thumbnail · 2016. 4. 11. · figure 25 mason–dixon line stone monuments. left: a five‐mile...

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Drawing the Line

Drawing the Line

How Mason and Dixon Surveyed the Most Famous Border in America

Revised Edition

Edwin Danson

This revised edition first published 2017copy 2017 John Wiley amp Sons Inc

Edition History John Wiley amp Sons Inc (1e 2001)

Registered OfficeJohn Wiley amp Sons Ltd The Atrium Southern Gate Chichester West Sussex PO19 8SQ UK

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For details of our global editorial offices for customer services and for information about how to apply for permission to reuse the copyright material in this book please see our website at wwwwileycomwiley‐blackwell

The right of Edwin Danson to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the UK Copyright Designs and Patents Act 1988

All rights reserved No part of this publication may be reproduced stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means electronic mechanical photocopying recording or otherwise except as permitted by the UK Copyright Designs and Patents Act 1988 without the prior permission of the publisher

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Limit of LiabilityDisclaimer of Warranty While the publisher and author have used their best efforts in preparing this book they make no representations or warranties with respect to the accuracy or completeness of the contents of this book and specifically disclaim any implied warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose It is sold on the understanding that the publisher is not engaged in rendering professional services and neither the publisher nor the author shall be liable for damages arising herefrom If professional advice or other expert assistance is required the services of a competent professional should be sought

Library of Congress Cataloging‐in‐Publication Data

Names Danson Edwin 1948ndash authorTitle Drawing the line how Mason and Dixon surveyed the most famous border in

America Edwin DansonOther titles How Mason and Dixon surveyed the most famous border in AmericaDescription Revised edition | Hoboken NJ John Wiley amp Sons Inc [2016] |

Includes bibliographical references and indexIdentifiers LCCN 2016002849 (print) | LCCN 2016002908 (ebook) | ISBN 9781119141877 (cloth) |

ISBN 9781119141808 (pbk) | ISBN 9781119141815 (pdf) | ISBN 9781119141822 (epub)Subjects LCSH Mason-Dixon LinendashHistory | PennsylvaniandashBoundariesndashMarylandndashHistory |

MarylandndashBoundariesndashPennsylvaniandashHistory | Frontier and pioneer lifendashPennsylvania | Frontier and pioneer lifendashMaryland | Mason Charles 1728ndash1786 | Dixon Jeremiah | SurveyingndashPennsylvaniandashHistoryndash18th century | SurveyingndashMarylandndashHistoryndash18th century

Classification LCC F157B7 D36 2016 (print) | LCC F157B7 (ebook) | DDC 9748802ndashdc23LC record available at httplccnlocgov2016002849

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

Cover image Courtesy of the Maryland Historical Society Item ID MS1741051

Set in 10125pt Galliard by SPi Global Pondicherry India

1 2017

For Linda

List of Figures ixAcknowledgments for the Revised Edition xiiIntroduction to the Revised Edition xiii

1 In the Reign of George the Third 1

2 The Fortieth Degree 6

3 Kings and Queens 14

4 Entirely at a Stand 20

5 Curious Knowing People 34

6 The Transit of Venus 51

7 Mr Birdrsquos Contrivances 65

8 Persons Intirely Accomplished 71

9 The Southernmost Point of the City 80

10 15 Statute Miles Horizontal 98

11 The Tail of Ursae Minoris 109

12 Fine Sport for the Boys 116

13 From the Post markrsquod West 123

14 The Pencil of Time 131

15 King of the Tuscarawa 140

16 From Hence to the Summit 150

17 At a Council of the Royal Society 160

Contents

viii Contents

18 Vibration of the Pendulum 167

19 Not One Step Further 176

20 A Degree of Latitude 189

21 The Last Transit 196

22 A Very Helpless Condition 202

23 Finishing the Job 216

Appendix 225 Astronomy 225 Longitude Latitude and the Shape of Earth 228 Surveying Methods 230 Degrees of Latitude A Short History 239 The Mystery of the MasonndashDixon Mile 242Bibliography 245Index 251

Figure 1 Map of the lines surveyed by Mason and Dixon 1763ndash1768 2

Figure 2 Fenwick Island monument Photo courtesy Allen C Browne 24

Figure 3 Middle Point of the trans‐peninsular line Photo courtesy Allen C Browne 27

Figure 4 Original Tangent Stone standing next to stone set in 1849 by Lieut Colonel James D Graham Photo courtesy Allen C Browne 30

Figure 5 The Strand and Fleet Street ca 1760 37Figure 6 Crane Court Fleet Street home of the

Royal Society 1710ndash1780 38Figure 7 Benjamin Franklinrsquos house at 36 Craven Street

London 40Figure 8 Nevil Maskelyne (1732ndash1811) engraving

by E Scriven ca 1800 National Museum of American History Courtesy of the Smithsonian Libraries Washington DC 43

Figure 9 Weir Farm Gloucestershire birthplace of Charles Mason 44

Figure 10 The Royal Observatory Greenwich ca 1800 from an engraving by Thomas Shepherd 46

Figure 11 Martin Savillersquos model of Mason and Dixonrsquos observatory in Cape Town Photo courtesy Jonathan Peacock 59

Figure 12 John Bird (1709ndash1776) National Maritime Museum Greenwich 67

Figure 13 John Birdrsquos transit and equal altitude instrument restored by master craftsman Jeffrey Lock of Colonial Instruments Photo courtesy David Thaler 69

List of Figures

x List of Figures

Figure 14 Location of the PlumstedndashHuddle house and observatory 86

Figure 15 Stargazers Farm ndash John Harlanrsquos house Photo courtesy Ms Kate Roby 95

Figure 16 The author at the Stargazerrsquos Stone 101Figure 17 Surveyorrsquos Gunterrsquos chain Photo courtesy

David L Ingram 105Figure 18 Fifteen miles south 106Figure 19 Site of the Post markrsquod West Photo courtesy

Allen C Browne 107Figure 20 Setting out the North Line from the Tangent

Point (exaggerated for clarity) 129Figure 21 Masonrsquos horseback journey 146Figure 22 Middle Point marker stones Photo courtesy

Allen C Browne 162Figure 23 John Sheltonrsquos regulator Copyright Museum

of Scotland Edinburgh 169Figure 24 Brownrsquos Hill Stone set in 1883 by Colonel

C H Sinclair of the US Coast and Geodetic Survey marking the limit of Mason and Dixonrsquos survey Photo courtesy Allen C Browne 184

Figure 25 MasonndashDixon Line stone monuments Left a five‐mile crown stone Photo courtesy Allen C Browne Right a milestone Courtesy Todd Babcock 185

Figure 26 On the MasonndashDixon Line The author with professional surveyor Todd Babcock of the MasonndashDixon Line Preservation Partnership 2002 188

Figure 27 The transit of Venus Above View of the transit and eclipse as it appeared through the telescope Below Schematic of the celestial mechanics 199

Figure 28 Schiehallion from the west 207Figure 29 Celebrating Charles Mason a MasonndashDixon

Line milestone and memorial plaque in Christchurch Burial Ground Philadelphia 212

Figure 30 Burial ground of old Friends Meeting House Staindrop Photo courtesy Jonathan Peacock by permission of owner Mrs L Machan 218

Figure 31 Tower of Independence Hall Philadelphia The south‐facing window is the one directly beneath the clock 223

Figure 32 The celestial sphere showing right ascension and declination 226

List of Figures xi

Figure 33 Sidereal time vs solar time 228Figure 34 Latitude 229Figure 35 The lines run by the commissionersrsquo surveyors

in 1761ndash1763 231Figure 36 Mason and Dixonrsquos solution to the tangent problem 232Figure 37 Observing equal altitudes 234Figure 38 10‐minute arc of the great circle The great circle

is the arc passing through A E and C The distance B to E = 1714 ft 236

Figure 39 Adjusting the 10‐minute (9‐mile) segment of the West Line 236

Figure 40 Running the sections from the Susquehanna 237Figure 41 Starting point for the 1766 season Sector at

the North Mountain (S) (A) marks the spot for the first change of direction 238

The first edition of Drawing the Line was based entirely on my own research and experiences It was not until two years after publication that I discovered there was an entire tribe of American surveyors who dedicated all their spare energies to recording collating maintaining researching and in all ways preserving the famous MasonndashDixon Line

It would be a long list to mention everybody to whom I owe thanks but in particular I must acknowledge in no particular order the Professional Land Surveyors Charles Langelan of the Surveyorsrsquo Historical Society whose enthusiasm knows no bounds Todd Babcock and Jim Shomper heroes of the MasonndashDixon Line Preservation Partnership Milton Denny and David Lee Ingram experts in early surveying methods and David Thaler whose research identified the fate of Mason and Dixonrsquos transit instrument

Grateful thanks also to Kate Roby owner of Stargazers Farm who so generously shared her research of the house that Mason and Dixon made their home‐from‐home Jonathon Peacock who so kindly shared his remarkable research into the life and times of Jeremiah Dixon George Dixon (a distant relation of Jeremiah) a man of extraordinary warmth and generosity Tony Pawlyn Head of Library National Maritime Museum Cornwall whose painstaking research proved invaluable in solving some of the maritime mysteries and Allen C Browne for generously providing excellent photos of some of the stones

Finally special thanks to my wife and soul‐mate Linda who with perse-verance put right all my wrongs made countless improvements demanded explanations and generally kept me focused and to Peter Coveney and all the staff at Wiley for their faith support and patience without which none of this could have happened

Acknowledgments for the Revised Edition

In the fifteen years since Drawing the Line was first published interest in Mason Dixon and their famous Line has blossomed The first edition was written based entirely on my own research and experiences as a land sur-veyor It was not until two years after the book came out that I discovered there was a group of American surveyors who dedicated all their spare energies to preserving the MasonndashDixon Line leading to new discoveries and solving some of the more intriguing enigmas

It is a sad fact that there are no known images of either Mason or Dixon Charles Mason had a large family six boys and two girls but so far no trace of his descendents either in Britain or in America where Mason settled shortly before his death has come to light All that can be said is that in the Mason family Charles appears to have been a scientific one‐off Jeremiah Dixonrsquos family on the other hand is still extant and have been very generous in sharing information on their famous surveying ancestor The Dixons were and are a talented family ndash Jeremiahrsquos brother George is credited as the first to use coal gas as a source of illumination The family also sired some outstanding engineers among whom were John Dixon and his brother Waynman who brought Cleopatrarsquos Needle to London from Egypt

For some six years Mason and Dixon worked together as a team and most likely remained in contact until Dixonrsquos death in 1779 It can only be concluded from their long and close association that they got on well but what sort of relationship they enjoyed is unknown What can be said is that their partnership marked a unique union of land surveying with positional astronomy creating perhaps for the first time what we call today the geodetic surveyor

The genesis for the first edition of Drawing the Line came in 1976 on the eve of my departure to set up a survey company in Tehran Iran Over a farewell pint of beer an old surveyor friend posed the question how

Introduction to the Revised Edition

xiv Introduction to the Revised Edition

would a surveyor run a 230‐mile line of constant latitude He was referring of course to Mason and Dixonrsquos famous border line at the time I had never heard of it But it was an interesting question and one that taxed my brain a few years later when I had to run a twenty‐kilometer line of latitude in Scotland However any interest I had in learning something of the history of the MasonndashDixon Line was thwarted by a dearth of information that is until I discovered a copy of Nelson Beecher Keyesrsquo 1954 edition of The American Frontier in a second‐hand book shop in New Orleans in it were half a dozen pages about the Line

A copy of Hughlett Masonrsquos 1969 transcription of Masonrsquos journal courtesy of the British library system and a set of the excellent research papers written by the physicist Thomas D Cope between 1939 and 1956 provided the foundations for starting the serious business of researching the book

ldquoItrsquos just pages and pages of gobbledygookrdquo so said a friend when I proudly showed him Masonrsquos journal but the endless lists of astronomical observations and surveying hieroglyphics spoke volumes to one who has spent many a chilly night taking star shots and wrestling with almanacs and log tables in the dim light of a hurricane lamp in the days before GPS Of course the MasonndashDixon Line is much more than a border between states and in an effort to gauge its meaning today I used my spare time during frequent visits to the United States to ask ordinary Americans what it meant to them Perhaps half of the fifty or so persons I asked knew the Line was something to do with the division between North and South and with slavery but of the two men themselves very few had any idea

It was to fill the gaps and renew interest in the MasonndashDixon Line and specifically to explain how they completed such a monumental feat that I wrote Drawing the Line This revised edition has been updated with all the latest research and includes a comprehensive bibliography and a fully revised appendix to explain the more technical aspects of the work I have also included a brief history of Earth measuring and short discussion on a theory of why colonial American miles including Mason and Dixonrsquos mile were longer than contemporary British miles

For simplicity British monarchy is referenced as kings or queens of England After the accession of James I of England (James V of Scotland) until the Act of Union monarchs carried two regnal numbers as related to England and to Scotland After the 1707 Act of Union the regnal number for Scotland was less frequent used Following the union with the kingdom of Ireland in 1801 the collective term for England Wales and Scotland as Great Britain became the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland until Irish independence in 1922

Drawing the Line How Mason and Dixon Surveyed the Most Famous Border in America Revised Edition Edwin Dansoncopy 2017 John Wiley amp Sons Inc Published 2017 by John Wiley amp Sons Inc

Their names were Charles Mason and Jeremiah Dixon And they were the last best hope for peace But little did they know what started as a mere border dispute would come to mark the greatest divide in American history

Later in history their names would become irrevocably linked with the boundary itself the MasonndashDixon Line best remembered today as the symbolic Civil War divide between North and South the partition bet-ween slave and free states In human terms the MasonndashDixon Line was the eighteenth centuryrsquos most ambitious border survey a perfect curve of latitude two hundred forty‐five miles from end to end

The long war with France was over but the costs had crippled the Exchequer In London the new Prime Minister was the unpopular Sir George Grenville intent on reducing the war debt and meeting the rising costs of maintaining the army in North America by taxing the colonies He was also rumored to be planning restrictions on settlement west of the Alleghenies to appease the restless Indians In the frontier lands far to the west there was serious trouble and reports of massacres

Seventeen sixty‐three was the year when every ship from England brought news of another tax or more stifling regulations to the American colonists but for the small cluster of people gathered on the river quay at Marcus Hook there was at least some good news The Hanover Packet had just berthed with a cargo from England and London merchants with an eye to business Among the fifteen or so passengers disembarking that gray November day were the two young Englishmen recently engaged by the landowners who held the royal grants the so‐called proprietors of

1

In the Reign of George the Third

Figure 1 Map of the lines surveyed by Mason and Dixon 1763ndash1768

In the Reign of George the Third 3

Maryland and Pennsylvania Their appointment had been a secret a last‐ditch attempt at ending eighty years of acrimony bloodshed and war The men who finally solved the contentious border were not lawyers or politi-cians but astronomers men of science

In the Age of Enlightenment when intellectuals across Europe and in North America were embracing reason logic and the concepts of civil freedom where mathematicians and astronomers were beginning to make sense of the natural world so religion and politics tried pulling it apart

In the seventeenth century the new English lords of America owed their good fortunes as much to their religious affiliations as they did to their enormous wealth Tensions between Catholic and Protestant inter-ests waxed and waned throughout the period as monarch succeeded monarch Towards the end of the century the Dutch Prince William of Orange became king and finally established in England the supremacy of Protestantism and Parliament and the modern era began British America grew apace as settlers poured into the territories and vast new trading pat-terns emerged Colonial expansion outpaced the political processes and when Mason and Dixon stepped ashore in America in the gray chill of a November day the land they found was substantially different from the one they expected

In England most people and certainly most members of Parliament regarded the North American colonies as if they were distant English shires Unlike their English counterparts qualifying colonists had neither the vote nor representation in Parliament Discontent and anger were growing towards the way the British government and especially King George III was running American affairs

At the time the British Empire as such did not exist and the nineteenth‐century plantation regime with its exceptional brutality was still in its infancy To be sure there were slaves in America perhaps as many as a million but not all the enslaved were black The colonial broadsheets of the time contained almost as many advertisements requesting the appre-hension of transported white convicts and indentured servants as they did for African runaways Even so the overwhelming majority of slaves were kidnapped West African natives and their progeny In 1750 the African Company of Merchants the last major London company engaged in the nefarious trade began slaving out of Bristol Also known as the Merchants Trading to Africa Company it was the direct successor of the Company of Royal Adventurers Trading to Africa founded by James Stuart Duke of York later the despised King James II Slaving was big business In the year Mason and Dixon voyaged to America the slave trade was at its height with more than one hundred fifty ships transporting forty‐five

4 In the Reign of George the Third

thousand Africans annually across the Atlantic to the American colonies the majority ending up in the middle and southern provinces by 1763 nearly forty percent of Marylandrsquos population working the tobacco fields were forced labor

Although at its peak in the colonies slavery was becoming morally unacceptable at least in England In 1772 Lord Chief Justice William Murray the Earl Mansfield presided over the case of James Somersett a fugitive Virginian slave who had escaped to England In Somerset v Stewart (1772) Lord Mansfield whose decisions reflected the morals of the Enlightenment ruled that

The state of slavery is so odious that nothing can be suffered to support it but positive law Whatever inconveniences therefore may follow from the decision I cannot say this case is allowed or approved by the law of England and therefore [Somersett] must be discharged1

No longer could a slave be repatriated forcibly to face retributive punishment at the hand of his master The poet William Cowper was moved to write

We have no slaves at home ndash Then why abroadAnd they themselves once ferried orsquoer the waveThat parts us are emancipate and loosrsquodSlaves cannot breathe in England if their lungsReceive our air that moment they are freeThey touch our country and their shackles fall2

Within ten years of Murrayrsquos judgment the beginning of the true abo-litionist movement was underway However all that lay in the future During Mason and Dixonrsquos travels in America slaves doing sweat labor in the fields would have been a familiar sight

Apart from the imported slaves there were also the indigenous American natives Neither races were properly understood Natural ignorance per-verted scripture and fear led to bigotry and atrocity and in this respect the settlers of British America were not unique To understand the America of Charles Mason and Jeremiah Dixon one has to cast away contemporary ideas of freedom and one‐man‐one‐vote there was no vote for the half million emigrants who flooded annually into the coastal provinces Their moral yardsticks they imported from the Old World refashioned for a new world where men and women were carving a new land from the wilderness It was a world where bravery and strength of spirit went hand in hand with the hardships of everyday life in an untamed environment Such condi-tions forged a fierce pride which melded with the radical waves of the


Enlightenment evolved into an article of faith As an American friend once observed ldquoin the United States freedom is mandatory and requires an excessive degree of expressionrdquo In Europe these ideas and values were to develop more slowly and more cautiously

The fragile peace that followed the end of the French and Indian War in 1763 was a time of transition that would ultimately lead to the transforma-tion of the colonists from European vassals into American citizens It was the era of the two Georges George III and George Washington To quote the 1851 edition of Charles Dickensrsquo A Childrsquos History of England

It was in the reign of George the Third that England lost North America by persisting in taxing her without her own consent That immense country made independent under WASHINGTON and left to itself became the United States one of the greatest nations of the earth

Ten years after Dickens wrote those words the slaves in the cotton and tobacco fields had helped generate enough wealth to fund the most awful of civil wars where the MasonndashDixon Line took on a darker more sinister meaning

Notes

1 The Somerset Case In Howellrsquos State Trials vol 20 cols 1ndash6 79ndash82 (1816) The National Archives online httpwwwnationalarchivesgovuk

2 William Cowper The Time‐piece vol II of The Task 1785


In the seventeenth century granting large tracts of American wilderness to adventuresome English gentlemen was a royal prerogative However because royal land grants were mostly inaccurate and ill‐informed affairs what few maps existed were unreliable The new colonial landowners or proprietors seldom if ever checked what they were granted before hand-ing over large sums of gold to the grasping royals Disputes followed inevitably leading to badly delineated blood‐soaked borders

Back in 1603 a Stuart king James VI of Scotland had succeeded to the English throne as James I of England although the son of a Catholic monarch Mary Queen of Scots James was a Protestant Shortly after his coronation he reintroduced the harsh recusancy laws which demanded penalties for those who did not attend Church of England services this in turn led to the Catholic plot to blow up Parliament on November 5 1605 Although the Gunpowder Plot failed it incensed James and reawakened anti‐Catholic fervor throughout England It was in this dangerous period of religious intolerance that the able and ambitious Secretary of State Sir George Calvert (1578ndash1632) a devout Catholic had the perverse task of presenting the kingrsquos anti‐Catholic policies to the House of Commons With the kingrsquos death in 1625 anti‐Catholic feelings diminished a little and Sir George felt safe enough to resign from politics For his services to the state and Crown he was created First Baron Baltimore in the Irish peerage and granted large estates in Ireland

Sir George Calvertrsquos first interest in founding an American colony came in 1621 when he employed a Welshman Captain Edward Wynne to establish an expeditionary settlement in Newfoundland1 To further his

2

The Fortieth Degree

The Fortieth Degree 7

American interests in 1624 Calvert secured a place in the prestigious membership of the Virginia Company of Planters He briefly visited his settlement in Newfoundland in 1627 returning there with his wife and family the following year However conflict over his Catholicism the poor quality of the land and the atrocious weather which exacted such a toll in death and illness amongst the settlers prematurely ended the Newfoundland venture Lady Baltimore moved to Jamestown Virginia while her hus-band returned to London to petition the new king Charles I for a grant of Virginian land south of the James River Without waiting for the kingrsquos decision Calvert joined his wife and family in Jamestown There he learned that his petition had been denied because of his Roman Catholic sympa-thies disappointed he returned to England

Undaunted Calvert tried for the area to the north of the Potomac River this time he was successful The royal grant provided for a vast slice of the American wilderness extending from the southern bank of the Potomac River to what was to become the contentious ldquopoint which lieth under the Fortieth degree of north latituderdquo

The new territory was named Maryland in honor of Henrietta Maria queen consort of Charles I Unfortunately George Calvert died on April 15 1632 two months before the grant of the royal charter on June 20 and the new Baltimore title and the new province passed to Georgersquos son Cecilius (1605ndash1675) also a devout Catholic Respecting his fatherrsquos wishes Cecilius made the province a haven of religious tolerance While Cecilius was occupied sorting out family and business affairs he passed to his younger brother Leonard Calvert (1606ndash1647) the task of colonizing Maryland Leonard with three hundred would‐be settlers both Catholic and Protestant arrived in the James River on May 27 1634 aboard the ships Dove and Ark The local Indians welcomed the new arrivals provided them with shelter and sold them corn and some land on which they founded their first settlement Saint Maryrsquos The new colony tolerating religious diversity offered a sanctuary to many Englishmen of the time three quarters of the settlers flocking to Maryland were non‐Catholic

The new English settlers were not alone for long In March 1638 to the northeast a shipload of settlers arrived from Sweden The Swedes also purchased their land from the Indians and quickly laid out their first settlement Christinahamn and erected a defensive position called Fort Christina on the site of modern Wilmington The Swedes accustomed to the harsh Scandinavian climate built their simple homes of hewn logs notched and lain horizontally With only minor changes the Scandinavians had introduced to the continent that enduring symbol of the American frontier the log cabin

8 The Fortieth Degree

During the period following Elizabeth Irsquos death and the start of the Long Parliament in 1640 a revolution in political thought and religious Puritanism fermented beneath the surface of English society The full fury of the long expected war between Parliament and king broke out in 1642 which resulted in the beheading of King Charles and put the monarchy on hold With a civil war raging at home and Catholic rebels threatening sta-bility in Ireland Englandrsquos focus became entirely introspective Although Parliamentrsquos general Oliver Cromwell supported overseas settlement the war and its aftermath effectively halted colonial activity in North America Englandrsquos colonial competitors attempted to take advantage of its disarray In 1651 Dutch colonists and their small army on Manhattan Island (New York) struck the Scandinavian settlements in a brief but bloody encounter The Swedes were overwhelmed and forced to capitulate and their victors built Fort Casimir (on the site of New Castle Delaware) to keep a wary eye on their new but dangerous subjects Cromwell and Parliament could only react with policy passing two Navigation Acts to protect Englandrsquos monopoly of trade with its colonies In particular these ordinances were designed to keep the maritime Dutch out of Englandrsquos North American trade and almost immediately precipitated war with the Netherlands The first of the Dutch Wars lasted from 1652 to 1654 and resulted in an English victory The Swedes seized the initiative and attacked their Dutch overlords but it was a short‐lived victory and they lost everything again to the Dutch in 1656

The Restoration of King Charles II in 1660 brought a return to English colonial expansion which in turn renewed commercial rivalry with the Dutch In 1664 the English fleet sailed into New Amsterdam and its governor Peter Stuyvesant surrendered the settlement without a fight The conquerors renamed the town New York in honor of the kingrsquos brother James Duke of York Much of the territory between the Hudson and Delaware was in the hands of the duke when in 1665 he sold a part of these lands to his friends John Berkeley and George Carteret to found the province of New Jersey That same year aided and abetted by the French the Dutch made the first serious challenge to Englandrsquos sea power since the Armada To compound Englandrsquos agony the Great Plague struck London with devastating effects The following year was no better despite a hard‐fought victory over the Dutch off the French coast On September 2 a blaze in a bakerrsquos shop started the Great Fire that destroyed eighty percent of London including the beautiful cathedral of Saint Paulrsquos In June 1667 the Dutch fleet sailed boldly into Londonrsquos River Thames bombarded the royal dockyard of Chatham and destroyed the anchored fleet Their war successes further encouraged Dutch colonial aspirations in North America


In 1670 with the signing of the secret Anglo‐French Treaty of Dover Charles II forged an alliance with King Louis XIV of France that would remove his financial dependence on the home Parliament Further Charles wanted to declare himself a Roman Catholic and to perpetuate that faith throughout his realm In return for French financial support and military aid Charles bound England to support French aspirations In May 1672 King Louis invaded the Low Countries and anxious to regain its damaged prestige England provided support with its naval power In America the conflict exploded in the territories to the east of Maryland by 1673 the Dutch had recaptured New York and much of the surrounding area Lord Baltimore Cecilius Calvert followed the events from London with alarm and urged Parliament to action There was much trade and territory at stake when James as Lord High Admiral in defense of his own interests and reinforcing Englandrsquos dominance of the region attacked and pacified the Dutch possessions including New York For England the third Dutch War came to an end in 1674 with the Treaty of Westminster whereby the Dutch impoverished by the costs of war ceded all their territory in the New World to England

In postwar England times had become politically very dangerous as Catholic interests vied with Protestant aims men of rank and consequence were examining their consciences their loyalties and their best interests Charles II was a profligate king and by way of cultivating favor Admiral Sir William Penn lent the king the vast sum of pound16000 On Sir Williamrsquos death his son also named William inherited the debt which ensured the kingrsquos favor The younger William Penn (1644ndash1718) had embraced the Quaker faith as a young man and his intent was like Calvert before to found a colony of religious tolerance It was to be available to all who pro-fessed ldquoa belief in the Holy Trinityrdquo that is Christians and as a refuge for the religiously oppressed

William Pennrsquos first experience of North American politics came in 1674 when he acted as a mediator in a dispute over ownership rights bet-ween two Quaker associates who had bought a share of the province of New Jersey from its proprietor Sir George Carteret It was an experience that should have alerted Penn to the serious difficulties owners faced in agreeing their colonial borders

Knowing well the pecuniary difficulties of the king and wishing to further his American objectives Penn petitioned King Charles with an offer he could not refuse In exchange for discharging his fatherrsquos loan in full Penn requested an American province On January 5 1681 he was able to write ldquoThis day my country was confirmed to me by the name of Pennsylvania a name the King would give it in honour of my father


I chose New Wales being as this a pretty hilly country I propose Sylvania (woodlands) and they added Penn to it and though I much oppose it and went to the King to have it struck out and altered he said trsquowas past rdquo On March 4 1681 the royal grant for Pennsylvania comprising all the territory west of New York and New Jersey and to the north of Maryland received the royal assent The grant stipulated that the land would extend south from the forty‐third parallel as far west as five degrees longitude from the Delaware River and ldquoa Circle drawne at twelve miles distance from Newcastle to the beginning of the fortieth degreerdquo Marylandrsquos northern border

The boundary dispute between Maryland and Pennsylvania started almost immediately when an offer to confer agree and mark their mutual boundary was ignored Penn remaining in England sent his cousin William Markham as deputy governor to the new province with instruc-tions to establish the province and mark its boundaries In August 1681 Markham visited Charles Calvert third Lord Baltimore at his estate on the Patuxent River but no sooner had he arrived than he was taken ill They agreed to postpone negotiations until October while Markham recovered Meantime Markham sent notices to all the settlers in north-eastern Maryland to pay their taxes to Pennsylvania and not Maryland This unfortunate though no doubt calculated demand further antago-nized the older province and relations soured

Some survey work around New Castle had shown that the proposed twelve‐mile circle was substantially short of the critical fortieth parallel that separated the two provinces Calvert and Markham next met near the modern site of Chester Pennsylvania to discuss the worsening situation and to try to work out an amicable solution Lord Baltimore suggested they journey up the Delaware River and observe the location of the for-tieth parallel of latitude using a backstaff a marinerrsquos instrument for measuring latitude Markham objected and cited the Pennsylvania charter that stipulated the boundary was to be twelve milesrsquo distance from New Castle The difference was a matter of some thirteen miles in Pennrsquos favor and potentially some four thousand square miles of territory was at stake Markham further attested that should the two grants overlap the matter would have to be decided by the king

It was at about this time that Baltimorersquos title claim to the three lower counties the modern state of Delaware was challenged Markham had already drawn his cousinrsquos attention to the fact that without Delaware Pennsylvania would have no seaport and should hostilities with Maryland increase would be denied access to the all‐important sea trade


In 1674 the province of New Jersey had been subdivided into West Jersey under the trusteeship of Quakers including William Penn and East Jersey controlled by Sir George Carteret Following Carteretrsquos death in 1680 the Quakers purchased the remaining eastern portion from Carteretrsquos estate William Penn heedful of his cousinrsquos worries took advantage of the land purchase and a friendly neighbor and petitioned his old friend the Duke of York for the remnant of his Dutch possessions the three lower counties or modern Delaware The critical conveyance in his hand Penn set sail from Deal Kent on the English Channel coast on August 30 1682 on his ship the Welcome arriving in New Castle on the Delaware River on October 27 It had been a swift passage just nine weeks to cross the Atlantic but it had also been a tragic one An outbreak of smallpox on the ship had carried off thirty of the company

Penn was welcomed to America by a delegation of Dutch Swedish and English settlers In New Castle he performed the ancient turf and twig ceremony known as the livery of seisin to take possession of New Castle County2 Spurred on by these happy auspices he immediately set about establishing the Pennsylvanian part of his royal grant together with that assigned to him by the Duke of York Penn then arranged to meet with his neighbor Lord Baltimore near Annapolis on December 13 1682

The two men with their advisors discussed some unlikely and imprac-tical solutions for establishing their mutual borders Lord Baltimore continued to press for the simple expedient of taking an instrument up the Delaware River and measuring the latitude Penn favored more exotic and unwieldy solutions including measuring a line northwards from the sup-posedly known latitude of Cape Charles and converting the distance to latitude using a value of sixty miles to the degree At this latitude the value would have been nearer sixty‐nine miles to the degree and would have favored Pennrsquos cause considerably Had Penn been advised by scientific men back home This is likely as the measure would have given him an additional twenty‐eight miles and land for a seaport In the event they could not agree and the meeting ended in another stalemate each man going his separate way

The next meeting between Penn and Lord Baltimore took place at New Castle in April 1683 again the previous ideas were discussed without resolution Penn tried to move forward by offering to establish the border between their provinces at his own expense conditional on his lordship selling sufficient land at the head of Chesapeake Bay to provide Pennrsquos colony with a seaport Lord Baltimore refused and the meeting broke up in yet more anger The next curious development in the saga


was a strange and unreliable survey conducted by one Colonel George Talbot (1636ndash1689)

Talbot a cousin of Lord Baltimore emigrated to Maryland in 1679 after the family forfeited its estates for their part in the 1641 Irish Rebellion Baltimorersquos plan in taking on his cousin was to exploit his relativersquos fiery and unstable character to keep the northern marches of the province in order ldquoby blood if necessaryrdquo

In the summer of 1682 Talbot as Marylandrsquos surveyor general conducted a survey between Octoraro Creek that drained into the Susquehanna and Naaman Creek a tributary of the Delaware River in New Castle County The thirty‐seven‐mile survey line was run on an azi-muth (bearing from North) of seventy‐three degrees and some nineteen miles south of the forty‐degree north parallel of latitude greatly favoring Baltimorersquos claims It was happily described by Lord Baltimore as a proper eastndashwest line

Clearly something was amiss although it is uncertain whether by error ignorance or design The result made more trouble compounded by Colonel Talbot presenting himself to Penn with a pompous demand for the relinquishment of ldquoall the Land upon the West Side of Delaware River and Bay and the Seaboard side of fourtieth Degree of Northerly Latitude and more particularly all that part thereof which lyeth to the Southward of the markt lyine aforesaidrdquo Mr Penn declined

Although Talbot was well rewarded for his efforts his stay in Maryland was short‐lived Two years after his confrontation with Penn he murdered Christopher Rousby a customs official Tried and found guilty by a Virginia court in 1686 Talbot being a Catholic of noble blood received a royal pardon and returned to England only to find himself on a treason charge and declared outlaw in 1688

The whole border issue between the two neighbors was getting seri-ously out of hand the only recourse open to the protagonists was a referral to the Crown Penn was supportive of this move as he commanded much influence in England and at court The Catholic Lord Baltimore was less enamored for his standing in the politics of state had diminished King Charles conferred with his Privy Council who referred the matter to the Board of Trade and Plantations The Boardrsquos commissioners carefully con-sidered the position with due regard for the representations of the quar-reling proprietors and finally issued its decree in 1685 The judgment of the Board of Trade was that the Delaware peninsula north of Cape Henlopen should be divided equally the western half going to Maryland the eastern to William Penn The northern border was confirmed in Lord Baltimorersquos favor (a sign of changing times) at the fortieth degree of north


latitude That was not the end of the matter further negotiations resulted in an amendment setting Marylandrsquos border nineteen miles south of the fortieth parallel The onus returned to the proprietors to set out the border marks in accordance with the decree but this grand opportunity to end the conflict quickly slipped away

Notes

1 Gillian T Cell ldquoWynne Edwardrdquo in Dictionary of Canadian Biography Vol 1 University of TorontoUniversiteacute Laval 2003

2 George Smith and H B Ashmead History of Delaware County Pennsylvania From the Discovery of the Territory Included Within Its Limit to the Present Time Delaware County Institute of Science 1862

Drawing the Line

Drawing the Line


Revised Edition

Edwin Danson





















1 2017

For Linda



















Contents

viii Contents





















List of Figures

x List of Figures


















List of Figures xi




























1






















Notes







2

The Fortieth Degree

































Notes



Drawing the Line


Revised Edition

Edwin Danson





















1 2017

For Linda



















Contents

viii Contents





















List of Figures

x List of Figures


















List of Figures xi




























1






















Notes







2

The Fortieth Degree

































Notes























1 2017

For Linda



















Contents

viii Contents





















List of Figures

x List of Figures


















List of Figures xi




























1






















Notes







2

The Fortieth Degree

































Notes



For Linda



















Contents

viii Contents





















List of Figures

x List of Figures


















List of Figures xi




























1






















Notes







2

The Fortieth Degree

































Notes





















Contents

viii Contents





















List of Figures

x List of Figures


















List of Figures xi




























1






















Notes







2

The Fortieth Degree

































Notes



viii Contents





















List of Figures

x List of Figures


















List of Figures xi




























1






















Notes







2

The Fortieth Degree

































Notes
















List of Figures

x List of Figures


















List of Figures xi




























1






















Notes







2

The Fortieth Degree

































Notes



x List of Figures


















List of Figures xi




























1






















Notes







2

The Fortieth Degree

































Notes



List of Figures xi




























1






















Notes







2

The Fortieth Degree

































Notes
























1






















Notes







2

The Fortieth Degree

































Notes























Notes







2

The Fortieth Degree

































Notes







2

The Fortieth Degree

































Notes



































Notes



thumbnail · 2016. 4. 11. · figure 25 mason–dixon line stone monuments. left: a five‐mile...

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