Bethel Township, Delaware County, Pennsylvania

Bethel Township is a township in Delaware County, Pennsylvania, United States. The population was 8,791 at the 2010 census.

History

Bethel Township was the smallest of all the original townships of Chester County, Pennsylvania. The township is mentioned as early as 1683, and means "House of God". In 1683, Edward Beazer and Edward Brown had 500 acres surveyed to them in the northeasterly end of the township. On this tract, Bethel hamlet, afterwards known as Corner Ketch, and the present village of Chelsea, is located. In 1686 the grand jury reported the laying out of the road from Bethel to Chichester.

The settlers of Bethel Township were among the earliest settlers of the Pennsylvania Colony, and many were members of the Religious Society of Friends, or "Quakers". The list of taxables for Bethel township in 1693, shows nine tax payers: John Gibbons, Ralph Pyle, John Bushel, Nicholas Pyle, Edward Beaner, Robert Eyre, Thomas Garrett, John Howard, Thomas Cooper. In 1715, the list had doubled to include: Robert Pyle, John Grist, Robert Booth, Edward Beazer, John Canady, Benjamin Moulder, Joseph Pyle, John Hickman, Edward Griffith, John Hopton, John Gibbons, and Thomas Durnell. Robert Pyle, a leader of the Society of Friends, was almost continuously a member of the Pennsylvania Provincial Assembly from 1688 until 1705.