1677.] HISTORY OF DELAWARE COUNTY. 115 



In 1669 a block-liouse had been erected at Wicaco for defence 

 against attacks by the Indians. This year it was occupied as a 

 church, the Rev. Jacobus Fabritius, the installed minister, 

 preaching his first sermon there in Dutch, on Trinity Sunday.^ 

 It is very certain that the Upland Court had not as yet com- 

 plied with the order of the general Court held at New Castle in 

 1675, in causing " a church (u- place of meeting to be built at 

 Wickegkoo ;" as no expenditure is included for this purpose in 

 the estimate for which the general levy was made. The block- 

 house was probably fixed up as a place of worship by private 

 subscription. 



The Records of New Castle show that Commander Collier sat 

 there as a Judge of the Court. The Governor being advised of 

 his conduct in this respect, ordered him to forbear, and imme- 

 diately commissioned Captain Christopher Billop as his suc- 

 cessor. Walter Wharton was at the same time commissioned as 

 "Surveyor in Delaware Bay and River," and Ephraim Herman 

 " to bee receiver of Quit Rents in Delaware river in the juris- 

 diction of New Castle and Upland Courts."^ 



Since the arrival of Fenwick, owing to difficulties about the 

 ownership of West Jersey, there had been no arrival of settlers 

 for that province, until this year, when three vessels arrived — 

 the Kent, the Willing-mind, and the fly boat Martha.^ These 

 were all well freighted with members of the Society of Friends, 

 the greatest number of whom settled at and near Burlington, — 

 some settled at Salem, and a few found their way to the western 

 side of the river. Among the latter were William Clayton, 

 Morgan Drewett, William Woodmancy, and William Oxley, and 

 probably Henry Hastings and other Englishmen, whom we first 

 find settled in the vicinity of Upland about this time. 



Directions are transmitted to the Upland Court by the gover- 

 nor, to purchase from the Indians, two miles in extent along the 

 river, from the lands previously purchased to the Falls. He also 

 requires, by authority of the Duke, of all persons who "have 

 or Clay me any land in Delawor River or Bay," that they make 



» » » * * the eastern line of which ran through the centre of the building, from its 

 S. E. to its N. W. corner. If it was rectangular in shape, its size was 14 by 15 feet, 

 **»«**» the house of Mrs. Sarah P. Coombe occupies about 11 feet of the South 

 end of the House of defence." 



1 Clay's Ann. 34. Fabritius was a man of such a turbulent disposition, that in 

 earlier life he was wholly unfitted for the performance of his duties as a clergyman. 

 Only two years previous to his call to 'Wicaco, he had acted the part of a ringleader 

 in " tumultuous disturbances'' at New Castle, and, being brought by a special warrant 

 before the Governor, it was ordered that " in respect to his being guilty, and his former 

 irregular life, [he] be suspended from exercising his functions as a minister, or preach- 

 ing any more within this government, either in public or private." Tempered by age 

 and misfortune, he appears to have conducted himself with propriety during the re- 

 mainder of his life, the last nine years of which he was blind. Ilaz. An. 419, 420 ; 

 Clav's Ann. 35. 



2"Haz. Keg. iv. 73. ' Smith's Hist. N. J. 99-103. 



