The Tavern Lot & A Scoundrel

Part 8 of the County House Series

It is time to return to the Tavern Lot north of the Courthouse, and its owner George Alexander.

My previous article (Part Seven, Stockton & Anderson, continued) was an epilogue for the lives of Lucius W. Stockton and Jacob Anderson, two men who did not own the County House tavern lot but spent a lot of time in the Flemington courthouse and were very significant to the history and politics of Flemington in the 1790s and early 1800s.

To get caught up with George Alexander’s history check out The County House, Parts One, Two & Five (County House series).¹

ALEXANDER BONNELL’S TAVERN

On July 19, 1797 (as the deed recites, “the 22d yr of Independence”), George Alexander of Amwell conveyed to Alexander Bonnell, innkeeper, also of Amwell, for £800 gold or silver, a lot of 6.25 acres and 11 rods, excepting out a half-acre lot sold by Alexander to the Hunterdon Freeholders on which to build a Court House.²

(Google tells me that £800 in 1800 would be worth $20,580 today, which sounds like a real bargain. But this was based on an average and very low yearly inflation rate of 1.45% and says a lot about how the value of real estate and the rate of inflation have both increased dramatically since then.)

The Deed included a ‘Whereas clause,’ explaining how this property was part of a large tract of land originally belonging to Samuel Fleming, which was seized by the Sheriff when Fleming could not pay his debts, and purchased by Thomas Lowrey and Gabriel Lee; how in 1773 Lowrey & Lee sold “a lot thereof” to Joseph Smith, who absconded in 1776, and how George Alexander purchased it from the Sheriff in 1779. The deed from George Alexander to Alexander Bonnell was witnessed by Joseph Atkinson and Jasper Smith. It was not recorded until December 15, 1801.

Alexander Bonnell & Catharine Mattison

Alexander Bonnell (1768-1819), a third generation tavernkeeper, was the fifth child of Col. Abraham Bonnell, a militia colonel during the Revolutionary War who kept a tavern in today’s Franklin Township, bordering the town of Clinton. Alexander’s mother was Elizabeth Foster. (See Bonnell Tree.)

The tavern near Clinton is the one most often associated with the Bonnell family and has continued in that family ever since the 18^th century. (For more information on this historic building and the family who lived there, see Bonnell Tavern.)

Alexander’s older brother, Clement DuMont Bonnell (1766-1836), took over the Clinton tavern following his father’s death in 1797. It was Clement’s son William (1804-1865) who painted portraits of several members of the Bonnell family. Unfortunately, he did not paint Alexander’s portrait because William was only 15 when Alexander Bonnell died in 1819. However, William Bonnell did paint his father Clement’s portrait, shown here.³ I suspect that Alexander did not have such a sour expression as his brother did.

Alexander Bonnell had been licensed to keep a tavern as early as 1789 and 1790. Dennis Bertland wrote that the licenses for 1789-90 were for a tavern “in the vicinity” of his father’s Clinton tavern.⁴.

Four years after Abraham Bonnell’s death, his sons Clement and Alexander settled his real estate with several deeds in which they released various properties in Bethlehem and Alexandria Townships to each other.

Alexander Bonnell must have moved to Flemington not long after the county seat was established in 1791. He probably realized that Flemington would be an excellent place to run a tavern, given the incoming traffic that a county seat created.

On January 3, 1793, when he was 25 years old, Alexander Bonnell married Catherine Mattison (1770-1854), daughter of Joseph Mattison and Catherine Bodine of Flemington.⁵ On January 11, 1799, Catharine Mattison Bonnell’s sister Agnes Mattison married Asher Atkinson, son of Joseph Atkinson & Jemima Prall, an example of how local families frequently intermarried. In a town with a low population, potential spouses were hard to come by.

Catharine & Alexander Bonnell had seven children, including first child, Joseph (1793-1823) a prominent attorney in Flemington; son Charles (1795-1830), who succeeded his father as Flemington tavernkeeper; and son Alexander Victor (1809-1872), who became a prominent merchant, real estate investor and State Senator. (Both Charles and Alex. V. Bonnell will be reappearing in a future article because of their ownership of the County House after their father’s death.)

SIDENOTE: According to Anne Kennedy’s Master’s thesis of 2010, William Bonnell painted a portrait of Catherine Mattison that was in a private collection. According to a letter sent to Hiram Deats by William M. Pettit in 1927, that painting was located in the old Bonnell tavern in Clinton.⁶ I contacted Hank Bonnell, current owner of the Bonnell tavern, to see if the painting was still there. Unfortunately, it is not. Hank wrote that “It might have been there when I was a child and it could have been sold at auction in the 1960s,” but he wasn’t sure.

The marriage of 1793 strongly suggests that Bonnell was present in Flemington well before that date. It also suggests that Bonnell may have been working for Joseph Mattison in his tavern on Main Street (the future Union Hotel)—at least until April 11, 1793, when it was sold to Samuel Taylor.

In May of 1795, Alexander Bonnell petitioned the County Court for a tavern license stating that he “has kept a public house of Intertainment [sic] for the year past in the house where he now lives in Flemington . . .”⁷ This was two years after the Mattison tavern was sold to Samuel Taylor, suggesting that Bonnell had relocated by 1794.

To where? Was he living on the lot sold by Jacob Mattison to Samuel Taylor? Or on the lot owned by George Alexander at the Main Street crossroads (where the Civil War memorial now stands), where Joseph Atkinson had built his hotel in 1792? Or perhaps he was keeping George Alexander’s tavern on Main Street.

In 1797, the Court of Common Pleas granted tavern licenses to both Alexander Bonnell and Joseph Atkinson, but not to George Alexander. (Both Bonnell and Atkinson were charged a fee of £6.)⁸ Joseph Atkinson’s petition to the County Court, dated May 8, 1797, stated that he has “lately moved to the Tavern house not long since occupied by Mr. Alexander Bonnell in Flemington (my emphasis).”⁹

In the deed from Alexander to Bonnell, Alexander’s occupation was not given, while Bonnell was identified as a tavernkeeper.

If only these tavernkeepers were more specific about the location of their taverns. My guess is that in 1794 and 1795, Alexander Bonnell was located at the tavern at the crossroads of North Main and East Main Streets, where the Civil War memorial is now located, and in 1797 he moved to George Alexander’s tavern on Main Street. And Joseph Atkinson, who must have moved out of the crossroads tavern during 1794-95, moved back to it in 1797 when Bonnell left. By 1800, Atkinson was “in possession” of the crossroads tavern, as described in the deed of that year to Charles Stewart, described in Part Four, The Stewarts of Flemington.

This seems to be a case of rotating tavernkeepers.

Shortly before buying George Alexander’s tavern lot, on April 12, 1797, Alexander Bonnell purchased a lot of 7.2 acres from Barnet Crise and wife Elizabeth for £99.12.0.¹⁰ This was located on the east side of Main Street, near Jacob Mattison’s lot. Perhaps Bonnell purchased it to serve as a woodlot to supply firewood for the Alexander tavern lot.

GEORGE ALEXANDER’S LAST YEARS

After selling the tavern lot to Alexander Bonnell, George Alexander and his family might have continued to live in the Main Street tavern, along with Alexander Bonnell. It is more likely that they moved to the crossroads tavern because Alexander owned that property.

In either case, one of those properties would be Alexander’s home for three more years, until September 1800, when he died intestate at the relatively young age of 55. His estate was administered by his sons, James and Thomas Alexander, who were about 30 and 25 years old at the time. The fellowbondsmen were George Holcomb and John Vandegrift.

SIDENOTES: James Alexander was the first child of George Alexander and Mary Fleming, born about 1770. His wife was named Penelope, but I have no information about her family. James and Penelope moved to Trenton sometime before 1805, probably soon after his father’s estate had been settled. In 1805, James together with brother Thomas and Jacob Housel purchased from Thomas & Esther Lowrey the Burnt Mills farm in Alexandria Township. In 1808 the Alexander brothers bought out Housel’s share, and then James & Penelope sold their share to Thomas.¹¹ James died in 1809 when he was only 41; his wife Penelope survived him until sometime after 1824.

1805 was the year that Thomas Alexander (1775-1839) married Mary Howe Lowrey (1783-1858), daughter of Shf Wm Lowrey & Martha Howe. They had seven children and lived on the Burnt Mills farm in Alexandria Township. Thomas served as executor for both his father George and his brother James. He will appear again in this story, in the 1830s.

In 1802, the Orphans Court found that George Alexander’s property was insufficient to cover his debts and ordered the sale of his remaining real estate, which consisted only of the crossroads tavern lot managed by Joseph Atkinson. In 1805, Alexander’s administrators sold the property to John Snyder at a public sale for $1,950. Snyder almost immediately sold the lot to George Rea for a handsome profit, $2,800.¹² I hope to publish a history of that property in the future.

THE ORIGINAL TAVERN LOT

The boundaries of the original tavern lot of 6.25 acres are not what I expected.

The metes & bounds (the direction and length of each side of the lot) were not included in 1773 deed from Lowrey & Lee to Joseph Smith or in the 1779 deed from Sheriff Tucker to George Alexander. The 1797 deed from Alexander to Bonnell is the first time the original boundaries were described.

Based on that description, here is how the property looked, with bordering owners named. (I have been unable to identify John Frankenbury.)

It is difficult to imagine, but in the 18^th and early 19^th centuries, Capner Street, Court Street and Park Avenue did not exist. The only roads were “the main road or street through Flemington” and the road to the Delaware River, usually called the Road to Howell’s ferry (Stockton), as the early deeds described them. The rest of the area was farmland and woodland.

The original tavern lot was laid out between these two roads. The north and south boundaries were probably drawn in relation to the Howell’s Ferry road, suggesting it was an older road than Main Street. It was, in fact, much older, being an Indian path that ran from Howell’s ferry on the Delaware River to Flemington and continuing north to Whitehouse and beyond. (County House Part One.)

As for Main Street, it originated as a property line. In 1762 Thomas Lowrey & Gerhsom Lee purchased the east side of Main Street from the estate of David Eveland, dec’d (Union Hotel, Part One) and the west side of Main Street from the sheriff who seized the land of Samuel Fleming. Main Street was the “old dividing line” between the two tracts. Lowrey & Lee immediately subdivided the Eveland tract and sold lots on the east side of the boundary, creating in the process a road that became Main Street. The tavern lot on the west side was not created until 1773.

STOCKTON’S LOT

The deed from Alexander to the Freeholders described the lot as being “in the southeast corner” of the tavern lot. I immediately, and incorrectly, jumped to the conclusion that it was the exact southeast corner of the original 6.25 acres that was being identified. Turns out, it was not. It was only the general area of the original lot. I found this out by plotting the metes & bounds for the courthouse lot and of an adjacent lot sold by Alexander Bonnell to Lucius W. Stockton, shortly after the purchase of the tavern lot.

Readers of my articles will now be familiar with Lucius W. Stockton, Esq. He was a major figure in the saga of Jacob Anderson’s campaign to be Hunterdon County Sheriff in 1794. (Stockton appears in The Stewarts of Flemington Part Four, Anderson v. Stockton Part Six, and Anderson & Stockton, continued Part Seven.)

Stockton was the second child of Rev. Philip Stockton (1746-1792) and Catharine Cumming (1748-1813) of Princeton. Catherine Cumming was the daughter of Robert and Mary (Noble) Cumming and sister of General John Noble Cumming. The Stockton genealogy describes her as “a woman of great personal beauty.”

SIDENOTE: Phillip’s oldest brother was the powerful politician, Richard Stockton, Esq. His sister Hannah was married to Elias Boudinot, another powerful NJ politician. And finally, the youngest brother of the family was Samuel Witham Stockton.¹³  All of these men are described in Part Seven.

When Rev. Stockton wrote his will on August 29, 1785, he left his real estate to his wife in trust until his youngest child was 21, and bequests of £300 to each of his sons, John, “Lewis” Witham, Elias B. and William. (Interesting that Lucius was called Lewis.) Another son was born after the will was written, named Richard (codicil dated Jan 12, 1789), but Richard probably died young. The real estate did not include property in Flemington.

Son Lucius was 21 years old when his father died in 1792. He had been studying law with his uncle, Richard Stockton in Princeton and was admitted to the bar in November 1793.

There is reason to think that Lucius W. Stockton moved to Flemington shortly after being admitted to the bar. He was identified as “of Flemington” in a deed of November 1794, when he contracted with Roger Bowman to purchase the old Skelton tract. Stockton was acting as agent for his widowed mother. On December 16, 1795, Stockton married Elizabeth A. Coxe The couple settled on a 10-acre-lot from the Bowman tract fronting on Main Street, Flemington, south of the Court House.

Lucius W. Stockton’s uncle, Samuel W. Stockton, Esq. had been serving as Hunterdon County Clerk since 1781 but died suddenly on June 27, 1795. As described in Part Seven, the Freeholders appointed Samuel’s nephew Lucius to take his place as County Clerk. Having his residence so near the courthouse must have been a great convenience for him.

This was a couple years before George Alexander sold the tavern lot to Alexander Bonnell. In that deed the tavern lot was bordered on the south by ‘land of Thomas Skelton.’

How did the property bordering the courthouse lot on the south get from Skelton to Bowman to Stockton?

By the time that George Alexander sold the tavern lot to Alexander Bonnell, Thomas Skelton was long gone. Clearly, the property description for 1797 was taken from a much older deed, one that was not actually recorded.¹⁴

Thomas Skelton & Elizabeth Lowrey

I cannot pass up the opportunity to provide Thomas Skelton’s history. He was too much of a scoundrel to ignore.

Skelton came to Hunterdon County after spending 25 years in “the island of Jamaica.” He must have made a good impression because soon after his arrival, he married on January 19, 1772, Elizabeth, the daughter of Thomas Lowrey and Esther Fleming.

“Philadelphia, Jan 27, Lately married, at Flemington, in New-Jersey, Mr Thomas Skelton, of the island of Jamaica, to Miss Elizabeth Lowry, daughter of Mr Thomas Lowry of Amwell in said Province, Merchant.“¹⁵

Soon after the Skelton-Lowrey marriage, Thomas Lowrey’s house and store were burned to the ground, as reported on in January, 1772:

“On Monday the 10th instant, in the Evening, a Fire broke out in the House of Mr Thomas Lowrey, at Amwell in Hunterdon County, New-Jersey, which entirely consumed his Dwelling-house, and Store adjoining, with a great Quantity of Dry Goods. We hear Mr Lowrey’s Loss amounts to between Three and Four Thousand pounds.”¹⁶

The house and store were soon rebuilt, perhaps with the help of Skelton’s money. Skelton later testified that he had arrived in Flemington with £3,300 in cash. If true, Skelton’s money may also have helped Lowrey open two more stores in Philadelphia and New York.

With new stores to manage, Lowrey needed someone to take care of business at the original Flemington store. On March 30, 1772, Skelton and Lowrey signed Articles of Agreement, in which Skelton would manage the Flemington store while Lowrey attended to the other two. Lowrey would get 2/3rds of the profits and Skelton 1/3. The Flemington store would be known as Lowrey & Skelton and the agreement would be in effect for three years (ending 1775). Whoever did not comply, would be obliged to pay the other £6,000.¹⁷

The agreement was witnessed by Rob’t Dodd and George Alexander, the man who was operating the tavern of Joseph Smith. It was not until June 23, 1787 that Alexander appeared before Robt L. Hooper to testify to the deed, which was recorded June 25, 1787.

About the time that the Agreement was to expire, the Revolution erupted and business plans were put on hold. It took 15 years for Lowrey to record the agreement.

Alfred Jones described Skelton’s activity during the Revolution, from testimony given by Skelton to a British Commission for reimbursing Loyalists whose property was confiscated after the Revolution. ¹⁸

“His share in a certain transaction is not quite clear, though Lord Cornwallis and Brigadier-General Cortlandt Skinner had every confidence in him. It would seem, according to Skelton’s statement, that his father-in-law, Thomas Lowrey, had promised to supply some boats belonging to Americans for the British army for crossing the Delaware. Skelton was requested by Lowrey to convey a message to General Skinner for Lord Cornwallis that he (Lowrey) had failed to obtain the boats. An American spy, who had gone to the British headquarters for the ostensible purpose of taking the oath of allegiance, perceived Skelton there and betrayed him, with the result that he was obliged to flee from home to the British army at Trenton. From that place he went to New York and was there employed in public office by Captain David Laird, Royal Navy, until 1782, his wife and baby having joined him in 1780. On May 13, 1782, he embarked for England.

“In his evidence, David Laird said that he first met Skelton in Jamaica in 1765 or 1766, when he was a clerk to a Mrs. Ellis. He had not heard that he had been in business for himself there and it was unlikely that he had much property. Captain Laird stated further that Skelton was now better off in England than in New Jersey, having tripled his fortune by the War, and that he ought to be ashamed to make a claim on the British Government. On this evidence the Commissioners reported the claim as fradulent [sic]. (“Loyalists’ Claims,” pp. 4-6; A.O. 12:13, ff. 1-13; A.O. 13:111; A. O. 12:109.)

“The New Jersey records indicate that Skelton was more or less of a fraud, and that his father-in-law was in no wise a Loyalist. Col. Lowrey was too active in the War on the American side, and held too many civil offices at this home later, to have had real suspicions of loyalty to the British side suggested against him by his neighbors or friends. The story of the “boats,” etc. was doubtless made up by Skelton to cover up some transaction of his.”

Another source of information on Thomas Skelton comes from Henry Race in his genealogical sketch of the Lowrey family.¹⁹ Race left out Skelton’s suggestion that Thomas Lowrey had supported the British during the Revolution.

Thomas Skelton was an Englishman. On account of his tory proclivities he went to New York when the British army was in occupancy. . . His wife evidently followed him to New York, as their son Thomas was born there on November 29, 1780. That their son John was born in Flemington on October 21, 1782, indicates that she, at least, returned home after the war.

He [Skelton] returned to England and wrote to his wife to join him there. She took her two little boys, the youngest being still an infant, and made the voyage as directed. On arriving in England she found awaiting her, a letter from her husband informing her he had gone to Scotland and desiring her to return to her parents. She was friendless, among strangers, and in delicate health. She started on her homeward voyage and died a few days before the vessel arrived and was buried at sea. Her mother took charge of her children. Three years later a letter came from Skelton requesting  that his children should be sent to him in England. Their grandfather placed them in charge of a Mr. Combs and sent them, as requested

Skelton claimed that he acquired his Flemington property two or three months after his agreement with Lowrey, in June 1772. He stated that it was conveyed to him by Charity Clarke. She was most likely a widow or relative of Thomas Clarke of New York City who took a mortgage from the prior owner, Richard Lanning, in 1766. Lanning failed to pay his mortgage, and Thomas Clark probably died soon afterward, leaving his widow with title to the property.

Joseph Smith, the original owner of what became the County Tavern lot on Flemington’s Main Street, absconded to join the British in December 1776. The tavern lot was bordered on the west and south by the land of Thomas Skelton, who also absconded about that time. Consequently, Skelton’s property was seized and sold at a Sheriff’s sale on April 5, 1779 to Thomas Lowrey.

Soon afterwards Lowrey conveyed it to a Quaker from Philadelphia, Roger Bowman, although a deed for that transaction was not recorded. Skelton was not pleased. But he kept quiet about it until ten years later, when on Feb. 5, 1789, he wrote a letter to Thomas Lowrey accusing Lowrey “of buying the chief part of his (Skelton’s) property underhanded and below its value.” Loyalist property probably went cheap, but it was more likely that Skelton was trying to make a case for some sort of reimbursement by Lowrey, which he did not get.

Roger Bowman

In his article on Fleming Castle, Dennis Bertland wrote:

Tax records suggest the Bowman acquired the tract after June, 1784 (he does not appear on the 1784 tax roll, but is assessed on the 1786 Amwell tax roll, the next extant one, for 165 improved acres of land. (NJ Archives, Amwell Township Ratables, June 1784 & July/August, 1786.)

Roger Bowman, wife Jane, and their four children were dismissed from the Quakers’ Philadelphia Monthly Meeting on May 27, 1785, when they joined with the Quakertown Friends of Hunterdon County.

The Bowman family remained in the Flemington area for only six years. On March 10, 1791, Roger received a certificate of removal from the Quakertown Monthly Meeting to return to Philadelphia, while still owning the Flemington property. In 1794, Lucius W. Stockton, who was moving to Flemington, made an arrangement with Roger Bowman, probably on behalf of his widowed mother Catharine, to acquire the Skelton-Bowman tract of 165.5 acres, which surrounded the tavern lot on the west and south and was adjacent to the courthouse lot.²⁰

On November 15, 1794, Bowman accepted £500 from Stockton as a down payment. But Stockton still owed Bowman £300. He probably assumed he would be able to raise it, but from what I learned of his life (as described in Part Seven), he was unable to profit from his attorney’s fees or his salary as county clerk. Bowman probably lost patience, so on October 17, 1800, Stockton’s uncle John N. Cumming paid the remaining £300 plus interest from Nov. 15, 1794.²¹

The 0.45-acre Lot

On December 12, 1797, only five months after purchasing the 6.25-acre lot (minus the courthouse lot), Alexander Bonnell of Flemington, innkeeper, and wife Catharine conveyed to Lucius W. Stockton, Esq., ‘Attorney of Law of Flemington,’ for £25, a lot of 0.45 acres, being the southeast corner of Bonnell’s property.²² This was Alexander Bonnell’s first real estate transaction after purchasing the tavern lot. There would be many more.

In addition to bordering the southeast corner of the courthouse lot, it also bordered “Stockton’s land” on the south and “the great road to Trenton” on the east. The deed included a Whereas clause taken from the deed of George Alexander to Alexander Bonnell, describing how the property went from Samuel Fleming in 1762 to Geo. Alexander in 1779.

Once again, a property in the tavern lot’s southeast corner.

This layout was just as strange as the one for the tavern lot. But the Stockton lot confirmed the boundaries described for the courthouse lot and for the original tavern lot.

The northern boundary of the lot sold to Lucius W. Stockton by Alexander Bonnell in 1797 (South 66 degrees 15 minutes West 2.5 chains) matches the southern boundary of the courthouse lot, with the exception that it was 2.81 chains rather than 2.5.²³

Stockton’s Triangle

On May 9, 1799, Lucius Witham Stockton, Esq. of Flemington conveyed to the “Board of Justices and Chosen Freeholders” for $1, “a certain lott or parcel of land in Flemington, adjoining the lott of land whereon the Courthouse and goal for the said County are now erected, . . . being 15 thousandths of an acre, more or less.”²⁴ (Note: This was one of the earliest examples of the use of dollars instead of pounds & shillings.)

The lot also abutted the main street through Flemington. The deed explained that the 15 thousandths of an acre came out of the lot sold to Stockton by Alexander Bonnell in 1797.

This must have been what is often known as a ‘boundary adjustment.’ It enlarged the courthouse lot to the south, with a straight line running west from Main Street. It may have been the location of an alley that ran alongside the courthouse on the south side, one that later, in 1845, became Court Street.

Here are the five lots together: the Tavern Lot, the Courthouse Lot, Stockton’s 0.45 acres and his 10-acre lot, and the 15/thousandths of an acre sold by Stockton to the Freeholders.)

I cannot say exactly where the original courthouse stood in relation to the lot’s boundaries. It was replaced in 1828 after being destroyed by fire. More than likely, the 1828 courthouse was built on the stone foundation of the 1791 courthouse. Location of the new courthouse in relation to the old one is not mentioned in Snell’s History of Hunterdon County. And there is nothing in the Hunterdon Gazette about reconstruction of the courthouse.

Not long ago, Dave Harding of the Hunterdon County Historical Society visited the courthouse to see if the original foundation stone (as described in County House Part Three, was still visible. He was unable to find it.

On Dec. 4, 1801, several years after the Stocktons had taken up residence in Flemington, the lot of 10 acres was conveyed to Lucius’ wife Elizabeth “for natural love & affection” and the sum of $300.²⁵

The seller was Lucius W. Stockton’s aunt and uncle, John N. & Sally Cumming, who had settled with Roger Bowman on October 17, 1800, paying him the balance due on the tract of 165.5 acres Bowman had bought from Thomas Lowrey.²⁶ The Whereas clause in this deed explained the arrangement that Stockton had made with Bowman back in 1794.

Previous to the sale to Elizabeth Stockton, on April 1, 1801, the Cummings sold 155 acres to John Phillips of Maidenhead for $2,733.33.²⁷ This was the original 165 acres minus the 10-acre lot that Lucius and Elizabeth had been living on, probably since first moving to Flemington in 1794.

I am not finished with Lucius W. Stockton, but the rest must be postponed to the next article, where I will write about the Road to Howell’s Ferry (present-day Route 523) and its several routes through Flemington.

End of Part Eight

Footnotes: