The mint grounds are part of “six inland city lots, lying between the two rivers, Delaware and Schuylkill.”
This deed, in addition to the six city lots which were evidently thrown in as a bonus, conveyed two river front lots, one on the Delaware and one on the Schuylkill, also 60,310 acres of land, variously and indefinitely located for the greater part. Two hundred and ten acres of this land was granted by warrant to Richard Noble, “old renter,” by Penn the 14th day of the 5th month, 1683, and afterwards by a patent to Noble the 5th day of the 6th month, 1685, by Thomas Lloyd, James Claypoole and Robert Turner, commissioners for Penn.
Another parcel of 100 acres of this land was part of a tract of 309 acres, “granted by an order from New York,” and surveyed on or about the 12th day of May, 1679, unto Wm. Clark, and afterwards disposed of to Richard Noble, and which was on the 8th day of the 8th month, 1689, granted and confirmed unto Noble by Wm. Markham and John Goodson, commissioners for Penn.
The 310 acres were transferred to Penn by Noble February 22, 1695.
The Penn deed to the Pennsylvania Land Company gives recital of grant to Penn by Charles II.
Richard Noble came over in the ship Griffith with John Fenwick in 1675 and landed at Salem, N. J. The Griffith was the first English ship to land in west New Jersey.
Noble surveyed and plotted the town of Burlington, N. J., in 1677, and on December 15, 1679, was appointed surveyor by Governor Andross, of New York, as surveyor of Upland, now Chester, Pa. He also surveyed a part of the present site of Philadelphia for the Swedes, Swansons, in 1681.
Wm. Markham was a cousin of Wm. Penn and landed in America in 1681. He at one time held a captaincy in the English army. He was the first Deputy-Governor of Pennsylvania.
Thomas Lloyd was president of council, justice of the peace of Philadelphia, and de facto Deputy-Governor in 1690. He founded, under Penn’s instructions, the first public school in Pennsylvania in 1689.
James Claypoole built the first brick house in Philadelphia, and was a member of council in 1687 and one of the Free Society of Traders.