Benjamin Franklin Papers

Deed to Benjamin Franklin from Samuel and Hannah Parker, 13 December 1771: résumé

Deed to Benjamin Franklin from Samuel and Hannah Parker7

Transcript: Department of Records, Recorder of Deeds, City of Philadelphia

<December 13, 1771. In 1741 Christopher and Mary Thompson deeded to Franklin a lot, with the reservation of an annual ground rent of £3 17s.8 In 1759 Thompson bequeathed his real property to his daughter Sarah, wife of Alexander Parker, and upon her death to her four children in equal shares. In January, 1771, the four divided the real estate among themselves by quadripartite indenture, whereby the ground rent on the Franklin lot came to Samuel Parker, brass-founder. He and his wife Hannah, in return for a payment from Franklin of £64 3s. 4d. in Pennsylvania money, now discharge him and his heirs and assigns from all future ground rent. Signed by Samuel and Hannah Parker and witnessed by Matthew9 and Mary Clarkson. Followed by Samuel Parker’s receipt for the payment from Franklin, and separate acknowledgments of the deed by him and his wife before Matthew Clarkson, justice of the peace. Recorded March 10, 1812. >

[Note numbering follows the Franklin Papers source.]

7. Not much seems to be known about them. Samuel Parker was a Quaker, who was censured by the Philadelphia Meeting in 1764 for taking arms to defend the city against the Paxton Boys. In 1765 he married Hannah George, who was apparently not a Quaker, for their marriage brought him again into trouble with the Meeting. He was a brass-founder of considerable reputation in Philadelphia. Geneal. Soc. of Pa. Pub., XIII (1941), 32, 212; 2 Pa. Arch., II, 191; PMHB, XXII (1898), 259; XLVI (1922), 256; Henry J. Kauffman, American Copper Brass [Camden, N.J., 1968], pp. 210–11.

8. See above, II, 311.

9. Matthew Clarkson was a merchant connected with Baynton, Wharton & Morgan, and an early member of the APS; he later became mayor of Philadelphia. He had been associated with BF in 1765 in land speculation in Nova Scotia. William O. Sawtelle, “Acadia: the Pre-Loyalist Migration and the Philadelphia Plantation,” PMHB, LI (1927), 273–4 n.

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    Source Project
    Franklin Papers
    Title
    Deed to Benjamin Franklin from Samuel and Hannah Parker, 13 December 1771: résumé
    Authors
    Parker, Samuel
    Parker, Hannah
    Recipient
    Franklin, Benjamin
    Date
    13 December 1771

    Reference

    Cite as
    “Deed to Benjamin Franklin from Samuel and Hannah Parker, 13 December 1771: résumé,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Franklin/01-18-02-0172. [Original source: The Papers of Benjamin Franklin, vol. 18, January 1 through December 31, 1771, ed. William B. Willcox. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1974, pp. 262–263.]