Yardley's Ferry House & Tavern

Our neighbor and close friend Catharine Belville (b.1897, d.1995) always believed that the left side of her house was the Yardley Ferry House & Tavern. J. H. Battle in 1887 had broadly stated that "There was a tavern near the bank of the river, but the ferry was located some distance below what was now the central portion of the town…"  not much more was known.  The lack of information on the ferries in Yardley was explained in a very comprehensive study by Kathryn Ann Auerbach in her report dated 1987.  This was the first important publication about the Yardley Ferry, the details of which had been almost a complete mystery up until that time. The photograph on the left shows Thomas Yardley's Ferry House & Tavern built sometime between c.1723 and 1763. The photo was "cropped" from Linford R. Craven's c.1908 photograph of the overall  Belville Home  built by Cornelius Vansant sometime after he purchased the property in 1805.

Richard Green is the Possessor or Occupant of the Dwelling House, etc. with a valuation of $800, and reputedly owned by Thomas Yardley

Enoch Green is the Possessor or Occupant of the Dwelling House, etc. having a valuation of $150, which is reputedly owned by Richard Green

Richard Green who owned Green's Ferry at least by 1779 [Ref: Erskine 1779 New Jersey Map] is designated in the Green family genealogy as "(6) Richard Green" and was the grandson of the original William Green who arrived in Ewing around 1700. Richard Green in 1794 stated he now dwells "at what had long been known by the name of Green's Ferry opposite Yardley's Ferry in the Township of Trenton [now Ewing Township] and that from the great concourse of people passing and Boatmen landing at Ferry… since Ferry more than 1/2 mile below has been discontinued on the Pennsylvania side."

The sons of (6) Richard Green included his third son (10) Richard III, followed by (11) Enoch, (14) Joseph, and (15) George. It was his son (11) Enoch who was living at dwelling #852 in 1798 ---more remote family members named Enoch were an older first cousin, a relative who died young, and a nephew who lived in Trenton. [Ref: Genealogy of Early Settlers in Trenton and Ewing by Eli F. Cooley].

On April 13, 1800 Thomas Yardley conveys 25-acres to Joseph & George Green (from Mill creek to just below College Ave)... late in possession of Richard Green with the Tavern and Ferry House in which the said Richard hath for several years "heretofore" lived... In a letter dated August 12, 1999, historian Ralph Thompson (the M.I.T. graduate who did the two Lower Makefield Township Historical Maps (copyrighted in 1998) reviewed my findings and signed off on my location for the 1673 road.

With only two dwelling houses on the 111-acres, and with Richard Green the owner of Green's ferry which had been operating directly across from Afton Avenue at least by 1779, and with Richard Green paying a "window pane tax" of $800, and with the younger Enoch Green living in the "other dwelling house" and paying only $150... that "other dwelling house" must obviously be the left downriver section of the "Belville Home" identified on Linford R Craven's c.1908 photograph by its lower second floor windows. It makes sense that the elderly father who owned the ferry moved into the Ferry House and Tavern, whereas his son Enoch occupied a lesser structure.

Another document uncovered by M-Th in 1999 was the    1794 River Road Survey   showing the Easement in front of the White Farmhouse below Letchworth, which turned out to line up with the 1763 ferry road. The fact that the Yardley Ferry House is not shown on this survey, and yet existed both in 1763 when the 1763 ferry road was surveyed, and still existed on the "19th day of December 1795" when the site was inspected by several citizens who again referenced the Yardley Ferry House in their description of the road, likely indicates it was abandoned and possibly overgrown, and fits the $150 valuation. The 1794 survey did show some mansion houses between Thomas Yardley's lands and Morrisville but the only structure shown in Yardleyville was Fleming's Tavern.

According to our reading of Bucks County Taverns License Petition, Vol. 1, 1742-1868, there is a listing for Daniel MacCarty, Makefield Township, Tavern Sign/Name: Yardley's Ferry and dated 1742, not shown by others, providing a very early possible date for the Yardley Ferry House. Our work, carried out mostly during the years 1994 to 1999, is documented in our  Yardley Ferry Chronology  

Catharine Belville entered a retirement home in Newtown prior to selling her home in 1982. And she had relocated from Newtown to one or more nursing homes on the Main Line prior to the January 1987 Auerbach study. However, we have a carbon copy of her   Lanrick Manor Notes   given to M-Th to transcribe. There was also an article titled "Old Houses in Yardley" by Miss Elizabeth D. Clayton, c.1923-24, which included the following: "It has been estimated by an expert on colonial architecture, who is familiar with other buildings of the colonial type in this vicinity, that this house was built about 1735 or 1740!"

It appears these early local historians have now been vindicated. When the totality of all the information is considered, it is very unlikely that the left downriver section of the Lanrick Manor mansion (even as modified in 1805 or utilized after 1805) is anything other than the original ferry house.

L. Hale, November 8, 2010
Copies mailed U.S. Postal Service this date to Taylor, Profy, Schillinger, Leegard, White, Thompson