Darby Township.

y^e s^d road to y^e Kings road at y^e Easternmost corner of Thomas ffoxes, from thence turning Northeasterly at thirty two feet distance, from the aforesaid line back again on y^e several corses, still continuing thirty two feet distance y^e s^d Morton's House End extend as aforesaid to the cross way near y^e s^d Morton's house then upon a strait line across y^e s^d way to a corner stone standing in y^e corner of y^e Mounce (Pettersons) house fence being also y^e corner of y^e cross roads, from thence down in a straight line down past and so forth to another corner stone standing by y^e s^d Mouncy's house fence-side making here the road thirty two foot from aforesaid stone at the lower corner of the s^d Morton's orchard then along by s^d Morton's corner of ye s^d Morwin's farm, from which s^d stone to y^e first mentioned stone it is six perches and two foot broad."

On the Mokormpates Kill, and just above the northern line of the Calcoon Hook patent, was a tract of two hundred and fifty acres, known in early times as "Boon's Forest," which was laid out to Andres Swason Boon April 13, 1680. From this sturdy Swedish settler a greater man descended, or at least he has secured more of the world's attention, than did his ancestor in Delaware County, - Daniel Boone, the pioneer of Kentucky. On the Boon tract the Knowles Presbyterian Church is located. To the east of Boon's land, extending to Darby Creek, was a tract of two hundred and fifty, entered to Surveyor-General Thomas Holme, Dec. 10, 1683, and July 1, 1688. John Blunston, as the agent of Holme, acknowledged a deed in open court conveying this estate to Joseph Wood. The property not only reached to Darby Creek, but a strip extended along the north line of Boon's land to the Muckinipattus Creek, as the stream forming the western boundary of Darby township is now called, and on that part of the estate Horntown is located. Above this tract, extending from creek to creek, was "Good Intent," a plantation of two hundred acres, which was surveyed to Edward Gibbs July 12, 1683. Immediately north of this estate was a tract of three hundred acres taken up by Thomas Brassey, March 15-16, 1681, who never resided thereon, but sold the property to John Bartram Aug. 30, 1685. On this plantation John Bartram, the earliest American botanist, was born, May 23, 1699. His early attention was first directed to botanical studies by one of those accidents which seem to shape the destinies of all great men. When a mere lad, he was plowing on the Darby farm, and uprooted a daisy. Despite everything the modest little flower kept intruding itself on his consideration, until after several days he hired a man to plow while he rode to Philadelphia to procure a treatise on botany and a Latin grammar. He, fortunately for himself and the world, had inherited a farm from a bachelor uncle, which gave him the means to marry early, and purchase the land on which he afterwards established the noted "Botanic Gardens." On this estate he built with his own hands a stone house, and on one of the stones in the gable was the inscription, - "John * Ann Bartram, 1831," with a star between their first names, as was then the custom, to indicate man and wife. Here he pursued his studious habits, his reputation spreading abroad until correspondence was solicited by the leading botanists of the Old World, - Linnæus, Dr. Fothergill, and others, - while in the colonies, all scientific men in the same line of study sought his favor, advice, and opinions. Dr. Franklin was his earnest friend, and constantly urged Bartram to authorship. His fame had so extended that in 1765 George III. appointed him botanist to the king. He died Sept. 22, 1777, in the seventy-ninth year of his age.

Above the Bartram farm a tract of three hundred acres, reaching to the Upper Darby line, which was taken up by William, John, and Thomas Smith, Aug. 30, 1685, to each of whom a plot of one hundred acres was allotted. John Smith came from Harly, County of Leicester, England, and resided on the estate until 1714. It is presumed that William and Thomas were of the same family, but the exact relationship is not known. That part of the Thomas and John Smith tract lying to the east of the Springfield road and west of Darby Creek became the property of John Ash. His heirs resided at the old homestead until their deaths. In the spring of 1862, within six weeks, Hannah, aged seventy-six years, James, seventy-four, Sarah, seventy-eight, and Alice Ash, aged eighty years, died. They were all unmarried, and had lived there all their lives. "Their habits were those of the world before the flood, retiring to their beds at five o'clock in the afternoon, having no furniture in their house but what had been purchased prior to the Revolution, and some of them, it was said, and perhaps correctly, never having visited that den of iniquities, the city of Philadelphia." On the east of Darby Creek, at the Upper Darby line, on Sept. 10, 1682, was surveyed to Thomas Worth two hundred and fifty acres, which he had purchased prior to leaving England. He was a man of superior education for that day, and was a member of the Provincial Assembly in 1697. He lived to an advanced age, dying in 1731. Below Worth's plantation, John Blunston, on Aug. 10, 1682, acquired three hundred and fifty acres of land, and he is said to have given the name of Darby to the settlement, in remembrance of his old home in England. The fact that the mill-race was cut through his land, and after John Bethel purchased the Darby mills, the right to use this mill-race was conveyed by Blunston, seems to indicate that he was the first person who operated the mills there. The tract of two hundred and twenty-two acres bounded on the east by Cobb's Creek, and to the west by Church Lane, was taken up by Samuel Bradshaw Aug. 10, 1682, the date of the early surveys to Penn's adherents, many of whom, it is said, accompanied the proprietary in the "Welcome," and located in the neighborhood of Darby. He emigrated from Oxton, County Nottingham, and the estate passed to Thomas Bradshaw, March 5, 1697/8, who, it is thought, was a brother of Samuel. To the south of Bradshaw's and partly of John Blunston's tracts was a plot of fifty acres, bounded on the east by Cobb's Creek, and on the west by Blunston's Run, which was surveyed, Nov.