PEGG'S RUN, &c.

(ILLUSTRATED BY A PLATE.]

NO part of Philadelphia has undergone such great and various changes as the range of commons, water-lots, &c. ranging along the course of this run, primarily known under the Indian name of Cohoquinoque. A present beholder of the streets and houses now covering those grounds, and the hidden tunnel now concealing the former creek, could have no conception of things as they were, even only 30 years ago. The description is unavoidably complicated.

On

At the north end of Philadelphia the high table land of the city terminated in a high precipitous bluff, at about 250 feet north of Callowhill street. This extended from Front street, at Poole's bridge, up as high as Fifth and Sixth street, bounding the margin of Pegg's run. On the north side of this whole range of Pegg's run which rises in Spring Garden (where was once a spring at its source) there was an extensive marsh into which the Delaware flowed, and into which, in cases of freshets or floods, boats could be used for amusement. Beyond the north side of this marsh, in the writer's time, (say till within the last 30 years) from near Front quite up to Second street, was a high open and green grazing common; it also had a steep but green hill descending into the marsh, at about 150 feet in the south rear of Noble street. this common there was Joseph Emlen's tanyard, with a spring on the south rear, and on the east side of it a powder magazine, then converted into two dwelling houses; these were the only lots occupied. From Second to Third street, beyond the same north side of the marsh, was a beautiful green enclosure, with only one large brick house, now standing on the south west corner of Noble and Second streets, called Emlen's haunted house, and then occupied by the Rev. Dr. Pilmore. Not one of the present range of houses on either side of Second street, from Noble to the Second street bridge, was standing there till within the last 25 years. Before that time, a low causeway made the street and joined the two bluffs, and was universally called "the Hollow." Even the Second street and Third street stone bridges were made since the writer's time, (35 years) and the Second street one was worked at by the "wheelbarrowmen," who were chained felons from the prisons. The writer, when a boy, remembers two or three occasions when the floods in the Delaware backed so much water into all this marsh from Front to Third street, as that boats actually rowed from bank to bank, even on * See a picture of this place on page 280 of my MS. Annals in the Philadelphia Library.

the top of the causeway several hundred feet in length. In that time, the descent of the Second street from Callowhill to the bridge, was nearly as great as at Race and Front street now; and it used to be a great resort for boys in winter to run down their sleds on the snow; they could run at least 150 feet. In that time, the short street (Margaretta) south of the bridge did not exist; but the brick house which forms the south side corner house, was at the utmost verge of the ancient bluff. On the west side of Second street south of the bridge were a few houses and a sheep-skindresser's yard, which seemed almost covered up (full the first story) by the subsequent elevation of the street. In raising the street, and to keep the ground from washing off, the sides of the road were supported by a great number of cedar trees with all their branches on, laid down and the earth filled in among them, and water-proof gutterways of wood were laid over them, to conduct the street water into the water-channels of the bridge. The wheelbarrowmen, who worked at such public works, were subjects of great terror, even while chained, to all the boys; and by often seeing them, there were few boys who had not learned and told their several histories. Their chief desperado, I remember, was Luke Cale. Five of them, whom we used thus to know, were all executed on Centre Square (the execution ground of that day) on one gallows and at the same time, for the murder of a man who dwelt in the then only house near that square-(say on the south side of High street, five or six doors east of the centre street circle, all of which was then a waste common.) From St. John street (now, but not then, opened) up the whole length of Callowhill street to Fourth street, beyond which it did not then extend, there were no houses in the rear of any houses then on the north side of Callowhill street, and of course all was waste grass commons down to Pegg's run. This high waste ground had some occasional slopes, which gave occasion to hundreds of boys to "sled down hill," as it was called, in the intervals of school.* As the snows lasted long then, this was a boy-sport of the whole winter. The marsh ground had much of vegetable production in it, and when not flooded, had some parts of its green with vegetation; this, therefore, was a great resort for snipe, killdears, and even plover, and many birds have been shot there. Doctor Leib was a frequent visiter there for shootingpurposes. In other places, earth had been taken to make an embankment all along the side of Pegg's run, and this left such ponds of water as made places where catfish, brought in by the floods, were left, and were often caught by boys. In the summer, the water which rested in places on this marsh gave life and song to thousands of clamorous frogs; and in winter the whole area was a great ice pond, in which all the skating population of Philadelphia, even including men, were wont to skate. This was more particularly the case before the ice in the Delaware closed for the season, which was usually by New-year's-day, and lasted till March. There were two springs, and perhaps several rills near them, proceeding from the north bank of this marsh-one at Noble's tanyard east of Second street, and one west of Second street; from these springs went an embankment on the marsh side parallel with the bank, and inclining east until one reached Second street, and till the other reached

From Third to Sixth street on the south side of Pegg's run, being very high, furnished all the gravel used in the city end of the Germantown turnpike.

the rear of the houses (say Roger's glue factory) on Front street; thence they went each at right angles south until they severally struck into Pegg's run. In these channels the tides of the Delaware flowed, and especially the lower one near Rogers', over which was once a little foot bridge to pass on to the marsh in dry seasons. In process of time (the time of my day,) these embankments got so wasted away, as to precisely answer the purpose of holding all the water which high tides could deposit, and so kept it in for shallow ponds, (at the eastern sides of the marsh chiefly) for the great amusement of the boys. Now, while I write, all these descriptions are hid forever from our eyes; the marsh is intersected by streets, and nearly all filled up with houses. The filling up was not a short work; it became long a deposit for all the loose rubbish of the city-first, the Corporation who filled up the streets, then the occupant or builder of each house would bring a little earth for his yard, and support his enclosure with stakes, &c. until another would build alongside of him; and he would frame rough steps up to his door until successive deposits of earth, as time and means would enable, have enabled them, at last, to bring their streets now to a general level. From Third street to Fourth street, on the north side of Pegg's run, the land was nearer the level of Pegg's run, and was filled to Noble street with many tanyards, and one very fine kitchen garden of about one acre of ground. The tanyard which bounded on the west side of Third street, (as the Commissioners filled up Third street) rested at least one story below the common walk; and the house at the south west corner of Noble street, which went up steps to the door sill, is now levelled with the street. New Fourth street across Pegg's run, was not opened at all until lately, nor none of the houses were built between it and Callowhill street. The causeway at Second street was something narrower than the present street; and the footway, which was only on the west side of it, was three feet lower than the street-(for they were for years casting refuse earth, shoemakers' leather, and shavings, &c. into it.) At the north end, where it joined to the present pavement way, it was separated by so deep and yawning a ravine, caused by the rain floods rushing down it into the marsh and pond below, that it was covered with a wooden bridge. Such are the changes wrought in this section of the Northern Liberties in from 25 to 35 years!

The name of Pegg's run was derived from Daniel Pegg, a Friend, who, in 1686, acquired the 350 acres of Jurian Hartsfelder's patent of the year 1676. He therefore once possessed nearly all of the Northern Liberties south of Cohocksinc creek, in their primitive state of woody waste. He appears to have sold about 150 acres of the northern part to Coates, and to have set upon the improvement of the rest as a farm-to have diked in his marsh, so as to form low meadows, and to have set up a brick-kiln. His mansion, of large dimensions, described to me as of two stories, with a piazza and double hipp'd roof, was always called, in the language of early days, "the big brick house," at "the north end." It was situate upon Front street, a little above Green street, and a little of the wall is said still to remain in the house now Samuel Emlen's, Whatever was its appearance, we know it was such that William