This is a Message Board Post that is gatewayed to this mailing list. Classification: Query Message Board URL: http://boards.ancestry.com/mbexec/msg/rw/oRB.2ACI/667 Message Board Post: Who is aware of the 1737 law suit regarding Pile (Piles) Grove, now consistently known as Pilesgrove? The 1737 Will of Samuel Smith, Esq., of “Mainton, Salem County,” (probably means Manneton/Mannington) bequeaths to his son PILE Smith, “the plantation I live on and £50.“ Samuel adds that the plantation he purchased from Roger Sherron must be sold to finance the “law-suit now pending about PILE Grove,” then any remainder goes to his three daughters and wife. Will Executors include Isaac Sharp “of Piles Grove.” Looking ahead for any further reference to this lawsuit, I find that the 1748 Will of a Thomas Smith says he was a miller “of Greenwich Township, Gloucester Co.” (not the village of Greenwich in Salem County). However, we notice that the Bondsman is Elisha Bassett, “of Township of Pilesgrove, Salem,” and one of the Appraisers is again an Isaac Sharp. Then I find an earlier (1734) Will summary saying that a John Davis was also “of Township of Pilesgrove.” And Shourds writes in “Fenwick’s Colony” that John Davis had moved to “Pilesgrove township, Salem county, near where Woodstown is now located, about 1705.” So, if the Township existed as early as 1705, I'm now thinking, "what is the Smiths' issue with Pilesgrove more than 30 years later?" What was so important that Samuel Smith provided for this lawsuit even before his family, and is it just a coincidence that his (seemingly only) son was named PILE? The Pilesgrove name origin is in "Get NJ," (which used the source of "Historic Roadsides of New Jersey, published by the Society of Colonial Wars in the State of New Jersey, 1928). This attributes the name to "Thomas Pile, whose ten thousand acres was laid out to him in 1682." This date makes sense, considering how Valerie Caulfield's report of "Hedge's 1690 Roll of Quit Rents" includes residents of Pilesgrove. Yet, even then there is no PERSON named Pile or Pyle named. Did ANY PILE ever live in early Pilesgrove? Glenn Bingham says Thomas Pyle or Pile did live there, so perhaps he was not on the Quit Rents list because of his land ownership. But -- WHAT was going on, legally, in 1737? -- Dolores Langley in Delaware The Will summaries are David Tourison’s transcriptions from the NJ Archives series.