Area History: Chapter 90 - Part III: Watson's Annals of Philadelphia and Pennsylvania, 1857, Vol I
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WATSON'S ANNALS of PHILADELPHIA and PENNSYLVANIA
Vol. I Written 1830 - 1850
Chapter 90. PERSONS AND CHARACTERS - Part III
JOHN FITCH
Among the wonderful things of this wonderful age, must be mentioned the
oblivious neglect of this extraordinary man ! The only parallel case among
us has been the long oblivion resting upon the name and fame of Godfrey.
Scarcely any seem to have acquainted themselves with the individual history
of Mr. Fitch. They only seem to know him, as being like "the man who the
longitude missed on" -- and as he, who failed to make his profits out of the
invention of the steamboat !!! The fame, and the rewards, have fallen into
later hands : -- not unlike the labours of the late Captain Edmund Fanning,
who first suggested and urged all the measures, means and benefits, for an
exploration of the polar regions of the South Pole, whilst other names and
persons are likely to engross the glory.
"There are insects that prey
On the brains of the Elk, till his very last sigh;
Oh, Genius ! thy patrons, more cruel than they,
First feed on thy brains, and then leave thee to die !"
Finding that none -- so far, will interest themselves to exalt, or
preserve the name and merits of "poor John Fitch", as he feelingly called
himself, I shall herein endeavour to set down sundry facts belonging to his
personal history. He went astray in the opinion of many in his religious
faith; but so far as we know, he lived correctly; and in general conduct was
much better than many who have juster theories to help their actions and morals.
The ancestors of John Fitch -- for he had respectable ancestors -- with a
vellum of pedigree and a coat of arms, were originally Saxon, and emigrated
to Essex, in England; from thence, they went out to Windsor, Connecticut;
where his great grandfather purchased one-twentieth of the original
settlement, and left it to three sons -- Joseph, Nathaniel, and Samuel.
John Fitch, the inventor, was born on the line between Hartford and
Windsor, on the 21st of January, 1743. He served his time, after he was
eighteen years of age, at clockmaking, with Benjamin Cheaney, in East
Windsor. He had two brothers, namely, Joseph and Augustus, and three
sisters, Sarah, Anne, and Chloe. He said of himself, that "take him all and
all, he was the most singular man all his life !" He met with harsh
treatment in early life from several, and especially from an elder brother
with whom he lived -- (his "good mother" Sarah Shaler, having died when he
was only four years of age) and he embraced infidel opinions when he was but
seventeen years of age -- superinduced, as he himself thought, by some
certain slights inflicted upon him about the building of a certain meeting
house in his neighbourhood. He was in the earliest youth fond of books and
study, which he probably inherited from his father, John Fitch -- (the son
of Joseph) "who had a genius for astronomy, mathematics and natural
philosophy, and was a truly honest and good man".
John Fitch, the subject of this memoir, was married in the twenty-fifth
year of his age, to Lucy Roberts, his elder, on the 29th December 1767, and
had a son, born the 3d November 1768; but he only lived with his wife, with
whom he dwelt in continual dissatisfaction, until the 18th January 1769;
when, as he says in his MS book, he could endure it no longer, and so left
his home, to seek more contentment in Trenton, N.J. There he remained and
pursued the business of a silversmith and the repairing of clocks, until the
breaking out of the revolutionary war -- when he estimated his property
acquired to be worth 800. He then took to gunsmithing for furthering on
the war; employed twenty hands at it, until the entry of the British, when
they destroyed his tools and furniture. He then fled into Bucks county, to
the house of John Mitchell, in Attleborough, and afterwards went to Charles
Garrison's, in Warminster township. While there, his 4000 dollars in
continental money depreciated to 100 dollars. After this, he went to the
west in 1780, as surveyor in Kentucky, and in 1782, intending a voyage to
New Orleans with flour, he was made prisoner by the Indians, near the mouth
of the Muskingum, on the Ohio. He was then carried, or rather driven,
twelve hundred miles bare-headed, to Detroit and Prison Island, where he was
given up to the British as a prisoner of war. He and his party were the
first whites who were captured after Wilkinson's massacre of the Moravian
Indians; and they had just reasons to fear every evil from their revenge.
Of that captivity, he used to relate many very stirring and affecting anecdotes.
It ought to be here mentioned, that many facts of himself are related with
much apparent frankness in his MS. books bequeathed to the Philadelphia
Library, and which being sealed, were not to be opened until thirty years
after his death, and never to be lent out of the institution without a
pledge of 500 for their safe return. Thus quitting his own age, and
appealing to another, as if to say, that he forsaw that the next age could
alone do justice to his memory. It may seem strange, that in such a reading
community as Philadelphia affords, there should be found so many, so long
indifferent to their examination and reading ! Who, even to this day, can
say that they have read them ? There is however, I am assured, for I have
not closely inspected them, much of deep instruction to be found in many of
his observations. Speaking of himself while at Trenton, he says, that he
had proved the fact, that "the best way to make the world believe him
honest, was to be the thing itself" -- and to his sedulous practice therein
he ascribes his rapid advancement in property. He had while there a greater
run of business than any silversmith, even in Philadelphia itself : and his
tools were certainly the best set then in America.
A gentleman, (D.L.) who entertains warm feelings for John Fitch --
regarding him as an unduly neglected and injured man, has kindly made me
acquainted with many facts concerning him, and among other means of
information which he possessed, he had made considerable examination of the
MS. remains found in the first volume in the City Library. He speaks of the
work as being "essentially a part and parcel of the man, and as exhibiting
him in bold relief every how, and in every way; in his shop, in his
thoughts, and in fin, in his very self". "You may there see a full
portrait of the man as he was in his sympathies and in his aversions; there
you may see the elaborate workings of an original and inventive mind." Will
any consider?
There were two individuals of Bucks county -- women who were the
neighbours and frequent observers of John Fitch, whilst he was a resident at
Garrison's, and whilst he was working for himself, at his inventions in
Jacobus Scouter's wheelwright shop; they were named Mary McDowell and Mrs.
Jonathan Delany. From Mary, I have learned some facts of Fitch's lands and
property in Kentucky. He owned there 1600 acres -- and whilst he was
engaged with his favourite object, the steam enterprise, others settled the
land and built thereon a fine mill and sundry dwellings and outhouses.
Being possessed of capital, and having possession, they were enabled to
suspend and defer any legal action. She thinks that his friends, Joseph
Budd and Doctor Say, were in partnership with Fitch, about its recovery.
Fitch, while in Kentucky, was a deputy surveyor, and seems to have been
intimate with Colonel Todd and Colonel Harrod, then men of consideration and
consequence there. He had one of the best requisites of an efficient
surveyor, in that he was a great walker; being tall, slender and sinewy. He
told Mary that he had sold 800 of his Maps of the north-western parts of the
United States, in the western parts of Virginia and Pennsylvania, making all
his journey on foot; and on such occasions, he could always out-travel a
horse. In walking he pitched forward, and went onward with a great swing.
On one occasion, when he was robbed of his silver and gold, to the amount of
200, which he had buried for its better security at Warminster, he walked
to Spring Mill and back, before sunset -- making forty miles in the journey.
One of his Maps is now at Warminster, preserved as a relic of the genius of
the man. It is inscribed as "Engraved and printed by the author" and with
equal truth it might have been imprinted thus -- "Engraved in Cobe Scout's
wheelwright shop, and printed on Charles Garrison's cider press, by the
author" -- for such were the facts in the case. All these efforts of the
man were specially designed to raise funds, whereby to push forward to
completion and success the absorbing subject of his steam invention. THAT
was the theme and the purpose of all his thoughts and wishes.
"Slow rises worth by poverty depressed !"
It was observed of Mr. Fitch, that frequently when engaged at his work in
the shop aforesaid, he would suddenly let fall his tools, and sit in an
inclined posture, meditating for two hours at a time. The "worthy Nathaniel
Irwin", the Presbyterian minister at Neshamany, was a frequent visiter of
Fitch while employed at Cobe Scout's (i.e. Jacobus Scouter's) and would
often stay examining the mechanical operations, and holding conversations
with the inventor, for half a day at a time. Fitch deemed his visiter a
"worthy man", and would frequently attend his sermons at the Neshamany
church. His friend Cobe Scout lived to the year 1829, and died at the age
of ninety years.
I am indebted to Mary McDowell for the fact, that Fitch had a daughter by
his wife, born not long after he left his home. She (Mary) says, that the
cause of his leaving his wife was an unfounded jealousy, and coupled with
the fact, that she united herself with the Methodists against his will and
expressed desire. This last may seem a small offence in the eyes of those
who now understand and respect that sect; but when they were "the sect every
where spoken against", and who went about every where "turning the world
upside down" in their progress of proselyting, who can now appreciate the
measure of offense to Fitch's hopes and wishes ! Besides, he was, as I
learned, a man of quick temper -- easily provoked -- not "slow to anger" --
and in the case of his wife, hard to reconcile. We understood it to be a
fact, that Mrs. Fitch, after the death of her father -- who left her a good
estate to herself and her two children-- sent her brother-in-law, Burnham,
with a letter to her husband, urging his return again to Connecticut, and
offering "to maintain him like a gentlemen for life" -- but he was
inflexible, and peremptorily refused the proffered benefit. His spirit was
entirely unbroken, though the winds and the fates were adverse in so many
other things. He sent a pair of silver shoe-buckes to his son, and a gold
ring to his daughter; but to his wife he refused to send any token of
regard, or rememberance -- although he was much importuned thereto at the
time, by Garrison's wife.
When I first became acquainted with the fact of John Fitch having left a
son and a daughter to inherit the name and fame, and yet knew not that any
could say who they were, or where they dwelt, I felt a strong desire to find
out the facts of their cases. The result has been, that I have ascertained,
after much inquiry, that his son was Shaler Fitch, a farmer of respectable
character and circumstances, leaving six children; and his eldest son, John
B. Fitch, is a respectable and intelligent gentleman, in the same vicinity
and has a family.
The daughter of John Fitch, named Lucy, married Colonel James Kilbourne,
of Worthington, Franklin county, Ohio; he is a gentleman of respectability
and influence, and has a family of six children. The wife of John Fitch is
buried at Harford, Ohio. I have other facts concerning other members of the
other branches of the family, not needful to be mentioned here. Some of the
original stock still remain about Windsor, Connecticut; but the most of them
have emigrated to Ohio. Colonel Luther Fitch, postmaster, at Sharon, Ohio,
who died there in 1841, and left a family, was the son of John Fitch's
brother Joseph.
The writer, in his boyhood, has himself seen the inventor, and feels
prepared to endorse the personal description which he now gives from Mary
McDowell's recollection. It agrees substantially with what I have
understood from Miss E. Leslie's recollections of him as seen by her when
visiting her fathers house in London; for it seems, though doubted by some,
that in his wanderings for patrons, he actually visited that metropolis, and
there published two of is pamphlets in 1793, now in the Philosophical
Library, in Philadelphia, numbered 330. He was in person upright and
"straight as an arrow", and stood six feet two inches in his stocking feet;
was what was called, "thin and spare", face slim; complexion tawny; hair
very black; and a dark eye, peculiarly piercing; his temper was sensitive
and quick, but soon over -- the case of his wife to the contrary
notwithstanding. His general character in Bucks county among his immediate
friends was that "he bore anger as the flint bears fire, which being much
enforced, shows a hasty spark and quick is cold again". His countenance was
pleasing and somewhat smiling. "In point of morals and conduct, he was
perfectly upright; sincere and honourable in all his dealings; and was never
known to tell a wilful falsehood, or indeed to use any guile". This was
certainly a good reputation among his neighbours, by quoting from the
Prophet Samuel, his challenge, and saying in effect, "let my religion be
appreciated by my life".
We avoid here, purposely, to say any thing of the peculiarities or merits
of Fitch's invention, because the little we have to say on that subject will
be told under the head and chapter of our notice of steam operations
generally. We may, however, remark that it was at this place he received
the first impulse to consider and investigate the subject. It was also
here, in Southampton run, on Garrison's farm, that he first tried his model.
I ought to add in conclusion, that the first person who ever stimulated my
mind to consider again, and to think better of the character and worth of
"poor John Fitch" as he called himself, when seeing the oppositions he was
called to encounter -- was himself a Christian man of the Society of
Friends, of the same neighbourhood of Warminster, and that he told me
feelingly, that he deemed it his Christian and civic duty, to endeavour to
see some justice done to the name and character of the deceased. He became
first concerned, as he assured me, in this matter, "when he first read the
insinuations and sometimes open slanders of Colden and others". They had
the effect to stimulate his inquiry and research, and the result was, at the
end of several years, that the inventor was either a misunderstood, or a
neglected, rejected and injured man. Whatever the mass of the public may
have considered or believed, it was a fact, that John Fitch had, in
Warminster and thereabout, a worthy band of warm admirers and enthusiastic
friends; and the few of them who still survive, are at this moment heartily
desirous to give reminiscences and anecdotes in confirmation of their
steadfast attachment to the name and memory of the injured benefactor of his
race. In all this,
"I will the tale as I've been told."
A second thought, inclines me to add a few supplemental facts, to wit:
The MSS. books of John Fitch in the Philadelphia Library, consist of five
volumes. Volumes 1 to 3 contain the memoirs of his life brought down to the
26th October 1792; the other two, contain the history of his steam
invention, with diagrams, &c. They occupy about 550 folio pages of cap, and
are dedicated "to the worthy Nathaniel Irwin, of Neshamany" the minister
before named.
Mr. Fitch was a ready writer with his pen, although careless as a
composuist. He wrote much as he would have talked, and seems to have
resorted, on many occasions, to writing rather than speaking, as if
preferring to present himself for consideration in that way, in his
intercourse with men in his business concerns, rather than by conversation.
In a power of attorney given by him to Jonathan Longstreth in 1786, he
speaks of his lands as lying in Jefferson, Lincoln and Fayette counties,
Kentucky; and mention is made in a letter to J. Fitch, of Thomas Speed and
John Rogers on Salt River, Mercer county. In another letter, dated from
Madison county, mention is made that Wilson, who lived on Fitch's land, had
a lawsuit with one Kite, about it. I mention these facts to elicit, if
possible, some future inquiry by others.
All things considered, it appears probable that Fitch must have died about
the year 1798, at or near Bardstown, Nelson county, Kentucky. This
inference is made, because he would be likely to be called there to
prosecute his claims. These he was earnest to make good for his son, to
whom he thus manifested parental fondness and regard.
At this crisis of his affairs, feeling "impatient of the law's delays", he
is said to have said at the court, "I'll wait no longer", and feigning
illness, he told a physician that he could not sleep (very probably, very
truly) and wished to take an anodyne. This he received from time to time in
the form of opium, without using it, till he had enough to take at once, and
wrapt himself in eternal sleep ! Thus perished the man, as the Longstreth
family have been informed, whose sensitive and disappointed mind could not
brook the cold apathy of the world, which was sneeringly looking upon his
darling project as the impulse of a diseased and deranged mind. It has also
been said by his host, one McCown, an innkeeper at Bardtown, who managed to
take to himself a parcel of Fitch's land after his death, that he had, in a
fit of desperation, drunk to excess and died. The truth of these matters
may be hereafter investigated. In the mean time, it is ascertained that he
made a will in June 1798, in favour of some of his creditors, who had been
before known as assisting him with funds for his steamboat experiments, &c.
He died a few days after. He had often been heard to say, before this
catastrophe, that if he failed to attain his legal rights, he should not
choose to survive his disappointment.
We have been thus particular as to names and places, on purpose to awaken
some inquiry, even yet, in the minds of others, who may have chances to
elicit future facts for the benefit of his family. His patents of 1782,
from Virginia, for 1600 acres, we have seen. If he, in mistaken faith, took
a Roman's remedy for "the ills of life" which a Christian may "keep beneath
his feet", what must be "the recompense of reward" to those who "by
covetousness" took the sin of his desperation, and their own injustice too,
upon their own souls !
How mortifying to contemplate, that the man who should have had the whole
civilized world as his willing admirers, and willing contributors to his due
reward, should nevertheless have died, and have been so little inquired
after in the time of his disappearance, as to have left ME the frequent
occasion of asking the American public where is his grave and where are his
lands !
One published account says he died of the yellow fever at Philadelphia in
1793; another printed account says he drowned himself at Pittsburg in the
same year; both setting the time when he was actually in London, printing
two of his publications ! In truth, he was allowed to come and go, without
notice and without observation ! It was only after much search and much
inquiry that I lately found out his remains at Bardstown, interred there in
June or July 1798; and now I propose to stimulate a few of the right kind of
men, to have a suitable monument erected to his memory, and over his
remains, somewhere on the banks of the Ohio, and within sight and sound of
the steamers, which owe their existence to his invention.
I ought here to add, that I have been well assured, from those who knew
the fact, that Fitch was wholly original in his conceptions; none of them in
the beginning were deduced from books. The over boiling of a tea-kettle
first suggested to his mind the power of vapour. It is known from his
friend, the Rev. Mr. Irwin, that when he brought him some engraved specimens
of a steam apparatus of some kind, found in some European work, that he
showed much chagrin and mortification, to have found himself not so wholly
unique as he had before presumed himself to be. It is known also, that his
first idea, told at the time, of propelling land carriages by steam, was
suggested to his mind in April 1785, while walking from meeting with James
Ogilbee, and was caused by his noticing the motion of a wheel in a passing
chaise. This fact has been certified by James Ogilbee and James Scout in
1788. The thought of steam carriages he entertained for a few weeks, and
then gave up that for steamboats. In June 1785, after making the drafts of
his boat scheme, he went to Philadelphia and showed them to Doctor Ewing,
Professor Patterson, and others. In August, he laid his models before
Congress. John Fitch, in his MSS. makes this admission, to wit : --
"although I knew that the thought of applying steam to boats had been before
known, yet I was the first that ever exhibited a plan to the public -- when,
therefore, I had shown it to General Washington, I felt all the elation of
hope and expectation". He admits that William Henry of Lancaster,
Pennsylvania, in conversation with Andrew Ellicot in 1775, had intimated the
thought that steam might be applied to the navigation of boats. Fitch was
an honest dealer to others, and admitted in his certificate to Henry Voight,
of May 9th 1789, that the said H. Voight "had invented a new boiler for
creating steam in a cheap and expeditious manner" and in another paper of
23d December 1789, he certifies that "H. Voight is a great genius, and that
except in a few instances, Fitch had given up his opinion of Voight".
"Honour to whom honour is due!"
One account which I have seen, says that his friends helped him to a fund
to go to France, at the request of Mr. Vail, our consul, who wished to
introduce the invention into France; but the progress of the Revolution
there prevented any sufficient attention to his schemes and his interest.
It is added that Mr. Vail afterwards subjected to the examination of Mr.
FULTON, when in France, the papers and designs. It is certain that Mr. Vail
is one of the legatees in Mr. Fitch's will. If Mr. Fitch was in France, it
probably furnished the occasion and the cause of his also visiting England
about the same time. Captain Wood, of East Windsor, says he went to France
before the Revolution (the French) and came away so poor that he had to work
his passage to Boston.
In June 1792, Mr. Fitch addressed a letter to Mr. Rittenhouse, in which he
said emphatically, "This, sir, will be the mode of crossing the Atlantic in
time, whether * I * shall bring it to perfection or not." At the same time
he urges Mr. R. to assist him, by buying his lands in Kentucky. To a smith,
who had worked upon his boat, he said "If I shall not live to see it, you
may, when steamboats will be preferred to all other means of conveyance, and
especially for passengers; and they will be particularly useful in the
navigation of the Ohio and Mississippi". Jacob Graff was his smith; Boyer
Brooks was his boat-builder.
When the project first presented to his mind of propelling by force of
condensed vapour, "he had not (as he himself affirmed) ever heard of such a
thing as a steam engine in existence". The Hon. N. Boileau, then of Bucks
county, remembers well, that Mr. Fitch had, besides his paddles, the
conception of using wheels also, for he actually engaged him, as an
ingenious boy, to cut out small ones from drafts, to serve as models, to
direct in the construction of larger ones. Some of the models were made in
brass.
Mr. Fitch did not admit that James Rumsey, though before him in his
schemes of a boat *without* steam, had preceded him in any of his proper
inventions for a boat *with* steam. This is tested by a publication of May
1778, printed by Z. Poulson, Philadelphia, entitled, "The original Steamboat
supported, or a Reply to Mr. James Rumsey's pamphlet, showing the true
priority of John Fitch, and the false datings, &c., of James Rumsey" in 34
pages, 8vo. The particulars of this will be seen under the article, in this
work, on steamboats.
John Fitch's pamphlet, which he published in London in 1793, entitled "An
Explanation for the keeping a ship's traverse at sea, by the Columbian Ready
Reckoner", is another manifest proof of the inventive and ingenious
faculties of his mind; such as was never idle ! In crossing the Atlantic,
in his voyage to Europe, he had observed the navigators using a round board
with the points of the compass cut on it, with holes in the points, into
which they put a peg as often as they had run an hour, and thus marking the
point they had run. Meditating upon this as his text, he, although no
mariner, soon formed his idea of a plate to be made of paper, skin, wood or
metal, to be so inscribed "as might reduce the art of navigation to the
comprehension of the smallest capacity, and greatly simplify it, so as to
save much trouble in their reckonings". "I have (says he) endeavoured to
bring the art of navigation into one focal point, and to make it unnecessary
to tease themselves with logarithims, signs, tangents, and trigonometry. So
that he believes that the use of the plate and the keeping of the ship's
traverse can be resolved in much less time than in the common way now used."
It might be learned, says he, in six hours' teaching, and the possession of
a moderate share of arithmetic; nay more, "a person who has not the use of a
pen may cross the Atlantic, without the necessity of making a figure !"
To those who are curious in this matter, the pamphlet, in 20 pages, may be
seen in the Library of the Philosophical Society in Philadelphia. It
certainly manifests a very generous spirit in the inventor, to have thus
offered his services gratis to the use of the mariner.
Mr. Fitch while in Indian captivity, made himself a great favourite with
the Buffalo chief, by making for him metal ornaments, and engraving his
powder horn, &c. Before his adoption of him, he had to run the usual
gauntlet, and received many blows. At one time, when he was descending the
Ohio with flour for New Orleans, when it was bringing forty dollars per
barrel, it was all captured by the Indians, and thus all his prospects were
frustrated. When he exchanged Indian captivity for the place of a prisoner
of war to the British at Detroit, he fell into money making, by making metal
ornaments for the officers. After eight or ten months as a prisoner, he got
from Quebec, round by sea, and arrived again in Bucks county, at the house
of his old friend Cobe Scout; where they rushed into each other's arms, like
warm-hearted brothers. Next day they went to meeting, and public thanks
were offered there, by his reverend friend Irwin. At one time he was
lieutenant in the army at Valley Forge. At another time he was sutler to
the army in the west, and made money. Often he was out on foot expeditions
with articles of silver made by him and to be sold through the country. He
was, in a word, essentially "a universal Yankee".
As soon as I had ascertained the place in Kentucky where rest the remains
of John Fitch, I took measures to have them brought thence, to be deposited
at the Laurel Hill Cemetery, where they might have a suitable monument
erected to their memory. But it has been deferred from the interference of
sundry gentlemen there, who have solicited to have them remain in that
state, with a view to have them deposited under a monument, to be erected on
the margin of the river Ohio, below Louisville; in sight of passengers
passing in the steamboats. This, in accordance with his known expressed
wishes -- and therefore to be inscribed on the tablet, to wit :
"His darling wish (he said) was to be buried
On the margin of the Ohio,
Where the song of the boatmen might penetrate
The stillness of his resting place;
And where the sound of the steam engine
Might send its echoes abroad."
"Nihil mihi optatius accidere poterat !"
Another inscription, with equal fitness, might be inscribed on another
side of his monument, equally forcible, from his own pen -- to wit :
"While living, he declared --
"This will be the mode of crossing the Atlantic in time,
Whether I shall bring it to perfection or not."
"Steamboats will be preferred to all other conveyance,
And they will be particularly useful
In the navigation of the Ohio and Mississippi."
"The day will come, when some more potent man
Will get fame and riches for my invention."
Should the Kentuckians be faithful to themselves, they will of course see
to the execution of this monument; but if not, we know of another disposal
of his remains, which will give them perpetuity of honour at Laurel Hill --
where they will be equally near the scenes of his early operations and
associations.
In fin, from what we have gleaned of John Fitch, and his perils,
adventures, and adversities of life, we feel satisfied, that he has left
enough of his written facts to make a lively work of romance and tale; even
if none should be found "to do him reverence", by making a true book of his
memoirs and biography. Will any take the hint?
WILLIAM LOGAN
William Logan eldest son of James Logan, was born at the family seat at
Stenton. His education was conducted under the eye of his father, and
completed in England. Commerce was selected as his profession, and after
the death of his father, he moved to Stenton, and devoted himself chiefly to
agriculture.
He occupied a seat at the Provincial Council, and took a part in the
passing public affairs. Like his father, he became at the same time, a warm
friend of the proprietary interests, and a decided protector of the Indian
race. He received the Indians cordially at his place -- gave the aged a
settlement (called the Indian field) on his land, and educated their young
at his own expense. When the fierce and inflamed spirits from Paxton sought
the blood of the unoffending Indians, even to Philadelphia -- he,
notwithstanding his union with Friends, joined others in taking measures to
defend their lives by force.
He travelled extensively in this country, and his Journal from
Philadelphia to Georgia is still preserved, and might, if published, show a
different state of society and country from what is now seen. During the
revolutionary war he was in England. With the same spirit of his father, he
executed the conveyance of the Loganian Library to the city of Philadelphia,
as well as the estates, which have since served to augment the catalogue and
the income.
JAMES HAMILTON
The Hamilton family, the owners and occupants of the elegant seat near the
city called Bush Hill, always moved in a style of elegance and distinction.
The first of the name settled among us was Andrew Hamilton, from Scotland
-- he was an eminent lawyer -- was made attorney general, and was for many
years speaker of the provincial assembly.
His city residence was the large house on Chestnut street near Third
street, called Clarke's Hall, and in that house was born his son James
Hamilton, the subject of the present short notice.
The education of James Hamilton was begun in Philadelphia and completed in
England. At the death of his father in 1741, he was left in possession of a
handsome estate, and in the appointment of prothonotary, then the most
lucrative office in the province. {Note : prothonotary = chief of any of
various courts of law.}
In 1747 he was appointed lieutenant governor of Pennsylvania, and being
the first native governor, and having much of that integrity, wisdom and
dignity which best fitted his station, he became a very popular officer. It
was against the wishes of all parties that he resigned his commission in
1754, and still more against his own inclinations that, when in England in
1759, he was prevailed upon again to accept the office. In 1763 he yielded
his place to John Penn, retaining however, his place at the council board,
but otherwise retiring from public life.
He was always a liberal supporter of all public and useful measures and
improvements. He gave a strong impulse to the college -- assisted Benjamin
West in his early efforts, and had his own full length portrait executed by
him. He had inherited from his father a strong attachment to the Penn
family and their interests, strengthened also by the marriage of his niece
to John Penn, the governor. He had also loyal feelings to the crown. It
consequently followed that he was unfriendly to the Revolution, but quietly
submitted for a season to what he could not control. He died soon after the
peace, an aged gentleman.
JAMES PEMBERTON
This gentleman, born, educated, and reared in Philadelphia in the bosom of
Friends, possesses in his personal characteristics the "beau ideal" of a
genuine Quaker of the old school, and it is because that we have had a
favourable opportunity of sketching the individual from the life, that we
here annex a portrait of himself -- in propria personna -- such as it once
was, as a walking figure in the streets of Philadelphia. His whole figure,
garb and air are primitive, and serve to show and perpetuate the Quaker
characteristics, as shown down to the year 1800. When shall we look upon
his like again ? I have spoken a little about the dress of Friends, under
the head of "Friends", and this portrait may serve to exemplify more fully
what was intended to be there described.
He was born at Philadelphia the 26th of August 1723 -- son of Israel, and
grandson of Phineas Pemberton, one of the early and distinguished settlers
of Pennsylvania.
His education was conducted at the Friends' school. From his youth he was
distinguished for diligence, integrity and benevolence. In 1745 he
travelled to Carolina, and in 1748 he visited Europe and travelled much in
England. On his return, he engaged extensively in commerce, in which he
received successful returns, and always by prescribed rules of the most
punctilious probity -- some instances of which are remembered to his honor.
He was an ardent agent in all measures of decided good. He was a liberal
contributor and useful manager of the Pennsylvania Hospital -- an active
member in the Friendly association for preserving peace with the Indians --
one of the founders of the Pennsylvania Abolition Society. He was a
leading member of his own religious society -- always loved and always
respected. He was averse to war, and to our revolutionary movements,
because he was a Friend, and besides this, he did not suppose that
differences could only be settled by arms. The consequence was, venerable
and peace loving as he looks in his portrait, he was included in the sixteen
or seventeen other citizens of Philadelphia who were banished to Virginia in
1777, "to keep the peace". There he spent a couple of years and wrote out a
journal, some of which has been published in the Friends' Miscellany, volume
7. He died, a patriarch, at Philadelphia, February 1809, in his 87th year
-- almost the last of the race of the "cocked hats" and certainly one of the
very best pictorial illustrations of by-gone times and primitive man.
THE REV. JACOB DUCH
He was the son of a respectable merchant of the same name, and grandson of
Andrew Duch, a worthy Huguenot, who fled from France and came to this
country with William Penn.
The reverend subject of this notice, Jacob Duch, was born about the year
1740.[sic] He was educated in the Philadelphia College, where he often
distinguished himself. He was a good orator, and a ready versifier. In
time he studied theology -- went to England for holy orders, and after his
return became an assistant and afterwards, in 1755, a rector in Christ
Church and St. Peter's. As a preacher he enjoyed great popularity. His
appearance and manners were imposing -- his voice was full and musical --
his elocution uncommonly graceful, and his sermons oratorical.
But what made his name and fame most conspicuous was his attempt, by
letter to General Washington, to bring him over to the British side in the
Revolution ! It was of course an abortive effort, and had the effect to
drive himself way, by flight, from his country and home -- so that he
remained abroad -- in England, till after the peace : then he returned and
died among us, repentant and humbled at the course he had taken. His conduct
was not so much the result of defection as discouragement. He had at the
beginning of the struggle set out as an ardent whig -- he had preached on
public occasions sermons full of patriotic ardour, and had been elected
chaplain of the American Congress in July 1776 : and while he held this
office he had appropriated his salary to the relief of the families whose
members had been slain in battle. But alarmed and terrified, at length, by
the increasing loom and despondency of the period, when the British marched
successfully through the Jerseys, and at length occupied Philadelphia, he
forsook his former principles and bias -- went over to the stronger side,
and then wrote his well known letter to General Washington, to urge HIM to
make the same peace for himself and country !
Chapter 91. AGED PERSONS
"The hands of yore
That danced our infancy upon their knee
And told our marvelling boyhood, legends' store,
Of their strange ventures, happ'd by land and sea --
How they are blotted from the things that be !"
There is something grateful, and perhaps sublime, in contemplating
instances of prolonged life -- to see persons escaped the numerous ills of
life unscathed. They stand like venerable oaks, steadfast among the minor
trees, e'en wondered at because they fell no sooner. We instinctively
regard them as a privileged order, especially when they bear their years
with vigour, "like a lusty winter", they being alone able to preserve
unbroken the link which binds us to the remotest past. While they remain,
they serve to strangely diminish our conceptions of times past, which never
seems fully gone while any of its proper generations remains among us.
These thoughts will be illustrated and sustained by introducing to
consideration the names and persons who have been the familiars of the
present generation, and yet saw and conversed with Penn, the founder, and
his primitive contemporaries ! How such conceptions stride over time ! All
the long, long years of our nation seem diminished to a narrow span ! -- For
instance :
Samuel R. Fisher, a merchant, late in this city, in his 84th year told me
he well remembered to have seen at Kendall Meeting, James Wilson, a public
Friend, who said he perfectly remembered seeing both George Fox, the founder
of Friends, and William Penn, the founder of our city !
Often, too, I have seen and conversed with the late venerable Charles
Thomson, the secretary of the first Congress, who often spoke of his being
curious to find out, and to converse with, the primitive settlers which
still remained in his youth.
Every person who has been familiar with Dr. Franklin, who died in 1790,
and saw Philadelphia from the year 1723, had the chance of hearing him tell
of his seeing and conversing with numerous first settlers. Still better was
their chance who knew old Hutton, who died in 1793, at the prolonged age of
108 years, and had seen Penn in his second visit to Philadelphia in 1700 --
and better still were the means of those now alive, who knew old Drinker,
who died as late as the year 1782, at the age of 102 years, and had seen
Philadelphia where he was born in 1680, even at the time of the primitive
landing and settlement in caves ! Nor were they alone in this rare
opportunity, for there was also the still rarer instance of old black Alice,
who died as late as the year 1802, and might have been readily seen by me --
she then being 116 years of age with a sound memory to the last, distinctly
remembered William Penn, whose pipe she often lighted, (to use her own words)
and Thomas Story, James Logan, and several other personages of fame in our
annals. The late Mrs. Logan has told me, that much of her known affection
for the recitals of the olden time were generated in her youth, by her
frequent conversations with old Deborah Claypole, who lived to the age of 95
years, and had seen all the primitive race of the city -- knew Penn -- knew
the place of his cottage in Ltitia court, when the whole area was tangled
with a luxurious growth of blackberries. Her regrets now are, that she did
not avail herself more of the recollections of such a chronicle than she
then did. The common inconsideracy of youth was the cause.
It may amuse and interest to extend the list a little further, to wit :
The late aged Sarah Shoemaker, who died in 1825 at the age of 95 years, told
me she often had, in her young days, conversed with aged persons who had
seen and talked with Penn and his companions. In May 1824, I conversed with
Israel Reynolds, Esq., of Nottingham, Maryland, then in his 66th year, a
hale and newly married man, who told me he often saw and conversed with his
grandfather Henry Reynolds, a public Friend who lived to be 94 years of age
and had been familiar with Penn, both in Philadelphia and in England. He
had also cultivated corn in the city near the Dock creek and caught fish there.
Mrs. Hannah Speakman, who died in 1833 aged 80 years, has told me that she
has often talked with aged persons who saw or conversed with Penn, but being
then in giddy youth, she made no advantage of her means to have inquired.
Her grandfather Townsend, whom she had seen, had come out with Penn, the
founder.
But now all those who still remain, who have seen or talked with black
Alice, with Drinker, with Hutton, with John Key the first born, are fast
receding from the things that be. What they can relate of their
communications must be told quickly, or it is gone !
"Gone ! glimmering through the dream of things that were."
We shall now pursue the more direct object of this article, in giving the
names and personal notices of those instances of grandevity, which have
occasionally occurred among us -- of those who,
"Like a clock, worn out with eating time,
The wheels of weary life at last stood still !"
1727 -- This year died Grace Townsend aged 98 years, well known among the
first settlers, and who lived many years on the property nigh the Chestnut
street bridge over Dock creek at the Broad Axe Inn.
1730 -- January 5, died in Philadelphia, Mary Broadway, aged 100 years, a
noted midwife; her constitution wore well to the last, and she could read
without spectacles.
1731 -- May 19, John Evet, aged 100, was interred in Christ Church
grounds. He had seen King Charles the First's head held up by the
executioner, being then about 16 years old.
1739 -- May 30, Richard Buffington, of the parish of Chester, a patriarch
indeed, had assembled in his own house 115 persons of his own descendants,
consisting of children, and grand and great grandchildren, he being then in
his 85 year, in good health, and doubtless in fine spirits among so many of
his own race. His eldest son, then present at 60 years of age, was said to
have been the first Englishman born in Pennsylvania region, and appears to
have been three or four years older than the first born of Philadelphia, or
than Emmanuel Grubb, the first born of the province.
Speaking of this great collection of children in one house, reminds one of
a more extended race, in the same year, being the case of Mrs. Maria Hazard,
of South Kingston, New England, and mother of the governor. She died in
1739, at the age of 100 years, and could count up 500 children,
grandchildren, great grandchildren, and great great grandchildren; 205 of
them were then alive. A grandaughter of hers had already been a grandmother
15 years ! Probably, this instance of Rhode Island fruitfulness may match
against the world.
1761 -- Died, Nicholas Meers, in his 111 year and was buried in Friend's
ground at Wilmington. He was born in the year 1650, under the government of
Cromwell, and about the time of the rise of the society of which he became a
member. He lived through eventful periods, had been the subject of ten
successive sovereigns, including two Cromwells. He saw Pennsylvania and
Delaware one great forest -- a range for the deer, buffalo, and panther; and
there he lived to see a fruitful field. If those who were conversant with
him in his last days, had conversed with him on his recollections of the
primitive days of our country, what a treasure of facts might have been set
down from his lips ! So we often find occasions to lament the loss of
opportunities with very aged persons, of whom we hear but little until after
their death.
"First in the race, they won, and pass'd away !"
1763 -- Miss Mary Eldrington, of Elizabethtown, New Jersey, died at the
age of 109 years. "She still looked for a husband, and did not like to be
thought old".
1767 -- Mrs. Lydia Warder died this year, aged 87 years; she was born in
1680, came out with Penn's colony, had lived in a cave, and had a lively
memory of all the incidents of the primitive settlement.
This same year, 1767, was fruitful in passing off the primitive remains
from among us; thus showing, that in the deaths of those named in this year,
of the first settlers, there were inhabitants lately alive, who must have
had good opportunities of making olden time inquiries.
"Of no distemper, of no blast they died,
But fell like autumn fruit that mellow'd long,
E'en wonder'd at, because they fell no sooner."
1767 -- July -- Died at Chester county, John Key, aged 85 years, the
first-born in Philadelphia, at a cave named Penny Pot, at Vine street; and
in August 10, (same year) died at Brandywine Hundred, Emanuel Grubb aged 86
years, also born in a cave, by the side of the Delaware river, and the
first-born child in the province of English parents. Both these first-borns
died near each other, and their deaths, in the same year, was not unlike the
coincident deaths of Jefferson and Adams, as the signers of Independence !
1767 -- Died at Philadelphia, Mrs. Elizabeth Morris, aged 94 years.
1768 -- September -- Died at Philadelphia, Peter Hunt, aged 101 years.
1769 -- July -- Hannah Miller died aged 101 years; she was the mother of
14 children, grandmother of 82 children, and great grandmother to 110
children -- making 206 children !
1770 -- This year died Rebecca Coleman, aged 92 years. She came to
Philadelphia with the first settlers. Some of her posterity at her death
were of the fifth generation. She could recount much of ancient
Philadelphia -- for she remembered it when it consisted of but three houses,
and the other dwellings were caves. Some now alive must remember her
conversation, and might even yet communicate something.
1770 -- January -- Died, Sarah Meredith aged 90 years. She was born in a
little log house, where now the city stands, where she continued until she
changed her maiden name of Rush to become the wife of David Meredith, and to
settle in the Great Valley, in Chester county, 28 miles from Philadelphia --
then the frontier settlement, and six miles beyond any neighbours save
Indians, who were then numerous, kind and inoffensive. There she continued
all her days; becoming the mother of 11 children, grandmother to 66, and
great grandmother of 31.
1770 -- June 30th, died at Merion, Jonathan Jones, aged 91 years, having
been 90 years in the country, he coming here from Wales, when an infant.
1770 -- This year died John Ange, at the extraordinary age of 140 years,
as declared by himself, and as fully believed by all his neighbours, from
the opinions of their fathers before them. He was settled as a planter
between Broad creek and the head of Wicomoco river in Pennsylvania. He had
been blind some years from age. He left a son of about 80 years a great
grandfather, hale, active and lively, and without gray hairs.
1774 -- 14th of February, died in Bucks county, Mrs. Preston, at the
advanced age of 100 years and upwards. She had seen Penn and his colonists
at Philadelphia; had acted as his interpreter occasionally with the Indians.
She possessed her memory and understanding till her last.
1782 -- 17th of November, died Edward Drinker, aged 102 years, having been
born on the 24th of December 1680, in a cabin near the corner of Second and
Walnut streets -- the triangular block. When Doctor Franklin was questioned
in England to what age we lived in this country, he wittily said, he could
not tell until Drinker should die and settle it !
1792 -- December 20th, died John S. Hutton, aged 109 years, having been
born in 1684; he was cheerful, good humoured, and temperate all his life.
He deemed himself in his prime at 60 years of age. He was very fond of
fishing and fowling, and could be seen when past 80 carrying his duck gun.
1802 -- This year died Alice, a black woman aged 116 years. She had known
the city from its origin. When she was 115, she travelled from Dunk's Ferry
to the city, and there told Samuel Coates, and others, of numerous early
recollections of the early days. See facts concerning her under her proper
name.
1810 -- Died at Philadelphia, George Warner, aged 99 years. This
patriarch was one of many emigrants that came out from England as farmers
and mechanics in 1726 -- a time when he saw our city in its green age, when
all was young. He often described things as he then found them, and
contrasted them with their subsequent changes.
The aged Barbara Niebuhr, a German by birth, who came to this country with
some Swedes, is named by Miss Leslie as known by her in her childhood, as a
real centenarian. She had, for all the period of Miss Leslie's girlish
days, been a vender of cakes and fruits from a table set in Chestnut street,
near the entrance of the Bank of North America. She was so old that she had
seen Penn at his landing, at the Dock creek mouth ! She described Penn as a
stout, well-looking man, dressed in dark plain clothes, with a short wig. A
few years before her death, (which occurred at her little house in Appletree
alley) her white hair all came out and was replaced by a new growth of black
hair, as seen by Miss Leslie. The old woman was visited by Dr. Priestly as
a curiosity -- and she much pleased him with her intelligent answers to his
inquiries, about incidents of the olden time. It was a matter of much self
gratulation to Miss Leslie (in 1838) to say, that *she* had *seen* and
*conversed* with a person who had *seen* Penn !
1823 -- Died at Philadelphia, Mrs. Hannah Till, a black woman who had been
cook to General Washington and General LaFayette, in all their campaigns
during the war of Independence. The latter at my instance went to see her,
at No. 182 South Fourth street, when he was here in 1825, and made her a
present to be remembered.
1825 -- Died at Philadelphia Almshouse, Margaret or Angela Millet, in the
112th year of her age. She was born and lived in Canada -- said she was
nearly forty when General Wolfe was slain -- remembered him well --
remembers and tells much of the Indian barbarities.
1825 -- Billy Brown, a black man of Frankford, was seen by me in his 93d
year of age -- he lived about two years afterwards. He was of the African
race, taken a prisoner when a lad, leaving his parents and five brethern;
and was two years before reaching the coast and being sold. I found him
quite intelligent, his memory good, and himself a pious, good man. He was
then the husband of a young wife, by whom he had children, the youngest then
16 years old. What made him most interesting, he had been at Braddock's
defeat, as servant to Colonel Brown of the Irish regiment. There he
remembered and described to me the conduct of Washington in that action --
how he implored Braddock for leave to fight the Indians in their own way,
with 300 of his own men, and how he was repulsed with disdain. {The detail
of Billy's narrative of the defeat, &c., was given by me to the Historical
Society of Pennsylvania, in my MS. book of "Historical Collections" in
1827.} He was afterwards at the death of General Wolfe, and near his
person, still with Colonel Brown; thence went to the attack of Havana;
thence at the peace, to Ireland with his master, who there set him free by a
vessel going to Philadelphia. There he was fraudently conveyed to Virginia
and sold -- became the slave of one Wiley, who was extremely cruel to him --
lost some of his fingers and toes by severe exposure -- was bought by
General Washington, and was his slave during all the Revolution at his
estate at the Long Meadows. Finally, free at Frankford; since died, and
made happy in a better world.
1825 -- This year died Isaac Parrish, in his 92d year, a respectable
inhabitant of Philadelphia, father of the late Dr. Parrish. It was
remarkable concerning him, that although there were 87 signers to his
marriage certificate when they passed Meeting, yet both he and his wife
survived every one of them. I could never see the aged couple abroad in the
streets, without thinking that they who had the best claims to be quite at
home, by their familiarity with every nook and corner of the city, were in
fact so perplexed and surprised with the daily changes and novelties, as to
be among the strangers and wonderers of the city. "The generation to which
they had belonged had run away from them!" -- Or, as Young strikingly
expresses it, to wit :
"My world is dead;
A new world rises and new manners reign:
The strangers gaze,
And I at them -- my neighbour is unknown !"
About this time I saw Miss Sarah Patterson of Philadelphia, then well, in
her 90th year. Robert Paul, an ancient Friend, still going to Pine street
meeting, I saw at the age of 95 years. Thomas Hopkins, another Friend,
going to the same Meeting, I saw and talked with when he was past 90 years.
There was lately alive at St. Thomas, seven miles from Chambersburg,
Pennsylvania, a man named John Hill, who was probably the oldest man then
alive in North America, deemed to be 135 or 6 years of age ! -- he having
been a soldier in the time of Queen Anne, and served 28 years. His
faculties of body and mind were still good, as good as most men of 60 or 70
years. He was born in England.
Chapter 92. CHILDHOOD AND IT'S JOYS
We cannot but believe that it is a part and parcel of our nature; wisely
appointed by the Creator, of set purpose that we should fervently love the
days of our childhood, and delight to look back upon them, through all the
wanderings and perplexities of our manhood. It is intended for our good,
and supposed to give a moral flow to our affections and thoughts. There we
see the innocency and purity of our first career. Most beautifully we are
supported in these our thoughts by a writer in Tait's Magazine. "See", says
that Journal, "that young urchin, with red cheeks and flaxen curls, paddling
in the runnel that rustles along the hedge side ! How he loves to feel the
cool water dance over his toes ! How eagerly he pounces upon the minnow
that darts from beneath the mossy stone before him, or comes flitting down
the stream ! How he flogs the tall weeds with his stick, and delights in
making a puddle of the crystal brooklet ! Observe that pretty black-eyed
girl in the blue frock with the toddling youngster by her side ! She is
making a garden in the dust, with twigs of trees, flowers plucked from the
hedge row, white pebbles, and bits of broken crockery picked up in the lane.
And how pleased is little Davie with the contrivance ! Now he fetches a
stone and stops up a gap in the border; now a blade of grass, or an
unmeaning straw, sticking it with profound judgement in the middle of the
miniature walk, or exactly in the place where it should not be. With the
spirit of mischief he now runs over the laboured work, and destroys their
little Eden, trampling under foot its flowerlets and its bowers."
"Does not every parent feel the force of this picture ? and does not every
reader remember his own delighted participations in scenes like these ?"
"Now see him again ! he is astride the grazing ass, supported by his
sister. How he kicks and jumps, and opens wide his eyes, and fancies
himself going to market ! Now he is unsupported; his sister has withdrawn
her arm. How grave, how motionless ! His tiny faculties seem to be busily
questioning the danger. The ass innocently lifts a leg; Davie's courage
fails him; he makes a comical wry face, and begins to whimper; and Davie,
stretching out his little arm, asks for help !"
Such is the picture fresh from our own recollections and observances; as
full of nature and ingenuous simplicity as are the dear little creatures
whose likenesses are portrayed. The associations it calls up are like the
strains of Caryl's music -- "sweet and mournful to the soul". As the mind
dwells upon it, charmed into a forgetfulness of the present, how does the
remembrance of our own childhood spread freshly o'er the thoughts, while the
image of the distant scene beams in the fancy as a vision far off,
illuminated by a heavenly light; a glimpse, bright and beautiful, of some
"loved island of the blest", whence come ethereal notes of harmony, rather
felt than heard.
It is something more than poetical phantasy which causes persons to revert
with feelings of tranquil pleasure to the period of childhood long gone by,
and to regret that it has passed away never to return. The days then of
those years are the happiest of our lives; and for this reason the mind
loves to recur in them : they are the happiest of our lives, because the
most innocent.
"How sweet to every feeling heart
The memory of the past;
To think of days when love and joy
Around our hearts were cast --
To let our thoughts swift take their flight
O'er days when life was new --
Roam through the haunts of pleasant youth,
Those scenes again renew."
Children may teach us one blessed, one enviable art : the art of being
easily happy. Kind nature has given them that useful power of accommodation
to circumstances, which compensates for so many external disadvantages; and
it is only by injudicious management that it is lost. Give but a moderate
portion of food and kindness, and the peasant's child is happier than the
lord's : free from artificial wants, unsatiated by indulgence, all nature
ministers to his pleasures; he can carve out felicity from a bit of hazel
twig, or fish it successfully in a puddle ! I love to hear the boisterous
joy of a troop of young urchins whose cheap playthings are nothing more than
mud, snow, sticks; or to watch the quiet enjoyment of a half-clothed,
half-washed boy, who sits crunching his brown bread and bacon at his
father's door. These the gentry may overlook or despise, as they dust them
in gilded equipages seeking their pleasures, but they cannot be happier, and
seldom as innocent.
"In my poor mind it is most sweet to muse
Upon the days gone by -- to act in thought
Past seasons o'er, and be again a child !"
END OF VOL I