Samuel Fulton Stone House

Samuel emigrated from Donegal in 1724, bringing Irish building methods with him. The house's one-and-a-half storeys were constructed from field stones he found on his land.

Samuel Fulton from Rathmelton, County Donegal, emigrated to America in the 1720s. Like so many people from West Ulster, he settled in Donegal Springs, Pennsylvania, about 100km west of Philadelphia.

Donegal Springs was then a remote frontier outpost and Samuel was able to acquire 309 acres of land. Using stones that he found on his land (a method used in Ulster), he built this house on top of a spring to ensure a supply of fresh water and to keep food fresh in the hot summers. The house and farm became known as Fulton’s Pleasure.

Samuel married Elizabeth Stewart with whom he had a daughter, Mary, and three sons, James, John and Samuel Jr. The Fulton family owned livestock and grew crops such as wheat, flax and rye. Their diet would have included wild game and native fruits and vegetables.

James became a trader and used to travel to Philadelphia where he would trade farm produce and animal pelts for molasses, sugar, rice, and cloth to sell to his neighbours back in Donegal Springs. The Fulton family network reached from Philadelphia all the way back to Rathmelton, as his cousins carried emigrants from Derry-Londonderry to Philadelphia in the 1760s and brought American produce to Ireland.

Samuel Fulton died in 1760 and farm passed to James. The Fulton family continued to occupy the land at East Donegal until 1778, when David Cook bought the farm.

From the bottom of the stairs, look up to the large loft area, used to store farm produce and goods for trading.

The Conestoga Massacre

Whilst massacres of white people were widely reported, large-scale massacres of Indigenous Peoples were rarely commented on. The Conestoga Massacre of 1763, during which 20 Indigenous men, women and children were brutally murdered by the Paxton Boys in Lancaster County, was unusual in the scale of reporting, perhaps because the Conestoga tribe, also known as the Susquehannock, had converted to Christianity. 

James Wimer’s lithograph of the massacre at the Lancaster workhouse was produced in 1841. It contains a number of historical inaccuracies, including the attire of both the murderers and the victims. In 2019, a graphic novel entitled, “Ghost River: The Fall and Rise of the Conestoga” was commissioned by the Library Company of Philadelphia. It tells the story of the massacre from the perspective of the tribe. 

Today there is no federally recognised Susquahannock nation, although several groups claim it.