, arriving at John Fenwick’s Salem Colony late in 1681, where they spent the winter. The following spring, the settlers moved north along the Delaware River until they arrived at the mouth of Newton Creek. Moving up the stream, the Quakers chose a site on the north shore of the rivulet and founded Newton Colony (Leap 1982:6). <br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TJ60QGWN1MI/AAAAAAAAAE8/cENUXCKsFlM/s1600/Sharp+1700+copy.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" px="true" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TJ60QGWN1MI/AAAAAAAAAE8/cENUXCKsFlM/s640/Sharp+1700+copy.jpg" width="542" /></a></div><br />
As part of his proprietary holding, Newton colonist Robert Zane took up 500 acres of land in the fork between Little Timber and Big Timber Creek and then sold the same land to newly arrived John Hugg in 1683, recorded in February 1686 (Clement 1877:284; West Jersey Deed Book B:103; Surveyor General’s Office, Revel’s Survey Book, 55). This transaction represents John Hugg’s first land purchase in the New World and his plantation extended more than a mile up Big Timber and Little Timber Creek (Clement 1877:284). He continued adding to his property holdings until he possessed more than 1,300 acres (Surveyor General’s Office Survey Book H:261). <br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TJ6zwy2U_TI/AAAAAAAAAE4/h1V_P61IQEY/s1600/Hills+1808.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="500" px="true" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TJ6zwy2U_TI/AAAAAAAAAE4/h1V_P61IQEY/s640/Hills+1808.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">John Hills 1809/1814</td></tr>
</tbody></table> <br />
John Hugg remained tenured at his farm until his death in 1706. In his will, John devised the homestead plantation to his sons, John and Elias. He ordered that the two brothers share the land with each possessing a moiety or half-interest in the entirety divided evenly along the lane leading to the Hugg Plantation (now Browning Lane) (New Jersey Wills 6H). Son John received the half on the Big Timber Creek side and Elias the portion along Little Timber Creek, which included the father’s homestead. At this house, Elias maintained a store for the watermen who navigated Big Timber Creek in flatboats and scows. Whiskey and tobacco sales were plentiful at the store, and many unseemly events occurred here as the rough and tumble clientele waited for the wind and tide to change (Clement 1877:289-290). Secondary genealogical sources indicate that Elias’s birth occurred in 1668 and that he married Margaret Collins, daughter of pioneer settler Francis Collins, sometime prior to 1695 (Hugg Family Genealogy website; Clement 1877:76). Elias and Margaret’s children include three daughters: Sarah, Mary, and Rebecca; and a son, John. Margaret died in 1723, perhaps in childbirth with John or Rebecca (New Jersey Wills 6H; Hugg Family Genealogy website; West Jersey Deed Book EF:145).<br />
<br />
In December 1712, Richard Bull and Thomas Sharp, two of the Highway Commissioners for Gloucester County, received petitions for a road between the head of Timber Creek near Upton and the original crossing of the Salem Road over to <span style="color: orange;"><span style="color: black;">“</span>…the King’s Roade to Gloucester</span>” (Stewart 1917:15-16). The road began at <span style="color: orange;"><span style="color: black;">“</span>…Porter’s Mill [near the head of navigation on Big Timber Creek] and from thence falling into the Old Roade that went to Burlington and along the same over Sheeyanees Run from thence to other [Otter] branch and thence over the hills to Beaver Branch by John Huggs land thence to the brick kills [kilns] upon Elias Huggs land and from thence upon a straight course to the little Bridge [bridge over Little Timber Creek]…</span><span style="color: black;">”</span> and on the Kings Road to Gloucester (<em>ibid</em>.). The blazing of this road followed, in part, the lane leading to Hugg’s plantation and now known as Browning Lane, changing the already extant Hugg’s Lane into one course of an official public road.<br />
<br />
Elias Hugg and his son, John, finally disposed of the Little Timber Creek side of the old Hugg plantation during January 1741, selling it to Bristol, Pennsylvania, merchant, William Buckley (West Jersey Deed Book EF:145). It is appears Buckley purchased the property an investment. It seems certain that Buckley did not reside in the house as he had a solid record of serving as a burgess for Bristol Borough in Pennsylvania between 1742 and 1758 (Battle 1887:434). The sale proceeds amounted to £100 and the deed described the property as <br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">…a Certain Massuage Plantation or Tract of Land thereunto belonging situate in Gloucester County aforesaid Bounded Northward with little Timber Creek and on the other Sides with the Land late of John Hugg deceased, brother of the said Elias and Lands of some other person or persons It being the moyaty of the Land later of John Hugg ye father of ye Sd Elias which he devised until him by his last Will and Testament of the Twentieth day of December in the year 1706 and containing be Estimation four hundred Acres….</span> (West Jersey Deed Book EF:145)<br />
<br />
It seems unusual and perhaps significant that Elias Hugg’s son, John, is listed as a party of this transaction, since Elias alone held the property as a devisee of his father’s will. The oldest portion of the house on the property, and the section featuring a gambrel roof, could have served as Elias’s residence prior to his father’s death in 1706. At some point subsequent to Elias’s moving into his deceased father’s house after 1706, Elias’s son, John, became of age and likely moved into the house and resided there until he and his father sold the plantation to Buckley. Elias included his son in the transaction presumably because John was the de facto possessor of the house and farm. If the house did not serve as a one-time residence for Elias, then he probably had it constructed for his only son, John, upon reaching his majority. Since the property hosted brick kilns and Elias’s nephew, Gabriel Hugg, is listed as a bricklayer in his will and other legal documents, Gabriel’s participation in constructing the house is strongly suggested (New Jersey Wills 205H). Buckley received less than the estimated 400 acres in Elias’s share of his father’s plantation because the Huggs sold 100 acres to John Jones, 30 acres to William Crowes, and 12 acres to Enoch Allison (West Jersey Deed Book EF:246). After the sale, Elias Hugg reportedly relocated across the Delaware River and took up residence in Philadelphia, although no documentation could be found to confirm this contention (Hugg Family Genealogy website). <br />
<br />
Buckley retained the property for ten years before selling it to Samuel Harrison in November 1751 for £300, making himself a tidy £200 profit (West Jersey Deed Book O:103). Perhaps during Buckley’s ownership of the property, he added the new rear section to the original gambrel-roofed house, thus increasing the property’s overall value. Samuel Harrison and his wife Abigail held the plantation until December 1756, when they sold it to Samuel’s brother, Joseph Harrison, for a mere 5 shillings and <span style="color: orange;"><span style="color: black;">“</span>…the kind love and natural affection which they have to bear unto the said Joseph Harrison…</span>” (West Jersey Deed Book N:475). In 1759, Joseph Harrison and William Hugg applied to the West Jersey Proprietors for a resurvey of the original John Hugg Plantation as it was devised to John and Elias Hugg in 1706. The resurvey verified the chain of title for the property, the boundary lines, and the acreage contained within those boundaries. The written record of the resurvey reveals small parcels that were added to and subtracted from the plantation over the years. The deputy surveyors also confirmed that the land contained an overplus of 31 acres and 11 perches or 31.069 acres, which Joseph Harrison dealt with by subtracting the same amount from another untitled proprietary land grant given to him in November 1755 (Surveyor General’s Office Survey Book H:261).<br />
<br />
Joseph Harrison retained ownership of this plantation until his death in November 1761. In his will, written during the same month and year as his death, he devised the property to his two daughters, Mary and Rebecca, to be equally divided between them when they reached their majority age. It appears Joseph’s wife predeceased him. He directed his brother Samuel to provide care for the two girls until the reach maturity and, as a reward, Joseph granted his brother the right to <span style="color: orange;"><span style="color: black;">“</span>…possess my Little Place untill [<em>sic</em>] my Daughter Rebecca arrives to age (which lies on ye Little Creek)…</span>” (New Jersey Wills 747H). It is unknown who rented Joseph Harrison’s “Little Plantation” after Joseph’s death. However, acting in his role of possessor and caretaker of the Little Plantation, in 1764 Samuel presumably contracted for an addition to be constructed on the west side of the gambrel-roofed house on the plantation, perhaps to make the property more attractive to a tenant. Built in a similar patterned brick style as the original house with a modified Flemish bond, the addition almost doubled the size of the dwelling space. The construction date is clearly shown in the western gable of the addition, but no initials are present, which strongly suggests that the person who ordered the addition constructed did not reside in the house. Amazingly, a comparison of this house, after completion of the 1764 addition, with photographs of Harrison Manor, Samuel’s residence in Gloucester Town, reveal the two houses are strikingly similar in appearance. Harrison Manor underwent demolition in 1941 and inexplicably did not become a structure selected for the Historic American Building Survey (HABS) prior to its destruction.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TJ63XbWcn2I/AAAAAAAAAFA/j_Y8QCOr5XI/s1600/Harrison+Manor.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="394" px="true" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TJ63XbWcn2I/AAAAAAAAAFA/j_Y8QCOr5XI/s640/Harrison+Manor.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Facade, Harrison Manor, Gloucester City, New Jersey</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none; text-align: center;"><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TJ6tHcpKUOI/AAAAAAAAAEs/Q0FpJZzFD8A/s1600/111435pr.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="460" px="true" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TJ6tHcpKUOI/AAAAAAAAAEs/Q0FpJZzFD8A/s640/111435pr.jpg" width="640" /></a></div></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">Facade, Hugg/Harrison/Glover House, Bellmawr, New Jersey</div></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none; text-align: center;"><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TJ6tHyvBGYI/AAAAAAAAAEw/yVZyKTVOwUA/s1600/111436pr.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="640" px="true" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TJ6tHyvBGYI/AAAAAAAAAEw/yVZyKTVOwUA/s640/111436pr.jpg" width="460" /></a></div></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none; text-align: center;">West wall of 1764 Addition, <br />
Hugg/Harrison/Glover House, <br />
Bellmawr, New Jersey</td></tr>
</tbody></table> <div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><br />
Rebecca Harrison, Joseph’s daughter, was born in February 1757 and in January 1780, after reaching her majority, married Robert Blackwell, an Episcopal minister from Philadelphia (Wallace Papers, Vol. 4). Her sister Mary married Israel Morris Jr. in May 1774, but died before reaching her majority (Gloucester County Deeds H:492). Unfortunately, Rebecca met a similar fate as her sister, dying quite young in February 1782, two days after giving birth to Rebecca Harrison Blackwell (Wallace Papers, Vol. 4). As a result of her death, Robert Blackwell gained title to the lands that Rebecca received from her father. Blackwell continued his ownership of Joseph Harrison’s homestead as a rental property. In July 1800, he advertised the property for rent and indicates in the advertisement that John Burrough resided there (<em>Pennsylvania Gazette</em> 16 July 1800). Five years later, Blackwell and his daughter and their respective spouses, sold the former Joseph Harrison homestead, located west of the cemetery house, to Benjamin B. Cooper and John Gill for $6,600 (Gloucester County Deed Book H:492).</div><br />
At some point in time, William Harrison Junior (relationship to Samuel and Rebecca currently unsure, but presumably a cousin), owner of an adjacent gristmill and plantation located easterly along Little Timber Creek, acquired the “Little Plantation” from either Samuel or Rebecca. If Samuel served as the seller, he fulfilled his role as guardian for an underage Rebecca during the sale; but if not, then this sale occurred sometime after Rebecca reached a majority but probably before she married Robert Blackwell. The deed for William’s acquisition is unrecorded and evidently non-existent today, as a thorough search for the document at numerous repositories has proven futile. However, it is documented that William Harrison held the property in 1782 when the Gloucester County sheriff received a writ from the New Jersey Supreme Court to attach all of William’s property after a number of creditors successfully won suits against Harrison for unpaid indebtedness. Thomas Denny, the sheriff, placed an advertisement in the 6 September 1783 edition of the <em>Independent Gazette</em>, a Philadelphia newspaper, detailing William Harrison’s properties:<br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">It is bounded by lands of Samuel Hugg Esq., Daniel Smith, John Glover, Jacob Albertson, lands late of Joseph Harrison, deceased, and others. It lies on the main branch of Little Timber Creek, which runs through the tract, and contains 613 acres and three-quarters, being divided as follows: a plantation of 155 acres and three quarters with a brick house; a plantation adjoining containing 287 acres and one quarter with a brick house; a plantation of 70 acres and three quarters with a frame house and a grist mill built with stone; and three tenements adjoining the latter of 35 acres each. To view the premises and to see a map of the whole, apply to William Eldridge living on the first mentioned farm. Sale will be by vendue on 22d September at the house of William Hugg, innkeeper, in the town of Gloucester.</span> (Wilson 1988:417-418)<br />
<br />
The sale occurred at the time and place stated in the advertisement, but Sheriff Denny did not draft two deeds of sale for a portion of Harrison’s property until April 1784. One deed acknowledged Samuel Hugg’s purchase of a 35-acre tenement parcel for £126 (Gloucester County Deed Book D:182). The second deed transferred title of the 155.75-acre plantation to William Eldridge in exchange for the winning bid of £935. The Hugg and the Eldridge bid represent the only two successful partial purchases of William Harrison’s land, so Sheriff Denny scheduled a second Sheriff’s Sale, which occurred on 26 March 1785 and presumably at Hugg’s Tavern (Gloucester County Deed Book L:504). Ephraim Tomlinson placed the winning bid of £960 for the 287.25-acre plantation described in the advertisement (above) as possessing a brick house. Denny drafted the deed for this sale during April 1785 and Ephraim Tomlinson became the titleholder for Joseph Harrison’s former “Little Plantation” (<em>ibid</em>.). Of the three remaining parcels—two 35-acre tenement lots and the 70.75-acre plantation containing a gristmill and a frame house—only a deed for the gristmill property could be located; William Eldridge acquired this tract in August 1792 (Gloucester County Deed Book K:473).<br />
<br />
Ephraim Tomlinson retained the former “Little Plantation” property and used it as his homestead farm. He died sometime prior to 22 March 1810, the date his heirs proved Ephraim’s will, drafted during November 1808. In his will, Tomlinson divided his plantation, the former Elias Hugg property, into two pieces with the upper portion devised to his grandson Warner Tomlinson and the lower section, including the Hugg/Harrison house, to his other grandson, Joseph Tomlinson, both sons of Ephraim’s deceased son, Joseph Tomlinson. Ephraim’s estate inventory value exceeded $6,300, indicating Tomlinson was a man of some wealth during his lifetime (New Jersey Wills 2790H). Joseph Tomlinson presumably worked and resided on the plantation his grandfather devised to him. His tenure ended in October 1835, when he sold the property, containing 119.70 acres, to Chalkley Glover, a resident of Deptford Township, probably as an investment and rental property (Gloucester County Deeds N3:484). Chalkley Glover died intestate sometime during late 1873 or early in 1874; his daughter, Sarah, applied for an estate administration bond in January 1874 (Camden County Estate Index). Since Sarah applied to the Camden County Surrogate’s Office for the Estate Administration Bond, it may indicate that Chalkley lived at the “Little Plantation” at the time of his death.<br />
<br />
Chalkley’s heirs, Theodore and Sarah Glover, retained the “Little Plantation” for another 40 years. <br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TJ6v0YwxNEI/AAAAAAAAAE0/lMzyYIUW1HU/s1600/1877+Detail+of+Glover+Property.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="542" px="true" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_OoQ5awwIjQk/TJ6v0YwxNEI/AAAAAAAAAE0/lMzyYIUW1HU/s640/1877+Detail+of+Glover+Property.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">G.M. Hopkins 1877</td></tr>
</tbody></table> <br />
In January 1914, the siblings struck an agreement with John G. Scofield, a resident of Centre Township, to purchase their late father’s former property, including the Hugg/Harrison house (Camden County Deed Book 383:621). The agreement dictated a series of payments to be made monthly. Finally in August 1918, Theodore and Sarah issued a deed of purchase for the land and house; Scofield paid $15,000 to them (Camden County Deed Book 434:168). At this point in time, Theodore Glover and his sister, Sarah B. Glover, resided in Deptford Township, Gloucester County, perhaps in their father’s old house. Three years later, during August 1921, Scofield sold 63 acres of the former Chalkley Glover farm and the old Hugg/Harrison house to St. Mary’s Roman Catholic Church of Gloucester City for $41,300 for use as a cemetery (Camden County Deed Book 490:599). While the Camden Diocese controls New Saint Mary’s Cemetery today, the former Hugg/Harrison/Glover house continues to serve as the cemetery’s offices, as it did when the church burial ground first opened in 1923 (Giglio 1987:233).<br />
<br />
<strong><em>Discussion</em></strong><br />
<br />
Pioneering proprietors locating farmsteads along navigable streams represent the primary early settlement pattern in at least the northern portion of Old Gloucester County in West Jersey—known today as Camden County (Dorwart 2001:27-29). The waterways served as the initial thoroughfares of commerce for these early settlers and, as noted historian William Leap states, “<span style="color: orange;">…</span><span style="color: orange;">it is difficult to find a settler who did not have access to tidal water in this area prior to 1770</span>” (Leap 1981:21). Author Jeffrey Dorwart put the early settlement period of Camden County history in perspective when he wrote, <br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">A select group of prosperous landowning families descended from and holding extensive kinship ties to the original settlers dominated life in Gloucester County during the eighteenth century. …This landed gentry held the largest tracts along the tidal creeks and tributary streams that defined the region’s distinctive cultural geography. Here they operated plantations of more than three hundred acres, partly cleared for planting and with meadows fenced for pasturage and wooded tracts and cedar swamps. Their estates were each valued at nearly £1,000. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">The original proprietary families and their kin controlled the landing places on the creeks that linked the county to markets on the Delaware River and in Philadelphia. Near these creeks landings they built their two-story brick and frame houses with bricks produced locally by a kiln [already] established in 1712 by the Huggs near Gloucestertown. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">…The most prominent plantation…owning families that dominated life between Timber and Pennsauken Creek in the upper part of old Gloucester County (forming the boundaries of modern-day Camden County) were even more tightly linked through kinship and business ties than those in the county below Timber Creek. …The Hugg and Harrison families dominated life at the county seat of Gloucestertown at the mouth of Big Timber Creek.</span> (2001:27-28)<br />
<br />
As the above quotation indicates, each of Camden County’s navigable waterways—the Pennsauken Creek, Cooper’s Creek, Newton Creek and the Big and Little Timber Creek system—once hosted numerous plantations and landings along their banks. However, today each of these streams retains only one or two colonial-era farmhouse to provide proper interpretation of the county’s early agrarian history:<br />
<br />
<em><span style="font-size: x-small;">Table of Surviving Colonial-Era Farmhouses along Tidal Waterways in Camden County</span></em><br />
<br />
<u><strong><span style="font-size: x-small;">Common House Name...........Location............Associated Waterway.........Year Constructed</span></strong></u><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">Burrough-Dover................ Pennsauken Twp.....Pennsauken Creek..................circa 1710/1793</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">Burrough-Lawrence...........Pennsauken Twp.....Pennsauken Creek..................circa 1728/1749</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">Ebenezer Hopkins.............Haddon Twp............Cooper’s Creek........................circa 1737</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">Pomona Hall.....................Camden..................Cooper’s Creek........................1726/1788</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">Thackara...........................Collingswood............Newton Creek.........................circa 1754</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">Stokes-Lee........................Collingswood............Newton Creek.........................circa 1761</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;">Hugg-Harrison-Glover........Bellmawr..................Little Timber Creek.................circa 1720/1764</span><br />
<br />
Gradually, the old farmsteads succumbed to twentieth-century developments. Along the Pennsauken Creek, the former 1775 Morgan/Hylton homestead, commonly called Mount Pleasant, met its demise in 1964 when the solid waste landfill operators sold the stone and timbers to a man from Moorestown, who built a modern house with the materials (Fichter 1991). All of the known colonial houses along the Burlington County side of the creek have been demolished as well. On Cooper’s Creek, the construction of a highway ramp between Baird Boulevard and Route 30 (Admiral Wilson Boulevard) circa 1940 caused the state to raze the 1699 Joseph Nicholson house (Bassett 1977:22-23). None of the farmhouses that once lined the Pennsauken and Cherry Hill Township side of Cooper’s Creek remain. These include dwellings owned by members of the Spicer, Browning, Morgan, Day, Champion, Spicer, Stoy, and Troth families. As indicated in the table above, only Pomona Hall and the Hopkins House remain on the south side of Cooper River (Sidney 1850; Sidney undated). <br />
<br />
On Newton Creek, the Champion House burned down in the late 1960s or early 1970s. Located in the Fairview section of Camden, this house was the reputed birthplace of Betsy Ross. Gone, too, are other Champion family homes, Harrison Manor (an almost identical twin to the Hugg-Harrison-Glover house), the Mickle House called “The Willows,” the Albertson House, Atmore’s domicile, and Collins family homes. Along the tidewater portion of the Timber Creek watershed, any vestige of John Hugg Senior’s house likely disappeared when the federal government constructed the Noreg Village (a World War I defense housing development) section of Brooklawn. Along Little Timber Creek, the Clement farmhouse is gone, as are two early Harrison dwellings and a Browning family home, leaving only the Hugg-Harrison-Glover domicile. Along the north side of Big Timber Creek, all of the farmhouses have disappeared, including the John Hugg Junior house, the Kay home and two Lippincott dwellings (Sidney 1850).<br />
<br />
Beyond the ability of the Hugg-Harrison-Glover house to provide interpretation of the Timber Creek tidewater plantations, it is also the last known standing structure to be associated with the Hugg and the Harrison families. Hugg family members served in the colonial legislature, as sheriffs, judges, militiamen, and other officials in the government of old Gloucester County, and as judges in Camden County. All of these Huggs were either born within or can trace their roots to the Timber Creek watershed (Prowell 1886:705; Clement 1877:283-291). Writing in the highly-esteemed multi-volume biographical series on early Princeton University graduates, authors Ruth Woodward and Wesley Craven provide some crucial background information on the Hugg family:<br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">William King Hugg, A.B., lawyer, belonged to one of the oldest and most influential families of Gloucester County, New Jersey. …The family, founded by one John Hugg in the seventeenth century, originally had been stoutly Quaker in its religious affiliation, but William’s father held a colonel’s commission in the militia and saw active military service during the Revolutionary War. He also served as commissary of purchase for West Jersey, and at different times as county clerk, clerk of the board of freeholders, member of the legislative council, judge, and justice of the peace.</span> (1991:125)<br />
<br />
The Harrison family has a similar history to the Huggs in fulfilling their civic obligations by serving as sheriffs, judges, freeholders, members of the legislative council, etcetera (Cushing and Sheppard 1883:119-142). William Harrison served in the Gloucester County militia and fought in the battle of Gloucester defending his own land (Munn). William’s grandson, Joseph Harrison Junior, would distinguish himself in the nineteenth century as a Philadelphia locomotive builder and mechanical engineer who also traveled to Russia to construct railroads for the Czar (Harrison 1869). Immediately associated with Hugg-Harrison-Glover house is Rebecca Harrison, who came to possess the house after her father’s death, married Philadelphia Episcopal minister Robert Blackwell. The couple met while Blackwell served the Anglican churches located in Gloucester County. Later, when the Revolutionary War began, Blackwell chose to side with the Americans. In January 1780, with the war beginning to wind down, he married <span style="color: orange;"><span style="color: black;">“</span>…Rebecca Harrison, daughter of a long-prominent family of Gloucester County landowners</span>” (McLachlan 1976:632). <br />
<br />
The Hugg-Harrison-Glover house provides the last remaining vestige of these once-important families and the vital role they played in the early development of today’s Camden County.<br />
<br />
<br />
<strong><u>Bibliography:</u></strong><br />
Bassett, William B.<br />
1977 <em>Historic American Buildings Survey of New Jersey</em>. New Jersey Historical Society, Newark, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
Battle, J.H.<br />
1887 <em>History of Bucks County, Pennsylvania</em>. n.p., Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and Chicago, Illinois.<br />
<br />
Camden County Deed Book<br />
Camden County deed books. Camden County Clerk’s Office, Camden, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
Camden County Estate Index<br />
Camden County estate index. Camden County Surrogate’s Office, Camden, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
Clement, John<br />
1877 <em>Sketches of the First Emigrant Settlers: Newton Township, Old Gloucester County, West New Jersey.</em> Sinnickson Chew, Camden, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
Cushing, Thomas and Charles E. Sheppard<br />
1883 <em>History of the Counties of Gloucester, Salem and Cumberland New Jersey, with Biographical Sketches of Their Prominent Citizens</em>. Everts & Peck, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.<br />
<br />
Dorwart, Jeffrey M.<br />
2001 <em>Camden County, New Jersey : The Making of a Metropolitan Community, 1626-2000</em>. Rutgers University Press, New Brunswick, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
Fichter, Jack H.<br />
1991 <em>The Pennsauken Story</em>. The Pennsauken Township Committee, Pennsauken, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
Giglio, Reverend Monsignor Charles J.<br />
1987 <em>Building God’s Kingdom: A History of the Diocese of Camden</em>. Seton Hall University Press, South Orange, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
Gloucester County Deeds<br />
Gloucester County deed books. Gloucester County Clerk’s Office, Woodbury, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
Harrison, Jr., Joseph<br />
1869 <em>The Iron Worker and King Solomon</em>. J.B. Lippincott & Company, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.<br />
<br />
Hills, John <br />
1808/1814 <em>A Plan of the City of Philadelphia and Environs</em>. Annotated through December 1814. John Hills, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. <br />
<br />
Hopkins, G.M.<br />
1877 <em>Atlas of Philadelphia and Environs.</em> G.M. Hopkins, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. <br />
<br />
Hugg Family Genealogy website:<br />
<a href="http://homepages.rootsweb.com/~marshall/esmd100.htm">http://homepages.rootsweb.com/~marshall/esmd100.htm</a> [accessed 25 September 2010]. <br />
<br />
Leap, William<br />
1982 <em>The History of Runnemede, New Jersey: 1626-1976</em>. Borough of Runnemede, Runnemede, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
Munn, David C.<br />
A Visit to Gloucestertown. Unpublished manuscript. David C. Munn, Gloucester City, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
New Jersey Wills. <br />
New Jersey wills, Secretary of State Collection. Microform edition. New Jersey State Archives, Trenton, New Jersey.<br />
<br />
<em>Pennsylvania Gazette</em>. <br />
<em>Pennsylvania Gazette. </em>Microform edition. <em>Pennsylvania Gazette</em>, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.<br />
<br />
Prowell, George R.<br />
1886 <em>The History of Camden County, New Jersey.</em> L.J. Richards & Company, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.<br />
<br />
Sidney, James C.<br />
undated <em>Map of the Township of Delaware Township, Camden Co., New Jersey.</em> J.C. Sidney, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.<br />
<br />
1850 <em>Plan of the Townships of Union and Newton, County of Camden. </em>Richard Clark, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.<br />
Stewart, Frank<br />
1917 <em>Notes on Old Gloucester County</em>. Vol. 1. New Jersey Society of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.<br />
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Surveyor General’s Office, Burlington, New Jersey<br />
Survey books. Microform edition. New Jersey State Archives, Trenton, New Jersey.<br />
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Wallace Papers<br />
John William Wallace Collection, 1725-1854. Manuscript Collection. Historical Society of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.<br />
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West Jersey Deed Book<br />
West Jersey deed books. Microform Edition. New Jersey State Archives, Trenton, New Jersey.<br />
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Wilson, Thomas B.<br />
1988 <em>Notices from New Jersey Newspapers: 1781-1790</em>. Hunterdon House, Lambertville, New Jersey.<br />
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</div>Woodward, Ruth and Wesley Craven<br />
1976 <em>Princetonians : 1748-1768 : A Biographical Dictionary</em>. Princeton University Press, Princeton, New Jersey.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com15tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-779291837523434339.post-38548605776811941462010-09-24T23:03:00.006-04:002011-03-31T13:16:52.277-04:00The Upper Delaware River Steamer COLUMBIAby Jerseyman ©2010<br />
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The Delaware River has had a long history of hosting steamboats, beginning with the very first steamer—John Fitch’s boat of 1787. Although Fitch operated three different steamboats on the Delaware River, including one that ran scheduled service to Burlington, America was not yet ready for steam-powered vessels. Finally, Robert Fulton introduced his steamer CLERMONT in 1807 and the United States began to awaken from its agrarian lifestyle and recognized the potentiality of steam and its attendant mechanical applications.<br />
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By the second decade of the nineteenth century, the Stevens family operated steamboats on both the Hudson and the Delaware as part of a through route between New York and Philadelphia. Steamers transported passengers from New York to South Amboy, where they boarded stagecoaches for the trip to Bordentown, and then transferred to river steamer for the trip to Philadelphia. <br />
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When the Stevens family constructed the Camden & Amboy Railroad to supplant the stage operation, the family still used steamboats on both rivers. <br />
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Eventually, the Union Line’s Delaware River boats succumbed to the more convenient steam ferries in Camden.<br />
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Beginning in the 1850s, Capt. Jonathan Cone acquired a large fleet of passenger and cargo steamers and his operations soon became the pride of the Upper Delaware, succeeding the Stevens Family’s Union Line. Initially, Cone employed the steamer THOMAS A. MORGAN for his Upper Delaware River Transportation Company’s passenger trips. In 1857, however, he introduced the iron-hulled JOHN A. WARNER. <br />
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Constructed in Wilmington, Delaware at the shipyard of Harlan & Hollingsworth, the WARNER was the swiftest vessel to ever steam on the Delaware River. During the Civil War, the federal government pressed the WARNER into service and brought many wounded and dying Union soldiers from southern battles to the federal hospital in Beverly, New Jersey.<br />
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Capt. Henry Crawford, an old Union Line pilot, attempted to break Cone’s monopoly on Upper Delaware service by having the steamer TWILIGHT built by the Harlan & Hollingsworth yard in 1868. <br />
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Crawford maintained a Philadelphia –Trenton schedule using the TWILIGHT. Steamer operations to Trenton always proved perilous due to the Perriwig shoal just above Bordentown. As a result, the tide chart always governed the steamer schedules to assure enough water covered the shoal to prevent running aground. Crawford’s service had little impact on Captain Cone’s operations and profits.<br />
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In the Centennial year of 1876, Captain Cone ordered the steamer COLUMBIA from Harlan & Hollingsworth. Like the JOHN A. WARNER, the COLUMBIA also featured an iron hull. <br />
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According to the 1902 <em>List of Merchant Vessels of the United States</em>, her specifications included:</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><br />
</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">Official No.: 125507</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"> Gross Tonnage: 663</div>Net Tonnage: 535<br />
Length: 220.0<br />
Breadth: 34.0<br />
Depth: 7.2<br />
Home Port: Philadelphia, Pa.<br />
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<div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">The COLUMBIA featured more enclosed space than any other steamboat on the river and most people considered her to be the handsomest boat that ever plied the waters of the Upper Delaware. She became the desire of every moonlight cruise and always carried the best orchestra. The crowds on the COLUMBIA usually comprised a better social quality than other steamboats. The crew always kept her decks clean, the stools stacked in an orderly array, the interior paint always washed, the carpet brushed, the furniture dusted and the plush easy chairs and wide settees never had frayed upholstery. Amenities onboard included big comfortable rockers for grandma or grandpa, a large mirror at the head of the grand stairs, and the congeniality of the old, white-capped black stewardess, who looked after the welfare of the mothers and their babies. The onboard piano was always in tune and as a special attraction on Wednesdays, the steamboat company employed a blind man from Bristol named Summerfield to play music on the COLUMBIA.</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><br />
</div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">Captain Cone became the COLUMBIA’s first master. After the press of business forced Cone to retire from the wheelhouse to the office, George C. Tyler assumed command of this fine boat. Tyler piloted the steamer on her usual circuit between Bristol and Philadelphia, making stops at a number of wharves—Burlington, Beverly, Andalusia, Delanco (occasionally), Torresdale, Riverton, and Tacony/Bridesburg. </div><div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;"><br />
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Although reserved almost exclusively for the passenger and excursion trade, the COLUMBIA would carry a small amount of farm truck and express. The usual schedule called for two round-trips for the COLUMBIA between Trenton and Philadelphia during the week, with three circuits being completed on Sundays. The fare for a regularly scheduled trip was $0.25 one-way or $0.40 for a round-trip to Bristol or $0.50 to Trenton. The boat maintained a special summer schedule from June 1st to September 15th. Beginning in 1895, the COLUMBIA terminated upriver at Bristol, with the remainder of the trip to the state capital handled by the new steel steamer TRENTON. The COLUMBIA carried a full orchestra onboard for its daily 2 p.m. trip.<br />
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<div style="border-bottom: medium none; border-left: medium none; border-right: medium none; border-top: medium none;">By 1892, the Upper Delaware River Transportation Company owned and operated all three river steamers mentioned in this monograph: the COLUMBIA, JOHN A. WARNER, and TWILIGHT. Under a common management, the three boats quickly and affectionately became known as The Three Musketeers of the Upper Delaware by those who lived along the riverbank. Many a fight ensued at the landings between the young men that hung around these wharves. Known as “wharf rats,” these boys would gladly suffer a shiner or torn shirt in staunch defense of their favorite Musketeer. A lad was not accepted into the ranks of the wharf rats until they could distinguish between the boat whistles from at least a mile away and name the steamer before it arrived.<br />
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The COLUMBIA became the queen of the excursion trade, operating innumerable trips to the various picnic groves along the river shore, moonlight dance cruises and, beginning at the turn of the twentieth century, to the many amusement parks that dotted the Delaware River shore. She sailed proudly with fluttering pennants strung from stem to stern while loaded with Sunday School groups on their way to the temperance picnic grounds at National Park. </div><br />
Sometimes these outings would require the services of more than one boat due to the large crowds. The amusement parks that made the excursion trade so lively included (from north to south): Island Park on Burlington Island; Washington Park on the Delaware (West Deptford); Lincoln Park (Billingsport); and Riverview Beach (Pennsville). The latter had the distinction of being the last amusement park to be served by steamboat on the Delaware River. <br />
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Captain Cone died at the turn of the twentieth century and his heirs sold the company and its boats, including <em>The Three Musketeers</em>. The new management reorganized the firm as the Delaware River Navigation Company.<br />
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In 1905, the new owners renamed the JOHN A. WARNER and she became the BURLINGTON. <br />
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But the passenger business on the Delaware River entered a downward spiral and the excursion trade could not sustain the company’s financial demands. The railroads, trolleys, and finally the exploding popularity of the automobile had all robbed the steamboats of potential fares. The summer of 1916 proved to be the final season of service for the COLUMBIA AND TWILIGHT as the Delaware River Navigation Company slipped into receivership. <br />
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The third <em>Musketeer</em>, the JOHN A. WARNER, a.k.a. BURLINGTON, had run aground on the Perriwig Bar in August 1911. The company left her where she grounded, her services no longer required and the recovery and repair bills too steep for her owner’s dwindling coffers. <br />
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After several months of ravaging by wind and tide, the Army Corps of Engineers declared her a hazard to navigation and stripped her hull of all superstructure and machinery. Her charcoal-iron hull remains extant today on the Pennsylvania shore of the river above the mouth of Crosswicks Creek and the Philadelphia Maritime Museum—now the Independence Seaport Museum—has conducted several archaeological surveys on the hull.<br />
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After being withdrawn from service, the company’s receiver tied up the TWILIGHT and COLUMBIA in the Camden Shipbuilding Company’s yard at Coopers Point, Camden. The COLUMBIA underwent an auction in 1918 and served as a floating boarding house for World War I dock workers while moored at Philadelphia’s Christian Street wharf. She did suffer some damage by fire during her wartime stationary service. The TWILIGHT remained at Cooper’s Point and the COLUMBIA returned there after World War I ended. A few years later, the TWILIGHT was sold and had just undergone a complete reconstruction in 1923 for new owners, when a disastrous fire swept through the Coopers Point yard and the TWILIGHT suffered total destruction. The COLUMBIA, tied up nearby, suffered some fire damage, but escaped complete burning.<br />
<br />
Workmen at the shipyard repaired the fire damage on the COLUMBIA and she again began running excursions for new owners by 1925, only to be returned to Cooper’s Point after a year or two when expenses exceeded the ticket proceeds. Five years later, an unattributed newspaper clipping dated June 13, 1930 provides the following information:<br />
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<span style="color: orange;">The old steamer, “Columbia”, for many years a familiar sight on the upper Delaware River, where she plied between Philadelphia and Trenton, has been reconditioned at the Kensington Shipyard, Philadelphia, after being tied up at Cooper’s Point, Camden, for several years. According to reports the vessel, which has been renamed “Franklin”, will soon be placed in service as an excursion boat running between Philadelphia and Deamer’s Beach, new Newcastle, Delaware. </span>[<em>sic</em>]<br />
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Owned by the Franklin Transportation Company, the COLUMBIA, a.k.a. FRANKLIN, only operated to Deamer’s Beach during the summer season of 1930. The new owners laid her up at a South Philadelphia pier until the Kensington Ship & Drydock Company purchased the steamer at auction in 1932 for $1,500.00 to satisfy their claims against the boat’s owners. On October 5, 1932, before the Kensington Shipyard management had the opportunity to move her, fire swept through the COLUMBIA, causing total devastation. Charles Haskell, a mate on the boat since 1910, served as the watchman and lived aboard the vessel. The firemen responding to the alarm call rescued the septuagenarian Mr. Haskell. <br />
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This fire brought an ignoble end to the COLUMBIA, a handsome and popular river steamer and the last surviving member of the Upper Delaware River’s <em>Three Musketeers</em>. She is remembered today through old photographs, faded newspaper articles, and steaming through the memories of the oldest of area residents.<br />
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</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-779291837523434339.post-26607436397871731172010-09-24T12:04:00.006-04:002010-09-26T23:26:13.723-04:00Kenilworth Lake, Evesham Township, Burlington County, New Jerseyby Jerseyman ©2010<br />
<br />
Extracted from <em>Village Improvement</em>, a publication of the Moorestown Improvement Association. Vol. I, No. 10, September 1905, pages 2-3.<br />
<br />
<strong><span style="color: orange; font-size: large;">CAMP KENILWORTH</span></strong><br />
<span style="color: orange;">BY GEORGE DE COU.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">Camp Kenilworth is located on Kenilworth Lake on the edge of the pines, about three miles south of Marlton. There is, perhaps, no more desolate spot in this section of New Jersey, yet it possesses for the lover of nature a charm that is almost indescribable.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">I recently spent two weeks in the camp with my family, and I can say with all truthfulness that I never spent a more profitable or more enjoyable vacation. To the business man whose brain is weary from the constant strain of business cares and responsibility, and to the housekeeper run down under the strain of household worries, it offers opportunities for rest and recuperation not to be found at our better-known and more popular resorts. Indeed, as modern life becomes more and more complex, it is the more necessary for us at times to avoid “the madding crowd” and seek “nature’s wilds” for rest and inspiration.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">The Jersey pines have been ridiculed from time immemorial, yet they possess a beauty peculiarly their own. Perhaps a poet will arise some day to sing their praises and interpret for us their message of quiet restfulness. Seated in retrospect on the bank of Kenilworth Lake I find it difficult to describe my surroundings or to express in words my love for this spot far removed from civilization. Before me lie the quiet and peaceful waters of Kenilworth Lake, in which during the morning and evening hours are mirrored the artistic pines that fringe its borders. At the upper end of the lake “Lovers’ Retreat,” a small island on which a rustic pavilion—almost hidden by vines and shrubbery—has been erected, adds an artistic touch to the outlook. Turtle log, in the foreground, jutting out into the lake, on which not infrequently may be seen two or three immense turtles, is a point of interest to the old as well as young.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">The lake is, perhaps, one-third of a mile in length, and is fed by a little stream known locally as “Back Run,” whose waiters are clarified by their long journey through the cedar swamps and pines. The lake offers many attractions to the lovers of bathing and boating, and at feeding time the elusive pike rippling the surface of the water tempts the disciple of Isaak Walton.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">At sunset the lake appears in its greatest glory. Its waters sparkle with the rays of the departing sun, and the glories of the sunset, even to the perfect coloring of the clouds, are mirrored in its depths. This picture, perfect in every detail, was equaled only by a moonlight scene during my stay when the heavens, illumined by myriads of stars, were reproduced in the waters of the lake. The milky way, the big dipper, and other beautiful constellations were perfectly pictured, and occasionally a shooting star, like a flying gold-fish, dashed through the water.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">The camp is located in a clump of pines on the bank of the lake. Near the water’s edge a large tent, fifty feet in diameter, serves as a pavilion, and is well supplied with comfortable chairs and hammocks. A little stream, part of the overflow of the lake, flows under one edge of the tent, and the music of the flowing water lulls us to sleep even in the daylight hours. A water-wheel, rudely built yet artistic, with its constant motion, reminds us sufficiently of the busy world outside to enable us to enjoy more fully the quietness and restfulness of our surroundings. The sleeping tents, fifteen in number, are pitched in the form of a horseshoe just back of the large tent, and within the circle thus formed a camp-fire of pine logs is built each evening.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">The camp-fire is the event of the day. Around it each evening the happy campers draw their chairs, and with constant flow of jest and story and song pass the evening hours most pleasantly.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">There is a fascination in a log-fire in the woods, beneath the blue canopy of heaven, which alone can be felt—it cannot be described. Long after most of the campers had retired I would sit with a few congenial spirits and enjoy its fascination. Song and story had ceased, and few words were spoken, yet there seemed to emanate from the glowing embers a spirit of fellowship which drew us together even though we were strangers to each other.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">A description of the camp would be incomplete without a tribute to our jolly host, Clayton H. Brick, and to the “Kenilworth spirit.” To a large extent the one inspired the other, for our host was tireless in his efforts to promote the happiness and comfort of his guests. At times the campers lapsed into a freedom of manner and speech that would not be acceptable in the “drawing-room,” yet a spirit of brotherly kindliness and unselfishness pervaded the camp which each one of us can with profit keep with us on our return to the ”drawing-room” or business office.</span> [end of quoted article]<br />
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Here are some views of the recreational resort that once existed at <em>Lake Kenilworth in the Pines</em>:<br />
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The dam the formed Kenilworth Lake became a victim of the July 2004 1,000-year storm, when massive amounts of rainfall slammed Burlington County, washing out many dams and causing widespread flooding. No effort has been made to-date to rebuild the dam and restore the lake to its original beauty.<br />
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I first became interested in Kenilworth a few years ago when I began researching antebellum African American enclaves in South Jersey. Evesham Township historian Maurice Horner, writing in his 1971 work, A History of Evesham Township, states:<br />
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<span style="color: orange;">Kenilworth Lake is part of the Evans tract. At an early date, a saw mill was erected there. The sawdust was dumped into the stream and carried down to Union Mill Lake. Luchas, who developed Union Mill Colony Club, uncovered this sawdust while cleaning out the lake with a bull dozer; it had been at the bottom of the lake for 150 years.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">Evans allowed fugitive slaves, who had escaped from the south through the underground, to settle around Kenilworth. At one time there were 40 of these slave families. The southern slave holders would plant colored spies in the colony. After getting the necessary information, these spies would return South; then raiding parties from the South would kidnap these slaves and take them back to the slave holders.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">To counteract this the colony would post lookouts, and if there was any sign of a raid, the lookouts would give the signal and the slaves could run to the woods and hide.</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">Evans gave these slaves a deed for their lots but these deeds were never recorded. Before he died, Evans told the slaves to give back to him their deeds. A descendant of a slave pointed out to me, “This is my land. I have nothing to show for it, and I can’t sell it. (page 11)</span><br />
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Indeed, if you examine some sheet maps published before the Civil War, particularly the 1860 Lake & Beers Philadelphia and Vicinity, you will find the surnames of black families living near the lake. Some names that come to mind include Worthington and Quann, but there are several others.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-779291837523434339.post-20162057858408649972010-09-19T00:40:00.001-04:002011-02-17T23:16:55.790-05:00The Battle of Long Bridge? Perhaps Not!by Jerseyman ©2010<br />
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A number of twentieth-century local historians contend that a battle or skirmish occurred in current-day Hainesport Township, Burlington County, New Jersey. In more recent years, artists have even prepared fanciful paintings of how the military exchange may have appeared. The bridge in question afforded a crossing over the South Branch of Rancocas Creek along the old road to Philadelphia from Mount Holly. The State Assembly approved an act in February 1794 to create a more direct route for this highway along today’s Marne Highway (C.R. 537). This more direct route became popular and the old road quickly fell into disuse and travelers soon abandoned it completely. But what about the supposed battle during the American War for Independence? Did it happen? Although no references to the battle can be found in the standard nineteenth-century sources, including Woodward’s <em>History of Burlington County</em>, I quote below what local authors such as George DeCou and Henry Shinn have written on the subject:<br />
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In George DeCou’s Pamphlet No. 1, <em>Historical Sketches of Mount Holly and Vicinity</em>, he writes,<br />
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<span style="color: orange;">Andrew Bell, General Clinton’s confidential secretary, tells in his Journal of a skirmish at the bridge over the south branch of the Rancocas—called Bally Bridge Creek—in General Clinton’s reports—in which five Americans were killed and two captured. Let us quote from Bell’s interesting Journal, which is the only account of this episode that we have today: “At a small distance from this town (Mount Holly) a bridge was broken down by the rebels which, when our people were repairing, were fired upon by those villains from a house, two of which were taken prisoners, three killed and the other two ran into the cellar and fastened it so that we were obliged to burn the house and consume them in it.”</span><br />
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<span style="color: orange;">This historic incident occurred near the bridge on the old Philadelphia Road which crossed the Rancocas about two hundred yards above the present railroad bridge at Hainesport. At the time of the Revolution, this bridge and the village near it, now known as Hainesport, was called “Long Bridge.” The present lane leading from the Lumberton Road to the residence of Mr. and Mrs. Fenton Middleton, which is beautifully located on the bluff overlooking the creek is said to have been part of the old road. Some of the piling of the original bridge may still be seen on the eastern bank at low tide. The exact location of the house in which the soldiers were burned is not known, although it probably stood on the bluff to the west of the Middleton residence and probably nearly opposite the bridge. In the woods east of Smithville there is an entrenchment that undoubtedly was thrown up by the American forces when it was learned that General Clinton had evacuated Philadelphia and had started on his march across New Jersey. </span><br />
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What is wrong with this quote? Well, DeCou states emphatically that Andrew Bell <span style="color: orange;">“…tells in his Journal of a skirmish at the bridge over the south branch of the Rancocas.”</span> Really? I don’t see any mention of the Rancocas in Bell’s journal (quoted further down in this essay) and certainly NOT specifically the South Branch! Furthermore, DeCou mentions “Bally Bridge Creek.” Bally Bridge or, more correctly Belly Bridge, stood in Eayrestown along modern-day Bella Bridge Road in Lumberton Township.<br />
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In DeCou’s Pamphlet No. 2, <em>Historical Sketches of Mount Holly and Vicinity</em>, he is not so certain about what he wrote in pamphlet No. 1. He writes in No. 2:<br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">General Clinton, who camped at Evesham (Mount Laurel) on the night of June 19, 1778, shortly after the evacuation of Philadelphia by the British Army, broke camp early on the 20th and part of his troops passed over “the Great Road,” as it was called, through Union Mills and over Long Bridge near Mr. Middleton’s residence to Mount Holly. It is <u>probable</u> [underlining added for emphasis] that this bridge was the scene of the skirmish described by Andrew Bell, confidential secretary to General Clinton, in his Journal. It is now known, however, that General Clinton’s forces were divided at Evesham, part going through Fostertown and Eayrestown to Mount Holly, and consequently it is possible that the fight may have taken place at the bridge over the Rancocas on Pine street in that town. According to Mr. Bell’s account, British soldiers who were repairing the bridge, which had been destroyed by the Americans, were fired upon by an American patrol stationed in a house near the bridge and five Americans were killed. William Edmond, of Hainesport, informed the writer that his great, great grandfather was burned to death during a fight at Long Bridge, which seems to uphold the tradition that the incident took place at Hainesport rather than in Mount Holly.</span><br />
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DeCou apparently derived information for his statement regarding Clinton’s Army dividing at Evesham from a letter that Major Richard Howell (2nd New Jersey – American) wrote to General Washington:<br />
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<span style="color: orange;">From Haddonfield, 20 June, ... before we Left our Detachment, the Genl. [Maxwell] had no Intelligence and, being acquainted with the Country, I have procured such as was in my powr. ... The Enemy march’d in 3 Columns, the first approached Ayres Town yesterday, the 2d [column] arriv’d at foster town & the 3d did [not?] move. This day the 1st [column] arrived at Mt Holly, 2d at Ayres town (perhaps at Holly) & the 3d March’d to Moor’s Town. Genl. Leslie commands the advanced Column of perhaps 2000 men, Gen. Clinton the 2d perhaps of 5000 men & Gen. Kniphauzen the Last of 2000 also. Each of these divisions has a great many Waggons, artillery & pontoons. They have many Deserters & move with great Caution & Slowly … Their March has been obstructed as much as possible & their flancks harrass’d by our parties. The General is now posted at Black Horse, where he will contend every advantageous post. The Militia are Collected & collecting, resolv’d to do great things. P.S. The Inhabitants are villianously plundered & some Houses burnt.</span><br />
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Having Clinton’s forces split between Fostertown and Eayrestown likely represents an accommodation of the road system in the area and there is nothing in this quote to suggest that one of the columns crossed at Long Bridge. Regarding DeCou’s other statements in his second pamphlet, I am dubious about William Edmond’s recollections about his great, great grandfather.<br />
<br />
Fast-forward twenty years from DeCou’s two pamphlets and you arrive at Henry Shinn’s work, <em>The History of Mount Holly</em>. It is in this book that the folklore (perhaps “fakelore”) is permanently cemented into the history of Burlington County. Shinn writes:<br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">Andrew Bell, Clinton’s confidential secretary, wrote in his journal on June 20:</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">“At a small distance from this town (Mount Holly) a bridge was broken down by the rebels which, when our people were repairing, were fired upon by those villains from a house, two of which were taken prisoners, three killed and the other two ran into the cellar and fastened it so that we were obliged to burn the house and consume them in it.”</span><br />
<br />
<span style="color: orange;">Bell’s account is the only existing record of this incident. It occurred at Hainesport on the old road from Philadelphia, the bridge spanning the Rancocas about two hundred yards above the present railroad bridge. The names of the patriots who died there are unknown. </span><br />
<br />
It is rather obvious to me that Shinn took his information directly from DeCou’s Pamphlet no. 1, only Shinn made the event more certain than even DeCou did.<br />
<br />
Now that I’ve quoted the local historians, I present below the original primary-source information on what happened during the British overland march through the Jerseys in June 1778:<br />
<br />
British General Henry Clinton led the Crown’s forces out of Philadelphia in June 1778 to make a daring crossing of the Jerseys to arrive at Sandy Hook and sail for New York. Based on received intelligence about this pending move, General Washington wrote a letter on 24 May 1778 to Philemon Dickinson of the New Jersey Militia and requested that he and his forces <span style="color: orange;">“…give the Enemy some annoyance, if Jersey is their route; It is said, that by cutting away the Bridges over Ancocus and _____ Creeks and obstructing the Roads, their March may be considerably retarded and rendered much more circuitous.”</span><br />
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General knowledge provides that Clinton led his men out of Haddonfield through Evesboro on 18 June and encamped for the night at Evesham (now Mount Laurel) Meetinghouse. Meanwhile, the wagon train, extending some 12 miles in length, lumbered up the Kings Highway towards Moorestown and Mount Holly, where the two armies would rejoin. Clinton planned this division of the army so the poorly maintained roads would better accommodate the march. The next day (19 June), Hessian Captain Johann Ewald, who traveled with Clinton’s forces, recorded the following in his journal:<br />
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<span style="color: orange;">The 19th. The army marched off one hour before daylight, as it had the day before, going by way of Fostertown. Toward midday the army arrived on the left bank of Belly-Bridge Creek, where the enemy had destroyed the bridges. There were still two beams left here, and since I had the advanced guard, I immediately tried to cross over with eighty jägers to take post on the other side of the water, by which the workmen on the bridge were protected. I found a very suitable post on a hill, which I occupied. I then took thirty jägers with me to patrol the area ahead. When I had ventured one hour further on, it seemed to me from my map that the terrain in the distance indicated I must not be far from Eayrestown, where the army was headed according to my idea of the march. I sent back a jäger who was to guide a lieutenant and thirty men to the place I had left, and I continued on my march.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">After a half an hour’s time, I caught sight of several roofs of houses in a hollow. I ordered ten men forward to skirmish, who fired in a little while and beckoned to me with their hands. I followed at once and found the creek. There was a bridge over it next to a mill, on which people were working to destroy it. The mill was occupied by riflemen, who boldly fired when they discovered us. But since I let fly in earnest at the windows of the mill, they abandoned the mill and bridge and ran away into the nearest wood. I immediately occupied the bank on this side of the bridge with twenty men. I then ordered a corporal and ten jägers to cross the beams of the bridge, occupy the mill, and barricade the entrance, which I reported instantly to my chief. During this time the army had crossed Belly-Bridge Creek and encamped in a long quadrangle. I received reinforcements of 150 jägers and orders to maintain the post. Toward evening the carpenters arrived with the construction wagon and the bridge was repaired. I received from the Commander in Chief his thanks and the compliment that I had saved the army a longer march by my diligence.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">The 20th. At daybreak the army set out, passed the defile of Eayrestown, and toward midday encamped in an irregular quadrangle on the heights of Mount Holly. On this march the head of the queue and both flanks were constantly annoyed by the enemy.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">The 21st. The corps under General von Knyphausen, consisting of the Stirn and Loos brigades, the grenadiers, the Ranger Corps, and the provincials, which was marching to the left of the army by way of Moorestown rejoined the army here. We received the news that Washington intended to cross, or had already crossed, the Delaware near Trenton in order to get in front of us.</span><br />
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Meanwhile, New Jersey Tory and Loyalist Andrew Bell, once the confidential secretary of General Clinton, traveled with General Alexander Leslie and his forces as they rode through the countryside to protect the wagon train. He kept a journal during the evacuation across the Jerseys and on Saturday, 20 June 1778, recorded the following information:<br />
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<span style="color: orange;">S. 20th,—Marched from this place [Haddonfield] at 4, and met with no interruption from the Rebels the whole day. Saw a man sitting by the road side who belonged to the forementioned party, and had been wounded by the Yagers with swords, in a dangerous way. He proved a deserter from the 28th Regiment—(executed.) A light horseman of theirs was found in the wood, wounded, yesterday, but was so obstinate as not to tell the route his comrades had taken. We arrived at Mount Holly at 11 and halted. The Rebels, to the number 1300 under Maxwell, had been here 16 days, and marched with precipitation yesterday morning, having received information from a Yager who deserted to them. Major Joe Bloomfield was among them.—The inhabitants had sent all their effects out of this place, but were sorry for it when they met with such civility from the army. At a small distance from this town a bridge was broken down by the Rebels, which when our people were repairing, were fired upon by those villains from a house, two of whom were taken, three killed, and other two ran into the cellar, and fastened it, so that were obliged to burn the house and consume them in it.</span><br />
<span style="color: orange;">June 21, S.—Remained here [Mount Holly] all day. At 9 o’clock A.M., Gen. Knyphusen arrived with his Division from Haddonfield by way of Moorestown; had had no kind of interruption.</span><br />
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There is nothing in the quote above from Andrew Bell that even hints the bridge was Long Bridge. Furthermore, on the following day, Bell records that Knyphausen arrived and encountered <span style="color: orange;">“…no kind of interruption.”</span> This statement strongly suggests that Long Bridge remained intact or relatively so, allowing the wagon train to cross the creek unimpeded. Since General Leslie had already arrived in Mount Holly, the bridge in question could be any of up to four bridges that spanned the creek in the immediate area of the Rancocas, not to mention other bridges that crossed smaller streams. Regarding the action at a bridge that Bell references, it is possible that Bell received some garbled intelligence concerning what Captain Ewald encountered at Eayrestown or some other military action at one of the other bridges in the Mount Holly area. A number of these bridges are depicted on Ewald’s map from 1776. He depicts the location of Long Bridge and even New Long Bridge, the current crossing of the Rancocas on Marne Highway, since he prepared his journal and his maps many years after the war from the field notes he recorded during the American War for Independence. <br />
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</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">So, did a skirmish occur at Long Bridge? It is certainly possible, but it is just a possible that it occurred at one of the other bridges near Mount Holly. The flimsy documentation provided by the twentieth-century local historians fails to hold up when exposed to the light of <span style="font-family: inherit;">modern evidentiary standards</span>.</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-779291837523434339.post-48412799156177738452010-09-18T23:59:00.001-04:002010-10-19T08:07:47.762-04:00A History of Pleasant Millsby Jerseyman ©2010<br />
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What follows is a history of the Pleasant Mills complex that I thought I would share with all and any interested in the property. For those seeking even more minutiae about the place, I highly recommend you consult the “Pleasant Mills” chapter of Arthur D. Pierce’s <em>Iron in the Pines</em>. <br />
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<u><strong>Pleasant Mills Paper Mill</strong></u><br />
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The mill seat at Pleasant Mills has served a colonial sawmill; a 3,000-spindle cotton mill, constructed in 1822 by Benjamin Richards and his three partners: William Lippincott, Edward Yorke, and Benjamin Sooy; and a paper mill beginning in 1861 after a great conflagration destroyed the cotton mill during 1855. The partnership consisting of Robert M. Pierce, Benjamin F. Holbrook, John McNeil, and Thomas Irving acquired the cotton mill property from Lewis Henry Richards in February 1860 and constructed a paper mill at the site of the cotton factory. Following some court action against Pierce and Holbrook, these two names disappeared from the firm and the two men sold any remaining interest in the paper mill to John W. Farrell in August 1862. By January 1864, the firm, now styled as McNeil, Irving, and Farrell, advertised for raw materials to meet demand for its products during the Civil War:<br />
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A letter from a Pleasant Mills inhabitant to the editor of the <em>South Jersey Republican</em> dated 18 January 1864, notes that “McNeil, Irving & Co., are also putting in 30 acres [of cranberries].” The letter writer also states that “T. Henderson, Esq., has a fine vessel of about 500 tons nearly ready to launch. He is also doing a heavy business in the manufacture of coal, and lumber, employing some 80 or 100 men.” The scribe concludes his letter by reporting, “McNeil, Irving & Co.’s Mills are making one ton of paper per day, having two sets of hands, and running day and night, they use 10 tons of old manilla rope per week, and during the last two years have made the largest portion of the Cartridge paper used by the Government. The amount of tax paid by them to the U.S. on their manufactures for the last three months, amount to the snug sum of $450, being more we believe than that paid by all others in Atlantic County.”<br />
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In February 1865, John W. Farrell’s son, William E. Farrell, acquired his father’s interest in the business:<br />
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By June of the same year, he had bought out the interest of McNeil and Irving and became the sole proprietor of the paper mill. Desirous of more capital in the face of the financial malaise that followed the Civil War, William E. Farrell, in concert with William Bargh, James M. Scovel, Peter L. Voorhees, P.C. Brinck, obtained an incorporation act for the Nescochague Manufacturing Company from the New Jersey State Legislature in March 1866. This corporation would continue to operate the paper mill for the ensuing 30 years or more.<br />
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A squib in the 2 March 1875 edition of the <em>Trenton State Gazette</em> noted:<br />
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<span style="color: orange;">Pleasant Mills, Atlantic county, is a great paper manufacturing village. A new mill for the manufacture of I.X.L. water proof paper will shortly be started. Manilla papers and rag and straw paper are also made here on an extensive scale. </span><br />
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A terrible hurricane struck southern New Jersey in late October 1878 and during the height of the storm, at 1:00 a.m. on 23 October, the paper mill burned down. Being a shrewd man, Farrell had the mill fully insured and used the proceeds of that policy in part to reconstruct the mill with new and improved machinery, capable of producing 4000 pounds of paper daily. While the Nescochague Manufacturing Company remained an active corporation, Farrell needed a fresh infusion of capital to complete the reconstruction, so he incorporated the Pleasant Mills Paper Company on 5 May 1880. The corporate charter authorized the issuance of $100,000 in stock. An amendment dated 13 April 1881 boosted the capital stock to $150,000. Farrell served as president of the new company and Herman Hoopes, of West Chester, Pennsylvania, filled the position of secretary. Ernest Hexamer completed a fire insurance survey of the new mill on 9 May 1881 and the steam lithographic press of Frederick Bourquin produced prints of the survey, which presents a plan view, a birds-eye view, and a complete description of the works:<br />
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<em><span style="color: orange; font-size: large;"><strong>Pleasant Mills Paper Co.’s Works,</strong></span></em><br />
<em><span style="color: orange;"><strong>Pleasant Mills, Atlantic County, N.J.</strong></span></em><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>MANUFACTURE</strong>:—<em>Manila and Hay Paper</em>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>RAW STOCK</strong>:—<em>Old Ropes and Salt Hay.—No rags, straw, paper shavings or jute butts.</em></span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>EMPLOYING</strong>:—<em>18 hands (15 men, 1 boys, 2 girls).</em></span></span><br />
<em><span style="color: orange; font-size: x-small;">Surveyed May 9th, 1881.</span></em><br />
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<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>OWNERS</strong>:—<em>The Pleasant Mills Paper Co., Wm. E, Farrel, Pres.</em></span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>SUPERINTENDENT</strong>:—<em>Not interested in the profits of the business.</em></span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>NAME</strong>:—<em>Pleasant Mills Paper Co.’s Works</em>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>AGE</strong>:—<em>Buildings entirely rebuilt 1880</em>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>LOCATION</strong>:—<em>Situated at Pleasant Mills, 6 miles from Elwood Station, Camden and Atlantic R.R., Atlantic County, N.J.</em></span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>CONSTRUCTION</strong>:—<em>Good.</em></span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>COMMUNICATION</strong>:—<em>As per plan</em>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>POWER</strong>:—Water—<em>Steam, used for heating and boiling only.</em></span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>HEIGHT</strong>:—<em>Boiler house</em>, 9'—11' and 20'.—<em>Machine house</em>, 9'—10' and 20'.—<em>Pulp Engine house</em>, 9'—10' and 20'.—<em>Rotary Boiler house</em>, 9'—10' and 20'.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>LENGTH</strong>:—<em>See plan</em>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>WALLS</strong>:—<em>Basement</em>, 24".—<em>1st story</em>, 18" thick.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>ROOF</strong>:—<em>Slate</em>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>CORNICE</strong>:—<em>Wooden finish.</em></span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>GUTTERS</strong>:—<em>None; projecting eaves</em>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>SCUTTLE</strong>:—<em>None</em>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>COLUMNS</strong>:—<em>None</em>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>WINDOWS</strong>:—<em>As per plan and view</em>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>FLOORS</strong>:—<em>Basement of boiler house, cement; basement of machine and pulp engine house, of ground,—Others of 3" plank, laid flat.</em></span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>CEILING</strong>:—<em>In office and machine room, boarded.—Others not finished.—Will have part of ceiling in basement of boiler house iron lined.</em></span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>ELEVATOR</strong>:—<em>Open elevator (a) in rotary boiler house, no trap doors</em>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>HATCHWAY</strong>:—<em>None</em>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>LIGHTNING RODS</strong>:—<em>None.—Will have some</em>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>MACHINE SHOP</strong>:—<em>None</em>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>WOOD SHAVINGS</strong>:—<em>Made only in case of repairs and cleaned out as soon as made.—No regular carpenter employed.</em></span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>FORGE</strong>:—<em>None</em>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>HEATING</strong>:—<em>Rooms warmed by 1¼" wrought-iron steampipe resting on iron</em>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>STOVES</strong>:—<em>None</em>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>LIGHTING</strong>:—<em>Rooms lighted by enclosed kerosene oil lamps</em>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>WATCHMEN</strong>:—2 <em>night watchmen constantly on the premises</em>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>WATCHCLOCK</strong>:—<em>None</em>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>FUEL</strong>:—<em>Are using cord wood and coal at present, will use coal only</em>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>BOILERS</strong>:—2, <em>located as per plan, enclosed by brick work in proper distance of wood work</em>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>SMOKE STACK</strong>:—<em>Of stone and brick, rising 30 feet above the highest roof</em>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>STEAM ENGINE</strong>:—<em>None</em>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>TURBINES</strong>:—<em>Four</em>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>ROPE CUTTER</strong>:—<em>In</em> 1<em>st floor of rotary boiler house, no lights used in rope cutter room, man having charge.</em></span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>RAG PICKER OR DEVIL</strong>:—<em>None</em>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>STOCK</strong>:—<em>Salt hay and rope; Salt hay stacked at least</em> 1000 <em>feet from mill; ropes stored in frame storehouse</em> 69 <em>feet from rotary boiler house.—No rags, paper, shavings, straw or jute butts used</em>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>ROTARY BOILERS</strong>:—<em>Two, located as per plan</em>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>UNSLACKED LINE</strong>:—<em>Keep about</em> 20 <em>bushels at a time on frame platform in</em> 1<em>st floor of rotary boiler house. </em></span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>ACIDS</strong>:—<em>Average </em>10 <em>carboys of sulphuric acid in yard</em>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>RESIN</strong>:—<em>Keeps from</em> 5—6 <em>bbls. of resin outside</em>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>OILS</strong>:—<em>Keep </em>1 bbl. <em>lubricating oil and</em> 1 <em>bbl. kerosene oil in tin oil cabinets in machine room</em>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>SIZE</strong>:—<em>Boiled by steam</em>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>OCCUPANCY</strong>:—<em>As per plan</em>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>PROVISIONS AGAINST FIRE</strong>:</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong> PUMP</strong>:—<em>None</em>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong> HYDRANTS</strong>:—<em>Several</em> 2" <em>hydrants with small sections of hose attached, used in manufacturing, could be </em></span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><em> used in </em></span></span><span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><em>case of fire; said hydrants supplied by the watertanks</em>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong> WATERTANKS</strong>:—<em>Two large watertanks located as per plan, one containing</em> 45,000 <em>galls. the other</em> 15,000 </span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"> <em>galls</em>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong> FIRE BUCKETS</strong>:—4 <em>doz. galvanized-iron fire-buckets about the premises, always filled</em>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong> AUXILIARY AID</strong>:—<em>Hand fire engine in Batsto</em>, ¾ <em>of a mile off</em>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>CARE IN MANAGEMENT</strong>:—<em>Good</em>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>GENERAL CONDITION OF THE PROPERTY</strong>:—<em>Good</em>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>EXTERNAL EXPOSURES</strong>:—<em>None</em>.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><strong>MACHINERY</strong>:—1 <em>rope cutter</em>, 2 <em>rotary boilers</em>, 3 <em>pulp engines</em>, 3 <em>drainers</em>, 3 <em>stuff chests</em>, 1 <em>paper machine with two sets super callenders and</em> 1 <em>cutter attached</em>, 1 <em>power press</em>, 1 <em>bleach mixer and</em> 1 <em>lime tank</em>.</span></span><br />
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To prevent a repeat of the fire that destroyed the mill, the company constructed a water tank and installed two hydrants, as well as place fire buckets around the plant in strategic locations. <br />
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Just as the paper business at Pleasant Mills had become profitable, William Farrell became ill during 1892. Dr. Thomas Reed, of Atlantic City, later testified that he attended to Farrell for heat prostration during July and August of that year. He also diagnosed the patient with aphasia and paresis. In response to questions, Farrell could not formulate sentences, but answered monosyllabically. The patient recovered sufficiently to marry Celia Hyslop of Troy, New York. His joy was short-lived, however, and he died less than a year later on 9 March 1893, the date of 55th birthday. He had drawn up a new Last Will and Testament, leaving all of his worldly possessions, both real and personal, to his new wife. His former heirs, thinking that Celia exercised undue influence on her much older husband, brought suit against the estate. The litigation continued for five years before the court ruled in favor of the widow. Meanwhile, she had remarried to Lewis M. Cresse, another man of great means. Celia appointed her new husband as president of the paper mill company, who hired Alexander J. McKeone as the new plant manager. In 1901, McKeone embarked on a major project to update the mill and its equipment. At that time, the paper mill employed 25 people. By August 1914, Lewis Cresse’s health had deteriorated rapidly and he committed suicide by shooting himself. His widow decided to close the paper mill as she had no managerial experience. <br />
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Two years later, in 1916, McKeone acquired the mill and its 300-plus acres from Mrs. Cresse. He sought to reopen the mill. A short article in <em>The Philadelphia Inquirer</em> noted,<br />
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<strong><span style="color: orange;">JUTE MILL TO REOPEN</span></strong><br />
<em><span style="color: orange;">Special to The Inquirer</span></em><br />
<span style="color: orange;">ELWOOD, N.J., Jan. 9.—Investigators are considering the reopening of the mill of the Pleasant Mills Paper Company, located at Pleasant Mills, on an arm of the Mullica River, five miles from this station. The mill has been closed since the beginning of the European war shut off the constant supply of jute, when owners declared the mill could not be profitably run further. Heavy papers for wrapping, sandpaper, bases, etc., are made from rope, jute and wood pulp.</span><br />
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But the mill failed to open and McKeone sold a controlling interest in the mill to the Norristown Magnesia & Asbestos Company. The new owners installed the necessary equipment to produce asbestos in sheet form. The Norristown-based company operated the mill for several years, but found production there to be unprofitable. They then attempted to go back to papermaking, producing color stock for theatre tickets, but this, too failed. The mill closed for the last time in April 1925 and the owners sold the equipment to scrap dealers. The mill and its attendant property passed through the hands of two development companies. The second developer, the McCorkle-Pleasant Mills Company, sold the mill in October 1948 to Raymond and Mary Baker (nee McKeone). The deed of conveyance contained a restrictive covenant:<br />
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The buildings now erected upon the said Land…shall be preserved and kept in their present artistic appearance and such repairs shall be made thereto as shall make said buildings usable for the purpose hereinafter mentioned…The said lands and premises shall be used only as an art center for the promotion and teaching of art, crafts and the manufacture and sale of art craft products…provided the tenant or tenants shall have the right to live and make their home in said buildings.<br />
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With that in mind, the Bakers used the old mill as an art gallery, but then sold the property in January 1952 to Mrs. Ada Fenno, of Swarthmore, Pennsylvania, who desired to convert the mill into a theatre. Possessing the necessary financial means to accomplish her goal, the Mill Playhouse opened for its first play on 3 July 1953, when the actors presented three plays by Noel Coward: “Family Album;” “Ways and Means;” and “Red Peppers.” The actor troupe included a teenage Tony Perkins; Efrem Zimbalist Jr. also appeared on stage at the Mill playhouse. A choral group from Hammonton actually preceded the play when they offered a recital at the mill in 1952. Meanwhile, Fenno relocated her residence to the mill, occupying the former office and supply room at the south end of the mill complex. The theatre closed in 1957, but not before it had incurred a loss of $80,000. Ada Fenno remained tenured in the property until her death on 24 June 1975. In her Last Will and Testament, she attempted to devise the old paper mill to the City of Hammonton, but they refused to accept the gift with the provisos and restrictions on the property. Her second choice was the charity known as Seeing Eye, Inc. They, too, refused the gift. Finally her executors, The Bank of New Jersey, sold the mill and its property to the Pax Amicus Foundation, a theatre group headquartered in Flanders, New Jersey. This foundation still owns the property today in 2010 and has leased the mill to a number of caretakers since they gained ownership.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com5