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Spruce Hill Township
Part II
History of that part of the Susquehanna and Juniata valleys, embraced in the
counties of Mifflin, Juniata, Perry, Union and Snyder, in the Commonwealth of
Pennsylvania...
Edited by F. Ellis and A. N. Hungerford.
Published in Philadelphia by Everts, Peck & Richards, 1886
Pages 791-801
SPRUCE HILL TOWNSHIP, Part II
by A. L.
Guss
SPRUCE HILL SCHOOLS.--There are six public schools in this
township: Centre, Matamoras, Spruce Hill, La Grange, Wisdom and Gap. These houses are all frame. Before 1807, a house stood near James Okeson's. Andrew Garner, Joseph Highlands, Robert Coulter, Alexander Coulter and John Glasgow were teachers. In 1830 it was known as the Big Spring school-house and taught by John Gray; later teachers, John Frow, Alexander Graham, George Morrow, Kelly Patterson, Jane Liggett, John Rutherford and Adam Nelson. About 1807 an old school-house stood on a lot where Widow Steward lives, and David Powell taught here. In 1817 a house stood on Samuel Mowery's land; William Williams taught here. In 1817 a house stood where S. A. Hoffman's wagon-shop now is, and Charles Woodney taught. Another old house stood a fourth of a mile below Conn's store, on the road. Another stood near Samuel Wharton's as early as
1802. The number of children in Spruce Hill attending school in 1884 was two hundred and forty.
Spruce Hill has been the birth-place of some men who have their mark elsewhere,--Rev. Joseph Kelly, minister of the Presbyterian Church at Spruce Creek; Rev. J. H. Barnard, son of Joseph, now of Kankakee, Ill.; Rev. Joseph Patterson, who died in Jacksonville, Fla.; Rev. William A. Patton, formerly of Willingford Colored Academy at Charleston, S.C.
THE GRAY LAND LITIGATIONS.--The survey of John Gray has
connected with it much interesting legal history. He had made an improvement on his tract of three hundred and eighteen acres prior to the date of his warrant, February 8, 1755.
On June 11, 1756, the Indians took Bigham's Fort, situated a few miles west of Gray's land, and account of which will be found in Chapter III of this work, entitled "Settlements and Massacres," page 69. They carried off Hannah, wife of John Gray, and a three-year-old child named Jane, whom Gray had left in the fort while he and another person went to Carlisle on business. As Gray was returning to the fort a bear ran across his track, frightened his horse and threw him off. In consequence of this accident he was detained sometime on the road in readjusting his pack, and when he returned to the fort he found that it had just been burned and every person in it either killed or taken prisoner. Among those carried off were Francis Innis and wife and George Woods. John Gray joined Colonel John Armstrong's expedition against Kittanning, in September following,
in hopes of hearing from his family; but he returned to his former home in Bucks County, where he died, leaving a will dated April 12, 1759. This will provided as follows:
"I give unto my sister, Mary Gray, one full half of my plantation on Juniata river, in Tuscarora valley, to be taken off the side lying next to my brother, James Gray's plantation, upon this condition, that she pay to my nephew, John Gray (son of James Gray), the sum of £5 in one year after my decease, and in consideration of her making no demand of £13 of any of my heirs or legatees, or of my estate now or forever, which £13 I formerly borrowed of her. The other half of my said plantation I give unto my loving wife, Hannah Gray, and my daughter,
Jane Gray, to be divided between them, share and share alike; but in case my said wife should die before the execution of this my will, or never return from captivity, then her part both of real and personal estate bequeathed to her to remain to my daughter Jane. And if it should so happen that my daughter Jane should die, or not return from her captivity, and my wife return and survive her, so, in like manner, that part given to my daughter shall remain in my wife and her heirs forever."
Mary Gray was executrix of the will.
The widow, Hannah, hid in the wagon of a trader in some deer-skins, and escaped. Having returned, she took possession of the property, and was taxed for it in 1763. Her husband's sister, Mary, it seems did not accept the devise, at least did not comply with the condition, as the following receipt signed by her, dated August 19, 1760, shows: "Received of Hannah Gray the sum of sixteen pounds, it being in full of all debts, dues and demands against the estate of John Gray." As Hannah paid the claim and interest on which Mary's half was made conditional, she and every one else considered her as the owner of the land. About 1771 she married Enoch Williams. They resided on the plantation, and were taxed for the whole tract for many years. They had no children. Their right
of ownership was undisturbed for twenty-five years. In 1764 Colonel Bouquet marched an army to the Muskingum, in Ohio, and forced the hostile tribes to surrender the captives held by them. Among those recovered were a large number of children scarcely able to recognize their parents. Thos unable to tell where they belonged were taken to Philadelphia, and persons who had lost children were notified. Mrs. Gray went and brought back a girl which she said was her Jane. The identity of this child became a matter of dispute.
Mary Gray never qualified as executrix, and there was a citation to her, on April 22, 1790, to appear at the register's office in Bucks County, in order to undertake the trust reposed in her by the testator. This she refused to obey, and Enoch Williams was appointed administrator of the estate March 16, 1791. This legal disposition of the estate did not prevent the coming storm. John Gray, the deceased, had a brother James, who settled above him, his residence being on the border of the present Tuscarora township. James had a son, John Gray, Jr., who desired to secure Mrs. Williams' land, which twenty-five years of hard labor
by Enoch Williams, her husband, had made very valuable. John Gray, Jr.,
somehow managed to get possession of a house on his Aunt Mary's half of the land. Measures were at once commenced to eject him. On November 9, 1796, Enoch Williams and his wife, Hannah, sold David Bale two hundred and fifty acres in trust for the benefit of said Enoch and Hannah, in their separate capacity, as if they were not man and wife, all damages arising from the ejectment suit then pending against John Gray to be for the sole use of Mrs. Williams [deed book C, p.359]. The price was five shillings and other valuable considerations. Once Mary Gray relinquished all her right to the half of this tract to her poor sister-in-law, and took sixteen pounds in full of all claims against the estate. In course of years this sympathy ceased. Hannah lived with another man, and busy-bodies were circulating the story that the child she had taken was not
her own. Young John persuaded his Aunt Mary to give him a deed for her half of the place, May 21, 1803, thus renewing or setting up a claim which she had abandoned many years before. Hannah Williams, on July 11, 1803, sold to David Bale all her rights to the half of these three hundred acres, as vested in her by the deed of trust of November 6, 1796 for two hundred and fifty dollars. David Bale, being thus armed with the title claims of Mrs. Williams, in conjunction with Enoch Williams' legatees, pressed the ejectment suit they had instituted, and succeeded in dispossessing John Gray, Jr., and afterwards placed David and John Frederick as tenants upon the place. The dispute was all confined to that half of the survey devised conditionally to Mary Gray. An ejectment suit was brought by John Gray, Jr., in August, 1810, against the Fredericks, then in possession under titles derived from Williams and his wife. In October, 1815, a jury rendered a verdict in favor of the defendants. An appeal was taken by Gray to the Supreme Court, which, at a session held at Sunbury, June 4, 1817, reversed the decision of the lower court, and sent the case back for re-trial. In the meantime there was a great change in the title of the Enoch Williams half of the
estate.
Enoch Williams, by his will dated April 19, 1802, devised his estate to legatees, and his interest in the half of the land was sold to satisfy the judgment of Messrs. Hale, Duncan & Watts, his lawyers, who got tired waiting, the land being then vested in Zachariah and David Williams, surviving obligers of Edward Williams, on August 21, 1821, and was bought in by Hale and deeded over to John Norris, of Mifflin County, for two hundred and sixteen dollars. Enoch Williams had died about 1803, and Mrs. Williams also died not long after. Bale and Norris thus became directly the interested parties in the suit. On May 20, 1823, it was tried again, and the verdict was for the plaintiffs, for one-half of the
place as devised to Mary Gray on the side next to James Gray, with six cents damages and six cents costs. It was then again taken to the Supreme Court. John Gray having died, his heirs, under John Cummin, continued the suit. The land in dispute was that part which was devised to Mary Gray. The Judge ruled that there being no actual survey dividing the place, James and Hannah were tenants in common, and that in such a case, twenty-one years of peaceable possession did not give title unless an actual ouster was proved. The case was taken to the Supreme Court, and, at Sunbury, June 30, 1823, the decision of the lower court was reversed. This case, as decided by the Supreme Court, is printed in 10 Sergeant & Rawle, page 182 to 188. The next trace found was in what was then called the Circuit Court, May term, 1827, and then again at May
term, 1832, it says: "Judgment as per agreement filed." The agreement is signed by John Cummin, Robert Barnard, John Norris and Joshua Bale, and by the attorneys. The two first represented the minor children of John Gray; and Joshua Bale, the heirs of David Bale. This remarkable compromise of conflicting claims reads: "And now to wit, May 7, 1832, by consent, judgment is to be entered for Plaintiff (now John Gray's heirs) for the one-fourth of the tract of land for which this ejectment has been brought--the line to cross N. 37 « W.--the defendants to pay docket costs and the plaintiff to file no bill." This compromise ended the
contest for the Mary Gray half of the place. The part gained by the Grays paid but a small part of the costs.
There was an ejectment suit instituted by William McKee against John Frederick and Samuel Kirk, January term, 1817. Frederick and Kirk were mere renters, holding the place at the time. The girl that Mrs. Hannah Gray (now Williams) had taken as her own, and always treated as her own, married a man named Gillespie, and they sold the property inherited from Mrs. Williams to a clergyman named William McKee, of Washington, D.C. , and he sold it to his nephew, William McKee, son of John, already named as married to Mary Hogg. [This lady is the "old Mrs. McKee," a witness at some of the trials. It has been published that she "spoke with a rich Irish brogue," and "on one occasion became quite garrulous, and entered into the history of the valley, to the great
amusement of the court." and that "she describes the spurious girl as a big, black, ugly, Dutch lump, and not to be compared to the beautiful Jenny Gray." Mrs. McKee was native-born, and no doubt a woman of education, culture and refinement. As her son was claiming the land through Mrs. Gillespie's title, it is a very unlikely story that she spoke of her as above stated. The same writer says: "Her historical developments so much interested one of the jury at Lewistown, an
old settler himself, that he, forgetting the restraints of a juryman, sent for the old lady to come to his room at the hotel, and enter more at large into the days of auld lang syne. The old man was a little deaf, and the old lady's voice could be heard throughout the house. One of the counsel, whose side of the case wore rather a discouraging aspect, overheard the old lady, and the next morning exposed the poor juryman, amidst a roar of laughter from the court and bar. The case, of course, had to be tried before another jury."]
The record shows that, after many postponements, the case came up for trial at Lewistown May 28, 1823, when the following jury was impaneled: Philip Gilmore, Thomas Elliot, Henry Dunmire, Nathaniel Cunningham, James North, Geo. Sigler, Aquilla Burchfield, Augustine Wakefield, Jas. Jacobs, Patrick McCahan, James Baily, James Brisbin. On the 29th Mr. Hale moved to discharge the jury "on account of improper conduct of the plaintiff and some of the jurors sworn in the trial of this cause."
The jury was discharged at the cost of the plaintiff. On March 19, 1825, a jury returned a verdict as follows: "We do find for plaintiff the upper half leased to Johns & Hills; also the divided half of lower part, now supposed to be in possession of Samuel Kirk; to be laid off by an artist on the ground." This verdict, certainly based on a belief in the genuineness of the girl taken by Mrs. Williams, and on the validity of the title derived from her as a lawful heir, was rendered by the following jurors, than whom the county contained no better men: Amos
Gustin, John Adams, John Beatty, Jr., Francis H. Kinsloe, David Brought, John Robison, John Crissman, John Maxwell, Stewart Turbett, John Gettys, William Kerr and Gabriel Lukens. This verdict gave McKee the Mary Gray half and half of the other part. A new trial was granted December 24, 1828, and on June 27, 1829, the case was removed by habeas corpus to the Circuit Court, the final decision of which, on May 3, 1833, was in favor of the defendants; and thus terminated forever the most celebrated land litigation in the history of this county, and perhaps having no equal in the annals of the State.
In the meantime David Bale had also died, leaving a will dated May 21, 1827, in which he authorized the sale of this land in case of a favorable termination of the suit. Accordingly, his sons, his executors, sold the undivided half to William Okeson for three thousand two hundred and eighty-five dollars, April 4, 1836; and John Norris sold his half to the same purchaser for three thousand five hundred dollars, March 29, 1836; and it is nearly all held by his son to this day. Samuel Gray was the only male descendant of John Gray, Jr., party to the suits here described. He removed to Mifflintown and kept a hotel, and at his death left no male descendants.
The last trial of this cause was before the Circuit Court held in Mifflintown. The names of the jurors and the papers connected with it could not be found. Samuel Creigh was present, and on May 2, 1833, wrote to his brother Alfred an account of the suit, which had just then closed. This account was published by the Pennsylvania Historical Society about a year afterwards, and was the basis of the numerous narratives which have since appeared.
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© 2013 by Michael Milliken
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