passes through this part of the county, and immense benefit has of late years been derived from its use, whole tracts having been renovated by its agency. Large quantities of cordwood and timber are taken to market from the SE. part, which, excepting occasional cultivated clearings, is covered with a pine forest interspersed with villages, some of which contain glass-works. The county is watered by many streams: those emptying into the Delaware furnish the means of transportation for the products of the county to Philadelphia, the principal market for this section. The county is divided into 10 townships, of which Deptford, Gloucester, Greenwich, Newton, and Waterford, were incorporated in 1798. The following is the list of the present townships :

Camden, Franklin, Greenwich, Union, Washington, Deptford, Gloucester, Newton, Waterford, Woolwich.

The population of the townships now comprising Gloucester co., was in 1810, 14,684; in 1820, 17,895; in 1830, 20,267; in 1840, 25,445.

*

CAMDEN.

Camden was formerly embraced in Newton township, from which it was set off, and incorporated into a city by a charter passed on the 13th Feb., 1828. The corporate limits of the city, containing in area about 2 square miles, are bounded on the N. and E. by Cooper's creek and Newton township, on the S. by Little Newton creek, and on the W. by the river Delaware. Within the liberties are included several farms and forests; the actual city extending in detached villages along the river, and leaving to the eastward "ample room and verge enough" for building and improvement. The most northerly of these villages is Cooper's Point, at which place were established the first settlement and ferry; the next and largest is Camden proper, lying east of Windmill Island; further down are South Camden and Kaighn's Point, lying opposite the Philadelphia navy-yard, and reaching nearly to the southern boundary of the city. The population in 1830, was 1,987, and in 1840 it had increased to 3,366.

In 1678, Samuel Norris purchased the land now occupied by Kaighnton and S. Camden, of Edward Byllinge and trustees; part of which was subsequently conveyed by him to Robert Turner, and by him to John Kaighn. Further up, a tract was located on the 20th Sept., 1681, by Wm. Royden, a purchaser from the trustees of Byllinge. This included the land between Kaighn's line and what is now called Cooper's-st. This tract was sold in 1689 to Wm. Cooper, who had before purchased "Pyne Point," the same now called Cooper's Point. A descendant of this individual, Jacob Cooper, bought from his predecessor 100 acres of land lying along

* Communicated for this work by Isaac Mickle, Esq., of Camden.

the Delaware from Cooper's-st. to Joseph Kaighn's line, for "the sum of five shillings, as well as for the natural love and affection borne him" by the vendor. By a descendant of this gentleman the town of Camden was laid out, receiving its name from an English nobleman who had shown himself favorable to the American colonists. As early as 1695, a ferry to Philadelphia was established here, and the place bore the name of Cooper's Point until changed to its present appellation.-(MS. Lecture by Dr. Mulford.) In the war of the revolution it was an outpost for the British during their occupancy of Philadelphia, and the remains of the barracks built by them are still visible on the farm of Joseph Cooper, Esq., at the Upper Ferry.

There are some reminiscences connected with the early history of Camden which it may not be uninteresting to record. In 1632, when Capt. De Vries returned from Holland, and found the friends he had left on the Delaware river murdered, and all the forts in possession of the perfidious natives," he was compelled to pardon," says Gordon," where he could not safely punish." He entered into negotiation with the Indians, and his first care was to obtain provisions, under the pretence of furnishing which the natives decoyed him into Timmerkill, or Cooper's creek, where they designed to murder him and his crew, as they had already others in the same place on a former occasion. The persons thus betrayed, are supposed by some to have been the colonists left a few years before by Capt. Mey, in Fort Nassau, and by others the crew of a vessel from Virginia. De Vries, not suspecting any snare, would have met a similar fate, but for the kindness of an Indian woman, who boarded his vessel by stealth, informed him that one company had already been slaughtered in that place, and put him on his guard against the meditated assault of her kindred. It is probable that the scene of the intended massacre was that part of Cooper's creek which lies opposite Ward's Mount: for here the bank rises abruptly on one side to a considerable height, while the channel is partially filled with stones which have rolled down from the hill. Having grounded the vessel, which was small, the Indians could have assailed her with stones and arrows from the precipice, and made her crew an easy sacrifice. This incident concurs with a thousand others, to show that kindness is an essential quality of the female heart, whether it beat in the savage or the belle; and the true lover of virtue cannot but regret that the name of De Vries' benefactress, because unknown, must remain forever unhonored and unsung.*

Windmill Island was formerly connected with the Jersey shore at Cooper's Point. The writer has before him a MS. letter from one Wm. Brown to Thomas Penn, dated "Philad., 8th mo. 20th, 1761,"-from which the following is an extract: "I am now willing to offer two hundred and fifty pounds for the whole island, rather than take the lease proposed; tho' John Kinsey, in his life-time, advised me to get a Jersey right for

* The incident here related forms the groundwork of a well-written tale in Miss Leslie's Magazine, called "Yacouta, a Legend of West Jersey."

The engraving shows the appearance of Camden, as seen from Walnut street ferry, Philadelphia. Windmill or Smith's Island appears in front of the city. The canal, for steam ferry boats, through the island, is seen on the right.

it, as there had been great strife with the Jersey people about the grass, (tho' they tell me where the grass grew then, it's gone, and gathered in this place,) and as that was not called an island when our worthy proprietor bought the islands in the river with the lower counties; which I accordingly did. And, as a Jersey man informed me, he could or did, when a boy, wade all the way from Cooper's Point to it; and now it is very shoal and stony all the way over, so that they claimed the right to it, till I bought it of a Jersey proprietor. Nevertheless, as our proprietors claim it, I am willing to pay them for it, if I can have the whole for what I dare venture to give." The wharfs having narrowed the western channel, and thrown an increased volume of water to the eastward of the island, it is now severed from the Jersey shore. It now is most generally called Smith's Island, from a man who purchased the Messenger of Peace, a Dutch vessel, which brought out the news of the treaty of Ghent. The vessel, being condemned, was run upon the northwest corner of the island, and turned into a pleasure-house, in which parties and dances were frequently held until 1841. In olden times the island was used as the place of execution for pirates. In 1798, three were hung there at one time, and were left some days on the gibbet, a terrible example to "all others in like cases offending." This island and bar being a great obstruction to the ferry navigation between Camden and Philadelphia, the legislature of Pennsylvania authorized a ferry company, incorpoted by New Jersey, to cut a canal through it. The work was begun in 1837, under the superintendence of Charles Loss, Esq., engineer of the Camden and Amboy railroad company, and of Joseph Kaighn, John W. Mickle, and Edwin A. Stevens, of the board of direction of the ferry company; and was completed at a cost of about $40,000. It is now passable at all tides, and greatly facilitates the intercourse between the two sides

of the river.

Within the memory of those living, the whole locality of Camden was tilled as a farm, with but a few dwellings along the shore, occupied by ferrymen. Then, long lines of black-cherry and mulberry trees stood in the highways, and numerous apple orchards allured the holyday and truant boys from Philadelphia. Towards the end of the last century, indeed, the eccentric William Cobbett and Matthew Carey fought a duel on a spot now the heart of the city, unperceived by any one but their seconds. Camden is exclusively the fruit of the nineteenth century, and her past growth warrants every hope from the future. It is even now a place of much business,-containing 17 mercantile stores, 5 churches, (Friends, Episcopalian, Baptist, and Methodist, the latter having one house for the whites and another for the blacks,) a bank, 3 newspapers, 8 hotels, 4 lumber-yards, and many mechanical and manufacturing establishments. There are several public gardens, resorted to, during the summer, by thousands from Philadelphia,to which place there are 6 ferries, constantly plying, at low rates. A bridge from Camden to Philadelphia was talked of some 30 years ago, and Mr. Edward Sharp procured the necessary enactments from the two legislatures. A street a hundred feet wide was laid out as a starting-place in Camden, and was called Bridge Avenue. But the project failed for want of funds, and the avenue is now occupied by the Amboy Railroad. From Camden, roads diverge in all directions; and it is the termination of two railways,—that from Amboy, of which we have spoken, and another from Woodbury, the shire-town of Gloucester co.

The following summary account of the death of Hutchinson Heberton by the hands of Singleton Mercer, (Feb. 10th, 1843,) is copied from the newspapers published at the time. Mercer was subsequently tried for murder at Woodbury, and acquitted: