Person:Benjamin Gilbert (10)

RESEARCH: Married at Christ Church. Dwelt in Byberry Twp., then in Richland Twp., Bucks Co., and in 1749, had gone to Makefield Twp., Bucks Co. to operate a mill. In 1755 his father, then 80, invited Benjamin to come home and run the 250 acres, which he rec'd as a bequest ten years later. After he sold land in 1775, he bought a place on Mahoning Creek in Northampton Co. about 9 miles from the Lehigh River.

LAND: 1758 - 136 A. from Joseph Foster & wife Christianna near center of Byberry Twp. on Byberry Creek, about a mile from his father's and a mile from Byberry MM. 1775 - sold most of the 136 A. to Richard Walton.

The family of Benjamin Gilbert came to the valley of the Mahoning in 1775, and settled on the Mahoning Creek at the place now owned by Michael Garber. His step-son, Benjamin Peart, located about half a mile away. Benjamin Gilbert was a native of Byberry, fifteen miles from Philadelphia, where he was born in the year 1711. He was educated by the Quakers, and resided near his birthplace till he moved to the Mahoning Valley, in 1775. He married a lady in his youth by whom he had several children. They arrived at years of maturity, and several of them settled there. About the year 1748 he published a trestise against war in answer to Gilbert Tennent. In 1769 and 1770 he published two large works on religious subjects. After the death of his wife he contracted a second marriage with Elizabeth, the widow of Benjamin Peart, who also had several children. It was some years after this second marriage that it was decided to move north of the Blue Ridge. His sons and daughters, connections and friends were not strangers to the dangers to which they would be exposed, and earnestly besought them to remain in their midst. The journey was made. The party consisted of Benjamin Gilbert, his wife Elizabeth, his sons, Joseph, Jesse, and Abner; Rebecca and Elizabeth, daughters; Benjamin and Thomas Peart, sons of Mrs. Gilbert. After reaching the place selected, a comfortable log house and barn were erected. Later a saw-mill and grist-mill were erected on the creek, which drew custom from a large extent of country and rendered the position of the family comfortable. After five years of quiet the family was surprised on the morning of the 25th of April, 1780, by a party of eleven Indians and taken captives. The house was plundered and all the buildings burned. The Indians then visited the house of Benjamin Peart, who a year or two previous had married and settled about half a mile away, and captured him and his wife and child. Abigail, a daughter of Samuel Dodson, a neighbor, had brought from home to the mill early in the morning a grist, and she was still there and captured with the rest. The family was in bondage two years and five months, and on the 22nd of August, 1783, its members were gathered together in Montreal and soon after returned to Byberry, with the exception of Benjamin, the father, who died June 8, 1780, while going down the river St. Lawrence, Andrew Harrigar, who escaped and returned to Byberry and conveyed the first knowledge of the fate and condition of the family, and Abigail Dodson, who was adopted by one of the families of the Cayuga Nation. After the return of the family, in 1783, the farm in the Mahoning Valley was sold to Capt. Joseph Longstreth, who, with Robert McDaniel, went up to the place and rebuilt the house and mill. How long Capt. Longstreth remained is not known. His name does not appear in the assessment-roll of 1808. Later the property was owned by Dr. S. Kennedy, and in 1820 was bought by Septimus Hough. The family of Samuel Dodson came to the valley about the same time the Gilberts came in. They settled about a mile distant, on a farm now owned by David D. Kistler, near Pleasant Corner. He was a native of Chester County, where he was married, and where his children were born. Abigail, when fourteen years of age, was sent by her father to the mill of Benjamin Gilbert, on the Mahoning Creek, early on the morning of the 25th of April, 1780. She was captured with the Gilbert family by the Indians. She was separated from the others, and adopted first by a tribe of the Cayugas and later by others. The family of Dodsons remained upon their plantation, and did not, like many others, abandon their settlement. In 1785, Thomas Dodson, a cousin of Abigail, determined to go up to the northward and make a search for Abigail. He was provided with the necessary equipment, and started on horseback. After much search she was found in the Genesee Valley with the tribe of Indians by which she had been adopted. As her return at some time had been anticipated, it had been decided that if her friends came for her she would be allowed to go. The chief of the tribe was away at the time Thomas arrived, and the family of which she was a member, although loath to let her leave them, consented, and preparations were made for her departure. A new suit of Indian cloth, ornamented with beads, was made for her, and feasts were given at which many gathered. When all was ready they departed. For some reason, Thomas had left his horse at Genesee, a few miles away. Upon reaching the place and applying for his horse, the man in whose care he had left him refused to let him have the horse except upon the payment of one hundred dollars. As he had not that much money, he was compelled to leave him. An arrangement was made by which they were taken to Towanda, where Thomas obtained a canoe, in which they paddled and floated down the Susquehanna River to Salem, and stopped at the house of Nathan Beach. He provided them with a horse, and they proceeded on their way to Mahoning Valley, where they arrived in October, 1786. Abigail had been absent from home five years and six months, during which time she had been with several different tribes and had learned the languages of five of them. On arriving near home, Abigail went to the house first and knocked. Her mother came to the door, invited her in, stepped back and called her husband, saying, "Here is a squaw, and a pretty good-looking one, too." Her father came in, and neither of them recognized her, upon which Abigail exclaimed, "Mother, don't you know me?" Thomas soon came in, and the family gathered around the long-lost one, and great was their joy at her return. The story of her captivity and wanderings was known to the family, up to the time of her separation from the Gilberts, who returned in 1783, and adoption by the Cayugas, but from that time no trace of her had been found until this time. She had for so long been accustomed to Indian life that she did not feel at home for some time, and often longed for the old life, but this feeling passed away. She remained at home, and moved with the family in 1797 to Shamokin, and later to Huntington township, Luzerne Co., where she married Peter Brink, and lived many years and died, leaving no children.

1. ↑ George E. McCracken. Rakestraw On the Delaware. (The American Genealogist).
2. ↑ Norman Walton Swayne (1885-1964). Byberry Waltons. (Philadelphia: Stevenson Brothers, 1958).

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