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Such are the leading facts of the ancient town of Germantownfirst, of its antiquities, as old as Philadelphia itself; and next of its stirring incidents as a captured country, and a battle field. We conclude with a single additional recital and confirmation, to wit:

Mrs. Hall, of Philadelphia, gave a short notice of the retreat of her family to Jersey-which, like many others, was by market wagons, carts, and other rough vehicles. She went away with others in a wood flat, fully crowded, sitting in smoky cabins, or wrapped in blankets and laying on the decks. Many were thankful to get into barns and out-houses in the country on their first arrival. Those who met abroad felt an instinctive brotherhood, and all did what they could to help and accommodate each other. Some went down to Delaware and along the Chesapeake, and were again driven from their asylums in the following summer, by new alarms. When they afterwards met at their desolate homes, marvellous and amusing were the adventures recounted at the firesides. "Sir, (said a gentleman, whose name was eminent among the patriots,) these stories will be told by our children when we are dead and gone!" And so they shall,-Ecce res facta!

Frankford.

There has been an opinion prevalent about Frankford village, that it derives its name from Frank, a black fellow, and his ford, where he kept a ferry for passengers on foot; but, besides its looking too artificial to be true, there are obvious reasons against that cause of its name. It is called Frankford creek in Holmes' map, in 1682. I see it, as early as 1701, referred to in a public petition concerning a road under the name of Frankford: besides, it lies on the creek, the Indian Wingohocking, which comes from the "Frankford Company's land" in Germantown. It was their proper water passage to

the river.

Jonathan Dickinson, in 1715, writing respecting Fairman's land at "Frankford creek," says, "a ford there will be very needful, and very expensive, as the winds drive the waters from the Delaware over much marshy land.' For two hundred and twenty acres he offers £400. It falls short in the survey thirty-seven acres, thus showing how vaguely it was first done. He says it cannot be surveyed on the marsh [now all converted into productive meadows, &c.] till the winter is so as to go over it on the ice. He states that one hundred loads of timber were cut off it, because untenanted in the last winter, by moonlight night. Thus there were great depredators then! They probably cut it for staves and ship timber.

In the year 1814, Christopher Kuhn, at Frankford, in digging a cellar foundation for a small store house, on Kinsey and Hilles' present tanyard, came to a pot of old coin, hid perhaps by pirates.

• Thomas Fairman had been a surveyor, who dwelt at the Treaty tree.

This tanyard, on the Frankford creek, was close to the bank where it is high; and at three feet depth, he came to an earthern vessel highly glazed, which held about half a pint, and contained one hundred pieces of various sizes and shapes of silver coin. None of it was left to be shown to me; the whole having been sold soon after to the silversmiths as old silver! On questioning him as to their character, he stated that there were many cut pieces of the size which would remain in cutting quarters and halves of dollars into sections of four pieces each. He observed dates to some as much as three hundred years old. One piece was as large as a crown, and was square. Two pieces had a tree on one side, and were marked Massachusetts; such a coin I have myself, of the year 1652. On the whole the vessel contained quite a treasure for a collector, and yet none were saved.

The aged Giles Gillingham, who died at Frankford in 1825, at the age of 93 years, said that when he was a boy, it was quite common with him to play with Indian boys in the neighbourhood. Frankford then had but very few houses, and was often called Oxford, after the name of its township. About the time of Braddock's defeat, there came an Indian from a distance, blowing a horn as he entered the Indians' place; they soon went off with him, and were no more seen near the place.

The Frankford mill, now possessed by Mr. Duffield, was originally used as a mill by the Swedes before Penn landed. The earliest house in the place, now T. W. Duffield's, near the same mill, was deeded to Yeamans Gillingham, by Penn's commissioners, in 1696. The "Swedes' mill" was probably a saw mill, as wind mills were first used for grist.

It appears, by the minutes of council, that the inhabitants of Frankford petition, in 1726, that the road may be altered so as to have but one bridge in use, instead of the two then existing.

Some very old tombstones are still in existence near Crescentville, in Bristol township, on the country seat of James N. Dickson, which have been intended to designate the remains of a mother and her two sons, of the name of Price, of Welsh origin, who died there in 1702. They were members of the community of Seventh-day Baptists, the same which afterwards took the name of Keithian Baptists, from their union in sentiment with George Keith, who had been a Friend. They owed their origin to Abel Noble, who arrived in 1684, and formed a society of Baptists in Upper Providence, Chester county, where he baptized Thomas Martin, a public Friend, and others. This last, as a public minister, baptized Rees Price, in 1697.

In the year 1702, Rees and John Price, and others, built a meeting house in Oxford township, on a lot given to them by Thomas Graves; but neglecting to get their deed in due time, it came to pass that the Episcopalians got both the lot and house,-the same premises on which now stands the Oxford Episcopal church. The tomb stones referred to are thus inscribed, to wit:

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It may not be inappropriate to mention another old tombstone, of the same vicinity. It is one to the memory of Ralph Sandiford, and is now in the possession of Jesse Griffith, at the place where R. Sandiford was buried-at Sandy hill-on the Bustletown road. The stone, to some, will be regarded as a curiosity, because he was a Friend, and was withal the early protestant against negro slavery— to wit:

IN MEMORY OF
RALPH SANDIFORD
SON OF JOHN SANDIFORD
OF LIVERPOOL. HE BORE
A TESTIMONY AGAINST THE

NEGRO TRADE, AND DYED
YE 28th OF YE 3d MONTH
1732, AGED 40 YEARS.

Byberry.

This township was settled as early as Philadelphia itself. The first Englishmen who explored it were four brothers of the name of Walton, who had landed at New Castle, and set out on foot to make their discoveries and choice of location. When they came to Byberry, they were much pleased with a spot of open grass land, and determined to make it their permanent home. They soon got a few acres into wheat, although they had to go back as far as Chester to procure their seed.

These were soon after joined by other settlers, among whom were Comly, Carter, Rush, and others, the latter named was the ancestor of the distinguished Dr. Rush. The greater part of the first settlers were Friends, which for numerous years afterwards gave to the country the ascendency of Friends' principles and manners. It was therefore, for many years, the preferred spot of visitation for the remaining Indians, numbers of whom used to gather annually from Edge Pillock and other places in New Jersey, forming little colonies, which would set down at favourite places in the woods, and subsist a while on the land turtle they could catch, and the game they could kill. In these woods they gathered their supply of materials for making baskets, spoons, and ladles, bows and arrows, &c., and saying, as their apology, that their forefathers had reserved such rights in their disposal of the territory. The people were too kind to them to dispute their privilege, and they continued to visit, unmolested, until the period of the revolution.

The frank and generous hospitality of the Indians to the original settlers deserved a kind and generous return. The descendants of the original settler, (Carver,) have told me of a striking case of kindness. When his family was greatly pinched for bread-stuff, and knew of none nearer than Chester or New Castle, they sent out their children to some neighbouring Indians, intending to leave them there, until they could have food for them at home; but the Indians took off the boys' trowsers, tied the legs full of corn, and sent them back thus seasonably loaded.

Byberry is remarkable for having been once destined as the location of Philadelphia city! At the lower or southern side of the mouth of the Poquessink creek is a pretty elevation of table land, conforming to the line of the river Delaware, covered with a range of pine trees and others, intermixed, and showing now a primitive state and character, such as we understand Philadelphia itself originally had. Our youth who pass it in the steamboats should observe it. This site had once been surveyed and plotted as Philadelphia; and circumstances, for numerous years afterwards, caused it to be called popularly, "Old Philadelphia." It is now a part of the country seat of Mr. Morgan;-and his present mansion, altered and repaired, was once celebrated as "the bake house," at which, on a large scale, biscuit were baked for sea service, and for the continental army.

So many of the descendants of the primitive inhabitants still occupy in prosperity the places of their forefathers, and give perpetuity to the names of so many original settlers, that it is gratifying now, to ride through their township, and to witness the comforts enjoyed by them.

It

This love of visiting and contemplating places filled with local impressions, generated by the events and doings of our forefathers, is one of the strongest and purest feelings of our nature, and one which we wish to foster, with warm hearted interest, in these pages. flings over the imagination a delightful spell, where fancy draws those pictures of the past, more homebred, social and endearing, when viewed glimmering through the mist of years. With thoughts like these, we are prompted to add, in conclusion, some extracts from a letter written with pathos and feeling by the celebrated Dr. Rush, to the Hon. John Adams-his warm and social friend, on the occasion of his visit to Byberry, in 1812, to see the old homestead, and to revive the images of his childhood and departed kindred;-even its length, in this place, will be excused by those who know how to appreciate such pure emotions, so prompted by country and home. Such feelings are full of poetry and sensibility, and may some day present to some future Byberry poet, the theme of a touching poem!

When silent time, with lightly foot,

Had trod o'er fifty years,

He sought again his native spot
With grateful thoughts and tears ;-

When he drew nigh his ancient home
His heart beat all the way,-

Each place he pass'd seem'd still to speak
Of some dear former day.

ແ I was called," says he, "lately to visit a patient in that neighbourhood, and having with me my youngest son, I thought I would avail myself of the occasion to visit the farm on which I was born, and where my ancestors for several generations had lived and died. In approaching it, I was agitated in a manner I did not expect. The access was altered, but every thing around was nearly the same as in the days of my boyhood, at which time I left it. The family there, though strangers to me, received me kindly, and discovered a disposition to satisfy my curiosity and gratify my feelings. I soon asked permission to conduct my son up stairs to see the room in which I drew my first breath and made my first unwelcome noise in the world, and where first began the affection and cares of my beloved and excellent mother. I next asked for a large cedar tree which once stood before the door,-planted by my father's hand. It had been converted into the pillars of the piazza before the house. Filled with emotion, I embraced the one nearest me. I next inquired for the orchard planted by the same hand, and was conducted to an eminence behind the house, where I saw a number of apple trees which still bore fruit, to each of which I felt something like the

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