1603.] HISTORY OF DELAWARE COUNTY. 185 



It might be supposed that the prompt erection of tlie new jail 

 ■was now a matter of certainty, but it does not appear that the 

 above levy was ever made ; owing, it is probable, to the desperate 

 condition of the affairs of the Proprietary ; for it was about this 

 time that the King and Queen took the government of the Pro- 

 vince out of his hands, and commissioned Benjamin Fletcher the 

 Governor of New York, to be Captain General of Pennsylvania 

 and the territories annexed. Be this as it may, a minute of the 

 December Court of this year shows that another levy was 

 authorized for the erection of the new prison. It is in these 

 words : 



" The Grand Jury presented the want of a prison in the 

 county, and they have given in their judgment, that one hundred 

 and fifty pounds will defray the charge — the order of the Court 

 is that there shall be a levy forthwith for the raising of the sum 

 for the defraying of the said charge." 



At a Court of Petty Sessions, held at the house of John Ilodg- 

 kins at Chester early in the next year, an assessment was au- 

 thorized for raising X150 for defraying the charge of the new 

 jail, " at the true value of two pence per pound upon the real 

 and personal estates of all the inhabitants of this county, seasa- 

 hh by the first act of the new laws^ — all freemen 6s. per head." 

 This is the first ad valorem assessment made within our limits. - 



It was the custom for the Grand Jury, whose duties were 

 about to expire, to meet and make their presentments of every 

 presentable matter that had come to their knowledge since the 

 adjournment of the previous Court. After naming the Justices 

 present, Sheriff and Clerk, the minutes of each Court, at this 

 period, proceed thus : 



"After proclamation made and silence commanded, by the 

 King & Queen's authority, and in the Proprietary's name, the 

 Grand Jury was called over, and appeared and gave in their 

 presentments and was discharged ; and a new Grand Jury re- 

 turned by the Sheriff was empannelled." A less number com- 

 posed a Grand Jury then than at the present day — usually about 

 fifteen. 



Some idea may be formed of the mischievously inquisitorial 

 character of Chester County Grand Juries at this period, from 



1 Governor Fletcher held that the laws that had been made under the Proprietary's 

 charter were no longer in force, and required them to be re-enacted by the Assembly 

 — many of them in a modified form. See Col. Rec. i. 364, &c. These new laws were 

 read at the July Court, 1693, by George Foreman, a member of the Council. 



^ The author has seen an original warrant issued by John Bristow " to Isaac Taylor 

 constable of Thornbury," dated the 23d of the 11th mo. 1692, in which the following 

 language occurs, viz: "these ma^" certifie, that y<' accounts were made up this Court, 

 and approved by the Grand Jury, and upon ballance of the acco', y*^ county is found 

 to be in debt £183: 19*: 6'', whereof for the raising of money to defray y'' s"* Charge, 

 & for y-' building of a new prison with stone, the Cort, by & with the advice <t consent 

 of y^ Grande Inquest, have unanymously agreed to Lay a levy Ac." 



