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CHAPTER LXII.
PRINCETON.
THE township
of Princeton, politically, is of recent origin, having been erected
in the session of 1837-38 by the Legislature, when the county of Mercer
was formed from portions of the counties of Middlesex, Burlington, Hunterdon,
and Somerset. Within its territorial boundaries was incorporated the
old borough of Princeton, from which the township received its name.
Prior to that time the borough embraced portions of both Somerset and
Middlesex Counties. The old road, or king's highway, as it was anciently
called (now known as Nassau and Stockton Streets in the borough), was
the line which had for many previous years divided those counties. That
portion which lay on the north side of the road formed a part of Montgomery
township in Somerset County, and that on the south side was a part of
West Windsor in the county of Middlesex. The inhabitants of Princeton
then residing on the north side were drawn generally to the villages
of Harlingen and Rocky Hill in the public business transactions of Montgomery
township, and to Somerville in the business of the county of Somerset;
while those residing on the south side were identified with the township
of West Windsor, and were drawn to New Brunswick, as the capital of
the county of Middlesex.
The history of Princeton has been fully written and published in two octavo
volumes so recently as the year 1879, by Mr. Hageman, who, beginning
with its early settlement, traced it through the Revolutionary war to
the present time, taking in its churches, schools, college, theological
seminary, literature, authors and volumes, prominent families and citzens,
civil war, and cemetery, etc.
There is but
little if anything left to be snatched from oblivion by the writers
of this new history so far as Princeton is concerned. In preparing this
historical sketch therefore, that the whole county of Mercer may be
properly presented, we shall take the liberty of drawing largely from
Mr. Hageman's volumes of “Princeton and its Institutions,” and abridging
portions of that work in order that Princeton may fill the limited space
assigned to her with the other townships of the county in this work.
The
township of Princeton lies in the northern part of Mercer County, being
bounded on the north by Montgomery township, in Somerset County; on
the east by the Millstone River, which separates it from Franklin township,
in Somerset, and from South Brunswick, in Middlesex Counties; on the
south by the Delaware and Raritan Canal, which separates it from West
Windsor; and on the west by the old province line, which separates it
from the townships of Lawrence and Hopewell. When the township was first
created the West Windsor boundary was the line of Princeton Borough
but the Legislature has since changed it by making the Delaware and
Raritan Canal the line.
The
township is about five miles in length from north to south, and three
miles in width, and, according to the last census (1880), it contains
four thousand three hundred and forty-eight inhabitants. It embraces
within its limits Rocky Hill Mountain, which lies across the northern
portion of the township. This mountainous ridge has been nearly cleared
of its forests, and much of it is under cultivation. From its top there
are beautiful landscape views on the north, extending for nearly twenty
miles over the cultivated champaign of Somerset County, through which
flow the Millstone and Raritan Rivers; while southward the eye takes
in a broad expanse of alluvial land, slightly undulating, with the blue
Navesink Hills rising to view in the distant southeast along the coast
of the Atlantic Ocean. The town of Princeton is peculiarly attractive
and picturesque from this point of observation. Somerville lies eighteen
miles north of the town of Princeton, New Brunswick east sixteen miles,
Trenton south ten miles. The township contains seventeen square miles,
and ten thousand nine hundred and six acres of land.
The Soil is
a rich clay loam, with the red sandstone underneath. It is well adapted
to farming purposes, and highly favorable to the growth of trees, which
are much cultivated, and grow with luxuriance. The red shale is found
a few miles north of Princeton, while the whole State south of it is
sandy alluvial land. The trap rock crops out everywhere on Rocky Hill.
The land in this as in the adjoining townships is productive, and generally
in a good state of cultivation. There are model farms and specimens
of model farming. Wheat, rye, corn, grass, oats, potatoes, and other
vegetables and a general variety of fruits are all raised, and readily
find a remunerative market. The surface of the land is undulating, with
a pleasant variety of hill and dale. The farms are not generally large,
but average about one hundred acres. The farm-houses are commodious
and attractive, and indicate a good degree of prosperity and home comfort.
Some of the most valuable farms in Princeton are owned by young men
of thrift, who have been liberally educated, and who apply to their
agricultural pursuits the results of science and reading.
The Climate of
Princeton is salubrious, and such is generally conceded to be the climate
of the whole State of New Jersey. Because of its healthfulness Princeton
was called by Dr. Witherspoon the “Montpellier of America.” Gordon,
in his “Gazetteer of New Jersey,” describes Princeton as remarkable
for the salubrity of its climate; and the Rev. Samuel Miller, D.D.,
who resided here for about forty years while professor in the Theological
Seminary, and who always watched the changes of the weather with interest,
and kept a daily record of the thermometer, wrote near the close of
his long life that “Princeton has one of the finest climates in the
solar system.”
On the
slope of the mountain, about a mile from the northern boundary line
of the borough of Princeton, is “Tusculum,” well known as once the countryseat
of the Rev. Dr. John Witherspoon, president of Princeton College. The
old stone house, on whose walls the year 1773 is inscribed, still wears
a stately appearance, and has escaped the transforming genius of modern
improvements, which has wrought such marvelous changes within a few
past years in the original college buildings. The house, though built
more than a century ago, testifies by its plan and structure that its
projector was a man who devised liberally for the comfort of his family
and friends.
CEDAR GROVE,
which is about two and a half miles from the borough of Princeton, on
the brow of the hill on the road leading from Princeton to Blawenburg
northward, contains a little cluster of dwellings, a district school-house,
a blacksmith-shop, and a neat chapel for preaching and religious services.
This chapel was originally a Methodist Church, but the building was
sold, when the Methodists built a church in Princeton, to Mr. Paul Tulane,
who at that time resided in that neighborhood, though doing business
in New Orleans. This chapel is open every Sabbath to the different denominations
of Christians in the vicinity for preaching alternately in succession,
Mr. Tulane paying from his own funds the several preachers for their
services. The legal title of the chapel, with an adequate fund to continue
the charity, have recently been conferred in trust upon the trustees
of the First Presbyterian Church of Princeton.
The place derived its name
from the grove of cedars which environ it. It has a beautiful southern
prospect. In the latter part of the last century a colony of French
refugees, families of wealth and distinction, settled at this place,
and bought up most of the farms in the neighborhood of Cedar Grove and
Cherry Valley. A particular account of these refugees may be found in
Mr. Hageman's “History of Princeton,” vol. i. p. 197.
CHERRY VALLEY is a name given to the cross-roads
about half a mile north of Cedar Grove, a neighborhood whose central
figure was a stone schoolhouse where the Princeton road crosses the
Pennington and Rocky Hill road. It was here where the public school
and religious services were maintained by the families residing in the
neighborhood before Cedar Grove and Blawenburg with better facilities
superseded it. It is now only the old name of a thickly-settled neighborhood.
MOUNT LUCAS,
which is also situated in this township, is about two and a half miles
north of Princeton, on the road leading from the latter place to Rocky
Hill village, and being on the top of the mountain is a most beautiful
and picturesque place. Its grand view is north of the mountain, and
embraces all the valley between the Millstone River and Sourland Mountain
northward as far as the eye can see, and westward up through Blawenburg.
It exhibits to view the whole township of Montgomery, presenting a landscape
of green farms dotted with white farmhouses and church-spires rising
from the villages of Harlingen, Blawenburg, Rocky Hill, and Griggstown,
with here and there little patches of timberland reserved to indicate
what heavy forests covered the whole area a century and more ago.
Mount Lucas is the centre of
a school district, a large modern school-house having recently superseded
the old stone building. It was formerly the site of the “Mount Lucas
Orphan and Guardian Institute,” which was the first orphan asylum in
New Jersey, so far as we can learn. It was founded in the year 1842
by Franklin Merrill, then a student in the theological seminary at Princeton.
The farm was held by private trustees until 1845, when it became incorporated
by law under a special charter. A large stone building was added to
the frame building on the place. The institution was supported by private
charity, and continued under the direction of private citizens for thirteen
years, and during that time it received about thirty pupils, boys and
girls. It was for the benefit of this institution that the Rev. Dr.
Archibald Alexander appropriated the proceeds of the “Log College,”
which he published in 1845. The enterprise finally failed of success
through the want of a successor who possessed the faith and enthusiasm
of the founder, and for want of a permanent endowment. The property was sold, and the surplus funds
which had been restricted from waste after payment of debts were handed over to what was then the “Ashmun
Institute,” now “Lincoln University,” in Pennsylvania, for the education
of pupils in that institution. The farm now belongs to the township
of Princeton, and is kept as the almshouse of the township.
STONY
BROOK. - In the southern part of the township, along
the historic stream of Stony Brook, there are still standing, hoary
with age and sacred with Revolutionary associations, Worth's Mills and
the ancient Quaker meeting-house, and near them a little cluster of
houses and shops, known before Princeton had a location and a name as
the hamlet of Stony Brook.
Adjoining these places on the north lies the
great battle-field of Princeton, where Washington turned the tide of
the war with greater personal danger than he elsewhere experienced in
his whole military career, and where the gallant Mercer sealed the victory
with his blood. There are no other villages or towns in the township
except the incorporated borough of Princeton, and this occupies so large
a portion of the territory of the township, and is so ancient and so
full of historic interest, that the greater part of the space alloted
to us must be devoted to it, after we describe the early settlement
of the township.
The Stony Brook
enters the township of Princeton on the west side thereof, and while
its crystal waters pass along through the tall and silent forest on
either side for a quarter of a mile it assumes the name of Pretty Brook,
a resort in summer for excursion parties of children and Sunday-schools,
then resuming its historic name and flowing down through the southern
part of the township, being utilized at Worth's Mills, and making a
semicircle along the Quaker road, it extends almost to the province
line, where a slight elevation or embankment prevents its overflow into
the depression of the Assanpink, and thence into the Delaware River.
Here, resisted in its southward course, it trends to the east and empties
into the Millstone River at the Aqueduct Mills, on the east side of
the township, about two miles distant from, and opposite to, the point
where it first entered the township. This stream has seven bridges built
across it in this township. The Delaware and Raritan Canal passes along
its banks on the line separating Princeton from West Windsor township.
The Millstone River, after
its confluence with the Stony Brook at the Aqueduct Mills, forms the
eastern boundary line of Princeton and of Mercer County as it flows down by the Kingston Mills to the Somerset County line,
near the mills and village of Rocky Hill.
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