Casper Shaver (1712-1784)
- Identifier
- NJS-PER-02360
- Given Name
- Casper
- Family Name
- Shaver
- Alternate Name
- Schaeffer
- Shafer
- Birth Date
- 1712
- Death Date
- 1784
- Sex
- Male
- Biographical Description
-
Casper Shaver (also Schaeffer, Shafer) immigrated from Germany to Philadelphia around 1738, and shortly thereafter came to settle in Sussex County, New Jersey. He was one of the founders of Stillwater, a rural community in Sussex County. He established a prosperous mill operation and was a civic leader before and during the American Revolution, serving as a delegate to New Jersey's Provincial Congress of 1776. He was an enslaver, according to local and family history books.
He built a mill on the Paulins Kill and a stone house on Main Street. The mill is now on the National Register of Historic Places and is known as the Casper and Abraham Shafer Grist Mill Complex. See the related place record for the Shafer Grist Mill to learn more about the property and the work performed there by enslaved laborers.
Local historians also attribute to him another dwelling, located across the Paulins Kill on Cedar Ridge Road, that is known locally as Casper Shafer's slave quarters, although less information is available about this dwelling and its use. - Keywords
- white person
- enslaver
- government official
- Parent of
- Abraham Shaver (1754-1820)
- References
-
Casper Shafer (1712-1784) historical marker. Historical Marker Database. https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=26448.
Schaeffer, Casper, and William M. Johnson. Memoirs and Reminiscences Together with Sketches of the Early History of Sussex County, New Jersey, With Notes and Genealogical Records of the Schaeffer, Shaver or Shafer Family. Hackensack, NJ: Privately printed, 1907. https://archive.org/details/memoirsreminisce00scha.
Township Overview. Historical Society of Stillwater Township. https://www.historicstillwater.org/township-overview/.
Virtual tour of the village of Stillwater, by Arnold B. Shafer. Casper Shafer's Family in America. https://www.historicstillwater.org/abshafer.com/stillwater.html.
This person is represented on the following page(s):
Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casper_Shafer - Image Rights and Source
- Image courtesy of the Historical Marker Database, photograph by Cheryl (Rome) Thom (https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=26448).
- Record Contributor
- Jesse Bayker
