Chester (And Its Vicinity) Delaware County

Chester (and its Vicinity), Delaware County, in Pennsylvania; With Genealogical Sketches of Some Old Families was published in 1877 by W.H. Pile and Sons. Authored by John Hill Martin, the publication was a "limited edition to 500 subscribers". In his work, Martin provides a classic "history of" outlining the history of Chester and it's surrounding county of Delaware. Martin's personal collection is now housed at the University of Delaware. Their website provided the following biography:

"Author, editor, genealogist, illustrator, lawyer, and publisher John Hill Martin was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in 1823. Martin, who remained single, became well known in Pennsylvania for his writings about genealogy, history, and marine insurance. His parents were William Martin and Sarah Ann Smith (b. 1801-d. 1876), and his grandparents were Dr. William Martin, Jr. (d. 1862) and Eleanor Crosby (who later married John F. Hill) and Margaret S. and William Smith, Jr. His father gave up his law practice to move to the Lungren House near Lungren Mills, which he named Lenni Mills after the Lenni Lenape Indians of Delaware. These mills later became Lenni Station, which was part of the Philadelphia, West Chester, and Media Railroad. After his father’s faltering career in the mills in the late 1820s, Martin was sent to live with his grandparents, the Hills, who lived on a farm (possibly called Martin’s Plantation) in Chester County, Pennsylvania.

When his family moved to Chester after his father was elected Secretary of the Delaware County Insurance Company, Martin returned to his parents’ home. Young Martin attended the Ridley School. At fifteen Martin was appointed a midshipman to West Point. He wrote that he was “too young and entirely unprepared for the course of education persued [sic.] at the Military Academy.” In 1841 after a checkered experience, he was asked to leave. He returned to Philadelphia where he studied law under George L. Ashmead. Martin was admitted to the Philadelphia bar in 1844, and practiced law until 1881. He concentrated his cases on the admiralty and insurance.

John Hill Martin incorporated his love of history and literature into his everyday life. For almost fifty years he was the legal editor for the Insurance Intelligencer (Philadelphia Intelligencer), and became an author and publisher in the 1870s. Many of his summers were spent in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. His fondness for the town inspired him to chronicle its history in a two-volume edition called Historical Sketch of Bethlehem in Pennsylvania, with Some Account of the Moravian Church (1872-1873). At the same time he wrote “Sketches in the Lehigh Valley,” which were several articles written for the Bethlehem Daily Times. Martin edited and published Historical Notes on Music in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania by Rufus A. Grider. He also published Martin’s Bench and Bar of Philadelphia (1873) and his work Chester (and its Vicinity) Delaware County, in Pennsylvania (1877). A member of the Moravian Historical Society and the Pennsylvania Historical Society, he bequeathed many of his papers to the latter. By 1897 Martin lived in Atlantic City, New Jersey. He died in 1906."

The copy I'm presenting today is extremely special. It not only is signed by the author but also was a gift presented to Rear Admiral Peirce Crosby by John Hill Martin. Both their signatures appear in the book. Attached throughout the book are handwritten notes by both John Hill Martin and Admiral Crosby outlining the the Crosby family history contained within the book.

Peirce Crosby (16 January 1824 – 15 June 1899) was an rear admiral in the United States Navy, whose active duty career included service in the Mexican-American War and the Civil War. Rear Admiral Peirce Crosby died at Washington, D.C., on 15 June 1899 and is buried in Arlington National Cemetery. The destroyer USS Crosby (DD-164) was named after him.

In addition to these famous people, my own ancestors appear in the book. Mentioned is Thomas Horne and his proprietorship of a Tavern in Delaware County. Not much but a nice little glimpse into his life.

Historical Sketch of Chester

While we're on a Henry Graham Ashmead run we'll discuss his book, 'Historical Sketch on Chester'. Published in 1883 by the Historical Committee of the Penn Bi-Centennial Association of Chester, Ashmead describes the book as follows:

The Historical Committee of the Penn Bi-Centennial Association of Chester, in the discharge of the duties confided to them, thought it but fitting that the people should have some enduring memorial of the celebration in our city of the Two Hundredth anniversary of the landing of William Penn, the Founder of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania - a memorial which could pass from father to son and keep alive, to some extent at least the interest which the even aroused and the lessons it taught.I find it fitting to be sitting here, a great-grandson of a father who participated in the Penn Bi-Centennial, studying and writing about this book. Utah wouldn't be a state for another 13 years, I wouldn't be born for another 84 years and the internet wouldn't be invented for another 79 years. Yet Mr. Ashmead and the Historical Committee had the foresight to document the great history of the City of Chester so that someone like me could learn and write about its history.

William Penn first landed in America on October 27, 1682 in New Castle, Delaware. There he preformed a traditional turf and twig ceremony. A turf and twig ceremony was an English common law, to convey property. The common law in those jurisdictions once provided that a valid conveyance of a fee interest in land required the physical transfer by the seller to the buyer, in the presence of witnesses, of a piece of the ground, a twig, key, or other symbol. Two days later he landed in Upland, Pennsylvania and promptly renamed it Chester.

Two hundred years later the members of the Historical Society of Pennsylvania and the Penn Club to mark the 200th anniversary of the landing erected a granite monument, standing about five feet tall and has Penn's coat of arms on the side facing inland. The site is now about 100 feet inland, with railroad tracks separating it from the Delaware River in an industrial section of Chester, just south of Chester Creek.

This book in particular has several unique features that any book collector would admire. Ashmead inscribed it to its owner Amos C. Brinton and the book plate indicates it was donated at one point to the Chester County Historical Society by Bart Anderson. Bart Anderson is the famous Delaware/Chester county historian. Two great signatures in one!