HISTORY: Annals of Harrisburg, 1858, Errata & Preface, Dauphin County, PA Contributed for use in the USGenWeb Archives by Judith Bookwalter Copyright 2008. All rights reserved. http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://www.usgwarchives.net/pa/dauphin/ _________________________________________ ANNALS OF HARRISBURG Annals, Comprising Memoirs, Incidents and Statistics of Harrisburg, From the Period of Its First Settlement, For the Past, the Present, and the Future. Compiled by George H. Morgan. Harrisburg: Published by Geo. A. Brooks, 1858. Entered according to act of Congress, in the year 1858, By George A. Brooks, In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. ERRATA. Page 34, in the ninth line from the bottom, for "Florster" read "Forster." Page 51, in the eighth line from the top, for "was," after "Mr. Elder," read "succeeded Mr. Bertram as." In the same line and the next, for the words "when it was first built, about one hundred and twenty years ago," read "in 1737." In the line following, omit the words "upwards of." And in lieu of the fifteenth, sixteenth, seventeenth and eighteenth lines from the top, read "The first Paxton church building was erected about the year 1732. It was constructed of logs and stone, chiefly of the former; and stood a short distance south-west of the stone church, (erected between the years 1750 and 1755,) still standing, about two and a-half miles from Harrisburg, on the Hummelstown turnpike." Page 83, in the seventeenth line from the top, for "Jesse Rowland" read "James Lackey." Page 85, in the seventh line from the top, for "July" read "January." On the same page, in lieu of the sentence commencing after the word "neighborhood," in the second line from the top, and ending before the word "From," in the second line following, read "The courts were afterwards held in the old log jail which formerly stood on the north- west side of Strawberry alley, a short distance north-east of Rasberry alley, and in a log house which formerly stood on the lot now occupied by the "Farmers' Hotel," on the east side of Market street, near Dewberry alley. Page 89, in the eighth line from the bottom, for "the year 1785" read "for the years 1785, and those following until 1799, inclusive." In the sixth line from the bottom, for "year" read "period." And for the two bottom lines, read "The expenditures for the erection of the present Court House commenced in 1792, and occur at different periods after that until 1799, inclusive. They appear in the book as follows." Page 144, in the eighth and ninth lines from the bottom, for "February" read "January." ii ERRATA. Page 145, in the top line, omit the word "foregoing." Page 147, in the sixth line from the bottom, for $490" read $400." Page 151, in the top line, for the words "the river, being" read "Sweet Briar alley, in." And in lieu of the sixth and seventh lines from the top, read "Under authority of a joint resolution passed by the Legislature, April 2, 1821, viewers, headed by Archibald M' Allister, were appointed between the commissioners and owners of lots running in front of the Capitol to the river, between North and South streets, who reported the value of said lots, as held by the owners, to be $24,400, which unexpected estimate caused the project of their purchase by the State to be abandoned." Page 211, in the second line from the bottom, for "Berks" read "Lebanon." Page 233, in the eleventh line from the top, for "or" read "of." In the fourteenth line from the bottom, for "wooding" read "wood." Page 234, in the seventh line from the top, between the words "of" and "equal" insert the word "nearly." In the tenth line from the bottom, after the word "alley," read "to the front wall of the building." Page 278, in the eighth line from the top, for "In" read "Previous to." Page 308, in the tenth line from the top, for "eight" read "six." Page 323, in the fifteenth line from the top, for "fourteen" read "sixteen;" and in the next line below, for "sixteen" read "fourteen." Page 324, in the third line from the top, for "M'Marland" read "M'Farland;" and in the next line below, for "Carman" read "Cannon." Page 355, in the eighth line from the top, between the words "The Paxton" insert the word "first." In the same line and the next, in lieu of the words "still standing about three miles from Harrisburg, was erected about the year 1722," read "was erected about the year 1732." Page 357, in the sixth line from the bottom, for the words "who died several years ago," read "still living in one of the Western States." Page 361, in the eleventh line from the top, for "Hale" read "Hall." Page 377, in the seventh line from the top, for "David J. Krause" read "David G. Krause." Page 380, in the seventh line from the top, for "1824" read "1825." PREFACE. Says that accomplished and indefatigable annalist, Watson, "Our love of antiquities - the contemplation of days by-gone - is an impress of the Deity. It is our hold on immortality. The same affection which makes us read forward and peer into futurity, prompts us to travel back to the hidden events which transpired before we existed. We thus feel our share of existence prolonged even while we have the pleasure to identify ourselves with the scenes or the emotions of our forefathers. For the same cause relics are so earnestly sought and sedulously preserved. 'They are full of local impressions,' and transfer the mind back to 'scenes before.'" The object of this work is to rescue from the ebbing tide of oblivion all those forgotten memorials of unpublished facts and observations, or reminiscences and traditions, which will serve to illustrate the domestic history of Harrisburg, past and present. It is designed as a museum of whatever is rare, surprising or agreeable concerning the primitive days of our sturdy forefathers, or of the subsequent changes by their sons, either in the alterations or improvements of given localities, or in the modes and forms of "changing men and manners." It is a picture of the doings and characteristics of a "buried age." By the images 4 PREFACE. which their recital creates in the imagination, the ideal presence is generated, and we talk and think with "men of other days." Herein the aged citizen may travel back in memory to the scenes and gambols of their sportive boyhood days; and the youth of the borough may regale their fancies with recitals as novel and marvelous to their wondering minds as the "Arabian Tales," even while they have the gratification to commingle in idea with the plays and sports of their own once youthful ancestors. The dull, unheeding citizen who writes "nil admirari" of the most of things, may here see cause to "wonder that he never saw before what the compiler shows him, and that he never yet had felt what he impresses." To natives of Harrisburg settled in distant lands, these particulars concerning the "old homestead" will present the most welcome gifts their friends here could offer them. It is not too romantic to presume that a day is coming, if not already arrived, when the memorabilia of Harrisburg, and of its primitive inhabitants, so different from the present, will be highly appreciated by all those who can feel intellectual pleasure in traveling back through the "vale of years," and conferring with the "mighty dead." Such will give their thanks and gratitude to labors as humble as these, for the complier has not aimed to give them that "painted form" which might allure by its ornaments of rhetoric; he has rather repressed the excursive fancy he sometimes could not but feel. His object has not been to say all which could have been adduced on every topic, but to gather up the segregated facts in their several cases which others had overlooked or disregarded, or to save fugitive facts 5 PREFACE. which others had neglected. In this way he has chiefly labored to furnish the material by which better or more ambitious writers could elaborate more formal history, and from which, as a repository, our poets and painters, and imaginative authors could deduce themes for their own and their country's glory. Scanty, therefore, as these crude materials may seem, "fiction" may some day lend its charms to amplify and consecrate FACTS, and "tales of ancient Harrisburg" may be "touched by genius and made immortal." The materials for the work have been chiefly derived from the Archives of the State, County, and Borough offices; Hazzard's Pennsylvania Register; Watson's Annals; Colonial Records; Legislative Documents; Graydon's Memoirs; Rupp's History of Dauphin County, &c.; Day's Historical Recollections; Pennsylvania Gazetteer; files of old newspapers, and from old citizens generally, among whom the compiler is particularly indebted to Messrs. Geo. W. Harris, Valentine Hummel, Sr., David Harris, Joseph Wallace, George Eicholtz, Robert Gillmore, James Peacock, Francis Wyeth, and John Roberts, for valuable aid.