Historiography of the Dupui Ledger:

IN HIS 18 FEBRUARY 1791 LETTER TO EBENEZER HAZARD, Thomas Jefferson expressed his own “life-long concern to protect the sources of American history against loss and to disseminate them for use.”[1]  His admonition to not fence such sources away from the public eye was a timely caution that still resonates (as one sees that historical sources in our own time still continue to be locked away within the musty repositories of local historical associations as resources privy only to the occasional scholar).  When such primary sources are not broadly available, when they remain either unpublished or restricted to non-digital archives, only sporadic commentary will ever come to be engendered.  Such, unfortunately, has been the case with respect to Pennsylvania’s Dupui general store ledger (1743-1791), a manuscript which has garnered limited attention from the community of historians.[2] 

As one of the very few extant store ledgers of the period, this register ranks among our nation’s greatest unrecognized treasures by dint of its ability to shed new light on our colonial frontier history.[3]  With respect to the historiography associated with the manuscript, it can be stated that while the Dupui family, as early area settlers, are indeed described by historians Hazard (1828) and Mathews (1886), no mention of the family’s store and ledger actually appears until a first brief commentary by Cummins (1911).[4]  The ledger once again escapes notice in an essay by historian Koehler (1950) but finally succeeds in achieving a paltry measure of recognition by way of aspiring historian McTernan (1969, 1972) who first alludes to it within an unpublished master’s thesis and then within a very brief published article.[5]  Rounding out this historiographical tour-de-force:  an undated and unpublished single-page commentary by Stroudsburg antiquities collector Dr. Earl F. Robacker, (died 1985), who described the Dupui ledger as a “source book unequaled in significance” – a highly astute observation.[6] 

One will have noticed that unlike a typical bibliographical essay that points to selected resources as the embodiment of the core literature on the subject, this researcher has tacitly admitted that, in truth, there is no significant body of historiographic literature specific to the Dupui ledger; such is the circumstance of the moment, and sometimes, you just have to play the hand that you are dealt.  That said, this essay is organized chronologically by contributor in the hope that, at the very least, the Dupui ledger will come to be placed in its proper sitz im leben (the “setting in life”, the alleged context in which the manuscript was created). 

Samuel Hazard:  The former curator of the Historical Society of Pennsylvania who “supervised the preparation of the sixteen volume Colonial Records”, who edited the Pennsylvania Archives and had multiple other tomes to his name, was a historian committed to the “Preservation of Every Kind of Useful Information Respecting the State.”[7]  Educated at the College of New Jersey (later Princeton University), Hazard was a partner in a New York publishing company from 1769 to 1775 and then became postmaster general of New York from 1775 to 1776.  A later period would see him as surveyor general of the Continental Post Office and Postmaster-General of the United States from 1782 to 1789.[8]  In commenting upon the history of the “Meenesink, Mine Holes, & etc.”, historian Hazard opts to rely upon “Extracts of Letters to the Editor” submitted by Samuel Preston, Esq. wherein a June 1787 interview with Nicholas Depuis is related.  These extracts tell us only that Depuis utilized the Mine Road to Esopus to haul loads of wheat and cider in the winter where they would be exchanged for salt and necessaries (while noting that Depuis was “generally very illiterate as to dates”).  Preston also relates that Depuis’ son Samuel advised that in the early days, the family had “no knowledge or idea where the [Delaware] river ran, Philadelphia market, or being in the government of Pennsylvania”.  This information, however is inaccurate; it is belied by the very words found in the 1727 “Indian Deed to Nicholas Depui” that describes the Depui land as “the said tract of land lying in Pensalvena, in the county of Bucks”.[9]  As a historian, Hazard did not err in the selection of commentary from Preston (as Preston had indeed transited through the Stroudsburg area for a little over a month in the early summer of 1787 on his way to a destination in Shohola), the error lay in not thoroughly vetting the accounts tendered for his consideration.[10]  

Alfred Matthews:  Although the name Alfred Mathews appears on the cover page of the 1368-page tome entitled “History of Wayne, Pike and Monroe counties, Pennsylvania”, a treatise that in a very few of its paragraphs broadly attends to the history related to northeastern Pennsylvania’s first plantation, Mathews can only be regarded as a historian in light of the standards of his own day (as he primarily functioned as an editor that compiled data provided by others, such as Luke W. Brodhead, described by Mathews’ publishers as the leading historical authority and writer in Pennsylvania’s Delaware Valley).  In essence, Mathews can be regarded as the equivalent of the chief technical officer of a search engine that met the needs of his own pre-Internet generation.  With a background as an editorial attaché of book publishing houses, he ultimately developed a reputation as a historical and literary critic in his work with the Philadelphia Public Ledger, the Philadelphia Press and the New York Times.[11]  Described as an “inimitable story teller”, his utilization of anecdotes as a technique to capture the character of leading period figures was inspired literary craftsmanship, but regrettably it had an unfortunate side-effect – it resulted in a tendency to either gloss over, or often ignore, decades of otherwise available pertinent data.  In terms that fellow artists might appreciate, Matthews was a painter that reveled in the use of broad strokes to tell a story. 

These broad strokes, however, invariably occasioned errors (as when Matthews cites Nicholas Scull as the surveyor of the Dupui properties while the actual survey work was performed by John Chapman).[12]  Another example emerges in his observation that “For nearly half a century Mr. Depui and other members of his family continued in undisturbed friendship with the Indians of the Minisink,” (historians have noted that Dupui’s immediate neighbors, the Shawnee tribe, in 1728 elected to relocate to the Susquehanna rather than to abide with him as a neighbor).[13] That said, and given Matthews’ penchant for storytelling, a truly serious issue arises in his use of anecdotes; consider the following:

Samuel Depui was a very powerful man.  A characteristic anecdote is told of him in connection with John Reading, who revived the old mine just across the river from Depui’s, although it proved to be a poor speculation for investors.  Reading became provincial Governor of New Jersey.  He and Depui were warm friends.  One day Reading was telling him of the trouble he had with a negro servant.  The negro was a strong man and knew it.  Whenever any one wanted him to do anything he would say, “Well, now, if you are stronger than I am, I will do it; suppose we try strength and see who shall do the work.”  In this way he managed to do about as little as he pleased.  Depui said, “Send him to me.”  The negro was sent.  Depui set him to do some work near the river, and the negro commenced in his old way:  “If you are stronger than I am, I will serve you; if not, we’ll see.”  Depui threw him down the side-hill about twenty feet and followed him up with a kick, and was about to throw him into the Delaware when the African cried, “Hold, hold, sir; I knock under!” and became after that an obedient and trusty servant.[14]

The issues:  First, the area immediately next to the Delaware River at Dupui’s has no side-hill (although so indicated by the anecdote); the area is as flat as a pancake:

Secondly, there is no reason to believe, nor documentary evidence to suggest, that Pennsylvanian Dupui would have had a “warm friendship” with the Governor of New Jersey – as the Proprietor of Pennsylvania at the time was bound by anti-slavery Quaker strictures, he couldn’t have very well been introduced into this story as a slaveholder with slave management problems, hence the selection of slave owner John Reading as the story’s foil.  Third, this “uppity nigger” trope bears the hallmarks of anachronistic language usage, namely the use of the phrase “I knock under,” that seriously calls into question its authenticity.  Etymologically, the phrase derives from “to knock underboard,” i.e. to succumb in a drinking-bout (a phrase whose utterance, almost exclusive to taverns, should not have been known and utilized by a slave of the period).  While the phrase does appear in an 1826 list of slang vulgarities and was actively in use in 1854 as evinced by its appearance in Henry David Thoreau’s “Walden,” actual usage during the time of Depui would have called for the earlier phrase “knuckle under”.[15]  If, like Thucydides (whose recounting of oratory was written in the language and style of Thucydides himself), Mathews chose to relate anecdotes in his own language and style, rather than retaining the accounts’ original wording, then such anecdotes may well need to be regarded as potentially specious.

George Wyckoff Cummins, Ph.D., M.D.:  As a former instructor of mathematics at Yale University, as Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, as member of the Medical Society of New Jersey and as author of genealogical articles in Snell’s “History of Sussex and Warren Counties”, and Chamber’s “Early Germans of New Jersey,” Dr. Cummins is certainly well credentialed.  He is not, however, overly verbose (having contributed only one short paragraph that relates to the Dupui ledger); he writes: 

The first store in Warren County was started here in 1741 by Aaron Depue, long before there were any stores in Easton, Phillipsburg or Bethlehem.  Mrs. H.A. Croasdale has the old ledger of this store, beginning with 1743, and from we learn that people came thither as far as thirty miles to do their trading.  Nicolas Dupue sent his Indian boys, Mark Anthony and Paxinosa, from Shawnee with orders for goods to this store at Oxford. 

The issues presented by this paragraph are numerous.  (1) Historian Cummins would have the reader believe that a store was opened up by Aaron Dupuiin Oxford NJ in 1741, two years before the family patriarch Nicolas would open up the family store some twenty miles away at Pennsylvania’s Shawnee-on-Delaware in 1743.  Although a good many other historians have weighed in on Oxford’s history dating back to 1726 (home to the famous Oxford Furnace nominated to the National Register of Historic Places), no other historian has ever mentioned the Oxford store referenced above.[16]  (2) The above-cited Croasdale ledger is now in the possession of the Monroe County Historical Association.  Within that ledger (currently described as the Depui ledger) are a sufficiency of references to the store physically being within the Smithfield Plantation in Smithfield, Pennsylvania (including the record of a tax bill payment for the same in the amount of 30 pounds).  (3)  The only ledger reference to Paxinosa appears in the account record of Samuel Dupui who expends ten shillings on behalf of Paxinosa’s wife.  Paxinosa was the area’s Shawnee Indian chief; he was not an Indian runner-boy for Nicholas Dupui.  (4) While the ledger references two Anthonys, one in the Edwart Boyles account who secured a fine tooth comb, and the other named Anthony the Great (in the Jacobus Kuykandal account) who acquired six pounds of shot, nowhere is a Mark Anthony listed therein. (5) Regarding the statement “people came thither as far as thirty miles to do their trading”.  A review of survey maps associated with the store’s customers indicates that the patron most distant was Adam Dingman of Dingman’s Ferry (only twenty miles away from Shawnee-on-Delaware, the site of the General Store).  Had the store instead been located in Oxford as Cummins suggests, then Dingman would have resided a full forty miles away. The “thirty miles” cited in the above paragraph would have implied that shoppers would have arrived from either Flemington NJ or from as far away as Bethlehem PA in order to partake of wares at Oxford; the ledger records no such remote patrons – all resided instead in close proximity to Shawnee-on-Delaware.  In one short paragraph, historian Cummins was incorrect on almost every point that he brought forth in his 1911 contribution; this raises serious credibility issues.

Leroy Jennings Koehler:  As head of the Social Studies Department at State Teachers College, East Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania, historian Koehler commands a sufficiency of credentials.  In the course of describing Monroe County during the Civil War, this author provides a prequel that commences with the county’s founding in which the De Puy settlement at Shawnee is mentioned.  While one spurious claim is made, namely that “Both Nicholas DePuy and Daniel Brodhead were established in the area by 1727,” it has no bearing on the Dupui ledger (which is not cited by this historian).[17]

Donald M. McTernan:  As an aspiring historian, a trustee of the Rhinebeck Historical Society and an NPS museum services chief, McTernan is the only modern-day scholar to have penned an article on the Dupui ledger.  His account in the pages of the Journal of the Pioneer Society of America is rather short, adequately written, and contains only one serious mistake – the article is entitled “Andrew Depuy’s 18^th Century Frontier Store,” even though there was no Andrew in the family (and McTernan actually names Aaron Depuy in his opening sentence).  There are, however, a myriad other minor errors in McTernan’s article, in the aggregate indicative of sloppy research and recordation.  An example:  McTernan notes that “The only firearm mentioned in the ledger is a gun sold to Joseph Hayce (Haines) early in July, 1755, for five shillings.”  The transaction was actually for 15 shillings:

Additionally, McTernan fails to mention the 1744 sale of gunpowder and lead to Rulph Brink, the 1744 sale of 3 lbs. of gunpowder to an Indian cited in the account of Samuel Dupui, the pound of gunpowder sold to Hendricus Varway in 1744 or the other dozen plus instances that multiple pounds of small shot and bars of lead were sold.  While McTernan tolerably succeeds in associating certain purchases and payments with occupations (such as blacksmith, Indian trader, carpenter, cooper, etc.), his brief overview fails to engage in any other analytical efforts.  While some authors will proffer such an article as a means to lay claim to a future body of research on the topic, the absence of any follow-up work since 1972 appears to indicate that McTernan has chosen to forgo any further analysis of this ledger.

Dr. Earl F. Robacker:  Describing the general store ledger of Aaron Dupuis, in his single-page synopsis, as “one of the earliest records of its kind in the Commonwealth – perhaps the earliest,” Robacker, as an antiquarian collector and quasi-historian, was the only individual thus far to recognize the inordinate significance of the Dupui manuscript.

THE UPSHOT OF THIS HISTORIOGRAPHICAL REVIEW is that no historian to date has done their due diligence with respect to the Dupui ledger, a manuscript that, in this researcher’s opinion, should properly reside at the State Museum of Pennsylvania owing to its incomparable value to the Commonwealth.   The manuscript screams out for an in-depth analysis on topics such as frontier settlement patterns, garment and textile usage, frontier innovations at retail, the mechanics of backcountry trade, profit/loss and margin considerations, frontier alcoholic drink consumption, the role of a general store as a banking institution, gender as a commercial factor, religious considerations, seasonal considerations, and local commodity production, among others.  The Dupui ledger, with its 167 accounts, represents an opportunity to thoroughly pursue the historian’s craft.  Let us not, as our predecessors have done, continue to give it short shrift. 

Works Cited:

Baumann, Roland M.  “Samuel Hazard: Editor and Archivist for the Keystone State,” The
     Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography Vol. 107, No. 2 (Apr., 1983), pp. 195-215 
     https://www-jstor-org.navigator-esu.passhe.edu/stable/20091758

Bell.  Notes and Queries: A Medium of Inter-Communication for Literary Men, Artists,
     Antiquaries, Genealogists, Etc. 1860, Volume 21, 225 Retrieved September 10, 2020, from
     https://books.google.com/books?id=fbJnG1q3n1MC

Boyer, Charles S.  Early Forges & Furnaces in New Jersey (Philadelphia: Univ. of Penn. Press,
     1931), 148-151. https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.39076006557875

Brewer, Ebenezer Cobham. Dictionary of phrase and fable giving the Derivation, Source, or
     Origin of Common Phrases, Allusions, and Words that have a Tale to Tell, (London: Cassell
     & Co., Ltd., 1885), 716; https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.39015024220140

Chapman, John.  “Nicklos Depues Land,”  Pennsylvania State Archives, Records of the
     Land Office, Copied Surveys 1681-1912 [series #17.114], Page D-86-284:      
     http://www.phmc.state.pa.us/bah/dam/rg/di/r17-114CopiedSurveyBooks/Books%20D1-
     D90/Book%20D86/Book%20D-86%20pg%20567.pdf

Charles, Augustus Hanna.  The Wilderness Trail, vol.1 (New York: G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 1911),
     155.  https://books.google.com/books?id=VEAahPSKyTkC&pg=PA155

Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, “Department of Internal Affairs Monthly Bulletin v.21 no.11”
     (Harrisburg:  State Printer, Oct. 1953), 32. 
     https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.39015073154778&view=1up&seq=36

Cummins, George Wyckoff.  History of Warren County, New Jersey. Retrieved September 09,
     2020, from https://books.google.com/books?id=aXK988_fF_cC

Founders Online: From Thomas Jefferson to Ebenezer Hazard, 18 February 1791. Retrieved
     September 09, 2020, from https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/01-19-02-0059

Grammarist. “Knuckle under vs knuckle down,” Retrieved September 11, 2020, from
     https://grammarist.com/idiom/knuckle-under-vs-knuckle-down/

Harte, Charles Rufus.  “The Oxford Furnace: Oxford, New Jersey; Various articles concerning  
     the old furnace, 1944 and 1946 [photoprints],” Archivegrid.  Retrieved September 09, 2020,
     from https://researchworks.oclc.org/archivegrid/collection/data/122370816

Hazard, Samuel.  Hazard's register of Pennsylvania, devoted to the preservation of facts and
     documents, and every kind of useful information respecting the state of Pennsylvania. ... v.1
     (1828). Retrieved September 09, 2020, from
     https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=hvd.32044098898356

Hunter, William A. Forts on the Pennsylvania frontier, 1753-1758 (Harrisburg:  Pennsylvania
     Historic and Museum Commission, 1960).
     https://archive.org/details/fortsonpennsylva00hunt/mode/2up

Kerr, Molly H.  “People, Places, & Things – The Power of the 18th Century Ledgers of John
     Glassford & Company,” History Revealed, Retrieved September 09, 2020, from
     https://www.historyrevealed.co/projects

Koehler, Leroy Jennings.  THE HISTORY OF MONROE COUNTY, PENNSYLVANIA, DURING
     THECIVIL WAR: A Study of a Community in Action from 1840 to 1873. Retrieved September
     09, 2020, from
     https://digital.libraries.psu.edu/digital/api/collection/digitalbks2/id/12729/download

Kurtz, Royce.  “Looking at the Ledgers:  Sauk and Mesquakie Trade Debts, 1820-1840,”
     The Fur Trade Revisited: Selected Papers of the Sixth North American Fur Trade Conference,
     Mackinac Island, Michigan, 1991.  (East Lansing:  Michigan State University Press, 1994),
     143-159.  https://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=QxJpDwAAQBAJ

Mathews, Alfred.  Alfred Matthews, History of Wayne, Pike, and Monroe Counties,
     Pennsylvania (Philadelphia:  R. T. Peck & Co., 1886). 
     https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=loc.ark:/13960/t0gt61s9r

Maxey, David W.  “Of Castles in Stockport and Other Strictures: Samuel Preston's Contentious
     Agency for Henry Drinker,” The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography Vol. 110,
     No. 3 (Jul., 1986), 424.    https://journals.psu.edu/pmhb/article/download/44143/43864

McTernan, Donald M.  "Andrew Depuy's 18th Century Frontier Store." Pioneer America 4, no. 1
     (1972): 23-28. Accessed September 9, 2020. http://www.jstor.org/stable/44897790

McTernan, Donald M. "The Esopus-Minisink Way: A Brief History of the Area with an
     Examination of the Legend of the Old Mine Road," Unpublished Masters Thesis, 1969

{note:  link access requires NPS permissions}
https://doimspp- my.sharepoint.com/personal/lrohrer_nps_gov/Documents/Attachments/The%20Esopus%20Minisink%20Way%20History%20of%20the%20Region_McTernan_1969.pdf 

Mengel, Holly.  “Samuel Hazard scrapbook and ephemera, Ms. Coll. 1257,” Philadelphia Area
     Archives Research Portal.  http://dla.library.upenn.edu/dla/pacscl/ead.html

Painesville High School Alumni Association, Alumni Record 1925, Painesville High School,
     Painesville, Ohio

     http://usgenwebsites.org/OHLake/bios/mathewsa.html

Perkins, Elizabeth A.  “The Consumer Frontier: Household Consumption in Early Kentucky,”
     The Journal of American History Vol. 78, No. 2 (Sep., 1991), pp. 486-510.
     https://www.jstor.org/stable/2079531

Peragallo, Edward.  “The Ledger of Jachomo Badoer: Constantinople September 2, 1436 to
     February 26, 1440,” The Accounting Review Vol. 52, No. 4 (Oct., 1977), pp. 881-892.
     https://www.jstor.org/stable/245586   

Soltow, J. H.  “Scottish Traders in Virginia, 1750-1775,” The Economic History Review, New
     Series, Vol. 12, No. 1 (1959), pp. 83-98. 
     https://www-jstor-org.navigator-esu.passhe.edu/stable/pdf/2591083.pdf

Thoreau, Henry David.  Walden (New York:  Thomas Y. Crowell & Co., 1910), 127;
     https://books.google.com/books?id=yiQ3AAAAIAAJ

Thorp, Daniel B.  “Doing Business in the Backcountry: Retail Trade in Colonial Rowan County,
     North Carolina,” The William and Mary Quarterly Vol. 48, No. 3 (Jul., 1991), pp. 387-408. 
     https://www.jstor.org/stable/2938142

Warren County Cultural and Heritage Commission, “Historic Sites of Warren County,” 121-134.
     http://www.co.warren.nj.us/Download/historic.pdf

Wild, Catherine (Kate). Attitudes towards English usage in the late modern period: the case of
     phrasal verbs. PhD thesis. (2010), 158.  http://theses.gla.ac.uk/2264/1/2010wildphd.pdf

Winjum, James O.  “Accounting and the Rise of Capitalism: An Accountant's View,” Journal of
     Accounting Research Vol. 9, No. 2 (Autumn, 1971), pp. 333-350. 
     https://www.jstor.org/stable/2489937