Flemington Historic District | |
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| Location | Roughly bounded by NJ 12, NJ 31, N. Main, Shields, and Hopewell Aves., Flemington, New Jersey |
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| Coordinates | Coordinates: 40°30′34″N74°51′42″W / 40.50952°N 74.8616°W |
| Built | 1756 |
| NRHP reference # | 80002493 [1] |
| NJRHP # | 1587 [2] |
| Added to NRHP | September 17, 1980 |
The Samuel Fleming House, also known as Flemington Castle, is an historic home located in Flemington, in Hunterdon County, New Jersey, United States, built in 1756. The building is now operated as a museum. It is the oldest surviving house in the borough. [3] It is part of the Flemington Historic District.
Flemington is a borough in Hunterdon County, New Jersey, United States. As of the 2010 United States Census, the borough's population was 4,581, reflecting an increase of 381 (+9.1%) from the 4,200 counted in the 2000 Census, which had in turn increased by 153 (+3.8%) from the 4,047 counted in the 1990 Census. It is the county seat of Hunterdon County. Most of the borough is in the Amwell Valley, but northwest portions of the borough sit on the Hunterdon Plateau.
Hunterdon County is a county located in the western section of the U.S. state of New Jersey. As of the 2018 Census estimate, the county's population was 124,714, making it the state's 18th-most populous county, representing a 2.6% decrease from the 128,349 enumerated in the 2010 United States Census, in turn increasing by 6,360 (+5.2%) from the 121,989 counted in the 2000 Census. Its county seat is Flemington.
New Jersey is a state in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States. It is a peninsula, bordered on the north and east by the state of New York; on the east, southeast, and south by the Atlantic Ocean; on the west by the Delaware River and Pennsylvania; and on the southwest by the Delaware Bay and Delaware. New Jersey is the fourth-smallest state by area but the 11th-most populous, with 9 million residents as of 2017, making it the most densely populated of the 50 U.S. states with its biggest city being Newark. New Jersey lies completely within the combined statistical areas of New York City and Philadelphia. New Jersey was the second-wealthiest U.S. state by median household income as of 2017.
Samuel Fleming, born in Ireland in 1707, came to the present-day United States and worked nearby as a tavernmaster, and bought 210 acres (0.85 km2) in present-day Flemington as the site for a home in 1741 from Thomas Penn, son of William Penn, the founder of the Province of Pennsylvania. After the house was constructed in 1756, the area becoming known as "The Fleming Settlement", then as "Fleming's" and was known as "Flemington" by the 1870s. Fleming operated a tavern, often said to be in the house itself, which was said to have been visited by General George Washington, who it was claimed wrote about "stopping at Fleming's" in his journal. [4]
Thomas Penn was a son of William Penn, founder of the Province of Pennsylvania, the English North American colony that became the U.S. state of Pennsylvania. Thomas Penn was born in Bristol, England after his father returned there in 1701 because of financial difficulties. Thomas Penn's mother was his father's second wife, Hannah Callowhill Penn (1671–1726), daughter of Thomas Callowhill.
William Penn was the son of the admiral and politician Sir William Penn. Penn was a writer, early Quaker, and founder of the English North American colony the Province of Pennsylvania. He was an early advocate of democracy and religious freedom, notable for his good relations and successful treaties with the Lenape Native Americans. Under his direction, the city of Philadelphia was planned and developed.
The Province of Pennsylvania, also known as the Pennsylvania Colony, was founded in English North America by William Penn on March 4, 1682 as dictated in a royal charter granted by King Charles II. The name Pennsylvania, which translates roughly as "Penn's Woods", was created by combining the Penn surname with the Latin word sylvania, meaning "forest land". The Province of Pennsylvania was one of the two major restoration colonies, the other being the Province of Carolina. The proprietary colony's charter remained in the hands of the Penn family until the American Revolution, when the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania was created and became one of the original thirteen states. "The lower counties on Delaware", a separate colony within the province, would breakaway during the American Revolution as "the Delaware State" and also be one of the original thirteen states. Ben Franklin- Pennsylvania
The site was sold to the Borough of Flemington by the Daughters of the American Revolution for use as a museum. The Castle has been arranged to depict typical life in the 18th century including a colonial-style kitchen, ladies parlor and tavern room. [4]
The Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR) is a lineage-based membership service organization for women who are directly descended from a person involved in the United States' efforts towards independence. A non-profit group, they promote historic preservation, education, and patriotism. The organization's membership is limited to direct lineal descendants of soldiers or others of the Revolutionary period who aided the cause of independence; applicants must have reached 18 years of age and are reviewed at the chapter level for admission. It has 185,000 members in the United States and other countries. Its motto is "God, Home, and Country."
A 2007 study by an historic preservation consultancy hired by the borough determined that claims that the house had been used as tavern, as a stagecoach stop and as a post office, and that it had been visited by George Washington were untrue, and had been embellished based on a newspaper story dating to 1870. A review of historical documents showed that Fleming operated a tavern, but that it was not located in the historic house. Court records showed that the Fleming Castle property had been seized in a sheriff's sale in 1763 and the tavern was seized in a separate sale in 1766. Records also showed that Fleming had been given a license to operate a tavern in 1746, ten years before the house was built. Despite longstanding tradition, an analysis of contemporary documents found no mention of Washington ever having visited the site. [5]
The research also determined that there was no evidence that Fleming used the term "castle" to refer to his home. The minutes of a meeting of the Colonel Lowrey Chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution held in 1906 contain the first reference to the site as the "Fleming Castle". The house was deeded to the Lowrey Chapter in 1927, which maintained the site and used it as its offices and as a museum. The group sold the house to the borough of Flemington in 2005 for $138,000. [5]
