The City Of Chester.

for in the will of Ruth Hoskins, dated July 3, 1739, she mentions only her sons Stephen and Joseph Hoskins, - although John was still living, - and devised to her son-inlaw, Mather, a house and lot. Stephen Hoskins was born in Chester, Twelfth month 18, 1701/2, and Joseph was born in the same place, Fourth month 30, 1705.

Stephen Hoskins married, in 1727, Sarah Warner, of Maryland, and moved into that province, but returned to Chester, 1730, and was elected coroner of Chester County. About 1743 he removed to Philadelphia, and it was to his son, John, of Burlington, that Joseph Hoskins, of the Porter house, devised the real estate of which he died seized. This Joseph Hoskins, to whom more particular reference will be made in account of the Porter house, purchased the homestead from his brother, John, to whom it was awarded in partition of John Hoskins', the elder, estate, and on June 4, 1762, Joseph sold the house and lot to Henry Hale Graham. A brief notice of Judge Graham has been given herein, as also an account of William Graham, his son, to whom the property descended. The house and lot was sold by the heirs of William Graham to John G. Dyer in 1857, by whose estate it is now owned.

The Old Porter (Lloyd) House. - It is doubtful whether any building in the United States, whose history extends over more than a century and a half, has had connected in the title to the property so many distinguished owners as will be found in that of the old Porter house in this city, whose record was closed in that appalling tragedy, in 1882, which enshrouded our city in mourning for a season.

By patent dated April 9, 1669, Francis Lovelace, Governor-General under the Duke of York, granted unto Neeles Laerson, alias Friend, a large tract of ground comprising one hundred and fifty acres, but which by subsequent survey proved to include in the boundary lines one hundred and eighty-three acres. The patent reserved a yearly rent of one and a half bushels of winter wheat, payable to the king. Laerson entered into possession of the land thus allotted him, built upon and improved the premises. By will, dated Dec. 17, 1686 (he died the following year), Laerson gave authority to his wife to sell the real estate in her discretion. In exercise of this power, Ann Friend (the family had by this time assumed the English alias as their family name, and had abandoned the Swedish patronymic absolutely), the widow, Andrew Friend, son and heir of Laerson and Johannes Friend, the second son, by deed dated May 27, 1689, conveyed the estate to David Lloyd. Lloyd, however, after he built the house whose history I am writing, seemed to have had some doubts of the sufficiency of the title, and therefore, thirty-four years subsequently, July 13, 1723, he had Ann Friend (then one hundred and five years old), and Gabriel Friend and Laurence Friend, the younger sons of Neeles Laerson and Ann, his wife, execute a deed conveying the premises he had purchased in 1686. Parts of the estate thus acquired were sold by Lloyd to Joseph Richardson, and to Rodger Jackson, but he subsequently repurchased the land thus conveyed, and in addition acquired from Jonas Sandelands a considerable tract, until the estate had increased to about five hundred acres.

David Lloyd, a sketch of whose eventful, useful life is given in the chapter on the bench and bar, was twice married. His second wife was Grace Growden, whom he married after the year 1703, for several deeds of that year are executed by him alone, indicating that at that time he was a widower. By his first marriage he was childless; by his second, he was the father of one son, who, at an early age, was killed by an accident. He died "6th day of ye 2d month" (May), 1731, aged seventy-eight years, for such is the inscription on his tombstone in Friends' graveyard here. If it be a fact that he was seventy-eight years old when he died, David Lloyd could not have been born in 1656, and yet all the authorities agree in giving the latter date as that of his birth. By his will, dated March 24, 1724, after a few bequests, the remainder of his estate is devised to his wife, Grace, who was twenty-seven years younger than her husband.

The old mansion was built in 1721, and the slab on which was engraved the letters "L. L. D. & G., 1721," which was formerly in the western gable of the dwelling. The house was of stone, massively built, and was one of the best specimens of colonial grandeur which had descended to our time. It received many additions to it after it passed into the possession of Commodore Porter, such as the building of the cupola on the roof, the walling up of the open corner chimney-place and substituting therefor the grates and marble mantels which were seen there when the ruins were visited by thousands of people after the explosion. Lloyd lived sumptuously in the old mansion, then, as before stated, one of the most imposing dwellings in the New World, entertaining largely and keeping a retinue of servants. He was one of the eight gentlemen of means in the province, including the Governor, who, in the year 1725, are recorded as owning four-wheeled carriages drawn by two horses.

Grace Lloyd, in her widowhood, was attended faithfully by her friend, Jane Fenn, a noted minister of Friends, until the latter married, and in turn became the mistress of the old dwelling. Jane Fenn was born in 1693, in London, and when very young was strongly impressed with the belief that it was her duty to go to Pennsylvania, and after several years had elapsed, in which she struggled against the impression, she sailed in 1712, in company with a Welshman, Robert Davis, who with his family were emigrating to Pennsylvania. Davis had paid her passage, and she had obligated herself to return the outlay out of the first money she could earn; but when he insisted that she should bind herself as a servant for four years to re-