History of Bucks County, PA
from the discovery of the Delaware to the present time
by W. W. H. Davis, A.M., 1876 and 1905* editions.
Excerpted and used on www.moland.org with the permission of Donna Bluemink, transcriber, editor and submitter to the USGenWeb Archives; obtained in September 2007.
Transcriber's note: Liberty has been taken with numbering footnotes so as to include all footnotes from both the 1876 and 1905 editions, plus any additional text and pictures in the 1905 edition. All 1905 material will be noted with an asterisk and often be bracketed - [ *]. Note: Where names differ, the 1905 edition spelling is applied.Excerpted with permission by Ed Greenawald. Clarifying comments are bracketed and tagged with a caret - [ ^], and were made in 2007.
CHAPTER XXV - WARWICK, 1733
First land seated. -James Clayton. -Bowden's tract. -The Snowdens. -Doctor John Rodman. -The Jamisons. -The Baxters.* -Middlebury. Township petitioned for. -Called Warwick. -Area. -Quaint petition. -The Ramseys. -Robert Ramsey. -Andrew and Charles McMicken. -Provisions of a will. -The Carrs. -William Rogers.* -Hendersons.* -Mathew Archibald.* -Neshaminy [-Warwick Presbyterian^] church. -Mr. Tennent. -Old tombstones. -Colonel William Hart. -Robert B. Belville. -James R. Wilson. -Change of hymn-books. -William Dean. -Andrew Long. -Accident. -Roads and bridges. -Wallaces.* Well-watered. -Hamlets. -Continental Army encamped on the Neshaminy.* -The Hares.* -Post-offices. -Aged persons. -Population. Considerable land was seated in Warwick prior to 1684, but it is doubtful whether there were any actual settlers at that date. Among the original purchasers of land, before 1696, was James Clayton, probably the ancestor of the numerous family bearing this name in eastern Pennsylvania, who came from Middlesex, England, in 1682 with his wife and children. He landed at Choptank, Maryland, in November, and came into the province the following month. We have no data to tell when he came into the county, but he took up an extensive tract west of the Neshaminy, extending from the Northampton line, or thereabouts, to Jamison's comer; also, John Gray, whose tract covered the Alms-house farm, Henry Bailey, about Hartsville, Benjamin Twily, in the vicinity of Jamison's comer, Nathaniel Stanbury, John Blayling, Dramell [Daniel*] Giles, John Fettiplace, John Cows [Clows*], Randall Blackshaw, George Willard, Thomas Potter and James Boyden. Boyden's tract was north of the [Little^] Neshaminy [Creek^], between the Bristol and [Old^] York roads, and lay along the road from the top of Carr's hill.down to Neshaminy [-Warwick Presbyterian^] church. As these names are not afterward met with in the township, very few, if any, were probably actual settlers. Jeremiah Langhorne and William Miller, [Sr.,*] owned 334 acres on the east side of the Bristol-road, which extended down it toward the meeting-house, from the top of Long's hill, and running back from the road. [Miller purchased from Langhorne and Kirkebride in 1726, and a large part of the tract became vested in James Wallace, 1762.*]
. . .
The population at that time cannot be given, but at the first enumeration of taxables that we have seen, made in 1759, when the township embraced a much larger area that at present, they numbered 138. Before it lost any of its territory it contained 11,883 acres. Its present [1876^] area is 10,731 acres. Since Doylestown Township was organized there has been one or two immaterial changes in its territorial limits.
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Warwick is well provided with roads, being cut by three main highways, the York, Bristol, and Alms-house roads, and a number of short lateral roads, that afford the inhabitants easy communication from one portion of the township to another. The road from the top of Carr's [or Kerr’s^] hill down to the Bristol road at Neshaminy [-Warwick Presbyterian^] church was laid out in 1756 between the lands of William Miller and James Boyden. In 1759 [1756 in 1905 edition*] a road was opened from Henry Jamison's mill [now a private residence still visible from the south-facing windows of the Moland House^], on the south-west branch of [the Little^] Neshaminy [Creek^], to the [Old^] York road. A stone bridge, on the [Old^] York road, over the Neshaminy, above Hartsville, was built in 1755. It was replaced by another stone bridge in 1789, which stood until within the last ten years [assume current year is 1876^], when it was destroyed by a freshet. The datestone had cut upon it a human heart. The present [1876^] bridge is an open wooden one [since reconstructed as a stone-clad bridge in 2006^]. Warwick is one of the best watered townships in the county. Two branches of the Neshaminy fonn part of its east and northern boundary, which, with their tributaries, supply almost every part of it with abundance of good water. This condition is very favorable to the building of mills, and their erection was begun with the first settlement of the township. Before 1760 there were four flour-mills in Warwick: Henry Jamison's, now Lewis Ross's [in 1876^], Mearns', Hugh Miller's, and Faries's.
. . .
In 1784 Warwick, which then embraced a portion of Doylestown township, contained 609 white inhabitants, 27 blacks, and 105 dwellings. In 1810 the population was 1,287; 1820, 1,215; 1830, 1,132 with 216 taxables; 1840, 1,259; 1850, 1,234; 1860, 881, and in 1870, 775, of which 19 were of foreign birth; 1880, 722; 1890, 709; 1900, 631. We cannot account for this constant shrinkage of the population of Warwick on any other theory than the incompetency of those who took the census. It does not speak well for the growth of a township which has 350 less population in 1870 than it had 40 years before. (6)
(6) The shrinkage in the population of Warwick is said to have been due to two causes, incompetency of the census takes, and adding portions of it to Doylestown, once if not twice. When Doylestown was organized, in 1818, it was taken from the three adjoining townships of Buckingham, New Britain and Warwick, the latter giving 3,515 acres. Some 40 years ago [1836^] the Alms House and farm was taken from Warwick and added to Doylestown. This reduced the population over 100. *
. . .
The surface of Warwick is not as level as the adjoining townships. In the vicinity of the Neshaminy it is considerably broken in places, with steep, abrupt banks and rolling [hills^]. The soil is thin on some of the hillsides. The Arctic drift, evidence of which is seen in Warrington township, extended into Warwick.
[Warwick lay in the track of the Continental army at one of the most critical periods of the Revolution. Washington passed the winter, spring and most of the summer of 1777 near Morristown, New Jersey, watching the British in New York [City^]; but, when he heard of the British fleet sailing south in July 1778 [actually 1777^], believing their destination to be Philadelphia, he put his army in march to intercept them. He crossed the Delaware [River^] at New Hope, then Coryell's Ferry, the 30th and 31st of July, marching down the York road to the vicinity of Gennantown, where, he halted to await further tidings. As the movements of the British fleet were uncertain and deceiving, the Continental army retraced its march to the Neshaminy hills, Washington quartered in the farm house of John Moland, then lately deceased [he actually died in 1761^], and the family probably lived there [the widow Moland and daughter Grace resided there^]. The dwelling was surrounded by a plantation of 134 acres, which Daniel Longstreth purchased, 1789. He sold it, 1790, to John Richards, a Philadelphia merchant, who probably never lived there, as he conveyed the property to Elijah Stinson April 1, 1792. The latter spent the remainder of his life there, dying March 5, 1840, at the age of eighty-nine. The dwelling, with about half the original plantation was sold by William Bothwell's executors, to Mrs. Sarah R. Campbell, April 3, 1889. The Moland house, still standing, in good preservation, is on the east side of the [Old^] York road, facing south and 300 yards north of [Little^] Neshaminy [Creek^]. It is a substantial stone building, 35 feet square [actually 27 x 24 feet^], two stories and attic with a stone kitchen at the east end, 16 x 18 feet [interior dimensions without the 32-inch wide hearth^]. A porch runs in front of each building on the south side. The end of the main building stands to the road on a bank a few feet high. As when Washington occupied it, the first floor of the main building is divided into two rooms with the entry near the kitchen; the larger room being on the south side and entered from the porch, the smaller, back. The latter is thought to have been used by Washington as an office, the larger a reception room. In each there was an open fire place and then as now a door opened into the kitchen. There has been no change in the porches in 60 years, and similar ones may have been there 1777-8. [No, the southern porches were removed during restoration since they were added after 1777.^] Here Lafayette reported for duty and first took his seat at the council board. The whipping post was on the west side of the [Old^] York road, opposite the house. The army was again put in march for Philadelphia on the 23rd to intercept the enemy, the battle of Brandywine and Germantown shortly following.*]
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