A EUREKA MOMENT IN FAMILY HISTORY RESEARCH – IN 1894
Letter to: The descendants of Dr William Darlington, West Chester, Chester County, Pennsylvania, USA
From: Thomas Darlington, ‘Glynderwyn’, Alleyn Road, West Dulwich, SE London, England
11th February 1894
‘Dear Sir
The occasion of my venturing to trouble you with this letter is briefly as follows: Whilst engaged on some researches at the British Museum a few days ago, I came across a little book entitled ‘The Sesqui-Centennial Gathering of the Clan Darlington”, which upon examination, I found to contain an account of the American branch of my own family – a connection which seems to have been broken for about 150 years.
I was a little surprised to find from the pamphlet that Dr Darlington had failed to discover Cheshire kinsmen during his visit to this country in 1851. I think that there would be very little difficulty in establishing the fact that Job Darlington of Darnhall, your ancestor, was a cousin of Richard Darlington of Aston.
I have not the exact particulars at hand but trusting to my memory for details, I believe that the Darlington of Aston of that date was named Richard, and that he was the “Cousin Richard” so frequently referred to in the letters of Job Darlington in the pamphlet.
The elder branch of the Darlingtons of Aston terminated in a female – Anne, daughter of John Darlington of Aston – who married in 1770 Henry Tomlinson of Dorfold Hall [near Nantwich, Cheshire]. The Dorfold estate then passed by another marriage into the family of Tollemache, the head of which is Lord Tollemache of Helmingham [in Norfolk].
This John Darlington had a brother, Abraham [from whom I am descended].
Both Job and Abraham are good old family names, still kept up on this side of the water – as are Richard and John. My father’s name was Richard – he had a brother John and three cousins, Abraham, Job and Richard. My grandfather was Richard – and he had an only brother, Abraham.
I should be extremely glad if this letter should lead to a renewal of relations between the two branches of the family on either side of the Atlantic. I should be only too happy to supply you with any particulars regarding your Cheshire ancestry which may be within my knowledge.
I shall look anxiously for a reply tho this letter, which is “a bow drawn at a venture”, inasmuch as I have no information as to the present whereabouts of any of my American relations.
Meantime, believe me, dear Sir,
Yours faithfully
Thomas Darlington'
In the event, it is reported that Thomas happily re-established contact between the American and English branches of the family. And Edwin L. Heydecker in his chapter ‘Our English Kith and Kin’ (in Gibert Cope’s extensive monograph “Genealogy of the Darlington Family: A record of the Descendants of Abraham Darlington of Birmingham, Chester County, Pennsylvania") writes that:
“Mr Thomas Darlington of London, England and Hafudomos, Aberystwyth, Wales attended the Bi-Centennial Gathering of the American Darlingtons in (late) 1894, bringing details of the English family gathered as a labour of love and out of respect for his Darlington lineage”.
As I have indicated previously, all of the Cheshire Darlington families appear to share a common origin, with most being descended from the Darlingtons of ‘Brookhouses’ (nowadays Brook House Farm) in the parish of Whitegate, Cheshire, traceable as far back as the baptism of Alice Darlington at Whitegate Church in 1567.
THE AMERICAN DARLINGTONS
So I will now provide a little background on the uprooting of some of the Cheshire Darlingtons and the settlement of this family in Pennsylvania.
In 1680, William Penn, a prominent and wealthy Quaker obtained a charter from King Charles II for the territory forming the present state of Pennsylvania. It was granted largely in consideration of a debt of 16,000 pounds due from the British Government to Admiral Sir William Penn [in relation to naval warfare against the Dutch]. Clearly, King Charles II also thought it would be an excellent means of ridding himself of powerful and potentially troublesome religious dissenters.
Prior to his departure for America, William Penn began to sell land to prospective English settlers, and by August 30th 1682, he had disposed of more than 500,000 acres. Among the purchasers was Thomas Rowland of Acton, Cheshire, who obtained 1,000 acres.
Thomas Rowland was also joined by John Dutton of Overton, Cheshire – and it seems that John’s wife Mary was a Darlington before marriage. Other early Cheshire settlers were John Nield and Robert Taylor (Mary Dutton married John Nield after John Dutton died around 1694).
A few years later, around 1711, two young Cheshire Lads, Abraham and John Darlington from Darnhall, Cheshire also settled in Chester County. They were nephews of John and Mary Nield and their migration was ‘influenced by inducements held out by their uncle that were not realized upon their arrival’.
On the 28th March, 1713, Job and Mary wrote a letter to their Dear Sons. In this they thanked ‘Allmighty God for preserveing you’ and prayed that ‘you will be Carefull of both soul and body for you are in a strang Country’. They were also asked to ‘presen both our Dear loves to our Dear brother John Neild and his wife our Dear Sister – and their sons unknown to us’.
Typical of the sort of admonishing that I used to receive from England as a student in Australia, the letter ends with a note that a reply should be sent either care of the Cock Inn in Nantwich, or through John Walker, merchant of Liverpool to Darnhall - and not addressed to Over near Middlewich, as in this case ‘it is sent by three posts to us and Costs Duble Price’.
Well, the Darlingtons did very well for themselves in their new country. As the family saga records:
‘As years went by and numbers grew, the fertile dales of Chester County, Pennsylvania still proved sufficiently attractive to Abraham Darlington’s children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren to induce them to remain near their ancestral homes. A few of them went into the adjoining counties or the neighbouring city of Philadelphia, but the greater part continued to cultivate their farms in the old county.
Through the 18th Century, as the frontier of settlement slowly pushed west of the Alleghanies (sic), they remained near the eastern tide-water, and not even the mighty stream of westward travel and settlement in the first half of the 19th Century caught many of them in its rush. Most of them continued to live in Chester County – substantial, thrifty, law-abiding citizens – Friends (i.e. Quakers) by persuasion, farmers by occupation, happy and contented’.
NEW FROM HOME
Before leaving my American kin, I want to quote from what I personally feel is the most fascinating letter among those transcribed by Gilbert Cope. It is a letter from Joseph Darlington, of Darnhall, Cheshire to John and Abraham in Pennsylvania dated 3rd April 1746. It is unusual in that it makes direct reference to contemporary English politics and the effects of the Jacobite Rebellion under the Young Pretender ‘Bonny Prince Charlie’:
‘About the last of November last, we were under the most dreadful apprehensions of receiving a visit from the French and Highlanders of Scotland, to the number of nine to ten thousand, who advanced through Macclesfield and so on to Derby – raising the most exorbitant contributions, and almost ruining the country as they passed – but thanks to God, they missed us. But now they are retired to Scotland, where his Majesty’s forces are in pursuit of them’.
A reference then to the last land war in the UK in 1745-46 – wow!
And so I’m now very glad that I took time out to visit the Old Stone House in Georgetown that predates the Revolution, during interludes in visiting the World Bank in the 1980s. I also have very happy memories of hiring a car and driving down the old turnpikes in Virginia to visit Williamsburg. I didn’t know it then but I do have a real connection with the East Coast of the USA!
RURAL CHAIN MIGRATION
In reading Cope’s monograph, I was constantly amazed at the number of Cheshire farming surnames that kept popping up in the descriptions of the Chester County population. Names like Vernon, Dutton, Davenport, Dodd, Dilworth, Gleave and Minshull. This clearly illustrates the process of Chain Migration, in which founders provide platforms and springboards for continued immigration from the same location. However, I had not thought that it would have been so obvious in the case of the early English settlement of America.
I have added some information about two additional families – the Hollinsheads and the Sherwins below.
OTHER CHESHIRE FAMILIES IN NEARBY NEW JERSEY – HOLLINSHEAD & SHERWIN
John and Grace Hollinshead were early settlers in Burlington County, New Jersey and it appears that they too have a considerable number of descendants in the United States. Like the Darlingtons, John and Grace Hollinshead were also ‘Friends’ or Quakers.
According to ‘Some Genealogical Notes on the Hollinshead Family’ by A. M. Stackhouse, 1911 (available online):
“The Hollinshead family originated from Hollins in the township of Sutton, Chester. The heiress of Sir Hugh Hollinshead the last of the elder branch at an early period married into the family of Ravenscroft. The next line was the Hollinsheads of Cophurst whose representative was Ralph (Raphael) Holinshed, the Tudor-era historian.
The only notice of the name traceable in the Friends' Record of Cheshire is that of a Thomas Hollinshead of Overwhitley who died in 1704”.
It appears that some time in the middle of the 17th Century, one family from the Cheshire Hollinsheads moved to London, partly to be closer to other Quaker families. But they suffered further persecution there after the Restoration of the Monarchy at the end of the English Civil War.
As Stackhouse relates of one such occasion:
"Scarcely had they (the Friends) taken possession of their rooms in Devonshire House, in 1666, when the authorities seized it in the King's name, padlocked the door, and affixed the mark of the broad arrow as a sign of its being Government property.
No guard, however, was set to maintain the seizure and accordingly the Friends quietly removed the padlock and continued their meeting. But these meetings, especially after the Meeting House was built in 1678 were frequently interrupted by violence and Friends turned out of doors”. Even then, “their open air worship was disturbed by the drum-beat of soldiery as they rushed up with swords and staves and cruelly maltreated the unoffending Quakers."
John Hollinshead was a silk stocking weaver or a "silk stocking frame work knitter”. At this time, Spitalfield, London, was the centre of this industry and when the Edict of Nantes was revoked in 1685 the Protestant Huguenot silk weavers flocked there from France, making the place famous for the manufacture of silk goods. John and Grace would have found natural allies in the Huguenot refugees.
In 1673, John and Grace Hollinshead had a son John - and at sometime around 1680 they left England to find a new home in the West Jersey Colony that was then being promoted.
Having survived the English Civil War (1641–1651), the Restoration of the Monarchy in 1660, the Great Plague of London in 1665, the Great Fire of London in 1666, and intermittent severe religious persecution, John and Grace were probably ready for a change!
There is a record of a town lot being purchased by the elder John Hollinshead at "Delaware over against the tower end of Burlington Island along the creek arount it" on November 14th, 1682 - and on the same date there was a purchase of another wharf lot on Rancocas Creek. This was followed on February 6, 1682, by the purchase of a wharf lot at Burlington.
It is reported that:
"Incidents of their (the early colonists of West Jersey) wants are many, and the supplies sometimes unexpected. The family of John Hollinshead, who lived near Rankokas, being unprovided with powder and shot, were in distress, when John Hollinshead the younger, then (about 1682) a lad of 13, going through a corn field, saw a turkey, and throwing a stick to kill it, a second came in sight. He killed both and carried them home.
Soon after, at the house of Thomas Eves, he saw a buck; and telling Eves, he set his dogs, who followed it to Rankokas river, then frozen. The buck running on the ice, slid upon his side - the dogs seized it - and Hollinshead coming up with a knife, eagerly jumped upon it.
The buck rose with young John on his back, and sprung forward, his feet spreading asunder, slip'd gently down on his belly and gave Hollinshead a respite from danger and opportunity of killing him.
By these means two families were supplied with food to their great joy. These and such like instances, in a new settled country, show with the along with the distress the relief that sometimes unexpectedly attends it."
There is also an account of the accidental death of James Sherwyn who married John’s sister Rebecca Hollinshead. James was Over-seer of the Poor in Chester Township in 1718, Surveyor of Roads in 1723, and Overseer of Highways in 1729.
According to The Pennsylvania Gazette (Dr Franklin's newspaper) of July and August, 1738:
"On the 26th of July past John Ward near Anchocus going out to hunt Deer perceived something to stir in the Bushes and seeing the Bosom Part of a Man's white Shirt he thought it to be the white of a Deer's Tail, fired his Gun off and Killed one James Sherwin, his Neighbor (who was out on the same Account) on the Spot."
Some of the neighbours seem to have believed that the shooting was not accidental and their tongues wagged accordingly.
The younger John Hollinshead settled on that part of his father's plantation adjacent to the Rancocas Creek, at "Hollinshead's Dock" a short distance below the place where the public highway from Burlington to Salem crosses the creek.
He appears to have been a man of sturdy independence of character who would not submit to what he considered an injustice and who was free and outspoken in his opinions. He successfully fought a case that was brought against him at the instigation of Lord Cornbery, the Governor of New Jersey from 1703, who took it upon himself to impugn the local Quakers.
A writer in 'The Friend" apparently said of him: —
"He was a diligent attender of Meetings and exemplary therein. He was a true lover of his Friends and being well qualified for usefulness and hospitably disposed, he was very serviceable to his friends and neighbors. He departed this life in 1749 being about 75 years of age."
Although the heir to Rancocas plantation, Hugh Hollinshead appears to have declared for the United States at the breaking out of the Revolutionary War, some of the Hollinsheads joined the Loyalist forces. Anthony Hollinshead was a Lieutenant in the 3rd Battalion ‘Stryker's’ New Jersey Loyalists up to January, 1779, when he left the service.
To the victors the spoils, and on his return home Antony left with many other refugees for Nova Scotia. His name appears on the muster roll of disbanded officers, discharged and disbanded soldiers and loyalists mustered at Digby, in the Province of Nova Scotia in May 29, 1784.
POSTSCRIPT
The process of rural colonisation from Cheshire is still continuing in the 21st Century. For example, the Kinsey family - neighbouring farmers in Wettenhall, where I grew up - have bought and developed a wheat farm in Western Australia.
And the youngest son from the Shore family in Duddon settled in Southland, New Zealand in the 1980s and has become a very succesful farmer there. I visited his farm, along with my brother-in-law John Hollinshead in 1994. I was touched to see that he had inset beams into the ceiling of a corner of his weatherboard NZ farmhouse to create a 'Snug' with an open fire, where his sons could mull and drink their ale.
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