All this territory was originally inhabited by Indians, and at the dawn of Amer. history in 1609, when Henry Hudson sailed up the Delaware Bay, those ignorant aborigines thought that the pale faced men coming to them in "winged canoes" were from heaven, and they called to one another, saying "Behold: the gods are come to visit us." They therefore, welcomed the visitors from the abode of the Great Spirit, and honored them with sacrificial feasts and offerings. These Indians were formerly known as the Algonquins, but were afterwards called Delawares, and they accepted the name gladly when told that Lord De La Warr was a great white chief.
But Henry Hudson, the great Dutch navigator and discoverer, in return for the kindness of the Indians, demonstrated his profound gratitude by giving them bottles of Holland gin, and they at once learned the art of becoming intoxicated. The savages, however, reciprocated by giving to the white men the tobacco pipe. So when the old world and the new met in America's primeval forests, each gave the other a much prized new vice.
We have no accurate account concerning the origin of the Delaware aborigines, and only vague or fanciful traditions regarding their early history. There was a tradition extant that their ancestors had migrated from the west. They claimed great antiquity and superiority over all other tribes, for they considered themselves to be the original people of the world, or "men of men." That their race had not been polluted by contact with other tribes and that their lineage had existed from the beginning of time. Several neighboring tribes, admitting their claim to great antiquity called them, "grand fathers."
There were never more than 25,000 of the Delaware Indians. They gave deeds for land as early as 1679, but began to emigrate towards the west from 1680 to 1690. The Nanticoke Indians were related to the Delawares. They were located in the southern part of Delaware and on the eastern shore of Maryland. In 1717 the General Assembly of Maryland ordered tracts of land to be laid out as reservations for the Nanticoke Indians. The town of Laurel, Delaware, is built upon an Indian reservation that originally contained 500 acres. They had a large cemetery about a mile from Laurel and their homes indicate that they were large and tall. A skeleton was found that was seven feet in length. The last remnant of the Indian tribes in Delaware left the colony in 1718, from the neighborhood of Laurel, and they carried with them the bones of some of their chiefs and near kindred.
The Indians of Delaware were divided into tribes and a Sachem, ruled each tribe, the office being hereditary on the mother side, but no female could rule. Intoxicating liquors, introduced by the white men, soon became a menace to the settlers and a curse to the Indians. When sober they were peaceful, but when intoxicated they were revengeful, and it is interesting to know that the first prohibition act in Delaware was passed by the Indians. The most valuable weapon of warfare that was known to the Indian when the white man arrived was the bow and arrow. The bow was about six feet in length, the arrow about four feet, winged with a feather and with flint for the point. They also had stone hatchets and the war club but they first obtained guns, powder, knives and iron tomahawks from the white settlers. They struck fire with dry wood, lived upon the flesh of wild animals and fish and grew melons and corn.
A great many theories have been advanced concerning the origin of the North American Indian, not one of which has been generally accepted. William Penn, however, promulgated the hypothesis that the American Indians are the lineal descendants of the ten lost tribes of Israel. But there is now no earthly means known to the author by which to account for the original settlement of the Indian tribes in Delaware. The fact is they were here when the white men came, and early settlers purchased some of their land from the Indians, and then secured patents from Lord Baltimore.
Historians claim that the disputed territory along the banks of the Nanticoke River, and Broad Creek in Sussex County, Delaware, was settled principally by families from the Eastern Shore of Maryland and Virginia on Lord Baltimore patents. The only way by which to account for these families immigrating to this locality is expressed in an old family tradition, which says that the reason of their migration was, a number of Indians from that section of the country had been in Virginia, and furnished a glowing account concerning the fertility of the soil, and told wonderful stories of the great timber and its rapid growth.
This was all disputed territory and grants were made both by Lord Baltimore and by William Penn. The first grant of land in this sparsely settled locality was made by Lord Baltimore, July 15, 1695, to George Layfield, for 540 acres on the main branch of the Nanticoke River in Great Neck, afterwards known as Nanticoke Hundred. This property was sold by Isaac Layfield to Charles Polk, March 19, 1777. Here stands the old brink mansion which was built by Charles Polk, father of Governor Charles Polk, who was a lieutenant in the Revolutionary War. In May 1705, William Penn made two grants of land in this section of 200 acres each, "lying on ye head of ye beaver dam which proceedeth out of the Nanticoke." But most of the settlers obtained their estates through Maryland Patents.
Although the boundary line of Delaware had been definitely settled in 1685, we find that on April 10, 1750 two Maryland warrants were issued to William Clarkson in North West Fork Hundred, called "Clarkson's Lot," and "Clarkson's Meadow." This infringement by the Maryland authorities upon the rights of Delaware continued in various parts of Sussex County until the end of the Eighteenth Century. And the deeds which are recorded in the Archives of Delaware are issued for Maryland property notwithstanding the fact that the land deeded was within the recognized limits of the State of Delaware.