The Coopers of Long Hill

Document I.192 · Published Genealogies and County Histories · transcription: verbatim

New Jersey. Genealogies 1600–1960 (FS Full-Text, image 158 of 1,338), COOPER §105 — the compiler's Daniel-Sr narrative: b. 1 May 1695 at sea, d. 2 May 1795 aged 100; 'lived at Piscataway until March, 1732'; the six wives; sister Ann 'lived near him in Piscataway'; and the New Brunswick ferry tradition ('he and his sister rowed passengers over the ferry… about 1710'). CAUGHT MIS-CITING BENEDICT — it smuggles '(among them Daniel Cooper)' into a quoted Benedict passage whose five settlers ([I.153]) contain no Cooper. ⇒ a direct reliability check on this compiler, and therefore on [I.191].

Transcription and notes

Data from the document [verbatim] (page 97., heading COOPER)

105. Daniel¹ Cooper was a pioneer in the settlement of Piscataway Township, Middlesex County, New Jersey. He was born May 1, 1695, on the Atlantic Ocean and died May 2, 1795, aged 100 years, in the Passaic Valley, Morris County, New Jersey. (123) Littel relates that the parents of Daniel embarked from Holland for New York in 1695 and that Daniel was born on the voyage but that his father never arrived at their destination. He probably died on the passage. His sister Ann, or Anna, who married Elias² Van Court, lived near him in Piscataway. (See Van Court, p. 99.) It is said that he had six wives, which proves that he was an intrepid man. His first wife was Grace Runyon (daughter of Peter and Providence Runyon) who was born January 17, 1706 and died in 1755. They lived at Piscataway until March, 1732, when they removed to the Passaic Valley, Morris County, New Jersey, where he bought Lot # 2 of the Berkeley Tract containing 500 acres. Daniel¹ married, secondly, Jane Westbrook; married, thirdly, March 11, 1768, Grace Manning of Essex County, New Jersey, who died April (—), 1777; married, fourthly, widow Fanny (——) Jones, who died January (—), 1787; married fifthly, Barbara Margaret Gibbs, who died December (—), 1789; married, sixthly, when about 95 years old, Hannah (—), widow of Col. Ephraim Martin. (123) At the baptism of Elias³, son of Elias² and Ann (Cooper) Van Court, in 1719, Ann's brother, "Daniel Kurpur" (Cooper) was one of the witnesses; and one of the Executors of the will of Elias² Van Court was his "brother-in-law Daniel Cooper". During most of the 17th Century there was a dense forest and a swamp called "Frigmore's" or "Pridmore's Swamp" where New Brunswick, New Jersey, now stands. The first inhabitant was Daniel Cooper who resided where the post-road afterwards crossed the river and kept a ferry. He was one of the very early purchasers and settlers under the Proprietors and his name appears as such in "The First Settlers of New Brunswick" by Wm. H. Benedict, (1912). Mr. Benedict says; "These first settlers, two on one side of the river and three on the other (among them Daniel Cooper) were really settlers of Piscatawaytown, and appear in an early list of inhabitants. They were not in favor with the Proprietors, which was quite natural, as they were occupying lands the Proprietors supposed they had purchased, so they treated them as interlopers. Their cartographer, Reid, referred to their 'pretended bounds' on his map and ranked them with Newark and Elizabeth. Their Deputies were called 'pretended representatives of Newark, Elizabeth and Piscataway'." "Daniel Cooper once related that when a boy he and his sister rowed passengers over the ferry at New Brunswick, probably about 1710 or a little later." (125)

The reliability finding — this compiler MIS-CITES Benedict (interpretation)

The claim: "his name appears as such in 'The First Settlers of New Brunswick' by Wm. H. Benedict, (1912)", followed by a Benedict quotation containing the parenthetical "(among them Daniel Cooper)".

The catalog already read Benedict. [I.153] records his first settlers as Drake (1667), Greenland (1675), Longfield (1678), Inian (1681), Pridmore (1694) — "two on one side of the river and three on the other" is exactly those five — and Benedict credits the ferry to John Inian. ⇒ There is no Daniel Cooper in Benedict's list. The parenthetical is the compiler's interpolation, inserted inside quotation marks, into a sentence that does not support it.

2026-07-18 — WHERE Jenkins got this passage: she COPIED it from MONNETTE (p. 361), and inherited the bogus Benedict attribution from him

The entire New-Brunswick / "first inhabitant Daniel Cooper kept a ferry" passage is lifted nearly verbatim from Monnette, First Settlers of ye Plantations of Piscataway and Woodbridge, p. 361 ("Beginnings of New Brunswick") ((image held in the family archive)). Monnette:

"…a swamp called 'Prigmore's' or 'Pridmore's swamp.' … The first inhabitant is said to have been Daniel Cooper, who resided where the post-road afterwards crossed the river and kept a ferry. This Cooper was one of the very early purchasers and settlers under the proprietors, and his name appears as such in 'The First Settlers of New Brunswick,' by William H. Benedict, (1912). (PROCEEDINGS, (3), Vol. VII, pp. 1 et seq.). … 'These first settlers, two on one side of the river and three on the other, were really citizens of Piscatawaytown…'"

⇒ The mis-attribution to Benedict 1912 originated with MONNETTE, not Jenkins. Monnette is the one who relayed the (real, gazetteer-tradition) "Daniel Cooper first inhabitant" claim and wrongly hung it on Benedict's title (whose text has no Cooper — [I.153]). Jenkins simply copied Monnette's paragraph, and made two changes: she dropped Monnette's hedge "is said to have been" → flat "was" (strengthening it), and inserted her own "(among them Daniel Cooper)" into the quoted Benedict sentence. So Jenkins's footnote (125)=Benedict is a second-hand citation carried over from Monnette, and her "fabrication" is really Monnette's error + Jenkins's embellishment. (The underlying "Daniel-Cooper-first-inhabitant/ferry" tradition is genuine 19th-c. gazetteer lore — Gordon 1834 / Barber 1846 — that the dedicated 1912 study [I.153] does not support.)

This is the entry's real value, and it points straight at [I.191]. The companion page ([I.191], VAN COURT §100, three images later) rests its Coriell bombshell on an unsourced "Since we know that Elias² Senior and Ann (Cooper) Van Court were uncle and aunt of Samuel² and DAVID² CORYELL." We now have a measured instance of this same author, on this same family, silently inserting an unsupported claim into a cited source. That does not make the Coriell claim false — but it materially lowers the prior, and it converts "read footnotes (124)/(127)/(131)/(129)" from a nice-to-have into the precondition for believing anything he asserts without a citation.

Assessment — what is actually new here? Almost nothing.

the page says catalog status
b. 1 May 1695 at sea; parents embarked from Holland 1695; father never arrived = [I.4] Littell, held verbatim (line 91). Derivative.
"lived at Piscataway until March, 1732" + Berkeley Tract Lot #2, 500 ac Known. [I.4] line 22 already records that Littell's "March, 1782" is a typo for 1732, and [I.46] Munsell 1882 ("removed to Passaic Valley, Morris county, in 1732") + [I.47] Rankin 1872 (Cooper among the 1732 Long Hill founders) independently corroborate it. [K.2] (1733) fits.
"Daniel Kurpur (Cooper)" witness at Elias Jr's 1719 baptism = [F.67] ("Daniel Korpus"), held. Also on [I.191].
"brother-in-law Daniel Cooper" executor of Elias's will = [A.12]/[A.68], held at primary grade.
sister Ann "lived near him in Piscataway" Mildly useful — an explicit statement of co-residence, though it is the compiler's gloss, not a record.
the ferry tradition — "when a boy he and his sister rowed passengers over the ferry at New Brunswick, probably about 1710" = [J.153], the 1816 "A Citizen" account, already held: "Daniel Cooper of Long Hill (near 100 yrs old)… resided at the ferry, and he and his sister used to row the passengers across the river." BUT SEE THE ONE REAL WIN BELOW.
the six wives, with wife #4 widow Fanny (—) Jones d. Jan 1787, #5 Barbara Margaret Gibbs d. Dec 1789, #6 Hannah, widow of Col. Ephraim Martin, m. at ~95 A compact, dated list — worth reconciling against [p.1]'s wife sequence (esp. Jane Westbrook as #2 and the Gibbs death date, cf. [pr.73] Barbara Margaretta Gibb).
"pioneer in the settlement of Piscataway" / "The first inhabitant was Daniel Cooper… kept a ferry" INCOHERENT + unsupported. Piscataway was settled in the 1660s–80s; a man born 1695 cannot be its pioneer or a 17th-century first inhabitant. The compiler has welded the 1816 ferry tradition onto a "first settler" role Benedict assigns to Inian. (This retires the "is there an EARLIER Daniel Cooper of Piscataway?" flag raised in todo.md from the snippet — the apparent early Daniel is a compiler artifact, not a second man. It does not retire the underlying [pr.2] C1 idea of a Cooper stepfather; it just removes this page as evidence for one.)

Footnotes (123) + (125) READ (the reference list is in hand — see [I.191] p.109)

2026-07-18 — the Deats "COOPER folder" is confirmed NULL for our line

The Deats Collection's own COOPER surname folder (DGS 008933523, imgs 1842–1850 + 1916) was fully read this date. It does NOT contain Daniel Sr's Long Hill family — it holds (a) the English Judge Thomas Cooper (b.1759 London → Northumberland Co., PA) Bible family, and (b) 1978 correspondence about a "John Cooper" of Hanover Twp., Morris Co. NJ (1780 tax ratables; left NJ 1804 for Northumberland Co. PA; dau. Julia Ann b. 1 Jun 1778) = a [fam.6]/[[name.408]]-orbit Hanover Cooper, not ours. ⇒ the Deats route to Daniel Sr's parentage is closed at the Cooper-folder end; what remains is the Coryell/Van Court material ([I.191]) + the still-unpulled NGSQ 25:91 Coriall Bible Record.

Cross-references