- Quintipartite Deed
The Quintipartite Deed was a legal document that split
New Jersey , dividing it intoWest Jersey andEast Jersey from1674 until1702 .On
July 1 ,1676 ,William Penn ,Gawen Lawrie (who served from 1683–1686 as Deputy to GovernorRobert Barclay ), Nicholas Lucas and Edward Byllinge executed a deed with SirGeorge Carteret known as the “Quintipartite Deed,” in which the territory was divided into two parts, East Jersey being taken by Carteret and West Jersey by Byllinge and his trustees.Almost as soon as the Deed was signed, disputes arose over the exact dividing point of the two provinces. The first attempt at resolving the issue, the
Keith line , was created by Surveyor-GeneralGeorge Keith in 1686, and runs North-Northwest from the southern part of Little Egg Harbor Township, passing just north of Tuckerton, and reaching upward to a point on theDelaware River which is just north of theDelaware Water Gap . More accurate surveys and maps were made to further resolve property disputes. This resulted in theThornton line , drawn around 1696, and theLawrence line , drawn around 1743, which was adopted as the final line for legal purposes.External links
* [http://westjersey.org/wjh_copowj.htm Council of Proprietors of West Jersey - Origin and History]
* [http://www.njpinelandsanddownjersey.com/open/index.php?module=documents&JAS_DocumentManager_op=viewDocument&JAS_Document_id=156 New jersey Pinelands on article on the division of East and West Jersey]
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