PA State Archives | Hours, Directions, & Fees | Research Topics | Finding Aids for Collections | Land Records |
This collection holds papers relating to the Preston family, chiefly of Buckingham
and Plumstead townships, Bucks County, with a branch located at Stockport, Wayne
County. Family members represented include Paul Preston (b. 1724, d. 1806),
Bucks County surveyor, tax collector, court translator of German, and clerk
for many years of Buckingham Monthly Meeting of Friends; his sons, Samuel (b.
1756, d. 1834), Paul (b. 1767, d. 1853), and Silas (b. 1769, d. 1855), the first
of whom was a pioneer settler of Wayne County and that county's associate judge;
Joseph Preston and his uncle, Thomas Stradling; Nathan Preston; and Mary Preston
and her husband, John M. South, who became supervisor of the Delaware and Raritan
Canal in 1879. A large part of the collection connects to Mary Preston, whose
interests in suffrage, female education, and Quakerism are well-represented
and whose correspondence makes up a substantial part of {series 143m.1}.
Striking aspects of the Mary Preston's correspondence includes discourse on
women's rights and mentions of other issues that were important to Mary Preston
and the friends with whom she corresponded.
The collection includes correspondence; legal papers, among which are deeds,
bonds, estate papers, copies of wills, and Friends marriage certificates; invoices
and receipts; essays and poetry; lecture notes, school class rolls, and copy
books; a translation by the elder Paul Preston, apparently from the German,
of an epistle by Christopher Shets; and genealogical notes. The material principally
concerns personal and family affairs; political matters; railroad and canal
construction; the general subjects of education and women's rights, as well
as the schooling and the teaching careers of Mary Preston and others; the Religious
Society of Friends (the Hicksite branch after 1827), particularly Buckingham
Monthly Meeting; and the histories of the Preston and related families. Also
in the collection is a quantity of printed material covering the period 1801-1939,
including general newspapers from several cities; religious, educational, literary,
and anti-slavery newspapers and magazines; almanacs; and a wide range of newspaper
clippings related to Preston family history.
The relationship of Sarah R. Meseroll, from whose estate this collection was donated, to the Preston family is unclear. The material was donated in 1964 and there is little documentation in the collection as to the relation of Sarah R. Meseroll to the Prestons.
PA State Archives | Hours, Directions, & Fees | Research Topics | Finding Aids for Collections | Land Records |