Darby Borough.

to the surrounding districts. In all the early orders of courts and reports of grand juries, in which Darby is mentioned as a particular point where a road begins or ends, the allusion is doubtless to the village, and there were located the stocks, erected in 1731, for which the then overseers of the poor, Samuel Horn and Edward Williams, in the quaint "Record for the Poor of Darby Township" claim credit, -

Dr. Smith, who had access to the early township books¹ of Darby, gave the following extracts from the proceedings in 1694:

"Agreed that this meeting begin at Eleven o'Clock in the forenoon, and that the constable give notice the first day before.

"And it is also agreed that the said town's meeting be held on the third day of the last week in the twelfth month to appoint officers for the Ensuing year, at which time the officers is to give up their accounts.

"Agreed that none of the inhabitants of this Town take any horses or mares either to keep in winter or summer, nor no cattle in summer except they keep them within their own fenced lands, upon the penalty of five shillings per head for every month."

The freemen of the township at these gatherings also exercised legislative powers, as is evident from the following extract from the township books:

"Agreed at a town meeting, 1697, that all plantations y^e lands not Joyning upon the road, that four of the Neighbours shall be chosen to lay out a convenient way as they shall see meet to the next convenient road, and being so done shall stand firm and not be blocked up with trees or plantations.
"Signed on behalf of the
"Town by

² Smith's "History of Delaware County," p. 384.

The first direct mention of Darby village, for the allusion of Gabriel Thomas to "Derby town," in 1698, does not prove that anything other than the mills were located there at the date given, is in the journal of Miss Sarah Eve, when, under date of Oct. 17, 1773, on returning from a visit to Chester, she says, "After we left Chester it began to rain pretty hard, and continued until we were near Darby. I could not help thinking of what Thomson said of Brentford was very applicable to that place, that is, that it was a town of mud. Foolish creatures to build a town in such a hole and have such delightful hills on each side of them, but who knows the reason."³ During the official correspondence of the Revolutionary war, Darby is constantly mentioned as designating a particular locality, a village. At the beginning of this century it is thus described:

"Darby is situated about seven miles and a half from Philadelphia; on the east side of the creek of the same name that empties into the Delaware a little above Chester. It contains about fifty or sixty houses and has a Friends' meeting-house."⁴

⁴ Travellers' Directory, Philadelphia, 1802.

Thirty-four years later (in 1836) the Upland Union published a description of Delaware County, and the various boroughs and villages contained within its territory. The account says, -

"Darby is next in importance to Chester. It is on the Southern great road about seven miles from Philadelphia by a good turnpike. It contains a Friends' meeting-house, Mount Zion Methodist church; a lyceum, a library company, a printing-office, four public-houses, three stores, a cotton-factory, a post-office, and about sixty dwelling-houses, and many elegant dwellings on the Haverford road."

The ancient village of Darby under the same time-honored name was incorporated into a borough, May 3, 1853, the act specifying the boundaries as follows:

"Beginning at a cedar tree on the Haverford Road on a line between A. Worrell and George Lincoln's land; thence along the line of said Worrell and Lincoln to Darby Creek; thence down said creek to the line of Isaac L. Bartram and the heirs of John Ashland; thence along the line of said Bartram and Ashland crossing the Springfield road and the same line continued between Isaac Bartram and John B. Bartram to a point on said line that is intersected by a line along a lane running from the Chester road between the lands of John Jackson and Samuel Crothers there to a corner of said John Jackson's land; thence along the line of said Jackson's land and passing through lands of Jonathan Heacock and Paxson Price to Darby Creek; and thence up said creek to a point opposite the line of between Elizabeth Grover and Benjamin E. Moore; thence along said line of Moore and Grover and William Lincoln to the west side of a private lane; thence along said private lane to the Philadelphia and Darby plank road; thence along said plank road on the south side of Cobb's Creek; thence up said creek to the corner of Hall Pennell's and Lewis Passmore's land; thence along the line of said Pennell and Passmore to said Pennell and Benjamin Serrill's land; thence along the line of Pennell and Serrill to Thomas L. Bonsall's land; thence on the line of said Pennell and Bonsall to the land late of Jacob Lincoln, deceased; thence along the line of Pennell and Lincoln to Jabez Bunting's land; thence on the line of Jabez Bunting and said Pennell to Bunting's lane; thence crossing said lane on the line of Jabez Bunting and Anne Bunting to a corner continuing on the same course to John H. Bunting's land; thence along a southwest course along the land of Jabez Bunting and John H. Bunting to Josiah Bunting's land; thence by the same course between Jabez and Josiah Bunting to Joseph Bunting's land; and thence a straight course to the place of beginning."

The election for borough officers was held on the third Friday in May following the date of the act of incorporation. The names of the burgesses and members of Council who have served from the organization of the borough to the present time, are as follows:

1858. - Josepb L. Bunting, John M. Andrews, Philip Sipler, John Verlenden, Hugh Lloyd, Joseph Bunting.