Notes and Queries

NOTES AND QUERIES97 we Send Enclosed hoping thou'lt Carefully Observe the particulars (therein) as farr as may tend to the Advantage of the Estate. As to the Companies affairs here, they Remain as when thou left us.—Perhaps we may give thee further Acc't in our next. We hope we need not say much in repeating the Directions given thee when here to make us as speedy Remittances of the ballance as possible, and likewise of the Outstanding Debts as the same shall be gott in. The Writings thou ordered to be made and see executed when here we send by Captain Annis in a Small Box Directed for thee in Number Twelve Leases and Twelve Releases which mayst Deliver the Purchasers and thereby more money may come into thy hand. Signed for the Trustees John Bell Bibliography Thomas Story's Journal, in Friends' Library, X, 1-372. " Logan-Story Correspondence" in Bulletin of Friends' Historical Association, XV, No. 2. " Determination of the case of Mr. Thomas Story and Mr. James Hoskins Relating to an affair of the Pennsylvania Land Co.," in Library of Historical Society of Pennsylvania, PhUa. Isabel Grubb, Quakerism and Industry before 1800, 82. Watson, Annals of Philadelphia, I, 33. "Testimony of Haddonfield Monthly Meeting concerning John Estaugh," Il mo. 9th, 1743, printed in Fragmentary Memorials of John and Elizabeth Estaugh (1881), 37-39. See also The Friend (Phila.), XXX, 181. Unpublished papers of John and Elizabeth Estaugh, concerning which the following facts may be of interest: Elizabeth (Haddon) Estaugh built a large house on her property at Haddonfield, New Jersey in 17 15. At her death, this house and the custody of her papers passed to her great-nephew and principal heir, John Estaugh Hopkins. In 1800 he gave the great house to his eldest son James and removed the papers to a smaller residence the building of which he had completed in 1799. Elizabeth Estaugh's papers remained there for one hundred and twenty-five years. Hannah Hopkins, his eldest daughter, long surviving the other members of the family of her generation, was the next custodian of the papers. At her death, in 1838, a granddaughter of John Estaugh Hopkins, Beulah Hopkins, afterward Nicholson, became possessor of the papers. At her death in 1863, the house and papers became the property of Sarah Nicholson, a great-granddaughter of John Estaugh Hopkins. She died in 1925, and the custody of the papers was then given to Rebecca N. Taylor, a great-great-granddaughter of John Estaugh Hopkins. These papers are now in the vaults of the Girard Trust Co. Philadelphia, accessible through Rebecca N, Taylor. NOTES AND QUERIES Who was the first Clerk of Philadelphia Yearly Meeting? This question was raised in the writer's mind while making a study recently of the life of Anthony Morris (1654-1721). In order to answer the question, a study was made of the early manuscript minute books of Philadelphia Yearly Meeting. For many years after 1681, no mention is made of the appointment of a Clerk. However, in 1687, a general epistle to the Quarterly Meetings, and a special epistle to the same advising against the sale of rum to the Indians, appear in the minutes, signed on behalf of the meeting by Anthony Morris. Further along in the minutes of the same year is the statement that the above epistles 98 BULLETIN OF FRIENDS' HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION " were ordered to be Signed by the Clerk." {MS. Minute Book, II, pp. 15-17.) Thereafter, for several years, there is no definite clue as to who was Clerk. The epistles were usually signed in this period by several Friends who were appointed to that service by the meeting. In 1691 "A Testimony . . . against all loose and Unclean Spirits" was "ordered to be signed on behalf of this Meeting by Anthony Morris." (Same, p. 25.) In 1696, there appears the first definite appointment of a Clerk, and the text indicates a change from the former Clerk: "Agreed that Phineas Pemberton be Clerk of this Meeting, and get the Books and Papers Relating to the Same, and Record all Minutes not Recorded, or so many of the Minutes and Papers...