inhuman murder committed by the Indians at Juniata and Sherman’s Creek
on the 27th of last month. Within three miles of Patterson’s Fort was
found Adam Nicholson and his wife dead and scalped and his two sons and
a daughter carried off; William Wilcock and his wife dead and scalped;
Mrs. Hugh Micheltree and son of said Nicholson dead and scalped, with
many children, in all about seventeen. The same day one Sheridan, a
Quaker, his wife and three children, and a servant were killed and
scalped, together with one William Hamilton and his wife and daughter
and one French, within ten miles of Carlisle, a little beyond Stephen’s
Gap.”
On March 24, Captain James Patterson with his scouting party of
borderers fell in with a party of Indians on Middle Creek, now Snyder
County, attacked them, killed and scalped one and put the rest to
flight. On their return, Patterson reported that the country from the
forks of the Susquehanna to the Juniata was “swarming with Indians,
looking for scalps and plunder, and burning all the houses and
destroying all the grain which the fugitive settlers had left in the
region.”
The Indians who committed these depredations were of the Delaware
Nation; there were no Shawnee among them. They had their headquarters on
the North Branch at Nescopeck and Wyoming, and were so incited by the
craftiness of the French that they threatened “to break the heads of any
of their own race who advised peace with the English.”
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John Penn, “The American,” Born in Slate-Roof
House January 29, 1700
When William Penn crossed the ocean in the Canterbury to visit his
province in 1699, he came up to Chester, December 1. Two days later Penn
reached Philadelphia, and made a formal call upon his deputy, Governor
William Markham, and other dignitaries of the town and province.
From Markham’s house Penn proceeded to the Friends’ meeting house at
Second and High Streets, and took part in the afternoon meeting,
offering a prayer and delivering one of those short incisive addresses
in which he was so happy.
Penn was very well received by all classes, says James Logan, who had
come out with the Governor and was in constant attendance upon him.
After the meeting was over and the Friends had dispersed to their homes,
Penn and his suite went to the house of Edward Shippen, and lived there
for a month. About January 14 he took up his residence in the
“Slate-Roof House,” which was his home during his sojourn in his
province.
On January 29, his son John, known as “The American,” was born. John was
the only one of William Penn’s children born in his province.
This old mansion when first built was the largest house in Philadelphia,
and better known than any other, not excepting the “Letitia House,” of
any place of historic interest connected with William Penn and the city
he founded.
The Slate-Roof House was built on the southeast corner of Second Street
and Norris Alley, the site for many years of the Chamber of Commerce.
The house was built by Samuel Carpenter, and it stood until 1867.
Besides being the residence of Penn in 1699, James Logan entertained
Lord Cornbury there in 1702 and Governor James Hamilton, Mrs. Howell and
Mrs. Graydon were successively its occupants, the ladies using it for a
boarding house.
Alexander Graydon, who lived there and whose mother was the Desdemona of
the pert British officers of the day and kept the place as a boarding
house just before the Revolution, describes the old house, “as a
singular old-fashioned structure, laid out in the style of a
fortification, with abundance of angles, both salient and re-entering.
Its two wings projected to the street in the manner of bastions, to
which the main building, retreating from sixteen to eighteen feet,
served for a curtain. Within it was cut up into a number of apartments
and on that account was exceedingly well adapted to the purpose of a
lodging house, to which it had long been appropriated.”
The yard or garden was graced with a row of venerable pine trees, and
the association of the place gave it a substantial historic interest. It
bore much less the look of a fortress than Captain Graydon’s military
eye conceived.
The back building was as peaceful looking as the culinary offices should
be and the neat little chambers in the so-called bastions were cozy
nooks, with chimney places in the corners. The kitchen had a giant pile
of chimney, with a great fireplace and the garrets were high and roomy.
This house was built for Samuel Carpenter by James Portens. It was
erected about 1698, and William Penn was probably its first occupant.
Samuel Carpenter had built in 1684–85 a house on Front Street, near his
wharf and warehouses, and it is likely he lived there after the
Slate-Roof House was completed.
Carpenter was a man of great ability and enterprise, accumulating wealth
rapidly and doing much to build up the city of his adoption. He married
Hannah Hardiman, a Welsh Quakeress and preacher, in 1684, and held many
important positions, member of the Assembly, treasurer of the province,
etc. He bought large tracts of land, owned numerous vessels, mines,
quarries and mill seats, so much property, in fact, that it impoverished
him and threw him into serious pecuniary embarrassment, though he was
ranked as the richest man in the province.
Samuel Carpenter died in his house on King Street (now Water Street)
between Chestnut and Walnut Streets, April 10, 1714, and the Friends
Meeting, after his death, said of him that “he was a pattern of
humility, patience and self-denial; a man fearing God and hating
covetousness; much given to hospitality and good works. He was a loving,
affectionate husband, tender father, and a faithful friend and brother.”
When Carpenter leased his Slate-Roof House to Penn it was furnished and
so occupied until his departure for England, when James Logan moved into
it.
The Slate-Roof House was sold in the latter part of 1703 to William
Trent, the Iverness miller, who founded and gave his name to Trenton, N.
J.
Trent paid £850 for the property. In 1709 he sold it for £900
Pennsylvania currency to Isaac Norris, who occupied it until his removal
to Fairhill in 1717.
Logan was very desirous that Penn should buy the house when Trent
offered it for sale, and said that it was hard that the Governor did not
have the money to spare. “I would give twenty to thirty pounds out of my
own pocket, that it were thine, nobody’s but thine,” said honest James.
The Slate-Roof House remained in possession of the Norris family until
1807, when it was bought by the Chamber of Commerce and torn down.
From 1717 onward it seems to have been used as a boarding and lodging
house, being in the hands of Mrs. Howell and then of Mrs. Graydon.
General John Forbes, successor to General Edward Braddock, died in the
Slate-Roof House in 1759, at which time the house was kept by Mrs.
Howell. Baron de Kalb lodged there in 1768–69, when he was the secret
agent of France. Sir William Draper, the target of Junius’ sarcasm,
lodged there during his visit to the colonies. James Rivington, the Tory
printer and publisher, ate and slept there.
It is also reported that John Hancock and George Washington lodged there
during the first sessions of the Continental Congress. Baron Steuben,
Peter S. Duponceau and others lodged there after the British evacuated
Philadelphia.
The Slate-Roof House then became the seat of a boarding school, kept by
Madame Berdeau, reputed to be the widow of Dr. Dodd, hanged in London
for forgery in 1777.
Then this historic old mansion became a workshop, a general place of
business, a tenement house, with shops on the ground floor, which were
occupied by tailors, engravers, watch-makers, silversmiths, etc. Under
one of the “bastions,” a notable oyster cellar was opened, the resort of
the merchants and bankers doing business in that vicinity.
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Betsy Ross, Who Made First American Flag,
Died January 30, 1836
When Elizabeth Claypoole died at her home in Arch Street, Philadelphia,
January 30, 1836, aged eighty-four years, her body was borne to Mount
Moriah Cemetery and interred by the side of her husband, who had
preceded her in death nearly twenty years. A simple monument records the
above facts, but does not tell those of the present generation that this
heroine was none other than Betsy Ross.
The school children of today are learning more of the history of our
country and its flag, but the story of the woman who made the first
American flag is always interesting.
The fact that the flag of our country had its birth in the City of
Philadelphia; that it was a patriotic woman of Philadelphia who made the
first flag; that it first waved over the United States Congress then in
session in Independence Hall, is sufficient incentive for every boy and
girl in Pennsylvania to be justly proud.
The story of the flag is told on another day, but the story of how Betsy
Ross became associated with it is to be today’s story.
Ever since the Revolution began there was real necessity for an American
flag, but there was, however, no national flag authorized by an act of
the Continental Congress until June 14, 1777.
The committee appointed by Congress to prepare a design for the new flag
consisted of General George Washington, Robert Morris and Colonel George
Ross.
Colonel Ross had a relative, Betsy Ross, who lived at 239 Arch Street,
and who had previously made flags for the American Army and Navy.
The committee called upon Mrs. Ross, stated their mission, and asked her
if she would make a flag such as was ordered by Congress.
“I do not know whether I can, but I’ll try,” was her reply.
The act of Congress did not specify the number of points of the stars,
or their arrangement, simply stating: “That the flag of the thirteen
United States be thirteen stripes, alternate red and white; that the
union be thirteen stars, white in a blue field, representing a new
constellation.”
Mrs. Ross suggested that a star of five points would be more distinct,
pleasing and appropriative than the six-pointed star which the committee
had designed. Folding a piece of white paper, she cut, with a single
clip of her scissors, a five-pointed star, and placing it on a blue
field, delighted the committee with her taste, ingenuity and judgment.
The committee decided that the stars, thirteen in number, should be
arranged in a circle in a blue field, as the circle is typical of
eternity.
So well pleased were the committee with the flag which Betsy Ross made
that they authorized her, in the name of Congress, to make the United
States flags. Betsy Ross employed many hands to aid her, and made flags
for the army, navy and public buildings.
The maiden name of Betsy Ross was Elizabeth Griscom. She was born in
Philadelphia in 1752, of Quaker parents. At an early age she married
John Ross, son of an English clergyman, an upholsterer. He was a nephew
of Colonel George Ross, of Lancaster, one of the signers of the
Declaration and one of the leaders of the young republic. Betsy never
went back to “Friends’ Meeting,” and was “read out” of meeting for this
marriage.
John Ross died soon after his marriage and Mrs. Ross continued the
upholstering business at 239 Arch Street, which had once been number 89.
This house is still standing, and is one of the most valued of the many
historic places in old Philadelphia. It was in this little house, where
Betsy Ross, a widow at twenty-five years of age, made the first United
States flag.
Betsy Ross was not only noted for her skill with the needle, but quite
as well for her piety and patriotism. So widely was her extraordinary
skill recognized that she adorned the parlors of the wealthy with
draperies, the theatres with curtains, hotels with quilts and even
state-rooms of the finest packet boats were fitted up by her. It is also
said that she made the handsome ruffled shirt bosoms worn by General
Washington, and not a few for other patriots who held high office in the
young nation.
At an early date, and before she made United States flags, she made
Colonial flags for the army and navy and there is a minute dated May 29,
1777, “an order on William Webb to Elizabeth Ross for fourteen pounds
twelve shillings and two pence, for making ships’ colors,” etc.
In time Mrs. Ross married Joseph Ashburn, who was captured on the
privateer Luzerene and died a prisoner of war in Mill Prison, England.
By this marriage she had two children, Zillah, who died in infancy, and
Eliza, who married a Mr. Sullivan. Ashburn sent a farewell message to
his wife by a fellow-prisoner, John Claypoole, who later was exchanged
for a British prisoner. On reaching Philadelphia he delivered his
message and personal effects, and about a year later married Mrs.
Elizabeth Ashburn.
In April, 1783, the Stars and Stripes were put to their first national
use in the demonstration for peace throughout the new nation. The Flag
of Peace was the name given to it in this widespread employment of the
ensign.
Two weeks after this occasion Betsy Ross (Ashburn) and John Claypoole
were married.
By this marriage five children were born. One, Clarissa by name, the
first child of this marriage, married a Mr. Wilson and succeeded to the
business of upholstering and making American flags. Subsequently Mrs.
Wilson became a member of the Society of Friends, and relinquished the
business of making flags for the United States Army and Navy, and thus
after many years, the making of the American flags passed from the house
and family of Betsy Ross.
Clarissa was thirty-one years old when her father died from
war-inflicted diseases.
After about eighty years of making American flags for the United States
Government, the contracts passed from the Ross family, when Clarissa
Claypoole Wilson made the following public declarations: “From
conscientious motives ceased to furnish flags for military and naval
purposes,” and “retired from the business on account of conscientious
scruples.”
Thus the Ross family discontinued to fill Government contracts a quarter
of a century after the death of Betsy Ross.
During all the eighty years women and girls were exclusively employed in
making flags, mostly daughters and granddaughters of Betsy Ross and her
neighbors, as the work grew in volume.
So the tradition of Betsy Ross, as the maker of the first American flag,
known as the Stars and Stripes, has quite as interesting a sequel in the
action of her daughter.
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Robert Morris, Financier of the Revolution,
Born January 31, 1734
Robert Morris was born in Liverpool, England, January 31, 1734, son of
Robert Morris, a nail maker, and grandson of Andrew Morris, who was a
seafearing man of the British Isles.
Robert Morris, Sr., was the Maryland agent of a London tobacco firm.
When Robert, Jr., was thirteen years old, his mother having died, he
came to America, rejoined his father and was for a time under the
tuition of a clergyman and then entered the mercantile firm of Charles
and Thomas Willing.
In 1750, Morris, the father, died leaving a small estate. When Robert,
the son, reached the age of twenty-one, Charles Willing made him a
partner in the business and turned over his own share to his son,
Thomas. The firm of Willing & Morris became famous, and soon their trade
was extended to Europe and the West Indies. Long before the battle drums
of the Revolution were heard the two partners became wealthy men and
were regarded as among the foremost people of the city.
Willing and Morris were among the merchants who protested against the
Stamp Act, and in 1766 Robert Morris was one of the Board of Port
Wardens.
As soon as the news of Lexington reached Philadelphia, the Assembly
appointed a Committee of Safety. Robert Morris was a member and helped
greatly to get powder and firearms, to organize troops and to fortify
the Delaware.
The Assembly elected him a member of the Continental Congress and his
practical knowledge of ships made him a member of the Naval Committee
and the first American Navy was soon launched.
April, 1776, he was specially commissioned to suggest methods and
provide plans for procuring money to prosecute the war. No other man in
Congress, probably, could have succeeded so well, and he was not
relieved from this task while the war lasted.
However reluctantly he subscribed to the Declaration of Independence,
when the crucial moment came he risked his fortune and faced beggary for
his family and he looked at the gallows for himself as bravely as any of
his contemporaries. Other Pennsylvanians who voted against it lost their
places, but neither Pennsylvania nor the Colonies could spare Robert
Morris.
When Congress in a fright fled from Philadelphia to Baltimore, Morris,
with two other men, was left in charge of its affairs and the defense of
the capital of the infant republic. The two men who were to assist
Morris failed to appear, but Morris stuck faithfully to his post, and he
became really the ruler of the city.
When Washington defeated the British at Trenton, the English were
surprised but not troubled. They expected Washington’s unpaid army to
disband and Morris thought so too. He promised $10 extra pay to each
soldier if he would remain six weeks longer, then went to his Quaker
friends and on his personal credit borrowed the money and turned the
cash over to Washington on New Year’s Day. Hope sprang up again in
patriotic hearts.
After the battle of Brandywine there remained no hope of saving
Philadelphia. Congress fled once more, this time to Lancaster, then to
York. The Liberty Bell was hauled away to Allentown, where it was hidden
under the floor of the Zion Reformed Church. The State officials went to
Lancaster, and Morris traveled there also.
Morris was not eligible for re-election in 1778, but he worked to supply
the army. He turned over a cargo of ninety tons of lead for cartridges
at a time when the troops sorely needed them. In 1780 he was again
chosen to the Assembly, and a year later was chosen by Congress to be
Superintendent of Finance.
Some persons had wished Alexander Hamilton to take this post, but
Hamilton himself proposed Morris. Until the end of the war Morris had
power to appoint and dismiss all employes in his own department and
could even fix their salaries. No one else connected with the Government
possessed such extensive powers.
Morris counseled with Washington the project of transferring his army
southward to block Cornwallis. When the troops appeared in Philadelphia,
Washington, Count de Rochambeau and other generals dined with Morris and
used his house on Market Street as their headquarters.
During this visit Morris borrowed money which the Count de Rochambeau
had brought to pay his own soldiers and gave it to the Americans. He
advanced every shilling of his own money and borrowed all he could
obtain from his friends.
Robert Morris realized that a national bank was necessary, but few had
sufficient confidence to invest in the shares, but just at this time
France sent over some hard money, which was landed at Boston. Morris
sent two trustworthy men to bring the coins to Philadelphia.
The treasure amounted to half a million dollars. The coins were packed
in great oak boxes, which when filled weighed a ton. These chests were
set on the axle of a cart and driven by oxen, through country which
contained many English troops. After a drive of two months, the coins
were safely dragged into Philadelphia. Half the money was used to start
the bank, which was chartered December 31, 1781, as the “Bank of North
America.”
At the same time the bank opened its doors, Morris reported to Congress
that a mint should be established, in which money could be coined of one
kind and one standard. The mint was established and has been making
coins to this day.
Robert Morris was a member of the convention which framed the Federal
Constitution, and he had the pleasure of nominating his friend, General
Washington, for presiding officer.
After this Constitution was ratified by the States, Pennsylvania chose
Robert Morris and William Maclay as her first two Senators.
Morris owned several magnificent homes, and much desirable real estate,
and was regarded as the richest man in America. But he had been too
hopeful. Land values did not rise quickly and he and his partners could
not sell their properties, nor were they able to pay their debts.
At last the crash came and Morris was sent to prison for debt, February
15, 1798. Close to the prison sat the Congress which, on April 4, 1800,
passed the Bankrupt Act, though it was not until August 26, 1801, that
Morris regained his liberty. He came out with three millions of debt to
be a pensioner on his family.
On May 7, 1806, Robert Morris died and was buried in Christ Churchyard.
His widow, who survived him twenty-one years, in 1824 received the first
private call made by Lafayette in Philadelphia.
It is sad to think that a man who did so much for his country should at
last have done so badly for himself. If we had had no Robert Morris
there would probably have been no United States. All he had was at the
service of America. There was no truer patriot. It was his confidence in
the quick growth of the young nation that ruined him. Our country owes a
great debt to Robert Morris, the Financier of the Revolution.
----------
First Division of Province Into Counties
Begun February 1, 1685
After William Penn had spent nearly two years in his new province and
had made a trip of investigation as far interior as the Susquehanna
River, held many interviews with Lord Baltimore over the vexed question
of boundary, made several treaties with the Indians and placed the
government of his province in competent hands, he returned to England,
where he arrived during August, 1684.
Charles II died December 12 following, and was succeeded by James, Duke
of York, whose accession was greatly dreaded by the Protestants, who
apprehended a revival of the persecutions during the reign of Mary. Penn
might have taken advantage of these apprehensions to induce more
emigrants to settle in Pennsylvania, but he was disinterested and used
his influence with the King to grant liberty of conscience to all
religionists, and more especially to the Quakers.
Penn stood in high favor with King James long before he ascended the
throne, on account of friendship which James had for his father, who had
bravely fought under his flag, and this was increased by the son, who by
that means succeeded in obtaining from the King’s Council a favorable
decree in his dispute with Lord Baltimore over the boundaries of his
province.
The lines of separation between the County of Philadelphia and those of
Bucks and Chester were confirmed by the Provincial Assembly February 1,
1685.
This was a peculiar situation. Bucks and Chester were laid out with
specified boundaries adjoining Philadelphia, and, as a consequence, the
County of Philadelphia embraced the whole province between Chester and
Bucks and north-northwest and northeast to an indefinite extent. This,
of course, meant as far as Penn had purchased the land from the Indians.
During his absence from the province all was not well with William Penn
in England or with his followers in the beloved Pennsylvania.
Dissensions sprang up between the Legislature and the Executive, and
between the members from the territories and those from the province
proper, which threatened the loss of all his possessions. Troubles of
Penn in America were not all confined to civil affairs, for his
religious society was torn with dissension.
In 1685, the Proprietary appointed Nicholas More, a London lawyer,
president of the “Free Traders” and a member of the Assembly, to the
office of Chief Justice. The Assembly was jealous of its prerogatives
and disregarded the fundamental laws of the province in enacting
statutes without previously publishing them as required to do by the
constitution.
Chief Justice More opposed some of the laws of the Assembly, and
particularly those which attempted to alter the organization of the
courts, and he incurred the enmity of the House, which proceeded to
impeach him. He was charged with violence, partiality and negligence, in
a cause in which the society of Free Traders was interested. Ten
articles were preferred against him, which he refused to answer, though
frequently summoned by the Council.
More was saved from conviction by a technicality, but was not protected
from punishment. He was expelled from the Assembly, and was interdicted
all places of trust by the Council until he should be tried upon the
articles of impeachment or give satisfaction to the board. His
punishment was not severe because he retained the confidence of the
Proprietary.