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PUBLIC LIPJ^ARY
ASTO«». L-«NOX AND
THE COOK MARKER, MONT ALTO, PA. see page i87
Photo by Prof. B. J. Gutknecht, of the Forestry Academy.
he Kittochtinny
Historical Society
ORGANIZED FEBRUARY 3, 1898
PAPERS READ BEFORE THE SOCIETY FEBRUARY, 1908,
TO FEBRUARY, 1910
With a General Index of ail Papers Published Since the
Organization of the Society
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ARRANGED BY THE SECRETARY •;A^fD:$?^€CUT;•VE COMMITTEE
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PEOPLE'S REGISTER PRINT
Chambersburg, Pa.
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CONTENTS
Page
•Officers of the Society 3
Members *
In Memoriam 5
Benedict Arnold, Patriot and Traitor. By Hon. Chas. H.
Smiley, New Bloomfield. Pa 9
The Seventh Day Baptists of Snow Hill. By Chas. W. Cremer,
Esq., "Waynesboro, Pa 10
Summer Vacation Assembly at "Ragged Edge." Guests of
Mr. M. C. Kennedy 30
James McLene. of The Cumberland Valley, in Pennsylvania,
a Statesman of his Times. By Benjamin Matthias Nead,
of Harrisburg 31
The Episcopal Church in the Cumberland Valley. By Rev.
E. V. Collins 46
Mount Delight. By John M. McDowell, Esq 73
Two Famous Military Roads of Pennsylvania. By Hon.
George E. Mapes, Philadelphia, Pa 93
Old Fort Loudon and its Associations. No. I. By Geo. O.
Seilhamer, Esq 105
Old Fort Loudon and its Associations. No. II. By Geo. O.
Seilhamer, Esq 125
The Conodogwinet Creek. No. 3. (Early Highways.) By
John G. Orr, Esq 140
Unveiling of Dr. Agnew Portrait. Guests of Dr. Irvine, Mer-
cersburg Academy 185
Vacation Assembly at Summer Home of Mr. M. C. Kennedy. . 186
The Dedication of the Capt. John E. Cook Marker. Address
by Benjamin Matthias Nead, Esq., Harrisburg, Pa 187
Regular Meeting of Society f\1 "Eldex-slie." Biographical
Sketch of Josiah Culbertbon. Read by J. S. Mollvaine. . . 199
A Day in the Courts. A. J. White I^uttoh. Esci 206
A Lawyer's Nosegay. By Linn Harbsugh, Esq 216
A Franklin County Cousin of Rcbt^rt Bnnu By C. W.
Cremer, Esq., Waynesboro, Pa
225
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IN MEMORIAM
Captain John H. Walker, December 16, 1900.
Rev. James F. Kennedy, D. D., September 6, 1901.
B. Latrobe Afaurer, Secretary, July 1, 1902.
John M. Cooper, Esq., December 4, 1903.
Capt. W. H. H. Mackey, January 4, 1904.
P. H. Shumaker, Treasurer, February 28, 1904.
Thomas B. Kennedy, Esq., June 19, 1905.
James W. Cree, Secretary, November 12, 1906.
Gen. J. F. Boyd, March 23, 1907.
Rev. J. Agnew Crav^rford, D. D., Sept. 19, 1907.
Prof. M. R. Alexander, Hollidaysburg, Pa.
Captain George W. Skinner, October 7, 1909.
Dr. P. Brough Montgomery, January 7, 1910.
OFFICE RS OF THE S OCIETY
1898—1802.
Hon. John Stewart, President. Executive Committee : Col. James
Rev. S. A. Martin, D. D. R. Gilmore, Chairman ; Wm.
Hon M. A. Foltz, Vice Presidents. Alexander, Esq., Secretary ; MaJ.
B. Latrohe Maurer, Secretary. Chauncey Ives, John G. Orr, Dr.
H. A. Riddle, Treasurer. Johnston McLanahan.
1902—1903.
S. A. Martin, D. D., President. Executive Committee : J. W.
Hon. M. A. Foltz, Sharpe, Esq., Chairman ; D. O.
Col. James R. Gilmore, Vice Gehr, Esq., Secretary ; Hon. W.
Presidents. Rush Gillan, Dr. J. O. Skinner,
B. L. Maurer, Secretary. Hon. A. N. Pomeroy.
H. A. Riddle, Treasurer.
1903—1904.
Hon. M. A. Foltz, President. Executive Committee : Hon. W.
•John G. Orr, Esq., Rush Gillan, Chairman ; Hon. A.
J. W. Sharpe, Esq., Vice Presi- N. Pomeroy, T. J. Brereton, Linn
dents. Harbaugh, Esq., J. S. Mcllvaine.
James W Cree, Secretary.
Fred H. Shumaker, Treasurer.
1904—1905.
John G. Orr, Esq., President. Executive Committee : Hon. A. N.
Joshua W. Sharpe, Esq., Pomeroy, Chairman ; T. J. Brere-
Hon. W. Rush Gillan, Vice ton, J. S. Mcllvaine, Dr. R. W.
Presidents. Ramsey.
James W. Cree, Secretary.
Col. James R. Gilmore, Treasurer.
1905—1906.
Joshua W. Sharpe, President. Executive Committee : T. J. Brere-
Hon. W. Rush Gillan, ton, Chairman ; Linn Harbaugh,
Hon. A. N. Pomeroy, Vice Presi- Esq., J. S. Mcllvaine, Dr. R. W.
dents. Ramsey, Irvin C. Elder, Esq.
James W. Cree, Secretary.
Col. James R. Gilmore, Treasurer.
1906—1907.
Hon. W. Rush Gillan, President. Executive Committee : Linn Har-
Hon. A. N. Pomeroy, baugh, Esq., Chairman, J. S. Mc-
T. J. Brereton, Vice Presidents. Ilvaine, Dr. R. W. Ramsey, Irvin
Col. James R. Gilmore, Secretary. C. Elder, Esq., Hon. John W.
FVank Mehaffey, Esq., Treasurer. Hoke.
1907—1908.
Hon. A. N. Pomeroy, President. Executive Committee : J. S. Mc-
T. J. Brereton, Ilvaine, Chairman ; Dr. R. W.
Linn Harbaugh, E.sq., Vice Presi- Ramsey, Irvin C. Elder, Esq.,
dents. Hon. John W. Hoke, Rev. E. V.
Col. James R. Gilmore, Secretary. Collins.
Frank Mehaffey, Treasurer.
1908—1909.
T. J. Brereton, President. Executive Committe»e : Irvin C.
Linn Harbaugh, Esq., Elder, Chairman ; Hon. John W.
J. S. Mcllvaine. Vice Presidents. Hoke, Rev. E. V. Collins, Capt.
Col. James R. Gilmore, Secretary. G. W. Skinner, Hon. M. A. Foltz,
D. O. Gehr, Esq., Treasurer. Secretary.
1909—1910
Linn Harbaugh, Esq. President. Executive Committee : Hon. John
J. S. Mcllvaine, W. Hoke, Rev. E. V. Collins,
Irvin C. Elder, Vice Presidents. Captain Geo. W. Skinner, W. S.
Col. James R. Gilmore, Secretary. Hoerner, M. A. Foltz, Secretary.
D. O. Gehr, Treasurer.
1910—1911
J. S. Mcllvaine, President. Executive Committee : William S.
Hon. D. W. Rowe, Hoerner, Esq.. Arthur W. Gillan,
Irvm L. Elder, Vice Presidents. H. A. Riddle, A. J. W. Hutton,
Col. James R. Gilmore, Secretary. M. A. Foltz, Secretary.
T. M. Wood, Treasurer.
•Col. Gilmore having declined the
1st Vice Presidency, the Nomi-
nating Committee named Mr.
Orr.
ORIGINAL MEMBERS
•Prof. M. R. ALEXANDER,
WILLIAM ALEXANDER, Esq.,
*.JAMES W. CREE, Sr.,
♦Rev. J. A. CRAWFORD, D. D.
Hon. M. A. FOLTZ,
Col. JAMES R. GILMORE,
D. O. GEHR, Esq..
tMaj. CHAUNCEY IVES,
•Rev. JAMES F. KENNEDY, D. D..
•THOMAS B. KENNEDY, Esq.,
M. C. KENNEDY,
•B. L. MAURER,
Rev. S. A. MARTIN, D. D.,
tJOHNSTON McLANAHAN, M. P.,
JOHN M. Mcdowell, Esq.,
J. S. McILVAINE,
•Capt. W. H. H. MACKBY,
FRANK MEHAFFEY, Esq.,
JOHN G. ORR,
Hon. A. N. POMEROY,
Dr. GEORGE F. PLATT,
H. A. RIDDLE,
Hon. JOHN STEWART,
JOSHUA W. SHARPE, Esq.,
i- EDWARD B. WIESTLING.
ELECTED 1898—1899.
•General J. F. BOYD, CHARLES F. PALMER. M. D.,
T. J. BRERETON, R. W. RAMSEY, M. D.,
Hon. W. RUSH GILLAN, Hon. D. WATSON ROWE,
WILLIAM S. HOERNER, Esq., *F. H. SHUMAKER,
JOHN MONTGOMERY, M. D.. fJOHN O. SKINNER, M. D.
WALTER K. SHARPE.
ELECTED 1900—1903.
LINN HARBAUGH. Esq.,
tGeneral A. S. DAGGETT. U. S. A.,
GEORGE A. WOOD.
Rev. WM. C. SCHAEFFER. D. D.,
Rev. RAY H. CARTER,
THOMAS M. NELfoON,
WILLIAM McCANDLISH.
IRVIN C. ELDER. Esq.,
M. H. REASER. Ph. D..
THEODORE M. WOOD.
Hon. JOHN W. HOKE,
ANDREW BUCHANAN,
Rev. E. V. COLLINS.
O. C. BOWERS, Esq.
ELECTED 1904.
Dr. L. M. KAUFFMAN.
ELECTED 1905.
THOMAS B. KENNEDY.
ELECTED 1906.
ELECTED 1907.
Rev. JOHN ALLAN BLAIR. MORRIS LLOYD,
WALTER B. GILMORE. Esq.. JOHN H. POMEROY.
A W GILL AN. Esq.. *Capt. GEORGE W. SKINNER,
A. J. W. HUTTON. Esq., fR. W. TUNIS,
Dr. M. C. IHLSENG, . fGEORGE C. VIEH.
ELECTED 1908.
•Dr. P. B. MONTGOMERY, Dr. W. F. SKINNER,
Prof. D. EDGAR RICE, C. PRICE SPEER.
Rev. A. F. WALDO, Rev. Dr. IRVIN W. HENDRICKS.
ELECTED 1909.
Rev C. W. HEATHCOTB. Rev. C. A. EYLER.
THOMAS G. ZARGER, Esq.. Dr. F. M. EMMERT,
H V BLACK ED. D. SOLLENBERGER.
NON-RESIDENT MEMBERS.
B. M. NBAD. Esq Harrisburg, Pa.
Rev. W. C. SCHAEFFER. D. D Lancaster. Pa.
Rev. RAY H. CARTER India.
W. M. IRVINE, Ph. D Mercersburg, Pa.
A. L. GARDNER Baltimore. Md.
HONORARY MEMBERS.
GEO O. SEILHAMER, Esq Chambersburg, Pa.
♦JOHN M. COOPER Martinsburg, Pa.
Rev. J. C. BOWMAN, D. D Lancaster, Pa.
J. P. MATTHEWS, Esq Baltimore, Md.
CHARLES W. CREMER, Esq Waynesboro, Pa.
WILSON L. HARBAUGH Haverford, Pa.
•Deceased. fWithdrawn.
BENEDICT ARNOLD, PATRIOT AND TRAITOR.
BY HON. CHARLES H. SMILEY.
The echoes of the tenth anniversary celebration had
scarcely died away when the Kittochtinny Historical Society
entered formally upon the eleventh year of its existence by as-
sembling at the hospitable home of W. S. Hoerner, Esq.,
Philadelphia Avenue, on Thursday evening, March 26, 1908.
President Brereton exhibited a map of Mercersburg from a
survey of 1853, presented to the society by Frank Keagy, who
was given a vote of thanks for the interesting relic. At this
meeting Prof. D, Edgar Rice was elected to membership.
Through the efiforts of Judge Gillan the Society was for-
tunate in having Hon. Charles PI. Smiley, of New Bloomfield,
Pa., present who delivered his lecture upon the career of
Benedict Arnold, Patriot and Traitor. Mr. Smiley is a veteran
of the Civil War, a leading member of the Perry County bar,
and is prominent in the political and social life of southern
Pennsylvania. He has made a special study of the life of
Benedict Arnold and his relation to Revolutionary times, and
he discussed the subject with thoughtfulness and intellectual
skill which disclosed thorough research into the history of
that period. It was a lecture which the author had delivered
before various institutions and for that reason he preferred
not to have it published. The subject thus brought forward
was discussed during the evening in an interesting manner by
Dr. S. A. Martin, J. S. Mcllvaine, H. A. Riddle and others.
Mr. Smiley was cordially thanked for his lecture, and the
Society also expressed its regrets that it would not appear
among the printed papers of the present volume.
10
THE SEVENTH DAY BAPTISTS OF SNOW HILL.
BY C. W. CREMER. ESQ., Waynesboro, Pa.
[The society held its April meeting at the home of Geo.
A. Wood, East Marltet street, Friday evening. May 1, 1908.
There was a large attendance to greet Mr. Cremer, well
known as the former editor of "Valley Spirit," and for the
last eight or ten years editor of "The Record" and "Blue
Ridge Zepher," Waynesboro. For more than a quarter of
century Mr. Cremer has occupied the chair editorial, and no
part of his work is accepted by his readers, the press and
literary circles, with keener delight than his occasional at-
tention to subjects of local history. His production on this
occasion therefore proved a rich intellectual and historical
treat that was well received, and the topic of discussion by
Dr. Martin, Judge Stewart and others pending the hearty
vote of thanks given the author and his election as an hono-
rary member of the Society.
At the business meeting the Rev. A. F. Waldo and C.
Price Speer were elected members of the society, and chair-
man Elder, of the Executive Committee, announced that the
report of the proceedings of the Tenth Anniversary meeting
of the Societj', including paper by Hon. M. A. Foltz on The
Work of Society, had been printed in pamphlet form as per
authority of the society, and was ready for distribution.]
The story you have asked me to write has nothing in it
of romance — as the word is commonly used; nothing of great
achievements — as men apply the term ; little of anything that
is substantial ; little of anything that will last, except the
memory of it all.
The Seventh Day Baptist congregation of Snow Hill is
yet in existence, its church hardby the station the railroad
company has aptly named the Nunnery, in Quincy Township,
a mile and a half north of Waynesboro, and close by it the
once well-known cloisters, that sheltered devout brothers and
sisters, now turned into the homes of two ministers of the
congregation.
The cloisters have lost their mission but the congregation
still holds its regular services every fortnight, it baptizes an
occasional member into its faith, it derives a revenue from a
productive farm of 156 acres tilled by one of its pastors as
tenant, it occupies a place in the denominational life of its
community, it is made up of men and women who are among
II
the leaders in their vicinage and it attracts the attention of
those who have an interest in the history of their own county
and those who can appreciate the uniqueness of its once little
principality and government; but the life that made it to
stand out in its marked individuality, the annual meetings
that drew thousands, the monastical customs that always
caused wonder among the strangers, the busy little factories
that it manned and managed — all these are gone.
In this there is romance, but of the kind the world doesn't
know by that name. It is the romance of a sturdy, thrifty,
unemotional people who, in a well-settled part of this county
set about to establish a congregation and afterward a monas-
tery that seem to us at this distant day foreign to all their
eailier ideas of religious customs and forms; that violated the
notions of their neighbors respecting the Sabbath and the di-
vine ordinances of giving and being given in marriage; that
cut them away from all those about them.
The story of it all may be characterized as the story of the
ambition of one man — an ascetic, probably because of personal
disappointment in early aspirations to leadership — which, for
a brief period, carried a family and then a community along a
path strange to them and then, when the hand on the rein was
loosed, slowly sought the way which was once familiar to
them and which was always the more-traveled.
Johann Conrad Beissel, the German mystic who separated
from his Dunker Brethren when they did not adopt his views
respecting the observance of the seventh day as the Sabbath,
and who gathered his own sect about him and established a
monastical society at Ephrata, Lancaster County, was the im-
pulse which created the Snow Hill Societies in Quincy Town-
ship, this county.
He was a strange component of many brilliant parts, of
energy, of ambition, and of whimsicalities, his biographers
say. Born in the Palatinate in 1690, he came to America in
1720 and his life here was a succession of disagreements with
his fellows and of ultimate triumphs.
The first year of his residence here he was given employ-
12
ment by Peter Becker, preacher of the Dunker congregation
at Germantown.
Then he persuaded a friend to become an anchorite and
together they went to Lancaster County and built a hut,
where they lived for some time in poverty and privation.
About this period Beissel visited a convent in Maryland and
studied the rules of conventual life.
In 1724 Peter Becker led a band of missionaries to
Ephrata, Lancaster County. Beissel joined him and v/as by
him baptized. The young disciple, however, soon came to a
disagreement with his teacher. He believed that Saturday, as
the seventh day of the week, should be observed as the Sab-
bath and he preached this doctrine. Parting from Becker he
drew with him many of the older minister's followers and es-
tablished a new sect, which he denominated the Seventh Day
Baptist Society.
Beissel soon made monasticism a part of his religious
tenets and in 1732 began the erection of the- celebrated
Ephrata cloisters. He introduced there regulations stricter
than those of Roman Catholic convents, wore himself and put
upon his followers the robe of Capuchin monks, he gave new
names to his followers and changed his own to Brother Fned-
sam ; he labored zealously for the increase of his order, tu'ned
his youthful musical skill to account in the formation of
choirs which rendered with exquisite effect the peculiar but
majestic Ephrata tunes and in the compiling of the Chor-
Gesaenge, a collection of hymns and tunes used by the monks
and nuns, many of these hymns being the composition of
Beissel himself. He died in 1768.
He had at this time a large following and his "seventh
day" doctrines were preached in more places than Ephrata.
Among his most enthusiastic supporters and his best-loved
lieutenant, was Peter Miller (known as Brother Jaebez). It
was through him that Beissel's ambition bore its fruits in this
county.
Miller was a man of extraordinary scholarship and served
as prior of the Ephrata community. His genius did much to
13
extend the fame of the Seventh Day Baptists and the Order of
the SoHtary. He was sent out as a missionary and in his
journeys visited Franklin County then a part of Cumberland
County, and but lately detached from Lancaster County.
Beissel had been here once or twice. It is known that in
July, 1764, he visited the Antietam congregation which had
but recently been established in a fertile valley where the East
Antietam crosses into Maryland, probably about two miles
south of Waynesboro. He came with several calvacades and
with a great lot of ecclesiastical finery which he, Peter Miller
and the Ephrata prioress, Maria, put on when they held their
first service among the German people of the congregation
and which created a tremendous sensation.
It is a tradition that Beissel preached at the Old Forge
on the farm now occupied by Harvey Pentz, near Glen Furney
and a little distance above Roadside.
He was impressed with this as a promising field and
urged Rev. Miller to greater efifort here.
Miller labored with zeal and by 1775 had secured enough
adherents to found a congregation and hold regular meetings.
His most important acquisition was Andrew Snowberger and
his family. Andrew Snowberger was a son of Hans Schnee-
berg, a Swiss property owner, who came with his family to
America, in 1750, probably "in the ship Queen of Denmark.
Geo. Parish commander from Rotterdam, last from Cowes,"
and also took the oath of allegiance to the crown of Great
Britain and to the Province of Pennsylvania.
Little is known of Hans Schneeberg. He reached this
part of the country, took out a warrant for land, and settled
along the Antietam, in a beauteous little valley that promised
him a goodly competence for himself, wife and seven children.
Plis son Andrew was one of his heirs and succeeded to a por-
tion of his father's land. Andrew Snowberger was a man of
intense religious convictions. He belonged to what is known
as the Amish branch of the Dunker Church. He did not
quickly embrace the doctrines of the Seventh Day Baptists.
It cost Peter Miller much argument to convince him that the
14
seventh day of the week was the Sabbath and that there
would not be much secular inconvenience, and possibly perse-
cution to him in observing Saturday as the day of rest and
divine worship and in laboring on Sunday, when his neighbors
were gathered in their churches and unprepared for the
rumble of the mill and the swish of the grain scythe. But
Snowberger was finally satisfied on this point. Tradition in
the congregation has it that Mrs. Snowberger, who was a
daughter of Melchior Karber, was the chief persuader.
It is told that she was baptized by Beissel during one of
his visits to the Antietam congregation. She accepted his
doctrines of the seventh day and when her husband would not
agree with her she took her child in her arms and started to
walk to Ephrata. Early the next morning Andrew followed
her and caught up with her at a house at which she had
stopped over night. He agreed to subscribe to Beissel's
seventh day doctrine if she would return to his home. She
accompanied him and tradition further has it that he was soon
afterward baptized as the result of his promise. Whether this
is absolutely accurate or not, it is known that Andrew Snow-
berger became the leader of the Snow Hill Society as it was
denominated, the Snow Hill being the Anglicized form of
Schneeberg. The services of the Society were held in his log
house, a quarter of a mile south of the present buildings.
In 1795, or a few years earlier, Rev. Peter Lehman, a na-
tive of The Glades, Somerset County, Pa., came to Snow Hill
as pastor of the congregation, at the urgent request of Rev.
Peter Miller, then prior of the Ephrata monastery, who told
young Peter Lehman that the Spirit had revealed to him that
he, Lehman, was to be consecrated as leader of this congre-
gation. Rev. Lehman was originally a member of the Amish
denomination. His work was to carry out the plans of Rev.
Miller and to introduce monasticism here. At the outset he
met opposition.
Andrew Snowberger did not believe in conventual life. It
was forbidden to him, of course, by reason of his marriage,
(and he would not put his wife from him, as did Brother
15
Jaebez, when he wished to join the order) but he did not ap-
prove of it for others. The faith of the Seventh Day Baptists
was sufficient to him without this appendage. But he fell as
he fell once before. His wife and his unmarried daughters set
themselves to the work the good pastor wanted done, and for
the second time the gentle, admirable old man was persuadeu
against his will. He consented to help in the dissemination of
the Gospel after Rev. Lehman's way, and about 1800 the
Snow Hill branch of the Order of the Solitary was brought
into existence in his stone residence, which he had erected in
1793. This building became the convent of the order. A por-
tion of it was used for fourteen years as the home, also, of
Andrev/ Snowberger and his wife. Four or six young women
(the number is not certain) among them two daughters of Mr.
Snowberger, Barbara and Elizabeth, offered to do all the
household work of the institution, asking only that clothing
and food be furnished them. Their ofifer was accepted and
with them and several men, one John Snowberger, a son of
Mr. Snowberger, the monastical society began its existence,
•as a branch of the church intended for those who wished to
devotes themselves to convent life and to remain celibates.
If Andrew Snowberger was at first indisposed to be
moved by Pastor Lehman's monastical inclinations, he soon
burned his bridges and became one of the most helpful sup-
porters of the order. He became its first prior and a diligent,
scrupulous head of the local branch did the disciple of Leh-
man prove. He was manager of all the secular afifairs in the
order, and during his term of office the grist mill was erected,
it is said, by Rev. Lehman, in 1807, and about the same time
the work shops of the monks and nuns, or brothers and sis-
ters, as the present members of the congregation prefer to call
them. The grist mill had one pair of buhrs and a pair of
choppers. For a time Peter Lehman & Co. was the title of
the operators. The millers were conscientious folk. Only the
best of grain was used for flour, the remainder being fed by
the women to the cows, and the product soon had a wide
i6
reputation. Teamsters hauled it as far as Baltimore, and it
was not long until its excellence was discovered.
Merchants inquired as to the makers of the flour, and the
teamsters carried back large orders for it. The mill was kept
running day and night, except Saturday. During this time
the farm was well tilled by the monks and nuns, and the same
busy people manufactured cotton and woolen goods and many
other articles. Flax was sown and wool grown and spun by
the nuns, and afterward woven into table cloths, shirting and
the like, linen goods and woolen pieces for the men's winter
clothing and for sale to the general public. Cotton was pur-
chased and made into cottonade goods, some of them being
colored by the nuns.
Andrew Snowberger devoted his time and money and
labor and children to the Society. The records in the Franklin
County court house show that his aim was to confer monetary
benefit and to provide a home for the recluses. January 15,
1804, he sold to John and Barbara Snowberger, two of his
children, "Snow Hill," a tract of 113 acres and 129^ perches,
which he had obtained by a patent from the Commonwealth
of Pennsylvania to him and to his heirs. His two children
paid him 800 pounds for the tract.
April 28, 1806, John Snowberger bought from John Tom
two acres and ninety-two perches of land, on which a dam
was partly located, for ^yy. This was, seventeen years later,
sold to Andrew Snowberger.
November i, 1809, Andrew Snowberger re-purchased
from John and Barbara the 113 acres of land, paying them
therefor 1000 pounds. In his house continued the convent
until 1814, when the increase of members made it necessary
to erect a separate building for these anchorites. It is still
standing and is 30x40 feet, two stories high and has window
glass 10x12 inches in size.
Congregation and monastical branch continued to grow
and Andrew Snowberger increased his fervor for them. Peter
Lehman, the preacher and the miller, died January 4, 1823, and
was buried at Snow Hill, but his influence continued. The
J?
same year Andrew Snovvberger proposed to his eight children
that each of them should accept $1000 from him and release
his claim upon his estate. Such faithful Seventh Day Baptists
as thev were hesitated not in relinquishing their future in-
heritance.
Then, September 22, 1823, Andrew Snowberger sold his
farm of 106 acres and the tract of two acres and ninety-two
perches his son, John, had purchased from John Tom in 1806,
and which had come into Andrew's possession by purchase,
September i, 1823, to the Seventh Day Baptist Society of
Snow Hill. The consideration was $1654.
The deed of sale, which is of record in the Franklin Coun-
ty recorder's office, was to "Abraham Ely, John Snowberger,
John IMonn, Charles Hough and Abraham Burger all mem-
bers of the religious society of Seventh Day Baptists of Snow
Hill". The 106 acres sold "were the remaining part of a tract
conveyed by patent of the State, May 11, 1803, to Andrew
Snowberger". The property was to be :
"In trust only to and for the several uses, interests and
purposes hereinafter limited, appointed and declared, and to
and for no other use, intent or purpose whatsoever, that is to
say, to and for the monastical branch of the Society now liv-
ing and residing at Snow Hill, viz : John Snowberger, Barbara
Lehman, Catharine Hough, Elizabeth Snowberger, Barbara
Snowberger, Veronica Snowberger and Susanna Fyock, and
to their successors forever, and every one of them, members
belonging to the monastical establishment of the said religious
Societ)'^ at Snow Hill." ,
Trustees of the property were to be elected every fourth
year, Mr. Snowberger made a provision of the article, and the
members leading secular and monastical lives were to elect
these trustees from their own number.
August 25, 1829. John Snowberger conveyed to John
Monn, Charles Hoch, Samuel Snowberger and Daniel Monn,
trustees of the Seventh Day Baptist Society, two pieces of
land, one of 18 acres and 68^ perches and one of i acre and
104 perches.
i8
August 3, 1832, Frederick Hess and Anna, his wife, for
$1082.50, conveyed 21 acres and 104 perches of land to John
Snowberger, John Monn, Charles Hoch, Samuel Snowberger
and David Snowberger, trustees of the Seventh Day Baptist
Society at Snow Hill and their successors, "in trust only to
and for the use of the monastical society residing at Snow
Hill".
March 27, 1833, John Snowberger deeded to John Monn,
Charles Hoch, Samuel Snowberger and David Snowberger,
trustees of the estate of the Seventh Day Baptist Society at
Snow Hill, twenty-five acres and ninety-one perches of land
adjoining the larger property for $400, "in trust only to and
for the use of the monastical society residing at Snow Hill
agreeable to their deed granted unto them by a certain An-
drew Snowberger, bearing date September 22, 1823, to and for
the use of the sole members of the aforesaid society and their
successors forever, and to and for no other use, intent, mean-
ing or purpose whatever".
Barbara Snowberger, March 27, 1833, in a deed similarly
worded, for $10 conveyed ninety-eight perches to the same
trustee, with the addition of John Snowberger. This com-
prised the property now for three-quarters of a century owiicr^
by the Seventh Day Baptist Society for its monastical branch.
Before all these transfers of property had been made,
Andrew Snowberger died. His death occurred in 1825. He
was succeeded as prior by his son Samuel, who was the last
of the priors.
For more than thirty years monasticism had been prac-
tised at Snow Hill and there had been a goodly number of
inmates in the convents. The monastical branch of the
Church was recognized and trustees of the monastical society
M^ere elected or appointed, but it was not incorporated until
after there had been acquired by it the broad acres and the
buildings which passed to it in the manner told of, and the
acquirement of which was made possible by the contributions
of its members. These contributions were not, as a rule, very
large, for not much was needed, the land in some instances,
19
notably that of Andrew Snowberger — who gave for $1634
what had cost him $13,000 — being practically donated to the
congregation.
June 17, 1834, the society was incorporated under the
name of "The Seventh Day Baptist Monastical Society of
Snow Hill." This, it must be remembered, was separate from
the Seventh Day Baptist congregation, which owned the
meeting house.
The incorporators were the monastical society, according
to the terms of the charter of incorporation. They were :
John Snowberger, Henry Bauman, Barbara Lehman, Elizabeth
Snowberger, Catharine Hoch, Barbara Snowberger, Veronica
Snowberger, Susannah Fyock, Hannah Fyock, Mary Fyock
and Mary Toms.
The charter is signed by these and four others : Solomon
Monn, Charles Hoch, Samuel Snowberger and David Snow-
berger.
The charter sets forth that all profits, rents and income
of the estate of the association were to be applied to the sole
use, benefit and support of the monastical society ; that mem-
bership was to be had after application was made and an ex-
amination had been satisfactorily conducted by the society
and trustees ; that any member could withdraw and take with
him any property he might have brought to the society ; that
the affairs of the society should be managed by five trustees
to be elected every four years by ballot from the members of
the Seventh Day Baptist congregation, secular as well as
monastical ; that the trustees might sell real estate belonging
to the society to an amount not exceeding at any one time
$5,000 and might receive any bequests made to the society to
be used for the society and for such religious and charitable
purposes and to erect such buildings as may be directed and
ordered by the majority of the corporation, providing that i".ie
clear yearly value or income of the estate or money must no:
at any time exceed $2,000.
January 16, 1835, after the charter had been granted the
state legislature passed a law to vest the real estate men-
20
tioned above in the Seventh Day Baptist monastical societ}^ ol
Snow Hill.
So that there might be continuity in the recital of the gifts
to the monastical society and of the incorporation of the
society there has been passed over the growth of tlie oruer.
Under Prior Samuel Snowberger the monastical society en-
joyed its greatest prosperity. Its buildings were largely in-
creased. In 1829 the large meeting house was erected, the
room in the convent having capacity for only a portion of tiie
congregation. The monastical society, as said, did not own
this. It belonged to the congregation but was used as a place
jf worship by the monastical society. The second of the con-
ventual houses was built in 1835. It is thirty feet square.
The lower room v/as used for dining purposes, that on the
second floor for a saal or chapel for the inmates and occa-
sionally for a prayer meeting of the congregation. In 1838
and again in 1843 "^w cloisters were built, each 30 by 40 feet
in dimensions. The buildings, when completed, were con-
nected in one long row, about 120 feet long. At the east end
was the sisterhouse, at the west end the brotherhouse and,
between, the refectory, the saal, etc.
The monastical society had its times of large membership
and of lesser members. When it was incorporated it had
eleven members. Three years later the number was 23 ; in
1842, 33, the maximum. Then the membership gradually
grew less until, on November 13, 1894, the last sister of the
monastical society — Elizabeth Fyock, who had been admit':cd
to it in 1839 — died in the nunnery. Then only one member of
the order remained — Obed Snowberger, who had b'^.en re-
ceived in 1842, four years later had withdrawn and again had
entered the order in 1889. He lived there six years and, on
November 24, 1895, he joined the other members of the order
in another world.
The convent was not yet empty of inmates, however.
Before the death of Obed Snowberger, four women v:ere ad-
mitted to it. They were Sally Ann Calimer, Melinda Cr.^imer,
Polly Knight and Dolly Misner. The last-named survived
the others. Her death occured in May, 1900,
21
Since then the convent has been in the possession of a
care-taker. Various men, members of the congregation, have
been installed in that capacity. Rev. John A. Pentz, one of
the ministers of the congregation, is now the tenant and
farms the 156 acres on the shares.
Rev. Pentz is the direct successor of Rev. Peter Lehman,
the first prior of the convent and the first elder of the congre-
gation. The second elder was Andrew Fahnestock. lie and
Rev. Lehman resided in the convent. They were succeeded
by these elders, who did not live in the convent : Jacob Mc-
Ferren, John Riddlesberger, John Walk and now by John A.
Pentz, who was elected to the office at a meeting in Lancaster
county, last fall. Rev. Walk is still living but is too infirm
to continue the active duties of elder. Oddly enough the new
elder is a resident of the old convent house, as were the first
to hold the office. Pie occupies what was the old brother-
house. With him in the building but at the other end — the
eastern end — in what was once the sisterhouse — resides Rev.
W. A. Resser, also a minister of the church.
At this day's distance it is more than passing strange
that in a community made of up of Germans and Scotch-Irish
there should be this introduction of a monastery and that
monastical customs should be practised there. To us it seems
out of harmony with the temperament of the community and
it provoked curiosity and more in those early days.
As many as four and five thousand people journeyed to
the nunnery and the nearby church on the occasions of its
annual meetings, the Saturday before Whit-Sunday, some to
take part in the services, some to gaze upon the unusual con-
vent, some to hear what manner of doctrine these people
preached and to observe their baptisms in the closeby stream
by immersion, some to inquire from the brothers and sisters
themselves of the monastical life, some to question whether
in very truth the members of this congregation did abstain
from manual labor on Saturday and did plow and sow grains
and reap harvests on Sunday.
Whatever many have been the judgment upon the reli-
22
gious tenets there expounded there was nothing but profound
respect for the manner of life of these people.
Orderliness, harmony, devoutness, characterized that
life. Between the convent and the church edifice flows a
placid stream of water, that is naked of ripples, that keeps
within its grass-heavy banks, that is steadily busy about its
mission of emptying itself into the great sea somewhere be-
yond. So went the life of the monastical society and so went
the life of the congregation.
In the monastery was the home of the simply gray or
black clad brothers and gray or white clad sisters. With the
early morning — at five o'clock — they came from their small and
frugally furnished room to the refectory, the brothers seated
themselves at one table and the sisters at another, the prior
read a chapter from the Bible, a hymn was sung and a prayer
was oflFered, the plain meal was partaken of, thanks were given
and all departed to take up the work assigned to them — the
sisters to the house work or to their spinning wheels or looms,
the brothers to the farm lands, the mill or the tin shop.
The day passed in toil, there was again a gathering of the
Society — this time in the saal, where hymns were sung and
other devotional exercises engaged in and where, twice a week,
members of the congregation could join in the devotions. Then
came the retiring hour and rest for the work of another day.
And thus their life was spent, day in and day out — with
the exception of Saturday. Then they observed the Sabbath
Beissel had ordained on that day. Then two by two, the
brothers in advance, they reverently marched from the con-
vent across the meadow, over the unrippling stream, to the
church and there heard the doctrines of their faith expounded
by preachers selected from their own order or from the con-
gregation. They lifted their hand in no toil, their horses
nodded sleepily in their stalls, the grind of the mill was un-
heard on that day.
Their Sabbath over, Sunday began their week's work and
herein the congregation brought upon itself a conflict with the
world about it. There were some neighbors of the Seventh
23
Day Baptist community who believed the members of the
church were violating a commandment in giving over the first
day of the week to work and who, conscientiously enough,
found fault that the plow horse should then be deep in the
furrow and the mill race pushing the water wheel into activity.
They offered personal rebukes and sometimes they entered
legal proceedings against the members of the congregation.
One case went to the Supreme Court of the State. Briefly
its history is this : John Lidy charged that Jacob Specht, a
cooper, had, on the i6th day of August, 1846, which day was
Sunday, engaged in hauling manure. Geo. W. Toms, a justice
of the peace, issued a warrant to Hugh M. Sibbet, constable of
Quincy Township, for the arrest of Specht. The latter was
taken before the justice and fined $4 for violation of the Act of
22d April, 1794. The Common Pleas Court of Franklin County
affirmed the action of the justice and Specht carried an appeal
to the Supreme Court.
He contended that one of the commandments required
him to work six days of the week and rest on the seventh ; that
he had rested on this seventh day and that it was necessary
for him to begin to work on Sunday in order to comply with
the commandment to work six days.
The Supreme Court sustained the lower court and de-
cided that members of a societ}^ who conscientiously observe
and keep the seventh day of the week as the Christian Sab-
bath can be convicted if they work on Sunday because Sunday
is the day set apart by the Act of 22d April, 1794, as the day
of legalized rest and that the act enforces the observance of it.
Once again the Society was compelled to have a promi-
nent place in the court records. August 24, 1899, Chas. A.
Suesserott, Esq., Chambersburg, was appointed escheator on
behalf of the Commonwealth of the property and estate of
the monastical society. Lengthy proceedings followed. Told
in a compact form, the case was this : The last member of
the monastical society was dead and the Commonwealth
claimed that the society had no longer an existence, and that
there was no legal heir to the 156 acres and 63 perches of
24
which the farm was then composed, to the grist mill and to
the convent buildings; and that, there being no heir, the prop-
erty should escheat to the state.
The trustees of the congregation put up the defense that
the members of the congregation and monastical society con-
tributed jointly to the funds with which the property was
purchased, that the monastical society was an integral part
of the congregation and that the property belonged to the
congregation which had in great part created it.
The courts decided that the land and buildings were of
right the property of the Snow Hill congregation and since
then the trustees of the congregation have had charge of it.
These trustees are now George C. Walk, Benjamin V. ]\Ionn,
Benjamin Funk, Jacob Decker and Jacob Smetzer.
There is one feature of the life in the monastery that is
exceedingly difficult of clear explanation. That is the music.
Beissel was a celebrated musician and he composed many
tunes for the h3^mns used at Ephrata and at Snovv Hill.
Brother Jaebez sent these tunes and the Ephrata tune books,
laboriously written with pen and ink, and man}^ handsomely
illuminated with colored inks at great expenditure of time and
skill, from the home convent to its thriving daughter at the
same time that he sent a printing press to Snow Hill, and, it
is said, copies of the books were made here. These books
were known as the "We3"rauch's Huegel," the "Psalterspiel,"
the "Turtel Taube" or the "Tauben-gesang" — the "Song of
the Doves" — and the masterpiece of Beissel, the "Chor-
Gesaenge." On the title page of the latter, which was printed
at Ephrata in 1754, it is told that the book "consists of a new
and unusual system of music arranged after the manner of the
angelic and heavenly choirs."
The music was set in four, five, six and seven parts.
When in five parts the first was called the choral or leading
part, the second the counter, the third the upper bass, the
fifth the lower bass. The six part tunes seem to have been
the composition of Elizabeth Snowberger, a daughter of An-
drew Snowberger and probably the prioress or mother su-
25
perior of the sisters for many years.
The seven-part tunes had the parts arranged as follows :
Counting from below, the first part was lower bass, the
second upper bass, third female tenor, second treble or
modern tenor, the fourth female treble, fifth counter or high
female voice, sixth leading voice, seventh second leading
voice.
The harmony was odd but very inspiring, it is said, and
very beautiful. It cannot be sung as written, but must be
transposed and it is probable only a few have studied it suffi-
ciently to understand the peculiar transposition required. I
do not believe many people know how to sing the music.
Obed Snowberger, the last of the monastical society,
knew, but Obed Snowberger was a strange man and a man
of odd moods and he chose to tell only such things as he
pleased. I spent an afternoon with him almost a quarter of
a century ago and I was told, afterward, that I had been ac-
corded an unusual honor and one that he showed few people,
yet 1 had much difficulty in getting him to speak of the things
about which I most wanted to know. I wanted to know of
the daily life of the people of the convent : he bade all others
stay back and took me to the saal and started to translate
Fox's Book of Martyrs to me. I asked him how to interpret
the Ephrata music : he led me from the saal to his private
residence nearby and played an unrecognizable tune on a dis-
abled pipe organ his own mechanical ingenuity had construct-
ed. I asked him the greatest number of monastics at any one
time in the Snow Hill Society : he took me back to the con-
vent and showed me all through the small sleeping rooms and
attic, the latter stored with spinning wheels and other much-
wanted relics of the monks and nuns and wouldn't give as
much as a broken plate to carry away as a memento.
He was a prolific writer upon such phases of Snow Hill
life as suited him and from some of these this story has drawn
copiously but there were some things he could not be induced
to talk about. He was the last link with the old convent ex-
26
istence and with him passed away much of the history that
is now so earnestly desired.
Since then the congregation has constituted the all of
Snow Hill and its life has passed on uneventfully except for
the escheat proceedings.
In its years of greatest membership many names now
familiar in the community were put on the rolls of the mon-
astic society. These include these brothers : Peter Lehman,
Johannes Schneeberger, Samuel Snowberger, David Fyock,
Benjamin Specht, Andreas Fahnesstock, Johannes Burger,
Heinrich Bauman, who was a member of the Order of the
Solitary 48 years; Heinrich Ritter, Obed Snowberger, p^-""'
these sisters : Veronica Schneeberger, Barbara Rank, Han-
nah Meinzer, Anna Kimmel, Barbara Schneeberger, Elizabeth
Schneberger, Catharina Schneberger, Catherina Hoch,
Lydia Mentzer, Elizabeth Mentzer, Susanna Goschet, who
was prioress or mother superior of the sisterhouse from 1848
to 1866; Polly Toms, Susanna Fyock, Barbara Schneeberger
and Elizabeth Fyock, who was known as Sister Zenobia.
Some of these lived to be 90 years old and many to be
more than 80.
One time there were nearly two hundred members of the
congregation ; now there are about fifty, and these fifty have
departed in no measure from the customs of the early wor-
shippers. They still hold their fortnightly services and their
annual meetings at Whitsuntide.
Half a century back these annual meetings drew thous-
ands. A quarter of a century ago the pilgrimage was made
by a lesser number. Today the gatherings are of a hundred
or so.
Have part with me in one of these meetings of twenty-
five years ago. Early on Saturday mornings team loads of
people begin arriving on the grounds. It is a topographical
fact that all roads in that section of the county lead to the
Nunnery and all roads hold an almost unbroken stream of
vehicles. Before the sun is well above the high hills to the
east of the buildings, the roads closeby begin to be congested
27
and soon one side of each highway is converted into a hitching'
place. Teams are tied to the fences for many rods in every
direction. All the country side is here or arriving and with
them visiting brethren of the faith from the congregation in
Morrison Cove, Bedford County, and many who are attracted
by curiosity from their homes thirty and fifty miles away.
It is an animated and oddly contrasted scene. In their
plain garments come members of the Seventh Day Baptist
Church and the older members greet each other with a kiss —
men so saluting each other and women extending the same
custom to the women. In gayer clothes come the curious. It
is the great clearing house of mild religious disputation, of
crop prospects, of family prosperity and family misfortunes,
of the neighbors' comings and the neighbors' goings, of the
tittle-tattle that brings a smile or sends away an enemy.
Over all the grounds, over all the roads they spread. All
peer into the monastery and at the church but not many go
into the sanctuary. Only the plainly-clad members of the
denomination gather there. It is theirs and they are at home
there. They stand in groups under its shadow while all
around them flit the curious-minded, many of them pretending
to nothing much but a display of the gay gowns and brilliant
neckties provided for this occasion.
Along the roads for a quarter mile in all directions are
the stands of lunch vendors, who have brought sandwiches
and cakes and candy and lemonade and colored water for the
refreshment of those who purpose spending the day there.
Around the bend in the road comes a young man driving
a pair of handsome horses with heads high and manes tossed
by their speed and the slight breeze. Everybody gives way
before him. He is the son of a well-to-do farmer of the
neighborhood and this is a show day for him.
Almost his buggy pole is driven into the curtains of the
plain carriage of a somberly-garbed man who is letting his
sedate old beast pull him and his family slowly to the church.
This team load is come for worship.
These are some of the contrasts that are so manv here on
28
this day and that with every minute make a new picture for
the onlooker.
But you have another purpose in coming to the grounds
and about ten o'clock vou follow the men and women of the
congregation into their church edifice — plain, white, without
attempt at decoration.
Soon the services are begun. Rev. John A. Pentz is in
charge. There is singing of tunes that are probably some-
what familiar in their theme. There are fervent prayers and
there are sermons. On this particular day it is your privilege
to hear Rev. John Walk, a minister of the Snow Hill congre-
gation, preach and Rev. Jacob Diamond, of the Morrison's
Cove branch.
They impress you with their earnestness and their sin-
cerity. They expound the Scriptures, which they hold to be
the only rule of life; they put their own interpretations upon
them and they proclaim some doctrines to which you may not
be willing to subscribe but which you know will" lead men
along right lines.
They do not preach from a pulpit or even from a plat-
form but take their place behind a good-sized table and there,
on an equality with the lay membership, they deliver the
messages of the Bible. It is a very close-listening congrega-
tion which they address and one that shows its great interest.
About noon the first service is over. Everybody leaves
the meeting house, except the committee for the occasion and
its helpers. These people quickly convert the church into a
dining hall, fill it with tables and then in a remarkably short
time invite the members of the congregation and the visitors
back to partake of a lunch. Of course, you go, if room can
be found for you.
On each table are big platters of applebutter and plates
of butter and soon men come through the aisles carrying
armsful of bread — white as snow, cut in thick slices and very
appetizing — and serve a slice to each person. After them come
men and women with steaming, fragrant coffee that has been
29
boiled in the big boiler in the kitchen attached to the meeting
house.
To each person is given a knife and he cuts his share of
the butter from the plate and dips out from the platter a poi-
tion of the applebutter for his bread. Long in the afternoon
the feeding of the visitors is continued.
Before it is over you may go to the stream of water at
the west end of the church grounds, where a pool has been
dug out of the sand, and observe the minister baptize new
members. Their baptism is by trine immersion, the body be-
ing inclined forward and the face going into the water first.
When the last of the converts has been immersed there is
a swaying of the crowds back and forward for a last look at
all the important places of interest, for the last ,vord with
some old or new friend, if he can be found, and then a scat-
tering along the road to find the carriages and start the home-
ward journey.
By the time the sun has gone down back of the mountains
far ofif on the other side of the valley, few are left except
members of the denomination. There remain for them two
important services. The first begins at early candle light. It
is that of feet-washing. The double method is practised here.
Beissel instituted this method for the church. Two persons
go together in administration of the rite. One washes the feet
and the other dries them and the work is generally divided so
that each pair serves only four or half-a-dozen people.
Then follows the Communion, at which bread and wine
are used.
One of the older members will tell you, that more than a
half century ago there was observed the eating of the Lord's
Supper between the feet-washing and the Communion. This
was in perpetuation of the supper "in the upper room." The
supper consisted of mutton broth and mutton and bread. For
half a century this has not been observed.
With the last solemn services of the Communion the an-
nual meeting comes to a close. The members from Morrison's
Cove and elsewhere, who wish to do so, retire to the nunnery,
30
to occupy the rooms and the beds once used by the monastical
brothers and sisters.
The night closes in on them. The sounds of the day's
activity are gone. A cricket nearby chirps. It seems an echo
— a faint one — of the day full of life and busy scenes.
The day and the night tell the story of the Snow Hill
monastery.
SUMMER VACATION ASSEMBLY
AT Mr. M. C. KENNEDY'S COUNTRY HOME.
The Society accepted Mr. M. C. Kennedy's usual cour-
tesy, and spent an afternoon in the latter part of May, in a
thoroughly enjoyable manner at his beautiful country home,
"Ragged Edge," the Directors and Staff of the Chambersburg
Hospital and heads of departments, C. V. R. R. -Company,
participating in the pleasures of the occasion which took the
place of the regular May meeting.
31
JAMES McLENE, OF THE CUMBERLAND VALLEY,
IN PENNSYLVANIA : A STATESMAN OF HIS
TIMES.
BY BENJAMIN MATTHIAS NEAD. Harrisburg, Pa.
The fall and winter work of the Society was resumed
Thursday evening, October 29, 1908, at the home of Linn
Harbaush, Esq. Mr. Nead, nothwithstanding a busy pro-
fessional and business life, has during the past thirty years,
as a recreation, devoted his leisure hours to historical re-
search, especially as it relates to our Commonwealth and the
Cumberland Valley.
At this meeting Rev. Irvin W. Hendricks, D. D., was
elected a member, and Wilson L. Harbaugh, Haverford, Pa.,
to honorary membership. The special committee made its
report on the proposed marker designating the spot of Cap-
tain Cook's capture at Mont Alto in 1859. * The report wa"?
accepted and the committee was continued to ascertain the
cost of a memorial and devise means for its erection.
J^ MLl,
^
Biography has a most important relation to history ; as
Carlyle expresses it "History is the essence of innumerable
biographies." We may therefore readily believe that it is
only through the composite study of the lives of individuals,
era by era, that we are able to arrive at the full and true story
of the world's activities in the past which constitute what we
call history. He is not necessarily a profound student of
history who has discovered that its principal epochs have been
marked by wars. Under this tendency simple greed of power,
oft times, has been recorded as unselfish patriotism and undue
•To the President and Members of the Kittochtinny Historical Society:
As a committee appointed by the Society, we visited Mont Alto
and neighborhood to gather additional information as to the place of
the capture of John Esten Cook of the John Brown liberating army.
Mr. Ward Seibert, of Chambersburg, was working at the stone
32
ambition as a shining virtue. Doubtless the " historian of
every time has found it to be a more facile undertaking to
make his periods of recountal coincident with and largely
dependent for interest upon the periods of organized strife,
and the actors therein have naturally stood forth as the chief
figures in the story, with the result that many, too many, of
the characters potential in the agencies of civil life and factors
in the important problems relating to the advance of civiliza-
tion and arising in times of peace have been superficially ad-
verted to if not wholly neglected.
The muster roll of the military characters of Pennsyl-
vania is a long one, and albeit the full measure of appreciation
and recognition of their self-sacrifice and patriotic service has
not been meted out to them, yet to a degree they share in the
stirring "story and song of the past," to be found in the
printed pages of the history of our land.
But aside from those who, by their military prowess con-
tributed to the general grand result of the building of our
State and Nation were the men in the more quiet walks of
house near the Episcopal Church at Mont Alto on the day of the
capture, and witnessed the scuffle and arrest. Coleman Reed, of
Mont Alto, then a boy eleven years of age, saw the occurrence, and
was with us when we inspected the ground. The Rev. "Wm. H.
Heaton, rector of the Episcopal Church at the, time, describes the
place and character of the struggle and capture in a letter to the
Rev. E. V. Collins, dated July 9, 1908. We also consulted Edward B.
Wiestling and others. From all the evidence before us it may be
concluded to a certainty that Captain Cook approached his captors
from the north and that the struggle began but a few yards from the
church, and that the prisoner was finally subdued and disarmed after
crossing the stream and reaching the public road leading from the
village to Mont Alto to the site of the old furnace.
We recommend that the place of his capture be marked by a
large boulder from the mountain nearby; that it be properly dressed,
and a bronze tablet with a suitable inscription placed on it.
October 26, 1909, will be the fiftieth anniversary of the capture
and we consider it a suitable time for the dedication. The fiftieth
anniversary of John Brown's raid and capture will be commemo-
rated next October at Harper's Ferry, and the general interest created
in this would he helpful to our Society in securing the necessary
funds. We have made no estimate of the cost of the memorial, which
will have to be raised by private subscription. **»»«»
Respectfully submitted,
JOHN G. ORR,
W. RUSH GILLAN,
IlTNN HARBAUGH,
October 29 1908.
33
civil life, many of whom who devoted their lives to public
service are rewarded with scarcely the mention of their names
in the history of their times. Of one of this class of almost
forgotten patriots it is my purpose, with your kind indul-
gence, to talk to you only a little while in this paper, this
evening.
The old "Conococheague Settlement," as Green Castle
and its vicinity were called in the early days, seemed to pre-
sent a peculiar attraction as a point of settlement for a class
of superior men. To particularize in this connection would
not be feasible. Sufifice it to say that they made themselves
felt, as the saying is, in those early days of political evolution.
In this coterie, a ruling spirit and a recognized leader was one
James McLene — M-c-L-e-n-e, not M-c-L-e-a-n, as once or
twice improperly spelled in the official records, nor yet
M-c-C-1-a-i-n, a totally different family name. James was the
son of William McLene and was born in New London, Ches-
ter County, Pennsylvania, on the 14th day of October 1730.
Notwithstanding this fact James was readily mistaken for a
native of Ireland. One who stood high in government service
and was intimately acquainted with McLene and his col-
leagues in public life (Charles Biddle, vice President Su-
preme Executive Council), speaking of his association with
them says : "When I first took my seat in Council (Supreme
Executive Council), not having been acquainted with any
people from the western country, I thought from their con-
versation, that McLene, Boyd, Smith and Whitehill were
Irishmen. * * * * * Talking one day with Smith
(i) (who had as much of the brogue and look of an Irishman
as any one who ever came from Tipperary) about being at
sea, he told me he never was at sea in his life. 'And how, my
honey,' says Dean who was sitting by me and who also
thought him from Ireland, 'did you get to Philadelphia ?'
'Why I rode here. 'And arrah honey ! did you ride here all
(1) Col. Abraham Smith who represented Franklin County in
the Supreme Executive Council from 1784 to 1790, was a native of
the county and a resident of Antrim Township and the brother of
William Smith, the founder of Mercer burg.
34
the way from Ireland ? I never heard of a bridge between
the two countries. 'Divil a bet of me,' says Smith, 'was ever
out of Pennsylvania/ And this I found was true and that
McLene, Whitehill and Boyd were all born in Pennsylvania.
People who live in an Irish settlement, or who are much with
the Irish generally affect the brogue."
McLene was fortunate in enjoying more opportunities in
the way of an education than were ordinarily available at that
period. During his boyhood New London, the place ol his
birth, was the seat of a classical academy, which under the
charge of the Rev. Francis Allison, a man of large scholarly
attainments, had become deservedly celebrated as an institu-
tion of learning. At this academy James was educated, in
company with such worthy companions as Charles Thompson
afterwards Master of the Quaker Free School in Philadelphia,
Secretary of the Conference of Committees and of the Con-
tinental Congress ; Thomas McKean who became Chief
Justice of the Supreme Court and second Governor. of Penn-
sylvania under the Constitution of 1790; George Reed and
James Smith, signers of the Declaration of Independence, and
other men who became prominent.
In the year 1753 James McLene, then a young man of
twenty-three years of age, attracted by the fame of the "Con-
ococheague Settlement," the name, as we know, which the
early settlers in old Antrim Township, Cumberland (now
Franklin) County had given to their home, took up a valuable
tract of land there and having married, July 5th, 1753, Chris-
tina Brown, of that vicinity, located the next year, upon his
purchase. Here he seems to have pursued for twenty years
and upwards the usual avocation of a yoeman of the frontier,
with no event in his early career, except his evident growth
in popularity, to challenge particular mention, until the thun-
der of the Revolution awoke him to activity in an important
sphere of labor for the cause of freedom.
Among the "number of gentlemen" who met at Carpen-
ter's Hall in Philadelphia on the i8th of June, 1776, was Mr.
James McLene from the County of Cumberland. These
35
gentlemen were deputed by the committees of tlic several
counties of the Province to join in Provincial Conference to
take action upon the resolution of t"he Continental Congress
of May 15th, 1776, which called upon the Colonies, "to adopt
such governments as shall in the opinion of the representa-
tives of the people, best conduce to the happiness and safety
of their constituents in particular and America in general."
Mr. McLene's colleagues from Cumberland County in
this conference were : Col. James Allison, John McClay,
Esq., William Eliot, Esq., Col. William Clark, Dr. John Cal-
hoon, John Creigh, Hugh McCormick and Hugh Alexander.
In the deliberations of this conference, the importance of
which it is not necessary to enlarge upon, Mr. McLene took
an active part. The conference lasted but one week, yet in
that time all the preliminaries for calling a State Convention
and for choosing representatives thereto, were arranged. Be-
sides this, important measures demanded by the exigencies of
the times and not strictly within the legitimate scope of the
conference were adopted. The most important of them was
the establishment of the Pennsylvania Flying Camp, a militia
force of 4500 raised in obedience to a resolution of Congress
and subsequently sent to the relief of General Washington's
army on Long Island. The disasters of the Continental army
at Fort Washington and in the battles on the Island were
shared to the utmost by this brave body of Pennsylvania
yoemen who have been accorded scarcely a mention in his-
tory. James McLene was on the committee which devised
the ways and means of raising the Flying Camp and of fitting
the organization to take the field.
Having been so closely and in so able and effective a
manner identified with the work of the Provincial Conference
Mr. McLene was logically chosen one among the members
selected from his County of Cumberland of the Constitutional
Convention which met in Philadelphia on the 15th of July.
1776, to complete the work begun in the conference and frame
a constitution for the State. Of this body, the deliberations
of which lasted a little over two months, he was an attentive
36
and aggressive member and here, doubtless, gained much of
that intimate knowledge of public men and manners which
fitted him for intelligent service in those positions of kindred
character which he subsequently filled ably and with credit
to himself and his constituency.
The other members of this convention from Cumberland
County — then including Franklin — were James Brown, Hugh
Alexander, William Clarke, Robert Whitehill, Jonathan Hoge^
John Harris, William Duffield.
Just as natural was the next step McLene took from the
convention to frame the fundamental law of the new govern-
ment of the State to the first Assembly of Representatives to
enact the statute law.
All of McLene's colleagues from the home county in the
Constitutional Convention, with the exception of Jonathan
Hoge, from the lower end, served with him in the Assembly
of 1776-7. During this session the good common sense and
executive ability of McLene is strongly indicated by the
character of the committees upon which he served and the
manner in which he performed his work. His attention as a
member of the Military Committee was closely given to for-
mulating a practicable militia system for the state. He w3.^
one of the Assemblymen of Pennsylvania delegated to confer
with the delegates of Maryland and Virginia respecting the
boundary lines, some point of that vexed question, notwith-
standing the impending war, at that time demanding at-
tention ; and when the British army took possession of Phila-
delphia and the adoption of extreme measures in the councils-
of the patriots became necessar}^ he was named on a com-
mittee to prepare a bill to authorize the President and Coun;iI
of Pennsylvania to suspend the habeas corpus Act. He was
also on the committee to devise a plan to prevent and punish
the giving of supplies and intelligence to the enemy.
In the session of 1777-8 the record of McLene as a leader
is still more marked. He was elected Speaker of the As-
sembly on the 20th of November, 1777, and served in that im-
portant capacity until the 20th of February, 1778, when he
37
voluntarily resigned the position and John Bayard was chosen
as his successor.
In March, 1778, a difficulty which seems to have been of
a somewhat serious nature, occurred between the Pennsyl-
vania authorities and the Continental Board of War, relative
to supplies for the army, ordered by Congress, then in session
at York. The precise nature of this difficulty is not apparent,
owing to the omission of the record concerning the same in
the minutes of the Council and Assembly. Pennsylvania had
a grievance and set it forth in an address from the Council
and Assembly to Congress. James McLene and Robert
Whitehill, members of Assembly, one from the upper end ana
the other from the lower end of Cumberland County were, on
the 6th of March, appointed a committee to go to Yorktown
and present to Congress the joint representation of the Penn-
sylvania Council and Assembly. Congress took steps to re-
move this grievance and in a short time subsequently passed
the following resolve with reference to the same :
"That Congress conceive all cause of complaint against
the instructions of the Board of War to their superintendents
must now cease, as three of said superintendents have been
dismissed, and it is expressly enjoined upon the others to
conform to the regulations of the State in which they are from
time to time employed."
On the 6th of November, 1778, McLene having won the
confidence of the people by his service in the Supreme Legis-
lative bratich of the new government, was advanced to a seat
in the Supreme Executive branch, viz : the Supreme Execu-
tive Council. For the choice of Councillors the State was di-
vided into three districts, the first consisting of the city of
Philadelphia and the three original counties of the State. The
remaining districts were made to consist of four counties
each. In the first district one Councillor was chosen from the
city of Philadelphia and one from each of the counties, Phila-
delphia, Chester and Bucks, to serve three years ; in the sec-
ond district one Councillor was chosen from each of the
counties, Lancaster, York, Cumberland and Berks, to serve
38
two years, and in the third district one Councillor was chosen
from each of the counties, Northampton, Bedford, Northum-
berland and Westmoreland, to serve one year. jMcLene was
chosen a Councillor to represent Cumberland County by the
people of the second district, at the October election 1778 and
served tw'o years.
James McLene is next recorded as sitting with the Con-
tinental Congress. Of that important body he was an able
and active member, during the trying session of 1779-80. His
colleagues from Pennsylvania in the Congress were John
Armstrong, Frederic A. Muhlenberg, William Shippen and
James Searle. It was indeed a time that tried men's souls.
Who can measure the importance of the problems which
those unselfish patriots, who constituted the Continental Con-
gress were called upon to solve, particularly at the period
when McLene took his seat among them ? The finances of
the country were in a wretched condition. The doctrine of
state's rights in its most radical form was rampant. The
sufiferings of the rank and file of the army ; the petty jealousies
of the officers and the secret distrust of men high in authority
constantly fostered by the envy of ambitious subordinates and
the hidden machinations of the tory element, were enough to
fill the days of these single-minded patriots with anxiety and
their nights with suspense. Yet, they never wavered in their
allegiance and service and the shadow of scandal never fell
upon any of their acts.
The framers of the Pennsylvania Constitution of 1776
evidently looked upon the result of their labors simply as an
experiment. They seemed to believe that the body politic
created under that instrument, following the analogy of the
human body would undergo radical changes in a period not
exceeding seven years. Accordingly by the terms of the Con-
stitution itself, it was provided that at the end of that time,
namely in the year 1783 (and every seventh year thereafter) a
so-called Council of Censors should be chosen by ballot con-
sisting of two persons from each county and city in the State.
The duty of the Council of Censors was defined to be to hi-
39
quire whether the Constitution had been preserved inviolate
in every part and whether the legislative and executive
branches of the government had performed their duty as
guardians of the people's rights or had assumed or exercised
other or greater powers than they were entitled to under the
Constitution. They were also to inquire whether the public
taxes had been justly levied and collected in all parts of the
Commonwealth, in what manner the monies had been dis-
posed of, and whether the laws had been duly executed. For
these purposes they had the power to send for persons and
papers and records. They also had authority to pass public
censures, to order impeachments and recommend to the Leg-
islature the repeal of such laws as appeared to them to have
been enacted contrary to the principles of the Constitution.
Theirs was also the right, upon consent of two-thirds of their
number, to call a convention to meet within two years after
their sitting, if there appeared to them an absolute necessity
of amending any article of the Constitution which was, in
their judgment, defective, explaining such as were not clearly
expressed and of adding such as were necessary for the pres-
ervation of the rights and happiness of the people. But all
proposed changes were to be promulgated for the considera-
tion of the people at least six months before the election of
delegates to a convention. Think of the power of such a
tribunal and of the high standard of the men who could safely
be entrusted with the performance of its functions !
In the Council of Censors which began its first session
Monday, November loth, 1783, James McLene and William
Irvine were the representatives from Cumberland County.
With them sat many of the ablest men of the State and the
record of their deliberations is full of matters of importance
and interest to the student of the technicalities of govern-
ment. The original Constitution of our present form of State
government bears in many particulars the impress of the
opinions of this Council, and is largely the result of its labors.
McLene was a member of its chief committee which was ap-
pointed to inquire whether the Constitution had been pre-
40
served inviolate in every part. It was this committee also,
albeit with the reluctant consent of McLene, which recom-
mended the bi-cameral system of legislation and suggested
the propriety of restricting the exercise of the executive power
to a single person.
In the year 1783, McLene was chosen to represent Cum-
berland County, a second term, in the Supreme Executive
Council, and the new County of Franklin having been created
from Cumberland, in 1784, he was elected in October of that
year to serve still another term in that body as the representa-
tive of the new county. Charles Biddle, who in turn filled
the offices of Vice President and Secretary of this Council, (in
his autobiography written in 1803), speaks of the situation of
affairs in this body in 1784, as follows : "Council was nearly
equal at this time with respect to parties. The Republican
members were Messrs. Neville, Hill, Muhlenburg, Ross, Will-
ing, Boyd and Elliott. The Constitutionalists were Messrs.
McLene, Whitehill, Smilie, Findley, Watts, Smith, Dean,
Hoge and Martin. The distinction was that the Republicans
wanted an alteration in the Constitution. They wished to
have a House of Representatives and a Senate. The other
party thought no alteration necessary. * * * -^Yg j^^^j
frequent and violent disputes between these members upon
political subjects, but they were of little consequence then,
and can be of none now. The best informed man of either
party and the readiest of business was Mr. Hoge, but he was
so diffident a man that if we had a full Council he could never
rise to make a motion, or even to second one. He was a
worthy, valuable man. McLene, Whitehill, Smilie and Find-
ley are all sensible men. They would not be the least em-
barrassed in speaking before any assembly whatever. Smilie
and Findley are natives of Ireland ; the former was brot up
a house carpenter, the latter a weaver. They are both men
of talents and if they had received a good education would
have made figure in any legislative body. McLene and
Whitehill are Pennsylvanians. These four had been leading
41
members of the State Legislature. They are all now living.
* * McLene has retired from public business."
By an Act of Assembly passed in 1782 the President and
Vice President and a member of the Supreme Executive
Council appointed by the Council for that purpose, together
with the Secretary of the Land Office, the Receiver General
and the Surveyor General for the time being were required to
sit as a Board of Property to hear and determine all cases of
controversy in regard to the title of lands in the Common-
wealth. The President or Vice President served on this
Board as long as he continued in office but a different member
of Council was chosen to serve each month. During the year
1786 and 1787 owing to the sickness of President Benjamin
Franklin, Vice President Charles Biddle presided over the
Board of Property and James McLene sat as Council's mem-
ber during the months of September 1786 and June 1787.
After his retirement from the Council, McLene was again
elected to the Assembly and represented the County of Frank-
lin until 1789. This service covered the exciting period, when
the adoption or rejection of a Federal Constitution was an
issue 1786-7. In a paper read before this Society, on another
occasion, I told the story of the part played in this drama by
a representative of Franklin County, one James McCalmont ;
how by his enforced detention in the Assembly a quorum was
maintained that the vote might be taken to call a convention
to elect delegates to a Federal Constitutional Convention.
McLene at the beginning of this period was a member of the
Supreme Executive Council, but later, the same year, was
sent to the Assembly and as a prominent member and leader
of the so-called "Anti-Federalists" was an adviser of McCal-
mont and the other protesting members of the Assembly and
a forceful aider and abettor of their filibustering plans to pre-
vent the Pennsylvania Assembly from acting upon the Fed-
eral Constitution resolution.
The election of delegates to represent Philadelphia in the
State convention to consider the Federal Constitution, was
held at the State House Tuesday, November 6th, 1787. Mc-
42
Lene, with Abraham Smith, a member of Council from Frank-
lin County, succeeding McLene, and James McCalmont, John
Piper and William Findley, fellow members of the Assembly
with McLene, were on that election night in Philadelphia,
stopping at their well known lodging place, the house of one
Adam Boyd, on Sixth Street. About midnight this coterie of
statesmen were awakened from their honestly-earned slum-
bers by the onslaught of a howling mob, which attacked the
house and treated its inmates in a most outrageous manner.
The story of that attack I will tell you as McLene himself
told it when four days later he rose to a question of personal
privilege as a member in the Assembly : (2)
It was Saturday, November loth. The order of the day
was the election of a State Treasurer. On motion of Mr. Alc^
Lene the House consented to postpone the order of the dav,
and Mr. McLene addressed his fellow members :
Mr. McLENE. "It is with the greatest diffidence I rise
to represent some facts which in my opinion respect more the
dignity and honor of this house than the personal safety and
resentments of those who are individually interested. As a
member of the Legislature it is my duty to guard and protect
its privileges in whatever form they may be attacked; and
even Mr. Speaker, when so humble a member as he who ad-
dresses you now, has been made the means of offering an
insult to the House, the offence which is but trivial when we
consider the man, becomes of great importance when we con-
sider his office. For these reasons therefore, I think myself
bound to lay before the House, the circumstances of com-
plaint to which I have alluded; but to their wisdom I shall
implicitly submit the measures which are proper to be pur-
sued upon the occasion.
"About midnight on Tuesday last a great concourse of
people assembled opposite to the house of Mr. Alexander
Boyd in which several other members of this House with
myself and several members of the Supreme Executive Coun-
( 2 ) Pennsylvania and the Federal Constitution. McMaster and
Stone, pp. 204 etc. Lloyd's Debates.
43
cil lodged, and at that time had retired to our respective
chambers. The persons thus assembled made a considerable
noise in the streets and at length assailed Mr. Boyd's house,
beating loudly at the door and breaking the windows,
through which they threw some very large stones, etc., ex-
claiming repeatedly, 'here the damned rascals live who did all
the mischief,' and using other words highly reproachful to
the members of this House and of the Executive Council.
What were the motives of the rioters for this conduct, 1 do
not know, nor am I solicitous to inquire; but having stated
these facts, I am confident every gentleman here is ready to
express his disapprobation of the proceedings, so grossly in
violation of the law of the land, and the established privilege
of this House."
It was a dignified and earnest speech and had its effect.
Mr. Findley, though he was aware as he stated that it
was neither conventional nor necessary to support with other
evidence what Mr. McLene had presented and that it would
receive the fullest credit, yet as he was solicitous to put the
authenticity of the facts stated beyond all doubt he presented
affidavits of disinterested eye witnesses setting forth fully the
facts of the outrage. By another member, Mr. Kennedy, a
resolution was then ofifered authorizing and empowering the
Executive Council to offer a reward for the discover}^ of the
offenders and requiring them to direct the Attorney General
to prosecute the offenders when apprehended. The extreme
Federalists in the Assembly, such as Mr. Peters and Mr.
Lewis, true to the partisan spirit of the day, endeavored to
delay the passage of the resolution and had it referred to a
special committee. The resolution, however, was eventually
and with little delay reported favorably and adopted. Presi-
dent Benjamin Franklin of the Executive Council, within a
week issued his proclamation denouncing "the authors of
such high contempts so inconsistent with the dignity and
good order of government;" offering a reward of $300 for the
apprehension of the offenders and enjoining those legally
charged with the duty "to make diligent search and enquiry
44
after, and to use their utmost endeavors to apprehend and se-
cure the said rioters, their aiders, abettors and comforters, so
that they may be dealt with according to law." This was a
high sounding but perfunctory act; the "utmost endeavors"
of the officers of the law were nil. In that early stronghold of
Federalism, Philadelphia, nothing ever came of the matter
and it became a forgotten episode of an exciting political
campaign as is the fate of all such matters even unto the
present day. The episode is alluded to here only as a pointer
to the aggressive character of McLene.
Retiring from his seat in the Assembly in 1789, not a
whit less popular, McLene was chosen a member of the con-
vention which framed the State Constitution of 1790, and
subsequently, after the adoption of that Constitution, was
again immediately returned to the General Assembly as a
member of the first House of Representatives, and faithfullv
serving two terms more, he retired in 1794 to the quiet of his
home in Antrim Township. Six years later, March «i8th, 1800,
when he had reached the ripe old age of seventy he was com-
missioned a Justice of the Peace, his active spirit refusing to
rest even after nearly half a century of earnest, important
service to the public.
In the quiet country, about four miles northeast of Green-
castle, now the principal town in old Antrim Township, there
may still be seen the remains of an ancient burial place. It
has been sadly neglected. Brambles and myrtle choke up its
paths, a few unkempt forest trees cast their shadows upon its
shattered and moss covered tombstones. This is "Brown's
Mill Graveyard." The ravages of Time may have rendered
it impossible for us to tell which of the neglected humble me-
morial stones covers his remains, yet here rests the body of
Hon. James McLene, who died on the 13th day of March,
A. D. 1806, aged seventy-five years, four months and twenty-
seven days. Idoneus Homo. (3)
(3) The will of James McLene was probated March 31st, 1806,
and left of record in the Recorder's Office of Franklin County in
Will Book "B" page 283. By its provisions the home tract of land
45
120 acres in Antrim Township known as "Mount Pleasant," is given
to Ills wife Christina; also a valuable cane and all the gold in his
possession. Other beneficiaries were his sons : Daniel McLene,
Thomas Brown McLene, James McLene (in Westmoreland, now In-
diana County), Lazarus B. McLene (Indiana County) and John Mc-
Lene and his daughters, Mary McLene Smith (Samuel Smith) and
E. McLene McPheron (Samuel McPheron).
46
THE EPISCOPAL CHURCH IN THE CUMBERLAND
VALLEY
BY REV. E. V. COLLINS.
Entertained by Captain Geo. W. Skinner, in Assembly
room of Chambersburg Trust Company, Wednesday evening,
Nov. 25, 1908. Large attendance of members, among the
latter being prominent members of the Hamilton Library
Association, Carlisle, Pa., Rev. Alex. McMillan, Archdeacon
of the Diocese; Professor J. T. "WTiite, of Dickinson College,
Colonel E. B. Watts, Senator Miller and Jere Zeamer. At
the conclusion of the reading of the paper, the President of
the Society called upon the distinguished visitors, who respond-
ed with happy speeches. Archdeacon McMillan said he was
glad to hear so much of interest relating to his parish. Old
St. Johns, and supplemented Mr. Collins' paper with many
additional facts of history. He was followed by Mr. Zeamer,
"One who knows it and never forgets it." Brief remarks
were also made by Colonel Watts, Dr. Martin, John G. Orr,
Judge Gillan and William S. Hoerner, Esq. The social hour
was one of special delight, and the refreshments par-excel-
lent. In the reception which followed in the banquet hall,
Mrs. Skinner was assisted by her daughter, Mrs. H. V.
Black, Mrs. Collins, Mrs. Tunis, Mrs. Suesserott, Mrs. Gillan,
Miss Julia Culbertson, of Lewistown, and Miss Kathleen
Watts.
At the business meeting the following committee was
appointed on Bibliography : M. A. Foltz, Colonel James R.
Gilmore and Linn Harbaugh, Esq.
As even a church door is approached by steps, so I may
be pardoned, I trust, if I take the liberty of leading up to my
subject of the Episcopal Church in the Cumberland Valley,
by taking some preliminary steps, showing the national his-
tory of that church, and her position with regard to the
history of the State and country at large.
It is with pardonable pride that our Church recalls the
fact that the earliest record of a church service in the English
language within the present limits of the United States is
that of a celebration of the Holy Communion by Rev. Francis
Fletcher, chaplain to Sir Francis Drake's expedition, on the
shore of San Francisco Bay, some time in June of 1579.
The famous attempt of Sir Walter Raleigh to plant a
47
colony on Roanoke Island in 1587 resulted in disaster, and is
marked in the history of the Church chiefly by the baptism
of the Indian Chief, Manteo, on August 13th, and Virginia
Dare on August 20th of that year. These are the earliest
authenticated records of baptisms in America, and were per-
formed by a Church of England clergyman.
Shortly after the destruction of the Spanish Armada in
1588, two English vessels visited the harbor of what is now
Plymouth, and remained for six weeks. As it was the custom
of the times to carry chaplains on such expeditions, it is
quite probable that Church of England services were held on
that "stern and rock bound coast" at least twenty-five years
before the Pilgrim Fathers landed with their celebrated free-
dom to worship God, provided it was done their way.
In 1605 Sir Geo. Weymouth visited the coasts of Maine,
and erected a cross on Monhegan Island to show that Chris-
tians had been there. On Sunday, Aug. 9th, 1607, a second
expedition stopped at the island, and the chaplain, Richard
Seymour, held a service by the cross. This was the first re-
ligious service held in New England, of which there is any
record. The colony was, however, soon abandoned.
As it is to \'irginia that we must look for the first settle-
ment of English speaking people, of a permanent character,
so too, as a part of that settlement, the very heart of it, we
must note the first religious services at Jamestown.
The colonists landed on Wednesday, May 13th, 1607. On
Thursday they began the erection of a fort. They prepared
for Sunday by hanging an old sail from some trees to shelter
them from the wind and rain, "their walls were rails of wood,
their seats unhewed trees, their pulpit a bar of wood." "This,"
said John Smith, "was our church, till we built a homely thmg
like a barne, set upon crotchets, covered with rafts, sedge, and
earth ; so was also the walls. We had daily Common Prayer,
morning and evening, every Sunday two sermons, and every
three months the Ploly Communion, till our minister died ; but
our prayers daily with a homily on Sundays, we continued
two or three years after, till more preachers came." They
48
had their first Communion on the 21st of June, being the
third Sunday after Trinity.
The pioneer of this permanent church work was the Rev.
Robert Hunt, and his influence in the councils of the colony
was of great value. More than once he reconciled the people
when dissensions threatened to break up the work.
Not long after the colony was established, they lost their
pastor, probably in what was known as the "Starving Time."
He was followed by Rev. Alex. Whittaker, who shares with
John Elliott, of New England, the title of Apostle to the In-
dians. He it was who baptized Pocahontas in 161 1.
The first elective Assembly in the New World met in
Jamestown Church in 1619, being opened with the use of
Prayer Book collects by one of the church clergy .
From the first landing of the colonists at Jamestown, is
to be reckoned the real beginnings of social, political and re-
ligious life on the Western continent, among English speaking
people.
It is a notable fact that the experiences of this colony
were duplicated by those of Plymouth, thirteen years later.
Trouble with the Indians, starvation, cold, sickness, and death
came near to exterminating both. American historians have
had a way of speaking slightingly of the Virginians as being
cavaliers and aristocrats, but this is manifestly unjust. Both
colonies were for the most part, of the same sturdy middle
class of English life. The historians, being mostly of New
England origin, have laid more stress upon the virtues of the
northern colonists, and have given less consideration to those
of the Virginians. It is a simple axiom to say that neither
was perfect in this respect, considering the times, and the
culture and refinement which marked them, but we may not
safely deny that the prayers of Virginia were as earnest and
heartfelt as those of New England.
Passing by the religious beginnings of the other colonies,
we come to the next step leading to my subject; the intro-
duction of the Episcopal Church, otherwise known as the
Church of England into the colony of Pennsylvania.
49
As this same church was not particularly dear to many
of the immigrants from England, it is not remarkable that it
had a hard time of it in some localities. This was especially
true of some of the northern colonies.
The laws of Penn, however, laid some stress upon relig-
ious toleration, and we find that, while the Quakers did not
care over much for the Church of England, they none the
less permitted it to exist in Pennsylvania.
Among the early settlers of Penn's colony were many
Welshmen, who were devout members of the English Church.
Having no clergymen of their own, they became to a large
extent, identified in worship, with their Quaker brethren.
The first Episcopal clergyman in Pennsylvania was prob-
ably a Rev. Mr. Sewell, who came from Maryland. The first
settled pastor was probably Rev. Mr. Clayton in charge of
Christ Church parish, Philadelphia, about 1695.
In 1700 a petition, signed by one hundred Welshmen,
most of whom lived in and near Radnor and Merion, was
sent to the Bishop of London, asking for a clergyman who
could speak and understand both Welsh and English. This
clergyman. Rev. Evan Evans, seems to have been the real
pioneer of our Church in Pennsylvania, and he labored most
successfully among his countrymen in and near Montgomery
County. Christ Church, Philadelphia, was begun about 1695,
probably by Rev. Mr. Clayton, and Mr. Evans was his imme-
diate successor. The parish had a small one-story church,
and their bell was hung in the crotch of a tree. Among the
rectors of Christ Church we may note the name of Rev. Jacob
Duche, the first chaplain to Congress, and also that of Bishop
William White, who likewise served as chaplain to that body
at the time when the British entered Philadelphia.
The English Society for the Promotion of the Gospel in
Foreign Parts was founded in 1701, and it supported many of
the early missionaries of the Church of England in the
American colonies, and among others, those of the central
portion of Pennsylvania. The Digest of the Society tells us
of a Rev. Wm. Lindsay, M. A., of Glasgow University, who
50
went to America in 1733. He returned for ordination, and
was sent out as an itinerant missionary in Pennsylvania 1735-
1745. He was probably the first of our missionaries to visit
these parts.
As early as 1734 an Episcopal Church was built at Con-
estoga, about fifteen miles from Lancaster; this was probably
at the mouth of the creek bearing that name.
The parish in Lancaster, St. James, was organized in
1744. In the records of St. James under date of Oct. 3d, 1744,
we read that "Rev. Richard Locke accidentally coming into
this our borough a little before ye date hereof, we agreed to
give him what encouragement we could for his residence
amongst us. And tho' destitute of any sett place of worship
for performing ye Divine Service of ye Church of England,
and its members here but very few, yet in order to keep up
and maintain ye polity or government of ye Church, we have
met this day for chusing Church wardens and Vestrymen,
when the foUov/ing were unanimously chosen ;"
Churchwardens :
Thos. Cookson, Esq.
John Postlethwaite.
Vestrymen :
Edward Smout, Esq.
Daniel Syng.
Wm. Bristow.
John Folke.
Morgan Morgan.
John Connolly.
Mr. Locke reported to the Society in 1748 that he was
still in Lancaster County, that there is no other clergyman
near the place, and that he meets with opposition and cannot
get a church yet. He says, "the Jesuits, Moravians, and New
Lights are overrunning the country and gaining ground, and
the Justices and governing part are all of that disposition,
though here are a great many well disppsed people, but scat-
tered about the country, that 'tis impossible under the present
circumstances of the place that they should have a proper
SI
supply." "I have constantly attended a Welsh Church every
Sunday at about 20 miles distant, and have preached and ad-
ministered the Sacraments in several other places about the
country since last March." Mr. Locke left Lancaster shortly
after this, and was succeeded by Rev. Geo. Craig, an ex-curate
in England to the Rev. Dr. Bristowe (who was itinerant in
Pequea, Lancaster, Carnarvon (now Churchtown, Lancaster
County), Huntingdon (now extinct, two and a half miles from
York Springs, also called Petersburg), and Carlisle, 1748-
1757, finally settling permanently in Lancaster .
Among the early missionaries of the Church of England
sent into this region by the Venerable Society, there was one,
the Rev. Thomas Barton, who appears to have been a man
of more than usual ability and force. He was born in Ireland
in 1730, and educated at Trinity College, Dublin. Soon after
graduating he came to America, and was assistant instructor
in Philadelphia Academy, (now University of Pennsylvania).
Although a layman, he was greatly interested in the peo-
ple and work of the Church in the colony and particularly
out on the frontier, and made occasional visits to York, Hunt-
ingdon, and Carlisle. Being urged by the people, he returned
to England for ordination, remaining two years in prepara-
tion. The Society sent him back to America as a missionary
in the counties of York and Cumberland, being located at
Huntingdon. He arrived in Philadelphia April i6th, 1755,
and in his first report to the Society he said, "My first busi-
ness was to visit and make myself acquainted with the state
and numbers of the three congregations at York, Huntingdon,
and Carlisle; and having seen the Wardens and Vestrymen in
each, they all met, and according to their numbers, agreed
mutually that I should officiate three Sundays in six at Hunt-
ingdon, two at Carlisle, and one at York. (Note that Hunt-
ingdon is now extinct, and that York is larger than Carlisle.)
"Upon hearing that within the limits of my mission there were
large numbers of the Communion of the Church of England,
in the settlements of Conococheague, Shippensburg, Sher-
man's Valley, West Pennsborough. and ^^larot's Creek, I de-
52
termined to visit each of these places four times a year to
prepare them for the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper, and to
baptize their children. I had the pleasure to see my hearers
increase daily, which amounted to such a number in a few
weeks at Huntingdon, that I have been sometimes obliged to
preach to them under the covert of the trees, and when it was
my turn at Carlisle, I am told that people come ten, fifty and
sometimes sixty miles. The Dissenters also, (who are very
numerous in these parts) attended constantly, and seemed
well disposed, and always behaved themselves decently and
devoutedly. The more rational part of these appear well
reconciled to the Church, and some of the principal of them
offered generously to subscribe to me."
The Marot's Creek which he mentions as one of the
settlements visited, I have not been able to identify. It is just
possible that it was a settlement on Marsh Creek in Adams
County.
As evidence that Mr. Barton had the true missionary
spirit, we may see from the next quotation from his report :
"From the advantage of my situation, bordering upon nations
of savages, I entertain strong hopes that it might please the
Lord to make me the happy Instrument to subject some of
these poor Creatures to the Kingdom of God and of Jesus
Christ, and hearing that a number of them were come down
from the Ohio to Carlisle to dispose of their furr and deer
skins, I made it my business to go among them and endeavor,
as much as possible, to ingratiate myself into their good
opinion. Next morning I invited them to Church, and such
of them as understood English came and seemed very atten-
tive the whole time. When I came to visit them in the after-
noon, those that had been at the Church brought all their
brethren to shake hands with me, and pointing often upwards,
discoursed with one another, sometimes in their own lan-
guage. I imagine they were telling them what they had
heard, and indeed I observed them to be pleased with the re-
lation. Just when I was big with hopes of being able to do
service among these tawny people, we received the melan-
53
choly news that our forces under General Braddock were de-
feated on the 9th of July, as they were marching to Duquesne,
a French fort upon the Ohio. This was soon succeeded by
the alienation of the Indians in our interest, and from that
day to this poor Pennsylvania has felt incessantly the sad ef-
fects of Popish Tyranny and Savage Cruelty ! Carlisle is the
only remains of that once populous County. (Probably of
Cumberland.) They have a garrison of about 100 men, but
how long they will be able to defend themselves is very un-
certain, as they have threatened that place in particular. They
still have their share of my ministrations. I officiate some-
times in a barn, sometimes in a wastehouse, or whatever else
convenience offers."
In view of the fact that Mr. Barton and others had suc-
ceeded in converting some of the Indians, the Society made a
grant of one hundred pounds per annum for the training of
native teachers in the College of Philadelphia under Rev. Dr.
Smith. This was in 1756, and the subsequent troubles on the
frontier doubtless put an end to the plan.
As we see from his reports, these troubles with the
French and Indians began at about the time that Mr. Barton
took up his labors as a missionary in these parts. His flock
suffered with the rest, particularly in the Marsh Creek and
Huntingdon settlements, and at Carlisle, and so we see the
clergyman arming himself and his people for the defense of
their homes, the young men of his charges demanding that
he should lead them in the fight against the French and In-
dians. Thus we see him not only as a pastor of the Church,
but also as a captain in the frontier army.
Rupp's History of Pennsylvania says : "These settlements
would have been entirely broken up had it not been for the
great courage and perseverance of Rev. Thomas Barton. He
organized the settlers of Marsh Creek and Conewago Creek
into companies, obtained from the Governor of the Province
arms and ammunition, and himself took an active part in the
defence of his people, and their humble homes, hastening from
place to place, wherever his presence was required." In a
54
letter of Mr. Barton's we read that his churches were indeed
churches militant, subject to dangers and trials of the most
alarming kind, the people attending the services with muskets
on their shoulders, and declaring that they would "d3^e Pro-
testants and Freemen sooner than live Idoloters and Slaves,"
whatever they may have meant by that.
How highly Mr. Barton was regarded by the people of
the colony may be judged from the following testimonial of-
fered by the inhabitants of York County in 1756, and showing
their appreciation of his services to the colony : "He has dis-
tinguished himself at all times of public danger with so much
warmth and zeal in behalf of liberty and Protestantism, that
he endeared himself to his own people and to all Protestant
Dissenters as well."
In a letter from the colony to John Penn, who communi-
cated the same to the Society which sent out Mr. Barton, it
was said : "Mr. Barton deserves commendation of all lovers
of their country for he has put himself at the head of his con-
gregation, and marched, either by night or by day, on every
alarm."
In the duties for which he had been particularly sent into
this new country, he displayed the same energy and devotion.
It would seem from what can be found in the old records, that
Mr. Barton was for a long time the only missionary of the
Church of England in this part of the colony. His charge was
over 200 miles in extent, reaching from the eastern part of the
present county of Lancaster to and including all of the Cum-
berland Valley. In his report for 1763-4 he has this to say :
"The churches in this mission now make as decent appearance
as any in the Province, those of Philadelphia excepted. The
county of Lancaster contains 40,000 souls, but of this number
not more than 500 can be reckoned as belonging to the Church
of England. The rest are German Lutheran, Calvinists, Men-
nonites, Moravians, New Born, Dunkers, Presbyterians, Se-
ceders, New Lights, Covenanters, Mountain Men, Brownists,
Independents, Papists, Quakers, Jews, etc." His note of pride
when he said that "the Churches of the mission made as de-
55
cent appearance as any," is quite pardonable in the face of
such a Babel of names.
Rev. Mr. Barton was certainly a man of ability and
strong character, who did much in developing the crude so-
cial and spiritual life of the new country, and while a cloud
hung over the last years of his life, even that is a witness to
his uprightness and honesty. Like many of the missionaries
of the Church of England, his pay came very largely from
England, and honor kept him loyal to the mother country.
At one time he was chaplain to the forces of General Forbes,
and this brought him in contact with men who afterwards
were prominent in the Revolutionary War. Among them was
Washington. In 1759 Mr. Barton removed to Lancaster, as
the rector of St. James, where he remained until 1778, Avhen,
because of his loyalty to the Crown, he was compelled to
cease his work. He was kept a prisoner in his own house for
two years, and then, probably through his acquaintance with
Washington, he was allowed to pass within the British lines
at New York City, where he shortly after died and was buried
beneath St. George's Church.
Mr. Barton was twice married, his first wife being a sis-
ter of David Rittenhouse, the mathematician. His second
wife was a Miss Thornberry. He left eight children, of whom
one was a professor in the University of Pennsylvania, and
another a captain in the regular army.
It is a generally accepted fact that there must be a be-
ginning and an end of ever3'thing, and so I found when i
began to consider what should be the geographical scope of
the subject in hand. To give a history of the Episcopal
Church in the Cumberland Valley, I must confine myself
within definite limits, and so I started my historical journey,
so to speak, with Harrisburg, the northern gate of the Valley,
and ended it with Waynesboro, keeping within the limits of
the State, although it would be proper, perhaps, to have in-
cluded Hagerstown, its southern gate.
It is not really known just when the first services of our
Church were held in the Cumberland Valley, but it must
56
have been before the middle of the i8th Century, on one of
the itinerant journeys of the missionaries whose field con-
sisted of all the territory to the west and north of York and
Lancaster Counties, and beyond the Alleghenys.
Those journeys were for the purpose of looking up the
scattered members of the Church, to be found among the far
greater numbers of Lutherans and Presbyterians settled in
the Valley. Thus Rupp, speaking of the colony at Silver's
Spring, in Cumberland County, says that there were "some
of the Church of England, or Protestant Episcopal Church"
living in that settlement, and it is more than probable that
there were many isolated members of the English Church
scattered among the Scotch Irish and German settlers of the
Valley, to whom the missionary went, and who received from
him the Sacraments of their own Church.
We should note also that Rev. Mr. Barton speaks of the
work among the people at Conococheague, Marsh Creek,
Sherman's Valley, and West Pennsborough, and at Shippens-
burg. Probably we shall not be far wrong in crediting the
first service to the Rev. Wm. Lindsay as the first clergyman
of the Church of England to visit the Cumberland Valley.
HARRISBURG.
The earliest reference to the work of the Church in Har-
risburg is found in the report of the missionary at Lancaster,
Rev. Mr. Barton. The date of the report was Nov. loth, 1/66.
(This was only 13 years after the establishment of Harris's
Ferry.) In it he says : "Mr. John Cox, a merchant of Phila-
delphia, by a deed presented to the Society, gave a lot for
Church purposes in Estherton, lying about 40 miles northwest
of Lancaster on the Susquehanna, where there are several
families belonging to the Church, who are too great a dis-
tance from any stated missionary to attend divine service.
This gentleman has also promised to give 20 Pounds himself,
and collect 100 Pounds more among his friends in Philadel-
phia towards building a Church upon said lot, and his lady
engages to furnish the bell." There is no record that the
57
Church was ever built, but the English Society reported to
appoint an itinerant missionary to travel about from one va-
cant Church to another, and Estherton was included in this
charge. Thus it will be seen that, although Estherton was
older than Harris Ferry, the latter place took the lead, but
there must have been, at one time, established services there,
as it is stated that Bishop White preached there on several
occasions.
It is interesting to note here that within the last year or
two Bishop Darlington made the discovery that a vacant lot
in the northern part of the city of Harrisburg, on which no
building seemingly had ever been erected, is really the prop-
erty of the Episcopal Church, having been given years ago
for church purposes. It is not impossible that this is the
same lot which was given by Mr. Cox.
Estherton was probably named after the wife of the first
John Harris, whose maiden name was Esther Say.
Previous to 1823 there was no organized parish or regular
services of the Episcopal Church in the town or borough of
Harrisburg. In that year the first regular services were held
by Rev. Wm. A. Muehlenburg, of St. James, Lancaster. He
attempted to organize a parish, but the effort fell through.
Various clergymen served the place during the next few years.
In 1826 Rev. John Clemson took up his residence in Harris-
burg, and organized the work and founded St. Stephens
Church.
St. Paul's parish was begun as a Sunday School in 1858,
and has done an important work to the north and east of
capitol hill.
St. Andrews parish is of more recent growth,being found-
ed about eight years ago as an offshoot of St. Pauls, and
already rivals it in size.
Besides these three parishes, there are three missions in
the city, and one at Steelton. One of them, St. Augustine, is
doing a very good work among the colored people.
Before leaving Harrisburg, it will be interesting to note
58
that the original John Harris was a Yorkshireman, and it is
said that his wife, Esther Say, was also from the same place,
in England and that they weremembers of the English Church.
The inscription on his tombstone, which stands in Harris-
Park, reads as follows : "A Cruse Salus. JOHN HARRIS
of Yorkshire, England; the friend of William Penn and the
father of the founder of Harrisburg. Died Dec. 1748 in the
Communion of the Church of England."
The records show that John Harris H., the founder of
Harrisburg, was baptized in old Christ Church, Philadelphia,,
where his mother took him for that purpose.
MECHANICSBURG.
Situated as it is, near the eastern entrance of the Cum-
berland Valley, it is quite probable that Mechanicsburg was
visited by the early missionaries of the church, being a part of
the vast parish described by Rev. Thomas Barton in his re-
port. However, no effort was made to found a parish or mis-
sion there until 1877, when Rev. Francis Striker began ser-
vices in the hall of the Washington Fire Company. Before
this, occasional services had been held by clergymen from
Carlisle, Gettysburg, and probably Harrisburg.
Rev. Dr. Clerc, formerly of Carlisle, mentions having
visited the place in July of 1866. In 1879 a lot was purchased
and the cornerstone of St. Luke's Church was laid on Friday,
July 23d, 1880, Rev. Dr. Spalding, of York, representing
Bishop M, A. DeW. Howe. The church was consecrated
April 3d, 1881. The rectory was built and occupied in 1890.
The furniture of the church was designed and made by com-
municants of the parish. For a number of years one of the
parish organizations has been a Crafts Guild, which manufac-
tures church furniture, the profits of the same being devoted
to the endowment of the parish.
The rectors of St. Luke's have been Rev. Francis Strieker,.
Rev. F. H. Almon, Rev. J. E. C. Smedes, Rev. J. M. Blackwell,
Rev. O. H. Bridgman, and Rev. M. L. Tate. The present
pastor is the Rev. Wm. H. Beuford.
59
CARLISLE.
In the story of the strenuous ministry of the Rev. Thomas
Barton there has been given a suggestion of the early life of
St. John's Church, Carlisle. Just when the parish organiza-
tion became a fact is not known, but as early as 1753 the
present Public Square was laid out with a site for a church
indicated. It is probable that at or about that time the first
log church was built, and there was a parish organization as
early as 1755.
The first settled pastor was the Rev. Wm. Thomson, son
of the first Presbyterian pastor of the Church at Meeting
House Springs. It is said that in consequence of his father's
second marriage, Wm. Thomson left home and went to
England, where he was ordained a clergyman of the Episcopal
Church. His ordination took place in the chapel of Fulham
Palace, the home of the Bishop of London, in December, 1759,
and in the 24th year of his age.
His wife, Susanna Ross, was a sister of that Geo. Ross,
who was a signer of the Declaration of Independence, and
who practiced law for a number of years in Carlisle.
During the rectorate of Mr. Thomson a stone church was
erected, being finally completed in 1768, through the kind as-
sistance of the State, which granted power to certain members
to raise money by lottery for that purpose. As money for
churches was often raised in that way in those days, there is
no reason to doubt that they availed themselves of the privi-
lege. This, the second church built by the parish, was of
stone, two stories high, about 40x60 feet in size and without
external ornamentation.
This building stood until 1824, when the present structure
was erected. At first the spire stood at the east, or chancel
end, as is indicated in the old woodcuts of "the Public Square,
Carlisle," but it was later taken down and rebuilt at the west
or entrance end.
It was during the Rev. Mr. Thomson's rectorate that the
sufferings of the fugitives who had fled from the perils of
6o
Indian massacre, were in great measure relieved by the gen-
erosity of Christ and St. Peter's parishes, Philadelphia. The
church wardens carried about subscription papers and raised
the sum of 662 pound, 3 shillings. In addition to this, "large
supplies of flour, rice, medicines and other necessaries were
immediately forwarded to the relief of the suflferers. And to
enable those who chose to return to their plantations to de-
fend themselves against future attacks of the Indians, the
Vestry of Christ Church and St. Peter's were of the opinion
that the refugees should be furnished with two chests of
arms, and half a barrel of powder, four hundred pounds of
lead, two hundred of swan -shot, and one thousand flints."
Mr. Thomson remained in Carlisle until 1769, when he
was transferred to Trenton, N. J. He finally became rector of
Mary Anne Church, North Elk Parish, Cecil County, Md.,
where he died August i6th, 1785. He was followed by Rev.
John Andrews, who had charge of York and Cumberland
Counties from 1769 to 1772. He was a Marylander'by birth,
and later became Provost of the University of Pennsylvania
and Professor of Logic.
St. John, Carlisle, is the oldest parish in the Valley, and
an extended history of it would be but a tiresome recital of
uneventful records. As nearly as I can ascertain, the rectors
who followed were Rev. DanieF Batwell, during or just before
the Revolutionary War, and then I can give no names until
that of Rev. John Campbell, 1814-1819, J. V. E. Thorn, 1820-
21, G. H. Woodruff, 1821-22, Jos. Spencer, 1822, who was also
professor in Dickinson College. Rev. P. H. Greenleaf was
rector in 1840.
The first visit of Bishop White was on August 12th, 1821,
although he had then been Bishop for thirty-four years. On
the next day he confirmed the first class to receive that rite in
the Cumberland Valley, Bishop White visited Carlisle for
the second time October 20th, 1824. In 1825 he went on an
extended journey to the western part of the state, and to the
neighboring parts of West Virginia. On his way out he
visited St. Johns, and also on his return about a month later.
6i
Owing to the fact that the Army post was near St. Johns,
the parish has always had the help of army people, many of
whom belong to the Church. This partly accounts for her
greater strength, but it is largely due to the fact that the few
faithful members of the Church of England who were living
in and near the settlement at Le Tort Spring, were gathered
together by those faithful missionaries of the Society, and
that their faith and faithfulness were strengthened and nur-
tured by the earnest pastoral eflforts of those sent to seek
them out.
St. Johns, Carlisle, has sent several men into the ministry
of the Church, and some of them have attained high positions.
Bishop Samuel A. McCoskey, first bishop of Michigan,
was a native of Carlisle, and Rev. T. M. Riley, S. T. D., and
sometimes Professor of Ecclesiastical History, in Nashotah
Seminary, and later at the General Seminary in New York
City, was also born there.
Of the early laymen who were prominent in the Valley
and members of the Episcopal Church, we may note James
Wilson, signer of the Constitution, and James Ross, signer
of the Declaration of Independence ; Edward Shippen and Col.
James Burd, who were active in the settlement and defense
of the Valley.
SHIPPENSBURG.
The history of the Church in Shippensburg is scant, de-
spite the fact that it covers a century and a half in point of
time. The earliest known record of services in that town is
of a visit to the place by Rev. Thomas Barton in 1755.
Dr. Nevin, in his "Churches of the Valley," says of the
Presbyterian Church in Shippensburg, that it was late in
starting, because the town was under the influence of the
Church of England, and yet there is no visible evidence, and
little historical, of that fact. It may be that he made the as-
sertion on the ground that Mr. Edward Shippen, the founder
of the town, was a member of St. James, Lancaster, where he
was a vestryman, and where he was buried. Col. Burd, who
62
also lived there for a time, was a Church of England man.
The next record of services in the town I obtained from
Rev. Dr. Clerc, who died in January of 1907, in Phillipsburg,
Pa. Dr. Clerc was rector of St. Johns, Carlisle, from i860
to 1867 ; a young- and hardworking clergyman. To him fell
much of the care of the mission work of the South Central
part of the state from Altoona to, and including, Lancaster
County. In a letter received from him I learned that he
visited Shippensburg once, and held services among the trees
which surrounded the Old Meeting House. This was possibly
the old Presbyterian Church on Penn Street. In the early 70's
a mission was maintained there by Rev. W. G. Hawkins.
During the rectorate of Rev. H. C. Swentzel in Cham-
bersburg a very promising mission was established in Ship-
pensburg under the name of The Good Shepherd. This was
maintained until Mr. Swentzel removed to Honesdale, when it
went to pieces. The services were held in rooms over the
National Bank, on Main Street.
Rev. V. H. Berghaus and Rev. J. B. Meade also held
occasional services in homes of church people, but the time
was not ripe for the establishment of another mission.
The history of the present work, which began with a
visit of Bishop Talbot in February, 1903, is too recent to be
the subject of extended comment. The following June, aided
by Mr. C. J. Phillips and Mr. H. L. Mitten, the writer began
services eveiy two weeks, on Friday evenings in the. Reformed
Church. In the fall these were held at the homes of members,
until a room on Earl Street was fitted up, where the services
were held weekly until Easter of 1908, when the first Com-
munion service was held in the new church.
On the first Sunday of the year 1905, Mr. Phillips and
Mr. Mitten opened a Sunday School in the new room with an
attendance of eight. This has grown until there are over 70
names on the roll.
In May 1906, was begun the erection of a stone church
after the designs by Mr. T. J. Brereton, a vestryman of
Trinity Church, Chambersburg, and the cornerstone was laid
63
"by Bishop Darlinj^ton on July loth following, assisted by
Rev. Brownlee Smith, of Harrisburg, and Rev. Wm. Gamble,
of Renovo, together with the rector of Trinity Church,
Chambcrsburg. The music w^as rendered by the choir of
Trinity Church, Chambersburg.
A first service was held in the unfinished church just at
dusk on St. Andrew's Day, 1907, but the church was not com-
pleted until 1908.
CHAMBERSBURG.
The history of the parish in Chambersburg is a more diffi-
cult task than one would think, in view of its comparative
vouth, and the uneventful nature of its existence, but those
two facts, combined with an almost complete absence of
records up to the time I came here, have made it no easy task
to compile a respectable history of Trinity Church.
By dint of many questions asked by me in calling on the
older members of the parish, and the fortunate discovery that
the founder. Rev. Wm. S. Heaton, is still living in Philadel-
phia, I managed to get together a short history, the sub-
stance of which follows.
The property on which the church stands at the corner
of Second Street and Burkhart Avenue, erstwhile known as
Gas Alley, is a part of the original grant made by the Proprie-
taries of Pennsylvania to Benjamin Chambers in 1743, and is
known on the town plot of Chambersburg as Lot 100. It was
sold in 1779 by Colonel Benjamin Chambers to Robert Camp-
bel for the sum of one pound, ten shillings, lawful money of
Pennsylvania. A copy of the original deed, made in 1783, was
found a few years ago, together with many transfers of later
date.
The records of holdings from the giving of the first deed
until 1830 are not now in evidence, although a part of the
property at least must have been disposed of during that
time, for in 1830 the south half of Lot 100 was made subject
of inquisition, being the property left by one James Thomp-
son, who died without known heirs. The half lot was sold at
64
public sale to Dr. Samuel Culbertson in 1837, and by him sold
again to William and Samuel Seibert for $197.50. Releases
on the entire lot were given in 1849 by the heirs ol both Ben-
jamin Chambers and Robert Campbel to Alexander Fullerton
and Erskine Hazard, and by them to Samuel Seibert in the
same year, he having bought William Seibert's share in 1842.
In 1861 the property was sold to Thomas Carlisle, who sold
it back to Agnes Seibert, wife of Samuel, in the same year.
The property passed into the possession of Trinity Church in
1869, but was sold at sheriff's sale to Isaac Diller, of Lan-
caster, and Thomas Franklin, of Lancaster, from whom the
church bought it again.
Of the history of the parish there is little to tell before
1859. There are various traditions of occasional services held
by visiting clergymen in early days, but no means of trans-
forming those traditions into facts.
One of these relates that Bishop Potter, then Bishop of
Pennsylvania, came here and preached in one of the churches,
probably the Falling Springs, some time in the early fifties. A
Madam Capron, who kept a girl's school here about 1840, was
said to be a member of the Episcopal Church, and despite the
fact that we had no church here, she did not unite with any
other Christian body, finding in her Prayer Book devotions
what spiritual satisfaction she wanted, and naturally was re-
garded as a heretic.
It is more than probable that there were few Episco-
palians among the early settlers in and around Chambersburg,
and w^hat few there were were looked after by the missionary
from Lancaster, and by the clergyman afterwards located at
Carlisle.
It was not until 1858 that any attempt was made to es-
tablish the Church in Chambersburg. On November 7th of
that year, Rev. Wm. S. Heaton, then a deacon in charge of
Emmanuel Church, Mont Alto, came here and began holding
services in the old Seceder's Church which stood on South
Second Street, on the lot now occupied by Mrs. John Lortz.
These services were held every two weeks, until Mr. Heaton
left Mont Alto in September of i860.
At the second service they had a choir organized, used a
melodeon, and, to quote Mr. Heaton, "we had a very pleasant
service." On Monday, December loth, 1858, a meeting was
called of persons interested in the services, but owing to the
fact that there was some misunderstanding, only five persons
beside the clergyman appeared. They were Mr. S. S. Shryock,
Mr. J. S. Nixon, Dr. J. K. Reid, Mr, Chas. Taylor, and one
other whose name cannot now be learned. They raised a
pledge of $80 for the missionary for the next year. It was at
that meeting that the name of Trinity Church was adopted at
the suggestion of Mr. Taylor.
The labors of the missionary were widely extended in
those days, for, in addition to the work at Mont Alto, he had
the mission in Chambersburg and another in Petersburg,
Adams County, the remains of the once promising church in
Huntingdon. Besides this, he held occasional services, when
stopping for tlie night, at Caledonia Furnace, where he was
the guest of the superintendent, Mr. Sweeney,
As the result of these divided services, the time appointed
for the Chambersburg mission varied between morning, after-
noon, and evening, according to the circumstances governing
the clergyman.
On Sunday July 3d, 1859, ^I'"- Heaton baptized Mrs.
Mary Ann Reid, wife of Dr. J. K. Reid. This was, so far as
there is any record, the first baptism of our church in Cham-
bersburg.
On Sunday, July 17th, 1859, Mrs. Reid was confirmed by
Bishop Samuel Bowman, being the first person confirmed by a
bishop in this place. . During the time of Mr. Heaton's charge
of the church here, John Brown, of Harper's Ferry fame,
made Chambersburg his headquarters. He was a frequent at-
tendant at the services of the mission, and often took up the
collection. He was not a member of the Episcopal Church,
and it is quite probable that he chose to attend the mission
66
because he would be less noticed there than in the larger con-
gregations of the town.
By a strange coincidence, Rev. Mr. Heaton was an eye
witness of the capture of Brown's lieutenant, John Cook,
which took place between his home and the church, at Mont
Alto Furnace.
In the fall of i860 Mr. Heaton having resigned his charge,
he was succeeded by Rev. John Reynolds, who remained un-
til 1863. He was followed by Rev. Chas. L. Fischer, who re-
mained until the fall of 1864. Both held the combined mis-
sions of Mont Alto and Chambersburg.
Rev. Mr. Clerc, of Carlisle, came to Chambersburg a few
times during the war period, and held services. Once he was
given the use of the Lutheran Church, and on one occasion,
through the courtesy of Colonel T. B. Kennedy, to whom he
had a letter from Judge Watts, he held services in the Falling
Spring Church, the congregation filling the building. General
Ord, then in command of the troops, with his staff, and mem-
bers of the Episcopal Church living here, aided in rendering
the services full and hearty. This was on the evening of Sun-
day, August 23rd, 1863, and services were maintained with
fair regularity after that by Mr. Clerc, the rector of York, and
others.
Dr. Clerc w^as a man of tireless energy and great personal
piety, which made his missionary zeal the more valuable and
effective. Like Mr. Barton, he was always on the lookout for
the scattered members of the Church. In his notes from his
diary I find that he made frequent visitations to Pine Grove,
Hamilton's School House, Newville, Petersburg, Mont Alto,
Bedford, and Gettysburg, that he might minister to the spirit-
ual wants of the few isolated members to be found in those
places.
During the war General Couch and staff frequently at-
tended the mission in this place, and in the absence of the
rector, some of them held lay services. With the burning of
Chambersburg the Seceder's Church was destroyed, and the
mission without a home. In the demoralized condition of
thing:s following the fire, it was thought best to discontinue
the mission.
In April 1868, Rev. W. G. Hawkins came to Chambers-
burg for the purpose of re-opening the mission. Through the
efforts of Messrs. Henry Stoner, A. C. McGrath, and G. W.
Brewer, prominent men of the order, the use of Masonic Hall
was obtained.
Aided by friends in New York. Philadelphia, and other
cities of the east, Mr. Hawkins began raising money for the
erection of a church, and at a meeting of the vestry held Feb-
ruary 9th, 1869, a committee consisting of the Rector, Judge
John Armstrong, and Mr. C. H. Taylor, was appointed to
select a site.
Contrary to the usual custom, the first purchase by the
young parish was a* rectory with a large lot adjoining, on
which to build the church. This house contained ten rooms,
being a two-story brick building now occupied by Dr. J. C.
Greenawalt.
Within four months the Rector and people, aided by
friends in New York and Philadelphia, were able to pay over
$4,000 on this property. The zeal and activity of Mr. Haw-
kins in gathering funds and material made it possible to begin
work on the church in the next year, and the corner stone was
laid by Dr. M. A. DeW. Howe, rector of St. Luke's Church,
Philadelphia, acting for Bishop Stevens, on Wednesday, July
6th, 1870.
The building was finally consecrated September 26th,
1871, by Bishop W. B. Stevens, of Pennsylvania. Dr. Howe
later became the first bishop of the diocese of central Penn-
sylvania.
Mr. Hawkins remained as rector of the parish until Sep-
tember, 1873, when he was succeeded by Rev. John Collins
McCabe, D. D., who died while rector in 1875.
Rev. H. C. Swentzel came to the parish in June 1875, r^"
maining until 1881, when he was succeeded by Rev. Geo. C.
Hall, D. D., now of Wilmington, Del. He remained until
1884, being followed by Rev. V. Hummel Berghaus. In 1891
68
Mr. Berghaus resigned because of ill health, and was suc-
ceeded by Rev. J. A. Farrar who remained but two years. In
1893 Rev. James B. Meade was called, who held the office
until 1898, when he resigned to accept the important work
at Whitehall, N. Y. In Januar}^ 1899, the present rector en-
tered upon his duties.
The first baptism in the new church was that of Mary
Taylor, daughter of Chas. H. Taylor. The first wedding was
that of John Wyeth and Frances McCullough,
In the fall of 1900 the old altar was replaced by a new
one, the gift of the Altar Guild, and made a memorial to the
dead of the parish. It was built in Chambersburg by H. Sierer
& Company from designs drawn by Mr. T. J. Brereton, a
vestryman of the parish. It was dedicated November nth,
1900, by Bishop Talbot, and the Rev. Mr. Heaton, founder of
the parish, was present at the service.
During the rectorate of Rev. Mr. Meade a very efficient
vested choir, trained by Mrs. Armstrong Myers, was or-
ganized and installed.
Those who have served on the vestry of the parish have
always been able and representative men of the town. As
nearly as can be determined the}' became members in the fol-
lowing order :
Judge John Armstrong Mr. W. W. Fischer
Hon. Geo. W. Brewer, Esq. Mr. T. M. McDowell
Mr. Henry S. Stoner, Esq. Mr. Nathan Greenwood
Mr. Alan McGrath Gen. S. Wylie Crawford, U. S. A.
Mr. Chas. H. Taylor Mr. John Culbertson
Mr. C. C. Tilghman Mr. Geo. Denton
Judge F. M. Kimmel Mr. Robert Lawrence
Mr James Kennedy Mr. S. P. Shull
Mr. Lewis "Wyeth Mr. John Sweeney
Mr. John Lawrence Mr. H. J. Plough, Esq.
Mr. S. S. Shryock Mr. M. C. Stoner
Hon. Hastings Gehr, Esq. Mr J. W. Cree
Major C. Ives
The present efficient members of the vestry are well known
men of the community, whom it is not necessary to mention.
The corner stone was laid July 6th, 1870, and, by a
curious coincidence, it was lettered by Mr. Joseph Haeslip, of
the parish, July 6th, 1905, exactly 35 years to a day from the
time it was laid.
69
GREENCASTLE.
The services of our Church in Greencastle were held a
few times during the closing years of the war. Judge Arm-
strong drove over to Greencastle with Rev. Mr. Fischer and
held an occasional service, probably in the town hall. The
late John Rodearmer had all his life been a member of the
Episcopal Church, but had not been able to attend services.
He expressed his regret to his friend, the Judge, who arranged
for the visits of the rector of Mont Alto. So far as is known
Mr. Rodearmer was the only Episcopalian living in the place
for years, and after Mr. Fischer left, no services were held
until 1900, when the writer, with the aid of Mr. Sterling Gait
and a few members of the Church then living in Greencastle.
began services in Council Hall.
These were maintained by the efforts of lay-readers and
the rector of Chambersburg, for about three years, and several
were added to the Church, but owing to the removal from
town of the majority of the members of the mission, and the
inability of the remainder to support the services, the work
was abandoned for the time being. The lay-readers were Mr.
Robert Roe and Mr. Leon Spencer. The Rev. C. Thatcher
Pfeifer was in charge for a few months in 1903. The mission
was called St. James.
WAYNESBORO.
In Waynesboro no services of the Church were ever held,
so far as is known, until the summer of 1899, when Rev.
Frank Schroeder, of Lancaster, began mission work there on
his own account. He found several Church people and got
them interested, and began a good work with the boys. He
called the mission St. Stephens, but it was never given offi-
cial recognition under that name. In the fall of 1899 Mr.
Schroeder left, and owing to lack of means and an available
man to send there, the work was abandoned, except for the
occasional services of the lay-reader from Greencastle.
In 1902 the work was revived and became quite promis-
ing under Rev, Samuel Thurlow, who had charge of both
70
Waynesboro and Blue Ridge Summit. He was followed by
Rev. H. W. Stowell, who did a good work until his health
failed and he was compeled to quit. Meanwhile the name
had been changed to St. Peter's, and services were held, first
in the G. A. R. hall, and then in the old Reformed Church.
Several had been confirmed, and the list of communicants
numbered about twenty. After Mr. Stowell left, there was
little done, owing to inability to find a good man for the
place.
In the summer of 1907 Rev. Wm. T. Twamle}^ from
Maryland, was sent to Waynesboro to take charge in con-
nection with Greencastle and Mont Alto, where the chapel
had been repaired. The name of the mission was again
changed to St. Mary's, a lot on Broad Street purchased, and
the work of raising funds to build a church was begun. Mr.
Twamley left in October, 1908, being followed by Rev. J^
Costello.
MONT ALTO.
Although I have reserved mention of it to the last, the
little stone church which stands at the cross-roads, just below
the Mont Alto Park, was the first Episcopal Church built in
Franklin County, and the mother parish of Trinity Church,
Chambersburg. Today it is used for the occasional services
which are supplied by the missionary from Waynesboro, and
for the union Sunday School which has been held there for
many years.
About the year 1850 an Episcopal Sunday School was
started by Mr. Wm. Hayman and Mrs. N. B. Hughes in the
public school house, for the benefit of the children of the em-
ployes of the Mont Alto Furnace, and of the people living
near by.
The ground for the chapel, one acre in extent, was given
by Major Holker Hughes, and conveyed by deed "to the
Episcopal Church in the state of Pennsylvania, forever." On
this ground a chapel was begun, and the corner stone laid
June 23rd, 1854, by Rev. Walter Ayrault, of Hagerstown, as-
71
sisted by Mr. S. Russell Jones, of New York, then acting as
lay-reader at Mont Alto. The church was consecrated No-
vember 3rd following by Rt. Rev. Alonzo Potter, Bishop of
Pennsylvania. There were present also Rev. Messrs. Ayrault^
W. F. Passmore, of St. James College, Md., Morse, of Car-
lisle, and Edward Kennedy, the latter being ordained at that
service. Two persons were also confirmed. An account of
these services, which were continuous, says that they "oc-
cupied some five hours, and were participated in with great
interest and attention by a numerous crowd of persons. The
church was entirely full, seats having been placed in the
aisles." Mr. Kennedy was the first resident clergyman at Mont
Alto, and remained until the following March, being succeeded
by the Rev. John Reynolds, who was obliged, as the result
of a severe fall, to resign at the end of six months. To supply
the vacancy. Bishop Potter sent, in August, 1856, his son,
Henry C. Potter, then a student at Alexandria Seminary, in
Virginia. The future bishop of New York remained during
the summer vacation as a lay-reader. The following summer
he returned for a single Sunday. At the time he had been
ordained a deacon by his father, and went on his way to-
Greensburg, Pa., his first charge.
The next rector was Rev. Plenry S. Getz, who remained'
for six months, until January, 1858. Mr. Getz was later rector
of the Church of the Holy Apostles, Philadelphia. He died
in 1902. Immediately following Mr. Getz in January, 1858,
came Mr. Wm. Heaton, who was soon after made a deacon
in Altoona. Mr. Heaton remained until September, i860,
and did a most excellent work. During his ministry of the
parish the deed of gift was recorded in Chambersburg, and
the parish admitted to union with the convention of the
diocese of Pennsylvania.
In i860 Mr. Heaton reported twenty families, 50 adults
and one hundred children as connected with the mission ; the
baptism of sixteen infants and two adults ; eight persons con-
firmed ; fourteen communicants and thirty-five scholars in the
72
Sunday School. Mr. Heaton is still in active service as a
member of the staff of the Philadelphia City Mission.
In i860 Rev. John Reynolds returned as rector, remain-
ing until 1863, when he was succeeded by Rev. Chas. L.
Fischer, who ofificiated at both Chambersburg and Mont Alto
until October, 1864, when owing to unsettled conditions
growing out of the burning of Chambersburg, he resigned and
accepted a parish in Philadelphia. For years he was a profes-
sor in Bexley Hall, Gambier, Ohio, and is now living in re-
tirement in Jenkintown, Pa.
The last resident pastor at Mont Alto was the Rev. J.
H. Hobart Millett, from November 1864 to December 1865,
when he resigned to become rector of St. Paul's, Harrisburg.
In 1864 the iron works passed out of the hands of Major
Hughes and he removed to Hagerstown. During the time
when he was running the furnace, his niece. Miss Anna Fitz-
hugh, and his sister-in-law, Mrs. N. B. Hughes, were the
active spirits in the mission work, together with Mr. Wm.
Hayman, Church Warden and superintendent of the Sunday
School. A fund was raised by them for a rectory, but this
money, being unfortunately invested, was lost.
With the removal of the Hughes family the work of the
Church gradually declined, and finally services were discon-
tinued. During forty years only an occasional service was
held. About twelve years ago Mr. John Lawrence, a lay-
reader of Trinity Church, Chambersburg, held Sunday ser-
vices there, but not until 1907 was there any determined effort
made to revive the work, when Rev. Mr. Twamley, of
Waynesboro, was given the care of the mission which was
revived. The Forestry School and the White Pine Sana-
torium, both permanent institutions located near by, give en-
couragement that the chapel may again become the center
of an active work, and the sound of the Church's services be
heard among the trees which cast their shade over the old
monument of the faith.
7Z
MOUNT DELIGHT.
BY JOHN M. Mcdowell, icsq.
The December meeting was held at the home of thw
founder of the Society, Rev. Dr. S. A. Martin, principal of the
State Normal School, Shippensburg, Pa., Tuesday evening,
the 23rd of the month, another of the successful assemblies
of the series of 1908. A special over the C. V. R. R. con-
veyed and returned the party, twenty-seven in number,
leaving Chambersburg at 7:30 and Shippensburg at 10:45
p. m. At the business meeting, in the absence of President
Brereton, First Vice President Linn Harbaugh, Esq., presided.
B. M. Nead, Esq., was re-appointed as a delegate to repre-
sent the Society at the meeting of the American Historical
Society, Washington, D. C, and Richmond, Va., December
28-31, and T. J. Brereton and Colonel James R. Gilmore,
delegates to the annual meeting of the Pennsylvania Federa-
tion of Historical Societies, Harrisburg, January 7, 1909.
David Eby presented this Society with a copy of a booklet,
of which he is author, entitled "The Retracing of the Famous
Old Turnpike between Chambersburg and Pittsburgh," for
which he was on motion given a unanimous vote of thanks.
Dr. and Mrs. Martin, who were at the head of the re-
ceiving line, had cordial greetings from the members, and
the social hour and entertainment, after hearing Mr. Mc-
Dowell's interesting paper, were greatly enjoyed. Mrs. Martin
was assisted in receiving by Mrs. G. A. Stewart, Shippens-
burg; Mrs. Geo. F. Zeigler, Greencastle; Mrs. Reisner and
Mrs. J. Bruce McCreary. Dr. Martin had as guests, J.
McCord Means, Dr. J. Bruce McCreary, Newton Kilpatrick,
Mr. Reisner, and the Rev. S. S. Wylie.
1 have chosen as the subject of this sketch, Mount De-
light, its owners and the persons born thereon. It is not my
intention to give a genealogical history of the family, in all
its ramifications, which has successively owned and contin-
uously occupied this place for five generations or near a
century and a half. But I will confine my attention to a short
sketch of the place or farm near Mercersburg, this county,
called McFarland's Delight or simply Mount Delight, in later
years, and of those persons only, who have owned and farmed
the same or who were born thereon during the past one hun-
dred and forty years or more.
The writer can recall no other farms in this county, that
74
have been successively and continuously owned, occupied and
farmed by members of one family for so many generations.
There may be others. If so, let them be named and recorded.
This and the fact that the writer has been requested, nay
commanded, by our executive committee, to write a paper,
is the only excuse or apology for this effort, and he trusts that
he may be able to add a few data for the future historians of
our county as this, as he understands it, is one of the objects
of our Society.
Mount Delight or originally, "McFarland's Delight," is
the name given, by the first settler, to a farm situated in Peters
and Montgomery Townships, Franklin County, Pa., about one
and a half miles east of Mercersburg, and west of West Cono-
cocheague Creek, with a beautiful stream of formerly clear
and sparkling water coursing through the length of it from
north to south, through three long, green meadows. The
mansion house, barns and out-buildings are built on the west-
ern side of a hill, which slopes down to the aforementioned
meadows and run from the east. A short distance on the
west of this stream, rises another and higher hill, partly cov-
ered with large timber. The meadows and stream and wooded
hillside form a pleasing and beautiful sight. Mount DeHght
is beautifully located and a delightful place to live. The public
road from Mercersburg past Mercersburg Academy, to Le-
masters and Upton, runs through this farm, making it easy of
access. Before this road was laid out and opened to the pub-
lic, there was a private' road running through this farm, di-
rectly in front of the house on the west, and leading to the old
Warm Spring Road and thence to Mercersburg. This private
road was the hilliest, steepest, most slanting road, that the
writer ever rode over. Sometimes you would think the hills
too steep to go up or down with safety, and then it was so-
slanting along the side of a hill that you were expecting your
vehicle to topple over.
This farm now contains two hundred and ninety-one
acres and ninety perches. The land is rolling and of slate,
free-stone and limestone formations. The first house erected
75
on this farm was built in or more likely, prior to 1769, and
was a log structure of one and a-half stories in height, with
four rooms on first floor and several on second. This origi-
nal building is still standing, but raised to two full stories
and weatherboarded, with a kitchen added thereto, on the
eastern side, about fifteen years ago.
In 1793 a large two-storied stone building was added
thereto on the southern side or end.
The barn is an old log building constructed prior to 1777
with some additions made between 1824 and 1827, on two or
three sides thereof. The young McFarlands and their visiting
relatives seemed fond of seeing their names in public places,
as every generation, since 1823, has many of their names or
initials cut in the logs and boards of the wagon shed attached
to this old barn.
From the porch on the western side of the old log house,
one has a fine view up and down the meadows and run, and
over to and beyond the wooded hill to the west and north.
Many a pleasant and happy hour has the writer spent on this
porch and the one preceding it, enjoying the view and scenery
and the delightful, cooling breezes wafted over and from the
rippling water below. And the magnificent sunsets seen there-
from words fail to describe.
This tract of land was originally taken up in 1769, or more
likely prior thereto, cleared and improved by one Robert Mc-
Farland, senior, to whom, in 1769 a patent therefor was grant-
ed by the Penns — Thomas and Richard — and it has been
owned, occupied and cultivated by McFarlands ever since.
The McFarlands are a very old family, which can be traced
back to the Highlands of Scotland — to the Clan Mac Farland —
to the I2th or 13th Century. Dr. Adams, in his "Clans, Septs
and Regiments of the Scottish Highlands," says : "This Clan
is the only one with the exception perhaps of the Clan Don-
nachie (Robertsons), whose descent from the ancient earls of
the district, in which their possessions lay, can be proved by
charter, and it can be shown in the clearest manner that their
ancestor was Gilchrist, brother of Maldowen, the third earl
76
of Lennox." Gilchrist's father was Aluin, second earl of
Lennox. Gilchrist had a son Duncan, called in old charters,
"Duncan fitius Gilchrist," or Mac Gilchrist, and thus his de-
scendants, for three generations, were called Mac Gilchrists.
His great grand-son was named Paitholan, which soon came
to be written Pharlan and Pharlane. Brown in his "History
of the Highlands," says "the descendants of Partholan were
called Mac Pharlan and MacPharlane." Subsequently the Ph
was changed to F and they were called McFarlan and McFar- -
lane, which became the patronymic surname of the clan. In
the introduction to Rob Roy, Sir Walter Scott spells the name
MacFarlane, where he says Sir Humphrey Colquhoun "was
murdered, the family annals say, by the Mac Gregors, though
other accounts charge the deed upon the MacFarlanes." The
MacFarlanes, in the 13th and 14th centuries, were a fiery,
restless, turbulent clan, and fighters of some renown. They
were designated the "wild MacFarlanes plaided clan." It is
also said that they could not or at least did not 'always dis-
tinguish between meum and tuum and som(^times had more
cattle than they could honestly claim. The clan occupied the
land "forming the western shore of Loch Lomand from Tarbot
upwards." Arrochar was the seat or castle of the chiefs or
Lairds of the clan for "six hundred years, until its sale in
1678," when they became "landless" as a clan. It is said "that
not an acre of clan territory now remains in MacFarlane pos-
session." Many of the clan, in the i6th and 17th centuries,
fled to the north of Ireland and from there emigrated to
America. In Ireland they changed the name to McFarland.
Another branch of the family wrote their name MacFarlin. We
are safe, we think, to conclude that however the name is
spelled, whether MacFarlan, MacFarlane, MacFarlin or Mc-
Farland, those bearing either name are all descended from
Pharlan, great-grand-son of Gilchrist, who lived in the
twelfth or thirteenth century. The MacFarlane Clan had
their coat of arms, their tartan or plaid, both of which are
known to and worn by many of their descendants, Clan
Pharlan :
17
COAT OF ARMS.
ARMS : A Saltire waved and cantoned with four roses
gules (being the original bearings of the Lennoxes).
CREST : A demi-savage holding a sheaf of arrows in his
right hand and pointing with his left to an imperial crown.
SUPPORTERS : Two Highlands in their native garb,
armed with broadswords and bows proper.
MOTTOES : Over Escutcheon— "This I'll defend" and
under Escutcheon— "Loch Sloy."
WAR CRY : "Loch sloidh"— "The Loch of the Host"
CLAN PIPE MUSIC : "Thogail nam bo"— "Lifting
the Cattle."
BADGE WORN IN THE BONNET : Cranberry.
The McFarlands who came from Ireland and landed in
Worcester and Boston, Massachusetts, in 1718, can trace their
ancestors back to Scotland. So can other families do this, but
not all.
Several dififerent families came, in early years, to and
settled in this and other counties of this State, but they are
unable to trace their relationship to each other, except through
their common ancestors, Pharlan and Gilchrist.
The emigrant ancestor of the branch of the family, which
has occupied McFarland's Delight since 1778, was Joseph Mc-
Farland, who with his two brothers, John and Robert, came
over from Ireland about 1732 and settled in Tinnicum Town-
ship, Bucks County, Pa. His brother John later moved to
Virginia and of him we know little. Robert McFarland, the
other brother, prior to January nth, 1769, came to Franklin
County, then part of Cumberland County, Pa., and took up a
tract of land for which a patent, dated 4th December, 1769,
was issued to him by "Thomas Penn and Richard Penn, Es-
quires, true and absolute Proprietaries and Governors in Chief
of the Province of Pennsylvania and Counties of Newcastle,
Kent and Sussex in Delaware, under warrant dated nth of
January, 1769, to Robert McFarland, senior, for a certain tract
of land called: 'McFarland's Delight, 'situated in Peters Town-
ship, Cumberland County, containing 2483':; acres and allow-
78
ance of six per cent, for roads, etc. Consideration of 38 pounds,
9 shillings." Patent is recorded in Recorder's Office, of Phila-
delphia, in Patent Book A. A. Vol. II., page 878. It is more
than likely that Robert McFarland, St., had been in this
section some time, possibly years, before he received the
Warrant, dated nth January, 1769. He built the log part of
the present house and part of the present barn.
Joseph McFarland, the third brother and the ancestor
of the branch of IMcFarlands of whom this paper treats, as
before stated, came over from Ireland in 1732 and settled in
Tinnicum Township, Bucks County, Pennsylvania, where he
lived until his death.
He was a farmer by occupation, a Presbyterian in religion
and therefore not a tory. By his will, probated on the 12th
day of December, 1759, and recorded in Will Book B at page
370, Bucks County, Pa., we learn that his wife's name was
Jean. Joseph and Jean left surviving them three sons :
Robert, Joseph and John, and two daughters, Rachel and Jean.
Of these children we have record only of Robert. Joseph died
between November 4th, the date of the will, and December
I2th, the date of the probate of his will. He and his wife
Jean were interred in the old graveyard near Krauss Hill,
Tinnicum Township, Bucks County, Pa.
Robert McFarland, Jr., son of Joseph and Jean McFar-
land, was born in Tinnicum Township, Bucks County, Pa.,
January 12th, 1740, and died at Mount Delight, June 22nd,
1823. He married Jane Cochran, a daughter of Stephen and
Jane Cochran, of Faggs Manor, Chester County, in 1770.
Jane Cochran was born February loth, 1743, and died April
2nd, 1827. The bodies of both Robert and Jane were buried
in the old White Church graveyard, in Peters Township,
Franklin County, Pa., about two miles east of Mount Delight.
Robert McFarland, Jr., removed with his wife and four
children, from Bucks County, to this county, then part of
Cumberland, in the spring of 1778. He had purchased of his
uncle, Robert McFarland, Sr., brother of John and Joseph,
'McFarland's Delight," as we learn from a deed dated Sep-
79
tember ist, 1777, and recorded in Deed Book E, Vol. I., page
168, of the Recorder's Office of Cumberland County, Pa. By
this deed "Robert McFarland, Sr., of Peters Township, in
Cumberland County, Province and Commonwealth of Penn-
sylvania, and Esther, his wife, of one part," conveyed to
Robert McFarland, Jr., of Tinnicum Township, County of
Bucks, in said province of Pennsylvania, of the second part,
for a consideration of fourteen hundred pounds, the tract of
land mentioned and described in the patent dated 4th Decem-
ber, 1769. For his patent in 1769 Robert, Sr., paid 38 pounds
9 shillings. Eight years later he sold the same tract to his
nephew for 1400 pounds, an advance of near $7,000. Robert,
Sr., had, however, cleared and improved the land, erected
buildings, etc. Whilst in Bucks County, Robert McFarland,
Jr., took the oath of allegiance to the State and received a
certificate, of which the following is a true copy : "I do
hereby certify that Robert McFarland, of Bucks County, hath
voluntarily taken and subscribed the Oath of Allegiance and
Fidelity, as directed by an Act of General Assembly of Penn-
sylvania, passed the 13th day of June, A. D., 1777.
Witness my hand and seal, the 28th day of August, A. D.,
1777.
L. S. THOMAS DYER."
Robert, as well as his father, Joseph, was a member, in
good standing, of the Presbyterian Church. He and his wife
brought with them from Bucks County, in 1778, a certificate
of good character and membership, of which the following
is a copy :
"That Robert McFarland and Jane, his wife, were born ot
christian Parents of the Presbyterian Denomination. Mr. Mc-
Farland has lived, in this Congregation since his Infantcy &
hath conducted himself in a sober, decent & Regular manner
at all Times since capable of understanding, as becomes his
Christian Profession, made in his Baptismal Covenant ; and
Mrs. McFarland has been received into this congregation by
virtue of a certificate produced, a copy of which is given ; and
8o
both are of an unblemished Character, free from Scandal or
Church Censure known to us. And now being about to re-
move from us, are committed to God's holy Protection &
recommended to the Care & Notice of any Christian Congre-
gation where divine Providence may order their Lot, as
worthy Members of Society both civil & religious. All which
is certified at Tinnicum in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, May
15th, 1778, by
WILLIAM McINTYRE,
DANIEL SAMEEL,
DAVID WILSON,
JOHN McKEE,
ROBT. SMITH,
ROBT. PATTERSON,
Elders.
A. MITCHEL, V. D. M.
In 1779 Robert McFarland was elected and ordained an
Elder of the Presbyterian Church of Mercersburg, and served
as Elder until his death. Robert and Jane McFarland had
eight children, named and born as follows :
Joseph McFarland — born Feb 22, 1771, died Nov. 20, 1782.
Stephen McFarland — born Aug. 15, 1773, died Nov. 1832.
Prudence McFarland — born April 17, 1775, died Dec. 2, 1804.
Robert C. McFarland — born Dec. 19, 1776, died June 15, 1850
Anna McFarland — born April 8, 1779, died April 26, 1816.
John McFarland — born Feb. 2^, 1782, died Dec. 18, 1856.
Jane C. McFarland — born Dec. 17, 1783, died Aug. 31, 1857.
Mary (Polly) McFarland— born Apr. 8, 1786, died Sep. T."], 1837.
Of these Joseph, Stephen, Prudence and Robert C. McFar-
land were born in Bucks County, the others in this county.
When Robert McFarland, Jr., came to this county, he
brought with him quite a small trunk, partly filled with
Continental money. The trunk is still in the old house in a
good state of preservation, but minus all money. He also
brought with him some seed of the honey-locust, which he
sowed on the hill-side in front of the old house. The seed
8i
sprouted and a number of honey-locusts grew to full size and
were much admired until a few years since. One of them is
still living, but showing its age. Robert McFarland, Jr., and
his wife were buried in the old White Church graveyard, in
Peters Township.
By his will probated and recorded in this county, Robert
McFarland, Jr., devised MacFarland's Delight (about that
time changed to Mount Delight) to his two sons, Robert C.
and John McFarland.
STEPHEN, son of Robert and Jane McFarland, married
Katharine Bard, November 13, 1800, and lived for a time in
Mercersburg. He and his wife and family moved to Cincin-
nati, Ohio, in April 1805, where he followed the occupation of
a hatter. By his skill and industry he accumulated a hand-
some fortune. He was a highly respected and influential
citizen of Cincinnati. He was a Colonel in the War of 1812.
Pie had five sons, Robert, Isaac, Bard (born 1802, died in Cin-
cinnati 1883), John and Thomas, and one daughter Jane, who
married Ira Atherton and lived and died in Cincinnati, leaving
two sons.
ROBERT C, son of Robert and Jane McFarland, was
born in Bucks County, Pa., December 19, 1776. He never
married. He and his brother John owned and farmed Mount
Delight in common, from 1823 to 1850, when Robert C. died.
He devised his undivided one-half interest in this farm to his
brother John.
ANNA, daughter of Robert and Jane McFarland, was
born April 8, 1779, and the first child born on Mount Delight.
She married Matthew Patton, son of the first settler of Fort
Loudon, and had two children, a son, James Patton, who
married Harriett Scott, a sister of Col. Thomas A. Scott and
Mrs. John King, of this place, and a daughter Mary Ann,
married to Barnes.
JOHN McFarland, son of Robert and Jane McFar-
land, was born at Mount Delight February 27th, 1782, and
died December i8th, 1856. He married Eliza, daughter of Col.
Robert Parker, an officer in the Revolutionary War, and Mary
82
(Smith) Parker, who was born — , 1790; died January 27, 1845.
John McFarland was a farmer and a leading citizen of
Peters Township, He was Captain of a Cavalry Company of
the militia, of which a son and one or two sons-in-law were
members. He lived on the farm, Mount Delight, of which he
became the sole owner, after the death of his brother, Robert
C, from 1823, until the spring of 1854, when he retired and
moved into Mercersburg, where he lived until his death. He
and his wife were members of the Presbyterian Church of
Mercersburg and were buried in the old White Church or
Church Hill graveyard. They had seven children, named and
born as follows :
Jane Cochran McFarland, born July 23, 1813; died March
20, 1893.
Robert Parker McFarland, born Oct. 29, 1814; died May
26, 1899.
John Franklin McFarland, born Oct. 11, 1816; died /an.
16, 1888.
Mary Smith McFarland, born June 16, 1818; died Jan.
12, 1861.
Anna Patton McFarland, born Dec. 11, 1819; died Feb.
15, 1899.
Thomas Bard McFarland, born April 19, 1828; died Sept.
16, 1908.
JANE (JEANNEY) C. McFARLAND, daughter of
Robert and Jane McFarland, was born December 17, 1783, and
died August 31, 1857. On the 26th day of March, 1807, she
married Thomas Bard, a prominent citizen of Peters Town-
ship, a member of the Legislature and a Captain in the War
of 1812. His sister, Katharine, married Stephen McFarland,
a brother of his wife, Jane C. Thomas Bard and Jane C, his
wife, had five sons, Richard, Thomas, John, Archibald and
Robert M., who became a prominent member of the Franklin
County Bar and the father of the Misses Mary P. and Louiza
J. Bard, of this place, and ex-Senator Thomas R. Bard, of
Hueneme, Cal.
MARY (POLLY) McFARLAND, daughter of Robert
83
and Jane McFarland, was born April 8th, 1786, and died in
Ohio, September 27, 1837. She married WiUiam Wilson,
April 5th. 181 5, and moved to College Hill, Ohio. They had
six children, John, Jane Cochran (married to Amos Worth-
ington). Prudence Ann, Mary Smith, William and Robert
McFarland.
JANE COCHRAN McFARLAND, daughter of Captain
John and Eliza McFarland, was born at Mount Delight, July
23, 1813, and died March 20, 1893. She married William H.
McDowell (born Feb. 13, 1813; died March 23, 1900), a young
farmer of Peters Township, at foot of Mount Parnell, where
they lived until the spring of 1856, when owing to the poor
health of Mr. McDowell, they moved to Chambersburg, where
they spent the balance of their lives. When Chambersburg
was burned by the rebels, under General McCausland, July
30th, 1864, they were burned out of house and home and all
their effects.
Mrs. McDowell was a bright, handsome woman, a great
reader, more than ordinarily intelligent, a good conversational-
ist and the light and cheer of her home. As another has well
said : "She had long professed her faith in the Son of God
and had walked worthy of her calling. Intelligent with an
air of quiet dignity and reserve, with much force of character,
true, gracious, rallying by her motherly ways those of her
household ; patient, submissive under many a heavy trial, she
had lived long and followed her Lord long. She follows Him
still." Mr. and Mrs. McDowell had nine children, four dying
in early childhood, and a daughter. Miss Elizabeth P., in 1902.
Four survive them, two. John M. and Annie C, living in
Chambersburg, Pa. ; Thomas H., the oldest, in Dayton, Ohio,
and Henry C, in Cambria, Weston County, Wyoming. They
were both members of the Falling Spring Presbyterian
Church, Chambersburg, Pa., for over forty years.
ROBERT PARKER McFARLAND, son of Capt. John
and Eliza (Parker) McFarland, was born October 29, 1814,
and died May 26, 1899. He received his education in the
public schools and Washington College, Pa. Shortly after he
84
entered college, he took typhoid fever and had to return
home. Had he received a collegiate education, he would have
equaled if not excelled his distinguished brother, Thomas B.
McFarland, at the bar, or in letters. After leaving college, he
learned the carpenter trade, but did not follow it any time.
He soon gave up working in wood and gave his attention to
farming, which he followed until disabled by feeble health and
old age. He spent the greater part of his life at Mount De-
light, the farm of his father and of his father's father. He
married Miss Ellen J. Robinson, a sister of Hon. David F.
Robinson, a prominent member of the Franklin County Bar,
and a member of the 34th Congress from the district of which
this county was a part. Mr. McFarland, like his two pre-
ceding ancestors, was a faithful and consistent member of the
Presbyterian Church of Mercersburg, and that for over fifty
years, and for many years a trustee thereof. He was a worthy
and devout Christian and endeavored to bring up his children
in the "nurture and admonition of the Lord." Well >does the
writer remember, when a boy and a man grown up, when
visiting Alount Delight, we would all, on Sabbath evenings,
be called around the table and required to read verse about of
a psalm or a chapter apiece from the Bible. This was a custom
that it would be well were it more generally followed in this
our day. He would often ask us the Shorter Catechism with-
out a book.
Mr. McFarland in early life was a Whig but since 1S56,
an ardent Republican, a great admirer of Horace Greeley, and
a close reader of The New York Tribune, but independent
and opposed to bossism, trickery and corruption in politics, as
well as in business. He was frequently elected a school di-
rector and filled the ofifice conscientiously and with ability. He
was urged, at different times, to run for the Legislature, but
would never consent thereto. He was more than an ordinary
farmer. He was a great reader and had his mind well stored
with information on most subjects. He was a good conver-
sationalist and ever ready to take part in discussions in re-
ligion, literature, politics or any matter pertaining to reform
85
of the betterment of his fellowman, his county, State or
Nation. He was a frequent contributor to the county papers,
and a writer of force, who had the courage of his convictions.
He was highly respected and greatly esteemed by all who
knew him. If measured simply by the fortune he left behind
him, he would not be a success in life. But he left that behind
him, which is a far more important legacy to his children and
posterity — a good name, a good example, a fine character, a
life well spent. He was a rugged, honest, noble man.
"The elements
So mixed in him, that Nature might stand up
And say to all the world, 'This was a man'."
His remains and those of his wife, who preceded him, lie
in Mercersburg cemetery.
Mr. and Mrs. McFarland had nine children, as follows :
1. Anna Fullerton McFarland, married to Arthur
Stabler, a farmer of Sandy Spring, Md., now in the insurance
business in Washington, D. C, a bright, intelligent gentleman,
of Quaker descent and quite a writer and speaker in farmers'
clubs and political meetings. They live in Washington during
the winter and on the farm in summer. They have no chil-
dren.
2. John D. McFarland, was educated in the public and
select schools of Mercersburg. When but a boy he entered
the army and served until the close of the war of the re-
bellion. In 1867 he went to Brownsville, Nebraska, taught
school, was in the United States Land Office for a time,
afterwards land officer of the Burlington & Missouri Railroad
Company. Whilst in Nebraska he accumulated a considerable
estate. In the fall of 1900 he moved to Los Angeles, Cal.,
where he died in the spring of 1902, leaving to survive him a
widow, three daughters and one son.
3. Virginia M. McFarland, married Benjamin L. Jordon,
a prominent farmer of Peters Township. She died in 1903,
leaving to survive her a husband, two sons and two daugh-
ters. Mr. Jordon, in 1906, had two sons and one daughter
86
graduate at three different institutions of learning. One soti'
at Pennsylvania State College, one at the University of Colo-
rado, and a daughter at Wilson College, at Chambersburg^
Pa. Not many parents have three children graduate the same
year at three different colleges.
4, 5, and 6. Eliza, Mary L. and Alice R. McFarland, all
living at Mount Delight, unmarried, the last two owning and
farming, by tenant, Mr. Clapsaddle, the home place, that has
been in the McFarland name and farmed by McFarlands, for
almost a century and a half, and they are doing well. Miss
Mary L. McFarland is the genealogist of the family, and to
her the writer is indebted for a great many of the data and
dates of this sketch.
7. Robert R. McFarland went to Nebraska in early
manhood, railroaded, married, and died in 1889, leaving one
son, now living in Wyoming.
8. Thomas Franklin McFarland, received his education
in the public schools and at Mercersburg Academy. He
married, in 1894, Miss Adelaid Brown, of Parkersburg, West
Virginia, by whom he had a daughter, Louise, and a son,
Thomas Bard. Both were born at Mount Delight. He re-
mained at home farming for his father until the death of the
latter, when he removed to Hueneme, Cal., where he is still
farming his own plantation and one of Senator Thomas R.
Bard's.
9. David F. McFarland, was born at Mount Delight and
educated in the public schools and Mercersburg Academy,
He removed to Nebraska when quite young, engaged in rail-
roading on the B. & M. R. R. for many years, was quite
successful in some investments in land in Nebraska and
Colorado, and is now living at Spirit Lake, Iowa, operating
several flouring mills. He married Ida, second daughter of
the late Marion Hays, of Mercersburg, Pa., and they have
one son and one daughter.
JOHN FRANKLIN McFARLAND, son of Capt. John
and Eliza McFarland, was born at Mount Delight, October
nth, 1816. He went to California with his brother, Thomas^
87
R., in 1850, mined for a time but not with much success. He
never married and was killed by a falling tree on January
1 6th, 1888.
MARY SMITH McFARLAND, daughter of Capt. John
and Eliza McFarland, was born June 16, 1818, and died
January 12, 1861. On October 20, 1847, she married Charles
G. Lowe, son of James and Elizabeth (Gillespie) Lowe, who
was born September 27, 1821, near Bridgeport, Peters Town-
ship, and died January 6, 1878. Some time after their mar-
riage they removed to Illinois, where Mr. Lowe farmed until
the death of his wife when he returned to Mercersburg. They
had two children, Elizabeth G., who married Charles H.
Fallon, a prominent merchant of Mercersburg, and Alice P.
married to J. C. Rummel, a successful business man and ar-
dent prohibitionist of Shippensburg, Pa. They have two
children and two grand-children.
ANNA PATTON McFARLAND, daughter of Capt.
John and Eliza McFarland, was born December 11, 1819; died
February 19, 1899. She married Col. Leonard C. Jordon, a
prominent farmer of Peters Township, near Dickey's Mill.
There they lived and reared a family of five children, until
the death of Col. Jordon, in December, 1875. Some years
later Mrs. Jordon and daughter Jennie, moved into Mercers-
burg, where, after a long and painful sickness, she died
February 19, 1899. She was a great sulTerer, but patient,
submissive, uncomplaining to the last. A sweeter, lovelier,
kinder woman never lived. Three children, one son, Benjamin
L., and two daughters, Elizabeth R., married to Van F.
Bradley, a farmer near Mercersburg, and Miss Jennie survive
her.
THOMAS BARD McFARLAND, son of Capt. John and
Eliza (Parker) McFarland, was born April 19, 1828. He was
educated at the public schools and at Marshall College, then
a prosperous small college in Mercersburg, but afterwards,
in 1853, removed to Lancaster, Pa., and united with Franklin
College of that place, and since known as Franklin and Mar-
shall College, of Lancaster, Pa. This union was thought for
88
a time to be a mistake, but later years have proven the wisdom
of the union of two weak colleges. It is a question, however,
whether the united college would not have grown and pros-
pered better had it been located at Mercersburg instead of
Lancaster. Young McFarland was loyal to his college and it
was largely through his efforts that Diagnothian Hall was
erected and the funds therefor collected.
He graduated in 1846 and immediately began the study
of the law, under the tutorship of his cousin, Robert M. Bard,
a leading member of the Franklin County bar. Whilst read-
ing law, he would teach part of the winter and work on the
farm in the summers. He took his examination for admission
to the bar, in January, 1850. Hon. Jeremiah S. Black was then
the Judge of our Courts. The examination of applicants for
admission to practice law had been so carelessly conducted
for some time, that Judge Black made a rule that a committee
of three should be appointed as examiners, to be changed
every year. He directed the committee to be sworn to dis-
charge their duties faithfully and to make the examination in
his presence. Young McFarland was the first one to be ex-
amined under the new rule. He was examined in the evening
in' Judge Black's room in the old Franklin Hotel, which
stood where the Central Presbyterian Church now stands.
The room was warm and Judge Black was in his shirt sleeves.
Judge Ellis Lewis, afterwards of our Supreme Court, was
visiting Judge Black and was present at the examination.
Mr. McFarland was the only applicant for admission and at
first was no little embarrassed. The committee would ask
the applicant a question and then Judge Black would put a
question or questions to the committee. It is said that the
young applicant answered the questions put to him by the
committee better than they answered those hurled at them
by Judge Black. Soon McFarland was at his ease and the
committee embarrassed and scared, which the two Judges
seemed to enjoy very much. At the conclusion the committee
seemed more relieved than the applicant. The next day, Jan-
uary 25, 1850, on motion of Joseph Chambers, Esq., Mr. Mc-
89
Farland was sworn and admitted to practice law in the several
courts of Franklin County, Pa.
Taking the gold-fever then largely prevailing, he left
the same year, accompanied by his brother, John Franklin
McFarland, for the gold fields of California, going over the
plains with an ox-team. They crossed the California line
about September 9th, i860, and stopped at Ringgold in El
Dorado County. He intended to go to Sacramento City,
where T. B. Kennedy, our late townsman, was then staying,
and to begin the practice of law, but a "half-breed Wyandotte
Indian, who crossed the plains with him was taken sick at
Ringgold and he would not leave the Indian" until he re-
covered. Whilst waiting on the half-breed to get well, he
went out one day, "prospecting," more for amusement than
seriously and struck a very rich claim. He afterwards wrote
home "had I known how to secure enough of ground, 1 could
have made a fortune out of the claim." He secured only six-
teen feet ofthe ravine. He was entitled to many more feet.
Out of this small claim he made in two or three weeks about
eight thousand dollars. He was so elated over his find that,
as he wrote, "he would not have gone into the practice of the
law, if Daniel Webster had offered him a partnership." He
followed mining at various places until the spring of 1854,
but with little luck, when tiring of his "rocker," a "number
2" (a shovel) and a pick, he decided to quit mining and to
begin the practice of law. He went to Nevada City and
opened an office, "with enough money in his pocket to buy
a few books." The "flush times were about over, the bar a
large and able one" — rather a gloomy outlook for a young
lawyer without money, influence or friends. He had spent
nearly all of the $8,000 he had made in prospecting and seek-
ing for more gold — usually the luck of most miners and pros-
pectors. But he succeeded "reasonably well at the law. In
1855 he took an active part in organizing the "Know Nothing"
party and was elected to the Legislature in 1856. In 1861 he
was nominated by the Republicans and elected Judge of the
Fourteenth District Court, composed of Nevada County, for
90
a term of six years. His election was a great surprise to him,
as his opponent was Hon. Niles Searls, an able and popular
Judge, running for a second term. The constitutional amend-
ments of 1863 redistricted the State and provided new elec-
tions should be held all over the State. Judge McFarland
was renominated and elected for a full term, without opposi-
tion. In 1869 he was again renominated. But owing to the
opposition to the 15th Amendment to the National Constitu-
tion, to which the Republican party was pledged and to the
Chinese question then first bobbing up, he was defeated, as
were all the Republican candidates for District Judges
throughout the State. His first election and his defeat were
surprises alike to himself, to his opponents and to the people.
Judge McFarland now decided to leave Nevada County
and in January, 1870, he removed to Sacramento City and
opened a law office in that city. He soon picked up a con-
siderable practice. In 1874, without his knowledge. Senator
Sargent, of California, had him appointed Regii^ter of the
United States Land Office at Sacramento City, which office
he reluctantly accepted for a term. He was re-appointed, but
resigned the same the following March. In 1878 he v^as elect-
ed a member of the State Constitutional Convention. He
anticipated much pleasure from its deliberations, as a number
of the ablest men of the State were among its members. But
the "Workingmen's Part}'-" got control of the convention and
passed the "worst constitution" as he put it, "ever adopted in
America." He opposed nearly all its provisions and was one
of the fifteen members who voted against it on the final vote
and opposed it before the people. "But the people were mad
with anti-monopoly mania and adopted it."
Judge McFarland was an able, zealous and successful ad-
vocate, and a good office and trial lawyer. Whilst in Sacra-
mento, he was the leading attorney of the Central Pacific
Railroad Company. During his occupancy of the district
bench, he probabl}" tried more criminal cases than any other
Judge outside San Francisco and Sacramento and only "one
of his judgments Avas ever repealed."
91
On December i8th, 1882, he was appointed to fill a two-
years' vacancy upon the bench of the Superior Court of Sac-
ramento County, and was elected in the fall of 1884 for a full
term of six years. In 1886, he was elected to a full term —
twelve years — as Justice of the Supreme Court of California,
whereupon he resigned his Superior Judgeship and took his
seat as Supreme Judge in January, 1887. In 1898 he was re-
elected, when seventy years old, to another term of twelve
years. He continued to sit as a Supreme Justice to the time
of his death, a period of near twenty-one years.
Judge McFarland always took an active interest in educa-
tion and made many addresses of much merit, before school
boards, colleges and seminaries. He was a member of the
board of education in Sacramento whilst living in that city.
He was an active and influential trustee of the Leland Stan-
ford, Jr., University, at Palo Alto, Cal., having been appointed
one of the original trustees by its founder, who was a life-
long friend. They arrived in California the same year, 1850.
Judge McFarland was tall and robust, of large frame,
erect, handsome and of striking appearance. In latter years
his hair was white and he wore a full white beard. He was
brusque in manner, but of kind disposition and generous im-
pulse. He cared little for wealth, beyond providing the wants
and comforts for himself and his loved ones. He was of a
judicial temperament, a conscientious, able and upright jurist.
His moral qualities were of the most sterling kind. His
integrity was never questioned, nor his honor impeached. He
was a man of fine literary taste, his decisions showing that his
education did not cease when he left college, but was a stu-
dent all his life. He is said to have Avritten "some of the most
important decisions ever handed down by the Supreme Court
of California." He was very popular with the people and
greatly beloved by the bar of the State, though his brusque-
ness and abrupt manner were, at times, not enjoyed by those
he interrupted and interrogated whilst addressing the Court.
For years he was the oldest member of the Supreme Court,
both in point of service and in years. He was, for years be-
92
fore his death, a great sufferer from cancer near his right ear,
but withal quite patient and gentle. He was an indefatigable
worker, never shirking any duty, and even in his last years,
when suffering and blind, he wrote out, with the assistance of
his daughter, opinions in the cases assigned him. He fought
the common enemy very bravely, but like all who have pre-
ceded him, he had finally to succumb. He died on the i6th
day of September, 1908, and his body was cremated.
In all Judge McFarland was on the bench — district, Su-
perior and Supreme — nearly thirty-five years.
Mr. McFarland was married at Nevada City, Cal., on
November 20th, 1861, to Aliss Susie Briggs, of Courtland
County, N. Y. They had one daughter, Jennie Hunt, now
living with her widowed mother in San Francisco. In the fire
following the earthquake of 1906, they lost their home and
all their furniture and household goods, pictures, photographs
and other articles so much cherished by old people, and had,
as it were, to begin life anew.
The McFarlands, as we have seen, came to this section
of our State in 1769, or earlier, and have owned and lived upon
Mount Delight ever since — a total of at least 140 years. They
were a hardy, sturdy, honest people, useful citizens, upright
and well-to-do, but few of them money makers, or at least
money savers.
93
TWO FAMOUS MILITARY ROADS OF PENN-
SYLVANIA.
BY HON. GEO. E. MAPES, Philadelphia.
The Society was entertained at the hospitable home of
Mr. R. W. Tunis, Philadelphia Avenue, Friday evening, Jan-
uary 29, 1909, with Mr. Mapes, the well known journalist as
historian. Mr. Mapes was given a fine reception, and quite
an ovation and hearty vote of thanks forhis excellent produc-
tion, which was the theme of animated discussion during the
remainder of the evening. The two military roads handled
in the paper opened the way for two mightier peaceful
armies to occupy and create an empire.
Congressman Adam Bede, who lectured at Wilson Col-
lege the same evening, joined the historians after his lecture,
and his striking personality and charming stories gave a
fitting climax to the first meeting of the new year.
At the business meeting Rev. C. W. Heathcote was
elected a member of the Society, and the volume completing
the first decade of the organization was announced as ready
for members and circulation among kindred associations.
Including illustrations the publication makes 350 pages.
In the first settlement of Southeastern Pennsylvania,
covering the three-cornered section between the Blue Ridge
and the Delaware on the east and the A^Iaryland line on the
south, no continuous highway system was necessary. As
settlements moved westward from the Delaware the settlers
found no serious difficulty in opening rude roads from farm to
farm. A very few days work would suffice to open tracks
through the forests which would permit the passage of the
cattle, pack-horses, and even the rude carts of the early set-
tlers. Much of the hauling of grain and merchandise in this
pioneer period was done in the winter upon rude sleds for
which a very narrow track would suffice.
The few early continuous roads were known as traders'
paths, which followed the Indian trails, widened sufficiently
to admit the passage of a string of pack-horses laden with
the peltries which were collected at the various trading
stations scattered through the Pennsylvania wilderness. Until
94
the arable land between the Delaware and the Blue Ridge
had been virtually occupied it may be said that the roads
necessary to serve the purpose of the pioneers almost made
themselves.
When, however, the wave of emigration reached the foot
of the mountain ranges of Pennsylvania, this process of road
building by successive steps had exhausted itself. Beyond and
between the mountains were fertile valleys, first visited by
venturesome traders and hunters, which tempted the land
hungry immigrants who swarmed into the country from Ire-
land and Germany, but the immigrants were poor, and the
opening of a road across a succession of mountain ridges
covering a territory of more than a hundred miles in extent,
was a costly undertaking which would have been beyond the
means of the toiling settlers who were anxious at that period
to occupy the unsettled forest sections of v/estern Pennsyl-
vania.
The French and Indian War at this juncture, although
regarded by the authorities of the Proprietary Government of
Pennsylvania as a misfortune, unexpectedly furnished the
necessity for opening a highway across the mountains at the
public expense, over which the army of English soldiers and
Provincial militia could pass on a mission of conquest which
was to result in the occupation not only of Pennsylvania, but
of the Ohio and Mississippi Valleys as well, by the English
speaking race. This highway, opened for the passage of a
conquering army originally, ultimately became the path over
which a mighty wave of immigration surged to take peaceful
possession of a wilderness continent and transform it into a
land of green meadows and golden wheat fields, studded with
a thousand towns and villages.
The highvv^ays of civilization must always remain sub-
jects of keen interest to the students of history and of these
highways in the United States none served a nobler purpose
than that originally known as the Forbes Military Road.
It would be a task of presumption on my part to address
an audience of the descendants of the pioneers of the Cum-
95
berland Valley upon the details of the history of the opening
of the Forbes' Road. This is an oft told tale, familiar even to
the school children of Southern Pennsylvania, which I need
not repeat at this time. The most obvious reflection suggest-
ed as one looks back over the stirring events that were en-
acted in this fertile valley and across the range of rugged
mountains to the west of us, at that time, is that the hard-
headed, iron willed, stubborn Scotchman, known to his sol-
diers by the sobriquet of "The head of Iron," w^ho a hundred
and fifty years ago refused to take the advice even of Wash-
ington as to the route to be pursued in his famous expedition
resulting in the capture of Fort Duquesne, builded better even
than he knew, and every patriotic Pennsylvanian has had
reason from that day to this to be thankful that Forbes had
his own way and insisted upon opening an entirely new road
through southern Pennsylvania to the Ohio, instead of follow-
ing the circuitous route by way of Fort Cumberland and the
Youghiogany, which had been opened by the ill-fated Brad-
dock three years earlier.
No one doubts the disinterestedness or patriotism of
Washington in advising the use of the Braddock route, and
one can easily understand why he thought the opening of a
new route would be fatal to the success of the expedition. It
is therefore no reflection upon his judgment or sincerity that
we can say at this time and in the light of our fuller knowl-
edge that he was mistaken and that Forbes was right in
choosing the new route.
How little we are prepared, however — we who ride in
luxury in Pullman coaches from the Delaware to the Ohio in
the matter of seven hours — to realize even in a faint degree
the Herculean task which confronted Forbes of transporting
an army of 7,000 men v/ith its train of provisions, artillery,
ammunition and camp equippage from one extremity of the
State to the other with not even a cart track opened through
the dense wilderness west of Bedford. In my boyhood days
I had some experience in opening an ordinary lumber road
through a few miles of primitive forest, and from that ex-
96
perience I can faintly imagine the gigantic nature of the task
which confronted Forbes who was required in the latter half
of one summer to open a road for the passage of the largest
army that had ever been gathered on Pennsylvania soil
through 150 miles of continuous wilderness. It was well for
posterity that Forbes was a man with an iron head and an
iron heart as well, for a man less resolute would have quailed
before the undertaking, and American history might have
been far other than what it is.
There seems now to have been something providential
about the French occupation of the Ohio Valley which made
it necessary that a road should be made for a conquering
army across the mountain wastes of Southern Pennsylvania,
to become afterwards a highway of civilization. As we see it,
the French occupation of the Valley of the Allegheny and the
Ohio was a comparatively easy matter. The opening of a
road for a stretch of a little over a dozen miles from Presque
Isle, on Lake Erie, to the headwaters of French Creek, from
which a canoe voyage could be made to New Orleans, was a
trifling undertaking compared with that of opening a high-
way across 150 miles of the successive ridges of the Allegheny
system in Pennsylvania. With this short portage from
Presque Isle, supplemented by an abundance of material for
the construction of canoes and boats along French Creek, it
was a comparatively easy matter to transport soldiers and
provisions a thousand miles to any desired point in the Ohio
Valley — the stream ran down hill, and the current itself
would float a fleet of canoes and boats from Le Boeuf to Fort
Duquesne in three or four days. It was first necessary, how-
ever, that this easy line of occupation should attract the ad-
venturous French to occupy the Valley, and that a war
should break out between England and France to make it
also necessary to open a road for an army across the Alle-
ghenies to dispossess the Frenchmen in order that a highway
of civilization might be opened for the peaceful occupation of
the great Mississippi Valley by the Saxon race.
All that has since followed has been the natural sequence
97
of the opening of the Forbes' road in that far ofif summer and
fall of 1758. Forbcs's 7,000 were resistless by any force which
the French could gather at the time when once the 7,000 had
reached the western foot of the Alleghenies. Forbes had
conquered Duquesne when he had successfully scaled the
Alleghenies. The French evacuated Duquesne when they
found it was useless to fight, and Fort Duquesne became Fort
Pitt and Pittsburgh. Forbes's army returned to civilization
and their homes, but a larger western army followed in its
wake to take peaceful possession of an empire. This stream
of migration followed the Forbes' Road under one guise or
another for three-fourth of a century, developing resources
and a traffic which made the Pennsylvania Canal with its
Portage connections, and later the Pennsylvania Railroad,
following a line of easier grades, but the same general di-
rection, necessary developments of the great transportation
system of the country.
And now since the million of people who constituted the
population of the country when the Forbes' Road was opened
have grown nearly to a hundred millions, Pennsylvania be-
gins to realize the necessity of again opening a great con-
tinuous permanent highway along the general line pursued
by Forbes when he marched to take possession of the Ohio
Valley. For three-quarters of a century immigrants, droves
of cattle and swine, trains of pack-horses, emigrant wagons,
Conestoga freight wagons, stage coaches, and travelers on
foot and horseback passed in endless procession across the
Allegheny Mountains by the Forbes' route. Then for a period
traffic and travel were diverted, first by canal and then by
railway along another route. And now again the Forbes'
Road bids fair to furnish a great State highway over which
automobiles, public motor coaches, great freight vans, and
all manner of modern vehicles will pass and repass between
the Delaware and the Ohio. Forbes blazed the way for his
army, and the road he opened through the wilderness was
never closed, never will be closed entirely, and the fact that
it has been the route of civilization westward for 150 years
98
may now be accepted as an instance in which the necessities
of war became the handmaid of civilization, and opened the
gatway for the occupation of an empire. To have lived along
the route by which Forbes' armies marched has been an
honor, for it his become one of the permanent pathways of
the mightiest civilization the world has ever known.
With this brief description of the causes which compelled
the opening of the first great military road in Pennsylvania,
we turn now to consider the second and only other dis-
tinctively military highway ever opened in the Common-
wealth. Twenty-one years had elapsed since Forbes scaled
the Alleghenies and made the Valley of the Ohio English
territory. The country was in the throes of the Revolutionary
War. The English had been expelled from New England, to
never again acquire a foothold east of the Hudson. Burgoyne
had invaded New York from Canada, had been caught as he
emerged from the northern forests with his provisions ex-
hausted, whipped to a stand-still by the patriot for'ces under
Gates, and starved into a surrender, thus insuring the country
against another invasion from that quarter. The British
forces had defeated Washington at Brandywine, occupied
Philadelphia for a winter, and then evacuated it to be defeated
at Monmouth by the forces trained in the hardships and pri-
vations of Valley Forge. On the whole, up to the mid-sum-
mer of 1778, the British had steadily lost ground in their
contest with the Colonies.
Suddenly, and without warning, in the mid-summer of
that year a force of savages and Tories invaded the beautiful
Wyoming Valley, transforming it into a scene of desolation,
and disclosing a continuous menace to all the frontier settle-
ments in New York and Pennsylvania. It is not necessary to
repeat in detail the horrors of that savage raid. Suffice it to
say that its eflfect was to depopulate for a period one of the
fairest portions of Pennsylvania. Of those who escaped death
or captivity at the hands of the savages some starved in the
trackless wilderness between the Susquehanna and the settle-
ments on the Delaware, and those who escaped took refuge
99
at Fort Penn, now Stroudsburg, and in Orange County, New
York, between the Delaware and the Hudson, some even re-
turning to their old Connecticut homes to remain until a suffi-
cient force could be furnished to protect them in the Pennsyl-
vania homes from which they had been driven.
The frontier thus menaced was so extensive that the
Continental Congress decided that the power of the Iroquois
Nation, with their Tory allies, to make future raids of this
sort, must be utterly destroyed. To this end Washington
was instructed to organize an invading force strong enough
to be irresistible by any power the Indians could concentrate,
and wage a campaign which would leave the hostile savages
without a base of supplies to provision another invasion.
As is well know^n, Gates was offered the command of this
invading force, and declined it. Washington's choice then fell
upon General John Sullivan, a New Hampshire lawyer who
had turned soldier and displayed good military capacity.
Sullivan accepted the command and concentrated the main
body of his army at Easton, and then found himself con-
fronted with the same difficult problem that Forbes had to
solve twenty-one years earlier — a forest fastness hundreds of
miles distant, to be invaded by an army of thousands of men
without a road by which to reach it. Between Easton and
the Wyoming Valley stretched the Blue Ridge, the Pocono
and Moosic Mountains in successive ranges, nearly the entire
seventy miles of distance being covered with dense forests.
The Connecticut settlers who had occupied the Wyoming
Valley had reached that territory by crossing the Hudson at,
or near Newburgh, the Delaware at Milford, and following
an Indian trail through a notch or gap of the Moosic range,
had succeeded in opening a road to that section that was
passable for carts, and rude sleighs in the winter season, but
entirely impracticable as a line of march for an army of in-
vasion.
Between Easton, where Sullivan concentrated his forces
and collected a portion of the provisions to subsist his army
during the proposed raid into central and western New York,
lOO
and what is now Tannersville, in Monroe County, an indiffer-
ent pioneer road had been opened by the way of the Wind
Gap in the Blue Ridge. This place, then known as Learn's
Tavern, was the extreme frontier of civilization, and the forty
miles of dense wilderness between that and the now city of
Wilkes-Barre, had been named "The Shades of Death" by the
hungr}^ starving fugitives who had threaded its swamps and
mountain ridges to escape from the brutal savages the year
before. Through this dense forest a road over which an army
with its artillery, provisions, camp equippage and ammunition
could march and transport its equipment had to be opened.
This important work was assigned to two regiments,,
one of New Jersey troops under Colonel Spencer, and another
of New York soldiers commanded by Colonel VanCortlandt.
Spencer's regiment reached Learn's Tavern by way of Wind
Gap from Easton. VanCortlandt's regiment marched from
Wawarsing in Ulster County, to what is now Port Jervis,
following what was afterwards the line of the Delaware and
Hudson canal. Crossing the Delaware he marched by way of
Shawnee to Fort Penn, now Stroudsburg, and joined Spencer
at Learn's Tavern. The combined working force of the two
regiments numbered about 500 men, and this force were
busily occupied from early in May until June 14th, 1779, in
opening the road to the Susquehanna. They endured untold
hardships in forcing their way through the forest, being at
times short of provisions, at other times supplied with meat
that was tainted — the art of embalming beef for military
purposes had not then been learned — and some of the lo-
calities through which they passed have carried to this day
names indicative of their rough experience. "Hungry Hill"
was one of the landmarks which have become historical along
this famous road. "Hell's Kitchen" was another, a pine tree
by the roadside having been furnished this inscription, which
was read and remarked upon by travelers over the route for
many years.
The road makers reached the Susquehanna June I4thy
1779, and four days later, on June i8th, Sullivan set his army
lOI
■of over 3.000 men in motion from Easton, occupying six days
on the march, reaching the Susquehanna on June 23rd. The
records of that time furnish one camping place with a pleasant
name. The route lay across the Tobyhanna and Lehigh head-
waters, streams that are still famous for trout fishing. Some
of the advance guard of the army on the march did some
fishing and had great luck, and the camp cook prepared a
meal of chowder made from the trout fresh caught from these
mountain waters, for Sullivan and his staff. This supper was
so palatable that Sullivan named the camping place that night
"'Camp Chowder," and history will record it as "Camp Chow-
der" until the end of time. Readers of present and future
ages will find their mouths watering as they contemplate that
feast of mountain trout enjoyed by Sullivan and his officers
in the long ago. *
At Wyoming, now Wilkes-Barre, all the available boats
on the Susquehanna between there and Sunbury had been
collected to transport the provisions to feed the army on its
further march. , This fleet of boats carrying provisions and
ammunition was propelled up the Susquehanna against the
current by boatmen equipped with setting poles, the army
following what was known as "The Warrior's Path," which
in some instances followed the stream, and at intervals crossed
the mountain ridges avoiding the bends by which the river
winds its way through the various gaps in the successive
ridges. In addition to the provisions carried in the boats the
army was accompanied by a thousand horses and 750 beef
cattle, and the objective point after leaving Wilkes-Barre was
Tioga Point, now Athens, in Bradford County, at the junction
of the Tioga and Susquehanna Rivers. Transporting the
provisions and ammunition by water from Wilkes-Barre to
Tioga obviated the necessity of opening a wagon road be-
tween those two points. The army, cattle and horses could
follow "The Warrior's Path," selecting at night for camping
grounds either an abandoned clearing or a natural opening in
the forest. Reaching Tioga, Sullivan halted, formed a camp
and threw up a fortification which was named Fort Sullivan.
I02
Here he waited for the arrival of General James Clinton, who^
with a brigade of 1,500 New York soldiers, had crossed over
the divide between the Mohawk and Otsego Lake at the head
of the Susquehanna River, built a dam on the outlet of the
lake, collected a fleet of boats, in which embarking with his
provisions and ammunition, including a light field battery, he
cut the dam, thus creating what afterwards came to be known
as "a pond freshet." He floated down the stream, joining
Sullivan a few days after his arrival at Tioga Point.
When one realizes that this voyage of Clinton on the
forest-fringed river from the outlet of Otsego Lake, starting
from what is now Cooperstown, passed the sites of the thriv-
ing villages and cities of Susquehanna, Great Bend, Bing-
hampton, Owego and Sayre, one cannot help asking whether
Clinton dreamed of the dense population that was to occupy
that lovely valley in the years to come.
The history of the remainder of the Sullivan expedition
is well known. Washington had instructed him to .make his
raid one of extermination so far as the Indian towns, villages
and plantations of central and western New York were con-
cerned, his especial injunction being "that there should be
nothing left to provision another Indian raid upon the
frontier settlements." Sullivan obeyed these instructions in
letter and spirit. After his junction with Clinton at Tioga
Point his available force was swelled to 5,000 men, and
against this army Brant and Johnson found themselves power-
less. He attacked their fortified position at Newtown, near
where Elmira is now located, and by mounting a battery of
light artillery on one of the hills which commanded the pali-
saded position occupied by the Indians and Tories in the
swamp, routed and drove them out with small loss. When
the cannon balls began to plow the dirt behind the palisade
and cut the limbs from the pine trees over their heads the
Indians fled, and could never be brought to face the invading
army again during the entire expedition. Sullivan penetrated
to the Genesee River, utterly destroying forty villages and
towns, with the corn fields and orchards surrounding them^
103
and returned to Tioga Point with the loss of only 40 men in
the entire campaign. The military power of the Iroquois
Nation was utterly broken, and while a few insignificant raids
were afterwards made upon the frontiers by small parties of
Indians who could subsist by the chase and by the meagre
plunder they were able to secure, Sullivan's expedition vir-
tually relieved the entire northern frontier from further danger
of any formidable invasion such as had devastated the Wyom-
ing Valley in 1778.
The most important effect of the opening of Sullivan's
military road, however, was yet to follow. Five thousand of
the most venturesome and stout hearted continental soldiers,
the pick and choice of the fighting men of the Colonies, had
penetrated northern Pennsylvania and central and western
New York on this expedition, and learned that they had in-
vaded a veritable paradise, a land of lakes and rivers, of rich
soil and an equable climate, and as soon as the war was over
they made another, and peaceful invasion of the same terri-
tory, following in a large measure the same route, bringing
their families with them and transforming this forest fastness
into well cultivated fields interspersed with thriving towns.
Every old graveyard from Wilkes-Barre to Buffalo contains
the bones of the men who marched with Sullivan, and after-
wards became the pioneer settlers of this section.
General James Clinton, Sullivan's second in command,
became the surveyor who helped to open the lands of central
and western New York to settlement, and a generation- later,
his son DeWitt Clinton, as Governor of New York, opened
the Erie Canal to furnish a continuous line of transportation
between the Hudson and the Great Lakes, by which the pro-
ducts of the section opened to civilization by Sullivan's expe-
dition could find transportation to a market. For twenty-
nine years, or until 1808, Sullivan's road was the only wagon
road between Easton and Wilkes-Barre. Now, the Delaware,
Lackawanna and Western Railroad parallels portions of this
historic highway, and the Lehigh Valley follows it from
Wilkes-Barre to Buffalo. Here and there portions of the
104
original route are still occupied as a highway, and a favorite
route of travel for automobiles over the Pocono Highlands
from the Water Gap to Wilkes-Barre touches it at intervals.
As the Forbes Road became the gateway of civilization
to the Ohio Valley, so Sullivan's Road over which he marched
to destroy the Iroquois Confederacy, became the highway by
which northern Pennsylvania and central and western New
York were peopled by the surplus emigration from the sea-
board Colonies. Each blazed a way for the westward march
of the army that has conquered a new world, and the occa-
sions which compelled the opening of the two avenues of
travel and transportation deserve to be indelibly imprinted
upon the minds of every son and daughter of the Keystone
State.
105
OLD FORT LOUDON AND ITS ASSOCIATIONS.
BY GEO. O. &EILHAMER, ESQ.
No. I.
The annual mettin,!r of the Society was held at the home
of John G. Orr. Esq., North Main Street, Thursday evening,
February 25, 1909. The nominating committee, appointed at
the January meeting, reported the following names of mem-
bers for oiTicers during the fiscal years, who were unani-
mously elected : President, Linn Harbaugh, Esq.; First Vice
President. J. S. Mcllvaine; Second Vice President, Irvin C.
Elder, Esq.; Secretary, Col. James R. Gilmore; Treasurer,
D. O. Gehr, Esq. Executive Committee. Hon. John W. Hoke,
Rev. E. V. Collins, Captain George W. Skinner, William S.
Hoerner, M. A. Foltz.
The Committee on Bibliography reported progress. Mr.
Orr, chairman of committee on Captain Cook "Marker" rec-
ommended October 29, 1909. the 50th anniversary of Cook's
capture, as date for dedication. The committee also recom-
mended that the marker consist of a rough boulder from the
mountain near the spot of capture, on which will be placed
a granite tablet with appropriate inscription. On motion of
Colonel Gilmore the Society, after discussion as to ways and
means, adopted report of committee.
Mr. Orr offered a resolution instructing the executive
committee to print the volume containing the papers of the
past year, and that hereafter the papers be printed monthly,
which was referred to executive committee. [The com-
mittee failed to report favorable action upon the resolution,
at subsequent meetings of the Society.]
R. W. Guthrie, of Pittsburgh, who was to read the paper
at this meeting, on account of pressing business engagements,
was unable, much to his regret, to meet the engagement. On
short notice the executive committee was fortunate in secur-
ing Geo. O. Seilhamer, Esq., as historian of the evening. Im-
paired health and pressing work in historical and literary
lines kept him close to work during the past j'ear, so that
he was seldom at the meetings of the Society. To see him
out again, therefore, made his reception the more hearty
and he was given quite an ovation. Mr. Seilhamer's paper on
"Old Fort Loudon and its Associai;ions," is one of the best
of his productions. It contains much which for the first time
appears, and is of exceptional value to the archives of the
Society. On account of its length, to suit the author, the
paper is given in two parts. The second part will be read at
the March meeting.
Delectable refreshments were served. Mrs. Orr was as-
sisted in receiving by Mrs. John Allan Blair, Mrs. Morris
Lloyd, Mrs. John R. Orr. Mrs. Nellie Hoopes, Miss Helen
Hoopes. Mr. Orr had as guests the Rev. S. S. Wylie, of
io6
Middle Spring; W. Tell Omwake, Esq., Waynesboro; Dr. J.
K. Gordon, J. S. Ross Snively, J. R. Ruthrauff, Esq., John
R. Orr, Esq., Dr. J. H. Devor, T. G. Zarger, Esq.
As the initial meeting of the twelfth year, it was by
members and guests regarded as a pronounced success. In-
creasing interest attended all the meetings of the year. Not
one was omitted, and places of meeting were in every in-
stance offered, in advance.
To most of US Old Fort Loudon is only a name utterly
devoid of associations. When I first thought of preparing
this paper I had only a vague notion of its history. The local
historians could afford me little or no help. In the work of
none of them is there any attempt at research or an intelli-
gent use of the material at hand. The ordinary maps of the
township and county fail to indicate its site. That the fort
was built by the Colonial Government in 1756, that it was
situated southeast of the present town of Fort Loudon, and
that it was frequently garrisoned by British and Provincial
troops, is the sum of the information given by Mr. McCauley.
The more voluminous '"History of Franklin County," pub-
lished in 1886, devotes a page to the fort, made up of ex-
tracts from the "Colonial Records" and other publications,
that lack vitality and interest. The account in "The Frontier
Forts of Pennsylvania" is remarkable only for incompleteness
of detail and fullness of blundering. If I had not sincerely
believed that I have something better to oft'er you I would
not be here claiming your attention on this occasion.
Matthew Patton and his wife Elizabeth were the original
settlers on the site of old Fort Loudon.
The author of the article in "Frontier Forts" generally
speaks of the pioneer as Patton or a Mr. Patton, but when he
tries to become more exact calls Matthew, Nathan. Even the
most cursory investigation would have shown that there is
nothing mythical or uncertain about Matthew Patton, the
pioneer. His original warrant for the land on which the fort
was built, issued in 1744, is still in existence. This is in itself
sufficient proof that he was among the early settlers at the
base of Mt. Parnell. Here he brought his wife and such of
his children as were already born, and here he built a house
and barn near the bank of the West Conococheague, just
I07
above the spring at the bend in the stream, on the ground
where the fort was afterward erected. Here his younger chil-
dren were born, and here also were born the children of his
son, James ; of his grandson, Matthew, the Judge ; and of his
great-grandson, Elias, the last named a familiar figure for
many years on the farm and in the village. In New England a
family name associated with a historic spot, such as this, from
its stirring days down to the calm and even present would
have been embalmed in history and literature, but with us,
alas! there is no one to sing the glories of the past, and none,
perhaps, to listen if the singer were to come.
When the Indians made their first swoop on the Conoco-
cheague Valley, November i, 1775, the first buildings they de-
stroyed were Matthew Patton's house and barn. The
slaughter in the Great Cove which marked the beginning of
the French and Indian War on this part of the frontier, had
occurred the day before. News of this slaughter had spread
like wildfire over the Conococheague Valley. The reports
were of the most alarming nature. Those that were able to
make their escape saw their houses in flames as they came
over the mountain. A youth named Galloway saw his grand-
mother, a venerable lady ninety-three years old, killed and
scalped and a stake driven through her body. So many per-
sons were unable to make their escape that the surprise be-
came a massacre. Adam Hoopes, the trader, whose name
often occurs in the annals of that dreadful time, but of whom
we know almost nothing, reported that fifty men, women and
children were killed or taken, and Sheriff Potter afterward
fixed the number at forty-seven.
While the alarm created by the slaughter in the Cove
was spreading over the county the two men who were most
active in warning the authorities and urging the settlers to
undertake measures for their own defense were Col. Benjamin
Chambers, at Falling Spring, and John Potter, the Sheriff of
Cumberland County, who lived near Brown's Mill. Colonel
Chambers sent expresses down the valley and to Marsh Creek
beseeching the inhabitans to come to the rescue. "As there
io8
are but one hundred of the enemy," Chambers wrote, "I think
it is in our power, if God permit, to put them to flight, if you
turn out well from your parts. I understand that the West
settlement is designed to go, if they can get any assistance,
to repel them."
Before any response could be made to this appeal the
Indians had followed the fugitives across the mountain. The
people of West Conococheague were in consternation and
many of them fled from their homes. The Rev. John Steel,
the intrepid pastor of the little flock that worshipped at
Church Hill, met those that tarried, able-bodied men and
shrinking women and children, at McDowell's Mill. When
the reports of the murders in the Cove reached Sheriff Potter
he sent messages to his neighbors to meet him at McDowell's
the next morning and he was himself early at the meeting
place. The Sheriff was there only a few minutes when
Patton's house and barn were fired. He at once proposed to
go against the enemy, but only a fourth of the men^who were
at the mill consented to go with him.
"We went to Patton's," the Sheriff wTote to Secretary
Peters, 'Svith a seeming resolution and courage, but found no
Indians there, on which we advanced to a rising ground,
where we immediately saw another house and barn on fire
belonging to Mesech James, about one mile up the creek from
Thomas Barr's. We set off directly for that place; but they
had gone up the creek to another plantation, left by one
Widow Jordan the day before; but she had unhappily gone
back that miorning with a young woman, daughter to one
William Clark, for some milk for her children, and were both
taken captives, but neither house nor barn hurt."
No one was killed in this foray, unless the captive women
were afterward murdered, as is not unlikely, but besides the
burning of the houses and barns of Patton and James their
cattle were shot down and in the language of Adam Hoopes
the horses were found standing, with Indian arrows in them.
What became of the victims of that day's work ? His-
tory is silent. Tradition is dumb.
I09
None of us can recall the story of that day without a
feeling of shame in which sorrow is stronger than anger. Out
of one hundred and sixty men at McDowell's mill that morn-
ing only forty went with Potter to Patton's blazing house.
The warriors of the piping times of peace were craven when
confronted by the tomahawk and scalping knife of the savage.
"Our old officers hid themselves, for aught I knew to save
their scalps, until afternoon when the danger was over," the
Sheriff wrote afterward, regardless of the fact that he was
arraigning his neighbors in history. It was impossible for
him, with only forty men, to pursue a hundred Indians,
flushed with the bloody w^ork of the day before, through
Loudon Gap into Path Valley, where an ambuscade was to
be feared at eyery step. He waited until the middle of the
afternoon for a reinforcement, but only sixty men came. A
council was then held to consider the question whether the
united force should pursue all night. Potter's little band
stood by him, but the recruits, almost to a man, voted to
return to McDowell's Mill. Of the latter only six were will-
ing to go forward. The Sherifif Vvas indignant; and that night
he returned to his home, declaring that he would not "guard
a man who Vv-ill not fight when called in so imminent manner."
Who was Mesech James, whose house and barn were so
quickly destroyed after the burning of those of Matthew
Patton, and where was his home ?
The name is a striking one — one that it is surprising that
it should have been so completely forgotten. It appears
among the taxables of Peters Township in 1786, in the big
subscription "History of Franklin County," but it has no
right there. Those names are merely a misleading repetition
of Rupp's list of taxables for 1751. All the inhabitants of
Peters Township, when Cumberland County was created, are
reported alive and at home when Franklin County was or-
ganized, and all the young bachelors are bachelors still.
Everybody seemed to have come back after the Great Run-
away of 1756. All the early settlers were paying taxes as of
vore. Not one old man had died, nor one young man come
no
of age in all those years. But all the same, Mesech James was
dead as early as 1771, as anybody will concede who will take
the trouble to examine the records in the office of the Record-
er of Deeds, that show how his son and his sons-in-law di-
vided the inheritance that he left for them.
Mesech James came to the West Conococheague as early
as, or earlier than 1745. He settled on what is now the site
of the village of Fort Loudon. William Wilson, whose son
Matthew was in his day one of the most prominent men in
the county, had obtained a warrant for the land in 1737, and
had a survey of it made in 1738, but finding another tract
more to his mind he abandoned this one, and James obtained
a warrant for it, October 4, 1745. Here he built the home that
was burnt by the Indians ten years later in the first on-
slaught on the Conococheague Valley. It is probable that
two of his sons, Isaac and William, were carried into cap-
tivity, either then or afterward, for an instrument in writing
executed August 27, 1771, by Enoch James, son, and John
Ross, Owen Davis and David Bowen, sons-in-law, of Mesech
James, declares that each of them had a right to a share in the
estate if he came to claim it. The James, Ross, Davis and
Bowen families were Welsh and gave its name to Welsh Run.
With the Bowens a favorite name for their daughters was
Gwen. Like John Hoge's wife, of Hogestown, who was
Gwenthlene Bowen, they may have been of the royal family
of South Wales. The descendants of David Bowen and Sarah
James were numerous, but the only living representative of
the James and Bowen families, apparently, of whom 1 have
personal recollection, was the late Banner Graves, of Mont-
gomery Township.
Although the house of Thomas Barr, which was between
the Patton and James houses, escaped destruction in the first
Indian foray, it was burnt in the onslaught of King Shingas
and Captain Jacobs, March i, 1756, and in it they consumed
the dead victims of their savage fury. In the attempt to save
the Barr house, young James Barr was saved from death by a
neighbor, one of the Alexanders, who saw an Indian running
Ill
upon the boy with an upraised tomahawk, and shot the savage
dead before he could strike.
As we have seen, the second incursion of the savages
followed quickly upon the first, and a third attack was made
early in November, 1756, in which Samuel Perry, who lived
near McDowell's Mill, and six of his neighbors, were killed
and scalped, and six children carried ofif. A party of fourteen
men, belonging to Captain Potter's company at Fort Mc-
Dowell, was sent out to search for Perry, and found his dead
body covered with leaves, but w^as surprised and routed by
the Indians, four soldiers being killed and two reported
missing. After the second foray it became apparent that the
stockade at McDowell's was too far inland to serve as a pro-
tection against the Indians entering the valley by way of
Loudon Gap, and this view of the matter was confirmed by
the slaughter of Perry and his neighbors. Colonel John Arm-
strong, after his return from his successful Kittanning expedi-
tion, undertook, under provincial authority, to erect a fort in
a more commanding situation. His first intention was to
place it at Barr's. In a letter dated November 8, 1756, in
which he reported the third slaughter on the West Conoco-
cheague and the defeat o^' Potter's man, he said, "This week,
God willing, we begin the fort at Barr's," but eleven days
later he wrote to Governor Denny from McDowell's Mill that
he had "carefully examined Barr's place, and could not find it
a proper situation for a fort, the soil being too strong to admit
the ditch, and the spot itself overlooked by an adjoining hill."
He added that he had "fixed on a place in that neighborhood,
near to Parnell's Knob, where one Patton lived."
In the devastated and depopulated condition of the valley
Matthew Patton was in no mood to finish the new house that
he had under way when the Indians burnt his old one. Th.e
logs were up and the roof was on, in November. 1755. and
thus Colonel Armstrong found it in November, 1756. Pat-
ton's new house was appraised and taken a^^ a storehouse, so
that provisions could be at once removed from McDowell's
and the first work on the new fort, the excavation for a cellar,
112
was done, November 19, 1756. The work of building the fort
was begun by the men belonging to the companies of Capt.
John Potter, Antrim, Sheriff of Cumberland County, and
Capt. Joseph Armstrong, Hamilton, member of Assembly.
The only persons that were hired were men to haul the logs
and a steward to care for the feeding of the laboring soldiers,
and the steward in the intervals between issuing the rations
was obliged to do carpenter work. Before the close of the
month twenty men and a commissioned officer were detached
from each of the garrisons within reach of the new fort to as-
sist Potter and Armstrong's men in their work. On the 22nd
of December Colonel Armstrong reported that the public
stores were safely removed from McDowell's Mill, the bar-
racks for the soldiers built and "some proficiency made in the
stockado." There was some delay in completing the stockade
because at this time the snow was more than a foot deep.
Pomfret Castle was the name for the new fort suggested
by Colonel Armstrong, but this high sounding title, had been
set apart for a projected work in the Juniata Valley, after-
wards known as Patterson's Fort, and so Governor Denny
named the Conococheague stockade Fort Loudoun, in honor
of the Earl of Loudoun, who had just arrived as Commander-
in-Chief of his Majesty's forces in North America. This title
was fully as aristocratic as that of Pomfret Castle, but from
the first the second u in Lord Loudoun's name was dropped
by the provincials, and from that time to this Fort Loudoun
has been Fort Loudon. A better name than either of these
inappropriate ones would have been Patton's Fort, or Fort
Patton. It was on Patton's land. It was on the spot where
the torch of the savage first blazed in the Conococheague. I
verily believe that the misnomer had much to do with the
obscurity in which the history of Fort Loudon is shrouded.
Beyond its site and a few episodes of the next ten years its
story is a blank. In the article on Fort Loudon in the misfit
book published by the State it is said that the enclosure
covered more than an acre of ground ; that the foundations
being of stone are still visible; and that the foundations of
"3
chimneys, within the enclosure, may still be seen. It is true,
there are some traces of possible masonry, but sharper eyes
than mine are necessary to fix these assumptions with any
certainty. All indications of the outline of the stockade have
disappeared. What became of Patton's new house is not
definitely known, and all that is claimed for the present farm-
house is that the logs and many of the stones in the rear
structure were taken from the fort. In the frontier defences
a spring of water within the enclosure was always an import-
ant matter, but we have no means of knowing whether
Patton's Spring was within or without the palisades. My
task is to revivify this long neglected and almost forgotten
spot, historically speaking, by collecting and vitalizing the
fragments of a history that has never been written.
While Fort Loudon was building, Colonel Armstrong's
attention was distracted by a beef scandal as exciting in its
way as the embalmed beef afifair of the Spanish-American war
of 1898. Hoops & Buchanan were the contractors — the same
Adam Hoops that v^'as on the ground when Patton's house
was burning. The terms of the contract were only vaguely
known, but Armstrong declared that the contractors would
have a profit of £2300 for feeding 448 men for one year. Such
gain in so small a transaction would be enormous even in our
time. Besides, the astute victualers had arranged with the
thick-headed or corrupt Commissioners of Supplies to furnish
six months' provisions at a time, thus saving the labor and
expense of more frequent delivery. It is no wonder that
Colonel Armstrong said of the contract that it was the most
mistaken thing he ever knew.
The contractors were able to buy beef at 12 shillings per
hundred, a cent and a half a pound ; pork at 2 cents a pound ;
and flour at 8 shillings per hundred, i cent a pound. As these
transactions were in Pennsylvania currency I use the word
cents instead of pence, an English ha'penny being as big as a
Pennsylvania penny. The rule had been to supply the sol-
diers with a pound and a half of fresh beef each day. Under
the arrangement with Hoops & Buchanan they were supplied
114
with only four pounds of beef, three pounds of pork, and ten
pounds and a half of flour each, by the week, and a gill of
whiskey or rum by the day. For this they were paid 5 shill-
ings for each man per week. The cost of the whiskey was
not more than a cent a day for each man. This gave the
victualers a profit of 2 shillings and 6 p. per week on every
soldier — in other words, of the money paid by the province
the soldiers got one-half and the contractors the other half.
Not only was the quantit}^ of beef supplied to each soldier
reduced one-half pound per day but its quality in the words
of Colonel Armstrong was "such young and thin beef as this
part of the world produces." Beef cattle in the Cumberland
Valley at that time was generally ill fed and seldom more
than two or three years old. Poor as such beef was at best,
its quality was still farther deteriorated by the necks and
shins being salted down w^ith the rest and weighed out to the
soldiers as part of their supplies, while all the tongues, tallow,
etc.,. was reserved for themselves b}^ the contractors. Even
the loss in weight after being salted was made to fall upon
the soldiers.
This contract gave great umbrage among the people and
almost drove the enlisted men to mutiny.
"A pound and half per day of this kind of beef," Colonel
Armstrong wrote to Governor Denny, "the men must have
whilst it's in pickle, else they will not serve, nor can the ofifi-
cers have any satisfaction, or peace, if less is given." Arm-
strong's complaints were answered with Franklin's trite phil-
osophy — the loss in weight was only water.
It was under conditions, such as these, that the Conoco-
cheague companies of Colonel Armstrong's battalion began
garrison duty at Fort Loudon. There were, apparently, four
Conococheague companies in the autumn of 1756 — Capt. John
Potter's, Capt. Hugh Mercer's, Capt. John Steel's and Capt.
Joseph Armstrong's. None of these companies has an entity,
or a history. Of the four. Captain Potter's is the most definite
and determinable.
That fretful afternoon after the burning of Patton's and
1^5
James's houses shows the kind of stuff of which John Potter
was made. He was brave, eager, energetic, choleric. He was
one of the early settlers of Old Mother Antrim, and served as
a lieutenant in Col. Benjamin Chambers' regiment in 1748.
When Cumberland County was created he was appointed its
first sheriff, and was now filling that important office for the
second time. He had the esteem of his neighbors, who were
not only willing to serve under him but to fight with him.
As Potter's men helped to build Fort Loudon it may be as-
sumed that they were part of the first garrison. Captain
Potter's lieutenant was William Armstrong, a son or nephew
of Captain Joseph or a brother of Colonel John. Lieutenant
Armstrong became captain of the colonel's company in 1757.
In the "Pennsylvania Archives'' James Potter, the eldest son
of the Sheriff, is named as ensign of two companies at the
same time — Colonel Armstrong's and Captain Potter's — and
Thomas Smallman is also set down in the records as Captain
Potter's ensign, in 1756. I can not disentangle this — I can
only guess. My impression is that Smallman was ensign of
the Colonel's company, and that Ensign Potter w^as with his
father's company in the Kittanning Expedition, in vvhich he
was wounded. In any event the company, as it then existed,
did not serve long at Fort Loudon. Sheriff Potter died early
in 1757, and the command of his company devolved upon
Capt. William Thompson in the reorganization of the bat-
talion. Ensign Potter became lieutenant of the Colonel's new
company, and Ensign Smallman lieutenant under Major
Mercer. It is evident from all this that, apart from the beef
controversy, the first weeks of the occupation of Fort Loudon
found at least one of the companies in an almost disrupted
condition.
The two companies of Captain Mercer and Captain Steel
present a problem equally indefinite and indeterminate with
the Potter puzzle. Before the defeat of Braddock, Dr. Hugh
Mercer had come from the LTniversity of Aberdeen to practice
physic on the Conococheague. The Rev. John Steel, an Irish-
man from Derry, was ordained by the Newcastle Presbytery
ii6
in 1744, and was settled over what are now the Mercersburg
and Greencastle churches a number of years before the young
Scotch doctor came to live among his people. Both were men
of intrepid spirit. Mercer went with Colonel Armstrong's
expedition against Kittanning in command of a company, was
severely wounded, and came near dying in the woods. Steel
built a stockade round his church on Church Hill and was
always as ready to fight as to pray — to give the word to his
soldiers as to preach the Gospel of Peace to his parishioners.
In the First Series of the ''Pennsylvania Archives" James
Holliday is given as Mercer's lieutenant in 1756, while in the
Second Series James Hayes is named, with John Scott as
ensign. My impression is — as before it is only an impression
— that in the Kittanning expedition Captain Mercer's subordi-
nates were Lieutenant Holliday and Ensign Scott. In that
case the company was a Conococheague company. Steel was
given a com.mission as captain March 25, 1756, and James
Holliday is named as lieutenant and Archibald Irwin as en-
sign. There is reason to believe that this company was or-
ganized for Fort Steel and that it had no lieutenant. It is
probable that this company was consolidated with Mercer's
early in 1757. It was one of the first companies that performed
garrison duty at Fort Loudon.
The effectiveness of the garrison at McDowell's had been
weakened by the detachment of some of the men for service
at Joseph Armstrong's house, east of Mt. Parnell. To meet
this condition Armstrong was given a commission as captain,
October i, 1756, and he maintained an independent company
for some time without any subordinate officers. His men
helped to build the fort. In April, 1757, it v/as ordered the
only four forts on our frontier should be garrisoned — Lyttle-
ton, Loudon, Shippensburg and Carlisle. In the subsequent
regulations both the Armstrong and Steel companies disap-
pear from the rolls.
The first military exploit in which the garrison of Fort
Loudon figured was a farce — the second was a tragedy.
A party of sixty Cherokees from Virginia, bitterly hostile
117
to the Delaware? and Shawanese, determined to go on the
war-path against their enemies and ours. They crossed the
Potomac at the mouth of the Conococheague, and followed
that stream by way of Davis' fort, at Philip's Knob, and
Justice Maxwell's fort, between Welsh Run and Mercersburg,
to Blacks-Town. The party had not come entirely unherald-
ed. Some weeks before one of the Campbells, who was in
North Carolina, had written to his father in Conococheague
that the Cherokees were getting ready to join Colonel Arm-
strong's battalion, but felt discouraged because of news that
the Government of Pennsylvania was about to treat with
their enemies and ours — the Delawares and Shawanese. Their
news was accurate, for at this time a council of the Six Na-
tions, managed by Capt. George Croghan, from which, how-
ever, the fighting Delawares and the Shawanese held aloof,
was about to meet at Lancaster. Croghan was thoroughly
hated by the Cherokees, and by their leader on this expedi-
tion. Captain Paris, an Indian trader who had great influence
over them. When they determined to come, it was not so
much to follow the tracks of their enemies as to thwart the
peace that Croghan was trying to patch up. But their coming
was a surprise to most of the people and to the commanding
officer at Fort Loudon. The whole party was lodged for the
night in a house at Black's without alarming anybody, ex-
cept a countryman in search of his horses, who carried the
news of their presence to the fort. That he was frightened is
not surprising, for the Indian Spectre was in every eye; but
to professional Indian fighters their coming could not have
betokened any hostile intention. They came openly, which
was not the way Shingas or Captain Jacob had come, or was
likely to come again. They slept without any watch or pre-
cautions for their safety. But they were Indians, and this was
a time of danger. A friendly Indian was something as un-
likely as a white blackbird. It might have occurred to the
commanding officer at the fort that if these were not friendly
Indians they were fool Indians. A fool Indian was even more
unlikely than a friendly Indian. None of these considerations
ii8
entered into the reasoning of the astute strategists in the
garrison. They were Indians. That was enough. They must
be bagged before morning.
About sixty soldiers, with three or four officers, marched
out to surround the enemy and vanquish the unsuspecting
braves. The house was surrounded while the Cherokees slept
the sleep of peace. Everything was in readiness for an attack
at daybreak. The delay would have resulted in the defeat of
the besiegers, if they had found a real enemy; for the besieg-
ing force was discovered before a shot was fired. This
vv^as fortunate, but at the same time exceedingly grotesque.
I do not know the exact terms in which Captain Paris
addressed the men that were making the investment. "What
are you jays trying to do ?" would have been the modern
phraseology. After an explanation the Indians came out and
laid down their arms ; the soldiers laid down theirs ; then
Waughhoughy, the older of the two Cherokee war captains,
complimented the white warriors on their skillful pteparations
for the assault, and Yaughtanno, the younger, smiled a sar-
donic smile of approval, full of grim humor. History does
not say that after these ceremonies both whites and reds ad-
journed to Cunningham's tavern near by. Well, what would
we have done ? The captured Cherokees were afterward con-
ducted to Fort Loudon, where they were sheltered as friends,
not as enemies.
The farce was acted early in May, 1757; the tragedy fol-
lowed on the 9th of June.
In anticipation of another onslaught that was almost
certain to come about midsummer, Lieutenant Holliday, with
seventy-five men, went out to reconnoitre the mountains west
of Fort Loudon. Among the early settlers of Peters Town-
ship were three Hollidays — John, William and James. James
was the lieutenant. His wife was Elizabeth McDowell, and
they had three children in the home nest under the shadows
of Mt. Parnell — all boys. That he was a brave young farmer
his military services and ardor show. That he was a man of
standing and character among the Presbyterians of the West
119
Conococheague is proved by the fact that he was the lieu-
tenant of the Rev. Captain Steel's company. After his death
his widow married Daniel McAllister, a son of Archibald
McAllister, the pioneer of McAllister's Spring, near Carlisle,
and by her second marriage she became the ancestress of a
•distinguished soldier a century later — Gen. Ormsby M.
Mitchell. James and Elizabeth Holliday's son, John, married
Mary McDowell, probably his cousin, and was made prisoner
of war at Fort Washington, on Manhattan Island, in 1776;
the youngest son, Samuel, who married Jannet Campbell, was
the ancestor of the Hollidays of Erie. The other son, William,
died young. I have been thus particular in telling you all that
I have been able to gather in regard to Lieutenant Holliday
and his family, because he seems to have been virtually the
first commander at Fort Loudon, and was certainly the first
officer to lose his life in defense of the Conococheague frontier.
When Lieutenant Holliday reached the Big Cove, he
went with fourteen of his men into the deserted house of
David McClelland, who had been killed in the first Indian
onslaught in 1755. and the rest of the company, unapprehen-
sive of danger, gathered at the spring. While the men at the
spring were drinking, the house vvas suddenly assailed by a
band of Indians, numbering, it was said at the time, a hun-
dred. The men at the spring seem to have run for their lives,
leaving Lieutenant Holliday and his companions to their
fate. Ten of the party got back to the fort at i o'clock the
next morning with a confused account of what had happened.
We only know that Holliday and the men that were with him
in the house were killed, and that other massacres followed in
Cjuick succession.
When Colonel Armstrong heard of the disaster to Lieu-
tenant Holliday's party he ordered Captain Callcnder and
Ensign Hays to Fort Loudon, and followed himself, having
the day before sent Lieutenant Armstrong with wagons and
cattle for the garrison. It was his expectation that Lieuten-
ant Armstrong would at once proceed from the fort in search
■of the savages, and Callender and Hays were to assist in the
120
quest. How futile these movements were and how inefficient
the service in every way are shown by two striking facts —
the records are silent in regard to Callender, Armstrong and
Hays and a month later the garrison at Fort Loudon was
almost starving. Perhaps, I do Ensign Hays an injustice, for
on the 28th of June Captain Potter received a letter from his
son Lieutenant Potter, then at Fort Lyttleton, saying that
Hays had returned after seeing a great many Indian tracks on
the Juniata. The only Indians seen by anybody were two
young braves, who were engaged in the pastoral occupation
of fishing.
Colonel Armstrong was a very busy and much harassed
man at this time. His duties were at once military, political
and diplomatic. His battalion was in a very unsatisfactory
condition — almost disorganized, in fact. The men were slow
to re-enlist and the officers were tendering their resignations.
Those at Fort Loudon seem to have resigned simultaneously.
All that we know about it is contained in a line in one of
Armstrong's letters. It was a mere allusion of uncertain
meaning, but it indicates the dissatisfaction with the divided
authority on the frontier. The provincials were expected to
do the fighting, but the Commissioners were parsimonious in
suppl3nng them with arms, ammunition, clothing and provi-
sions. Nothing could be done without an order from Colonel
Stanwix, and Stanwix was a martinet and would do nothing
except in a military fashion, which Vv^as impossible with the
Indians swooping down at unexpected places all along the
frontier from the West Conococheague to the Susquehanna.
After every attack the savages escaped.
Disgusted with the attempt to dismantle Fort Chambers,
the treatment of the soldiers, the neglect of the garrisons, the
feebleness of the campaign, and the bickerings of the Govern-
or and the Assembly, the justices of Cumberland County
threw up their commissions. Colonel Armstrong busied him-
self with filling the vacancies. The selection of the new mag-
istrates for Carlisle he found a very difficult task; for Ship-
pensburg he recommended Capt. Hugh Mercer, and for the
121
Conococheague, Joseph Armstrong, John Potter and William
Smith. Mercer declined to serve, but Smith figured con-
spicuously and adversely in the later history of Fort Loudon.
Colonel Armstrong's diplomacy was exhibited in the
negotiations with the Cherokees. When Waughhaughy's
party came to Fort Loudon he regarded their coming as a
favorable providence. Armstrong knew Captain Paris, and he
believed that with a Pennsylvania commission Paris and his
Indians could be made very useful in the woods. Paris held
a Virginia commission, but this did not deter him from look-
ing to Maryland and Pennsylvania for employment. He was
not very honest, perhaps, but neither was Croghan, who had
just came back as the agent of Sir William Johnson, and was
eager to project himself into the Indian affairs of the
province, and was then promoting a Peace Conference at Lan-
caster. Of the two men Armstrong preferred the Virginian.
He suggested that an arrangement should be made with
Paris, but begged the Governor to send no Indian interpreters
or corrupt peacemakers — a double-barreled shot aimed at both
Weiser and Croghan — saying, "nothing is so likely to lose us
the friendship of these Southern tribes as the appearance of
tampering with a few abject Delawares and Shawanese ; east
of Susquehanna peacemakers may be requisite, but west of
it warriors are most needed, these in the end will make
the best peace." While he was thus paving the way for
the employment of the Cherokees, Paris was eager to
meet him, and asked Armstrong to come to Fort Frederick.
Armstrong went, accompanied by Capt. Hugh Mercer and
Lieutenants William Armstrong and Thomas Smallman, and
a conference with Paris and the two chiefs was held on the
i8th and 19th of May. Waughhaughy proclaimed himself
governor of thirty towns on the East Side of the Hills, and
Yaughtanna called himself chief of Over the Hill Cherokees.
It was arranged that a later meeting for presents should be
held at Fort Loudon. This led to intrigues and complications
that gave Armstrong much trouble.
Colonel Stanwix, while disavowing any knowledge of
122
Indian affairs, was keenly alive to the jealousies of the Indian
agents. Those with whom we have to deal were all jealous
of each other — Croghan of Armstrong, Paris of Croghan, and
Edmund Atkin, the Virginia superintendent, of everybody.
Atkin especially resented Paris' action in taking the Chero-
kees to Pennsylvania without consulting him. Croghan suc-
ceeded in supplanting Armstrong as the agent through whom
the presents from this province should pass at Fort Loudon,
This gave umbrage to Captain Paris, "I durst not mention
Mr. Croghan as a fit person to distribute your presents," Paris
wrote to Governor Denny, " as the thoughts of that gentle-
man, to the Cherokees, is very aggravating, knowing him to
be a corrupt peacemaker among the nations, who are our
enemies. This can't properly be called a treaty, as they are
our friends; it is only a friendly conference, and I think you
are not obliged to send Mr, Croghan. The Chiefs have re-
peatedly urged that Colonel Armstrong should be the person
chosen to distribute the presents. I shall come with the
Cherokees to Fort Loudon." With the fatuousness for which
English governors in America were always noted in dealing
with the natives Denny persisted in sending Croghan. It is
possible that Croghan would have attempted to placate Paris
but for the interference of Atkin. Atkin was determined to
have the same control over the Southern Indians that Sir Wil-
liam Johnson had over the Six Nations and the Indians of
the North. He was voluble and self-sufficient, indiscreet and
abusive. He wrote a long letter to Croghan, that he sent by
express to Fort Loudon, in which he depreciated Paris and
drew a picture of the Cherokees that was far from flattering.
He described the warriors under Paris as the worst behaved
in the nation, and Waughhaughy as the greatest rogue among
them — a man of unbounded avarice and without regard for
the English, except to get presents from them. All this was,
no doubt true, but it was written when Atkin was eager for
Croghan to bring the Cherokees back to Virginia, and was
intended to create a false impression that they were only
plunderers and freebooters.
123
Croghan reached Fort Loudon on the nth of June, where
he met Armstrong and received Atkin's letter. He at once
determined to go to Winchester, and induced Colonel Arm-
strong and his brother, Capt. George Armstrong to go with
him. They started on the 12th and arrived on the 13th. By
some means that does not appear from the records Waugh-
haughy and the Cherokees were brought there at the same
time. Poor Paris was completely circumvented, for the wily
chief, finding his interest in a different direction, declared that
neither he nor his people wanted anything further to do with
the backwoods captain because nobody could trust him.
Atkin afterward reported that Waughhaughy was very peni-
tent, and was willing to give up his pretensions to presents
from Pennsylvania. Atkin must have known that the Chero-
kees were not built that way. Armstrong left Winchester on
the 1 6th l)ut Croghan remained some days, returning to Fort
Loudon on the 27th with fifty-five Cherokee warriors to
whom, he said, he was denied the privilege of speaking. Atkin
had been compelled to allow the braves to meet the Greeks
bearing gifts.
In the autumn of 1757 Atkin sent a long wail to Governor
Denny and Sir William Johnson, in which he charged Crog-
han with enticing the Cherokees to Fort Loudon in the early
summer with a pretence that it was only to receive their
presents. This accusation must have been an afterthought
with Atkin. After leaving Fort Loudon in May Captain
Paris' party had killed four Indians and taken two prisoners,
but to reward this voluntary service was only a part of Arm-
stiong's purpose. It is certain, however, that Waughhaughy
deceived both Armstrong and Croghan by promises he had
no intention to keep. To complete the deception two parties
of Indians went out a few days after their arrival at the fort
on a pretence of scouring the woods. Ten Cherokees inider
Richard Smith, the interpreter who came with them from
Winchester, went to Carlisle, and from Carlisle they accom-
panied Lieutenant Armstrong to Shearman's Valley, but as
soon as they found traces of the enemy they showed the
124
white feather and returned. On the 2nd of July, five days
after their arrival at the fort, twenty-eight of the warriors
went out with Captain Potter to the westward, but returned
the next day, and never stirred from the fort afterward until
they went back to Virginia. This expedition failed because ot
Croghan's treatment of Paris in the matter of the pres'ents.
According to Atkin, Croghan promised the Cherokees horses
for the scout, and sent to Paris to bring them to the Big
Cove. This Paris failed to do. The rivalries of the two agents
and the jealousy of Atkin utterly destroyed the usefulness of
the warriors not only to this province but to Virginia, unless
indeed these Cherokees were the worthless and rascally In-
dians that Atkin said they were in his letter to Croghan.
The Cherokees received the promised presents at Fort
Loudon on the last day of June, and other presents afterward
although they had performed no service to merit this second
gift. According to Atkin the second of these Fort Loudon
presents included thirty bridles with which the Indians caught
horses belonging to the Maryland and Virginia farmers. Thus
ended the Fort Loudon Cherokee episode, which began with
the affair at Blackstown. The story, so far as I know, has
never been told by any of the historians. It is not a creditable
story, and its suppression is not surprising. As to Atkin's
long pieces, Colonel Stanwix wrote to Secertary Peters, whom
he had asked to return the letters after copying them, "pray,
hurry not yourself, they will keep cold." The entire episode
has been in cold storage ever since.
125
OLD FORT LOUDON AND ITS ASSOCL\TIONS.
BY GEO. O. SEILHAMER, ESQ.
No. JI.
The Slarch meeting was held Friday evening, 26th, in
the assembly rooms of the Chambersburg Trust Company
building, with a large attenaanoe of memoers and guests.
Dr. Charles F. Palmer entertained the Society and had as
guests the local clergy and members of the city council, who
were graciously received by the host. Linn Harbaugh. Esq.,
made his bow as the newly elected president of the Society,
and expedited the business in excellent form. Dr. Irvine's
invitation to the Society to be present at the unveiling of the
portrait of Dr. D. Hays Agnew, in Mercersburg Academy,
May 13, was accepted. T. G. Zarger, Esq., was elected to
membership in the Society. Rev. John Allan Blair was asked
by President Harbaugh to say a word in behalf of the clergy.
Responding Mr. Blair said the clergy and members of the
Society should be closely allied in historical research, and
urged co-operation in the work of writing the history of the
churches of the Valley, which would be of reciprocal value.
After all, he said, it is the personal element that prevail.?,
and it is the philosophy of history that we seek in our re-
searches.
Mr. Seilhamer read the concluding part of his paper on
Old Fort Loudon. As he concluded he was heartily applauded
and given a unanimous vote of thanks. Like all of Mr.
Seilhamer's productions, it showed faithful, conscientious re-
search, as well as the graceful literary style for which the
author is so widely known.
Adjourning to the banqueting room the large company
was regaled with a sumptuous dinner. The party by this
time had increased in size, a number of business men and
still others representing the professions surrounding the
splendidly laden boards. As a dispenser of genuine hospi-
tality. Dr. Palmer, it was conceded, was unequalled, and
the social hour and after-dinner speeches were a delight to
all. Before "good night" was said, there was a pause in the
conversation, during which Dr. Palmer read several anec-
dotes, much to the amusement of his guests. They were at
the expense of Judge Gillan and one of the newspaper re-
porters present.
At this time Col. John Stanwix was contemplating a
march to the Potomac with five companies of the Royal
Americans, of which he had command, and 250 men of Col-
onel Armstrong's battalion. He did not march because his
military chest was empty and he was unable to procure
wagons, but Armstrong's contingent went to Fort Lyttleton,
126
where it was placed under the command of Capt. Hance
Hamilton, a garrison being left at Fort Loudon. In July
dysentery became epidemic in the garrison, twelve men being
down with it at one time. This epidemic was owing to in-
sufficient and unwholesome food. Dr. Blair, who was at the
fort, hastened to Carlisle and reported that there v/as not a
pound of meat in the garrison, that six of the men were very
low with the prevailing disease, and that it was impossible to
eftect a cure without a change of diet. Supplies w^ere sent,
or ordered to be sent, including rice for the sick soldiers. From
the fact that Dr. Blair left the medicines at the fort in charge
of Lieutenant Lyon, when he departed for Carlisle, we may
infer that Lyon was in command at Fort Loudon, in July,
1757-
Our knowledge of Dr. Thomas Blair is meagre. He. was,
perhaps, a son of Alexander Blair, the first settler at Shade
Gap. His wife was a daughter of John McClellan, one of the
earliest settlers of Peters Township, and it is not iinprobable
that he succeeded Dr. Mercer in the practice of medicine at
Conococheague. At this time he was surgeon of Colonel
Armstrong's battalion.
Lieut. William Lyon was a nephew of Col. John Arm-
strong, and his wife was Colonel Armstrong's daughter, Alice.
His eldest daughter, Peggy, married the Rev. David Denny,
for many years pastor of the Falling Spring Presbyterian
Church, and his youngest daughter, Alice, became the wife of
Judge George Chambers. He was an early settler at Carlisle,
and a deputy surveyor, and helped Colonel Armstrong to lay
out the county seat of Cumberland County. His presence at
Fort Loudon at this time is explained by the fact that he was
then serving with Captain Potter's company. He was with
the expedition under General Forbes, in 1758.
At the beginning of 1758 there were two companies, com-
prising 109 men, at Fort Loudon. One of these was the com-
pany organized by Capt. John Potter in 1755. Captain Potter
died late in 1757, and in the re-organization of 1757-8 the
company was reconstituted, with William Thompson as cap-
127
tain, William Lyon as lieutenant, and Thomas Hays as ensign.
These officers were all from the neighborhood of Carlisle.
Captain Thompson commanded a Troop of Light Horse in
the Forbes expedition later in the year. His military exper-
ience in this campaign gave him such prominence as a soldier
that he was appointed to the command of the Pennsylvania
Battalion of Riflemen that marched to Cambridge, in 1775, to
assist in the leaguer of Boston. He was made a brigadier-
general, in 1776, but he had the misfortune to be captured at
Three Rivers, which had the eii'ect of blighting his Revolu-
tionary career. The other company in the garrison, in 1757-8,
I am unable to identify.
While the Forbes expedition was in preparation there
was another Cherokee episode at Fort Loudon. Early in
April, 1758, forty of these Indians arrived at the fort bare-
footed, without match-coats and without arms. Colonel Arm-
strong wrote to Governor Denny, calling attention to their
destitution and asking the Provincial Council to provide
for them. The Governor applied to Sir John St. Clair, his
Majesty's quartermaster-general, to order the needed gurij»,
and match-coats, and a little leather to make moccasins, but
Sir John answered curtly that the Assembly and people of
this province had such singular and unreasonable notions
of Indians, particularly the Cherokees, that he would have
nothing to do with that matter. Governor Denny then sent
a message to the Assembly asking to be enabled to supply the
needs of the Indians. Whether the Cherokees went away
saying, "We came to you naked, and you clothed us not," is
not set down in history, but it is certain that three of the party
succored Richard Bard.
Carlisle was the principal place of rendezvous of the
Forbes expedition, Fort Loudon being little more than a
house of call for the troops on the march. It seems likely,
however, that the York County companies, which were a
part of Colonel Mercer's battalion, joined the command at
this place. Lieutenant Colonel Lloyd's company of the First
Battalion, under Captain-Lieutenant Miles — Colonel Miles in
128
the Revolution — which matured at Fort Chambers, was in-
duced to go to Loudon to be paid as a condition of continuing
with the expedition. When the army — for so it deserves to
be called — had swept by to Bedford and Ligonier, Fort
Loudon was no longer a frontier outpost. The fort was even
denuded of its garrison. But its situation was such that it
was needed as a military storehouse, and it could not be en-
tirely abandoned. In a sense it was also a military tavern.
The feeble Forbes, while being carried with his army on a
horse litter, stopped here to refresh himself and recruit his
strength, and the famous Bouquet, the real deliverer of the
Pennsylvania frontier, was here a number of times. Its
caretakers for awhile was a sort of invalid corps from Forbes'
army, some of the soldiers who gave out on the march being
sent back to it. After the capture of Fort Pitt it was included
among the forts that General Forbes thought ought to have
a permanent garrison. It is probable that this suggestion was
acted upon. We know that some of the returning soldiers
stopped here after the close of the campaign, but from 1758
the fort is not again mentioned in the "Colonial Records"
until 1762, when it was said that goods belonging to the
Western Indians were still at Loudon. Governor Hamilton
directed Colonel Burd to have them packed and to employ a
wagon to carry them to Fort Pitt. The fort was not con-
spicuous in the expedition of Colonel Bouquet in 1763-4, but
in a letter of June 18, 1764, Sir William Johnson expressed
his regrets at the losses at Fort Loudon. After this a detach-
ment from the Royal Regiment, known as the Highlanders,
was placed in the fort under Lieut. Charles Grant, and a year
later occurred the episode of the "Black Boys," the most
interesting of all the associations of old Fort Loudon.
It is no easy task to outline a truthful picture of the Fort
Loudon episode. Our sources of information at first hand are
tainted with interested misrepresentation and downright
falsehood. The printed accounts of the annalists like Rupp
and Day are an incomplete and unintelligible jumble. Even
the picturesque narrative of Parkman in "The Conspiracy of
129
Pontiac" is distorted by blundering", prejudice and ij^norancc.
Nobody had the courage to assert the simple truth that the
troubles were due entirely to the great colonial trading house
of Boyerton, Wharton & Morgan, of Philadelphia. But be-
fore I recount the causes of the episode, or attempt to fix
the responsibility for it, it is best that I should relate in as few
words as possible the story of the conflict of the "Black Boys"
of the Conococheague with Ralph Nailor and his drivers at
Sideling Hill, and of the subsequent contests with the High-
land garrison at Fort Loudon.
Early in 1765 the Philadelphia merchants sent a large
quantity of goods, intended ostensibly for presents to the
Western Indians but in reality for the Indian trade, to Henry
Pawling's tavern, near Greencastle, for shipment to Fort Pitt.
At Pawling's the' goods w^ere transferred from wagons to
pack-horses, and the more laborious part of the journey was
begun. This attempt to open premature trade with the In-
dians caused great excitement on the Conococheague. At
Squire Smith's, where Mercersburg now stands, the cavalcade,
consisting of seventy pack-horses with their drivers, was met
by a large number of the border inhabitants. William Duf-
field, a young man of prominence in the neighborhood, and
the ancestor of the Duffield family of Montgomery Township,
tried to dissuade the men from carrying out their purpose at
that time. Failing in his effort he followed the drivers to the
Big Cove, with about fifty of his neighbors but met with no
better success. The drivers made game of his entreaties, and,
in the quaint language of the time, "would only answer him
by ludicrous burlesque."
Among those who witnessed Duffield's discomfiture was
Capt. James Smith, a typical frontiersman, with a wader
knowledge of Indian and frontier life than was possessed by
the average settler. In 1755, he accompanied the roadmakers,
engaged in cutting the New Road for General Braddock,
under his brother-in-law, William Smith, and was captured by
the savages. He was at Fort Duquesne, a prisoner, when
the French and Indians returned after the defeat of Braddock.
I30
For five years he remained a captive and became like an In-
dian in gait and gesture. He returned to Conococheague in
1760. Soon after his return he organized a company of
Indian fighters, who were dressed in the Indian fashion and
trained according to Indian methods. To these men was
given the name of the "Black Boys," because they painted
their faces in the Indian colors — red and black. When the
Indians again became troublesome in the spring of 1763 a
subscription was raised among the inhabitants of Conoco-
cheague and the riflemen were put under pay. Smith was
form.ally elected captain by the committee having the matter
in charge, and he was accorded the privilege of naming his
subordinates. "I chose two of the most active young men
that I could find, who had also been long in captivity v/ith the
Indians," Smith wrote. Unfortunately, he failed to supply
the names of these officers, and neither history nor tradition
has preserved them.
In 1764 Smith received a lieutenant's commission, and
went out with Bouquet's expedition on the Muskingum. It
is to be regretted that he failed to write such an account of
his share in this campaign as he was capable of writing,
instead of the perfunctory paragraph in his Narrative. Here
he was in the wilderness into which he had been carried a
captive nine years before, with an army of which Parkman
has given a brilliant picture, when the awed tribes of the
West met Bouquet in Council — the ridges of bayonets flashing
in the sun, the tartans of the Highland regulars fluttering in
the breeze, the bright red uniforms of the Royal Americans
captivating the eye of the savage; with the darker garb and
duller trappings of the Pennsylvania troops, and the bands of
Virginia backwoodsmen in fringed hunting frocks and Indian
moccasins, leaning on their rifles in the background. This
picture, with the deliberations of the council, the delivery of
the hostages, and the surrender of the prisoners, some of them
at headquarters and the others at Fort Pitt, must have ap-
pealed with great force to the emotional side of Smith's na-
ture, and his narration, if he had given it, would have gone
i
131
still farther to justify his title of "the untutored De Foe."
But Smith was a man of deeds rather than of words, and
it is easy to imagine his feelings after his return when, in the
face of the probal)ility of hostilities being renewed, he saw the
Indian traders defiantly enter the Gap, above Mercersburg, to
follow the Packers' Path to Fort Pitt, with ammunition and
arms for the truculent savages. Conditions were ominous.
The hostages had escaped. The Indians were assuming their
hostile and threatening attitude once more. He could not
fail to remember that the Wyandots at Detroit, after their re-
turn from the slaughter of 1757, with their scalps, prisoners,
horses and plunder, had boasted that they would entirely
subdue Tulhasaga, the children of the Morning Light, and t3
believe that under the inspiration of another Pontiac the
Western Indians would be ready to attempt it.
Captain Smith was present at the interview between Wil-
liam Duffield and Nailor and his drivers in the Great Cove.
The arrogance of the drivers disgusted him, but it was only
when he saw that Dufifield was ready to yield and would allow
the calvacade to proceed that he resolved to take the matter
into his own hands. Ten of his old warriors were with Duf-
field's party. Communicating his design to these, they with-
drew privately into the woods, where they encamped for the
night. In the morning they painted their faces red and black,
and waylaid the cavalcade at Sideling Hill.
The engagement was brief and decisive.
One can hardly suppress a grin at the description of the
incident in "The Conspiracy of Pontiac."
"The mountains towered above the wayfarers in gray
desolation," Parkman*says ; "and the leafless forest, a mightv
Aeolian harp howled dreary music the wind of March.
Suddenly, from behind snow-beplastered trunks and shaggy
bushes of evergreen, uncouth apparitions started into view.
Wild visages protruded, grotesquely horrible with vermilion
and ochre, white lead and soot; stalwart limbs appeared, en-
cased in buckskin ; and rusty rifles thrust out their long
■muzzles. In front, and flank, and all around them, white pufifs
132
of smoke and sharp reports assailed the bewildered senses of
the travellers, vv^ho were yet more confused by the hum ^t"
bullets shot by unerring fingers within an inch of their ear^J
'Gentlemen,' demanded the traders, in deprecating accents,
'what would you have us do ?' 'Unpack your horses,' roared
a voice from the woods, 'pile your goods in the road, and be
off.' The traders knew those with whom they had to dea^
Hastening to obey the mandate, they departed with their
utmost speed, happy that their scalps were not nimibered with
the booty."
Captain Smith wrote with something of the directness
with which he fought.
"I scattered my men about forty rods along th'^ side of the
road," Smith said, "and ordered every two to take a tree and
about eight or ten rods between each couple, with orders to
keep a reserve fire, one not to fire until his comra ie had load-
ed his gun ; by this means we kept up a constant slow fire
upon them, from front to rear. We then heard nothing of
these traders' merriment or burlesque. When they saw pack-
horses falling close by them, they called out, 'Pray, gentlemen,
what would you have us to do ?' The reply was, 'Collect 3^our
loads to the front, and unload them in one place ; take your
private property, and immediately retire.' W^hen they were
gone we burnt what they left, which consisted of blankets,
shirts, vermilion, lead, beads, wampum, tomahawks, scalping
knives, etc."
Warlike stores, such as these, were clearly not "booty"
as Parkman calls them. They were as clearly unfit for pres-
ents or barter at a time when another Indian war was im-
pending.
While the flames were consuming the stores, upon the
safe conveyance of which the Philadelphia merchants had felt
no misgivings, the discomfited Nailor hurried back to Fort
Loudon to make his complaints to Lieutenant Grant, the
commandant. This Nailor was a rude fellow, fired with wrath
and burning for revenge. According to his representations
the goods that he was carrying were mostly for the garrison.:
133
at Fort i'itt, and the men that lie had intreated in the hour of
Oiinger as gentlemen were robbers. Later when he carried his
omplaints before Chief Justice Allen, and asked for "writes"
for the apprehension of the "robbers," the Chief Justice dis-
approved of the expedition and refused the writs. Nailor had
done wrong- in carrying the goods, he said, and the "Black
Boys" had done wrong in shooting his horses, but that, as
nobody was killed, he had no business with the matter. The
Highland lieutenant had no such scruples. Grant made
Nailor's cause his own, and sent out Sergeant Leonard Mc-
Glashan and twelve men to bring in the offenders. Capt.
Robert Callendar, of Middlesex, near Carlisle, who had served
in the Kittanning expedition as captain lieutenant of Colonel
Armstrong's company, was at the fort when Nailor reached it.
He was interested in the Indian trade, and he was very eager
for the recovery of the goods that were not burnt. Like all
traders, he believed in the potency of mony. He told the
sergeant that the men should have something for their trouble
and offered a reward of £ lo for the arrest of every person
concerned in burning the stores. McGlashan seems to have
needed no such spur to his activity. He looked upon the
whole community as enemies of the king, was zealous in his
work, and not discrimnating in his captures. McGlashan made
prisoners of such innocentcoimtry people and chance wayfarers
as he was able to find, and brought them to the fort. It is
uncertain whether there were any "Black Boys" among them.
Without any proof of their complicity, and without a warrant
or civil authority, Grant held McGlashan's captives as military
prisoners. The work of scouring the mountains was a con-
genial task to Highlanders, and the guard-house at the fort
was soon filled with alleged robbers. Grant's course was re-
sented and finally resulted in his humiliation. The whole
Conococheague country was ablaze with indignation, and it
was easy for Captain Smith to collect a force that greatly out-
numbered the garrison and invest the fort. When Lieutenant
Grant took a survey of the surrounding country on the morn-
ing of the 9th of March, he found the hill east of the foit
134
swarming with armed men. For the first time in its history
Fort Loudon was menaced by a foe determined to attack it.-
A rare muster of desperadoes is what Parkman calls the-
little army of brave and hardy frontiersmen that Captain
Smith had summoned in a few hours to compel the surrender'
of their friends and neighbors. Grant sent for the Chief Des-
perado, and Smith appeared at his call.
"What do you mean by appearing with such a mob before-
the king's fort ?" the commandant demanded.
"We came to demand the prisoners in the fort," was the-
quiet response.
"What will you do if they are sent to Carlisle jail, es-
corted by the King's troops ?" Grant asked.
"We shall first fire over the soldiers," Smith answered;
"if they refuse to give up the prisoners, we are determined to
fight the troops and die to a man rather than let our friends
go to jail."
The parley, resulted in nothing and Smith went back to
his men on the hill in sight of the garrison. A strict watch
of the fort was maintained and soldiers venturing outside
were captured. It was not long until Smith had twice as
many British troops prisoners in his camp as there were
"robbers" in the guard-house. An exchange was effected, the
settlers giving the garrison two for one until all the prisoners
in the fort were released.
Incidents that followed each other in such rapid succes-
sion — that brought an orderly community so near to rebellion^
— must have had their inception in causes of unusual potency...
In our own time we are apt to regard Rings and Trusts as a.
recent invention. The truth is that in comparison with some
of the colonial monopolies our dreaded Octopus is a harmless-
reptile. One of the boldest and most grasping of the colonial
trusts was that which met its first check at Sideling Hill.
This check only spurred the great trading house of Boynton,.
Wharton & Morgan to renewed efforts, and it had a trade
with the Western Indians so extensive that it claimed that in
three years from the close of Pontiac's war the savages had'-
135
destroyed goods belonging to the firm amounting in varue to»
£40,000 Pennsylvania currency. In compensation for these
losses the chiefs made over to the mechants' territory com-
prising a large part of the State of West Virginia at the treaty
of F^ort Stanwix, in 1765, and the grant would have been
confirmed by the Crown had not Samuel Wharton's corres-
pondence with Franklin been discovered while the negotia-
tions were pending. This grant was the basis of the famous
Indiana Company, which has been confounded by some
writers, Professor McMaster among them, as comprising the
territory of the present State of Indiana.
When Col. Henry Bouquet, of the Royal Americans,,
whose love episode with Anne Willing is one of the romances
of Philadelphia Society, was in the Quaker City, in 1763,.
preparing for his expedition to the Muskingum, he promised
Boynton, Wharton & Morgan exclusive privileges for trading
with the Indians. Their goods for the Indian trade were got
ready, but no opportunity occurred for sending them until the
spring of 1765. Previous to sending them they consulted CoL
George Croghan, and it was afterward represented that some
of the goods destroyed at Sideling Hill were for him in his
private trade. This insinuation gave Croghan much dis-
quietude, and he wrote to Sir William Johnson from Fort Pitt
in regard to his alleged connection with the Philadelphia mer-
chants. "They desired me," he said, "to mention their design
to Colonel Bouquet, which I did, and the necessity which I
thought there would be of goods here when the trade should
be opened, and he told me, as I had a pass to take up the
presents, if I thought it necessary I might pass those goods
under it, in consequence of which, as I had left part of the
presents in the care of Captain Callendar I gave a pass to
bring out part of theirs, in which step I find I have been
wrong." He was very wrong indeed, but Mr. Wharton re-
lieved him from the more serious aspersions, declaring that he
had no connection with their venture. Croghan's complaisance
and Bouquet's Philadelphia friendships go a long way toward
explaining Lieutenant Grant's attitude, and the zeal with.
136
which the young Highland officer constituted himself the
military arm of the traders.
With the example of the daring and enterprising Phila-
delphia merchants to stimulate them, and interested political
influences to support them, backed as they were by the mili-
tary power, the men engaged in the Indian trade assumed a
determined attitude. In a few weeks Fort Loudon became a
great store-house of Indian goods. But the people of Conoco-
cheague were equally determined. They organized what in
this day would be called a Vigilance Committee. The goods
of the traders were rigorovisly inspected. The roads leading
over the mountain were watched by armed men. No trader
was allowed to pass without a certificate of inspection and a
magistrate's safe conduct. All this made the traders restive
and they implored Lieutenant Grant for an escort from the
garrison over the mountains. Grant was willing, and he again
sent out the truculent McGlashan.
Early in May Captain Smith's '"Black Boys", captured a
party of pack-horse men on or near the site of the present
village of Fort Loudon. The traders were taken to the house
of Roland Harris in the Gap. Harris was an early settler and
a man of character and influence in the neighborhood. He
owned nearly all the land between the village and Richmond
furnace. His house has disappeared, but part of a barn built
by him in 1779 still remains. His son, Roland, conducted an
extensive tannery near the old Harris homestead, on the prop-
erty now owned by Mr. J. H. Hoerner, traces of the vats being
visible in wet seasons. On the 6th Lieutenant Grant sent the
sergeant and twelve men to Harris' house to relieve the cap-
tured drivers. When the soldiers reached Harris' they found
that the "rioters" were gone, and not knowing which way
they went, McGlashan "pressed the aforesaid Harris" to pilot
him in his pursuit. Harris conducted them as far as the
Widow Barr's house where the soldiers had a skirmish with
Smith's men. After shots were exchanged the soldiers took
refuge in the widow's house, where, says McGlashan, "we
were fired upon warmly for some time." The troops sue-
137
ceeded in wounding a countryman, James Brown, in the thigh
and taking him prisoner, "which prisoner," McGIashan naively-
declared in an affidavit printed in the Pennsylvania Archives,
"we kept about one hour, and then released him, being per-
suaded by a Country Man that happened to Come there (as
he sayd by Chance) and told us that if I did not Release the
afore mentioned prisoner, Neither me nor any of my party
would Ever Gitt back to the Fort, upon which I Released
him, and Proceeded back to Fort Loudoun." Like Sairey
Gamp Serjeant McGIashan was no "scolard."
Four days after the skirmish at the Widow Barr's house
the "Black Boys" again appeared on the hill east of the fort.
Soon afterward Justices Smith, Reynolds and Allison arrived,
and asked to be allowed to inspect the goods intended for the
Indian trade. Their value has been estimated at £ 11,000.
"I have orders from the General," Lieutenant Grant said,
"to send for a magistrate, and take an inventory of all goods ;
but I can not proceed on any such business at a time when
there is a body of armed rioters about the garrison."
The flippant young officer added that he would send for
one of the Justices the next week. Justice Smith, who was
the nearest magistrate to the fort, declared that if he did not
get liberty to make an inventory then he would not come
again.
"I am not subject to the General's orders," Justice Smith
said ; "this is not a king's fort, nor is this the king's road ;
the General's pass is no pass, and no military officer's pass
will do without a magistrate's pass ; five hundred men will
not escort these goods without a magistrate's pass."
Lieutenant' Grant was obdurate and the Justices retired.
If Grant had manifested an accommodating spirit on this oc-
casion it is probable that the troubles would have come to an
end without further disorders. As it was he soon fell a victim
to the wrath of the "Black Boys." On the 28th of May, while
he was riding within a mile of the fort, he was suddenly sur-
rounded by five men, among whom was the redoubtable Cap-
tain Smith, unhorsed, and taken prisoner. "Take the dirk
138
from the rascal," said one of the men, as they grappled with
him. After disarming him they carried him seven miles into
the woods and kept him all night without any shelter. They
seem to have guyed him unmercifully. They threatened to
take him into the mountains and keep him there, while the
country rose and captured the fort. But the bugaboo that
frightened him most was the declaration that they would set
off for Carolina and take him along. They actually started
with him, as if they meant what they said. This brought him
to terms. The cause of his capture was his refusal to return
some arms belonging to the country people that were taken by
McGlashan in his first raid into the Big Cove. Rather than go to
Carolina he consented to give a bond for forty pounds for the
delivery of arms in five weeks. The bond was executed at
Cunningham's tavern and he was set free. When Grant got
back to the fort he resolved to repudiate the agreement and
keep the guns. Captain Smith thereupon wrote him a letter
that breathes contempt for the man and the soldier:
Smith's Run, Jime 19th, 1765.
Sir : The Arms that are detained in Loudon you may
keep them, keep them, keep them !
JAMES SMITH.
Soon after his return from captivity among the "Black
Boys" Lieutenant Grant received a demand for non-com-
pliance with which he was fully justified. This was a warrant
issued by Justice Smith commanding the arrest of Serjeant
McGlashan for shooting James Brown in the scrimmage at
the Widow Barr's house. Brown had entirely recovered be-
fore the warrant was issued or, perhaps, even thought of, and
lived to become a member of the Pennsylvania Convention of
1776 But Grant's manner of treating the warrant shows the
littleness of the man. After asking the constable to show
him the warrant he retained it, as he said, "to make use of it
against Justice Smith," who in his opinion had "forfeited every
right to act as a magistrate." His aspersions of Colonel Arm-
strong were even more indiscreet and contemptible. If he had
139
surrendered McGlaslian, he wrote to General Gage, Justice
Smith "would have got the poor Sejt. Try'd with a Jury of his
own adherants, with Mr. Armstrong, of Carlisle, at their
head, who favours the Rioters, and woud have had no Mercy
on him." It is no wonder, with such a commandant at Fort
Loudon, that Justice Smith declared : "These Highlanders
will ruin the country."
A closing incident of the occupation of Fort Loudon by
the Highlanders was the Romberg episode. Thomas Rom-
berg, commissary for the garrison, on the road from the fort
to Nathan McDowell's, found a so-called advertisement that
created a great stir at the time. It was a satirical call for the
Loyal Volunteers to meet at Hell's-Town, as the writer said
Squire Smith's Town ought to be named, to have "Grant, the
officer, hang'd or whipt." It was a very coarse document and
must have been written b}^ some illiterate person. Its pur-
pose, if it had a purpose, was either to cast odium on the
Black Boys, or on the garrison. Its authorship was imputed
to Romberg. He denied the charge under oath, but failed to
convince the people of Conococheague, because he had only a
copy, the alleged original having been destroyed after being
copied. It must be confessed that the advertisement and the
Romberg deposition have many infelicities of style in common.
Although Lieutenant Grant so long and strenuously in-
sisted upon retaining five rifles and four smoothbore guns on
a mere question of punctilio, he at last consented to surrender
them to William McDowell, November lo, 1765, Mr. Mc-
Dowell agreeing to hold them to await the Governor's pleas-
ure. But even this surrender was made only after the fort
had been besieged for two days and two nights by the Black
Boys. During this attack the sentries dared not show them-
selves in the bastions. Many shots were fired at the fort,
some going through Patton's house and some lodging in the
stockades. Two hours after the surrender of the arms Ensign
Herring arrived from Fort Pitt, with thirty men, to escort
the garrison to that post, and so Lieutenant Grant disappears
from Fort Loudon, and Fort Loudon from the pages of history.
I40
THE CONODOGWINET CREEK.
BY JOHN G. ORR, ESQ.
No. III.
The April meeting of the Society was held at the home
of H. A. Riddle, Philadelphia Avenue, Tuesday evening, May
4, 1909. After the transaction of some routine business, the
paper, announced as the third of a series on the "Early
Highways," was heard by a much interested assemblage of
members of the Society, and personal friends of Mr. Riddle.
Mr. Orr's researches brought out a number of interest-
ing facts about our own Conococheague Creek in addition to
the exhaustive tracing of the Conodogwinet from source to
mouth. The author well sustained the reputation he had
made for himself in the production of his former studies
upon the ''Early Highways," and fully justified the semi-
serious introduction of him by President Harbaugh as "the
most noted highwayman of modern times in Pennsylvania."
The regular meeting for May was dispensed with be-
cause of the proposed visit of the Society to Mercersburg.
And see the streamlets how they run
Through woods and meads, in shade and sun.
Sometimes swift, sometimes slow.
Wave succeeding wave they go
A various journey to the deep.
Like human life to endless sleep !
This is the third contribution I have made to this Society
under the title of "Early Highways" and while they are
numbered consecutively they are not a continuous story. Each
is complete in itself and yet there is a sort of continuity, since
they relate to the same section of country and cover partly the
same periods of time, and out of one has come the germ or
suggestion for another. I have been asked : "Why don't you
say more about the roads themselves because that is what I
am interested in." To this I make answer, "I have given
some account of the country through which the road passes,
reasons "for the need of the road," the petition of citizens to
the Court praying that it be opened, the Court's answer to the
request in appointing viewers to examine into the need of the
road, the viewers' report with the work of the surveyor's,
showing their actions, and recommending its opening and
giving the distances with their courses and bearings. Then
141
follows the order of the Court that the road be opened in ac-
cordance with the survey as given, and when this final action
has been taken it is a highway ready for the public uses. If 1
were only to tell of its location, its length in perches, its
courses and bearings, its width in feet, its terminals, the story
would be brief and lack in interest, because the life would
have been taken out. The traffic and the travel that passes
over it, the people who reside along or near and use it, the
events of interest and importance that have occurred on it, the
growth and development of the country through which it
passes and thus brought into touch with the outside world — it
is these that help to make a highway.
There are two questions that suggest themselves under
the title — "Early Highways" and Conodogwinet Creek" — and
either one might first arise : Why called Conodogwinet, and
how is it a highway ? As is generally known it was christened
Conodogwinet by the Indians and is one of the few names
that this valley has inherited from the Indians who imme-
diately preceded the white settler. The early settlers were not
content with dispossessing the Indian and driving him west-
ward from his inheritance, but have also almost blotted out
his names of the valley, the mountains that make and the
streams that water it.
CHOOSING OP NAMES.
This Society, in choosing its own name, Kittochtinny, has
helped to perpetuate the name of the valley and the mountains
which surround it. Its new owners called it the Great or
North Valley until the rapidly increasing immigrants desired
a new county made out of Lancaster. In 1750 the new county
was formed and named Cumberland in honor of Cumberland
County in the extreme northwest of England to which it
bears some resemblance, which also has a shiretown named
Carlisle, where the assizes were held. After the formation of
the new county, by common consent and custom it gradually
became known as Cumberland Valley and the older names
disappeared from usage and from the maps. It is without
142
local meaning and lacks the musical rhythm of Kittochtinny
("Endless Mountains") which the Indians applied to the
range, which is a part of the great Appalachian system, as it
stretches through Pennsylvania, Virginia, Tennessee, Ala-
bama, almost to the Gulf of Mexico.
The other county of the valley in Pennsylvania is Frank-
lin, formed in 1784, and named in honor of one whose services
for his State at home and his country abroad will be held in
remembrance after Pennsylvania has ceased to be a Common-
Avealth.
In Cumberland County the townships bear English
names, as Hampden, Middleton, Middlesex, Southampton,
East and West Pennsboro. Franklin has the Scotch-Irish of
Antrim, Lurgan, Letterkenny, Fannett and once a Rath Mul-
len changed to Peters. It has the English names of Guilford,
Hamilton, Southampton and names of revolutionary heroes
as Washington, Greene, Montgomery. Their towns and vil-
lages bear the names of the founder or promoter. The town
of Carlisle named its streets Hanover, Pitt, Bedford, Louther,
after Dukes and Lords of England. It also has a High Street
which is of English origin, where the principal street of a
town, especially a market town, is a continuation of a high-
way; hence. High Street. Shippensburg and Chambersburg
have each a King and Queen Street. The streams are named
after some early resident, as Herron's Branch, Denny's Run,
Paxton's, etc. The stream that passes through Shippensburg
and is a part boundary line of this county, heads as Main's
Run, at Shippensburg becomes the Branch and flows into the
Conodogwinet as Middlespring. Some of the streams are
without a name on the maps.
WHY CONOCOCHEAGUE.
The two largest streams of the Valley, are the Conoco-
cheague and the Conodogwinet, the first flowing to the Po-
tomac, the other to the Susquehanna. These names are about
all we have left of the "poor Indian" except the thrilling tales
of his savage life. There is considerable uncertainty in their
143
orthography as they appear on the written or printed pages,
owing to the lack of knowledge and sometimes in accord with
the opinion of the writer. In early surveys and papers of the
early settlers it appears as :
Conocogig.
Chonocogig.
Conecocheague,
Connocochegue.
Conocochegue.
The Indian name is Gimeukuschig.
Rev. John Gotlieb Heckwalder, who was born in Bedford,
England, March 12, 1743, came with his parents to America
at the age of eleven years, landing at New York. From there
the family went to Bethlehem where he grew to manhood and
became one of the Moravian Missionaries, among the Indians
of Pennsylvania, Ohio and elsewhere. He lived among them
for many years and obtained a good knowledge of their his-
tory, their lives, languages and customs, and is generally con-
sidered as good authority on matters pertaining to them. He
gave much time to the study of their language, and among
the information given of these people, has furnished interpre-
tations of many of their names to streams, etc. His interpre-
tation of Conococheague "is indeed a long way," supposed to
have arisen from the fact that a party of Indians, after a long
journey along the stream, tired and disappointed, gave ex-
pression to the word Conococheague.
WHY CONODOGWINET.
As to Conodogwinet there are stories or traditions that
have covered two or three generations, giving reasons why
we have Conodogwinet. One that was familiar along this
creek a half century and more since was : "In the early
settlement of this valley, on a day when the stream was over-
flowing its banks, and spreading over the lowlands as is its
habit once or more during a year, a "redman," who had
reached the rising waters, called across the stream to the 'pale
face' on the other side, *Can-I-go-in-it,' and from that day to
144
this it has been called 'Conodogwinet'." It has been the
wonder to many why the Indian who was a long time settler
full of traditions, and who had often forded the stream, put
the question to a newcomer. This story was apparently made
to fit the name by which it had long been known.
Another less familiar is the one given by Mr. Harbaugh
in a paper read before this Societ}^ January, 1909, on "Truths
and Traditions of Early Times." His story runs thus : "Two
Indians had discovered a deer (date not given) at or near the
present site of Orrstown and were chasing it toward the
mountain. With a bound it had crossed the stream and was
already beyond the further shore, and the hunters' dog was
bravely but slowly swimming the stream in pursuit. Both the
hunters paused on the near bank and were watching intently
the progress of the chase — the dog against the deer. Presently
the one Indian turned to the other and gazing calmly into his
face and without a tremor in his voice, said, 'Can a dog win
it ?' and from that time to this it is 'Can-o-dog-win-it'."
This story is doubtless a tradition, but I doubt if it comes
among early or late truths. Mr. Harbaugh states both In-
dians are dead and their testimony cannot be had. There are
some incidents in the story that throw doubt on it. First
doubt, the Indians of that day did not hunt with dogs. Second
doubt, the two Indians would have hotly pursued the deer. An
Indian may be stoical, but not when he is in pursuit of game
or hunting the scalp of his enemy. I am inclined to believe
that Mr. Harbaugh found the story while searching among
some old papers found at the Jordan ford when some forty
and ten thousand Ephraimites were slain because they could
not say Shibboleth.
Like Conococheague, there are many ways in which
Conodogwinet is spelled and for the same reasons, among
these are :
Conodogwinet.
Conedogwinet.
Connodoguinet.
Conodoguinit.
145
Rev. Heckwalder uses Conedogwinet and Conodogwinit.
The latter spelling I use because I believe the missionary
knew the proper way of spelling it and it is the simpler way.
The Indian name is Gunipduckhanct
And according to Heckwalder is interpreted '*a long way
with nothing but bends." Any one familiar with the "winding
ways" of the creek will accept this as appropriate to and sug-
gestive of its sinuous course. This is true of it as it grows in
volume and enters Cumberland County, which was that part
of the stream most traveled by the Indians on their way from
the Susquehanna to reach the Allegheny or Kittanning path.
As it gets nearer its mouth these bends increase in number
and enlarge in size. In Mifflin Township is a large loop of
two and three-quarter miles, with five-eighths of a mile in a
straight line. Frankford, the next township, has one of about
three miles, which, as the crow flies, would be but one mile
and a quarter. West Pennsboro comes next with one that
uses two and a half miles, which in a direct course would
reach the same point in a half mile. There are also in this
township a number of smaller bends. In North Middleton
township it makes a loop over a stretch of four miles which
could be reached in one and a quarter miles, also one three and
three-quarter miles, which in a direct course would be about
one-third of a mile. Middlesex Township has three bends but
not so large. Silver Spring Township has four of these curva-
tures of the stream that follow in succession that measure
some eight miles, while three and three-quarter miles would
be about the distance across. Hampden Township has four
great curves of nine miles whose points can be crossed in less
than a mile and a half. East Pennsboro Township has three
bends that curve the stream a distance of nine miles when it
could reach its destination direct in some one and a quarter
miles. An Atlas map of Cumberland County, published in
1872, gives the tendency of the stream to make these long
bends from which the Indian christened it Conodogwinet.
Another question that requires answer is : How does the
Conodogwinet become an early highway ?
146
CONODOGWINET A HIGHWAY.
A history of London of nine hundred years ago, when
there was but one bridge ocross the Thames, says, "the river
was the only safe highway in London for travelers." Some
writers refer to canals as "moving highways," a very true and
suggestive definition. We read of roads and lanes for vessels
in their passage across or through the ocean. There are in-
ternational laws of the road governing the navigation of
vessels at sea and the precautions required to avoid collisions.
A highway is defined as a "road open to the use of the
public." "A public road over which all persons have full right
of way — walking, riding or driving," "a public road or passage,
a way open to all passengers by either land or water." A
writer in the Century says : "The summer drought renders
the Tennessee River useless as a military highway." These are
some of the reasons it is classed as a highway. When it had
its beginning as a highway there is no record beyond the fact
that in 1492, when Columbus found a new world, it was flow-
ing as now and will so continue to run until there is a need for
its to cease.
In the early history of Pennsylvania when the progres-
sive men of a community were its legislators, there was a
great interest in inland navigation. The question of internal
improvements became a national one and Congress continues
to improve navigation under the guise of the "River and Har-
bor Bill," or what is more clearly and bluntly named the
"Pork Barrel."
On March 9, 1771, a law was passed by the Assembly of
this State with reference to the Susquehanna and some of its
tributaries, declaring them public highways. Among these
tributaries the Conodogwinet was declared a public highway
from its mouth to Cove Fording on the road leading to the
Forty Shillings Gap. This is a pass in the mountain now
called Long's Gap, on the road from Carlisle to Perry County..
Opposition developed along the Conodogwinet against this
proposed law largely on account of the damage that would
147
'.ensue to the milling; industry. Among these were Ephraim
Blaine, who wrote thus :
"TO THE HONORABLE JOHN PENN, LIEUTEN-
ANT CxOVERNOR AND COMMANDER IN CHIEF OF
THE PROVENCE OF PENNSYLVANIA AND THREE
LOWER COUNTIES OF NEW CASTLE, KENT AND
SUSSEX, DELAWARE.
"The petition of Ephraim Blaine, of Cumberland County,
-Ihis will promise."
That a bill hath lately passed the House of Assembly for
-clearing and making navigable the Conodogwinet from the
river Susquehanna to William Thompson's Mill dam upon the
said creek, which bill hath not been as yet sent up to your
honor, that your petitioner hath purchased a tract of land
adjoining the said creek and at some distance below the said
William Thompson's Mill with the intention of erecting a mill
thereon. And hath put himself to a great expense in provid-
ing every necessity to build the same. That should your
honor pass the bill as it now stands your petitioner would be
considerably injured as his mill will be clearly and effectually
ruined. The petitioner therefore prays your honor not to pass
the said bill without hearing his objections to the same and
that such amendment may be made thereto as that he may
reap equal benefits with them who have already got mills on
.the same creek.
And your petitioner will ever pray.
February 5, 1771. EPHRAIM BLAINE.
The bill was approved March 9, 1771, and the Conodgwi-
net was a public highway. On April 5, 1793, a bill passed the
Assembly and was approved by the Governor, giving permis-
.sion to John Walker to erect a mill dam on the Conodogwinet
not to extend more than half way across the creek provided
that in building or keeping it in repair it shall not impede
navigation.
On March 5, 1808, the following was enacted : "From
Cove Fording to the Franklin County line Conodogwinet is
148
hereby declared a public highway for the passage of floats and'
boats."
The law further declares it shall be lawful for the inhabi-
tants to remove natural and artificial obstructions during its
construction or when kept in repair with complete slopes and
locks or complementary parts of each dam so that navigation
of such creek for boats and rafts will not be injured.
They were also empowered to set out and make towpaths
or ways for towing, hauling or drawing of boats, vessels or
other small craft and rafts of any kind whatsoever in or
through such rivers and streams, which paths shall be free
and open to all persons whatsoever.
I have this story from Attorney John R. Miller, Esq., of
Carlisle. "In the late 70's I was defending old Davy Brenizer
in a case where his cattle had gone up the Conodogwinet and
browsed on a neighbor's cornfield. The law, as it stood at
that time, required the owner to fence his fields on the high-
way. I found the Conodogwinet had been declared a public
highway. After the plaintiff had his evidence in I requested
the Court (Judge Graham presiding) to direct a verdict for
the defendant at which he 'kicked,' until I showed him the xA.ct
of Assembly. With some manifest amusement the Court di-
rected a verdict be rendered for the defendant. The attorney
for the plaintiff accepted without demur and the case was
won. The point of the story is, some years afterwards I was
looking up some matters about the Conodogwinet and found
the Act had been repealed some forty years before the verdict
was rendered."
The first thirty years of the eighteenth century were busy
decades in the building of turnpikes, the construction of canals
and the improvement of navigable waters. They were to
meet the beginning of the remarkable growth of the country
and the wonderful development of its products and industries.
The turnpike was superceding the old "dirt roads" and the
canal building, to quicken and cheapen transportation. In
1826, preliminary surveys were made, by the Canal Commis-
149
sioners in this valley which later became the Cumberland
Valley Railroad.
New York, under the zealous and wise guidance of Gov-
ernor De Witt Clinton, was leading in the building of canals
and he lived to see the completion of that great waterway, the
Erie Canal, connecting the lakes with the ocean. This canal is
•of great service to the public, as a means of competition in
traffic and thereby cheapening transportation. Pennsylvania
was pushing forward similar improvements and these arteries
•of trade were reaching out through the Commonwealth.
Unlike New York she did not retain or improve her canals,
but under the guise of reform was induced to sell the Pennsyl-
vania Canal and today her transportation is largely at the
mercy of one great railway system. For years the destruction
of the Canal system has been going on until now but little of
it is left. But the question of water-ways is again rising and
will engage the attention of the business world to facilitate
transportation. Today the three great railways to the sea-
board, the New York Central, the Pennsylvania and the
Baltimore and Ohio cannot promptly move the products to
market. Their policy is to shut out competitors from traffic.
How will it be ten, twenty years from now, with greater pro-
duction and no increased facilities to carry it to market ? With
the New York and Erie and Chesapeake & Ohio improved
and the Pennsylvania Canal reconstructed the greatly in-
creased tonnage could be more cheaply and quickly handled.
In the National Intelligencer published at Washington
City, bearing date of July 8, 1829, appears these notices about
the beginning of canal transportation in Pennsylvania.
INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS
The Fourth of July just past, seems to have been consid-
ered, by common consent, an epoch in the progress of Internal
Improvement.
On that day, the communication between the Chesapeake
-and the Delaware was completed, the barge actually passed
150
through it, arriving at Delaware City on Sunday morning at
two o'clock.
On the same day, the first boat was to have passed, by
the Canal, from Worcester to Providence, R. I.
On the same day, it will be seen by the following para-
graph from Poulson's Daily Advertiser, the navigation of the
Lehigh Canal was also begun :
First Arrival of Coal from Mauch Chunk by the Lehigh Canal,
July 4th, 1829.
We have the pleasure to state that seven boats loaded'
with coal, arrived this day at Philadelphia, from Mauch
Chunk, being the first shipment via the new canal. A large
supply of Lehigh coal may now be expected to arrive regular-
ly during the remainder of the season, which will be sold at
$6.50 per ton delivered, as heretofore. We congratulate the
stockholders of the Lehigh on the completion of their enter-
prise, and also the public generally, at the prospect which is-
thus afforded of obtaining a very considerable addition to the
stock of Anthracite coal at the moderate rate of the past year..
Washington, July 8.
Stage Accident — We learn that the Frederick stage, on-
its way to Baltimore on Saturday, was turned over at Poplar
Spring, by the driver, when coming up to the tavern door.
The stage was broken and several of the passengers severely
scratched and bruised, among them, Mr. Everett, of Massa-
chusetts, returned from a Western tour.
In the Record of April 11, 1909, is this account of the-
little that is left of transportation by canal in Pennsylvania.
Navigation has opened on the Schuylkill Canal, but the
large number of boats that have already been loaded at Port
Clinton are delayed at Leesport because of the channel in^
Moyer's Dam, south of that place, being choked with culm..
The dredging machine is at work opening same. The boats
on the canal this season are in better condition than for some
j'ears, many of them having been rebuilt and repainted during-
the past winter.
CONODOGWINET CANAL.
On the tenth of March, 1826, the Board of Canal Com-
missioners of Pennsylvania adopted this resolution :
That it is expedient to make an arrangement for survey-
ing and examining the route from the city of Philadelphia to
the northern boundary of the State towards the Seneca and
Cayuga Lakes, and the route through Cumberland and Frank-
lin Counties to the Potomac River and the route by the Con-
estoga and Monocacy and the Conewago and Susquehanna.
On June 12, 1826, at a meeting of this Board with John
Sargeant as president, Richard M. Patterson, Adam Leacock,
Daniel Montgomery, John Philips, Thomas Enoch, Charles
May and John Marshall present, John Mitchell was appoint-
ed to make the examination through Cumberland and Frank-
lin Counties to the Potomac River and of the route by the
Conococheague and Monocacy on the same terms as employed
last year, and with authority to employ the necessary assist-
ants.
Mr. Mitchell proceeded with his work and the news-
papers made mention of the location through which he sur-
veyed. He concluded his work during the summer and fall
of 1826. At a meeting of the Board of Canal Commissioners
on Dec. 26, 1826, "a report from John Mitchell was filed; his
examinations upon the route between the Susquehanna and
the Potomac accompanied with his drafts, profiles and field
notes was received and read."
In my search in the Department of Internal Affairs I
found field notes, profiles, etc., of other surveyed routes, but
none of this route filed by Surveyor Mitchell. These would
have been of much interest since they would have more clear-
ly marked his way and given the locks, etc., along it. I find
the report given in the Venango Herald published at Franklin,
Pa., and of the Carlisle Volunteer, both bearing date of Feb-
152
ruary 22, 1827. The report relating to matters that interest
us is as follows :
FROM REPORT OF CANAL COMMISSIONERS.
The Potomac and Susquehanna Survey — Mr. Mitchell
was instructed to examine all the proposed routes between
the Susquehanna and Potomac, contemplated by the Act of
nth of April, 1825, to ascertain with decision the prominent
features of the country, the elevation of the respective sum-
mits, and how far they afford an adequate supply of water.
He commenced his line of levels on the Susquehanna, at the
mouth of the Conodogwinet Creek, and continued it up the
latter stream to Greenvillage, in Franklin County, which he
found to be the most favorable summit between the Conodo-
gwinit and Conococheague. From his measurement it ap-
pears that a supply of water estimated at forty-three cubic
feet per second may be brought to this point by short and
convenient feeders, a quantity believed to be sufficient for the
supply of a summit of moderate length. The length of this
line, from the mouth of the Conodogwinet to the summit at
Greenvillage is about seventy-five miles, with an ascent of 365
feet From Greenvillage Mr. Mitchell proceeded along the
turnpike towards Gettysburg, to the summit of South Moun-
tain, which he found to be 823 feet above the Susquehanna, at
the mouth of the Conodogwinet. Having satisfied himself
that this mountain intervenes between the waters of the Cono-
cocheague and Conewago, and consequently that a navigable
communication between them is impracticable, he proceeded
to the summit between Monocacy and Conewago, near the
town of Gettysburg. This summit was ascertained to be 250
feet above the mouth of the Conodogwinet, 115 feet lower
than the summit at Greenvillage. In order, however, to as-
certain the comparative lockage which the two routes would
require, the fall of the Susquehanna from the mouth of the
Conodogwinet to that of the Conewago must be added to the
height of the Gettysburg summit, which would make them
nearly equal in this respect. The measurements of the water
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near Gettysburg show an aggregate of only 23 cubic feet per
second, a quantity insufficient for the supply of an active
navigation. The Conococheague and Conodogwinet route is
therefore the only one by which a communication can be ex-
pected between the Potomac and Susquehanna.
On April 14, 1834, that part of the law making the Sus-
quehanna and some of its tributaries a public highway was
repealed so far as the Conodogwinet was included, and it
ceased to be a public highway. The prospect of a "moving
highway" with its quaint boats, its winding towpath is ap-
parently more remote than eighty-four years ago, and the
^'cheering notes" of the boatsmen's horn will not sound up
and down Culbertson's Row, or through the streets of Green-
village and the residents of Buzzard's Glory, Pleasant Hall,
Roxbury and Orrstown will not have their slumbers dis-
turbed by the cannon's roar from the battleships of England
or Japan as they drop shot or shell into their backyards. They
can rest in peace.
CONODOGWINET CHANGES.
There has been but little written about the Conodogwinet.
Various maps of the county locate its rise differently. A wall
map of this county made from actual surveys by D. H. Davi-
son and published in 1858 by Riley and Martin, of Greencastle,
locates its rise on Jordan's Knob, Peters Township, and flow-
ing through St. Thomas Township into Horse Valley. An
atlas map of this county published in 1868, compiled from
actual surveys, gives its rise and flow in the same township.
But this stream no longer has its rise in Peters Township.
It has not changed its location nor its flow, but the law has
made the change. Where Letterkenny, St. Thomas, Peters
and Fannett once touched boundaries there was a section over
which none claimed ownership. In the legislative sessions of
i860 a law was enacted concerning this portion of the county.
It stated :
"Whereas, There is a certain portion of land at the head
of Horse Valley situated between the lands of Saint Thomas
154
and Peters Townships in Franklin County, and which has
heretofore not been taxed by either of said townships."
It was therefore enacted that this land should be annexed
to and made part of St. Thomas Township, liable and subject
to all laws of the Act of Assembly for Saint Thomas. By
this act of legislature Conodogwinet no longer rises in Peters,
but makes its first start in Saint Thomas Township, through
whose northwestern corner it flows into Letterkenny Town-
ship.
NOR'-EAST FURNACE.
Leaving the turnpike about a mile east of Fort Loudon,
where the finger board points the way, we begin the ascent of
the mountain by a public road that leads to Horse Valley.
Starting at the foot of Jordan's Knob we go up its rugged side
for about a mile and take the right hand road, which leads to
the site of Nor'-East furnace built by Gen. James Chambers
and put into blast in 1795. Many years later the Forge was
built by John Beaver and from the spring of 1848 to 1851 was
operated by Samuel and David Lewis. It was then run a
short time by John Beaver, the owner, who last operated it as
"Ironworks." After his death it was sold to Joseph Hohn,
whose son is the present owmer. It has not been operated toi
many years. The old stack of the furnace is yet standing and
the remains of the dam are there. From it the water was run
across the small valle}^ in wooden trunks to the furnace and
forge to drive the bellows, the great hammer and other ma-
chinery. The big old dwelling, part frame and part stone, and
the office have gone to decay. At the foot of the stack, over
among the decaying buildings, are tall trees, the growth of
fifty years. The output of the furnace was about one hundred
tons a year and its value has been as high as $100 per ton. It
was put into marketable shape and disposed of to country
stores and to blacksmiths. Reuben Lewis, one of the old resi-
dents of Fort Loudon, as a young man worked at the forge
and traveled to Fort Loudon to take lessons from 'Squire
Hamman in penmanship.
155
HORSE AND BEAR VALLEYS
Returning to the Horse Valley road we resume our jour-
ney winding around Jordan's Knob upward toward its sum-
mit. A short distance before we reach it we come to Cold
Spring, which finds an outlet in Broad Run on its way to the
Conococheague.
As we go upwards towards the summit we look down at
Fort Loudon lying low in the valley, and see the Conoco-
cheague as it winds its way toward the Potomac. Far in the
southeast rise the mountains of Maryland and Virginia, and
within our view lies our pride, the Cumberland Valley, with
her beautiful farms, her wooded hills, her busy towns and
picturesque villages.
After leaving the summit of Jordan's Knob we begin the
descent over a fairly good road into Horse Valley which we
see nestled close to the mountains. At the west side of Clark's
Knob a mountain range starts and runs southward for about
nine miles, making the one boundary of the valley. It then
curves at Jordan's Knob and runs northward, making the
western boundary line of Horse Valley and the eastern of
Path Valley. At McAllister's Gap the valley extends north-
eastward, into Perry county and is known as Gunter's Valley.
This mountain range on the State map of 1770 is named Cono-
cocheague Ridge.
The North Mountain which lies within our vision almost
any day, ends at Mt. Parnell and makes the southern boundary
of Bear Valley which lies between it and Broad Mountain,
which has its starting point at Clark's or Strasburg Knob.
Bear Valley is divided by the water shed into the upper and
lower valleys. Broad Run rises in the upper valley, having as
its source what is known as the Bear Swamps, near the St.
Thomas and Letterkenny Township lines. It flows southward
for seven miles and empties into the Conococheague at Fort
Loudon, passing between Mt. Parnell and Jordan's Knob.
This water shed of Bear Valley lies between Franklin Furnace
and Yankee Gap and the dividing line is near the Bear
156
Swamps. This valley is uninhabited and about all the timber
of the lower part of it was cut off between 1875 ^"^ 1882. To
get the timber out of the valley to a point where it could be
loaded on wagons and shipped to market, a lumber railway was
built starting at the top of the Strasburg mountain and run-
ning some four or five miles down into Bear Valley.
It was operated until the timber was cut out and the val-
ley was again permitted to return to its natural uses of grow-
ing trees and furnishing water to help swell the Conodogwinet
and Conococheague.
The Broad Run part of Bear Valley was also cleared of
its timber within the last ten years and is now returning to its
primitive state. A tramway starting near the Hohn place was
built to the head of the valley to convey the timber to a saw
mill at a point near Nor'-East furnace where it was converted
into railway ties, telegraph poles and other uses.
This portion of the valley was cleared of timber two or
three times while the furnace was in blast.
CONODOGWINET'S RISE AND FLOW.
Continuing down the Horse Valley road we reach a point
opposite a cleared place in the mountain. Following the road
on the left we come v/here several acres were cleared at the
first settlemnt. The cabin built by the first settlers has disap-
peared and a new commodious one has succeeded it. Here
Adam Mealman lived until he was eighty-four, his son Wil-
liam following, and here John Mealman has lived seventy-four
years. Jordan's Knob is where the mountain curves at Fort
Loudon, and the Mealmans live on a continuation of the range,
which by courtesy is called Jordan's Knob. A short distance
south of the house is Mealman's Spring where rise the waters
of the Conodogwinet. It is near the summit of the mountain
at the head of Horse Valley, in Saint Thomas Township, some
three miles east of Fort Loudon by the road, and about one
and- a half miles in a straight line. The stream has not much
volume, but it is soon joined by the waters of other springs,
and in less than a mile has become a good stream. Soon after
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it leaves Mealman's it becomes a public highway, for the rea-
son that the road and the creek both run into the same bed
because there is room for but one.
Soon after leaving its head waters we come to the Gil-
berts ; next Lewis and Frederick Gilbert where a saw mill was
built in the early 50's and some years later Peter Geyer erected
a grist and chopping mill which is now in ruins. Near this
point a saw mill of the "up and down" kind was operated by
Jere Geyer, The stream here is small, requiring all the avail-
able water to turn the wheels. Passing through the farm of
Jeremiah Rosenberry, John Forester and Benjamin Rosen-
berry, the stream grows from the inflowing springs. Here the
valley is about a half mile wide. Near this, some years ago, a
post office was established to supply the people nearby with
their mail over a post office route from Fort Loudon. The
history of its establishment is familiar to the writer because
by his efforts this office was opened during President Cleve-
land's first administration. Being a Democrat was no bar to
one's influence in those days at Washington, rather to one's
help. A representation from Horse Valley, headed by the late
George W. Swank, of Carrick Furnace, called on me one day
in my office in the "Valley Spirit" to see if post office facilities
could be extended to the people of Horse Valley, I filled in a
blank application and when I asked the committee what they
intended to call the post office Mr. Swank said, Benville. I
asked why Benville ; he replied, to honor the name of Ben
Rosenberry. 1 asked if there were any other Bens in the Val-
le}'. Oh, yes, several. I said, well, if it is to honor this early
settler why not call it Rosenberry ? They said, we never
thought of that ; and so it became Rosenberry, then the only of-
fice of that name in the United States. Later it was changed
to Freestone because their mail got mixed with Roxbury. It
finally died a natural death.
Passing through Ephraim Rosenberry 's farm it reaches
the Mackey estate, where springs again increase its flow. Here
in 1875, William P, Mackey built a saw mill which can yet be
158
used. The next farm to be watered is that of the late Stephen
Keefer, a well-to-do citizen who was active in securing the
erection of two United Brethren Churches in Horse Valley.
As a sportsman he killed a bear with an axe and the huge
paws of the bear hang at his house as the evidence of an after-
noon hunt.
It next reaches the Horn place and "the large place,"
known as the Rosenberry farm, now owned by the Keefer
estate. Here it turned the wheels of a saw mill built by
"Uncle" John Rosenbery, w^here rails were sawed for the Cum-
berland Valley Railroad, when it used wooden rails upon
which to lay the fiat iron long used by the railways, afterward
succeeded by what is known as the T rail.
A short distance from Bear Swamps, the source of Broad
Run, there rises in Letterkenny, or Lower Bear Valley, a
stream now known as Trout or Bear Valley Run. It gets its
first supply from these same swamps and passes- close by
Broad Run and flows north about four miles and then out of
Bear Valley through Reefer's Gap into Horse Valley where
the Conodogwinet, after a run of eight miles down the valley,
is joined by this Bear Valley Run, and its waters help to make
it a much larger creek. It then reaches what was long known
as the Skinner place. John Skinner, who had settled in New-
Jersey and later removed to Hopewell Township, Cumberland
County, purchased of Captain Robert Peebles, of Shippens-
burg, a tract of land in Horse Valley named Penguin. His son
John had a saw mill and grist mill. Many years later a sumac
mill was built. These have all disappeared for lack of need.
Pie also kept the tavern later known as Scriba's tavern.
George Skinner, another son, kept the lower tavern, well
known during the years of stock driving as David Geyer's
tavern. It is now owned by his son, George W. Geyer. Here
is a stone bridge, over which the Three Mountain Road
crosses the creek. A short distance above this bridge flows in
a stream which is said to have its rise near the top of Clark's
Knob and flows all the year round. There is, however, a dif-
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ference of opinion among residents of that community as to
where this streamlet starts to flow. A former resident of
Horse Valley who knows the mountain says : "There is a
spring on top of the Knob and in the winter you can see from
Strasburg the sun shining on the ice." Another who was born
in Horse Valley, near "Geyer's Tavern," and spent most of his
life in the valley and has been often in the mountains sur-
rounding it writes : "A spring rises on Clark's Knob and
flows into the Conodogwinet near Geyer's." A person who
was born in Strasburg and there spent his many years of life
v/rites : "As to a spring on top of the Knob, I don't think
there is any. although it is talked of by many. I have never
been on top of the Knob in daylight, but was there in the night
'fighting fire.' I have been told by reliable people that there
is a level or flat piece of land up there, and that in time of wet
weather some water stands there and wild animals go there
to drink."
A short distance below, a saw and stave mill was built
by John Rosenberry where wooden rails were sawed for the
Cumberland Valley Railroad. Flowing on for a quarter of a
mile Pine Run comes in from Dothan Valley.
Between the North Mountain and the Conococheague
Ridge, sometimes called the Path Valley Mountain, is a ridge
that forms Dothan Valley. This little valley gets its name
from a Mr. Dothan who resided in it many, many years since.
He had cleared a portion of it from its timber and erected
a dwelling and other improvements and planted an
orchard which w^as long known as "Dothan's Orchard."
These have all disappeared save the ruins that have long
marked the spot in spite of time's destroying hand. In this
valley a stream of water rises that finds its way into the Cono-
dogwinet and Daniel Powell, years ago, utilized its power for
the operation of two saw mills. The first one was about two
miles above McAllister's or the Forge Gap. The second one
was at "Dothan's Orchard," not far from "Barney's Narrows,"
through which several railway surveys have been made. The
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stream is a small one, but its head is much above the level of
the valley. Mr. Powell, by wooden pipes or trunks, conveyed
the water to his mill at such height as to enable him to erect
a water wheel twenty-two feet high, and this furnished him
with a strong water power. He later had a steam saw mill,
the first one in this section, and many hundreds of thousands
of feet of lumber he sent to market. These mills have all dis-
appeared and nature is again covering these secluded valleys
in the mountain with a new growth of timber.
Passing through lands once owned by David Geyer it
lingers long enough to turn the wheels of David Beltz's iaw
mill, built by Joseph Kilgore in 1851, and then runs on to the
saw mill of John West, built in 1875. Next it reaches the saw
mill of Thomas Pomeroy where once a chopping mill was
built, gathering volume from the mountain springs it reaches
after a run of nineteen miles, the northern end of Horse Valley
and receives the waters of Gunter's Valley or .Trout Run. This
run has its source eight miles up Gunter's Valley, and three
miles across the Perry County line. From another source I
have, it is shown that the "Gunter's Valley Run, known here
as Laurel Run, has its source about one mile below the Perry
County line on lands of C. H. Burke and Mrs. Samuel Sent-
man"
Thirty years ago there were two saw mills and a small
farm in Gunter's Valley, but they have been deserted and gone
to ruin. Three miles above the forge are the twin tunnels
whose completion promised much for Southern Pennsylvania,
but they were never finished and are some of the fading
memories of the almost defunct South Penn or Vanderbilt
Railroad.
On the site of the "Old Forge" in the Gap above Roxbury
some years ago, John W. Powell erected and operated a saw
mill. Just at the opening of Gunter's Valley David C. Byers,
in the fifties, ran a saw mill.
After being joined by Gunter's Valley or Trout Run the
Conodogwinet passes through McAllister's Gap where once
was a busy furnace and later Soundwell Forge, but their days
i6i
of usefulness were long since ended. From the source of the
Conodogwinct to McAllister's Gap it has run between the
mountains and keeps a comparatively straight course, but as
it leaves these confining mountain walls it passes into the
Cumberland Valley and soon begins its sinuous course. Its
first work in the valley has been turning the wheels of a grist
and saw mill since 1762, and having a fall of twenty feet has
done it with ease. Leaving Roxbury it flows in an easterly
course, when it changes its direction and inclines to the south-
east until it is almost two miles above McAllister's Gap and
three or four miles out in the valley. It has passed a chopping
mill, two saw mills, a grist mill now disappearing, two more
saw mills and a grist mill, a distillery, a clover mill and a
sumac mill. It is within sight of the Three Mountain Road
and turns its course northeasterly toward its destination, the
Susquehanna. A fourth of a mile from Orrstown, near the
stone bridge built in 1840, its course was obstructed by a dam
that gathered power for an oil and later a clover mill. A mile
further down its power was used for a fulling mill which
passed out of existence some fifty years ago because there was
no further use for it. A short distance below, Herron's Branch
has come from Strasburg to add its water to it. Its next duty
was to furnish power for a clover mill and lath mill, and a
little further down to run a saw mill and grist mill and then
an axe factory, but these have all disappeared and only an
overall factory at Buzzard's Glory makes use of its strength.
Next comes the Maclay mill which is its last work until it
passes out of Franklin County where Middle Spring largely
increases its flow.
During its passage through Franklin County it has formed
the boundary line between Lurgan and Letterkenny Town-
ships and Lurgan and Southampton Townships. Of its course
through Cumberland County I will leave much unsaid for
some Cumberland County historian or for a future paper. I
will therefore state briefly that in Cumberland County it
passes first through Hopewell Township in a fairly straight
course, and then by a winding course forms the boundary be-
1 62
tween Mifflin, Newton, Franklin and West Pennsborough
Townships, then winding like a great serpent through North
Middleton and Middlesex Townships flows into and through
Silvers Spring Township, passing through Hampden Town-
ship it flows out of East Pennsborough into the Susquehanna.
CONODOaWINET IN THE CUMBERLAND VALLEY.
Standing on Washington Heights, west of the Susque-
hanna opposite Harrisburg, you look up and into the Cumber-
land Valley. Before you within your vision, lie the fertile
acres of almost seventy miles in length, and fifteen to thirty in
width. It is a beautiful stretch of country with its growing
towns, thrifty villages and well improved farms and an abun-
dant supply of pure water from springs in the mountain and
fountains in the valley. As it stretches away to the southern
horizon, nature has shown her ability to diversify, by shutting
the valley in with the two mountain ranges, that are different
in formation, contour and beauty, which run parallel the en-
tire length of the valley.
The South Mountain drops out of view every few miles
in a succession of ridges broken by deep ravines from which
charming streams flow into the valley. On its summits are
many acres of level land known as the "Big Flat," etc., where
apple and peach trees blossom in the spring and later ripen
into luscious fruit. The North Mountain is a very uniform
ridge with its outline along the sky, in sight almost to the
Potomac. On a clear day without hazy atmosphere it can be
easily seen to the Franklin County line, with "two top moun-
tains" as the southwest back ground. We are familiar with
the beauty and fertility of the Cumberland Valley, so much
so that we do not always appreciate it. Absence horn it is a
reminder of the grandeur and picturesqueness of its beauty.
After a trip along the seaboard and gulf coast, or across the
great prairies of Illinois, or through the hills of Indiana in a
great drought, when these hills are used for coasting, as we do
with ours in mid-winter, we would look with great delight on
the green hills, the inviting forests and the charming streams
1 63
of running water of this valley. Some three years ago I met
on the country road near Orrstown, with Robert Bridges, a
native of Shippensburg, now the editor of Scribner's Maga-
zine. He was enjoying a horseback ride in the crisp air of a
September morning. He spoke of the wondrous beauty of the
valley and in referring to the mountains said that in his travels
through other countries he had never seen a more picturesque
range of mountains than the North Mountain which we were
then admiring.
CONODOGWINET'S GENERAL DRAINAGE.
Fift}^ miles away, standing out in the valley as it curves
more southwesterly, is Clark's Knob. Some two miles south
of Strasburg. which lies at the foot of Clark's Knob, there rises
on the farm of Adam Hunsecker a spring which is the head
waters of Muddy Run which joins Herron's Branch near
Pleasant Hall and finds its way to the Conodogwinet. Not far
from it on the same farm is a stream whose waters flow into
the Conococheague. These are near Summit Level school
house and are on the water shed diverting the waters to the
Susquehanna or the Potomac. This division line runs in a
northeasterly direction passing some distance north of Salem
Church, near Culbertson to Greenvillage, extending on past
the Summit beyond Scotland to the South Mountain. The
highest point along the turnpike is at the residence of Chris-
tian Wingert, near Greenvillage. All the drainage north and
east of this water shed which includes Greenvillage, from the
mountain tops on both sides of the valley to some distance
beyond Big Pond Furnace is to the Conodogwinet. Beyond
Leesburg, Cumberland County, are the head w^aters of the
Yellow Breeches. The drainage on the north side of the
Conodogwinet with the exception of a few small streams near
the Susquehanna drain to the Conodogwinet. On the south
side from Big Pond nearly all the drainage west of the Cum-
berland Valley Railroad and the turnpike and some distance
east of them is to the Conodogwinet. The drainage extends
•considerably beyond these heads. It therefore drains the
164
greater part of the Cumberland Valley and Gunter, Horse and'
Bear Valleys.
This stream with its tributaries has a great capacity of
water power, more than enough to run every industry in the
valley. For many years the trend for power was towards
steam and once valuable water powers went into disuse. Saw
mills, clover mills, oil mills, fulling mills passed out of service.
The larger flouring mills put out of use many grist mills and
their water power was no longer utilized. The discovery of the
enlarged uses of electricity is bringing new life into these long
unused sites for water power.
On the Conodogwinet at Carlisle the power of the stream
is used for lighting the town, and at Middlespring two of these
sites of grist mills generate electricity for Shippensburg, and
at the Means mill in Lurgan, and the site of the old Byers
mill large dams are in course of erection for the transmission
of power and there is a possibility of that section of the county
running its machinery and getting its light from this stream.-
TRIBUTARIES IN FRANKLIN COUNTY.
The streams that help to swell the Conodogwinet are
many. Those that flow into it from the west side have their
fountains in the North Mountain or the slate lands and are
generally small. The Atlas maps of Franklin and Cumberland
Counties show on the west side a net work of streams that
drain that section of the valley, and with the exception of two
or three small runs near the Susquehanna find their outlet in
the Conodogwinet.
These streams are chiefly small ones and the volume of
w^ater they discharge would not make good the amount lost
by evaporation or other causes as it flows to the Susquehanna.
The only stream in Franklin County that flows into the
Conodogwinet on its east side is Herron's Branch which rises-
in Strasburg at the foot of the North Mountain and receives
the waters of Rohrer's or Lehman's Run, Muddy Run, Row
Run and one other. This spring is located near the mountain
foot and has a steady flow which never failed but once and
i65
tliat in 1884 when the twin tunnels on the Vanderbilt road
were building, when it was dry for five hours which some at-
tribute to the obstructions made by the blasting. This would
indicate that the supply was on the other side of the moun-
tain some eight or ten miles beyond its exit. Its next stream
on the east side is Middle Spring which has Mean's Run for its
"head and increased by numerous springs along its course. This
has a steady flow of a good volume of water and forms part of
the boundary line of Franklin and Cumberland Counties.
These streams have their heads in the South Mountain or in
the limestone lands and send steadily forth large volumes of
water. On the west side are several small runs some of them
without a name and two are known as Wingert's Run and
Wise's Run.
TRIBUTARIES IN CUMBERLAND COUNTY.
The tributaries of the Conodogwanet in Cumberland
County are furnished by John R. Miller, Esq., of Carlisle, who
says "it is now an accepted thing that the Big Pond, which
has no surface outlet excepting when its fountains are very
full, flows under ground and makes its exit at Big Spring,
and through Newville to the Conodogwinet. This is one of
its largest tributaries. Passing down the valley we find the
next stream is Mt. Rock spring, source at Mt. Rock. Next is
Lynes Run, source on Spring Road in West Pennsboro Town-
ship at Alexander's Spring. Next is Letort, source at Bonny-
brook in South Middleton Township. Next is Hoge's Run,
rising in Silvers Spring Township, but in dry weather the
upper part of it has no flow, and it is supplied from two
springs about a half mile south of Hogestowm. One is called
"Big Plead," from the size of it, and the other "Gwinnie
Spring." John Hoge, one of the early settlers, after wdiom
Hogestown is named, was married to Gwenthaline Bowen
Davis. He owned the land around the spring. The short name
for Gwenthaline was "Gwinnie" and the spring is called after
her. Next is Trindle Spring which flows into Silver Spring,
and then to Conodgwinet. Trindle Spring rises a mile or so
i66
west of Mechanicsburg. Returning to the west side at the head'
of the county we find flowing in a number of small streams that
have their sources at indefinite places in the North Mountain.
Starting in Hopewell Township we have first Paxton's Run.
which rises along the mountain below Roxbury and which is
added to by Clippinger's and other streams from the North
Mountain and which drains much of Lurgan Township and
reaches the Conodogwinet by Cumberland County. The next
is Peebles Run. In Mifflin Township we have Heberlig's Run,
Brandy Run, Whiskey Run, Black Run and Big Run coming
down from Doubling Gap. In Frankford Township we have
Slate Lick, rising at Slate Lick, Cayman's Run, Stine's Run
and Parker's Run.
In North Middleton Township we have Indiana or
Swigert's Run, Pine Run, Yartlett's Run and Weary's Run.
In Middlesex Township we have the Sulphur Springs Run,.
Wilson's Run, Zeigler's Run, Neiswanger's Run and Don-
nelly's Run. In Silver Spring there are four streams coming
down from the North Mountain, these are Brenizer's, Smith's
Hempt's and Vogelsong's. In Hampden Township are Sheaf-
fer's Run, Black Run and Holtz's Run. In East Pennsboro
Township is Possum Hollow Run, a short distance west of
West Fairview. These tributary streams reach out over a
large section of country carrying freshness and fertility ta
many acres of land."
FIRST SETTLERS.
There is a disagreement as to the first settlers of Horse
Valley. From one source we learn that Rosenberrys came
into Horse Valley by way of McAllister's Gap, at Roxbury,
and passed up beyond what was afterwards known as Dave
Geyer's tavern and were the first to locate in the valley. An-
other is that the Mealmans, Krones, Vinegars, David Mills,
Levi Clough, David Flora, David Beltz and others, first lo-
cated at or near what is now known as Mealman's Springs and
the upper part of Horse Valley, and soon afterwards were fol-
lowed by the Rosenberrys, Skinners, Peebles, Gilberts, Freys,
167
Eshelnians and others. Which of these were first there is un-
settled, but the descendants of a number of them reside on the
lands of their ancestors.
CONODOGWINET'S LENGTH.
Starting at the spring on Jordan's Knob, Saint Thomas
Township, which is the source of the Conodogwinet, 1 have
followed its course for nine miles down between the moun-
tains that make Horse Valley. I have followed it through
McAllister's Gap, whence it flows out into the Cumberland
Valley. Passing by Roxbury it changes its course to the
southeast until within a mile of Pleasant Hall and then runs
northeast, passing close to Orrstown, Buzzard's Glory and
near to the hamlet of Middle Spring, which is just over the
boundary line of Franklin County. In Cumberland County it
has many places of water power around which cluster a few
buildings. The villages are nearly all some distance from the
stream and it leaves the large towns of Newville and Carlisle
to the east. It keeps about an average of five miles away from
the North Mountain, finding its way along the ridges that
separate the slate lands from the limestone. It rarely breaks
into the limestone formation and these slate ridges do much
towards making the many bends that have given it its name.
It flows through a country that has great historic interest, for
along the Conodogwinet and its tributaries the Scotch-Irish
immigrants settled and began their work of making the
wilderness "to blossom as the rose," and lay the foundation for
this great Republic. For almost two hundred years it has
never failed to give its help to every industry on its banks
that needed it and faithfully fulfilled its purposes by day and
by night. The project to make it part of the chain of internal
navigation failed and many of its sites for valuable water
power are unused, but there is hope that in a decade or two
these silent sites will be sending out the notes that are set to
the "hum of industry."
, The estimated length of the Conodogwinet is one hundred
and eight miles from its rise on Jordan's Knob to where it
i68
falls into the Susquehanna, This estimate is made by meas-
urements of the Atlas map of Cumberland County and the
known lengths in Franklin County. There are many small
curves not on the maps and an allowance is made for these.
When the survey for the Conodogwinet Canal was made in
1826 by John Mitchell, he followed the Conodogwinet to
where Herron's Branch flows into it and thence along Her-
ron's Branch to the outlet of the Row Run, and up this stream
to Greenvillage, the summit or watershed of the valley. His
measurement was seventy-five miles to this point. This is
about ten miles from the Franklin County line, where Middle-
spring joins the Conodogwinet. The map measurement to
this point from the Susquehanna is about seventy-five miles.
This proves the estimated length as about correct.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS.
I was born along the Conodogwinet where I resided for
twenty-five years. I have been "swimming" in it m the sum-
mer, skated upon it in the winter. 1 have fished in it by day
and by night with the "bait on the hook" ; with the stir net
and dip net, with the gig and the loop and bunch of hooks,
with set net and outlines. I have waded it, forded it, crossfed
it on boats and foot-logs and bridges at many places. I have
been at its head where it rises and at its mouth where it falls
into the Susquehanna. I thought I knew much concerning it,
but since I began the preparation of this paper I have learned
many new things about it. If I have succeeded in giving
something of value about it for the archives of this Society
and in any way interested my hearers, I am repaid for the
labors, which required part of a day at the Department of In-
ternal Affairs and another in the State Library, a visit to
Washington Heights at Harrisburg, part of a day at West
Fairview where it joins waters with Susquehanna and another
at its headwaters in Horse Valley with James P. Starliper, of
Fort Loudon. Letters from George W. Geyer, of Horse Val-
ley, with a map of Horse Valley; D. D. Swanger, of Lurgan;
D. O. Shearer, of Dry Run; L. D. Burkholder, of Fort Loudon,
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169
and a drive to Nor'-East Furnace with Reuben Lewis; letters
from C. M. Deatrich, of St. Thomas ; Squire W. W. Britton,
of Upper Strasburg; a visit to the law libraries of Judge Gil-
Ian and Burgess Wm. Alexander; a half day among the old
tax lists in the vaults of the court house ; letters from Jere
Zeamer and John R. Miller, of Carlisle, Rev. T. J. Ferguson,
of Silvers Springs. Cumberland County. These added to my
personal knowledge of years, have enabled me to give you the
story of an Early Highway, the Conodogwinet.
ADDITIONAL NOTES.
Little streams are light and shadow
Flowing through the pasture naeadow,
Flowing by the green wayside,
By the forest deep and wide.
Little streams, their voices ch«ety,
Sound fortn welcome to the weary.
Flowing on from day to day
Without stint and without stas>-.
Down in valleys green and lowly.
Murfnuring not, but gliding slowly
Up in mountain hollows wild
Fretting like a peevish child;
Through the hamlets where all day
In their waves the children play.
Running west or running east,
Doing good to man or beast,
Always giving, weary never.
Little streams I love thee ever.
In a paper read before this Society February 29, 1902,
concerning the "Early Grist Mills of Lurgan Township," I
gave the date of the erection of the first grist mill on each site
on the Conodogwinet and its tributaries, also the name of the
owner with something of his history and the mill as well. In
these additional notes I give all the water powers on these
streams with their uses. The persons named, excepting four,
were the original owners.
The illustrations made from photographs taken on June
14, 1909, are three in number. The first one is the spring
where the Conodogwinet has its rise, which is a short distance
from the summit of the Conococheague Ridge, or Jordan's
Knob. It flows all the year round and comes out of the slate
170
of which the mountain is formed. Farther down the mountain,
south of this spring, rises the second spring which flows from
a sandy formation and is a different water and cooler. It also
flows steadily all the year. During a long freshet in the spring
time an eel found his way to it and is occasionally seen. The
story that a panther or "painter" caught it as it was climbing
a tree near the spring and refused to eat it because of its slime,
is told, but generally doubted. The landscape is the meadow
at the Mealman house, extending up to the top of the moun-
tain. This was cleared away some one hundred and thirty
years ago. The figure, with staff in hand, in the centre of the
group, is John Mealman, born here seventy years ago, and
whose grandfather found this secluded spot about 1780. The
nearest neighbor to the west is two miles and a half and down
the mountain eastward into the valley a mile and a half away.
It is a quiet, retired, secluded neighborhood. In passing over
the road into Horse Valley on two different days, I met on
the way three persons, and they were with a wagon moving
a new family into Horse Valley. The Corduroy Bridge is more
than a mile from the headwaters and is one of the charming
scenes of trees and streams in these acres of solitude.
When the captured Hessians of the Revolution were
paroled many of them decided to stay in the new country and
a number found their way into the Cumberland Valley. In
this out-of-the-way valley several made their new homes.
Hessian was a term of much opprobrium for more than a cen-
tury after the revolution, and the descendants of Hessians were
looked on with suspicion if nothing more. But that feeling is
passing and their descendants are good, trusty American citi-
zens.
In giving the water powers of the Conodogwinet and its
tributaries I have kept within the boundaries of Franklin
County, beginning at the head of each stream and following
its course to its mouth. So far as I have been enabled to
learn, it is a complete list of every water power that has been
in use since the early settlement of the valley. In some crises
as many as four industries have had their power from the
171
same dam, and occasionally two of them have been in opera-
tion at the same time.
When the Forge at McAllister's Gap was shut down, the
Conodogwinet for miles was almost a dry bed. The result
was, many of the mills below the Forge were idle until the
Forge started or the water filled the dam to overflowing and
the wheels of industry again turned. I have crossed the bed
of the Conodogwinet below the Orrstown bridge "dry shod,"
which is over six miles below the Forge.
There have been ninety-one industries on the Conodogwi-
net and its tributaries making use of their various water
powers. Of these, twenty-two were grist mills, twenty-nine
saw mills, four chopping mills, four oil mills, five fulling mills,
two forges, two furnaces, one lath mill, one stave mill, two axe
factories, four clover mills, one carding mill, four stills, two
sumac mills, five distilleries, one cider mill, one buckwheat
mill, one overall factory. Of these the Conodogwinet had
eight grist mills, two chopping mills, seventeen saw mills, two
oil mills, three fulling mills, one forge, one furnace, one lath
mill, one stave mill, one axe factory, one overall factory, one
distillery, one still, one cider mill, one buckwheat mill, three
clover mills, two sumac mills ; in all forty-seven. Of these in-
dustries run by water power four grist mills, five saw mills,
one cider mill, one buckwheat mill, one chopping mill and one
overall factory, thirteen, continue in operation.
On Herron's Branch were four grist mills, three saw mills
and one still, eight in number ; now in operation on this stream
two grist mills. Its length is some six miles.
On the Row Run were two grist mills, two saw mills,
one forge, two distilleries, two stills ; nine in all. There is now
one grist mill running. The length of the Row Run is about
two miles.
On Middlespring were eight grist mills, five saw mills,
one furnace, two fulling mills, one hemp mill, two oil mills,
two chopping mills, one axe factory, one carding mill, one
clover mill, one distillery, twenty-five in all. In operation at
172
present, five, viz : three grist mills, two electric light power
plants. This stream has a length of some five miles.
On Gunter's Run were two saw mills. There is now a
portable saw mill in this valley clearing away all the good
timber that has grown up since the late fifties. This stream is
about eight miles in length.
Conodogwanet, in Franklin County, is about twenty-five
miles in length, with forty-six miles of water power on the
Conodogwinet and its tributaries. There are now twenty-one
sites for water power in use.
The first grist mills erected on these sites were nearly all
built in the latter half of the eighteenth century, and used for
the grinding of grain for home use. Probably the oldest mill
was the' one erected by Robert Chambers, near Middlespring,
which was in operation in 1754, when supplies were being
stored at Shippensburg for General Braddock's army. The
mill has long been out of use but the old walls are standing in
part with traces of the race and dam site.
The stills were the more primitive methods for manufac-
uring whisky with small capacity. The distilleries were
modern in methods and their output was much greater. There
were many other stills running in the townships through
which the Conodogwinet flows, but not on these streams.
A stream rising on the east side of Clark's Knob, south of
Strasburg, joins Muddy Run below the Sunsecker Spring.
Date of Erection of Grist Mills — Original Owners.
CONODOGWINET.
James McAllister, at Roxbury, built prior to 1762.
John and William McKnight, built prior to 1763.
John Maclay, built prior to 1784.
John Skinner, built prior to 1790.
John Creamer, prior to 1797.
Frederick Schroeder, built prior to 1807.
Peter Guyer, built prior to 1840.
David C. Byers, built prior to 1848.
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ROW RUN
Peter Schoaff, built prior to 1767.
Lawrence Stumbaugh, built prior to 1783.
HERRON'S BRANCH
Charles Cummins, built prior to 1781.
Dewalt Kccfer, built prior to 1794.
John Herron, built prior to 1796,
Unfinished mill prior to 1800.
MIDDLE SPRING
Robert Chambers, near Middlespring, built prior to 1754.
James Piper built prior to 1764.
Williams Reynolds built prior to 1764.
Samuel McCune built prior to 1775.
Benjamin Reynolds built prior to 1783.
Samuel Ely the built prior to 1790.
Robert Peebles built prior to 1790.
John Colwell built prior to 1799.
WATER POWERS USED.
CONODOGWINET.
Saw mill. Gilbert's;
Grist mill, Geyer;
Saw mill. Geyer;
Saw mill, Mackey;
Saw mill. Skinner;
Grist mill, Skinner;
Sumac mill;
Saw mill, Rosrnberry;
Stave mill, Rosenberry;
-Saw mill, Beltz;
Saw mill. Powell;
Saw mill, Weist;
Saw mill. Pomeroy;
Chopping Mill, Pomeroy;
Saw mill, D. Powell;
Furnace , Gap, Dunlap;
Forge, Gap, Dunlap;
Saw mill, McAllister;
Grist mill, McAllister;
Fulling mill. Skinner;
Saw mill, McLelland;
Saw mill, up-and-down, Byers;
Fulling mill, James McCall;
Chopping mill, Bingham;
Distillery, Byers;
Clover Mill, Byers;
Grist mill, Byers;
Saw mill, Byers;
Sumac mill, Byers;
Saw mill. McKnight;
Grist mill, McKnight;
Grist mill, Creamer;
Cider mill, Minehart;
Buckwheat mill, Minehart;
Clover mill. Wise;
Oil mill. Wise;
Fulling mill, Jacob Nicholas;
Oil mill. Hollar;
Clover mill. Holler;
Lath mill, Hollar;
Grist mill, Schroeder;
Saw mill, Buzzard's Glory;
Overall factory. Buzzard's Glory;
Axe factory, Brady;
Grist mill, Maclay;
Still, Maclay;
Saw mill, Maclay;
174
GUNTER'S RUN.
Saw mill, Gunter; Saw mill, Gunter.
HERRON'S BRANCH.
Grist mill, Felty;
Saw mill, Felty;
Saw mill, Cummins;
Grist m.ill, Cummins;
Still. Culbertson;
Still, Kyner;
Saw mill, Stumbaugh;
Grist mill, Stumbaugh;
Forge, Crall;
Unfinished mill;
Still, Herron;
Saw mill, Herron;
Grist mill, Herron.
ROW RUN.
Distillery, Breckenridge;
Distillery, Orr;
Saw mill, Gish;
Grist mill, Gish.
MIDDLE SPRING.
Saw mill, Blythe;
Grist mill, Blythe;
Furnace, Southampton;
Distillery, Furnace;
Saw mill, Mains;
Grist mill, Wm. Reynolds;
Saw mill, Wm. Reynolds;
Grist mill, B. Reynolds;
Grist mill, Peebles;
Grist mill, Colwell;
Fulling mill, Frazer;
Oil mil, Frazer;
Chopping mill, Frazer;
Grist mill. Chambers;
Axe factory, Brady's;
Fulling mill. Cox's;
Chopping mill. Cox's;
Hemp mill. Cox's;
Clover mill. Hayes;
Oil mill, Hayes;
Carding mill, Hayes;
Saw mill, McCune;
Grist mill, McCune;
Distillery, Harklerode;
Saw mill. Strain;
Grist mill. Strain.
Mr. Hosfeld purchased some time since the farm of the
late David C. Byers, of Lurgan Township, He is building a
large dam near the old mill site and he purposes using it for
generating electric power for all uses to which it can be put.
He began the erection of this dam in 1908 and expects to have
it completed by May, 1910. The length of the wall is twenty-
eight hundred feet with an average height of twelve feet and
a thickness of three feet, all concrete. This dam will cover
sixty acres with a head of twenty-seven feet and with an es-
timated horse power of four hundred. It is three miles from
Orrstown, two from Roxbury and about thirteen from Cham-
bersburg. Mr. Hosfeld has made a proposal to furnish Cham-
bersburg with electric light.
This story of the Conodogwinet begins about 1740 and
continues dovv^n to the unfinished concrete dam near Orrstown.
175
The date of the erection of the mills is taken from their
first appearance on the tax lists excepting the Chambers mill.
The two remaining illustrations are the Conodogwinet
between the mountains in Horse Valley, near its confluence
with Gunter's Run.
Along the Conodogwinet is near what was originally the
Creamer mill. In the background is McAllister's Gap.
176
REPORT ON THE SUSQUEHANA AND POTOMAC
ROUTE
BY JOHN MITCHEIi.
To the Board of Pennsylvania Canal Commissioners:
GENTLEMEN : —
In compliance with your letter of instructions dated the
17th of June last, I immediately proceeded to the duties as-
signed me, and commenced my levelings as marked on a but-
tonwood tree, on the north side of the Conodogwinet Creek at
the junction with the Susquehana of the County of Cumber-
land. I continued my level up the creek, following the differ-
ent windings of the channel the distance of three miles and
ninety-eight perches, to a marked swamp white oak, making
an ascent of 16.68. On the south side of the creek the banks
are high and afford no bottom which does not overflow by
high waters. On the north side for a short distance above the
mouth of the creek the ground ascends gradually from the
creek, the high banks put in the same as the south side. The
slate and limestone soil is divided by the stream, the former
being on the north, the latter on the south side. Continued
my level a distance of five miles and seventy-nine perches to a
marked cherry tree near the dwelling house of a Mr. Orr,
ascent 16.02, the banks, bottoms, etc., the same as before de-
scribed. Continuing a distance of four miles, two hundred
and forty perches to Rupp's mill dam. Ascent 17.63, banks
steep and high, bottom as before. Continued a distance of nine
miles and thirty-eight perches to Fisher's mill. Ascent 29.18
in this distance. Three limestone bars put across the creek
from the south to the north side, the banks and the bottoms
as before. Continued a distance of five miles and ten perches
to Hoover's mill dam. Ascent 12.30 in this distance, one
177
limestone bar extending to the north side of the creek, the
banks continue steep and high but occasionally the bottoms
are wider. Continuing a distance of four miles, one hundred
and sixteen perches to the mouth of Letort Spring. Ascent
6.95, one limestone bar across the creek, banks not generally
as high as before and bottoms increasing in breadth. Con-
tinued a distance of four miles and one hundred and twenty-
eight perches to the mouth of the Cove at Blair's mill dam.
Ascent 14.35, bottoms wider than before and banks not so
high. Continued a distance of six miles and two hundred and
fifty-six perches to Haye's mill dam. Ascent 21.26, in this dis-
tance banks are alternately high and low ; a short distance
below the mill the slate land commences on the south side.
Continued a distance of four miles and thirty-eight perches to
Diller's mill dam. Ascent 13.05, limestone again on the south
side, and a bar of thirty perches crosses to the north side, bot-
toms and hills as before. Continued a distance of four miles
and two hundred and eighty perches to a point near and below
Judge Graham's. Ascent 13.04, a part of the distance slate
banks on both sides, bottoms as before. Continued a distance
of ten miles and forty-three perches to Mrs. Thompson's.
Ascent 46.57, in this distance there are alternating high banks
on one side and bottoms on the other; slate on both sides the
creek. Continued a distance of eleven miles and thirteen
perches to the mouth of Herron's Branch. Ascent 65.35, slate
banks on both sides and occasionally extending to the water's
edge with considerable elevation. Proceeded up Herron's
Branch a distance of four miles and forty-six perches to a
point marked near Koiner's house at a place called Culbert-
son's Row. Ascent 35.85, in this distance the slate soil termi-
nates and the limestone continues on both sides the branch.
Continued my level to the head of the spring, a distance of one
hundred and ninety perches. Ascent level 12.27. Here are
two large and standing springs at the place calTed Culbertson's
Row Returned to the point at Koiner's and proceeded along
a natural water course, but now dry, a distance of two miles,
one hundred and twenty-four perches to the summit level near
178
Greenvillage as marked on my draft. Ascent 43.73, in this
distance the limestone rocks appear to approach near to the
surface of the ground, and have in many places the appearance
of being washed by a stream of water and are entirely bare
and exposed to view on the surface of the ground. After ex-
ploring in search of the lowest ground, and being accompanied
by a number of gentlemen from Chambersburg, I returned to
the summit and returned two different levels to the Conoco-
cheague Creek both of which terminated at the same point,
say at Weaver's Mill, being at the height of my summit level.
One of these surveys only is represented on the draft and
marked as a feeder, the length of which will not be more than
two miles. Descent from the summit by the first survey which
is not represented on the draft, and which terminated at the
head run of Hettick's mill, but a considerable distance below
his dam, is 17.22. I would approve of building a dam of six
feet in height across the creek one hundred and eleven perches
above Chamber's mill, from which the water can be conveyed
to the summit, and will not only give an increase of water by
the addition of two springs, one of which is large, but also
avoid a very difficult construction of the feeder which arises
from the very steep and limestone rocks, projecting to the
water's edge above the projected dam. Beginning at the
summit I continued my level towards Chambersburg, on the
ground of which the canal might be made, and following the
natural channel leading to the creek which is laid down in my
draft. Distance to the creek one mile and eighty-two perches,
descent 34.70, the soil is limestone but appears not to ap-
proach so near the surface of the ground as on the ascending
side of the summit. Continued down and along the creek a
distance of one mile and thirty-four perches to where the
bridge on the turnpike road crosses the same. Here our
course terminated at the height of the west end of the bridge
above the water making to this point a descent of 5.33, there
are bottoms on the one side or the other of the creek for the
last distance. My course from the bridge was along the turn-
pike a distance of two mites and one hundred and forty-one
179
perches to the surface of the water of the Conococheague
Creek in the town of Chambersburg. Descent 40.07, the
creek for the distance on my right. Soil, limestone on the
south side and slate in part on the north. From this point I
commenced leveling to connect my survey with the Monocacy
and the Conewago Creeks and pursued the turnpike road lead-
ing to Gettysburg, finding the heighth of the South Mountain
on the same road 823.39 above the creek at Chambersburg.
Here I departed from my instructions believing it a use-
less expenditure of - time and money, to search for the lowest
summit between the Conococheague and Conewago Creeks.
They both rising in the South Mountain and nearly at the
same elevation above stated from Chambersburg. Continued
a distance of twenty-four miles and one hundred and thirty-
four perches, being the distance from Chambersburg to a
marked thorn at Rock Creek east of Gettysburg, making that
point at Rock Creek 195.33 lower than the summit at Green-
village and 115.23 lower than the creek at Chambersburg.
From here I proceeded up Rock Creek to the summit marked
on the draft the lowest summit to connect with the Conewago,
distance seven miles and one hundred and forty-two perches.
Ascent 80.20 above the thorn at Rock Creek near Gettysburg,
making the summit 115.25 lower than the summit at Green-
village.
This country, so far as I have been through it since cross-
ing the South Mountain, is entirely a slate soil, and in many
places a red slate rock, approaching within from eighteen to
twenty-four inches of the surface of the ground. This dis-
covery was made principally along the small streams of water.
I carried the levels to five different summits on the draft. I
then carried the level to a point on the Conewago Creek suffi-
ciently high to bring the water to the summit — this point des-
ignated on the draft by a white oak. To this point all the water
descending for the summit is brought, and from there passes
in one feeder as represented on the draft. The water for the
summit to be taken from Conewago, Opossum and Marsh
Creeks, the different measures are stated in Note Book TMo. 4.
i8o
PVom a particular inquiry among the people on these waters^
I am inclined to believe the streams become much lower than
when I measured them, the Conewago more than either of the
others. I carried my level towards the south branch of Marsh
Creek with a view of bringing it in, but in this I failed. The
ground is such as cannot be passed to a height necessary to-
throw the water into the Marsh Creek feeder. From here I
returned to the Roxbury branch of the Conodogwinet and
leveled up to the B. O. as marked on the draft, and the height
of the summit, the feeder from this point was a little less than
nine miles; the ground part slate and part limestone; the
water of this stream was measured above the Forge, as
marked on the draft and was a little swollen by the rain which
fell the evening before; it is however, said to be a standing
stream.
Here my explorations ceased and with my party I re-
turned home. For further information and particulars I refer
to my note books, four in number, they are the original notes
and remarks taken on the ground. I have, so far as consistent
with my duty, conformed to the wishes of the people of the
country which I passed through in making the explorations
suggested by the most intelligent of them. The public prop-
erty which remained in my hands from the last year has been
deposited in the Arsenal at Harrisburg — the receipt now de-
livered to you. The leveling instrument is now in the posses-
sion of Mr. Rawle at Harrisburg. The only public property
now remaining in my possession is the small water level
which will be delivered to your order.
J. MITCHELL.
December 8, 1828.
N. B. — I find I have neglected to state my leveling up the
west branch of Marsh Creek. It will be found as represented
in the draft as terminating at an elm on the creek and at a
place where the feeder commences. J. M.
Since Surveyor Mitchell's report was printed in the maia
i8i
body of this story of the Conodogwinet, I came accidentally
across his official report as published by the State in the Car-
negie Library at Pittsburg. This is of greater interest to any
who have knowledge of the country through which the pro-
posed canal was to pass, because it gives his route of survey
and names the different points along it. T have, therefore,
copied it in full and put it among additional notes. The note
books to which Surveyor Mitchell refers, are possibly among
the archives of the Department of Internal AfTairs at Harris-
burg, but could not be found.
The care he takes of public property and makes note of
its return to the Commonwealth is worthy of commendation.
THE WASTE OF WATER POWER.
In the main story of the Conodogwinet reference is made
to the immense water power of the stream which could be
utilized in the manufacturing industries of the Cumberland
Valley. From the Wall Street "Daily News," of February,
1910, I take the following article on "The Waste of Water
Power," which is interesting and suggestive.
What Samuel Slater first demonstrated in New England
three generations ago, namely, that the streams of New Eng-
land contained power-producing energy which, if utilized,
would be capable of turning New England into a great manu-
facturing section, some of the leading men of this day are now
discovering with respect to New York State and also other
states. The very competent commission which has been inves-
tigating the water powers of New York State, and wasted
energy that is in them, has now reported that by means of
proper reservoirs the vvater power of the State should be suffi-
cient to serve nearly all of the manufactories and a consider-
able portion of transportation by trolley or electricity.
But curiously enough, this commission does not refer to
the opportunity for colossal generation of power which the con-
struction of the Catskill aqueduct wilt give. The reservoir,
which is to be the fountain head for the aqueduct, will be,
when completed, large enough to float the navies of the world.
1 82
The giant current of water from it will have a total descent
from the reservoir to the bottom of the Hudson, where the
great syphon is to be constructed, of about 1,500 feet.
E. H. Olcott, who years ago became familiar with some
of the greater engineering work of Northern South America,
because he had part in it, has suggested to the aqueduct com-
mission, although informally, that it should be possible so tO'
utilize this unexampled energy as to convert it into electric
energy, thereby furnishing practically all the power needed for
much of the greater part of the Hudson Valley, possibly
touching even as far south as New York City. And there are
some reasons for surmising that the aqueduct commission
may take up this proposition as soon as it is known whether
or not it is to be possible to syphon the water under the Hud-
son to the hills upon either side of the river. There are under-
stood to be no engineering or mechanical difficulties in estab-
lishing a work of this kind, and when it is remembered that
the fall from the penstock at Niagara Falls to the -giant tur-
bines, which convert the energy of the water into electricity is
only 150 feet and that this energy is sufficient for all the needs
of Buffalo, 25 miles distant and the manufacturing districts
between the Niagara Falls and that city, then there may be
better understanding of the capacity of the Catskill aqueduct
to furnish electric energy sufficient for all the towns of the
Hudson Valley, and possibly that part of New York City
which is the borough of The Bronx.
In this story there are water power suggestions that might
be of service to Chambersburg in its coming gravity system.
This supply will have a very considerable descent and might
be utilized to run the dynamos that furnish electric lighting
and power for the town.
CONODOGWINET BUTLERS.
Thomas Butler and Eleanor, his wife, settled in West
Pennsborough Township, Lancaster County, about 1745. His-
place of residence was several miles north of Newville in what
1 83
is now Frankford Township, on the north side of the road at
the first farm west of Bloserville. In the family were five sons,
all of whom served with distinction and bravery in the War
of the Revolution. Richard was a lieutenant colonel and after
the Revolution was appointed by President Washington
Major General under General St. Clair and was mortally
wounded at the Miami disaster. William became a lieutenant
colonel of the fourth regiment of the Pennsylvania line.
Thomas entered the service as first lieutenant of the Second
Pennsylvania Battalion and became captain in the third regi-
ment of the line and was in every action that was fought in
the Middle States during the war; Edward, the youngest of
the brothers, was an officer in the second, fifth and ninth regi-
ments of the Pennsylvania line. Percival served as a lieuten-
ant in the second and third regiments of the Pennsylvania line.
He removed to Kentucky and was adjutant general during the
War of 1812.
One of his sons was General William Orlando Butler,
born in Kentucky 1798, practiced law, was in the War of 1812,
and a member of Congress four years, ran for Governor
against 'Henry Clay, was a major general in the war with
Mexico. In February, 1848, he succeeded General Scott of the
American forces in Mexico, led the daring charge at Monterey
in 1849, and later was presented a sword by resolution of Con-
gress. In 1848 he ran for vice president on the Democratic
ticket with General Lewis Cass. General Butler also wrote
poetry, but about the only one that survived was a pocn»
printed in the "Western Review" published at Lexington,
Kentucky, in 1821, It is entitled "The Boatman." It is found
in Coggershal's collection of western poetry, also in Venable's
early history of Ohio. I give it not only on account of its
beauty and sweetness, but because it helps to connect his
youth with his ancestors who settled near the Conodogwinet
over a century and a half since which seventy-five years later
had some hope of hearing the music of the boat horn.
1 84
THE BOATMAN. j
O, Boatman wind that horn again, ■(
For never did the empty air . ■
Upon its lambent bosom bear ■
So mild, so soft, so sweet a strain. ■
What though the notes are sad and few ' ^
By every single Doatman blown, ?
Yet is each pulse to nature true |
And melody in every tone. (
How oft in boyhood's joyous day, ,1
Unmindful of the lapsing hours, |
I've loitered on my homeward way j
By mild Ohio's bank of flowers |
When some lone boatman from the deck 'i
Poured his soft number to the tide '<
As if to charm from storm and wreck
The boat where all his fortunes ride. ,;
Delighted nature drank the sound, ;
Enchanted echo bore it round. . j
To whispers soft and softer still
From hill to plain and plain to hill.
Till as e'en the thoughtless frolic boy,
ELite with hope and wild with joy,
Who gamboled by the river side
And sported with the fretting tide,
Feels something new pervade his tread.
Change his bright steps, refuse his gait,
Bends o'er the flood his eager ear
To catch the sounds far off yet dear.
Drinks the sweet drafts but knows not why ,
The tear of rapture fills his eye.
And can he now to manhood grown
Tell why these notes simple and lone,
As on the ravished ear they fell
And every scene ip magic spell.
There is a taste of feeling given
To all on earth, its fountain heaven.
Beginning with the dewy flower
Just ope'd in floras vernal bower
Rising creations order though
With louder murmur, brighter hue.
That tide is syinpathy, its ebb and flow
Give life its hues, its joy, its woe
Music the Master spirit that can move
Its waves to war or lull them into love
Can cheer the sinking sailor mid the wave,
And bid the warrior on nor fear the grave.
Inspire the fainting pilgrim on his road
And elevate his soul to claim his God.
Then boatman wind that horn again.
Though much of sorrow mark its strain;
Yet are its notes to sorrow dear.
What though they wake fond memory's tear.
Tears are sad memory's sacred feast
And raptvire oft her chosen guest.
i8s
UNVEILING OF THE DR. AGNEW PORTRAIT
AT MERCERSBURG ACADEMY.
The portrait of Dr. D. Hayes Agnew was unveiled at
Mercersburg Academy, Thursday evening, May 13, 1909. The
members of Kittochtinny, upon invitation, were present at the
function. Dr. J. William White, of the University of Penn-
sylvania, made the address, in which a glowing tribute was
paid the noted surgeon. Dr. Irvine referred to Dr. Agnew's
growing practice and residence in this county seventy years
ago, whose office was "on the Greencastle and Mercersburg
turnpike (Upton), midway between the above named places,
May loth, 1839." Dr. I. N. Snively, representing the Franklin
County Medical Society, paid a high tribute to his preceptor.
Judge Gillan spoke on behalf of the Kittochtinny Historical
Society. The Judge referred to the great eminence Dr. Ag-
new had achieved, and the portraits the Academy was ac-
quiring, and closed by saying: "But above all will hang the
one unveiled tonight, that of the great, tender-hearted, lovable
Christian surgeon." After the exercises all present repaired
to North Cottage to meet Dr. White. Dr. and Mrs. Irvine
received the guests in their usual cordial manner. Refresh-
ments were served, and thus ended an exceedingly enjoyable
occasion.
It should be added that the portrait is the gift of twenty
of the leading physicians of Philadelphia who were students
under Dr. Agnew. Miss Rebecca Agnew, a relative of Dr.
Agnew, unveiled the portrait amid the applause of the large
audience.
i86
SUMMER VACATION ASSEMBLY AT COUNTRY
HOME OF MR. M. C. KENNEDY.
On Saturday afternoon, July 31, 1909, there was a fine
social gathering at "Ragged Edge," the attractive home of
Mr. M. C. Kennedy, when he was again host to the members
of the Kittochtinny Historical Society; directors, officers and
medical staff of the Chambersburg Hospital, and to« the heads
of departments and clerks of the C. V. R. R. Co. In all more
than one hundred guests shared in the hospitality of Mr. and
Mrs. Kennedy. Assembled on the beautiful lawn and hillsides
the company in jolly groups partook of the delectable re-
freshments served, after which were exchanged the annual
collection of new and old stories over coffee and cigars. The
young bloods preferred baseball, quoits and other amusements.
The guests returned home well pleased with the outing
and generous reception and entertainment of host and hostess.
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i87
THE DEDICATION OF THE CAPTAIN JOHN E. COOK
MARKER AT MONT ALTO, OCTOBER 25, 1909.
For several years the Kittochtinny Historical Society has
had under consideration the marking, in some suitable and
permanent way, the principal places of historic interest in
Fra .klin County. Its activities in this direction have been
entrusted to a committee — Messrs. John G. Orr, W. Rush
Gillan and Linn Harbaugh — who have from time to time
-made reports which may be found among the records of the
Society. The suggestion that this work be inaugurated by
erecting a marker at the place where Captain John E. Cook
was captured at Mont Alto, had its inception in this commit-
tee and was promptly endorsed by the Society. More than a
year before the dedication took place the committee above
referred to, visited the scene of the capture and determined by
careful examination of the ground, and eye witnesses of the
event, just where the marker should be placed. At the same
time a large mountain boulder lying about a mile and a half
from the scene of Captain Cook's capture, was selected as the
marker upon which it was decided to place a granite tablet
with appropriate inscription.
Citizens of Mont Alto headed by David Knepper freely
tendered their services in moving the boulder down the moun-
tain side and placing it in position. This in itself was no or-
dinary task as the rock weighed about three and a half tons.
Natives of Mont Alto and students of the Forestry Academy,
however, became interested and there was no lack of help.
A skid was constructed by placing two pine logs about
twelve feet long and eight inches in diameter as runners upon
which were pinned heavy cross bars. The boulder was then
rolled upon this structure and to it was hitched a team of
twelve mules owned, and driven on this occasion, by George
W. Miller, a contractor at the White Pine Sanatorium, and
i88
after a long and strong pull the heavy drag was brought suc-
cessfully down the mountain road.
On Monday afternoon, October 25, 1909, fifty years after
the capture, the dedication of the marker took place in ac-
cordance with a program arranged by the committee. It was
an ideal October day and the large number of people who at-
tended were met at the Mont Alto station by Superintendent,
George H. Wirt, chief marshall, and the students of the For-
estry Academy on horseback.
Led by the Citizens Band of Mont Alto, the procession at
once formed and marched to the location of the marker near
the little Epispocal Chapel. More than a hundred citizens of
Mont Alto and the neighborhood joined the procession. Busi-
ness was practically at a standstill, and the school children
were dismised for the occasion. After a patriotic air by the
band, prayer was offered by the Rev. John Costello, rector at
Waynesboro, and also of the Emanuel Episcopal Chapel at
Mont Alto. Two impressive national airs were rendered by a
quartet composed of W. G. Underwood, T. J. Brereton, Brin-
ton B. Holler and C. E. Hoke. The unveiling of the marker
then took place, and when Linn Harbaugh, President of the
Kittochtinny Historical Society, drew the large flag aside, the
crowd applauded, and many persons stepped forward to read
the inscription on the granite tablet. Judge W, Rush Gillan
then presented the Hon. B. M. Nead, who delivered the oration
of the day.
There are only two men living in the county who were
witnesses of the capture of Captain Cook. J. Warren Seibert,
known as "Ward" to his associates, was working on the stone
house near the church, and was an eye witness to the scuffle
and arrest. He gives a very interesting account of it, and his
evidence was important in helping to locate the spot, Cole-
man Reed, of Mont Alto, then a boy of eleven years, saw the
occurrence and has a very distinct recollection of it.
Mr. Nead's scholarly oration which here follows, em-
bodies what is regarded by the Kittochtinny Historical Society
as a correct statement of the facts, and also sets forth in a
i89
terse and admirable way the aims and purposes of the Society
in perpetuating this incident in the unfortunate and tragic
career of Captain John E. Cook.
MR.NEAD'S ORATION.
Mr. CHAIRMAN — With greetings to you and my fellow
members of the Kittochtinny Historical Society and to all
here present.
It was a great German Master of Literature who gave
expression to this homely but forceful thought "that occasions
arise when we must read between the lines of books and
printed records to properly understand them," and so occa-
sions arise when we must read between the lines of precon-
ceived ideas and commonly accepted views of matters of pub-
lic interest to learn their true inwardness. So it is that I feel
constrained to preface that which through the grace of the
committee I have the honor and privilege of saying here to-
day with the statement, as I read between the lines, that the
Kittochtinny Historical Society has erected this marker and
arranged these ceremonies neither with the intent to do honor
to a military or civil hero nor to memorialize a martyr.
In my view, it is not within the province of this Society,
working, as it does and should, within the wide field of its local
territory as an unbiased discoverer and conservator of facts,
to pass judgment upon the character, the motive, or the aims
and purposes of the man upon whose name is mentioned in
connection with these ceremonies today ; what he was and
what he did of himself is now of little importance. He was
merely an insignificant pawn in the earliest opening move of
a great game to be played upon the chess board of a nation.
The Historical Society has been moved to do this thing that
it might take the first step toward performing that which may
be considered an important function, viz., the marking of
historic sites in the territory within its purview.
So we may, therefore, with profit, briefly consider the
utility of systematic and rational work along this line of ac-
tivity, and its results upon those who are to live after us, con-
190
trasted with the woful outcome of the culpable neglect of this
patriotic duty, demonstrated by the experience of the past^
especially in Pennsylvania.
Passing from the statement of the true purpose of the
ceremonies appointed for this day, it will be in point to con-
sider the occurrences and their sequel which lend sufiicient im-
portance to this particular spot in this secluded locality to
warrant the setting up here of a memorial stone which will
attract the attention of the passing youth, not only of the
present but of coming generations. Which will provoke him
to inquiry into the full story of the event in the history of his
country to which it is related.
If then from the whole we may point a moral and evolve
a little lesson in true patriotism, then will have been served a
worthy purpose in this modest function of to-day.
I do not hesitate in this presence to-day, for I consider
the occasion opportune, to emphasize certain strictures which
I have frequently given expression to before upon the indif-
ference of my native state in maintaining her true place among
her sister states in the great work of the civilization of the
new world.
Among a certain class of thoughtful citizens of Pennsyl-
vania, who were not wholly absorbed in the contemplation of
the glory, the wealth and the political power of their native
state, from the sole standpoint of evolving dollars therefrom
and forwarding methods by which these dollars might be con-
verted to their individual uses and advantage, there arose a
spirit of discontent, call it, if you will, wounded pride, or civic
shame. This spirit received an impetus in the centennial year
of American independence, when the nations of the world and
the sister States of the Union gathered by representation in
the historic metropolis of our own State, where American
liberty was "both cradled and crowned." Each endeavoring
to show by striking object lessons, not only its pre-eminence
in material wealth, in which rivalry Pennsylvania easily bore
the palm, but as well its pre-eminence in history, as a factor in
nation building. In this latter claim, alas, the poverty of
191
Pennsylvania was only too apparent, however conscious of her
merits were many of her well informed, but as usual, too com-
placent, people.
The secret why Pennsylvania was such an insignificant
figure in the recorded story of the nation's past was then laid
bare to any thoughtful individual who cared to look into the
situation.
How may we measure the serious results flowing from
the prideless and unconcerned neglect of the people of Penn-
sylvania to properly preserve the memorials of her glorious
founding and her grand achievements, and to present for her
dignity and honor among the sisterhood of States ; for the
instruction and inspiration of the present and coming genera-
tions of her children, the full and true story of the priceless
sacrifices endured, and the mighty deeds performed by her for
the common good, in every era of our country's history.
Painfully apparent is the neglect of Pennsylvania, not
only in the emasculated, scattered and unprotected condition
of her archives but also in her almost absolute failure to mark
her historic sites. New England has preserved with jealous
care, every accessible minute of governmental act or note of
individual performance in the past, and has marked with en-
during monuments every historic locality. These monuments
which emblazon the pathway of her greatness are so plainly
set that "the wayfaring man, though a fool," may read the
glorious story they tell. The printed volumes of her archives
and documentary history are a great memorial to the achieve-
ments of State and individual citizen, and a rich mine from
which the New England writers of general history gather in-
formation, and the New England compilers of school histories
obtain the leaven of New England greatness, which they plant
with impunity in every Pennsylvania school, whose scholars,
under its workings, grow eloquent in composition and debate
over the brave and meritorious conduct of some New England
worthy of the past, while they tread in ignorance every day,
it may be, over the unmarked and forgotten graves of many
Pennsylvania born soldiers, high in rank and service in the
192
Indian, Revolutionary, and late wars, and of heroes, easily the
first in civil life, in every era of our country's history.
This lovely valley of ours is rich in historic sites. Marked
and identified with enduring monuments which intelligently
set forth the carefully garnered truth, they may become elo-
quent object lessons to inspire with patriotic ardor and to
teach, with a note of warning, the youth of to-day and to
morrow something of the golden story of the singleness of
purpose, the self-sacrificing spirit, of the true love of country,
in the days when the nation was building; as contrasted with
the brazen spirit of the commercialism of to-day, to which a
benighted people in their complacency would fain accord
stately monuments.
"Oh, for the ancient spirit which curbed the Senate's will,
Oh, for the tents which in olden times whitened the sacred hill."
In the lapse of time there comes a passing under the inex-
orable law of nature, first, of human witnesses; then of writ-
ten records, and lastly of traditions, and if men have- not been
wise in their day and generation, the Past is lost and without
a knowledge of the Past how may we rightly and intelligently
live in the Present, or forecast the Future ?
Just over this mountain's summit lies the pride of Penn-
sylvania and the Mecca of the Union. How few the genera-
tions until that Gethsemane of a nation had become a half
forgotten tale, a lost tradition, if it were not for the stately
array of monuments to tell the story of the Past !
Let us be wise in our day and generation.
In the darkness of the earty morning of the sixteenth day
of October, 1859, j^st fifty years ago, at the picturesque little
village of Harper's Ferry, in Virginia, there was enacted a
scene which was the culmination of an undertaking planned
by one of sincere convictions and fervid soul, but with a brain
then overwrought by the memory of sufferings and outrages
endured, such as rarely fell to the portion of man. It was an
undertaking, notwithstanding the immortal principles involved
in it, for which a cool brain, at its inception, would have
193
reckoned failure and disaster. John Brown, self-anointed
from his youth to the service of the oppressed, with his heart
aflame with the hallowing memories of Kansas, where he had
been sore wounded in body and temporarily broken in spirit
with the long and unavailing strife there for the principle
which he espoused, now ventured all in one supreme effort to
accomplish his end.
With twenty-two followers (three of whom were his own
sons, and five negroes), most of them young men whom he had
fired with zeal by his eloquence and example, he made a secret
armed attack upon and captured the United States arsenal and
other government buildings in this little hill-begirt Virginia
town. His hope was to establish there a rallying point where
the southern slaves would rush, as he undoubtedly believed,
to his assistance.
Four of his followers he had commissioned as captains.
Three of them were his sons, and the other was John E. Cook,
of Connecticut.
Like wildfire spread the story of this raid through the
country. The inevitable end came quickly. A handful of
United States regular troops, after a short and decisive battle,
wounded and captured John Brown, the leader, and killed or
captured all of his followers, excepting six, who made good
their escape. The conviction for treason and punishment by
death of the captured followed.
The Brown raid was a failure, but we have learned to
know what an important bearing it had on the history of our
country. It accomplished things. It fully opened the eyes of
the conservative North to the enormity of the curse, slavery.
And, from a Southern view, in the words of one of their lead-
ers: It "capped the climax of aggression and 'let slip the dogs
of war,' for the time and blew a bugle blast from a gallows
platform of convicts which resounded from one end of the
continent to the other and roused every evil passion for the
conflict, at the next presidential election."
The companions of John Brown who escaped from
Harper's Ferry, followed north under the leadership of Owen
194
Brown, one of his sons. There were six in the company, and
John E. Cook was the dominating personality.
The pathway of the fugitives, chosen for safety, led them
into the hidden coves and fastnesses of this, our mystery-
enshrouded mountain, in the shadow of which we stand to-day.
Will you permit me to recall my memory description of this
locality ? In imagination we may people those recesses under
the trees which deepen into cypress shade; the vicinity of
those springs which sparkle like jewels, reflecting the errant
rays of sunshine as they pierce the shadow, or those sinuous
pathways which lead summit-ward, with the characters identi-
fied with them in the different periods of past existence. Again
appears the stalwart form of the dusky Indian. Again is
heard, scarcely discernible on the mossy carpet, and almost
drowned by the laughter of the neighboring streamlet, his
stealthy tread, and in harmony with the wild cry of the beast
of prey from its distant lair, echoes through glen and across
glade, his shrill war whoop or the notes in minor chord of his
defiant death song.
Then, in panoramic view, passes the long procession of
the heroes and heroines of legendary story and song which,
born of the superstition of a simple folk in the past, people the
mountain from the Chattahooche, on the south, to the borders
of the Catskills of that other romance land on the north. More
vivid than all the rest in this presentation of fancy are the
sad episodes of slavery time, when the "Underground Rail-
road" had right of way through this mountain and many a
dusky fugitive having escaped from his shackles, gazed from
its summit upon the North Star which pointed the way to
freedom.
A sad incident connected with the flight of these fugitives
through the South Mountain was the wandering away from
his companions and the capture of Captain John E. Cook ; the
sequel of which misfortune was his return to Virginia and his
execution there. This incident is responsible for the existence
of the footprints of a historical event — Brown's raid — in this
195
remote by-path, which yon boulder, taken from the mountain
-side, is intended to mark.
Let us talk with Owen Brown, the leader of the fugitives.
This is what he himself says about his last companionship and
parting with Captain Cook in the mountain :
***** "The forest now seemed so extensive
that, after resting a while we thought it safe to go on by day-
light ; and we traveled on in what we considered the direction
of Chambersburg till the middle of the afternoon, seeing no
traces of inhabitants. ***** pjg (Cook) talked a
great deal about the prospective meeting with his wife and
boy in Chambersburg. I remember as if it were yesterday, I
told him his imprudence would be so great that he would
never see his wife and child again.
"We stopped at a clear spring that afternoon and ate the
last of the provision bought the day before. Then the boys
said it would be a good time to go and get a new supply. More
earnestly than ever I tried to dissuade them, but to no pur-
pose. * * * * * I said, since they were determined
that somebody must go. Cook was the man most fitted for the
mission, and I gave him money, and the same red silk hand-
kerchief (a disguise used). He left everything but one re-
volver and took his leave of us, as nearly as we could judge,
between three and four o'clock in the afternoon. * * * *
Cook hadn't been gone long when two ravens flew over our
heads, croaking dismally. You may think it queer, but it
struck every one of us as a bad omen. We waited until dark
but Cook did not come; we waited until dark and starlight,
still he did not come; we waited until nine o'clock, till mid-
night, and still he did not come. He might have got lost, we
thought ; and we lingered about calling and watching for him,
till at least two o'clock in the morning. Cook never came."
When Captain Cook left his companions for the last time
fifty years ago to-day, he wandered down the mountain and
entered a ravine, and whether or not one, David Bombaugh,
met him there and suspecting his identity led him into a trap,
or whether he came down the ravine alone, matters little ; at
196
all events, he suddenly came into the presence of a number of
furnace men engaged at work. With them was Cleggett Fitz-
hugh, the manager of the furnace. There happened there at
the same time, Daniel Logan, and these two last mentioned,
men are usually named as the chief actors in the capture of the
fugitive, and the ones who earned and received the reward
offered for Cook's arrest. It is said, however, that Daniel
Bombaugh, a cousin of David Bombaugh, also came upon the
scene and had a hand in the capture. He is said to have at-
tacked and disarmed Cook from behind, thus enabling his
other captors to close in upon him. I know not how this may
be, but certainly the evil star of Cook was in the ascendency
when he placed foot on yonder spot, for there, it has been well
determined, he lost his liberty, and there the last prisoner of
the insurrection was captured, and so we raise the marker.
Cook was one of the most daring and reckless of the in-
surgents. He was the leader of the party which, on the early
morning of the attack on Harper's Ferry, took Colonel Lewis
Washington from home, some five miles from the ferry, and
carried him to that point as a hostage. At the same time he
carried away from Washington's mansion cherished relics of
the Colonel's kinsman, General George Washington ; a silver
mounted pistol, the gift of the Marquis De Lafayette, and a.
sword of fine workmanship and beauty, presented to the Gen-
eral by Frederick the Great. Cook retained possession of the-
Washington pistol and caused his companions in flight great
annoyance and uneasiness by his reckless use of it in the
mountains. He left this pistol, I believe, with Owen Brown
M^hen he set forth on the unlucky foraging expedition which
ended in his capture. The Washington sword. Cook himself
delivered into the hands of John Brown at the engine house
of Harper's Ferry, before he left on a mission across the river,
and it is of the irony of fate that old Captain Brown used it in
unsuccessful defence of his liberty and life, in this, his last
battle. The sword fell from his hands when he was taken
prisoner and was recovered by its owner, who was present-
near at hand, among the so-called "hostages."
197
Kind hearts were touched by the story of the sad fate of
John E. Cook, but as an officer, holding a commission under
John Brown in his plan of insurrection, and establishment of a
Provisional Government for the United States, he came within
the meaning of the law which declared such conduct traitor-
ous and his punishment followed as a certain consequence.
It is a lesson often repeated yet never fully learned by
either young or old that upon a decent respect and obedience
for duly constituted authority depend the safety and perpetu-
ity of our American institutions.
May yon marker stand for generations unnumbered to
bear testimony to these things.
Chambersburg was thrown into great excitment on that
Tuesday evening, (Oct. 25, 1859) when Clagget Fitzhugh and
Daniel Logan arrived from Mont Alto, bringing with them the
alleged Captain Cook, of John Brown's army, who had es-
caped from Harper's Ferry on the second day of the raid,
October 17.
Cook was brought to the Franklin House, which was on
the site of the Central Presbyterian Church, and thence con-
ducted to the office of Samuel Reisher, Esq., where a hearing
was had, conducted upon the part of the Commonwealth by
Stumbaugh & Carlisle, and Duncan & Welsh, and on the part
of the prisoner by A. K. McClure, G. W. Brewer and T. M.
Carlisle, Esq.
Daniel Logan produced papers found on Cook's person,
and stated that the prisoner had made confidential admission
to him, and said that there were three or four of his followers
yet upon the mountains. Cook was then committed to prison
to await the requisition of the Governor of Virginia.
In every respect Cook answered the description of him
given in the papers. How he was released the next day near
noon on requisition papers from the Governor of Virginia,
which were first forwarded to Carlisle, believing that Hazlitt
who was in jail there as one of the Brown men, and without
the presence of counsel, has been related.
198
Accounts differ with reference to the route the Virginia,
officers took with their prisoner, one of them saying that they
started for Charlestown on the noon train of the C. V. R. R^
(via the Northern Central to Baltimore, and so on), and an-
other believed by many to be the most correct, as given by
James P. Matthews, Esq., who says:
"The prisoner was turned over to the Virginia deputies,,
who drove rapidly southward, and were soon out of the juris-
diction of the Pennsylvania courts. My wife, then a school
girl in Hagerstown, saw Cook next morning standing on the
veranda of the Washington House. "According to the news-
papers, he was a man of great courage, who met his fate
bravely; but the recollection of this school girl is that his ap-
pearance was that of a man paralyzed with fright, and given
over to abject despair."
The Chambersburg "Times" in its account of his hearing-
before Justice Reisher, says: "Throughout the whole pro-
ceedings, he exhibted the utmost coolness and fortitude, as
much so as if they were no concern to him. Had he not been-
thrown off his guard when taken, it is believed his capture-
could not have been made, and although surprised, he strug-
gled with extraordinary power."
199
SKETCH OF JOSIAH CULBERTSON.
READ BY J. S. McILVAINE. ESQ.
Upon Invitation of Irvin C. Elder, the first Fall meeting-
of the Society was held at the hospitable and beautiful
mountain home, "Elderslie," Thursday afternoon, October
28, 1909. About fifty members and guests were in attend-
ance. The committee on Captain Cook marker made final
report. Its completion and erection were at a cost of $76.74.
B. M. Nead was given a unanimous vote of thanks for his
excellent and appropriate address. Judge Rowe, T. J. Brere-
ton and T. G. Zarger gave interesting reminiscences of Cook
and others of the John Brown men. The Society was pre-
sented with a gavel made of a piece of wood from the first
Court House of Cumberland County, which still stands at
the southwest corner of Main and Queen Streets, Shippens-
burg. It was the gift of Rev. E. V. Collins who fashioned
it, and was presented to the Society through its president,
Linn Harbaugh, Esq. Thanks were voted Mr. Collins, who
continues an esteemed member of the Society. As It was the
first regular meeting since April much of interest had trans-
pired to claim the attention of the historians. The death of
Captain Skinner was noted and a committee was appointed
to report a minute on the demise of one of the most es-
teemed members of the Society.
In the absence of President Harbaugh, J. S. Mcllvaine
presided, who read the sketch herewith presented after the
business meeting.
The assembly were regaled with refreshments that were
greatly enjoyed. The amiable hostess was assisted by Mrs.
T. B. Kennedy, Jr., Mrs. Nancy Wingerd, Mrs. Alex. B. Sharpe
and the Misses Boyd.
Mr. and Mrs. Elder have built on a knoll which com-
mands a magnificent view of the valley. The v/ell planned
and finely built residence was greatly admired by all present.
Union District S. C, January 2nd, 1840. From the Weekly
Register, Vol. i, No. 5. Published in Washington, Indiana,
October 17th, 1839.
Another Revolutionary Patriot gone. Died at his resi-
dence, in this county on the 27th ult., Mr. Josiah Culbertsori,
Sr., aged 91 years. His remains were escorted to the grave by
the Military and a large concourse of the citizens of the town
and vicinity, and interred with Military honors and other tes-
timonials of respect due to his revolutionary services.
There are many incidents in the life of Mr. Culbertson
which are worthy of record, and entitle him to the gratitude
200
of his country. Few private soldiers, during our arduous
struggle for independence had the good fortune to render
their country more important service than he did; and some
of his personal exploits and adventures, for daring and success,
may be compared with those of a Newton and a Jasper. A
succinct memoir of his life and adventures may not be unin-
teresting to our readers.
Mr. Culbertson was born at Culbertson Row, near Ship-
pensburg, Pennsylvania, in the year 1748. His father, Samuel
Culbertson, was a native of Ireland, but was brought to
America, by his parents, when he was four years of age. The
family were Presbyterians. The father of Mr. Culbertson
moved from Pennsylvania about 1753 or 1755 when he was
about ten years old, to Newriver, Virginia, beyond the then
irontier of that State, and thirty miles from the nearest white
settlement, where he resided at the time of Braddock's defeat.
It is well known that after the defeat of General Braddock
the Indians threw themselves upon the defenseless inhabitants
of the frontier, ravaging the country and sparing neither age
nor sex, in their indiscriminate butcheries. Shortly after the
defeat and before the family had any intelligence of it, a party
-of thirteen Shawnees came to the house of Mr. Culbertson's
father on a marauding excursion to the settlements. They
surrounded the house before they were discovered, but did not
molest the family ; but after extorting some provisions from
their reluctant hospitality they departed with many expres-
sions of friendship. A day or two afterwards a runner from
the settlement came to inform the family of their danger, and
that the same party of Indians was then committing depreda-
ions upon the settlement of Greenbrier river. They imme-
diately retired to the nearest settlement. The same party of
Indians captured a Mr. English and a German woman, and on
-their return took the house of Mr. Culbertson's father in their
route, and were much exasperated (as Mrs. English stated
after her escape) when they found the family had removed;
no doubt intending to murder or take them prisoners on their
return. Mr, Culbertson's father continued to reside in the
201
settled part of Virginia. The inhabitants of the frontier for
their safety and to prevent surprise, frequently despatched
scouting parties to hunt for Indian "Signs." One of these
parties consisting of twelve men was accompanied by Josiah
Culbertson, then fourteen or fifteen years of age. After being
out several days they came upon an encampment of Indians
who had a woman and five children prisoners. They attacked
the Indians, killed nine of them, rescued the prisoners and
took seventeen guns.
Some years before the Revolutionary War broke out the
elder Mr. Culbertson removed with his family to North Caro-
lina. While residing here Josiah and one of his brothers were
in the army of George Tryon, where he defeated the insur-
gents in 1770. After this the family removed into South
Carolina where Mr. Culbertson was married in 1774, to a
daughter of Col. John Thomas. About this time the Cherokees
commenced war upon the frontier of South Carolina and forces
were raised to repel their excursions. Mr. Culbertson volun-
teered in the company of Captain Thomas, his brother-in-law,
and served fourteen weeks in the Cherokee country. During
their campaign a party of fifty men, of whom Mr. Culbertson
was one, was sent out to collect some cattle of the Cherokees,
for the sustenance of the army. They had not proceeded more
than a mile and a half from the main body of the army when
they were surrounded by a large body of Indians, far superior
to them in number. The whites immediately took post upon a
hill, which gave them a great advantage over the foe, and en-
abled them to keep him in check. The Indians at the com-
mand of their chief made a rush up the hill with tomahawk in
hand, and were as often driven back by the murderous fire
of the whites. The firing was heard by the main army and
relief was immediately sent, and the Indians fled, leaving
forty-seven dead on the ground. Of the whites three were
killed and Major Downs and Captain Lacey were mortally
wounded and died the same evening. The Indians, as they
stated in their treaty afterwards w^ere on their way to attack
the main army when they encountered the party.
202
Josiah Culbertson was in company with Major Parsons
and Gowen when the celebrated Cherokee chief, Big Acorn,,
was taken and afterwards killed in attempting to escape. Mr,
Culbertson being raised on the frontier was one of the most
active and effective scouts of his day. He was generally de-
tached as a spy on the movements of the enemy, and fre-
quently had his comrade shot down at his side.
When the Revolutionary War broke out he joined the
Whigs and was actively engaged in most of the campaigns of
South Carolina. Early in the war Governor Rutledge, of
South Carolina, sent a large quantity of ammunition into the
then back country, to enable the Whigs to keep the Tories in.
check. It was placed under care of Col. Thomas in ninety-six
district, who kept it at his house under a guard of twenty-five
men — a body of Tories under the command of one Col.
Moore, of North Carolina, attempting to take it, made an at-
tack on the house of Col. Thomas, at the commencement of
which Col. Thomas and the guard took to flight leaving the
women of the family and Mr. Culbertson, who refused to re-
treat, in the house. Mr. Culbertson kept up a fire on the
Tories so fatally and rapidly (by aid of the women) that the
Tories were compelled to retreat, leaving several of their
horses. After the retreat of the Tories Mr. Culbertson and
the women concealed the ammunition in the woods and it was
subsequently delivered to Gen. Sumpter, who was heard after-
wards frequently to say that he used the same ammunition in
the skirmishes at Rocky Mount and Hanging Rock.
Soon after this a notorious Tory Captain, called "Plun-
dering Samuel Brown," took Col. Thomas, the father-in-law
of Mr. Culbertson, prisoner, and carried him together with his
negroes and horses to the British, and also threatened to burn
Mr. Culbertson's house with his family and abused Mrs. Cul-
bertson very much. This conduct determined Mr. Culbertson
to attempt Brown's capture, and getting upon his track pur-
sued him in company with Capt. Hallowill and Studman and
Wm. Neal and Wm. Mcllhenny and came upon him at Dr.
Thompsons, an uncle of the late Judge Thompson of this
203
county, where he had stopped to refresh himself and his men.
The party crawled within gun-shot of the house and after
laying concealed some time Brown stepped out of the house
into the yard and was shot dead by Mr. Culbertson, and
Brown's men taking alarm immediately fled. Brown was an
active and shrewd man and the terror of the women and chil-
dren wherever his name was known.
Mr. Culbertson was at the siege of Savannah when an at-
tempt was made by the Americans and the French to take that
place by storm, their force consisting of a Platoon of Regulars
in front and a Platoon of Militia close in the rear.
A cannon loaded with a ball, together with bars of lead
cut into small pieces was fired from the British works. The
ball struck the head of the commanding officer of the regulars,
severing a portion of his head from his body, his brains flying
in every direction when the officer fell into the arms of Mr.
Culbertson. Two young men bearing the officer up, one upon
each side, were wounded by scattering pieces of lead, a portion
of the contents of the cannon passed through the hair and
clothes of Mr. Culbertson.
At the taking of South Carolina by the British and Tories,
the liberty party fled to North Carolina where Mr. Culbertson
became acquainted with the late Col. Isaac Shelby, once
Governor of Kentucky, and here too he became acquainted
with Col. Clark, of Georgia. With these officers Mr. Culbert-
son formed an intimate acquaintance and was the warm friend,
and confident of Gov. Shelby, who appointed him as the most
suitable person to select the ground upon which to bring on
an engagement with the enemy and placed under his command
twenty-four men for the purpose of inducing a battle at Mus-
grove's, which was accordingly done when Mr. Culbertson
commanded a flanking party with so much adroitness and
resolution that the result was a total discomfiture and defeat
on the part of the Tories.
Mr. Culbertson also acted in the capacity of a spy under
Shelby at the battle of Cedar Springs. Some of the Tories who
were acquainted with Mr. Culbertson piloted Col. Ferguson to
204
his (Culbertson's) farm where they destroyed everything they
could, after feeding their horses with his corn and oats, made
a bonfire of his fences, killed his hogs and cattle, plundered
his house, abused Mrs. Culbertson, and took from her even
her finger rings and picked her pockets, finally rode off the
horses, thus leaving the family destitute of the means of
sustenance.
Ferguson then moved to King's Mountain. Culbertson
was in Shelby's regiment and was commanded to take posses-
sion of an elevated piece of land for which Capt. R
fought hard, but Culbertson pressed so close upon him as to
compel him to give way and conceal himself behind some
large rocks, where Culbertson shot him in the head when the
Tories all gave way and rallied their forces against Col. Cleve-
land's regiment, but they were received with so much warmth
and resolution from that quarter with rifle balls, that they
were again repulsed and begun to surrender, when Ferguson
attempted to make his escape.
Culbertson, a few days previous having had a description
of him, through the instrumentality of some prisoners, was
at that moment in the act of priming his rifle to shoot when
Ferguson came in view and was shot at by two individuals,
and fell dead from his horse.
Some weeks previous to this event, Culbertson, acting
in the capacity of a spy, fell in with the enemy, while march-
ing, and was so near Ferguson that he could have powder
burned him.
Culbertson was in the seige of ninety-six as well as in
most of the engagements with the Tories in the back country.
At one time the Tories had possession of the neighborhood
where he lived. When he and three other persons went into
the settlement of the Tory Camps, Culbertson was taken sick
at the house of a friend. The Tories being informed of this
fact, determined on taking him, and twenty-five of them set
out in the night, but when they arrived within a short distance
of the house where Culbertson was, he got intimation of the
fact and made his escape before their eyes, they being afraid
205
to attack him, leaving, however, all his clothes behind, except
the shirt on his back. At this event, the Tories became so
much enraged that upon entering the house they vent their
hellish spleen and malice upon a younger brother, then but a
,lad, by cutting him with their swords in a most brutal and
shocking manner. The lad in order to save himself from the
lacerating blows, which the Tories were inflicting upon him,
took shelter behind Mrs. Culbertson, holding up his hands
that his head might escape the blows, but his arms were so
cut to pieces that large particles of bone were found in his
shirt sleeves and this ends the fiend-like tragedy upon the part
of the Tories upon that occasion.
The faithful rifle with which Culbertson saved the maga-
zine and the lives of many individuals was carried by him
throughout the American Revolution is still in the possession
of his youngest son.
In i8io Mr. Culbertson moved to this State and settled
in the forks of White River where he resided until his death.
One of his sons was killed in 1812 by the Indians. In 1827 he
lost his wife. He had been in a helpless and feeble condition
for several years past. The spark of patriotism burned in his
bosom to the last, and during his last sickness he talked with
grateful remembrance of his officers, "Shelby and Clark."
206
A DAY IN THE COURTS.
BY A. J. WHITE HUTTON. ESQ.
The November meeting of the Society was held at ilie
hospitable home of Dr. and Mrs. P. B. Montgomery, West
Market Street, on Friday evening, 26th of the month. The
occasion was of unusual interest by reason of its historic as
well as social features. Mr. Hutton is one of the younger
members of the Franklin County Bar, and a mernber of the
faculty of Dickinson law school. President Harbaugh had
great pleasure therefore in presenting him as the historian
of the evening.
The committee, appointed at the October meeting, re-
ported the following minute on the death of Captain G. W.
Skinner which was unanimously adopted :
George Washington Skinner was born in this county,
January 13, 1846, died at the Soldiers' Orphans' Industrial
School at Scotland October 7th, 1909. He was educated in
the public schools of the county. Shade Gap Academy and
Washington and Jefferson College, Washington, Pennsyl-
vania. At a little over the age of sixteen years he ran away
from college and enlisted as a private in Company A, 77th
Pa. Vol. Infantry. When but a few months past the age of
eighteen he was commissioned captain of the company; he
was honorably discharged from that service December 6th,
1865. After his discharge he returned to his native county.
At the age of twenty-one he was chosen treasurer- of the
county. He was six times elected a member of the Pennsyl-
vania House of Representatives, twice representing the
counties of Franklin and Perry, and four tirnes the county of
Fulton. For several terms he was journal clerk of the House.
He was admitted to the Bar of Franklin County May 7th,
1879, and to the Fulton County Bar, June 9th. 1879, in
in which latter county he resided from 1872 to 1897. For
over four years he was United State Pension Agent at Pitts-
burg, and for almost ten years superintendent of the Soldiers'
Orphans' Industrial School at Scotland, which position he
filled at the time of his death, a place for which he was, by
nature, especially qualified. By reason of his kindness of
heart firmness of disposition and capacity for organization,
he made of the school a great success; his management of
the institution has received the highest commendation of
those in authority.
Captain Skinner was brave in war; in peace kind, gen-
erous and lovable. He- was a most agreeable companion;
always a welcome guest in the house of his friends. He was
actively interested in the affairs and welfare of this Society
from the time he became a member. In his death, not only
has the Society lost one of its most active and useful mem-
bers, but each member of the Society a personal friend.
We tender to his stricken family our most sincere and
earnest sympathy.
Resolved, That this minute be entered of record.
W. RUSH GIL.LAN.
D. WATSON ROWE
THOS. J. BRERETON,
H. A. RIDDLE,
JOHN G. ORR,
Committee.
207
Members of the Society, Ladies and Gentlemen :
With the remembrance of the words of the Psalmist,
■"That a day in thy Courts is better than a thousand," this
paper has been entitled "A Day in the Courts," a day or period
however, of many years ago. It is with much diffidence that
I presume to read a paper of historical import before this
Society and for two reasons, in the first place, I can lay no
claim to any gift in the matter of historical lore, and secondly,
it is with some trepidation that I launch into regions hereto-
fore unexplored, with a certain alarm as to how my explora-
tions will "take" with you. In the past we have listened to
discourses upon ancient roads, schools, academies, banks,
graveyards and a host of kindred topics of local interest, and
I have been deeply impressed with the remarkable pre-emp-
tion of the historic field by those who have preceded me, in
fact so much so that considerable mental effort was required
to select an hitherto unappropriated subject.
In the round of duties at the Dickinson Law School we
are required to make very thorough and systematic searches
into our State Reports in order that we may impart to the
students not only principles of law, but the evolution and
history of principles, sometimes embracing the careful culling
of several hundred years of decisions. When engaged in this
work I have at various times been deeply impressed with the
historic potentialities involved in our Pennsylvania State Re-
ports, not only to the legal profession but to the laity as well,
especially if a competent and enthusiastic commentator could
be secured who would galvanize or vivify as it were, what
otherwise is apparently the ebodiment of dry uninteresting
facts. To the average lay mind I opine that the reports of the
decisions which adorn a lawyer's library, present a rather
mysterious aspect. To the student of law they are the incar-
nation of legal wisdom embracing the profundities of the law
from that dim distant past, whose period of remoteness finds
expression in the phrase "The memory of man runneth not to
the contrary." Moreover these grim fronts of law sheep and
maroon contain not only the determined axioms and principles
2o8
of law, the essence, yea, "the perfection of human wisdom" as
Lord Coke devoutly declared, but they have distinctly a hu-
man side, which if properly presented should, I think, retain
a lively interest for all. I do not believe that this field has
heretofore been touched by this Society and I am impelled to
attempt such a treatment in the hope that my efforts may be
at least suggestive to some member of the Bar within hearing
who will perform greater things. These reports record in a
brief but accurate manner many events which are of great
historic value, if sufficiently commentated or elaborated.
Furthermore, there appear in these pages the names of many
personages who in their day occupied prominent positions in
local life, but alas! through the lapse of time have been for-
gotten.
"But past is all their fame. The very spot
Where many a time they triumphed is forgot."
It has been said of great lawyers that at best they leave
but frail and unenduring monuments. The reputation of a
great advocate is soon dissipated in memory after his decease.
The thrill, the force, the enthusiasm of the forum are soon
forgotten by the general public, but we of the Bar cherish
traditions of noble character, of brilliant intellects, preserved
to us mainly through the instrumentality of "The Reports."
And likewise many a layman whose grave may be forgotten,
whose monument has long since crumbled to dust, whose
very name once so familiar in the community is effaced from
the memory of the oldest inhabitants, may, nevertheless ac-
quire enduring fame, almost immortality through the medium
of our reports. In his day he fortunately or unfortunately had
a legal controversy with his neighbor or graver still with the
Commonwealth itself and so his name is preserved to us. To
the student of constitutional history the Federal cases of
Marbury vs. Madison, McCullough vs. Maryland, and Dred
Scot vs. Sandford will ever endure in memory. So likewise
in our own State Reports there are names forever embalmed,
familiar to the practicing attorney by reason of their associa-
209
tion with certain legal principles but apparently of no further
moment.
Some of these cases however are rich in local interest.
I will take one instance. In our law of partnership we have a
leading case entitled Purviance vs. McClintee et al., Executors
of Samuel Dryden, deceased, recorded in the 6th Vol. of old
Sergeant &Rawle at page 259, a case decided by the Supreme
Court of Pennsylvania, in the year 1820. This case laid down
the broad principle of law in reference to partnerships, that
he who participates in the profits of an enterprise is by reason
thereof liable to any losses which may occur. This case is the
declaration of a remarkable principle, yet adhered to by the
courts in this State, but exploded years ago in mother
England. However I mention the legal principle but inci-
dentally. The point that I want to make is that wherever the
common law of England is in force, whether in any of the
United States, the British Isles, Canada or Australia, the case
of Purviance vs. McClintee is always cited as the law of Penn-
sylvania when a question involving this phase of partnership
law is at issue, and that our Supreme Court then consisting of
three members, viz: William Tilghman, Chief Justice; John
Bannister Gibson and Thomas Duncan, Justices, sat in the old
Court House in Chambersburg occupying the site of the
present one, when this important principle was enunciated,
and that the parties litigant as well as counsel concerned in
the case, were for the most part citizens of Chambersburg, or
at least of the county. Possibly it is not known to some of
you that years ago the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania at
stated intervals during the year sat to hear cases not only in
Chambersburg but also at Carlisle.
Let us look for a few moments at the facts of our case and
the dramatis personae. The action was to recover money
alleged to have been loaned and was brought against Samuel
Purviance and Samuel Dryden, Jr., partners in trade, by Mc-
Clintee et al., executors of Samuel Dryden, deceased. Samuel
Dryden, Jr., did not appear to defend the action and the suit
proceeded against Samuel Purviance alone. His defense was
2IO
that Samuel Dryden had given the money in question to his
son, Samuel Dryden, Jr., on the latter's private account, and
that Dryden, Jr., was not a partner but that the arrangement
between them was that Dryden, Jr., was to be a clerk and re-
ceive as his compensation one-half the profits of a store kept
at New Lancaster, Ohio. On the other hand the plaintiffs
alleged that Purviance and Dryden, Jr., were partners and
that the money in question went into the partnership and upon
the trial the learned president of the court charged the jury
that if Samuel Dryden, Jr., was to receive one-half of the pro-
fits he was by this fact constituted in law a partner of Pur-
viance. The case went against Purviance and upon writ of
error, based on the trial judge's charge, the Supreme Court
<ieclared the principle of law as already given. Very eminent
counsel appeared for both sides, the report tersely saying that
Chambers and J. Riddle appeared for the plaintiff executors
and for the defendant Purviance appeared Clarke, McCullough
and Brown.
This was evidently a hard fought case, for history states
that these men at the time of the trial were the recognized
leaders of the Franklin County Bar. Unfortunately, the report
does not state who the trial judge was, and there is nothing
to indicate the time of the trial, and as our Common Pleas
records only extend back to the year 1846, many having been
destroyed at the burning of the town in 1864, I can only make
a guess that the case was tried in the time of Judge Charles
Smith, or possibly Judge John Reed, both residents of Carlisle,
the former having served on the bench here from March 27,
1819, to April 27, 1820; the latter serving on the same bench
from July 10, 1820, to March 29, 1824. It is a matter of interest
to observe that Judge Reed afterwards became the first pro-
fessor of law of Dickinson College.
At the time of this famous case two of the justices of the
Supreme bench already mentioned, were residents of Carlisle,
to wit: Gibson and Duncan, which is a fact of some signifi-
cance in these days when arguments are advanced concerning
the lack of representation of certain sections of the State in
211
the Supreme Court, as from this account two-thirds of the
Supreme bench resided in the Cumberland Valley. It has al-
ways been a matter of great interest to me in studying this
case to know just who the protagonists were and I will give
you the benefit of my searches. As to Samuel Drydcn, al-
though it is stated that this action was brought by his execu-
tors, I can find no trace of either will or letters testamentary
recorded either in Cumberland or Franklin Counties, and am
driven to the conclusion that Samuel Dryden, although at one
time a citizen of the county must have taken up his residence
elsewhere before his death. The earliest record that could be
found of these two men is a reference in the Franklin County
records in Deed Book, Vol. loi, page 182, to a conveyance
dated 1774 of 215 acres of land in what was then Letterkenny
Township, Cumberland County. The grantees of this con-
veyance were Samuel Purviance, Samuel Dryden, described
as Cordwainers, and one Alexander Cunningham, which would
indicate that at this early date the Purviances and the Drydens
were associated in a business way.
It is of interest to note in passing that on February 20,
1894, George H. Stewart and \\\ie, and Alexander Stewart and
wife conveyed to the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, one
hundred acres of the aforen^entioned two hundred and fifteen,
which now constitute the site of the Soldiers Orphans' School
at Scotland. In volume 5 of the same records, at page 403, I
find that on August 21, 1782, Samuel Purviance described as
merchant, and Agnes, his wife, and Samuel Dryden, Cord-
wainer, and Martha, his wife, all of the town of Chambers-
burg, joined in a conveyance of a certain lot of ground located
on what was then called Front Street, now Main Street, in the
iDorough of Chambersburg. Other conveyances of record would
all argue that Samuel Purviance was a citizen possessed of a
substantial fortune. The last record of Samuel Purviance is
found in Will Book, Vol. D, page 91, of the records of Frank-
lin County, containing his last will, probated February 10,
1829, almost nine years after the decision in Purviance vs.
McClintee. The will mentions the following children: Polly,
212
Nancy, Elizabeth, Jane, Samuel, John, James and a deceased'
daughter, Margaret, The executors' named were Samuel D.
Culbertson, Thomas G. McCullough and Barnard Wolff. I
have found from other sources that both Samuel D. Culbert-
son, known to some of you as old Doctor Culbertson, and
Thomas G. McCullough were both sons-in-law of Samuel
Purviance. I do not know in just what part of town Samuel
Purviance lived but I have been told that his son Samuel
Purviance, lived for many years in a stone house about where
the J. Sierer Carpet Store is now located.
As I have said the array of counsel in this case was im-
pressive for the executors of Dryden, Chambers and J. Riddle,
for the defendant Purviance, Clarke, McCullough and Brown.
The Clarke referred to was evidently Matthew St. Clair
Clarke, who was admitted to our Bar in October, 1811. Ac-
cording to Mr. J. M. Cooper Mr, Clarke afterwards became
Clerk of the United States House of Representatives. I have
been unable to find anything further concerning Mr. Clarke.
Thomas G. McCullough, also of counsel for the defendant,.
Purviance, as I have said was the son-in-law of Mr. Purviance
and also executor of his will, and at the time of this case was
one of the rising attorneys at the Bar, having been admitted in
April, 1806, and for many years occupied a position of great
prominence in the civic affairs of Chambersburg.
Mr. McCullough was the first president of the Cumber-
land Valley Railroad and was the third president of the old
bank; was a leader at the Bar and member of Congress. At
the time of Purviance vs. McClintee, although a young man,
Mr. McCullough had established a reputation as a sound and
well read lawyer, not an orator in the common acceptance of
the term, but a man of great analytical powers, and of telling"
force in the use of words. The Brown mentioned as asso-
ciated with Clarke and McCullough, was William M. Brown,
admitted to our Bar in September, 1791, a lawyer of great
prominence in the community and a son-in-law of Col. Benja-
min Chambers. Mr. Brown is said to have had a large prac-
tice and amassed a considerable fortune in his profession. He
213
is described as being eloquent and pleasing as a speaker and
a successful advocate, of very highly cultivated mind, polished
manners and social qualities. The historian especially com-
ments upon the personal appearance of Mr. Brown, being de-
scribed as very neat and tasty in his dress and to have paid
great attention to his personal adornment. Shortly after the
■case of Purviance vs. McClintee, owing to unfortunate in-
vestments and the pressure of the times Mr. Brown was
broken financially and removed from Chambersburg to the
State of Tennessee, and subsequently to Mississippi, where he
died in 1843, ^^ the age of eighty years. Mr. Brown was one
-of the first trustees of the old Academy and was also a di-
rector of the old bank from 1809 to 1818.
The Chambers referred to as of counsel for the plaintiff
executors, was probably Judge George Chambers, who was
admitted to our Bar in November, 1807, and was for many
years an honored practitioner, a scholar, a gentleman in the
highest and best sense, a justice of the Supreme Court of
Pennsylvania, and a member of Congress. By a cotemporary
Judge Chambers was characterized as shedding honor upon
his profession and enjoying the confidence and esteem of his
fellow citizens. Judge Chambers was the fourth president of
the old bank. James Riddle, also of counsel for the plaintiff
executors, was admited to our Bar in December, 1784, being
at the time about thirty years of age. Pie had been graduated
from Princeton College with great honor, and was appointed
in 1794 Conmion Pleas Judge of this county, a position he
filled until 1804, when he resigned because, it was said, of
strong partisan feeling against him. He is described as well
read in science, literature and the laws, a good advocate and
very successful with the jury. After his resignation Judge
Riddle returned to the Bar and practiced for many years with
great success. Pie was a director of the old bank from 1809
to 1831.
Space forbids more than a cursory reference to these
worthies of ye olden times. Suffice it to say that Clarke,
McCullough, Brown, Chambers and J. Riddle were the heroes
214
of many forensic contests, and the case which we have de-
scribed is not the only one in the old reports of Dallas, Binney
and Sergeant & Rawle, as well as later numbers which would
constitute the ground work of much, interesting local histori-
cal data. As declared in the outstart this paper v/as prepared
more for its possible suggestive than its historical merit, for
I feel there are older and wiser heads within hearing who-
could more successfully unearth much of local interest in our
old reports. Personally, I linger with peculiar fondness over"
these old volumes and with a touch of something akin to sad-
ness. The names of the Purviances and the Drydens are no^
longer familiar ones in our community, and I fear that pos-
sibly a good portion of our Bar would be little stirred in emo-
tions by the names of Clarke, McCullough, Brown, Chambers-
and J. Riddle. It is said comparisons are "odyous," yet as I
sit musing over Purviance vs. McClintee, and kindred cases,,
there arises in my mind's eye a calm strong face with intel-
lectual head, surmounting a form clad in a broadcloth swallow
tail coat and breeches, and a ruffled shirt. The head adorned
with a bell crowned high gilk hat; this form is dignified, re-
served, and courteous, yea, courtly. Need I tell you that this
personage is a lawyer of the old days, a man endowed with a
classic education, profoundly learned in the law, a student
of literature, versed in all the grand old traditions of a noble
profession, animated and inspired by the illustrious examples
of Coke, of Bacon, of Blackstone, of Lord Mansfield, of Lord
Ellenborough and Lord Elden, a man who looks rather to-
the ancient honorarium of the profession than to the fee. In
short, one who looks upon the law rather as a sacred science
than a mere art for making money.
With no thought of captiousness one sometimes fears-
that the march of commercialism, the age of the typewriter,
the counting machine and other adjuncts of rapid fire work,
have deprived the Bar of that love of learning, that pride in
an ancient profession with all its honored traditions, which
were characteristic of the lawyer of long ago, and those of
us who are still old fashioned enough to admire the spirit of
215
this early time, may comfort ourselves in the cry of the Latin
poet "O tempora ! O Mores !"
2l6
THE LAWYER'S NOSEGAY.
BY LINN HARBAUGH, ESQ.
The Fall and Winter campaign of the Society ended
Thursday evening, December 30 1909, with one of its most
delightful literary feasts, at the home of Mr. and Mrs. J. S.
Mcllvaine, Philadelphia Avenue, who royally entertained the
members and guests.
At the business meeting, Rev. Clarence A. Eyler, of
Waynesboro, was elcted to membership. T. J. Brereton
and Colonel James R. Gilmore were elected to represent the
Kittochtinny, at the meeting of the State Federation of His-
torical Societies to be held at Harrisburg, January 6. 1910.
Those of us who heard Mr. Hutton's admirable paper, "A
Day in the Courts," must have realized what little attention
this Society has given to the courts, the law and the lawyers.
And the non-lawyers present must have experienced keen
regrets something akin to those of a crafty old Irish tramp
who made the rounds of our town some months ago. His
specialty was to have or to assume some personal acquaint-
ance with you or your business, and it was well worked. His
garrulous tongue made no stops, and scarcely gave you op-
portunity to order him out. He claimed to have been blown
up in a coal mine, and showed scars to prove it. In one Mar-
ket Street office his pleadings were manfully resisted. But
Tiis last observation on turning to depart, brought forth the
coin. With tears in his voice, he exclaimed : "I wish to God
1 had studied law instead of going down in the mines."
And yet his opinion of the law was much higher than
that of a class mate of mine at college who was taking a full
classical course with a view to entering the ministry. He was
asked whether his brother, who had joined him at school, also
expected to complete the course, and to this he replied: "Oh
no, he will likely go a year or two so that he can study law or
be a doctor." It is true that many a lawyer has become great
on less schooling than a year or two, but he has had a good
substitute for it in the burning of the midnight oil.
217
But the scale falls still lower in an opinion expressed in
the Chambersburg Gazette of 1794. It is left to you to say
which is worse — the opinion expressed, or the wretched dog-
gerel in which it is clothed :
♦ Quoted by B. M. Nead, Esq., in Repository.
"Roguery is so common grown,
That it is decent looked upon.
To cheat, outwit and to beguile.
Each one to wrong his neighbor's child.
The lawyer cheats you to your face,
He picks your pocket with a grace,
He'll keep you waiting here in town.
Till your expense is heavy grown;
Still says tomorrow you will hear
Your cause brought forward to the ear
Of judges four, and president
Of court and jury equal vent
To do the right and shun the wrong.
This is as true as any song;
You wait till Friday morning when
He'll tell you naught can be done then
Until next court, but surely then
Your cause shall be brought to an end.
Thus are their clients by them robbed
And then the profits by them clubbed
Between these lawyers o'er a pot.
When the poor client knoweth not."
The editor of the Gazette comes to the rescue, however,
and in his comment is the redeeming feature:
"The author of several poetical productions who signs
himself a "Farmer of Franklin County," has liberty to with-
draw them as they are not deemed worthy a place in the
Chambersburg Gazette. Should his muse at a future time
inspire him to more sublime ideas, we will thank him for his
favours."
A young man called to see the War Governor, Curtin, a
few years before his death, and in the course of conversation
the Governor was reminded of the firm of Flarbaugh and
Neill who conducted a stage-coach line between Wheeling
and points in Southeastern Pennsylvania in the early part
of the last century. After a successful business career, the
firm had a disagreement and the result was a suit in court — in
assumpsit entitled Harbaugh vs. Neill. This was long before
the Act of Assembly of 1887 by which many changes in prac-
2l8
tice and pleading were introduced, and the old familiar
declaration with common counts was in use.
The plaintiff's cause of action was set forth in various
shapes in different counts, so that if he failed in the proof of
one count, he might per chance succeed in another. In this
form the amount really sued for was repeated a number cf
times to the confusion of the untutored client.
In this case Neill's counsel began to make known to his
client the nature of Harbaugh's claims by reading the various
counts of the Narratio, and he disclosed that : ''For that
whereas the said defendant, Neill, was indebted to the said
plaintiff, Harbaugh, in $6000 for the price and value of
coaches, horses, and harness, then and there bargained and
sold by the plaintiff, etc." * * *
To this part of the declaration, Neill made no response.
Counsel continued: "And in $6,000 for the price and
value of goods then and there sold and delivered, etc."
Neill was considerably roused up at this, and, remarked,
"That's a lie." His counsel by this time caught on to the
situation, and determined to have some fun. And he read on :
"And in $6,000 for money received to the use of the plain-
tiff." And at this Neill broke out impatiently : "My souls,
but he's a liar."
And in $6,000 for money due on account stated."
This last count was too much for Neill and he started
hastily to leave the office, with the exclamation : "Well, he
is one damned liar."
Upon taking my leave of the Governor's home that even-
ing he gave me an affectionate slap on the shoulder and said :
"Harbaugh, that v/asn't your father."
Now and then a casual listener in court catches some-
thing more than half of what is going on and thinks he has it
all. One of this kind came in a few weeks ago and said that
he had been a witness at court in Westminster, Maryland,
but he was not required to stay long, as they had not been in
a half hour when "the Judge pronounced it a non prosperous
suit and threw the old woman out of court."
219
Another one had caught a half idea nearer home when he
said that a certain party could not appear as a witness because
the lawyers at Chambersburg had put a lie-bell on him. But
a young boy sitting in court several years ago when the ac-
counts were being called, hit upon the broad functions of a
court better than he knew, when he remarked that "every-
thing in here seems to be first and final." "It is not so diffi-
cult to know the law as it is to know where to find it," said
Justice Sharswood. And he further said, in his Legal Ethics :
"A lawyer cannot be faithful to his clients unless he continues
to be a hard student of the learning of his profession." Very
often a lawyer will fortify himself well with his case until the
matter goes into the hands of an executive officer, and then
trust to the knowledge of the process server, or whatever he
may be, for the successful outcome. Generally speaking,
court house officials know their responsibility and are well
informed as to their duties, but occasionally one who is per-
haps constitutionally predisposed to have a little learning,
which is a dangerous thing, will rush in where Angels fear to
tread. Such an one was he who some years ago, as Sheriff,
in serving a writ of scire facias to revive and continue the
lien of a judgment, found the defendant and brought him to
jail ; and a Chambersburg Justice of the Peace of the old
school, during the tramp-storm a quarter of a century back,
committed the policeman to jail in due form of law, and the
tramp had him in charge, though neither of them knew the
situation at the time.
There were no serious consequences, however, in these
incidents, and absence of evil intentions would probably place
them under the rule of "Damnum sine injuria esse potest."
By way of supplement to Mr. Hutton's paper, it was in-
tended herein to attempt some analysis of the case of Kelso
vs. Dickey, a Franklin County case. But the tempora and the
mores of holiday week have made it an unpromising venture.
While it is an important case, and has been cited a number
of times in the books, as bearing on the question of contingent
remainder, yet it goes more to the particular facts and is not
220
as general in its principles as the case of partnership law dis-
cussed by Mr. Hutton.
The case, however, brings forward a number of promi-
nent names in our community which help to make it interest-
ing. It involved the construction of the will of Sarah B.
Huston who was a sister of James Buchanan.
Charles W. Kelso, husband of Elizabeth Speer Huston
Kelso, a daughter of Sarah B. Huston, defendant below, and
James Dickey and Charles Gillespie, trustees under said will
were plaintiffs.
The persons really interested as against Kelso, were the
brothers and sisters of Sarah B. Huston, one of them being
James Buchanan, afterwards President of the United States,
and his brother, the Rev. Edward Y. Buchanan. Also the
minor children of a sister, Jane Lane, among whom is men-
tioned H. Lane, who was none other than the Harriet Lane
Johnston who graced the White House during her uncle's
administration.
The action was in the nature of a case stated, and was
argued before Judge Jeremiah S. Black, Buchanan's future
Attorney General, then President Judge of this district.
Alexander Thompson, who had then lately been Judge of
the district, represented the defendant, and George Chambers,
who afterwards became a Justice of the Supreme Court of
Pennsylvania, the plaintiffs.
Judge Black rendered judgment on the important point
in favor of the plaintiffs. In the Supreme Court judgment
Vi^as affirmed, in May, 1844. A Syllabus of the case would be
rather long and not of much interest on this occasion, and it
is therefore omitted.
At this time Jeremiah S. Black was the youngest judge in
the State. An instance of his ready wit was told of in the
papers of the day. I have never known to a certainty but I
think it must have occurred in our own Court, and the
Chambers referred to was likely the future Justice of the
Supreme Court.
In the trial of a case the young judge had occasion to
221
differ sharply on a question of practice with the older lawyer
whose feelings were very much hurt. Other lawyers explained
it to the judge, who expressed his regret from the bench thai
his blunt remarks had wounded Mr. Chambers, and closed
with the apt quotation from Othello : "Ilaply I am black
and have not those soft parts of conversation which chambcr-
ers have."
In a letter from Hon. Chauncey F. Black, December ii,
1903, he gives a glimpse of his father which is well worth
preserving: "My father's ten years on the bench of the 16th
district," he writes, "is, in matter of records, practically a
blank. Little is known of it — of the judicial work. And what
is extant consists of personal anecdotes and traditions with
which you are much more likely to be acquainted than I. He
traveled the district on horse back, and later in a two-horse
buggy, drawn by a pair of superb roans. He loved these long
rides, and the mountain roads over which they took him.
One of his favorite stopping places was Mcllvaine's — another
Reemers. I have been with him at both when a child. He
was a splendid horseman, when paying attention, but very
careless.
"Except in 1845, when he had a tedious fever, he was
during all that period, in perfect health and thoroughly en-
joyed his work, as well as the society of the Bars, and other
friends in the county towns. He always said those were the
happiest years of his life."
You will bear with me while I record here an early im-
pression of Judge Black's successor, Francis M. Kimmell.
As law judge of all the Courts of four large counties, for ten
years, and with a wide territory over which to travel. Judge
Kimmell had little time that did not belong either to the
public or to his family. After that came the active strife and
distraction of politics, and then he settled down to the exact-
ing duties of a large and responsible law practice which ended
onl}' with his death, May 19, 1890.
Before a jury he was considered strong. He had a clear,
silvery voice. His words were crisp, well chosen and de-
222
livered with unmistakable confidence and sincerity. In his
office practice he was cheerful to his clients, and always gave
them a respectful hearing, but he was quick to interrupt any
irrelevant talk or attempts to color the statement of a case.
He was impatient of little delays, somewhat indifferent to
the old forms of law, and all too brief in his Court papers. A
column of figures annoyed him, and a detailed calculation was
an abomination, but he had a very graceful and winning way
of handing over such work to a law student, and seemed to
be able to verify the count of another without much effort.
He was impulsive in his work, and whatever was to be done
he wanted done at once.
With very little effort of the recollection, one might pic-
ture him hastening towards the Court House, high hat of
earlier date slightly set back, and with open paper in one
hand and a pen in the other, from which he kept dashing the
ink into the gutter, while in his wake followed an interested
and admiring client.
Some of our older citizens recall the presence of men of
national fame in our community, and I shall make a note in
passing of two who were lawyers but who were distinguished
more on account of other things than their exploits in the law.
Daniel Webster once stood upon the top of Cove Moun-
tain and delivered a soliloquy which has been handed down
but perhaps never before written down. He was making a
trip from Pittsburg to Philadelphia over the pike, and local
committees were appointed to accompany him from one
point to another. Judge Alexander King, formerly of this
judicial district, then a young man, was one of the committee
to accompany him from Bedford to Chambersburg. When the
coach reached the summit of Cove Mountain, Mr. Webster
asked that it be stopped, and then walking to the brow of the
mountain, he was heard to soliloquize in these words :
"Well, here I am standing on the top of the Tuscaroras
looking out into the great valley of the Cumberland."
Judge King was wont to give this as an instance of Mr.
223
Webster's knowledge of geography, for as he said he had
always known it as Cove Mountain.
Perhaps Judge King discovered later that it really was
Cove Mountain, and that they were not on or very near Tus-
carora Mountain at all. It would seem as though Mr. Web-
ster was playing off slyly with the committee, and was
perhaps addressing in this dramatic fashion the little men of
the mountains such as Rip Van Winkle encountered on his
way up the Catskills. And it is doubtful whether he knew
just what he meant himself, when he spoke about looking out
over the valley of the Cumberland. This is not the valley of
the Cumberland.
Another man who became famous for theories of govern-
ment, very much opposed to those championed by Mr. Web-
ster, was Alexander H. Stephens. He made a political ad-
dress in Kennedy's woods, north of town, in the Presidential
campaign of 1856. Professor Hockenberry heard him, and
gives this description of the man :
"He was slight, weighed perhaps 100 pounds. He was
dressed in a linen suit very stiffly starched and too large for
his person. His voice at first did not seem to carry twenty
feet from him, but after a short time he made himself heard
without difficulty to a large crowd present. It was the best
speech I ever heard from a Democratic standpoint. His voice
was metallic and not at all pleasant, but he made himself
heard and held the attention of the large crowd."
There is some more of this kind of material in the old
green bag, but I have some misgivings as to whether such
rapid firing is the honest kind of work contemplated by this
Society. However, I have given here, what I have here given,
not necessarily for publication, but as evidence of good faith.
We need not regret so much the passing of the lawyer of
the old school, as the passing of the old school itself; and
Sharswood's Legal Ethics ought to be one of its text books.
One of the complaints of the day is that all kinds of
commercial and material enterprises are undertaken by law-
yers, so that they are mentally and physically scattered
224
around at different places. And something like a paraphrase
of Judge Sharswood's maxim gets abroad, that : It is not so
difficult to know your lawyer as it is to know where to find
him.
225
A FRANKLIN COUNTY COUSIN OF ROBERT BURNS.
BY C. W. CREMER. ESQ., Waynesboro, Pa.
The first meeting of the New Year was held at the home
of Mr. and Mrs. T. B. Kennedy, Thursday evening. January
27, 1910. It was an evening of rare enjoyment for the staid
historians. Circumstances seemed to conspire in bringing
forward an exceptionally interesting paper, and then Mr.
Cremer excelled himself in applying his literary talents
and years of experience as a writer in its production. At its
conclusion, the rising vote of thanks to the author was pre-
ceded by a discussion of the subject so ably developed, in
which Judge Rowe, Dr. Martin and others took part. Judge
Howe said the Society could not show its appreciation of the
work of the author in terms too strong, and the vote should
show it. What followed was in the nature of an ovation in
which the ladies present heartily joined. During the discus-
sion, Mr. Cremer in answer to Judge Rowe for certain facts
relating to the Renfrew girls, gave quite a history of the
scalping of the maids.
At the business meeting H. V. Black, Editor of Public
Opinion, was elected to membership. The Rev. Clarence A.
Eyler's offer to furnish photos of the old school house and
graveyard, referred to in Mr. Cremer's paper, was accepted.
T. J. Brcreton and Colonel Gilmore, delegates to the
State Federation Historical Society, made report of that
institution and its excellent work and the splendid work
the Society is accomplishing
The committee appointed to prepare a minute on the
death of Dr. P. Brough Montgomery, reported as follows :
Be it resolved. That, inasmuch as the life of usefulness
and high example lived by Dr. P. Brough Montgoinciy, «,
member of this Society, has come to an untoward end at
Buena Vista, Florida, on the 7th of January, last, it is fitting
and proper that we testify to the loss suffered by us
through the death of this active member and to the even
greater burden cast upon us individually by the death of a
loved friend. In both aspects the suffering is the more acute,
in that it came unexpectedly and because Dr. Montgomery's
last social act before leaving on his final journey to Florida
was the entertainment of this Society at its November meet-
ing.
The Society also joins in the sorrow and regret of the
members of Dr. Montgomery's profession, and of his pa-
tients, in the loss of one of the most lovable and able physi-
cians of the county, and of the entire community in the loss
of a strong, upright and patriotic citizen, and extends its
sincere sympathy to the immediate victims of the bereave-
ment, the sad and sorrowing widow and son.
W. S. HOERNER,
T. M. WOOD
M. A. FOLTZ,
Commitee.
226
It had been my fancy, when I accepted your committee's
Tcind invitation to prepare a paper for this occasion that I
would try to "sing of arms and of men." It was of John
Bourns, capable son of a forceful Scotchman ; a sturdy,
God-honoring man and a patriot who forged with his ham-
mer the first cannon made in America and who served as a
soldier in the ranks and then an artificer in the army of Wash-
ington, that I purposed writing; and of his son, James Burns,
who fought as an officer in the War of 1812; and of Hugh
Dinwiddle, who won such recognition for bravery and knowl-
edge of warfare in the French and Indian War, that he was
made an officer in the forces of the colonies when the Revo-
lutionary War was precipitated.
It was of these and some of their descendants I set out
to tell, when there came, unexpectedly, the knowledge that
the story of war heroes must be mellowed, in part, to the
peaceful, love-filled measures of a master among poets.
COUSIN OF ROBERT BURNS.
Within the past ten days there came to descendants of
John Bourns in this county, a belated but richly appreciated
message that there belonged to the family of their forebears
the most graceful and the best loved of Scotch poets, Robert
Burns.
Some time ago there was begun, in curiosity rather than
tradition or hope, an inquiry into a possible degree of re-
lationship between Archibald Bourns, father of John Bourns,
the cannon-maker, of this county, and Robert Burns. The
inquiry led to records in London and in Edinburg and, after
long waiting, established the fact that Archibald Bourns was
a brother of William Burness, the father of Robert Bums;
that John Bourns, in whose blacksmith shop along the Antie-
tam Creek, not far from Waynesboro, was made the first
American piece of artillery, was a first cousin to the great
Scotch poet, and that there flows in the veins of a number
of Franklin County people the same blood that gave such
vigorous life to the immortal "Bobby" Burns.
227
The work for this evening had new fascination then and
'there was added new interest to the story of men of action
for a century and a half in this county. ,
BROTHERS CAME HERE.
Two of the brothers of WilHam Burness came to this
•country. Thomas Bourns emigrated from Scotland and found
a new home for himself in Mifflin County, this State, in 1747.
Archibald Bourns, the second brother of William Burness,
an uncle of Robert Burns, and the Bourns with whose de-
scendants this sketch has to do, came to America from Lanark
■or Edinburg, Scotland, in 1752. With him came his wife,
Janet Cuthbertson, her brother. Rev. John Cuthbertson, and
Mr. Bourns' nephew, Thomas. Archibald Bourns settled h\
what is now Adams County. He and his wife and her
dominie brother were of the Covenanter faith. The latter was
sent out by the Church of Scotland to act as the shepherd of a
colony in this section of Pennsylvania.
To Archibald and Janet Bourns were born two sons, James
and John. Archibald Bourns died while his sons were mere
lads and his widow married Francis Meredith. James Bourns
married a Miss Gabby and, after a brief residence in the east-
ern end of this county, moved to Ohio, settling on land now
occupied by Cincinnati. Little is known to the Franklin
County Burns descendants of his history.
It is of John and his descendants that this sketch will
treat — John, the cousin of Robert Burns, in whom Scotland
has been so rich.
SETTLED ALONG ANTIETAM CREEK.
John Bourns took to wife Esther Morrow, daughter of
Jeremy Morrow, grandfather of a Governor of Ohio. John
Bourns and his wife left Adams County in 1773 and selected
for their home a beautiful spot on the banks of the east branch
of the Antietam Creek, near what is now Roadside, in Wash-
ington Township, this county.
Small wonder is it that a Scotchman should delight in a
228
home there. To the north and east are mountain peaks. Be-
tween them, on the north, runs a curving gap, the gateway to-
the Old Forge section, where in years gone by the Mont Alto-
iron makers had their forge. On the east is another gap,
through which the Mentzer Gap road climbs easily and
through beautiful scenery to the mountain top where is built
the highway from Baltimore to Waynesboro and on to Fort
Loudon to connect with the turnpike that stretches across the
State from east to west.
Here were the reminders of Old Scotland, the hills and
their rocks, and in these was homelikeness. And here, too,
was a bit of level land waiting for the plow and the hand of
the husbandman to turn its glebe ; and a rollicking stream
filled with fishes and ready to use its strength to help the
miller or the artificer.
"Amang tliae wild mountains shall still be my path,
Ilk stream, foaming down its ain green narrow strath."
Rimmed by the hills, that, with a little imagination,
brought Scotland nearer, was such a garden spot as carried"
delight and peace to the immigrant.
A HOME AND AN INDUSTRY.
Here John Bourns established his home and, thrift)'- Scot
that he was, inaugurated at once an industry. Of the timbers
of the forest he put up his house and along with it a sawmill
and a blacksmith shop and then he was ready to rear a family
and build up a business. In accord with strict accuracy it
must be told that the sawmill was the first pretentious struct-
ure completed by the thrift}^ Scot. In it he sawed the lumber
for his permanent home and his smithy. He must have been
a resourceful man, for while he was a sicklesmith by trade, he
could saw out the timbers for houses and barns, could fashion:
irons for wagons and hinges for doors and nails for all sorts
of uses.
One of the buildings for which he sawed the timbers is
still standing on the eastern edge of Waynesboro. It is not
a large structure and externally it does not look much like the^-
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house that he built, but the logs that he fashioned are yet in
its walls and under its floors. The building; was purposed for
a school house and it was used as such and as a place for re-
ligious services of the strict Covenanter faith during the
Revolutionary War and afterward. Not only did John Bourns
provide the lumber for this building, that was to be strong
enough to resist the attacks of Indians, but he hammered
out the door hinges and fastenings and all the nails for it.
AN OLD WAYNESBORO HOUSE.
In this school house the children from a wide section of
country — three miles toward every point of the compass —
gathered to acquire knowledge. John Bourns' own children
trudged three miles or rode horseback to recite their lessons
to the teacher who, with gun close at hand, kept one eye on
the pupils and one on the approaches to the bvtilding for a
prompt glimpse of prowling Indians if such might see fit to
loiter in the vicinity of the place of learning. There, too, on
Sunday came the men and women to engage in divine worship.
Man}'^ of them carried their children with them in saddle
pockets or in their arms and all the men had slung over their
shoulders the guns which Indian cruelty made necessary.
During the service the weapons were stacked near the door.
As a digression, it may be told that many years after-
ward one of the descendants of John Bourns wanted to par-
chase this old building because of its erection by his ancestor.
The owner didn't know whether or not he wanted to sell. He
agreed to dispose of it and he rued bargain time and again,
until, finally, General James Burns laid out on his hand nine
gold dollars. The bargain was closed in a minute. But, un-
fortunately for General Burns, the owner again rued bargain.
He wouldn't leave the property and it has not yet come into
the possession of John Bourns' descendants.
A MAGNIFICENT CHARACTER.
Old John Bourns must have been a magnificent character.
His industry, his versatility, his esteem of education and his
230
devotion to his church were all manifest to all men from his;
earliest entry into this count}^ but there was another attribute
which was to be demonstrated in notable degree when the
Revolutionary War began. He was a very sturdy patriot:
and he did for his adopted country what no man had ever
done before in America.
With his Scotch perspicacity he reasoned that what the
American arm}^ needed as much as anything else was cannon
and he set about to make one. He had none of the appliances
for casting a cannon, so he determined to create one of
wrought iron. He made all his preparations and then called
in his neighbors. They came in goodly numbers and they
came with enthusiasm for they were all patriots, too, and they
wanted to help in this work of furnishing a big war gun to
the army of the colonies. It is suspected, too, that they had'
a fancy to see what this indomitable Scotchman would make-
of his hitherto unheard-of undertaking.
There were busy people about the Bourns place that day-
There was to be no cessation of work and the women of the
household, aided by some of the housewives of the vicinity,
prepared huge and steaming meals for all who were to have a-
part in this strange venture.
MAKING THE CANNON.
Ever3^thing was made ready. An extra pair of bellows,
was set up ; a big lot of fuel was supplied ; the neighbors were
assigned their duties, and then the momentous work began.
Under the leadership of James Bourns, brother of John, the-
men pumped the several pairs of bellows and kept up a con-
tinuous hot fire.
John Bourns had prepared a core of iron and as the
neighbors heated iron bars to whiteness he took them from'
their beds of coal and welded them around the core. Never
did his hammer ring out a lustier sound than was carried out
from the blacksmith shop to the hills and sent back in ringing"
echoes, to penetrate in quivering waves the gaps in the moun-
231
tains and to follow with increased intensity the rippling
waters of the Antietam.
John Bourns worked without resting. His helpers at the
bellows relieved each other so that all might gain new
strength from the food which was always kept ready for them
by Mrs. Bourns and her neighbors.
At last the cannon was made and there must have gone
up a cheer from the patriots gathered in the little blacksmith
shop on the Antietam as this contribution to the army of
Washington was completed.
CAPTURED AT BRANDYWINE.
With such tools as he had John Bourns fashioned the
bore and it was smooth and round when he sent it forward to
the troops. It was not a monster affair but it spoke with no
uncertain sound when the primer was applied to it and no-
where was more execution asked of it than in the battle of"
the Brandywine, September ii, 1777. In this engagement
it was captured by the British and there are records extant
which indicate that it was taken to England and placed in the ■
Tower of London. Possibly it was but, if so, it did not always
remain there, for Benjamin M. Nead, one of your Society's
most honored contributors, could find no trace of it there
some years ago when he made inquiry for it.
Singularly enough John Bourns was one of the partici-
pants in the battle in which his cannon was captured. He
had gone into the army some time before the battle of the
Brandywine and fought there, it must be supposed, with as
much determination as he exhibited when he made his
wrought iron cannon. But his superior skill as a smith was
soon recognized and he was detached from active service as a
fighting man and detailed to repair gun locks and make
bayonets for the soldiers.
When the colonists had gained their freedom John
Bourns took up his old life at his home along the Antietam
and there he lived almost a score of years, a useful citizen.
He served for a long time as a magistrate and he was a leader
232
among his fellows. He was a Scotch Covenanter in his re-
ligious belief and he was tenacious in the practise of its doc-
trines. Just the other day I had a verification of this from
the lips of his great-granddaughter, who told it as she heard
it from her grandfather and his sister. These children of the
old cannon-maker were taught a rigid observance of the
Sabbath day.
COVENANTER SABBATHS.
They were not allowed to pick an apple from the ground
or crack a nut on that day. These things were all made ready
on Saturday and not later than six o'clock or "sun-down" of
that day. The food to be eaten on the Sabbath day was all
prepared on the preceding day and no cooking was allowed on
Sunday, except a cup of cofifee for breakfast. Assuredly some
of our people of today who make a feast day of the Sabbath
would not enjoy hospitality such as his must have been on
that day nor would our good wives possess themselves in
patience were they compelled to — as Esther Bourns, was com-
pelled to — let the washing of the dishes over until Monday.
The Sabbath da}^ was not pre-eminently a day of rest in
John Bourns' family, for he started a cavalcade from his home
soon after the breakfast hour to some church, maybe in Green-
castle or some other place equally as far away, and there
listened to one or more sermons each from an hour and a half
to two hours in length. If the journey was to the Welsh Run
church or to the one near Scotland, the trip was begun on
Saturday. When the regular days for the celebration of the
Sacrament came around there was longer absence from home,
for these services began on Thursday and continued until
Monday evening. All these were sacred days and all un-
necessary work was forbidden. W^hen there was no preaching
by the minister in one of the churches, the Covenanters fre-
quently journeyed to each other's homes and held services
there, laymen expounding the Scriptures and offering the
prayers.
A SIMILE.
Each week day had its Bible reading and prayer. The
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233
day was begun with the singing of a Psalm, the reading and
expounding of a passage of Scripture and a prayer, and there
was a like ceremony at the closing of the day. Assuredly
John Bourns kept bright the customs of his Covenanter an-
cestors in Scotland for this brief description of his family
religious services is a homely telling of what Robert Burns,
in "The Cotter's Saturday Night," so beautifully depicts as the
rule in his father's daily life.
John Bourns died April 20, 1802, and was buried in a pri-
vate graveyard not far from the banks of the Antietam, on the
Willow Glen farm now owned by Dr. A. H. Strickler, about
two miles southwest of his home and the shop where he had
made his famous cannon. He was buried by the side of his
wife, Esther, who had died June 8, 1797. Their tombstones
still stand and the inscriptions on them are still legible. Others
of their family are buried there, filling the small burial plot,
except for two graves that are unmarked but which contain
the remains of the two Renfrew sisters, who were murdered
by Indians as they did the family washing at their humble
home just a little distance away, across the creek.
JOHN BOURNS' CHILDREN.
John Bourns was father of eleven children. They were :
1. Margaret, born May, 1774; died in early youth.
2. Jeremy, born January 4, 1775 ; died February, 1847.
He married Sarah Renfrew, of near Fayetteville, and lived in
the old Bourns homestead.
3. John, born August 24, 1776; died unmarried.
4. Sarah, born March 19, 1778; married David Bingham
and moved to Ohio and afterward, to La Grange, Indiana.
5. Archibald, born March 19, 1780; died in his youth.
6. Thomas, born February 4, 1782; married a Miss
Stewart and lived near Fort Loudon or Mercersburg. He had
two children. One died in infancy; the other, Jane, never
married; she died in Chambersburg in October, 1863.
7. Elizabeth, born March 22, 1784; married Thomas Pat-
terson, a first cousin. They made their home in the Big Cove,
234
Fulton County, Pennsylvania. They had these children:
Hadessa, married her cousin, Samuel Morrow; had two
daughters, all of the family are dead. Jane, married Samuel
Stewart, no descendants. William Patterson, married, first,
Miss Hunter; second, Mrs. Scott; had two children: Hon.
Hunter Patterson, Fulton County, and Mrs. Henrietta Carson,
Baltimore. John Patterson, married first, Miss Hunter;
second, ; had four children: Hon. Elliott Patter-
son, Philadelphia ; Colin Patterson, Linn Patterson and Miss
Bessie Patterson, all of Fulton County. Thomas Patterson,
married Miss Ella Sharpe, near Newville ; had three children :
Sharpe Patterson, Newville ; Alexander Patterson, near Mc-
Connellsburg; and a son, McConnellsburg. Mary Patterson,
married David Carson, Mercersburg; had four children: Mrs,
Anna Riddle, Denver, Col.; Patterson Carson, Phoenix, Ariz.;
John Carson, Lincoln, Neb. ; Jennie Carson, Nebraska.
8. James, born March 9, 1786; married Jean Downey.
9. Franklin, born June ii, 1788; died February 10, 1814,
just before his wedding day.
10. William, born May 18, 1790; married and moved to
Richland County, Ohio.
11. Esther, born June 4, 1792; died August 2, 1875;
married John Wallace, a descendant of the founder of
Waynesboro.
There are a number of descendants of John Bourns still
living in this county.
JEREMY BURNS' FAMILY.
Jeremy, the second child of the old cannon-maker who
married Sarah Renfrew, died February 16, 1847. There were
born to him and his wife twelve children. All are dead. One
daughter, Hannah Jane, married a Mr. Foutz. They had two
children, of whom one is living, Mrs. Nannie Byer, whose
residence is not far from the old homestead and is on the old
Bourns property.
Another of Jeremy's daughters, Nancy, born March 15,
181 1, married Samuel White, the owner of a woolen mill at
Fayetteville. Her children were: Hon. J. Burns White, Mrs.
235
Nannie George and Miss Emma White, Fayetteville. Nancy
Bourns White died October 22, 1902.
Still another daughter of Jeremy, Esther E., born March
13, 1819, died August 24, 1854, married John Downey, Fay-
etteville. There are two living children : Mrs. Emma Colby
Chicago, formerly of Chambersburg, and Mrs. Laura Heis-
inger, Philadelphia.
Samuel Rea Burns, a son of Jeremy, born April 2, 1810,
died December 26, 1887, married Margaret Renfrew, a cousin.
Two children are living: Mrs. Sallie Coffman, wife of Dr. J. J.
Coffman, and Miss Annie Burns, both of Scotland.
A POET IN THE FAMILY.
John Francis Bourns, a son of Jeremy Bourns, was a phy-
sician, who died only eleven years ago in Norristown, aged 90
years. He was the only one of the grandsons of John Bourns
who continued the old way of spelling the name — Bourns. He
was a school teacher in early life. For awhile he taught in
Shippensburg. Then he went to Chambersburg and read
medicine there with Dr. Jeremiah Senseny. A letter to his
mother tells that he was there during the cholera epidemic.
Later he went to Philadelphia. He was a poet of no mean
talent and the columns of the Chambersburg Public Opinion,
under the editorship of Hon. M. A. Foltz, and of the Waynes-
boro Record, when edited by William Blair, often were graced
by the products of his pen.
Esther, the youngest child of John Bourns, born June 4,
1792, died August 2, 1875, married John Wallace, a descendant
of the founder of Waynesboro, which once bore its founder's
name. To them were born four children: Esther A., Thomas
Hazlet, Sarah Jane and John. Sarah Jane Wallace died De-
cember 10, 1907. John died in early youth. Esther married
Thomas S. Cunningham, now borough treasurer of Waynes-
boro. Four children are living, all in Waynesboro : Smith
W., an ex-councilman of Waynesboro; Scott, teller of the
People's National Bank ; Frank, of the Cumberland Valley
Railroad office, and Miss Grace. Thomas Hazlet Wallace
236
married Elizabeth A. Johnson. These children are living:
Johnston Wallace, Washington, D. C. ; John B. Wallace and
Misses Hattie and Anna Wallace, Waynesboro,
GENERAL JAMES BURNS.
James Burns, fifth son of John Bourns, married Jean
Downey, who was a descendant of the Dinwiddle family of
Scotland, which traced its ancestry back to 1296 and whose
ancestral home was at Annandale, Dumfrieshire, Scotland. A
number of the Dinwiddle lairds were of distinction in their
country. Hugh and David came to this country in 1741 and
settled in York County. David was the first ruling elder
of the Covenanter Church either in America or in York
County; the record is not clear.
Hugh was a soldier and distinguished himself in the
French and Indian War. When the Revolutionary War began
he entered the army as a major and was made a lieutenant
colonel of the York County associated battalion (third bat-
talion), December 31, 1776. He received his commission,
January i, 1777, and died January 12, eleven days later, aged
49 years. His body is buried in the graveyard of the Second
Presbyterian Church, Philadelphia.
Hugh Dinwiddie married Jean Crawford, daughter of
John Crawford. They had eight children, one of whom,
Rosanna, married James Downey, and lived in an immense
stone house near the juncture of the east and west branches
of the Anti'etam Creek, a mile or two south of Waynesboro.
The house is now owned by C. L. Walter, Waynesboro, and
was long occupied by him as his residence. To James Downey
and his wife were born seven children, one of whom, Jean,
married James Burns, in October, 1814.
A BRAVE SOLDIER.
James Burns was an officer in the army in the War of
1812 and a brave soldier. His sword is now in the possession
of Hon. J. Burns White, Fayetteville. He was long known
as General Burns in Waynesboro and received this title from
237
his command of the infantry which was organized in the com-
munity.
He was an exceedingly modest man but a soldier of fear-
less bravery. He was promoted from second lieutenant to
first lieutenant in the War of 1812 for distinguished gallantry
and on the eve of his discharge from the army, in August,
1814, he received his commission as captain.
Several times, when volunteers were called on for perilous
work, he was among the first to respond. Once he volunteered
to take the place of his captain, because he was unmarried
and his captain was a man of family. Another time at Niagara
he volunteered for an exceedingly hazardous undertaking. He
was to take a boat filled with ammunition down the river
to forces placed there to check the British. When he and
several other men started with the boat they received orders
not to go below the second bend in the river; if they went
further they would get in the swirl of the rapids. Unfortu-
nately the second bend was a small one and they didn't
recognize it. They continued on down the river and soon
heard men shouting to them from the shore. Believing them
enemies they kept on and soon found themselves close to
the rapids.
SURRENDERED TO FRIENDS.
The men on shore shouted again and again to them to
pull to the bank and finally, covering them with their guns,
ordered them to surrender. There were two alternatives. One
was certain death in the rapids ; the other surrender, with the
probability of being exchanged or recaptured by their own
army. They chose the latter, drove their boat against a rock,
climbed on the rock and then to the shore. As they reached
the bank, they turned and looked back. The rock, which had
been their bridge to the land, had been washed away by the
strong current.
Then they surrendered themselves and to their great joy
— and maybe also to their chagrin — they found the soldiers
they were trying to escape were of their own army.
James Burns did not often talk of his service in the war
238
but when some of the soldiers from New York State stopped
at his home during the Civil War and complained of what
they called the horrible condition of the food they were sup-
plied with, he burst out in anger. He told them they were
soldiers in their country's service and must put up with hard-
ships. Then he related the experience of some of the soldiers
of the War of 1812. Often they tramped through deep drifts
and, worn out at night, pitched their tents, rolled their
blankets around them and slept on the frozen snow. More
than once, when on a long march on a hot summer day, they
had nothing to drink and when they saw a puddle of dirty,
repulsive water ahead of them on the road, raced to it to get
the chance to dip it up with their hands and satisfy their con-
suming thirst.
James Burns was sheriff of this county from 1836 to 1839.
JAMES BURNS' DESCENDANTS.
James Burns had two children : Rosanna, born August
15, 1815; died April 28, 1879; and Jane, born February 21,
1817; died February 19, 1884.
Rosanna married, July 30, 1844, William Smith Amber-
son, a prominent merchant of Waynesboro. To them were
born five children : Dr. James Burns Amberson, Sarah Cun-
ningham Amberson, Jane Downey Amberson, Mary Elizabeth
Amberson and Presley Neville Amberson. Dr. J. B. Amber-
son, Miss Sarah C. Amberson and Presley N. Amberson are
the only children living.
Dr. Amberson is a prominent physician and member of
the state and county and Waynesboro medical societies. He
was married to Miss M. K. Good, December i, 1873. To them
were born these children : Mary E., William Smith, Gurney
G., Ruth Detrich, James Burns, Jr., Katherine Good and
Jean Downey.
Presley N. Amberson holds a responsible position with
Frick Company, Waynesboro. He was married to Margaret
Isabel Ruthrauff, May 17, 1892. They have two children:
William Ruthrauff and Rosanna.
239
Jane Downey, second daughter of General James Burns,
married David Hoerner McGaughey, a farmer of near Bridge-
port, this county, December 21, 1848. Three children were
born to them : Rosanna Mary Love, who died February 7,
1909, in Waynesboro; Eliza Jane and James Burns, the latter
two dying in infancy.
It will be observed that all the female descendants of
John Bourns are entitled to membership in the Daughters of
the Revolution and the Colonial Dames and that the female
descendants of General James Burns have the right of entry,
too, to the Daughters of the War of 1812.
JOHN BOURNS' WIFE.
Much has been said of the men of the family, but little of
the women. Esther Bourns, wife of the cannon-maker, was a
woman of great strength of character. She helped build a
home in the almost unbroken forest and to rear a family of
worthy children. One time she displayed in remarkable de-
gree her promptness of decision. She had gone on horseback
to visit a neighbor, taking Jeremy, her second child, then an
infant, with her. On the way the horse frightened and Mrs.
Bourns lost control of it. She quickly realized that she could
not manage the animal and hold her baby in her arms at the
same time. She must either get rid of the baby or she must
let the wilful steed have its way, with consequences to her
and the child that could be easily guessed.
She determined to both save the infant and conquer the
horse, so she waited for the opportunity, leaned far off the
animal and dropped the baby gently into a brush pile and
then proceeded to very vigorously teach the horse that she
was its master. The animal was speedily brought up by some
expert horsemanship and then taken back to the brush-heap
cradle, whence the youngster was taken, cooing and laughing,
and then the journey was resumed with the horse ambling
along in gentlest spirit.
The house which John Bourns built of logs is not now
standing. Four locust trees stand at the four corners of the
240
site of the home of the patriot and within this square and
round about it people have frequently dug for some relics of
the founder of a family or for some arrow heads which might
tell of an attack upon the structure by Indians, but nothing
has been found. Not very far away is a big brick house built
by Jeremy Burns and now owned by Theodore Wiesner and
it is one of the landmarks of the section.
The warriors of the family have occupied this sketch in
large measure but there have not been lacking in the descend-
ants of John Bourns those with the gift of poetizing. Dr. John
Francis Bourns, as told, wrote many delighting verses and
others of the name have given proof of the "divine afflatus"
which filled the soul and the life of the cousin of the cannon-
maker of the Antietam.
PLACE FOR A MONUMENT.
There is little of the old left. There are "the everlastmg
hills," of course — one of them perpetuating the name of the
old cannon-maker — but nearly all else is marked by the
twentieth century advance. Hundreds of acres rolling away
from the mountain sides are cultivated, many of them scien-
tifically. Three or four miles to the east, up on top of the
mountain, are great summer resorts for those who would es-
cape the burdens of the city's summer. A few miles to the
north is the State's big White Pine Sanatorium for tuber-
culosis sufferers and even nearer are the orchards in which the
State Forestry forces are growing a million or more of little
trees. The new has overtaken the old but there yet remains
the memory of the man who made the first American cannon
and fashioned it with his own forceful grit and brawny arms
and who was such a patriot and such a citizen as well deserves
a monument that, looking upon it, coming generations may be
made sturdier by the example of the pioneer who accom-
plished unusual things in an unusual way.
A LITTLE ROMANCE.
And here, possibly, you will permit of a bit of romancing
241
that fresh communion with the wealth of the Scottish poet
has inspired.
What if Robert Burns had not received the commendation
of Dr. Blacklock, the critic for whose good opinion he had not
dared to hope, and his book of poems had not sold so well in
1786 ? Would he have made the voyage in the steerage
quarters he had engaged, to Jamaica, and would he there have
yearned for the "banks, and braes, and streams" of old Scot-
land, and in his loneliness turned to the kin separated by the
fewest miles ? And would he have come to this country and
to this county and found contentment with his cousin, the
cannon-maker ? And would he here have sung the songs that
long have thrilled the world ?
GENERAL INDEX.
Papers Read before the Kittochtinny Historical
Society.
SIX VOLUMES
VOL. I. February
VOL/. II. February
VOL. III. February
VOL. IV. February
VOL. V. February
VOL. VI. February
1898 to February 1899.
1899 to February 1901.
1901 to February 1903.
1903 to February 1905.
1905 to February 1908.
1908 to February 1910.
Subjects Classified
Vol.
Page
II.
I.
II.
V.
93
22
29
100
III.
209
IV.
286
VI.
105
VI.
125
1. THE RED MAN AND COLONIAL PERIOD.
"The Indians of the Valley." By Major Ives
"Path Valley Before the Revolution." — Mr. Pomeroy. . . .
"Colonial Defences of Franklin County." — Mr. Hoerner. .
"Colonel Sam Brady, the Indian Hunter." — Mr. Collins..
"John Wilkins, Carlisle Merchant and Indian Trader."
— Mr. Brereton
"The Indians of the Lower Susquehanna." — Robert C.
Bair, York, Pa
"Old Fort Loudon and Its Associations." (No. 1) Mr.
Seilhamer
"Old Fort Loudon and Its Associations." (No. 2) Mr.
Seilhamer
2. THE EARLY HIGHV^^AYS.
"Braddock's Route." — Major Ives I.
"Our Early Highways." (Three papers.) By Mr. Orr.
No. 1. The Three Mountain Road V. 9
No. 2. The Three Mountain Road V. 223
No. 3. The Conodoguinet — Report on Susquehanna
and Potomac Route VI.
"Two Famous Military Roads of Pennsylvania." — By
Hon. Geo. Mapes, Philadelphia VI.
3. RELATING TO THE BARRENS, ETC.
"The Traditions Relating to the Barrens of the Limestone
Lands of the Cumberland Valley, with Special Ref-
erence to Franklin County." — Mr. Orr III.
"The Tradition Concerning Our Limestone Lands." —
Mr. Cooper II.
12
140
93
18
74
244
Vol. Page
4. RELATING TO OUR MINERAL, WEALTH.
"Franklin County, Past, Present and Future, Geologically
and Mineralogically Considered." — Colonel Darning,
Harrisburg III. 7
"Topography of Franklin County." — Dr. Ihlseng V. 308
5. EARLY SCHOOL DAYS AND SCHOOLS.
"Early School Girls of the Conococheague." — Mr. Seil-
hamer V. 70
"The Schools of Our Fathers." — Prof. Alexander TI. 169
-'The Old Academy." — Mr. Cree I. 101
"The Mercersburg Academy." — By Dr. Irvine V. 53
6. RELATING TO THE SCOTCH-IRISH.
"The Origin and Early History of the Scotch-Irish." —
Dr. Crawford II. 5
"Mother Cumberland."- — Mr. Seilhamer II. 141
"A Backward Glance at the Traits, Traditions and Per-
sonality of the Early Scotch-Irish." — Mr. Foltz IV. 9
"Scotch-Irish Occupancy and Exodus." — Judge Stewart. . II. 14
"An Ancestry Hunt in Ulster." — Mr. Seilhamer III. 156
"Missing Branches of Our Oldest Family." — Mr. Seil-
hamer IV. 171
"Some Missing and Misplaced Ancestors." — Mr. Seil-
hamer V.
^ o -/
"Old Conococheague Families." — Mr. Seilhamer II. 281
"Contents of a Barrel." — Mr. Seilhamer III. 35
"Scenes and Incidents of the Cumberland Valley." —
Mr. Brereton ■ III. 39
"Jamies McLene. of the Cumberland Valley, in Pennsyl-
vania, a Statesman of His Times."— By Benjamin
Matthias Nead, of Harrisburg VI. 31
Unveiling of Dr. Agnew Portrait. Society Guests of
Dr. Irvine, Mercersburg Academy VI. 185
"Franklin County Cousin of Robert Burns." — By C. W.
Cremer, Esq., Waynesboro VI. 225
7. GERMAN SETTLEMENT AND GERMAN INFLUENCE.
"An early Literary By-Path Along the Conococheague."
— Mr. Harbaugh IIL 197
-"The German Settlement." — Mr. Seilhamer V. 267
"German Influence in Pennsylvania, with Special Ref-
erence to Franklin County." — Mr. Foltz I. 62
"Facts Suggested by German Influence Paper." — Mr.
Cooper I. 8 4
8. CHAMBERSBURG AND ITS FOUNDERS.
^'The Founders of Chambersburg." — Mr. Seilhamer I. 113
"Benjamin Chambers." — Mr. Cooper I. 57
9. THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR.
"Benedict Arnold, Patriot and Traitor." — By Hon.
Charles H. Smiley, New Bloomfleld, Pa VI. 9
"Josiah Culbertson, A Patriot." Sketch. Read by Mr.
Mcllvaine VL 199
10. THE WHISKEY INSURRECTION.
"The Relations that the People of Cumberland and
Franklin Counties Bore to the Whiskey Insurrec-
tion." — C. P. Humrich, Carlisle, Pa III. 221
^'General Washington in Franklin County." — Mr. Orr... I. 36
Vol.
Page
*
11.
67
V.
315
II.
49
I.
5
I.
109
245
11. TRADITIONS OF AN EARLY DAY.
"The Doctor Woman of Southampton Township." — Mr.
Orr
"Truths and Traditions of Early Days." — Mr. Harbaugh. .
"Lewis, the Robber and Outlaw." — Joshua W. Sharpe.Esq.
"The Old Church Yard." — Mr. Maurer
"A Romance of Cowan's Gap." — Mr. Maurer
12. ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO.
"Manners and Morals One Hundred Years Ago." — Dr.
Martin I. 95
"Transitions of a Century." — Mr. Foltz II. 259
13. STATESMEN, SOLDIERS AND THEOLOGIANS, ETC.
"Franklin County in State and Nation Building." — Mr.
Nead
"James Buchanan, 15th President of the United State.s."
— Judge Gillan
"Dr. Hugh Mercer and Colonel Robert Magaw." — Dr.
Montgomery
"The Men of Middle Spring." — Mr. Seilhamer
"The Christian Scholar — Dr. Philip Schaff." — By Mr.
Harbaugh
"Dr. John Williamson Nevin, the Theologian." — Rev.
John C. Bowman, D. D., Lancaster, Pa
"Rev. Dr. E. Elnathan Higbee." — Prof George F. Mull,
Lancaster, Pa
"Culbertson Row." — Mr. Orr
14. RELATING TO OUR COURTS AND BAR.
"The Story of an Ancient Law Suit." — Mr. Hoerner
"A Day in the Courts." — Mr. Hutton
"A Lawyer's Nosegay." — Mr. Harbaugh
15. RELATING TO CHURCHES.
"The Episcopal Church in the Cumberland Valley." —
Mr. Collins
"The Seventh Day Baptists of Snow Hill." — C. W. Cremer,
Esq., Waynesboro
16. RELATING TO OLD FAMILIES.
"HLstory of the Wilson Family." — Judge Gillan
"J. Orr & Brothers." — Mr. Orr
"Mount Delight." — Mr. McDowell
17. EDITORS AND PUBLISHERS.
"John M. Cooper, Journalist and Historian." — Mr. Foltz
"A Notable Publication House in Chambersburg, 1835-
6 4." — Mr. Foltz . . . .'
18. RELATING TO INSURRECTIONS.
"The Buckshot War." — Mr. Cooper
"John Brown." — James P. Matthews, Esq., Washington,
D. C.
"What I Saw in Charlestown, Va., in December, 1859."
— Mr. Maurer
"Reminiscences of Captain Cook and William Hazelett."
• — By Hiram E. Wertz
The Dedication of Capt. John E. Cook Marker. Address
by Benjamin Matthias Nead, of Harrisburg
IV.
148
IL
181
HI.
III.
129
52
IV.
307
IV.
85
V.
II.
152
113
IV.
VL
VI.
32
207
216
VL
46
VI.
10
V.
IV.
VL
200
52
73
IV.
191
V.
183
IL
217
IV.
109
I.
89
V.
38
VI.
187
246
Vol. Page
19. REMINISCENCES OF THE CIVIL WAR.
-"A Forgotten Battle of the Civil War." — Mr. Harbaugh V. 87
''An account of Jenkin's Raid." By a lady of Cham-
bersburg V. 92
20. HISTORIC STREAMS.
"The Falling Spring." — Mr. Maurer II. 210
"Our Mountain Streams." — Mr. Maurer II. 304
21. RELATING TO SOME OF OUR POETS.
"Some of Our Native Poets." — Mr. Harbaugh IV. 204
"Isabella Oliver, an Early Poetess of the Cumberland
Valley." — Joshua W. Sharpe IIL 141
22. VILLAGE AND TOWNSHIP SKETCHES.
"Fort Loudon." — Rev. James M. Mullan, Baltimore, Md. IV. 2 30
"St. Thomas." — C. M. Deatrich IV. 244
"North Hamilton Township." — C. M. Deatrich V. 286
23. OTHER LOCAL SUBJECTS.
"The Flora and Fauna of Franklin County." — Dr. Palmer II. 243
"Our Banks." — Mr. McUvaine III. 178
"New England and Federal Hills." — Mr. Maurer I. 8
"Personal Pickings from a Political Field." — William I.
Cook, Baltimore, Md V. 119
"Early Grist Mills of Lurgan Township." — Mr. Orr III. 75
"Wagons and Wagoners of 1840." — B. K. Goodyear, Esq.,
Carlisle, Pa III. 171
"Arnold Brooks; a Noted Colored Man of Mercersburg."
— Mr. Harbaugh V. 44
"Decade of Society." — Mr. Foltz V. 338
Two of the papers read before the Society by Mr. Seilhamer were
not furnished for publication in the volumes that have appeared, viz:
"Penn's Land Purchases from the Indians" and "In Medias Res
Scripta Est." ("This Writing is in the Midst of Things.")
Also, one each by Mr. Maurer, by Mr. Matthews, Capt. John Hays,
of Carlisle, Pa., and one by Mr. Smiley.
In all, over one hundred papers have been prepared and read
before the Society by the following :
247
WRITERS
WRITERS
Major Chauncey Ives
Rev. Ernest V. Collins
Thomas J. Brereton
William S. Hoerner
George O. Seilhamer
J. G. Orr
A. Nevin Pomeroy
Hon. M. A. Foltz
John M. Cooper, Esq
Linn Harbaugh, Esq
Rev. J. A. Crawford, D. D
Hon. John Stewart
Hon. W. Rush Gillan
Hon. B. M. Nead
Dr. John Montgomery
Dr. John C. Bowman, Lancaster, Pa. . . .
Dr. M. C. Ihlseng
Rev. Dr. S. A. Martin, D D
Joshua W. Sharpe, Esq
B. Latrobe Maurer
Prof. M. R. Alexander
James P. Matthews, Esq
James W. Cree
Rev. James M. Mullan
C. M. Deatrich. Esq
Dr. Charles F. Palmer
J. S. Mcllvaine, Esq
Robert C. Bair. York. Pa
Captain John Hays, Carli-sle, Pa
C. P. Humrich, Carlisle, Pa
Prof. George F. Mull, Lancaster, Pa. . . .
Colonel Deming, Harrisburg, Pa
B. K. Goodyear, Carlisle, Pa
William I. Cook. Esq., Baltimore, Md..
C. W. Cremer, Esq., Waynesbofo
Hon. Charles H. Smiley, New Bloomfield
John M. McDowell, Esq
Hon. Geo. E. Mapes, Philadelphia
A. J. W. Hutton, Esq
No.
of Papers
2
2
2
2
14
9
1
6
4
7
1
1
2
3
1
1
2
1
2
7
1
2
3
1
2
1
2
1
1
1
1
1
1
1
2
1
1
1
1
95
iJLloLlb'KARY f
LPL-W (
L"'N'-\
THE KITTOCHTINNY
HISTORICAL SOCIETY
ORGANIZED FEBRUARY 3, IfHoS- ^••^
PAPERS READ BEFORE THE SOCIETY
FEBRUARY, 1910 TO FEBRUARY, 1912.
With a General Index of all the Papers Published Siace
the Organization of the Society.
VOLUME VII.
ARRANGED BY THE SECRETARY AND EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE.
1912:
FRANKLIN REPOSITORY PRESS
CHAMBERSBURG, PA.
^■\\l\wOV'i 'nvUTi
THE KITTOCHTINNY
HISTORICAL SOCIETY
ORGANIZED FEBRUARY 3,f9fil$;
PAPERS READ BEEORE THE SOCIETY
FEBRUARY, 1910 TO FEBRUARY, 1912.
With a General Index of all the Papers Published Since
the Organization of the Society.
VOLIME VII.
ARRANGED BY THE SECRETARY AND EXECUTIVE COMMinEE,
1912:
ERANKLIN REPOSITORY PRESS
CHAMBERSBIRG, PA.
i ij ... hK
^ E? Q f 9
R 19-4 t
rfv
«•«
CONTENTS.
Page
Officers of the Society I,
Members C,
In INIemoriam ',
Twelfth Annual Meeting. Paper by Dr. M. C. Ihlseng. Subject:
Early Engineering Enterprises in Pennsylvania !■
The Ancient Law of England. By Hon. W. Rush Gillan 12
Colleges of The Cumberland Valley. By The Rev. S. A.
Martin, D. D 15
Historians at Country Home. Entertained by Dr. and Mrs.
Kauffman 29
Summer Vacation. Entertained at "'Ragged Edge" 29
Unveiling of Justice McFarland Portrait, Mercersburg Academy.
Address by The Rev. James Gray Rose, D. D oO
The Poes of Antrim. By Thomas C. Van Tries, M. D., Beile-
fonte. Pa 43
The Judiciary of Franklin County. By Judge Gillan 55
Introductory to Bibliography of Franklin County. Mr. Harbaugh. 90
The Underground Railroad. By H. E. Wertz, Quincy, Pa 100
Lutheran Church in the Cumberland Valley. By The Rev. C. W.
Heathcote, S. T. D., 534 West Tioga Street, Philadelphia, Pa. 106
Judge Thomas Cooper. Ey Professor Charles F. Himes,
Carlisle, Pa 122
Summer Vacation. Entertained by iM. C. Kennedy at Countr.\
Home, June 11, 1911 151
Early Highways. iNo. 4. By John G. Orr, Esq 152
The Evolution of a Back Country Fisherman. By B. 'M. Nead,
Harrisburg, Pa. Reprin:ed by permission from "Mount and
Stream", Official Organ of the Hunters' and Anglers' Protec-
tive Association of Pemsylvania 186
APPENDIX:
Report of Committee on Markers 19"J
Letter from J. H. Renfrew 197
OFFICERS OF THE SOCIETY.
1898—1902.
Hon. John Stevv;irt, President. Executive Committee : Col. James
Rev. S. A. Mai-tin, D.D. R. Gilmore, ChMirniaii; Wm.
Hon. M. A. Foltz, Vice Presidents. .VIexander, Ksq., Secretary; Maj.
B. l.atrohe Mauier, Secretary. Chauncey Ives, John G. Orr, Dr.
H. A. Riddle, Treasurer. Johnston McLanahan.
1902—1903.
S. A. Martin, D.D.. President. Executive Committee : J. W.
Hon. M. A. Foltz, Sharpe, Esq.. Chairman; D. O.
Col. James R. Gilmore, Vice Gehr, Esq., Secretary; Hon. W.
Presidents. Rush Gillan. Dr. J. O. Skinner,
B. L. Maurer, Secretary. Hon. A. N. Pomeroy.
H. A. Riddle. Treasure)-.
1903—1904.
Hon. M. A. Foltz, President. Executive Committee : Hon. W
John G. Orr, Esq., Rush Gillan, Chairman; Hon. A.
J. W. Sharpe, Esq., Vice Presi- N. Pomeroy, T. J. Brereton. Linn
dents. Harbaug-h, Esq.. J. S. Mcllvaine.
James W. Cree, Secretary.
Fred H. Shumaker, Treasurer.
1904 — 1905.
John G. Orr. Esq., President. Executive Committee : Hon. A. N.
Joshua W. Sharpe. Esq.. Pnmerow Chairman; T. J. Brere-
Hon. W. Rush Gillan, Vice ton, J. S. Mcllvaine, Dr. R. W.
Presidents. Ramsey.
James W. Cree, Secretary.
Col. James R. Gilmore, Treasurer.
1905—1906.
Joshua W. Sharpe, President. Executive Committee : T. J. Brere-
Hoii. Vk'. Rush Gillan, ton. Chairman; Linn Harbaugh,
Hon. A. N. Pomeroy, Vice Presi- Esq., J. S. Mcllvaine. Dr. R. W.
dents. Ramsey, Irvin C. Elder, Esq.
James W. Cree, Secretary.
Col. James R. Gilmore, Treasurer.
1906—1907.
Hon. W. Rush Gillan, President. Executive Committee : Linn Har-
Hon. A. N. Pomeroy. baug-h, Esq., Chairman, J. S. Mc-
T. J. Brereton. Vice Presidents. Ilvaine, Dr. R. W. Ramsey. Irvin
Col. James R. Gilmore, Secretary. C. Elder, Esq., Hon. John W.
Frank Mehaffey, Esq., Treasurer. Hoke.
1907—1908.
Hon. A. N. Pomeroy, President. Executive Committee : J. S. Mc-
T. J. Brereton. Ilvaine, Chairman; Dr. R. W.
Linn Harbaugh, Esq., Vice Presi- Ramsey, Irvin C. Elder, Esq.,
dents. Hon. John W. Hoke, Rev. E. V.
Col. James R. Gilmore, Secretary. Collins.
Prank Mehaffey. Treasurer.
1908—1909.
T. J. Brereton, President. Executive Committee : Irvin C.
Linn Harbaugh. Esq., Elder, Chairman; Hon. John W.
J. S. Mcllvaine, Vice Presidents. Hoke, Rev. E. V. Collins, Oapt.
Col. James R. Gilmore. Secretary. G. W. Skinner, Hon. M. A. Foltz,
D. O. Gehr. Esq., Treasurer. Sec)etary.
1909—1910.
Linn Harbaugh, Esq.. President. Executive Committee : Hon. John
J. S. Mcllvaine, W. Hoke, Rev. E. V. Collins,
Irvin C. Elder, Esq., Vice Presi- Captain Geo. W. Skinner. W. S.
dents. Hoerner, Esq., M. A. Foltz, Sec-
Col. James R. Gilmore, Secretary. retary.
D. O. Gehr, Treasurer.
1910—1911.
J. S. Mcllvaine, President. Executive Committee : William S.
Hon. D. W. Rowe, Hoerner, Esq.. Ai'thur W. Gillan,
Irvin C. Elder, Esq., Vice Presi- Esq., H. A. Riddle. A. J. W. Hut-
dents, ton, Esq., M. A. Foltz, Secretary.
Col. James R. Gilmore. Secretary.
T. M. Wood, Treasurer.
1911—1912.
Hon. D. W. Rowe. President. Executive Committee : Arthur W.
Irvin C. Elder. Esq., Gillan, Esq., H. A. Riddle. A. J.
Wm. S. Hoerner, Esq., Vice W. Hutton, Esq.. T. B. Kennedy,
Presidents. M. A. Foltz, Secretary.
Col. James R. Gilmore. Secretary.
T. M. Wood, Treasurer.
1912 1913.
Irvin C. Elder. Esq., President. Executive Committee : A. J. W.
William S. Hoerner. Esq., Hutton, Esq.. H. A. Riddle, T. B.
A. W. Gillan. Esq.. Vice Presi- Kennedy, Charles Walter. Esq.,
dents. M. A. Foltz, Secretary.
Col. James R. Gilmore. Secretary.
T. M. Wood, Treasurer.
ORIGINAL MEMBERS. i
*Prof. M. R. ALEXANDER, Rev. S. A. MARTIN, D.D., .!
WILLIAM ALEXANDER, Esq., fJOHNSTON McLANAHAN, M.D., ' >
*JAMES W. CREE, Sr.. JOHN M. McDOWELL, Esq., '
*Rev. J. A. CRAWFORD, D.D.. J. S. McILVAINE, 1
Hon. M. A. FOLTZ, *Capt. W. H. H. MACKEY,
Col. JAMES R. GILMORE, FRANK MEHAFFET, Esq., ,
D. O. GEHR, Esq., JOHN G. ORR, 1
fMaj. CHAUNCEY IVES, Hon. A. N. POMEROY, I
*Rev. JAMES P. KENNEDY, D.D., Dr. GEORGE P. PLATT, '
*THOMAS B. KENNEDY, Esq.. H. A. RIDDLE, ;
M. C. KENNEDY, Hon. JOHN STEWART, :
*B. L. MAURER, JOSHUA W. SHARPE, Esq., i
fEDWARD B. WIESTLING.
£[_^Q-j-^Q 1898 1899. *
♦General J. P. BOYD, CHARLES F. PALMER, M.D.,
T. J. BRERBTON, R. W. RAMSEY, M.D., '
Hon. W. RUSH GILLAN, Hon. D. WATSON ROWE, '
WILLIAM S. HOERNER, Esq., *F. H. SHUMAKER,
*JOHN MONTGOMERY, M.D. fJOHN O. SKINNER, M.D., '.
WALTER K. SHARPE. i
ELECTED 1900—1903. ]
LINN HARBAUGH, Esq., THOMAS M. NELSON, i
♦General A. S. DAGGETT, U. S. A. T^^ILLIAM McCANDLISH, \
GEORGE A. WOOD. IRVIN C. ELDER, Esq.,
Rev. WM. C. SCHAEFFER, D.D., THEODORE M. WOOD.
Rev. RAY H. CARTER, '
ELECTED 1904. (
Hon. JOHN W. HOKE, Dr. L. M. KAUFFMAN. i
ELECTED 1905. '
♦ANDREW BUCHANAN, THOMAS B. KENNEDY, . i
Rev. E. V. COLLINS. i
ELECTED 1906. ?
O. C. BOWERS, Esq. !
ELECTED 1907. ' 1
Rev. JOHN ALLAN BLAIR. MORRIS LLOYD,
WALTER B. GILMORE, Esq., JOHN H. POMEROY. ;
A. W. GILLAN, Esq.. *Capt. GEORGE W. SKINNER,
A. J. W. HUTTON, Esq., fR- W. TUNIS, !
Dr. M. C. IHLSENG, fGEORGE C. VIEH. ,:
ELECTED 1908. i
*Dr. P. B. MONTGOMERY, Dr. W. F. SKINNER, |
Prof. D. EDGAR RICE, C. PRICE SPEER, i
Rev. A. F. T\L4lLDO, Rev. Dr. IRVIN W. HENDRICKS. I
ELECTED 1909. i
Rev. C. W. HEATHCOTE, H. V. BLACK, '
THOMAS G. ZARGER, Esq. Rev. C. A. EYLER, ^
ELECTED 1910. i
Dr. F. N. EMMERT, E. D. SOLENBERGER. ;
ELECTED 1911.
Major JOHN K. CREE, CHARLES V^A.LTER, Esq.,
The Rev. A. E. RACE, FRED. B. REED, '
Dr. JOHN K. GORDON. j
ELECTED 1912. (
DAVID H. RIDDLE, JOHN M. RUNK. :
HENRY SHLTMAKER NIXON. |
NON-RESIDENT MEMBERS.
B. M. NEAD, Esq Harrisburg, Pa.
Rev. W. C. SCHAEFFER, D.D Lancaster, Pa.
Rev. RAY H. CARTER, India.
W. M. IRVINE, Ph.D., Mercersburg. Pa.
A. L. GARDNER, Baltimore, Md.
J. A. KELL Philadelphia, Pa.
Dr. A. M. SPEER Pittsbura-n, Pa.
M. H. REASBR, Ph. D., Philadelphia, Pa.
HONORARY MEMBERS.
GEO. O. SBILHAMER, Esq., Chambersburg-, Pa.
♦JOHN M. COOPER Martinsbnrg, Pa.
Rev. J. C. BOWMAN. D.D., Lancaster, Pa.
J. P. MATTHEWS, Esq., Baltimore, Md.
CHARLES W. CREMER. Esq., Waynesboro, Pa.
WILSON L. HARBAUGH Haverf ord. Pa.
♦Deceased. fWithdrawn.
IN MEIVaORIAM
Captain John H. Walker, December 16, 1900.
Rev. James F. Kennedy, D.D., Septem'ber 6, 1901.
B. Latro'be 'Maurer, Secretary, July 1, 1902,
John 'M. Cooper, Esq., Decemlier 4, 1903.
Capt. W. H. H. Miackey, January 4, 1904.
F. H. Shumaker, Treasurer, February 18, 1904.
Thomas B. Kennedy, Esq., June 19, 1905.
James W. Cree, Secretary, November 12, 1906.
Gen. J. F. Boyd, March 23, 1907.
Rev. J. Agnew 'Crawford, D.D., September 19, 1907.
Prof. M. R. Alexander, Hollidays'burg, Pa.
Captain George W. Skinner, Octo'ber 7, 1909.
Dr. P. Brough Montgomery, January 7, 1910.
Dr. John Montgomery, June 16, 1911.
Andrew Buchanan, November 20, 1912.
9
EARLY ENGINEERING ENTERPRISES IN PENN-
SYLVANIA.
BY DR. M. C. IHLIS'ENG.
The Kittochtinny Historical Society held its twelfth
annual meeting on the evening of the 22d of February, 1910,
at the home of Mr. T. J. Brereton, Fifth Avenue. The
spirit of Washington's birthday was in conversation and the
host himself was not unmindful of it. The parlor was draped
with a large American flag between and over the portraits of
Washington and Lincoln. The refreshments also partook of
the spirit of the day, the ice cream served being in the form
of a ;hatchet on wbich were several cherries which Mrs. Brere-
ton declared were from the original George Washington cherry
tree.
The newly chosen officers were duly inaugurated by
the retiring President, Linn Harbaugh, Esq. In addressing
himself to the society Mr. Harbaugh said : "The constitution
admonishes me to administer the office of President until a
successor has been chosen. I can only wish that in taking a
new President, you may take new courage, and under the
leadership of him whom you have elected, you will smite the
demons of error and untruth hip and thigh, and will continue
to gather much ancient lore to be stored up in the beautiful
monuments and temples of history."
President Harbaugh then gracefully handed over the gavel
to J. S. Mcllvaine, the senior vice president who had been
chosen his successor, and in so doing said that he would leave
with the society a few thoughts in verse, which he had entitled:
MEDITATION OF A CONOCOCHEAGUE PIONEER.
Thou who hast stayed the wa^'es of the sea.
And hast led me safe to the west ;
Who vouchsafed further my guide to be
In forests of labor and vale of rest,
I bow as a suppliant, praying to Thee,
And thou wilt my praying heed :
lO
As thou ihast mercy and tolerance shown,
Let tolerance and mercy be mine own,
In thoug^ht, in word and in deed.
Oh teach thou me upon freedom's land
To learn from nature's book
How strength and purity hand in hand,
Sweep on in the crystal brook;
As I quench my thirst and cool my brow
In the stream that turns the wheel
Bestow, I pray thee, on me and mine.
Such strength and purity benign
Here symbolled forth so real.
May yonder mountain crests uplifted
Draw my spirit towards the sky,
And these valleys verdure drifted
Teach of bounties from on high ;
So would I live an upright life
That when my bones shall scattered be.
My memory may mildly shed
On generations far ahead.
The fragrance of integrity.
As he bowed himself out, the retiring president was
rapturously applauded, and his successor was as warmly
greeted.
As historian of the evening, President Mcllvaine happily
presented Dr. M. C. Ihlseng, president of Blairsville College,
who was given a cordial reception, and at once addressed him-
self to his subject, "Early Engineering Enterprises in Pennsyl-
vania."
Dr. Ihlseng's paper covered the ground of transportation,
usages and customs of the earlier history of Pennsylvania. Not
the least interesting of these was the development of trails,
canals, steamboats, railroads and railroad traffic. It was afte"
all apparent that the cost of transportation was not much
greater than today, notwithstanding the rapid transit advan-
tages we enjoy.
The engineers of the i8th and 19th centuries were engi-
neers by instinct and self training, and their works were surely
great. Without text books to guide them all their works were
of necessity experimental.
II
Dr. Ihlseng, as he conclutled, was g-iveii quite an ovation,
and a hearty vote of thanks. His production was the theme
of animated discussion. A promise by the author of the paper
to furnish a copy for the archives of the society, for want of
time on his part continues unfulfilled, much to the regret of
the officers and members of the Kittochtinny (historical society.
Dr. Ihlseng has always been regarded as one of the most
esteemed members of the society and follows its work as
closely as any one of its resident members. His transfer to
another field is felt to be a distinct loss to the community.
During his principalship at Penn Hall and residence in Cham-
bersburg he took an active part in all that related to the welfare
and progress of our town. In municipal and civic affairs Dr.
Ihlseng wielded a salutary influence whether at public gather-
ings of citizens for municipal advancement or through discus-
sions in the local newspapers.
After brief reports from the committee of Bibliography
and discussion thereon the report of Treasurer Gehr was made
indicating a healthy condition of the society's finances.
Dr. F. N. PjnnKMi was elected a member of the society.
12
THE ANCIENT LAW OF ENGLAND.
BY HON. W. RUSH GILLAN.
The March meeting of the society proved another of tlie
successful social and literary events of the winter and spring
assemblies of the organization. It was held on the evening
of the 31st of March, 1910, when the society was the guest of
the genial and gifted pastor of the Falling Spring Presbyterian
church, the Rev. John Allan Blair.
The executive committee having been disappointed in
securing a historian. Judge Gillan, in the dilemma, consented
to read a paper which he had prepared and read before the
Avon Club of Mercersburg, while that club was studying the
history of England. In this the committee was most fortunate,
as was manifest by the appreciation with which the production
and its author were received.
The subject of the paper was the "Ancient Law of Eng-
land." Judge Gillan said that while our law was based on the
law of England, many of the English laws were based on the
ancient Hebrew law. Even the same complaints we hear
today, were heard during- the very early administration of the
Hebrew law. As was illustrated by Jethro, when he visited
his son-in-law, Moses, and found him acting as sole judge of
the people of Israel, Jethro made the complaint that by his
incessant labors, Moses was wearing himself out. He asked
and insisted on and succeeded in having established to the relief
of Moses a number of inferior courts.
This is the first recorded instance of an overworked judic-
iary. As an instance of how the law has always been so con-
strued as to meet changed conditions or unforeseen circum-
stances, Judge Gillan cited the ancient law of Israel, which
provided that when a member of the tribe died his estate should
go to his sons. When Zelop, head of the tribe of Joseph, died
leaving no sons but daughters — a contingency which had not
been anticipated — Moses decreed that the estate should go to
the daughters. The chief men of the tribe appeared in Moses'
13
court, and asked that the decree be modihcd, lest the daughters
marrying- out of the tribe should carry into another a part of
the wealth of the tribe of Joseph, and thus create an unequal
holding of property. Moses at once decreed that the daugh-
ters must marry within the tribe or lose their inheritance.
Judge Gillan pointed out that the measure of damages for
personal injuries today in England, and in all the States oi
this Union, is the same as that laid down in the 21st chapter
of Exodus, except that we add the additional compensation for
pain and suffering, which usually swells the verdict.
Judge Gillan said that Christianity had been received as
part of the Common law of England and America. He
quoted from a number of opinions of the Supreme Court of
Pennsylvania to prove that it has always been so regarded in
Pennsylvania.
Continuing, the Judge referred at some length to a local
case in an entertaining manner. It was the case of the Com-
monwealth vs. Jacob Specht, who was convicted before George
W. Toms, Esq., a justice of the peace of Ouincy township, oi
having performed worldly employment on Sunday. The
defendant pleaded that he was a member in full communion
of the Seventh Day Baptist congregation of Snow Hill; that
he conscientiously believed that, the seventh day of the week
w^as the true Sabbath of the Lord, and that he observed it as
such.
The case finally reached the Supreme Court, wdien it was
argued on the part of the defendant, Specht, by Thaddeus
Stevens, and on the part of the Commonwealth by Judge Nill.
Mr. Stevens declared "that the doctrine that the Christian
religion is a part of the law w^as promulgated .in the worst
times by the worst men." "It was this doctrine," he said,
"which gave the Holy Inquisition such horrid force, and
placed the civil and religious liberty and the lives of nations
of men at the mercy of the bloodiest power that ever inflicted
misery upon the human race in the name of Demons or
of Gods."
Notwithstanding this philippic, the Supreme Court
affirmed the judgment of the magistrate.
Judge Gillan referred to many of the laws of England
from the time of Egbert to the time of Canute, giving instances
of the rude and crude manner in wihich justice was adminis-
tered, and closed by saying that nothing better illustrates the
advancing march of civilization 
