You gain a better appreciation of the families that will be introduced in future blogs if you have historical context along with family events as they are told. This brief introduction to the early history of New Jersey begins and ends before Thomas Weast is born around 1790.
At the end of this blog, you will notice that Trenton and Princeton briefly served as the capital of the United States in the 1780’s. Next week’s blog will cover the eight capitals that are not well known before Washington, DC.
The following was extracted from Genealogy Inc.: https://www.genealogyinc.com/newjersey/
In the early 1600’s European countries began settlements in New Jersey to establish their control in this part of the new world. As you will see in the following excerpt, the Dutch, Swedes, Finns, French, Germans, and English all had an impact on colonizing this land. This information is presented to give you some historical perspective in relation to Thomas Weast, who was born in 1790 in New Jersey.
After Henry Hudson’s initial explorations of the Hudson and Delaware River areas, numerous Dutch settlements were attempted in New Jersey, beginning as early as 1618. These settlements were soon abandoned because of altercations with the Lenni-Lenape (or Delaware), the original inhabitants. A more lasting settlement was made from 1638 to 1655 by the Swedes and Finns along the Delaware River as part of New Sweden, and this continued to flourish although the Dutch eventually gained control over this area and made it part of New Netherland. By 1639, there were as many as six boweries, or small plantations, on the New Jersey side of the Hudson across from Manhattan. Two major confrontations with the native Indians in 1643 and 1655 destroyed all Dutch settlements in northern New Jersey, and not until 1660 was the first permanent settlement established—the village of Bergen, today part of Jersey City.
Of the settlers throughout the colonial period, only the English outnumbered the Dutch in New Jersey. When England acquired the New Netherland Colony from the Dutch in 1664, King Charles II gave his brother, the Duke of York (later King James II), all of New York and New Jersey. The duke, in turn, granted New Jersey to two of his creditors, Lord John Berkeley and Sir George Carteret. The land was named Nova Caesaria for the Isle of Jersey, Carteret’s home.
The year that England took control there was a large influx of English from New England and Long Island who, for want of more or better land, settled the East Jersey towns of Elizabethtown, Middletown, Piscataway, Shrewsbury, and Woodbridge. A year later, migrants from Connecticut founded Newark. In 1685 a large group of Scots came to Perth Amboy, but they were not part of the great wave of Ulster-Scots who in the 1720s began their immigration to the New World, including New Jersey. For a brief period, from 1673 to 1674, the Dutch regained control of New Jersey and New York, but it soon reverted back to the English.
The King renewed his agreement with Carteret for control of the northern part of the colony, but not with Berkeley, who was forced to sell his interests in the southern part to Quaker John Fenwick. When Carteret died, his widow sold his interests to another group of Quakers, which included William Penn, who in 1676, forced the setting of a boundary that divided the colony into two provinces, East and West. These provinces were controlled by proprietors, with capitals at Perth Amboy and Burlington, respectively. The poorly surveyed boundary cut diagonally across the state in such a way that all of the southern part fell in West Jersey and the northern in East Jersey.
For two years beginning in April 1688, New Jersey was, with New York, part of the Dominion of New England, but no significant records of New Jersey seem to have been generated in its capital of Boston. The proprietors of both provinces gave up their right to rule in 1702 but continued to control first sales of the land. (The West Jersey Proprietors still hold this right today, although unappropriated parcels are rare; the East Jersey Proprietors dissolved in 1998.) New Jersey was then under united rule by the royal governor of New York and New Jersey until 1738, after which New Jersey had its own royal governor.
Significant migrations and immigration continued into the eighteenth century, including the French Huguenots, who fled France. New Yorkers, mostly from Long Island, Staten Island, and New York City, settled throughout New Jersey, constituting the majority of the population in many counties. A large Dutch migration formed the basis of settlement in Bergen and Somerset counties and contributed to the peopling of Middlesex and Monmouth counties. Some of the Palatines who immigrated to New York in 1709 came to New Jersey, as did Germans who entered through Philadelphia throughout the 1700s. Descendants of some of these families migrated to northwestern New Jersey.
New Jersey was a major battleground during the Revolutionary War, with more battles fought on its soil than in any other colony. Both American and British troops ravaged much of New Jersey as both armies passed back and forth from New York and Pennsylvania, which caused some destruction of records. New Jersey residents were quite divided by the war, and a large number of Loyalists left for Canada.
Throughout the nineteenth century, the state continued to grow through the increased development of transportation, including the completion in 1834 of a canal connecting the Delaware and Raritan rivers that enabled faster travel between Philadelphia and New York. Since New Jersey is completely surrounded by water, with the exception of its forty-eight-mile border with New York, the canal remained one of its major means of transportation until the Civil War.
The years immediately before and following the war saw the coming of the railroads and development of roadways, which today make New Jersey the major corridor between the northeast and the south. The 1800s also saw New Jersey develop industrially, starting with the establishment of the nation’s first factory town at the site of present-day Paterson. New Jersey is the most densely populated state in the country, with many of its families moving back and forth, to and from—and many of its residents commuting to work in—the neighboring states of New York and Pennsylvania.
The following historical timeline depicts the evolution of New Jersey from the first explorer in 1524 until it became the 3rd state admitted to the Union in 1787). All this prior to the birth of Thomas Weast in 1790:
1500s – 1600s
1524 – The Spanish Giovanni da Verrazzano (1485-1528) explores the Jersey coast for the French
1609 – Henry Hudson sailed into Newark Bay, claimed land for Dutch, named it New Netherlands
1638 – Swedish settlement led by Peter Minuet starting the New Sweden Colony
1655 – The Dutch defeat the Swedes on the Delaware, ending the New Sweden Colony. Delaware becomes a part of New Netherland
1660 – Dutch settled Bergen, first permanent town
1664 – British took control of New Jersey from Dutch; renamed it New Jersey
1676 – New Jersey colony divided into East and West Jersey
1700s
1702 – East and West Jersey became Crown Colony under supervision of governor of New York
1721 – William Trent establishes Trent’s Town (later to be known as Trenton)
1736 – New Jersey formed own government
1746 – Princeton University founded
1756 – From 1756 – 1763: The Seven Years War (French and Indian War) due to disputes over land is won by Great Britain. France gives England all French territory east of the Mississippi River, except New Orleans. The Spanish give up east and west Florida to the English in return for Cuba.
1758 – One of the first Indian reservations in the United States was established in Burlington County in 1758 for the Lenni-Lenape tribe. The first and only reservation in New Jersey, the Brotherton Reserve was sold back to the state in 1801 by the remaining members of the tribe, who moved up north to join relatives in New Stockbridge, New York.
1766 – Rutgers University is founded
1774 – Tea burning at Greenwich in protest of taxes
1775 – From 1775 – 1783 – The American Revolution creates the United States of America. The Revolution was due to the British burden of taxes and total power to legislate any laws governing the American colonies. The “Crossroads of the Revolution,” New Jersey was the site of more than 100 battles during the fight for American independence.1776 – NJ’s first newspaper, the New Jersey Gazette, issues its first edition
1776 – July 4, 1776 – United States Declaration of Independence
1776 – New Jersey adopted first state constitution; George Washington crossed Delaware River from Pennsylvania in surprise attack on British; Washington defeated British at Battle of Trenton
1777 – Washington headquartered at Morristown
1778 – Washington victorious at Battle of Monmouth
1778 – July 10, 1778 – France declares war against Britain and makes an alliance with the American revolutionary forces
1783 – The Treaty of Paris is signed by the victorious United States and the defeated Great Britain 9/3/1783
1783 – Princeton served briefly as U.S. capital
1784 – Trenton served briefly as U.S. capital
1787 – New Jersey was 3rd State admitted to the Union – December 18, 1787, preceded by Delaware and then Pennsylvania.