FIRST VISIT TO PENNSYLVANIA
The proprietor of the new province sailed from Deal, in England, on
August 30, 1682, leaving his wife and children at their home in the
country. His ship was the _Welcome_ and carried about one hundred
passengers. The voyage across the Atlantic took nearly two months, for
it was the 24th day of October when the _Welcome_ sighted the capes of
the Delaware. During the voyage thirty of the passengers died of
smallpox, a common sickness for a ship to carry in those days.
The _Welcome_ took three days to sail up the Delaware to New Castle,
which was the chief settlement thereabouts. This place was in the
territory that had been granted to Penn by the Duke of York, and here
the agents of the duke gave the title to the land to its new owner in
their master's name by the old ceremony of "turf and twig and water," a
custom long continued in Pennsylvania, and which meant that the former
owner, by giving the new owner a piece of turf, a bit of twig, and a
cup of water, transferred to him full possession of whatever was to be
found on the land in question.
After this ceremony Penn sailed on up the river to the small village of
Upland, where his agent, William Markham, was waiting for him. When he
had landed at Upland, he asked his friend Pearson to choose a name for
the town there, and Pearson, who hailed from the town of Chester in
England, gave the settlement the name of that English place.
From Chester William Penn began to explore his new possessions. He found
a soil that was rich, woods and fields filled with animals and birds of
many kinds, and a wide river with many tributary streams that led far
into the interior of his province. Along the Delaware wild birds were
plentiful, and every day Indians brought deer from the forests and sold
them to the settlers for small amounts of tobacco. The settlers who were
already living in the clearings along the Delaware were chiefly Swedes
and Dutch, with a few English, who fished in the river, hunted in the
bays, and pastured their cattle in the open meadows along the river
banks.
Penn was rowed in a barge up the Delaware past a place called Old
Tinicum, which had been the residence of the Swedish governor, past that
point where the Schuylkill joins the Delaware at what is now League
Island, and on to a stretch where the Delaware grew narrower and deeper
and where there was high land with a good frontage for deep-draft boats.
Here the shore was covered with pines, chestnuts, walnuts, oaks, and
laurel, and a small stream flowed into the river. This was the place
that Penn's commissioners had chosen for the site of his city. He landed
at the mouth of the small stream called Dock Creek, which to-day flows
into the sewer under Dock Street, on the water front of Philadelphia,
and where then stood a log tavern known as "The Sign of the Blue
Anchor." Tradition says that some English settlers and Indians were on
the shore to greet the new owner, and that he sat down with the Indians
and ate the hominy and roasted acorns that they offered him. Then they
indulged in some athletic sports for his entertainment, and Penn himself
took part in a jumping match. Tradition has it that he out-jumped the
best of the natives!
He liked the site of his "green country town" very much, and also the
plans that had been made by his agents. Some of the names they had given
to streets he changed. He altered Pool to Walnut and Winn to Chestnut
Street, because of the trees that grew near those thoroughfares. One of
the main roads he named High Street, which was later changed to Market
Street. He planned the open square at Broad and Market streets where the
City Hall now stands, but he intended to have it include ten acres of
ground. He left a wide boulevard along the Delaware River, and staked
out the city on the plan of a checkerboard, leaving four open spaces,
which were later given the names of Washington, Franklin, Rittenhouse,
and Logan squares.
Hardly had Penn outlined the map of what he hoped his little village of
Philadelphia would grow to be, than he set about planning for the
education of the people he was urging to follow him from Europe. He had
induced William Bradford, a printer of Leicester, England, to make the
sea voyage with him, and set up a printing-press in the province. In
December, 1683, Enoch Flower opened a school in a two-room shack built
of pine and cedar planks, and six years later a public school was
founded, to be known in time as the William Penn Charter School,
destined to continue to the present day. Although the post office had
existed in England for only a few years, Penn thought it so valuable
that he issued orders to have a post office installed in his province
with deliveries once a week, and letters were sent at the very
reasonable cost of twopence from Philadelphia to Chester and sixpence
from Philadelphia to Maryland.
The first frame building that had been completed in Philadelphia was the
"Blue Anchor," which was at one and the same time an inn, an exchange, a
corn market, a post office, and a landing-place. It stood fronting the
river, and was built of heavy rafters of wood and bricks that were
brought from England. The colonists were men of energy and resource;
they built substantial houses rapidly, and before long residences with
pointed roofs, balconies, and porches were common sights, while an
enterprising man named Carpenter built a quay three hundred feet long,
where a ship of five hundred tons could be moored. Penn was justly proud
of the achievements of his colonists. To Lord Halifax he wrote, "I must
without vanity say, I have led the greatest colony into America that
ever any man did on private credit;" while to Lord Sunderland he said,
"With the help of God and such noble friends, I will show a province in
seven years equal to her neighbor's of forty years' planting."
When he had started men to work on his new city, Penn traveled through
West and East Jersey, saw Long Island, and incidentally stopped and
preached to any Quakers he found in that part of North America. It used
to be supposed that he made his famous treaty with the Indians at
Kensington at about that time, but historians now believe that it was
not made until the following year.
As soon as his new government was in order, the owner of the province of
Pennsylvania, accompanied by his council, went to Maryland to discuss
the boundary line with Lord Baltimore. The two proprietors met at West
River, but could reach no satisfactory adjustments. Then Penn returned
to his own colony and spent the winter in the little settlement of
Chester. By this time other ships were bringing Quakers to Pennsylvania;
twenty-three vessels had arrived within a short time, and their
passengers were made very welcome by the settlers who were already
established. The young proprietor--he was only thirty-eight years
old--must have enjoyed his experience in his new country, if we may
judge from his letters. He wrote to his wife, "O how sweet is the quiet
of these parts, freed from the anxious and troublesome solicitations,
hurries, and perplexities of woeful Europe!" And again he wrote, "I like
it so well that a plentiful estate, and a great acquaintance on the
other side, have no charms to remove; my family being once fixed with
me, and if no other thing occur, I am like to be an adopted American."
In the spring he was very busy overseeing the building of the houses of
Philadelphia, and moved from Chester to what was known as the Letitia
House in Philadelphia. This house had been built for him facing the
river south of what is now Market Street, in a lot that contained about
half a city block. The house was built of brick and was later given by
Penn to his daughter Letitia.
[Illustration: THE LETITIA HOUSE.]
While the newly arrived settlers were building their frame houses, they
lived in huts of bark and turf, and some even in caves excavated in the
steeper parts of the river bank. There was none of the famine and
illness, and few of the hardships, that attended the early settlements
in Massachusetts and Virginia. There was plenty of game to be had in the
woods and along the river, stone for buildings was plentiful, and the
clay beds under the soil provided material for bricks. The colony was
comfortable and prosperous, and Penn's system of government had been so
well planned that laws were made and enforced with very little friction.
Sometimes Penn himself presided over the meetings of the Provincial
Council, which frequently sat as a court of law. One of the early trials
was for witchcraft among the Swedes, and was handled so quickly and
decisively that the old superstition was prevented from spreading among
the people, as it did in Massachusetts a little later. Penn charged the
jury, which brought in a verdict that the prisoner was "guilty of the
common fame of being a witch; but not guilty in manner and form as she
stands indicted." As this amounted to deciding that the prisoner was not
guilty of having done any wrong, in spite of her reputation for dealing
in witchcraft, a precedent was set which showed that Pennsylvania was to
be fair in dealing with all kinds of men and women.
Every one is familiar with Benjamin West's famous picture of Penn making
a treaty with the Indians under the great elm at Kensington. That
scene, however, like many other striking scenes in history, seems to
rest on vague tradition rather than on facts. There is no exact record
of his first treaty with the Indians, but the place where it was made is
generally supposed to have been on the bank of the Delaware River near
the foot of what is now called Shackamaxon Street in Philadelphia. This
treaty was simply an agreement as to the method of buying the land and
how it should be surveyed. Later, deeds were drawn up for the actual
transfer of the lands, and the tracts to be transferred were surveyed by
the old method of walking against time. Thus it was agreed that what was
known as the Neshaminy tract should reach beyond the mouth of the
Neshaminy Creek "as far as a man could walk and back in three days."
How this was done was described by John Watson. "Governor Penn," said
he, "with several Friends and a party of Indians, began in the month of
November at the mouth of the Neshaminy and walked up the Delaware. In a
day and a half they arrived at a point about thirty miles distant at the
mouth of a creek which they called 'Baker's' (from the name of the man
who first reached it). Here they marked a spruce tree; and Governor
Penn decided that this was as much land as would be immediately wanted
for settlement, and walked no farther. They walked at leisure, the
Indians sitting down sometimes to smoke their pipes and the white men to
eat biscuit and cheese.... A line was afterward run from the spruce tree
to Neshaminy and marked, the remainder was left to be walked out when
wanted for settlement."
[Illustration: _Reproduced from Buell's "William Penn," through the
courtesy of D. Appleton and Company. Originally printed in Watson's
"Annals of Philadelphia."_
THE TREATY TREE.
Under this tree William Penn is supposed to have made his first treaty
with the Indians. The tree was blown down in 1810, when it was found to
be 283 years old. During the winter of 1778, when Philadelphia was
occupied by the British, their foraging parties were sent out in every
direction for fuel. To protect this famous old tree from the ax, Colonel
Simcoe, of the Queen's Rangers, placed a sentinel under it, and thus its
life was spared for many years.]
This unusual method of measuring land appears to have been fair enough,
at least as long as William Penn was in authority over the white
settlers. The Indians had already learned that they could trust him, and
found no cause for raising the war-cry against the "Children of Mignon"
(Elder Brother), as the followers of William Penn were called. Half a
century later, however, when William Penn's son Thomas was the governor,
the Lenni-Lenape, or Delaware Indians, from whom Penn had bought much
land, became uneasy at the encroachments of some of the settlers, and
asked to have a distance, stated in the old agreement to be "as far as a
man can go in a day and a half," definitely determined. Thomas Penn, the
governor of Pennsylvania, and the chiefs of the Delawares agreed that
the distance should be determined by a walk to take place on September
19, 1737. Very early on that morning a large number of colonists
gathered at the crossroads near the Friends' meetinghouse at Wrightstown
in Pennsylvania.
A large chestnut tree stood at the crossroads, and this was the center
of interest for the white men and for the Indians who joined them there.
"Ready!" commanded Sheriff Smith, and at the word three white men
stepped out from the crowd and put their right hands on the chestnut
tree. The three were James Yeates, a New Englander, described as "tall,
slim, of much ability and speed of foot"; Solomon Jennings, "a
remarkably stout and strong man," and Edward Marshall, a well-known
hunter, who was over six feet tall, and noted as a great walker.
Governor Thomas Penn had promised to give five pounds in money and five
hundred acres of land to the walker who should cover the greatest
distance, and these three had entered the contest for the prize. As the
sheriff gave the word to start the three men were off. Yeates took the
lead, followed by Jennings, beside whom walked two Indians to see that
the walking was fair. After them came men on horseback, among whom were
the sheriff and the surveyor general, and at a little distance Governor
Thomas Penn himself. At the back of the procession came Edward
Marshall, walking easily, swinging a hatchet in his hand, "to balance
himself," as he said, and munching dry biscuits that he took from his
pocket. He had said in advance that he would "win the prize of five
hundred acres of land, or lose his life in the attempt," but he walked
as if he had forgotten that determination.
The walkers pushed steadily on, never at a loss for direction, for
Thomas Penn had secretly sent out a surveying party in advance to blaze
the trees along a straight line for as great a distance as it was
thought possible for a man to walk in eighteen hours. Therefore even
when they reached the wilderness the walkers had the straightest course
marked out for them. Then the Indians began to protest against the
increasing speed of the white men, saying again and again, "That's not
fair. You are running! You were to _walk_." In answer the white men only
said that the treaty had used the words, "As far as a man can _go_," and
therefore they had a right to run if they wished. Presently the Indians
tried to delay the march by stopping to rest, but the horsemen who were
with the party dismounted and insisted on the Indians riding their
horses, and so the "march" continued as rapidly as ever. At last the
Indians refused to go any farther, and left the white men.
Solomon Jennings was tired out before the Lehigh River was reached, and
left the race to the other two, following for a time with some of the
spectators.
That night the walking party slept on the north side of the Lehigh
Mountains. In the morning some of the white men hunted for the horses
that had strayed from camp during the night, while others went to the
village to ask the chief to send other Indians to accompany the white
walkers. The chief answered angrily, "You have all the good land now,
and you may as well take the bad, too." Another Indian, who had heard
how the white men had raced along, trying to get as much land as
possible, said disgustedly, "No sit down to smoke; no shoot squirrel;
but lun, lun, lun, all day long!"
The last half-day's walk had hardly begun when James Yeates dropped out,
finding the exertion of such a rapid pace too much for him. Marshall,
however, still pressed on, traveling very fast. When he passed the last
of the trees that had been blazed to guide them, he took a compass held
out to him by the surveyor general, who was riding, and kept his
direction by its aid. At last the sheriff, looking at his watch, called
out, "Halt!" Marshall threw himself forward, and grasped a sapling.
That point then became the mark for the northern boundary of the
purchase made many years before, a mark that was sixty-eight miles from
the chestnut tree at the crossroads at Wrightstown, and close to the
site of the present town of Mauch Chunk. The distance covered had been
twice as great as the Indians had supposed it would be.
In another way also the Delawares, who knew little of legal matters,
were tricked by Thomas Penn's officers. The deed that set forth the
purchase did not state in what direction the northern boundary was to be
drawn, but the Indians had naturally expected that it would be run to
the nearest point on the Delaware River. The surveyor general, however,
decided that the line should be drawn at right angles to the direction
of the walk, which was almost straight northwest. If a line were drawn
from the town of Mauch Chunk to the Delaware so that if it were extended
it would reach New York City, that line would represent what the Indians
thought the northern boundary should be. But if a line be drawn from
Mauch Chunk to the point where New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania
meet, the result will be the boundary that Thomas Penn's surveyor
general actually marked out four days after Edward Marshall finished
his remarkable walk. As a result the amount of land that was taken from
the Indians under this purchase was increased from the three hundred
thousand acres they thought they should give to half a million acres,
and all because white men took a selfish advantage of a loosely worded
deed!
The Delawares, or Lenni-Lenape, had always trusted William Penn, because
he had been scrupulously fair with them. They had said, "We will live in
love with William Penn and his children as long as the sun and moon
shall shine." The result of this "Walking Purchase" in 1737, however,
which took away from the tribe all the land along the river from which
they took their name, was to embitter them against the white men, and
destroy the friendship that William Penn had been so careful to create
between the two races.
It is pleasant to remember that the settlers of William Penn's time paid
the Indians when they made purchases of land. There is a record of the
sale of what was called the "Salem tract," a piece of land with a
frontage of twenty-four miles on the Delaware and extending back far
enough to include over eight hundred square miles. For this, it is
related, the Indians received the following curious assortment of
articles in payment:
"30 match-coats, 20 guns, 30 kettles, 1 great kettle, 30 pair of
hose, 20 fathoms of duffels, 30 petticoats, 30 narrow hoes, 30 bars
of lead, 15 small barrels of powder, 70 knives, 30 Indian axes, 70
combs, 60 pair of tobacco tongs, 60 pair of scissors, 60 tinshaw
looking-glasses, 120 awl-blades, 120 fish-hooks, 2 grasps of red
paint, 120 needles, 60 tobacco boxes, 120 pipes, 200 bells, 100
Jew's-harps, and 6 ankers of rum."
A great deal of oratory was expended on the making of these treaties.
Penn wrote of one of them, "When the purchase was agreed, great promises
passed between us, of kindness and good neighbourhood, and that the
Indians and English must live in love as long as the sun gave light:
which done, another made a speech to the Indians, in the name of all the
Sachamakan, or kings, first to tell them what was done; next, to charge
and command them to love the Christians, and particularly live in peace
with me and the people under my government; that many governors had been
in the river, but that no governor had come himself to live and stay
here before; and having now such an one that had treated them well, they
should never do him or his any wrong. At every sentence of which they
shouted, and said, Amen, in their way."
Usually in making these treaties a belt of wampum was given to an Indian
with an injunction to remember a certain clause of the agreement, so
that when the Indians wished to refresh their minds in regard to any of
the treaties, they would gather together, and as each displayed his belt
of wampum he would recite the agreement that the white men had made when
they gave the belt to the native.
[Illustration: PENN'S WAMPUM BELT.]
In general, William Penn's treaties simply promised that the Indians
should be fairly treated, and that they should have redress from the
colony's government in case any settler cheated them. Similar treaties
had been made between the settlers and the natives for years in that
neighborhood and in other parts of North America. The only thing that
made Penn's treaties really remarkable was that the Quaker proprietor
actually kept his promises. The Indians came to regard this as
remarkable, after they had dealt with other white men, and spread the
word that Penn, or Onas, as the Iroquois called him, or Mignon, as the
Delawares called him, was really a man of his word. In time this unusual
reputation of William Penn spread across the sea to England and to
France. In both countries the reputation for dealing honestly with the
Indians caused great surprise, mixed, fortunately, with great admiration
for the white governor. Voltaire, the famous French writer, said of
Penn's agreement, "This was the only treaty between these people and the
Christians that was not ratified by an oath and that was never broken."