Re: Cornelius NICE b. 1754 Germantown, PA - Could he have been a Loyalist??
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In reply to:
Cornelius NICE b. 1754 Germantown, PA - Could he have been a Loyalist??
ShirleY Olfert 2/20/04
Hi Shirley,
I wanted to bring something to your attention regarding Cornelius Nice being a Loyalist. I am not a Nice family member, but I live in the Philadelphia neighborhood which was founded by Hans Nice. I have been researching the area for several years now. Hans was a Mennonite Minister who had come to America for religious freedom after William Penn himself evangelized the Krefield area of Germany where he then lived, but at some point he had a difference with another in the church and moved closer to Philadelphia and just outside the borders of Germantown. An 8th descendant of the family informed me that Hans and his family did buy land which now lies outside of Philadelphia, but that Hans and wife and family always lived in Nicetown.
The reason this may interest you is the Shippen family owned much of the land immediately West of the Nice settlement. I recently heard that someone just published a book on Benedict Arnold and his 2nd wife Margaret "Polly" Shippen. The book implies that Polly Shippen Arnold had a huge influence on Benedict's switching loyalties.
Philadelphia now has a lot of the City Archieves on line in the Greater Philadelphia GeoHistory Network. If you search this title and click on the site you will see the Resource Browser. Click this and then click on the "A Map of Philadelphia and Parts Adjacent" by Scull and Heap circa 1750. Once you click the map up, enlarge it so you can make out the rectangular grid which is the lay out of the original city. The river on the right of the map is the Delaware, follow the shore up about 1/2 inch above the original grid and you will find a major roadway going Northwest. As you go up this road you will see the Hall, Green, Masters, Mill,Jones, Neglee, and Norris homes. Just above the Norris home you see a fork in the road with Fair Hill Meeting (a Quaker Hall and burial ground)listed above it. Take the right fork and you see the Nagle, Greenway, and Clem homes and the Rising Sun community. Just above the fork where you see Rising Sun you can see the Nice home and what becomes Nicetown. Immediately to the left you can see the Shippen property.
I know that both families had homes within the grid of the original city, but both had large family homes in this area beside each other. Living in the town home during the worst of the winter was a good idea, but most city residents spent their springs and summers and falls in their country places if they could. This area was a bucolic country setting during the 1600,1700 and 1800's until the Industrial Revolution turned it into the Workshop of the World after the Civil War. I am sure the Shippens spent many months in close connection to their Nice neighbors. The only race course/track to be found in Philadelphia was just to the East of the Nice family and probably provided both families lots of visitors when races or competitions were going on.
I apologize that I do not know the name of the recent book on the Arnolds, but I heard the information just last week on a public/educational TV program.
Mary Benton Nicholas