FOOTNOTES:
[1] Colonial Records, X, 95. The Fair Play settlers were outlawed by a proclamation of the Council signed by Governor John Penn on Sept. 20, 1773. The proclamation was issued "strictly enjoyning and requiring all and every Person and Persons, already settled or Residing on any Lands beyond the Boundary Line of the Last Indian Purchase, immediately to evacuate their illegal Settlements, and to depart and remove themselves from the said Lands without Delay, on pain of being prosecuted with the utmost rigour of the Law." The "Last Indian Purchase" referred to here is, of course, the Stanwix Treaty of 1768.
[2] Smith, Laws, II, 195.
[3] Richard W. Leopold and Arthur S. Link (eds.), Problems in American History (Englewood Cliffs, N. J., 1957), p. 22. The entire first problem in this excellent text deals with the question of authority in American government.
[4] This Fair Play system was certainly not unique, for other frontier societies employed the same technique, even down to the ruling tribunal of three members. See Solon and Elizabeth Buck, The Planting of Civilization in Western Pennsylvania (Pittsburgh, 1939), pp. 431, 451. However, it must be pointed out that the Bucks' "Fair Play" reference is based on Smith, Laws, II, 195, which Samuel P. Bates used in "a general application of the practice to W. Pa. areas after 1768," in his History of Greene County, Pennsylvania (Chicago, 1888). This was the interpretation given in a letter from Dr. Alfred P. James to the author, July 17, 1963. Dr. James also says that "It is possible that there are evidences of Fair Play Men titles in the court records of Washington and Greene Counties."
[5] This designation was often employed to classify those settlers who took up lands beyond the limits of the Treaty of Fort Stanwix in 1768, that is to say, west of Lycoming Creek on the north side of the West Branch of the Susquehanna.
[6] Russell, "Signers of the Pine Creek Declaration of Independence," p. 5. Mrs. Russell, whose historical accuracy can be verified through her indicated sources, refers to old borough minutes of Jersey Shore as her source for the names of the tribunal of 1776, namely, Bartram Caldwell, John Walker, and James Brandon. Upon discussing the matter with her, I learned that a clipping from an old Jersey Shore paper, now lost, which described the minutes, was her actual source. However, adequate documentation and meticulous research characterize her work. Furthermore, Bratton Caldwell (he signed his name Bartram) is also labeled a Fair Play official by Linn, "Indian Land and Its Fair Play Settlers, 1773-1785," p. 422. Linn's identification comes in the case of Greer vs. Tharpe, Greer's case being a pre-emption claim on the basis of military service.
[7] "Eleanor Coldren's Deposition," Now and Then, XII (1959), 220-222. The deposition reads "That in the Spring of 1775, Henry Antes and Cookson Long, two of the Fair-Play Men, with others, were at the deponent's house...."
[8] Oscar T. Barck, Jr. and Hugh T. Lefler, Colonial America (New York, 1958), pp. 258-260. Although Barck and Lefler indicate in this section on "The Colonial Franchise" that universal suffrage did not prevail in the colonies, they do note the significance of "free land," of which Fair Play territory was an excellent example.
[9] Ibid, p. 260.
[10] William Cooke to James Tilghman, Pennsylvania Archives, First Series, XII, 286-287.
[11] Pennsylvania Archives, Fourth Series, III, 545-546.
[12] Report of the Commission to Locate the Site of the Frontier Forts of Pennsylvania (Harrisburg, 1896), I, 390, 392, 394-418.
[13] Smith, Laws, II, 195.
[14] Linn, "Indian Land and Its Fair-Play Settlers," p. 424. This six weeks provision is noted in the deposition of John Sutton in the case of William Greer vs. William Tharpe, dated March 13, 1797.
[15] Ibid., 422. Bratton Caldwell, one of the Fair Play men, indicates this practice in his deposition in the Greer vs. Tharpe case.
[16] "Eleanor Coldren's Deposition," pp. 220-222.
[17] Linn, "Indian Land and Its Fair-Play Settlers," pp. 422-424. William King, in his deposition taken March 15, 1801, in Huff vs. Satcha [sic], in the Circuit Court of Lycoming County, notes the use of a company of militia, of which he was an officer, to eject a settler. Linn errs in his reference to the defendant as "Satcha." The man's name was Latcha, according to the Appearance Docket Commencing 1797, No. 2, Lycoming County.
[18] See nn. 6 and 7, p. [33].
[19] Smith, Laws, II, 195. See also, pp. 31 and 32, this chapter, in which the excerpt from this source is quoted verbatim.
[21] Infra, [Chapter Six]. The question of leadership in conjunction with the problems of this frontier is discussed in Chapter Six.
[22] The Appearance Dockets and Files were checked for Northumberland County from 1784 to 1795 and for Lycoming County from 1795 to 1801. These records, obtained in the offices of the respective prothonotaries, produced thirty-seven cases in Northumberland and twenty-two in Lycoming County dealing with former Fair Play settlers. Unfortunately, only four were reviews of actual Fair Play decisions.
[23] Northumberland County originated in 1772 and Lycoming County in 1795. Clinton County was not created until 1839.
[24] Meginness, Otzinachson (Philadelphia, 1857), p. 172.
[25] The cases referred to here are: Hughes vs. Dougherty, Huff vs. Satcha, and Grier vs. Tharpe. They were located in the Appearance Dockets of Lycoming and Northumberland counties in the respective prothonotaries' offices. Hughes vs. Dougherty appears in the Northumberland County Docket for November, 1783, to August, 1786, in the February term of the Court of Common Pleas, file 42. Both the Huff and Grier cases were found in the Lycoming County Docket No. 2, commencing 1797, court terms and file numbers indicated as follows: Huff vs. Satcha, February, 1799, #2, and Grier vs. Tharpe, May, 1800, #41. A partial deposition by Eleanor Coldren, Now and Then, XII (1959), 220-222, was also employed. Although the case appears to be Dewitt vs. Dunn, I could not locate it in the Appearance Dockets. Depositions taken in the Huff and Grier cases were published in Linn, "Indian Land and Its Fair-Play Settlers," pp. 422-424.
[26] Leyburn, The Scotch-Irish, p. 205.
[27] Jasper Yeates, Pennsylvania Reports, I (Philadelphia, 1817), 497-498.
[28] Smith, Laws, II, 195.
[29] Yeates, Pennsylvania Reports, I, 497-498.
[30] "Eleanor Coldren's Deposition," pp. 220-222.
[31] Linn, "Indian Land and Its Fair-Play Settlers," p. 422.
[32] Ibid.
[33] Ibid.
[34] Ibid.
[35] Meginness, Otzinachson (1889), p. 469.
[36] Now Linden, in Woodward Township, a few miles west of Williamsport.
[37] King refers here to the Great Runaway of 1778.
[38] Linn, "Indian Land and Its Fair-Play Settlers," p. 423-424.
[39] Meginness, Otzinachson (1889), p. 470.
[40] Ibid., p. 471.
[41] D. S. Maynard, Historical View of Clinton County (Lock Haven, 1875), pp. 207-208. Maynard has reprinted here some excerpts from John Hamilton's "Early Times on the West Branch," which was published in the Lock Haven Republican in 1875. Unfortunately, recurrent floods destroyed most of the newspaper files, and copies of this series are not now available. John Hamilton was a third-generation descendant of Alexander Hamilton, one of the original Fair Play settlers.
[42] Meginness, Otzinachson (1857), p. 193.
[43] Ibid. An alleged copy of the declaration published in A Picture of Clinton County (Lock Haven, 1942), p. 38, is clearly spurious. The language of this Pennsylvania Writers' project of the W.P.A. is obviously twentieth-century, and it contains references to events which had not yet occurred.
[44] Fithian: Journal, p. 72.
[45] Muncy Historical Society, Muncy, Pa., Wagner Collection, Anna Jackson Hamilton to Hon. George C. Whiting, Commissioner of Pensions, Dec. 16, 1858.
[46] Ibid., John Hamilton to Hon. George C. Whiting, Commissioner of Pensions, May 27, 1859.
[47] The veracity of the witness is an important question here. Meginness, in his 1857 edition, devotes a footnote, p. 168, to this remarkable woman who was in full possession of her faculties at the time. The Rev. John Grier, son-in-law of Mrs. Hamilton and brother of Supreme Court Justice Robert C. Grier, wrote to President Buchanan on Nov. 12, 1858, (Wagner Collection), stating that "Mrs. Hamilton is one of the most intelligent in our community." Buchanan then wrote an affidavit in support of Grier's statements to the Commissioner of Pensions, Nov. 27, 1858, (Wagner Collection). Aside from the declarations of Mrs. Hamilton and her son, the only other support, and this is hearsay, is found in the account of an alleged conversation between W. H. Sanderson and Robert Couvenhoven, the famed scout. W. H. Sanderson, Historical Reminiscences, ed. Henry W. Shoemaker (Altoona, 1920), pp. 6-8. Here again, the fact that the reminiscences were not recorded until some seventy years after the "chats" raises serious doubts.
[48] Pennsylvania Archives, Fourth Series, III, 545.
[49] Ibid., p. 546.
[50] Linn, History of Centre and Clinton Counties, p. 473.
[51] Ibid.
[52] Ibid.
[53] Ibid.
[54] Ibid. See also John H. Carter, "The Committee of Safety of Northumberland County," The Northumberland County Historical Society Proceedings and Addresses, XVIII (1950), 44-45.
[55] See [map] of the Fair Play territory in Chapter One.
[56] Linn, History of Centre and Clinton Counties, p. 469. See also, Carter, "The Committee of Safety," pp. 33-45, for a full account of the activities of the Committee. Carter notes that the county committee consisted of thirty-three members, three from each of the eleven townships chosen for a period of six months.
[57] Ibid., pp. 472-474.