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[edit] SourceOriginal Source: Beers, 1886. History of Cumberland and Adams Counties, Pennsylvania [edit] DiscussionTHE Cumberland (then known as the North) Valley was first divided
into the townships of Pennsborough and Hopewell. This was in 1735,
years before the formation of the county, which was then a portion of
Lancaster. At this time the Indian title to the lands had not yet been
extinguished, for it was in October of the following year that the
Penns finally purchased their title. White settlers, by permission of
the Indians, had come into the valley about the year 1730, but they
were few in number, and Cumberland County was not formed until fifteen
years after the formation of these two townships. The First Proprietary Manor. - A small portion in the lower part of
the North Valley, and which was afterward a portion of Pennsborough
Township, was surveyed at a still earlier period (1732) into a
"Proprietary Manor on Conodoguinette," the more effectually to keep off
white settlers as opposed to the rights of the Indians, which had not
yet been satisfactorily purchased. This manor was also called
"Pastang" or "Paxton Manor," and after the formation of Cumberland
County "Louther Manor," in compliment to a nobleman of that name who
had married a sister of William Penn. About sixty families of the Shawanese Indians, who had come from the
south, settled there about 1698, by permission of the Susquehanna
Indians, to which the first proprietory, William Penn, afterward
agreed. In 1753, complaint is made "that they had not been paid for
the lands, part of which had been surveyed into the Proprietory Manor
on Conodoguinette." This manor embraced all of what is now East Pennsborough, Lower
Allen, and a corner of Hampden Townships. In other words, it was
bounded on the east by the Susquehanna River, opposite John Harris'
ferry, and included all the land lying between the Conodoguinet and
Yellow Breeches Creeks, past the Stone Church or Frieden's Kirche, and
immediately below Shiremanstown. It was surveyed by John Armstrong in
1765, and by John Lukens, Esq., surveyor-general under the Provincial
Government, in 1767, at which time it was reported to contain 7,551
acres. The two original townships, we have seen, were Pennsborough and
Hopewell. Pennsborough, which lay on the east, at its formation
included the whole of the territory which is now embraced in Cumberland
County. Hopewell, which lay on the west, included most of the land
which is now embraced in Franklin. Six years later (1741) the township
of Hopewell was divided, and the western division was called Antrim,
after the county in Ireland. This territory afterward became a portion
or nearly the whole of what is now included in Franklin County.
Soon after the formation of Pennsborough Township, portions of it
began to be called North and South, East and West Pennsborough, and in
1745, ten years after its formation, and five years before the formation of the
county, it seems to have been definitely divided into East and West
Pennsborough. In the years which have elapsed many townships have been
formed, so that now one portion of this original township lies west of
the center, and the other at the northeastern extremity of the county,
separated by the many intervening townships which have been formed from
them. One other township, Middleton, also originally part of Pennsborough,
was just before or coincident in its birth with the formation of
Cumberland County, so that when the county was formed, its map,
including only that portion of it which was known by the name of "North
Valley," would have embraced East and West Pennsborough, Hopewell,
Antrim and Middleton Townships. That is the map of this portion of
Cumberland County at its formation in 1750. The date of the formation of the succeeding townships is as follows:
Allen, 1766; Newton, 1767; Southampton, 1783; Shippensburg, 1784;
Dickinson, 1785; Silvers' Spring, 1787; Frankford, 1795; Mifflin, 1797;
North and South Middleton, 1810; Monroe, 1825; Newville, 1828; Hampden,
1845; Upper and Lower Allen, 1849; Middlesex, 1859; Penn, 1859; Cook,
1872. The organization of boroughs was as follows: Carlisle, 1782; Newville, 1817; Shippensburg, 1819; Mechanicsburg, 1828; New Cumberland, 1831; Newburg, 1861; Mount Holly springs, 1873; Shiremanstown, 1874; Camp Hill, 1885. |