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Free-traders, Company of.

When the province of Pennsylvania was granted to William Penn, a number of settlements already existed there. A royal proclamation confirming the grant to Penn, and another from Penn himself, were sent to these settlements by the hand of William Markham in the summer of 1681. In his proclamation Penn assured the settlers that they should live free under laws of their own making. Meanwhile adventurers calling themselves the Company of Free-Traders made a contract with the proprietor for the purchase of lands at the rate of about $10 the 100 acres, subject to a perpetual quit-rent of 1s. for every 100-acre grant; the purchasers also to have lots in a city to be laid out. Three vessels filled with these emigrants soon sailed for the Delaware, with three commissioners, who bore a plan of the city, and a friendly letter from Penn to the Indians, whom he addressed as brethren.

Harper and Brothers Publishers. . New York. 1902.

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