Manuscripts Concerning the Otsego Purchase of 1769

MANUSCRIPTS CONCERNING OTSEGO PURCHASE 21 been found. Excellent facilities are available for showing pictures on the screen (or directly on the wall), which has proved very satisfactory. The dedication ceremonies and opening reception on December 10th, 1930, was a notable event for Frankford. More than three hundred people assembled to admire the beautifully decorated, and well designed structure, and to inspect the many historic treasures; and relics. All were enthusiastic in their praise for the generosity of the donor, whose family has been for so many years identified with the cultural and educational life, and the industrial development of the community. MANUSCRIPTS CONCERNING THE OTSEGO PURCHASE OF 1769â By Amelia M. Gummere There has recently been given to the manuscript collections of Haverford College, a notable set of papers relating to the purchase of lands in Otsego County, New York. The gift was made by Miss Caroline Allinson, of Yardville, New Jersey, whose greatgrandfather , Samuel Allinson, Attorney and Surveyor-General of West Jersey, drew up these papers and deeds. They have remained in the family since his death in 1791, and by the foresight and generosity of Miss Allinson are now placed where they will be permanently available for the student of American history. These manuscripts gain added interest for the historian in connection with the recently published lives of Sir William Johnson and of George Croghan, Great Britain's Indian Commissioners in America.1 There is but one transfer to George Croghan from the Indians before 1769, when the Canajoharies sold 100,000 acres of land in Albany County, New York, to King George III, through Sir Henry Moore, Governor of the colony. The indenture of Charles Read, of New Jersey, to Samuel Wharton recites the names of the " Chiefs and Proprietors of the Country of the Canajoharie Indians." The date and the sum paid for these lands 1 Arthur Pound and Richard E. Day, Johnson of the Mohawks. Macmillan , 1930 ; Albert T. Volwiler, George Croghan and the Westward Movement . Arthur H. Clark Company, Cleveland, 1926. 22 BULLETIN OF FRIENDS' HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION are not stated, but the Historical Society of Pennsylvania owns the bill of Edward Milne, silversmith, to George Croghan for articles in silver, chiefly ornaments, given to the Indians in payment for lands in 1761. As witnesses to these interesting names we find those of John Lawrence, father of Captain James Lawrence of " Don't give up the ship " memory, and of Ann de Cou, who shortly after married Jonathan O'Dell, the " Tory Rector " of St. Mary's Church in Burlington, New Jersey, where they both lived. One is led to wonder whether the Indians were present in Burlington when the deed was made. Both Sir William Johnson and George Croghan were Irishmen, possessing the ingratiating manner and diplomatic adjustability to the peculiar traits of the red man, which gained his confidence and friendship. During the French and Indian wars their knowledge of the Indian language, character and customs proved invaluable in the preservation of life and territory to the English, and materially aided in the outcome of the Revolution which, however, lost to both much of their great possessions. It is not possible here to comment at length on the various papers in this important collection, but there are two fine documents for the sale of 69,000 acres in Albany County, New York, from which Otsego was later on laid out, Albany County then extending from the Hudson River into the unknown wilderness west of the colony of New York. On January 29th, 1770, Governor Cadwalader Colden of New York, who succeeded Governor Moore on the death of the latter, sold this large tract in the King's name to sixty-nine purchasers, nearly all of them from Pennsylvania and New Jersey, each of them taking out a patent for one thousand acres. These purchasers then sold to Thomas Wharton, Senior, of Philadelphia, who, with his brother Samuel, was already a large landholder in the west, exporting hides and choice skins traded from the Indians. The deeds for this great sale are on two separate parchments, a single sheep not furnishing a large enough skin to contain all the names. The text is therefore...