The Aserdaten Tract Location

Teegate

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Wow, haven't seen anyone talk about "Aserdaten" in years. Aserdaten appeared on a 1948 Topo map produced by the Geo.survey. The one feature that made it a usable tract is it's elevation. It was approx 3 ft. higher than the surrounding swamp.
I'm as sure as I can be that I have been on the site. My guide was one Chester Mathis, aka "Uncle Chet". Chet was the typesetter for the Tuckerton Beacon for 50 years, and had an uncanny knowledge of obscure S. Jersey history. [Chet was extremely proud of never having spent a single night out of NJ] When he took me to the site we had to trek through from the Batsto side of the swamp. [This was in the early 60's, before the "Restoration" of Batsto. Confirmation of the location came from the "postmaster" at the Batsto store, Rod Koster.]


Welcome! Thank you for posting.

Unfortunately, you must be referring to a different location than this thread is about. Batsto is many miles from Aserdaten and in a complete different county. I am sure many of us would be interested in trying to determine the location you are refering about. Can you give us more detail?

Guy
 

Wrangleboro

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Okay, so both Chet Mathis and Koster were either lying or dead wrong, I was about 15 at the time and I have no alternatives to what I posted. As I knew them both fairly well, I'll stick to what they told me. Thanks anyway.
 

Teegate

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You seem a little annoyed. All I said is that the Aserdaten I am referring to is not near Batsto, in fact, it is about 30 miles away.. I was not criticizing the two individuals you mentioned or you. I asked for more details to try and figure out what was going on.

Don't take this the wrong way, but you have to work with us on this site because we are always trying to narrow down locations and learn something new, and when someone like yourself arrives we are looking to find new information. We, or I should say I, would prefer to work with you to learn something new.

Does anyone else agree or disagree with me?

Guy
 
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Boyd

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Wow, haven't seen anyone talk about "Aserdaten" in years. Aserdaten appeared on a 1948 Topo map produced by the Geo.survey.

I think many of us first learned of Aserdaten by reading Henry Charlton Beck's More Forgotten Towns of Southern New Jersey - see chapter XLIV, "The Forked River Mountains". That book was first published in 1937.

He devoted a full chapter (16) to it in Jersey Genesis, "The Adventure of Aserdaten". That book was first published in 1945.
 

Teegate

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I wonder if it isn't Mordecai Swamp he is referring to?
 

Wrangleboro

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Howdy JM. Some interesting stuff there. I don't live in Martin's Beach, My home is actually in Twins Hills Section of Willingboro. However our backyard faces out onto what was Irish Wharf. The site at the bottom of Kennedy way was under another name. IW was the last 2 quays at the end of what is now Beechnut lane. At about the time we're speaking of it was owned by "Aunt Sally" Haines. From what Granville Haines told me, any of the quays upstream from IW belonged to "The Port Of Rancocas". The Customs House was the Brownstone on the curve coming off the bridge.

Crick Angels?? First I've heard of this. Before moving into Rancocas, we lived in Willingboro, then Levittown. We moved in winter, 59-60. I went to HS with folks from the familys you mentioned, never noticed anything odd about them though. I came to know Wat Buck rather well and with all of the respect due him, I will say that you have to be careful when accepting his recollections as total fact. I was fortunate to have known him, however I was moreso to have known folks like Granville Haines, Nelson Grovatt Sr. [young Nelson is alive and still farming] and Ed Friend. I had sources to check Wat with, and the most valuable in that sense was "Pop Gibbs". The last Senior chemist for the Match Factory that stood at the end of Texas Ave. near or where the Turnpike runs now. There was an entire company town there called Texas, population approx. 200.
I don't think you could find a single cellar whole now. It was the site of the first mass produced phosphorus tipped matches. In the late 1890's Diamond Match bought them out and dismantled the entire complex, workers homes and all.
 

Wrangleboro

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Wrangleboro, do you recall the name of the swamp that the tract was located in?

Well, like I said, I was fifteen at the time, I'm 65 now, and this is from memory, but both of them called it "Penn's Swamp". It was not a short stroll from Batsto, it took about an hour of walking to reach it. I do recall that Chet had told me it was the only easily travled trail to it. I have no way of being certain of that. I actually have no way of being certain of any of this except for knowing the people involved and trusting that they knew what they were talking about.
 

46er

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Does anyone else agree or disagree with me?

Guy

I agree with you Guy. I was going to post a similar response as yours, but you did before me. I see nothing antagonistic about what you said. Perhaps there is some confusion over time as to the name, as there is an Albertson Brook boarding some higher land to the NW of Batsto. The historic topo's on the site don't help, not sure what year they are though.
 
Howdy JM. Some interesting stuff there. I don't live in Martin's Beach, My home is actually in Twins Hills Section of Willingboro. However our backyard faces out onto what was Irish Wharf. The site at the bottom of Kennedy way was under another name. IW was the last 2 quays at the end of what is now Beechnut lane. At about the time we're speaking of it was owned by "Aunt Sally" Haines. From what Granville Haines told me, any of the quays upstream from IW belonged to "The Port Of Rancocas". The Customs House was the Brownstone on the curve coming off the bridge.

Crick Angels?? First I've heard of this. Before moving into Rancocas, we lived in Willingboro, then Levittown. We moved in winter, 59-60. I went to HS with folks from the familys you mentioned, never noticed anything odd about them though. I came to know Wat Buck rather well and with all of the respect due him, I will say that you have to be careful when accepting his recollections as total fact. I was fortunate to have known him, however I was moreso to have known folks like Granville Haines, Nelson Grovatt Sr. [young Nelson is alive and still farming] and Ed Friend. I had sources to check Wat with, and the most valuable in that sense was "Pop Gibbs". The last Senior chemist for the Match Factory that stood at the end of Texas Ave. near or where the Turnpike runs now. There was an entire company town there called Texas, population approx. 200.
I don't think you could find a single cellar whole now. It was the site of the first mass produced phosphorus tipped matches. In the late 1890's Diamond Match bought them out and dismantled the entire complex, workers homes and all.


Wrangleboro:

The information about the Crick Angels I know about first-hand and did not come from Watson, although he knew of them as well. There are numerous branches of the families I identified and not all of the members of those families can be identified as Crick Angels. But for those who intermarried, the physical appearance is unmistakable. I suspect many of the old-time Crick Angels have died off by now and their progeny have either married outside the family or relocated to other areas. Nonetheless, they are a known quantity to some people. The Mohn family in Rancocas Village had some relationship to them. They lived at the eastern end of 2nd Street.

The quays or landings that you mention at the end of Beechnut belonged to the Stokes family and Granville and Charles Stokes during the late nineteenth century. I used the phrase “at the foot of Kennedy Way” as convenient reference point for other readers, but the Irish Wharf actually stood just upstream from there and the predecessor of Levitt’s Beechnut Lane led to it. I’ve been conducting research on the Rancocas for the past 45 years and I know through separate research that the cement block plant stood precisely where Watson pointed out. When it comes to oral history and traditions, I check what everyone tells me. By profession, I am a documentary historian, so I always need to see everything down on paper. If I can’t verify what I am told, I either discount it entirely or, if I do cite it in my work, I proclaim it as suspect information.

While I never had the opportunity to speak with Granville Haines, I knew Nelson Grovatt Sr. and Jr. I knew Ed Friend and I knew Bill and George Gibbs. I also knew Engle Conrow, who lived on Bridge Street. I’ve seen that population figure for Texas, but I don’t accept it because it is derived from the application for Bougher Post Office and the numbers on those applications are always inflated to provide a rationale for the USPO Dept. approving the application. Sometime back, some folks had found a number of clay retorts that Gibbs & Lowell used to store the phosphorus in the pond that had served as a millpond for the clover mill that once stood there. They wanted $25,000 for the retorts. Needless to say, they did not receive any bids! The development on Creek Road known as Timbercrest pretty much wiped out was what remained of the phosphorous plant.

Here is a birds-eye view of the plant at Texas:

Gibbs & Lowell.jpg


Here is a view of the steam tug Mary Louise coming down past those landings you mentioned:

Tug Mary Louise.jpg


If you look closely, you can see the Centerton Bridge in the background. And here is a shot of that bridge, completed in 1907:

Centreton Bridge.jpg


And here is the second Annie L. Vansciver waiting for Mr. Johnson to open the swing span at Centerton with his giant key:

Annie L. at Centreton.jpg


Someday, if I live long enough, I hope to write a book about the creek.

Best regards,
Jerseyman

P.S. Obligatory Pine Barrens content: the Rancocas Creek is the only watercourse that drains the Pines to the Delaware River instead of the coast.
 

bobpbx

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From intermarriage, they all had similar physical features, including bulbous noses, cherubic faces, little tufts of hair projecting from their heads, and usually short of stature. And these features applied equally among the men and the women! When I resided in Rancocas Village back in the late 1960s and early 1970s, I encountered numerous people from their tribe. Jerseyman

I like that description Jerseyman. Good as a photo. In fact, better!
 

Wrangleboro

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You seem a little annoyed. All I said is that the Aserdaten I am referring to is not near Batsto, in fact, it is about 30 miles away.. I was not criticizing the two individuals you mentioned or you. I asked for more details to try and figure out what was going on.

Don't take this the wrong way, but you have to work with us on this site because we are always trying to narrow down locations and learn something new, and when someone like yourself arrives we are looking to find new information. We, or I should say I, would prefer to work with you to learn something new.

Does anyone else agree or disagree with me?

Guy

I apologise if I came off as being annoyed, I was but not with anything here. I own an international history forum, All Empires. I had just come from there and had to handle a nuisance problem and it apparently carried over in my attitude here. I also might have been a little annoyed at having to think back onto something that, in my mind, was a set thing.

Okay, if the site they took me to wasn't Aserdaten, what would it have been? And why, if Aserdaten was actually much farther away, would these 2 men, whose families had been in the area since forever, have treated their information as gospel?
I had only met Koster the year before, and only new him in regards to Batsto. But Chet was a member of the family and I'd known him since my dad opened "Scotty's Barber Shop" in Tuckerton in 1949. Chet wasn't prone to fantasy or spinning yarns. Another thought, Chet wasn't a kid when he took me out there. He was in his late 50's early 60's, and more than a little overweight and not in the best of shape for a hike like that. But he had insisted, apparently wanting to show me something he thought important. So at least he thought for certain he was taking me to the right place.
 

dogg57

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[

P.S. Obligatory Pine Barrens content: the Rancocas Creek is the only watercourse that drains the Pines to the Delaware River instead of the coast. UOTE]



P.S. Obligatory Pine Barrens content: the Rancocas Creek is the only watercourse that drains the Pines to the Delaware River instead of the coast.

You are like Mr Wizard. Thanks for that info
 

Teegate

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It is water under the bridge in my mind now. Lets try to figure this out.

One confusing aspect about Aserdaten is that Jersey Genesis by Beck is about the Mullica River, but he was so fascinated and frustrated in Aserdaten that he devoted a complete chapter to it and the location is nowhere near the Mullica. However, I seriously doubt those two individuals were confused by that. So we have to try and figure out where they were taking you. In the area between Batsto and Penn Swamp is a grey area that really does not have too much history.

Guy
 

Teegate

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He was in his late 50's early 60's, and more than a little overweight and not in the best of shape for a hike like that. But he had insisted, apparently wanting to show me something he thought important. So at least he thought for certain he was taking me to the right place.


What did he actually show you?

Guy
 

Wrangleboro

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From the back side of Batsto lake we walked for over an hour. The first 10 miutes or so we waled the same trail now used for the Nature walks. Eventually we came to a raised area, noticebly higher than the ground surrounding. A short distance into this area we passed a couple of cellar holes, and some other signs of previous use, nothing spectacular. It was there that he said this was the site of Aserdaten. He did say something about stock pens or something like that but no ref. to "deer pens" or the enigmatic Asa Dayton. Which I myself believe is a myth.
 

Teegate

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Maybe he was relating it to Aserdaten since he had knowledge that this particular location had "pens" like Aserdaten?? I still can't even think of what this place would be.
 

ecampbell

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If you were walking north and not along the river, that is in the range of Mount and Jemima Mount. Mount has no rise but I remember hiking on the back side (west) of Jemima Mount and seeing fence posts and old wire. That sounds like a good area to explore and I think I will do it in cooler weather.
 
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