Somerset County, New Jersey in the 1780s

Work

Grain, mills, stores

Grain farming, livestock, and milling shaped work across the county^3,4, while store accounts show flour, corn, buckwheat, rum, coffee, and chocolate changing hands⁶.

Faith

Dutch churches dominate

Dutch Reformed congregations anchored much of the Raritan and Millstone valleys⁷, with Presbyterian and Lutheran churches also present. Church discipline, baptism, burial, and the Sabbath made religion a public structure, not just private belief.

Law & power

Court and jail move

The old county seat at Millstone had been burned in 1779^2,7, and Somerville became the new center of county business in 1784². Law had a physical face in the brown frame jail built in 1782².

In the air

Money and liberty argued

New Jersey papers argued over depreciating paper money, taxation, war news, and slavery notices⁵. Political rights were unsettled too: New Jersey’s constitution allowed some propertied women and free Black property holders to vote in principle⁹.

What people feared

War still nearby

Somerset lay between American and British military lines during the war^2,7, so raids, confiscations, militia duty, and passing troops were recent memories. The burned courthouse at Millstone was a visible wound^2,7.

Money

Accounts, credit, taxes

Local buying appears in store daybooks rather than in cash-only transactions⁶. Statewide, Continental currency depreciation and taxation were public arguments in 1780⁵.

Who lived here

Dutch, English, enslaved

Many families in southern Somerset came from Dutch Long Island stock³, but the county also had English-speaking Presbyterian and Lutheran communities. In 1790 Somerset County counted 1,810 enslaved people⁸.

Roads & news

Roads carry news

Millstone kept importance through old colonial roads and the river⁷, even after losing the courthouse. Stage-wagon service between Philadelphia and Princeton⁵ put Somerset within reach of printed news, travelers, and wartime rumor.

Year by year

1. 1779Simcoe’s Raid destroyed the courthouse at Somerset Courthouse, ending Millstone’s role as a secure county center. here^2,7
2. 1780The New-Jersey Gazette printed arguments over paper money, taxes, war finance, and military news that would have circulated through central New Jersey. nearby⁵
3. 1781Rochambeau’s French army marched through New Jersey toward Yorktown, bringing allied troops and war news through the region. nearby^2,7
4. 1783The Treaty of Paris ended the Revolutionary War, turning Somerset’s military roads and encampments back toward civil life. the country^2,7
5. 1784Somerville replaced Millstone as the practical county seat for Somerset County courts and offices. here²
6. 1786New Jersey banned the importation of enslaved people while leaving slavery itself in place. the country⁹
7. 1787The federal Constitution was drafted in Philadelphia, a political event close enough to be followed by newspapers, taverns, churches, and county leaders. the country
8. 1789George Washington became the first president of the United States, while Somerset store accounts still recorded everyday purchases of flour, corn, buckwheat, rum, coffee, and chocolate. the country⁶

What the sources say

• Somerset County in this decade is best treated at county scale: settlement and work are spread across the Raritan and Millstone river valleys rather than concentrated in one town. from the sources³
• Millstone, then known as Somerset Courthouse, had served as the county seat from 1738 until the British destroyed the courthouse during Simcoe’s Raid in 1779. from the sources^2,7
• After the courthouse at Millstone was burned, courts were held in Hillsborough until 1784, when county business shifted to Somerville near Tunison’s Tavern. from the sources²
• A county jail had been built at Somerville in 1782; it was a square brown-painted frame building with three rooms below and the jailer’s room above. from the sources²
• Millstone remained important after losing the courthouse because it stood on old colonial roads and by the Millstone River. from the sources⁷
• Early settlement in southern Somerset County included many second- and third-generation Dutch families moving from Long Island for larger landholdings. from the sources³
• A 1789 page from John Boylan’s Somerset Hills store records flour, corn, buckwheat, rum, coffee, and chocolate among goods being bought locally. inferred⁶
• Eighteenth-century Somerset County agriculture centered on grain, livestock, and mills, with wheat and flour moving toward wider Raritan and New York markets. from the sources^3,4
• Before the Revolution the Raritan and Millstone valleys had Dutch Reformed churches at Six Mile Run, Millstone, Harlingen, Raritan, Neshanic, Readington, and Bedminster, with Presbyterian and Lutheran churches also present in the county region. from the sources⁷
• Somerset County had 1,810 enslaved people in the 1790 census, the second-largest enslaved population of any New Jersey county after Bergen. from the sources⁸
• New Jersey’s 1790 census counted people by free white males over 16, free white males under 16, free white females, all other free persons, enslaved people, and total inhabitants. from the sources¹
• Somerset County lay between Washington’s army at Morristown and the British line across New Jersey, so militia outposts, raids, and military traffic were part of local wartime experience. from the sources^2,7
• The New-Jersey Gazette in October 1780 carried arguments about Continental currency depreciation, taxation, military news, thanksgiving proclamations, land sales, stolen horses, and a runaway enslaved man. from the sources⁵
• The same 1780 Gazette issue advertised stage-wagon service between Philadelphia and Princeton, showing one route by which news and strangers approached central New Jersey. from the sources⁵
• Raritan Landing, just east of Somerset County across the river system, functioned as a trading place where secondary traders supplied farmers and storekeepers and handled agricultural produce. from the sources⁴
• An earlier Somerset County mill lease required 10,000 bushels of wheat to be ground and packed as rent and included the labor of an enslaved man named Dick, showing how grain milling and slavery could be linked locally. from the sources⁴
• In 1786 New Jersey banned the importation of enslaved people, but slavery remained legal in Somerset County through the decade. from the sources⁹
• New Jersey’s revolutionary constitution allowed propertied women and free Black property holders to vote in principle, before the franchise was restricted to white men in 1807. from the sources⁹
• No single online source found here gives a full list of ordinary Somerset County house types, room contents, or diets specifically for the 1780s. not known
• No opened source gives day-wage rates for ordinary Somerset County farm laborers in the 1780s. not known

Sources

1. 1790 Census: Return of the Whole Number of Persons within the Several Districts of the United States. U.S. Census Bureau, 1793
2. Somerset County, 1688–1930. Bernards Township, 1930
3. Somerset County Comprehensive Farmland Preservation Plan. Somerset County Agriculture Development Board, 2020
4. Rediscovering Raritan Landing: An Adventure in New Jersey Archaeology. New Jersey Department of Transportation, 2010
5. The New-Jersey Gazette, Wednesday, October 25, 1780. New Jersey Archive, 1780
6. John Boylan’s 18th-Century Daybooks. The Historical Society of the Somerset Hills, 2024
7. Centennial History of Somerset County, New Jersey. Genealogy Trails, 1878
8. The Marion Thompson Wright Reader. Rutgers University Press, 2018
9. When Women Lost the Vote: A Revolutionary Story, 1776–1807. Brewminate, 2024

Somerset County in other decades

Nearby, about the same time