HISTORY OF BUCKS COUNTY. 



107 



"The habit consisted of a black hat 

 and phinie, with coat and bodice and 

 flowing skirt of green velvet, faced with 

 gold." Her father wore the short trous- 

 ers of the day with silk stockings and a 

 powdered wig on all important occasions. 



An interesting discovery was made at 

 Trevose in 1888. It was part of the neigh- 

 borhood tradition that before Mrs. Grace 

 (Growdon) Galloway was forced to leave 

 her home at the time of the Revolution, she 

 buried a good deal of her treasure, which 

 was too bulky to take with her. In August, 

 1888, this tradition was confirmed. A la- 

 borer while working on the farm unearthed 

 the remains of what had been a box of rare 

 and costly eggshell or India china. It was 

 unfortunately nearly all broken when found, 

 but enough remained to show that it had 

 been hand-painted with pictures of Chinese 

 life, with the funny and impossible perspec- 

 tive so much in use by the artists of the 

 Flowery Kingdom for the last thousand 

 years. Just enough remained to show 

 what once had been. They had evidently 

 been carefully packed. Saucers and tea 

 plates were found standing on their edges 

 in rows, and there was a strong partition in 

 the box separating them from the larger 

 and heavier pieces of china. There were 

 also a number of pieces found belonging to 

 a children's toy -tea set of common blue 

 ware. There was but one other article de- 

 serving of mention, and this was a bowl of 

 the commonest ware ornamented with a 

 likeness of King George III., taken when he 

 was a young man, with the words "George 

 III., King," on a scroll at the base of the 

 portrait. There seems to have been no 

 reason why so worthless an article should 

 have been hidden away, excepting that, as it 

 indicated the loyalty of the family, it was 

 dangerous to allow it to be exposed to view. 

 A similar box of china was dug up in 1847 

 by the late William Ridge, who was then 

 lessee of the property. 



In 1847 the Burtons, grandchildren of 

 Betty Galloway, sold Trevose to their sec- 

 ond cousin, George Williams, a lineal des- 

 cendant of the Growdons. At his death he 

 devised it to his niece Lydia (Williams) 

 Taylor, wife of Caleb Taylor ; Lydia at her 

 death devised it to her son, the late Charles 

 W. Taylor, father of the subject of this 

 sketch. It is somewhat singular that, from 

 the time of the Growdons down to the time 

 of the Burtons, there is no mention in any 

 deed or will conveying the prope'rty to any 

 male heir being born to the estate. There 

 has always been a female heir in each gen- 

 eration for whom the property has been 

 held in trust. From 1681 to the present time 

 the property has been sold but twice. 

 Through the Williams family the present 

 owner is a lineal descendant from the 

 Growdons, the first purchaser from William 

 Penn, and while the property has not al- 

 ways descended in a direct line, yet it is 

 interesting to note that it has never passed 

 out of the hands of the descendants of Law- 

 rence Growdon the elder, since the time he 



received it by grant from Penn, the pro- 

 prietor of the province of Pennsylvania. 



Lydia (Williams) Taylor, wife of Caleb 

 Taylor, was also a lineal descendant of 

 Thomas Langhorne, father of Jeremiah 

 Langhorne, of Langhorne Park. The lat- 

 ter was an interesting contemporary of 

 Lawrence Growdon. He was a branch of 

 the Langhorne family of Wales, "a family 

 of much wealth, and great note." They 

 were the owners of all the country from 

 St. Davids' to Carmarthan, over sixty 

 miles. St.' Brides' was the family seat of 

 the Langhornes, settled by one Thomas 

 Langhorne during the reign of Richard II. 

 Langhorne Castle was dismantled by Crom- 

 well. Thomas Langhorne, of Kendall meet- 

 ing, Westmoreland, England, came to Bucks 

 county in 1684. He took up some eight 

 hundred acres of land covering the ground 

 between the present borough of Langhorne 

 and Glen Lake, and was one of the first set- 

 tlers. His mansion house was situated 

 about one half-mile south of the present 

 borough of Langhorne ]\Ianor, and on the 

 property now owned by J. Hibbs Buckman, 

 Esq. He had four children: Jeremiah; 

 Elizabeth, who married Lawrence Grow- 

 don; Sarah, who married William Biles; 

 and Grace, who died at the age of thirty- 

 four, unmarried. 



Jeremiah Langhorne was farfamed as one 

 of the ablest ministers of the religious So- 

 ciety of Friends. He was chief justice of 

 the province, and held court in many places 

 in it. He lived a single life with his sister 

 Grace until her death, and after that alone 

 with his servants. Besides Langhorne Park, 

 his residence, he owned several thousand 

 acres in Lehigh county. As to the date of 

 his death there is no known record. His 

 remains are said to lie in the Middletown 

 meeting graveyard in the borough of Lang- 

 horne. His will was proved in 1774. By- 

 marriages and deaths without issue Jere- 

 miah Langhorne's estates went largely to 

 the Growdons and the Galloways of Tre- 

 vose. For an interesting essay on "Jeremiah 

 Langhorne and his Times" the reader is 

 referred to a paper read before the Bucks 

 County Historical Society on August 9, 

 1898, by Samuel C. Eastb'urn. Esq., of 

 Langhorne, from which much of the infor- 

 mation herein contained is taken. 



The Williams family are also descended 

 from the Mauleverer? of Arncliffe, Eng- 

 land. Hezekiah Williams, Jr. (ante) great- 

 grandfather of the late Charles W. Taylor, 

 was the son of Hezekiah Williams, Sr., and 

 Sarah Abbott, his wife. The latter was a 

 daughter of Anne ISIauleverer and John 

 Abbott, of Burlington county, New Jersey, 

 who were married April 16, 1696. John 

 Abbott was born in Nottinghamshire in 

 1663, and arrived in Philadelphia in 1684. 

 Anne Mauleverer was the daughter of Ed- 

 mund Mauleverer, of West Auyton, York- 

 shire, and Anne Pearson, his wife. He died 

 27 November, 1679. Edmund's father was 

 James, who married Beatrice, daughter of 

 Sir Timothv Hutton, Bart. Records in St. 



