The King house was later included in the Gibbs purchase and was occupied by the gardener employed by Mr. Gibbs, and while so used it was destroyed by fire. Mrs. Gibbs remembers the building as a typical old frame farm house snuggled down under the shelter of the hill, embowered in roses and so picturesquely situated as to make her long for the simple life.
BURIED TREASURE.
There have been many stories in the past of Captain Kidd and his buried treasure, and there has been much digging in the fields hereabout by those who would acquire riches without due process of labor, but the only find that I have heard of occurred where the Gully road joins the River road.
The building of the Erie Railroad necessitated a change where the Gully becomes the River road, and a strip some eighty feet wide was lopped off the Gibbs property. When the fence was moved back certain articles of silver were dug up by the workmen in the slender triangle which now lies between the drive and the railroad. The matter was kept quiet, presumably through fear that the stuff would be claimed, and the pieces disappeared before any one could inspect them.
Where this occurred would have been just in front of the older King house and it is possible that these articles were family treasures buried during the Revolution in fear of a British raid.
WHEN BRITON MET BRITON.
A story has come down from the elders to the effect that at some point in the game of war two detachments of British troops were foraging in this region apparently each “unbeknownst” to the other, for the legend has it that while one was on the River road nearly opposite Jasper King’s, the other, which was on higher ground, mistook them for the enemy and fired a volley among them, whereupon the hirelings rushed for the cover of the river bank, which was much higher then than now, and in their excitement threw their guns into the river. Some of these guns were recovered after the war by fishermen.
THORNHILL.
What has been known to most of those now living as the Gibbs house is an imposing brown stone edifice which was built by Governor Pennington for his daughter Mary when she became the wife of Hugh Toler. In due time the place was sold to Mr. Alfred H. Gibbs, and has since been known as Thornhill. It was a sightly place with the river at its feet.