Class Book. COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT Digitized by tine Internet Arciiive in 2010 witii funding from Tine Library of Congress Iittp://www.arcliive.org/details/liistoricalsketcli01wrig HENDKICK B. WRIGHT. P L Y BI U T 11 11 O C K. HISTORICAL SKETCHES OP PLYMOUTH, LUZERNE CO., PENNA. BY HES"DRIOK B. WEIGHT, OF WILKES-BARRE, PA With Twenty- Five Photographs of some of the Early Settlers and Present Residents of the Town of Plymouth; Old Landmarks ; Family Residences-: and Places of Special Note. PHILADELPHIA:^ T. B. PETERSON & BROTHERS; 306 CHESTNUT STREET. Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1873, by HENDRICK B. WRIGHT, In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington, D. C. DEDICATION. To Hendeeson Gayloed, Esq., Mt Deae Sie : — Three of your name and kin- dred were members of Captain Samuel Kansom's company, in the Eevolutionary War. Another was a lieutenant in Captain Whittlesey's company, and fell in the memorable battle of Wyoming, on the third of July, 1778. Among the brave men who volunteered under the flag of our country in the recent Eebellion, your son, Asher, occupied as proud a position for courage as the best of them; and was stricken down upon the field, covered with three honorable scars, which he had previously received in the same number of engagements. A private of his company informed me, since the following sketches were prepared for the press, that (17) 18 DEDICATION. " Captain Gaylord was ever in front of his men in the heat of action ; bidding them ' to follow him/ A braver soldier, or more daring man, never drew sword from scabbard." As the survivor, therefore, of a family possessing such a record ; and having been yourself one of the most successful of our early merchants — a man of exemplary private character, exalted Christian vir- tues, and liberal charities ; to all of which, I have been myself a witness for more than half a century — it affords me much gratification, to dedicate to you these sketches, which are designed to preserve, in grateful memory, recollections of the representative men of Old Plymouth, who have reached that goal, towards which we are both rapidly advancing. Very Sincerely Yours, THE AUTHOR. Wilkes-Barre, AprU lOtli, 1873. CONTENTS. ' CHAPTER I. Its name. — wheis" settled, . . . Page 33 CHAPTER n. The Shawkee Tribe of Ijtdians, and the Fikst White Man. — Grasshopper Battle, . 41 CHAPTER in. The First Settlers, . . . . . . 59 CHAPTER IV. The Pennamite and Yankee War. — Commencement OF Troubles.— Captain Stewart. — Lieutenant Jenkins. — Patterson's Administration. — Ar- rest AND Imprisonment of Settlers. — Battle of Nanticoke, 71 (19) 20 CONTENTS. CHAPTER V. Pennamite and Yankee "War continued. — ^Ice Flood. — Expulsion of the Settlers and Acts OF Cruelty Inflicted upon Them. — Settlers Return. — Fight on Ross Hill. — Tories Driven OUT OF Shawnee, 110 CHAPTER VI. Pennamite War. — Legislation. — Decree at Tren- ton. — Confirming Act. — Compromise Act. — Peace. — John" Franklin, .... 129 CHAPTER VII. Revolutionary War. — Patriotism. — Captain Dur- kee's and Captain Ransom's Companies. — Gar- rison Hill. — Our Men Under Fire. — Wash- ington's Opinion of Them. — Battle of Wyo- MDsrG. — Mr. Washburn's Statement, . 156 CHAPTER VIII. Indian Murderers and Prisoners. — Conduct of the British Government. — Perkins, Williams, . BiDLACK, Pike, Rogers, Van CAmpen, Pence, Benjamin and Elisha Harvey, George P. Ransom, Louis Harvey, Lucy Bullford and McDowell, 200 CHAPTER IX. The War of 1812, 242 CONTENTS. 21 CHAPTER X. Town Meetings. — Eaklt System of Laws. — Fiest Town Officers, . . . . . . 255 CHAPTER XI. Occupations and Habits of the People in Ear- ly Days. — Industry. — Economy. — Church. — School-Teachees. — Rogers, Patterson, Curtis, Sweet, and others, ... . . 268 CHAPTER Xn. Old Landmarks. — Pound, Swing-Gate, Common- field, Sign-Post, Mills, Etc., . ' . . 284 CHAPTER Xni. Shad Fisheries. — Game, .... 293 CHAPTER XIY. Early Merchants, 303 CHAPTER XY. Coal Trade, antd Coal Men, . . . 313 CHAPTER XVI. Early Physicians — Morse, Moreland, Chamber- lain, AND Gaylord, 332 22 CONTENTS. CIIArTER XYll. EauIA- ruK.VOUKUS— IvOGEKS, Le-^VIS, LANE, PeARCE, AND Peck, 341 CIIAl^TER XVIII. Old Families. — The Bidlacks', . . . 851 ClLVrTER XIX. Oi.u Famu.f.s continued — IvEWNoi.os" — N"esbitts' — AVadhams' — Davekpokts' — Van Loon"s' — Pein- GLEs' — Turners' — ^Athertoxs' — C ashes' — L .vmek- ovx, 3G0 CHxVPTER XX. OlO FamU IKS CONTINUED — JoSEPH WrIGHT, . 402 ILLUSTRATIONS. PoETRAiT OF Heitdrick B. Wright, . Frontispiece. Plymouth Rock, " " Portrait of Jameson- Harvey, . . Fage 109 The Old Ransom House, ..." 164 Portrait of Colonel George P. Ransom, (Taken at 85), "240 The Old Elm, or Whippin"G-Post, . " 266 The Old Academy, " 279 The Wright House, and Birth-place of the Author, " 306 John B. Smith's Opera House, . " 309 Portrait of Hejstderson" Gaylord, . " 311 Portrait of Samuel Davenport, . . " 313 Abijah Smith's Coal Opening of 1807, " 315 Portrait of John" Smith, . . . . " 317 Portrait of Freemai^ Thomas, . . " 327 Portrait of John" B. Smith, ..." 332 (23) 24 list of illustrations. Residence op Henderson Gaylord, , Portrait of Rev. George Lane, Portrait of Rev. Benjamin Bidlack, Portrait of Benjamin Reynolds, Portrait of William C. Reynolds, . The Wadhams House, . Portrait of Calvin Wadhams, Portrait of Samuel Wadhams, . Portrait of Elijah C. Wadhams, . Portrait of Joseph Wright, Page 340 a 347 a 352 a 361 u 365 « 371 (( 376 u 379 u 380 (( 402 PREFACE. In a conversation, some months since, with an old Plymouth friend, he remarked : — " that all of the original settlers of the town had gone to their final resting-place, and that but a few of their children remained — and that these were now far advanced in years; that some of the old family names had become extinct; and that some one ought to prepare and write out a few biographical sketches of the most noted and prominent pioneers of the town. Their descendants should be informed of their early trials, sacrifices, and exposures; and what a vast amount of labor they performed, and what hardships they endured, to lay the foundation of all that wealth, which their kindred were now realizing." I replied, that I thought Mr. Charles Miner had pretty well accomplished this, in his " Hazleton Trav- (25) 26 PEEFACE. ellers." He said, " no ; and if I would refer to Mr. Miner's "book, I would see that h.e had written of but some four or five Plymouth, families. Mr. Miner spoke of the representative men, of the old time, throughout the entire valley. His limits would not, of course, permit him to go into that detail, which I am now suggesting," I said that the publication of a volume containing such biographical notices, would be attended with very considerable labor and expense ; that the sub- ject matter of the book would be entirely local, and of little interest, save to the comparatively small num- ber of people, who were the immediate descendants of the first settlers of the town, and it would also be a difficult matter to procure a competent person to perform it. He replied, by saying, "that he thought I was the only person living possessing the necessary knowledge of the old people of the town — many of whom were, in their day and generation, men of mark; some of whom had rendered their country signal services, while others had been carried into captivity by the Indians — to write a personal history of their exploits, sufferings, and perils, and he thought that I PREFACE. 27 ought to be willing to bestow the labor of doing the work. " That as to the cost of publishing the work, when written, if the descendants of the old heroes who are now sitting down in comfortable ease and luxury, enjoying the fruits of the large coal properties which they have inherited, and which are the legacies re- sulting from the toil and hardships, as well as the sagacity of their ancestors, are unwilling to foot the bill, why, you and I will do it for them," With much warmth and feeling he continued; "it will be, at most, a paltry sum; and the memories of many of these old people are dear to us, and there- fore let us put them in history ! There is not a New England town of the population of ours that has not its local history written out and published, and so let us have our history — ^we have the materials to make it one of interest, and it should be done." " Therefore," said he, " go at it, and when you have completed it, name my share to be contributed." Impelled, therefore, by such generous impulses, I could not well decline; and accordingly, soon after this conversation, I commenced writing out some of the personal notices of the representative men of the 28 PREFACE. town, contained in the following pages. But in tra- cing out the characters of the subjects I had selected, I found they were so intimately blended with the startling and exciting events of the Revolutionary struggle, "the Yankee and Pennamite" dispute, Indian captivities, and border raids, that mere bio- graphical sketches of a few leading men, would not correspond with my own ideas, at least, as to what was due to old Plymouth, and the hardy and intrepid men who had founded the town. I therefore concluded that instead of drawing a series of personal portraits, I would write up the his- tory of the town. Not a history precisely, either, with its connected chain of events, dates, and chrono- logical tables; but rather outlines and sketches of the principal men, and most noted events; commenc- ing with the settlement of the town, and continuing down to the year 1850 ; noting the early habits, customs, and amusements of the old settlers; giving memoranda of the early merchants, ministers of the gospel, physicians and schoolmasters; also an account of the shad fisheries, old land-marks, game, and many other matters purely municipal, but still of interest to those who had knowledge upon the sub- PREFACE. 29 jects directly, or held them, in tradition, from their fathers. For half of the period of the hundred years of which I write, I have a personal knowledge. Being a native of the town, and a resident in it for a num- ber of years, I had a personal knowledge of, and an intimate acquaintance with, I may say, nearly all the people of the town for more than half a century. From the survivors of the first settlers I received the traditionary characters of their cotemporaries and predecessors. This personal knowledge, therefore, enabled me to collate and prepare materials for the volume which, under other circumstances, would have been attended with much trouble and great research. Many of the events which I have written out, have been heretofore given to the public by the his- torical writers of the valley. I have therefore, not in all cases, cited authorities, for the reason that I had the same sources of information, and had become familiar with them long before their publication. The traditionary history of the town was a subject as thoroughly fixed in my mind, as the lessons taught me in the old Academy. As to facts, in some cases, 30 PREFACE. I diifcr with tlic authors who have preceded me and who have written upon tlie same subject matter. I have done tliis, however, under the impression that my sources of information were the most reliable. For instance, the tragedy attending the capture of Pike, Rogers and others, is stated differently by me, compared with previously written accounts of it. I made this change, because I have had repeatedly an extended and minute account of the whole affair from the mouths of both these men. While all the writers agree in the main, they are widely apart as to some of the minor details. This has been mainly pro- duced by the incorrect statements, from time to time made, by Van Campen, and which have been received as truths. When, therefore, I am in collision with the gentle- men who have gone over the same ground before me as to the verity of any point, I must fall back upon what I regard as my own superior opportunities of information. Nor have I, in such cases, relied wholly upon my own knowledge; but have consulted with aged persons, old residents of the town now living, whoso facilities of information were even better than my own; and have accordingly declined to change PREFACE, 31 the thread of published history without their concur- rence in opinion with me. But as the changes so made are comparatively few, and do not materially alter former texts, it was probably hardly necessary to have been alluded to at all. Still, those who write should be very exact in their statements, especially on historical matters. It is in this view that I have made allusion to the subject. To Jameson Harvey and Henderson Gaylord, both aged gentlemen, and old residents of the town, I am under deep obligations for many of tlie facts and inci- dents contained in the volume. To Stewart Pearce, author of the Annals of Lu- zerne, and Steuben Jenkins, both gentlemen who have devoted much time to the research of those t]iin<2:s which concern the early settlement and occupation of the valley by our ancestors, I also tender the expres- sions of my gratitude. Mr. Pearce is, upon his mother's side, of the family of Captain Lazarus Stew- art, whose name occurs honorably in the following pages. Mr. Jenkins is a lineal descendant of Colonel John Jenkins, who headed the first Connecticut immigrant colony that set foot upon the banks of the Susquehanna. 32 - PEEFACE. Both of these gentlemen have for many years past been very industrious and persevering in hunting out and treasuring up the early antiquities of the valley, and have thus become possessed of a large store of historic matter, from which, at their request and approval, I have made liberal draughts. The photographic Hkenesses, and vievs^s, were executed and prepared by Mr. William H. Schurch, of Scranton, in this county. It is to be hoped that the clever style, and artistic manner in which they have been produced, may lead to a more general patronage towards him upon the part of the peo- ple of the valley. Wiltes-Barre, April lOth, 1873. HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. CHAPTER I. ITS NAME. ^WHEN SETTLED. I DESIGN to write some of the historical events of Plymouth ; give sketches of some of the early set- tlers, and note clown some of the old landmarks. In a few years those who were cotemporaneous with a generation which held the tradition of its early his- tory, will have passed away, as the old monuments and once noted emblems are fast disappearing. For more than fifty years I have had a personal knowl- edge of the place. It is the town of my nativity ; for there, on the twenty-fourth day of April, 1808, I first saw the light of day. The twenty years follow- ing, it was my home, and since that time I have lived in close vicinity to it. My father died there, and it had been his residence for more than three-fourths of his long and well-spent life. I do not therefore hear the name of Plymouth pronounced that it does not remind me of my old home, and bring vividly before me the scenes of my (33) 34 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. cliildliood. There is something inexplicable that clings to the memory connected with the place of our birth. However humble it may have been, its name has a charm which lingers upon the memory, and which we dwell upon with a keen satisfaction. And how forcibly will this strike the minds of many who now reside there, engaged in busy and exciting em- ployments, who may chance to read this, whose homes in early life are separated from them by the great ocean ! These reflections carry me back through a long term of years, and bring before me afresh the faces and forms of men, now passed away, who, in their day and generation, were the representative men of the town ; who filled the local offices, who established the public morals, and whose opinion and judgment were the law of the vicinage. They were a hardy and resolute people, as I first knew them — and they were, many of them, the same men who had erected their residences upon the same places, where the fires had scarcely abated, around which had assembled, in coun- cil, the Indian braves and sachems. These had gath- ered up their implements of the chase, wound their blankets about their swarthy shoulders, and with their squaws and papooses, turned their faces, and com- menced their march toward the setting sun, to give place, under the laws of destiny, to those who were to succeed them. The conqueror and the vanquished have gone to THE EAELT SETTLERS. 35 their last home ; the Indian to his hunting-ground in the Spirit Land, and the pale face to the white man's Heaven. Who can say that the destination of both is not in the same sphere ? It is some idea of the appearance and character of some of these early settlers of Plymouth, as I knew them, and as I am informed from other reliable sources, that I would write down — that it may be preserved to their descendants. To a large portion of the people of the present populous town, the subject of which I write may not be of any special interest ; but to that portion of the population whose fathers and grandfa- thers were among the first settlers of the town, I am quite certain that it will. The labor upon my part will be considerable, but I am willing to bestow it. In my simple and plain narrative Of events, and sketches of personal character, I shall make no preten- sions to rhetorical style. I will deal with facts in a plain way, and state them as I knew them myself to be, or from the mouths of reliable witnesses, or pubhc records. My object and design being to save from oblivion an outline, if nothing more, of the men of Plymouth a half century ago. The town fifty years ago, and wdthin my own recollection, was but a small village, compared with its present dimensions — in fact it could hardly be call- ed a village, the residences being so scattered along what is now the great thoroughfare, that it was much more country than town. 36 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH, The early settlers were principally immigrants from New England. They were a hardy, robust class of adventurers, who came to the western frontier to es- tablish their new homes and erect their religious altars. Firm men, men of decision of character, and who were fully impressed with the conviction that their success depended solely upon their industrious habits ; without means, their strong hands and reso- lute hearts were their whole stock in trade, and in many cases, their trusty rifle the chief value of their personal effects. Had they not possessed these quali- ties they would never have incuiTed the hazard, and toil, and exposure, incident to the wilderness they came to occupy. For the land was not only to be subdued, but the savages were to be expelled. The young adventurer, therefore, thus reasoning at his New England fireside, must needs have had courage as well as indomitable perseverance, or he could never have gathered up sufficient resolution to embark upon his perilous enterprise. In' true Puritan style, and emblematic of their ancestral line, they brought with them the name of their new colony. It was an off-shoot of the "Kock of Plymouth" — hallowed by the first foot- prints of their fathers, when they stepped from the deck of the " May Flower," upon the shore of a New World. The refugees of English intolerance had conse- crated that rock, and the legacy came down to their THE EARLY SETTLERS. 37 cMldren ; and more and more to be revered as time and distance came apace. The Puritans, under old Jolm Kobinson, their pas- tor and leader, baptized the soil they first landed upon in the New World with the name of Plymouth, after the name of the last place they touched in the Old, previous to their embarkation. Immigrants, in time, carried the name with them to Plymouth, in Litch- field county, Connecticut — and their children brought it to the shores of the Susquehanna. Our name, therefore, antedates the landing of the Pilgrims, on the twentieth of December, 1620, upon Plymouth Eock. Age has made it venerable, and the stirring incidents connected with its transmission, are subjects that we dwell upon with much satisfac- tion — and particularly such of us as have had ances- tors connected with these incidents. I have now in my own custody the veritable cane which that stern and unbending old Dissenter from the English Church, brought with him upon the " May Flower," in her voyage to the New World. It has been handed down from generation to generation, with pious and reverential care. It is a family heir- loom, inherited by my wife from her father, the late John W. Eobinson, Esquire, of Wilkes-Barre, who was a descendant, in direct line, of the founder of the English Dissenter's Church. It is a valuable relic, and considering its age of over two hundred and fifty years, is in a state of perfect preservation, save that 38 HISTOKICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. the initials, J. E., engraved upon its silver head, have become nearly defaced ; but still enough is left of the outline of the letters to indicate their character. The date of the birth of our Plymouth may be fixed on the twenty-eighth of December, 1768 — thus making it over one hundred years of age. On that day the Susquehanna Company held a meeting at Hartford, Connecticut, to make prelimina- ry arrangements for settling the Wyoming lands. It was then resolved that five townships, each five miles square, should be granted to two hundred settlers ; that forty should set out immediately, and the re- maining one hundred and sixty in the following spring. The five townships thus decreed to be laid out were named, Plymouth, Kingston, Hanover, Wiikes-Barre, and Pittstou. The names of them all were not then assigned, but Plymouth was one of them that was then designated. SeePearce's "Annals of Luzerne," p. 63. Immediately after this meeting of the Susquehan- na Company, immigration commenced ; and before the close of the year 1769, the whole of the two hun- dred had arrived in the valley. Some of them settled at once in Plymouth upon their arrival ; but I am un- able to ascertain if the whole party, the quota assigned for Plymouth, settled there in that and the previous year. It appears, however, that the Eev. Noah Wad- hams, the great grandfather of the present gentle- men of that name, now resident there, was preach- THE CONNECTICUT CHARTER. 39 ing the gospel there in 1772, but three years after- wards. Ph^mouth is one of those noted seventeen town- ships in this part of Pennsylva^nia, the territory of which was vested in the Susquehanna Company, and known under the name of the " Connecticut Charter." The grant was made on the twentieth of April, 1662, to the Connecticut Colony, by Charles II., in which that monarch recognizes the gi'ant as the same which had been previously made by King James I. in 1620, to the " Plymouth Company." So that we find this name cotemporaneous with the first landing. The charter for the tract of land named was of peculiar dimensions. It ceded to the company the land between two parallel lines of latitude, in width from the Atlantic to the Pacific ocean. The geography of the country at that early day was very imperfectly understood. North America was supposed to be a narrow peninsula. When the extremes of the new continent were measured, and the area ascertained, it showed that the boundaries of King Charles' grant to the colony were sixty- nine miles in width, and some four thousand in length ! Within the limits of tliis grant, and under this title, Piyiaouth was settled. The length of the Con- necticut Charter in yea,rs gone by was a by- word; and in old times, when the matter was better understood, and was often the subject of conversation, a person 40 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. who told a long stoiy was said to have made it as long as the Connecticut Charter, The application of the phrase now would be little understood; but forty years ago, everybody within the Wyoming valley had some knowledge about the length of that ever-memo- rable charter. The occupation and settlement of the '"' Susque- hanna Country/' as the territory in earlier days was called, were prevented by the hostilities among the Indian tribes, growing out of the French and EngUsh war. On the twenty-eighth of December, 1768, as I have already stated, the Susquehanna Company made the first formidable movement towards the occupation of the land claimed under their charter. The reason, probably, of the action of this company at that time, was produced by the settlement of long-standing troubles between the British Government and the Six Nations of Indians, in a treaty at Fort Stanwix, con- cluded in that year. This opened the door for immigration, and the company immediately availed themselves of the op- portunity. Plymouth was considered as one of the most desirable of the seventeen Yankee towns, on ac- count of the broad sweep of remarkably fertile land which skirted its south-eastern border. It embraced an area of from two to three thousand acres, made up of alluvion, and was without the natural obstructions of forest trees ; so that it invited the plough-share of the hardy pioneer, without that preceding toil and THE SHAWNEES. 41 labor necessary to prepare ground for cultivation, cov- ered with trees and herbage. The Shawnee flats were a little oo.sis in the wilder- ness, ready prepared for cultivation, and was an ex- ceedingly inviting spot to the young New Englander, compared with the rough and stony fields he left be- hind him. CHAPTEE 11. THE SHAWNEE TRIBE OF INDIANS, AND THE FIRST WHITE MAN. GRASSHOPPER BATTLE. THE Shawnee tribe of Indians occupied Plymouth in 1742, when first visited by the white man. The tribe was not numerous. As early as 1608 they had, in league with the Hurons, been engaged in war on the Canadian frontier "v\-ith the Iroquois, the con- federate tribes known as the Six Nations, and defeated, were obliged to leave their hunting-grounds. They wandered south as far as Florida. Their numbers had become decimated, and they were by no means a tribe, considered by their race, as formidable upon the w^ar-path. Becoming there engaged in a war with the Spaniards, who then owned that territory, they mi- grated west in 1690 to the Wabash; and finally in 1697, upon the Conestoga Indians, who lived near the present city of Lancaster, in this state, becoming 42 HISTOKICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. security to William Penn for their good behavior, they removed to Pequea creek, below Lancaster. In 1701 William Penn made a treaty with the tribes upon the Susquehanna, and a portion of the Shawnee tribe located within the present limits of Plymouth, under the order and direction of the Six Nations, whose power and authority was absolute over all the Indian tribes of Pennsylvania, and from whom they demanded and received annual tribute. When, therefore, Count Zinzendorf, on his Chris- tian mission, visited Plymouth in the autumn of 1742, he found the Shawnees, with their chief, Kakowatchie; and their principal wigwam situate on the west bank of the small stream emptying into the river above the old village, and between the main road and the river, known in the early days of the wliite settlers as the farm of Noah Wadhams, Esquire, and upon which he lived and died. The Shawnee tribe at this time probably did not number over two hundred braves and warriors. They were subjects of the Six Nations, and completely under their orders and control; in fact a part of their own associates and tribe who had occu- pied this very ground, were obliged to surrender for the benefit of the fresh immigration from the Dela- ware, and make a new home upon the Ohio and Alle- gheny. Because the Shawnees had refused to fight the English, the enemy of the Six Nations, these con- federate tribes kept the poor Shawnees almost con- stantly in motion; and whenever they came within THE INDIAN TRIBES. 43 the confederate juvisdiction, they seem to have been dealt with without regard to mercy. This tribe, however, occupied the present territory of Plymouth at the time of the first imprint of the foot of the white man. It has thus become a proper subject for us to inquire about. There are not enough of them left now to kindle a respectable council lire. The scattering remnant is merged in the names of more numerous and powerful western tribes — and even these in a very, very few years will have disappeared also. A hundred years ago the decree of the Iroquois, or the Six Nations, was clothed with the elements of power. The messenger who went forth with it was regarded with as much consideration and respect, through the vast country watered by the Susquehanna and its tributaries, as the ambassador, sent out at this day, by any crowned head in Europe to the subjects of his colonies, is treated by them. But the Avheels of progress, or destiny, if the word better defines the idea, have crushed out the rule and sway of the haughty braves and warriors Avho gave tone and character to the name of these confederate tribes. Their wigwams have disappeared; their hunt- ing-grounds have put on the garbs of civilization, in the shape of towns and hamlets, and cultivated fields. All this may be right. Grod, in the wisdom of His providence, did not create the red man in vain. The laws of concxuest have an indefinable meaning when we 44 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. come to square tliem Ly the Christian impulses of the human heart. The red man, in this hind, " Was native to the manor born." Owner, not by discovery, nor that more imperfect title, by conqnest, we have no reason to question the theory but that here he was originally created, and this was his proper as well as legal home. How far we may assert the uncharitable, but too often inexorable plea of necessity as a palliation, may be a question of doubt as to his removal and extermination. CiAdliza- tion has done this, but is that an element of civiliza- tion? Statesmen and philosophers may well pause for reflection. It is a knotty problem for solution to determine whether might is right. And when the idea is brought home to us, in robbing us, by force, of that wliieh has cost us a life-time of industry to acquire, we would hardly reconcile our belief to the argument of its legal necessity. I apprehend there is not one of us who would not exclaim against the act as one of oppression and the rankest tyranny. It is a law of brute force, and not of morality, which sanctions the doctrine of the submission of the weak to the strong. Ages have sanctioned the creed, but does this long usage confirm it as right ? It is said that necessity knows no law. And under this title, the broad acres of the American Continent are now held and occupied. INDIAN RIGHTS AND WRONGS. 45 If the poor Indian were created for the purpose of a temporary occupatioi^ of this country, to be succeed- ed by a higher and more intellectual race, then we may reconcile our ideas to his oppressions and wrongs. But who is endowed with the power of comprehension and knowledge to solve this question ? " Man is lit- tle lower than the angels," but not high enough in mental stature to grasp this subject, and decide it in conformity with correct principles. When Alexander the Great was told by the petty thief whom he was about to punish, that he only de- spoiled individuals of their property, but that the great conqueror robbed and subjected whole countries, it furnished him a new theme for consideration. He discovered in his criminal a mirror that reflected two thieves, one guilty of petty, the other of grand larceny 1 And while we profess to be governed by the best and purest principles of moral ethics, we must not conclude that, because our fathers did wrong in the acquisition of property in which we had no partic- ipation, we are therefore entirely absolved from all the blame ; for we are in the full enjoyment of the fruits. In tracing back, the title of our home- stead, it all goes along smoothly enough tiU we come to that missing link between the ivMte and red proprietor ! If we are keenly sensible at this point, and governed by the true maxims of humanity, we shall begin to conclude " that the partaker is as bad as the thief." 46 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. But tken "we have the soothing consolation that we all stand on precisely the same platform ; that we are not 'only on the side of the majority, as to any question of blame in usurping the whole territory of the country from its original owners ; but that there is not one dissenting voice ! This is a very comfort- able view of the subject. The voice of the entire na- tion cannot be at fault. It is unanimous, therefore it must be right. This argument before an intelligent judge might be called sophistry ; but then we are relieved from all this trouble, for we are the judges in our own case, and as we conclude so stands the final decision. But let us return to old Plymouth, and talk about facts, instead of discussing general theories. It is these we must deal with, and let others, if they will, pursue the line of thought I dropped into some dozen paragraphs or so back. Having given a short sketch of the Shawnee tribe, the people who were in possession before the occupa- tion by a superior race, let us inquire whose was the first wliite foot, that made its imprint upon Shawnee soil ? This is an inquiry involved in some doubt, but with the traditional evidence we have, connected with the researches upon the subject by Isaac A. Chap- man, Charles Miner, and Stewart Pearce, who have all written, and written well, upon the antiquities of the Wyoming Valley, it is to be fairly presumed that THE FIRST WHITE MAN. 47 Conrad Weiser was tlie first white man that visited the Wyoming Valley ; "but as to his being the first white man who visited Plymouth, is a question that anti- quarians will have to settle between him and Count Nicholas Louis Zinzendorf, As to the time of the ap- pearance of the latter we have correct dates, and there is no room for doubt. Our local historians agree that Conrad Weiser was " an upright and worthy man." He had resided with the Mohawk Indians from 1716 to 1729, and spoke the language of several tribes. He had made repeated journeys among the Indians north and west : he frequently acted as interpreter, and was often the agent of several of the tribes in their treat- ies and negotiations, — and Mr. Pearce, whom I regard a very good authority in our early history, concludes that there is no doubt or question but that " he was the first white man who ever trod the soil of Luzerne county." While this may be the fact, it does not follow that he was the first white man who trod the soil of Plymouth. We shall see that he was with Zinzendorf in Ply- mouth in the autumn of 1742, but he did not join the Count for several days after he had been in Ply- mouth, laboring with the Shawnees on his Christian mission. As to the time this missionary visited Plymouth there seems to be no doubt ; and the probability is 3 48 HISTOEICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. that lie was the fii'st white man who put his foot upon Plymouth soil, as we do not learn that Mr. Weiser passed up or down the Susquehanna, on any of the journeys which he performed in liis Indian service. Count Nicholas Louis Zinzendorf, a German of means, a man of great piety, and a leading elder of the Moravian church, came to Bethlehem, Pa., in the year 1741. This town at that time was the principal location of the Moravian brotherhood. During the following year he made up his mind to advance to the Susquehanna, and visit the Indian tribes who lived there. For tliis purpose he applied to Mr. Weiser, whose reputation was well knoAvn as friendly with the Indians, and also understanding the lan- guage, to accompany him. His engagements did not immediately permit him ; and the Count, in com- pany with John Martin Mack and his wife, set out on their journey in the fall of 1742, and arrived safely on the lands of the Shawnee tribe. And until very recently, when a diary of Mr. Mack turned up, it was supposed that they crossed the mountain by the Warrior Eun war-path, from Fort Allen, on the Lehigh, to the Susquehanna, in Hanover townshijD. It is now well understood that this was not the road they passed over, in their approach to the Sus- quehanna. Mr. Pearce has placed in my hands an extract from the diary of John Martin Mack, obtain- ed recently by him from the Moravian Society, at COUNT ZINZENDORF. 49 BetUeliem, whicli gives a general account of the jour- ney of the Count to the Wyoming Valley ; Ply- mouth being the first place where they stopped. I give the substance of this diary. Zinzendorf went from Bethlehem to Shamolduj Northumberland county ; and from thence he went up to the mouth of Loyal Sock creek, now known as Montoursville. The name of the Indian town was Otstenwacken, now in the county of Lycoming. To this place he was accompanied by Mr. Mack and his wife. At this place he preached to the Indians in French. He was entertained by " Madam Montour," a French Canadi- an woman, who had married Andrew Montour, a half- blood. This woman had great influence at the In- dian council-fire. She possessed much shrewdness, and her manners and kind acts made a good impres- sion on the wild men of the forest. From this point, according to the diary, Zinzendorf, in company with Mack and his wife, Andrew Montour, son of the " Madam," as she was styled, with four others whose names are not given, Indians probably, set out upon horseback, by the way of the war-path, to Wyoming Valley, on the head waters of Fishing, Muncy, and Huntington creeks. On the fifth day they reached the Shawnee village, in the plains of " Skehando wan- na " (Susquehanna), where they halted at a wigwam of the Shawnee tribe on the banks of a creek, near an Indian burial-ground, and li'ected their tent. Mack says that the red warriors gathered around 50 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. them and brandished their knives in a threatening and menacing way. The distance they had made from the mouth of Loyal Sock creek he puts down at seventy miles, which is very correctly stated. He speaks of being opposed by wild beasts, swollen streams of water, and dense thickets ; and that it was five days of hard labor to accomplish the journey. He states that they remained with the Shawnees ten days. Zinzendorf shared what little provisions he had with the Indians — gave them the buttons off his shirt, and his silver knee-buckles, and lived prin- cipally upon boiled beans during his sojourn with them. He preached to the Shawnees through his in- terpreter ; told them that the object of his visit was peace, and to instruct them for the good of their souls in the spirit land. To all this they listened, but were incredulous. They could not be persuaded but that there was some other motive concealed, which looked to some serious injury to their tribe. And a secret plan was laid for his assassination. On one of the evenings of the old man's visit, some of the Shawnees approached the tent for the purpose of murdering him, but as they pulled aside the blanket which covered the opening of his tent, they saw at that moment an adder pass over his legs, unnoticed by the holy man, who was deeply involved in his religious th^ghts. The savage warriors construed this as a direct COUNT ZINZENDOEF. 51 intervention of the Great Spirit, and they with- drew, unbending their bows, and sheathing their knives. The accounts heretofore given of this incident by the local historians, represent the serpent to have been a rattle-snake — nor do any of them give the exact locality. The diary continues to enumerate several other , incidents which, at this remote time, are of exceeding interest. Zinzendorf visited the Mohican village, supposed to have been located at Forty-fort, in the township of Kingston. He preached to the Indians there, and met among them an Indian woman who professed Christianity. He travelled from one village to another, engaged in his religious instructions, and was joined, after several days in the valley, by Conrad Weiser, and also by three Moravian missionaries, who left Bethle- hem on the fifteenth of October. From this date we may infer that Zinzendorf first reached the Shawnee village in the latter part of September. We are not informed by Mr. Mack, the precise length of time the party remained in the valley. Mr. Chapman, how- ever, fixes it at twenty days. He is probably correct, as in a note in his book, p. 22, he speaks of obtaining his information from a companion of Zinzendorf, who afterwards visited Wyoming.^ We are informed from the diary that the names of the three Moravian missionaries who joined the 52 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. Count were, David Kitscliman, Anton Seyffert, and Jacob Kohnn. Mr. Mack says that on leaving tlie Shawnee vil- lage, near the burial ground (the Noah Wadhams farm), in crossing the creek, which was swollen by- recent raius, the horse of Zinzendorf stumbled, and threw his rider into the stream; and that he was res- cued by the party from his perilous situation. The Indians standing upon the bank saw the ac- cident, and in their opinion, here was another mirac- ulous interposition of Manitou. They again express- ed themselves as fully satisfied, that the man who had escaped the flood and the venomous reptile must be under the protection of the Great Spirit. And this is the substance of a journal, written down at the time of tlie occurrence of the matters contained in it, a hundred and thirty years ago. It throws new light upon a subject that the local historian did not possess, founded upon an authority that may be considered as authentic. John Martin Mack, who was also a Mora\dan missionary, informs us that he was born in Wurtem- burg, Germany, on the twelfth of April, 1715 ; that some time after arriving in this country, he married Jeannette, a daughter of a Mohawk chief. She spoke that language, as well as that of the Delaware and Shawnee tribes. "* This knowledge of the Indian tongue of the Shawnee tribe accounts for the presence of Jeannette, THE FIEST MISSIONARIES. 53 in the missionary expedition of Zinzendorf, amidst the perils of his visit to the Susquehanna. She spoke the language of the people who occupied the soil of old Plymouth, before our fathers took posses- sion of that part of the " Skehandowanna plains/' now known as the Shawnee flats. It was probably her lips which were the organ of interpretation of the words of the reverend old man, to the stoical and haughty audience that surrounded him. But the language, as well as the tongues and Kps of the wild roaming people who gave it articulation, are now alike silent, and will so remain forever. It would be an interesting fact to know what finally became of this man who was jotting down history over a century ago in old Plymouth, and of Jeannette, his Indian bride, whose voice uttered to the wild warriors of the Shawnee tribe the doctrines of peace and good will. But of their subsequent ca- reer we have no record. Zinzendorf returned agam to his native land, and died at a ripe old age. He did not probably live long enough to realize the fact, that to civilize and Christianize the North American red man, was a work not to be accom- pHshed. And probably it is well that it is so ; but in either case, it is a question beyond our comprehen- sion, at least. From the testimony I have thus refeiTed to, and which to my mind is conclusive, I think there can be no doubt but that the first white feet that trod 54 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. tlie soil of 6ur towiisliip, were those of Nicliolas Louis Zinzeiulorf and John Martin Mack ; and also that the&e were the first heralds there of the doctrines of the Cross, as well as in the other parts of the valley of the Susquehanna, That the first sermon upon the subject of man's redemption, through the mediation of Christ, was preached near the Shawnee burial- ground, within the limits of the township of Ply- mouth. We are thus enabled to locate the very spot where these things occurred. And what a study for the art- ist is here presented ? It is to be hoped that some son of Plymouth may yet arise, who shall have the qualifications to place upon canvas, in its true light, the aged missionary and his Indian woman inter- preter, his humble tent and his swarthy, sun-burned audience. It is a subject worthy the pencil of the cleverest painter. The old Indian burial-ground is a spot that was familiar to the early settlers of Plymouth. Its loca- tion is near the bank of the little stream I have de- scribed, and between the railroad and the main thor- ouglifare. I have myself, fifty years since, seen the Indian bones turned up by the plough-share, lying in heaps upon the pubhc highway, where they had been cast, taken from the identical place referred to in the journal from which I have quoted. And more than this, for acting under the impulse of revenge, im- pressed upon my mind in Hsteniug to the deeds of MISSIONARY GROUND. 55 hoiTor produced by the tomahawk and scalping-knife, related by the men who had been eye-witnesses of them, I have pounded and pulverized these relics of the departed warriors, and stamped upon, them, as if the cruelties their owners had perpetrated could thus be avenged; and my fellow boyish associates and my- self have consoled ourselves with the reflection, after an exhibition of this valiant conduct, that if we had not killed an " Ingen," we at least had the profound satisfaction of having had a glorious knock at his dry bones ! What a pity that the " Christian Church " edi- fice, standing on the opposite side of the way from the site once occupied by Zinzendorf 's tent, should not have been located upon it. It is ground conse- crated by the acts and deeds of the first man, upon the Susquehanna, who proclaimed "glad tidings of great joy." Though the seeds of faith fell upon sav- age ears, the noble and self-reliant example of the man is a living model for Christian imitation. It is agreeable for us, at this remote day, that we are enabled to ascertain definitely the precise locaHty. And we know it — the exact place where the pilgrim missionaries of our religious faith pitched their tent, at the end of their five days' journey in the wilder- ness; and where their venerable, pious old leader, gave the Indian chiefs of the Shawnee tribe "the buttons from off his shirt, and the silver buckles from his knees," as a peace-offering in the name of the 56 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLTMOUTH. Lord, amidst the gleams and flashes of tlieir brand- ished scalping-knives, and in the heai-ing of their piercing war-whoops. Mr. Chapniau, in his liistory, p. 24, is under the impression that most of the Shawnees had k^ft Ply- month before the advance of the white man in 1769 ; and that at this period the Delawares, who resided on the east side of the Susquehanna, and nearly op- posite, had become proprietors of the Shawnee plains; and the eracnation of the Sliawnees is based upon the consequence of their defeat by the Delawares in the memorable Grasshopper battle. The circumstances which led to this battle, I will briefly relate. A number of the Delaware squaws, with then- cliildren, were gathering wild fruits along the eastern bank of the river, some two miles below their village, which stood on the lower side of the present limits of the city of Wilkes-BaiT^, where they met with some squaws and their children of the Shaw- nee tribe, who had crossed the river in their canoes for the same purpose. A child belonging to the Shawnees had taken a large grasshopper, and a quarrel arose among the children for the possession of it, in wliich their moth- er soon took part. The Pehiwai-e women contending that the east side of the river was tlieir property, persisted in their right to the grasshopper, and the feminine conflict terminated in the expulsion of the Shawnee squaws over to the west side. And it is GRASSHOPPER BATTLE. 57' asserted, tliougli I apprehend upon very questionable authority, that some of these women were killed in this engagement. The expulsion of the Shawnee women irritated and maddened their husbands, and the consequence was a declaration of war on the part of the Shawnees- against the Delawares. The Shawnees embarked in their canoes, but were met by the Delawares before they could obtain a foothold upon the east bank of the river ; but still they were able to effect a landing, and a bloody conflict ensued at the great bend of the river, immediately above the present railroad bridge. It is said that nearly half of the Shawnees fell upon the battle-field. They were certainly driven back to their own side of the stream. As this event took place some thirty years only before the advent of the white settlers, and as the tradition of the battle was then fresh in the memory, and probably pretty well understood by them, it is a little remarkable that they should not have given us the facts of the expulsion of the Shawnees by the Delawares. The early settlers always spoke of the Indians which they found upon their entry into Plymouth as of the Shawnee tribe. I have heard this often from the lips of Colonel Kansom, Jonah Kogers, and Abra- ham Pike. The statements of these men were cer- tainly to be rehed upon, and they had the means of knowledge upon the subject. OS IllSTOIUCAL SKETOHKS OV riAMOUTH. It. is a niattor of much doiil>t ^Yllotl\er the Grass- hoppor bat tlo was a very serious atVair. The Shaw- no('s and l\^la\varos woro i;iMiorally on very friendly tonus, aud from the uiost reliable authority I can tiud, the greatest uiuuber of these two tribes removed to Pialiopi (Tiopi) some ten yeai"s previous to the advauet^ o\' th^^ white niau. I eouelude, therefore, tluit the Indians who made the greatest ineursions upon the early settlers of Ply- mouth, were a remnant of the iSliawnees, who were lingering about their old hnnting-gronnds upon the Shawnee mountain. This is by tar the most proba- ble oonolusion. If, as ]Mr. Chapman writes, the Shawnees were expelled by the Pela wares after the Cirasshopper battle, it seems strange that ten years after the two tribes should have been travelling together to Dia- hogi\, the spot designated for them by the order of their mastei-s. the iSix Nations. A further distinetion is drawn by some of our his- torians, that the Shawnei^s were a more bloodthii-sty tril>e than the other tribes upon the Susquehanna — the Nantioe>kes. the Pelawares. and the Mohieans : that it was an impelling ivason whieh moved Zinzeu- dorf to make the Shawnees, for this eause, the tirst objects of Ohristianization. The pivlv^bility is that the ohai^acter aud temperament of this tribe wexe not \*erv ditVeivnt from other triWs. The same feelinsr of blvvdy ivvengv for ival or supposed injuries, is an THE FIIUST SETTLERS. 59 element in common with th(3 whole race ; and, as a Shawnee man, I feel inclined to stand by our tribe, and deny this unjust calumny, which is attempted to be heaped upon their memory. Though not precisely of the same houseliold, still my young feet trod their paths, and my young eyes witnessed their bones and fortifications; and there- fore it would be unmanly, while writing their history, not at the same time to defend their memory against an accusation that "the Shawnee tribe of Indians was the most bloody and revengeful tribe that ever placed foot upon the Skehando wanna plains ! " Having thus disposed of the Shawnee tribe, and the question as to the first white man who visited Plymouth, I will turn my attention to other subjects involved in its first settlement. CHArTEE III. THE F I K B T B E T T L E R 8 . MOST of the early settlers of the town were men of strong minds: a few of them were eccentric characters, and now and then, one addicted to habits of intemperance ; but they were all industrious, and not one of them, as I ever learned, espoused the Tory- side of the great question of their day and generation. CO nll^!Touu^\^ skktohes of tlymouth. Thoy wore selt-n>liaut, and tliis was an imperative noeessity, siirroutuloil as they Avere by eranipod ineaiis oi' subsisteiiee, and daily exposure to Indians and tlveir l\Mman>i(o eiuMuic^s. Thoy \V(M-o loyal to their Govonnuont, and niauy oi' tliotu were in the revolutionary war, and some of them served the whole seven years in that protracted issue. As a whole, they were a brave, patriotic, and industrious people, but little acquainted with luxu- ries, and none more tamiliar with the severe conliicts of frontier lite. Their hostility io the Indian race was bitter and vindictive. This had arisen from the fact that some of their little society had undergone savage torture and murder ; others more fortunate were taken into captiv- ity. One of them, Elisha Harvey, had been sold to an Indian trader, in Canada, for half a barrel of rum. Even in my day, which did not conuuence for the period oi' over twenty years after the cessation of the valley troubles, Colonel Ransom, Abraham Nesbitt, Jonah Ivogers, or Abraham Pike Avould have shot down an Indian, if they had met with him, as unhes- itatingly as they would a prowling wolt'or panther. Time did not seem to elBice and wear away this embittered feeling. The common subject of conver- sation, within my own recollection, among these old veterans when they met, was Indian ati-ocities com- mitted upon themselves, their lamilies, and friends. The youth of the town therefore grew up under a TIIK KAJlI.y HKTTLKMl. 61 deop Bcnfio of thcHe wrongH. Tlioy fully parti cipatod in tho (}rnf)tioriH produced by tlio constant rcilujarrsal of fudiari (jutolKjrioH. Tho Honiiroont waH univorHal. J(, waH i>lio al)HOj|>in^' iopio in iho Wald, IIk; iriochan- ic'M Hhop, the Hchool house, and the jmlpit, year in and year out. Probably in no other part of the county did this feelinj^ of Indian hoKtility cxiHt,to the «ame degree and extent an in Plymouth. The old frame Academy, now standinj^, — and it is to 1)0 hoped may be yjcrmittod to remain, aw one of the few land-rnarkH of the pant — wan built not far from th(} year J.SI.G. Jonah Itoj^-erH kept school in it. He had been taken a prisoner, when a })oy of iour- teen, by the Indians. The bloody sc(!ne which at- tended his escape, will be fully noticed }i(in;afi(;r. The old j^entleman was in tli/; habit oi' njpeatinj^, almost daily, in open school, his knowledge of Indian tragedies. He would speak of the number of reeking scalps lie had seen strung upon a cord, and dangling from the belt of the red warrior, as a trophy of his prow- ess ; some of them taken from the heads of his own personal friends ; how the savag(;s were in the habit of stripping their victims, binding them with thongs to a tree, piercing their naked bodies with sharpened pine knots, and then setting them on tire ; and how the poor creatures would writhe in torture, and die the most agonizing of deaths ; how they had inhu- manly murdered such a man that he knew, pointing 62 HISTOKICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. to the exact place where it was done, and naming the exact time ; of their stealthy habits of lying in am- bush and springing like tigers upon their prey ; how he could detect them by the smell of their smoked and painted bodies, before they were visible to the eye ; and how it would be serving G-od to remove and ex- terminate the entire race. These were some of the lessons we learned in the old man's school, and in a building still standing in our town. They were a part of the education of the youth, fifty years ago in the township of Plymouth. The old man was kind and indulgent, and it was not unfrequently that he would resort to these re- hearsals as a means of quieting the unruly element of his school ; and it worked like a charm, for when he commenced all eyes were fastened upon him, and all ears ajar ; nor did their interest in any manner abate from their frequent repetition. An Indian story would produce instantaneous order. The effect of these relations upon the mind of childi'en was wonderful ; and the moment we were dismissed, how we would collect in groups, and doub- ling up our little fists, "wish that we were big men, that we could avenge the wrongs that we had heard ; and that if we had been big men when these cruel- ties were perpetrated, the bloody 'Ingens' would have stood but a poor chance for their hves." And so the children of Jonah Eogers' school rea- soned and talked a half centmy ago. THE EARLY SETTLERS. 63 I repeat these tilings now, after the long lapse of time, to illustrate tlie state of popular feeling which then existed in our town, towards the poor Indian, and the feelings of the men who occupied his corn- fields, his hunting-grounds, and the spots whereon he had pitched his wigwams. We grew into manhood, perfect Indian haters. And to accomplish this was the great lesson of the school. The early settlers, no doubt, had cause to curse the Indian tribes ; but if they had paused in their vehement and rapid conclusions long enough to in- quire whether they were not really in the wrong themselves, in driving them from their homes and firesides, they might have made at least some allow- ance for their atrocities, acting as they did on the de- fensive ! They did not, however, stop to draw the line between civilized and savage life. They seemed to think that brutality was no more to be tolerated in an Indian, than in a civilized white man. Time, however, has somewhat changed public opinion. As the old people of Plymouth, who were the actors in the wild scenes of border life, have passed away, one after another, the chapter of their sufferings has become more and more indistinct ; their exposures and privations less talked of by their children ; and the third generation, now in occupa- tion of the homes of their ancestors, seldom, if ever, allude to or mention the trials and incidents of early 4 ^ 64 HISTOEICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. days. In fact most of them have lost even the tra- ditionary chain of these stirring events. And to re- mind them of these events, is why I am now writing, at an advanced age myself, that they may not be entirely obliterated and lost. The name of Ply- mouth is dear to me, because it is linked with recol- lections of the happiest days of my life ; and I like to dwell u]3on the memory of the brave and generous people whose hairs were gray, at the remote period of which I write. Plain and simple in their habits, they had no idea of procuring their bread but " by the sweat of their brow." They lived by hard and continuous labor, and at a time when labor was not only respectable, but dignified and inviting. Alas, the change ; but this is not the subject of our inquiry. I have stated that the white settlement of the town commenced in 1768, and immediately succeed- ing the treaty at Fort Stanwix. I am unable, how- ever, to ascertain how many immigrants came in that and the following year. Forty were assigned to Ply- mouth : most of that number probably arrived. The best evidence, in the absence of family traditional knowledge, is an enrollment of the resident inhabit- ants of the whole valley, in 1773, made by Colonel Zebulon Butler, and in his handwi-iting. This list comprises the names of two hundred and sixteen set- tlers. By this list, I am enabled to state with cer- tainty that in that year, and which was not more THE EARLY SETTLERS. 65 than three or four years after the first immigration, the following named persons were residents of Ply- mouth, viz. : Noah Allen, David Whittlesey, Na- thaniel Watson, Samuel Marvin, Jabez Koberts, John Baker, Nicholas Manvil, Joseph Gaylord, Isaac Bennet, William Leonard, Jesse Leonard, Nathaniel' Goss, Stephen Fuller, Samuel Sweet, John Shaw, Joseph Morse, Daniel Brown, Comfort Goss, James Nesbitt, Aaron Dean, Peter Ayres, Captain Prince Alden, Naniad Coleman, Abel Pierce, Timothy Pierce and Timothy Hopkins. I am a httle surprised that this list does not con- tain the names of Noah Wadhams, Silas, Elisha, and Benjamin Harvey, Samuel Ransom, James Bidlack, Benedict Satterlee, Caleb Atherton, David Reynolds and Henry Barney. There is an old deed among the valley archives of " Samuel Love of Connecticut to Samuel Ransom, late of Norfolk, Connecticut, now being at Susquehanna, " which bears date November fifth, 1773. This is probably for the Plymouth Homestead farm. Among the same papers is a deed, dated Ply- mouth, September twenty-ninth, 1773, of Henry Barney to Benedict Satterlee. I think most if not all of these men, were in Plymouth previous to the general enrollment of all the settlers of the valley, in 1773, and it is pretty certain that the Reverend Noah Wadhams preached in Plymouth before this period. But the persons whom I have last named, if not 66 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. in Plymoutli in 1773, came immediately afterwards. The persons whose names I have last mentioned were pioneer settlers. From this period up to the time that Captain Samuel Ransom enlisted what was known as the Sec- ond Independent Company, for the Revolutionary service, January first, 1777, there is no list preserved of tlie early settlers of Plymouth. This was four years after the general enrollment.. On this list I find the names of Mason F. Alden, Charles Gaylord, Ambrose Gaylord, Aziba Williams, Asahel Nash, Ebenezer Roberts, Isaac Benjamin, Benjamin Clark, Gordon Church, Price Cooper, Na- than Church, Daniel Franklin, Ira Sawyer, John Swift, and Thomas Williams, who are not named in the foregoing list, and all of whom, I suppose, to have been Plymouth settlers. On the list of Captain Durkee's company. First Independent Revolutionary Service, are the names of Jeremiah Coleman, Jesse Coleman, Benjamin Har- vey, and Seth Marvin. These were Plymouth men. From this it would appear that in 1777, the num- ber of men able to bear arms in Plymouth was not far from eighty. There were other persons of com'se whose names are not included in either of the above lists. There were the Nesbitts, Rogers, Drakes, George P., William and Samuel Ransom, the Bar- neys, Baldwins, Bennetts, etc. It may be that the number all told exceeded eighty. THE EARLY SETTLERS. 67 There is no further record evidence of the pop- ulation of the town till 1796. The commissioners' office of this county contains the Plymouth assess- ment of that year. And it is the first trace of the assessor on file in the county archives, notwithstand- ing Luzerne had been set off from the county of Northumberland on the twenty-fifth of September, 1786. As this was after the close of the Kevolutionary war, and there was comparative quiet in tlie valley, it is difficult to understand why there should not be on file, somewhere, a list of taxable inhabitants. The same deficiency in the office at Wilkes-Barre, applies to the other townships of the county. The assessment list of 1796 shows but ninety-five taxables. But it is not strange by any means that the increase of population advanced so slowly. The Indian troubles had made their mark ; the Penna- mite war had carried off several ; and the Kevolution- ary war had made sad havoc upon the settlement. All these were fearful obstacles in the way of the in- crease of population. If in 1796 we estimate four, in addition to each taxable inhabitant, the whole population of the township, including the territory of Jackson, set off into a municipal jurisdiction in 1844, would be but four hundred and seventy-five souls. These very facts, which impeded the increase of population, tell us but too plainly of the formidable, CS IIISTOmOAL SKETCHES OP PLYMOUTH. and Avo may add learrul obstructions Avliicli were in tho path ot" our piouoor fathers. riyinouth was never backward in filling its quota of men for the general cause, or raishig men for pro- tection against an internal i'oc. From the time they tirst put their toot upon the Shawnee plains, down to the passage of the act coufirming their title, a period of nearly thirty years, they knew hut little of peace and repose. For more than half of this period they were in local hroils, Indian invasions, and the Revolu- tionary struggle. They slept with their arms ready at hand. The ritie was as necessary an implement of husbandry as the sickle. They carried it with them, ahuost constantly, to the tield of their labor during many, many years of sutfering, hope, and fear. They had to take turns relieving each other on guard in the night, to ward otf the Indian and Pennamite incur- sions. 80 that with British, Tories, Indians, and Fenuamites, om- people had their hands full, and it is really a matter of surprise that they should have had the couraire and endurance to fight it out so lono- and valiantly as they did. The massacre at the battle of TVyoming alone cost them the lives of not less than thirty of their citi- zens ; the Eevolutionary war as many more ; and the troubles with the Indians and exposure of a frontier life, and its dangers and wants, an equal number. And these causes probably disposed of at least one- fom-tli of tlio people., who were in Plymouth, from THE EARLY SETTLERS. 69 1769 to 1785. It is more probable tliat my estimate is under than over the mark. These then were not merely troublesome, but they were trying times. I have heard it from the lips of the old people frequently, that death was preferable to the constant alarms and daily exposures that they were obliged to undergo. But they would say, "we had johnny cake, and shad in the spring, and eels in the fall ; and here we had pitched our tents, and so we resolved to face all dangers and submit to all perils." I subjoin the assessment list of 1796. It will be an interesting relic of the names of the men who have now all passed away, but at that time were the active, stirring men of the township : Samuel Allen, Stephen Allen, David Allen, Elias Allen, William Ayers, Daniel Ayei-s, John Anderson, Moses Atherton, Isaac Bennet, Benjamin Bennet, Joshua Bennet, Benjamin Barney, Daniel Barney, Henry Barney, Walter Brown, Jesse Brown, William Baker, Philemon Bidlack, Jared Baldwin, Jude Bald- win, Amos Baldwin, Jonah Bigsley, Peter Chambers, Wiliam Craig, Jeremiah Coleman, Thomas Daven- port, Ashael Drake, Rufus Drake, Aaron Dean, Hen- ry Decker, Joseph Dodson, Leonard Dercans, Joseph Duncan, Jehial Fuller, Peter Grubb, Charles E. Gay- lord, Adolph Heath, Elisha Harvey, Samuel Healy, John Heath, Samuel Hart, Josiah Ives, Josiah Ives, Jr., Crocker Jones, Thomas Lameraux, John Lamer- aux, John Leonard, Joseph Lenaberger, Samuel Mar- 70 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. vin, James Marvin, Timothy Meeker, Ira Manvill, Epliraim McCoy, Phineas Nash, Ahram Neshitt, Si- mon Parks, Samuel Pringle, Michael Pace, David Pace, Nathan Parrish, Oliver Plumley, Jonah Eog- ers, Joze Eogers, Elisha Eogers, Edon Euggies, Hez- ekiah Eoherts, Jacob Eoberts, Stephen Eoherts, David Eeynolds, Joseph Eeynolds, George P. Ean- som, Nathan Eumsey, Michael Scott, Lewis Sweet, Elam Spencer, "William Stewart, Jesse Smith, Icha- bod Shaw, Palmer Shaw, Benjamin Stookey, John Taylor, John Turner, Abraham Tillbury, Matthias Yan Loon, Abraham Van Loon, Nicholas Van Loon, Calvan Wadhams, Noah Wadhams, Moses Wadhams, Ingersol Wadhams, Amariah "Watson, Darius "Wil- liams, Eufus Williams, and John Wallen. Ninetjr five all told. Not one of them now living:. CHAPTER lY. THE PENNAMTTE AND YANKEE WAE. — COMMENCEMENT OP TEOUBLES. — CAPTAIN STEWART. — LIEUTENANT JENKINS. — PATTEESON'S ADMINISTRATION. — AR- REST AND IMPRISONMENT OF SETTLERS. — BATTLE OF NANTICOKE. AS the forefathers of our town were almost all of them participators in the serious troubles and difficulties, which grew out of the contest be- tween the Connecticut claimants, under the grant of the Susq^uehanna Company, and the Proprietary Gov- ernment of Pennsylvania, as to the questions of own- ership of the land, and the civil jurisdiction over it and the people occupying it, there will be occasion to give a condensed statement of the subject generally, and particularly in reference to the part taken in it by the early settlers of Plymouth. And as this township furnished the chief battle-ground during the continuance of this internecine contest, where the parties met in respectable numbers, and in which the almost entire male population of our town took part, it becomes a question of much interest to the de- scendants of these people, I have already stated that the territory of the town lies between the two parallel lines of latitude, which were the northern and southern boundaries of (71) 72 HISTOEICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. the grant to the Susquehanna Company. Under this grant the State of Connecticut not only claimed the ownership of the land, but the jurisdiction over it. To these pretensions the State of Pennsylvania, at the commencement known as the "Proprietary Government of Pennsylvania/' took exception. The proprietors, William Penn and his associates, founded their claim to the same land and jurisdiction under a grant of King Charles II., bearing date the fourth of March, 1681, and nineteen years after the date of liis letters patent to the Con- necticut Company. I have already stated that the want of knowledge as to the geographical situation of the country produced this blunder. It can be called by no other name ; as there was not, undoubtedly, on the part of the British king, a de- sire to grant a second time any part of his territory, in his colony, which had been previously ceded to others. Taking, therefore, the dates of these two letters patent, and particularly, as in this case, the precedent occupation by the people of Connecticut, they had the law and equity of the case upon their side. But unfortunately for Connecticut, the State of New York intervened, and thus left a span of over a hun- dred miles between the western line of the former and the Susquehanna lauds. Had not this difficulty been in the way, the final result would in all probability have had a different termination. CONFLICTING CLAIMS. 73 The grant to Connecticut bore tlie oldest date: the people of that State made the first entry. Law- 3^er or layman, therefore, could not justly decide but in one way, and that in favor of the people claiming under the charter of 1662. We thus find the Wyoming valley claimed by two separate and distinct parties. Firstly, under corpor- ate grants from the king ; and after the termination of the rebellion, under two separate State sovereign- ties. The Grovernors of these issued their paper proc- lamations, and left the citizens of each to fight out the dispute in a hand to hand conflict ; and at it they went in literally bloody earnest. The Yankees were ahead of the Pennamites in occupation. As early as 1753, the Susquehanna Company sent out John Jenkins, a surveyor, to make an exploration of the valley, and feel the Indian pulse ; and if favorable, to negotiate friendly relations with them. His appointment from this company directed him " to repair to the said place " (Wyoming,) " in order to view said tract of land, and to purchase of the na- tives there inhabiting, their title and interest to said tract of land, and to survey, lay out, and receive proper deeds or conveyances of said land to and for said company." Under these instructions he commenced the im- portant part of the duty assigned to him, of conclud- ing a purchase of the Indian title ; and his mission 74 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OP PLYMOUTH. would undoubtedly have been attended with success, but for the interference, as we shall notice hereafter, by the Proprietary Government of Pennsylvania; William Penn being under the conviction, and proba- bly honestly so, that the country of the Susquehanna legally belonged to him, under his Koyal grant, though of a later date. Through the representations made to the Susque- hanna Company by Mr. Jenkins, on his return, and other reasons which do not become necessary here to state, but by the sanction, however, of the colonial authorities of both Connecticut and Pennsylvania, a Congress of delegates was convened at Albany, in 1754, with the approbation of the Crown, to meet the Iroquois, or the great confederated Six Nations of In- dians, and consult together on the subject of their mutual welfare. At this important council, it appears that the Proprietary Government of Pennsylvania was repre- sented by distinguished men : John Penn, Isaac Norris, Benjamin Franklin and Eichard Peters. And it is a marvel why the Proprietary Government, after the consent and approbation of the purchase of the Wyoming lands, by the Susquehanna Company, by such distinguished agents, should ever have made the eflbrt to annul the solemn act of the Albany Con- gress ! For at this very Congress, and as Mr. Miner states, "under the eye of the Pennsylvania Delega- tion, a treaty with the Indians, the acknowledged CONFLICTING CLAIMS. 75 proprietors of the territory, was executed, dated July eleventh, 1754, and a purchase of land made." See Miner's Hist., p. 68. A deed was executed, signed by eighteen chiefs and sachems of the Six Nations, of the Wyoming lands, to the Susquehanna Company. The purchase money, " two thousand pounds current money of New York," was counted out in silver, " and carried by the Indians in a blanket into an orchard, and there divided among them." It is a little singular that the word mines is mentioned in this ancient deed. The Connecticut charter, therefore, based on a Eoyal grant, and a subsequent purchase of the In- dian claim, would seem to establish an indisputable and unqualified title. Such, however, as the bloody sequel which follows shows, does not appear to have been so considered by the Proprietary Government of Pennsylvania. In January following, the Pennsylvania authori- ties made an appeal to Governor Johnson of New York to use his influence with the Six Nations to nul- lify and cancel the deed made on the eleventh of July previous. This course was persisted in, until at a council, at Fort Stanwix, on the fifth of November, 1768, a conveyance of the same lands was made by the Iroquois to the Pennsylvania proprietors. At this time then, the local strife that had smouldered from 1754, broke out into a blazing, consuming fire. In 1755, the Susquehanna Company again sent 76 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. Mr. Jenkins with a corps of surveyors to locate lands on tlie Susquehanna. Among these was Ezekiel Hyde, a well known name in the valley for years suc- ceeding. Some sm'veys were made, and the party re- turned to Connecticut. Some seven years elapsed before an effort was again made to establish a settlement in the valley. This delay was undoubtedly produced by the troubles and difficulties growing out of the English and French war, which terminated in 1763. The people, however, interested in, and claiming under, the Sus- quehanna Company, from the fact of the attempt being made by the Pennsylvania proprietors to de- stroy and annul the deed of the Iroquois, executed at Albany in 1754, came to the conclusion that their occupation must necessarily be one of conquest. The Indian atmosphere was murky; dark clouds hung over the beautiful valley and the noble river meandering through as fertile soil as the husbandman ever cultivated, — as delightful a spot as ever the eye of red or white man looked upon. There was a prize worth a noble effort. The Yankee was fully per- suaded as to the equity of his claim and the legality of his title, and why should he hesitate ? It is true the Indian hand lay upon it, but he held against the solemn obligations of a treaty, and be-side this it was weak. A powerful competitor had crossed the " big water in his big canoe," and he was strong. There was but one avenue now open to occupa- CONFLICTING CLAIMS. 77 tion, and that was conquest. The treaty had been violated; the deed of purchase had been annulled. The man who had been reared amid New England rocks and upon her sterile soil, had manly develop- ment; he could endure hunger and fatigue; he pos- sessed ambition and courage; these were about the only legacy inherited from his proud and independent ancestors. They had furnished him a precedent, in the way of adventure, remarkable for its boldness and daring. They had crossed a tempestuous and un- known sea in mid- winter, and planted the standard of religious toleration upon a savage and inclement coast. The fame of this achievement had been the first lesson of his infancy. For him to shrink, therefore, from the obstacles which lay in his road to the Susquehan- na, and the difficulties which awaited him there, would be unworthy of his ancestral name. In money and this world's goods he was poor; but the self- denying, self-sacrificing and indomitable courage of his Puritan father led him on. That same blood which coursed through the veins of the bold Dissenter of the English Church, galloped in the veins of his offspring. If that one could muster resolution to abandon home and country upon the score of relig- ious dogmas, — this one could enter the wilderness and maintain his home there against fearful opposition. In 1762, the year preceding the treaty of peace between England and France, the Susquehanna Com- pany sent out Mr. Jenkins again, in company with 78 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. Isaac Tripp, Benjamin Follet, William Buck and a hundred and fifteen other adventurers, to take posses- sion of their lands here, and by force if necessary. They commenced the erection of log houses at the month of Mill Creek, a mile above the site of \Yilkes-Barre. They cleared some land and sowed it with grain ; but we learn of no effort to reconcile the Indians. In the autumn of this year they returned to Con- necticut. In the following spring they came back, and remained tiU the month of October, when they were expelled and driven from their improvements by the Indians. Some of them were cruelly butch- ered. This was a check upon their enterprise. Those of them, however, who had seen the valley, became fas- cinated with the inducements it held out to them. They saw a plain of good and fertile land, twenty miles in extent, and an average of five in width. It was virgin soil: the plough-share had never entered the glebe. The climate was salubrious ; and when they compared this land with the rock-bound hills of their Connecticut homes, they regarded it as the land of promise, and one "flowing with milk and honey." All these things they painted in glowing colors on their return ; but some of their bretkren they left be- hind them, who had been murdered by the Indians. This was a drawback to theu' hopes and expectations, yet they coveted the land, though beset with dangers. THE YANKEE AND PENNAMITE WAR. 79 In hope and fear a half dozen more years passed away. The treaty at Fort Stanwix had been com- pleted ; the French and English war ended, and they supposed the Indian races had become more rec- onciled ; and they began to prepare for another expe- dition to the Susquehanna country. In 1768-9 the Connecticut people came back with a determination to remain. They had resolved to stand by their possessions ; but upon their arrival in the valley, they found them in the occupation of Stewart, Ogden, Jennings and others, who had reach- ed the valley a few days in advance of them, and had raised the flag of the Proprietary Government. Here was a dilemma ; this was an incident upon which they had made no calculation. What was to be done ? There were two alterna- tives only : either to retrace their steps to Connecti- cut, or stand their ground. They chose the latter. And here began that long and bitter conflict be- tween the Connecticut and Pennsylvania men, known as the " Yankee and Pennamite War," which never became finally settled till the passage of the com- promise law of 1799, by the Legislature of Penn- sylvania. Sometimes attended by bloodshed, some- times reprisals only, but always a bitter and vindic- tive feud. The jails of the adjoining counties of Northampton and Northumberland were often filled with Wyoming prisoners, sent there by the authori- ties of Pennsylvania for trespassing on the disputed 5 so niSTOlUCAL SKETCHES OF rLYMOUTH. land^. And thus a series of murders, arsons, battles, sieges, arrests and angry personal disputes, continued lor more than a fourth oi' a eeutury. I have siiid that Ogdeu and his party occupied the Yankee buildings and improvements at the mouth of JMill Creek. They also erected a block house, the tirst milit^iry fortification in the valley. This looked too formidable for an attack, and the Yankee immi- grants crossed the Susquehanna and erected a block house ; and in compliment to the number of men to whom the territory of Kingston was set oft*, they called it "Forty Fort." After thus securing themselves, they concluded, upon consultation, to attack Ogden and his party in his stronghold. They crossed the river, and invested his fortitieation. In the name of Connecticut they demanded a surrender. Ogden lioisted a white llag and demanded a parley. The Yankees sent a com- mittee to the fort, as they supposed, to agree upon terms of capitulation and surrender, when they were arrested by the sheritf of the county of Northampton, who was concealed in the fort, with his warrant of axrest in Ms pocket. The committee lieing seized, the party outside surrendered, and the whole number were marched over the Blue Mountain to the Eastou jail. This quiet and imresisting surrender was an evi- dence certainly, that these Connecticut men were a law-abiding and peace-loving people. A few years THE YANKEE AND PENNAMITE WAR. 81 later we shall find that they were not so submissive to the Proprietary civil authorities. They were soon released, however, upon giving bail for their appearance, when they returned to their land of promise. As there were a hundred and sixty behind, of the two hundred raised by the Susquehanna Company, these came on soon after the return of the Easton prisoners, and erected a fortification on the southern extremity of the Wilkes-Barre river common. This, in honor of their captain, they christened Fort Dur- kce. Within less than two years after the first real oc- cupation of the valley by white men, the Yankees had two fortifications — Forty Fort and Fort Durkee ; and the Pennamites, Fort Ogden. A pretty good display, for mutual attack and de- fense, considering the Indian tribes that both of them had to contend with. As was to be supposed, Ogden could not withstand the forces occupying the two for- tifications, and in 1770 they expelled him. This act aroused the Projirietary Government, and they sent back Ogden with additional men, who erected Fort Wyoming, on the common, near the ter- minus of Northampton street, and some sixty rods above Fort Durkee. This enabled the Pennamites to retake Fort Og- den at Mill Creek. During this year the parties, being pretty equally divided as to numbers, carried 82 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. on a succession of storms and sieges, arrests and im- prisonments ; sometimes attended Avitli the death of a man or two, and the wounding of several, without any decided advantage upon either side. Of the party who came out to the valley in 176S-69 there was a son of John Jenkins, known in the subsequent history of the valley as Lieutenant, and afterwards as Colonel John Jenkins. This young man, then in his nineteenth year, became one of the prominent and leading spirits of the valley in the long and continuous chain of tragic events, which occurred during the quarter of a century succeeding the fii'st settlement of it. And although Lieutenant Jenldns does not come within the exact sphere to which I have limited my sketches, I will not pass over him in silence. I shall have occasion to use his Diary hereafter, and a brother of his belonged to the Plymouth colony. His father having been the leading man in immigration, and Provisional Judge of the new settlement up to the time the town of Westmoreland was estabhshed by the State of Connecticut, and made a part of the county of Litchfield, and a long period subsequently ; also a prominent person among the pioneers : presi- dent of that town meeting of the people of West- moreland, held on the first of August, 1775, approving of the acts of Congress which preceded the Declaration of Independence, and also of the meeting held on the eighth of August following, when the feeble col- LIEUTENANT JENKINS. 83 ony endorsed the measures of Congress " in opposing ye late measures adopted by Parliament to enslave America ; " in 1776 a member of the Colonial As- sembly from Westmoreland ; at the meeting of the people, over which Colonel Zebulon Butler presided, convened at Wilkes-Barre on the twenty-fourth of August, 1776, when it was resolved to proceed at once to the erection of forts for the common defense, " without fee or reward from y^ town," and immedi- ately after this meeting joined with his neighbors, in the erection of Fort Jenkins, in the upper end of the valley : all of which furnished young Jenkins with a motive for the entry into that field, which afterwards became one of danger, toil, and exposure. In October, 1776, he enlisted in Captain Solomon Strong's company of United States troops. Twenty- fourth Kegiment Connecticut Militia, as First Lieu- tenant. In the year 1777 he was taken prisoner and sent to Fort Niagara, where he was treated, after the fashion of all the Continental soldiers, with great severity — brutality is the better word. In 1778 he made his escape, and after many exposures and great suffering, he made his way to his family, in Westmore- land. On the day of the Wyoming battle, he was assigned by Colonel Butler to take charge of Forty Fort. After the terrible disasters of that day of gloom and horrors, we find him among the fugitives in their desolate march through the wilderness. He accompanied Colonel Hartley in his march from the 84 ■ HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. west brancli of the Siisqiielianna, tlirougli tlie Indian country to Tioga Point, and participated in all the engagements in that expedition with the Indians and Tories. He was detailed to the command of the companv, charged with the burial of the slain on the Wyoming battle-field. This was accomplished on the twenty-second of October, 1778. General Washington summoned him to his headquarters in the early part of the year 1779, for the purpose of procuring infor- mation, preparatory to the march of the expedition under General Sulliran, as to the condition and state of affairs along the line of that anticipated military movement. He returned from headquarters, and met SuUiran at Wilkes-Barre, and was appointed by that general as his guide, up the Susquehanna, and through the Indian country. He participated in the skirm- ishes and battles of that expedition. He was also at the siege of York Town, and in the trenches, under Baron Steuben, at the sun-ender of that place. This man passed an eyentful hfe, and may be classed among the prominent leading men of the val- ley. The Diaiy of local events, wlrich he kept, has been of great benefit to the historians of the valley. The data are written in plain and intelligible language, and so far as corroborating chcumstances are left to us, they are remarkable for their truthfulness. He began with the occupation of the vaUey, and he sur- vived its perils and afilictions. Always taking an ac- tive part, and ever at the post of honor and of dan- CAPTAIN LAZARUS STEWART. 85 ger. He lived to realize the fruits of his early hard- ships, and died, at his residence, upon the Wyoming battle-ground, on the nineteenth of March, 1827, in his seventy- sixth year. I have in a manner digressed from the line of local township history, in giving this short notice of one of the prominent men of the valley ; but as he headed that colonial band who forced their way through the wilderness — through the Indian border bristling with spear heads — exposed to hunger and the severest suffering and privations, I felt that I could not pass the old veteran by, in silence. But the chances are that the Yankees would have been driven out of the valley by force, had they not been joined by Captain Lazarus Stewart,and his com- pany of forty others, known as the Paxton Kangers. This new ally produced a kind of equilibrium of pow- er, and saved the Connecticut men from probable de- feat and expulsion. These men came from the county of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, to join the Connecticut standard. They were a brave and gallant set of men, fearing no danger, and able to sustain great fatigue and expos- ure. The late Judge Matthias HoUenback, the head of the family of that name in this county, was one of these Paxton Eangers. The Susquehanna Company gave them the township of Hanover, as a considera- tion for their services to the Yankee cause. Captain Lazarus Stewart was a bold, chivalrous 86 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. soldier, I cannot pass tlie opportnnity without say- ing a -word or two about this remarkable man. He commanded a company at Braddock's defeat, in the French and English war. He was engaged to be married to a Lancaster girl, on Ms return from the war. In his absence, the home of the father of this young lady was burned by Indians, and the whole family butchered : her head was severed from her body, and planted upon a pole, and raised above the smouldering ruins. Captain Stewart on his return from the disasters of Braddock's field, was in time to see the slaugh- tered remains of this family, and of his affianced bride. The smoke of the building had not yet sub- sided on his arrival. The scene lashed his mind into a state of fury. Seized with a paroxysm of frenzy, and impelled by a deep sense of revenge, he swore eternal enmity toward the whole Indian race. Brood- ing over the terrible wrongs he had received, he became more and more embittered against the Indian tribes. He firmly resolved that between him and them, there should be no peace. He jjursued and slew them whenever the opportunity was presented. He was unceasing in his energy, and unrelenting in his purpose. This conduct the Proprietary Govern- ment could not sanction. It was the policy of the government to have peace with the Indian tribes if possible. The course of Captain Stewart was proliib- ited by law, and the consequences were that the Pro- CAPTAIN LAZARUS STEWAET. 87 prietary Government ordered his arrest and trial. This lie would not submit to. He turned his eye to the Wyoming valley, and his mind to the making of .a league with the Connecticut settlers. The views and opinions of these people ran in the same channel with his own. They hated the In- dians and so did he. They were in opposition to the Proprietary Grovernment, and the curbing of his re- venge by that government, had placed him in that position also. The Wyoming valley was therefore the spot of all others for him ; and the hardy pioneers of New England, fighting under the rights of first grant and first occupation, in deadly hostility to the jurisdiction of Pennsylvania, were the people whose sympathies were in perfect accord with his own. Here then was a new field for operations. He made up his mind to enter it. He made common cause with the Wyoming settlers. At the head of his brave and intrepid band he came, and surrounded by his new allies, he threw down the gage of battle, and with them and their fortunes he pledged the service of his life. And true to them and their cause he faithfully remained. Wherever was the post of danger, there was Captain Stewart. He was one of the leading spirits of the Connecticut men amidst all their con- flicts, even up to his death upon the Wyoming bat- tle-ground, where he fell at the head of his company, in the foremost rank. 88 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. For the particular biography of this remarkable person, I refer the reader to the ^'Annals of Lu- zerne," written bj one of his kinsmen, Stewart Pearce, Esq. They are well worthy a perusal. I have glanced only at the picture, which is there very cleverly di'awn. The Yankees being joined by such an auxiliary as Captain Lazarus Stewart, and who by his military prowess and daring had infused into the rank and file of the company under his command all the spirit and enthusiasm of their leader, were rejoiced at this piece of good fortune. It gave them new hope, it nerved them with new energy. A new spirit seemed to prevail, and the capture of a fort upon an assault for that purpose, under the charge of Stewart and his Paxton boys, as they were termed, was always a matter of almost absolute cer- tainty. Thus, at the very commencement of the actual settlement of the lands upon the Susquehanna, we find two hostile flags displayed, each as the index of a separate power. And while the continued struggle upon the side of both belligerents was pretended to be classed under a civil regime, and as a means only of adjusting civil wrongs, there were all the para- phernaha and outward demonstrations of war — ^forti- fications, arms, munitions, drills, parades, and all the demonstrations and martial ajopearances which sur- round the camp. And to complete the picture, there CIVIL PROCEEDIISrGS. 89 was the most vindictive and burning hate in the hearts of the opposing factions. The Yanl^ee hated the Pennamite, and the Pennamite hated the Yan- kee. There was not the least particle of love between them, to incur the risk of loss. The capturing and recapturing of forts, the taking of prisoners, robbery and murder, all passed under the name of civil proceedings. The sheriff of North- ampton would have a hundred armed deputies to exe- cute a warrant, and Sheriff Cook, of Northumber- land, was surrounded by Colonel Plunket and seven hundred militia, to make an arrest of a few persons charged with a breach of the peace ! This was the way in which the Proprietary Gov- ernment conducted its civil administration ! And in the selection of agents by it, men were ap- pointed who seemed to pay no regard to the ordinary feelings of humanity. A fellow, by the name of Alexander Patterson, who was sent to Wilkes-Barre as a civil ruler, seemed to relish the persecutions he heaped upon his prisoners, to a degree that astonishes the mind of a civiHzed man ; and he gloried in the opportunity for the exercise of his vindictive feelings toward the Yankee population. He regarded them as outlaws, and no punishment was too severe to inflict upon them. Some of the acts of brutality of this civil magistrate, upon Plymouth men, I shall al- lude to hereafter. But it is not within the line I have shaped out to 90 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. go into a general account of the circumstances and incidents of this Pennamite and Yankee war, save so far as it may have a particuhir bearing upon the peo- ple of Plymouth. To those who would wish to understand the sub- ject in its lengthy details, I must refer them to our local historians — Chapman, Miner, Pearce, Peck and Stone. The three iirst named, speak more particu- larly of this conflict than the two latter. The chief scenes of these feuds were upon the east side of the river, and in the vicinity of the forts at and near Wilkes-Barre — though the last grand de- monstration came off at the battle of Nanticoke, which was upon Plymouth soil. The people of Plymouth had a small fort or stockade upon "Garrison Hill," which had been erected by the early settlers, in 1776, as their first movement of defensive operations, on the declaration of war, by the United States against Great Britain, This spot is at the turn of the flat road, and some seventy rods from the main travelled road through the town, and not far from the location of the old "swing gate." It was years ago, and within my recollection, the field where we went in search of Indian curiosities — arrow-heads, pipes, stone hatchets, pots, etc., and sometimes we would find leaden bullets and pieces of broken muskets, wliich were the evidences of civiliza- tion. TEOUBLES OF PLYMOUTH PEOPLE. 91 THs stockade never became necessary for the ex- ercise of its military properties, in the Revolutionary or Pennamite troubles. It was important, however, as an Indian defense. But the people of Plymouth, composing at least one-fifth of the whole population of the valley, had their full share of the troubles, as weR as the respon- sibilities of the border war. Several of our people were killed, many of them imprisoned and cruelly treated — for it was the Plymouth man who received no quarter, if he was so unfortunate as to fall into the enemy's hands. As the Shawnee tribe before them had been the especial objects of persecution by their masters, the Iroquois, so their misfortunes seemed to have fallen on their successors, as to the spirit of malevolence ; and whenever one of them fell into the clutches of Esquire Patterson, or Captains Christie and Shraw- der, he was certain to feel the pangs of their malice. These people had been of the first Connecticut importation — " The Forty Thieves," as Patterson de- nounced them, and as such he treated them. Mr. Miner, in his history of Wyoming, informs us that Patterson, in his capacity as Justice of the Peace, visited the Shawnee settlement with an armed force, and under some legal pretext, arrested eleven respectable citizens and sent them under guard to the fort at Wilkes-Barre. "Among the prisoners was Major Prince Alden, 92 HISTOKICAL SKETCHES OE PLYMOUTH. sixty-five years old, feeble from age and suffering from disease. Compassion yielded notliing to attenu- ate liis sufferings. Captain James Bidlack was also arrested. He was between sixty and seventy. His son of the same name bad fallen, as previously re- corded, at tbe bead of bis company in tbe Indian bat- tle ; anotber son, Benjamin, bad served in tbe army tbrongb tbe Eevolutionary war. Mr. Bidlack bim- self bad been taken by tbe savages and suffered a te- dious captivity in Canada. All tbis availed bim no- tbing. Benjamin Haiwey, wbo bad been a prisoner to tbe Indians, was also arrested. Samuel Eansom, son of Captain Ransom, wbo bad fallen in tbe massacre, was most rudely treated on being arrested. ' Ab, ba !' cried Patterson, 'you are tbe jockey we wanted; away witb bim to tbe guard-bouse, witb old Harvey, anotber damned rascal ! ' "Eleven in all were taken and driven to tbe fort, wbere tbey were confined in a room witb a mud floor, on tbe tbirty-first of October, wet and comfortless, witb no food and little fire, wbicb as tbey were sitting round. Captain Cbristie came in, ordered tbem to lie down on tbe ground, and bade tbe guard to blow out tbe brains of any one wbo should attempt to rise. Even tbe staff of tbe aged Mr. Alden was taken from bim." Tbe object of these acts of brutality upon the part of Patterson, it is supposed, was to enable bim in their absence, to drive then- families from their MR. Harvey's mission. 93 houses and their homes, and put some of his minions in their places. Another motive may have been to pum"sh old Mr. Harvey for an act it appears he had committed, which consisted in being sent as an agent by some of his people to Connecticut, to ascertain the names of the two hundred, who came out under the auspices of the Susquehanna Company. I insert an extract of a letter from Captain Shraw- der, who backed legal precepts with a military com- pany, and was at that time stationed at Wilkes-Barre. This letter bears date, Wyoming, March thirtieth, 1783. " On Monday Colonel Butler arrived here, and the day following he and several of the principal in- habitants were over the river to Shawnee ; but whether on private (as they would fain make me be- lieve) or pubhc business, I cannot tell. On Thursday they had a town meeting here, when they agreed, ac- cording to Captain Spalding's information to me, to send Mr. Harvey to a certain place in Connecticut for a copy of records, to see what time the first settlers came here, and who they were; accordingly Mr. Har- vey set off yesterday morning." This little piece of service, therefore, of Mr. Harvey, was by no means palatable to Patterson and Shrawder, and was a thing to be jotted down and remembered some day on the general summing up of charges against the " damned rascal," as Patterson pleased to designate him. The jail calendar at Easton contains the names, 94 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. among otliers, of Grideon Chiircli, Abram Pike, Thomas Heath, Prince Alden, Jnstiu Gaylord, Abra- ham Ncsbitt, and Benjamin Bidkick. But this was but one importation. The calendars of that and the Sunbury jail, in Northumberland, if all produced, would run into scores. And for ^^hat oifence ? The cultivation and claim of land to which they had the first grant and the first occupation. And this was defined and punished as a crime, in the terrible days of which we are writing. The people of our town had, in common with their New England friends, done everything in their power to aid the Colonial struggle in the efi'ort for Liberty. At least two men out of three were in the Revolutionary service, including the terrible slaughter at Wyoming, and still this great tax, paid with half their substance, and sealed on Revolutionary battle- fields with the heart's blood of scores of them, availed them notliing, after the surrender of Cornwallis' sword to Wasliington. The occupation of land they had settled upon was a sufficient cause, upon the part of the Proprietary Grovernment, to harrass the remnant of them, saved from slaughter, with every imagiuable device. When peace came, most of the soldiers of the na- tion who had survived the seven-years' conflict, were at rest. Not so with the people of Plymouth and the Wyoming valley at large. The foreign foe had suf- fered his defeat, returned to his home, and }-ielded THE BATTLE OF NANTICOKE. 95 to the fortunes of war ; and the people generally who had achieved the victory were at rest. But the Wyo- ming soldier, on returning to his fireside after a seven- years' siege, and when he should have been released from further exposure and excitement, could not lay down his arms; for though war had relieved nearly the whole country, it still showed its glowering fea- tures at the threshold of his home. He had survived Brandywine and Germantown, to meet as vindictive a foe, on his return, as he had faced upon those fields. This was cruelly hard, but so it seemed to have been noted down in the book of his destiny. As the battle of IsTanticoke was contested on Ply- mouth soil, and as every able-bodied man and boy in the township were engaged in it, there will be a pro- priety in giving the full details of it. At least one third of the Yankee force was made up of its citizens. In the month of December, 1775, the Proprietary Grovernment sent an armed force of some five hundred men, under the command of Colonel William Plun- ket, to destroy the Yankee settlement at Muncy, on the west branch of the Susquehanna. This settlement embraced the two townships of Charleston and Judea, which were within the limits of the charter of the Susquehanna Company, though settled some years after the Wyoming valley. The number being small, and not having the necessary means of defense, they were obliged to surrender at discretion. 6 96 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. One man was killed by Plunket's command, a few wounded, and, as was usual in such cases, tlie leading men were conveyed to the Sunhury Jail. Flushed with this easy victory over the defense- less people of Charleston and Judea, the Proprietary Grovernment resolved upon sending Colonel Plunket to Wyoming, to remove the Yankees from that place. So they commenced making preparation for the campaign, by the addition of two hundred more Northumberland militia, collecting the necessary sup- plies and boats for their transportation. Any property in those times which belonged to a "Wyoming Yankee, was the proper subject of plun- der by the Proprietary Government, through its agents. It required two boats to carry their supplies, ammunition, and a field-piece. It seems they were determined on this occasion to add artillery to their small arms. It would have a more imposing ap- pearance. They had little difficulty in procaring their ships of war. They were at hand. A boat of Benjamin Harvey, Jr., had been seized a few days before at Fort Augusta, and the cargo confiscated, upon the ground that he was a traitor to the government. One of his neighbors had been treated in the same way. Here then were the two boats for the expedition. And what was better, Mr. Harvey was impressed in the service, to pilot the boats up the Susquehanna, with the glorious privilege, on arriving at Nanticoke, . THE MARCH TO WYOMING. 97 of shooting at, or being sliot by, bis family and friends. But there was no release from bis position. Tbere is no apology available against vindictive force. He submitted. But tbere was another necessary wanting. When the Proprietary Government made war, it was done under the authority of a civil process. To meet this emergency, a warrant was sworn out to arrest some Yankee settler for treason. Against whom it was di- rected in this case, we have not the record to show. The blanks in these warrants were generally filled up with the names of John Franklin, Zebulon Butler, Lazarus Stewart or one of the Harvey s. But this was of little importance. The warrant of arrest was obtained, and put in the hands of Sheriff Cook, of the county of Northumberland, for execution, in the name and on behalf of the Proprietary Govern- ment of Pennsylvania. The two hundred additional men were mustered into the service of the sheriff's posse, which now numbered from six to seven hundred strong. Am- munition and supplies were stored in the two ships of war, the cannon mounted, and in the early part of December, the soldiery commenced their march to Wyoming, upon the main road skirting the west side of the river ; and the flotilla, with Benjamin Harvey, Jr., as pilot, weighed anchor upon the head-waters of the Susquehanna. With colors flying and martial instruments sending out notes of the slogan, or some 98 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. other tune in oliaractor, the whoh> foree commenced their movement toward tlie enemy's country. On the twentieth of December, Colonel Flunket, at the head of his invading army, — to carry out the civil process in the hands of Sheritf Cook, — arrived at the mouth of Nescopeck creek, something like twenty miles below Nanticoke. On this very day Congress, probably having been informed of the onslaught upon the poor settlers of Charleston and Judea, and the preparation by the Pennsylvania authorities, prompt- ed by the chivalrous acts of the colonel in that cam- paign, for the subjugation, if not the expulsion of the Yankees on the north branch of the Susquehanna, passed a very important resolution. Its substance is, that in the opinion of Con- gress, the contending parties on the Susq[uehanna should cease all hostilities, and avoid every appear- ance of force ; that all property taken should be immediately restored to the original owners ; that there should be no interruption caused by either party in t1ie passing and repassing of persons behav- ing peaceably, through the disputed territory; that those who had been seized and kept in custody ought to be immediately released, that they might go to their respective homes; and recommending peace and quiet until a legal decision could be had on the dis- pute, or until Congress should take further orders. It is probable that, in those days of mail facili- ties. Colonel Plunket and Sheriff Cook did not re- COLONEL ZEBULON BUTLER. 99 ceive this resolution of Congress till after the battle of Nanticoke, which was fought on the twenty-fourth and. twenty-fifth. It is possible, however, that the knowledge of this may have had something to do with their precipitate retreat ; and it is fair to pre- sume that their Yankee reception, the floating ice in the river, and the severe cold weather which came on every northern blast, had much more to do with it. Eailroads and telegraph wires had not then made their appearance. There was but little ice in the Susquehanna, when the expedition left Fort Augusta. This obstruction, however, increased as they ascended the river. The fact of making but thirty miles in three or four days is evidence that they had pretty serious obstacles in the way. The people of the valley had received information of the fitting out of the expedition, before the march had been commenced from Sunbury. They therefore had but little time for preparation. And as there had been a respite from any serious collisions for a year or two previous, they were not in a condition to meet successfully so large an opposing force. The whole valley could not muster, including old and young, seven hundred men. Under the direction, however, of Colonel Zebulon Butler, they commenced operations with a right good will. Impressed with the idea that they were to fight on their own territory, and in defense of their civil 100 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. rights, their homes and their children, they mustered men and bo5^s some three hundred. A small force compared with the little army of Colonel Plunket ; hut for the deficiency in rank and file, they made up in resolution and courage. Those who could not be provided with guns were supplied with long poles with scythes fastened upon the ends — a formidable weapon in a hand to hand encounter ; and as the soldiers marched along they jokingly named their imique weapons, " the end of time." On the night of the twenty-third of December, Colonel Butler encamped with his command near the mouth of Harvey's creek. From this position he sent Major John Grarret,with a flag, down the river some two or three miles to meet the advancing column, and inquire of Colonel Plunket a? to the meaning of this hostile approach and military dis- play ? Major Garret was informed that it was alto- gether a peaceable demonstration, for no purpose but to aid the sherifi" of Northumberland county in exe- cuting a warrant for the arrest of several persons at Wyoming, for the violation of the laws of the Pro- prietary Government, and that it was to be hoped there would be no resistance to such a reasonable and proper request ! And this was the mode and manner, at that time, in this part of Pennsylvania, of executing civil process ! Major Garret knew well, from the military force before liim, that tliis declaration was a most infamous lie. ENSIGN MASON FITCH ALDEN. 101 So on Ms return, he reported tliat the enemy out- numbered their own forces more than two to one. "The conflict will be a sharp one, boys," said he. " I for one am ready to die, if it need be, for my country." Early on the morning of the twenty-fourth, Colonel Butler retired up the river about a mile from the place, where he had bivouacked on the night of the twenty-third, to a point of natural defense on the Harvey farm. This natural defense consists of a line of elevated rocks, extending from the base of the mountain, in a south-easterly direction, almost to the bank of the river, a distance probably of half a mile. The road crossed this ledge through a gorge in the rocky promontory, at a short distance from the river. The ground was covered with forest trees. Here he took his stand ; his men finishing an ad- dition to the breast- work, which they had partially constructed on their way down. The outline of this natural barricade may be easily traced by the eye. On the south-west line of it are the entrances to a coal mine which is now in operation. Colonel Butler, on leaving his camp in the morn- ing, had detailed Ensign Mason Fitch Alden, with eighteen men, to remain there as a corps of observa- tion, with orders to report as to any movement of the enemy. He also detached Captain Lazarus Stewart, with twenty men, with orders to cross the river to the 102 HISTOEICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. east side, and take position a short distance above the Nanticoke falls, on the Lee farm, to repel any attempt that might be made, on the part of the enemy, to effect a landing on that side of the stream. Having thus disposed of the details of his plan of arrangement, and which were done with profound military skill, he put his men in position behind his rock barricade, and awaited the approach of the enemy. He was thus guarded at all points, and his position was one that was almost impregnable against a force, such as was about to advance upon it. On the same morning, December twenty-fourth, Colonel Plunket reached the ground occupied by Alden, about eleven o'clock. Alden slowly retiring out of the reach of gunshot, was followed by the enemy up to the barricades. Colonel Plunket marched up with much display, his drums beating and music pealing from his instru- ments. Observing the strong position before him, he halted at a respectable distance, exclaiming, "My God ! what a breast-work." Mr. Miner, in his history of this battle, and whose text I have mainly relied on, says that John Carey, who was in the action, told him, in speaking of the conduct of Colonel Butler throughout the affair, " I loved the man ; he was an honor to the human species." The taking of life was not the object or design of these defensive operations. As the Yankees were PASSAGE ACKOSS THE RIVEK. 103 in a safe position, Colonel Butler ordered his entire line to fii'e a volley of blank cartridges, thinking that this would give the enemy the idea, by the re- port, that their force corresponded with the formida- ble character of their breast- work. The device answered the purpose ; the enemy's line was thrown into confusion. Without firing a gun they retreated out of range of the fire at the breast-work. Colonel Plunket, supposing that the barricade could not be stormed without great loss, commenced another movement. Placing a reconnoitring force into a boat, he directed them to cross the river, with a view of ascertaining the practicability of enter- ing the valley, on the east side. The passage of this boat and crew was watched by both parties with much anxiety. The Yankees, however, had some knowledge as to the result of the adventure, which the Pennamites did not. As a kind of shield, Benjamin Harvey, Jr., was put upon this boat. As the crew were approaching the shore, Capt. Stewart with his guard of twenty men gave them a volley. As there were no blank cartridges about this part of the affair, there was some mischief done ; two or three were wounded, and probably the whole crew would have been killed if Harvey had not called out to them to desist, as .they might kill some of their friends. Kecognizing him. Captain Stewart discontinued his fire. 104 HKTOEICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. The crew plying their oars, and coming within the draught of the rapids below, passed throngh them in a moment. And thus ended the operations of the twenty- fourth. Colonel Plunket withdrew to the camp which Colonel Butler had left in the morning, and re- mained there over night. The result of a military consultation that night, it is to be presumed, held between him and Sheriff Cook, was to diyide the attacking column in the morning — ^the ris-ht of his line to storm the breast- works of the Yankees, and the left to outflank their rio-ht. This was a matter which seemed more feasible in. theory, than it afterwards proyed to be when tested. And if Colonel Plunket had under- stood the ground as well as Colonel Butler did, he might haye changed his plan of attack. I haye aheady stated that this natural defense of rocky ledges was nearly a half mile in length, striking the base of a very steep hill on the west terminus, and reaching nearly to the bank of the riyer on the east. A flanking moyement, therefore, on the set- tlers' right, was opposed by a steep hill, and by the riyer on the left. This then was impracticable. And as for storming or scaling the breast -work, that was a serious affair when met squarely in the face. "With this plan of operations in yiew. Colonel Plunket marched out of camp, on Christmas morning, to giye battle. Concealing his men with branches DEATH OF SURVEYOE LUKEXS' SOIN". 105 and loose rocks, he advanced upon the fortifications. The fije now became general along the whole line. Gruarded at all points, Colonel Butler had provided for the movement on his right, by detaching a force to guard his flank, at the base of the mountain. The conflict lasted most of the day. The flank- ing party was repulsed at every attempt,to storm or scale the fortifications. It has never been known what number were killed or wounded in this battle. Probably as many as a dozen were slain on both sides, and maybe three times that number wounded. A son of Surveyor- Greneral Lukens was killed, on the side of the enemy, and I have been informed by those who were in the battle, that there were three or four others, and sev- eral wounded. Four days after the battle, December twenty- ninth, the records show that the people of Westmore- land were in town meeting, and among other things they, '^ Voted — 'Titus Hinman and Perin Boss be ap- pointed to collect the charity of the people for the support of the widow Baker, the widow Franklin, and the mdow Ensign." Baker and Franklin were Plymouth men. Mr. Miner gives it as his opinion, and he had been very industrious in the collection of facts in the compilation of his history, and most of his knowl- edge derived from the actors in the afiair — "that 106 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. probably six or eiglit were killed, and three times tbat number wounded," on tlie side of tlie settlers. Towards the close of the day, Colonel Plunket, finding Colonel Butler's position too strong to be car- ried, withdrew from the field, and immediately com- menced his retreat on the west side of the river. He was pursued by Captain Stewart on the east side of the river some miles, but without any damag- ing results. And thus ended the battle of Nanticoke. The de- sign of the invasion, in mid winter, though with very formidable numbers for those days, was an evidence if not of folly, at least a want of military skill and precaution. The battle itself was the most formida- ble, and concentrated more force, and was attended with more bloodshed, than any one other conflict be- tween the Connecticut and Pennsylvania people. And as the field of action was upon Plymouth soil, that township being more in immediate danger, it is probable that on that memorable day, there was not one of her citizens, capable of bearing arms, that was not engaged in it. An incident or two connected with the battle of Nanticoke,must be mentioned for the first time in his- tory. It is related by William Jameson, who was in the engagement, that he and old Benjamin Harvey (father of the Benjamin impressed in the boat service of Colonel Plunket) occupied a position together be- hind one of the rock breast-works. Mr. Harvey was BENJAMIN HARVEY. 107 an aged man, and grandfather of Jameson Harvey, Esq., late of Plymouth. He fought with a musket, and as the old hero would drive down the bullet with his ramrod, he would "pray the Lord to direct it to the hearts of the bloody Pennamites; " and whenever he would fire through the loop-hole, he would ex- claim, " there, damn you, take that ! " He thus load- ed with a prayer and discharged with a curse ! I learn on traditionary authority, that on the first day of the battle, when Colonel Butler ordered the first round of blank cartridges to be fired, he noticed the bark, limbs, and twigs falling on his left where the Plymouth men were stationed. He turned to a subaltern, remarking, "that there was no more use in attempting to restrain those fellows, (the Shawnees) than wild Arabs ; that they would shoot a Pennamite if they knew they were to die for it the next minute, and by refraining, they could save their life." More than fifty years ago, I remember seeing a large flat rock, set up on edge between two trees, near the natural breast- work, upon this battle-field. It stood between two chestnuts, and as the trees grew, it became firmly imbedded between them. This was pointed out to me by my father as " one of the barricades of the early settlers of the valley, in a bat- tle that had been fought on that ground many years before." I saw it often in after years. It is not there now. Progress has removed this old landmark, an in- 108 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. dex of early border warfare, a monument in com- memoration of brave and fearless men, and around wbicli clung the dearest recollections of the past. Why was it done ? Progress did the work, and so progress drilled holes into the great boulder, detached from the precipice, on the brow of the hill above and near the entrance to the Grand Tunnel, and put in blasts of powder and rent it into pieces. This huge rock, some ten feet in height, Avith an even surface of some twenty feet in diameter, was a precious relic of the past : it was the threshing-floor of old Benjamin Harvey, before the dawn of Independence. It re- mained there quietly in its bed as late as 1840. Pro- gress itched for its destruction, and it is gone ! The next movement of this modern Sirocco will be the tearing away of the old Academy. Vandal- ism is unloosed. Progress, unrestrained by sound and discriminat- ing judgment, is a more ferocious monster than the beast of seven heads and ten horns of the Apoca- lypse, which arose out of the sea, the fearful type of the great enemy of man, and which so troubled the visions of St. John ! His greedy and capacious maw can contain every- thing : Yankee fortifications, rock threshing-floors, public commons, dedicated under the solemnities of law as places for the recreation of toiling men and their little ones ; the Column Vendome, the Palace J A BI E S O N H A E V E Y. ^ HARRISON WRIGHT. 109 of the Tuilleries, and will yet swallow up tlie Pyr- amids ! Progress will soon turn his great glaring eye-balls upon the old Academy, which in its day, has sent out some of the very best business and professional men of this Commonwealth. You who doubt, look to the substantial business men and merchants of Ply- mouth during the last thirty years, and call to mind the stirring appeals and nervous forensic declama- tions of Harrison Wright. It is a subject of regret that, of the numerous members of the Harvey family, many of them being conspicuous men in the early settlement of Plymouth, no likeness is to be had of any one of the earlier im- migrants. I insert the photograpic likeness of Mr. Jameson Harvey, now well advanced in years; but who is of the third generation of the family, since their settle- ment in the town. The same farm that his grand- father resided upon, this gentleman occupied as his home till within the last three years, when he re- moved to Wilkes-Barre, where he now resides. The land is underlaid with coal, and has become very val- uable. CHAPTER V. PENNAMITE AND YANKEE WAR CONTINUED. — ICE FLOOD, EXPULSION OF THE SETTLERS AND ACTS OF CRUELTY INFLICTED UPON THEM. SETTLERS RETURN. FIGHT ON ROSS HILL. TORIES DRIVEN OUT OF SHAWNEE. THE battle of Nanticoke was upon the eve of the Revolution. The intervening time was but from Christmas to July. Local strifes were to be laid aside. The great and momentous question of a na- tion's liberty, was at hand. The cry " to arms ! " resounded throughout the land. The issue was be- tween Liberty and Despotism. The people of Ply- mouth were undivided on this issue ; their enemies were not. Our town furnished more soldiers than its quota. For the present we pass over the ensuing seven years of toil and exposure, of misery and bloodshed, and come down to the close of the rebellion, to see how our veterans were rewarded for their sacrifices and their valor. Articles of peace, in which the Independence of the United States of America was recognized, were signed and exchanged on the twentieth day of No- vember, 1782. The soldiers of Plymouth who had survived the terrible encounter returned to their (110) THE ICE FLOOD, 111 homes in tlie winter of 1782-83. They laid aside their implements of war, and took up those of the husbandman. During the summer they prepared their ground and sowed their grain, but they were not allowed to gather their harvest. They would do to fight on the battle-fields for hb- erty, but not to reap the harvest their hands had pre- pared. The children of the men who perished from the inclemency of the winter at Valley Forge, or who fell at the Wyoming Massacre, could plant the seeds, but not gather the crop. On the thirteenth and fourteenth of March, 1784, occurred the memorable ice flood in the Susquehanna. The elements seemed to have joined the common enemy of the poor settlers. It is said that misfor- tunes never come singly. I copy the account of the flood and its disasters from Mr. Chapman : "After a winter of unusual severity, about the middle of March the weather became suddenly warm, and on the thirteenth and fourteenth rain fell in tor- rents, melting the deep snows throughout all the hills and valleys, in the upper regions watered by the Sus- quehanna. The following day the ice in the river began to break up, and the streams rose with great rapidity. The ice first gave way at the difi'erent rapids, and floating down in great masses, lodged against the frozen surface of the more gentle parts of the river, where it remained firm. In this manner 7 112 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF rLYMOUTH, several large dams w-ere formed, whicli caused such an acciiraulatiou of water that the river overtiowed all its banks, and one general inundation overspread the extensive plains of Wyoming. The inhabitants took refnge, and saw their property exposed to the fnry of the waters. "At length the upper dam gave way; huge masses of ice were scattered in every direction. The deluge bore down upon the dams below, which successively yielded to the insupportable burden, and the whole went otf with the noise of contending storms. Houses, barns, stacks of hay and grain were swept otf in the general destruction, to be seen no more. The plain on which the village of "Wilkes-Barre is built, was covered with heaps of ice, which continued a great portion of the following summer." A graphic and well-drawn picture, truly. Those who have witnessed the breaking up of the huge ice fields of the Susquehanna, caused by a sudden thaw, will recognize the force and power of the description from the pen of Mr. Chapman.. There has been no Hood approximating to its character since, in the Susquehanna. The one known as " St. Patrick's Flood," of 1S65, approaches the nearest to it. So called because of its occurrence on the seventeenth and eighteenth of March, the former being the birth-day of that saint. It was regarded as proper for the subject of record. The court of the county at August session 1865, THE FLOOD ON '^GARRISON HILL." 113 caused the following entry to be made on the minutes : "The flood of the seventeenth and eighteenth of March, 1865, known as " St. Patrick's Flood/' was 24 7-lOths feet above low-water mark in the Susque- hanna, and it is the general opinion that it was four feet higher than the " Pumpkin Flood " of October, 1786." From the most reliable information I can gather, the flood of 1784 was from five to six feet higher than the one of 1865. It may therefore be styled the king of the floods of the Susquehanna. The river probably rose thirty-three feet above its ordinary low- water mark. A fearful and terrible deluge was the result. The people of our town were not aware of these sudden and great rises which occasionally occurred in the Susquehanna, and therefore did not exercise proper precaution in the selection of the sites for their new homes. There were eight or nine dwellings on " Garrison Hill " in 1784. No one in these days would think of erecting buildings upon that level. All of those dwellings with their sheds and out- houses were swept off, in that memorable flood. Rev. Benjamin Bidlack was carried away in the house he occupied. After a perilous voyage of a night, plung- ing about amidst ice bergs and floating debris, ex- pecting every moment to be engulphed, he finally found a safe harbor at the lower end of the Shawnee Flats. 114 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. Mr. Asa Jackson, of Abraham's Plains, was drowned. There were no Kves lost in Plymouth, but the destruction of property there, as well as through- out the valley, was immense. Before the calamities of the flood had subsided, the people of Plymouth and the whole valley were subjected to a new horror, Alexander Patterson, the civil magistrate of "VVilkes-Barre, conceived that the time had come to exterminate the Yankee race in Wyoming. Devoid of the common impulses of the human heart, and im- pelled by the most wicked designs, he commenced the work of driving a helpless people, now composed principally of old men, boys, women and children, from the few homes that the angry waters had spared them. John Franklin, whose brother was a Plymouth man, and had been killed at the battle of Nanticoke, informs us in his journal, "that the soldiers (Chris- tie's and Shrawder's companies, stationed in the Wilkes-Barre garrison, and the body guard of Pat- terson), were set to work removing the fences from the enclosures of the inhabitants, laying fields of grain open to be devoured, fencing up the high- ways, and between the houses of the settlers and their wells of water ; that they were not permitted to procure water from their wells, or travel their usual highways. The greater part of the people were in the most distressed situation, numbers having had CRUEL TREATMENT OF THE SETTLERS. 115 their houses swept off by the uncommon overflowing of the Susquehanna, in the month of March preced- ing ; numbers were without shelter and in a starving condition. They were not suffered to cut a stick of timber, or make any shelters for their families. They were forbid to draw their nets to fish ; their nets were taken from them by the officers of the garrison. The settlers were often dragged out of their beds in the night season by ruffians, and beat in a cruel manner. Complaints were made to the justices, as well as to the commanding officers of the garrison, but to no purpose, and were equally callous to every feeling of humanity." What a picture is here presented of the condition of our people. The elements and the wrath of man seemed to have been in accord. The evil passions of the human heart had culminated. The worst of pas- sions were unloosed, and mercy no longer had an ex- istence in the heart of Patterson, and the minions whom he had in his train. He unleashed his hounds and they eagerly scented, and savagely pursued, their prey. The grievances portrayed by Franklin, were but the prelude of the tragedy which followed. On the thirteenth and fourteenth of May, just sixty days after the horrors of the flood, the two com- panies of soldiers, under the order of Patterson, were marched out, with fixed bayonets, for the purpose of expelling the whole Yankee population of the valley. The settlers were weak now ; the battle-fields of 116 UISTOEICAL SKETCHES OF FLYMOUTH. the revolutiou had decimated their number. The Groddess of Liberty smiled com'plaeendy upon the people of most of the laud, but her tace was veiled upon the plains of the Susquehanna. The day of their tribulation had usurped the day of their jubilee. Eejoicings and thanksgivings were the songs elsewhere, but here was the land of mourn- ing. The woman who had become widowed, and the child who had become orphaned, by the ravages of war, had none to lean upon. The old man who had given his sons to his country in the hour of need, hobbled upon his crutches as his only support now. The battles and the tloods had joined hands; these had erected the scatfold. and Pattei^on now ap- peared as the common hangman. His orders were to expel the people ; " to take no excuse ; to give no quarter ; to burn the houses of those who were refractory or disobeyed ordei^s.'' Not more unrelenting and revengeful were the de- crees of Pharaoh, issued against the children of Isra- el. The same evil spirit actuated the minds of both. The Egyptian king gtwe his fugitives the choice of the road they should travel : Pattersons orders were that the Wyoming people should travel the roads where there wei*e no bridges, and where the wilder- ness had not .yet received the kindly imprint of the foot of the pioneer. The poor settlei"s begged that they might go np or down the river, as in this wav thev could use EXPULSION OF THE SETTLERS. 117 boats. Their liorses and wagons had been carried away by the floods. Patterson said no. They then besought him to permit them to take the road by Stroudsburg, to Easton^on the Delaware. The mon- ster said no. These roads had bridges over the streams and wagons coukl pass over them, and there- fore the exodus coukl not move upon them. The road to Lacka waxen was the road to Connec- ticut, that the refugees must travel upon, and no other, and upon that they must take up their line of march at once, without food, without clothing, with- out the means of transportation, without hope. Six- ty miles of a howling wilderness lay before them, and there was no land of promise beyond. The road they were compelled to travel had not been repaired, or used during the seven years of the Kevolution; it was almost impassable, even for persons on foot. The streams were swollen with rains, the bridges were decayed and gone, there was no inn by the way- side, and no shelter to screen the helpless creatures from winds and storms. Mr. Miner, in his history, p. 345, says : "About five hundred men, women and children, with scarce provisions to sustain life, plodding their weary way, mostly on foot, the road being impassable for wagons ; mothers carrying their infants, and wading streams up to their arm-pits, and at night slept on the naked earth, the heavens their canopy, with scarce clothing to cover them. A Mr. Gardner, and John Jenkins, 118 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. (who had been a representative to the Connecticut Assembly, and who was chairman of the town meet- ing which had in 1775 adopted the noble resolutions in favor of liberty,) both aged men and lame, sought their weary way on crutches. Little children, tired with travelling, crying to their mothers for bread, which they had not to give them, sank from exhaus- tion into stillness and slumber, while others could only shed tears of compassion and sorrow, till in sleep, they forgot their griefs and cares. Several of the unhappy sufferers died in the wilderness, others were taken sick from excessive fatigue, and expired soon after reaching the settlement. A widow with a numerous family of children, whose husband had been slain in the war, endured inexpressible hard- ships. One child died and she buried it as she could, behind a hemlock log, probably to be disinterred from its shallow covering and be devoured by wolves." One of the exiles, Elisha Harding, Esq., gives a very spirited account of this terrible journey through the wilderness, which I cannot omit. He says : " It was a solemn scone ; parents, their children crying from hunger ; aged men on their crutches ; all ursred forward bv an armed force at our heels." In seven days they made their journey of sixty miles. They had reached the Delaware ; they were in a civilized land. Some of them went up and some of them went down that river, seeking shelter where they could, and living as they could. SYMPATHY AROUSED. 119 Mr. Harding says lie took the road, east, in the direction of Connecticut, but when he reached the summit of the Shongum Mountain, he turned back, as did the Israelites of old, to survey the land he had left. But hear him in his own language : " I looked back with this thought — ' Shall I abandon Wyoming forever ? ' The reply was ' No, oh, no ! There lie yom' murdered brothers and friends. Dear to me art thou, though a land of affliction.' Every way looked gloomy except towards Wyoming. Poor, ragged and distressed as I was, I had youth and health, and felt that my heart was whole. So I turned back to de- fend or die." The news of the brutal conduct which caused these sufferings spread wide and far. The sympathy of the whole country was aroused. The entire people of the State of Pennsylvania, except the few land- speculators who had title rights in Wyoming, became excited, and demanded that these people should be restored to their possessions. The Proprietary Gov- ernment had become a Sovereign State. An order was issued on the thirteenth of June, directing the companies of Christie and Shrawder to be forthwith discharged. These soldiers immediately left the valley. A month of exile thus passed, and the settlers of the Susquehanna were stragglers and outcasts, wan- dering upon the shores of the Delaware; but the people of New Jersey and of Pennsylvania who lived in that 120 HISTOEICAL SKETCHES OP PLYMOUTH. region, were liospitable and kind to the wretched and forlorn objects, who appealed to them for charity. The Pennsylvania authorities not only directed the soldiers stationed here to be discharged, but they also ordered the sheriff of Northumberland — the pres- ent territory of Luzerne at that time being a part of it — to repair to Wyoming, invite the settlers back again, and reinstate them in their possessions. Sher- iff Antis accordingly came into the valley about the middle of June. He sent messengers to the Delaware to inform the settlers, in the name of the State, that they might return to Wyoming. This was of course glad tidings to them, and they com- menced their march back again, and in a week or ten days afterwards, most of them had arrived. They halted on the summit of the Wilkes-Barre mountain, and erected a fort there, called " Fort Lillo-pe." There were reasons, of which they were informed, why they did not at once descend into the valley below. After the discharge of the soldiers of Christie and Shrawder, Patterson immediately — setting the orders and decrees of the State authority at defiance, — commenced enrolling those of the Pennsylvania claimants who were here ; persons also who had taken the side of Grreat Britain in the war, tories, and all the disaffected characters whom he could seduce, either by threats or promises, and took possession of the garrison. Under this state of affairs, the author- ity of the sheriff amounted to nothing. BRUTALITY OF PATTERSON. 121 Patterson sent a flag up to the fort on tlie moun- tain, to give the people an imdtation to come on. They having heard from their runners that their houses and farms were in the possession of the tories and Pennamite claimants, were afraid of Patterson. They knew the man and the perfidy of his heart. Upon consultation, however, it was agreed to send a committee and see how matters stood ; but the Plymouth people were excluded from this piece of work. It would not do for the Franklins, the Bid- lacks, the Harveys, the Gaylords, nor the Nesbitts, to go on such a mission. These were marked men. The committee came, but this monster in human shape, disregarding all rules of honor and the sacred character of a flag of truce, immediately caused the committee to be arrested ; and two of them. Captain Jabez Fish, of Wilkes-Barre, and John Gore, of Kingston, were cruelly beaten with iron ramrods. This information reaching the people at their mountain fortification, they unanimously resolved to brave every thing, and, if needs be, die in the cause. Their committee, invited under a flag of truce, had been shamefully and cruelly beaten with iron rods ; and they made up their minds, old and young, women and children, to take up the line of advance, pre- ferring death to the terrible state of suspense and suf- fering to which they were exposed. They had reached the mountain on the thirtieth of May, and in accordance with the resolve, I have 122 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. stated, they boldly commenced their advance into the valley on the third of July. And the same night, without molestation, they took nj) their quarters in Kingston, on Abraham's (now Tuttle's) creek. Pat- terson having satiated his venom by beating their committee with iron rods, considered this, we are to suppose, as a sufficient vent to his malice and re- venge, and laid no further obstacles in the way of their march. And thus, after nearly two months of great suf- fering, want and destitution, the settlers were again in the valley of blood — if not within their own houses, spared by flood, or the occupation of their enemy. The next thought was to gather such of their crops as still remained upon the ground. For this purpose, as well as for measures, we may say not of retaliation, but purely self-preservation, a company of thirty young men associated themselves together, their first object being to gather the crops. Armed with the rifles and muskets which were left, and tak- ing their farming implements, they started to gather the crops upon the Shawnee flats. On the western slope of Kosshill they were met by a band of Pat- terson's men, who immediately gave them battle. The young settlers did the best they could, but lost in the skirmish two very promising young men, Elisha Garret and Chester Pierce, one of whom was a Plymouth man. Patterson's men had two wounded and left on the field, Wilhelmus Van Gordon and RALLY OF THE SETTLERS. 123 Henry Brink; another one of them returned to the garrison, his broken arm swinging in his sleeve : three or four others were wounded. This new trouble put an end to the gathering of the crops on Shawnee flats, the seeds of which had been sown by the men who had returned the previous year from the Continental battle-fields! There was no peace. The wanton slaughter of those two young men produced among the settlers, in camp at Abraham's creek, the keenest anguish, and the bitterest feeling of revenge. How could it be otherwise ? Under a flag of truce Patterson had decoyed some of their old men into his clutches to gratify the black malevolence of his heart, beating them in a cruel and barbarous manner. He had slain some of the young men who were going to gather the crops to save the lives of starving women and children. These settlers were mortal; they were subject to the like feelings and moved by the like passions of their race. They were now driven to a stage of des- peration. A general rally of the settlers was the result. Forty-two effective men and twenty old men mustered under John Franklin, marched to Shawnee for the purpose of exterminating the tories who had taken possession of their lands, under the permission of Patterson, while they were in miserable exile upon the Delaware. Here they found the interlopers. Brink and Yan 124 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF FLYMOUTH. Grordon. -mounded a day or two before upon Eoesliill. These men were lielpless : they spared them. Such would not have been the fate of two of their own men, under hke cuTumstances, falling into the hands of Patterson. Captain Franklin cleaned Shawnee thoroughly of the tory element, save the two men wounded. They, however, never found that locaUty a veiy agreeable residence, and I do not tind the names of either upon any of the enrollments or assessment lists from that time down. The probability is that when they recovered from the wounds received upon Eosshill. they letl: the town. In fact there can be but httle q^uestion of that ! Plymouth had an un- wholesome atmosphere for tories to breathe. Too many revolutionaiy heroes lived there to make it healthy in this particular. After disposing of Shawnee^ Captain Frankhn crossed the river at Xanticoke, and removed all per- sons between there and TVilkes-Barre who had squat- ted down upon Yankee possessions. Dm-ing them before him. they took shelter in the garrison occu- pied by Patterson and his men at Wilkes-Barre. He invested the block-house and demanded a sur- render. So war was inaugurated anew : and it seemed that the Connecticut settlers were tarther from the dawn of peace than ever. Christie's and Shrawder's com- pinies, on retiring from the valley, had left a hundred BURNING OF TWENTY-THREE BUILDINGS. 125 and thirty stand of arms, and large quantities of am- munition. The block-house had four cannon ; the ancient four-pounder of the days of Stewart, and three left by Sullivan in his expedition through the valley. With these means of defense in the hands of four hundred men, what could Franklin do with the handful of old men and boys under his com- mand ? The attempt at the investment of the fort was desperation. Patterson's men made a sortie from the garrison, drove off the besiegers, and applied the brand to twenty-three buildings in Wilkes-Barre, which were consumed. These were of course the dwellings of Connecticut people. And Patterson no doubt rel- ished exceedingly the assault upon his fortifications, as a pretext to burn out his helpless and impover- ished enemy. Captain Franklin retired with his people to Mill Creek ; took possession of the only flouring mill in the settlement, kept it running day and night, till his friends were bountifully supplied with meal. Their wants were few, and a few pounds of flour was a blessed affair in their limited view of the necessaries of life. But the stakes I have set to define the limits of a local inquiry, will not permit me to proceed further with this Yankee and Pennamite war. I have culled from the controversy such incidents of it as had an immediate bearing upon our town. To do this intelligibly, I was forced into a statement of 126 HISTOKICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. the leading measures which necessarily involved onr people. It will be sufficient to say that the beating of Fish and Grore with iron ramrods, and the slaughter of Garret and Pierce upon Rosshill, swung back the gate of war upon its creaking hinges ; and scenes of murder, reprisals, and imprisonments were of very frequent occurrence for the ten following years. During the same year, 1784, thirty of the settlers were sent in irons to the Easton jail; forty-six others were bound with chains and cords and confined in barns and stables in Wilkes-Barre; forty-two of these were sent to the Northumberland jail, in both of which places they remained a long time in captivity. Thus we find sixty-six of the settlers at one time in prison. And during the confinement of fathers and sons, what shall be said of the wives and helpless children ? Ah ! tliis is a question that cannot be answered. The cloud of suffering has passed away, and so have the miserable objects of pity which it covered. Patterson, as civil magistrate, was succeeded by Armstrong; but the change did not much improve, if any, the iron rule of these petty tyrants. They looked at but one side of the question, and the color- ing of that was crimson. Extermination of the Sus- quehanna claimants was the grand absorbing theme. All minor questions, involving humanity, charity, and even justice, were merged in the one grand idea of extermination. TIMOTHY PICKEKING. 127 The people of our town came in for their full share. Of the sixty-two in irons in the jails of Easton and Sunbury, one-fourth at least were people of Plymouth. The rich alluvial lands of Wyoming were a prize. To hold them cost our people blood, carnage, star- vation, and many of them death. There is no record of the number of slaughtered men during this long- continued struggle. It ran up to hundreds. Almost every family contributed to the hecatomb. Under Timothy Pickering, a man of New Eng- land birth but Pennsylvania proclivities, matters assumed a somewhat more peaceable character. In his administration there were some grains of clem- ency ; though in the end he was obliged to leave the scene. Matters never became finally settled till the pas- sage of the compromising law of 1799. By this law the Connecticut man triumphed. But the flag of his victory waved also over the graves of his slaughtered relatives and friends. Its fruits were bitter; but their descendants were enriched by the toils, priva- tions, and exposures of their ancestors. Are they fully sensible of it 7 Do they ever pass these exciting and bloody turmoils in review .^ Do they look back to those fearful days, and nights, and weeks and months, and years of the severe past ? * Some of them may ; but I fear that the greater majority do not realize who placed the rounds in the 128 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. ladder of tlieir elevation in wealth, nor stop to esti- mate the cost of them. I am by no means speaking in the way of cen- sure ; hut if there he a Plymouth man who is to-day in comfortable circumstances in life, whose wants are all within the range of his means of gratification, — and I know there are many such, — let these reminis- cences of the past which I have grouped together and placed before him, be a reminder of the dark days which have preceded him. My mother, now in her ninety-sixth year, a Con- necticut woman, informs me that during these early times, though not in the valley till 1790, she passed through the wilderness between here and Connecticut no less than eight or ten times. The little party made up for the journey, would go on horseback, carrying their own provisions and provender for their horses, encamping frequently at night in the open air. Sometimes the journey was made in consequence of the turbulence of the times, sometimes for the pur- pose of friendly visits to New England friends. W-h-e-w ! ! Young ladies of Plymouth, what would you tliink now of mounting a horse on top of a canvas bag, with oats in one end, and pork and beans in the other, with a journey of two hundred and fifty miles before you, and half the way a howling wilderness, the sky for your canopy by night, and the music of wild, beasts your lullaby ? Well, well, probably if the emergency arose, you LAKGE ASSESSMENTS. 129 would have equal courage to meet the occasion — and certainly I shall not pass judgment upon you, till you have made the trial — and may the time never come to require the test. CHAPTER VI. PENNAMITE WAR. LEGISLATION. — DECREE AT TREN- TON. — CONFIRMING ACT. — COMPROMISE ACT. PEACE. — JOHN FRANKLIN. THE paper proclamations of the State of Con- necticut, like the Pope's bull to the comet, amounted to nothing. And yet we find that these early settlers of Wyoming were paying large sums of money for that period. The assessment of 1776 was £16,996 13s — a large amount of money for the times. The assessment made in 1780, and the first one after the slaughter at the Wyoming hattle, was £2,358. It is not probable that much of this money found its way into the Connecticut treasury, but one fact is very clearly shown, that the settlers were by no means a bill of expense to that State. The troops raised here for the revolutionary strug- gle were credited to that State by the Continental establishment. The people here mustered into the Colonial army more than twenty to one over the home department compared with the population. 130 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF rLYMOUTH, Two repro!>ei\ta fives were annually eleeted from Wyoming to the Connecticut Assembly tVom the year 1774 to 1782 inclusive. Commencing -with Zebulon Butler and Timothy Smith, and ending with Obadiah Grore and Jonathan Fit eh. During these nine years the claims of the people of Wyoming for losses, and the expenses for the erec- tion of fortifications for their defense, made through their representatives, generally ended in tabling the resolves oifei-ed. The government of Connecticut never seemed to have exhibited that disposition to aid and defend her Colonial establishment, in its dark houi-s and troubles, that the necessities of the case demanded. Litchfield county, Connecticut, is situate on the extreme western line of the State: the town of "West- moreland, in that county, boniers upon the line of Xew York. This being the nearest to the Yankee settlement on the Susquehanna, the ••' seventeen towns," as they were called, were made a part of the town of Westmoreland, of the State of Connecticut. So they remained till the year 1776, when the terri- tory was set ofi' into a separate municipal existence, under the name of the county of Westmoreland. It was a strange state of things, under our pres- ent view, this repi-esentation in the Connecticut Leg- islature trom the foicn of Westmoreland, in the county of Litchjield, State of Connecticut^ in the Com- monieealth of Fennsylvania ! \ DECREE OF TRENTON. 131 Congress finally, at the instance of the State of Pennsylvania, with the concurrence of the State of Connecticut, intervened the federal authority to ad- just the Susquehanna troubles. This body adopted a resolution, naming commi&- sioners, who mot at Trenton, New Jersey, in No- vember, 1782. The commissioners, after a protract- ed session of forty-one days, during which the agents and attorneys on both sides discussed at length the subject of the troubles, decided, on the thirtieth of December, 1782, that the State of Connecticut had no right to the land in controversy, and that the jurisdiction and pre-emption of all lands of right be- longed to Pennsylvania. To this decree, as it has always been called, the two contending States, as well as the settlers, as- sented. It was supposed now upon all sides that the troubles had found a peaceful as well as final end. Not so, however. Those who claimed title, under the Proprietary Government, of the land paid for by the Connecticut settlers to the Susquehanna company, and in pursuance of which they had taken possession, asserted that such title had been decided in their fa- vor by the decree at Trenton. That the commission- ers not only decided the question of jurisdiction and title to the land between the two States, but also between individual claimants. The question of individual rights, it was sup- 132 HISTOEICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. posed, was neither submitted to nor decided by that tribunal. And the probability is that this was the view taken previous to the decree by both of these State authorities. Jurisdiction became a fixed fact; the title to land not occupied or claimed by purchase was also con- ceded to be determined ; not so with land owned and occupied by the settlers under the Susquehanna company. The people of the valley having reason to fear that the State authorities might claim that personal rights had been decided by the Commissioners at Trenton, presented their petition to the General As- sembly of Pennsylvania. This paper is written in strong language, and is supposed to have emanated from the pen of John Franklin. The composition could not be improved in these days. The following is an extract, which I copy from Chapman's history : "■Wyoming, January 18, 1783. " The Honorable Congress established a court ; both sides were cited and appeared ; the cause was heard for more than forty days, and the ground stated in which each asserted their right of jurisdic- tion. On which the court finally adjudged in favor of Pennsylvania, by which the jurisdiction of the dis- puted territory on which your memorialists live is adjudged yours. By this adjudication we are under your jurisdiction a-nd protection. We are subjects PETITION TO THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY. 133 and free citizens of the State of Pennsylvania, and have now to look up to your honors as our fathers, guardians and protectors — entitled to every tender regard and respect, as to justice, equity, liberty and protection. "It is impossible that the magnanimity of a powerful and opulent State will ever condescend to distress an innocent and brave people, that have un- successfully struggled against the ills of fortune. We care not under what State we live, if we live protected and happy. We will serve you, we will promote your interests, we will fight your battles ; but in mercy, goodness, wisdom, justice, and every great and generous principle, leave us our possessions, the dearest pledge of our brothers, children and fathers, which their hands have cultivated, and their blood, spilt in the cause of their country, enriched." It will be observed that this memorial, couched in strong and respectful language, does not yield the question of their title. And the old veterans were in the right. The law was with them. Franklin set out for Annapolis on the second of May of the following year, where Congress was in session, carrying with him a petition of like import for the consideration of that body. I quote from his venerable and almost obliterate diary, lying on the table before me : " May 2d, 1784, 1 set out for Annapolis with a x>e- 134 EISTOEICAL SKETCHES OF PLTMOITTn. tition to Congress, setting forth our situation, and praying to be made quiet in our possessions ; went in a canoe. '•Mondar, 3d, went to Middletown. "' Tuesday, 4tli, left my canoe at Conawago Falls, and traTelled by land twelve miles below Little York. ■■• Wednesday, 5th, went within six miles of Bal- timore. " Thursday, 6th, went on board a schooner at Bal- timore. ••' Friday morning, the 7th, arrived at Annapolis, and put np at Mr. Brenner's. I found Esquire Sher- man and Greneral Wadsworth ; gave my petition to Esqnire Sherman, which was laid before Congress, and referred to a committee that had been appointed upon a motion for suspending the loy ■^" * * (obHt.). •• The 10th, wrote a letter to His Excellency, the Groremor of Connecticut, in which I gave an account of the proceedings of the State of Pennsylyania towards us. irom the decree of Trenton to this time. Sent it by Mr. Grilmore. "Wednesday, 19th, left Annapolis and set off for Sunbury. I got no business completed iu Con- gress. '• On Tuesday, 25th, I arrived at Sunbury ; the Court of Quarter Sessions beiug held ; met Mr. Ma- son and Eansom. and a number of others ; they in- formed me that on the 12th the troops at Wyoming APPOINTMENT OF THREE COMMISSIONEES. 135 and Patterson's party disarmed the Connecticut set- tlers." The Commissioners of Trenton had no power over personal rights. They had power over jurisdic- tion and title to land not appropriated. The ques- tion of pre-emption they decided. This was proper; and this applied to lands not located or claimed. Pre- emption means the exclusive first right to buy. The Connecticut settler had bought his land, paid for it, and located upon it. It became a personal vested right, and so he regarded it ; and he was justified in holding on, and he did hold on, and he held on to some purpose. The response to the memorial by the Greneral As- sembly of the State was the appointment of three Commissioners to visit Wyoming, "to examine the state of the country, to act as magistrates, and to recommend what measures the government should adopt in relation to the settlers." These Commissioners, entirely under the influence of the Pennsylvania claimants, after visiting the val- ley and making what they deemed a general inquiry and examination, reported to the State government: " That reasonable compensation, in land, should be made to the families of those who had fallen in arms against the common enemy, and to such other settlers as had a proper Connecticut title, and did actually reside on the land at the time of the decree at Trenton ; provided they immediately relinquish all 136 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. claim to tlio soil they now inluibit, and enter into contract to deliver np fnll and q^^it^^ possession of their present tenures to the rightful owners, under Pennsylvania, by the fii-st of April next." And liere was the cause of the terrible prelude to those successive acts of inhumanity the following year, and which instigated persecutions, and impris- onments, and bloodshed, and murder, in quick suc- cession, overspreading the entire valley, and which continued for yeai-s. First came the civil magistrate, Patterson, with his two armed companies under Christie and Shraw- der, with instructions '•' to march to Wyoming, and take every proper measure for maintaining the post there, and for pkotecting the settlement. I under- score the word protecting. The original order con- tained no such ear-mark. These gentlemen were on the ground within a month after the report of tlie Commissioners. Under tlie sanctity of the law, and for the jprotection of the settlement, those acts of brutality on the part of Pat- terson were intlicted which I have already mentioned, some of them being extracts from Franklin's diary. Strange protection was that in robbing the poor settlei"S of- their fishing-nets ; tearing down their fences, burning their buildings, and driving five hun- dred helpless old men, women and children at the point of the bayonet through a howling wilderness, some of whom died by the wayside of starvation and INSOLENCE OF THE SOLDIERS. 137 exposure ! Protection indeed; the protection the wolf extends to the hinib, tlie falcon to the sparrow. From the nionient the civil magistrate, Patterson, and his two companies of armed soldiers arrived, the settler realized his position. He made an effort to accept the new situation, but this was in vain, unless ho surrendered his home and his fields, and abandoned the valley. I have had it from the mouth of old Mr. Abraham Nesbitt, who lived many years and died on the spot where Mr. Love's house now stands, that the insolence of these soldiers was intolerable; and that they did no act of indecency or impiopriety shocking to civil- ization, that even elicited a reprimand from Patter- son when informed of it. They were instructed to treat a Yankee with any kind of abuse; and such conduct was the cause of praise and approbation upon the part of their com- mander. The Legislature of the State began to understand that a whole community of people, now numbering — men, women and children — two or three thousand, ought not to be annihilated, and particularly when the public sentiment was running strongly in their favor throughout the commonwealth; that the decree at Trenton might not bear the construction, that private rights were involved in, and had been decided by, the Commissioners under the resolve of Congress. Some of the wiser heads, and with more human- 138 HISTOKICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. ity in tlionglit and action, did not relish the remark ■which Patterson had made in a commnnication to the Executive Coimcil on the twenty-ninth of April, two or three weeks after the disastrous ice tlood, and some two weeks before the inhuman creature expelled so large a number from the Talley, burning their homes and destroying their crops, " that it must not be con- strued into a Avant of zeal or lore for the Common- wealth, if he should, through dire necessity, be obliged to do some things not strictly consonant with the let- ter of the law." "When the news of the terrible suffering of the poor settlers came, in hot sjpeed, from thousands of disinterested people residing along both sides of the Delaware, for fifty miles in extent, the legislator be- gan to know what he meant by '^' some things" done under a sense of '"' dire necessity, and not consonant with the letter of the law." Humanity screeched out from one end of the broad Commonwealth to the other, and the echo was taken up, and it went from hill top to hill top throughout the whole land. A great WTong had been perpetrated, and justice demanded redress. As time moved on public sentiment underwent change — so that the Assembly of the State, which convened in 17S7, was prepared for an effort to accom- modate affairs in Wyoming, that peace might reign and the flowing of blood cease. Dming this year the people of the seventeen town- PASSAGE OF THE CONFIRMING LAW. 139 ships concluded to propose to the Legislature a plan for the adjustment of difficulties. The townships known and designated as the " sev- enteen," were Salem, Newport, Hanover, "Wilkes- Barre, Pittston, Kingston, Northmoreland, Braintrim, Plymouth, Bedford, Exeter, Huntington, Providence, Putnam, Springfield, Claverack and Ulster. The four latter being within the present territory of Bradford and Susquehanna counties. The substance of this proposition, embraced in a memorial to the Legislature, and read in that body in March, 1787, was, that if the Commonwealth would grant them the land within the " seventeen " townships, and on which settlements had been com- menced previous to the decree of Trenton, in 1782, they would, on their part, relinquish all claim to any other lands within the Susquehanna purchase. Coupled with this proposition was another condition, that the Pennsylvania claimants who held conflicting warrants and surveys within the townships, should relinquish their title to them, and the money paid be refunded to them by the State. I may add that these warrants and surveys were generally in the hands of land jobbers and speculators, and had not been reduced to residence and occujDation. The Legislature, on the twenty-eighth of March, 1787, accepted this proposition, and passed an enact- ment generally known as the confirming law. It was hailed pretty generally as a pacific measure, 140 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLTMOUTH. and really seemed to be a pretty fair adjustment. But the trouble still in the way, was that the set- tlers outside of the "17" towns, and claiming by the same title as those within, were not recognized un- der the hberal provisions of the confirming act. It was as a kind of moderator under this law, for the purpose of quieting matters, with the commissions of the court offices in his pocket, that brought Timo- thy Pickering into the valley. The great majority of the Connecticut people re- sided within the " 17 " townships — but still a consid- erable number did not, and that made a determined opposition to the confirming law. They contended that they were as worthy of protection as their breth- ren, whose farms happened to be within these town- ships. Such undoubtedly was the fact, and the error was that the enactment did not include them. It was possibly an oversight, and in many instances these people were imder the impression that they were within the certified township lines, and were only un- deceived by an actual survey upon the ground. The people of Plymouth had no cause to com- plain of the law, and did not, save that their sympa- thies were with their Connecticut friends, who may be called outsiders. There may have been excep- tions. For the first time now the Connecticut people pre- sented a di\-ided front, and the feelings of acrimony and ill-will extended very generally among them. TIMOTHY PICKERING AND JOHN FRANKLIN. 141 The Pennsylvania claimants taking advantage of this family quarrel, and Timothy Pickering having been taken a prisoner from his home by a party of turbu- lent settlers, to be held as a hostage for the exchange of John Franklin, who was at the time a prisoner in Philadelphia upon a charge of treason for opposing the confirming laAv, the Legislature suspended the law in the way of a menace. But this did not have the desired effect, and the consequence was the repeal of the law soon afterwards. Chaos was once more the order of the day, and the question again rested upon the award of the Trenton Commissioners. But the same discord did not prevail. Luzerne county was now established; the majority of the people vsdthin it were Connecticut settlers; the new constitution of the State was more liberal than the Proprietary establishment, under the Penns : they now elected their own members to the Legislature, as well as the county and township offi- cers. They had the matter therefore pretty much in their own hands. And although nearly ten years passed before a def- inite compromise, bloodshed, imprisonments, and re- prisals had ceased. The conflict assumed more of a political complexion, and the elections were not un- frequently conducted in a most boisterous and turbu- lent manner. But the settlers would elect their assemblymen, and they therefore had a friend at court. 142 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. Finally, in 1799, and nearly thirty years after the commencement of the troubles growing out of this Pennamite and Yankee difficulty, the whole question was arranged in the passage by the Legislature of the " Compromise Law." Under the terms of this enactment, commission- ers were appointed to cause a survey to be made of all the lands claimed by the Connecticut settlers within the seventeen townships previous to the decree of Trenton, in which titles had been granted to them, according to the rules and regulations among them. They were to classify and value these lands, and give certificates to the owners, upon the presentation of which, to the secretary of the land-office, on the pay- ment of a small sum as purchase-money, a patent was granted by the State. The purchase-money to be paid was for the first class, $2.00 an acre; for the second, $1.20 ; for the third, 50 cents ; and eight and one fourth cents for the fourth class. The lands of the Pennsylvania claimants were also to be ascertained and valued, and where they came in conflict with the claim of the Connecticut man, they were required to relinquish their title to the State and receive from the Treasury, in full com- pensation for land of the first class, $5.00 an acre, $3.00 for the second, $1.50 for the third, and twenty- five cents for the fourth. As soon as forty thousand acres should thus be released to the State by the Pennsylvania claimants, END OF THE CONTEOVERSY. 143 and the Connecticut claimants, wlio owned an equal quantity, should bind themselves to submit to the law, to the satisfaction of the commissioners, then the act was to take effect. This, then, provided for the settlers within the " 17 " townships : and the minority ohtside, as is the usual case with minorities, had to fight their battle in the best way they could; but as none of these were residents of Plymouth, it is not my purpose to examine the subject further. And so ended the Pennamite and Yankee contro- versy. Both sides accepted the terms of the act of 1799, and it still quietly reposes upon the statute book, not obsolete from age precisely, but in a meas- ure a dead letter, for all the troubles it was desifirned to heal have been long since disposed of, and the actors in the busy scenes connected with them have passed from the stage. As many as forty years ago, when I came to the Luzerne bar, it was rare that a case came into the court that required to be decided under the provis- ions of the law of 1799. The Yankee surveys, and particularly those on the east side of the river, were strangely located. They commenced upon the bank of the stream, and extended to the top of the mountain. They were some forty rods wide, and in some cases five miles long. The mountain end frequently at an elevation of fifteen hundred feet above the other on the plain. 9 144 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. They tliiis had all varieties of soil, and almost of climate. The Yankee idea, as they expressed it, was a " streak of fat and a streak of lean " in each lot. Nathan Beach, of Salem, and whom I knew well, and for whom I procured a pension for Revolutionary services as long ago as 1832, told me that the settlers' price for one of these lots was a horse, saddle and bridle. The young Yankee, therefore, who could be- come owner of these, could, on Ms arrival here from Connecticut, exchange them for a lot. Some of these same lots are worth to-day one hundred thousand dollai^s. The Plymouth surveys were on a smaller scale. The house and meadow lots, as they are termed in the certificates, vary from ten to twenty acres. This land being regarded remarkably valuable, was subdivided into small slices. The most of Kingston, in the days of the Wyoming battle, was a pine plain. I can remember myself when that part of it above the village of Troy, or Wyoming, was mostly covered with pitch pines. — Shawnee flat was a prairie when the white man took possession of it. I cannot conclude the sad story of the Wyoming troubles, growing out of the conflict between the Pennsylvania and Connecticut jurisdiction, without a biographical sketch of one of the great and acknowl- edged leaders of the Connecticut settlers. The man of probably the largest intellect and most persevering energy. JOHN FRANKLIN. 145 John Feanklin was tliis personage. And it is a matter of much satisftiction to me that I am able to classify this distinguished character among the first settlers of Plymouth. It is true that he remained there less than a year before removing to Huntington township, where he made his permanent abode. Mr. Jameson Harvey, now an aged man, informs me that Franklin and his father were very intimate friends ; that Franklin never passed his father's house, in travelling to and from Wilkes-Barre, then the principal rendezvous of the Connecticut people, without stopping, and generally arranged his journey so as to stay over night; that he has very often heard him, among other narratives of his adventures, speak of his immigration, and where he first settled. Mr. Harvey represents him as a tall, muscular, well-built man, with wonderful developments of phys- ical power. He leaned slightly forward in his walk, but moved with a firm step. Mr. Charles Miner makes him six feet in height; Mr. Harvey, six feet four inches. From the accounts of both, he seems to have been a man of Herculean frame, and possessing strong muscles and sinews. This we may readily understand when we learn that it re- quired the united strength of four men to hold and bind him with cords when arrested for treason (?) and sent off to the Philadelphia prison. All of the early settlers, from whom I have gathered information, in years gone by, represent him as a " tall, square- 146 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. shouldered man/' and endowed witli great physical power. He wns a native of Canaan, Litchfield county, Connecticut. He came with his wife and children to Plymouth ia 1774. He had brothers who either im- migrated with him, or about the same time, to the valley. One of them, as already stated, fell at the battle of Xanticoke the year after. Some of the femily settled m Hanover at a very early day. I am unable to ascertain if Eoswell, Jr. and Arnold Frank- lin were brothers to John. The probability is that they were not. Eoswell and Arnold were taken prisoners by the Indians, in Hanover, in September, 1781. The spring following the wife and four children of Eos- well were also carried oif by them into captivity. The wife of Eoswell was murdered by the Indians in an attempt to rescue the prisoners. In the spring of 1775 John Franklin entered, sol- itary and alone, the wilderness ; and upon the banks of Hunting-ton ci-eek, in the territory now embraced within the township of that name, made his " pitch." Having circumscribed the limits of his claim by notching and blazing the bark of trees, he knocked up some turf with the pole of his axe, and these were the formahties appropriating the forest : this was his waiTant of entry. !^s^o white man had preceded him in this vicinity. He was the first ; and the unmolested choice of the vir- JOHN FRANKLIN. 147 gin soil, that had never been turned up by the 2ilough- share, or impressed by the white man's foot, was spread out before him, and here he made his selection and dedicated his future home. His faithful dog, the only witness to this act of possession, and his rifle, leaning against a tree hard-by, the only battery of his defense. The man who had the courage and personal brav- ery to do all this, possessed the qualifications to fill the places of trust that were in years afterwards con- ferred upon him. During the summer of that year he chopped over and cleared off some three or four acres, sowed it with grain, erected his log hut, and was now ready for the introduction of his wife and Httle children to their home in the woods. His nearest neighbor was at the Susquehanna river, a distance of some seven or eight miles. " In that year he came up to take a round in Plunket's battle," and returned to his wild home again when it was over; a little variety in his life, the incidents of that affair, compared with the peace and quiet which reigned amid the forest about his new home. And thus we find the resolute man engaged, whose capacious intellect, in succeeding years, dispelled the sophistry concealed in the Trenton decree, and whose untiring energy and iron will gave cast and coloring to the almost helpless Yankee cause. The same, too, whose persuasive language and 1-iS HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF FLYMOUTH. solid arguments before the legislative body, in after years, gave legal form to tlie conclusions of his own well-balanced and discriminating mind. The man of the people ; the man for the people. The tall ami stately form, whether at the head of his company, driving the Tories before him out of Plymouth ; taking his oath of revenge against his persecutors upon the rifle, all stained with the heart's blood of his friend; bound in chains as a traitor, for serving his people but too well; at the head of his company, under Sullivan, exterminating the enemy who had covered the TTyoming battle-field with his slaughtered relatives and friends, or pleading the case of his af- flicted associates, ever loomed up, and was the object of love, affection, and the profoimdest veneration by the Connecticut settlers of "Wyoming. In the following spring of 177(3, he installed his wife and children in the primitive home he had pre- pared for them. Even at this time his was the only family in the township. He resided there up to the time of his arrest and imprisonment at Philadelphia. Sometime after his release he moved to Bradtord county, but still witliin the '' 17 " towns, where he spent the remainder of his life, and died in 1831, at the advanced age of eighty-two years. Some of his children remained in Huntington, and members of the family still reside there. His wife died within two or three years after his settlement in Huntington. I make the following ex- JOHN FRANKLIN. 149 tract from Mr. Miner's history. He says : " Not long after his removal to Wyoming, his wife died, leaving three small children, one an infant of a week old. Having no person to take care of them, he deter- mined to place them in charge of his kind friends in Canaan. Harnessing a horse to a little cart, he put in the three children, tied a cow by the horns to fol- low, and drove on, having a cup in which, as occasion required, he milked and fed the babe. Thus he trav- elled the rough way, more than two hundred miles, in safety, exhibiting all the patience and tenderness that might be expected from a mother." There cannot be much doubt but that this man, and more particularly after the first ten years of his residence here, was the leading, controlling spirit of the Yankee people. No one questioned his bravery; no one doubted his integrity and honesty; while they all relied on his sound and well-balanced judgment. It is true that he differed with some of them as to the propriety of ac- cepting the confirming law of 1787, but while there was this difference, the view that John Franklin took of the question was the one which ultimately pre- vailed. To it the opinions of statesmen, of jurists, and of laymen, were forced to give place. Upon that question there was ground for an hon- est difference of opinion. At a meeting, in which an angry debate occurred, held in Wilkes-Barre, on the propriety of acquiescing in this law. Judge Hoi- 150 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. lenback struck a blow at his head with a loaded whip, which he had at the time in his hand. Great confusion ensued, and came near ending in an open fight. But this did by no means put down the old hero; it onlj^ added new converts to his side. The judge, who was a passionate man, and easily excited, afterwards made ample apologies. Franklin was on his voyage, in his canoe, to meet Congress at Annapolis, when Patterson expelled the Connecticut people from the valley in 1784. I have stated that after the return of these people they en- camped in Kingston, upon Abraham's creek. Here they immediately erected four large log tenements, for the double purpose of occupation and defense. Armstrong, who had succeeded Patterson, — and in this exchange matters were not very much improved, — made an attack upon these houses with an armed force. They were gallantly defended, and the besieg- ing party compelled to retreat. An intimate friend, however, of Franklin, William Jackson, was seriously wounded. Seeing his comrade in what he supposed a dying condition, Franklin, then captain, as he had been promoted to the command of the fortification, seized the rifle from the hands of Jackson, covered with the blood from Ms wounds, and summoning his . companions around him in the log hut, with his eyes elevated to heaven, and his right hand upon his heart, solemnly took upon himself an oath — ''That he ivoidd never lay clown his arms until fkanklin's oath. 151 death sJiould arrest his hand, or Patterson and Armstrong he expelled from Wyoming ; the people restored to their rights of possession ; and a legal trial guaranteed to every citizen hy the Constitution, hy justice, and by law." This scene, wlien we reflect upon the tall figure of the excited and angry man; the nature of his oath; the terrihle cause of provocation; the group of ragged, famished men about him; the silence, save only the voice of imprecation; the visages of sorrow, hope, fear and revenge variously reflected from the audience ; makes our blood tingle and thrill through our veins. We being thus impressed, after a long lapse of time, at the rehearsal only, what must have been the impulses and feelings of those who were actors in the drama ? In this transaction we read the heart of Franklin, and learn the brave and determined character of the man. His position was established now among his associates ; he had fully defined his status. The ef- fect of the oath upon the bloody rifle had brought out a full development; he saw in himself, and so did his men, his future position — the leader of the cause. His nine previous years of training had culminated. He stood before them the head of the line. Not long after this, "at a parade in Shawnee," Captain Franklin was unanimously elected colonel of the regiment. By common consent he was now 152 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. their cliosen and revered cHef, and upon liim were centred all the aftection and confidence that the soldiers of the Revolution had ever reposed in Wash- ington. Henceforward he was their agent, their chief man- ager, their representative, their advocate, and their bosom companion. And probably no man ever be- came so familiar with his associates, and yet at the same time retained their respect. He could let him- self down, but his dignity of character was sustained in the exalted qualities of his heart. Mr. Miner thinks "that he could make no pre- tensions to eloquence; yet he rarely failed to com- mand attention, even from the learned and accom- plished; earnest, often vehement, and his whole soul' seemed to be in the matter he discussed." I don't want to take issue with Charles Miner. I have a great regard for his opinions. I honor and revere his memory. But I think in the above para- graph he has pretty well defined oratory. What is eloquence .^ The utterance of strong emotion; the power of persuasion; elevated, forcible thought; well chosen language, and an impassioned manner. Most of these quahties Colonel Franklin possessed, and to a large degree. The language of his memorial to the legislature, which we have already recorded, and his oath upon the bloody rifle, are specimens of the highest order of eloquence. It cannot, of course, be said that he can i JOHN FRANKLIN. 153 be measured by the standard of men like Burke or Clay, wbose choice language, lofty tones, refined sen- tences, an impassioned delivery, furnish models of their kind for the world; but it can be said of Frank- lin, as of Paul before Felix, that when he spoke there was silence, and men trembled. The few specimens left us of his legislative efforts show a thorough comprehension of his subject, and a bold, fearless course of argument. No tropes, no figures, but great solidity of matter and concentration of thought. They may be classed as solid and com- mon-sense productions. He possessed but the rude elements of education, and lacked a want of the knowledge of the proper gram- matical construction of sentences. What the schools had not supplied, God Almighty had. The general features of the compromising law of 1799, and which were the panacea of Wyoming troubles, were mostly the result of his labors. He was a member of the general assembly of that year, and he made his mark. For these services he was continued a representative for the four succeeding ones, ending in 1803. The members for the county for the three preced- ing years, were Ebenezer Bowman and Koswell Wells, both men of very respectable standing at the Luzerne bar; Mr. Wells, particularly, had a very good reputa- tion as an orator. They both failed, however, in ef- fecting a compromise of the Wyoming struggle. 154 HISTOKICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH, This work was reserved for Colonel Franklin, and he acconiplished the task. It was the crowning act of his life. He lived not only to see peace restored, as the result of Iris O'^ti labor, but he had the proud and triumphant satisfac- tion of seeing it established upon his own basis; and upon a theory, too, for which he had at one time con- tended, against the opinions of eminent lawyers and many of the Connecticut settlers, among whom were several who had been leaders at an earher day. The eifect of the decree at Trenton as decisive of title to lands thus became abrogated, and the principles of that same confirming law, for opposition to which he had undergone an imprisonment of six mouths in the Philadelphia jail, were also abandoned. Colonel Franklin triumphed, and the flag of the Connecticut settlers, which had long trailed in the dust, went to the head of the staff. The acts of his treason found ample and full just- ification with the legislative power of the State — and so his crimes became virtues. At this period the Legislative body met at Lan- caster. There were no pubhc stage coaches; the con- dition of the roads forbade their use, the members Were accustomed to go and return on horseback; they could not travel either, for the same reason, in private carnages, and if they could, they were gener- ally too poor to own them. It was the custom of Frankliii to walk with the JOHN FRANKLIN, 155 bridle rein over his arm, liis horse following after, with a huge jiortmanteau on his back, filled with his clothes, books, and papers. The people along the road became accustomed to the tall, athletic figure known as the man who travelled " a foot on horse- back; " and as they could easily recognize him at a distance, would exclaim, " there comes Franklin, the great Yankee hero ! " After the conclusion of his services in the assem- bly, he retired from public life. But his home was always the resort of the old settlers; many of- them would make him annual visits. He had a wonderful memory, and treasured up all the incidents, adven- tures, and anecdotes of the eventful times in th.e val- ley, in most of which he had participated, and even up to the close of his checkered life, delighted to dwell upon them in his conversations. And when he gave his last breath, there died the head and front of the Yankee column. But he had lead it to victory, and his heart had been cheered with the shouts of triumph. CHAPTER YII. KEVOLUTIOXAKY WAK. FATRIOTISM. CAFTAIN DUR- KEE'S and captain ransom's companies. GAR- RISON HILL. OUR MEN UNDER FIRE. WASHINcV TON'S OPINION OF THEM. BATTLE OF WT03IIN0. MR. WASHBURN'S STATEMENT. IT has been stated that the enrolment of the set- tlers of Wyoming, in the handwriting of Colonel Zelnilon Butler, in 1773, contained but two hundred and sixteen names. Ther are called settlers : it was probably the number of men who were capable of bearing arms. The whole effective force of the Taller was prob- ably assembled on the reception of the news of Plun- ket's adyance, in December, 1775. Tliis was an excit- ing occasion, which affected every one of the Connec- ticut settlers, and it is to be presumed they were all out. All the local authorities fix the number in that battle at about three himdred. On the Declaration of Independence, the fourth of July following, the whole fighting force of the val- ley did not exceed four hundred men. Mr. Miner estimates the entire population at that time at twen- ty-five hundred. He is probably not far out of the way. (l-3!i) PATRIOTISM. ■ 157 Congress had declared war; the tocsin of rebellion had been sounded, and Wyoming was expected to do her duty. She responded nobly. On the twenty- fourth of August, 1776, " at a town meeting legally warned and held in Westmoreland, Wilkes-Barre district, Colonel Butler was chosen moderator for y^ work of y^ day." '•'Voted, as the opinion of this meeting, that it now becomes necessary for the inhabitants of this town to erect suitable forts, as a defense against our common enemy." Sites were accordingly fixed on in Pittston, Hano- ver, Plymouth, and Wilkes-Barre. Forty Fort, in Kingston, was to be repaired and enlarged. The meeting closed after adopting the following vote: " That we do recommend it to the people to proceed, forthwith, in building said forts, without either fee or reward from y" town." From the fourth of July to the fourth of August, thirty days, and the people of Westmoreland were in council, and ready to begin the campaign at their own expense. The people of old Plymouth at once commenced operations, and erected their fort upon "Garrison Hill." And they piled up with their strong hands, and with willing hearts, the walls of their fortress, '■'■without any fee or reward from y^ toivn." Their heart was in the sacred cause of liberty. Our people were but carrying out those imperishable 158 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. principles wliicli liad driven their ancestors from Lon- don to Leyden; from Leyden to Plyrc.outli Eock; to Plymouth in Connecticut, and thence to Plymouth on the shores of the Susquehanna. The first genera- tions endured persecution, imprisonment, and death for religious liberty: their children in the vast wilds of Pennsylvania, with the same blood coursing in their veins, the same haughty and independent carriage, were now building up the breast-works of civil liberty. And they went at it in earnest : the metal was in them. The old Puritan blood boiled; and to a man they ral- lied around the tri-colored flag. Captain Samuel Kansom hauled the first log of the garrison, and old Benjamin Harvey planted the first flag upon the turret ! An effigy of Greorge III. was hung up by the neck, and Yankee Doodle, upon the drum and fife, concluded the ceremonies of instal- lation. Men of Plymouth, is there to-day one of twenty amongst you that can point out the spot where this exciting scene occurred ? No Fourth of July sun should hereafter be permitted to send his morning rays over the town without gilding the tri-colors, flung to the breeze, from a flag-staff on Grarrison Hill. See to this ! Congress being informed of the exposed condition of the valley to predatory Indian tribes, and its loca- tion being comparatively nearer to the Canadian frontier, passed a resolution on the twenty-third of APPOINTMENT OF OFFICEES. 159 August, and the day only preceding tlie town meet- ing in Westmoreland, directing — ^^ Two companies on the Continental establishment to be raised in the town of Westmoreland, and sta- tioned in proper places for the defense of the inhab- itants of said town and parts adjacent, till further order of Congress ; the commanding officers of the said two companies to be immediately appointed by Congress." This resolve, however, was coupled with a strange and inexplicable condition, and which was within four months afterwards made available, certainly against every princi23le of justice. The only plea that can be put in by way of extenuation is that of neces- sity. This, it is said, knows no law. This condition was, " that the said troops be en- listed to serve during the war, unless sooner dis- charged by Congress ; " and further, " that they be liable to serve in any part of the United States." On the twenty-sixth of August Congress appoint- ed Eobert Durkee, of Wilkes-Barre, and Samuel Kansom, of Plymouth, captains for the companies to be raised, and also their respective subalterns. It was mutually agreed between the two commis- sioned officers, that Captain Durkee should take the east side of the river for the enlistment of his compa- ny, and Captain Eansom the west. They immediately commenced mustering men, and notwithstanding the severe terms prescribed by Con- 10 IbO HISTOKICAL SKF.TCIIF.S OF PLYMOUTH. gress, witliin sixty days tliey each had their comple- ment of eighty -tlnir uieu. Tliis rapid enlistment of so large a proportiop of the people was, nndonbtedly, etfeoted nuder the impression that the companies *• icere to he sfafioncil in j^trajpt r j>hic€s /or the diftnse of the inhabitants." Upon no other principle c^\n it be possibly accounted for, as we shall see that this included nearly half of the population of the valley capable of bearing arms. And had there been the least pix^pect or intimation that they were to be transferred to the general service, leaving their friends and families to be slaughtered, as did afterwards occiu-, they would never have put themselves willingly into such a position. Nor did the cause justify such a sac- rifice. They relied upon the clause of the resolution that their location was to be within the valley and for "<^c defense of the inhahitants." In tlus view, how- ever, they were sorely, and as it turned out, fatally disappointed. On the twelfth of December following. Congress resolved : '■ That the two companies raised in the town of Westmoreland, be ordered to join Washing- ton icith all j^>ossihIe e^vpedifion." Before two months elapsed they were under his immediate command. And thus the people of the valley were in that helpless and exposed condition which soon after iuviteil the northern invasion of British, Indians, aiid Tories, which deluged the val- ENLISTMENT OF COMPANIES. 161 ley with blood, leaving its red marks upon almost every hearth-stone in Westmoreland, Previous to the raising of the companies of Cap- tains Durkee and Ransom, Wisner and Strong, two recruiting officers had enlisted for the service thirty men. Adding these to the two companies of Dur- kee and Ransom, and we find that of the four hun- dred fighting men of the valley, one hundred and ninety-eight are enrolled in the Colonial service. And this a-U transpires within six months after the Decla- ration of Independence. Had the authorities of the new government, throughout the limits of the States, mustered a corresponding complement of men, Wash- ington would have had an army of a hundred and fifty thousand, in the place of forty thousand. No spot of ground of the same extent, and con- taining the same number of people, made anything like such a contribution. One half of the whole pop- ulation of the valley, capable of bearing arms, are in the short period of six months transferred from their exposed homes upon a savage frontier to the national camp. It remains for history to justify the action of Congress in thus exposing the people of this valley to the scene of horror which resulted from this pro- ceeding. Humanity and justice are now groping in the dark for a solution of the question. A satisfac- tory reason will never be attained, and the pursuit may as well be abandoned. The resolution of Con- gress, holding out the pretext that these two compa- Lx 162 HISTOKICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. nies were "fo be_phtced/or the defense of the inlidbi- tantSj" was a trap; the unsuspecting settlers took the bait, and murder, rapine, and the extermination of almost a whole community of people, were the conse- quence. But the error, upon the part of the citizens in volunteering, had been committed, and there was no remedy to cure it. The national arm had been strengthened ; but the stout hand that could firmly resist the combined predatory bands of savage, Brit- ish and Tory invaders, was paralyzed. The defense- less homes were thus made the inviting lure of a relentless and terrible foe. . And in this hour of trial, in these days of gloom, and amid these clouds of despondency, what was the position of Connecticut ? Ah ! she was but a foster mother at best. She stood aloof in action and saw her child divided by the sword. The two companies of troops raised in her town of Westmoreland, two hundred miles from her border, and far from the hearing of the wails of women and children, in a strictly business loay, were entered to her credit, as a part of the quota of the military force which Congress exacted of her. She should have sent to the frontier two hundred armed men for the support and protection of the people of her town of Westmoreland. In this there would have been justice and reason. Connecticut always acted in a penurious and selfish manner with her people of this valley. She refused aid and assistance to- APPEALS FOR ASSISTANCE. 163 wards compensating the poor settlers in their losses in the Plunket invasion. John Jenkens and Solomon Strong, who were the representatives of Westmoreland the year succeeding the Nanticoke battle, prepared a bill and urged it upon the consid- eration of the Assembly, but it was laid upon the table, and there suffered to sleep. A like application was made after the ice-flood, which destroyed an im- mense amount of property, but it shared the same fate as the Plunket bill. And within my own recol- lection, when we were all making a strong effort to erect a monument upon the "Wyoming battle-field, in commemoration of the brave men whose bones still repose there, a committee, with Charles Miner at the head, visited the legislature of that State, humbly asking the bestowal of a mite for that noble purpose; but they failed to get a farthing. Ever ready to avail herself of the people of Westmoreland, to fill up the military requisition, but always turning a deaf ear to the petition for alms, education, defenses, and memorial columns. A hundred years have now elapsed since she claimed jurisdiction over the valley, and we can afford to talk out, and talk plainly. How stands the Revolutionary record of our old town of Plymouth ? What res2:)onse had her sons to make to Captain Samuel Ransom, when his drum beat for recruits ? The roll of the Second Independ- ent Company was immediately filled up, and nearly 164 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. oiie-lialf of the eighty-four men were residents of the to^Yn. It woukl be a subject of gratification at this re- mote day to know where Captain Eansom had his headquarters. It was undoubtedly at Forty Fort or Garrison HiU. As he was a resident of the town, then occupying the same site where now stands the oki. red house, fast falling to ruins, and so long the residence of liis son, the late Colonel Greorge P. Ean- som in after years, that Garrison Hill was the ren- dezvous of his recruits. But this is conjecture mere- ly, as much more of our early history might be, if permitted to rest much longer without the eftorts to collect and save the fragments. It is pretty difficult to ascertain a majority of the names of the men which made up Captain Eansom's roll, and who were Plymouth people. The foUowiug I think were : Caleb Atherton, Mason F. Alden, Isaac Benjamin, Oliver Bennett, Benjamin Clark, Nathan Church, Pierce Cooper, Daniel Franklin, Charles Gaylord, Ambrose Gaylord, Timothy Hopkins, Benjamin Harvey, Asahcl Nash, Ebenezer Eoberts, George P. Eansom, Samuel Saw- yer, Asa Sawyer, John Swift, Thomas Williams and Aziba Williams. To these twenty we may add the names of Jeremiah Coleman, Jesse Coleman, Nathan- iel Evans, Samuel Tubbs, and James Gould — total, in the two companies, twenty-five men. The name of Benjamin Harvey appears upon the roll of Captain THE OLD EANSOBI HOUSE. 1 durkef/b and ransom's companies. 165 DLirku(5; but Mr. Jarnos Ilurvoy, IiIh grandson, in- forms me this is a mistake, that he was a member of Caj)tain Eansom's cojnpany. The roll, as we now liave it, contains but fifty-five names. If we give riymouth the credit of one-third of the full complement of eighty-four men, then it would appear that the town furnished iK^t less than thirty-five men in the two companies in tlie Revolu- tionary establishment. The name of Benjamin Bidlack does not appear on either of the rolls, when it is a fact tljat he served throughout the whole seven years of the war. It does not appear either from any records how many of the men were from Plymouth, enlisted by Wisner and Strong, who recruited previously in the valley. If we put down the whole number at forty, we should probably fail to do justice to the early settlers of the town. There is one undeniable, positive fact, however, which does not admit of dispute or cavil, and that is, that the people of the town came boldly up to the work, and tliat they have left behind them a record worthy of the imitation of their descendants, if occa- sion shall ever require, and one which will never cause them to blush. And another fact is also positive, that each and every one of tliem went through the terrible ordeal of those days with honor and credit, and that they are well entitled to our gratitude and respect : to our 166 HISTOIilCAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. gratitudo tor the rioh legacy tlioy lH\\ue;uliod to us, in tlie kind ot' govoruTuont we enjoy; to our respect, for the deeds of daring and bravery they exhibited. Our men, under Purkee and Eausom, were sta- tioned between the British and American lines, near MorristoAvn, N. J. The lii-st time they were under fii-e was on the twentieth of January, 1777, at the battle of Millstone, '* as gallant and successful an ac- tion," sa}'s Miner, " considering the number engaged, as was fought during the war." They were attached to a command under General Dickinson, which num- bered about four hundred men ; they made a raid upon a foraging party of British trooj^s of about the same n uuber. The affair resulted in a complete suc- cess. They nobly repulsed the enemy : he fled in confusion, leaving to the victore some fifty wagons loaded with flour and pixwisions, and over a hundred hoi"ses. Each man shared in the booty — the prize- money of each amounting to several doUai-s. Cajv- tain Kansom sent home a wagon to Ph-mouth as a trophy. Porter, one of Kansom's men, was killed in this action by a cannon-ball. General Washington, in giving a i-eport of this atfair to Congress, uses the following complimentary language : '* Tliis action happened near Somei'set Court House, on Millstone river. Gx'neral Pickinson's be- havior reflects the highest honor on him: for though his troops were aU raw, he led them through the OUR MEN UNDER FIRE. 167 river, middle de(![), ;iiid <^jive tlie enemy so severe a charge, that althougli supported by three field-pieces, they gave way and left their convoy." It will be borne in mind that half of this force of Dickinson was composed of Wyoming men, and probably not less than forty of these were from old Plymouth. Raw and imdisciplined, yet true to their colors, under the first fire, and receiving the com- pliment of their great chief in a written report of the battle. How often have I listened to the details of the affair at Millstone, from the lips of our old friend, Colonel George P. Ransom, who was in his father's company, and in that engagement ! We next hear of the two Independent companies in the battles of Brandywine, Germantown, Bound Brook and Mud Fort. The battles of Brandywine and Germantown were severely fought contests; the two companies were merged in large masses, and we cannot follow them through these engagements. They had stood fire at Millstone, and they undoubtedly maintained their courage afterwards. At the terrible bombardment of Mud Fort, Lieu- tenant Spalding, of Ransom's company, was in com- mand of a detachment. As the raking fire of the British artillery made sad havoc with the slender breast-works, and the balls came whizzing through in all directions, one of his soldiers threw himself upon the ground, exclaiming, " nobody can stand this ! " lliS HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. " Get up, my good follow/' said Spalding coolly, ^'I should hate to have to run you through; you can stand it if I can; " and the man. springing to his feet, returned to his duty. Constant Mathevrson, one of Ransom's men, was killed in this enga^'ement, and several were Avouuded. The two Sawyers, Plymouth men. died soon after with camp disease; also Spencer, and one of the Gay- lords. Others died whose names are not given. Ben- jamin Harvey was frozen to death at Valley Forge — so that we find Captain Eansom's company, in Octo- ber. 1777. reduced to sixty-two men. The following spring dark and ominous clouds "began to overshadow the valley. The Indians hegan to show themselves on the outskirts, committing murder and carrying olf prisoners. The tories, here- tofore silent, hegan to thro ^' out hints of an approach- ing storm. '•Coming events cast their shadows be- fore." The demon of carnage and battle was preparing for his grand banquet, which was to be displayed on the approaching third of July. The entire popula- tion became restive and excited: the runners who were sent out brought back chilling information, and a general alarm throughout the valley was created. Tliis state of things reached "Washington's camp, at Morristown, where the two Independent companies were stationed. Those of them who had left their unguarded and unprotected wives and children at home BATTLE OF WYOMING. 169 became excited and furious. All the commissioned of- ficers but two resigned; and these, with some twenty or thirty men (w.th or without permission does not appear), left the camp and sped to Wyoming. It is probable that the authorities in the camp, knowing the desperate condition of the families of the men, winked at their departure. The single men remained, and on the twenty-fourth of June, 1778, the two comjDanies were united in one, and Lieuten- ant Spalding, of Eansom's company, was appointed ca]3tain. As this was but ten days preceding the massacre, it is probable that was about the time that the men left the camp. They had waited to the last moment : human endurance could be delayed no longer. Their love and affection for their families, their fear for their safety, their knowledge of the terrible foe that was hovering over them, were reasons which could brook no restraint. They came; but alas, poor fel- lows ! they came to sodden the field of carnage with their blood. Their bones, now gathered together in one common receptacle, repose at the base of the humble and unpretending monument which their children in after years erected, to point out the spot, to strangers, where their fathers were slain. It was not my design in giving Historical Sketch- es of Plymouth, to write an account of the details of the battle of Wyoming. I find, however, that there were so many of our town's people engaged in it, that 170 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. my outline would be imperfect did I not give at least a condensed view of the engagement. Connected as our people were with this battle, and so many of them having fallen on that eventful day, my sketches would not be complete were I not to include in them an account of it. While, therefore, tliis will lengthen out the chain of local events necessarily, still they are so intimately blended with our township history that it is proper to speak of them. In the latter part of June the people of the val- ley were fully apprised of the approach of the enemy. The Indian vanguard, descending both sides of the Susquehanna, commenced gathering their crop of scalps for the British market. The price of the article varied : this was graded in amount, beginning with the scalp of the robust and able-bodied man, and so down to the child of two years. They were all assorted, and labeled, and baled as tlie Indians pack their peltry, and in this way delivered over to the officers of the Crown entrusted with this branch of fJie British service / In their descent upon the valley they murdered and scalped all before them, sparing neither age, nor sex, nor condition. On the thirtieth of June, the British Colonel Butler, at the head of some four hundred provincials and tories and about seven hundred Indians, took up his position on the mountain bordering the north- BATTLE OF WYOMING. 171 eastern part of the township of Kingston. Here the British, tory and savage commander made his point of observation. He soon ascertained that his tory allies, the Wintermoots, Van Gorders, Von Alsteens, and Secords, who had visited him the year before, in the " Lake conntry," had made a true and faithful exposition of the helpless condition of the people of the valley. It was an easy prey. To meet this invading force now became the great and momentous question upon the part of the people of Wyoming. And when we take into consideration that the whole possible available force of the valley did not amount to one-third of the number invading it, we may well be amazed that an effort should even have been made to resist it. But retreat would have been death, and to meet the foe would only add the pangs of torture which were to follow. The poor chances of success overbalanced these : a firm stand was the only alternative. A council was convened, and resistance to the last determined upon. Plymouth, ever ready to respond, gave every man and boy that could bear arms. Cap- tain Samuel Ransom, now at home, having resigned his commission in the army to stand or fall with his friends and neighbors, went into the Plymouth com- pany as a private in the ranks. The people of the town assembled, had elected Asaph Whittlesey captain. The rank and file of this company, the remnant of the people, after the drain made upon them to fill up the 17- HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF TLYMOrTH. muster-roll of the Second Independent company of United States troops, numbered forfi/-four: too many for the slaughter that Avas depending. The roll of this company was not preserved. Proh- ahly it perished in the pocket of the dead orderly upon the battle-field. The only ^vay left to us to as- certain -who were on it after the lapse of ninety-three years, is to copy the names of our dead from the mar- ble slab of the monument erected upon the ground where they fell. The following are believed to have been Plymouth men: their names are enrolled upon the monumental tablet: their memory should be upon the hearts of the people of Plymouth in all time to come. Samuel B-ansom, Asaph TVhittlesey. Aaron Gay- lord. Amos Bullock, John Brown, Thomas Brown, Thomas Fuller, Stephen Fuller, Silas Harvey, James Hopkins, Xathaniel Howard, Nicholas Manville, Job Marshall, John Pierce, Silas Parke. Conrad Daven- port, Elias Koberts, Timothy Boss, Reynolds, James Shaw, Joseph Shaw, Abram Shaw. John Wil- liams, Elihu Williams, Jr.. Eutus Williams, Aziba Williams and William Woodring. These are su].v- posed to be twenty-seven of the forty-four. As to the renuiining seventeen, those who knew them have passed away, and their names, as well as the tate of some of them, are lost to history. Of the little band of forty-four of our town's pet^ple whom Captain Asaph Whittlesey led to the THE BATTLE OF WYOMING. 173 field on the third of July, 1778, probably twenty of the number did not survive the disasters of the day. Captain Whittlesey occupied and owned the pres- ent Calvin Wadhams homestead. The little stream running through the premises, and emptying into the river near the Nottingham coal shaft, still bears his name. The united force of the valley amounted to from three to four hundred men, and most of them were enrolled into four companies. Ist. Captain Dethick Hewit's company, composed of forty men, regulars, just recruited for the general service. 2d. Captain Asaph. Whittlesey's company, Ply- mouth, forty-four men. 3d. Captain Lazarus Stewart's company, Han- over, forty men. 4th. Captain James Bidlack's company, lower Wilkes-Barre, thirty-eight men. 5th. Captain Kezin Geer's company, upper Wilkes-Barre, thirty men. 6th. Captain Aholiab Buck's company, Kingston, forty-four men. The companies of Plymouth and Kingston, each forty-four, were the largest companies in the little army. All told make two hundred and thirty-six men. There were others who volunteered for the oc- casion, not enumerated in either of the company 17-i niSTOKICAL SKETCHES OF FLTIifOUTH. rolls, the "v\'liole constituting a body of some four hundred men. The historians of the valley lix the number at about three hundred, but the probability is that it approached nearer to four hundred. As there was a general excitement and alarm, the people rushed to the common headquarters, and there was not that at- tention to enrollment and classilication by companies that there would have been in a state of C[uiet. The enemy was upon the border, and it was not known what moment he would advance. So that confusion was the element which ruled the situation. The names of one hundred and sixty-fom- persons are preserved to us of the slain. There can hardly be a doubt but there were nearly three hundred. Franklin's account in his journal of the event says '' that near three hundred brave men fell a sacrifice to Indian barbarity." He was on the spot the evening of the day of the battle, and probably his jotu-nal is as correct an accoimt as is left us of the actual num- ber slaughtered. But the exact mimher of our people who went forth to battle upon that eventful occasion will never be known. On the twelfth of December. 1S37, I carefully wi'ote down the narrative given me by Samuel Finch, one of the survivors of the battle. The old gentle- man was. at the time of my interview with him, in his eighty-first year. His mind was unimpaired, and BATTLE OF WYOMING. 175 his memory about details, so far as I had previously- learned from others who had escaped from the general slaughter, was very correct. This old veteran, in 1837, was a resident of Tioga county, in this State. He was on a visit, at the time I speak of, to Mr. George M. Hollenback, of Wilkes- Barre, who brought him to my office, with the re- quest that I would write down his account of the battle. Mr. Hollenback's father, the late Judge Hollenback of this city, and Mr. Finch, made their escape from the field together. Hollenback was in Captain Durkee's company. The captain was seri- ously wounded in his thigh and could not walk. Hollenback, being much attached to him, carried him some distance from the field on his shoulders; but being pressed closely by Indian pursuers. Captain Durkee " prayed him to abandon him to his fate, as they would both lose their lives in any further eflbrt to save him." Keluctantly, Hollenback laid him upon the ground, with his prayer of " God Almighty protect you, captain," and sped on towards the river in company with Finch, They had gone, however, but a few rods before they heard the crash of the tomahawk in poor Durkee's brain. Hollenback was an expert swimmer. He plunged into the river — having disposed of the most of his clothing as he ran — and putting a guinea in his mouth — about his only fortune — amidst the discharge of Indian bullets, safely reached the western shore. Finch being unable 11 176 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF rLTMOUTH, to swim, concealed liimself iu some drift-"\vood near the shore, but was, on the following morning, discov- ered, taken back to Queen Esther's rock, and among the orgies there practised, was ordered to run the gauntlet, which he safely accomplished, escaping twentv-four blows directed at him br twenty-four tomahawks, in the hands of the same number of savages, standing in parallel lines some ten feet apart ! His escape from this terrible ordeal '' he at- tributed to the tact that it was a common pastime among the eai-lier settlers of those days to pmctise run- ning the g-auntlet. not knowing but the time might come when their skill thus ac(.]^uired might be of ser- vice to them, and in my case it most certainly was.'' Mr. Finch further stated, •'that along with the other prisoners he commenced the march toward the Canadian frontier, but on the journey luade his escape, and found his way back to his friends in Wyoming/' But my design in referring to this narrative, writ- ten down from the mouth of the witness thirty-live years ago, is to throw light, if possible, upon that long-disputed and never-to-be-settled point, touching the number of our people who fought the battle of Wyoming. Samuel Finch states, " that he, with another sol- dier, was stationed at the gateway of Forty Fort by Colonel Butler to count the men as they passed out to battle; and that, including the regulars and militia, there were four hundred and eighty-four men." THE WYOMING BATTLE-FIELD. 177 If this information be correct, then the number is larger than that mentioned by any of the numer- ous persons who have heretofore written upon this subject. My written memoranda is in the exact language of the witness; nor am I aware that there is any reason why the account thus given by him should not be en- titled to credit and belief. He could certainly have had no motive to state a falsehood. Mr. Finch further stated, " that he was the mes- senger sent to Colonel Dorrance, at the extreme left of the line, with the order to ' fall back,' which, through mistake, was accepted as an order to retreat," The memorable field upon which the Wyoming battle, or more generally and appropriately known as the field of the Wyoming massacre, was fought, is sit- uated upon the west bank of the Susquehanna, and a half mile north-east of the granite monument erected, commemorative of the event, in the "old certified" township of Kingston. The base of the mountain being the northern, and a break or elevation in the plain, midway between the mountain and river, the southern boundary. At the foot of this divide, in the plain, one portion being some twenty feet higher than the other, is a morass, which at the date of which we speak, was covered by a thick growth of under- brush. At the base of the mountain was also a much wider morass than the one named, covered densely with scrub oaks and a thick net- work of undergrowth, 178 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. very difficult of access. From this jungle came forth the Seneca chief and his savage braves. The distance between the southern boundary of the upper plain and the thicket at the foot of the mountain is about a half mile. This space was mostly covered with a sparsely growth of native pines, there being a cleared field of some two acres on the extreme right of the American line. Upon the brow of the little hill was located the Tory fortification, known as Fort Wintermoot. When this fort was first erected, it was considered as belong- ing to friendly people; in a few years it passed as one of neutrality. On the morning of the battle, how- ever, the British flag floated over it. The lower plain was also sparsely covered with pines, and it was across this ground that a large num- ber of the fugitives, after the defeat, made an effort to reach the river. Such I believe to be a pretty correct description of the ground upon which was fought the short but decisive and disastrous battle of Wyoming, in the afternoon of the third day of July, 1778. On the second day of July, the day preceding the battle. Colonel John Butler, the commander of the British, Tory and Indian army of invasion, removed his camp from the mountain, in the immediate vicin- ity, entered the valley, and established his chief depot at the Wintermoot fort. The Wintermoot family occupied the fort at the time, and by previous ar- DEMANDS OF BRITISH BUTLER. 179 rangement, had made all the necessary preparations for the reception of their distinguished guest. The day before this, Colonel Zebulon Butler had made a reconnoissance in force, of the upper end of the valley, to inquire into the circumstances of the murder of the Harding family, and others, perpetra- ted by the Indians who were attached to the command of the British leader, as well as to gather what in- formation he could of the position and numbers of the enemy. The day that the British Butler established him- self at Wintermoot, he sent a deputation of three men to Forty Fort, under a white flag, who demanded a surrender of that fort, together with all the other stockades and military defenses of the valley, muni- tions of war, public property, as well as all men in arms, in opposition to his majesty the King of Great Britain. This demand of course was refused. On the morning of the third of July, a like deputation was sent, which ended in a like result. A demand of surrender had thus been made and refused. The next step was the casting down and the acceptance of the red gauntlet of battle. Which, if not done with all formulas of civilized warfare, was understood well by the offensive and defensive parties. From the thirtieth of June to the morning of the fatal third day of July, the entire effective force of the whole valley, including men of seventy years of 180 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. age and boys of fourteen, had been gathered together, and mostly enrolled and organized into companies, for the purpose of meeting the approaching foe; as to the actual numbers of which, the people of the valley entertained but a vague and indefinite knowledge. The women and children had been placed in the different fortifications of the valley, on both sides of the river, for safety and protection. The greater num- ber, however, had been quartered in Forty Fort, that being the most capacious as well as the strongest garrison. Its enclosure contained an area of about a half acre of ground, surrounded by a stockade, the sharpened timbers firmly set in the earth, and of suf- ficient height and strength to afford an available de- fence, except against siege artillery, which neither of the belligerents possessed. Here assembled on the morning of the disastrous day, in council, for the last time, the httle band of bold and daring men who were soon to meet in dead- ly conflict with more than three times their own num- ber, to decide the momentous issue, whether they would fall with their faces or backs to the foe. To meet them was death; to retreat was death; and death therefore tainted the atmosphere which the people of the little garrison inhaled. But they were nevertheless firm and resolute, and they had made up their minds that if they must die, they " would die with harness on their backs." Colonel Zebulon Butler, a commander of one of PEOPOSITION TO SURRENDER. 181 the regiments of the Continental armj, being at liis liome in Wilkes-Barre on a fmiougli, had. been, by common consent, invested with, the command in chief of this little army. His staff consisted of Colonel Na- than Denison, Lieutenant-Colonel George Dorrance, and Major John Garret. To this he added Captain Samuel Kansom and Captain Eobert Durkee, men of military skill, and upon whose judgment he placed great consideration and reliance. The first question to be disposed of on that day, which terminated amid the darkest gloom and the the most heart-rending sorrow, was to decide upon the proposition of the British commander to surrender! Upon this question there was not a dissenting voice. A conflict was inevitable, so they took up the gage of battle defiantly thrown at their feet by the lead- er of a force more than thrice their own number; a fact which he knew, but which they did not. And if they had, it would not have changed their conduct. The next point to be determined was, whether they should immediately give battle, or remain within the fortification and stand a siege, with the expecta- tion of the arrival of reinforcements. This gave rise to a division of opinion. Colonel Butler and his staff took the ground that there should be delay, for a short time at least, be- cause there was reason to hope that Captain Spalding, with his Continental company, was on his way to Westmoreland; that Captain John Franklin, with a 182 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. company from Himtington and Salem, was also on his way to join them; tliat tliere should be time for the general panic throughout the valley to subside; that coolness, resulting from discipline, as well as valor, were elements necessary for success. To these arguments were interposed the objection, that the enemy had now been three days in the valley; they were fast carrying on their work of conquest and murder; that this fact would be likely to create in- stead of suppress panic; that two forts had already surrendered; that all the craft in the river above Forty Fort were in the possession of the enemy, thus affording him an opportunity to cross to the east side, which would compel the abandonment of the only really stronghold they had for retreat in case of disas- ter; that they could not rely upon keeping their men together when most of them were within gun-shot sound of their helpless and unprotected families; and finally, if death was to be their doom, there were enough of them to suffer the penalty. These argu- ments were decisive of the matter. The last one re- minds us of the speech of Henry V, before the battle of Agincourt; "If we are mark'd to die, we are enough. To do OUT country loss : and if to live, Tlie fewer men, the greater share of honor." It is not for us to say, after the lapse of nearly a hundred years, without those means ol knowledge vrhich existed on that occasion, whether the decision DECISION OF THE COUNCIL. 183 they arrived at was judicious and prudent, or other- wise. The men who made it had to assume the fear- ful consequences that followed. If an error was com- mitted, the motive which prompted it cannot be ques- tioned. It is true that Captain Spalding was between the Pocono and the Blue Mountain, within two days' march of Wilkes-Barre, with a company of sixty men or more, and that Captain Frankhn, with thirty-five men, was within eight hours' march of the camp. But it is no more than reasonable to suppose, as circum- stances afterwards transpired, that if Spalding and Franklin had been present, that there would have been contributed an additional hundred to the slaugh- tered hecatomb in reserve. The decision of the council of war to adopt imme- diate offensive action may possibly have been prema- ture. From the limited knowledge, however, of the circumstances which is left to us at this remote period of time, we cannot help concluding that the decision was right. The men who made it were not aware of the nu- merical strength of their enemy; and the sequel, as de- veloped afterwards upon the field, is pretty conclusive that a hundred men more could not have saved the day. The fair presumption is, that a hundred more would have fallen had they been in the engagement. Three or four to one are fearful odds in an open field, and where the strategy of war cannot be made available. 184 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. Two o'clock in the afternoon liad arrived; the solemn decision to fight in the open field had been made; the minority had cheerfully yielded their opin- ions to the majority, and the little army of four hun- dred men marched out of the fort in battle array. Colonel Butler detailed Captains Durkee and Ean- som, and Lieutenants Eoss and Wells, for the purpose of making a reconnoissance of the ground, and to es- tablish the locality of the line of battle. These men had been under fire upon continental battle-fields, and were, therefore, properly selected for the purpose with which they were entrusted. They went, but they never returned from the field they surveyed. Upon the ground they designated. Colonel Butler formed his line. The two posts of honor were as- signed to Captain Durkee, who was put at the ex- treme right, and our townsman. Captain Whittlesey, upon the extreme left. Durkee was protected as to any flank movement by the morass; Whittlesey by the mountain and dense thicket at its base, which the savages however could penetrate. Colonel Butler, with Major Garret, took the com- mand of the right wing; Colonel Denison, supported by Colonel Dorrance, the left. Durkee was placed with Bidlack, and Kansom with Whittlesey. This was the order of battle at three o'clock in the after- noon of the third of July, 1778. All this preparation had undoubtedly reached the ears of the British, Tory and Indian commander, for SPEECH OF COLONEL BUTLER. 185 at about the same time lie had formed his line a short distance below Fort Wintermoot. Divesting liimself of his plumes and martial tawdry, with a black handkerchief bound about his head, he took the command of his left wing, composed of regulars and provincial troops. He placed his right wing, com- posed of Indians and Tories, under the command of Gucingeracton, a Seneca chief, supported, probably, by Captain Caldwell, of Johnson's Eoyal Greens. The fact as to the presence of Johnson is somewhat obscure, but as Caldwell was his next in rank, the better opinion seems to favor the idea that he com- manded the Royal Greens on this occasion. Both parties, therefore, being within a half mile of each other, and in battle array, it required but the signal gun for the commencement of the conflict. Colonel Butler made a short address before he displayed Ms column. He said : " Men, yonder is the enemy. The fate of the Hardings tells us what we have to expect if defeated. We come out to fight not only for liberty, but for life itself ; and, what is dearer, to preserve our homes from conflagration, our women and children from the tomahawk. Stand firm the first shock, and the Indians will give way. Every man to his duty." As Denison was filing his column ofl" to the left, he again repeated : " Be firm, everything depends on resisting the first shock." Our line began the advance, and at the same time 1S6 HISTOKIOAL SKETCHES OE FLTMOUTH. the flames and smoke were seen to ascend from Foii; TVintermoot. Tlie motive for tliis lias never been disclosed; but as the bm-ning embers were afterwaids used as a means of torturing wounded and disabled prisoners of war, we may suppose that the savage- hearted man. who that day led his Indian and Tory bands, prepared his rack in advance for the torture of his Tictims. Colonel Zebulon Butler ordered his men to fire throughout the whole line, and to keep up the volley as they advanced. The fire was rapid as well as steady the whole length of his line. The British advancing at the same time, the dischai^e of mus- ketry became continuous. There being fewer natural obstacles on the right, Colonel Zebulon Butler made rapid advances, and drove the left wins: of his adversarv before him: he not only compelled him to ^'ield his ground, but also created confusion in his ranks. The British line could not withst^md the regular and steady tire to which it was exposed. Following up their advan- tages, the British Butler's left wing was now more than a quarter of a mile in the i"ear of the point of attack, and very close upon the burning fortification; eveiything looked favorable upon the right, but, £das ! not so on the left. Colonel Denison had to meet a concealed foe. The morass literally swarmed with savages, and while our people were partially upon a plain, they be- HAND-TO-HAND CONFLICT. 187 came the objects of deliberate aim from the concealed savage warriors. In a few moments they had picked out Colonel Dorrance, Captains Eansom and Whit- tlesey, and who, like brave men as they were, fell in the front ranks. The Indians becoming encouraged at their success in the fall of these officers, with a tremendous yell, which was taken up and repeated from band to band through the morass, darted upon the company of Whittlesey by a flank movement which of course threw it into confusion. Colonel Denison did what any prudent soldier would have done under the circumstances. He made the effort to place Whittlesey's company with its front to the enemy, which had just turned his flank. To do this it was necessary that they should fall back, and such was his order; but we must bear in mind when this order was given probably half of his company had fallen, and that each survivor, in this hand-to-hand fight, had to contend with a half dozen infuriated savages against him. Orders under such circum- stances could amount to nothing. The left wing was overpowered; it had not the strength nor the num- bers to resist the enemy it had to contend with. Seven hundred of these excited and wild savages let loose upon the left wing, which probably did not exceed two hundred men all told, was a fearful ob- stacle ; and therefore whether the order were retreat or fall back, it could not have changed the result. The line was too feeble to withstand the avalanche; it did 188 HISTOKICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. not waver, it was cruslicd. Nothing short of a mira- cle conhl hare resisted the overpowering weight thrown upon it. Most of our k")cal historians, from Chapman down, taking up the oft-repeated version of this fea- ture of the Wyoming battle, impute the failure upon om- part to the misunderstanding of the order to fall back for one of retreat. There is no doubt whatever but what many men who escaped death upon that iield were under this impression. Suppose the left wing had understood the order to fall back, would it have been possible for them to have faced successfully an enemy of such su- perior force ? Where would they have made their base ? They were smTOunded on all sides, in front, and rear, and flank. It is time that public opinion should decide this question, and that the facts should be properly un- derstood. The rout upon the left became general. The success which Butler had achieved on the right amounted to nothing amidst the disasters which had taken place on his left. Amid desperation and hope he rode between the two lines, appealing to his men, whom he called his children, "to stand their ground." It was the last act remaining for him to do as a brave man; but superior numbers had accomplished its work, and thus within half an hour after the com- mencement of the battle, the whole line was in fuU butler's brutality 189 retreat, each, flying for his life, and seeking the most available refuge from his bloodthirsty pursuers. The scenes of brutality and murder which fol- lowed the disastrous defeat at the Wyoming battle, thank God ! have but few parallels. The sickening, abhorrent and disgusting details of which, though done within an enlightened age, perhaps ought not to be repeated to an enlightened people. The part played by the wild and savage Indian does not so much shock the senses, because he was cradled in blood and educated in the belief that he was serving the Great Spirit in taking vengeance in the most cruel manner upon his real or imaginary enemies. But what have we to say in defence of the memory of the man, born and educated within the pale of civilization, and placed in command as a reward of merit, probably, of a regiment of British infantry ^ And can we wonder either that a British King, whose sense of humanity, as exhibited in his conduct towards his American subjects, was of the most cruel kind, should have stood aghast and refused the honor of knighthood to Colonel John Butler until he cleared up the charges against him of brutal conduct at the battle of Wyoming. It was too much for George III., by no means a monarch of nice and discriminat- ing virtues, to swallow the dose. And how grateful it is to reflect that British gold could not purchase from our old settlers of this val- ley a certificate palliating the monstrous conduct when 190 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. eagerly souglit for by his entreaties ! They were poor, but tliey were honest. Gold did not bny them. The principal avenue of retreat from the battle- ground was in the direction of the river. The flank movement made by the savages cut oft' the means of escape by the road leading to the fort. Some few escaped in that direction, but the main body of the fugitives sought the river, the enemy in full pursuit. Scores of them were shot down, or wounded and car- ried back to Queen Esther's rock for the bloody car- nival which was to come off there. Twenty-seven mutilated and disfigured bodies were afterwards foimd at that place, and so disfigured by wounds and gashes as not to be recognized. The Tory animosity and hate, if they did not ex- ceed the savage disposition, came almost up to it. Upon Monocasy Island, in the immediate vicinity of the battle-ground, where many of the poor creatures sought refuge, a beast in human shape, by the name of Pensil, deliberately shot down a brother who was upon his knees before him supplicating for his life. With the imprecation that " he was a d — d rebel," he blew out his brains. There were instances where other Tories invited back their fleeing enemy, under the promise that their lives should be saved, but in every case where they returned under such promises, they were mercilessly butchered. Captain James Bidlack, with others, who were wounded, were thrown by the Indians and Tories into the flames of Fort HOERIBLE BRUTALITY. 191 "Wintermoot, and held down by pitchforks till the burning embers consumed their bodies. Deeds of cruelty inflicted in the civil family feuds between the houses of York and Lancaster are dwarfed in their comparison with those of the Wyoming massacre, and perpetrated, too, under the eye, if not by the order of the British commander, a man who had the benefits and advantages of civilization. But the progress in moral reform of three hundred years had extended no kindly influences over him. The battle did not exceed half an hour in dura- tion, so that from four o'clock until the dawn of the next day, the horrid creatures carried on their fearful orgies. The atmosphere for miles around was pol- luted with the stench of burning human bodies. "All night long," says Pearce, "there was a revel in blood and in the fumes of burning human flesh. Not until the morning light did they cease their de- moniac orgies for want of victims. The sun never shed his rays on a bloodier fieM. Spectators standing upon the opposite shore of the river saw naked men forced around the burning stake with spears, and heard their heart-rending shrieks and dying groans." I pass over the troubles and sacrifices which befel the women and helpless children in their flight from the valley. Their husbands and fathers and broth- ers were nearly all slain. Of the army which went out in the morning, fifty did not return ahve. Of the fifteen officers, eleven were slain. Every captain 12 192 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. of the six coropanies, including Kansom and Durkee, ■were found dead at the front of the line, with the exception of Bidlack, whose charred body was found anions: the burned debris of "Wintermoot fort. The women and children of Plymouth started on the night of the battle for Fort Augusta, at Sunbury. The roads in every direction leading from the valley were throncred with fu2:itive women and children — and as they ascended the high hills skirting the valley, they looked back upon their burning homes and in- haled the tainted breeze from the battle-field of their slaughtered husbands, brothers and fathers. On the preceding day, July fourth, the British Biitler marched to Forty Fort, where he found Colonel Denison with a small remnant of the men who had escaped the hoiTors of the day before. Captain Frank- lin, with his thirty-iive men, had reached there on the evening of the battle. These soldiers and the women and children composed the garrison. Articles of ca- pitulation were drawn up and signed. But except as to the comimission of any other deeds of murder, the conditions were almost totally disregarded. The In- dians were still Indians, and the British commander pretended he could not control them. They robbed the women of their clotliing and the children of their bread. What they could not cany away they burnt and destroyed. After the signing of the treaty, bands of Indians and Tories traversed the valley and de- stroyed by fire nearly all the buildings. DOUBT AS TO BRANDT's PEESENCE. 193 To show the brutal character of the British com- mander, we will give an incident. In entering the gateway of Forty Fort, he recognized Sergeant Boyd, a deserter. " Boyd," said he, with the sternness of savage ferocity, " go to that tree." — " I hope," said Boyd, imploringly, "your honor will consider me a prisoner of war." — " Gro to that tree, sir." And then summoning an Indian squad he ordered them to fire upon him. The poor sergeant fell dead. In this we read the temper and disposition of the man. He had it in his power to have checked the slaughter of his prisoners; he had it in his power to have saved the people of the valley from plunder, and their homes from the brand. He was under Tory in- fluence and acted from savage impulses. And after all these examples of monstrosity, he sought the honorable distinction of knighthood. It was too much for even George III. to grant ! Brandt was not in the battle. It is somewhat re- markable that almost every survivor of the massacre was under the impression that the Mohawk chief was at the head of the Indians on the third of July. Chapman took up the same idea from revelations un- doubtedly made to him by the survivors, and such was and is the tradition of this matter, I have been told, time and again by them, that they saw him and they would describe his dress and person. Miner followed Chapman, but doubtingly, and in a note he submits the question to the judgment of his readers. Pearce 194 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. says tliat lie was not in tlie battle^ and Dr. Peck is of the same opinion. In order to satisfy my own mind, some years since I wrote a letter to Mr. Bancroft, the historian, on this subject. He had come down in the chain of his his- tory to the eve of the Wyoming battle. I wrote stating to him that there was a difference of opinion on the question whether Brandt was in the battle of Wyoming. I give the copy of his reply to my letter on the subject: " New Yokk, April 15, 1867. " My Dear Mr. Wright : I had already written the account of the Wyoming massacre, and having had before me very full contempo- rary materials, I had avoided the error against which you so kindly caution me. " Brandt was not in the valley ; your party was of the Seneca tribe, and led by a great Seneca chief. Brandt led an expedition in New York, as the enclosed papers will show. " Very truly yours, G-EO. BANCROFT." The enclosed paper which is here referred to, is a copy of a report, of the massacre, made by Colonel Guy Johnson to Lord George Germain, at the time Secretary of War under George III., dated at New York, on the twentieth of September, 1778, two months after the battle. The following is the report : " Tour Lordship will have heard before this can reach you of the successful incursions of the Indians and Loyalists from the Northward. In conformity to the Instructions I conveyed to my officers, they as- GUY Johnson's repokt. 195 sembled their force early in May, and one division un- der one of my Deputies, Mr. Butler, proceeded with great success down tlie Susquehanna, destroying the Posts and Settlements at Wyoming ; augmenting their number with many Loyalists, and alarming all the country; whilst another Division under Mr. Brandt, the Indian Chief, cut off two hundred and ninety-four men near Schoharie, and destroyed the adjacent settlements, with several Magazines, from whence the rebels had derived great resources, thereby affording great encouragement and opportunity to many friends of the Government to join them." This document would seem to settle the question that Brandt was not in the battle of Wyoming. He took his two hundred and ninety-four scalps at Scho- harie, "and destroyed the settlements" in that coun- try at the same time that " Mr. Butler " took nearly or quite the same number of scalps at Wyoming, "and destroyed the settlements " on the Susquehanna, as well as " alarming all the country." How idle was it, therefore, for " Mr. Butler " to allege to Colonel Denison that he could not control the Indians in their destruction of property in the vaUey. His master, Mr. Guy Johnson, says that such were the orders he gave. Butler, therefore, when his Indians and " Loyalists " (Tories) were de- stroying the entire settlement of Wyoming with the brand and the sword, was but carrying out the orders of the agents of a Christian King:. 196 HISTOKICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. It is well that this part of the history of Wyo- ming, as to the presence of Brandt, is fully settled and understood, though at a very modern date. I have in this statement of the battle of Wyoming not gone into it as fully as I should have done, because it did not have a material bearing on the subject I have in hand. The local history of Plymouth, how- ever, became so much connected with it, that I was compelled to give it a short examination. • I have already stated the number of our people slain in the massacre, and the circumstances under which they were marshalled into the ranks, and that they did not flinch from the duties which events im- posed upon them. The Williams family alone con- tributed four of their number to the slaughter. Our people should know the spot where their an- cestors fell in the battle. When any of them here- after shall, through curiosity or motives of regard, visit the field, they will find the particular locality about a mile above the Lackawanna and Bloomsburg depot, at Wyoming station, and very nearly on the bed of the track of that road. There our townsmen. Captain Samuel Eansom, Captain Asaph Whittlesey, and some twenty-five of our people were outflanked and slain by Indians and Tories on that ever-memor- able day. The following statement of Daniel Washburn, a Plymouth man, was kindly furnished me by Steuben Jenkins, Bsc[., as written down by him in 1846, from STATEMENT OF DANIEL WASHBURN. 197 the moutli of the old man. I give his precise lan- guage. It is an interesting statement of the thrilling events of the times, from one of om- own people : "I lived in Shawnee. The Nanticoke company came up to Shawnee and I joined in with them under Captain Whittlesey. We all marched up to Forty Fort that night. The next morning we saw the flag of the enemy coming with two men; one carried the flag and the other played upon the fife. They had a letter for our Colonel, from what I could learn, telling us to give up the fort. The Colonel told them he would not give up the fort, and they left. After they had left, orders were given by our Colonel, Butler, that we must go and meet the enemy." (Here fol- lows an account of the massacre.) * ■■•'" "■•'■" " We then started, and steered a straight course for the Shawnee fort (Grarrison Hill), through fields and woods, till we came to Ross Hill, where we came in the main road, and went to the fort. We came to the fort about midnight, and to our great surprise it was occupied by no one except my father, Jesse Washburn, and my brother Caleb, my step-mother with two small chil- dren, and Mrs. Woodring, the wife of William A. Woodring, who was killed in the battle. Mrs. Wood- ring had five children, four sons and one daughter. We all remained till daybreak, when we could see no one else around. The fort was full of provisions and store-goods, bedding and house furniture. In the morning we three, father, Caleb and myself carried 198 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. rails and made a raft. At nine o'clock we had our raft j&nished. About this time we heard the report of the enemy shooting at the Wilkes-Barre fort (and we kneio it to he the enemy). We then got aboard of our rail raft; my father and mother, Caleb and the two children, and Mrs. Woodring and her five chil- dren, taking with us provisions to last us across the Blue Mountains. We then set sail with our rail raft and went on very well till we got to Nanticoke Falls, when we saw two boats fast on a rock. They called to us to help them loose. There were in these boats men, women and children. We then landed our raft on the Shawnee side and went and helped them loose, and helped them below the riff safe, for which they paid us. When we were getting the boats loose we saw a man come out of the woods. He was naked and had not a stitch of clothes about him. He said he swam the river about Forty Fort, and had come down through the woods. He spoke to us from the other side and told us of his happy escape, and then went on again. When we had them all loose — it was about twelve o'clock in the day — then we pushed off our rail raft again and sailed on very well till night, when we landed at, or a little above, the mouth of Little Wapwallopen, and put up for the night in a small cabin that stood where Jacob and Joseph Hess now live (1846). A man by the name of Dewey had moved out about two days before. Here we stayed over night. In the morning we again pursued our STATEMENT OF DANIEL WASHBURN. 199 journey along the old Indian path. This day we travelled beyond the Buck Mountain and put up for the night in the woods^ Mrs. Woodring and her five children being still with us. The next morning we again renewed our journey, and on the third day we landed at a place called Greaden Head (Gnadden- Hutten), in Northampton county. I was about fif- teen years old at the Wyoming battle, and went for my father. I am now nearly eighty-three. When we got to Wapwallopen we met a man with a horse and some cows which he wished us to assist him in driving to Northampton. The women and children rode alternately upon the horse. We had much trouble in driving the cattle." There seems to be no definite account preserved of the number killed of the enemy in the battle. They removed their dead and wounded. It is probable that fifty would include the enemy's loss — ^possibly a less number. We are left to conjecture as to the fact. CHAPTER VIII. INDIAN MURDEKS AND PRISONEES. — CONDUCT OF THE BRITISH GOVERNMENT. PERKINS, WILLIAMS, BID- LACK, PIKE, ROGERS, VAN CAMPEN, PENCE, BEN- JAMIN AND ELISHA HARVEY, GEORGE P. RANSOM, LOUIS HARVEY, LUCY BULLFORD AND M°DOWEL. ALESS number of our townspeople were murdered or carried into captivity by tbe Indians than in otber parts of the valley, compared with our popula- tion. The records we have, though probably incom- plete, show but two murdered and fourteen carried away as prisoners. Some of those taken prisoners were not afterwards heard from, and were probably murdered. This number does not embrace those slain in the Wyoming battle. Mr. Miner's list of the murdered within the town of Westmoreland contains the names of sixty-one, and his prisoners' list sixty, making a total of one hun- dred and twenty-one; and while this catalogue wa ■ made with great caution and with much research and labor, we do not find upon it the names of Louis Harvey and Lucy Bullford of Plymouth, who were captured at the time Colonel Ransom and the two Harveys were. He, however, admits that the num- (200) CONDUCT OF THE BRITISH GOVERNMENT, 201 ber, including those killed and captured, was larger than the list he furnishes. There can be but little doubt of this, as sixty years had passed by from the time of these slaughters and imprisonments to the period in which he wrote. The one hundred and twenty-one would probably bear an addition of fifty, and come nearer to the true state of the facts. Our people of Plymouth, therefore, were remarkably fortu- nate considering the terrible sacrifices that their sur- rounding neighbors were subjected to, for the three years succeeding the Wyoming battle. Before the occurrence of this event, there was not an instance of murder or capture in the town. It was after the battle that the Indian character took on those terrible and remorseless features of cruelty, the exhibitions of which, in some cases, are too shocking to relate. To the natural feeling of revenge and the thirst for blood, the policy of the British king had imbued the Indian heart with the new elements of avarice and cupidity. These were before unknown to the red man. He was proud and haughty in his manners, in- different to any luxuries, content with the bare neces- saries to sustain life, and in the language of Camp- bell, " A Stoic of tlie woods ; a man witliout a tear." In his intercourse with the white man he had ac- quired a new appetite. He tasted of the cup which intoxicates, and he became unscrupulous as to the manner of gratifying it. The scalp of an American, 202 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. wliether of man, woman or cliild, had a market value under British law. The Indian dealt in the commod- ity; he could make more money in the traffic of the •white man's scalp than he could in the peltry of the chase. He could sell them on presentation; the market was never dull; there was no credit; the gold was paid over the counter on delivery of the merchan- dise. This would buy rum, and rum made the red man happy. The new appetite supplanted all the others, and his natural savage ferocity became in- creased tenfold. Before this it was prescribed by limits. True, the boundary was frail, but still the line was discernible; the scalp bounty removed all re- straint. The king gloried in the accumulation of his new article of traffic; and the Indian, made more savage in his cups, sharpened the already keen edge of his knife with the exult~ant feelings of a monster. The minds of purchaser and seller were in accord, and so the trade went on for the mutual profits of each. The voices of such men as Chatham, Wilkes and Barre, in the English Parliament, were impotent. There was no mercy to be shown to rebels; they were outside of the pale of humanity — their crime did not entitle them to " the benefit of clergy." It is therefore not a matter of surprise that the savage, nerved up to acts of cruelty by the example of a nation professing to be governed by rules of Christi- anity, and basking in the sunshine of a high civiUza- tion, would stop to scrutinize the mode or manner of THE HARVEST OF SCALPS. 203 executing his new calling. His well strung girdle (jf reeking scalps was not ornamental merely to the savage warrior, but it jossesscd a specific vnlue in pounds, shillings and pence — which the British trea- sury paid on the production of the article. The dull and obtuse faculties of the Indian m'nd could not be made to comprehend that there was any immorality in the mere act of murdering the victim for the value of the scalp upon his head, when the transaction received the endorsement of so renowned a dignitary as George III. The conduct, therefore, of this inhuman prince gave license to the commission of the most terrible and revolting brutalities. He gathered his harvest of three hundred scalps at the massacre of Wyoming — and while this scene was being transacted upon the Susquehanna, his friend Brandt strung upon his belt two hundred and ninety-four, taken from the heads of the defen ;eless people of Schoharie, upon the Mc^hawk. In the two expeditions under the orders of his Majesty, one intrusted to " Mr. Butler," on the Sus- quehanna, and the other intrusted to " Mr. Brandt," on the Mohawk, his royal tannery was rft])lenished with about six hundred fresh scalps; some of them, it is true, from the heads of women and children, but all in a good state of preservation — all marketable ! Now when we consider that this course of conduct was in the eighteenth century, and in not merely a civilized but an enlightened age, we are confounded 204 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH, and amazed. There is one redeeming feature in it, however, and which, will ever redound to the honor of English statesmen, that the high-toned men of the Lords and Commons denounced the act of their Sov- ereign in the most bitter and scathing invective. The untutored wild man of the woods, without the pale of civilization as to the knowledge even of an accountability to a supreme ruler in the world to come, or being clothed with the mantle of Chris- tianity, may plead these things in palliation of his beastly murders; but with the memory of Greorge III. est the curses and anathemas of the enlightened world. Immediately succeeding the Indian battle where the great harvest of scalps had been reaped by Butler and his allies, bands of straggling, marauding Indians and Tories commenced their incursions upon the now desolate people of the desolate valley of Wyoming. Colonel Zebulon Butler was in command of the fortifications, but his force was inadequate to suppress the raids which were frequently made by the enemy; and instances of murder and capture were often occur- ring within sight of the people in these fortifications. The following letter from Washington, in reply to one from Colonel Zebulon Butler asking for aid, I found many years since among some old papers of Colonel Butler. It has never before been published. The original is still in my library, and is in a perfect state of preservation. Washington's letter. 205 " Headquarteks, ) " MoRRiSTOWN, April 7, 1780. ) " Sir : I received yesterday your letter of the 2d instant, and am extremely sorry to find that parties of the enemy have appeared and committed hostilities in the neighborhood of Wyoming. It is not in my power to afford any troops from the army, and I should hope those already there, and the inhabitants, -will be able to repel at least incursions by light parties. " It was my intention, as I informed you, that you should join your regiment immediately after your return : however, I am in- clined from the face of things to let you continue where you are for the present, and you will remain till further orders. Should fur- ther depredations and mischief be committed by the enemy, you will take occasion to inform me of them. " I am, sir, " Your most obedient servant, " G-. Washington." " To Colonel Zebulon Sutler." This letter fully shows that the people of the valley could not depend upon Washington for any as- sistance. The defense of the valley was left with Colonel Butler, his command consisting of Captain Spalding's company, composed of the remnant of the two independent companies of Durkee and Eansom, with a few stragglers which Sullivan had left the year previous. Death and slaughter had intimidated the living, and the people were a helpless prey to the pre- datory hands of Tories and Indians who were contin- ually prowling ahout the valley. And it now became the lot of our townspeople to submit to their share of the pains and penalties in reserve for them, John Perkins, a Plymouth man, was murdered by the Indians on the seventeenth of November, 1778, 908 HISTORICAL SKKTOHK^ OF ri.YMOUTH. in tlie lowvr oud ot' t\\o township, s^liartly after the battle. In ^[aivli tollowiiig. « lv\ud of twenty ImUaus aj>- pmiwl on the Kingston ^ido of tUo river, iu sidght of the Wilkos-Bai-re fort» iu bivad dnvUght, and miir- dorxxl tlirw \'aluablo eitinons: Mr. l\Hhu Williams, Lioutoiiaut l>uok aud ^Ir. Stophou Tot ti bono. Fivd- crick FoUots who w-;\« with thonv, fell pierced hy so\Ttt w\>uud$ frvnn a spear, and with the otliers Avas sealjKHl and k^llt ^n* dead. Instantly a det^veli- meut of men an-^is sent over: the Indians had tU\l. Folletj sweltering in hkx>d, g^>ve signs of lite and wi\s taken to the f^wt Dr. William Hooker Smith, on e^imining his w\ninds, Sivid that while everything sJiould he done that kindness and skill could sug- gests he reguixicvl his recvn-ery a^ hopelesis. Yet he did recover. One spear thrust havl penetrated the sitomach, so that its contents oame out at his side, ^[r. Follet KwhI tor n\any \-ears, and ivmoveil to Ohio, wheiv he lett a lai-gv family. — Mithr's Uiiiorj/f p. :263, It w>nild attoixl me much pkwsure to spciik of Dr. William H\vker ti^mith at length. He wjs the pion- eer physician of tlie Mvlloy ; a man of gvod q^nalidca- tions as a physician juid surgeon, and possessed of a knowledge of the prv.>siH»ctive value of anthracite coal llu* K\vond his contemporaries. The mimeivns deevis made to him in earlv days of Cv>al privilegvs and min- eral rights, pro\-e him to have been a man of great ornt, PKon-K m Indian DAi-rivrrv. 207 forocuHl- und houihI jii(lji,iii()ni. IliH liiHi-ory, liowcvcr, d()(3H not proporly coino wiUiin our liniiiH. Elilm WilliairiH whh n IMymoiilJi iii;ui. \\\h hod. liad TalNiii in Uk; iiuiHHucn) tlio your proviouH. 'Vho rvH\{\vA\vA'. of Uio WilliairiH (iirnily, and wJi(!ro the llov. ])ariiiH WillianiM, a (l(!H(!(!n(Iaiil;, livod for many yoarH, WiiH on Mi(! HodlJi Hide- oC l\u) riyiiioiilJi roiid NiJidiiij^ iVoni WilkdH-liai'ro io Kosh J I ill, and immediately l)()low ilio mjuiliino nliopR ol.' tlio Jiackawarina and BlooniKhur^ Railroad Company. J)fi,riiiH WillianiM waM (or many y(!ari-! a local M(!ili- odist Ej)iHcopal jmsachor, and a man of Htronj^ nrind and pocnliar j)ow(!rs of pnljnt (ihxpKinco. Tho writer haH ort(!n Iniard liim prcauli. lie had ^reat oarnoRt- ness of mantKir, and his language wan Kirorig and well choH(ui. lie oarnod, and wv,vy jiiHtly too, the repu- tation of not only being a good and ex(;mplary man, but also of poHsoKHing a high order of tahints. Ho died at the old homoHtcad, probably about thirty yoarH ago. Oa[)tain danuis ]>idlac;k, a IMymonth, man, father oC tlve (Japtain rramen liidlaek who fell in I ho Wyo- ming ])attle, at tin; head of l)iK oompany, waH taken prisoiKM- on the second of March, 1779, in the upper end of the township. ITo made liis escape, or was re- leased about a year afterwards. Captain ]5idlack had anotlici- son, tlnj ]1(}V. Ben- jamin Bidlaek, who served the whole period of the Kevolutionary war, and wn.s diflehargcnl at Yorktown 18 HISTOKICAL SKETCHES OF rLYMOtJTH. upon the surrender of Gorn-wallis. The Eev. Benja- min Bidlack resided many years in a small log house on the north side of the main road, immediately below the Joseph AVright homestead. My mother, now liv- ing at an advanced age, informs me that Mr. Bidlack occupied this house when she fii-st went to Plymouth to live^ about the year 1795 ; that Mr. Bidlack was then a Methodist preacher, and travelled the circuit. I shall have occasion to speak of him hereafter. Our local historians agree mainly as to the circum- stances attending the capture of Kogers, Tan Campen and Fike, but they are wide apart as to the incidents attending their release and escape. 3Iy o^^-n memory i& somewhat imperfect as to the account I have heard of the circumstances, though I have probably listened to Mr. Eogers" statement of them more than a score of times. But this is long ago, fifty yeare at least. I shall, however, rely more upon my own memory — as I have learned the story from the actors of the drama — than the written accoimts of it by others. A band of ten Indians, on the tAventy-seventh of March, 17S0, made their appearance in Hanover. This was ten days preceding the date of the letter I have introduced from Greneral Washington to Colonel Zebulon Butler; and their acts, together with another band of six. who made their appearance on the same day in Kingston, carrying off three prisoners, proba- bly gave lise to the correspondence. The ten who visits Hanovex shot and kiUed Asa Upson about two ABEAHAM PIKE, THE INDIAN KILLER. 209 miles below Wilkes-Barre, on the main road. On the day following, two men were engaged in making sugar near Nanticoke : one of them was killed on the spot, the other taken prisoner. This was the work of the same party, undoubtedly; the man taken prisoner was never heard of again. On the twenty-ninth they passed over the river, near Fish Island, and found Jo- nah Rogers, a boy then fourteen years of age, who had been sent by his parents on an errand to the lower end of the valley. They took Eogers and went down the river to Fishing Creek, in the vicinity of Bloomsburg, and on the following day they surprised the family of the Van Campens. Moses Van Campen, a young, athletic man, they took prisoner, having murdered and scalped his father, his brother, and his uncle. On the same day they captured a boy by the name of Pence, whom Eogers says was older than he— probably eighteen years of age. From Fishing Creek they passed northerly through Huntington. Here they were opposed by a scout of four men under the direction of John Franklin. A skirmish ensued; two of Franklin's men were wounded. The Indian party being too numerous for Franklin to contend with, they continued on to what is known as " Pike's Swamp," in the southern part of what is now Lehman township. Here they found Abraham Pike, a Plymouth man— and known for the rest of his life as '^The Indian Killer" — and his wife, makinc^ su^^ar Mrs. Pike had an infant some four months old. 210 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. Here they staid over night. In the morning they took Pike and his wife prisoners; binding the child up in a blanket, they threw it on the roof of the sugar cabin and hastened on with their prisoners. The lamentations of Mrs. Pike for her poor child, thus left to exposure and certain death, seemed to excite the feel- ings of the savages. After travelling a few miles they halted, and upon consultation, they painted Mrs. Pike, saying, "joggo squaw" — go home, woman. She returned to her cabin, got her child, and fled to the settlement and gave the alarm; but the Indians were out of reach. It is an interesting fact that the bottom logs of this old cabin are still visible; and a gentleman in- forms me, who visited the spot within the last year, that in the centre of it stands a beech tree some two feet in diameter. Ninety-one years is a long time for the foundation logs of Pike's cabin to resist the en- croachment of the seasons. I remember seeing it a great many years since : it was then three or four courses of logs high. About the third of April, they encamped for the night upon the Susquehanna, some fifteen or twenty miles below Tioga Point. The Indians feeling that they were now safe from pursuit, and upon the bor- ders of their own possessions, made arrangements for a night of quiet repose. Not so with Abraham Pike; he was a British deserter. He had fought under that flag at Bunker Hill, and received a wound there. An ABRAHAM PIKE. 211 Irisliman by birth, and full of the idea of liberty, he made his escape and volunteered for a term of two years in the American army, at the end of which time he came to the Susquehanna. He had also been in the battle of Wyoming, thus not only deserting the British ranks, but having openly fought against the British flag. His Indian captors knew these things. He was now on the way to the British lines, and he would soon be handed over to the men whose cause he had abandoned. He knew his fate; his position was one of desperation. We may, therefore, readily understand who was the originator of the bold scheme which took place on the night of that encampment. There was no one of the party who had the same issue at stake that he had, and we must rely upon the statement of Sog- ers and Pike, in opposition to that of Van Campen. The two former died before the latter, and he strange- ly asserted the claim of the whole credit of the es- cape, and there was no one to contradict. As I have had the story from Mr, Eogers, he says : " That in the afternoon of the day before we reached the place of encampment, we came to a stream; I was tired and fatigued with the journey; my feet were sore, and I was just able to proceed; Pike told the chief of the gang that he ' would carry me over on his shoulders.' The old chief in a gruff voice, said ^ well.' Pike whispered in my ear as we were crossing the stream : ' Jonah, don't close your eyes to-night; 212 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. wh.en they sleep take tlie hiife from the chief's helt and cut the cords ivith ivhicJi I am hound.' I was the only one of the prisoners who was not bound, and every night the old chief toot me under his blank- et. The nights were cold and raw, and though pro- tected in this way, I thought that I should perish." This much of the project was communicated to the other prisoners by Pike. Towards nightfall, they halted on the banks of the river, kindled the camp fire, partook of their meal, and were soon extended upon the ground, five Indians upon each side and the four prisoners in the middle. Mr. Eogers says : ' ' In a few moments the old chief was asleep, and in the course of half an hour, the savages were all snoring, but he knew his friends were awake, from their occasional half-suppressed cough. Pike was the nearest to me, and not over two feet in distance. It was a terrific efibrt for me to make up my mind to perform my part of the business, for I knew that instant death would be the penalty in a failure. But as the time passed on, and the snor- ing of the savages grew louder, my courage seemed to gather new strength. I had noticed that when the old chief laid down, that the knife in his belt was on his side next to me. I peered out from under the blank- et and I saw the embers of the fire still aglow, and a partial light of the moon. I also saw the hands of Pike elevated. I thought the time had come, and these two hours of suspense I had passed were more STATEMENT OF JONAH EOGEES. 213 terrible than all the rest of my life put together. I cautiously drew the knife from the scabbard in the old chiefs belt, and creeping noiselessly out from under the blanket, I passed over to Pike, and severed the cords from his hands. " All was the silence of death, save the gurgling noise of the savages in their sleep. Pike cut the cords that bound the other prisoners. We were now all upon our feet. The first thing was to remove the guns of the Indians ; the work for us to do was to be done with tomahawks and knives. The guns were carefully removed out of sight, and each of us had a tomahawk. Van Campen placed himself near the old chief and Pike over another. I was too young for the encounter, and stood aloof. I saw the tomahawks of Pike and Van Campen flash in the dim light of the half- smouldering flames ; the next moment the crash of two terrible blows ; these were followed in quick succession, when seven of the ten arose in a state of momentary stupefaction and bewilderment, and then came the hand-to-hand conflict in the contest for life. But our enemy was without arms, still they were not disposed to yield. Pence, however, seizing one of the guns, fired and brought down his man, making four killed, and two of them were very dangerously wounded; they fled with a tenific yell on the report of the gun. As they were retreating. Van Campen hurled his tomahawk, which buried itself in the shoul- ders of one of the retreating foe. And this Indian, 214 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OP PLYMOUTH. I \?ith the temble scar in his shoulder-blade, I saw years afterwards, and who ackuowledired that he irot the woimd npou this occasion." This is the ston*, as near as my memory retains it, and which I have so often heard from the hps of my old school-master, Jonah Eogers. It would ap- pear from this that four were killed, six escaped, three of whom wei^e woimded, two probably tatally. Tan Campen represents that the whole number were killed, and chielly by his own hands. This is wholly improbable, and it is a matter of much doubt if any one of the prisoners knew precisely the condi- tion of the battle-field after the conflict. It was light: it was of com-se the most exciting state of afiaii-s in which men could possibly be placed. The prisoners, now free, collected together imme- diately the arms of their savage captors, their blank- ets, the scalps of their friends, and the provisions at hand, and left the camp. In the morning they found a canoe. Getting into this they pHed the pad- dles with celerity, and, in two days after, were at the fort at Wilkes-Barre. It is untbrtunate that there should have been any spirit of rivalry on the part of Tan Campen, induc- ing him either to confuse the state of facts connect- ed with this g"allant exploit, or by misrepresentation, to have diminished its thiiUing charact^^r. There was glory enough for them all. I knew Abraham Pike well, and towards the close COLONEL JENKINS' MEMORANDUM. 215 of his life, I made several attempts to get Ms version of this startling adventure; but lie became extremely- intemperate in his old age, and his mind was im- paired and his eye wandered in vacancy, and he failed to give a satisfactory statement. But his ac- count of the affair, as I have heard it from others, agrees substantially with that given by Rogers. I am inclined to make him the hero of the trans- action, and I think the facts fully sustain the con- clusion. Colonel Jenkins — and who by the way may be regarded as a safe authority, a man of much intelli- gence, and one of the leading men in those days in the valley — says in a memorandum made by him at the time : " Pike, and two men from Fishing Creek, and two boys that were taken by the Indians, made their escape by rising on the ground, killed three, and the rest took to the woods and left the prisoners with twelve guns,'' etc. This statement very nearly agrees with the ac- count of Mr. Rogers which I have given, with the exception of making one prisoner more and one In- dian killed, less. Van Campen, as late as 1837, in his petition to Congress for a pension, — in which he gives a narrative of the transaction, — represents himself as the prin- cipal man, giving Pence some credit, but stating that the others were terrified and inactive. At this time he was the only survivor, and the mouths of 216 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. his fellow-prisonei'S wore sealed. AVe eau afford to allow an old man — ;iud at the time in poverty — con- siderable of a margin, Init we can harc^y jnstify him in so gross a misrepresentation of the ease. Mr. Mi- ner thinks '• there was honor enongh for all, and that there could be no motive but excessive self-gloritication for representing Pike and Rogers as cowards." Eogers does not pretend that he took an active part in the melee, but the share assigned to him — • considering that he was but a lad of fourteen years — was performed with great adroitness and uncommon courage. The statements of Pike and Eogers connected with the journal of Colonel Jenkins, agreeing with them in the main features, must establish the true history of the matter. Reviewing the whole subject from this stand- point, it presents a case of the exhibition of won- derful courage based upon a cool, deliberate, and daring resolution. This fearless and courageous act, accom- panied at about the same time by a corresponding one by Bennett and the prisoner arrested with him in Kingston, and attended with nearly the same re- sults, served as a salutary check to Indian incursions. While prisoners were taken afterwards, there were no such acts of brutality attending them as were prac- tised by the band who arrested Pike and his com- panions. Poor old Abraham Pike, who had been a ser- ABRAHAM PIKE. 217 geant in the Britinh army — a soldier of the Revolu- tion — fought bravely in the Wyoming battle ; a Hcout for Sullivan's army in its expedition into the Indian country, became in the latter years of his life a wan- dering mendicant, going from door to door for charity, and finally died a pauper, by the roadside, November eleventh, 1834, with no kindly hand even to close his eyes after his spirit had departed. Ills habits of extreme intemperance in his old age had blasted and destroyed a mind quick, discriminating, and very sensitive to honor ; and utterly prostrated a stout and well-knit frame, which in its hour of develop- ment had undergone great hardships and endured the most oppressive fatigues. It is probable that there is no one left in the val- ley who can point out the spot where repose the bones of the old " Indian killer." Jonah Rogers remained in Plymouth till within a few years before his death, when he removed to the Township of Huntington. He was a man highly re- spected, as also a man of comfortable means. His death occurred about the year 1825, though as to this, I speak only from vague memory. His residence was upon the back road, about midway between those of the late Calvin Wadhams and Captain James Nes- bitt. But I suppose this designation will hardly be intelligible to the majority of the people of Plymouth of this day. Pike may be said to have had no residence during 218 HISTOBICAL SKETCHES OF PLTSfOrTH. the last years of Ms life. He "^as a Tvanderer, and while his citizenship was in our town, the bine vanlt of heaven was the roof, and the soHd earth the floor, of his cabin. There is one circinnstance which is related both hy Pike and Bogers, which does not reflect mnch credit npon Tan Campen, and weakens materially his credibility in the narrative which he fnmishes ns. Oa the night of their escape from the Indian camp. Eogers became so disabled that he could not walk. Tan Campen proposed to leave the boy in the wilderness, and the rest of them make their jonmey withont him. To this proposition Pike solemnly pro- tested, and said " that he wonld carry the boy back to his parents or he wonld die with him." And he accordingly took him upon his shonlders, and thns saved him from desertion, and very likely, from death. Probably this circnm stance shonld not now be noted, as all the parties are dead; and my only excuse is that Tan Campen, in his published statement, deliberately branded Pike and Eogers with cowardice. The capture and arrest of the two Messrs. Harvey, Colonel Eansom and the two young women, Louis Harvey and Lucy "Rn 11 ford, are not involved in any questions of doubt or perplexity. Benjamin Harvey was an aged man at the battle of Xanticoke, December twenty-fifth, 1775. He had three sons, Benjamin, of Captain Eansom's Indepen- dent Company, Eevolutionary service, who died at V BEXJAMrS" HARTEY. 219 Valley Forge from the severity of tlie winter; Silas, who fell in Captain Whittlesey's company at the bat- tle of Wyoming; and Elisha, father of the gentleman of that name, and till yery recently a resident of Ply- mouth. Old Benjamin Harvey resided in 1780 in a log honse standing on a little elevated spot on the north side of the main road, opposite the old Indian burial- groimd, and between the Christian Church edifice and the small stream I have heretofore noticed. On a cool evening on the sixth of December, 1780, the elder Mr. Harvey, his son Elisha. Miss Lucy Bull- ford and his daughter Louis, and George Palmer Kansom,were seated around a bright wood fire in the house I have named. Colonel Ransom was then a young man of some twenty years, of pleasant personal address, had been with his father in the Revolution- ary war acting in the capacity of orderly-sergeant, and gained some credit for his valor at Millstone, Bound- brook, Germantown and Braudywine. On this even- ing he put on his best regimentals and went up to Mr. Harvey's, as he has frequently told the writer, " a sj)arl'i?ig." Now this word, which in old times meant the civil attentions of a young gentleman to a young lady with a view of marriage, if all things went on mutually agreeable, is not probably quite so euphoni- ous as our word courting, yet still its significance is entitled to the same consideration. . Our young soldier, dressed in his blue coat, with 220 HISTOKICAL SKETCHES OF FLTMOrXH. biiff lappels and gilt buttons, had just made Ms best bow and laid aside his cocked hat, when there was a gentle knock at the door: but while the knock was just audible, the party inside knew that it did not proceed from the knuckles of a closed baud. There was a shriller tone to the sound, verr much as though it were made with the head of a tomahawk. The practised eaar becomes rerr sensitive in discriminating sounds. The partr about the fire looked at each other, and read in e^ch others looks •■the cause of that alarm." Old Mr. Harver broke the silence br saving, '•' they had better invite them in, as resistance might make the matter worse;" and as the £;entle knock was a^ain repeated, he bade them enter. A band of six Jndians came in. and immediately b,nmd the whole party and set out towards Canada. This was the route the Indian always travelled with his bale of scalps, or with his prisoners of war. There his friends resided, and there his human peltry brought a better price than in any other market of the world, barbarous or enlightened. Arriving on the top of the Shawnee mountain — and out of danger of immediate pursuit — the party made a halt for consultation. Of the Indians, one of them was past middle age, two others were some years younger, and the remaining three were mere youths, this probably being one of their first expeditions. To the credit of himianitv. this consultation re- EELEASE OF THE YOUNG WOMEN. 221- suited in the release of the two young women. The old chief taking them aside from the rest of the party, painted their faces in true Indian style, and dis- charged them in the dark and gloomy wilderness, with directions to go to Colonel Butler, and tell him that " / put on this paint." To this they did not, of course, take exceptions; so parting with their friends, whom they never again expected to see, they cjm- menced their descent down the mountain, arriving at the fort at Wilkes-Barre on the following morning. The cannon was fired as the signal of alarm, but the captors and the captured were by this time far on their journey, and out of the sound even of the signal which fell upon the ears of the people of the valley as a no- tification, that somebody had been murdered or car- ried into captivity; a sound that not unfreq[uently in- formed them of terrible deeds as well as reminded them of human suffering and woe during the three years immediately succeeding that fearful massacre upon the Wyoming battle-field. The report of the cannon meant torture, death or bondage. The Indians and their prisoners moved on their trail after the girls had been released. The inclem- ency of the weather, or the snows and the wilderness were obstacles not to be considered. They travelled on that night, and the close of the day which fol- lowed brought the party to the head waters of the Mehoopany Creek, which empties into the Susc[uehan- na, some fifteen miles above Tunkhannock. nr§TOTU0AT. Sv \ > OF rwMorTii. Bonjaixiin Harwy wass an old, RvWo luaiu and not al>lo to nuvt tho oxpo$ui\^s ho had aU\\uiy iuounxHi. Ho \\-^\.« noavly «»o>v\\tY vxwi"^ of j\^\ It w»^ ovidoiit that lio OvMiId not ondwv tho iwiuvh vm\ tho tollowinij iuvM'niusi\ At>or $jHM\dh\g tho ov>Ul at\d chilly uight of D^ ^viulvr a$ thoy Ix^^t ovmld, in tho morning tho IwdJaiis hold a OvHinoil of w^U" iv^? to what wa^j to W douo with old Mr. Hai'\w. Tho valuo of his siulp iu tho British luarivOt pn^poixdoratod tho soah^ against his liio. The Sin-;\iivs IxMrndhim to a trxv with though. and fastonod his hoad in a jx^sition that ho ovnild noithor mow to tho right nor to tho lot>. Tho old chiof thou iuea«- nrod otf tho gTv^nnd somo throo rvxis^ callod tho thre« >\ning hv?n-os, and placing a tomahawk iu tho hand of 0{\oh and stopping a^j^ido, pointoil his tingvr to tho ho«\d of tho old nmn. All this Avas dono in sOoni.^ iu\d xrithont tho loast omotion dojnetod npon thoir stoic ovMintonanvVi?. Tho tirst ono hxirlod his tmnahawk — aftor givii\g tNY.^ or tlnvo flonrishos in tho air — with a piercing whov>p. It fexstonovl itsiolf in the tiwo, tivo or six inches alxnie tho old man's hoad. Tho siwnd and thinl made tho same otlort, but with liko ot^vt ! The vrholo Indiaix p\rty now Kx^arao turious; tho young Ax-arrioTs, ^^r their want of skill in this^probixbly their tii-st otVort, and the ohler OT\es fivm some other im- pulse. An angry s<.vne etisutxl. and they eame nojvrly to blows. The old chiof approached the victinj» unt- I'.I';n./amin iiAkVKV. 223 looHoncd liiH 1>;iii(Jh, iukI jjoiiiiijij^ l,o ilio iruil ilicy had paHHful ovor, told liim io "f^o." TIk; n;Hi of iln? (xiriy ]ii()V(mI Hiilli;iily on Uicir way, jijkI old Mr. Ihuvcy took IjIh. TIk! old ^•(!iiM(!iii!in ir) ^'iviiiMun uccoujil/ ofMiinHMid, " iliui iiH <',ii(!ii toirijiliiiwk (;afn<; whizziiij.'; iliroij^li ifif; uir, il, H<^<;nH'(| ,'i,h Uioiij'li if. could iiol, IhiL Hplit liiK hoad in I, wo. [V\\ti\, ho far aH ho could iiiidcn-)l,aiid from ilic ludiari diH[)ul-(! — haviiij^ HoriK! knowlcdi^'o of Ihcii' laii^iia^fi, l,lioii}i;li irr)[)(',i('(;c(,- — Ukj old cliicT look ili(! fj;roiiiid Miiit, "I.Ik; (;!rc.;i,i S[>iril. Ii;i,d irilc ifcrcd ;uid j)r(!V(;ni(;d liiK (Jcaili," wliilc l,lic oMictH iiripiil,<',(| il, wholly (,o l,li(! (iM[)rucl,iKcd liarKlH (d" Uic youii^j; hravcH, and thai; "the (;!i(!a(, Hpiril/ had no liiiiid in the maiicr." The Hl.uhhorti will oC ilic old HJicheiri, liow- (!vcr, pHivailcd, and l,hoMj^h in IJk; ininofily, JiiH c(>un- Hcl in tlxi idTair dccid(;d IJk; inHU*;. Mr. Ilarvccarno l)(3wil(lcrcd, and aftor f ravelling.'; Uic whole (hty found liirnHclf at ni^'ht at the f)oint iVom wfiiefi lie lia(J net out on iliat fiarCid niorninf^. Ovorcorno with (jxliauH- tion, he r<'.l\i\y to join Gen- eral Harrison's army on the western frontier. They numbered thirty-one men. They proceeded to Pau- ville in their boat, and thence they wei\t overhmd to Lake Erie. In passing through Bedford coimty, Cap- tain Thomas procured the addition of thirtv-seven recruits, and in Eannte twenty-seveu more, thus makii\g his full comphnneut of ninety-four men. On their arri\-al at Erie, the company (artillery) of Captain Thomas was attached to a rennsylvania regiment under Colonel Reese Hill. Of this company the following were riymouth men : Abitiliam Eoberts, John Blaue, Festus Free-- man. James Hevans and AVilliam Face. The company had not been long at the point of OVIOJt THK UAR. 243 tlioir (]tain Thoman' men, they received enpecial commendation. In consequence of tho bar, however, Terry could not get his heavy nhipH out, and dared not meet the enemy wilJiout the.m. To hin great relief, however, Barclay moved to the Canada Hhore, not Hupponing that his adversary was ready to go to nea. Perry immediately taking advantage of the ab- sejice, paHHefl his flag-ship, the Lawrence, and the Niagara, his largest vessels, over the bar with light- ers, the schooners following; and within twenty-fVjiir hours after the departure of Barclay, ho had his ships ready for action. He lacked, however, his comple- ment of men. 244 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. And here comes in tlie Plymouth, feature of the great battle of the Lakes, small, comparatively, it is true, but nevertheless so important as to be stamped upon medals of silver to be held in perpetual memory. The tenth of September was approaching, when the gallant young officer of but twenty-seven years was to measure swords with the mistress of the seas. The crews of his new ships were to be replenished. Time was short, and the slow progress of enlistment in the ordinary way would not meet the emergency. He sent an invitation ashore for volunteers to fully man his quarter-decks. The proportion which fell to Captain Thomas' company was four. He ordered out his company, read the request, and desired four men to volunteer by stepping four paces to the front. William Pace, Benjamin Hall, Grodfrey Bowman, and James Bird advanced to the line of honor. They were immediately placed on board the Niagara. A thousand cheers for old Shawnee and Kingston. Kevolutionary sprouts ; they bore high aloft the fame of their ancestors. The blood of the Ransoms, the Hd,rveys, the Graylords, or the Bidlacks had not sod- dened the Wyoming battle-field in vain. The shore of Lake Erie was about to chronicle new feats of valor of men of the same soil, after the lapse of a third of a century. On the morning of the tenth of September, the British fleet of sixty-three guns weighed anchor in THE BATTLE OF LAKE ERIE. 245 the port of Maiden. Perry, with his fleet of fifty- four guns, was waiting to meet it. He hoisted the flag upon his own vessel, on which were inscribed the last words of Commodore Lawrence : " Don't give UP the Ship." This was the signal for action^ and cheer upon cheer rolled down the line. When within a mile and a half of the enemy's }ine, the blast of a bugle came ringing over the water, the signal of battle. This was followed by a single gun, whose shot went bounding by the Lawrence, and then followed the discharge of the long guns of the whole British squadron. Perry was unable to use his carronades, and was thus exposed for a half hour be- fore he could bring his guns within range. " Steering straight for the Detroit, a vessel a fourth larger than his own, he gave orders for the schooners that lagged behind to close up within half cables' length. Those orders, the last he gave during the battle, were passed by trumpet from vessel to vessel; the light wind having nearly died away, the Lawrence suffered severely before she could get near enough to open with her carronades, and she had scarcely taken her position before the fire of three vessels were di- rected upon her. Enveloped in flames and smoke, Perry strove desperately to maintain his ground till the rest of the fleet could close, and for two hours sustained, without flinching, this unequal contest. The balls crashed incessantly through the sides of the ship, disrnounting the guns ai|d strewing the deck 246 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF TLYMOUTH. with the dead, until at length, with every trace and bowline shot away, she lay an unmanageable wreck on the waters. But still through the smoke, as it went before the heavy broadsides, her colors were seen fly- ing, and still gleamed forth in the sunlio-ht that o-lo- rious motto : ' Don't give up the Ship ! ' Calm and unmoved at the slaughter around and his own des- perate situation, Perry gave his orders tranquilly as though executing a manoeuvre." — (Headley.) After every gun had been dismounted, and out of the one hundred men who entered the action with him but eighteen stood before him un wounded, when peer- ing through the smoke, he saw the Niagara, ap2:)ar- ently uncrippled, drifting out of the battle. Leaping into a boat, he exclaimed: " If a \dctory is to be gained, I will gain it!" and amidst a perfect storm of shot and shell he boarded the Niagara, faced her about, and flung out his signal for close action. He immediately bore down upon the enemy's centre, reserving his fire till in the midst of the enemy's fleet; with the Detroit and Lady Provost within pistol shot on the right and left, he opened his broadside. Headley says, that " the shrieks that wrung out from the Detroit were heard even above the cannonade; while the crew of the Lady Provost, unable to stand the fire, ran below, leaving their wounded, stunned and bewildered commander alone on deck, leaning his face on his hand, and gazing vacantly on the passing ship." An action conducted in tliis manner could not last THE BATTLE OF LAKE EEIE. 247 long," and within fifteen minutes after the desperate charge, the British flag struck — the proud and haugh- ty " Mistress of the Seas " had met more than her equal; and so Perry notched it down upon the tablets of history, before the smoke had cleared away, or the last echo of his guns rebounded from the shore : " We have met the enemy, and they are ours." One of the most brilliant naval engagements of the world, and the victory at the time was almost de- cisive of the war. Three hundred men were killed and wounded upon both sides. Our townsman, William Pace, has very fre- quently given me an account of the engagement, and as he would dilate upon the conduct of Perry and the terrible charge of the Niagara upon the two vessels, the little man's frame would shake with emotion. He assisted to raise Perry from his boat to the deck of the Niagara. He was also upon the Lawrence imme- diately after the action, and saw the fifty men, whose bodies were mangled, still lying there, the blood and gore covering the entire surface of the deck. The Legislature granted those who volunteered for the naval action and citizens of this State, silver medals. He brought me his in 1847, with the view of obtaining for him a pension. It is a circular plate, probably four inches in diameter, and the eighth of an inch in thickness. On one side is the raised profile likeness of the American commander, with the in- scription: "Presented by the Government of Penn- 248 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. sylvania. Oliver Hazard Perry; Pro patria vicit." Upon the otlier side : " To William Pace, in testi- mony of his patriotism and bravery, in the Naval en- gagement on Lake Erie, September Tenth, 1813." He was a short, thick-set little man, probably five feet four inches in height, with a pleasant smile gen- erally on his face. He remarked, " that so long as he had been able to support himself he would not accept a, pension from his State; but now, as he was getting old, he thought the State ought to assist him." And 60 I thought, and I sent the medal to General Eoss, who was then our representative in the Senate of Pennsylvania, who procured the passage of a law on the fifteenth of March, 1847, granting him a pen- sion. Pace lived in the back part of Plymouth, known as Blindtown, at the time of his enlistment, and died but a few years since an humble and unpretending man; upright in his conduct, and held in the esteem and good opinion of all his neighbors. Our company was in several engagements before they were discharged. At the battle of the Thames the company behaved well under the command of Lieutenant Ziba Hoyt, who by the way was a most excellent and worthy citizen. Captain Thomas, being detained at Detroit with a part of the company and the field-guns, for its defense, the rest of the company, under Lieutenant Hoji:, followed the fleeing enemy to the Thames. LETTER FROM CAPTAIN THOMAS. 249 They were honorably discharged after the expira- tion of the term for which they enlisted. During the time I was engaged in preparing these sketches for publication, I received the following very interesting letter from Captain Thomas, now a resi- dent of Wyoming, State of Illinois, and in good health at the age of eighty-five years. I insert the letter, as it will be not only a reminder of an old and valued acquaintance to the citizens of this county who knew him, and where he spent the greater part of his life, but also testimony of some of the facts about which I write. " WTOMme, Illinois, Nov. 23, 1871. '' Colonel H. B. Wright: " Dear Sm. — Mr. Charles Myers (formerly from Wilkes-Barre) brought to my notice a statement under your name, in the Luzerne Union of the first of this month, giving a short sketch of the com- pany that marched under my command to Lake Erie in the year 1813. " In reading your remarks it brought vividly to my mind all the circumstances of the part I had in that campaign, although fifty-eight years have passed, and the years of my age will be eighty-five on the second of February next. "While you have given a more favorable as -well as acctirate account of the behavior of the company while in the service of our country than has been written or published, yet I see that you are in fault in some particulars. "•One instance I mention : you state * that the company march- ed with the army to the river Thames under the command of Lieu- tenant Hoyt.' This requires explanation. The fact is, that when we crossed the Lake and marched up opposite to the city of De- troit, the hostile Indians appeared in strong force on the bank of the river in a warlike and threatening attitude. I was ordered to cross the river with my company and drive the Indians from the 250 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. city, and to remain there and guard tlie place while the main army followed in the pursuit of the retreating enemy. This service waa faithfully performed, although the Indians tried to prevent our landing, firing at us with their rifles ; but when we opened upon them with our field-guns, they scattered like a flock of sheep. While we were guarding the city we had several alarms, but the Indians finding us always in readiness to meet them, never ven- tured to come within reach of our guns. " I would like to relate many incidents that I recollect con- nected with this service, but I have been wholly out of the prac- tice of writing many years ; still, I must mention one circumstance. "We went down the Susquehanna on a board raft that Elihu Par- rish was taking to market. "We ran into Shupp's Eddy, and landed, for the purpose of taking in some men in that vicinity who were members of my company. Among them was a man by the name of Moyer. All of them had got aboard of the raft but him, and we were impatient to get off. He did not come, and I went to his home near by to hurry him on. I opened the door and entered, when a scene presented ibself that requires one of better descrip- tive powers than I have to describe. Moyer stood there in his uni- form, and apparently ready to march. His wife and a number of children surrounding him, crying bitterly, and as though their hearts would break at the parting — they literally held him so fast that he could not move. *' James Bird, whose sad fate has been commemorated in song, was standing by, and seeing the family in such distress, it touched his generous sympathies, said to Moyer, ' Give me youk TINI- FORM COAT AND I WILL GO IN YOUK PLACE.' Moyer was SO Over- powered by the generous and noble act that he could not say a word, but silently took off his coat and gave it to Bird ; when we immediately went upon the raft and proceeded at once on our journey to Lake Erie. Very respectfully yours, "Samuel Thomas." ■ Tlie correction of General Thomas is not very ma- terial. The point of discrepancy is, whether the JAMES BIRD. 251 whole of his company passed over the river to De- troit, or a part of it only. The tradition of the affair is that Lieutenant Hoyt, with a part of the compaDy, left Captain Thomas at this place and proceeded on with the army to the Thames, and participated in the battle there. The noble conduct of poor Bird, in taking the military coat of Moyer and joining the company as a substitute, cost him his life, and that too under a state of facts that shocks the mind. It is true he was convicted of desertion, but it was not desertion through cowardice or a desire to shun the service of his country. It is, indeed, passing strange, how the man should have been convicted, or what the oflScer meant, in command, who could affirm such a finding. Bird was a patriot and a man of unquestioned courage. He had voluntarily left the ranks of his company and went on board the Niagara at the mo- ment, when every one knew that a desperate action was about to be fought. And when severely wounded, was ordered to " leave the deck" by Perry — " No," cried Bird, " I will not go, Here on deck I took my station : Ne'er -will Bird his colors fly; I'll stand by you, gallant Captain, Till we conquer or we die ! " This was the language of a man who a few days afterwards was condemned for desertion by a " drum- 252 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. head " court-martial and shot down like a dog ! And what was the charge ? Certainly not an offense that corresponded with the awful character of the penalty inflicted. Was it cowardice ? No. Was it a desire to flee the service ? No. It was charged upon him that he had deserted the ranks, but it was after the battle was fought and the victory won — a victory too that was sealed by his blood. I well remember, though then but a lad of six years of age, that the report of the execution of this man sent a thrill through this valley. G-rief pervaded the entire population. He was a great favorite with the people, and the sensation produced by his death was as sincere as it was intense. The people of the valley could not believe the rumor; and when the facts of the case became known, it only added fuel to the burning fire of excitement. He was promoted on the Niagara for deeds of courage. Shortly after the naval engagement on the lake, and in which he had exhibited so much courage, he learned of the intended attack by the British on New Orleans; that the South were arming for resist- ance, and he made up his mind to be with them. In company with some of his men, he left without orders; he was overtaken at Pittsburg, where he had made ar- rangements with a few bold and congenial spirits to join him, and enter Jackson's army. Tried by a court-martial, he was condemned for desertion, and shot to death, kneehng upon his coffin ! JAMES BIED. 253 The poor fellow's prayer to be allowed time to lay his case before Perry was denied him, and his execu- tion immediately followed the unrighteous sentence. It makes one's heart sick at such savage and inex- cusable conduct. Such a penalty for such an offense! It might have suited an age of barbarism, but is not to be tolerated in this. It was the untimely death, and the inexcusable circumstances which surrounded it, that inspired the muse of Hon. Charles Miner, from whom we have al- ready quoted, in the production of that commemora- tive, and, at the time, most popular ballad, commenc- ing : " Sons of Freedom, listen to me." Deeds are sometimes done under the sanction of law that shock our senses, and make us feel the utter imbecility and total want of qualifications in human jurisprudence. A more glaring case in proof of this cannot be cited than in the conviction and execution of James Bird! More than fifty years have passed by since the tragedy; but these same fifty years have not erased from my memory the deep and lasting impression the sad event indelibly stamped upon my mind. I am but one of the multitude that shared this feeling at the time, yet all of those who are now gone, as well as those who survive, never changed their opinion of the cruelty of this judicial murder. Upon the attack upon Baltimore by the British, in 254 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. 1814, a requisition was made upon our northern coun- ties for a draft. Five companies were raised in pursu- ance of tliis order. The Plymouth men were in Cap- tain Peter Halleck's company. Those who were drafted from Plymouth were: Adjutant of the regi- ment, Noah Wadhams; Second Lieutenant, Jeremiah Fuller; Third Sergeant, Joseph Wright; First Corpo- ral, Ezralde; Privates, George D. Nash, Thomas Lynn, John Hunter, Anson Car Skadden, Aaron Van Loon, Wm. Blane, Philip Group, Luke Blane, Samuel Harvey and Aaron Closson. The company of Captain Halleck marched to Danville, and was there attached to a regiment under the command of Colonel James Montgomery. But before full arrangements were made at Danville, the northern rendezvous, in making the necessary organi- zation for a march, news came of the gallant defense of Fort McHenry and the expulsion of the British from the Chesapeake; and the regiment was dis- charged, the men of the northern companies returning to their homes. Among the papers of my father, I find one of which the following is a copy. It seems that he was not only a member of Captain Halleck's company, but also an ojicer. 1 give the paper as a relic of the past. "Joseph Wright, Third Sergeant: " Take notice, that you are hereby required personally or by suf- ficient substitute to appear at the house of Jonathan Hancock, ia TOWN MEETINGS. 255 the Borough of Wilkes-Barre, properly armed and equipped for service at the hour of ten o'clock A. M. on the ninth day of Novem- ber next, to march "when required. Appeals to be heard at tho house of Jonathan Hancock, on the ninth day of November next. " Given under my hand, the twenty-eighth day of October, A. D. 1814. " Stephen Van Loon, Captain." , It appears, as I find by a memorandum in a small diary of his made on the fourteenth, that " on this day I eat my first rations of bread and beef furnished by the United States." In years after I procured his land warrant, as also for most of the others, who were at, as they termed it, " the Siege of Danville ! " As to the part our people took in the war with Mexico and the late rebellion, I leave it to be re- corded by some other pen. CHAPTER X. TOWN MEETINGS. — EARLY SYSTEM OF LAWS. FIRST TOWN OFFICERS. rriHE "town-meeting" of our ancestors was an -1- important affair, and so it was within my own recollection in Plymouth. In the early days of the valley, the town meeting of Westmoreland assembled the "Freemen" of all that territory between the Delaware river east and the 16 256 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. present Sullivan county line west, and from the Le- liigh soutli to Tioga point north, embracing more than seventy miles square. Within this tovm of Westmoreland, Plymouth had been early designated and named one of the first five, as already stated, and set ofi" by the Susquehanna company in 1768. Other townships from time to time were set off and designated as districts. Plymouth was known outside of the public records as Shawnee — Shawanee or Shawney — Franklin's journal spells it Shawney; the Indian name being provincialized from cJi'uanois, which is a very pretty appellation. The town of Westmoreland was governed by a digest of laws, or more properly called rules and reg- ulations. These were prepared by the Susquehanna company, at Hartford, Connecticut, on the second of June, 1773, with the acquiescence of the settlers. The principal authority under these rules, as to the township or district municipal government, was vested in a board of directory, " to be composed of three able and judicious men among such settlers." These were to be elected annually on the first Mon- day in December; and their duties were, "to take upon them the direction of the settlement of each town, under the company, and the well-ordering and the governing the same; to suppress vice of every kind; preserve the peace of God and the King therein; to whom each inhabitant shall pay such, and the same, submission, as is paid to the civil authority in the directors' meetings. 257 several towns of this colony." The rules provided for the election of a constable, "to be vested with the same power and authority as a constable by laws of this colony is, for preserving the peace and apprehend- ing offenders of a criminal or civil nature." These directors of each town were required to meet " on the first Monday of each month, and oftener if need be, with their peace officers, as well to consult for the good regulation thereof, as to hear and decide any differences that may arise, and inflict proper fine or other punishment on offenders, according to the general laws and rules of this colony, so far as the peculiar situation and circumstances of such town and plantation will admit of ; and as the reformation of offenders is the principal object in view, always pre- ferring serious admonition and advice to them, and their making public satisfaction by public acknowl- edgment of their fault, and doing such public service to the plantation as the directors shall judge meet; to fines in money or corporal punishment, which how- ever, in extreme cases, such directors shall inflict as said laws direct." The directors of all the towns were required to meet quarterly " to confer with each other on the state of each particular town, and to come into such resolutions concerning them as they shall find for their best good; as also to hear the complaints of any that shall judge themselves aggrieved by the decisions of their directors in their several towns, who shall 258 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. have tlie right to appeal to such quarterly meet- ing/' The rules further provide, " that no one convicted of sudden and violent breach of the peace, of swear- ing, drunkenness, stealing, fraud, idleness and the like, shall have the liberty of appeal without first procuring good security for his orderly and sober be- havior," etc., and in civil proceedings an appeal was confined to matters in controversy exceeding twenty shillings. In this way petty matters were to be disposed of ; but when it came " to the high-handed crimes of adultery, burglary and the like, the convict shall be sentenced to banishment from the settlement and a confiscation of all their personal effects therein to the use of the town where such offense is committed; and should there still be the more heinous crime of mur- der committed, which Grod forbid, the offender shall be instantly arrested and delivered into the hands of the nearest civil authority in Connecticut," etc., etc. No appeal lay " from the doings of such quarterly meeting, or their decrees to the Susquehanna company, save in disputes as to land," And thus we find the character of the tribunal and the mode of administering justice in Plymouth ninety-eight years ago. As the frame of law was adopted and promulgated by the Susquehanna company in June, 1773, and the time named for the election of directors in December APPOINTMENT OF DIRECTORS. 259 in eacli year, a general town meeting is warned, i. e., of the whole territory of Westmoreland, which on as- sembling appointed three directors to act till the fol- lowing December, in the towns of Wilkes-Barre, Ply- mouth, Providence, Kingston, Pittston and Hanover. The appointments for Plymouth were Phineas Nash, Captain David Marvin and J. Glaylord. These gentlemen, therefore, we may consider as the first ju- dicial ofiicers who ever sat in judgment upon the Ply- mouth bench. But only reflect, if these three civil magistrates were alive to-day, and in commission, what labor would devolve upon them in disposing of all the cases of "breaches of the peace, swearing, drunkenness, gaming and idleness." Would they have many spare hours out of the twenty-four, that is, if they faithfully discharged their duties ? And this is a question we have no right to ask, as all officers in those days discharged their official du- ties personally. Those were days when there was no pay and competent men held office, and their charac- ter was at stake to do the duty faithfully. Is such the case now ? This is a question we have a right to ask. But as I am writing history, I must confine myself to the past, and let some one who shall follow me comment upon the present ! Each district was thus empowered on the December following the general town meeting, to elect its three directors, composing a municipal court, and its constable; the appointing 260 HISTOEICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. power for all other officers was vested in the general town meeting, and so remained up to the time when Westmoreland was set off into a county. At a town meeting held on the first of March, 1774, the districts were established and all the officers appointed. I copy from the journal the following : " Maech y*^ 2d, 1774. " Voted, That y® town of Westmoreland be di- vided in the following manner into districts, that is to say, that y® town of Wilkes-Barre ' be one entire dis- trict, and known by the name of Wilkes-Barre dis- trict; ' and that Plymouth, with all y^ land west of Susquehanna river, south and west to the town line, be one dibtrict, by the name of Plymouth district." And at the same time defining the limits of Kings- ton, Pittston^ Hanover, Exeter, Providence; also mak- ing Lackaway^ Blooming Grove, Shehola and Coshu- tunk districts on the Delaware. After defining the boundaries of each, the meeting proceeds to appointing officers. I shall only name those appointed for Plymouth. Seven selectmen were chosen, one of them was Samuel Kansom ; seven collectors of rates, one of them, Asaph Whittlesey; twenty-two surveyors of highways, three of them, Elisha Swift, Samuel Eansom and Benjamin Harvey; fourteen fence viewers, two of them, John Baker and Charles Graylord; fifteen listers, i. e., persons to make enrolments, two of them, Elisha Swift and Gideon THE TOWN SIGN-POST. 261 Baldwin; twelve grand jurors, two of them, Phineas Nash and Thomas Heath; seven ty thing men, one of them, Timothy Hopkins; eight key keepers, one of them, Thomas Heath. And so the civil list was filled up. The represen- tatives to the Connecticut Assembly were chosen semi-annuaUy — they had probably been chosen at a former meeting. Two hundred and six persons took the freemen's oath at this meeting, which shows that there were not a dozen absentees of the whole male voting population of the town of Westmoreland at the time this meeting assembled. It was " voted at this meeting that for y^ present, y^ tree that now stands northerly from Captain But- ler's house, shall be y^ Town Sign-Post." The year following, a strife grew up between the people on the two sides of the river, the Plymouth and Kingston people demanding that the Sign Post should be on the west side of the river, and accord- ingly they met to take a vote. The west side carried it by a small majority, and designated a certain tree in Kingston, " ten rods north of the house of Mr. Koss, the Public Sign-Post." The proceedings of the few succeeding meetings, and important ones too, for there were chosen at them representatives to the Gen- eral Assembly of Connecticut, do not state at which Public Sign -Post they were held. Bad blood grew out of this strife. A compromise was finally made, and at a general town meeting it was c;» 262 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF rLYMOUTH. " Voted, That for tlie future tlie aunnal to-svn meetings aud Freenieu's meetings shall be held half the time on the east side of the river, and the other half on the west side of the river, for one year." In this vote they had a precedent, for the home government of Connecticut had settled a like diffi- culty between Xew Haven and Hartford, in designat- ing each of these towns as the alternate places of the meeting of the Legislature. The Public Sign-Post in these davs meant some- thing; it was the public hall for conducting the pub- lie business and holding elections; the place for post- ing notices, for newspapers had not yet made their appearance there; the public whipping-post for pun- ishment of petty offenses, and it may be well doubt- ed whether our reform in this particular has bene- fited the public morals; it was the central place of business transactions, the exchange, the auction mart, the forum, the hustings, the recruiting depot, and the general centre of all public afiairs. It don't precisely conform to our modem ideas of things, but nevertheless did very well ninety-eight yeai"s ago. There is one thing about which there cannot be much question, and that is, that at these Public Sign-Posts th.ey elected better men to office than now; and that if some of the men who now hold places, had lived in the days of Sign-Post elections, and used the effrontery and despicable practices they now do to procure them, they would have been tied SELLING THE TOWN POOR. 263 up to these same Sign-Posts and enlightened with the cat-o'nine-tails. Those were the blessed days when the office sought the man, and it was sustained in its dignity by his acceptance; not as is the case now, frequently, when the office gives the incumbent the only claim he has to notice. These annual town meetings furnished the occa- sion for not only a general assemblage of the voting population, but of the young men also. It was a day of jubilee and amusement. The young men would engage in feats of physical strength — wrestling, throwing the bar, playing ball, foot races, and like amusements. In later years I can well remember myself, that the annual town meeting day in Plymouth was a day of amusement as well as of business. This was held, if I remember, on the third Friday in March, at which time the township officers were elected. All turned out, old and young, and made it a general jubilee. The practice, I suppose, came down from the prece- dents of the town meetings of old Westmoreland. But there was one thing always done at these annual meetings which did not very much redound to the credit or humanity of our early settlers ; that was the selling of the town poor to the lowest bidder, to be boarded for the year. Along from 1812 to 1820, Jerre Allen, a deranged man, would be brought to the place of holding the town meet- 264 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. iiig, iu cliains, and thus put up for sale. Speedy Nash, a poor, simple, foolish creature, also. The bidding on the paupers, for the year's keep, would generally begin at a hundred dollars and go down to fifty or forty-five, and would be generally struck ofi:' to some mountaineer, living in a log hut, and the town contribution would sustain pauper and purchaser. The practice was not local; it reached throughout the State. Finally, however. Judge Burnside caused the overseers of the poor of some district to be indicted in his court, and the penalty he imposed on this ofiense of inhumanity, put a final stop to the selling of the township poor annually, at auction, to the lowest bidder. The town meeting, however, is one of the institu- tions of the past. The last twenty-five or thirty years have changed its features to such an extent, that one of our old settlers, were he to return, would not recognize it any better than he could divine the meaning of a telegraph wire or a locomotive ! In a careful re^aew of the system of laws applica- ble to Plymouth a hundred years ago, we can hardly say that there has been much improvement for the better. That they were better administered I think there cannot be a doubt. If drunkenness, and gaming and idleness were upon our calendar of this day, and made the subjects of punishment, there cannot be a question but the moral tone of the community would occupy a higher standard. THE FIRST TRIUMVIRATE. 265 We cannot therefore say that we are ahead of our plain and unpretending ancestors in this particular. Idleness, perhaps, should not be classed as a crime, and yet the example it furnishes to those who cannot afford to be idle, is of the most pernicious character. I have not been able to ascertain, after diligent inquiry, where our first Triumvirate held their court. Phineas Nash, Captain David Marvin, and J. Gay lord, clothed as they were with the municipal power of Plymouth, must have had a court, and un- doubtedly a whipping-post and stocks ; but the lo- cality o these things deemed necessary in a past age, has become somewhat obscure. These men and their successors were to Plymouth what the three triumvirs were to Eome after the fall of Caesar, or the three Consu s to France who preceded the first Empire. Holding therefore the commissions of the peace, and the balances of justice for old Plymouth, it is to be regretted that not only the records of their court but the place of administration are gone. Nor can we find any record of the acts of their successors, or even the names of them. The floods and the ravages of the common enemy have left but little to enlighten us. A friend has furnished me with a very venerable looking paper, but well written, and in a hand too which I recognize as that of my old schoolmaster, of which the following is a copy: " At a meeting of the proprietors of the common- 266 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. ' field in Sliawney, legally -warned, and held on the twenty-fonith of March, ITS 6, " Voted, That John Franklin, Esq., be moderator for said meeting. " Voted, That all such houses as are within the limits of this commonfield, and occupied with tamilies, "be remoyed out of said field by the tenth of April next; the committy to giye speedy warning to any such residents and see it is put in execution. The house now occupied by the widow Heath excepted, provided the said widow Heath shall run a fence so as to leave her house without said field. '' [A true copy]. " Attest: Jonah Eggeks, Clark." It is probable that this commonfield, as it is called, may have had something to do with the place of the administration of justice. One or two of the oldest people, now resident in Plymouth, have a per- fect recollection that the general parade-ground was on the brow of Ant Hill. The fences in those days had not so far encroached upon the common. This was the commonfield refen-ed to in the memorandum of the meeting, for Mrs. Heath's house, afterwards Mrs. Morse, still stands near the elm tree; and here was a common place of assembling within my own recollection; and it is more than probable that the elm tree still standino; there was the Public Si2;n- Post of the town. My own recollections do not go fm-ther back than fifty-five years; and while I remem- THK OLD ELM, OR WHIPPING POST. THE rUBLIO SIGN-POST. 267 ber well the tree standing there fifty years since, of large size then, I do not remember the tradition of its being the Public Sign-Post of the town. The sign post, commonficld,and house of justice, were probably all on this parade-ground. In those days there was a public school-house on the opposite side of the road, a few rods below the locality of the elm. Here I first went to school, to John Jiennet, Esq., late of Kingston. The benches and desks were removed from that to the academy, and the old house was torn down about 1815.. I have but little doubt, therefore, but the old school-house upon Ant Hill was in early days the fo- rum of justice, and the old elm, the Public Sign and whipping-post of Plymouth, ninety-eight years ago. Will you spare it ? It stands there now, erect, green and vigorous; a glorious old landmark of the early days of Plymouth, and it is to be hoped that it may be permitted to remain. The eyes of our ances- tors rested upon it in days agone. To me it is a pleasant reminder of the plain and primitive days of the town. CHAFTEE XI. OCCUPATIONS ANP HABITS OF THE FEOrLE IN EARLY PAYS. INPUSTKY. — ECONOMY. — CHVKCn. SCHOOL-TEACHEES. KOCERS, PATTERSON, CVR- TTS. SAVF.F.T AND OTHEJRS. I COME now to that time in onr history when I write chiefly from my own knowledge and per- sonal obse^^'atiou. I have i-eached the point where it w^is my original design to have begnn. Starting ont in company with onr people, in 176S, from Litchtield, Connecticut, we found a tril^ of red men in the possession of old Shawnee. This led to the inquiry who they were, where they came from, and what finally became of them. Disposing of this, it was very natural to ascertain if thei-e had been any white people there ahead of us. Before I had fairly got through the mazes in which these inquiries in- volved the thread of my story. I found myself in the midst of the Pennamite and Yankee war, and then in the Revolutionary struggle. And while pui-suing the i-ed line of battle, I at last foimd myself on board the Niagara, alongside of our giillaut and brave old friend, "Billy Pace," charging imder the command of yoimg Perry, the British fleet on Lake Erie. And into all these ditferent positions I found my- (•26S) HAB/TH or TJiK PEOPLE. 269 self compelled to go because the j^eople were ttiere of whom I was writing. And this muBt be my apology, if an apology is necessary. My readers may well conclude that I Piave given them a long introductory chapter. But those of them who are the descendants of Plymouth men must blame their ancestors and not me. Bo long as they were fighting men, if we speak of them, at all, we must speak of them in the battle as well as on the fann, or in other occupations. We have seen how they behaved themselves throughout the most trying and disheartening difficul- ties that it was ever the destiny of men to encounter. War at their own thresholds; war throughout the land ; murder, captivity and torture : these made up the yearly calendar. Tlieir valor and courage at Millstone elicited the especial notice and public commendation of Washing- ton. Butler put Whittlesey and his Plymouth men at the post of honor, as well as danger, at the battle of Wyoming. The officers of this company fell in the front ranks; the rank and file were literally over- powered and cut to pieces by a vastly superior force. At Lake Erie, the conduct of a private in the ranks is singled out as the object of especial notice by the Government, and the deeds of his bravery recorded upon a plate of silver. Wherever the exigency of the exciting times call- ed them, there they were, and they maintained their 270 HISTOKICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. honor. It is a pleasant tiling indeed to be able in af- ter years to record such, facts. They showed them- selves men of high tone and remarkable valor ; great self-reliance, and unflinching patriotism. These traits of character were alike exhibited upon the field of battle, as well as in Indian captivity. We are, therefore, by no means afraid to lift up the veil and disclose them to the world in their pri- vate employments and domestic relations. The war of the revolution had taught the lesson of personal as well as national independence; captivity the lesson of submission, as well as the important fea- ture of self-reUance; and the final result of the long and bitter conflict as to the question of the title to their lands, that a just cause should never be aban- doned. When universal peace therefore dawned, and do- mestic strifes were healed at their own homes and firesides, those of them who had survived the crash of war, and could breathe in repose, free from the re- straints of fear, were in a condition, if any people ever were, to enjoy the luxuries of a plain, simple and un- obtrusive life. The sons of those who had fallen in the public service, or in defense of their own private rights, knew well the cost of the soil they uiherited and therefore how to appreciate it. When, therefore, peace reigned and titles were con- firmed, they immediately set themselves down with no other view than to live by their labor. This they HOME PRODUCTS. 271 were not only willing to do, but it was to them a source of perfect happiness. The musket and the sickle did not now require partnership. The field could be planted with the expectation of gathering the crop it produced. The occupation of the people of the town fifty years since was agriculture. A retail store, a couple of blacksmith shops, a wheelright shop, and a carpen- ter's shop, were about the only exceptions. The coal business was then in its swathing bands. It may have been used in a dozen houses, partially, but upon the big kitchen hearth blazed the wood fire. The people had but little to do with the store. They lived upon what they produced by their own labor from the earth. The food they eat and the clothing they wore, they produced with their own hands — a little tea, some spices, salt and molasses were the chief articles of their purchases. The best of them drank rye coffee, unless upon some holiday or other extraordinary occasion. They dressed in homespun. I do not think that I wore an article of clothing till I was sixteen years old, that did not come out of my mother's loom ; and I suppose that my father's means were as ample as a majority of the people. A shirt made of homespun linen was a little scratchy at first, but after being washed a few times it sat very easy. In its new state it kept the pores open, and that was beneficial to health. In these times there was not much inducement for 17 07-7 niSTORICAL SKETCHES OF rLYMOUTH. mercliaiidising. Even the artielo of tobacco was a home product. I presume that the Plymouth mer- chant of those daj-s considered that he had done a good business for the year, if his sales reached two thousand dollars. Most of the early settlers owned a lot on the flats. Here was the broad field of their labor; and daily labor in those primitive days began at sunrise and ended with the approaching stars. One common highway led to the liats. Upon tliis i\>ad could be seen almost the entire male population of the town wending their daily way, at early dawn, during the season of planting and harvest, to the productive tields of the broad plain. Old and young made up this line. The summer school was for small children not yet of sufficient age for the requirements of the field. There was a common equality between master and man. They were clad alike; they ate the frugal but substantial meal from the same board. To save time, they carried with them their noon meal, so that on leaving home in the morning they made provision for the whole day, and did not return till evening. And so along the main thoroughfare and through " the old swing gate," passed and repassed for the six daj-s of the Aveek of the summer, a long line of in- dustrious and contented people, x^ll labored. There were no drones in the busy hive. No man was above work. Labor was respectable: labor was inviting; and more than all that, labor wiis the true and genu- INDUSTRY AND ECONOMY. 273 ine test of Rocial position in those good old primitive days in Plymoutl) — Uod IjIcss them. A hard hand was the ind(}x of manhood; and if the countenance did happen to bo a little burned in the rays of the sun, it detracted nothing from the social status of the person. The homespun garment did not derogate from the character of the man who wore it. In harvest time the minister, the schoolmaster, the blacksmith, the wheelwright and the carjjenter lent a hand, and all went " merry as a marriage bell." No one in these days, in our town, lived upon the perquisites or the spoils of office. The seeds of cor- ruption had not been sown even, and there was of course no crop. One idea of obtaining a livelihood only prevailed. The door opened to this the path of honest and simple toil, and this was the one they all pursued. The primitive door of the Plymouth home- stead a half century ago needed no locks, no bolts. These are the precautions of a higher state of civili- zation ! The days of simplicity and integrity and honesty required no defensive walls for the protection of the humble castle. A lock upon the door ! It would have implied that thieves and robbers were about; that some one of the community was under the ban of suspicion. All being occupied, there was little time either to think of, much less to commit crime. Noah Wad- hams, for a great number of years the sole justice of the peace of the town, held his coujrt on Saturday 274 HISTOIUCAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. afternoons to hear nny cases thatweve to be tried; Imt a half day's Avork had to he done in the field hefore the parties litigant eonld he heard. And at these trials there were no persons present save the parties and their witnesses. There were no idle lonngers thronging the tribnnal to gratify their curiosity or waiting their chances, if need he, on either side for witnesses. This is a commodity more in demand, I an\ told, in modern days; and the article is cheap. The dwellings were very generally on the main road; a few of which are still standing: the barns were on the opposite side. The honutiful harvest was stowed away in these, and when the winter set in, the sound of the tlail resounded from the one end of the long road to the othei-. Modern invention has almost totally supplanted this implement. But I like the music of the flail, and with the accompaniment of the keen whirr of the spinning-wheel, and the meas- ured beats of the old sipiare loom, which was in motion in almost every house, it was infinitely ahead of the tones of the piano. This may be in bad taste upon my part, but I am now too old to be taught other- wise ; nor do I desire to be. The principal crop in those days was wheat. Upon the sale of tliis, the tarmer relied for all the money he received. The remaining products of the farm were used in barter and exchange. There was very little money: what there was came from Easton, en the Delaware, the market for the wheat of the "tkips to easton." 275 whole valley. There were no banks. Easton hank hills made up the entire currency. When the winter set in, the first matter was the thrashing of the wheat. It was put away in bins, awaiting the fall of the first snow for transportation. When this occurred, all was commotion. The mo- ment the snow fell in sufficient quantity to warrant the journey, the teams were started. The distance by the Easton and Wilkes-Barre Turnpike, and then the only avenue of travel out of the valley toward the east, was sixty miles. The round trip could be made in three days. The load was usually about thirty bushels. It was an exciting and pleasant excursion in early days, this Easton journey. I have hauled many a load, and I have counted on Pecono a hundred sleds in line. The jingling of bells, the mirth and laughter, and sometimes the sound of music^ gave it a charm that made it very agreeable. Besides this, every tavern upon the roadside had its fiddler, and we generally had a dance for half the night, and then ofi" in the morning, our horses steaming in the snow flakes, and the merry songs and shouts made the summits of Po- cono and the Blue Mountain ring with their echoes ! Ah! if we could only always be young! I noticed, however, in these " trips to Easton," as they were called, that the " old settlers " enjoyed them quite as much as the boys. The first segar I ever smoked was while walking behind my sled up the Blue -iO uisrouuwi. sKKTouKs ov" riAMorTn. AlouutAiu. 1 ivnuMubov it wvll. tor tho otVoot^ wore not so agivoablo. I Nvas thou a bov ot" jioiuo oightoou yt?ars; I am told that vouwg- gvutlenieii oouiu\oi\vV smoking now at oight and ton yoafs of ago. !So muoh tor pivgiv!«s. l^nt I am waudoving. Kvorv tannov in iho days I am writing about. i-aistxl his own thvx. Fivni it tho liuon ot" tho hons<.^ hold wi\* manntaotmvd; ho givw his own wool: ho, in tact, pivdnood tivni his land almost ovorything oon- smued m tho family, l.uxurios woro tow. tho nooos- S{U"\os of life wvro abundant. 1 havo no ivason to question, hut that undor this mode and manner of life the mavises enjoyed themselves and wen? i\uite as happy as they are now. >yay. more so; for no debts weiv inounvd thou as now, in apoing the follies and the viivs of those who assume a higher sooial position on aeoonnt of their money. Fitty yoai-s agv ovjuality was tho rule: oaste in society had not ivaivd its head; thetv was no mwssity of striving for the highest ivund in tho ladder Ivcauso all were perched upon it. Every man was as good as his neighbor, that is if he behavevi himself vrell. lie wi^s not set lv\c"k for the ivason that his hands wore soiU\l with labor, or that he woiv a homespun coat. lattle was known in tho primiti\*e days of our town alxMit distinction in the social ivlations of Hte, There was a common scale of friendly and personal interconi-so which was verv ffeneraUr acknowU\lge^l K()(;rAii i^'-QiiAMTv. 277 11,11(1 (»l)Hc,rv('. HISTORICAL SKETCHES 01^ rLYSlOUTH. interost in each other's affairs. It ^^•;\s not an umisual thing for the \vhoh> farming eonimnnitv to turn out and gather the ei\^p, Avhioh ^Yonhl otherwiise have gvnie to wj\ste, of some nnfortnuate neighbor ^Yho \m\s pros- trate<.l upon a siek bini. This I have very freixuently ^YitnesstHi, and scjutx^ly a year pissed that an inst^ince did not take ph\ee. Bvvs weiv very common with the men, chopping new gixnindy raising huihiingSj corn hushing, and a variety of other branches of mamial hibor: with the women, qnilting, spinning, sewing, etc. These fivquent assemblages of the peoph^ were a means of uniting industry with ph^asui'e. They wouhl generally conclude with a supper, succcetled by games and otlier amusements: sometimes by a dance This, however, was of rare occurrence, as the Furitau mind had not yet come down to the l>elief, that danc- ing was altogether a harmless recreation ! The settlei-s were very gvnerally Xew England people, ami the social customs of their ancestors were pretty generally adheiwl to. Pjmcing, therefore, "was an innovation, and its progress was slow. But in the end it was reg^arvled with more favor, and very pi\>perly too, so tliat at this day, in our town, thei-e are few probably of the " stnughtest " religious sect who would condemn the amusement. Buildings for the purpose of religious woi-ship and for education wei-e eivcted by common contribution. All g^\^■c their mite in these enterprises, and those THE OLD ACAD E M Y. FAMILIARITY OF RELIGIOUS SECTS. 279 who had not money gave their labor, so that there was no tax imposed, and consequently no sinecure for the indolent, in its collection. No one grew suddenly rich because he was fortunate enough to hold the tax duplicates. There was but one road open to compe- tence and respectability, and that was honest, diligent and persevering lal)or. All denominations of religion worshipped in the second story of the old Academy for a great number of years. The fact that a particular sect had occu- pied the common benches on one Sabbath day, did not require their purification before another sect could use them on the next. Presbyterian, Methodist, Bap- tist, Episcopal, Christian, Catholic and Congregational in turn, all knelt at one common altar, and they were none the worse for it. The public morals and private virtues were not dimmed in the least particular by this familiar intercourse. It may be said, however, that this state of things was better suited to a primi- tiv(;, simple people than to a people more advanced in civilization. It is possible, barely possible. The schools were kept open winter and summer; in summer, however, they were taught by female in- structors; in winter, by male. It was small children only who attended the summer school; the larger ones were at labor. The school-master " boarded around." And as most of my readers may not know what this means, I will explain it. Ho would go from house to house 280 HISTOKICAL SKETCHES OF TLYMOUTH. for board and lodging", among the patrons of tlie school, and remain aeeordiug to a sehednle of time, which he based upon the mmiher of his pnpils, and in the proportion -whieh each patron sent to him. It was frequently said, however, hut I do not pretend to as- sert upon what ground ot' authority, that the master did not always adhere to his schedule time with all. He would eyer incline to exceed his limit where he tared best, and shorten it where he tared worse. And it was not unfroipiontly the case that the master in en- tering into his contract, which was a monthly allow- ance, "board and lodging in," provided to be relieved from sojourning with certain families; though this was a kind oi' confidential arrangement, and charity would ascribe it to distance, a large family, or sickness. And this was the way in which the kind-hearted, burly old settlers would dispose of a knotty question; and their memory is to be held in generous remem- brance for it. Among those who may be classed as the early per- manent instructors, were Jonah Rogers (of whom no- tice has already been made), Thomas Patterson and Charles C. Curtis. Dr. Tliomas Sweet, an eminent physician afterwards, and now a resident of Scranton, taught occasionally; and, by the way. the doctor presented me with a thin, tlat ruler, a few years since, which he said he broke over the shoulders of the writer for misconduct, and had retained it some fifty years as a souvenir of early days. The circumstance had passed THE SCHOOL-MASTERS. 281 my memory, as flagellations in the remote days of which we are writing were of too frequent occurrence to be held in memory. The old idea, and one by no means to be scouted, pretty generally prevailed, " that if you spared the rod you spoiled the child." Jonah Rogers never called up a poor urchin for punishment that this quotation was not a matter pre- cedent; and the consequence was that he came very nearly making his whole school unbelievers in the di- vine doctrines of the revelation ! But I must say that while the good old man made a great deal of fuss and talked very loud, and looked uncommonly fero- cious, his blows were exceedingly light. He taught in the public school of Plymouth probably fifteen years, commencing, I am informed, not far from 1800. Thomas Patterson succeeded him, and he contin- ued as the principal instructor for probably ten years. He spent his summers upon his farm, and his win- ters in Plymouth in the capacity of teacher. He possessed a very good education; in all the English branches he was very proficient, and he had some knowledge, though limited, of the classics. He had much energy of character, and was a man of strict integrity and honor. He was an Irishman. Having taken part in the Rebellion of 1798, he fled in disguise from his native country and made this one his home. He would often tell his scholars of the marked and bloody events of the noble effort of the Irish people to rid themselves of their English oppressors; and in 282 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. speaking of the execution of Eobert Emmet — witli whom he was acquainted — upon his conviction of high treason, the old man would shed tears. His reverence and love for the free institutions and government of the United States were unbounded. He would say, " that the only hope for the ameliora- tion of the condition of man was centred in the American Kepublic; that when this system failed, de- basement and slavery would follow in its train." I attended his school when he commenced teach- ing in Plymouth. This was not far from 1817. He was then a man of near fifty, stout, broad-shouldered, and nearly six feet in height. He had a well-de- veloped head, prominent features, a keen blue eye, heavy bushy eyebrows, and when his countenance was lighted up, he exhibited evidence of great intel- lectual power. The old gentleman always had lying upon his desk, before him, a bound volume containing the speeches of Ourran and Grattan, with the speech of Emmet delivered before his judges, when the ques- tion was propounded as "to what he had to say why the sentence of death should not be pronounced against him." A boy of sixteen, I committed this speech to memory, and would declaim it occasionally in school exercises, which was very agreeable to his feelings; and I have no doubt but that this fact led to the liberal education which I afterwards received, as the old gentleman never ceased his importunity with my father to give his son a collegiate course. And THE SCHOOL-MASTERS. 283 Ms arguments prevailed. It is due, therefore, that I, at least, should honor the old patriot's memory, and I do. He came to the valley soon after the conclusion of the Irish EebeUion, selected this spot as his home, married a daughter of the late Colonel Nathan Deni- son, of Kingston, and settled in Huntington, where he ended his days. He died some twenty years since. On a visit to Huntington some years ago, I went some distance out of my course to visit the old man's grave. He left a comfortable estate to his family. Three of his sons held prominent positions of trust in the Lehigh Coal and Navigation Company, in the days of Josiah White and Erskine Hazard. One of them, Ezekiel, is a prominent man in New Brunswick, New Jersey. Charles C. Curtis was the successor of Thomas Patterson. He continued several years in the public school as instructor. He was a kind and affable man in his deportment, and very highly respected for his probity of character. He married a daughter of Colonel George P. Eansom, who still survives her husband. Mr. Curtis, after the close of his occupa- tion as school-teacher, settled down with his family upon a farm in Jackson township, inherited byjiis wife from her father, where he died about the year 1850. And thus much for the early instructors of the youth of Plymouth. There were others, but they 284 HISTOEICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. were of more recent date, and I cannot therefore speak of tliem from my own knowledge. The languages were taught in the old Academy as early as 1829. Mr. Nyce and Mr. Patterson, gradu- ates of Dickinson College, were engaged three or four years in the capacity of teachei'S — they were suc- ceeded by Mr. Seiwers. I am not aware that the dead languages have been a part of the system of education in Plymouth since Mr. Seiwers left. As it is not my purpose to bring the Historical Sketches of Plymouth down to a later period than 1850, it will be no part of my labor to speak of the later progress of the school system, and which has been attended with very cheering and hopeful pros- pects, not only as regards our town but the coimtry at large. CHAPTEE XII. OLD LANDMAEKS. POUND, SWING-GATE, COMMON- FIELD, SIGN-POST, MILLS, ETC. IN early days, the " Shawnee Flats " were all with- in one common enclosure. The several lots com- posing the great field were divided by surveys, with stone monuments at the corners, but there were no fences dividing as well as protecting the re- PUTTING UP FENCES. 285 spective ownerships. The annual floods, caused hj the rise of the Susquehanna, were deemed too formid- able to permit the idea of erecting fences. Since the great ice flood of 1784, which removed all the buildings from Garrison Hill, no owner has presumed to put up buildings for any purpose upon the lower plain. About the year 1820, my father made the first experiment of inclosing his land by fencing. The other proprietors, waiting a year or two, and seeing that the fences remained, followed his example, and in a short time each owner had at least the exterior lines of his lots protected by inclosures. These, from that time down, have been pretty generally main- tained. Before this, the river was the only barrier on one side, and the fence, which skirted the main road, on the other. The two ends of the plain coming to an acute angle, the highway and river were very close together at each. After the crops were gathered in the fall, the whole field was thrown open to the public. This was bad farming, as the winter crops were very much in- jured by being eaten off and trampled upon by the herds of cattle grazing over them. This led to the necessity of enclosures, and a good farmer would be well satisfied if he did not have to replace his enclo- sures oftener than every seventh year — about half the ordinary time they would have lasted without the ac- cident by floods. 286 HISTOEICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. But while the plain was thus in common, and which continued from 1784 to 1820 — nearly forty years — some extraordinary means had to be adopted to prevent the trespasses of cattle running at large. To obviate this, the proprietors of the flats — and this embraced very nearly two-thirds of the taxable inhabitants — erected a public Pound. This structure was built of hewn logs. It was of an octagon shape, covering an area of probably a thousand square feet, and some ten feet in height. It stood on the lower side of the flat road, and at the junction of it with the main thoroughfare, upon land of the late Colonel Eansom, and a few rods east of the old red mansion house, in which he resided many years, and in which he died. In this stronghold were impounded all the cattle which were found running at large upon the Flats, before the season of their being thrown open to the public. The owners conid only procure their release on the payment of a fine. This averaged probably about twenty-five cents a head, which was paid to the " Key Keeper." This ofiicer, at the first date of my own recollection — over a half century ago — was Heze- kiah Koberts. He occupied a house upon the little rise of ground on the opposite side of the way from the pound — now the estate of Oliver Davenport, Esq. Hezekiah was an active, dajjper little man, and supposed that the running gear and the machinery of the whole universe, and the United States in particu- THE "key-keeper." 287 lar, depended very much on the faithful discharge of his duties as keeper of the municipal keys. You might see him every morning during the summer, at the dawn of day, mounted on his gray horse, making a reconnoissance of the hig field, and if he made a large haul, it was a pretty profitable day's work. He did not become, in this tour of a Sunday morning, lialjle to a fine for pursuing worldly employ- ment on the Lord's day. It was a work of necessity. For while the forefathers were very exemplary, and extremely exacting in the observance of the Sabbath, they still had an eye to the security of their crops. All very proper, undoubtedly. This office of " Key- Keeper," at the first settlement of Plymouth, was considered a matter of especial trust, and was a mark of distinction that no one of them would refuse. I have already mentioned the fact that at a town meet- ing of the people of "Westmoreland, held on " March y° second, 1774," Thomas Heath, one of the promi- nent men of the town, was chosen for this office. Next to the selectman and the board of directors, came this functionary. His duties were to hold the keys of the garrison, the church, the school-house, the pound, and the swing-gate. And it was a mark of the public confidence for which any man of reasona- ble ambition might very properly feel elated. He may have been said to have carried the state and the church in his breeches pocket; at all events, the key which opened the door to each. And I can well re- 18 288 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. member tlie impression the display of these bright shiuing evidences of power, as well as personal dig- nity, made upon my mind. No less, probably, than that produced by the distinguished personage entrust- ed with the keys of Dover or Calais, upon the hum- ble people of the wayside. As these were the days of summary justice, the public sign-post in its double capacity of gazette and whipping-post, supplied the place of criminal records and prison, and there was no occasion for a jail key on the official ring. Whipping and banishment were the two penalties for crime. Our early pioneers went upon the principle that it was not worth their while to be bothered with lock-ups, and taken from their useful occupation to lounge about courts, waiting days and weeks for a trial, in the case of some miserable fellow who was of no account to the community, in prison or out of prison. So for a small offense they tried the culprit, and if found guilty, tied him up to the whipping-post and gave him ten or twenty lashes; and thus fifteen minutes ended the whole matter, and the court, the constable, the complainant, witnesses, and the criminal could all go to work, and probably in the same field. A pretty efficacious, if not sensi- ble, way of doing things. The fellow who committed felonies they sent ofi" to Connecticut to be dealt with according to his deserts, and for the intermediate grade of crime they banished. So that dispatch was the order of the dav, and moderate taxation. HEZEKIAH ROBERTS. 289 My own memory does not reacli back to the time when the whipping or sign post, or the town forti- fications were in use. So that when I first became acquainted with the town key-keeper, in the person of Mr. Hezekiah Eoberts, he only had on his ring the key of the pound, the school-house and the swing- gate. Troublesome men had crept into the church; it now had two doors to it, so that the old office — which in the days of Thomas Heath was of great honor and importance — I am sorry to say, in the days of Heze- kiah Eoberts, had become very much curtailed, though still respectable; and people who did not have "just at that moment " the ready money to pay over for the redemption of their impounded cattle, were very ob- sequious to Mr. Koberts. The old pound was one of the institutions of its day, and its locality and purposes were well under- stood by every man, woman and child over six years of age, fifty years ago in Plymouth. Some thirty years since it disappeared ; the in- closures on the flats, and the people beginning to learn that it was not lawful to permit their cattle to run at large, seemed to have diminished the necessi- ties for its continuance. It was a landmark, and I could not well pass by it in silence. Famous as is the memory of the Pound, the " old swing-gate " is quite as much so. That and its chil- dren have survived a hundred years. It opened to the flat road, and through it passed and repassed 290 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. daily during tlie summer season, going to and returning from their labor ; the substantial representative men of the township; men who were an honor to their race because they lived by the sweat of their brow, and whose word did not require to be wi'itten down or at- tested by a witness. And through it rolled too, upon creaking wagons, the annual produce of a thousand acres of as fertile land as the sun ever shone upon. Why this should have been particularly called the swing-gate, I do not understand, as I am pretty sure that there was not in the township any other gate, public or private, that did not swing upon hinges. This too will probably disappear in time. " The commonfield," so called because it was the parade-ground, the place where the common sign-post was located, and the spot of general rendezvous, was upon Ant Hill. The ground was originally eight rods wide, and extended from the brow of the hill above the house of J. W. Eno, Esq. The fences upon the west side have gradually encroached upon the " commonfield," and it is now by no means what it was fifty years since. We find so long ago as the twenty-fourth of March, 1786, at the meeting at which John Franklin was chairman and Jonah Rog- ers clerk, that the people owning land on the borders of the commonfield were encroaching upon it, and that they warned them off", with the exception of the Widow Heath. Her house was made a special case, probably because her husband had been entrusted at THE OLD ELM. 291 one time witli the responsible office of holding the public keys. This commonfield has long since ceased to be occupied for public purposes. I can remember when it was used for military pa- rades, but for no other purpose. But on this field stood a hundred years ago, and stands to-day, the lofty old elm which was the public sign-post of our ancestors. There is no reason but wantonness why this old landmark should be re- moved. Like the Charter Oak of revolutionary mem- ory, now standing upon the Boston " commonfield," it should be nursed and preserved with the same care that it is. It should have a strong barricade put about it, that its life may be prolonged to the latest possible day. If the old elm had a tongue and could speak, strange stories to our ears, at least, would it relate. It could inform us that on such and such days, such and such ofienders, who stood charged and convicted of sundry and divers crimes of " swearing, drunkenness, frauds, gaming, and idleness," were lashed to its rough bark, and soundly whipped, as they deserved to be, for these and all like crimes and offences ! Wise men were the good, solid men of Plymouth. Labor was honorable, and idleness a punishable crime. They knew how to keep down taxes; and honor to their memory, for their independence of char- acter in adopting and enforcing, too, the means to prevent idleness and dissipation. But I fear that the 292 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. ■wisdom and courage of tliese old patriarchs, were tliey back to-day, would not be equal to the task of re- formation. Mr. Pearce informs us, in his "Annals of Lu- zerne," that '• Eobert Faulkner erected a log grist-mill in 1780, on Shupp's creek, below the site of the old Shupp mill ; and the same year, Benjamin Harvey erected a log grist-mill and residence on Harvey's creek, which was occupied by his son-in-law, Abra- ham Tillbury; and that about the same time, Heze- kiah Eoberts erected a saw-mill on Eansom's creek; and in 1795 Samuel Marvin built a saw-mill on "Whittlesey's creek, on the Calvin Wadhams farm." The foundations of these old mills have passed away. I remember the old log grist-mill of Mr. Tillbury, and the saw-mill on Whittlesey creek: the others had disappeared before my day. The Shupp mill must have been erected as early as 1800. That, when I was a boy, was the principal flouring mill of the town, and many a time have I carried my grist on horseback to it. One horse wagons were unknown till after the close of the war of 1812, Mr. Philip Shupp, the grandfather of the present gentleman of that name, now a resident of Plymouth, then owned the miU and mill farm. A short, gtout-built old German, from Northampton county, and a man of the strictest integrity, I have known three generations at that mill. It has also disappeared. THE SHAD FISHERIES. 293 Having spoken of the stone threshing-floor, the barricades, and the old Academy, with a notice of the other old landmarks of Plymouth, I conclude the sub- ject, in the earnest hope and prayer that the old Academy and the big elm sign-post may be permitted to remain as venerable indexes, pointing back to the good old days of our ancestors. They are not here to speak for them, and in humble supplication I do, in their name, and on their behalf. CHAPTER XIII. SHAD FISHERIES. GAME. WHEN the State of Pennsylvania commenced the building of her public canals, it put an end to the shad fisheries. It became necessary to use the large rivers for the purposes of feeders; and the erection of dams to accomplish this, created a barrier which totally interrupted the annual ascent of this delicious fish up the Susquehanna. Before that, this stream had become famous for its shad fisheries, and, in fact, this product was one of the chief staples of food in the early settlement of the country. The system of internal navigation commenced in 182.5; since then the fisheries have been abandoned. It was in one sense a public calamity, for the people along the shores of the Susquehanna looked forward with as 294 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. mneli interest to the fishing season as to the time of their harvest. The crop, indeed, was quite as im- portant to them. Many poor families the fisheries supplied with the chief article of their food, for at least a third of the year. By a reference to Franklin's diary, it will be seen that one of the causes of the wrongs inflicted upon the Plymouth settlers by TTilkes-Barre magistrates, as far back as 1784, and of which he complains, was the destruction of their fishing-nets and seines. From that time down to 1825, a period of thirty- nine years, the shad crop was relied upon by the people as one of the utmost importance. Large num- bers of the people of Plymouth were shareholders in the shad fisheries. Those who were not, were sup- plied at a mere nominal price. Previous to 1800, the price probably did not average more than two cents a piece, and from that period up to 1825, when the dams were put in the river, the highest price did not exceed eight or ten cents apiece. Thus a laboring man, who had no interest in the fisheries, could lay in his year's supply for the receipts of a week's wages. And while the whole population along the Sus- quehanna were exceedingly anxious to have the canal, they indulged in feelings of deep regret at the idea that it would result in the total destruction of their fisheries. The great advantages they contemplated from the inland navigation, overbalanced the conse- quent loss of the fisheries. They submitted, but a THE SHAD FISHERIES. 295 great many of the old settlers could hardly reconcile their minds to the exchange. They did, however, hut with extreme reluctance. The day of railroads had no existence forty years ago. " De Witt Clinton and the grand canal," were the watchwords of progress. New York led off, and the other states followed in her wake. The motto was interwoven upon handkerchiefs and vest patterns. I well remember of wearing a vest with these words interwoven all over it. And so with the ordinary- water pitchers; they would be decorated with the profile likenesses of Washington, Lafayette, Decatur, Lawrence, Perry, or Scott, so that every time the old pioneer brought the cider mug to his mouth, he had looking him in the face some one of the land or ma- rine heroes of the country. A good reminder ! It may be said these were days of primeval simplicity. I would they could return to us again. Particularly if they would bring along with them those habits of honest rusticity, when jails were tenantless, and the scaffold a thing of the imagination only. But our subject is not to theorize, but to jot down facts and things connected with the past, and blended with the lives and transactions of our ancestors. Plymouth was noted for its good shad fisheries. There were three of them. " The Mud Fishery," nearly opposite the old Steele ferry. The point of " hauling out " was on the west bank of the river, and probably a half mile below " Ganison Hill," called 296 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF FLYMOUTH. also a ''night lisUovy." Tliev never drew the seine in the daytime. I have taken part in the work liere a great many nights, in years gone by, and have shared as many as a hundred shad for the hibc-r of a night. Another fishery was located at " Fish Island," sometimes called " Park's Island." Its last name came from the residence of an old rheumatic man ■who hobbled on two crutches, one under each arm- pit, with a bag slung over his shoulders, in which he carried herbs. He was an herb doctor, and was known tar and wide as Dr. Parks. Some time about the year 1S35, he made a voyage to Washington, D. C, in his canoe. He went for a pension, and he got it. He came back with his canoe by the way of the Chesapeake and Delaware canal: thence up the Del- aware to Easton, and then up the Lehigh navigation to White Haven, within twenty miles of his home. Canoes in past days were an important river craft. I have already stated that this was the vessel Colonel Franklin navigated when he went on his mission from the valley to Annapolis, to present the settlers' peti- tion to Congress. He informs us that he left his canoe at Conawago Falls, near Harrisbnrg, and pro- ceeded the rest of his journey on foot, by land. Dr. Parks being unable to walk, or with very great difiiculty, passed through the falls and landed at the wharves on the Potomac at Washington. The doctor gave a circumstantial and interesting account of his voyage on his return, and exhibited his pension THE SHAD FISHERIES. 297 certificate; as to the propriety of granting it, the people of the valley generally entertained very grave doubts. And I believe it never has yet been ascertained, and probably never will be, for what particular military service this bounty was granted. He said "it took him just two months to make the voyage; and the rheumatics enemost killed him, too; the tide water, seemed to baffle the vartu of all his yarbs, and at one time he nearly give in." Dr. Parks had a slab hut some ten feet square, and six feet high, on Fish Island. This was his dom- icile and home, except during high floods, and when these occurred, the doctor, along with the exodus of his friends and neighbors, the muskrats, would seek refuge on the main land. His cabin was fastened by a cable to a huge sycamore hard by. The old name of Fish Island became partially obscured; the long residence of the root doctor at- taching to it his own patronymic. Before the erec- tion of the dam immediately below, this island was much larger than it is now, the back flow of the water has submerged probably two-thirds of the original surface. This was a day fishery, and in early times there were some most extraordinary " hauls " made. One of them, somewhere between 1790 and 1800, tradi- tion informs us, yielded " nine thousand nine hundred and ninety-nine shad." I have been informed by persons who were present, that this haul was made on 298 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. a Sunday morning; that in bringing tlie seine to, on tlie point of tlie island, it soon became apparent tliat the twines of the meshes would not withstand the pressure of the load, and that two other nets were put around it, and in this way only a part of the immense catch was secured. That the number of fish taken at this haul was nearly or quite ten thou- sand, there is no question. I have heard the relation of the story from the mouths of credible persons who were present at the time. The third was known as the "Dutch Fishery," located at the lower end of the narrows below Nanti- coke; the upper end of the Croup farm was the point of " hauling out." The fishing was done most gen- erally here during the night, though occasionally they dragged their nets in the daytime. My father said that his share at one night's catch, at this fishery, was nineteen hundred. He was the owner, however, of the seine, and drew a fifth of the product. I think that it may be fair to estimate that these three fisheries, in an ordinary season, would yield not less than two hundred thousand shad. The state, therefore, in closing up the natural channels of the Susquehanna, did an immense injury to the people along its shores. The pohcy, however, which caused it may have made a full equivalent for the damage in other ways. The generation, however, who immedi- ately preceded us, could not forget the annual luxury which the shad fisheries of the Susquehanna had THE OSWEGO BASS. 299 aftbrded them. "With them it was ever a subject of regret, that they had exchanged their fisheries for the canal. An attempt has been made within the few past years to so arrange the schutes of the Susquehanna dams that the shad may pass up them; but the result thus far has been an almost total failure. The people of this valley will probably never have the sat- isfaction of seeing the river stocked with this most delicious fish, so long as the waters are made contrib- utory for feeders of the canal. The shad fisheries, therefore are among the things of the past. The Susquehanna, but for its shad, was not re- markably celebrated for its fish. Eels were pretty abundant in the fall of the year, but the season for taking them was very short; and its waters contained but few other specimens, and those comparatively in- significant in number. " The Oswego bass," however, were common in its waters, and sometimes obtained a large size. I have seen them of fourteen pounds weight. Within my own recollection the Plymouth moun- tains, and the broad stretch of forest between them and the Blue Ridge, contained a great abundance of game. Deer were remarkably plenty ; and wild turkeys might be seen in large flocks. Pigeons, particularly in the spring of the year, would alight upon the Shawnee flats in countless numbers. Peter Gould, who resided in a log; house a few rods above the Acad- SCO HlSiTORICAL S5KST0HKS Or PLYMOr^TH. eiUY, wa$ eelebmt- I»eared. Our town does not ehromele the names of any very celebrated hunters. Those people lived a step further towarvts the "given woods." Joseph Worth- ington, of Lake memory, was a renowned hunter, as was James AVandel of Union township. The ex- ploits of these two men wc>uld till a small volume. They wvmld make cvmtraets with the early retail deal- ers of merehandise to furnish them g'ame by the wagvm load, which was sent to ^S^ew York and Phila- delphia in exchange ft>r goods. The price of venison in those days was four and live cents a poxmd.for the saddle. These two men» when the game disapjx'ared, wended their way west. They had K\^n so long ac- customed to a life on the borvier, that they felt the encrvvichment of the pioneer's axe. Worthingtvm went first to Illinois, then to Kansas, and the last hearvl of him was in California, still in pursuit of his old ivnd darling oecttpation. Though now if living — OLD HUNTERS. 301 and lie was a year, since — waning towards eighty, still upon the track of the quarry ! A Daniel Boone of the wild woods. Wandel also went west under the same impulses which moved Worthington, and was also living at a very recent date. It is a marvel to what an extreme old age these hunters will attain. We would suppose their occu- pation would be very prejudicial to health. George Sax, the great panther hunter of " the shades/' is living at over eighty. I think that John McHenry, of Fishing creek, is still living. Mr. Pearce, in his Annals, informs us that the old hunter told him in 1840, that his registry then numbered nineteen hun- dred deer and sixty-five bears, besides immense quan- tities of other game. The forests of the Susquehanna and its tributaries were alive with game. When we reflect that the streams also were well stocked with fish, and that the natural prairies bordering the river were free from trees and incumbrances, so that the Indian could easily till his cornfields, we may well conclude that he left his wigwam with as keen an anguish as the most intellectual and enlightened white man would his houses, his fields and his herds. Human natures are alike in their attachments. The Indian was happy in the occupation of his wild domain. He roved over it with all the conscious pride of a conqueror. He ac- knowledged no allegiance but to Manitou. The (jrreat Spirit was, in his judgment, his only superior. 30"2 UISTOUIOAL SKETCHES OK FIAMOUTU. To hiiu alone ho aokuowlodgvd sulnnission. To the white man ho Avas too proud to pay tribute. When t]\o Gorinau missionavv. prompted hv the most elevated piety, and ready to moot almost any saoritioe, approaehed the wig-warn of the Shawnees, the keen and penetrating glanee of these ehildrou of nature saw, that in the professions for the good of their spiritual w^\nts, they wore coming iu contact with a people who, though tliey might tender kind olHccs, still might injflict great harm; they hmndished their scalping-knives and exhibited every demonstra- tion of dissatisfaction. They were prokibly in the right. Events which followed show but too plainly that the adA-ance of the white man was to them, the signal of extermination and death. But civilization cmue. aud the Indian and the for- ests and the wild g-an\c A-anished hcfoi-e it. And in all this change it is prob;\bly tor the best. The territory of old riymouth to-day furnishes employment, and its industrial pursuits fecvl some ten thousand intelligent people. Ohuivhes and seminaries of learning, aud manutj\ctories and machinery, all tell the st<:)ry of the ad\-juice of knowledge and the useful arts. The ex- changY of these for the oeeupations of the trapper and hunter, bespeak a better state of thing-s. It is the enlaip>ment of the area for the more useful em- ployments of five and enlightened men. Though this may have been a saeritiee to a tew. the general good which the multitude has reaped, is a consummation EARLY MERCIIANTH. 303 wliicli in 1,0 Ixi .'ipijrovcd. J{nj;i,(l and diirusivo as ilio niyn ol' ilio kiki, Mk; l)IoHHin;^H of lii^fi civilization i-oacli and perinea to the f^reat inaHHCH; tliouBandH arc rriacJo ha])[)y and indojxjiidont, inntcad of the compar- atively Hmall numb<;r of the past. We will conclude tlie chapter with, the njinark of OtiieJJo to horttfit Ia<^o, that "it in better aH it i,s." CHAPTER XIV. E A II L Y M E 11 C 11 A N T H . 3 ENJAMTN IIARVE Y, Jii., oiTJaj,tain Ransom's ^ Indej)endent Company revolutionary service, and who died from exposure at Valley Eorge, seems to have Ijeen the first merchant of Plymouth. In 1774 he started a small retail store in the lo»^ house of his father, wliich has been already mentioned, and located very near the site of the Christian Churcli building. Here, for a couple of years, he dealt in a small way in articles of absolute necessity — salt, leather, iron, a few groceries, etc. At that time, and for many sub- sequent years, all articles of merchandise were trans- jjorted upon the river in " Durham boats." Thes(; b(jats wer(; some forty feet in length, with a b(;am (;f some ten feet, and would carry from fifteen to twenty t(ms burden. They were propelled with long "set- ting-poles," with iron sockets at the ends, three men 19 304 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF rLT3I0UTH, on oacli side, with, a stoorsmau at tlie stern. Ten or twelve miles up tlie stream was considered a fair day's work. These boats were the only means of transportation of merchandise until the making of the Easton and Wilkes-Barr^ turnpike. This thoronghtare was com- pleted about the year 1S07. Thence down to the time of the canal navigation in 1S30, the merchants of the entire valley received all tlieir goods, either by ''Durham boats'' on the river, or by wagons on the turnpike. The turnpike company was chartered in 1S02, and the road was constructed at a cost of $^75,000. This road was regarded as a very import- ant matter by the early settlers of the valley; and in- deed such was the fact, as it gave a much shorter outlet to the seaboard. The corporation was a joint- stock company, and it required the contribution of nearly every landholder in the valley to accomplish the construction of this important link of intercommu- nication. Seventy-five thousand dollars in 1S02 was a large sum of money to be raised, and it required a united effort of all the people to accomplish it. The old " Conestoga wagon," drawn by four horses, was the vehicle of transportation on the turn- pike. It has disappeared: but it was a goodly sight to see one of those huge wagons drawn along by four strong, sleek, and well-fed lioi'ses, with bearskin hous- ings and "winkers tipped with red.'" It was very common to have a lifth horse on the lead. I have THE CONESTOGA WAGONS. 305 seen trains of these wagons, miles in length, on the great road leading to Pittsburg, as late as 1830. It was the only way of transportation over the Allegheny chain westward. A wagon would carry three, four, and sometimes five tons. The bodies were long, pro- jecting over front and rear, ribbed with oak, covered with canvas, and generally painted blue. There were several persons, residents of the valley, who made it their only occupation to carry goods for the early merchants here. Joshua Pettebone, one of this num- ber, is still living in Kingston at an advanced age. But in the days of the first merchant of Plymouth, the " Conestoga wagon " was not known. His trans- port was the " Durham boat." It will be remembered that Benjamin Harvey, Jr., that same first merchant, was at Fort Augusta, near Sunbury, with his boat, in December, 1775, when Colonel Plunkett impressed him and his vessel into the Proprietary service, imme- diately preceding the battle of Nanticoke. He was then on his way down the Susquehanna for a supply of goods for his log store. After the enlistment of Mr. Harvey in the United States army, his father took charge of his small stock of goods and sold them out, but the store was never replenished. From this time down to the year 1808, there seems to have been no store kept in Plymouth. In February of that year, my father, the late Joseph Wright, opened a small retail establishment in the 306 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. east room of liis residence, in tlie lower end of the village; the same building is now standing there, in a good state of preservation. By a reference to his ledger, which is in my possession, I find the first en- try bears date the twenty-sixth February, 1808. "Abraham Tillbury, Dr. " To one qt. of rmn, at 7-6 per gallon, £0. Is. 10 l-2d." It is well for our young people, therefore, to know, that even as late as 1808, accounts were kept in Plymouth in pounds, shillings, and pence. Mr. Jameson Harvey informs me, and to whose kindness I am indebted for many interesting facts concerning the early settlement of our town, that he made the first purchase at the new store. He bought "a Jew's Harp, and paid sixpence for it in cash." He being at that time a minor, it is probable he did not deem it prudent to ask for credit. Mr. Tillbury therefore, must be placed as second upon the list. These old books, which tell in plain and simple language the plain and simple habits of a race of people gone, I cannot lay aside without permitting them to speak out. In the first place, the handwrit- ing is dear to me; for it brings before me the benev- olent and honest countenance of the man who noted down the memoranda upon these venerable pages, nearly seventy years ago. And in the next place, are the names of all the hardy old settlers of the THE WRIGHT HOUSE, AND BIRTH PLACE OF AUTHOR. THE OLD LEDGER. 307 town, with tlie faces of nearly every one of whom I was familiar. And their economy, and that all im- portant question of living within one's means, are spread out on every page of the ancient ledger. It is true that the accounts against Ahraham Pike, William Hodge, Thomas Car tSkadden, Benjamin Rumsey, Adolph Heath, John L. Shaw and some others, have rather too much of a sprinkling of rum about them ; hut then we must remember that it was wise lips which uttered the sentence — " Let him that is without sin, cast the first stone." The logic of the old ledger shows us that people can live comfortably and happy without money. Barter and exchange seem to have been the rule in the primitive days of the town. The old ledger shows the jjayment of a small, very small sum of money, occasionally. Abijah Smith was one of the principal customers of the store. He was then making a small beginning of the trade, and engaged in the develop- ment of an article which later years has increased to a wonderful magnitude. He paid money, while nearly all the other customers of the store paid in the pro- duct of the farm. The accounts exhibit the fact that of an annual sale of probably two thousand dollars, there was not paid in casih, exclusive of the money of Abijah Smith, ten pounds. The credits are for wheat, rye, corn, oats and flax. The last article particularly is a large item. And this is by no means singular, as tow and linen cloth were staples of old Plymouth in 308 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH, those remote days. Credit also for bear and deer skins, venison and wild tnrkeys, appear here and there, but cash rarel)^ Tlie goods bartered in exchange were mostly the absolute and necessary wants of life; iron, leather, salt, molasses (generally sold by the pint and quart), sugar, tea, coffee (in small quantities, a quarter and half pound at a time), cutlery, spices; no cloths of any account, thread, nee- dles, pins, calico, muslin and cambric (in small quan- tities), to the most opulent; and these made the bulk of the necessaries. The luxuries may be summed up in rum, whisky, tobacco and snuff. The old settlers of that day generally smoked their tobacco in pipes. The charges of pipes, at three-pence a piece, are numerous. The only entry I find of cigars are several charges to John Turner, at the very moderate price of three-pence a dozen. The accounts embrace the names of the people generally of the town — Calvin and Noah Wadhams, Benjamin Eeynolds, Abraham and James Nesbitt, Samuel and James Pringle, Thomas Davenport, Wil- liam Currie, George P. Ransom, Mrs. Rosannah Har- vey, Abraham, Nicholas and Stephen Yanloon, Hez- ekiah Roberts, Joshua Pugli, Jonah and Joel Rogers, Charles Barney, John and Daniel Turner, Jesse Cole- man, Moses Atherton, Jacob and Peter Gould and Philip Andrus. These, with names already given, and a few others, were the principal customers at Joseph Wright's store in 1S08. JOHN B. SMITH'S OPERA HOUSE. EARLY CUSTOMERS OF THE STORE. 309 There is not one of them except Abijah Smith whose annual account amounts to a hundred dollars. We do not find in this fact a want of ability to pay, but it exhibits a frugality and a disposition of the men of that day to contract no debt that they could not pay. And to show how little our ancestors knew about paper money, every note paid in is registered in the back of the ledger, giving the name of the bank issuing the note, from whom received, and its date and number. In 1812, Joseph Wright sold out his stock of goods to the Eeverend George Lane, who continued the best part of the year at the old stand, then taking Benjamin Harvey, a son of Elisha, and whom we must designate as the third of that name, into part- nership with him, they commenced business in a small frame building, lately removed by Mr. John B. Smith, and on the site of the new Music Hall. They continued on at this stand until 1816, when Mr. Lane removed to Wilkes-Barre, put up a dwelling and store at the north-west corner of the public square and Market street (Osterhout proj)erty now), where he carried on the business of a merchant for several y6ars. Mr. Harvey the same year removed to Hunt- ington, where he still resides. The next mercantile adventure in the township was a firm composed of Joseph Wright, Benjamin Eeynolds, and Joel Rogers. This firm opened a store in a small frame building on the east side of the road, 310 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF rLTMOUTH. opposite the present residence of Mr. Henderson Gay- lord. This was in tlie year 1S12. They employed Mr. Gayloixi, then a young man and resident of Himt- ington. as the clerk and salesman. And this yomig gentleman here commenced the pursuit of an occupa- tion, which he carefully and industriously followed up in after years, with a very prosperous result. This firm was dissolved in Octoher. ISl-i. and the business continued hy Mr. Eogers and Mr. Graylord, under the firm of Joel Eogers ^ Co., up to 1S16. In this year a new fii-m of Eeynolds. Gaylord «S- Co. was formed, consisting of Benjamin Eeynolds, Henderson Gfaylord and Abraham Fuller, which con- tinued to December. ISIS, wlien Abraham Fuller died. From this period down to the fall of 1S24. Mr. Gaylord continued the business, and then entered into a partnership with the late WiEiam C. Eey- nolds. This partnership lasted for a period of ten years, under the firm name of Graylord & Eeynolds. During this time they had established a branch at EiQgston. Shortly after the dissolution of the firm of Grtiy- lord »S: Eeynolds, in 1S36. Mr. Gaylord and Draper Smith formed a partnership, which continued down to 1839, when it was dissolved. In 1816, the business stand was removed to the premises now occupied as a hotel by John Deen. and continued there to the year 1S27. In that year Mr. Gtiylord erected a store-house on the opposite side of > "1 HENDERSON G A T L O R D. OLD FIRMS. 311 tlie street, in whicli he and Mr. Smitli earned on tlie business till they dissolved, and Mr. Gaylord alone from that time up to 1856, when he retired. About the year 1828, John Turner opened a store where Turner Brothers now are. Soon after that he sold his stock to Gaylord & Eeynolds. Asa Cook, now a resident of Eoss township, commenced business in the Turner store, and was soon followed by John Turner, in the same building, and the establishment has been continued down to the present time either in his name or the name of his sons. Samuel Davenport and Elijah W. Eeynolds opened a store where A. S. Davenport, son of Samuel, now keeps, in the year 1834. This firm was dissolved in 1835, and the business continued by Samuel Daven- port to the year 1840, when he formed a partnership with John B. Smith; this firm lasted till the death of Mr. Davenport, which was in the year 1850, and for several years succeeding the store was continued by Mr. Smith. Ira Davenport opened the establishment he now occupies in the year 1845. Chauncey A. Eeynolds also opened a store in 1850, which was continued by him some four or five years. And this completes the history in a few para- agraphs of the early merchants of the town. It is an agreeable reflection that none of them failed or became bankrupt. All of them were successful, and the most of them, though begin ning with small 312 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. means, "became men of wealth. I am not aware that any of them were addicted to habits of intemperance, and being acquainted with them all, with the excep- tion of Benjamin Harvej, the pioneer, if such had been the case, it would not have escaped my knowl- edge. They were, too, men of correct business hab- its, and enjoyed the confidence and respect of the people of the town. It is certainly worthy of record, that among so considerable a number of men engaged for so long a period of time, that there should hare been no fail- ures, and that sobriety and temperance should have been a characteristic of every one of them, and each successful. It may be a very difficult task to find a parallel. The business character, enterprise and upright conduct, therefore, of the merchants of Plymouth of earlier days, furnish a good model for the imitation of their successors; and if he who writes the history of the merchants of Plymouth at the end of the next fifty years, will be able to truthfully state what is here recorded of the fifty and more years past, it will not merely be to him an agreeable duty, but will illustrate the fact that moral precept and good examples have had their influence. SABIUEL DAVENPORT. CHAPTEK XV. COAL TRADE, AND COAL MEN. IN the fall of the year of 1807, Abijah Smith pur- chased an ark of John P. Arndt, a merchant of Wilkes-Barre, which had been used for the transpor- tation of plaster, for the price of $24.00. This ark he floated to Plymouth, and loaded with some fifty tons of anthracite coal, and late in the same season he landed it safely at Columbia, Lancaster county. Pa. This was probably the first cargo of anthracite coal that was ever ofiered for sale in this or any other country. The trade of 1807 was fifty tons; that of 1870, in round numbers, sixteen millions! It may be fairly estimated that the sale of 1880 will reach twenty-five millions. Abijah Smith therefore, of Plymouth, was the pioneer in the coal business. Anthracite coal had been used before 1807, in this valley and elsewhere, in small quantities in furnaces, with an air blast; but the trafiic in coal as an article of general use, was commenced by Abijah Smith, of Plymouth. The important discovery of burning coal without an air blast, was made by Hon. Jesse Fell, of Wilkes-Barre, one of the Judges of the Luzerne county courts, on the eleventh day of February, 1808, and less than six months after the departure of the first cargo from (313) 314 niSTOKIOAL SKF.TCHF.S OF rLTMOUTH. tlie riymouth mines. This important discovoiy, w-liich led to tlie use of coal for culinary and other domestic purposes, enabled Mr. Smith, in the year succeeding his first shipment, to introduce it into the market. But even then, as is tlie case in most new discoveries, the public were slow in coming to the conclusion that it would answer the p\n"poses of fuel. Time, however, has fully demonstrated its usefulness; and the rapid increase of its consumption, from fifty tons annually, to sixteen millions, in a period of a lit- tle more than fifty years, is one of the wonders of the nineteenth century. The statistical tables of the trade, which yearly appear in the public press, date the commencment in 1S20. It is put down in that year at thi*ee him- dred and sixty-rive tons, as the shipment from the Lehigh region to market. In this there is error, for thirteen years previous to that time, as we have already stated, Mr. Smith had shipped coal from his Plymouth mine. But in fact the article had been put in the market long pre- vious to 1S20, by other pei"sons than the Messrs. Smith. Charles Miner, Jacob Cist, John W. Robinson and Stephen Tut tie, all of Wilkes-Barre, had leased the old Mauch Chunk mines, and in August, 1S14, had sent an ark load of it down the Lehigh. Mr. George M. Hollenback sent two ark loads down the Susq^uehanna, taken from his Mill creek mines, iu ABU AH SMITH -3 n O A L OPENING 01-' 1807. EARLY COAL MINING. 315 1813. The same year, Joseph Wright, of Plymouth, mined two ark loads of coal from the mines of his brother, the late Samuel (Jr. Wright, of New Jersey, near Port Grriffith, in Pittston. This was an old opening, and coal had been mined there for the smith's forge as far hack as 1775. The late Lord Butler, of Wilkes-Barre, had also shipjjed coal from his mines, more generally known of late years as the " Baltimore mines," as early as 1814, and so had Crandal Wilcox, of Plaines township. My object in making these references is to show that the coal-trade actually began in 1807, and not in 1820, as is now generally believed. But while the persons I have named did not fol- low up the business, Abijah and John Smith, his brother, continued the business down to the period of their respective deaths; and their children contin- ued on the trade long afterwards. Abijah Smith came to the valley in 1806, and in that or the following year he jjurchased some seventy-five acres of coal-land on the east side of Pian- som's creek, for about five hundred doUars. In 1807 he commenced mining; and coal has been taken al- most yearly from the opening he made dow^n to the jjresent period. In the year 1808, his brother John came to the valley. He bought the coal designated in the deed, from Wm. Curry, Jr., as " Potts of Coal," on the ad- joining tract of one hundred and twenty acres, for 3 It) niSTOlUCAL ski: TO HE S OF FLY MOUTH. the consideration of six hundred dollars. This mine "wa^ soon after opened, and workings have heen unin- terruptedly coutiuued ever since. Ahijali and John vrere partnei-s iu the coal Inisiucss tor numy years. They -wei^e natives of Perby, in the state of Connec- ticut. From the time they commenced coal opera- tions, they continued on in trade, as a means of living, for the remainder of their lives. Ir >Yas their sole oc- cupation. They prosecuted their employment with great energy and perseverance, and amid a great many difficulties and disappointments : and although neither of them lived to see their anticipations real- ized, their descendants — who are still the ownei-s of the estates they purchased more than a half century ag\~i — are enjoying the advantages and comforts which resulted from their ancestor's foresight and judg- ment. Ahijah died in 1826. at his residence, the site of which is now occupied hy the new brick Music Hall, recently put up hy his son, John B. Smith, of Ply- mouth. His brother John died iu 1S52. I knew them both intimately for a great number of years. They were industrious, upright and worthy men. They started the coal trade, and their names will ever be blended with it. It is proper that we shoulit examine into the details of the mode and manner of mining and trans- portation, as pui-sued by these early pioneei"s iu the business. There are but few now eno;-jioed in the li-reat J O E >' ff 31 I T H. PROCESS OF MINING. 317 trade who are aware of the troubles and sacrifices which attended it in its infancy. We will look at the child when in its swathing bands; it is now a giant, but fifty years ago it was in its infancy. The experi- ment which was perseveringly followed up, and beset on all sides by difficulties and hazards, resulted in a grand success. The annual trade, which at the commencement was limited to hundreds of tons, has now become tens of millions of tons. The price of coal land of five dollars an acre, in the days of the Smith purchase, is now a thousand per acre. What the future d(jmand for the article may be — or the annual production — the future alone can determine, human foresight cannot; nor can it be said that the field is inexhaustible. There is a limit to it; and those who will occupy our places five hundred years hence, will say that our prophecy is not entirely fiction. In the early process of mining, there was no powder used: this, under the present system, is the chief agency. It was all done with the pick and wedge. The miner did his labor by the day, and received from fifty to seventy-five cents. The product of his day's labor was about a ton and a half; his time was from sunrise to sunset. The coal was transported from the mine to the place of shipment, in carts and wagons, and de- posited upon the banks of the river, to be put in arks, in the time of the annual spring freshets of the Sus- quehanna. 318 HISTOKIO.VI. SRV.TOUF.S OF Vl.YMOTJTH. The pTvx>os$ of n\i;iiug Avitli tlie pick and Avodgo was too iilow and too oxpou^ivo. Mr. Abijah Smith Ciuuo to the cvMiohi^ou that tho ovduiary powxlor Wast might \v made availahle in miiai\g\ Ho must hax^o some cue, howowr, who \vas aeoinjtomed to tho quarries. There wns no ouo hoiv ^Yho imdei'stood the Ini&iue^s. In the NW^r ISlS ho found that he oouhl get a man tor the work, Tliis man \ras John Fhmiganj of Milford, Oonnectient His oeeupation was quarrying stone with tlie powder Wast. He wivte to Mr. Fhviii- gan to eome and make the experiment, — ^we say ex- periment, heeause it was cvmtended that coal had not enough of strength and consistency to be proj>erly mined with a Wast. That the explosion wonhl not reach tj\r enough, and kx'»sen and detach a suthcient quantity to make the Wast economic^\l in mining. In March of tJiat year, Mr. Fknig-an came on. The ivsult of the experiment was a sneeess. We may theretlnv chixniicU* the name of John Flanig-an as the first man who ever bon?d a hole and applied the powder Wast lu the anthracite coe\l of Pennsyh-ania, An im- portant era in the c.unmeneement of a trade that has Ixwnne so immense iu later yeaj^s. In August of the Si\me year he returned to Mil- forxi in company with Samuel Fivnch, a step-son of John Smith, for the purpose of removing his timnly to riymouth. I am oWiged to Mrs. Flanigan, who is stiU living MRS. FLANIGAN'S JOURNEY. 319 with one of her sons in Kingston, at a very advanced age, for an account of their journey from Milford to Plymouth. She says, "that on the sixth of September, 1818, my. husband, myself, and five children, in company with Samuel French and Henry Gabriel, set out for the Susquehanna. Our conveyance was a two-horse covered lumber wagon, in which myself arid children and a few traps were deposited; the men walking. At the end of eleven of the longest days of my life, we landed at Abijah Smith's, in Plymouth, I bore up under the dreaiy journey, and j)resen^ed my courage pretty well, till we struck the log way, on the Easton and Wilkes-Barre turnpike, when I was forced to give vent to my feelings, and wept like a child. Had I but foreseen, before starting, the trials and misery of the long journey ahead, I should never have con- sented to have left my old home and friends." Of this party, Henry Gabriel was one. He was a blacksmith, and made Plymouth his home and resi- dence. He married respectably, and spent a long, la- borious and useful life there. He was a man of intecr- rity, and a most excellent and exemplary citizen. He accumulated some property, and died but a few years since, beloved and regretted by the whole of the com- munity, in which he spent the greater part of his life. Samuel French afterwards became one of the prin- cipal coal operators of Plymouth. He was engaged in the trade for several years, and at a time when the 20 320 HISTOKICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. profits arising from it, conducted in tlie most skilful and economical manner, would afford a living only. Mr. Frencli, through much prudence and great in- dustry, accumulated some property in coal lands, which have recently been sold by his family at a thou- sand dollars an acre. He died some ten years since. He was a man very highly esteemed, and his conduct and manner of life most richly warranted it. Two of his sons are now business men of prominence in Plymouth. A daugh- ter of his is the wife of Elijah C. Wadhams, Esq. The annual average of the business of the Messrs. Smith, from 1808 down to 1820, was from six to eight ark loads, or about four to five hundred tons. The old Susquehanna coal ark, like the mastodon, is a thing of the past. The present men of the busi- ness should understand the character of the simple vessel used by the pioneers of the trade. Its size and dimensions, cost and capacity, must be chronicled. And the difference between it and the present mode of transportation is as wide as the rough old grate of Jesse Fell — still to be seen — compared with the costly heating fixtures of the modern palace, of the modern coal prince. The length of the craft was ninety feet, its width sixteen feet, its depth four feet, and its capacity sixty tons. Each end terminated in an acute angle, with a stem-post surmounted by a huge oar, some thirty feet in length, and which required the strength of THE OLD COAL ARK. 321 two stout men to ply it in the water. It required, in its construction, three thousand eight hundred feet of two inch-plank for the bottom, ends and sides; or seven thousand six hundred feet, board measure. The bottom timbers would contain about two thousand feet, board measure, and the ribs or studs, sustaining the side planks, four hundred feet; making a total of some ten thousand feet. The cost at that time for lumber was $4.00 per M $40.00 Construction, mechanical work. . . . 24.00 Kunning plank, oars, caulking material, hawser (made of wood fibres), baiUng scoops, etc 6.00 Total cost $70.00 The ark was navigated by four men, and the or- dinary time to reach tide water was seven days. The cost attending the trij) was about $50.00. Two out of three arks would probably reach the port of their destination; one-third was generally left upon the rocks in the rapids of the river or went to the bottom. The following estimate, therefore, of sixty tons of coal, laid down in market, is not far from the facts: Cost of mining 60 tons $45.00 Hauling to the river 16.00 Cost of ark 70.00 Expenses of navigation 50.00 Total $181.00 322 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. or eqnal to $3.00 a ton. To this must be added one- tiiird for the perils of navigation, which will make the actual cost of the ton at tide water, $4.00. Commis- sions on sales, transhipment from the ark to coasting vessels and other incidents, would probably make the whole outlay upon a ton, about five dollars. The average price of sales at this time was proba- bly $10.00, leaving a profit of $5.00 on the ton. If, therefore, three hundred and fifty tons of the five hundred annually transported by the Messrs. Smith reached the market, it left them a profit of seventeen hundred dollars, not taking into the account their personal services. Eight hundred and fifty dollars each, A modern family would consider themselves in very straitened circumstances, if limited to this sum for their yearly support. Times have materially changed, it is true; but foolish and unnecessary wants have multiplied be- yond all rules of propriety or necessity. These men lived comfortably and respectably upon the product of the business they were engaged in; and this did not sum up a thousand dollars annually to each. If the primitive days of our fathers did not spread their tables with unnecessary luxuries, or their wardrobe with tinselled tawdry decorations, they slept as sound- ly, enjoyed themselves as well, and were quite as hap- py as the most favored and wealthy of the present time; nay, a thousand times more so ; for their wants were few, and their ambition did not require curbs and fetters to prevent its " overleaping itself." "black stones" for fuel. 323 In this small way the coal trade continued on from 1807 to 1820, when it assumed more importance in the public estimation. The years preceding that of 1820, were the years of its trials, and the men during that period who were engaged in the business, were merely able to sustain themselves with the closest economy and the most persevering and unre- mitting labor. Some of the Plymouth men who em- barked in the business, made total failures; and oth- ers encumbered their estates with debts which re- q[uired subsequent years of labor to wipe out. It was the work of forty years to convince the people that " black stones " could be made available for fuel. The problem at this day is fully solved. The following account current, rendered by Price & Waterbury, of New York, to Abijah Smith & Co., composed of Abijah and John Smith, in 1813, and furnished me by Mr. John B. Smith, is a remarkably interesting relic of the coal business in its infancy. It very clearly exhibits two facts: one, the demand, price and consumption of coal, in the great city of New York, at that period; and the other, the won- derful zeal manifested in the pioneer dealers to intro- duce the article into the market. The coal was sent to Havre de Grace, Maryland, and thence by coasting vessels to New York. "New York, February, 1813. "Messrs. Abijah Smith & Co.— Gentlemen : Having lately- taken a vie-w of the business we have been conducting for you this 324 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. sometime past, we have thought it -would be gratifying to have the account forwarded, and therefore present you with a summary of it up to the eighteenth of January, 1813, containing, first, the quan- tity of coal sold and to whom ; second, the amount of cash paid by us from time to time ; third, the amount of interest, cash on the various sums advanced, the credit of interest on sums received, and lastly, the quantity of coal remaining on hand unsold. Should you, on the receipt of this, find any of the items incorrect, we need hardly observe that the knowledge of such an error will be cor- rected with the greatest pleasure. As it respects our future plan of procedure, we shall expect to see one of your concern in the city sometime in the spring, when a new arrangement may be fixed upon. Our endeavors to establish the character of the coal shall not at any time be wanting, and we calculate shortly to dispose of the remaining parcels of coal unsold. 1812. June 8. — By cash of Doty & Willets for 5 chaldrons coal $100.00 By cash of John Withington for 5 chaldrons coal 100.00 By cash of Coulthaid & Son for 10 chaldrons coal 200.00 By John Benham's note (60 days) for 10 chal- drons coal 200.00 By cash of G. P. Lorrillard for 1 chaldron coal 20,00 By cash of J. J. Wilson for 4 chaldrons coal .... 80.00 June 13. — By cash of Doty & Willets for 5 chaldrons coal . . 100.00 By cash of Gr. P. Lorrillard for 11^ chaldrons coal 230.00 By A. Frazyer's note (90 days) for 25 chaldrons coal 475.00 By cash received of T. Coulthaid for 5 chaldrons coal 100.00 By M. Womas's note (90 days) for 20 chaldrons coal 880.00 By half measurement, received for 9 bushels. ... 6.33 ACCOUNT CUKRENT. 325 June 13. — By B. Ward and T. Blagge for I5 chaldrons at $20 25.00 By Wittingham for If chaldrons coal 10.00 June 25. — By Pirpont for ^ chaldron coal 11.00 By Mr. Lands for f chaldron coal 12.00 July 16. — By Robert Barney for 17| chaldrons at $23 per chaldron 385.00 Sept. 15. — By cash for 1 chaldron coal 12.50 Oct. 9. — By William Colman for ^ chaldron coal 12.50 By Sexton & Williamson for 1^ chaldrons coal 37.50 Oct. 24. — By cash for 1 chaldron coal 25.00 Oct. 29. — By cash for ^ chaldron coal 12.50 Nov. 7. — By cash for | chaldron coal 12.50 Nov. 12. — By cash for 1 chaldron coal 25.00 Nov. 16. — By Mr. A. Le Briton for 12 chaldrons at |25 per chaldron 288.50 Dec. 5. — By cash for | chaldron coal 12.50 Dec. 11. — By cash of A. Daily for ^ chaldron coal 12.00 Dec. 14. — By cash for ^ chaldron coal 12.50 1813. Jan. 4. — By cash for 1 chaldron coal 25.00 Jan. 18. — By J. Curtiz for 9 bushels coal 6.27 By amount of balance this day 763.13 Total $3,601.20 Errors excepted. PRICE & Watekbuky." It -will be seen by this account current tliat coal was sold by tlie clialdron : thirty-six bushels, or nearly a ton and a third, to the chaldron. The sales, therefore, for the New York supply in 1812, were inside of two hundred tons. Though the price was liberal, about $15.00 a ton, most of the early coal operators of Plymouth were unsuccessful. The risk attending 326 HISTOEICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. the navigation, and the system of barter and ex- change of those days, instead of cash, were serious obstacles in the coal trade. And even at a later pe- riod, when the canal opened a new thoroughfare of transportation, the trade was not remunerative. The demand for the article was limited, and it required years of struggle to establish the cash in the place of the credit system. Mr. Daniel Davenport embarked in the trade about the year 1826. He pursued the business for several years, but the result was the final loss of the greater part of his estate. ZibaDavenport also made the attempt, but with no better result. And to the unsuccessful catalogue of coal men may be added the names of Thomas Borbidge, Francis J. Smith, John Ingham, John Flanigan, and Martin Brenan. At a later period, some of the merchants connect- ing the coal trade with their business, turned it to some account; but still down to 1840 the coal busi- ness in Plymouth could by no means be regarded a success. And with the exception of the Messrs. Smith, nearly all of the men engaged in the trade at its commencement, or immediately after, met with disasters. The Smiths pursued the business steadily, with great economy and energy of purpose. These qualities, combined Avith the knowledge which they had gleaned from long experience, enabled them to live merely, but not to accumulate money. They held on to their FREE BI AN THOMAS. GREAT KEI) ASII VEIN. 327 mines, which in subsequent years became very vahia- able. The Messrs. Smith w^orked what is known as the great red ash seam, and which is thicker and the coal of a much, better quality than the same seam on the east side of the river. On the east side of the river this seam crops out near the summit of the ¥/'ilkes-Barre mountain, and is not exceeding eight feet in thickness, while at the Smith mines, Avondale and Grand Tunnel, it averages twenty-six feet of pure coal. During the entire period that the Messrs. Smith worked this vein, some twenty years, and their successors a quarter of a century after them, the whole space cleared out has not reached ten acres. Modern mining and modem facilities of transpor- tation to market, and the demand are, of course, mak- ing deep inroads upon the red ash vein, and it is dif- ficult to anticipate what the next quarter of a cen- tury will have produced in the extent of mining in this very valuable coal seam. It is the underlying seam of the coal measures of the valley, and on the west side of the river by far the most valuable, because the largest. The John Smith part of the old mine is now owned by Mrs. William C. Keynolds, his daughter, and the Abijah Smith partjby his sons and the writ^^r of this notice, and both under lease to Messrs. Broderick, Conygham and Walter. Among the later coal men, I must not omit the name of Freeman Thomas. He came to Plymouth, 3-^ lUSTOUlOAL S-^KKTOHKS OF ri.Y MOUTH. t\\Mu "Nov(U;\u\ptvMi ooiiuty, abovit tho yoar 1811. IIo purohasod tho Awnulalo pivpevtv. Ho g!UO it that nanio llt'tv voai-s ^iuoo. But whou tho old tarmeroini- fenvil upon it this poetical eoguomon, he was not a^Yntv of tho Y'jist minora! tivasuiv >Yhioh its siti-taee coiuvahHl. Mr. Thomas was in ad\-;iuee of most of his noigh- lK>rs iu his knowkxlgv of iwvl measures. At tui etwly day ho ooimiioiuvd driving" the " Grattd Tunnel '" into the mountain side, with tho purpose of strikii^g the e<.-«^vl. This was probably as eai'ly as ISilS. This was the lirst experiment of tunneling in the Wyoming \-i\lley thivugh r<.>ek. Ho laboivd on very assidu- ously for several yeai^ hefoiv the objeet \v^\s aoeom- plished. His neiglilx>rs ivg^\rded the enterprise as Utopian, but amidst all ol>staele^, and ag-jiinst the oonnsel and adviee of his friends to alwndon tho tun- nel, he move^l steadily and pemstently on; and alter thrt?e or four yeai^ of persevering labor, and with his oiwlit almost sunk, he strnok the big iwl a$h ^-ein. This experiment ostablishovl a new theory, new at least in this valley. And the " Irnmd Tunnel.** as ite esonstructor named it, will long l>e ivmembered as one of the most expensive etforts of the early daY-s of the eot\l pioneers, as also a motnmient to eommomiv- rate the name of the man Yvhose sag-aoity and foiv- gdght were ^ in ad\-anee of his contemporaries. In the toiling years which ho dovoteil to the excavation of the tunnel, ho constantly encountoiVvi tho opposi- FREEMAN TIfOMAH. 329 tiori of hi.s fricndH; and many of ilicjn i'n'iWti'^; In ar- /;;uin(;fji to of>nvJnoo hifii of wl);i,t ilj'-,y callo'J Jjih Mir- ror, \v," at which Colonel John Franklin appeared as moderator, and Jonah Eogers, "dark." But the old two-story double frame house, was an old house when I tirst knew it, and Mi-s. Doctor Moi-se was then the tenant and owner. Her tii-st husband was Thomas Heath, the '* town key-keeper,'* and grand juror, elected at the town meeting of Westmoreland, held "y^ second March, 1774," and but live years after the first settlement of the town. At the time I speak of, Anna Morse, as an M. D., she had survived her second husband, and the old double-framed house was a licensed tavern. Before it creaked, on rusty hinges, a capacious sign-boaixl, oix which were painted in bold characters: — "Entertain- ment for Man and Horse! " The north-east room, or the iii-st floor, contained the chest of drawers whereii were deposited the mysterious cures for all diseases. I have an occasion to remember the treatment of W DR. MORSE. 335 Dr. Morse; for when a child I was a patient of hers, and I distinctly reiiKnnlx'r listening to the conversa- tion upon her iirst visit, when the question was dis- cussed, in a low voice, whether the prescription should bo "a hemlock sweat, or a dose of calomel and jallop." These were her invariahle prescrij)tions, both for old and young, as well as for all diseases. The scale of occult science (to me at least), prepon- derated in favor of calomel and jallop; and holding in remembrance the nauseating taste, I have never been able to be reconciled to the appearance of a green bag, for from one of this kind the dose was taken. As a member of the bar, I never carried one. I could not abide it. Dr. Morse continued on for several years in the double capacity of the healing art, and vending liquor by the gill and half-gill. In these times liquor was bought by the measure ; the bottle was never set before the customer, to drink according to his pleas- ure. In fact the old custom of selling by the gill and half-gill was not abrogated till within the last forty years. A bold landlord was he, who first introduced the habit of placing a full decanter before his cus- tomer. After the decease of Mrs. Morse, Dr. Moreland, an old gentleman, resided a couple of years or so, in the town. This was proljably about the years 1814 and 1815. He left, and was succeeded by Dr. Ebenezer Chamberlin, in the year 1816. He was born in 21 336 HISTOKICAL SKETCHES OF PLTJlOrXH. Bwanzer, Cheshire oountv, New Hampshire, Decem- ber first ITiX^, and was the x>raotising physioian of the town, from the time of his immigration to his death, which oocun-ed Apil tweltth. lSt)6. An elibrt upon my part to give a bic^raphicai sketch of the doctor* I fear, will be abortive; and yet, pn>bably, no one has more of the material at hand with which to do it. He was a man of gvxni common sense: but his pro- pensity to turn everything which he touched into rid- iculej was a governiii^ passion. As a physician, he was careful and prudent : and his long practice, united wirh his obser's'aTion of the numerous cases which tVU into his hands> made him ordinarily proficient. He might be dassevl as a very respectable physician: he made no pretensions to surgery. A redeeming feature of the man was his perteot wilUngness to listen to the counsel and advice of a consulting brother: a some- what rare virtue with the cral\ generally. He was an eccentric man, and the fund of his an- ecdote was inexhaustible. The greater part of his abundant stock, and alAvays on hand ready for de- livery, will not bear repetition. He was not remark- ably choice in his selections. He was an original, and I have never met with an individual who so thoroughly blended sense and nonsense together; and yet there was a vein of cleverness throughout his con- versation. Before you reached the point of condemn- ing an out-of-place expression, he would convulse you DOCTOR OHAMBERLIN. 337 with laughter witli an unexpected hit, the cmhodi- ment of wit and sarcasm. As ]i(3 waH for fifty years tlie town })}iyBician, and known to everybody, great and BUiall in it, it will not, I hope, be amiBS to write out a few personalities of tliis unusual character. It was during the time tliat Cliarles 0. Curtis kept the puljlic scliool in tlieold Academy, that a Sat- urday afternoon would be occasionally assigned for what was called a "manners school." On these occa- sions the friends and patrons of tli(; scliool would be invited to participate: tjjere would be hjctiires on j)roper and l^eeoining behavior — suggestions as to polite conduct, and now and then there would be short dramatic entertainments and colloquies — all having in view the lesson of civility and gentlemanly and womanly deportment. To give an impression of the clown, he must needs be exhibited. And this part was always assigned to the doctor. Without him the r(jle would have been incomplete, and he acted it out to life. His grimaces, and blunders, and vulgar attitudes, actions and expressions, were life-like models, and the then, young doctor would bring down the hearty ap- plause of the house. His observation of men and things was scrutiniz- ing, and his conclusions were correct, but he had an odd way of illustration. Having in a measure lost the run of affairs in my 3SS lUSTOKlOAl. SKKTOHF.S OF ri.\ MOUTH, native town, mooting- the doctor, I ini^nirod of him how matt 01"^ woiv pivgiv^^ing thoiv ? ** Prog'iV5?j>ing," he repUe, while in the \>t^ter, about the neeessitry depth wheiv the Si^orament should be performed. It wi\s finally eomprv>misevl at " a depth of \Miter reaching the lowest button on his vest." At the conclusion of the ceremony, as he came dripping out of the stream, with a strv.n\g shake of the shoulders, he repeated in a loud voice, " This is glory enough for one day." I am obligwl to say, however, that he did not make a shining light in the chuivh. To illustrate this ruling passion which he had of the ludiervms, when upon his death bed, he was asked the (][uestion, " how he Mt with the approach of death so near at hand ?'* He ivplicd, " that he was entirely contented. That since his sickness Ivg-an, and which would prv^bably be his last, he had carefully reviewed the whole subject of the past, and carefully contem- plating the future, the result of his conclusion was, that he had liveil over fortv vears of his life in Shaw- l>Of"l'OK (MlAMIiKIUJM. 339 n<'/',, UH(] liiu] f)iiHHii1 'li'l not anticipate, tliat under any Ktii,t(; of circuniHtiinccH, Ijo couhJ \)(i placfid in a rnon; linfavorable f)OHition !" j'lit wliih; tlic doctor iiad a rouj^li <;xtr;rior, ;i,n'J would make encrnioH by tho wovcrity of liin criticiHms and remarks, he wan a kind-hoaricd, j^ofieroiiH man, and the last one in tlie world to (jntertain or eaiine a feeling.'; of malevolence. At the cost, however, of re- laxing the bonds of friendnhip, he conid not refrain from the p(;rpetration of a joke. JIIh gibes, Ijowever, were entirely liarrrdess, and witli those who knew liiia well^ tlj(;y were always forgiven. He was commissioner of the county for three years, and held for a long time tlie commiBsion of Justice of the Peace. lie never possessed the faculty of accu- mulating projjerty, and the conftequence was that he died poor; but there was no citizen of Plymouth who did not feel that in Dr. Chamberlin's death, there passed from the stage a man of generous impulses, and one who would not knowingly do a wrong. Dr. Charles E. Gaylord, fixther of the worthy gen- tleman of that name, still residing in the town, and in the enjoyment of a liberal fortune, the result of his own careful industry, can hardly be classed among the jjhysicians of the town. Dr. Gaylord was an eminent pliysician. He was the Bon of one of the original " Forty " who first planted the advanced standard of civilization on the 340 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF FLYMOUTH. "wilderneus frontier, in 176S. And there were none of tliat g-allanr and persevering band who sutfered more in tlie toils, and exposures, and battles, than this family. Three of them wei^e in Captain Eansom's company, in the Kevolntionary war, and another fell in the Wyoming massacre. The lather of Dr. Gaylord g-ave him a liberal course of study, and he graduated at an early day, in one of the medical colleges of Connecticut. He set- tled in HuiiTingtou, in tIus county, where he spent a long life in a laborious practice. He had an excellent reputation as a physician and sm-geon. In the latter pait of his life he came to Plymouth, and resided with his son to the time of his death, which was on the fourth day of February, 1839. While resident in Plymouth, he would occasionally be called on, in cases of consultation. He did not, however, pretend to practice to any extent in Plymouth. I remember him well, but at a time when he had become debihtated by the infirmities of age. He was a man very highly respected for his social virtues, and lived to a good old age. Dr. Charles E. G-aylord was one of the ablest phy- sicians of the territory of old Westmoreland. It was common to see the physicians of the ad- joining towns, in Plymouth, upon professional calls, forty years since. Doctors Baldwin, Whitney, Crary, Covels — lather and son : Atkins, Chrissey, J. J. Wright, Miner, Jones, all distinguished men: and all RESIDENCE OF HENDERSON GAYLORD. EARLY PREACHERS. 341 save Dr. Wriglit, wlio is now tlie oldest surgeon in commission of the United States army, have paid the great, last debt of nature, and their names even have almost become forgotten. CHAPTER XVII. EARLY PREACHERS — ROGERS, LEWIS, LANE, PEARCE, PECK. HAVING already spoken of Noah Wadhams and Benjamin Bidlack, the two pioneers of the gospel of the town, I come now to the consideration of the state of the church, the different creeds, and the men who respectively supported them, after the conclusion of the two wars through which our people had passed. Before the erection of the old Academy, the sec- ond floor of which was dedicated exclusively to reli- gious meetings, and a common place of worship for all religious sects, services were conducted in private dwell- ings, school-houses, and sometimes in barns. The old stone-house in the lower part of the town, now occu- pied by Mrs. French, but in early days by the Cole- mans and the Hodges, was a very frequent place of meeting. Tradition informs us that Mr. Bidlack and Anning Owen, preached in this house very frequently. Both of these men were preachers of the Methodist o42 niSTOKlOAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. faith. Xoah Wadluims would hold his meetings at his own house on the l\\ek road, and in the sehool- house upon " the Commontield." He Avas a Congiv- gatioualist. and pivvious to ISOO, this order of pe*,>ple Avas lai-gely in the aseendant, in point of numbers. Kot fer from this time, Elder Joel Eogers, bix^ther to Jonah, who has been fi>.\|uently mentioned in our rt^miniseenees of the town, hoisted the Baptist flag, and continued for many years to act in the capacity of a preacher. He was joined by Elder Griffin Lewis a few yeai-s later. ]Mr. Lewis residcvl in that pirt of Plymouth now called Jackson. These two men were at the head of the Baptist p\rt of the population. They were both excellent and exempla y men ; and while neither of them could claim any pretensions to what is calhxi pulpit oi-atory, they nevertheless might be classed as solid, sensible men, and preached solid, sensible doc- trines. When I lirst knew them, they were both past middle age. They wer^ of the old school of divines, who wer^ governed by the idea that the sanctity of their lives, their exemplary conduct, their weekly dis- courses, and the importance of their mission, furnish- ed a sufficient guarantee of success. ri\->gress in church, however, as well as in state, was steadily weav- ing a web of a ditferent texture. The agitating poli- cy wliich had uptmned the foimdations of a govern- ment, was not limited to temporal affiurs alone. The THE PRIMITIVE METHODISTS, 343 8|)Irit of the country was becoming changed: old cus- toms were giving place to new ones; — and in the spir- itual field, if the multitude would not come to the sanctuary, for religious instruction, the doctrines of the church must he carried to the hearth-stone and domicile of the indifferent and the heedless. The Revolutionary ideas brought into the field a new class of competitors. Under the banner of Meth- odisnj, they were literally scouring the highways and hy-ways, the lanes and alleys, and forcing the doc- trines of the cross upon men who might have heard of the Christian religion, but to whom its necessities were a sealed book. This system of persevering labor and untiring energy was a controlling element of the l^rimitive Methodists, and the old system of manag- ing and conducting sj^iritual affairs must needs yield to the new order of things,in the hands of young and determined men. The matter may be pretty well illustrated by the comparison of the speed of the old stage-coach with the locomotive — Napoleon with the Bourbons and the old dynasties of Europe. The Methodist clergy were generally young, ath- letic and vigorous men. They had the power of en- dm-ance. They devoted their whole time to their calling, week days as well as Sundays. They trav- elled upon horseback in sunshine and storm; their clothing, which was not much, to be sure, they car- ried in their portmanteaus; and if they could not 344 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. get enoiigli food to allay tlieir appetites wliere niglit overtook them, they went hungry. Like the crusader of the Thirteenth Century, with staff in hand, his eyes fixed on the Holy Sepulchre, and his mind chafed to fury at the wrongs of the infidel Saracen ; on they went, over bog and mire, over mountains accessible by a bridle-path only, and over streams without bridges; through snows and hurricanes, despising all obstacles and disregarding all perils, so that they planted their flag upon the embattled walls of the enemy's castle. They were types literally of the Apostles, and whose acts they strove to imitate; and therefore they moved on, having "no scrip, no bread, no money in their purse." Devoted and self-sacrificing, they would do a thousand times more severe labor for a yearly compensation of fifty dollars, than men like Beecher and Frothingham, of the present day, with a salary of twenty thousand. With a firm grasp on the handles of their big subsoil, spiritual plow, they plunged through roots and stumps and rocks, through quicksands and hard-pan. They prepared and sowed the field, and laughed and rejoiced at its product of an " hundred-fold." With the manifestation of all this zeal and de- termined progress, there would be, of course, now and then an act of indiscretion. At a quarterly meeting, held in the old Academy, somewhere about fifty years ago, one of the preach- EARLY METHODIST CLERGY. 345 ers declared from the pulpit^ " that on the death of a Plymouth sinner, Satan would hold a grand jubilee, and throw wide open the gates of his dominion, and exclaim, at the top of his voice, ' clear the way, re- joice now, brethren, for here comes one of my be- loved subjects from Shawnee.' " I shall not repeat the name of the author of this threat; he was a venerable man, and in years after he died full of honors, and left a name of renown throughout the valley. To this language some of the people took umbrage; but they were mostly of the class who were down upon the men who were daily thinning the ranks of their wayward associates. The liberal, sensible part of the community concluded that religious zeal was entitled to a clever margin; and like sensible men came down to the stubborn fact, that there was no more severity of punishment for a " Shawnee sinner " than for a sinner of any other locality. The doggerel rhymes, therefore, which the expression provoked, and which were designed to slap the Methodist church full in the face, did not long sm'vive ; and a twelvemonth cleared up the murky spiritual atmosphere. The activity and energy displayed by this class of men, formed and fashioned anew the habits and dis- position of the people. The man driven to his house from felling the forest trees, preparatory for his new ground crop, by severe cold, or heat, or storm, peering through his window at the Methodist minister, in his 346 HISTOKICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. white hat and blue surtout coat, galloping ahead upon his horse, would conclude that he also was alike able to resist the elements, and would resume his labor. In this way men became accustomed to walk faster, talk faster, decide quicker, and work harder; and many has been the rough field whose ledges, inequalities and declivities would not have been reclaimed and culti- vated for years but for the go-ahead example of the man in the white hat and blue surtout. His zeal gave a new impulse in temporal, as well as spiritual matters. Under these influences the old Congregational es- tablishment soon gave way. It could no more stand up against them, than the French squares at Water- loo, could resist the dashing charges of the Scotch Highlanders. The Baptists contested the ground, and while they maintained a respectable position in point of numbers, they were nevertheless far behind the Methodists. Several years later the Christian church attained a foothold in the town, which it still maintains, and has a very respectable congregation. The Baptist church finally became nearly extinguished, until more recently renewed by the Welsh immigration into the town. Of the earlier Methodist preachers, some of them were of decided talents. Without disparagement to others, I name particularly George Lane, Mar- maduke Pearce, and Dr. George Peck, with each of whom I was well acquainted, and who were on the REV. GEORGE LANE. GEOKGE LANE. 347 Plymouth circuit before I removed from the town to Wilkes-Barre, which was in 1824. Mr. Lane was assigned to what was known as the Wyoming circuit, in the year 1809. This included Plymouth. Gideon Draper, a man of whom the peo- ple of early times spoke in the highest praise, and who was reputed as an orator of unusual power, was associated with him as presiding elder. Mr. Lane was a stout, thick-set, firmly-built man, of medium height, blue eyes, and fair complexion. He possesssd a well-disciplined mind ; his ideas were expressed in forcible language, and when warmed up with the excitement produced by his subject, he would deeply enlist the feelings of his audience. His meth- od and manner were both agreeable and pleasant, and his argument was always the result of careful thought and, apparently, laborious research. His mind was thoroughly disciplined, and he possessed many of the elements of genuine oratory. He married a daughter of Ehsha Harvey, and as has already been stated, was engaged in mercantile pursuits in Plymouth and "Wilkes-Barre. The occupation, however, did not comport with his ideas of his duty, and after a few years he abandoned it and returned to his church, in the service of which he ended his days. He ever maintained a high standing among his people, and for many years was entrusted with the management of their large " Book Concern," located in New York; a position not merely of responsibility, in a financial 348 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. point of view, but also requiring literary qualifica- tions. As ]\Ir. Lane was many years a resident of our town, and married tliere, he may be considered a Ply- moutli man. He died in Wilkes-Barre, in the year 1858. Two of his sons survive him — Harvey B. Lane, a merchant of New York, and Charles A Lane, a citizen of Wilkes-Barre. Marmaduke Pearce, father of the author of the " Annals of Luzerne," and the present postmaster of the city of Wilkes-Barre, came on to the Plymouth circuit in 1815. He was continued in the capacity of presiding elder and preacher, on that circuit, for some eight or ten years. He was an immense man, physically; about six feet in height, and weighing, in ordinary health, three hundred pounds. He had a well-developed head, fair complexion, and .gray eyes. He was born in Chester county, in this state, August eighteenth, 1776 — his father's farm and resi- dence being upon the famous Paoli battle-ground, of revolutionary fame. A brother of Mr. Pearce — Crom- well — was Colonel of the sixteenth U. S. Infantry in the war of 1812, and was in some of the engagements on the Canadian frontier. As a preacher, Mr. Pearce was the embodiment of sound common sense. Reason and logic were the weapons which he employed. His sermons did not generally exceed thirty minutes, but in that period, by reason of his unusual powers of condensation, he DE, GEOEGE PECK. 349 would say as much as most men in double that time. He seldom became excited, but in a cool and delib- erate manner, would hold his audience at his will ; because his sermons were the product of a strong in- tellect, abounding in the illustrations of practical life, plain and sound, but devoid of what is commonly un- derstood, as oratorical flourish. He died at Berwick, Columbia county, Pa., in 1852, in his seventy-sixth year. Dr. George Peck, a venerable man, still living, and still in the service of his church, in which he has been an exemplary ornament and shining light for more than half a century, made his debut in the old Academy of Plymouth, in 1818. I say debut, but probal)ly this may not have been the theatre of his first efforts, but however, not far from the first. He was frequently after that assigned to the Wyoming circuit, in the capacity of presiding elder and preacher, and having married his wife in Kingston, an adjoin- ing town, we may almost claim him as a Plymouth man. He preached there, at different times, through a term of several years. I have a distinct and vivid recollection of the man from the commencement of his ministry in Plymouth. Of a tall and commanding figure, a countenance showing a high order of intelligence, a clear and dis- tinct utterance, a fine flow of language, with a capac- ity of analysis, he, of course, would not only attract, but entertain an audience. The announcement of his :>:>0 HlSl'OKKWl. SKETCHES OF ri.YMOl'TH. name, though thou comparatiYoly a youth. >YOuhl al- Avays bviug out the people. Ris styU\ at this i-emote period, w*as of the fervid aud nervous order of oratory. His strmous were ex- oelUnit speoimeus of this class. I have uot hoard him of lato voavs: probably ago aud loug praotioo have touod hiui down. I rou\ouiKn- now, thougli moiv tlum fifty }'ears ago, with their cares aud anxieties iutorveuiug, the s\i"l>$tanee of a soruiou 1 hoard him dolivor in the old Academy. The text, involved the relation be- tween paivuT and child: and the irapivssion made upon my mind, is still fresh and unimpaired. Fivm memory alone I ara able to repeat the text. I would like to say more of Dr. Peck, and speak of him as he deserves: but it is of the memory of those who have gone that I am writing, and uot of tiie living. The biogi-aphy of the living is out of place; for opinions are restrained, and besides, our motive may l)e the subjeot of criticism. At a later period, the Kev. Cyrus Gildei-sleeve, pastor of the Pivshyterian church, W'ilkes-Banv, and Doctor James May, of the Episcopal chmvh of the same place, pivached occasionally in Plymouth. This extended over a period of probably ten yeai^, commeneiuir about lS-4. CHAPTER XVIII. OLIJ KAMILIKH. 'J'lIK JiJDLACKM. AMONG the carlicHt of Hjo r]yn)Out}i BolilcrK, though not of the first, was Captain James Bid- lack. He came from Windham, Connecticut, with liis family, in J 777, and Ijtjilt for IjirnKclf a lo;^' Iiouko on GarriHon Jlill. At Uijk lime ;i,]l ihe rcKidences were clustered in a grouj) ut this place, and until after tlie ice-flood of 1784, there were no huildings elsewhere within the certified lines of the old town- Bliip, unless on the east side of Koss Hill. Captain Bidlack had three sons — James, Benjamin and Shu- bal. James, as has already been stated, comm;inded the company made up of men from lower Wilkes- Barre, and was stationed upon Colonel Zebulon But- ler's right wing at the battle of Wyoming, and being wounded, was captured and inhunjunly tortured in the burning flames of Fort Wintermoot. The life of Benjamin was an eventful one. After the house of Captain Bidlack was swept away in the great flood, he erected a small log house on a lot adjoining the Wright homestead farm, where he resided for several years, and at the time of his death. During the time he lived on Grarrison Hill, March twenty-first, 1779, on returning home from Wilkes-Barre, he was captured by the Indians, not far from his house. He and tho. elder Jonah Rogers 22 (351) 352 HISTORICAL SKETCHF.!- OF ri.YMOUTH. ■\Yoro vMi hort^obnok. Upon (ho attaok of tho Tudi;uu not informed. Snbsequent to this period, there is no furthei' mention of the name of Captain Bid- hick, nor am I able to ascertain when he died. He was a man past middle life when he c^\me to the vaUoy. His son Benjamin became one of the prominent and loading men of the township of Westinoivland. lie enlisted at the commencement of the Kovolutionaiy war. and served throughout the wntest. His name does not appear upon the ivUs of Pnrkoo's or Rjvn- som's companies. He pivlmbly w;\js among tlie vol- nnteei-^ of AVisnor or Stixmg: — these men wei"^ i"e- cruiting in Wostmoivland before tlie two independent companies were raised. He was at Boston when "Wasliington took chai"g\> of the patriot army to op- pose denenvl Gage. He was at Taunton on tlie tak- ing of the Hessians: ho was at Yorktown on the oc- casion of the sunvnder of Cornwallis, and wi\5 in AVashington's camp, at Xewburg. when the army was disbimde^l. li JC V. BENJAMIN 15 1 D L A C K BENJAMIN BIDLACK. 353 During the rcnnamito and Yankee conflict, ho was arrested and lodged in the Sunhury jail. lie escaped from his prison, under laughable circura- stances. He was a reniarkahly good singer. The canap is a good school to develop this faculty. I had occasion, frequently, to visit our ru Hilary encampments during the late rebellion, and it seemed as though almost every soldier had acquired the capacity of song sing- ing, and very many of them became very clever in this particular. Mr. Bidlack, in the later years of his life, would dwell with a great deal of satisfaction upon the vocal music of the men of the Revolutionary army. He liad assisted in erecting the "Temple of Liberty" at Newburg, and the singing which he had there listened to, and in which he had joined, lingered upon his memory. The great battle had been fought and won, and many of the soldiers' songs were commemorative of this event. There was reason for the deep impres- sion it seems to have made upon hira. In speaking to a friend of the songs in the " Temple of Liberty," he remarked: "I never heard such singing in my life. Some of the officers from New England were trained singers, and many of the men could sing well, and they made the temple ring with sweet and powerful melody." In his confinement at the Sunbury jail, his songs led the people to collect about the grated window of 354 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF rLTMOVTH. his cell. And in the evening, men, 'women and chil- dren -wonld gather there to listen to the Yankee's songs. They dually prevailed npon the jailer to let the man out, Trho had afforded them so much pleas- m-e. that they might see him. And thus many a pleasant evening ivas spent in mirth, song and laughter. Upon one of these occa- sions, in singing a song called •• The Swaggering Man," he told his audience that to give them a proper appreciation of the character he was represent- ing, they must give him a cane, and make room for him. as he could not do his subject justice otherwise. They furnished him a cane, and cried out, " Grive him room, make Avay, let him have a fair chance." The prisoner, after taking a drink, and passing backwards and forwards several times, acting out the character of a drunken man, to the infinite amusement of his audience, and suiting the action to the word, when he came to the chorus, '* Here goes the old swaggering man," he bounded from them like a wild deer. Pur- suit was in vain, '•' the swagg-ering man " was too fleet of foot and strong of limb for the pack at his heels. They could not overtake the quarry : and the dawn of day found him thirty miles trom his prison door; and before sunset, he rejoined his family in his log house in Plymouth. For a more particular accoimt of this incident, I refer the reader to Pr. Pecks History. At this jeriod of his life, Mr. Bidlack seems to EEV. BENJAMIN BIDLACK. o.05 liave Leen addicted to habits of intompcrance. 1'Ijo army is a poor school for temperance. Many, very many grains of allowance are to he made i'or tlio poor soldier, amid the hardships and exposures of the camp. This vice, however, he had the courage and decision to cast off, after he had assumed the ranks of civil life. He reformed, became a religious man, joined the Methodist church, and devoted the remain- der of his days to preaching the Gospel. For the last ten years of his life, he was placed upon the " super- annuated list," but so long as he was able to travel the circuit, he labored zealously in the cause. He was present at the remarkable discussion among the officers of the army, in Newburg, in 1783, previous to the disbanding of the troops. It was an occasion of unusual excitement. The officers and men had feceived their pay in Continental bills: they were worthless. They were about to be discharged and sent to their homes in poverty. Congress had no money nor credit. The situation became one of fear and alarm. The celebrated anonymous letters, said to have been written by General Armstrong, were circu- lated in the camp. These fanned the flame of dis- cord, and but for the firm stand taken by Washing- ton, the probabilities are, that the glorious fruits of the rebellion would have been destroyed. The con- duct of this great captain and noble patriot was never reflected in brighter colors, than upon this memorable occasion. The name alone of Washinj^ton caused 856 HISTOEICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. the Teteran soldier to lay dovrn his arms: his venoxa- tion tor his gn^t leader made him submit to want aud destitution, and tluvgo the rightei^us claims he had upon his country for his sevi^re labor. These let- ters wery? drawn with exeetnling ability, and appealing to the men to take eai>? of themselves Wfore their arms weiv taken frv^m them, and they dislvindeil. and sent hungry and naked to their unprovided homes and helpless families. In their debates the offieei"S spoke in their uni- forms, with their sworvls by their sides. On one oc- casion one of them, laying his hand upon the hilt of his sworvi, demanded with great vehemence: '^* Gentle- men, are you pi>?p\revl to give up these swords, which have promired fiWvlom for the Cv>uutry. and for yoiur- selves glory and renow n ? Can you retire to your ^urms or shv>ps. and iugloriously abandon the pix>feissicai of arms .^ Will you not rather spill your heart's blood in defence of rights which have been so dearly bought in the camp and upon the field of battle ?" But the genius of Washington was equal to the crisis. It was his noble example and boundless influ- ence that quieted the storm, and subdued the fearful and threatening commotion. The argimients pro and con which were made in this celebrated council, Mr. Bidlack had tceas^ured up in his memory, and when the old man would repeat them, in his deoliniug days, as he was very frequently in the habit of doing, he would become animated, and "our WASHINGTON." 357 often eloquently emphaHizing Iuh periods, by Liinging his staff down upon the ground with force. He would generally wind up his rehearsal with a benedic- tion on Wa8]jirjgton. And never was mortal man worshipped with more sincerity than he hy his soldiers. I was intimately acquainted with a large number of these venerable patriots. I attended their meet- ing, in the court-house in Wilkes-Barre, in 1832, where they were invited for the purpose of preparing their pension applications. I made out several of them. A pension application without the name of Washington embodied in it, they would look upon with suspicion. Time and time again I have intro- duced the name in their pjapers merely as a gratifica- tion to them. They were never tired of speaking of " Our Washington," as they endearingly called him; and they would give him the whole credit of achiev- ing American Indejjendence, reserving none whatever to themselves. A large number of these old veterans met in Wilkes-Barre on a fourth of July, probably about 1830. There may have been some thirty of them. The Rev. Benjamin Bidlack was their orator. The old gi;ntleman was then straight and erect, and moved off at the head of his column with a firm step and mar- tial bearing. They marched after the drum and fife to the old meeting-house upon the square, a large crowd following after. The occasion seemed to have invigorated their 358 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. venerable orator. He made a powerful impression upon his compatriots in arms, as well as upon the dense mass of spectators. He was a tall man, six feet in height; he had a bass voice, though well mod- ulated, and his delivery was graceful, and his manner earnest. The prevailing feature of this speech was that the Providence of God marked every feature of the eventful struggle of the Eevolution, and that Washington was his viceroy on earth, and the instru- ment of his will. His description of the cannonading of the British fortifications at Yorktown was well drawn, and de- livered with great effect. " For fourteen days and nights," said he, " there was one continual thunder and blaze. At night it was so light that you could see to pick up a pin. A white flag was raised from the British breastworks, and the firing ceased. Cornwallis proposed to leave the ground with the honors of war, with colors flying, and to embark his army on the English ships in the nearest harbor. ' No,' was the answer, and the parley closed. 'Now,' said Washington, 'give it to them hotter than ever,' and sure enough the storm of the battle raged more terribly than ever. They soon came to terms, and the heart of the war was broken." Language like this, from the mouth of one of the actors in the terrible scene, and addressed with all the fervor and power of youth, to the scarred and hoary veterans before him, many of them too who had taken REV. BENJAMIN BIDLACK. 359 a part in the decisive victory, went with a thrill to the very centre of the heart ! When the old patriot, with hands and eyes eleva- ted to Heaven, and in his deep, sonorous, and pathetic voice, invoked the blessings of God upon the spirit of Washington, and upon the band of noble veterans, covered with honorable scars, and bent with years of hard service, assembled before him ; big tears coursed down the deep furrows of his broad and manly face, and they wept like children. There was not a dry eye upon the thousand up-turned faces there present. The old man's utterance failed him to pronounce a benediction, and he and his revolutionary comrades separated in silence and tears. A feeling of conscious pride flitted over my mind at the conclusion of that day's business, that old Shawnee had won the garland of honors in the person of one of her pioneers. Eloquence and patriotism had clasped hands, and the people wept for joy. Mr. Bidlack removed from Plymouth to Kingston, where he closed his days. He died on the twenty- seventh of November, 1845, in the eighty-seventh year of his age. During the last few years of his life he had become imbecile in mind, and died from the ef- fects of a cancer upon his nose. By his second marriage he had one son, Benjamin A., who was a representative from this district both in the State and National Legislatures. He was also appointed, under Polk's administration, to the mis- SCO HISTORICAL SKETCUKS OF riAMOl'TH. siou at Bogota, Coutral Aniorioa, whovo ho died iu 1S47. Shubal. tho ivmaiuiug oi\e ot" the thvoo sous ot' Captain Jamos Bidlaek, settled iu Saleui. after the family separated in Plyniouth. Some of his descend- ants still reside thei^e. Dr. Peek, iu speaking of the Bidlaeks, says: '* They were a fan\ily of patriots — were all tall, large-boned, po^YOvt"ul men, and good soldiei-s." I have already referrov.1 to the incident of the Bid- lack mansion having been swept away by the gi-eat flood, with Benjamin in it. The name in Plymouth has become extinct, but seventy yeai-s ag\) it was pixnninent, and stood out in bold ivlief ; it was a part of the historical feature of many a well-fought bjittle- field iu the great revolutionary struggle. GHAPTEK XIX. OLD FAMU.IFS, 00:jrTI^t'Er KHYNOLPS ^NESBITTS WADH AMS — P AV KX FOR I'S — V AN -l.OO:S S— PRINGLES TURNERS ATHERTOiJS OASES LAMEROFX. I SHALL conclude my historical sketches with a short biographical notice of a few of the ecu-ly settles, who \\-ere not so closely connected witli the trials, suflerings, and exposures, as those who ha^*e Iven already alluded to. Some of them came to the n E N J A 51 1 N II !■: y N L D s. THE REYNOLDS FAMILY. 3C1 valley at a vciy early ])eriod of its settlement, and re- turned to Connecticut, wliere they remained until the troubles terminated; others emigrated to the town several years afterwards. But inasmuch as some of tliem shared in many of the hardahij)s, and others were of the principal femilies of the town, though making their home there at a later period, it is proper that they be noticed. The Keynolds lamily may be classed among the pioneers of the town. David, the ancestor, came from Litchfield, Connecticut, under the auspices of the Susquehanna Company, not long after the first immigi-ation to the town. He was one of the forty adventurers assigned by the company for Plymouth, though he did not reach the valley till the year 1770. This would make the commencement of his residence two years later than the arrival of the first settlers. His father — William — came out with him, with the view of seeing his son located in his new home, and was in the habit of occasionally visiting his son, and died while on one of these visits to him, and was buried in the graveyard upon his son's premises. David selected the farm now owned by the family, and upon which stands the Nottingham coal-breaker. He erected a log house a few rods east of the shaft. Soon after the commencement of the Pennamite and Yankee war, his house, with his other buildings, were destroyed by fire — the work of Indians or his Pen- namite enemies. He fled with his family to the fort 362 HISTOKICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH, at Wilkes-Barre, and a short time after, made his way back to Litchfield. A very fortunate thing for him, probably, as it may have saved him from the fate of his friends and neighbors at the Wyoming massacre. At the close of the Kevolutionary war, he again returned to his possessions. But he still found war raging in the valley. This was about 1784. His stay was short — as he, with the other settlers under the Connecticut claim, were driven from the valley by the order and decree of Patterson, the civil mag- istrate, (?) under the Pennsylvania authorities, sta- tioned at Wilkes-Barre. During this exodus, one of his children was born in the wilderness, between the , Susquehanna and the Delaware. David did not re- turn with the fugitives; he continued on his journey to his father's, in Litchfield. When the domestic broils had become in a meas- ure quieted, he came back, erected a house on the same site now occupied by the family mansion, where he remained to the time of his death, which occurred on the eighth of July, 1816. I have a distinct recollection of the old man, though I was but eight years of age when he died. In the last few years of his life, he became totally blind. From this misfortune he never recovered. The only members of David's family, within my recollection, were Benjamin and Joseph. There were others. Joseph resided for many years, and died, in REYNOLDS. 363 that part of Plymouth now Jackson. Benjamin remained upon the homestead farm during his long and industrious life. He died in 1854^ in the sev- enty-fourth year of his age. As he was one of the rep- resentative and substantial men of Plymouth for a half century or more, it is appropriate that I should notice him more particularly. He was a stout, square- built man, five feet eight or ten inches in height, light brown hair, and dark eyes. Inclined to corpu- lency, but very active. He had a pleasant and agree- able manner, and a character for much benevolence. Fifty years ago, when political excitement ran high, he and Noah Wadhams and Stephen Van Loon were the active political men of the town. They were of the Jefierson school in politics, and strongly attached to that side of the question. But while they strongly adhered to their opinions, and were thoroughly convinced of their correctness, neither of them permitted their party opinions to affect their social relations. Stephen Van Loon was elected sheriff in 1816, soon after the war, and when political affairs were conducted with much feeling. The boys even, of those days, wore the black and tri- colored cockades as the badges of the Federal and Kepublican parties. Mr. Reynolds was also elected sheriff of the county in 1831. I had just been admitted to the bar, and though a mere novitiate in the law, he did me the kindness to name me as his legal adviser. 364 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. This was an introduction to the business of the pro- fession ; it created, upon my part, an attachment to the man which ended only in his death. He was a man of great industry; up with the sun and astir with his men upon the farm, he did not know what it was to be idle. He was a pleasant and agreeable man in his intercourse with his neighbors, and remarkably kind and indulgent to those depend- ent upon him. He reared a large and highly respect- able family, and gave all his children a good common school education. It may be said that Benjamin Keynolds was one of " the solid men " of old Ply- mouth. His name was connected with three of the early mercantile firms of the town. He never gave the store any part of his time. The premises were too contracted and cramped for him. His ambition and pleasure were upon the farm, with an open sky above him. He was for many years a justice of the peace for the town. In those days the justices were appointed by the Grovernor, and the very best men were selected. They were appointed for life, or during good behavior. It was in the times of the old constitution, and in the days when the office of justice of the peace was hon- ored, and the incumbent respected. The men hold- ing the commissions of justice, at the period of which. I am writing, were as much, or more respected by the people, than the men of the present day who occupy the Common Pleas bench; nor do I speak in deroga^ WILLIAM C. REYNOLDS. REYNOLDS. 365 tion of the character of any of our judges. The days when Thomas Dyer, Eoswell Wells, Matthias Hol- lenback, Nathan Beach, Noah Wadhams, Abiel Fel- lows, Elisha S. Potter, Lawrence Meyers, John Marcy, and men of that stamp were the keepers of the peace of the county, the men who formed the type and character of the times in which they lived. When, therefore, Benjamin Keynolds was appointed a justice for life, or during good behavior, it was not a mere compliment, it meant something; it was a mark of distinction. His sons were all thorough business men. One of them. Honorable William C. Keynolds, amassed a large fortune. He was a successful merchant, elected to the Greneral Assembly, and at one time one of the associate judges of the county. The success of Judge Keynolds is but an illustration of what can be accom- plished by a life of industry and perseverance, guided by a sound mind and discerning judgment. He was the architect of his own fortune. He began business with comparatively small means, but as an offset to this, he was untiring in his efforts, and devoted all his time to his business. A merchant for the greater part of his life, and in which occupation he succeeded well; but his foresight and high character of intellect led him to make the investment of his spare funds in coal lands; and the increase of the value of these lands was the foundation of a large estate. Judge Keynolds and myself were intimate in early 366 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH, life. "We went to scliool together^ in the old Acad- emy, in tlie winter months; and were plow-boys in the summer, upon Shawnee Flats. Our fathers' lands adjoined; and many were the conversations we had, while we would be eating our frugal meal, at noon, under a tree shade, as to our future hopes and expectations in life. In these discussions we came to the conclusion that some other occupation would be more advan- tageous to us both. He talked up the store, and I the bar. And while we carried on this juvenile dia- logue, there was before us the apparently insurmount- able obstacle of the means to buy his stock of goods, and to procure the necessary legal education, on my part. And well do I remember his manly argument, though more than half a century has elapsed: " The WILL IS HALF THE BATTLE, AND DETEEMINED PER- SEVEEANCE, WITH UPRIGHT, TEMPERATE, MORAL DEPORTMENT, THE OTHER HALF," Apples of gold are contained in this noble sen- tence. And it is somewhat strange that time found him in his counting-house, and myself at the bar. The subject of our colloq[uy, as plow-boys, became a reality. And his " upright, temperate, moral deport- ment, and determined perseverance," not merely laid the foundation, but erected the superstructure of his fortune. He was a man of fine social qualities, and the most kind and indulgent of fathers. NESBITTS. 367 The photographic likeness of him herein inserted, is perfect and life-like. To my own mind, a more correct delineation of features was never transfen-ed to canvas. To me, this is a source of much satisfaction; for when I look ujDon it, there comes back the agreeable events of long past years; and the consoling reflec- tion, that the intimacy of our childhood was only sep- arated by death; and that nothing in the long interim occurred to mar or interrupt the friendship of many, many succeeding years. He died in Wilkes-Barre, where he resided at the time, some three years ago. Colonel J. Fuller Eeynolds, another, and a man of ]3robity and excellent business qualifications, still resides upon the old family homestead. Another one, Abraham H., is a prominent business man of Kingston. NESBITTS. The Nesbitt family were among the first settlers. Jamss Nesbitt, the ancestor, immigrated from Con- necticut in 1769, and was one of the "Forty." His name appears on the list of settlers of the valley, made out by Colonel Zebulon Butler, on the twenty- fourth July, 1769; and also upon a list prej)ared by Colonel Butler, of the persons in the Fort at Wilkes- Barre, on the twelfth April, 1770. Both of these enrolments are still preserved, and are in the hands of Steuben Jenkins, Esquire. 23 368 HISTOKICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. He made liis " pitch " (the phrase used in those days to indicate permanent location and settle- ment) at the foot of Ant Hill, where he resided with his family during the remainder of his life; and which was also the residence of his two sons, Abra- ham and James, during their respective lives after Mm. He returned to Connecticut in 1774, on account -of the Pennamite and Yankee troubles, but came back to Plymouth in 1777. From this period he remained on his farm to the time of his decease, July second, 1792. He was, therefore, a resident of the town at the time of the Wyoming massacre. He was in the Wyoming battle, and one of the sm'vivors of Captain Whittlesey's company. The proprietors of Shawnee flats, at the com- mencement of the Eevolution, leased their lands to an association of the settlers, on condition that they •would maintain their possessions, and keep the block house upon Garrison Hill in repair. Among the per- sons who thus became lessees, is the name of James Kesbitt. Mr. Miner represents the person as Abra- ham Nesbitt. This is undoubtedly an error, as he was at that time a boy only. The associates of Mr. Nesbitt in this enterprise were, Major Prince Alden, Alexander and Joseph Jameson, Jonih Eogers, the elder, Samuel Ayres, Samuel Ransom, and others. The two Jameson ; were at this time residents of Hanover; but the troublesome times brought the peo- NESBITTS. 369 pie together for self-preservation. The Jamesons were never permanent residents of Plymouth. Major Prince Alden was a citizen of the town, but for a year or two only. He was a Hanover man, and the owner of the very valuable homestead farm of the late Colo- nel Washington Lee. The name of James Nesbitt appears in the pro- ceedings of several of the early town meetings. He was an officer at a meeting held December sixth, 1779. On the death of the old gentleman, he divided his homestead farm between his two sons, Abraham and James; the latter taking the part of it north of the back road, and the former that part between the back road and the river. These brothers resided many years upon their patrimonial estate. Each of them reared large families, and were among the representa- tive men of the town. Abraham died January sec- ond, 1847, and James, August sixteenth, 1837. James Nesbitt, Jr., a son of Abraham, was elected sheriff of the county, upon the expiration of the offi- cial term of Mr. Reynolds, and was also elected to the General Assemb y of the State, after retiring from the sheriffalty. He was a man of unusual business qualifications, and left a large estate to his son Abraham, now a resident of Kingston, and his daugh- ter, late the wife of Samuel Hoyt, Esquire, of the same place. He resided many years on the eastern slope of Ross Hill. His dwelling stands near the railroad bridge that spans the Susquehanna at that 370 HISTOKICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. place. The largest part of this now very yaluable estate, he inherited in right of his wife, who was the daughter of Philip Shupp, owner of Shupp's mill of early days. The farm is still owned by his son and son-in-law. It is an evidence of their sagacity and good judgment to have held on to this estate, as the coal which underUes its surface has now become exceedingly valuable. I must relate an incident connected with the pur- chase of a part of tliis property, for the purpose of showing the astonishing increase of the value of land, on account of coal developments, and to which I was a witness. A part of the estate of the late James Barnes, who resided many years en the north-eastern slope of Eoss Hill, was exposed to public sale — some thirty or forty acres of woodland, adjoining the Nesbitt farm. He was a competing bidder for the land at the sale. This was probably in 1832 or 1S33. As he bid "seven and a half dollars" an acre, I stepped up to him and remarked, that I thought him wild in bidding seven dollars and a half per acre for unculti- vated woodland. He rephed, '"that the land adjoined him, and that he could make pasturage of it; that he .was aware that he was oflering more than its value, and should not bid any farther." The auctioneer failing to get another bid, struck it down to Mr. Nes- bitt, and he thus became the owner of it, and, as I thought, against his inclination. THE WADHABIS HOUSE. WADHAMS, 371 The same land to-day, I presume, could not be bought at a thousand dollars an acre. Its intrinsic value exceeds two thousand. After the expiration of his term, as sheriff, Mr. Nesbitt remained in Wilkes-Barre, and entered into mercantile pursuits. He died in that town some thirty years since. WADHAMS. The Eeverend Noah Wadhams, a clergyman of the Congregational church, and the progenitor of the Plymouth family, was one of the original " forty " of the first immigrants. He came from Litchfield, Con- necticut, in the year 1769. He had previously been first pastor at the church at New Preston, in that county — installed in the year 1775. A portion of this immigration came the year previous, but the main body of them came in the year 1769. Mr. Wad- hams was the shepherd of the small flock, which took up their residence in the wilderness, made more for- bidding because of the savage people who were in possession of the valley. Our Puritan ancestors were thoroughly imbued with the idea that religion and progress were insepar- able; that an enterprise which did not have a sprink- ling of the church about it could not succeed. A very safe rule, perhaps, and the observance of which might well be followed upon the part of their descend- ants, even down to the third generation. When, 372 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. therefore, an expedition was fitted out by the Susque- hanna Company, with a view of founding a Yankee town, upon any part of the company's chartered ter- ritory, the providing of a pastor was considered of as much importance as that of a physician, or a person skilled in any of the mechanical branches. Without a clergyman, the expedition would be incomplete. And that this personage might not be an incumbrance upon an infant colony, the company made provision for his support and maintenance. Thus, at a meeting of the company, held in 1768, I find among other things the following entry: — " The standing committee was directed to procure a pastor, to accompany the second colony, called the ' first for- ty,' for carrying on religious worship and services ac- cording to the best of his ability, in a wilderness country." The proceedings further make provision, " that he shall receive one whole share, or right in the purchase, and such other encouragements as others are entitled to have and enjoy." This share amounted to some three hundred acres, besides the perquisites, which sometimes accompanied the grant. The company further required the colonial adventurers to provide their pastor, when they located upon the promised land, " with sustenance according to the best of their ability." It will be seen, therefore, that there was a condi- tion precedent attached to every Yankee grant, to sup- REV. JACOB JOHNSON. 373 port and maintain a religious pastor. And this the immigrants faithfully executed, as we find in all the divisions and allotments of land among them, that a certain part was set off for education and religion. This was done by the people of all the " seventeen " towns. As early as 1762, when John Jenkins and his band of bold and fearless associates entered the val- ley and located at Mill Creek, the Kev. William Marsh accompanied them as pastor. In the autumn of 1763, Mr. Marsh was one of the number, of which mention has already been made, who were slain by the Indians. The Kev. George Beckwith, Jr., from Lynn, Massachusetts, came to Wyoming in 1769, as the successor of Mr. Marsh; he remained a year or two, and was succeeded by the Kev. Jacob Johnson, of Grroton, Connecticut. Mr. Johnson was the pastor of the Wilkes-Barre '' forty " from 1773 to the time of his death, in 1795 — for nearly a quarter of a century. Mr. Johnson was a man of strong mind, though pos- sessed of some eccentricities of character. It is said that he prepared his grave with his own hands, a year or two preceding his death, on the rocky eminence on Bowman's Hill, at the termination of Franklin street, in Wilkes-Barre. And upon this rocky promontory still repose the bones of the old Puritan leader, along with those of his wife — their's being the only graves of the locality. Some of the descendants of Mr. 374 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF FLYMOUTH. Johnson were men of mark in later years. Ovid F. Johnson, an eminent lawyer, and at one time Attor- ner-General of the State, was a srrandson. Eev. Andrew Gray was the pastor of the Han- over ••forty." He contimied for many years in that capacity in Hanover. It Avas under his administra- tion that the old church was erected on the Hill, a short distance below the Colonel Inman home- stead. When, therefore, preparation was being made to start the Plymouth colony, on their journey to the wilderness, it became a necessary part of the pro- gramme to select a pastor. The Rer. Noah "\Yadhams was chosen for the pur- pose, and he accepted. He was at this time, 1769, forty-three years of age, and had a family of small children. Leaving his family at home, he embarked with his flock amid the perils which lay before them, on the distant shores of the Susquehanna. The spirit of adventure was a ruling passion with our ancestors, and it has by no means become extinct with their descendants. Mr. "Wadhams was born in Middletown, Connec- ticut, on the seventeenth of May, 1726. He was a graduate of the college of Xew Jersey. His diploma, bearing date the twenty-fifth of September, 1734, is now in the custody of his great-grandson, Calvin TTadhams, Esq., counsellor-at-law, of "Wilkes-Barre; and what is a most singular coincidence, this same WADHAMS. 375 great-grandson graduated at the Karne university, just one hundred years after his paternal ancestor. The old diploma is a venerable looking paper. It bears the name of Aaron Burr, father of the celebra- ted man of Kevolutionary fame, as president of the college. There are also attached the signatures of the trustees of the college, Jacob Grreen, William E. Smith, Eichard Treat, John Braynard and John Pierson. The document is the surviving witness of three generations, past and gone : a testament also of the times of George III., and when the jjres- ent state of New Jersey was one of the colonies of his realm. Mr. Wadhams continued his pastoral relations, interrupted by an occasional visit to his family, in Litchfield, until the year succeeding the Wyoming massacre, when he removed them to Plymouth. From this time to the period of his death, on the twenty- second of May, 1806, he faithfully pursued his relig- ious duties; preaching in Plymouth, and in other parts of the valley. He was a man of very consider- able talents, having received a liberal education, as already stated, and as a mark of merit, he had also conferred upon him, by Yale College, in 1764, the degree of master of arts. He left four sons, Ingersoll, Calvin, Noah, and Moses. They were all too young to have taken any part in the early and angry strifes of the valley. I find all their names, however, ujjon the assessment d/b HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. list of tlie township, returned in 1796. Moses died of the yeUow fever in 1803. Calvin and Noah were for many years prominent business men of the town. The success of the former was remarkable. At the time of his death, in 1845, Calvin Wadhams was the man of the largest wealth in the townsliip; and probably there was not more than one other citizen of the county^ who possessed more property than he. He was a stout, athletic man, as I remember him, about five feet eight inches in height, dark blue eyes, and a florid complexion. He possessed an agreeable presence, and always had a kind expression upon his lips. I knew him well and intimately, and I don't remember of ever seeing him angry, or even excited. He was strictly temperate, very industrious, and lived in a plain and economical manner. He possessed a sound judgment, and no man knew better the value of real estate. All these qual- ifications, united with good health and a strong con- stitution, he could not but succeed. He made up his mind to become rich, and he succeeded. But in his progress towards the accomplishment of this purpose, his business relations with the world immediately about him, and connected with the theatre of his op- erations, were not marked by acts of oppression; nor did he avail himself of the opportunity of enforcing the collection of his debts, and becoming the OAvner of the property of his debtors at forced judicial sales. CALVIN WADHAMS. WADHAMS. 377 He was, in addition to his occupation of farmer, what would be called, in these' times, a private banker. He was in the habit of loaning money, and it seemed to afford him more satisfaction to lend to the poor than the rich. A plausible story, upon the part of a man of small means, was pretty generally success- ful, and such people would procure the loan of money from Calvin Wadhams, when it would have been out of the question to have succeeded elsewhere. Accommodating such people, as a matter of course, he would be annoyed when the day of payment came; and to resort to execution was the last remedy he em- ployed. To avoid this, he would extend the time, and receive almost any thing under the name of prop- erty in payment. I question if he ever sold out the house or home of any one who had become indebted to him. In this particular, his conduct was remarka- bly praiseworthy. But his chief occupation, and the one from which he derived the most satisfaction, was that of a farmer. He was a practical farmer too, for he put his own hand to the plow; and in the later years of his life, when the infirmities of age had overtaken him, you might see him in the field superintending the gather- ing of his harvest. When he became unable to walk there, he would ride there in his carriage. It had been his custom so many years to superintend the work going on upon his farm, that he could not con- tentedly relinquish it. 378 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. He was kind and indulgent to tlie men in his em- ployment, and lie would sell them corn upon credit, when they might have gone further and with less success. Living in a frugal way, and with his mind con- stantly upon his business, he accumulated a large es- tate. His old homestead farm — and being but a part of the estate which he left at his death — was recently sold, by his family, for seven hundred thousand dollars. As to his habits of frugality and industry, he was a genuine type of the men of the generation imme- diately preceding us. Labor, temperance, and econo- my, in his judgment, proved the true standard of man- hood, and that made up the rule of his long and pros- perous life. He was a religious man, and strongly devoted to the church of his faith. Born and educated as a Congregationalist, he left the creed of his ancestors, and embraced the Wesleyan doctrines. Having done this, he remained firm and steadfast in that creed to the end of his life. His home was ever open to the brethren of the Methodist church. At a quarterly meeting of these people in Plymouth, he would enter- tain as many as fifty of them at a time. Nor was his hospitality confined to the people of his own re- ligious sect — it was broad and general, and his home was open to all. He died at a ripe age, and in the full enjoyment of all his faculties. But one of his children survived him — the late SAMUEL WADHAMS. WADHAMS. 379 Samuel Wadhams, Esq., who inherited the larger part of his father's estate. He inherited too, the business qualifications and the even temper and kind disposition of his fath- er. Stepping into the occupation of so large an es- tate, he exhibited great skill and judgment in its management, and made valuable additions to it. Samuel Wadhams was a remarkably methodical man in his business affairs. He understood the detail, and knew well how to manage and control. He was probably more cautious than he might have been, in view of the accumulation of property. But he had that other and probably more useful qualification, prudence. He came to his conclusions with moderation, and they were generally right. Those who succeeded him will not have occasion to reflect upon his memory, for a lack of genuine good sense, as to the mode and man- ner of managing the large estate, the most of which he inherited. He was cautious in entering the great field of speculation which lay before him; he hesitated at the contraction of debt; he seemed to have been governed by the idea, that as his fortune was ample, there was no need upon his part of putting any of tliat fortune in jeopardy, by grasping with cupidity for that which might, and still might not, be as advanta- geous as the theories of speculation pointed out. And there is not, in this view of the case, any reason to question the propriety of his conclusions. 380 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. He had enouo-h. Possessino- the cautious and o o methodical characteristics of his father, he turned over the large estate, with the accumulations it had received, through his careful management, to his chil- dren; which makes each of them an ample fortune. He died on the fifteenth of December, 1868, in his sixty-third year. He died as he had lived, a man of unblemished integrity; upright in his dealings, and a worthy Christian member of society. He left three sons — Elijah C, Calvin, and Moses, and one daughter, who is the wife of Hon. L. D. Shoemaker, the representative in Congress from this district, at this time. The faces of three members of this family, repre- senting three generations, accompany the short bio- graphical sketches I have attempted to draw of them. Noah, the third son of the pioneer, was one of the early Justices of the Peace of the county. He was a graduate of the famous law school of early days, at Litchfield, under the management of Judge Keeve. He was admitted to the bar of Luzerne county, not far from 1800 ; hut the profession did not seem to have afibrded him any attractions, and he settled down upon his patrimonial estate in Ply- mouth, where he spent the remainder of his life. He was an industrious, upright man. As a justice of the peace, his decisions seldom found their way to the ap- pellate court. His knowledge of the law, assisted by his good common sense, enabled him so to decide, be- ELIJAH C. WADHAMS. NOAH WADHAMS. 381 tween the parties before him, that they seldom ap- pealed. As an evidence of the way in which the early people of the town economized their time, the regula- tions of Esquire Wadhams' court will afford an ex- cellent illustration. Saturday afternoons were his re- turn days, as well as the times fixed for the trial of the cases before him. This gave the magistrate an opportunity to do a half-day's labor before the open- ing of the court, and if an unusual amount of business was on hand, and it became necessary to extend the session into the night, it was so much gained. But the adjournment of an unfinished case went over to the succeeding Saturday. This was the general rule; there may have been exceptions to it. Noah Wad- hams was a frank, outspoken man, and one not in- timately acquainted with him, might have thought him rude and severely harsh, in his manner. But he was remarkably sensitive; and while his outward de- portment carried the semblance of a brusque and haughty appearance, the heart and disposition of the man were as docile as a child's. The defendant upon whom he would pronounce the judgment of the law, ■v\ath the appearance of not merely cold indifference, but boisterous anger, would find in him the most ac- cessible person to become his bail, even for stay of execution. His eyes and tongue were but a poor ex- ponent of the emotions of his heart. Probably a purer man, or one who strove harder 382 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OP PLYMOUTH. to do even and exact justice, in Ms official capacity, never received or acted under a commission of the peace. He was a model magistrate, and for many long years did he enjoy the confidence and respect of his neighbors. He was as positive a man in his politics, which were of the Jefferson school, as his brother Calvin was in his, which were Washingtonian. No two men were ever more diametrically ojDposed to each other than these two brothers, in their political principles. One a radical Democrat, the other a radical Federalist. Noah Wadhams died in 1846, in the seventy-sixth year of his age. His farm was situated between the river and the back road, and extended from the Lackawanna and Bloomsburg railroad depot to the small stream heretofore referred to, and on which now stand some of the most expensive and best buildings of the borough. There are now, none of his family left in Plymouth. DAVENPORTS. The Davenports, a very numerous family of the present day in Plymouth, were among the early set- tlers of the town, and one of them was of the original "Forty." I am not able to ascertain the length of time he remained in Plymouth after his immi- gration. The name of Danford is on the original list. The surname is so obliterated that I cannot decipher a DAVENPORTS. 383 letter of it. It was undoubtedly Eobert, however, father of Thomas, who came a few years afterwards. The name of Davenj)ort and Danford are the same. The family were known by the latter name many years since my recollection; and it is so wiitten in the old deeds of conveyance. The family is of low Dutch origin, and this may account for the dilferent manner of spelling the name. The name of Conrad Davenport is upon the dead list of the Wyoming battle. I think this man was a resident of Newport, and a member of Captain Stew- art's company, and probably of that family of Daven- ports still residing in Union township, but who are not related to the Plymouth family. The Danford whose name appears upon the roll of the Susquehanna immigrant company, and to whom was allotted some of the lands still in posses- sion of the family, came out, most likely, as an ex- plorer; and, on his return, giving a favorable account of the new country, his son Thomas succeeded his father in the Plymouth possessions. Kobert does not seem to have returned to the valley. It is also pretty well settled that he was a member of Captain Whittlesey's company in the battle, and a survivor of that terrible disaster. Such is the tradition of the family at the present time, and most likely a correct one. Thomas Davenport, the ancestor of the now resi- dent family, came from Esopus, on the Hudson, state 24 384 HISTOEICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. of New York, in the year 1794. His name is regis- tered on the assessor's list of 1796, and he was then the owner of a large landed estate. His name does not appear on the enrolments of the people of the town before this period. He died in the year 1812, leaving a large family — six sons and four daughters. His sons were Thomas, John, Robert, Samuel, Dan- iel and Stephen. A considerable part of the old homestead farm is still owned by the descendants. In early days the four Davenport houses, with their long stoops extend- ing the length of the entire front of each, presented a unique appearance, compared with the other buildings of the pioneers. The latter followed Yankee models, built after the Litchfield houses of Connecticut, The former were after models of the people of Sir Hendrick Hudson. This row extended from the " Swing-gate " to the mountain road, near the Not- tingham colliery. The residence of the ancestor was situated about half way between the two points named. Two of these ancient buildings still stand; but they have lost the old ornament of the front stoop, and they do not have the cheerful appearance they possessed forty years ago. From the death of the old gentleman down to the year 1820, the entire estate remained in common, not- withstanding three of the sons had residences of their own, and three of the daughters were married and re- DAVEiSTPORTS. 385 siding away from the paternal mansion; still, for the period of eight years, the property remained in com- mon. A somewhat strange state of affairs, compared with the present times — for now the earth has scarcely time to settle down upon the lid of the ancestral coffin, before the process goes out for carving up and dividing the ancestral estate. The Davenports, for the period of time named, labored in the same field; fed, we may say, from the same board — as the crib and granary contained the same common stock of grain — and they were, in fact, a commune of themselves. The whole machinery moved without a jar; there was perfect accord. When they would meet together of an evening, after the day's labor, upon the old homestead stoop, it used to be the remark of others, that " Congress had assembled." And here were discussed, not those in- triguing and subtle questions which now occupy the time of a somewhat degenerate body of men, known by the same name, but the more useful and necessary and solid questions of life, such as how such a field should be tilled ? What should be the character of the succeeding day's employment ? Which of them should swing the cradle, and which rake and bind ? How much of the crop should be thrashed and sent to Easton, and how much put into bins for the year's supply ? Solid, sensible, and man-like discussions. And in this way the Davenport congress managed their affairs. Secret schemes, involving the means of 386 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. living, independent of industry and hard labor, had no place upon their " private calendar." And so they went on through years of prosperity, their names appearing neither on the criminal, or civil dockets of the courts, of the county, as litigants. The family for two generations, within the knowledge of the writer, have been upright, industrious, and active business men. Of the six sons of old Thomas Daven- port, Stephen, late Count}'- Commissioner, and now a resident of Huntington, is the only survivor. Daniel, as has already been stated, became seri- ously involved in the coal trade, at an early day, and lost most of his estate. He was a man of integrity, of frank and pleasant deportment, and very popular with the people of the town. His misfortunes in the coal business enlisted the sympathies of the citizens deeply, and these troubles were undoubtedly the cause of his premature death. He was a representative man of his day; and he gave employment to, and fed large numbers of labor- ing men, for those times, and of them all, no one ever had cause for comjjlaint in his dealings and inter- course with them. I refer back to this generous and kind-hearted man with feelings of lively emotion. He was but three or four years my senior; we were inti- mate for many years. We occupied the same bench in Thomas Patterson's school, in the Old Academy; and when I came to the bar, he was one of my first and best clients. These reasons make me cling with DAVENPORTS. 387 great regard to his memory. He left a large family at his death, as did also Thomas, John and Eobert. In the division of the estate of their father, each received a competency. Jacob Gould and John Pringle, both highly respectable men, married daughters of the old gen- tleman. Mrs. Pringle is living; she and Stephen are the only survivors of the family of ten. The Davenports were among the substantial busi- ness men of the town for a great many years. They were of that class which, above all others, are entitled to public consideration, because they were devoted to their own affairs, and were not in the habit of med- dling with those of others. They faithfully main- tained their credit, and their lives were marked with strict economy, industry and fair dealing. The six sons were all farmers, and they literally were gov- erned by the sentiment contained in the couplet of our great American philosopher, Benjamin Franklin, that — " He tliat by the plough would thrive, Himself must either hold or drive." VAN LOONS. The family of Van Loons also immigrated from Esopus in the year 1794. There were three broth- ers — Abraham, Mathias and Nicholas. As the name indicates, they were of low Dutch origin. I find them all on the assessment list of 1796. They came to Plymouth after the valley troubles had ceased 388 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. to exist. Tliey were a family of hard workers, and were among the active business men of the town. Abraham, or as he was generally called, Brom, had a large family of children. His residence stood on the south side of the Nottingham shaft, at the corner of the Main and Mountain roads. Stephen, his eldest son, was elected high sheriff of the county in the year 1816. He was captain of the militia of the town in 1814, and mustered the men of his company into the United States service, who were drafted from it. He was a man of very considerable energy, and during the war of 1812 was a very noted politician of the town. Being of the democratic party, he was rewarded by it, with the office of sheriff, as a compensation for his political services. He discharged the duties of the office faith- fully. He died February 1840 or 1841. Samuel Van Loon is a son of Stephen, a man well known in the county. He was also elected to the same office in 1859. He was the last of the five sheriffs of the county selected from Plymouth men. It is somewhat remarkable that the township of Plymouth should have held this office a third of the time, from 1816 to 1859. The county being large in territory, and the population numerous, Ply- mouth had more than her share of sheriffs. The order in which they were elected is as follows : Stephen Van Loon, Benjamin Reynolds, James Nes- bitt, Caleb Atherton and Samuel Van Loon. VAN LOONS. 389 Another feature marks tlie case, whicli is well worth recording — these gentlemen wei'e all of them descendants of the first settlers of the town. The grandfathers of three of them were of the original " Forty." The ancestors of the two Van Loons came but a few years later. John, another son of Abraham, was a man of keen and sarcastic wit. How many times I have listened, with others, to the stories of John Van Loon, while the men of the harvest field were laying under the shade of the big cherry-tree, on my father's farm, on Shawnee Flats, taking the " hour's nooning." Like Shakspeare's Yorick, " he was a fellow of infinite mirth." He would for a half hour keep the company in uproarious laughter. At the risk of being charged with a departure from the dignified theme of history, I must relate a specimen of his numerous stories, though I do not vouch for the truth of it! He was a pilot of the Susquehanna, and made the navigating of arks a part of his employment. At the foot of the Halifax mountain, this side of Harrisburg, an old man by the name of Hoaklander kept a way-side inn. The ark and raftsmen Avere accustomed to stop at this tavern. The house stood at the base of a very high hill and with a steep ascent. As Van Loon related the story: "Hoaklander had a one horse sled, which he used in transporting S90 HISTORICAL $XKTCr.::< OV rLTMOCTH. his fiT>tywc>od trvnu tliis mouuiaiu dde. The haniesss had Iniok^kiu tra«x^ Ou a thawing spriwg dav iu Marvh he a;^vttdt\l tho lull with his one horse sled, put ou his load v>f wood, and started homewarvi, lead- ing his horse. On arriving at his house at the bot- tom o>f the hilU he foxmd his sled missing: in a gre«t fury he jerked otf the hamesSj anvl thr>?w it o\>?r a stnmp by the way-side, and put his horse in the sta- ble, vexed Wyond endurance at the r>i«ult of his work. The weather changed at night, and it became sud- denly very cold: the eJ^vt of this wus to it?tract the stretched bucls^in traces;. The old man was awak- ened by a rumblii^ noise during the night, hke dis- tant thunder. The s^nmd cvmtinued: he jumped fr»m his Kxi and went to his dootv when loS in the moon- %ht he ssaw his sled load of wvxxl preciptately de- scending the mountain pitch: and to his astonishmeni it came uj)> to his door with a rush." Baddy Hoakknder and his buckskin traces would wvU bear an annual repetition. John rvn\oved with his :6uaily to rr,e Stale of Ohio, wher? he died some twenty-five years ago. Jeitemiah, another brother, rumored to the same Btate a frw years before John. Aoijuainted with two generations of this SunilT, it al^mls me much satisfaction to speak of them all as men of probity, industry, and congenial social dis- positions. A str>eus or- der of people to the hour of his death. Notwith- standing he had been expelled from the Society, be- cause he had married outside of the church hmits, and in direct violation of its discipline, he ever consid- ered himself as one of the order, however, and bound by its formulas and creed. He would say, " that in matter of substance he had lived up to the faith of I his fathers; but that in two matters of form only, viz. : his marriage, and submitting to the military draft of 1812, he had wandered a trifle, but that this was by no means a matter of regret." And 23robably these were the only two instances in which he had failed, during a long and eventful life, of fulfilling the requirements of his creed. And yet it is somewhat difficult to reconcile his professed religious obligations, in view of his conduct in entering the service in the JOSEPH WRIGHT. 407 war of 1812. His argument was, "mj people enjoin peace, and so do I, unless tlie enemy is upon the border, and then there should be no peace till he be expelled; nor can I relieve my conscience by sending a substitute in my place, for I would thus only be doing indirectly what the country demands directly of all her citizens. I must, therefore, lay aside the Quaker coat, and shoulder the musket, if the requisi- tion of the draft falls to my lot." It did; and in 1814 we find him in Captain Hal- leck's company of Pennsylvania militia, on the march for the defense of Baltimore, which was besieged by British guns. Patriotism had triumphed over relig- ious fealty; the tri-colored cockade usurped the broad brim. The regiment, however, was countermanded in its march, and he, with the others, was discharged; but for the small service he lived to receive the govern- ment bounty in a land warrant of one hundred and forty acres of the public domain — an acknowledg- ment upon the part of the government of which he was exceedingly proud. And who shall say that van- ity, under such circumstances, is not tolerable ? The occupation of a merchant does not seem to have been congenial to him. He pursued it but a short time, and abandoned it, for, to him, the more active and agreeable employment on the farm. And into the business he went with all his energy and in- domitable will. 408 HISTOEICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. Endowed by nature witli an iron constitution, and possessing a frame-work begirt with stalwart thews and sinews, he was prepared to resist ordinary obsta- cles, and his mind was made up to light out the great battle of life in a heroic and resolute manner. The marshals of the First Consul, fighting under the eye of their great captain, never entered the field with a more determined purpose to win than did he. And with this fixed and unchangeable determination, you might see him at all hours and seasons, and in all kinds of weather, steadily pursuing his occupation. Entirely temperate in his habits, and eminently moral in all his relations of life, and having a well balanced mind, and much more than ordinary intellect, success was certain. The early Plymouth men, almost, I may say, without exception, seem to have had a hankering for a share of the broad acres of the great field. Their wealth and social consequence seem to have been measured by the number of acres they could acquire of it. As the wealth and position of the nomadic chiefs of the hills of Judea were estimated according to the number of cattle of their grazing herds, so were these men as to the number of acres they owned of the " Shawnee Flats." Sharing therefore this feeling of ambition, if not to a greater extent than most of his neighbors, at least to an equal degree with any of them, he deserted the shop, and entered the field of labor, literally, without JOSEPH WRIGHT. 409 the least mental reservation. His aim was the ac- quisition of land; and had he followed out this idea alone, he would have died a man of very large wealth. In the place of leaving for his children thirty or forty thousand dollars^ it might have been ten times mul- tij)lied. He was a model farmer; no man understood its theory and practice better. He knew when to sow, and when to reap; how to crop, and the mode and manner of agriculture, from the most important to the smallest details. And his rapid success was an evidence that he thoroughly understood the business, Andj as Byron said of George III.: " A better farmer ne'er brushed dew from lawn." He possessed a solid judgment, and he came to his conclusions after deep thought and deliberate re- flection. He read much in his intervals from his daily toil. Josephus, Eollin, Hume and Eamsay were his standards as to ancient and modern history. Shakspeare, Sir Walter Scott and Burns were his posts. He could almost entirely repeat the " Lady of the Lake," and " Marmion." And the " Cotter's Saturday Night " was his ideal of the master. Thus reading, and reflecting upon what he had read, there was presented to him an obstacle in his pathway to a liberal fortune. He stopped to consider it, and relaxed his efforts for the addition of acres, 410 HISTOKICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. and turned his thoughts upon the education of his children. " Knowledge, if properly applied," he would say, " is of more importance than gold or silver. A stock in trade of education needs no policy of insurance; it cannot be burned by fire; it cannot be encumbered with debts and sold under the auctioneer's hammer; and therefore my sons may 'choose, at the proper age, whether they will pursue my occupation, or acquire a learned profession." Adopting, therefore, this idea, and treating it as a fixed fact, he set himself about the work of its accom- plishment. To do it, however, must necessarily dis- pel the hope of becoming rich; the money, therefore, annually laid aside to buy more acres, must now be applied to other purposes. " Boys," he would say (and by the way this was the manner in which he would address us when we were gray-headed men), "boys, it is my purpose, if my life be spared, to give each of you an opportunity of fitting yourselves for the pursuit of a learned profession. While I am en- tirely satisfied with my own lot in life, I cannot but feel that if I had had a better education, I should Lave been a happier man. Though as to this, I may be mistaken; for I entertain a greater respect for a first-rate farmer or mechanic, than I do for a second or third-rate professional man. Knowing, therefore, that I am a first-rate farmer, my position is one that I am proud of; and as such, the community respect JOSEPH WEIGHT. 411 tne. Had I held an indifferent standing in any of the professions, with my ambition, I should not have the same feeling of pride that I now enjoy. There- fore, it is probable that it is all for the best. You must understand, however, that you must thoroughly learn my trade first. For this I have two reasons. In the first place, you will leave me with a fully de- veloped frame, with sinews and muscles matured, and you will thus be prepared for the rough shock of the world, whether in the camp or civil life. All this may be done now, but not after you have reached the years of manhood. In the second place, if you shall not have the talents and ability to sustain yourselves in a learned pursuit, you will have the knowledge of my trade to fall back upon as a reserve, and so be enabled to make a living with the lessons of industry I shall teach you. Bear in mind, too, if you choose a profession, to strive and be at the head of it, or do not make the effort at all. You will, therefore, con- tinue to labor daily in the field by my side, in seed time and harvest; attending the school, at home, during the winter months, till you severally reach the age of eighteen years; by that time you will have matured your physical power, and also have learned my trade; and I hope will also have obtained suffi- cient knowledge and judgment to decide for yourselves as to your future course. And as you shall then de- termine, the responsibility must rest with you, not me." 412 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. Here is the reasoning of a philosoplier, and could not have been improved with the possession of the learning and wisdom of all the schools. Plain common sense, accompanied with a sound discretion, seldom to be found in a man who had been blessed with so few opportunities in early life. Acting, therefore, under this advice, myself and two younger brothers, in arriving each at the age of eighteen years, with a pretty good knowledge of the rudiments of learning, acquired during the winter months, in the old Academy, under the tuition of Jonah Kogers, Thomas Patterson, Charles C. Curtis, and Thomas Sweet, as well as a pretty good develop- ment of body and frame from the field lessons on Shawnee Flats, went through a classical course of study, and severally became members of the Luzerne county bar. With what degree of success, however, it does not become me to speak. My readers, how- ever, vnll pardon me in saying of my younger brother, Harrison, now deceased some fifteen years, that a more profound lawyer and jurist, or an abler or more eloquent advocate, never practised law in the courts of the county of Luzerne. He died in the meridian of life, and with the most brilliant prospects of an eminent professional career before him. While my father professed to belong to the old Federal school in politics, and was a regular reader of the United States Gazette, so long as Mr. Chand- ler continued to edit that paper, he did not have any- JOSEPH WRIGHT. 413 tiling to dOj ordinarily, with party affairs. He would generally make his own selections from both party tickets at the polls, and seldom voted what is called a " straight ticket." He was, however, a great admirer of Henry Clay, and whenever the name of this great statesman came before the people, then his energies knew no bounds. In fact all of the old party men of the Federal, or in later days the Whig school, were wonderfully attached to Mr. Clay. They would make any reasonable sacrifice for his advancement, and I have seen many of his old friends and sup- porters shed tears over his defeat. He was literally the idol of his party, and a more noble and gallant political leader never occupied the commanding posi- tion of party ranks. The unkindest remark I ever had from my father, came from him in consequence of some strictures I had made upon Mr. Clay, in a speech, advocating Mr. Polk's election, in 1844. He remarked to me, " that he blushed to be the father of a son who had not the independence of character to sustain such a man as Henry Clay, in preference to a man of the talents and statesmanship of James K. Polk ! That no personal benefit could arise to me, if he should by scheming strategy and deception mis- lead the public mind, and secure the election; of which, in his judgment, there was not the remotest chance." This language was expressed with much energy and deep feeling, and months elapsed before the 414 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. impression wore away from the old gentleman's mind. Mr. Polk, however, was elected, and as events turned out, there was a strange reality in the prophecy; for notwithstanding I had been the presiding officer of the boisterous and stormy convention which gave him the nomination at Baltimore, and participated in all the preliminary movements which terminated in his nomination and subsequent success,- 1 was unable to control the appointment of a ten-dollar postmaster, in this district, during his administration of the gov- ernment. Meeting, therefore, with this rebuff, after the important relations between him and myself, I must canfess that my mind would go back to the expres- sions made by my father. For I never did know, and do not now know, the cause of Mr. Polk's turning a deaf ear to every suggestion I made to him on the subject of local patronage. A third of a century has however elapsed, and it is now a matter of exceed- ingly small moment. My father had a wonderful passion for the drama, and particularly in the representation of the plays of Henry IV., and the Merry Wives of Wind- sor, in the character of Falstaff. The humor of these plays seemed to have filled full the cup of his enjoy- ment. In his early days he was in the habit of visit- ing Philadelphia two or three times a year to pur- chase the goods for his store. He would attend faith- fully to the work of the day, but would always go to JOSEPH WEIGHT. 415 the theatre at night, if any play was posted that pleased him. I have heard him say " that if he were in Philadelphia with but two dollars in his pocket, he would spend one of them at the theatre." This, in fact, was about the only thing in which he was extravagant, and the expenditure of a dollar for any thing else not absolutely necessary, very sel- dom occurred. Hospitable in his house, moderately indulgent only to his children, economical in his apparel, though always dressed neatly and becomingly, when not engaged in labor, he may be classed as a man of the strictest economy, and governed by the most rigid rules of frugality; not parsimonious, but prudent and close in his management. To all this, however, he made one grand exception in the expenditm-es, for a man considering his means and habits of life, in the education of his sons. In this he was liberal to a fault. The ruling and absorbing passion of his early life to become rich, became merged in the nobler and more exalted sentiment of education, and in that moving idea he was most generously seconded by my mother. On that topic they acted in perfect accord, as well as to the full and 23erfect accomplishment of their purpose. Through years of toil and personal privations they accomplished the object nearest their hearts. And it affords me much satisfaction to re- cord the fact, that neither of them ever expressed a regret for these sacrifices they assumed, 26 416 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. Altliougli sectarian in his Qiial^er creed, the spirit of universal toleration in matters of religion never more eminently shone out in the character of any man. His doors were always open to the visiting clergy, and they were profusely entertained with the best his house afforded. To those of them who were poor and needy, he was liberal. They did not go away without carrying with them some evidence of his generosity. He was temperate in all things—- in his tastes, in his language, and all his habits. I never saw him under the slightest influence of liquor ; nor did I ever hear a profane or irreverent expression escape from his lips. During the last few years of his life, though in very easy, if not to say affluent circumstances, he would not permit himself to be idle. If he did not take a farming implement in his hands, he would nev- ertheless spend most of the day in the field, and if a necessity arose, would cheerfully give his aid and assistance. In the fulfilment of his engagements he was exact, and up to the hour. No man ever had more horror of debt. In the settlement of his estate, and it was a large one, the whole amount of his indebtedness, of his own contracting, did not amount to ten dollars. He avoided the law; and would incur the loss of a small debt sooner than prosecute the claim. He would say to his debtors who had disappointed him, "you JOSEPH WRIGHT. 417 have deceived me, but I shall take care that you do not have another opportunity." In his business trans- actions of half a century, and they were large, I know that an action of law was never instituted against him; nor do I remember of an encumbrance of judg- ment or mortgage entered against him, or of a suit brought by him. He bought and he paid — and he never bought till he had the means to pay. He was literally a peace-maker among his neigh- bors. Frequently called upon to act as umpire in neighborhood disputes and difficulties, he would most generally reconcile the conflicting opinions of the par- ties who sought his advice and counsel. Understand- ing the whims, caprices, and peculiarities of the people before him, and knowing how to humor and when to use argument, his strong and well-adjusted mind gen- ei-ally terminated the controversy. I have seen neigh- bors thus before bim, who would refuse to speak to each other civilly when they came, shake hands before they left, and go away apparently the best of friends. He would frequently bring these people in his pres- ence by strategy, and after he had healed up the open wound of dispute, and reconciled them to each other, he would tell them how they had been brought face to face, and for what purpose; and then they would all laugh, and after emptying a mug of cider, all part in merry glee. His judgment fee would generally be "a big apple!" I have seen the parties litigant, on more than one occasion, in the way of carrying out 418 HISTOEICAL SKETCHES OF PLYMOUTH. the joke, come afterward and make a formal tender of "the big apple," and demand "a receipt in full of the taxable cost of the case." The Danes have a law, that is in force in their West India possessions, and probably also with the home government, that no suitor shall be permitted to bring his case into coutr, till he has first made an eifort to settle the matter of dispute with his adver- sary^ before a mutual friend or umpire. Might we not improve our own jurisprudence by engrafting this Danish law upon a limb of our legal tree ? And so, in a few paragraphs, I have sketched the outlines merely of a moral, industrious, upright, and exemplary man : " For even Ms failings lean'd to virtue's side." The last acts of his life were in keeping with his previous conduct. But a few days before his death, and when it was manifest that the end was near at hand, some one at his bedside inquired if he would have a minister, in view of religious services ? He said, "No; I am not aware that I ever did a human creature a wrong, and I have, therefore, no confession to make; and as to the future, I have an abiding and firm faith in the creed of my fathers. Death has no terrors to me. I rather consider him my friend," And under this state of mind he entered the spirit world. The expressions are fresh in my memory, and so JOSEPH WEIGHT. 419 they will be wMe it exists; and I have thought a thousand times how happy a man I should be, if it were in my power, to truthfully utter such a sentiment, in my own case. He died on the fourteenth day of August, 1855, in his seventy-first year. His remains rest in the Hollenback Cemetery, in the city of Wilkes-Barre. THE END. LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 014 645 182 2