Part 37
At the beginning of the Revolution Colonel Croghan embarked in the patriot cause, being elected chairman of the Committee of Safety of Augusta County, May 16, 1775. He later became an object of suspicion.
June 15, 1778, he was declared by Pennsylvania a public enemy, and his office of Indian Agent was conferred upon Colonel George Morgan. He continued, however, to reside in Pennsylvania, and died at Passyunk, in the summer of 1782. His will is dated June 12, 1782.
Colonel Croghan married a Mohawk Indian, and their daughter, Catherine, became the third wife of Joseph Brant, the celebrated Mohawk chieftain of the Revolutionary period.
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Pennsylvania Navy Meets British in Action, May 8, 1776
The Committee of Safety, which organized July 3, 1775, early in the following year, had a survey made of the Delaware River, with a view to its more extensive fortification. Leave was obtained from New Jersey to construct works on that side of the river; a permanent fort was determined upon at Billingsport; the fort at Fort Island was hurried to completion; it was decided to fortify Liberty Island, and additions were made to the chevaux-de-frise. To the naval flotilla were added the floating battery Arnold, the ship-of-war Montgomery, the fireship Aetna and some guardboats for Philadelphia harbor. This naval force soon had a chance to show its mettle.
On May 6 news came to Philadelphia by express from Fort Penn that two warships, a schooner and three tenders were coming up the river. The Committee of Safety ordered the gunboat flotilla and the Montgomery and Aetna, under command of Commodore Andrew Caldwell and Captain James Reed, to attack the enemy. His vessels were the Roebuck, forty-eight guns, under command of Captain Hammond, and the sloop-of-war Liverpool, twenty-eight guns, under command of Captain Bellew, and their tenders.
Captain Proctor, in command of the fort at Fort Island, volunteered for the fight with 100 of his men and served on board the Hornet. The Montgomery, the Continental ship Reprisal, under command of Captain Wickes, and the battery Arnold, under Captain Samuel Davidson, remained near the chevaux-de-frise, in a line with the forts. The other boats went down the river to the mouth of Christiana Creek, coming up with the enemy on the afternoon of May 8.
Fire was immediately opened on both sides and was maintained with much spirit until dark. The Roebuck ran ashore and careened; the Liverpool came to anchor to protect her and the provincial boats withdrew to obtain more ammunition.
During this engagement, the Continental schooner Wasp, with Captain Alexander, which had been previously chased into Wilmington, came out and captured an English brig belonging to the squadron. The fireship was not brought into use, and before morning the Roebuck was again afloat.
The attack was renewed at 5 o’clock in the morning when the British ships retired, being closely pursued as far as New Castle by the Philadelphia navy.
The officers of the flotilla complained grievously of the supplies furnished them by the Committee of Safety as being defective in quality and deficient in quantity; the powder was so bad that the men had to cut up their clothes and equipments to make the cartridges serviceable. There were also other defects, so that the officers threw the whole blame of their failure to destroy or capture the enemy vessels upon the committee. The Assembly investigated, however, and exonerated the committee.
The American loss was one killed and two wounded. The British lost one killed and five wounded. So it was quite probable this engagement was fought at long range. Members of the Provincial Navy, however, brought up some splinters from the enemy’s ships to exhibit at the Coffee House as trophies of the fight. The Roebuck and the Liverpool returned to their stations at Cape May, depending upon New Jersey, instead of Pennsylvania, for poultry and fresh provisions.
This engagement served a valuable purpose. Congress and the Provincial Assembly were certainly admonished to increase their navies. The Committee of Safety added to the galleys and other vessels, sloops, schooners, guard boats and also firerafts. This added force was composed of 743 men. Samuel Davidson was appointed to succeed Commodore Caldwell, as commander of the flotilla, soon after the fight, but on account of much opposition from other officers, never took up the command.
The Committee of Safety organized a system of privateers and letters of marque at this time, with the sanction of Congress. They created a Court of Admiralty, of which George Ross, of Lancaster, was judge; Matthew Clarkson, marshal, and Andrew Robinson, register.
Before July there had also been commissioned the brigs Hancock and Congress, and the sloop Chance, under Captains Wingate Newman, John Kaye, and James Robertson. As early as May the Congress and Chance had taken three valuable ships from Jamaica bound for London, with large cargoes of rum, sugar and molasses, 22,420 “pieces of eight,” 187 ounces of plate and a fine turtle, intended as a present to Lord North. The President of the Continental Congress received and enjoyed this turtle.
It is also of interest to our Province to note that the activities of the young navy resulted in other important prizes. The privateer Congress captured the schooner Thistle; the privateer Franklin, of Philadelphia, took a British storeship with seventy-five tons of gunpowder and 1000 stands of arms; the ship Lexington, under Captain John Barry, of Philadelphia, captured the Edward; the Wasp took the schooner Betsy. In the meantime the British Roebuck and Liverpool, with their tenders, made many captures of vessels about the Delaware Capes, chasing others ashore. But the record of the young American Navy was glorious and certainly a fine beginning for the brilliant successes which were to follow.
Thus we find that the Committee of Safety constructed the Pennsylvania State Navy three months before Congress proposed a Continental navy.
By August, 1776, the fleet numbered twenty-seven vessels, with Captain Thomas Reed as commodore, the first officer of that title in America. Another distinguished officer was Nicholas Biddle.
Three months after the State Navy was begun the Continental Congress took action for the construction of a Continental navy, which was also fitted out in Philadelphia. When the Congress of the United States established the Navy Department in 1798, the first navy yard was located in Philadelphia, where ship building had been an established enterprise since 1683. The city is today famous for the quality and quantity of ships built for this and other nations of the world.
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Bishop John Heyl Vincent, Founder of Chautauqua, Died May 9, 1920
General Grant once introduced Bishop J. H. Vincent to President Lincoln and said: “Dr. Vincent was my pastor at Galena (Illinois), and I do not think I missed one of his sermons while I lived there.”
This same Bishop Vincent, of good old Pennsylvania stock and many years a resident of Pennsylvania, was the founder of the Chautauqua Assembly, next only to the public-school system in bringing to the masses of the people some share of their inheritance in the world’s great creations in art and literature. This is the work of a man—a great teacher and educator and university preacher—who did not himself have a college education.
In 1772 the Vincent family, consisting of John Vincent and wife, their sons, Cornelius and Peter; their sons-in-law, Timothy Williams and Samuel Gould, removed from Essex County, N. J., and settled in Northumberland County, Pa., near the present town of Milton.
When the Indians became hostile during the Revolutionary War the early settlers along the West branch of the Susquehanna erected stockade forts at central points, into which the women and children of the neighborhood were gathered for protection at the approach of danger. In one of these forts, known as Fort Freeland, situated on Warrior Run, were gathered the Vincents, the Himrods, the Miles, the McKnights, the Boyds, the Kings, the Littles and others.
June 21, 1779, a party of Indians approached stealthily and fired upon six men hoeing corn in a field near the fort. They killed Isaac Vincent and James Miles and took Michael Freeland and Benjamin Vincent prisoners.
July 28, 1779, 200 British under Captain John McDonald and 300 Seneca Indians, under Chief Hiokatoo attacked the fort and compelled it to capitulate, the conditions of surrender being that all the men over seventeen should become prisoners of war, and the women and children and the aged should be set at liberty. Under this capitulation, Cornelius Vincent and his sons, Daniel and Bethuel, with their neighbors, were marched across the country to the Lakes, then to Quebec, where they remained prisoners till the close of the war.
The aged John Vincent and wife, with the wife and younger children of Cornelius, wended their way back on foot to New Jersey and were scattered among their friends until the return of the captives.
Soon after their return from captivity Cornelius Vincent and his wife and their sons, Daniel and Bethuel, returned to the West Branch Valley and resumed the settlement they had been obliged to abandon. Daniel built and owned a large mill on Warrior Run. Bethuel built a large hotel in Milton, and became its most prominent citizen. Bethuel Vincent was postmaster at Milton, June 29, 1803 to February 22, 1822, and again July 13, 1822 to June 23, 1829.
Cornelius Vincent died in Milton, July 16, 1812. Daniel Vincent died near his mills, January 26, 1826, and Bethuel died at his home in Milton, April 30, 1837.
Bethuel Vincent, born June 3, 1762, married Martha Himrod, January 1, 1788. They were the parents of nine children, of whom John Himrod, born April 20, 1798, was the youngest of the four sons.
John Himrod married Mary Raser, a native of Philadelphia, who died at Chillisquaque, Pa., February 16, 1852. They were old-fashioned Methodists, and parents of Bishop Vincent.
During a short residence in Tuscaloosa, Ala., John Heyl Vincent, the subject of this sketch, was born February 23, 1832. The parents soon moved back to their Pennsylvania home, where John H. attended the schools at Milton and Lewisburg. He began to preach at eighteen years and studied for awhile at Wesleyan Institute, Newark, N. J.
Reverend John Heyl Vincent joined the New Jersey Conference in 1853. Was ordained deacon, 1855; elder, in 1857. Transferred to Rock River, Ill. Conference, he became pastor at Galena in 1857, and General U. S. Grant was one of his parishioners. He then preached elsewhere and in Chicago.
A trip to the old world in 1862, contributed an important part to his intellectual training. He visited Egypt, Palestine, Greece, Italy and other countries.
In 1866 he was elected general agent of the Methodist Episcopal Sunday School Union and in 1868, corresponding secretary of the Sunday School Union and Tract Society, with residence in New York City. A complete series of his books forms an encyclopedia of modern Sunday School literature.
This work culminated in 1874, in the Chautauqua Sunday School Assembly, from which he founded, in 1878, the Chautauqua Literary and Scientific Circle and was its Chancellor until his death.
He was made resident bishop at Zurich, Switzerland, 1900, and placed in charge of European work of the Methodist Church.
Bishop Vincent became preacher to Harvard, Yale, Cornell, Wellesley and other universities and colleges, and was the recipient of many honorary degrees.
In speaking of his great work at Chautauqua he remarked: “I do not expect to make a second Harvard and Yale out of Chautauqua, but I do want to give the people of this generation such a taste of what it is to be intelligent that they will see to it that their children have the best education the country can give.”
Bishop Vincent died in Chicago, May 9, 1920, aged 88 years.
Bishop Vincent’s son, Hon. George Edgar Vincent, a distinguished educator and powerful orator, is president of the Rockefeller Foundation.
Pennsylvania may well be proud to claim the ancestors of Bishop Vincent, the founder of Chautauqua, as their own.
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Long Standing Boundary Line Dispute Between Maryland and Pennsylvania Proprietaries Signed May 10, 1732
In the boundary dispute between Pennsylvania and Maryland Lord Baltimore had observations taken of the latitude of New Castle, Delaware, which showed that town to be 39° 39′ 30″, which would place the end of the fortieth degree many miles to the north, and its beginning far beyond the reach of the radius of twelve miles as called for by Lord Chief Justice North, of England.
A degree of latitude is a band about sixty-nine and a half miles wide, extending around the earth parallel to the equator.
Lord North, William Penn, Lord Baltimore, and others, in the absence of better knowledge, simply assumed that the degrees on the maps were all too far south, which was only a guess, but in fact they were nearly correct.
Penn obtained his charter and sent William Markham, his cousin and deputy, to the Delaware to take an observation of the latitude, and he was to meet Lord Baltimore, or his agents, and settle the boundaries.
This meeting was held in Upland, now Chester, in latter part of the year 1681. The observation was taken, and it became manifest that an absurd mistake in latitude was revealed, and that the fortieth degree, the southern boundary of Pennsylvania was twelve miles farther to the North. Lord Baltimore already knew that the end of the fortieth degree was many miles north of its position on Captain John Smith’s map, and he renewed his old claim that his province of Maryland extended to the fortieth degree complete. Thus began the controversy which lasted twenty years.
This claim carried the northern boundary of Maryland far into Penn’s province, just north of Philadelphia, and if successfully defended would have cut from the southern part of our State all the territory south of a line running through Philadelphia, Dowingtown, just south of Lancaster, and north of York, Bedford, Somerset, Connellsville, Brownsville, and the village of West Finley in Washington County.
But Penn had a strong case to defend his territorial limits, his charter expressly defined the southern limit of Pennsylvania, as on the beginning of the fortieth degree, which would make its southern limit reach nearly to the City of Washington, and would have cut off from Lord Baltimore’s province much more territory than he was trying to cut from Penn’s. Penn also possessed the later grant from the Crown, and in such a dispute, where the limits overlapped, it would be taken to have annulled the older.
Penn was willing to yield his stronger position and compromise, all he demanded was that the line be placed where it was supposed to be when his charter was granted. The mistake in latitude made Penn’s boundary on the Delaware ridiculous, for the circle of twelve miles from New Castle could not possibly touch the beginning of the fortieth degree, which was forty miles to the south of it.
It would have been unfortunate to obstruct the settlement of this country by putting claims in which both seemed to be justified, but Penn did even more than expected. He offered to purchase from Baltimore sufficient land to give Pennsylvania a harbor at the head of the Chesapeake. At another personal interview with Baltimore at West River he suggested a compromise even more favorable to Maryland, by suggesting that additional territory should be given Baltimore to make up the loss of the increased length of a degree, which was recently ascertained to be 69½ instead of 60 miles. This would have placed the northern line of Maryland about seven miles north of the head of the Chesapeake.
Lord Baltimore refused all compromises offered by William Penn. He fancied he could obtain great acquisitions of territory, and was determined his province should consist of the present Maryland, Delaware and the southern strip of Pennsylvania above described.
The controversy was thrown in the privy council. The case was argued for two years, the council finally deciding that Baltimore’s charter did not give him a title to Delaware, because at the time of granting the charter that region had been in possession of the Dutch, and they ordered Baltimore and Penn to divide Delaware equally between them by a north and south line, midway between the Chesapeake and the Delaware. The decision of the council was confined to the controversy between Delaware and Maryland, and nothing was said about the disputed boundary of the 40° between Maryland and Pennsylvania and it remained unsettled.
This condition proved a great hardship, the inhabitants on the border, uncertain of their position, refused to pay taxes to either government, and the sheriffs of adjoining counties carried on a warfare of petty annoyance. This gave the rougher and lawless men an excuse for fighting. One of the most notable of these was Thomas Cresap. He caused so much trouble in the southern counties that when he was arrested and carried to Philadelphia, which he called a pretty Maryland town, his exploits were known as the Cresap War.
William Penn died July 30, 1718, leaving the question as unsettled as it was in 1682. Charles Calvert, the fifth Lord Baltimore, was now the proprietor of Maryland, and the first of the family to show much cleverness.
He went to Penn’s widow and admitted he had no just claim to the title of Delaware, and suggested that no more land should be granted near either of the disputed borders by either government for eighteen months, within which time they could settle all difficulties. This agreement was signed in February, 1723, and long after the eighteen months had passed into history, the agreement was faithfully observed by Hannah Penn, and after her death by her children. Baltimore also observed it.
William Penn’s widow died in 1726, and her young sons did not immediately mark the boundary, and Baltimore now assumed the role of an injured person, and in 1731 petitioned the Crown to compel the Proprietors of Pennsylvania to join with him in settling the boundaries. He applied to John and Thomas Penn to meet with him and sign an agreement of settlement, which they agreed to do, and they also accepted the terms proposed in it by Baltimore and the articles were signed May 10, 1732.
The southern boundary of Pennsylvania was fixed about seven miles north of the head of Chesapeake, and the same as William Penn had offered Baltimore in their interview at West River. By this agreement Lord Baltimore received more than had ever belonged to him.
A map was prepared, and attached to the agreement, on which the boundaries were plainly marked. This map was prepared by Baltimore, and the Penns accepted it as correct.
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Captain Stephen Chambers Fatally Wounded in Duel with Dr. Rieger May 11, 1789
In May, 1789, there was a brilliant banquet given at the public house of Colonel Mathias Slough, on the southeast corner of Penn Square and South Queen Street, Lancaster. This social function was attended by a large number of officers and soldiers who had fought in the Revolutionary War, among whom were Captain Stephen Chambers and Surgeon Jacob Rieger.
Captain Chambers was neatly dressed in his military uniform, and in personal appearance was one of the finest-looking officers of that period. Dr. Rieger was quite the opposite, rather diminutive in stature, unshaven and otherwise very untidy.
During the progress of the banquet Captain Chambers made some disparaging remark about Dr. Rieger, which the latter overheard and deemed insulting. The result was a challenge to a duel, which was as promptly accepted.
The parties immediately named their seconds, who fixed the following Monday evening, May 11, as the time. The parties met according to arrangement on the outskirts of Lancaster, and after the necessary details were concluded the antagonists faced each other, and at the command of fire neither shot took effect. The seconds, at this point, made an earnest effort to reconcile the principals, Captain Chambers and his seconds being in a mood to offer such terms as they believed to be proper and satisfactory, but Dr. Rieger would not consent to any terms of reconciliation.
They took their places and on the command of fire Captain Chambers snapped his pistol without discharging, but Dr. Rieger sent a ball crashing through both legs of Captain Chambers. His wounds bled freely, and for two days it was thought they were not dangerous; mortification, however, set in and he died in great agony on Saturday morning following, May 16.
Thus perished one of the noblest patriots and most brilliant legal minds of the bar, an event which agitated the public mind for years afterward as an unwarranted and cold-blooded murder.
Judge John Joseph Henry married Chambers’ sister, Jane, and was the attorney for his executors.
Captain Chambers was a native of Ireland, being born there in 1750. He came to Pennsylvania prior to the Revolution, and settled at Lancaster. He studied law and as soon as he was admitted to practice in 1773, he removed to Sunbury, where he became the first resident attorney of Northumberland County. Fithian, in his journal under date July 20, 1775, met him at Sunbury, “a lawyer, serious, civil and social.”
At the outset of the Revolution he entered the service. He was appointed first lieutenant of the Twelfth Regiment of the Continental Line, October 16, 1776, and promoted to captain in 1777.
He was chosen to the General Assembly from Northumberland County, October 2, 1778, and while in attendance thereon was admitted to the Philadelphia bar, March 6, 1779. In 1779 he was a member of the Republican Society of Philadelphia, whose object was the revision of the Constitution of 1776.
In the fall of 1780 he returned to his former home in Lancaster and soon attained a large and lucrative practice, owned several farms and also became interested in the iron business. He represented Lancaster County in the Council of Censors, 1783 and 1784. He also was one of the original members of the Pennsylvania Society of the Cincinnati.
He was a delegate to the convention November 29, 1787, which ratified, on the part of Pennsylvania, the Federal Constitution. In the debate he took a most aggressive part, frequently becoming very personal in his attack upon members of the opposite side, especially toward William Findlay. Captain Chambers voted with his comrades in arms, and on the side of the adoption of the Federal Constitution.
It is a matter of interest that Captain Chambers was among the distinguished patriots who were in the house of James Wilson, in Philadelphia, when the mob made a disgraceful attack against it, October 4, 1779. Captain Chambers appeared with James Wilson, and others, before Supreme Executive Council, October 19, 1779, and was bound over to appear at the next term of court, in the sum of £5000. George Clymer and Samuel Caldwell becoming his sureties in the sum of £2,500 each.
The evening of the day of the riot at “Fort Wilson,” Captain Chambers attended the Quarterly Communication of the Grand Lodge of Ancient York Masons and was installed Worshipful Master of Lodge No. 22, which was constituted at Northumberland the following month.
At the constitution of Lodge No. 22, about the middle of November, 1779, Chambers became its first Worshipful Master, and the warrant for that body was produced and presented by him at “his own proper cost and charges.”
In July, 1785, he became the warrant Worshipful Master of Lodge No. 43, at Lancaster, and both of these ancient lodges are still at labor, the former, Lodge No. 22, now at Sunbury.
Dr. Joseph Rieger was the surgeon of the Pennsylvania Rifle Regiment, commanded by Colonel Samuel Hiles. He was commissioned March 22, 1776. He was a highly respected physician of Lancaster. He died there in 1795.
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War of 1812 Began in Pennsylvania with Message of Governor Snyder May 12, 1812