Thursday, February 26, 2015

Moore land in Philadelphia

I am a bit confused on where the land on which James and Rose Moore lived in Philadelphia.  So I am trying to sort out what I can sort out.  The Philadelphia Business Directory of 1690 (WOW!  Could there really be such a thing?)  says that there are five smiths in Philadelphia:

Lyonel Brittain a blacksmith from Alney, Buckinghamshire

Thomas Peart a whitesmithwho brought a certificate of removal from Thusk Meeting in Yorkshire

Joshua Morris a tynn-plate-worker or tinsmith who arrived on the Welcome with William Penn in the fall of 1862

James Moore, blacksmith, by warrant dated 17 4m 1684, had a lot surveyed to him at Center apparently at the southeast corner of High Street and Schuylkill Eighth.  Here he built a house and presumably lived here while employed at the Proprietor's mill, and while making the windows for the Center Meeting House.  In December, 1693, he sold it to Richard Worthin, but was not taxed that year.  (the footnote says:  Pennsylvania Archives, 3rd Series, II 752, ibid, 2nd series XIX, 328, which recites Moore's said of the house and lot to Richard Worthin in  1693 , ibid, 89, 92, PGSP, II, 169, See also PGM, XX, 62 for further notes on James Moore.

Jeremiah Elfreth, blacksmith, in 1686 bought from John Wheeler the latter's lot "before Henry Flower's House."  When he came to build on this bank lot in 1690, he bought from Richard Russel the right to build into Russell's north "gavell" wall.  He was not taxed in 1693.  There was a footnote about this entry.  This is almost certainly the Jeremiah Elfreth of Elfreth's Alley fame.

All of this is taken from the book Colonial Philadelphians by Hannah Benner Roach that I bought from the Philadelphia Genealogical Society on Tuesday.  The information about the smiths was found on page 47.

OK, I just reread page 31 of the article in Ms Roach's article about the 1690 Business Directory.  It explains that John Goodson wrote a letter to friends in England in which he listed some thirty-five different grades and businesses that were flourishing in Philadelphia in 1690.  He did NOT list names.    The author has examined many sources that she names on pg 31 in identifying these individuals.  Ms. Roach has footnotes to explain her identifications of the various tradesmen.

On December 8, 1853, Councils gave them new names. Schuylkill Eighth became Fifteenth Street. Schuylkill Seventeenth Street. Schuylkill Fifth became Eighteenth Street. Schuylkill Fourth became Nineteenth Street. Schuylkill Third became Twentieth Street. Schuylkill Second, and Ashton Street to Twenty-third Street.
http://www.ushistory.org/philadelphia/formerstreets.htm



Market Street (Philadelphia) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Market_Street_(Philadelphia)

Wikipedia
Market Street, originally known as High Street, is a major east–west street in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. 

The City was laid out by William Penn, the founder of the province in 1683, and settled by a colony from England, which arrived in that and the preceding years, and was increased by a constant and regular influx of foreigners, to so great a degree, that in just less than a century, and within the lifetime of the first person born within it of European parents, it was computed to contain 6,000 houses and 40,000 inhabitants.
The ground plot of the city is an oblong square, and is intersected by a number of streets at right angles with each other, nine of which run East and West from Delaware to Schuylkill, and twenty three North and South, crossing the first at right angles, forming one hundred and eighty-four squares of lots for buildings.
The streets running East and West are named (except High Street near the middle of the City) from the trees found in the country upon arrival of the colony: Vine, Sassafras, Mulberry, High, Chestnut, Walnut, Spruce, Pine, and Cedar Streets, and those running North and South from their numeral order, Front, Second, Third, Fourth, etc. to Broad Street, which is midway between the two rivers.
http://www.fmoran.com/kuhn2.html

Thus  James Moore's land in 1690 would have been on the corner of what would now be Market and Fifteenth Street.  Literally right where Dilworth plaza is today.  I have proven for myself what my buddies told me!  So if James and Rose lived on the property from the time that he had it surveyed until the time that he sold it they were on that property for almost ten years.

So the next question is how does the land up in the Northern Liberties fit into the story of James and Rose?  Certainly this must be the bank lot?

OK...I found it.  Rose is selling this lot in 1709:

...... to wit in the first month 1689/90 surveyed & laid out to the above named James Moore The Right & property of which sd Lot as Surveyed appertaineth unto me the sd Rose Moore.....  James had sold the Center of town lot in December 1693 according to Ms. Roach.  James seemed to have died the following year.  And his widow, Rose, then sold the bank lot 3 May, 1709.  In the land transaction in which Rose is selling the land it is said that she sells the premises and appurtenances. I believe that this implies that it was not vacant land.  Perhaps she and James had moved to the bank lot on the Delaware River from the Center of the City lot for whatever reason.    


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