The latest from the Sussex County Historical Society Facebook page…
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Sussex County Historical Society - NJ
Sussex County County Historical Society, Hill Museum
82 Main Street
Newton, NJ 07860
973-383-6010
http://www.sussexhistory.org/
Did you know NJ was once divided in two – and that West Windsor lies along one of the old division lines?![]()
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In the 1600s, our area lay near the center of one of colonial NJ's great proprietary disputes. In 1664, the Duke of York granted NJ to Lord John Berkeley and Sir George Carteret. When Berkeley sold his share to Quaker investors, the new proprietors and Carteret disagreed over the division line. A clear boundary was needed to determine who could sell land, collect quitrents, govern settlers, and issue land titles.![]()
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In 1674, a provisional boundary known as the “Duke of York Line” attempted to divide the proprietors' interests (see the map), but its vague description left the location open to dispute. The Quintipartite Deed of 1676 replaced it by formally dividing the colony into East Jersey (EJ) and West Jersey (WJ). WJ became largely rural, agrarian, and Quaker, while EJ grew more populous, commercial, and religiously diverse.![]()
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This line wasn’t formally surveyed until 1687, when representatives met at Henry Greenland's tavern near present-day Kingston and commissioned George Keith to survey the “Keith Line,” or “Province Line.” Much of the Province Line Road and Quaker/ Quakerbridge Road (i.e., West Windsor’s southwestern boundary - note the star on the map) follow this line. However, it strayed too far west compared to the Quinpartite Deed, so the Coxe-Barclay Line (1688) modified portions of the Keith Line, while the competing Thornton Line (1696) was also surveyed but never accepted. NJ reunited as a single colony in 1702, but uncertainty over land titles remained. So, surveyor John Lawrence established the Lawrence Line in 1743, which matched the Quintipartite Deed truer than the other lines. In 1855, NJ’s Supreme Court affirmed it as the legal boundary for resolving colonial property claims.![]()
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It’s not just West Windsor that retains the old Keith Line. Many municipal and county boundaries across New Jersey still trace this colonial division as well - for instance, Princeton, Lawrence, Hamilton, and Robbinsville. 350 years after the Quintipartite Deed, local jurisdictions continue to reflect these historic decisions.