Papers of the Historical Society of Delaware 
 
 II 
 
 ADDRESS 
 
 ox THE 
 
 History of the Boundaries 
 
 OF THE 
 
 State of Delaware 
 
 By HON. JOHN W. HOUSTON 
 
 THE HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF DELAWARE 
 
 WILMINGTON, 1879
 
 The following paper was read by Judge Houston, on the invitation of the 
 Historical Society of Delaware, on Thursday, February 21, 1878.
 
 JL.iiJX»_fi_lL J.) 
 
 UM\TRSITY OF CALIF0rwui4 
 SAiNTA BARBARA 
 
 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY 
 
 OF THE 
 
 Boundaries on the State of Delaware 
 
 Gentlemen of the Historical Society: 
 
 I have selected for the subject of ray address on this 
 occasion the history of the early and primitive questions 
 in relation to the coterminous boundaries of this State and 
 the States of Maryland and New Jersey, respectively. For, 
 notwithstanding they have long since been practically and 
 definitively settled, as we think, and Delaware, the oldest 
 State in the Union (I say so, because she was the first to 
 enter it), has now been in the undisturbed possession of all 
 her present domain for more than a hundred years on the 
 one side, and for nearly two hundred years on the other, 
 yet, I am extremely sorry to say that, small as it is, the 
 whole world, it seems, is still not fully satisfied that we 
 are justly and rightfully entitled to quite all of it. Now, 
 I must admit that it is not very pleasant, if it is not posi- 
 tively painful, to be obliged to make, at this late day, such 
 a public confession; but for the melancholy proof of the 
 
 3
 
 4 ADDRESS 0\ THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 statement which I have just made I have but to refer you 
 on the one hand, to the fact that the great State of New 
 Jersey has actually sued us, within a year past, for a little 
 piece of land entirely covered with water, and not much 
 larger than the Pea Patch, before the highest tribunal in 
 the country, where it is now pending; and on the other 
 hand, to the interesting and elaborate address of an emi- 
 nent citizen of the State of Maryland, delivered before this 
 Society a few years since only, upon the original validity 
 of the Lord Baltimore's title to the whole of it, under the 
 royal grant contained and described in his letters patent for 
 the Province of Maryland. I must, however, do New Jer- 
 sey the justice to say that she is this time seeking, it seems, 
 to recover water with its incidental rights of fishery, rather 
 than land, or mud merely, as in the Pea Patch case. Now, 
 before a tribunal of conscience and equity jurisdiction, my 
 first defence to her present claim would be, that she already 
 owns and is surrounded by more water than any other State 
 in the Union, and has no further need of any more of that 
 unstable element, until a second flood comes. And the 
 same remark may be made with regard to fish also. And 
 on that subject I would add, that it is unfortunately but too 
 well known to all her neighbors that her remarkable and 
 innate affinity for fish is already too strong and selfish, par- 
 ticularly as to shell-fish, and always has been; and that it 
 ought not to be encouraged in this liberal and enlightened 
 age of the world, and in a country like ours. Her claim is 
 therefore clearly unconscionable, I think, on both of these 
 grounds. 
 
 Although the questions presented are separate and dis-
 
 BOrXDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 5 
 
 tinct from each (jther one historical review will inchide 
 both from the time the one in relation to the boundary 
 between this State and New Jersey arises, which was some 
 fifty years subsequent to the origin of the other in relation 
 to the boundary between this State and Maryland; but in 
 the consideration of the latter we must necessarily com- 
 mence the review with the date of the first settlement by a 
 Christian people within the limits of our State, and with 
 the date of the letters patent to Lord Baltimore for his 
 Province of Maryland, together with the petition on which 
 they were issued, and the terms of it, describing the lands 
 applied for in it, and which were granted to him purs^iant 
 to the description. For upon these facts alone that question 
 originally depended. 
 
 Prior to that period, and even to the discovery of our 
 bay and river, or of any part of our coast from the capes of 
 the Chesapeake to Cape Cod, the English had discovered 
 and claimed all the coast of New England north of the latter 
 cape, and had also discovered and claimed all the coast 
 from the capes of the Chesapeake to the coast of Florida; 
 and although the intervening portion of it had not yet been 
 actually discovered by any English or other European navi- 
 gator, the Crown of England had already made grants to 
 its subjects of the whole country, extending from North 
 Carolina to the northern limit of New England, with a 
 view to the speedy colonization and settlement of it; and 
 under one of those early grants to the London Company, 
 by name, the colony of Jamestown, Virginia, had been 
 planted on the southern shores of the Chesapeake Bay as 
 earlv as the vear 1607, and three thousand miles of its
 
 6 ADDRESS OS THE II J STORY OF THE 
 
 shores, and of the rivers flowing into it, had been explored 
 as early as the year following. In the year following that, 
 or in 1609, the fearless and intrepid navigator, Captain 
 Henry Hudson, an Englishman, but then sailing under the 
 flag of the United Netherlands, and in command of a ship 
 belonging to the Dutch East India Company, in seeking 
 the capes of the Chesapeake with the view of touching at 
 Jamestown for provisions, missed them, and bearing north- 
 ward along the coast, in full view of the land and the long 
 line of lofty forests in full leaf which then overshadowed 
 the solitude of the unknown shore, on the 28th day of 
 August in that year discovered for the first time in the 
 annals of history the capes of the Delaware, which he 
 entered about noon, and, after spending the rest of the day 
 and night on the bosom of our bay, sailed early the next 
 morning, and, still standing northward along the coast, in 
 six days afterwards discovered and entered the Bay of New 
 York. He lingered there for several weeks, and long 
 enough to explore the surrounding shores and the Hudson 
 River as high as the site of the city of Albany. 
 
 The report of his discoveries, which reached Holland 
 before the close of the year, produced such an impression 
 in Amsterdam and other cities, that steps were promptly 
 taken by individuals on their own account as private ven- 
 tures, to open a direct trade with the natives of these newly- 
 discovered regions, and commencing as early as 1610, they 
 had established in five or six years two very considerable 
 trading-posts and settlements, the principal one on Man- 
 hattan Island, and the other on an island in the Hudson 
 not far below the site of Albany ; and as small forts of rude
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 7 
 
 and primitive construction were speedily erected for the 
 defence of the posts and the stores and goods kept in them, 
 the former was named Fort Amsterdam and the latter Fort 
 Orange. In the mean while, the Delaware Bay and River 
 had been explored as high as the mouth of the Schuylkill, 
 and the Connecticut River had been added to the Dutch 
 discoveries soon afterwards, and the Hudson and the Dela- 
 ware had already been baptized in their conception and 
 their language as twin rivers, by the name of the North and 
 the South River, respectively. As early as 1620 the English 
 had planted another colony at Plymouth, in Massachusetts, 
 and from the date of the first occupation by the Dutch of 
 the intervening country between that and Jamestown, in 
 Virginia, they had persistently denied their title to it, or 
 any part of it. In 1611, Lord Delaware, governor and 
 captain-general of the Jamestown colony, before any intel- 
 ligence of Hudson's discoveries had reached the colony, 
 sailed thence in the month of March in that year for the 
 West India Islands on account of his health, which was 
 much impaired, and, encountering heavy head winds soon 
 after leaving the capes of the Chespeake, was driven north- 
 ward, when the capes of a new and entirely unknown bay 
 to any one on board the ship were discovered, and which 
 they entered, and where they remained for a day or two, 
 anchored under the lee of the southern cape awaiting a 
 change in the wind, and which in honor of his lordship was 
 then named Delaware Bay, and which it has retained ever 
 since among the English. It is a httle remarkable that, 
 being so near the capes of the Chesapeake, and particularly 
 with the activity and enterprise which had been so early
 
 8 ADDRESS OX THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 exhibited in the exploration of the shores of that bay, the 
 discovery of ours should have been so purely accidental 
 in both instances, and even more so in the second than in 
 the first. 
 
 I do not deem it necessary for my purpose to notice the 
 Dutch settlement or colony planted by Captain Cornelius 
 Mey at Nassau on the Delaware River, near Gloucester 
 Point, in 1623, because it was on the eastern side of the river 
 and not within our limits, and could never have had any ma- 
 terial bearing on the question involved between the Province 
 of Maryland and the three lower counties on the Delaware 
 which now constitute our State. Besides, I have reasons 
 for believing that there were Dutch traders settled on the 
 Hoorn Kill, now Lewes Creek, as early as 1622, although 
 no colony or regular settlement transplanted from Holland 
 had been founded there so early as that date. There was a 
 permanent native settlement or Indian village on the banks 
 of it when the bay was first discovered, and according to 
 the description we have of the creek fifty years afterwards, 
 it deserved to be called a river instead of a creek, with a 
 fine roadstead within the mouth of it for the ships of that 
 day of all burdens, and none like it for safety in all the bay, 
 the right channel for sailing up the bay passing it, and 
 only two leagues above Cape Henlopen; for being within 
 so short a voyage of Fort Amsterdam, and as the sole ob- 
 ject of those early Dutch adventurers was trade and traffic 
 with the natives, chiefly in furs and peltries, and game of 
 all kinds was then abundant in the surrounding regions, 
 the opening of such a market would soon attract the notice 
 and attention of the natives and the traders alike, and
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DEE AW ARE. 9 
 
 draw them to that Indian settlement for such purposes. 
 That a casual intercourse of that kind first sprung up at 
 a very early period between that point on our shores and 
 the Dutch traders on Manhattan Island and the Hudson, 
 I think there can be no question, and which not only war- 
 rants the opinion I have expressed, that there were such 
 settlers there as early as 1()'"2'^ or 16'28, but it accounts for 
 the more important fact that the Hooni Kill soon l)egan 
 to attract the attention of a class of gentlemen in Holland 
 Avho looked to a larger business that might be established 
 there with success and with much greater profits, as they 
 imagined, than any trade with the natives there or '6n the 
 Hudson could possibly afford to such as were engaged 
 in it. And it was this that led such men of means as 
 Messrs. Godyn, Blommaert, Van Rensselaer, De Vries, and 
 a considerable number of others of like intelligence and 
 means in Amsterdam and other cities in Holland, as early 
 as 1629, to form a private company, or copartnership, to 
 purchase all the .-.ait-marsh skirting our side of the bay- 
 shore from Cape Henlopen to Bomby Hook Roads, for the 
 purpose of establishing a whale-fi.shery on our bay, and in 
 connection with it, and as a part of the enterprise, to plant 
 a Dutch colony on the Hoorn Kill. They, or some of 
 them at least, also probably aspired to the honor and 
 dignity of becoming in time Dutch patroons on the shores 
 of the Delaware, and they would have well deserved the 
 full fruition of their ambition had they succeeded in the 
 undertaking. But as Dutchmen generally move with care 
 and caution in all great enterprises, I have no doubt they 
 were a good while in gradually growing ripe for such a
 
 10 ADDRESS OX THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 grand oil speculation, and I have as little doubt that there 
 were at that daj' a good many large fish in the Delaware 
 Bay, and among them not a few whales of very respectable 
 proportions. They had enjoyed the undisturbed posses- 
 sion of its waters for so many ages that such a thing 
 was certainly possible. But I suspect that the Dutch 
 traders I have spoken of, and the Dutch sailors who had 
 become familiar with our bay prior to that time, had been 
 so long indulging in stupendous fish-stories both as to the 
 multitude and magnitude of them, as to have quite upset for 
 the time the mental balance of those gentlemen. It is 
 certain, however, that they embarked in the enterprise with 
 the confident expectation of making a success of it, and De 
 Vries, who had filled with credit to himself a post of re- 
 spectability in the military service of the Netherlands, and 
 had recently returned from a protracted residence in the 
 East Indies, was selected and solicited to assume in person 
 the management of the enterprise as the director-general 
 of the colony. They also had suflBcient encouragement in 
 their undertaking and influence with the Dutch West India 
 Company, which despatched three ships early in the spring 
 of 1629 to Fort Amsterdam, to procure an order that on 
 their arrival there one of them should proceed with an 
 agent of theirs to the Hoorn Kill to complete the purchase 
 of the salt-marsh mentioned from the Indians of the village. 
 The ship arrived there as ordered in the latter part of 
 May. and on the first day of June in that year the pur- 
 chase was duly made, and the sale was afterwards acknowl- 
 edged by a delegation of the Indians of the village before 
 the director-general and council of the New Netherlands, —
 
 BOUXD ARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 11 
 
 the general name which all their territory had now received, 
 — in Fort Amsterdam, on the fifteenth day of July. 1630. 
 And to show still further the extent and magnitude, as well 
 as the gravity and importance of this great enterprise in the 
 estimation of the projectors of it., they soon after purchased 
 from the Indians on the other side of the bay a long and 
 narrow strip of land extending from Cape May several miles 
 up the shore, and which would look as if they even con- 
 templated making a mare clausum of the Delaware Bay, so 
 far, at least, as the business of whale-fishing in it was con- 
 cerned; and when we consider the characteristic trait of the 
 Dutch at that day, and what rigid monopolists they were in 
 regard to trade in all their foreign possessions, it is not a 
 violent presumption perhaps to impute such a motive to 
 them. They were well informed, however, although none 
 of them had ever visited America up to that time, of the 
 character of the tract they were about to purchase, that it 
 was an almost continuous body of salt-marsh, extending from 
 Cape Henlopen to the mouth of the river, between forty and 
 fifty miles in length, with a mean breadth or depth back to 
 the mainland of from two to three miles, and that it, of 
 course, skirted the whole bay-shore on its southern side; 
 and therefore it has occurred to me that, with the sanguine 
 hopes and expectations then evidently entertained by them 
 in regard to the results of their immediate undertaking, 
 there was probably an ulterior design also on their part 
 ultimately to reclaim it by embankment, and which was by 
 no means a visionary conception in the minds of such men 
 bred and born in Holland. And had it been the destiny 
 of that remarkable race to which they belonged to retain
 
 12 ADDRESS OX THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 permanently the dominion which it had then so recently 
 acquired in certainly one of the very finest regions in 
 America, may I not ask how long would that vast expanse 
 of salt-marsh have been doomed to look both to heaven 
 and man in vain for such an improvement? 
 
 There is some uncertainty as to the year in which the col- 
 ony first projected and planted within the limits of our State 
 arrived on the banks of the Hoorn Kill. There is no doubt, 
 however, that it was as early as the spring of 1631, although 
 De Vries himself, the director-general of it, in the incidental 
 allusion to the massacre of it by the Indians, contained in 
 his letter of indignant protest and remonstrance written some 
 /ten or twelve years after that event, and addressed to Director- 
 General Kieft of the New Netherlands, and then residing 
 at New Amsterdam, against the design he had formed of 
 slaughtering the Indians at Pavonia in revenge for the brutal 
 outrages perpetrated by them on the Dutch settlers in that 
 vicinity, speaks of it as having occurred in 1630. The j)as- 
 sage to which I refer is brief, and I will repeat it: "Consider, 
 sir, what good will it do.' We know that we lost our set- 
 tlement at the Hoorn Kill in 1630 by mere jangling with 
 the Indians, when thirty-two of our men were murdered." 
 De Vries came with it as director-general and in command 
 of the expedition from its departure from the shores of 
 Holland. His birth and residence was in the little city of 
 Hoorn in that country, a seaport on the Zuyder Zee, and 
 it is said that he conferred the name of Hoorn Kill on the 
 creek in honor of it. The colony certainly consisted of a 
 small Christian community of European settlers expressly 
 formed and organized for colonizing that portion of the
 
 BOl'SDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 13 
 
 southern shores of the Delaware Bay, and which was not 
 only done with all the regularity and method usual in such 
 cases, but its arrival on our shores was preceded by a larger 
 purchase of land from the natives for the purpose of its 
 plantation than had perhaps occurred before in the history 
 of any of the English or Dutch settlements. Including De 
 Vries, it must have numbered on its landing at least thirty- 
 three men, to say nothing of women or children. A gen- 
 eral storehouse and a stockade fort, named Fort Oplandt, 
 was erected on a well-selected site on the northern bank of 
 the creek, not far above the mouth of it, and a body of land 
 adjacent to it, pronounced by enthusiastic Dutch admirers 
 several years later to be the best in all the New Netherlands, 
 was laid out for the habitation and cultivation of the set- 
 tlers, and named Swandale in compliment to the natural 
 rights of the large number of swans that were now to be 
 dispossessed of it as a favorite bay-side resort for them at 
 that season of the year. But De Vries was obliged to leave 
 it before the close of the summer and return to Holland on 
 business connected with the enterprise. He had gained 
 from the beginning of the settlement the esteem and respect 
 of the natives, and left it with relations of entire concord 
 and amity subsisting between them and the colonists; but 
 for reasons on which neither history nor tradition sheds any 
 further light than we have from the brief passage which I 
 have just read from his letter referring to it (for the account 
 given of it to him by a native on his return to the Hoorn 
 Kill was evidently a faction of the Indian's imagination 
 purely), they were suddenly assailed and totally massacred 
 by the savages before the fall of the leaves of that season.
 
 14 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 while at work in their fields, with the exception of two, who 
 were butchered with like barbarity in the storehouse. If it 
 occurred in 1631, the intelligence of it must have reached 
 De Vries very soon after his arrival in Holland. He was, 
 however, so shocked and discouraged by the disaster that he 
 was unable for a considerable time to pay any attention to 
 business; and yet there is no doubt of the fact that he was 
 liack again at the Hoorn Kill with several new colonists 
 from Holland early in December, 1631, prepared to enter by 
 the opening of the next spring upon his novel experiment 
 of whale-fishing in the Delaware Bay, and on what is now 
 called Lewes Beach, and whibh was industriously prosecuted 
 through the spring, summer, and fall of 1632, not without 
 some success, for a considerable quantity of whale oil was 
 shipped by him during the season to Amsterdam, but the 
 business having proved more expensive and less profitable 
 than was expected by him, it was not resumed the following 
 year; and early in the spring of it De Vries himself re- 
 moved to the North River, where at a later period he found 
 congenial employment in establishing several Dutch settle- 
 ments, but retaining his interest in the lands purchased at 
 the Hoorn Kill and on our bay-shore until the skle of it by 
 the copartnership to the City of Amsterdam in 1635. 
 
 If I have detained you too long with this tedious and pro- 
 tracted detail of the plantation of De Vries's colony, as it 
 has generally been styled, on the Hoorn Kill, the great his- 
 torical importance of it will excuse me when I inform you 
 that it was the sole fact on which the question of title to the 
 three lower counties on the Delaware, now constituting our 
 State, between Lord Baltimore and the Dutch of the New
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 15 
 
 Netherlands in the first instance, and subsequently between 
 his lordship and William Penn, originally and finally de- 
 pended for its solution during a period of just one hundred 
 years thereafter, or up to the year of 173'2. the date of the 
 first agreement entered into between their respective heirs- 
 at-law for the amicable settlement of it by mutual compact 
 between the conflicting claimants. For, with the exception 
 of that settlement, and with all the light and information 
 which the most patient and thorough historical research and 
 examination has in the mean time shed upon the subject, I 
 am constrained to say that there is no good reason for be- 
 lieving that there was a solitary Christian, or child of civili- 
 zation, within the limits of what now constitutes the State 
 of Delaware, or anywhere west of the Delaware River, on 
 the 20th day of June, 1632, nor until nearly six years after 
 that date. 
 
 In the due course and order of historical events which 
 now follow in quick succession, I must next pass from the 
 shores of the Delaware to those of the Chesapeake. In the 
 year 1632, George Calvert, Baron of Baltimore, having three 
 years before visited the English settlements in Virginia, and 
 made some exploration of the Chesapeake Bay, presented 
 a petition to his Majesty Charles I. for a grant of lands 
 in that region of the country lying between the 38tli and 
 
 « 
 
 40th degrees of north latitude, in which he stated that it 
 had not up to that time been planted by any Christian 
 people, although it was then inhabited in some parts of it 
 by a certain barbarous people, having no knowledge of 
 Almighty God. The application was graciously entertained, 
 and a royal order was given for the preparation of letters
 
 16 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 patent for the grant pursuant to his petition, and which were 
 soon afterwards prepared with a recital referring to his peti- 
 tion and the representation contained in it, that it was a 
 region of country hitherto uncultivated, and partly occu- 
 pied by savages having no knowledge of the Divine Being, 
 and with the boundaries of it described as all that part of 
 the peninsula or chersonese lying in the parts of America 
 between the ocean on the east and the Bay of Chesapeake 
 on the west, divided from the residue thereof by a right 
 line drawn from the promontory or headland called Wat- 
 kin's Point, situate on the bay aforesaid, near the river 
 Wighes on the west, unto the main ocean on the east; 
 and between that boundary on the south, unto that part of 
 the bay of Delaware on the north which lieth under the 
 40th degree of north latitude from the equinoctial where 
 New England is terminated; and all the tract of that land 
 within the metes underwritten, that is to say, passing from 
 the said bay called Delaware Bay in a right line by the 
 degree aforesaid unto the true meridian of the first fountain 
 of the river of Pattowmac, thence verging towards the south 
 unto the farther bank of the said river, and following the 
 same on the west and south unto a place called Cinquack, 
 situate near the mouth of the said river where it disem- 
 bogues into the aforesaid bay of Chesapeake, and thence 
 by the shortest line unto the aforesaid promontory or place 
 called Watkin's Point. 
 
 It was well known at that time that a right line drawn as 
 described, from Watkin's Point on the Chesapeake Bay due 
 east across our peninsula to the ocean, would be directly 
 under the i>arallel of the 38th degree of north latitude. No
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 17 
 
 part of the Delaware Bay, however, is as far north as the 
 40th degree, nor is any part of the Delaware River below 
 the city of Philadelphia. And this clearly shows that his 
 lordship was mistaken at the very outset as to the distance 
 in degrees from Watkin's Point to Cape Henlopen, and 
 could not have known that the 40th degree of north lati- 
 tude would include within his grant not only the whole of 
 the peninsula north of Watkin's Point, and the whole of 
 the Delaware Bay, but also nearly one-half of the State of 
 New Jersey. But this may be in some degree accounted 
 for by the well-known fact that even British sovereigns and 
 British noblemen at that day supposed that a degree of 
 latitude, as far north of the equator as those named in the 
 patent, measured but sixty miles to the degree. For it is 
 but reasonable to presume that Lord Baltimore dictated the 
 description of the boundaries embodied in it. Before, how- 
 ever, the patent was issued Lord Baltimore died, and pur- 
 suant to the order of the king the necessary alterations 
 were made in it, and on the 20th day of June, 1632, the 
 patent was issued to his eldest son and the heir-at-law of 
 his title and estates, Cecilius, Lord Baltimore. It was 
 named in the patent the Province of Maryland at the in- 
 stance of the king in honor of the queen, Henrietta Maria. 
 I deem it proper here to observe that by the law of na- 
 tions as then recognized by the maritime powders of Europe, 
 and which the recent discovery of the New World rendered 
 more important than it had ever been before, that no dis- 
 covery and exploration merely of a new island or a new 
 country inhabited by barbarians only, even when followed 
 by a formal grant or cession of it from the sovereign under
 
 18 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 whose flag or auspices it had been made, could confer any 
 right or title to it upon the discoverer until he took posses- 
 sion of it, or some part of it, but when that had been done 
 his title would commence from the date of his grant; and 
 that possession should follow discovery to give a title in all 
 such cases. 
 
 Lord Baltimore had contemplated on the receipt of his 
 patent visiting his province in company with the first set- 
 tlers despatched to it, but circumstances prevented it, and 
 under his authority and appointment his brother, I^onard 
 Calvert, conducted the expedition organized for the purpose 
 of taking formal possession of it under his letters patent, 
 and of planting the first settlement under it in the province. 
 It consisted of some two hundred Englishmen, the most of 
 them possessed of considerable, and a few of very handsome 
 means, the design being to found a miniature government 
 in the province on the model of the British constitution, 
 with an order of nobility possessing large landed estates. 
 The expedition sailed from England in a ship named the 
 Ark and a pinnace belonging to Lord Baltimore of about 
 fifty tons named the Dove, and after a tedious voyage by 
 the Canary Islands and the southern passage of that early 
 period, arrived in the Chesapeake, and made their first set- 
 tlement on the Potomac River, not far above the mouth of 
 it and between it and the western shore of the bay, at a 
 place which they named St. Mary, on the 27th day of March, 
 1634; and Leonard Calvert now assumed the office of first 
 governor of the province. 
 
 Virginia had long prior to the date of Lord Baltimore's 
 patent, claimed not only the w^hole of the Chesapeake Bay
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 19 
 
 and the regions surrounding it, but even as far as the 41st 
 degree of north latitude, and as early as 1627 the governor 
 of that colony had granted to one of the early settlers of 
 Virginia, William Claybourne, who had been a member of 
 the council and the secretary of the colony, authority to 
 discover the head of the bay, or any part of Virginia lying 
 between the 34th and 41st degrees of north latitude, and 
 in 1631 Charles the First had granted him a royal license to 
 make discoveries and to traflBc with the natives, under which 
 he had in that year with a party of men from Virginia 
 taken possession of Kent Island in the Chesapeake Bay, 
 and almost in the centre of the Province of Maryland, and 
 had established a trading-post on it, and had been so in 
 possession of it from 1631 until the arrival and settlement 
 of the first provincial colonists under Governor Calvert at 
 St. Mary's. The first question, however, that was raised as 
 to the legal right and title of Lord Baltimore to the territory 
 designated and described in his patent was between him 
 and the authorities of Virginia, and went to the whole of 
 the grant, for by them the validity of it was denied in toto. 
 The legal controversy which arose out of it between them 
 ultimately went to the privy council of the king for adjudi- 
 cation and settlement, but they declined to entertain it, and 
 left the parties to their remedies by due course of law. 
 Claybourne had also from the first repudiated and refused 
 to recognize the validity of the grant and the authority and 
 jurisdiction of the government of the province over Kent 
 Island, and the governor having within one year after the 
 settlement issued an order for his arrest, a hostile collision 
 occurred between their respective armed forces, consisting
 
 20 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 of two small vessels sent against him by the governor, and 
 one cruising under the orders of Claybourne, in which one 
 man on the governor's and several on Claybourne's side 
 were killed. The latter, however, was defeated, and was 
 obliged to flee for refuge to Virginia, whereupon commis- 
 sioners were sent from the province to demand him of the 
 colony, but the governor of it refusing to surrender him, 
 the assembly of the province proceeded to seize and forfeit 
 his property on the island, and he was also indicted, tried, and 
 convicted in his absence of the combined crimes of murder, 
 piracy, and sedition. He afterwards went to England and pre- 
 sented a petition to the king, Charles the First, setting forth 
 his grievances and praying for the redress of them, which 
 with the testimony produced in support of them, made such 
 an impression on the mind of his Majesty that he severely 
 reprimanded Lord Baltimore for having, contrary to his 
 commands, dispossessed him of Kent Island and slain several 
 of the inhabitants of it. Nevertheless, in the following year 
 the lords of the committee of the privy council of the king 
 for trade and plantations rendered a report in favor of Lord 
 Baltimore's title And yet even this did not terminate the 
 angry strife and contention, for serious political disturbance 
 and commotion afterwards arising in the province. Clay- 
 borne, who had in the mean time returned from England 
 and retaken possession of Kent Island, availed himself of 
 the occasion to manifest his spirit of resistance again to the 
 authority of the proprietary, and the effort of the governor 
 to dispossess him not only failed, but Claybourne and his 
 partisans, with the aid of the political malcontents referred 
 to, compelled the governor of the provinc*^ in turn to flee
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 21 
 
 for refuge to Virginia, and thereby gained for a time the com- 
 plete control of the government of it. This occurred in 1645. 
 But Governor Calvert returned with a sufficient military 
 force to re-establish his authority in 1647, and'Claybourne 
 was again driven from the island. Two years later the 
 execution of Charles the First followed, and the Common- 
 wealth of England was established under the protectorate of 
 Oliver Cromwell, and in 1652, commissioners having been 
 sent from England to Virginia and Maryland to reduce 
 them to obedience to the Commonwealth, with whom Clay- 
 bourne was associated, he again regained possession of the 
 island. The authority of the proprietary and his govern- 
 ment in the province was now completely superseded and 
 suspended, and upon the effort of Lord Baltimore to recover 
 it, the most serious collision and conflict of arms which had 
 yet occurred in the province ensued between his forces and 
 those of Claybourne and his political partisans in 1655. It 
 was successful, however, although it was not until the year 
 1658 that the authority and government of his lordship 
 was completely restored in his province. 
 
 Among the many evils and misfortunes resulting to his 
 lordship from such a state of affairs in his province was the 
 notoriety which it gave from the start to the question in 
 regard to the validity of his grant, and the unfavorable 
 impression which it produced upon the mind of the king 
 himself on discovering for the first time, under such painful 
 circumstances, the melancholy fact that such a grave and 
 fatal mistake had been committed in issuing the royal patent 
 to him on the faith of the representation contained in the 
 application, that there were none but Indians or barbarians
 
 22 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 then inhabiting any part of the territory solicited and 
 granted; and I think it will hereafter clearly appear in the 
 further development of the history of the question that his 
 lordship's interests in the province never recovered from the 
 unfavorable effects then produced in the highest places in 
 England by the discovery of this grave and serious blemish 
 in the very inception of his title. 
 
 I will now return to the history of the settlements on the 
 Delaware, and after having traced the history of events 
 on the Chesapeake, so far as it is necessary for my present 
 purpose to notice them, from the year 1631 to 1658, the first 
 remark which I have to make on returning to our own 
 shores is, that there is a singular coincidence, in the chron- 
 ology at least, of the principal events in the cotemporaneous 
 history of the two States during that early period, notwith- 
 standing the marked difference in the European races which 
 they respectively concern. In the first place, the first civil- 
 ized settlement within our limits, and the first similar settle- 
 ment within the limits of Maryland prior to the date of 
 Lord Baltimore's patent, were almost simultaneously made 
 by different European races and under different European 
 sovereignties; and while our history is subsequently char- 
 acterized during that period by strife and contention of a 
 higher historical grade and dignity between rival European 
 races for the possession of and dominion over our territory, 
 so far as the epochs or eras (if they deserve such an appella- 
 tion) of each is concerned, they were almost as simultaneous, 
 although during the greater part of that period the settlers 
 on the Delaware and the settlers on the Chesapeake within 
 the limits of Maryland had no intercourse, or acquaintance
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. "ZS 
 
 even, with each other, and knew about as little of each 
 others' troubles or disputes as if they had been settled on 
 the opposite sides of the equator, and thirty -eight or forty 
 degrees from it. Both the Dutch and the Swedes knew 
 from the time almost of their arrival within our limits, of 
 Jamestown and Virginia, and of the claim of that colony to 
 all the territory on the Delaware, but I question if any one 
 of either race had ever heard of either St. Mary's or Kent 
 Island until after they had ceased to attract any particular 
 attention on the Chesapeake. De Vries was fully informed 
 of the English claim by the governor of Virginia on his 
 visit from the Hoorn Kill to Jamestown in the summer of 
 IGS^, and the Swedes learnt of it in like manner when their 
 first expedition touched at Jamestown in 1638, on their 
 voyage from Sweden to our shores. 
 
 The first event which I shall have occasion to notice in 
 the cotemporaneous history of the two States, after the 
 settlement of De Vries' colony on the Hoorn Kill, is of 
 the date of 1638, and which occurred during the progress 
 of the first controversy between Lord Baltimore and Clay- 
 borne in regard to his title to Kent Island, and in the same 
 year in which his Majesty rebuked his lordship for dispos- 
 sessing him of it. The Dutch West India Company, which 
 had been incorporated by the States-General of the United 
 Netherlands as early as 1621, for the purposes of coloni- 
 zing the Dutch possessions in this country and promoting 
 trade and commerce in all the regions of the New Nether- 
 lands, as those possessions were then for the first time 
 formally denominated, had so long neglected to make any 
 settlement, or to take actual possession of any part of the
 
 24 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 country on the western side of the Delaware above the 
 mouth of the river, that it ultimately led to an effort on the 
 part of one of the original promoters and most active mem- 
 bers of the company, who had become dissatisfied with 
 the management of its affairs, to find some other power in 
 Europe to undertake the enterprise, and it was such a 
 motive that prompted Mr. William Unclincx, of the City of 
 Am^terdairi, to repair in 1624, to the court of the young and 
 able sovereign of Sweden, Gustavus Adolphus ("of ever- 
 blessed memory," as the venerable Campanius invariably 
 and reverentially styles him whenever he has occasion to 
 mention his illustrious name in his Delaware diary, written 
 several years after his untimely and lamented death on the 
 battle-field of Lutzen), and to submit to him a plan for the 
 formation of a Swedish West India Company for the ex- 
 press purpose of colonizing the neglected regions on the 
 Delaware. That young and magnanimous monarch em- 
 braced the flattering overture, I apprehend, with too much 
 ardor and alacrity to inquire sufficiently into any mere legal 
 impediments or obstacles which might lie in the way of such 
 a grand and noble proposition; or, if he did so, the specious 
 and wily Dutchman and shrewd ex-member of the Dutch 
 West India Company may have soon satisfied him that 
 there were no obstructions of that nature in the way of the 
 enterprise, and that the Dutch company already had more 
 liand than it either wanted or needed north and east of the 
 Delaware. A West India Company similar to that in the 
 Netherlands was accordingly incorporated and organized 
 without delay in that kingdom; and with the animated 
 spirit and enthusiastic emulation now abroad in behalf of
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 25 
 
 the measure, and the influence of the king's example, who 
 subscribed with royal liberality to the stock of it, princes 
 and prelates, noblemen and commoners, and men of all 
 classes, as well as ladies of the highest rank, vied with each 
 other in responding with like promptitude and liberality, to 
 the cordial recommendation of their sovereign in behalf of 
 it. It was the first novelty of the kind perhaps, which had 
 ever caught and captivated the fancy or imagination of the 
 Swedes to such a degree, and compared with which, to 
 them at least, according to the accounts we have of it, the 
 enchanting hues and evanescent splendors of all lat^r South- 
 Sea bubbles must have seemed but pale and dim. Before, 
 however, all the necessary preparations had been completed 
 by the company for the dispatch of the first expedition of 
 colonists from Sweden to the Delaware, their young and 
 gallant king, who was now acknowledged and hailed with 
 universal acclaim by the Protestants of Germany as the royal 
 champion of their cause, was suddenly drawn into the vortex 
 of that memorable religious conflict of nations known as the 
 Thirty Years' War in Europe, and all further proceedings 
 by the company and the government for the plantation of 
 the colony were interrupted and suspended, until several 
 years subsequent to his fall in the battle before mentioned, 
 in November, 163'-2, after a rapid series of brilliant and sur- 
 prising victories terminating in that of Lutzen, although he 
 lost his life in it, which has rarely, if ever, been surpassed 
 in the wars of Europe. But, as if forewarned by some 
 presentiment of his approaching doom, amidst the perils 
 and vicissitudes of the war in which he was about to engage, 
 he had prepared in advance a last will and testament, con-
 
 26 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 taining particular instructions in relation to the guardianship 
 and education of his only child and heir to his crown, a 
 young and tender daughter, and with it another paper ad- 
 dressed to his prime minister, Chancellor Oxenstiern, a man 
 of great ability and virtue, as well as devotion to his king 
 and country, enjoining upon him in any event or contin- 
 gency which might befall him personally in the war, as a 
 duty not to abandon this great enterprise in which he felt 
 so much interest, but to see the design of it fully carried 
 into execution pursuant to the directions given in the paper, 
 and in accordance with the views which he had often before 
 communicated to him on the subject. But it was not until 
 after the war in which he fell had been terminated with 
 the brilliant success with which it had been begun, under 
 the able ministry of Oxenstiern, and the command of 
 generals in the field worthy of the school in which they 
 had been trained under their late king, and not until five 
 years after his demise, that the chancellor was prepared to 
 enter upon the discharge of the grave duty thus enjoined 
 upon him. Since the death of the king the government 
 of the country had been vested in a council of regency 
 during the minority of the young queen, of which Chan- 
 cellor Oxenstiern was president, and who was also one of 
 her guardians. 
 
 The interesting gentleman from Amsterdam and dissatis- 
 fied ex-members of the Dutch West India Company before 
 referred to, and who had been so successful in originating 
 this rival company at the court of Sweden, had also by this 
 time passed from the stage of action and the scene of his 
 glory to
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. '21 
 
 The undiscovered country, from whose bourne 
 No traveler returns. 
 
 And yet, strange to say, just about this time while Chan- 
 cellor Oxenstiern was preparing to institute active proceed- 
 ings in the undertaking, another gentleman from Holland, 
 of still greater eminence, and still more familiarly acquainted 
 with the affairs of the Dutch West India Company and 
 their possessions in the New Netherlands, turns up in 
 his place at Stockholm and the court of Sweden, and also 
 submits a plan for colonizing the western banks of the 
 Delaware, under the charter of the West India Company 
 of that country, and modestly suggested his willingness to 
 assume the duties and responsibilities of conducting their 
 first colony to our shores as the director-general of it. And 
 this distinguished Dutchman was no other than Peter 
 Minuitt, Esq., late director-general of the New Netherlands 
 under the Dutch West India Company, from 1624 to 1632, 
 eight consecutive years. He had, of course, during that 
 time become very familiarly acquainted with all their pos- 
 sessions, and their title and claims to the same, both on the 
 North and the South River, knew all about the settlement of 
 De Vries's colony on the Hoorn Kill, was director-general 
 and president of the council of the company when the 
 Indian delegation from the village there appeared before it 
 in Fort Amsterdam in 1630, to acknowledge the sale of the 
 salt-marsh from Cape Henlopen to the mouth of the river 
 to the Dutch purchasers before mentioned, and was still in 
 office and residing there when the colony was massacred. 
 He had, however, been removed from office without his own 
 approbation and consent by the company in 1632. The
 
 28 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 chancellor was very favorably impressed with his manners 
 and address and general intelligence, and particularly with 
 his familiar knowledge of the geography of the region, its 
 soil, climate, and resources, and the character and relations 
 of the aboriginal races, or Indian tribes, inhabiting it, and 
 even esteemed himself fortunate in finding a gentleman so 
 admirably qualified to fill the responsible position for which 
 he had so generously tendered his services; and he was 
 accordingly in due time appointed director-general of New 
 Sweden, that name having already been conferred on the 
 country designed to be settled under the charter and grant 
 of the company, and to be held and considered as an ap- 
 pendage to the crown and kingdom of Sweden. 
 
 The first expedition formed for colonizing it consisted of 
 some fifty settlers duly provided and furnished for the pur- 
 pose, which embarked from Sweden under the immediate 
 command of the director-general, Mr. Minuitt. in an armed 
 ship of the navy and a transport, and after a protracted 
 voyage of several months by the southern passage and a 
 short stoppage at Jamestown, in Virginia, entered the capes 
 of the Delaware on a bright and balmy day in the month 
 of April, 1638. They came in with a fine breeze from the 
 southeast and all sails spread to it, and gliding directly 
 past the mouth of the Hoorn Kill, stood up the bay some 
 fifteen miles farther, when the anchors were dropped, the 
 sails were furled, the boats were got out, and the whole 
 community was in due time rowed ashore at a much less 
 convenient and inviting landing-place, but in a perfect trans- 
 port of rapture and delight, to refresh and regale themselves 
 for a few hours on that genial and delicious day, upon what
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 29 
 
 is now termed Mispillion Point. It is a long, low, flat, and 
 sandy cape jutting well into the bay when viewed from Cape 
 Henlopen and the beach of Lewes and the mouth of the 
 creek, and could have possessed even at that day no attrac- 
 tion beyond the fine view which it commanded of the cres- 
 cent curvature of the western shore towards the Hoorn 
 Kill and Cape Henlopen, the whole of the bay below and 
 the ocean vista through the capes, of which one would sup- 
 pose they had already seen enough in the last five months 
 to be sick of the sight of it for as many more at least; and 
 yet so charmed and enchanted were they with the spot, that 
 they could find no term sufficiently graphic and poetical to 
 express their unbounded admiration of it short of Paradise 
 itself, and therefore they at once named it Paradise Point. 
 There was one, however, in that happy company, I appre- 
 hend, as he stood in their midst and looked towards the 
 Hoorn Kill and recalled the recollection, yet fresh in his 
 memory, of the massacre of the Dutch colony planted 
 there, and of the sale of the very land then beneath his feet 
 to the founders of it with his own sanction and approval 
 but a few years before, Avho must have been wholly unable 
 to so far surrender himself to the common illusion prevail- 
 ing around him, as to have felt for a moment that he stood 
 on anything like holy ground, so far, at least, as he was 
 concerned; and that was Peter Minuitt himself, the com- 
 mander of the expedition, and now the director-general 
 of New Sweden. 
 
 But the site of their first settlement in this country had 
 been selected before their embarkation from Sweden, and re- 
 suming their voyage up the Delaware,they entered your beauti-
 
 30 ADDRESS OX THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 fill river, the Christiana, even then, by the broad expanse of 
 its waters, at least more deserving of being so called than 
 now, and sailing on some two miles or more, landed upon 
 its northern bank, on a firm and fast foundation in nature, if 
 not in law, at a place then named and ever since called, I 
 believe. The Rocks, and which furnished a very convenient 
 wharf for the purpose already made to their hands. And 
 now as we survey in imagination, at this late day, all the 
 virgin features and picturesque beauty of the natural scene 
 which here opened for the first time to their astonished 
 vision, what must have been the measure of their admiration 
 and delight when they compared and contrasted it w ith the 
 scene which they had just left below! And if but the day 
 before they imagined themselves almost in heaven, must 
 they not have thought this nothing less than a sudden trans- 
 lation to the very empyrean of the gods themselves, if any 
 of them had ever read of such place in classic story! Minu- 
 itt had never visited the locality before, so far as we are 
 informed, but that he had learned of it from some one w^ho 
 had seen it, and who was capable of portraying the scene to 
 him with some degree of justice and fidelity, there can be 
 no doubt — the winding Christiana with its green meadows 
 on the one side, the rocky banks and the water-power of 
 the romantic Brandywine on the other, their confluence in 
 the foreground of the landscape, and flowing with united 
 volume in full view to the broad bosom of the majestic Dela- 
 ware; all this and doubtless much more had been faithfully 
 depicted to him, and he certainly exhibited as much good 
 taste as sound judgment in selecting it for the site of his 
 first Swedish settlement within our limits. This settlement,
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 31 
 
 the second made within the Hmits of our State, became in 
 the spring of 1638 the feeble beginning of your fair and beau- 
 tiful city of Wilmington, and which is all that was required 
 to crown and adorn the natural embellishments and advan- 
 tages of the original site with the flowers, fruits, products, 
 and structures of art, labor, culture, commerce and manu- 
 factures, civilization and Christianity, to make it what it has 
 since become, one of the fairest and finest cities of its class 
 in our whole country. 
 
 The first thing in order after they had landed upon its 
 banks was to find a suitable name for your river in their 
 own vernacular tongue. And where or in what language 
 could they have found one more beautifully appropriate 
 on such an occasion than the chaste and sweet and sacred 
 name of Christina, in honor of their fair young queen, sole 
 daughter of the house and heart of their beloved and la- 
 mented sovereign, still as much a martyr to the sacred 
 cause of their religious faith, as a glorious monarch in their 
 estimation, then in the twelfth year of her minority, and an 
 object of tender regard and solicitude to every loyal Swede 
 the world over? She was only six years of age when her 
 father fell at Lutzen, but was now pre-eminently distin- 
 guished for all the brilliant bloom and promise which so 
 well beseemed the rosy dawn of such a splendid career and 
 destiny as then lay in prospect before her, only to be, to 
 the grief and astonishment of all her subjects, so soon and 
 so strangely and mysteriously darkened, disappointed, and 
 with thickening clouds overcast after ascending the throne, 
 as never was that of queen or royal princess before or 
 since in the history of the world. But as a just and meri-
 
 32 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 torious tribute to the memory of her better and brighter 
 and more happy days, is it not to be regretted that it was 
 not retained in all its pristine purity and beauty as the true 
 name of it to this day? 
 
 The next thing was to erect a fort on the banks of it at 
 or near The Rocks, on which the name of Fort Christina 
 was bestowed, and which became for many years afterwards 
 the only name by which the settlement formed about it was 
 called and known. The director-general had his permanent 
 residence in it until his death, three years afterwards. He 
 had hardly begun to build it, however, before he received, 
 from the director-general of the New Netherlands residing 
 in Fort Amsterdam, a formal and solemn protest against 
 the intrusion, encroachment, and aggression by the Swedes 
 upon their territory on the South River, and asserting in the 
 strongest terms their unquestionable right and title to the 
 whole South River of the New Netherlands, both the upper 
 and lower parts of it, and denouncing the consequences of 
 his own conduct against him to the last extremity. But 
 Minuitt neither replied to it, nor paid any attention to it. 
 The former, however, proceeded forthwith to repair and re- 
 garrison the Dutch Fort Nassau, on the opposite side of the 
 Delaware River, just below Gloucester Point, and to main- 
 tain it in a proper state of defence. A few other sparse and 
 scattering Swedish settlements followed the first, but all of 
 them, on the same side of the Delaware, were made above 
 the Christina, and between it and the mouth of the Schuyl- 
 kill, chiefly in the vicinity of Upland or Chester, and what 
 is now marked on our maps and called the Lazaretto, but 
 none whatever were made below the Christina, although
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 33 
 
 the colonial authorities of New Sweden claimed to have ac- 
 quired, as early as 1642, the Indian title, by purchase from 
 the natives, toall the country west of the Delaware from 
 Cape Henlopen to the falls at Trenton, and that they had 
 rightful dominion and jurisdiction over it. 
 
 A controversy, however, not only at once arose between 
 the Dutch and the Swedes in regard to their respective 
 rights and claims to the territory, but a more serious dis- 
 pute and contention soon followed it in relation to the trade 
 with the natives on the Schuylkill and the western side of 
 the Delaware above Fort Christina, and the control of the 
 navigation of the Delaware River in connection with it, 
 the Swedes progressively and practically growing bolder 
 in the assertion and exercise of both, as rights exclusively 
 belonging to them, and which were sometimes attended 
 with acts of violence and gross aggressions upon the Dutch; 
 and for these pretensions on their part it was found that 
 the position of Fort Christina, being below that of the 
 Dutch Fort Nassau on the eastern side of the Delaware, 
 afforded them material support and advantage. This con- 
 sideration at length induced Peter Stuyvesant, who in the 
 mean time had been appointed by the Dutch West India 
 Company the director-general of the New Netherlands, and 
 had taken up his residence in New Amsterdam, as the set- 
 tlement at Fort Amsterdam was now named, to make his 
 first visit to the South River and to Printz, then governor of 
 New Sweden, and residing in some state on Tinicum Island, 
 with a view, if practicable, to effect some accommodation 
 of these increasing difficulties, and if not, to erect a fort on 
 the same side of the Delaware and below Fort Christina,
 
 34 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 to counteract the advantage which the Swedes had derived 
 from it in the dispute about the navigation of the river, 
 and also to recover without any further hostile movement 
 or demonstration the command of the river and the do- 
 minion of the whole country on the western side of the bay 
 and river from the Christina to Cape Henlopen. He failed, 
 however, in the first object of his visit, and as the whole 
 country from the Christina to the Hoorn Kill was still an 
 Indian wilderness, he made a hasty but sufficient survey of 
 the river to satisfy himself that the point of land on which 
 New Castle several years afterwards grew into a settlement 
 of so much note and promise, as not only to eclipse the 
 feeble and flickering lustre of Fort Christina, but even to 
 excite serious apprehensions at New Amsterdam at one 
 time that it was about to become what Carthage had been 
 to Rome, so far as the embryo city of New York was just 
 then concerned, was the true strategic point for the erection 
 of the fort which he had now resolved to build for the pur- 
 poses which he had in view. The municipal- government 
 of the City of Amsterdam now held the legal title to the 
 Hoorn Kill and all our bay front from Cape Henlopen 
 to Bomby Hook Roads, and as he knew very well that 
 the Swedes could not pretend to any title prior to theirs to 
 that portion of the country below, he convened a general 
 assembly of all the Indian sachems inhabiting the country 
 from the Christina to the mouth of the river, and after 
 learning from them that they had never sold any part of 
 it to the Swedes, he concluded a contract with them for 
 the purchase of it on behalf of his company, and pro- 
 ceeded, without delay, in the year 1651, to erect a fort on
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 35 
 
 the point I have mentioned, and to garrison it with a suffi- 
 cient Dutch force to hold it against any the Swedes could 
 then bring against it, and which he named Fort Cassimer. 
 A few Dutch settlers soon collected about it, and it became 
 from that date the third Christian or civilized settlement 
 within the limits of our State. Fort Nassau had also been 
 abandoned on the erection of Fort Cassimir, by the removal 
 of the garrison from it to the latter post. 
 
 The West India Company of Sweden had formally pro- 
 tested against these proceedings of Stuyvesant, and their 
 governor, Printz, after having repeatedly admonished them 
 in v'ain of their danger from them, and of the necessity of 
 their taking more decisive steps to recover the ground 
 which they had lost by the erection of Fort Cassimer, had 
 at length resigned the office, and was shortly afterwards 
 succeeded by John Claudii Rising, under the title of direc- 
 tor-general of New Sweden, and who became, for a brief 
 period at least, all that his name imports in our language. 
 Both the Dutch and the Swedes had long entertained seri- 
 ous and growing apprehensions of the designs of the British 
 government upon the whole territory of both companies, 
 under their asserted claim, from the beginning of its settle- 
 ment, of a superior title to it; and Rising's official instruc- 
 tions, therefore, particularly admonished him to proceed in 
 his administration of affairs in New Sweden with the utmost 
 prudence and circumspection, and to avoid by all means any 
 breach of friendship with either the Dutch or the English, 
 as a breach with the former might afford the latter an oppor- 
 tunity to seize Fort Cassimer, and that it was better for them 
 that it should continue in the possession of the Dutch than
 
 36 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 fall into the hands of their more powerful and dangerous 
 neighbors in that country. He was, however, to employ 
 every peaceable method in his power, without resorting to 
 any hostile act, to induce the Dutch to abandon and relin- 
 quish Fort Cassimer to them. Whether he had secret in- 
 structions of a contrary tenor does not appear, but it is, at 
 least charitable, for his sake to presume that he had from 
 the course which he immediately afterwards adopted. He 
 embarked from Sweden in an armed ship, with military 
 officers and troops and settlers on board, amounting in all 
 to some two hundred and fifty men, and arrived in the 
 Delaware in the latter part of May, 1654. On ascending 
 the river and approaching Fort Cassimer the ship was pre- 
 pared for action, and rounding to opposite the fort, fired a 
 salute and signalled to it to send an officer on board, which 
 was soon done by the commandant of the fort, and upon 
 liis arrival on board Rising informed him ^ho he was, and 
 at once demanded the surrender of it as on Swedish ground, 
 and with it the surrender of the river also, as a part of their 
 possessions. The officer from the fort and his boat's crew 
 having been delayed in reaching it on their return, and re- 
 ceiving no answer to his demand in the mean time, the next 
 morning he landed a military force from the ship, and as 
 much by surprise as by force stormed and seized it without 
 resistance at the point of the sword and the bayonet. He 
 did not propose to take any prisoners of war, as none had 
 been declared, or any intimation given of his hostile inten- 
 tion previous to the demand made for the surrender of it, 
 and he therefore, after suddenly overpowering and disarm- 
 ing the Dutch garrison, chased them out of the fort at the
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 37 
 
 point of the bayonet, and took possession of it, and garri- 
 soned it with his own forces. He also proceeded soon after- 
 wards to improve, enlarge, and strengthen it, and to change 
 the name of it and of the small settlement which had formed 
 about it to Fort New Anistel. And as a fit conclusion to 
 this brilliant achivement by way of surprise, he immedi- 
 ately communicated by letter to Governor Stuyvesant the 
 first intimation he had of it, informing him of what he had 
 done, but intimating that he could have no further corre- 
 spondence with him on the subject, and that any discussion 
 or negotiation in regard to the matter must be referred to 
 •their respective sovereigns. For my own part, I do not 
 think that Stuyvesant ever thought of replying to that 
 letter by means of paper, pen, and ink, but, on the con- 
 trary, that his only thought from that moment was how to 
 get even with him in the way of mutual surprises in that line 
 of business, so that Rising should have nothing to boast 
 of on that account when it should be finally settled between 
 them. In a few days after the capture of Fort Cassimer, 
 Rising took up his permanent abode in Fort Christina, and 
 made it not only his headquarters, but the seat of his gov- 
 ernment as director-general of New Sweden. 
 
 The indignation produced in Holland by this bold and 
 hostile invasion of their possessions here was intense and 
 general, and the immediate effect of it was to reduce the 
 long pending controversy between the two companies and 
 the two races in this country to the usual and last resort 
 in such cases, the arbitrament of arms. Stuyvesant was 
 promptly ordered by the company to prepare to recover 
 Fort Cassimer and to reduce the Swedes to entire obedience
 
 38 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 to their authority and government with whatever force 
 might be necessary for the purpose, and with as much 
 despatch as practicable. Meanwhile corresponding prep- 
 arations were made for the emergency by the company in 
 Holland, and even recruiting stations were opened and 
 drums were beaten for recruits for days in the City of Am- 
 sterdam for the great war that had at last broken out 
 between the Dutch and the Swedes in America. All 
 Dutchmen were excited everywhere. Delaware was at 
 stake, and nothing short of the speedy and complete subju- 
 gation and conquest of New Sweden would now satisfy the 
 universal expectation. But the coolest man among them- 
 all perhaps, on either side of the ocean, was Governor 
 Stuyvesant. He had neither forgotten that surprising 
 march which had been stolen upon him by the dashing 
 hero of New Sweden, nor that short and surprising letter, 
 in which he had condescended to apprise him of it. Stuy- 
 vesant was an old soldier by profession, and had learnt 
 the art of war in a subordinate station in the Low Coun- 
 tries, and had served with some distinction and lost a leg 
 in battle in other regions on this side of the Atlantic, and 
 who now begun in his heart to realize and cherish some of 
 
 "That stern joy which warriors (eel 
 In foemen worthy of their steel," 
 
 in anticipation of the pleasure and the opportunity which 
 he would soon have of surprising Rising in turn by steal- 
 ing a similar march on him. He accordinly set to work 
 with as much secrecy as coolness and calculation to make 
 all his preparations for a combined military and naval ex-
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 3J) 
 
 pedition of entirely unnecessary proportions against New 
 Sweden, his only points of attack l)eing Fort New Amstel, 
 late Fort Cassimer, and Fort Christina, neither of which 
 contained a garrison of more than thirty or forty men, and 
 with a military force at his command quite equal in numbers 
 to the entire population of the Swedish settlements on the 
 Delaware, women and children included. And yet, he con- 
 ducted all his preparations for the occasion with so much 
 patience, prudence, and circumspection through a period of 
 nearly one year, that Rising received no intimation of them 
 at Fort Christina, except by admonition from friendly In- 
 dians towards the last, who, it seems, had learnt more of what 
 was going on in New Amsterdam than he had; and who, 
 even then, seemed never to have apprehended or imagined 
 that the object of such an expedition on Stuyvesant's part 
 was anything more than the recovery of Fort Cassimer and 
 the country below the Christina. 
 
 The Dutch West India Company had promised Stuy- 
 vesant from the first assistance in vessels, munitions, and 
 soldiers from Holland, and had directed him to impress 
 into his service, at their expense, any vessels in the New 
 Netherlands that the occasion might require, and had 
 already sent over to New Amsterdam one man-of-war and 
 two other ships, with men and munitions, whilst Stuyve- 
 sant, by hiring and impressment, had added four others to 
 the number, and among them a French privateer, captain 
 and crew, which had been hovering on the coast in pursuit 
 of prey on the commerce of any nation the King of France 
 was then at war with, and had just come into New Amster- 
 dam for water and stores. And with this formidable Dutch
 
 40 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 armada, as it may well be called, considering the era, locality, 
 and destination of it, consisting of seven sail, and containing 
 from six to seven hundred men in all, he sailed for the 
 capes of the Delaware on the 5th day of September, 1655, 
 which he entered the next morning, with his flotilla well in 
 line, but spent several days in the lower part of the river in 
 marshalling and arranging his military forces preparatory 
 to landing them in sections, with their proper officers and 
 colors, at their place of destination. Rising was now at 
 Christina, but had learnt enough from the sources which 
 I have mentioned a short time before this, to do the best 
 he could to prepare Fort New Amstel for the impending 
 crisis, and to order the commandant not to allow the fleet 
 to pass it, if he could prevent it, or without firing upon it. 
 Both orders, however, he flatly disobeyed, for, after getting 
 under way again, the fleet ascended the river, and the whole 
 of it passed the fort without any effort on his part to arrest 
 or prevent it, and came to anchor above it, out of reach of 
 its guns. And now ensued a display . of military genius, 
 skill, and science on the part of Stuyvesant, considering 
 the overwhelming superiority of the force, land and naval, 
 imder his command, which must have amused Irving very 
 much in his young days of authorship, and tempted him, in 
 his burlesque history of New York and Delaware at that 
 early period, to present the gallant hero and Dutch con- 
 queror of New Sweden in such a ludicrous and comical 
 aspect in the fictitious pages of the simple and venerable 
 Dutch historian, Diedrich Knickerbocker, as to give great 
 offence to his descendants in New York at the time of its 
 publication. For it would really seem from the excessive
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 41 
 
 amplitude of his preparations for it, and from the slow and 
 exceedingly cautious manner in which he proceeded to 
 take both Fort New Amstel and Fort Christina, weak and 
 feeble as they were, that he was actuated all the tune by 
 the supreme and humane desire and intention of achieving 
 the conquest without anybody's being possibly hurt on 
 either side. And such was in fact the result. He at once 
 summoned the fort to surrender, but the commandant not 
 complying with his demand, he landed all his troops out of 
 reach of cannon-shot, and then proceeded to invest it by 
 posting a detachment about five miles off to watch Fort 
 Christina, and another somewhat nearer to cut off any rein- 
 forcement or relief from that quarter, and then by digging 
 trenches and throwing up embankments, and by what, I 
 believe, is termed in the military art gradual approaches, 
 to get the residue of his forces near enough to the works, 
 under entirely safe cover, to open his guns upon its log 
 battlements. He had in the mean while repeated his de- 
 mand for its surrender, and at last peremptorily, with a 
 solemn threat of opening his guns upon it forthwith in case 
 of refusal, when the commandant, to save any further use- 
 less waste of time, concluded to surrender, and accordingly 
 capitualted on the very favorable terms offered, without any 
 one being hurt, even by accident, on either side; and New 
 Sweden was half conquered already. He next proceeded 
 in like manner against Fort Christina, ordering his armed 
 ship and the French privateer round into the Christina and 
 into such a position as to rake the fort with their guns, and 
 then spent twelve days in investing it and in erecting half a 
 dozen different batteries on the several commanding posi-
 
 42 ADDHESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 tions surrounding it, mounting in the aggregate not less 
 than twenty cannons, independent of the guns of his two 
 armed ships, when, on his final and peremptory summons, 
 it followed the example of Fort New Amstel, and surren- 
 dered with preciselj^ the same result, — nobody hurt and no 
 powder l)urnt, which fortunately, perhaps, for all concerned, 
 happened to be a very scarce article in Fort Christina just 
 at that time. The capitulation was also on equally liberal 
 and favorable terms. Stuyvesant even treated Rising in 
 particular, quite generously and handsomely, for the ex- 
 chequer, both public and private, of the latter being now 
 in (juite a collapsed condition, he loaned him money 
 enough to pay his expenses back to Sweden. The sum- 
 mary effect of this last surrender was to efface New Sweden 
 forever from the map of our country. The date of it was 
 the 25th of September, 1655. From the best information 
 which we have on the subject, I do not think the whole 
 population of the Swedish settlements on the Delaware, 
 men, women, and children included, amounted to more 
 than three hundred and seventy-five souls at that time. 
 One of the results of this conquest was to increase the 
 previous indebtedness of the Dutch West India Company 
 to the City of Amsterdam to so large an amount as to induce 
 them, together with other considerations, to apply to the 
 city government to accept and assume the proprietorship 
 and dominion of all their possessions on the Delaware 
 below the Christina in satisfaction of the debt, which was 
 assented to, and soon after the same were duly relinquished 
 and conveyed to the city; after which they were called the 
 possessions of the colony of the City of Amsterdam, or the
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 43 
 
 City Colony, the company still retaining, as before, all north 
 of the Christina, including the fort and settlement about it 
 bearing that name. The authorities of the City of Amster- 
 dam seem at once to have conceived the idea of building up 
 a settlement and a port on the South River that should 
 equal and rival New Amsterdam on the North River, and 
 to have selected New Amstel for that purpose; and so zeal- 
 ously did they embark in the enterprise, and liberally and 
 generously promote and stimulate the growth of it, that it 
 contained more than one hundred houses, a population of 
 five or six hundred inhabitants, and some twenty to thirty 
 farms around it, by the year 1659; and it was probably this 
 unexampled growth and prosperity of New Amstel that first 
 attracted the special attention of Lord Baltimore and his 
 oflBcial representatives in the Province of Maryland, so soon 
 after their domestic commotions and conflicts had been suffi- 
 ciently composed and settled in the centre of the province, 
 to admit of their turning their attention to his interest in 
 any other direction, and which, as we have before seen, was 
 not until the year 1658. New Amstel had now become 
 the seat of government of all the possessions belonging to 
 the City of Amsterdam, or the City Colony, and had a 
 director-general and council residing in it, who had juris- 
 diction over all of its possessions, the former being ap- 
 pointed by the authorities of the city; and, furthermore, it 
 was not until the year 1659 that it first became known to 
 any settler within our limits that Lord Baltimore had any 
 claim or pretension whatever to any territory on the Dela- 
 ware. That information was first communicated by a mem- 
 ber of the provincial council residing on the Eastern Shore,
 
 44 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 to the director-general of the City Colony at New Amstel, by 
 a messenger sent by the latter to him with a letter addressed 
 to the governor of the province, and a request that he would 
 forward it to the governor, and which contained a respectful 
 application for the surrender of five or six soldiers who had 
 recently deserted from the fort at New Amstel and fled into 
 the province, and which he politely received and promised 
 to forward as requested; but he, at the same time, took 
 occasion to instruct the messenger to inform the gentleman 
 who had sent him, that he then had in his possession a 
 commission from Lord Baltimore to go to New Amstel 
 and demand the possession of it in his name as rightfully 
 belonging to him, because he believed that it was within 
 the limits of his Province of Maryland, but that his lordship 
 had since arrived in the province, and had ordered that all 
 the lands between the degrees of his grant should be sur- 
 veyed, and as soon as ascertained, that they should be 
 reduced to his authority and jurisdiction without fail and 
 without relinquishing any part of them. The communica- 
 tion was verbal merely, but it was duly delivered by the 
 messenger on his return to the director-general, and as 
 soon as it became known, which was instantly, of course, 
 the universal surprise and astonishment which it at once 
 produced was simply stunning on all New Amstel; and 
 from the account we have of the sudden panic into which 
 they were thrown by it, some of the weak-kneed inhab- 
 itants of the place would, if they could, have instantly fled 
 from it in the opposite direction, so completely were they 
 appalled and paralyzed by it. This occurred in the month 
 of June, 1659.
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 45 
 
 In the month of August of the same year, at a meeting 
 of the governor and provincial council held for the purpose 
 of taking into consideration his lordship's instructions and 
 commands to send to the Dutch, in Delaware Bay (I quote 
 from the minutes of the council) seated within his lord- 
 ship's province, to command them to be gone, "it is ordered 
 that Colonel Nathaniel Utie do make his repair to the pre- 
 tended governor of a people seated in Dealware Bay within 
 his Lordship's province, and that he do give them to under- 
 stand that they are seated within his Lordship's province 
 without notice given to his Lordship's lieutenant here, and 
 require them to depart the province." This was followed 
 in a distinct paragraph by an additional instruction of a 
 private nature, and which was evidently intended for the 
 eye of the commissioner only, but which the gallant Col- 
 onel, the Harry Hotspur of his lordship's cavaliers and 
 provincial council, either forgot, or did not deem it neces- 
 sary, to detach from his commission and the preceding 
 instructions embodied in it, when he came to lay his 
 credentials before the pretended governor and council 
 of New Amstel, assembled in due form and in grave and 
 solemn state to receive him as the accredited envoy, not 
 of his Majesty, the King of Great Britain, but of a grand 
 dignitary second only to him, I have no doubt, in his 
 estimation, his noble lordship of the Province of Mary- 
 land. It was literally as follows: That in case he finds an 
 opportunity, he insinuate into the people there seated, that 
 in case they make their application to his lordship's gov- 
 ernor here, they shall find good conditions according to 
 the conditions of plantation granted to all comers into
 
 46 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 this province, which shall be made good to them, and that 
 they shall have protection in their lives, liberty, and estates 
 which they shall bring with them. And which clearly 
 indicates that they were not so anxious for them to be 
 gone, after all. But if they expected this delicate and 
 sinister part of the embassy to be accomplished by gentle 
 hints, or diplomatic address, finesse, or insinuation merely, 
 they were very much mistaken in their man when they 
 appointed such a person as the straightforward, plain- 
 speaking, gallant Colonel Utie to execute it. A communi- 
 cation, however, of a more polite and courteous tenor had 
 been about the same time addressed in terms to the com- 
 mander of the people on Delaware Bay in reply to the 
 letter I have before mentioned from the director-general at 
 New Amstel, to the following effect: 
 
 Sir, — I received a letter from you addressed to me as Lord 
 Baltimore's Governor and Lieutenant of the Province of 
 Maryland, wherein you suppose yourself to be the governor 
 of a people seated in a part of Delaware Bay, which I am 
 very well informed lieth to the southward of the degree of 
 forty, and can therefore by no means own or acknowledge 
 any for governor there but myself, who am by his Lord- 
 ship appointed lieutenant of the whole province lying 
 between these degrees, 38 and 40, but do by these presents 
 require and command you to presently depart north of his 
 Lordship's province, or otherwise desire you to hold me 
 excused if I use my utmost endeavor to reduce that part 
 of his Lordship's province unto its due obedience under 
 him.
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 47 
 
 Three days after the session of the council and his 
 appointment, Colonel Utie, with two other delegates and a 
 servant, mounted on horses, made their imposing entrance 
 into New Amstel, but, as if to assure the inhabitants at first 
 sight of the friendly purpose of his mission and his desire to 
 propitiate their good will by a graceful tender of the olive 
 branch or calumet of peace, concord, and amity, he brought 
 with him in custody, not the five or six soldiers who had 
 deserted from the fort, but three or four unfortunate debtors 
 to the City Colony, who had adsconded from New Amstel 
 into the province to escape imprisonment for the crime of 
 getting in debt without the ability to get out of it, and duly 
 surrendered them to the proper authorities. In return for 
 this civility and chivalric act of colonial comity, he demanded 
 an audience of the director-general and council at the 
 earliest practicable moment, for his business was urgent and 
 would not admit of delay, which was promptly granted; and 
 on the introduction of the business of his mission, he opened 
 the proceeding by laying his commission and instructions 
 in full before them, which relieved their apprehensions very 
 considerably, particularly the private portion of them; but 
 in the course of the discussion, which was conducted in very 
 good temper on their part, he soon lapsed into a vehement 
 and violent harangue, in which he added a good deal to the 
 imperative force and emphasis of his public instructions, 
 and concluded in effect by demanding an immediate com- 
 pliance with them, and with a threat of instant war as the 
 only alternative left them. They replied that it would be 
 necessary for them to consult Governor Stuyvesant before 
 answering his demand, and that it would require several
 
 48 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 weeks for that purpose, whereupon their meeting was ad- 
 journed for three weeks; and yet the colonel, notwith- 
 standing his haste for an answer and to return to the province 
 as speedily as possible on his arrival, remained a minister 
 resident for the whole of that time in New Amstel, and did 
 faithful service in the mean while among its landholders 
 by insinuating in a very free and open manner how much 
 better it would be for all of them to repudiate the claim 
 of the Dutch and accept Lord Baltimore's conditions; and 
 there were not a few fence-men in the place and vicinity 
 who were half inclined to agree with him on that question, 
 and were always willing to hear him discourse, either in 
 public or private, on that interesting subject. This gave 
 much uneasiness as well as offence to the constituted 
 authorities of the town, but no one was so much outraged 
 by it as Stuy vesant was when he learned it, for he did not 
 hesitate to denoimce him as a spy, and to threaten to have 
 him arrested as such and sent a prisoner to Holland. The 
 name of Fort Christina and the settlement around it had 
 prior to his time been changed to Altona, and meeting with 
 the director-general of that post and settlement on the 
 streets of New Amstel during the time I have just spoken 
 of, the colonel notified him that Lord Baltimore claimed 
 Altona also as within his province, and told him that he 
 must consider what he had said to him there as sufficient 
 notice of that fact. On the day appointed, however, the 
 director-general and council, with the consent of Stuy ve- 
 sant, again met the colonel, when they respectfully informed 
 him that they rejected the claim and refused to accede to 
 the demands of Lord Baltimore, and then delivered to him
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 49 
 
 a formal protest against his claims and pretensions on behalf 
 of the New Netherlands. 
 
 Steps were immediately taken in the next place to prepare 
 to defend their possessions on the Delaware against the 
 demands and menaces made in the name of his lordship, 
 and pursuant to instructions given by the City of Amster- 
 dam, all of the country lying west of their previous pur- 
 chase, from Cape Henlopen to the mouth of the river, was 
 bought of the Indians, and a new fort was erected and 
 garrisoned at the Hoorn Kill. A considerable body of 
 troops were also ordered from New Amsterdam, and sta- 
 tioned at New Amstel. But whilst these preparations were 
 in progress, Stuyvesant concluded to despatch an embassy 
 to his excellency his lordship's governor of the Province 
 of Maryland, with full powers to demand instant and ample 
 reparation for the audacious and insolent manner in which 
 his demand for the surrender of their possessions had been 
 made on behalf of Lord Baltimore, and for the great loss 
 and injury which had been entailed on the prosperity of 
 New Amstel by the consternation which it had produced 
 there, and for the sinister and insidious efforts which had 
 been made there to frighten and seduce the inhabitants from 
 their fidelity to their true and lawful government, and also 
 to compose, compromise, and settle all matters in dispute 
 and controversy on such terms as should be mutually ac- 
 ceptable to the parties interested; and which constituted 
 in fact the main if not the only object of the mission. The 
 commission consisted of two very intelligent and respect- 
 able gentlemen of New Amsterdam, Mr. Augustus Herman, 
 a native of Bohemia, and the original proprietor of the
 
 50 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 manor of that name, containing eighteen thousand acres 
 originally, and lying partly within the limits of this State 
 and partly within those of Maryland, and Mr. Resolved 
 Waldron, who, after reaching New Amstel, proceeded on 
 their journey with Indian guides arid a small escort of sol- 
 diers, threading their way for the most part through prime- 
 val forests, arrayed in all the rich autumnal tints of the 
 month of October, until they reached a small affluent of the 
 Chesapeake, and thence by canoe navigation past the resi- 
 dence of the redoubtable Colonel Utie, on an island at the 
 mouth of the Sassafras River, of whom they had heard 
 such terrible things at New Amstel that they did not deem 
 it prudent to wait on him, for fear of his arresting their 
 farther progress to Kent Island, where after several days 
 of land and water travel, they procured a fine sail-boat, and 
 proceeded on their voyage down the Chesapeake. They 
 were received very courteously, and had several protracted 
 and interesting interviews and official sessions with Gover- 
 nor Fendall, Secretary Calvert, and the provincial council, 
 during which the conflicting claims of the Dutch and of 
 Lord Baltimore to the territory in dispute were ably can- 
 vassed and discussed by their respective representatives; 
 and among other matters urged by the Dutch commission- 
 ers against the pretension of his lordship, the misrepresen- 
 tation contained in the petition on which his grant had been 
 made, and the fact that the Dutch had planted colonies and 
 settlements within its limits, and had sealed their title to the 
 territory with their blood — alluding to the massacre of their 
 colony on the Hoorn Kill — prior to the date of it, were 
 distinctly presented and pressed during the discussions.
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 51 
 
 But the most remarkable thing perhaps developed in the 
 course of them was the final proposition submitted by the 
 Dutch commissioners. Finding there was no other pros- 
 pect of accommodating their differences, they at length 
 proposed to divide the peninsula by a conventional line 
 running north and south through the middle of it, even 
 designating on the map prominent points in the location 
 of it, and so near to where our present coterminous boun- 
 dary is established, as to leave no doubt that early 
 proposition in 1659 became the original of the idea and 
 conception of the conventional division afterwards pro- 
 pounded to the succeeding Lord Baltimore by William 
 Penn. This proposition was rejected, however, and the 
 deliberations closed, and their mission terminated without 
 any practical results. No further negotiations were insti- 
 tuted between them on the subject, nor were any further 
 demands made by either upon the other afterwards; before 
 the close of the year, however, the governor of the prov- 
 ince ordered a survey to be made of lands within six or 
 eight miles of New Amstel, and allotted and granted them 
 to inhabitants of the province; but none of them ever at- 
 tempted to take possession of them, and the effort would 
 have been wholly abortive if they had, because the Dutch 
 were on the alert for it, and had instructions from Stuyve- 
 sant to repel it by force of arms, if necessary, as an unlaw- 
 ful invasion of their possessions. 
 
 In the following year Lord Baltimore made his next effort 
 to acquire by purchase the lands claimed by him through 
 his agent in the City of Amsterdam, and by a direct appli- 
 cation to the Dutch West India Company to surrender to
 
 'fZ ADDRESS ON THE HISTOHY OF THE 
 
 liim the settlements of Altona and New Amstel and their 
 respective neighborhoods, upon condition of his reimbursing 
 the company all expenses incurred on account of them, 
 which offer the company not only peremptorily refused, but 
 took occasion in their reply to his communication, which 
 asserted his claim to them under his patent and as within 
 the degrees of his grant, to affirm their right and title to 
 them by possession under the grant of the State-General 
 for many years without claim or molestation from him or 
 any other person, and to admonish him that they were re- 
 solved to retain and defend them to the utmost extremity, 
 in case he persisted in his pretension and should resort to 
 forcible means to obtain possession of them. They also 
 soon afterwards appealed to the State-General to represent 
 through their minister at London to the ministry of Eng- 
 land the situation of their affairs with Lord Baltimore in 
 relation to the matter, and to request that the British sover- 
 eign would require his lordship to desist from any encroach- 
 icent upon them until a boundary could be established 
 between his Province of Maryland and their possessions on 
 the South River, and which was in due time attended to by 
 the State-General as requested; and that it was also duly 
 brought to the attention of the British sovereign is, I think, 
 to be reasonably inferred from the fact that at a session of 
 the governor and council of the province held eight months 
 afterwards, in May, 1661, they adopted a resolution to the 
 following effect: that inasmuch as it was doubtful whether 
 the settlement of New Amstel was below the fortieth degree 
 of north latitude, and the Dutch West India Company was 
 determined to maintain their possessions on the Delaware
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 53 
 
 by force, and there was no hope of any aid from the other 
 Enghsh colonies in the attempt, no further efforts should be 
 made to reduce them to obedience to the authority and 
 jurisdiction of the province, until the will of his lordship 
 should be known in regard to the matter; and that some 
 effort should be made in the mean while to ascertain whether 
 it was within the boundaries of his grant. 
 
 As to the events which occurred between the date last 
 mentioned and the month of August, 166*2, which we have 
 on the authority of some of the historians of our sister 
 State, such as the advance of an organized military force 
 under the banners of Lord Baltimore against the fort and 
 settlement at the Hoorn Kill during that time, the evacua- 
 tion of the fort and the retirement of the Dutch settlers 
 from the place, and the occupation of it by Maryland set- 
 tlers, and the collections of duties there by his authority, I 
 can only say that while I think it verj^ questionable, or their 
 statements much exaggerated, it is quite certain that if the 
 Dutch settlers ever retired from it, or the fort was ever 
 evacuated, they must have returned very soon afterwards, 
 and that if the Maryland settlers ever possessed themselves 
 of it, they must have abandoned it quite as speedily, as the 
 well-authenticated historical events which followed soon 
 after will conclusively shoAv. By them all this is recorded 
 as having occurred in the year 1661 ; and yet this date brings 
 us down to an era of good feeling pre-eminently character- 
 ized by friendly and harmonious relations between the Dutch 
 and English settlers on the opposite sides of the peninsula, 
 and also between Lord Baltimore himself and the principal 
 officers in all the Dutch settlements; for in Auffust, 166'-2,
 
 54 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 liis lordship with a numerous suite made a friendly visit to 
 the director-general of the City Colony at New Amstel, and 
 was very cordially received and entertained by him, and two 
 days afterwards extended his visit to the director-general at 
 Altona, where he was received and entertained in the same 
 friendly manner, and where there was an invitation from 
 Governor Stuyvesant awaiting his arrival, to extend his 
 visit as far as New Amsterdam, Avith a tender of a proper 
 escort from Altona, but which his engagements compelled 
 him with regret to defer to another and more convenient 
 opportunity. I shall have occasion hereafter to mention 
 another important fact which would seem to be equally 
 incompatible with the statements which I have referred to, 
 or with the presumption even, that any such hostilities had 
 occurred between them in 1661, or that his lordship was in 
 possession of the fort and settlement at the Hogrn Kill in 
 that year, or any year afterwards. 
 
 On the 12th day of March, 1664 (O. S.), letters patent 
 were issued by Charles the Second of England to his 
 brother, James, Duke of York and Albany, his heirs and 
 assigns, for all the mainland beginning and extending from 
 the River St. Croix, now the northern boundary of the 
 United States, where they adjoin the British province of 
 New Brunswick, to the east side of Delaware Bay; and 
 among the rights, powers, and privileges conferred upon 
 him by it were those of royal governor of it, subject to 
 the sovereignty of the king over it. Prior to that date 
 it having been the purpose of Charles the Second for a 
 long time to terminate the disputes and contentions be- 
 tween the Dutch and English settlers in America by estab-
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 55 
 
 lishing in the only jiractical method left to him, the long- 
 asserted claim of the Crown of England to all the terri- 
 tory then in possession of the Dutch in this country, he 
 despatched in the latter part of the month of May following 
 a fleet, consisting of two frigates, a sloop-of-war, and a trans- 
 port with three hundred troops, under the command of 
 Colonel Richard Nichols, with whom were associated as 
 royal commissioners Sir Robert Carr, George Cartwright, 
 and Samuel Maverick, Esquires, with powers and instruc- 
 tions to visit the English colonies on the coast, and hear 
 complaints and settle the peace and security of the same, 
 and that their first duty would be the reduction of the 
 Dutch in or near Long Island, or anywhere within the 
 English dominions, to entire obedience to the sovereignty 
 of the British Crown, to remedy the many grievances which 
 the neighboring British colonists had for many years 
 suffered at their hands. In the mean time, before the 
 expedition had reached its destination, on the 25th day of 
 June, 1664, the Duke of York sold and conveyed to Lord 
 Berkeley and Sir George Carteret that portion of the lands 
 granted to him Ij'ing between the Hudson River and the 
 Delaware Bay, and now constituting the State of New Jer- 
 sey; and which was then named New Jersey in compliment 
 to Sir George Carteret, who had been governor of the island 
 of Jersey, and had firmly held it for Charles the First during 
 the rebellion and his war and conflict with Parliamen- 
 tary forces, and whose devotion to his cause was in part the 
 consideration for the sale to them. 
 
 It is not necessary to trace in detail the progress and 
 movements of the English fleet and expedition in the work
 
 56 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 assigned them. It Is sufficient to state that by the 9th of 
 September following the fleet had appeared before New 
 Amsterdam, the capital and principal settlement of the New 
 Netherlands, and Governor Stuyvesant had submitted to 
 the demands of Colonel Nichols without forcible resistance 
 or firing a gun, and had surrendered to the English all of 
 the Dutch possessions over which he had authority and 
 command at that time, and England was now in full pos- 
 session and control of them. A short time prior to this 
 event, however, the residue of all the Dutch and formerly 
 Swedish settlements on the western side of the Delaware, 
 above the Christina, including Altona, had also been 
 sold and conveyed by the Dutch West India Company to 
 the City of Amsterdam, and had been incorporated in the 
 City Colony, and was now solely subject to its government 
 and authority. That fact had been made known to Colonel 
 Nichols and the commissioners, either before or upon the 
 surrender of Stuyvesant, and as their instructions were to 
 reduce all the Dutch possessions on our coast to obedience, 
 their next duty was to proceed in like manner against their 
 settlements on our river. They had left England with 
 ample instructions for every contingency that might arise, 
 and for this occasion most especiall3^ Accordingly, Sir 
 Robert Carr was directed by Colonel Nichols and the other 
 commissioners to proceed with one of the frigates, the sloop- 
 of-war, and transport of the fleet, and the troops not required 
 to hold the fort and community at New Amsterdam in 
 proper subjection, against the fort and the town of New 
 Amstel, on the Delaware, as then the principal settlement 
 upon it; and for that purpose a commission was duly issued
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 57 
 
 to him by them with written instructions, among which was 
 the following, and which was evidently dictated at the War 
 Office in London, bj' the command of the king, before the 
 departure of the expedition from England: "If Sir Robert 
 finds he cannot reduce the place by force, nor upon the con- 
 ditions before mentioned, he may add such as he may deem 
 necessary; but if both fail, he is, by a messenger to the 
 Governor of Maryland, to ask aid, and from all other Eng- 
 lish who live near the Dutch plantations. He is to declare 
 to Lord Baltimore's son and all the English concerned in 
 Maryland, that this great expense to His Majesty in ships 
 and soldiers has been incurred solely for the purpose of 
 reducing foreigners in these parts to His Majesty's obedi- 
 ence; but that being reduced at His Majesty's expense, he 
 is commanded to hold possession for His Majesty's own 
 behoof and right, and that he is willing to unite with the 
 Governor of Maryland in His Majesty's interest on all oc- 
 casions; and if my Lord Baltimore doth pretend right 
 thereto by his patent (which is a doubtful case), you are 
 to say that yoVi only keep possession till His Majesty is 
 informed and otherwise satisfied." 
 
 Fortunately, Sir Robert had no occasion to call on the 
 Governor of Maryland for any assistance on his arrival 
 before New Amstel. But suppose it had been otherwise, 
 with such a wet blanket as that instruction and admonition 
 to his lordship contained thrown on the shoulders of every 
 cavalier and soldier of Maryland called on to aid in such 
 an exigency and such a struggle, with how much ardor or 
 spirit would they have engaged in it? Under the instruc- 
 tions referred to. Sir Robert Carr sailed with his fleet
 
 58 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 and troops for the Delaware, and, after a tedious voyage in 
 ascending the river, passed the fort at New Amstel without 
 being fired upon, and anchored above it. He then made a 
 formal demand in the name of his Majesty, the King of 
 England for the surrender of the fort, the town, and all the 
 possessions of the City Colony on the bay and river. After 
 one day of parley and delay, the authorities and citizens of 
 the town were generally disposed to submit and to sur- 
 render the place without further hesitation, but a minority of 
 them, at the head of whom firmly stood the director-general 
 of the colony, D'Hinoyossa, were strenuously opposed to 
 it, and would come to no terms, and as Sir R.obert was in 
 hopes that they also would at length see the necessity 
 and propriety of it, the effort to procure it without firing 
 either upon the fort or the town was protracted for three 
 days, when the town authorities and citizens determined to 
 capitulate and surrender it without the consent and against 
 the will of the director-general, on which he retired with 
 his officers into the fort, resolved to hold it, at least, to the 
 last extermity. The next morning the frigate and sloop-of- 
 war were ordered to drop down below the fort, but within 
 musket-range of it, and each to discharge two broadsides 
 into it, and the troops were also landed for the purpose of 
 storming it as soon as those discharges were made. The 
 plan of attack was promptly executed by both the ships and 
 the soldiers, and in a moment the fort was theirs, with a 
 loss to the Dutch of four killed and ten wounded out of a 
 garrison of between thirty and forty men. It was an act of 
 consummate courage and heroic resolution on the part of 
 the director-general to withstand such an attack, but it was
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 59 
 
 at the same time but little better than an act of madness, for 
 the fort was utterly untenable, and could afford no security 
 or protection against such a combined assault both by land 
 and water. The terms of capitulation, though liberal to 
 all the inhabitants submitting to them, constituted a total 
 surrender of the Dutch possessions on the Delaware to 
 the sovereignty of the British Crown. Officers and troops 
 were immediately despatched to the Hoorn Kill to enforce 
 the surrender and take possession of the fort and settlement 
 there; and there were strong complaints on the part of the 
 inhabitants both there and at New Amstel of the bad 
 treatment and spoliations of private property to which they 
 were subjected by the British troops after the surrender. 
 The name of New Amsterdam was now changed to NeV 
 York, and of New Amstel to New Castle, by the English 
 conquerors; the former of which contained at that time 
 a population of about fifteen hundred, while all the settlements 
 within the limits of our State did not probably comprise a 
 population of more than two thousand. The failure of the 
 two preceding races to make any greater progress in the 
 settlement and population of this fine and favored region in 
 America during the time they had been in the possession 
 of it, is only the more remarkable when we reflect that 
 each embarked in the grand enterprise with great spirit and 
 ardor at an unusually brilliant and auspicious epoch in the 
 history of both countries apparently for such an under- 
 taking, and when the star of empire shone in the ascendent 
 with the brightest effulgence over each of them, whilst 
 the sky of Sweden was yet radiant with the lustre of the 
 achievements and conquests of Gustavus Adolphus in
 
 60 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 Russia, Prussia, and on the shores of the Baltic, and that 
 of the Netherlands was still in a blaze with the glory of 
 the still grander achievement of their entire independence 
 of the Crown of Spain, and the magnificent conquests of 
 their meteor flag both in Oriental and in Western seas; 
 and yet, s.trange to say, not even the faintest and feeblest 
 reflection of that splendor and glory on either hand ever 
 reached to their dominions on the shores of the Hudson 
 or the Delaware. Full fifty years had now elapsed since 
 the Dutch had commenced the plantation of their posses- 
 sions in this country, and yet in one hundred years after 
 that time Delaware alone must have contained a civilized 
 population of nearly fifty thousand, and the four States 
 of New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Delaware a 
 similar population of nearly one million; and now, after 
 the lapse of a little more than two hundred years from that 
 date, the population of the same cannot be far short of ten 
 millions. It is therefore manifest that the English conquest 
 was no calamity, but a great blessing in the first instance to 
 the region conquered, and afterwards to our whole country. 
 For it was the fortune of these four States to bear the brunt 
 of the American Revolution, as the regions of the Hudson 
 and the Delaware became the theatre of its greatest and 
 grandest conflicts, and here, in turn, our national independ- 
 ence was afterwards substantially conquered; and from that 
 time they both became illustrious in the history of the 
 country, and the Delaware particularly memorable as the 
 historic river of the Revolution. 
 
 In the following year was was formally proclaimed by 
 England against the Netherlands, and continued until 1668,
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. Gl 
 
 without anj'^ change in the relations which the province of 
 the Duke of York now sustained to England, and into 
 which our territory, with the sanction of his Majesty 
 Charles the Second, had been duly incorporated immediately 
 after its conquest, by his royal highness the duke under 
 his letters patent, which did not include it, and by which he 
 thus constituted his whole territory one province and one 
 provincial government under them, making New York the 
 central seat of it, and the official residence of his lieutenant- 
 governor for the time being. But war again occurred be- 
 tween the two countries in 1672, during which the Nether- 
 lands temporarily recovered the possession of the whole 
 region, ours as well as the residue of it, and re-established 
 their government over it ; on the conclusion of it, however, in 
 1674, by the terms of the treaty it was restored to England, 
 and which had the effect at last to confirm the title of that 
 country to it by the peaceful and solemn compact of the 
 two countries; and inasmuch as the intervening recapture 
 of it flagrante bello was supposed to have had the effect in 
 law to abrogate and annul the estate and powers granted 
 and delegated immediately from the king to the Duke of 
 York in the province, it was deemed advisable to revive 
 and confirm the grant liy a renewal of the letters patent 
 after the close of the war and the ratification of the treaty 
 of peace restoring it to the Crown of Great Britain, and 
 which was accordinly done on the 29th day of June, 
 1674. 
 
 On the 14th day of June, 1680, William Penn presented 
 to his Majesty Charles the Second, with whom he was per- 
 sonally well acquainted, as he was also with his brother,
 
 62 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 the Duke of York, a petition to grant to him in Heu of a 
 claim on the British government, which he had inherited 
 from his father (late an admiral in the British navy), for 
 money advanced and service rendered, to the amount of 
 sixteen thousand pounds, a tract of country in America, lying 
 north of Maryland, bounded on the east by the Delaware 
 River, on the west limited as Maryland, and to extend 
 northward as far as plantable. There then existed in the 
 privy council of the king a body of councillors of the 
 Crown well known to the laws and constitution of the 
 realm, a duly constituted committee, named in polite and 
 strictly technical terms The Lords of the Committee of 
 His Majesty's most honorably Privy Council for the Affairs 
 of Trade and Plantation, of which Lord Chief Justice North 
 of the Court of King's Bench was ex officio a member, 
 among many other eminent noblemen and gentlemen. This 
 committee had, among other powers conferred upon it, 
 special cognizance of disputes in relation to plantations 
 and colonial and provincial boundaries arising in the distant 
 colonial possessions of the Crown, and beyond the jurisdic- 
 tion of the courts of law of the kingdom, notwithstanding 
 they might involve questions of right and title to extensive 
 possessions in such distant colonies; and whenever a ques- 
 tion arose between two provinces of America, or elsewhere 
 in their remote possessions, concerning the extent of their 
 charters, mutual limits, or matters of that kind, the juris- 
 diction of the committee was original. It had, however, 
 no power to enter judgment or decree as a court of law or 
 equity, or to enforce its decision against either party, for its 
 province simply was to investigate such cases and to advise
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 63 
 
 the king of their conclusions in regard to them. To that 
 committee, by the direction of the king, Mr. Penn's petition 
 was promptly referred. I am here happy to have the oppor- 
 tunity to acknowledge the obligation we owe to the distin- 
 guished commissioners appointed a few sessions since on 
 behalf of this State to consider, in conjunction with a like 
 body of commissioners appointed on behalf of the State 
 of New Jersey, what was then known as the fishery ques- 
 tion between the two States, and to report to the Legis- 
 lature thereon, for the thorough and patient research and 
 investigation made by them in the matter, and which 
 brought to our knowledge, for the first time in the history 
 of the questions we now have under consideration, the full 
 and interesting details of the proceedings before that dis- 
 tinguished committee of the privy council on the petition 
 so referred to it. I shall repeat the substance of them only. 
 On the l^th of June, 1680, the Committee in session in 
 the council chamber, the petition of William Penn was 
 read, praying in consideration of debts due to him, or his 
 father, from the Crown, to grant him letters patent for a tract 
 of land in America, north of Maryland, bounded on the east 
 by the Delaware River, on the west limited as Maryland, 
 and northward to extend as far as plantable; whereupon 
 Mr. Penn was called in, and having been asked what extent 
 he would be contented with northerly, declared he would 
 be satisfied with three degrees to the northward, and was 
 willing, in lieu of such a grant, to remit his debt due to 
 him from His Majesty, or some part of it, and to stay for 
 the remainder until His Majesty should be in a better con- 
 dition to satisfv it. And after consideration of the whole
 
 64 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 matter it was ordered that copies of his petition be sent to 
 Sir John Werden on behalf of His Royal Highness (the 
 counsel and representative of the Duke of York), and to 
 the agents of Lord Baltimore, to the end that they might 
 report to the Committee how far the pretensions of Mr. 
 Penn might consist with the boundaries of Maryland, or 
 the Duke's property of New York, and his possessions in 
 those parts. Whitehall, June 25, 1680. Committee again in 
 session. The petition of Mr. Penn was again read concern- 
 ing a tract of land to be granted to him in America, to- 
 gether with a letter from Sir John Werden, and another 
 from Lord Baltimore':, agents touching the same. And Mr. 
 Penn having been afterwards called in, was told that it 
 appearing by Sir John Werden's letter that part of the ter- 
 ritory desired by him was already possessed by the Duke 
 of York, he should apply himself to His Royal Highness 
 for adjusting their respective pretensions; and Mr. Penn 
 being also acquainted with the matter of the letter from 
 Lord Baltimore's agents, he does agree that Susquehanna 
 Fort shall be the bounds of Lord Baltimore's province; and 
 as to the furnishing of arms and ammunition to the In- 
 dians, Mr. Penn declares himself ready to submit to any 
 restraint their Lordships shall propose. Whitehall, Nov. 
 4, 1680. Committee again in session. The petition of 
 Mr. Penn was read, desiring that a day might be appointed 
 for preparing a grant unto him of proprietary in a tract of 
 land in America upon Delaware River; and their Lord- 
 ships appoint this business for Thursday next. Whitehall, 
 Thursday, Nov. 11, 1680. Committee again in session. 
 Mr. Attorney-General presents the Committee with his
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 63 
 
 observations on the draft of Mr. Penn's patent. AVhite- 
 hall, Dec. 16, 1680. Committee again in session. Mr. 
 Penn is called in concerning the patent desired by him, 
 and upon reading the letters from Sir John Werden touch- 
 ing the boundaries wherein His Royal Highness may be 
 concerned, their Lordships think it best for the settlement 
 thereof that Sir John Werden be desired to attend on 
 Saturday next in the afternoon, at which time the agent 
 of Lord Baltimore is likewise ordered to give his attend- 
 ance as to what concerns his Lordship's property of Mary- 
 land. Whitehall, Saturday, Jan. 15, 1681. Committee 
 again in session. The boundaries of Mr. Penn's patent, 
 settled by Lord Chief Justice North with the alterations 
 of Sir John Werden, were read and approved, and their 
 Ldrdships appoint Wednesday next, at nine in the morning, 
 to review the whole patent. Whitehall, Saturday, Jan. 2'2, 
 1681. Committee again in session. Upon reading the 
 draft of a patent for Mr. Penn concerning his absolute 
 proprietary of a tract of land in America, northerly of 
 Maryland, the Lords of the Committee desire my Lord 
 Chief Justice North to take said patent into his considera- 
 tion, and to provide by fit clauses therein that all acts of 
 sovereignty as to peace and war be reserved to the King; 
 and that all acts of Parliament concerning trade and navi- 
 gation and His Majesty's customs be duly observed; and 
 in general that the patent be so drawn that it may consist 
 with the King's interest and service, and give sufficient 
 encouragement to planters to settle under it. A paper 
 being also read, wherein my Lord Bishop of London 
 desires that Mr. Penn be obliged by his patent to admit
 
 6f) ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 a chaplain of his Lordship's appointment, upon the request 
 of any number of planters; the same is also referred to 
 my Lord Chief Justice North. Whitehall, Thursday, Feb. 
 24, 1681. Committee again in session. A draft of a patent 
 for Mr. Penn is read, and there being a blank left for the 
 name of the tract or province, their Lordships agree to 
 leave the nomination of it to the King. 
 
 The communications by letter which in the mean while en- 
 sued between the committee through its secretary, William 
 Blaithwaite, Esq., and the representative of the Duke of 
 York, and the agents of Lord Baltimore, in relation to the 
 matter, will furnish further information on the subject which 
 the journal of its sesions merely, of course, could not 
 supply, and will clearly explain and show how and why 
 the northern boundary of our State is in the form of an arc 
 of a circle, and which was originally fixed, pending these 
 proceedings, by agreement between the Duke of York and 
 William Penn, as his southern limit of his Province of 
 Pennsylvania, where it was to abut upon the northern 
 boundary of what his royal highness then called his 
 Delaware, or New Castle colony. The first is a letter in 
 reply to his service of a copy of the petition of Mr. Penn 
 j)ursuant to the order of the committee at its first session, 
 from Sir John Werden on behalf of the Duke of York. 
 
 St, James, June 23, 1680. 
 
 For William Blaythwaite, Esq., Secretary of the Right 
 Honorable the Lords Commissioners for Trade and 
 Plantations at Whitehall. 
 
 Sir, — I had answered your letter of the 14th sooner, but
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 67 
 
 my going to Windsor just when I received it hindered me 
 then, and also made me think it proper to acquaint the 
 Duke with the contents of it first. What I have now to 
 say is, that by all which I can observe of the boundaries 
 mentioned in Mr. Penn's petition, they agree well enough 
 with that colony or plantation which hath been hitherto 
 (ever since the conquest of New York by Colonel Nichols) 
 held as an appendix and part of the government of New 
 York by name of Delaware Colony, or more particularly 
 New Castle Colony, that being the name of a principal place 
 in it; the whole being promiscuously planted by Swedes, 
 Finlanders, Dutch and English, all which hath been actually 
 under the government of His Royal Highness' Lieutenant 
 at New York hitherto; but what are its proper boundaries 
 (those of Latitude and Longitude being so very little 
 known, or so ill observed, as experience tells us, in all the 
 West Indies) I am not able to say; if this be what Mr. Penn 
 would have, I presume the Right Honorable the Lords of 
 the Committee for Trade and Plantations will not encourage 
 his pretensions to it by reason of what is mentioned, which 
 plainly show the Duke's right preferable to all others 
 (under his majesty's good liking), though it should not 
 prove to be strictly wnthin the Duke's Patent; but if it be 
 any other parcel of land unimproved in those parts, which 
 is without all other patents, and not interfering with the 
 possessions of His Majesty's subjects, already settled there, 
 I humbly submit to their Lordships how far they may 
 think convenient (under fitting restrictions and qualifica- 
 tions to tie up the government of such new colonies as 
 near as may be to the laws of England) to recommend the
 
 68 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 petitioner's request to His Majesty; thus I think I have, as 
 far as I am able at present, fully answered your letter upon 
 this subject; so I remain. 
 
 Sir, your most affectionate Friend and Servant, 
 
 Jo. Werden. 
 
 On the same day he received from the agents of Lord 
 Baltimore the following reply: 
 
 Sir, — In answer to yours in reference to Mr. Penn's 
 petition, some things are thought proper to be offered 
 in respect to the particular concern of my Lord Balti- 
 more, and something in reference to the public on his 
 Lordship's behalf. It is desired that if the grant pass 
 unto Mr. Penn of the lands petitioned for in America, 
 that it may be expressed to be land that shall lie north 
 of Susquehanna Fort, also north of all lands in a direct 
 1 lie between the said fort and Delaware river; and also 
 north of all lands upon a direct line westward from the 
 said fort; for that fort is the boundary of Maryland north- 
 ward. It is further desired that there may be contained 
 general words of restriction as to any interest granted to 
 Lord Baltimore, and saving to him all rights granted; it 
 is also prayed that my Lord may have a sight of the grant 
 before it pass. On the public account it is offered that 
 some due caution be provided that no arms, powder, shot, 
 or ammunition be sold by any that shall settle in this new 
 plantation to the Indians or natives; for hereby a common 
 mischief may happen unto all his Majesty's neighboring 
 plantations.
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 69 
 
 This, with our thanks on my Lord Baltimore's behalf for 
 your care of him, is all at present from. 
 
 Sir, your humble servants, 
 
 Barnaby Dunch,, 
 Richard Burk. 
 
 On the 16th day of October, 1680, a second letter was 
 received from Sir John Werden on behalf of the Duke of 
 York, as follows: 
 
 Sir, — You heretofore wrote to me touching Mr. .William 
 Penn's petition then before the Right Honorable the Lords 
 Commissioners for Trade and Foreign Plantations; to which 
 I answered you as at that time I was obliged to; since then 
 Mr, Penn hath represented to the Duke his case and circum- 
 stances, in relation to the reason he hath to expect favor 
 from his Majesty touching that request of his, to be such 
 as that his Royal Highness commands me to let you know, 
 in order to your informing their Lordships of it, that he is 
 very willing that Mr. Penn's request may meet with success; 
 that is, that he may have a grant of the tract of land which 
 lies on the north of New Castle Colony, part of Delaware, 
 and on the west side of Delaware River, beginning about 
 the latitude of 40 degrees, and extending northwards and 
 westwards as far as his majesty pleaseth, under such regu- 
 lations as their Lordships shall think fit. 
 
 Sir, your very humble servant, 
 Jo. Werden. 
 
 In the mean while a draft of the proposed grant had been
 
 70 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 prepared by Mr. Penn, and by the order of the committee 
 had been submitted to the attorney-general, that if upon 
 consideration of the powers therein proposed he should 
 have any objection to it, he might report the same to them. 
 And in obedience to their order their secretary had on the 
 ISth day of November, 1680, addressed a letter to Sir John 
 Werden, apprising him also of that fact, and that they had 
 been informed that a copy of the draft had been laid in his 
 hands, and that if he had nothing more to offer to them on 
 the subject, they proposed to take their final resolution in 
 relation to the patent at their next meeting, and stating the 
 time of it; to which he replied on the 20th of that month 
 as follows: 
 
 Sir, — At two of the clock of this day I met with your 
 letter to me of the 18th instant, and a copy in it (which I 
 here return to you) of some part of Mr. Penn's patent for 
 land in America. I am to first premise to you that in cases 
 of this nature it were most proper to have the advice of 
 council learned in the laws for settling the boundaries of 
 any new patent which may be liable to encroach on those 
 of another's possession; but in regard I remember well the 
 Duke's directions expressed in a former letter by me to you 
 by his Royal Highness' order, dated the 16th of October, 
 1680, I shall frankly tell you my thoughts thereupon, viz.: 
 That I believe the description by longitude (especially) and 
 of latitude are very uncertain, and so also is it under what 
 meridian the head of Delaware river lies, which I do believe 
 hath never yet been observed by any careful artist. But it 
 being the Duke's intention that Mr. Penn's grant be bounded
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE Of DELAWARE. 71 
 
 on the east side by the Delaware river, and that his sguth 
 hmits be twenty or thirty miles beyond New Castle (which 
 colony of New Castle is northwards and distinct from Mary- 
 land, that being under the jurisdiction of Lord Baltimore), 
 which extent northwards of New Castle colony, we guess, 
 may reach as far as the beginning of the fortieth degree of 
 latitude; therefore, if Mr. Penn's patent be so worded as to 
 leave New Castle twenty or thirty miles beyond, free, and 
 to be bounded on the east by Delaware river, I think this 
 is all that needs as to the Duke, who will not concern him- 
 self how far north or west Mr. Penn's patent takes him. 
 I am, Sir, your most affectionate Friend and Servant, 
 
 Jo. Werden. 
 
 Three days afterwards, that is to say, on the 23d of Nov- 
 ember, 1680, he wrote again to Secretary Blaythwaite, as 
 follows : 
 
 Sir, — Mr. Penn having often fallen into discourse with 
 me of his concerns in America since I wrote to you on 
 Saturday, I have told him the substance of what I wrote, 
 and he seems to fear that if his south limits be rightly set 
 at twenty or thirty miles north from New Castle Town, he 
 shall have so little of the river left as very much to prevent 
 the hopes he hath of improving the rest within his patent; 
 but, on the other side, he is willing that twelve English 
 miles north of New Castle be his boundary, and believes 
 the distance will fall under the beginning of the fortieth 
 degree of latitude; I have already signified to you all I 
 know of the Duke's mind herein, which is in general to
 
 72 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 keep- some convenient distance from New Castle north- 
 wards for a boundary to that colony. But I confess I do 
 not understand why it is precisely necessary to insist on 
 just such a number of miles, more or less, in a country of 
 which we know so little, and when all the benefits are in- 
 tended to this patentee which others enjoy; so as I submit 
 this point to their Lordship's consideration, and do not 
 think it material to add more at present, from 
 
 Your very affectionate Friend and Servant, 
 
 Jo. Werden. 
 
 The agents of Lord Baltimore, as well as Sir John Werden 
 on behalf of the Duke of York, were again duly notified to 
 appear before the committee, on the 18th of December, 
 1680, to present their objections to the draft of Mr. Penn's 
 patent, if any they had, and were desired not to fail in 
 their attendance, as their lordships were determined to 
 proceed at that time to a resolution in the matter. But 
 neither of them then appeared, or made further answer. 
 
 Assuming, on the basis of this last letter, that the Duke 
 of York had at length assented to the fixation of the 
 southern line of Mr. Penn's patent for his Province of 
 Pennsylvania at the distance of twelve English miles north 
 from the town of Newcastle, the Lords of the Committee 
 for the Affairs of Trade and Plantations requested Lord 
 Chief Justice North to draw the description of the bound- 
 aries to be inserted in it, and which he did in the following 
 terms : 
 
 "As the same is bounded on the east by Delaware River 
 from the twelve miles distance northward of New Castle
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 73 
 
 Town, beginning of the fortieth degree of northern lati- 
 tude unto the three and fortieth degree of northern lati- 
 tude, if the said river doth extend so far northward; but if 
 the said river shall not extend so far northward, then by 
 the said river so far as it doth extend; and from the head 
 of the said river the eastern bounds are to be determined 
 by a meridian line to be drawn from the head of the said 
 river unto the said three and fortieth degree; the said lands 
 to extend westward five degrees in longitude, to be com- 
 puted from the said eastern bounds; and the said lands are 
 bounded on the north by the beginning of the three and 
 fortieth degree of northern latitude, and on a circle drawn 
 at twelve miles distance from New Castle northward and 
 westward, unto the south by the beginning of the fortieth 
 degree of northern latitude; another by a straight line west- 
 ward to the limit of longitude above" mentioned, except- 
 ing all lands within twelve miles of the town of New- 
 Castle that shall happen to lie within the said bounds, now 
 in the possession of His Royal Highness, or his tenants or 
 assigns." 
 
 Their final report to the king in the matter was as 
 follows : 
 
 May it please your Majesty: 
 
 In obedience to your Majesty's order, signified to us by 
 the Earl of Sunderland on the 1st of June last, we had 
 prepared the draft of a charter constituting William Penn, 
 Esq., absolutely proprietary of a tract of land in America 
 therein mentioned, which we humbly present to your Majesty 
 for your royal approbation, leaving also the naming of the
 
 74 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 said province to your Majesty, which is most humbly 
 submitted. 
 
 In response to their inquiry of the attorney-general, 
 they received the following communication from the first 
 law officer of the Crown during their consideration of the 
 matter: 
 
 May it please your Lordshiis: 
 
 I have considered the petition of Mr. William Penn, 
 praying his majesty to grant unto him a tract of land in 
 America, lying north of Maryland, bounded on the east 
 by Delaware bay, to the westward by the Indian countries as 
 Maryland, and do not find that such boundaries do intrench 
 upon the Lord Baltimore's province of Maryland, which 
 is bounded southward by a part of Virginia, eastward by 
 the main ocean and Delaware river, and northward by that 
 part of Delaware river that lieth in the fortieth degree of 
 latitude, and so by a direct line westward through the 
 continent. And the patent granted to His Royal Highness, 
 of New York being bounded westward by the east side of 
 Delaware bay, is sufficiently distinguished from the grant 
 desired by Mr. Penn, which is bounded eastwardly by 
 Delaware bay or river; so that the tract of land desired 
 by Mr. Penn seems to be undisposed of by his majesty, ex- 
 cept the imaginary lines of New England patents, which 
 are bounded westwardly by the main ocean, should give 
 them a recall, though impracticable to all those vast terri- 
 tories. But I am further to offer unto your Lordships, that 
 there are several Dutch gjid Swedish plantations, which
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 75 
 
 have been under the English government, that He scattered 
 on the westward of Delaware River, and some of them 
 perhaps within the bounds of Mr. Penn's petition, and have 
 for a long time, either acknowledged the protection of His 
 Royal Highness, who took them from the Dutch upon the 
 conquest of New York, or of Lord Baltimore, near whose 
 borders they are settled; and how far Mr. Penn's grant may, 
 in this consideration, concern his neighbors, is most humbly 
 submitted to your Lordships. 
 
 It is to be observed, and it is for that purpose I have re- 
 ferred to them, that pending this important and protracted 
 proceediag and investigation, Lord Baltimore presented be- 
 fore the committee of the privy council conducting it with 
 the utmost deliberation and impartiality, no claim or preten- 
 sion whatever to any of the settlements on the western side 
 of the Delaware Bay and river, although every one then 
 existing lay below the parallel of the fortieth degree of north 
 latitude, and the only way in which their attention is directly 
 called to that matter is to be found in the rather gratuitous 
 allusion and suggestion of the attorney-general contained in 
 the last lines of his communication to them; but even that 
 recognizes the right and title of the Duke of York to them, 
 as formerly Dutch and Swedish plantations or settlements 
 held by the right of conquest, and his peaceable possession 
 of them for several years prior to the application of Mr. 
 Penn for his grant. But though not needed for such a pur- 
 pose, because it is manifest from the moment the petition 
 of Mr. Penn was read to them, they were well aware that 
 Ix)rd Baltimore's interests might be affected by it. and that
 
 76 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 he might have grounds for objecting to it, it had the effect 
 to bring this particular matter to their immediate and direct 
 attention, and the care with which they proceeded to adjust 
 the southern boundary of the province in reference to these 
 settlements to the satisfaction of the Duke of York, indi- 
 cated not only a clear and deliberate recognition of his 
 right and title to them and to his Delaware or New Castle 
 colony, but (juite as clear and deliberate a repudiation and 
 condemnation of Lord Baltimore's claim and pretension to 
 them, on their part, under the circumstances. And such 
 having been their final conclusion and decision in the case, 
 it only became the stronger and more conclusive against the 
 claim of Lord Baltimore when it was approved and con- 
 firmed by the king himself by the grant of the province to 
 Mr. Penn. And well might it have been inferred from the 
 course pursued by him during that inquiry, that his lordship 
 had at last come to the conclusion to renounce tacitly, at 
 least, all further claim to them. But scarcely had his royal 
 highness parted with his title to them, thus recognized and 
 sanctioned by such high authority, and soon afterwards fur- 
 ther confirmed to him by a formal grant and letters patent 
 than his pretension was revived by his lordship and his 
 heir and successor, not to be definitively settled until nearly 
 Seventy years afterwards, and then only by a solemn decree 
 in the High Court of Chancery in England against the 
 validity of it. 
 
 The grant and letters patent from his Majesty Charles 
 the Second to his brother, and heir presumptive to his 
 throne, the Duke of York, to which I have just alluded, 
 were made and delivered in due form in about two years
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 77 
 
 after the termination of the proceedings before the Lords 
 of the Committee for the Affairs of Trade and Plantations, 
 on the 22d day of March, 1683, and were for "all that the 
 Town of New Castle otherwise called Delaware and the 
 Fort therein or thereunto belonging, situate, lying and 
 being between Maryland and New Jersey in America; and 
 all that tract of land lying within the compass or circle 
 of twelve miles about the said town, situate, lying and 
 being upon the River Delaware, and all the Islands in the 
 said River of Delaware, and the said river and soil thereof, 
 lying north of the southermost part of the said circle of 
 twelve miles about the said town; and all that tract of land 
 upon Delaware River and Bay, beginning twelve miles 
 south from the said town of New Castle, otherwise called 
 Delaware, and extending south to Cape Lopen; together 
 with all the lands, islands, soils, rivers, harbors, mines, 
 minerals, quarries, woods, marshes, waters, lakes, fishings, 
 bawkings, hunting, fowlings, and all other royalties, privi- 
 leges, profits, commodities, and hereditaments to the said 
 town, fort, tracts of lands, islands, and premises, or to any 
 or either of them belonging or appertaining, with their and 
 every of their appurtenances, situate, lying, and being in 
 America, and all our estate, right, title and interest, benefit* 
 advantage, claim, and demand whatsoever, of, in, or to the 
 said town, fort, lands, or premises, or any part or parcel 
 thereof, and the reversion and reversions, remainder and 
 remainders thereof, together with the yearly and other 
 rents, revenues, and profits of the premises, and of every 
 part and parcel thereof; to have and to hold the said town 
 of New Castle, otherwise called Delaware, and Fort, and
 
 78 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 all and singular the said lands and premises, with their and 
 every of their appurtenances hereby given and granted, or 
 herein before mentioned to be given or granted, unto our 
 said dearest Brother, James, Duke of York, his heirs and 
 assigns forever." A nominal rent of four beaver-skins per 
 annum, when demanded, being reserved therein to his 
 Majesty, his heirs and successors. It also granted to him 
 his heirs and assigns, the general powers of internal gov- 
 ernment over it, and of making laws and enforcing the same 
 within its limits. 
 
 Prior to the date of it, however, the Duke of York had 
 made and delivered to William Penn, on the 21st day of 
 August, 1680, an indenture of lease for the term of ten 
 thousand years for the town of New Castle, and the lands 
 and the river about the same within the twelve mile circle 
 surrounding it, and had afterwards, on the 24th day of 
 August, 1682, sold and conveyed by his deed of feoffment 
 all that the town of New Castle, otherwise called Delaware, 
 and all that tract of land lying within the compass or circle 
 of twelve miles about the same, situate, lying, and being 
 upon the river Delaware in America; and all islands in 
 the said river Delaware, and the said river and soil thereof, 
 lying north of the southermost part of the said circle of 
 twelve miles about the said town, and all the estate, right, 
 title, and interest of his royal highness therein and thereto 
 belonging; and also, on the same day, another deed of feoff- 
 ment to him for all the land lying below the said circle on 
 the river and bay, and extending from it to Cape Henlopen; 
 and under both of which deeds of feoffment in fee to Mr. 
 Penn livery of seisin was duly and formally made, and he
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 79 
 
 was thereupon put in full and complete possession of all 
 the lands and all the river and soil thereof, and all the 
 premises so sold and conveyed. A moiety of all the rents 
 and profits thereof being reserved to the duke. 
 
 I should here say that the name of Pennsylvania bestowed 
 on his province was not only suggested, but was insisted 
 upon by the king, in an interview with Mr. Penn on the 
 subject, in honor of his father, Admiral Penn, his own 
 preference being that of New Wales, — Wales being the 
 land of his nativity, and bearing some resemblance, as he 
 thought, to his new province. And every Pennsylvanian, 
 I think, ought to be satisfied that in that matter the king 
 evinced better taste than Mr. Penn. 
 
 His arrival on the Delaware after the date of his deeds 
 of feoffment was at New Castle, on the 27th day of October, 
 168!2, where he was received by the inhabitants with a 
 cordial welcome: and within three weeks afterwards he had 
 writs issued for an election of representatives to a general 
 assembly to be held at Chester, to which he had in the 
 mean while changed its former name of Upland. We even 
 then had three organized counties, named respectively New 
 Castle, Jones, and New Dale, while Pennsylvania, by the 
 operation of the twelve miles circle, had but one and no 
 more, and the germ of that she had obtained from the lib- 
 erality and generosity of the Duke of York, and from 
 our own incipient little State. Pursuant to the call and 
 Writs issued elections were held, and the General Assembly, 
 composed of members from the Province of Pennsylvania 
 and the three lower counties (or "territories of the prov- 
 ince," as they were soon after designated in contra-distinc-
 
 80 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 tion to the province proper), convened at Chester on the 
 fourth day of December following, and on the petition from 
 the inhabitants of these counties asking for an act of union 
 by the governor, and for their incorporation with the prov- 
 ince in order to obtain the enjoyment of all the rights and 
 privileges of it, such an act was passed at its first session, 
 which was only for a few days. By the terms of it they 
 were annexed to the Province of Pennsylvania as of the 
 proper territory thereof; and it further provided that the 
 people therein should be governed by the same laws, and 
 enjoy the same privileges in all respects, as the inhabitants 
 of Pennsylvania then enjoyed, or should thereafter enjoy. 
 So that our little State first began its history by a close and 
 cherished union with the great State of New York, and 
 after that by another spontaneously sought with the great 
 State of Pennsylvania; and being devoted to union of that 
 kind from the start, it was quite natural that it should have 
 stepped as promptly and spontaneously into the great union 
 of the States as soon as the constitution of it was formed 
 and presented for adoption. She has always been devoted 
 to such union, and never tried secession but once, and then 
 she made a complete and grand success of it, as we can all 
 proudly and gratefully attest to this day. 
 
 Early in the ensuing month of January, 1683, the General 
 Assembly again met, this time in Philadelphia, the Provin- 
 cial Council having also assembled there a few days before. 
 There were then six counties organized and represented in 
 both bodies, three in the province and the same number in 
 the territories, and to show the liberality and enlarged views 
 of William Penn on the subject of legislative representation.
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 81 
 
 I will here simply state that by his original charter of gov- 
 ernment conferred upon the inhabitants of his province, and 
 the act of settlement passed at the preceding session, each 
 of these counties was represented by nine delegates in the 
 General Assembly, and by three members in the Provincial 
 Council, elected by what were then denominated the free- 
 men of the county; but with the sanction of the governor 
 and at the request of the Assembly, the former number was 
 reduced to six for each county at that session. 
 
 Before I proceed any further, I should here remark that 
 Cecilius, Lord Baltimore, died and was succeeded by his 
 son and heir-at-law, Charles, Lord Baltimore, in 1676. 
 
 Meanwhile, between the sessions of the General Assembly 
 before mentioned, Governor Penn, who had previously de- 
 spatched a messenger to Lord Baltimore to arrange a meet- 
 ing between them in relation to the boundaries of their 
 provinces, joined him at West River on the 19th of De- 
 cember, 1683, where he found his lordship attended by a 
 numerous suite, and who by his attention and civilities and 
 the state with which he was surrounded, probably sought 
 as much to impress the plain and simple proprietary of the 
 adjoining province with his exalted character and power, 
 as to flatter and please him with these demonstrations of 
 respect for the like office and position which he held and 
 enjoyed on the other side of the unsettled and disputed 
 boundary which divided them. In their conference the 
 next day Mr. Penn presented to him a letter from King 
 Charles the Second, to the effect that Lord Baltimore had 
 but two degrees according to his patent, and that, beginning 
 at Watkin's Point, he should admeasure the degrees at sixty
 
 8*^ ADDRESS Oi\ THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 miles to the degree, that being well and universally under- 
 stood to be the extent of a degree of terrestrial latitude at 
 that point when his letters patent were issued. To which 
 he replied that the king was greatly mistaken, and that he 
 would not abandon his patent to follow the king's letter, 
 nor could a letter void his patent; and by that he would 
 stand; and which was about the substance of all he had to 
 say on the subject to the end of the conference. To which 
 Mr. Penn rejoined that he thought the mistake was on his 
 part, for though his patent began at Watkin's Point and 
 went to the fortieth degree, yet that was assumed to be 
 under the thirty-eighth degree, and if he had to start be- 
 low that degree, then Virginia would be wronged. At this 
 point of the colloquy, the uncle and chancellor of his lord- 
 ship, who was present during the conference, remarked that 
 his father's grant was not by degrees, as at first contem- 
 plated by him when he applied for it, for he had more of 
 Virgnia given him, but being planted, and the grant intend- 
 ing only land not planted, or possessed by any other than 
 savage nations, he left it out so that it might not forfeit the 
 rest. Upon which it instantly occured to the mind of Mr. 
 Penn that by that answer he could pretend nothing to Dela- 
 ware which had been discovered, bought, and planted by 
 the Dutch before that time, and so it could not have been 
 intended to be included in it; but I must here observe that 
 that was true only as to the purchase from Cape Henlopen 
 to the mouth of the river and the settlement of De Vries's 
 colony on the Hoorn Kill, so far as our side of the bay 
 and river, was concerned. And Mr. Penn also considered 
 that even if his lordship's patent had in good faith and
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 83 
 
 according to the intention of it included any part of 
 Delaware Bay and River, his lordship had forfeited his right 
 to it by the long interval of time which had elapsed without 
 any possession of it on his part, or reducing it to the sov- 
 ereignty of England under which he claimed it, until the 
 king at last had to do that, and therefore it was his to do 
 as he pleased with it. Finding, however, that his lordship's 
 mind was fixed on that point, he next proposed to him 
 that though it was two degrees and a half from Watkin's 
 Point to the fortieth degree of north latitude, at sixty miles 
 to the degree, instead of seventy, yet if he would consent 
 that the measurement should be computed at sixty miles 
 to the degree, he would agree to commence at the fortieth 
 degree, fall where it might. But his lordship dissented, 
 and the conference was concluded without any compromise 
 or adjustment of the matter. 
 
 In the month of May following he received a formal 
 message from Lord Baltimore to meet him at the head of 
 Chesapeake Bay, but his engagements preventing it, he met 
 him a few days later ten miles west of New Castle, and 
 thence invited and accompanied him to that place, where he 
 entertained him as handsomely as the facilities of the town 
 would afford; and finding that he was desirous of speaking 
 privately with him only, he proposed that whatever com- 
 munications were to pass between them should be in writing 
 in the presence of their respective councils at their several 
 lodgings, the better to avoid misapprehension or failure of 
 memory in the progress of their negotiations on the sub- 
 ject. But. his lordship deferred it, and excused himself on 
 the plea that he was not well and would return to Maryland
 
 84 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 as soon as he could, and reserve any further consideration 
 of it for another season. Penn had learned, however, prior 
 to that time, that he had issued a proclamation in\ iting set- 
 tlers, under his authority and promise of protection as the 
 proprietary of the Province of Maryland, into our counties 
 at lower prices for land than he was offering them, and that 
 the proclamation was attracting some attention in those 
 counties. The next communication which he received 
 from his lordship was a formal demand, by a special agent 
 duly authorized to present it, of all the country south of the 
 fortieth degree of north latitude., both in the Provilice of 
 Pennsylvania and the three lower counties annexed to it, 
 and the same being promptly refused, a party from Mary- 
 land, under the command of Colonel George Talbot, in the 
 spring of 1684, made forcible entry on several plantations 
 in the territory, and who even proceeded so far in this hos- 
 tile invasion as to seize a piece of ground five miles west of 
 New Castle, belonging to a gentleman by the name of Ogle, 
 who had come over with Sir Robert Carr, and had partici- 
 pated in the capture of Fort Cassimer and the English con- 
 quest of the three lower counties, and erected a log fort 
 upon it, raised a breastwork and built a palisade about it, 
 and placed a force of armed men in it, and which he held 
 for some time against the formal demands of the civil 
 authorities at New Castle, in the name and under the com- 
 mission of Lord Baltimore. In the mean while, the gover- 
 nor and council at Pliiladelphia instituted legal measures to 
 reinstate the parties dispossessed, and to have the invaders 
 prosecuted according to law, and a full account of which 
 was forthwith addressed by letter from Governor Penn to
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE 85 
 
 His Royal Highness, the Duke of York. His lordship 
 must have felt himself by this time impelled by a stringent 
 necessity to fortif j^ his claim and title by some show of 
 actual possession, or he would hardly have ventured at that 
 late day, and after all that had happened, on such a rash and 
 desperate expedient. But not long after this event Lord 
 Baltimore returned to England, and Governor Penn, appre- 
 hending his purpose, and aware that the controversy con- 
 cerning their boundaries would shortly be brought again, 
 before the Lords of the Committee for Trade and Planta- 
 tions, soon followed him. In four months after his arrival 
 in England Charles the Second died, and his brother James, 
 Duke of York, peaceably succeeded him under the title 
 of King James the Second of England, and after the delay 
 w^hich followed this event and two hearings before the Lords 
 of the Committee, at which Lord Baltimore and Governor 
 Penn were both present in person, and after full argument 
 of the question before them, on the 13th day of November, 
 1685, they directed the following order of council to be 
 entered: That the said lands intended to be granted by 
 the Lord Baltimore's patent were only such lands as were 
 cultivated or inhabited by savages, and that the part then 
 in dispute was inhabited and planted by Christians at and 
 before the date of the Lord Baltimore's patent, as it had 
 been ever since that time, and continued as a distinct colony 
 from that of Maryland, and so they were of opinion that 
 for avoiding further difference, the tract of land lying be- 
 tween the River and Bay of Delaware and the Eastern Sea 
 on the one side, and Chesapeake Bay on the other, be 
 divided into two equal parts by a line from the latitude of
 
 86 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 Cape Henlopen to the fortieth degree of north latitude (the 
 south boundary of Pennsylvania by charter), and that the 
 eastern half thereof be adjudged to His Majesty (viz., King 
 James, who, when Duke of York, granted to Mr. William 
 Penn), and the other half remain to the Lord Baltimore, as 
 comprised in his charter. And this was not only afterwards 
 recommended, but it was ordered by the king to be done 
 in 1709. 
 
 I have now traced with too much prolixity, I am aware, 
 the facts of the case and the history of this question from 
 the first European or Christian settlement in this State down 
 to the year 1685, but I do not propose to pursue it in detail 
 any further, although sixty-five lingering years still remain, 
 through which it slumbered for the most part in a state 
 of comparative silence and suspension before we reach the 
 ultimate conclusion and settlement of it. There is, how- 
 ever, one important and independent event in the history 
 of our State which I will here notice before I proceed any 
 further with the narrative of the question. The proprietary 
 and governor, William Penn, had been long absent from the 
 province and unavoidably detained in England by the state 
 of his affairs and a succession of misfortunes and calamities 
 there, from most of which the purity of his life and charac- 
 ter should have been alone sufficient to have exempted him, 
 and owing to that circumstance probably, as much as any 
 other, jealousy and dissension had sprung up between the 
 province and the territories, in the legislative as well as in 
 other branches of the provincial government, in which the 
 counties of the two portions of the whole territory being 
 equal in number, and also in representation, there was, of
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 87 
 
 course, from the beginning a very delicate and sensitive 
 equipoise of power between them in that branch of it. And 
 besides, from the very start the province had not only been 
 increasing in population and wealth more rapidly than the 
 three lower counties, but more so than any other English 
 colony or province in America. And yet, strange to say, 
 notwithstanding this fact, the first manifestation of invidious 
 feeling, or spirit of sectional jealousy exhibited by the one 
 towards the other in the General Assembly, was on the part 
 of the province towards the territories. Governor Penn had 
 sadly disappointed the hopes and expectations of New Cas- 
 tle, and of many in the three lower counties also, when he 
 passed by such a magnificent site as that of New Castle, and 
 went so far above it, into the woods and among the Indians, 
 to found a great city and a great capital for his fine province; 
 but for that very reason, in part at least, he had conceived 
 form the first a kinder regard for the place, and a stronger 
 desire to promote its welfare and prosperity as far as it was 
 in his power. 
 
 Actuated by this, as well as by other considerations, he 
 had occasionally called and convened the General Assembly 
 at New Castle before his departure for P^ngland, and having 
 returned after an absence of nearly fifteen years, during 
 which period much dissatisfaction with certain i)roceedings 
 of the council of the government having arisen in the three 
 lower counties, in December, 1699, he issued his next call 
 for the General Assembly to meet in New Castle in the fall 
 of 1700, with a view, it is said, to conciliate and reconcile 
 this dissatisfaction. It was not his custom to address them 
 by written messages, but when they assembled he went be-
 
 88 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 fore them in person, and generally in a brief speech recom- 
 mended such measures as he deemed advisable, and the 
 one he made at the commencement of the session I am now 
 speaking of is comprised in seven printed lines. It recom- 
 mended an amendment of the frame of government, a re- 
 vision and completion of the body of laws, and particularly 
 for the settling of property, a supply for the support of 
 government, and closed with these words, "I recommend 
 to you amity and concord among yourselves." The mem- 
 bers were all very happy to meet him, and the session was 
 harmonious, and closed apparently to the satisfaction of all 
 its members, both from the province and from the territories. 
 There was among other statutes a general revenue act passed 
 at that session, applicable alike to the province and the 
 territories. 
 
 The next session I shall refer to was called by him to 
 meet in Philadelphia on the 15th day of September, 1701. 
 In the mean while there had been another general election 
 of its members, with an increase in their number from the 
 province, and which, of course, for the first time transferred 
 the preponderance of power in the body to that section. But 
 to the surprise of members from the three lower counties, 
 not long after it had assembled an act was introduced by two 
 members of the council elected from the province to confirm 
 the revenue act before mentioned and all the acts passed at 
 the preceding session of the Assembly held at New Castle 
 in 1700, on the ground that such a confirmation at a session 
 held in the province was necessary to give them any force 
 or effect in the province, or in other words, that it was 
 not competent for the body when sitting in the territories.
 
 BOUNDARIEf^ OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE 89 
 
 though composed of all its members, and so sitting under 
 the call of the proprietary and governor, to pass any law to 
 bind the province or the inhabitants of it. Such an arro- 
 gant assumption and pretension, and such a foregone con- 
 clusion to subordinate and degrade the territories to a 
 condition so inferior to that of the province, and so mani- 
 festly contrary to the basis of equality on which the union 
 of the two sections had been formed in that respect, sug- 
 gested as it was for the first time immediately on the province 
 attaining a majority in the body, met of -course with all the 
 indignant and vehement resistance from the representa- 
 tives of the territories which it so well deserved. It was, 
 however, insisted on and sustained by the unanimous 
 voice of the members from the province, and when on the 
 10th of October it was put upon its first vote, the entire 
 delegations present from New Castle and Kent counties, 
 numbering nine members, arose from their seats and retired 
 from the chamber. The vote was then immediately taken on 
 the bill, and it was passed by the remaining members, con- 
 sisting of twelve from the province and two from Sussex, 
 no others from that county attending at the session. But 
 wherefore the two who remained did not retire also history 
 saith not. The retiring members however reappeared in 
 their seats five days afterwards, and on being interrogated, 
 answered that they were willing to join with the other 
 members, provided they might have liberty to enter their 
 dissent to the bill for the confirmation of the laws, "and 
 nothing might be carried over their heads by over-voting 
 them;" and declared that they were willing to anything 
 for the good and tranquility of the government, and then
 
 90 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 withdrew. They were afterwards recalled into the House 
 again, and were told they should have liberty to enter their 
 dissent to the bill referred to, but for the House to promise 
 not to over-vote them, it was a thing so unheard of, and such 
 an infringement of the rules and privileges of assemblies, the 
 House could not yield to that demand. The reading of the 
 till three times over was then proposed, when the dissent- 
 ing members departed from the House again. By confer- 
 ence on the part of the House and the mediation of the 
 governor with the- absenting members, an accommodation 
 was afterwards affected, and they returned to their seats in 
 the House a few days before the close of the session and 
 declared their dissent to the bill which had been finally 
 passed in their absence, and continued to perform their 
 functions and duties as members for the remainder of it. 
 But all foreseeing that this was not the end of the disruption 
 threatened, amendments were incorporated in the charter 
 of privileges originally granted by the proprietary and gov- 
 ernor to the inhabitants of the province and territories on 
 their union as one under his government, providing for and 
 sanctioning in advance on his part their legislative separa- 
 tion and the establishment of a distinct legislative assembly^ 
 both in the province arid in the territories, and which was 
 afterwards completely accomplished by each of them within 
 the time and in the mode provided for. And after the close 
 of the session of 1701, the members of the Assembly for the 
 province, and the members of the Assembly for the territo- 
 ries, or the three lower counties on Delaware, a$ they were 
 now generally called, never met again in joint session, or as 
 one body; and for all the purposes and powers of govern-
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 91 
 
 ment, legislative, judicial, and ministerial, they became en- 
 tirely separate, distinct, and independent of each other, the 
 only remaining governmental link or ligament connecting 
 them together being one and the same proprietary and gov- 
 ernor over both of them from that time until the declaration 
 of American independence. 
 
 I now descend through the silence of the intervening 
 period before alluded to in reference to the particular 
 matter under consideration, to the year 1732. Both Wil- 
 liam Penn and Cecilius, Lord Baltimore, had been gathered 
 to their fathers years before this time, leaving this unsettled 
 question as an unfortunate legacy and yoke of discord to 
 vex and perplex their descendants and heirs-at-law, when a 
 change at length seemed, for a time at least, to come over 
 the spirit of the succeeding Lord Baltimore, the third from 
 Cecilius, and articles of agreement under seal executed in 
 England on the 10th day of May, in that year, were entered 
 into between the heirs of Governor Penn and his lordship, 
 to settle this dispute on the basis recommended by the 
 Lords of the Committee for Trade and Plantations and 
 commanded by the king, which I have already read to you. 
 The articles of agreement were accompanied with a map or 
 plan of the territory to be divided under them, and which 
 related solely to our peninsula, as high up as the northern 
 and circular boundary of our State, which Lord Baltimore's 
 agents, by his directions, had prepared for the purpose 
 before the agreement was entered into, and which was an- 
 nexed and specially referred to in the agreement for places 
 and points mentioned in it; and upon that plan Fen wick's 
 Island was named and designated as Cape Henlopen, and
 
 92 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 from that island a& the place of beginning, by the terms of 
 the agreement, a line was to be run due west to the Chesa- 
 peake Bay, and from the middle of that line a direct line 
 was to be run in a northerly direction until it struck as a 
 tangent a circle of twelve miles, to be drawn about the town 
 of New Castle, and from the point of contact of that tan- 
 gent and circle a line was to be run in a due north direction 
 to the point where it would be intersected by a line to be 
 run in a due west direction from a point fifteen miles south 
 of Philadelphia, with the qualification or proviso that if the 
 said line to be run in a due north direction should cut off 
 any part of the said circle, such part of the circle should 
 constitute the boundary of division. And the boundaries 
 were to be marked by stone pillars to be set up on it. By 
 the terms of the agreement, also, commissioners were to 
 be appointed by the parties to do this on or before the 25th 
 day of December, 1733, and for want of a quorum of com- 
 missioners to meet at any time for that purpose, the party, 
 by default of whose commissioners the articles could not 
 be carried into execution, should forfeit to the other the 
 penalty of five thousand pounds; and when done the par- 
 ties were to make conveyance to each other for their several 
 and respective portions of the territory to be divided by it 
 between them. 
 
 But for eighteen years more the question still remained 
 unsettled, when at last a bill was filed in the High Court of 
 Chancery in England by the heirs of William Penn against 
 Lord Baltimore, for the specific performance and execution 
 of the articles of agreement, all the parties then being in 
 that country, which was resisted by his lordship, and after
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 98 
 
 it had been duly prepared for trial, and all the evidence had 
 been taken on both sides, was finally heard and decided 
 by Lord Chancellor Hardwick in 1750. It was very thor- 
 oughly and elaborately argued by able counsel on both 
 sides, and as the counsel for the defence endeavored to 
 avoid the obligation of the agreement, they entered into 
 the consideration and discussion of the whole question, 
 from its earliest origin, and as it stood before the agreement 
 had been entered into, and in which they were followed by 
 the counsel on the other side. The jurisdiction of his 
 honor, as the Lord High Chancellor of England, to try 
 such a case of disputed claim to real estate and a princely 
 province in the remote regions of America, was of course 
 questioned and denied, and was among the first grounds 
 of defence earnestly urged by the counsel for his lordship, 
 in reply to which, in announcing his final opinion after the 
 closing of the case, he took occasion to pay our three lower 
 counties the fallowing flattering compliment in a classical 
 allusion, which for dignity and elegance was never sur- 
 passed, I am sure, by anything that ever fell from a Lord 
 Chancellor in England. It is in the opening paragraph of 
 his opinion, and as it strikes the key-note of the whole of 
 it in the very first line, I will repeat it: "I directed this case 
 to stand over for judgment, not so much from any doubt of 
 what was the justice of the case, as by reason of the nature 
 of it, its great consequence and importance, and the great 
 labor and ability of the argument on both sides; it being 
 for the determination of the right and boundaries of two 
 great provincial governments and three counties; of a 
 nature worthy of the judicature of a Roman Senate rather
 
 94 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 than a single judge, and my consolation is, that if I should 
 err in my judgment, there is a judicature equal in dignity 
 to a Roman Senate that will correct it." And that judi- 
 cature to which he referred, of course, was the House of 
 Lords in England. But when we reflect that that decision, 
 which practically settled this question forever, and saved 
 our territory from the persistent and pertinacious effort of 
 Lord Baltimore and his ancestors to absorb it in his Prov- 
 ince of Maryland, had the direct effect, in the due course of 
 the historical and political events which soon followed it, to 
 make those three counties, in sixteen years from that time, 
 a sovereign and independent State in the first confederation 
 of the United States of America, the justice as well as the 
 dignity of it becomes still more appropriate and striking. 
 The obligation of the agreement had been denied in the 
 answer and in the argument on the ground of mistake and 
 surprise on the part of Lord Baltimore, who did not know, 
 as it was contended, at the time of entering into it, the 
 superiority of his own claim over that of the complain- 
 ants to the three lower counties; and as to the alleged 
 misrepresentation in the petition of the first Lord Balti- 
 more for the grant of the province, they further contended 
 that there had been no such Dutch or Christian settlement 
 proved to have been established at the Hoorn Kill or else- 
 where within their limits prior to and at the time of the 
 issuing of his letters patent aS could invalidate his grant on 
 that ground; and even spoke of De Vries's colony as con- 
 sisting of mere stragglers there, without the knowledge, 
 recognition, or sanction of the king. But, on the evidence 
 in the case, the Lord Chancellor overruled both objec-
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 95 
 
 tions, and on the latter remarked that if they had been 
 but stragglers settled there, yet if they had set up marks 
 of possession on the soil, though not expressly recognized 
 by the Crown as a settlement, it would have been sufficient 
 to constitute the misrepresentation a deceit on the Crown. 
 And although he sustained the agreement and decided the 
 case upon it, still, as the bill and answer and the argument 
 of counsel had placed the history of the whole case before 
 him from its inception, he took occasion to review and 
 consider it in the opinion delivered by him, in which he 
 held that the relief prayed for in the bill was the ordinary 
 equity dispensed in that court, the specific performance of 
 an agreement for the settling and fixing of boundaries in 
 peace, to prevent diswder and mischief, which in remote 
 countries distant from the seat of government were most 
 likely to happen and prove most mischievous. That his 
 court had no original jurisdiction on the direct question 
 of the original right of the boundaries, but the bill did not 
 stand in need of that, because it was founded on articles of 
 agreement executed in England under seal for mutual con- 
 siderations, which gave jurisdiction to the King's courts, 
 both of law and equity, whatever might be the subject- 
 matter. The conscience of the party was bound by the 
 agreement, and being within the jurisdiction of that court, 
 which acted in personam, the court might properly decree 
 it as an agreement if there was a foundation for it. 
 
 But the settling of the limits was not a dismembering of 
 a province, and if a license from the Crown were necessary 
 in law or policy to do that, it sufiiciently appeared by orders 
 in council made in 1685 and 1709, that the Crown had not
 
 96 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 only recommended, but ordered this division to be made, so 
 far as respects the three lower counties, as to which there 
 was no dismembering, for the dividing line was there ex- 
 actly the same; indeed, the circle was not within those 
 orders. But as to that no difficulty could arise. The ar- 
 ticles were not like a submission to arbitration. In those 
 cases generally the time is conditional, so as determination 
 be made by a certain day; but here the line and circle are 
 agreed on by distinct, independent covenants, and that they 
 shall form the boundaries of these tracts of land. That 
 therefore, was a particular, certain specific contract of par- 
 ties that those should be the boundaries. There was nothing 
 left to the judgment of the commmissioners, who were merely 
 ministerial agents to run the lines according to the agree- 
 ment, and set the mark. Therefore it was not like an award, 
 but an agreement which this court would see pursued. 
 
 As to any imposition or surprise, the evidence was clearly 
 contrary thereto. It would be unnecessary to enter into the 
 particulars of that evidence; but it appeared that the agree- 
 ment was originally proposed by the defendant himself; he 
 himself produced the plan afterwards annexed to the ar- 
 ticles; he himself reduced the heads of it to writing, and 
 was very well assisted in making it; and further, that there 
 was a great length of time taken for consideration and re- 
 ducing it to form. Then was he to presume that he was 
 imposed on in a plan, too, sent to him by his own agents; 
 as to the plan itself, it was in his own power. A plain mis- 
 take, without imposition or fraud, would be a ground for not 
 decreeing a specific performance. But the evidence shows 
 that the defendant and his ancestors were conversant with
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 97 
 
 this dispute about fifty years before the agreement was 
 entered into; therefore no ignorance, want of information, 
 or mistakes were to be presumed. And in cases of that 
 kind after an agreement, and plain mistake contary to the 
 intent of parties not shown, it was not necessary for the 
 court to resort to the original right of the parties; it was 
 sufficient if it were doubtful merely. 
 
 To consider the points in dispute, and first upon the de- 
 fendant's charter, on which it was insisted that the whole of 
 the fortieth degree of north latitude was included, and if so, 
 it was not to be limited by any recital in the preamble. There 
 was great ground for saying that the computation of lati- 
 tude at the time of the grant varied much from what they 
 were then, and that they were at that time set much lower 
 than at present. But whatever that was, did it take the 
 whole of it in by description? It came to the question 
 whether the usque ad was inclusive or exclusive; therefore, 
 however described, the same question remained. 
 
 But there was another argument advanced by the plaintiffs 
 to restrain the defendant's charter from taking in the whole 
 fortieth degree, viz., the recital of it, because they say the 
 information given to the Crown by Lord Baltimore was that 
 this part was land uncultivated and possessed by barbarians; 
 whereas it was not so, but was possessed by Dutch and 
 Swedes, and therefore the king was deceived in his grant. 
 There was considerable evidence that Dutch and Swedes 
 were settled on the east part of that country. But that was 
 said to be no deceit on the Crown; for, though some strag- 
 glers were settled there, yet if not recognized by the Crown, 
 that was not a settlement. He was of a different opinion.
 
 98 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 For in those countries it had been always taken that the 
 European country which has first set up marks has gained 
 the right, though not formed into a regular colony. And 
 that was very reasonable on the argument on which they 
 proceeded. Then would not that affect the grant? If the 
 fact were so, that would be as great a deceit on the Crown 
 in notion of law as any other matter arising from the infor. 
 mation of the party; because such grants tend to involve 
 this Crown in wars and disputes with other nations; nor 
 could there be a greater deceit than a misrepresentation 
 tending to such a consequence, which would be a ground to 
 repeal the letters patent by scire facias. 
 
 Next consider the dispute on Penn's charter, which grants 
 to him all that tract of land in America from twelve miles 
 distance from New Castle to the forty-third degree of north 
 latitude, under which the plaintiffs do not pretend a title to 
 the three lower counties, which relates to the two feoffments 
 in 1682. Upon that title it is clear by the proof that the 
 true situation of Cape Henlopen is as it is marked in the 
 plan annexed to the articles of agreement, and not where 
 Cape Cornelius is, as the defendant insists, which would 
 leave out a great part of what was intended to be included 
 in the grant; and there was strong evidence of seizin and 
 possession by Penn of that spot of Cape Henlopen, and of 
 all acts of ownership in regard to it. But the result of the 
 evidence, taking it in the most favorable light for the de- 
 fendant, amounts to making the boundaries and rights of 
 these parties doubtful, and being so, it was the most proper 
 case for an agreement, which being entered into, the parties 
 could not resort back to the original rights between them,
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 99 
 
 for, if so, no agreement could stand; whereas an agreement 
 entered into without surprise ought to be encouraged by a 
 court of justice. 
 
 In relation to the coterminous boundary of this State and 
 New Jersey, I would remark that, inasmuch as the original 
 grant from the king to the Duke of York was of all the 
 territory from the river St. Croix to the east side of the 
 Delaware Bay, and his later grant to him subsequent to 
 the Delaware conquest, of the town of New Castle, and all 
 the lands embraced within the compass or circle of twelve 
 miles surrounding it, together with all the islands in the 
 river Delaware and the said river and soil thereof lying 
 north of the southernmost part of the said circle of twelve 
 miles about the said town, it has always been considered 
 and held in this State that, when we come to inquire for and 
 ascertain the boundary between the two grants where they 
 abut on each other, they must, of course, be read and con- 
 strued together with strict reference to the manifest import 
 of the terms employed in each to designate their respective 
 limits, and the extent of territory, land, and soil intended 
 to be granted and conveyed in each of them respectively; and 
 as the former is to extend to the east side of the Delaware 
 Bay, which was then and has ever since been understood to 
 include the Delaware River also (otherwise the grant would 
 not have extended to the river, but to the bay only), and 
 the latter conveys not only the town of New Castle and 
 all that tract of land lying within the compass or circle of 
 twelve miles from the said town, situate, lying, and being 
 upon the river Delaware, but also all the islands in the 
 said river Delaware, and the said river and soil thereof
 
 100 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 lying north . of the southernmost part of the said circle of 
 twelve miles about the said town, it extends to the east side 
 of the river likewise within the circumference of the said 
 circle; for it was as clearly the intention of the king to 
 convey to the duke in the second grant, with the town of 
 New Castle and the lands about it as limited and described, 
 that part of the river itself, and the soil thereof, or the bed 
 thereof, to the east side of it lying within the circle, as it 
 was his intention to convey to him in the first grant all the 
 land on the other side of it to the east side of the Delaware 
 Bay. And such is the construction we have always given 
 to the two grants, and the courts of our State have from 
 the earliest period claimed and exercised jurisdiction over 
 that part of the river to low-water mark on the east side of 
 it, as a rightful portion of the domain of our State, and as 
 much so as any other part of it claimed under that or any 
 other grant. And the construction w^hich we have thus 
 give to it is in accordance with the construction which has 
 been uniformly given to similar grants in analogous cases in 
 the highest courts of the United States. But without that 
 express grant of the river itself, and the subaqueous soil, or 
 bottom of it within the compass or circle designated, the 
 second grant would have been controlled by the general 
 principle of legal construction applicable in such cases, and 
 would have extended adfUum aqua, or to the channel, or 
 the middle of the river only. 
 
 But we derived our title to it immediately, not from the 
 second grant of which I have been speaking, but from the 
 deed of feoffment in the same terms from the Duke of York 
 to William Penn for the same possessions, the essential
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 101 
 
 portion of which I have before read to you, and which I 
 then stated to you was executed and deHvered to him before 
 the grant for the same had been made to the duke by the 
 king, although he had been placed in full possession and 
 command of them as absolute owner, proprietary, and royal 
 governor of them by the king eight years prior to the sale 
 and conveyance of them by him to William Penn, and had 
 so been in the possession of them for eight years when he 
 made that sale and conveyance to Penn. And as this was, 
 among others, made a matter of particidar objection before 
 Lord Chancellor Hardwick in the case before mentioned, and 
 from which I have already read so largely, by the counsel 
 for Lord Baltimore to the ability of the heirs of William 
 Penn to make a good and sufficient legal title to him for 
 any portion of the territories in dispute between them, in case 
 his lordship should decree a specific execution of the article 
 of agreement, you will excuse me for now reading what the 
 Lord Chancellor said in regard to that matter. 
 
 "As to the plaintiff's estate and possession, this must 
 concern only the three lower counties which plainly passed 
 by the feoffment. I will lay aside the question of estoppel, 
 which is a nice consideration, for the Duke of York being 
 then in the nature of a common person, was in a condition 
 to be estopped by a proper instrument. In 1683 the Duke 
 of York takes a new grant from the Crown, and having 
 granted before, was bound to make further assurance; for 
 the improvements made by Penn were a foundation to sup- 
 port a bill in equity for further assurance. The Duke of 
 York, therefore, while a subject, was to be considered as a 
 trustee. Why not afterwards as a royal trustee.^ I will not
 
 lOi ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 decree that in this court, nor is it necessary; but it is a 
 notion estabhshed in courts of revenue by modern decis- 
 ions that the king may be a royal trustee; and if the per- 
 son from whom the king takes by descent was a trustee, 
 there may be grounds in equity to support that; and if 
 King James the Second, after coming to the crown, was a 
 royal trustee, his successors take the legal estate under the 
 same equity; and it is sufficient for the plaintiffs if they 
 have an equitable estate. Then consider this in point of 
 possession of the Penns, the proof of which is very clear. 
 They have been permitted to appoint governors of these 
 lower counties, which have been approved by the Crown, 
 according to the statute of King William. Indeed, all the 
 acts of possession are with a salvo jure to the Crown. But 
 the evidence for the defendants amounts to this. Not a real 
 possession or enjoyment, but of attempts to take possession, 
 sometimes by force, sometimes by inciting people to come 
 there; otherwise why should Lord Baltimore grant here 
 for half what he granted in other places? Which shows 
 plainly that it was an invitation to get settlers there under 
 their title. But what ends this point of want of title to 
 convey is, that no part of the lower counties is left to be 
 conveyed by the plaintiffs to the defendant; so that nothing 
 being to pass by plaintiffs, it is not material whether they 
 have title to convey or not. But now, in cases of this kind, 
 of two great territories held of the Crown, I will say, once 
 for all, that long possession and enjoyment, peopling and 
 cultivating countries, is one of the best evidences of title 
 to lands or districts of land in America that can be; and so 
 have I thought in all cases since I have served the Crown;
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE lOS 
 
 for the great beneficial advantages arising to the Crown from 
 settling such regions is that the navigation and commerce of 
 the country is thereby improved. Those persons, therefore, 
 who make these settlements ought to be protected in the 
 possession as far as law and equity can; and both these pro- 
 prietors appear to have great merit with regard to the Crown 
 and the public, for these two provinces have been improved 
 in private families to a great degree, to the advantage of their 
 mother-country; this regards the three lower counties, the 
 strength of which is vastly on the side of the plaintiffs." 
 
 Another very kind and complimentary allusion to the 
 worth of our infant little State, of which we may well feel 
 proud, for it certainly ought to be eminently gratifying to 
 us, even at this day,to know that so good and a great a man, 
 and such a profound and able jurist and statesman as Lord 
 Chancellor Hardwick entertained such a kind and favorable 
 opinion of us at that early period. I apprehend, however, 
 that his distinguished lordship could have had but little, if 
 any, presentiment in his noble mind that the same radiant 
 little gem which he was just then contemplating with such 
 a high and favorable estimate of its value was so soon to be 
 wrenched by an unlineal hand, with all its other and still 
 more resplendent American jewels, from that same magnifi- 
 cent crown which he was then serving with so much ability, 
 admiration, and devotion in that exalted station. 
 
 But to return from this digression, I will simply add on 
 the point from which I was diverted, that all the equities 
 involved in the question presented are clearly in our favor; 
 and perhaps, before an equity tribunal, among them there 
 is none more deserving of attention than that alluded to
 
 104 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 by his lordship in analogy to a plea of estoppel in law. 
 Both States, New Jersey and Delaware, derive their legal 
 title from the same noble grantor, he derived his to both 
 estates immediately from the Crown, to which he himself 
 succeeded so soon after selling to Penn, and after obtaining 
 his legal title for the same from the Crown, and the death 
 of Charles the Second occurring so soon and suddenly and 
 unexpectedly after that, there was scarcely a reasonable time 
 left under all the circumstances for obtaining a conveyance 
 of further assurance from the Duke of York before he 
 became king; and after that there was no method of com- 
 pelling it, if he either neglected or declined to make it. 
 But since that decision it has been ruled and established 
 under the sanction of such names at Lord Mansfield's and 
 Lord Kenyon's, that even in the courts of law of that 
 kingdom such a trust would be presumed to have been 
 surrendered by the holder of the legal title for the security 
 of the equitable owner of the estate after such a long pos- 
 session of it by him. 
 
 The decree in the case of Penn vs. Lord Baltimore was 
 for a specific performance and execution of the articles of 
 agreement, which finally settled (practically, however, only, 
 it seems) the long vexed and perplexing question in rela- 
 tion especially to what now constitute the coterminous 
 boundaries of this State and the State of Maryland, and 
 under it the same were run, marked with stone pillars one 
 mile apart, and established in conformity with the terms of 
 the agreement. 
 
 But to complete the present narrative of the subject, I 
 think it but just and proper out of the respect which I
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 105 
 
 entertain for that State, and the favorable opinion and regard 
 which its citizens have always cherished for the character and 
 memory of their provincial proprietaries, and in extenuation 
 of what would seem to have been the perverse and obstinate 
 spirit so long maintained and manifested on the part of the 
 chief of them against any amicable settlement of the contro- 
 versy, to quote again from the opinion of Lord Chancellor 
 Hardwick, what he finally said in the conclusion of it in re- 
 lation to the last of them, and as a matter throwing some 
 further light on this interesting portion of its history. It was 
 more particularly with reference to his refusal to execute the 
 articles of agreement and resisting the suit that he remarked 
 when considering the question of costs in the case, — ■ 
 
 "But in America the defendant's commissioners behaved 
 with great chicane in the points they insisted on (when 
 they had met for the purpose of performing the duties de- 
 volved upon them by the articles prior to the institution of 
 the suit), as the want of a centre for the circle about New 
 Castle, and the extent of that circle, viz., whether a diameter 
 of two or of twelve miles, the endeavoring to take advan- 
 tage of one of the plaintiff's commissioners coming too late 
 to make the plaintiffs incur the penalty. The defendant has 
 been misled by his commissioners and agents in America 
 to make their objections his defence, which brings it nearer 
 to himself; and although he would not at all have thought 
 of it as from himself (so that I impute nothing in the least 
 dishonorable to him), yet I must take it as his own act; 
 and then should not do complete justice if I did not give 
 plaintiffs the costs of this suit to this time, to l)e taxed, 
 reserving subsequent costs."
 
 106 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE 
 
 The execution of the decree by the commissioners and 
 the -surveyors, Messrs. Mason and Dixon, in running, mark- 
 ing, and estabhshing the boundary, was not completed until 
 the year 1768, nor was it confirmed by the king and by 
 orders in council until the month of January in the follow- 
 ing year, and it was not until the 8th day of April, 1775, 
 that the Governor and Commander-in-Chief of the Three 
 Lower Counties and Province of Pennsylvania published 
 his proclamation requiring all oflScers and other persons 
 residing on our side of it, as thus established and confirmed, 
 to yield obedience to the laws of the said counties and gov- 
 ern themselves according thereto, and which was followed 
 by the act of the Legislature reciting the foregoing proceed- 
 ings, and extending the divisional lines of the counties 
 through the newly-acquired strip of territory from their 
 former western termini to the boundary so established, and 
 to all persons inhabiting it as the lately disputed lands of 
 this government all the immunities, rights, liberties, and 
 privileges which they could or might be entitled to as if 
 they had always been acknowledged actually to have re- 
 sided within the same, and which was not passed until the 
 2d day of September, 1775, and which was the last statute 
 but two enacted under the proprietary government by the 
 Honorable John Penn, Esq., with his Majesty's royal appro- 
 bation Governor and Commander-in-Chief of the Counties 
 of New Castle, Kent, and Sussex upon Delaware, and Prov- 
 ince of Pennsylvania, by and with the advice and consent of 
 the representatives of the freemen of the said counties in 
 General Assembly met, and by authority of the same. 
 
 And now these massive stones and monumental marks just
 
 BOUNDARIES OF THE STATE OF DELAWARE. 107 
 
 planted upon the boundary and duly confirmed and ratified 
 with all the forms and ceremonies of the law, are already 
 beginning to shake and tremble with the earthquake throes 
 of a great upheaval, for we are now on the very verge of 
 the American Revolution. On the 4th of July following 
 the Declaration of Independence was adopted in the Con- 
 gress of the United States, and in glad response to it and 
 under the majesty of its sanction, by the 20th of September 
 following the freemen of the three lower counties upon 
 Delaw^are had, by their delegates duly chosen and in con- 
 vention assembled, framed and adopted a constitution of 
 government as a free, independent, and sovereign state of 
 the world, under the name and style of The Delaware State. 
 But for that we were indebted in a peculiar manner and 
 degree to that Congress of the United States and to the 
 Declaration of Independence, and as no other of the thir- 
 teen States that came out of it was; for we entered it as the 
 territories or three lower counties of the Province of Penn- 
 sylvania upon Delaware, by virtue of the executive and 
 proprietary ligament which then connected us to it; but 
 that was severed by the word of the Declaration, on the 
 faith of the sword that was instantly drawn to complete and 
 consummate it, because all the powers of government which 
 William Penn or his heirs or lieutenants had ever possessed, 
 either in the province or its territories, were conferred by 
 and held at the will and pleasure of the King of Great 
 Britain, our king as well as his king up to that moment, 
 and when his Majesty ceased to be our sovereign, he and 
 his heirs and his deputies ceased, of course, to be our gov- 
 ernors. Their subordinate powers, of course, perished with
 
 108 ADDRESS ON THE HISTORY OF THE BOUNDARIES. 
 
 the sovereignty on which they solely depended. And the 
 last link which bound us to the Province of Pennsylvania, 
 was at the same time dissolved with it. But suppose there 
 had been no legislative secession and separation from the 
 province prior to that, we should have still remained the 
 three lower counties of the State, instead of the Province of 
 Pennsylvania upon Delaware; or, on the other hand, sup- 
 pose Lord Chancellor Hardwick had ruled and decided in 
 the case referred to, in favor of, instead of against, the claim 
 and pretension of Lord Baltimore, we should have gone 
 into that Congress and come out of it, and been to this day 
 nothing but three more counties added to the Eastern 
 Shore of the State of Maryland. 
 
 And now after this presentation of the history of the 
 subject, have I erred in the conclusions to which it has con- 
 ducted me, or over-estimated the significance and importance 
 of the three great events which I have regarded as the most 
 fortunate and momentous in their consequences and results 
 that have ever occurred in our history up to the date of the 
 Declaration of Independence; the settlement at the Hoorn 
 Kill prior to the date of Lord Baltimore's patent, the legis- 
 lative separation from the Province of Pennsylvania, and the 
 decree of the High Court of Chancery in England in the 
 celebrated case to which I have referred so much at large.'' 
 They made us a constituent and co-ordinate member of the 
 great republic of the United States of America, and certainly 
 constitute the three golden links.both in our colonial history 
 and in our colonial destiny.
 
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