Nescopeck Township, Luzerne County, Pennsylvania in the 1800s

Work

Mills drew settlement

A small log gristmill on Nescopeck Creek^1,2 was built to make land saleable, so grain, waterpower, and land speculation were tied together. A sawmill near the mouth of the creek^1,2 caught river logs and turned them into usable boards.

Roads & news

Canoes, ferry, road

Before the local store, trade went to Sunbury by canoe¹. Overland movement followed the Nescopeck Falls to Lehigh road¹, while travelers also used the ferry and its log-cabin hotel^1,2.

Who lived here

Northampton families arrived

The township was still newly settled: a named 1807 list of settlers^1,2 was small enough to preserve in county memory. Those settlers were nearly all from Northampton County^1,2, so migration came largely from older Pennsylvania communities.

Law & power

Township before borough

This was Nescopeck Township, set off from Newport in 1792^1,2, not yet a borough. Formal politics in Pennsylvania still meant adult white male voters under property or taxpaying rules, not universal local power.

What people feared

Floods shaped memory

The old story of settlement begins with water: the 1786 “pumpkin flood” destroyed Walker’s attempted mill^1,2. The later Susquehanna bridge was still absent, since it was not built until 1816^1,2.

Home & table

School came late

For children in the 1800s, no township school is recorded yet; the first school appears about 1810². Houses and farmsteads were part of a young settlement, with no opened online source describing church life in the decade.

Money

Store replaced long trips

Samuel Mifflin’s 1796 store by the river¹ changed daily exchange by reducing the need for canoe trips to Sunbury. The biggest capital works were private mills, including Rittenhouse’s gristmill^1,2, built to attract land buyers.

In the air

Land, roads, republic

Local arguments likely turned on patents, roads, mills, and access, since some tracts were occupied before patents were issued¹. Nationally, people here lived through the partisan change of 1800 and the Jefferson administration, though no opened local source records their opinions.

Year by year

1. 1800Thomas Jefferson and Aaron Burr tied in the presidential election, sending the choice to the House of Representatives and making national politics a subject of talk even in rural Pennsylvania. the country
2. 1801Thomas Jefferson became president after the contested election, marking the first transfer of national power between rival parties. the country
3. 1803The turnpike following much of the old Nescopeck Falls to Lehigh route was chartered about this year. here¹
4. 1803The Louisiana Purchase doubled the claimed territory of the United States and would have been national news carried by papers, travelers, and officials. the country
5. 1807A remembered cluster of settlers had arrived in Nescopeck, most of them from Northampton County. here^1,2
6. 1807John Myers built the first frame hotel at Nescopeck, adding a more substantial stopping place at the ferry. here^1,2
7. 1807Congress passed the Embargo Act, disrupting American trade and becoming a national controversy that reached inland communities through newspapers and merchants. the country
8. 1808Jacob Bittenbender received the land grant for the later Evans mill tract. here¹

What the sources say

• Nescopeck Township was named from Nescopeck Creek, whose name a county history glossed as meaning “deep black waters.” from the sources¹
• Nescopeck Township was set off from Newport Township in 1792 and then included the later Hollenback and Conyngham areas. from the sources^1,2
• By 1807, the remembered settlers in Nescopeck included Henry Dewespecht, Michael Harrier, Conrad Bloos, Jacob Bittenbender Jr., William Moore, Thomas Cole, Conrad Reiderich, John Henry, Caspar Henry, Michael Whitenecht, Michael Nauss, Conrad Bingheimer, Peter Clingerman, Bernard Snyder, John Rooth, George Bittenbender, George Keens, John Buss, Daly, Bassinger, and a surveyor named Chesney. from the sources^1,2
• The 1807 settlers named in the county history were said to be nearly all from Northampton County. from the sources^1,2
• A road from Nescopeck Falls to the Lehigh was laid out in 1787, completed in 1789, and later followed nearly the line of the turnpike chartered about 1803. from the sources¹
• William Rittenhouse built a small log gristmill on Nescopeck Creek about 1795 as an inducement for settlers to buy his lands, and sold it to Jacob Rittenhouse in 1808. from the sources^1,2
• Before Samuel Mifflin opened a small store near the river in 1796, people in Nescopeck traded at Sunbury, going and returning by canoe. from the sources¹
• Samuel Mifflin built a sawmill near the mouth of Nescopeck Creek in 1795, where logs floating down the river were caught and sawed. from the sources^1,2
• The first hotel was kept by a man named Steiner in a small log house at the ferry, and John Myers built the first frame hotel in 1807. from the sources^1,2
• Nescopeck village was described as standing on the site of an ancient Delaware town and a Native rendezvous during the French and Indian War. inferred²
• The earliest settler named by later histories was George Walker, who located near the later Benjamin Evans gristmill site as early as 1786. from the sources^1,2
• Walker’s attempted mill was destroyed by the October 1786 freshet remembered as the “pumpkin flood.” from the sources^1,2
• The land on which the later Evans mill stood was granted to Jacob Bittenbender in 1808, though other tracts had been taken up before patents were issued. from the sources¹
• The first school in Nescopeck was not recorded until about 1810, when William Coder taught near Martin Frey’s residence in a house built by neighborhood gatherings. inferred²
• The Susquehanna bridge was not yet present in the 1800s; it was built in 1816 at a cost of $36,000. from the sources^1,2
• Nescopeck Borough did not yet exist in the 1800s; Pennsylvania municipal records list it as incorporated from Nescopeck Township on September 10, 1889. from the sources³
• In Pennsylvania in the 1800s, political power formally belonged to adult white men meeting property or taxpaying qualifications, while women, Black residents, children, and many poor laborers had no vote. inferred
• No online source opened here gives a reliable count for Nescopeck Township’s population in 1800 or describes its church life during the decade. not known
• As across rural Pennsylvania, ordinary work in this decade would have mixed clearing land, planting, animal care, hauling, milling, blacksmithing, and river or road travel. inferred
• The township lay on the Susquehanna side of Luzerne County, with Sunbury important enough as a trading destination before the 1796 local store. from the sources¹

Sources

1. History of Luzerne, Lackawanna, and Wyoming Counties, Pa.: Early History of Nescopeck Township. S. B. Nelson and Company, 1880
2. Nescopeck Township. Luzerne County PAGenWeb
3. Luzerne County: Incorporation Dates for Municipalities. Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission

Nescopeck Township in other decades

Nearby, about the same time