Pennsylvania 1630-1684
By Rudolph J. Walther
Pennsylvania was settled as 1630 by Dutch pioneers who came up the Delaware Bay and River and settled at Gloucester point.
Captain Kornelius Jacobus May, a Dutchman, is regarded as the first explorer of our bay and river, after whom Cape May was named.
These pioneers eventually drifted over to Pennsylvania. They designed to raise tobacco and grain. A few scattered and settled in Bucks County, other settlers having made New York, which they named New Amsterdam, their objective point.
Swedes began to arrive about 1631, as related by their historian Campanius. Their first landing was at New Castle, which they named Stockholm.
King Charles 2, in 1664, whose claim to New England gave him power to claim to the southward, being unwilling to sanction the prosperity of the Dutch, as a separate community, granted patent to his brother James, Duke of York and Albany, of lands in America, including all that the Dutch then held as their New Netherlands. The Dutch reluctantly submitted, New York being named after the conquering duke.
The Duke of York, possessed of the Jerseys, Granted same to Sir George Carteret, who came from the Isle of Jersey. His intention was to call same in honor of his family, Nova Cesaria, but the people preferred to call it by a name they could better understand, to wit the Jerseys. (The Indian name of the Jerseys was Scheyichbi.)
In 1675 the west part of Jersey was sold to one Edward Byllinge of the Society of Friends, to whom William Penn, soon afterwards, became a trustee. Penn, in his efforts to settle the estate of Bylling, became so well acquainted with the region of Pennsylvania and colonial settlements, as to be afterwards induced to purchase that for himself, by receiving it as an equivalent for claims due his father, Admiral Penn.
Michael Schlatter's Description of Pennsylvania
Written at Amsterdam, June, 1751
"Pennsylvania, lying in the northern part of America, is a country of no small compass. It lies in a healthy climate; it is not merely inhabitable, but very much inhabited, not only by the ancient dwellers in the land, but also by thousands who have emigrated thither from Europe and still arrive every year. It extends toward the north to the five largest inland seas known in the world, along the course of which it is not difficult to reach the celebrated Mississippi River, down which one can sail to the Gulf of Mexico.
"Since the time when the English have taken possession of Pennsylvania, and the country has been peopled from various European nations, it has been divided into nine cantons, these called counties. The most important towns, as they have been built successively, are:
- Philadelphia, consisting at present of 2,300 houses, mostly of stone.
- New Castle, consisting of 240 houses, mostly of stone, and lying from Philadelphia distant 40 miles.
- Chester, consisting of 120 houses, lying 10 miles distant from New Castle.
- Germantown, consisting of 250 houses, lying 6 miles from Philadelphia.
- Lancaster, consisting of 500 houses, lying from Germantown 63 miles.
- York, consisting of 190 houses, lying from Lancaster 23 miles.
- Reading, lately built, consisting of 60 houses, lying 60 miles from York.
"In the whole of Pennsylvania, according to estimation, there are 190,000 souls, in which the pagan inhabitants are not included. Of these, it is estimated 90,000 are Germans;... These are scattered through all the cantons or counties; still they have more especially settled down in the counties of Philadelphia, Bucks, Lancaster, York, and Chester."
In this same document Schlatter solicited contributions for educational and religious work among the Pennsylvania Germans from charitable persons in Holland, Switzerland and England, stating that "a yearly salary of forty or fifty Belgic florins... would be sufficient (for the yearly salary of a clergyman) in Pennsylvania, a very fertile province, where the cost of living is generally low."
As a result of Schlatter's appeal (see right) $60,000 — an enormous sum for days — was contributed by the people of Holland for educational purposes in Pennsylvania in 1752. He also caused nearly $100,000 to be raised in England. An interesting feature of this was the application of some of this money that "four or six young persons of talent from these free schools (at York, Lancaster, Reading, New Hanover, Skippack and Goshenhoppen) should have the privilege of going to the University of Oxford, there to study and afterwards to serve their Fatherland."
The first English colony that came out under the sale to Byllinge went into Salem Creek, which they so named, and there began the present existing town of Salem. The neighborhood had been previously settled by the Swedes, who had near there a fort which they called Elsinburgh. In fact the Swedes built numbers of forts, or rather block houses, at the entrance of creeks in the bay and river.
In 1677 the ship Kent arrived with 230 passengers, mostly Friends, with good estates. They landed at Raccoon Creek, where they found some Swedish houses, but not being well accommodated, they, with the commissioners who came in the ship, went up to Chygoe's Island (now Burlington) called after the Indian Sachem who then dwelt there. The town plot was purchased and called New Beverly. Shortly thereafter another band of settlers came from Wiccacoa.
The first ship that ever visited Burlington was the Shield of Stockton, from Hull, in 1678. Then the site of the present Philadelphia was a bold and high shore called Coaquanock. The ship in veering there, chanced to strike the trees with her sails and spars. It was then observed that the passengers often exclaimed "what a fine place for a town."
Other vessels continued to follow to Jersey. In 1682, as many as 360 passengers came out in one vessel.
Burlington and the adjacent county settled very rapidly.
Some Friends settled on the western side of the Delaware before Philadelphia was laid out, notably at Shackamaxon, now called Kensington.
The founding of Pennsylvania, about 40,000 square miles, was confirmed to William Penn under the Great Seal on the 5th of January, 1681. Thereupon Penn induced people to emigrate, the terms being 40 shillings per hundred acres, and "shares" of 5,000 acres for 100 pounds. These generous terms induced many to set out for the new world.
The town of Philadelphia was located in 1682, "having a high and dry land next to the water, with a shore ornamented with a fine view of pine trees growing upon it."
The first adventures made their settlements in this way, to dig caves or shelter in which to place their families or effects, then to get warrants of survey, and to wander about for their choice of localities.
William Penn set sail from England in August, 1682, with Captain Greenway, in the ship Welcome. The ship was filled with additional passengers, mostly Friends. They arrived at New Castle on October 27th, 1682, the next day arriving at Philadelphia. Penn and his friends came up from Chester in an open boat and landed on the low and sandy beach at Dock Creek. Penn at that time was 38 years of age.
In the year 1683-84, emigration increased. Pioneers came from England, Ireland, Wales, Holland and Germany.
King Charles the Second owed Admiral Penn, the father of William Penn, a large debt, and to cancel same, the claim being the main part of William's inheritance, he merrily gave a large tract of wilderness to Penn in cancellation of the debt.
Penn with broad ideas and unarmed, as was natural for a Quaker, came and made the famous treaty with the Indians, "as long as water flows and the sun shines and grass grows." A treaty which was not sworn to and yet never broken.
A plain and simple monument stands in Shackamaxon, at Penn Treaty Park, in Kensington, a modest memorial of a momentous act, the spot where was signed an unbroken treaty; probably the only treaty of the world's which was not broken.
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