Photo by Ph. B. Wallace
IMMANUEL CHURCH, NEWCASTLE, DEL.
In the rear of the courthouse, though still on the green Market Square, is old Emmanuel Protestant Episcopal Church, which was organized in 1689, though the building now occupied was begun in 1703. This cruciform structure is the oldest church of English building on the Delaware, and services have been held here continuously since 1706, when it was completed. Queen Anne gave to the church a "Pulpit and Altar Cloath, with a Box of Glass." A memorial tablet on the wall tells of the first rector, Rev. George Ross, who came as a missionary from England in 1703, and served for fifty years. His son, also George Ross, was one of the Signers of the Declaration of Independence. His daughter Gertrude married George Read, another of the Signers. The tomb of George Read is in the rear of the church.
Photo by Ph. B. Wallace
DOORWAY OF PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH, NEW CASTLE, DEL.
Across the street from the Market Square is the Presbyterian church, whose first building, erected in 1707, is still in use as a part of its ecclesiastical plant. The pastor and many of the members of this church had a prominent part in the War of the Revolution.
The visitor who crosses from one of these churches to the other is attracted by a stone pyramid, on the edge of the Market Square, whose story is told by a tablet:
"These stones were sleepers in the New Castle and Frenchtown Railroad, completed in 1831, the first railroad in Delaware, and one of the first in the United States."