1645.] HISTORY OF DELAWARE COUNTY. 39 



distant wood, which phice is named Kinsossinf; by the savages, 

 whic'li was before a certain and invariable resort for trade with 

 tlie Miii((uas, but which is now opposed by the Swedes, having 

 there built a strong house. About a half a mile further in the 

 woods. Governor Printz constructed a mill on a kill which runs 

 into the sea [river] not far to tiie south of Matinnekonk, and on 

 this kill a strong building just by the path which leads to the 

 iNliniiuas ; and this place is called by the savages Kakarikonk, so 

 that no access to the Minquas is left open ; and he, too. controls 

 nearly all the trade of the savages on the river, as the greatest 

 I»art of them go a hunting in that neighborhood, which they are 

 not able to do without passing by his residence."' 



The above extracts have been introduced not only because 

 they exhibit the means resorted to by the Swedes to secure the 

 whole trade of the river, but because they contain all that the 

 Dutch Commissary Hudde, relates on the subject of the location 

 of the Swedish fort on the Schuylkill ; in respect to which Mr. 

 Ferris in his Hhtory of the oHginal settlements on the Delmvare^^ 

 has fallen into a ver}'' serious error — an error, the correction of 

 which has been rendered more important from the fact that the 

 opinion of Mr. Ferris has been relied upon by subsequent writers,' 

 on account of his supposed "local knowledge." 



Mr. Ferris locates this fort on a cluster of rocks, once a very 

 small island in the Schuylkill above Bartrani's Garden, but now 

 connected with the shore by marsh meadow. As the island on 

 which the fort was erected, " lays about the distance of a gun- 

 shot within the kill," it became necessary for our author to re- 

 move the mouth of the Schuylkill to a point a short distance 

 below the site of the Bartram Garden — now the seat of Mr. 

 Thomas Eastwick, because the water at high tide was over " the 

 great meadows," extending from thence "in a southerly course 

 to the Delaware." Even if the real mouth of the Schuylkill had 

 been mistaken by Hudde, the " cluster of rocks" fixed on by Mr. 

 Ferris would entirely fail to meet his description of the island 

 upon which the Swedish fort was erected. This island, from the 

 west was "secured by another creek," and "on the same island 

 beautiful corn was raised." While these facts could not possibly 

 apply to the site designated by Mr. Ferris, they, as well as the 

 other facts mentioned by Hudde, exactly fit the island then, as 

 now, at the real mouth of the Schuylkill. The location of the 

 fort was undoubtedly upon what is now known at Province island ; 

 and as it could not in " any manner whatever obtain any con- 

 trol on the river," but had "the command over the whole creek" 

 or kill, its exact site must have been near the western abutment 

 of Penrose Ferry Bridge, or perhaps a little lower down. 



1 Hudde's Rop. in N. Y. Hist. Col. i. N. S. 429. 



2 Page 70. 3 Haz. Ann. 78. 



