Admiral Sir William Penn, the father of the founder of Pennsylvania, left, at his death, claims to a considerable amount against the crown, for his services. His son, with the two-
* This is the island upon which the lazaretto now stands, and is not the low, sandy island in the middle of the Delaware above.
Charter granted to William Penn.—Emigrations. Arrival of Penn.—His Biography. Annexation of Delaware.
fold motive of settling these claims and providing an asylum for his persecuted Quaker brethren, applied to King Charles the Second for a grant of land in the New World. He was successful, and on the 4th of March, 1681, a charter was granted. The assent of the Duke of York on the north, and of Lord Baltimore on the south, was obtained to the provisions of the charter, and a province on the west side of the Delaware, three degrees of latitude in breadth by five degrees of longitude in length, was named by the kind's proclamation, as well asApril, 1631. in the charter, Pennsylvania, in honor of the illustrious Admiral Penn.
The proprietor immediately published "certain conditions or concessions" to adventurers; and an association, composed principally of Quakers, was formed at London and Bristol, called "The Free Society of Traders," who emigrated to America to purchase lands in the new province. William Markham, a kinsman of Penn's, had been sent forward as his deputy to take possession of the country and prepare for the colonists.
On the 30th of August, 1682, Penn, and quite a large number of emigrants, chiefly Quakers, sailed in the Welcome, from England. They arrived at New Castle on the 7th of October. The settlers of every kind received the new proprietor with great joy, for the fame of his noble and excellent character had preceded him. At Upland (now Chester) he convened an assembly, where he made known his plans and benevolent designs. His words were heard with delight, and the people flocked around him with the affectionate feelings of children. The Swedes said, "It was the best day they ever saw." At this assembly an Act of Union was adopted, conformable to a deed which he had obtained, by which the "three lower counties," Essex, Kent, and Sussex (now the State of Delaware), were annexed to Pennsylvania. A few days afterward, Penn proceeded to Shackamaxon (now Kensington, in Philadelphia), where he entered into a treaty with the Indians, and established with them an everlasting covenant of peace and friendship. This was the memorable treaty held
* William Penn was born in London, October 14th, 1644, and in his fifteenth year entered, as a gentleman commoner, a college in Oxford. Brilliant talents and unaffected goodness characterized his early youth. While at Oxford, he heard an itinerant Quaker preach, and was so impressed with the doctrines which he taught, that he joined, with other students similarly impressed, in withdrawing from the established worship and holding meetings by themselves. He was fined for non-conformity and expelled from college when he was sixteen years of age. Parental discipline attempted to reclaim him, but in vain. He was sent to France, where he passed two years, and became a very polished young gentleman. He studied law in Lincoln's Inn until the breaking out of the plague in London in 1665. He was sent to Ireland in 1666, to manage an estate for his father, but, associating with Quakers there, he was recalled. He could not be persuaded to take off his hat in the presence of his father or the king, and for this inflexibility he was expelled from his father's house. He became an itinerant Quaker preacher, and made many proselytes. He suffered much "for conscience' sake," sometimes by revilings, sometimes by imprisonments. He wrote much, and preached with daily increasing fervor. In 1668 he wrote his No Cross, no Crown; and in 1670 he was tried at the Old Bailey, but acquitted by the jury. His father died soon afterward, leaving him a very large estate, but he continued to travel, preach, and write as usual. Having obtained a charter for a province in America, and settled his government on a sure basis, he formed a plan for a capital city, and named it Philadelphia—brotherly love. Two years after it was founded it contained two thousand inhabitants. On returning to England in 1684, he obtained the release of thirteen hundred Quakers then in prison. He resided mostly in England, but visited his colony occasionally. He was seized with a paralytic disorder in 1712, which terminated his life on the 30th of July, 1718, at the age of seventy-three. His posterity held his possessions till the Revolution. His last surviving son, Thomas Penn, died in 1775.