BROADKILL LANDINGS

BROADKILL RIVER BENDS AND LANDINGS

The Broadkill takes many twist and turns on its way from the Delaware Bay to the mill pond dam in Milton. Times past, this river, aka creek, bustled with boat traffic, both pleasure and commerce. There were docks, wharves, landings and such along the banks, with names, usually from the family farms at their location, but others from someones imagination. Wooden boats shuttled between Milton and the rest of the world, using the Broadkill River as the best available entry and exit road.

The following data was gathered and put into archives by Charlie Fleetwood from data he received from Martha Donovan that had been authored by David Donovan, all of Milton.

EAST TO WEST

From the bay, on the left bank came the mouth of Old Mill Creek, supposed tributary of Coolspring Branch, aka Red Mill Pond Creek of past years.

Still on the left bank, next was Oyster Rock Landing which in colonial days was a somewhat major port. Up river, prior to the first so called 'bend', were what were called the Flat Lands to the right bank side. At the east side of a 'U' bend, next up the river, right bank, was Hazzards Landing. Northeast of Hazzards lay the marsh, and north of the landing were Island Farm and Wall Island, more than likely serviced by Hazzards Landing. Hazzard famlies owned much of this section of Broadkill Hundred in early days of settlement. At the top of this 'U' bend was Greys Ditch which runs into the Broadkill. After the river 'flattens out' , on the left bank there is a 'gut' by name of Long Reach. Above it, on the right bank were lands of the Norman Family which likely had a wharf, maybe two. Than we come to and pass Shorts Reach, Peterfield Ditch, to Wiltsbank Point that appears to have had at least three landings or docks. Wiltbanks lands were to the north and south of the river. A large tract of land and mash.

Blacks Landing is next, today we know it as Steamboat Camp Ground and I think called Steamboat Landing. Blacks Landing sits at the north edge of Whites Neck, a strip of land bordered south by a stream at one time known as Pine Ditch. It looks like Whites Neck was the homestead location of the white Holland family. Yes, there was a black family of prosperous Hollands that resided more to the south, near Oyster Rocks Road, closer to Overbrook Crossroads. Going on towards Milton, on another and much larger 'U' bend in the river were Linn's Reach, Russels Reach and Argo's Slip almost to the Drawbridge which carried the Lewes to Milford highway across Broadkill River. The drawbridge was described as a Bascule Bridge or “a structure, such as a drawbridge, of which one end is counteredbalanced by the other end, on the seesaw principle”. Now we are near the confluence of the Beavedam Branch, creek or whatever, with the Broadkill. Early on there was a village here, Drwabridge, with a post office and in colonial days a shipyard owned by one Batist Lay, said to have been the very first of the many Broadkill ship building sites. Beaverdam Creek flows to or from , whichever, Harbeson and beyond, which has several of its own mill ponds, such as hollands Mill Pond, Hunters Mill Pond, a bridge name of Round Pole Bridge, another village with a post office, name Whitesville. The river is now in the vicinity of, repete 'vicinity off' Cave Neck,which holds Holland Glade, on the rivers south bank, Jones Landing and on the rivers north bank, Cedar Landing, both of which appear to be deep in marsh lands. A south bank landing named Shorts Landing, then on toward town to Havalows Landing. Remembering history lessons, at Havelow landing there is a vaught for the burial of the Havelow family. Near here, to the north, is Reynolds road intersection with route 16 highway. Also, here the rived heads back south a bit, running by Conwell haul Landing, Old Orchard Landing, Vaughns Landing. Between Vaughns Landing and Black Horse Ditch flows Round Pole Branc or Creek, maybe once called Neibert Ditch. Next , closer to town is Brick Yard Landing, the Black Horse ditch, then past a spot where there was evidently a chemical works of somesort, and Sampson Landing on the north bank of the river just west of Rattle Snake Hill and Carey Landing Sand Haul Landing, Blacks Drain, Neals Drain. Then you are in down town Milton, Paynters Pond, aka Wagamons Mill Pond, Lavinia Street Pond, Ferby Mill Dam , Pemberton Branch to Redden Forest. Another story.

BROADKILL RIVER BRANCHES

CHAMBER CLIPPER

BRANCHES OF THE BROADKILL AND THEIR MILLS

COOLSPRING BRANCH

The Coolspring Branch begins two to thee hundred feet up the Broadkill River at it's junction with the Delaware Bay . On this branch was the “Red Mill” , a grist mill owned by Samuel Paynter around 1750. Grist is grain, and a grist mill grinds it into meal or flour. Farther “up” the branch or creek as they were often called, was a Carding Mill and a 'tannery' which located it's tanning or soaking vats on the banks. Carding is a textile process that disentangles, cleans and intermixes fibers and produces a continuous web, thread or sliver for additional processing. Tanning was the process of producing leather from animal hides. A tennyard was one of the early businesses of America and had its own odors. Both of these mills were property of Hermanius Wiltbanck at one time.

BEAVER DAM BRANCH

Beaver Dam Branch or Creek if you wish, is the creek off the Broadkill just a bit west of the Delaware roaut one Broadkill River Highway Bridge, what was once known as 'Drawbridge' which was a village with it's own post office. Mill Creek, aka today as “ Old Mill Creek “ is a branch of this creek and was known to have several early owners. The predominant owner's were the Holland family and the stream was then known as Holland Mill Pond Stream and/or Hollands Old Mill Stream. At the junction of Beaver Dam Creek and the Broadkill River there was a ship building yard owned and operated by Babtist Lay near the small village of “Drawbridge'. This 'boat yard is said to be the first along the Broadkiln. Westward was Holland Mill Pond and there James Hunter and Major William Perry erected a dam and build a timber saw mill.

ROUND POLE BRANCH

Where did that name come from? John Conwell once owned the land bordering Round Pole Branch where there was a timber saw mill owned by Ben Benson, David Hazzard and Sam Wright around 1701 and furnished building materials at an early time. Perhaps the first supplier. Up stream of this saw mill was located a iron furnace that was owned by Robert Shankland which furnished the iron used in the ship building trade of the Broadkill River.

Traveling east out of down town Milton on Front Street, beyond the town sewer works you will note the waters of Round Pole Creek or Branch, whatever you wish, on each side of the road, sometimes going under and sometims going over the road., depending on the tide and rainfall.

LONG BRIDGE BRANCH

Three of four miles east ward, on Cave Neck Road, is Long Bridge Branch. In 1733, the Osbourne Brothers, Henry and Thomas, reserved eight acres for a mill and John Meir erected a grist mill here hat was destroyed by fire in 1825. Later on Gideon Waples build a causway and dam 'downstream' where there was a 'bark mill' and a timber saw mill owned by Governor Dr. Joseph Maull in 1815.

A bark mill was used to grinding the roots, branches, bark or other timber trash of a special species tree into a powder called tanbark, for the tanning industry process. There was a pond above the mill named Saw Mill Pond until early 1900.

Upstream of Maulls was the joseph tour Mill in 1809 later owned by Ben McIlvain which supplied water to the mills and in early 1900 to a electrict generator that gave lights to the town of Milton. Upstream of Tours Pond and dam , in 1807, was a saw mill of Zodoc James and later Aaron Marshall in 1838 which was destroyed by fire.

PEMBERTON BRANCH

Pemberton Branch is on the far north fork of Broadkill, west of the town of Milton, on which in 1809 Isaac Clowes had a grist mill at Lavinia Crossing. There is evidence of this crossing to be seen from the current Levinia Street. The land around Pemberton Creek was part of a grant to Captain Henry Pemberton, became lands of Thomas Carlisle in 1717. A powder mill was planned by John Clowes but never erected, somewhere in here there was a cotton mill, and the Pemberton mills were sold 1809 to Arthur Melby. The cotton mill as abandond in 1864 and the grist mill sold to J. G. Betts.

OTHER MILLS

In Milton was Fergus Bridge Dam over the Broadkill where a grist mill was built later known as Wagamon's Mill, three others, Waples Mill on Prime Hook Creek, Reynolds Mill , 1809 owned by Nathan Reed, William McIlvain. Rodrick and silas Reynolds and James Ponder. Then on the south side of Prime Hook Creek was a mill owned by Ingram Brothers , later sold to Arthur Milby at a sheriff sale.

The source of this information was gathered from the “Chamber Cliper” , printed in Milton in 1988, article by William Wagmon , Milton historian and Wanda Clendaniel King, reported.

Pilot Boat Tunnell and 1889 Great Coastal Storm

SEPTEMBER 1889 GREAT COASTAL STORM

AND

THE PILOT BOAT TUNNELL

Lewes, Delaware September 14, 1889

During the past few days since the Great September East Coast Storm, excitement in Lewes has it's citizens busy doing what needs to be done to assist those that are in need of assistance and many gathering around the Virden House in downtown listening to stories and the news going the rounds.

One of those stories is of the Pilot Boat Tunnel, under the charge of Pilot John M. Barnes, which has been listed as missing. All of the prayers and hopes of the pilots dear ones involved were answered this morning as the sun, which has been shut out so long by the storm clouds rose in all it's glory over the sand dune which is occupied by the Cape Henlopen Lighthouse, here comes the missing Tunnell, full speed under full sail, into the harbor.

The account of the perilous cruise was offered by Pilot Barnes. “ We took the gale in it's full force at 8 in the morning, Tuesday, ten miles off the Capes, and made doubled reefed sails all around. Then the gale winds increased to a hurricane. The main sail was blown from it's ropes as we headed out to sea some twenty miles before the winds. Eventually they got the storm-try sail on her with great difficulty , and hove to, laying easy but working off shore. The gale winds increased until Wednesday about ten in night.

During the height of the gale, the oil bags were brought out on deck and gave some relief to the cross wind and heavy seas. Wednesday night, after the wind veered to north and lulled a little, the double reefed foresail was lofted and we headed for shore. From two hundred and fifty miles off land we made slow headway toward the capes until Thursday morning when more sail was made and we made one hundred and two miles. Thursday evening was when we sighted hog Island and the Tunnell arrived at the Breakwater this morning at three o'clock.

Tuesday during the winds she skipped a heavy sea, upsetting the cook stove and utensils , etc. Pilot Barnes, one of the Tunnell owners, gave credit to the sea going qualities of the boat, and said if it were not for these they would have been lost. As he was also out during the 1888 March blizzard he felt the late storm was more severe.

A young friend of Barnes, Harry Hickman, who was on board, has abandoned his desire to make a voyage across the Atlantic when his school days are over, feeling sure that Lewes Creek will be as far as he cares to navigate.

Source: The Monday, September 16^th 1889 issue of Wilkes Barre Record newspaper of Wilkes Barre, Pennsylvania. Newspapers.com

Delawares First Constitution Presented in September

Delaware Constitution Convention was held from August 27 to September 21 , 1776 and there drafted the first state constitution in the United States written by a body of men elected  for that purpose.

FIRST DELAWARE RAILROAD LINE

New Castle, Delaware,  1 September 1832:

The first trip by a locomotive train occurred in Delaware as the New Castle to Frenchtown Railroad, the first railroad in Delaware the first State and one of the first in the United States which opened in 1831.  This first year the train was pulled by a horse team, switching to a steam locomotive in 1832. The railroad originally meandered southwest from New Castle, Delaware to Frenchtown, Cecil county, Maryland

1890 SEVERE ATLANTIC COAST STORM.

SEVERE STORM OF SEPTEMBER 1890

ATLANTIC COAST

At Ocean City, Maryland the damage and destruction wrought by this storm is great. The porches of most of the ocean front cottages and hotels were washed away, doors and windows broken, furniture is seen floating about the beach. The seas were breaking into the second story of the Atlantic Hotel and Congress Hall and running six feet deep throughout the hotels leaving the furnishings floating about the rooms. .

A railroad train was sent last night to rescue the beach dwellers and a large number of men were seen joining hands and wading through waist deep water to bring the women, one by one, to the cars seated on their joined hands.

In New York City Port , nine authority pilots were carried to sea on steamers they were guiding as they could not find pilot boats to bring them ashore and will need to take involuntary trips to Europe and other southern ports.

Incoming steamships arriving today from the east and south report passing through a storm of almost unexampled severity.

New Jersey shore reports the steamer trip from Somers Point to Atlantic City was abandoned due to the storm. Postmaster Chester of Sea Isle City reaching the mainland today told of that place being in very bad shape, the sea walls being destroyed and fifteen house washed away, including the New Land, The Star and the Shakespeake hotels. The Continental, the larges hotel there, is safe and no lives were lost. West Jersey Railroad has reestablished communications with Atlantic City this afternoon and the fire reported there proved to have consumed only a half dozen shanties of small value at the south end of the island.

At Lewes, Delaware, on the 11^th, the pilot boat, Thomas A. Bayard, dragged her anchors and came ashore with her keel gone, but the eleven man crew was safe. A schooner, J & L Byron, Captain L. L. Risley master, with cargo of coal from Philadelphia went to pieces on fourteen Foot Bank last night. Here, the crew came ashore on pieces of the wreck, with four members evidently lost.

The Lewes Life Saving Station was partly washed away and the Breakwater fog bell was found washed ashore at Lewes. The beach between Lewes and Rehoboth is strewn with wreckage and it is thought that at least fifty lives were lost on Delaware Bay. Men were seen clinging to the top rigging, calling for help which the life saving crews were powerless to provide owing to the fury of the gale and many of their bodies were washed ashore and buried in the sands along the water.

Damages may reach well over $5,000,000 to vessel property at the Breakwater as reported by the Decatur Daily Dispatch of Illinois , Friday, 12 September 1890..

TAYLORS AND CARYS IN LEWES DELAWARE DURING 1690'S

Lewestown on Delaware:

Thomas Cary, arrived America from England and was wealthy and educated.  He had two brothers,  Edward and John, his parents and other siblings who lived in Somerset County Maryland and owned land south of the Crouch and Gardey families land.  John Cary was a young and wildman, often in trouble and early court records show he was charged with public intoxication, cursing in public,  and twice with lewd behavior with another man wife.  He was accused of running away with the wife of one James Ingram. Needless to say,  John Cary was a bounder and no doubt a source of expense and worry to his parents.  It is thought the behavior of John was one of the reasons that he, Edward and Thomas left Somerset and relocated in Sussex county, Lewes-Rehoboth Hundred,  Delaware, where the family owned land in addition to land on Assateague Island.  Once they were settled in Lewestown they became prosperous  purchasing and selling land.  John Cary became a jurist on the Sussex County Court, which was held in Lewes.  Qualifications for this post were that one needed to be a male, literate and a land owner. John met those very well.
It is known that both the Cary family and the Taylor family lived in Lewes after 1694. Now for several assumption, corroborated by land and court records.  At appears that around 1699 Rose Taylor had two children she claims were fathered by her sisters brother in law, John Cary.  A court record confirms that "two bastard children" were born to Rose Taylor , and said to be Peter and Moses, sons of John Cary.  
Source Ancestry Memoirs :   Rose  Rosamund Rozanna CrouchL