1739 Israel Shreve, the fifth child and fourth son of Benjamin Shreve and Rebecca French, was born December 24, 1739, in Burlington County, New Jersey.
1749 Mary Cokely was born August 17, 1749, in Amity Twp, Berks County, Pennsylvania.
1760 Israel Shreve married, first, Grace Curtis, Feb. 27th, 1760, by Friends' ceremony in Burlington County, New Jersey. [1] The marriage was reported as accomplished on day 4 of month 2, 1760. [2]
1771 Grace (Curtis) Shreve died December 12, 1771.
1773 Israel Shreve married, second, Mary Cokely, daughter of Cornelius and Johanna Cokely, May 10th, 1773, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
1799 Israel Shreve died December 14, 1799, in Fayette County, Pennsylvania.
"Israel Shreve was thirty-six years of age when the battle of Bunker Hill occurred and at the time was living on the "Franklin Park Farm" in Rancocas, Burlington County, New Jersey, and as far as known his only occupation was farming. He was evidently a man of influence and integrity and had acquired a sufiicient knowledge of law to occupy the office of justice, for which he was commissioned in Gloucester County, February 28th, 1775, and in Burlington County, Nov. 30th, 1781. Soon after the engagement at Bunker Hill the Provincial Congress ordered four regiments to be raised from New Jersey. Although Quaker blood coursed through his veins, Israel Shreve promptly responded and was appointed Lieutenant-Colonel of the second battalion New Jersey troops November 8th, 1775, and upon the reorganization of the "Jersey Line" November 28th, 1776, he was made Colonel of the Second Regiment, in which capacity he served until the end of the war. He was regularly commissioned "Colonel of the Second Battalion of Troops raising in the State of New Jersey" January 1st, 1777, and as "Colonel of the Second New Jersey Regiment to take rank as such from the 1st day of January A. D. 1777" on March 12th, 1779. His regiment was a part of Maxwell's Brigade and was with Washington in many of the most important battles of the Revolutionary War. The battalion which he commanded won laurels in many bloody encounters.
His son John, then a lad of only thirteen years, took an active part in the war much of the time in service with his father, in the latter part of his life he made a record of his services, wherein is found the best account of Colonel Israel Shreve's military career.
On the morning of July nth, 1777, Col. Shreve's battalion opened the engagement at Brandywine, in which battle two horses were shot from under him and he was wounded. John Shreve took charge of his father and nursed him until he recovered and joined his regiment. They marched to Germantown, where, after skirmishing with the enemy, they formed the left wing and reserve of Washington's army in the battle of Germantown, Oct. 4th, 1777. The winter of 1777 and 1778 was passed in sufifering and gloom at Valley Forge. A detachment of Shreve's Gloucester troops was encamped at Newark, New Jersey, and in May, 1779, the brigade took part in General Sullivan's expedition up the Susquehanna Valley to punish the Seneca Indians for their massacres. During the march of the British through New Jersey they passed near his plantation, about one mile from Mt. Pleasant, and because he was an American officer they burned his residence and destroyed his crops.
In 1781 Colonel Shreve, then weighing three hundred and twenty pounds, was unable to get a horse that could carry his weight faster than a walk and consequently he retired from the army on half pay. The State records of New Jersey state that he was discharged at the close of the war.
When the war closed emigration to the west from the coast States was large. Colonel Israel Shreve in 1788 moved from New Jersey to Fayette County, Pennsylvania, where his son John with his family had preceded him in 1787. There he purchased from General Washington the first tract surveyed by the latter in 1748, and still known as "Washington Bottom." The purchase included the dwelling and the slaves of the partner of Washington. The house became Col. Shreve's dwelling, and but a few years ago was still standing. He engaged in farming until his death, which occurred during the same night Washington died. It is said that the last words of Colonel Shreve were: "Washington! O, Washington!"—their spirits passing to the great beyond about the same hour." [3]
[1] Howard Barclay French, Genealogy of the Descendants of Thomas French, Volume 1 (1909), 222, [HathiTrust].
[2] Charlotte D. Meldrum, Early Church Records of Burlington County, New Jersey, Vol. 2 (1995), 74.
[3] L. P. Allen, The Genealogy and History of the Shreve Family from 1641 (1901), 345, [GoogleBooks], [HathiTrust], [InternetArchive].