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East Marlborough Township Historic People
John and Hannah Cox
From the 1830s, when John became head of Pennsylvania Anti-Slavery Society, to the Civil War this couple worked tirelessly for the end of slavery. They fed and sheltered several hundred fugitives and most of the speakers who came to the Progressive Meeting. Thomas Garrett of Wilmington often sent fugitives to their "station" even though Hannah worried that travelers on the Great Nottingham Road, which ran by their door, would become suspicious. Hannah kept a diary of their activities but, unfortunately, it has disappeared.
James Fitzpatrick - (a.k.a. Sandy Flash)
Sandy was a burly, red-headed blacksmith from Doe Run who played as hard as he worked. He joined the Continental Army but deserted to the British when he was flogged for disobedience. He soon preferred highway robbery and was caught and hanged at Chester in 1778. Countless hours have been spent in the futile search for the treasure he is said to have buried all over Chester County. One of his campsites was near Marlborough Meeting.
Pierre S. du Pont (1870 - 1954) Story
As duPont enlarged his Longwood Estate, he brought in more workers and built homes for them. Most were along Red Lion Row but there are three handsome stone houses: two on Route 1 and one on Longwood Road. He also built local schools, including the combined elementary and high school in Unionville, now Unionville Elementary.
Indian Hannah
Hannah Freeman was born in a cabin on William Webb's property near the Anvil Tavern. As a widow, with her pet pig and cow she wandered from house to house doing chores to support herself. She died at the county home in 1802 - the last Lenape Indian in the area.
Herb Pennock (1894 - 1948) - Story
Herb Pennock pitched for the Philadelphia Athletics at the age of 18. He went on to the Boston Red Sox and New York Yankees. Later he became general manager of the Phillies and is in the Baseball Hall of Fame at Cooperstown, New York. He owned a farm along Route 1.
John Romig
In the 1924 Olympics in Paris, Romig was the first American to run the 5,000 meter event and took fourth place. In 1928 in Amsterdam he ran the 10,000 meter race. In 1930 he bought a farm on Schoolhouse Lane, which was one of the oldest houses in the township, said to have been started in 1699. The farm is called Romeade and his descendants still live there.
Bayard Taylor (1825 - 1878) - Story
Taylor was born in in a house on the southeast corner of State and Union Streets in Kennett Square but raised on the family farm, Hazeldell, on Spottswood Lane. As a reporter for Horace Greeley's New York Tribune he traveled the world and told his adventures in the paper, in over thirty books, and at lectures throughout the northern states. He refused to lecture in the South because they forbade him to condemn slavery. He went to California for the Gold Rush, then to Africa to explore the Nile, and in 1853 was the only reporter with Commodore Matthew Perry at the opening of Japan. He learned languages easily (he claimed to speak seven) and was the first great translator of Goethe. He also wrote several novels and volumes of poems and stories. His first wife was Mary Agnew of Kennett who died shortly after their marriage. His second wife was Marie Hansen, a German who had aristocratic connections. He was a friend of Abraham Lincoln's and served twice in the diplomatic corps: first in St. Petersburg (1862-63) where he foiled a Confederate plot to enlist European aid for the Confederacy; and later in Berlin in 1878. He died there and, after a huge funeral procession in New York City, was buried in the fenced family plot in Longwood Cemetery.
Other Famous People of Chester County