Part 24

On March 20, 1780, a law was passed to effect a reorganization of the whole militia system in Pennsylvania. It provided for the appointment of a lieutenant for each county, and two sub-lieutenants or more, not exceeding the number of battalions, which were to be divided into classes as heretofore. Fines, however for non-attendance on muster days were fixed for commissioned officers at the price of three days’ labor.

When called out, the pay of privates was to be equal to one day’s labor. Persons called out, but neglecting or refusing to go, were liable to pay in each case the price of a day’s labor during the term of service, beside a tax of fifteen shillings on the hundred pounds upon their estates. As a relief to this class, the hiring of substitutes was allowed. Pensions were promised the wounded in battle, and support to the families of those militiamen who were killed, at rates to be fixed by the courts. Considerable opposition was made to this law, from the fact that by permitting the hiring of substitutes it would relieve the disaffected and Tories.

While this bill, undoubtedly, had many defects, it was the first real effort toward the establishment of a military system in the Commonwealth upon a practical basis.

Militia companies were provided in each county, the State being divided into districts, and all males were required to enroll, who were between eighteen and fifty-three years of age.

This act was modified in 1783, when a more specific code of discipline was adopted. This act remained in force until 1793.

The militia act of March 20, 1780, was the outgrowth or development of the militia system of Pennsylvania which may be considered to have begun in the year 1747. Altho in the charter given to William Penn, the Governor was given authority to levy, muster and train men, to make war upon and pursue the enemy, even beyond the limits of the province.

As early as 1702, Lieutenant Governor Hamilton asked the Assembly to enact a bill to provide for “what may come against us by land or by sea.”

Several years later Lieutenant Governor Evans urged a similar law, but the idea was unpopular. Several other similar bills were subsequently defeated, yet the Assembly occasionally appropriated funds for “the King’s use,” for the purchase of bread, beef, pork, flour, wheat and “other grain.” Franklin later commented that “other grain” meant black grains of gunpowder.

It was through the effort and influence of Franklin, in 1747, that a volunteer military association was effected, consisting of about 1200 of the most influential men in the province. This soon grew to 10,000 and the following year the “Associated Companies,” by which name the organization became known, had enrolled 12,000 horse, foot and artillery, each armed and equipped at personal expense, and the officers chosen from the members. Franklin was one of the original colonels.

This association rendered conspicuous service in the French and Indian wars and preserved its organization. Many of the companies volunteered for service in the Revolution and formed the backbone of the State’s militia.

In 1756 there were in Philadelphia three of these companies, with a total of seventeen officers and 260 private men, one troop of horse with five officers and forty men and one battery of artillery with three officers and 150 men. In Bucks County there were nine companies with thirty-nine officers and 513 men; in Chester County there were several companies, under command of Captain John Singleton, Samuel West, Robert Boyd and Jacob Richardson. In York County there were eight companies with an enrollment of 642 men and in Lancaster County there were nine companies and 545 men.

It was not until Braddock’s defeat that the Assembly voted a substantial sum for the “King’s use,” but made no provision for an organized military force. November 25, 1755, the Assembly passed “an Act for the better ordering and regulating such as are willing and desirous to be united for military purposes within the province.”

This was the first act of Assembly which in any way provided for the organized defense of the province, and this was to remain in force only until October 30, 1756.

By March 29, 1757, the Quakers had become a minority in the Assembly and an act was passed which was more satisfactory. It also provided for the compulsory enrollment of all male persons between the ages of seventeen and fifty-five years. It also stated the financial responsibility required of those who would serve as officers.

One section of this act provided “that all Quakers, Menonists, Moravians and others conscientiously scrupulous of bearing arms, who shall appear on any alarm with the militia, though without arms, and obey the commands of the officers in extinguishing fires, suppressing insurrection of slaves or other evil-minded persons during an attack, in caring for the wounded, conveying intelligence as expresses or messengers, carrying refreshments to such as are on duty, and in conveying to places of safety women and children, aged and infirm, and wounded persons are free and exempt from penalties of this act.” This act remained in force until the close of the French and Indian War in 1763.

There was no special control of military affairs again until June 30, 1775, when the Assembly passed an act for “the defense of their lives, liberty and property.”

At this same session there was established a Committee of Safety, of twenty-five members, which constituted the Board of War, whose powers enabled them to call into service so many of the associators as they deemed necessary or the occasion required.

The Committee of Safety was organized July 3, 1775, with Benjamin Franklin as president.

This committee exercised supreme control of the land and naval forces of the province until October 13, 1777, when its powers were transferred to the body known as the Council of Safety, this comprising the Supreme Executive Council and nine others. The Council of Safety was dissolved December 6, 1777, when the military authority was assumed by the Supreme Executive Council and the Assembly.

The aggregate number of men furnished by the Associators during the Revolution was in excess of 35,000.

Pennsylvania furnished in all arms of the service, under the various calls, a total of 120,514 men, which number does not include many bodies of militia and many men who were under arms for a brief period, a record of which service was not kept during the early years of the war.

Laws were passed during the war relating to the military forces, but these were all repealed by the formal act of March 20, 1780.

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Old Northumberland, Mother of Counties,

Erected March 21, 1772

The political development of Pennsylvania followed closely in the wake of its expanding settlements. In 1682 the Counties of Philadelphia, Bucks and Chester were formed, with limits intended to include not only the populated area, but territory enough in addition to meet for a considerable time to come the growing necessities of the rapidly increasing immigration.

It was not until 1729, therefore, that the extension of the settlements and the purchase of new lands from the Indians led to the erection of Lancaster County. At that time the Susquehanna River marked the western limit of the land purchased from the Indians in the province. But the purchase of October 11, 1736, opened a triangular area west of the river, which was attached to Lancaster until the convenience of the increasing settlements in this region in 1749 demanded the erection of York County, and a year later for the erection of Cumberland County.

The northern extension of these counties was limited by the Indian boundary line, marked by the Kittatinny Range.

Again the extension of settlements and the treaty of August 22, 1749, demanded new county organizations, and in 1752 Berks and Northampton were formed to include in their jurisdiction the northern portions of the older counties and the newly acquired territory between the Delaware and Susquehanna Rivers. Berks embraced the larger area.

Additional territory west of the Susquehanna was acquired from the Indians by the treaties of 1754 and 1758, which made the outlying county of Cumberland too large for the convenience of its inhabitants, and in 1771 Bedford County was erected.

A similar development was rapidly taking place east of the Susquehanna, occasioned by the activity about Fort Augusta, at the Forks of the Susquehanna, and the Pennamite-Yankee War, which was being waged for possession of the territory in the Wyoming Valley and elsewhere, claimed by the Susquehanna Company of Connecticut, and the treaty of November 5, 1768, added much new territory.

By an act passed March 21, 1772, the County of Northumberland was erected out of parts of the counties of Lancaster, Cumberland, Berks, Bedford and Northampton. The bounds of the new county stretched to the New York-Pennsylvania boundary line on the north and to the Allegheny River on the west, including in its extensive territory the present-day counties of Susquehanna, Lackawanna, Luzerne, Wyoming, Bradford, Sullivan, Columbia, Montour, Northumberland, Snyder, Union, Lycoming, Tioga, Potter, Clinton, Cameron, Elk, McKean, Forest, Jefferson, Clarion and parts of Schuylkill, Center, Mifflin, Juniata, Clearfield, Indiana, Armstrong, Venango and Warren.

It is with eminent propriety this tenth county of Pennsylvania has been frequently styled “Old Mother Northumberland,” and each of her twenty-nine children refer back to her for their earliest political history.

Its greatest proportions were attained in 1785, when, by the Act of April 9, all that part of the purchase of October 22, 1784, east of the Conewango Creek and Allegheny River was placed within its limits. The county thus extended along the northern line of the State as far west as the Conewango Creek, which crosses the New York-Pennsylvania boundary line in Warren County, and from the Lehigh River to the Allegheny River, with a maximum width of nearly two-thirds that of the State. The extent of this region exceeds that of several States of the Union.

By the Act of September 24, 1788, Allegheny County was created, including all the territory in the State north and west of the Ohio and Allegheny Rivers, and from this territory, by act of March 12, 1800, the counties of Beaver, Butler, Mercer, Crawford, Erie, Warren, Venango and Armstrong were erected. Thus it would seem that the first five of these should be added with the offspring of Old Northumberland, for three years at least. If this be the case her children would number thirty-four of the sixty-seven counties of the State.

The first curtailment of this generous domain resulted from the erection of Luzerne County, September 25, 1786. West of the Susquehanna the first county to which Northumberland contributed was Mifflin, erected September 19, 1789, but the part taken from Northumberland with additional territory from Northumberland and other counties, was erected into Center, February 13, 1800. The formation of Lycoming County, April 13, 1795, deprived Northumberland of the large extent of territory it had acquired under the purchase of 1784, with a considerable part of its original area.

Northumberland was thus reduced to the position of an interior county. With this reduced territory the statesmen of Pennsylvania were not fully satisfied, and March 22, 1813, the townships of Chillisquaque and Turbot were detached to form part of the new Columbia County, but this was an unpopular move and the greater part of these townships were re-annexed to Northumberland, February 21, 1815.

On June 16, 1772, the surveyor general was directed to “lay out a town for the county of Northumberland, to be called by the name of Sunbury, at the most commodious place between the fort (Augusta) and the mouth of Shamokin Creek.”

Until the court house was built the courts were held at Fort Augusta, the first session being held April 9, 1772.

The first jail in the county was the dungeon beneath the magazine of Fort Augusta. This is the only part of the early county buildings now in existence, and this particular dungeon and the old well which supplied water for the garrison are now the property of the Commonwealth.

When the county was erected the Governor appointed William Plunket, Turbut Francis, Samuel Hunter, James Potter, William Maclay, Caleb Graydon, Benjamin Allison, Robert Moodie, John Lowdon, Thomas Lemon, Ellis Hughes and Benjamin Weiser to be justices. William Plunket was the president of the court and served as such four years.

William Maclay was the Prothonotary and Register and Recorder, and served until March 22, 1777; George Nagel, Sheriff of Berks County, served in a similar capacity in the new county; Edward Burd was the State’s attorney, and the Coroner was James Parr. The original County Commissioners were William Gray, Thomas Hewitt and John Weitzel. Alexander Hunter was Treasurer, and Walter Clark, Jonathan Lodge, Peter Hosterman, James Harrison, Nicholas Miller, Jacob Heverling and Samuel Weiser, Assessors; Thomas Lemon, Collector of Excise; Joshua Elder, James Potter, Jesse Lukens and William Scull were appointed to run the boundary line; Samuel Hunter was the first member of the Assembly.

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Peter Pence, Indian Fighter, Captured

March 22, 1780

One of the conspicuous characters along the Susquehanna Valleys during the period of the Revolutionary War, and afterwards, was a Pennsylvania Dutchman by the name of Peter Pence. It is generally believed that his proper name was Bentz, a name which occurs frequently in Lancaster County, from which place he went to Shamokin. The well-known aptitude of the Dutchman to incorrectly sound his letters is given as the reason that his name was pronounced and spelled Pence.

In accord with the resolution adopted by Congress, June 14, 1775, directing the formation of six companies of expert riflemen in Pennsylvania to be employed as light infantry, one of the companies was recruited in Northumberland County, June 25, 1775, under the command of Captain John Lowdon.

Captain Lowdon then resided on a farm called Silver Spring, adjoining the present town of Mifflinburg, Union County, where he died in February, 1798, aged sixty-eight years.

The company formed part of the battalion of riflemen commanded by Colonel William Thompson, of Carlisle. This company boarded boats on the Susquehanna River and were conveyed to Harris’ Ferry, then marched overland to Reading, where they arrived July 13, and received knapsacks, blankets and other equipment. This battalion was composed of nine companies, two from Cumberland County, two from Lancaster, and one each from York and Northumberland, Berks, Bedford and Northampton.

The battalion arrived at Cambridge August 7, and soon became the picketguard of the 2000 provincials there. It also became the First Regiment of the Continental Line, Colonel Thompson being promoted to brigadier general, March 1, 1776. He was succeeded by Colonel Edward Hand, of Lancaster, who also became a brigadier, September 17, 1778.

This battalion participated in the Battle of Trenton, was at the taking of Burgoyne, was with Sullivan in his expedition against the Six Nation Indians, was at Stony Point under General Wayne and finally served in the campaign of South Carolina during the latter days of the war.

The first record of Peter Pence is as a private soldier in Lowdon’s company, and the further fact that he served faithfully is sufficient introduction to the thrilling life he led in the frontiers of Pennsylvania.

On March 22, 1780, the Indians made an attack on some settlers in the vicinity of Fort Wheeler, on the banks of Fishing Creek, about three miles above the present town of Bloomsburg, Columbia County. The Indians killed and scalped Cornelius Van Campen and his brother, and a son was tomahawked, scalped and thrown into the fire. Lieutenant Moses Van Campen, another son, was taken captive, as was his cousin, a young lad, and Peter Pence. Soon after this, at another place, the Indians took a lad named Jonah Rogers and a man named Abram Pike.

With their captives the Indians made their way over the mountains, into what is now Bradford County. The savage warriors were ten in number.

One evening, while the prisoners were being bound for the night, an Indian accidentally dropped his knife close to Van Campen’s feet, and he covered the knife unobserved.

About midnight, when the warriors were all asleep, Van Campen got the knife and released Peter Pence, who in turn released the others. Cautiously and quickly the weapons were obtained and a plan of action determined. The prisoners had been placed in the midst of the warriors. Van Campen and Pike were to use the tomahawk on one group, while Peter Pence opened fire on the other with the rifles.

The work was well done, Van Campen and Pike dispatched four while Pence, with unerring aim speedily killed his group. A hand to hand fight between the remaining Indian, John, a Mohawk sachem, and Van Campen, resulted in the Indian making his escape.

The liberated captives scalped the Indians, picked up their plunder and hastily constructed a raft, and, after a series of adventures, reached Wyoming, April 4, 1780, where Pike and young Rogers left the party. Peter Pence and the Van Campens reached Fort Jenkins on the morning of April 6, where they found Colonel John Kelly, with 100 frontiersmen who had hurried there from the West Branch. The following day Pence and Van Campen reached Fort Augusta, where they were received in a regular frontier triumph.

The next exploit in which we find Pence engaged is in the year 1781, when one of the most atrocious murders was committed near Selinsgrove.

Three brothers by the name of Stock were at work in the field when a party of about thirty Indians appeared. They did not attack the boys, but passed on to the house, which they entered. On the way they found another son plowing, whom they killed. Mrs. Stock and a daughter-in-law were found in the house. The mother defended herself with a canoe pole, as she retreated toward the field where her husband was working. She was tomahawked, however, the house plundered and the young woman carried into the woods nearby and killed and scalped. When Stock returned and found his wife, son and daughter-in-law inhumanly butchered he gave an alarm.

Three experienced Indian fighters, Michael Grove, John Stroh and Peter Pence went in pursuit of the enemy. They found them encamped on the North Branch, on the side of a hill covered with fern. Grove crept close enough to discover that their rifles were stacked around a tree and that all but three were asleep.

One of the Indians was narrating in high glee how Mrs. Stock defended herself with the pole. Grove lay quiet until all the Indians fell asleep. He then returned to his companions, Stroh and Pence. They decided to attack, and crept up close to the camp, when they dashed among the sleeping savages. Grove plied his deadly tomahawk, while Stroh and Pence seized the rifles and fired among the sleepers. Several Indians were killed; the others, believing they were attacked by a large party fled to the woods.

A captive white boy was liberated and the three brave men brought home a number of scalps and the best rifles.

March 10, 1810, the Legislature passed an act granting an annuity to Peter Pence, in consideration of his services, of $40 per annum. He died in the Nippenose Valley, in 1812. He left several sons and daughters. Robert Hamilton, of Pine Creek Township, Clinton County, was the executor of his estate. He left a will which is recorded in Lycoming County.

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John Bartram, First Great American Botanist and Founder of Bartram Gardens, Born at Darby, March 23, 1699

It is not generally known, at least outside of Pennsylvania, that that State was the birth place of a man whom the celebrated Linnaeus pronounced the greatest natural botanist in the world. This man was John Bartram, a native of Delaware County.

August 30, 1685 John Bartram bought three hundred acres of land from Thomas Brassey, which land was situated along Darby Creek, in now Delaware County. Here John Bartram was born March 23, 1699.

His early attention was first directed to botanical studies by one of those accidents which seem to shape the destinies of all great men.

When a mere lad and helping his father with the work about the farm he plowed up a daisy. Despite everything the modest little flower kept intruding itself on his consideration, until after several days he hired a man to plow while he rode to Philadelphia to procure a treatise on botany and a Latin grammar.

Fortunately for himself and the world he inherited a farm from a bachelor uncle, which gave him the means to marry early, and purchase the land where he afterwards established the noted “Botanical Gardens.” His wife was Mary, daughter of Richard and Elizabeth Maris; they were married April 25, 1723. Mrs. Bartram died within a few years, and he then married Ann Mendenhall, February 11, 1729.

Bartram bought his piece of ground at Gray’s Ferry in 1728. On this estate he built with his own hands a stone house, and on one of the stones in the gable was cut “John * Ann Bartram, 1731.”

Here he pursued his studious habits, his reputation spreading abroad until correspondence was solicited by the leading botanists of the Old World,—Linnaeus, Dr. Fothergill, and others,—while in the colonies, all scientific men in the same line of study sought his favor, advice and opinions. Dr. Benjamin Franklin was his earnest friend, and constantly urged Bartram to authorship.

His fame had so extended that in 1765 King George III appointed him botanist to the King.

He transmitted both his talents and tastes to his son William, and their joint labors during a period of nearly one hundred years were the most valuable contributions that this country has made to the science in whose behalf they were devoted.

They were pious Quakers, admired and loved by their acquaintances.

James Logan was probably the first person who directed the mind of John Bartram seriously to botany as the pursuit of a lifetime.

Logan was a lover of plants and flowers and enjoyed a wonderful garden at “Stenton,” and Bartram was a welcome guest.

Logan, in 1729, sent to England for a copy of “Parkinson’s Herbal,” saying he wanted to present it to John Bartram, who was a person worthier of a heavier purse than fortune had yet allowed him, and had “a genius perfectly well turned for botany.”

A subscription was started in 1742 to enable Bartram to travel in search of botanical specimens. It was proposed to raise enough for him to continue his travels for three years, he being described as a person who “has had a propensity to Botanicks from his infancy,” and “an accurate observer, of great industry and temperance, and of unquestionable veracity.”

The result of these travels was the publication of two very delightful books by this earliest of American botanists.

The specimens he collected were sent to Europe, where they attracted Kahn and many other naturalists to this country.

In 1751 he published his work, “Observations on the Inhabitants, Climate, Soil, Divers Productions, Animals, etc., made in his Travels from Pennsylvania to Onondaga, Oswego, and the Lake Ontario.” In 1766 appeared “An Account of East Florida, by William Stork, with a Journal kept by John Bartram, of Philadelphia, upon a Journey from St. Augustine, Fla., up the River St. John’s.”

He also contributed numerous papers to the Philosophical Transactions from 1740 to 1763.

He was the first in this country to form a botanical garden.

On the outside of his house, over the front window of his study, was a stone with the inscription, carved by his own hand:

“’Tis God alone, Almighty God, The Holy One, by me Adored. John Bartram, 1770;”

and an inscription over the door of his greenhouse was:

“Slave to no sect, who takes no private road, But looks through nature up to Nature’s God.”