Deed from Isaac and Elizabeth Hale, 25 August 1830
Source Note
and , Deed for property in , Susquehanna Co., PA, to JS, 25 Aug. 1830; printed form with handwriting of ; signatures of and ; witnessed by and ; two pages; JS Collection, CHL.
Single leaf measuring 15⅝ × 12½ inches (40 × 32 cm). Printed form filled in with ink. Portions of the paper are ruled with graphite. On the verso, the document bears a docket in the handwriting of , identifying it as a deed from to JS, and an endorsement in the handwriting of Norman I. Post, recording fees and taxes paid. Seals on recto, likely stamped after signing, and embossed seal on verso with possible image, partially legible: “[SU]SQUEHANNA. CO. [S]EAL.”
Historical Introduction
On 6 April 1829, JS entered into an agreement with his father-in-law, , to purchase for $200 a thirteen-and-a-half-acre portion of the Hales’ property in , Pennsylvania, including a frame home, a barn, and other improvements. The agreement required JS to pay $114 by 1 May 1829 and the balance of $86 by 1 May 1830. JS paid the first installment but when he missed the second, Hale allowed him to pay interest on the payment and extended the due date, rather than rescinding the contract. By 26 August 1830, the property was transferred to JS.
The deed, featured here, acknowledges that JS made payment in full on 25 August 1830. At the time and signed the document, two brief additions were inserted, as was a notation acknowledging the insertions. Two witnesses also signed the deed: JS’s friend and Justice of the Peace . The following day an addendum was added in which Isaac and Elizabeth Hale jointly acknowledged before Lane that the document represented “their act & deed,” and Elizabeth separately affirmed that she signed “of her own free will & not from any fear or Coersion on the part of Her said Husband,” a statement confirming that she received a privy examination separate from her husband as required by law in land transactions involving the “estate of the wife.” This interest was commonly called the wife’s “dower interest.”
Within a few days of concluding this transaction, JS and departed , never to reside there again. They moved to ’s home in , New York, staying there until they moved to in January 1831. In June 1833, JS and Emma sold the Harmony property for $300 to , the neighbor on the east side of the property.
Agreement with Isaac Hale, 6 Apr. 1829; Knight, Reminiscences, 3; Susquehanna Co., PA, Tax Assessment Records, 1813–1865, Harmony Township, PA, Tax Record for 1829, p. [12]; Tax Record for 1830, p. [12], microfilm 1,927,832, U.S. and Canada Record Collection, FHL.
Knight, Joseph, Sr. Reminiscences, no date. CHL. MS 3470.
An Act for the Better Confirmation of the Estates of Persons Holding or Claiming under Feme-Coverts [24 Feb. 1770], Statutes at Large of Pennsylvania, 329–332.
The Statutes at Large of Pennsylvania from 1682 to 1801. Vol. 7, 1765–1770. [Harrisburg, PA]: Wm Stanley Ray, 1900.
Before me the Subscriber one of the Justices of the Peace in & for said County of Susquehanna Came , & his wife and acknowledged the within indenture or instrument of wrighting to be their act & deed for the purposes theirin mentioned & being of proper age & being examined Apart from her Said & the contents explained to her by me Said she Signed it of her own free will & not from any fear or Coersion on the part of Her said Husband
Dated at this 2◊ 26th day of August in the year of our Lord 1830
Susquehanna County ss
[seal]
Recorded in the Office for Recording of Deeds &c in and for said County in Deed Book No 8 page 59. the thirty first day of August AD eighteen hundred & thirty.
In Testimony whereof I have hereunto set my hand and seal of office at Mon[t]rose the day & year above written
William Jessup was Susquehanna County recorder from January 1824 to January 1833. (Blackman, History of Susquehanna County, Pennsylvania, 42.)
Blackman, Emily C. History of Susquehanna County, Pennsylvania. From a Period Preceding Its Settlement to Recent Times. . . . Philadelphia: Claxton, Remsen and Haffelfinger, 1873.
Docket, inscribed after leaf was folded, begins. Norman I. Post handwriting ends; Jesse Lane begins.
Jesse Lane handwriting ends; Norman I. Post begins.