Chelsea is an

unincorporated community An unincorporated area is a parcel of land that is not governed by a local general-purpose municipal corporation. (At p. 178.) They may be governed or serviced by an encompassing unit (such as a county) or another branch of the state (such as th ...

in Bethel Township in Delaware County,

Pennsylvania Pennsylvania, officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a U.S. state, state spanning the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern United States, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes region, Great Lakes regions o ...

, United States. Chelsea is located at the intersection of Concord Road, Chelsea Road, Foulk Road, and Valley Brook Road in the northern part of the township. The Chelsea blacksmith shop was the longest continually used

blacksmith A blacksmith is a metalsmith who creates objects primarily from wrought iron or steel, but sometimes from #Other metals, other metals, by forging the metal, using tools to hammer, bend, and cut (cf. tinsmith). Blacksmiths produce objects such ...

shop in Delaware County and was reputed to be one of the oldest in the County. A blacksmith had operated from that location since the time of the

French and Indian War The French and Indian War, 1754 to 1763, was a colonial conflict in North America between Kingdom of Great Britain, Great Britain and Kingdom of France, France, along with their respective Native Americans in the United States, Native American ...

. The original building was demolished in February 2013 and the operations were moved to a larger facility on Foulk Road. The blacksmith shop is still run by the same owners since the early 1900s, the McKinleys.

History

In 1683, Edward Beazer and Edward Brown had 500 acres surveyed to them in the northeastern corner of Bethel Township. On this land was founded Bethel hamlet, later known as Corner Catch (Ketch) and the village of Chelsea. In 1777, after the

Battle of Brandywine The Battle of Brandywine, also known as the Battle of Brandywine Creek, was fought between the American Continental Army of General George Washington and the British Army of General Sir William Howe on September 11, 1777, as part of the Am ...

, the

British Army The British Army is the principal Army, land warfare force of the United Kingdom. the British Army comprises 73,847 regular full-time personnel, 4,127 Brigade of Gurkhas, Gurkhas, 25,742 Army Reserve (United Kingdom), volunteer reserve perso ...

passed through Chelsea on Concord Road as they chased the retreating

Continental Army The Continental Army was the army of the United Colonies representing the Thirteen Colonies and later the United States during the American Revolutionary War. It was formed on June 14, 1775, by a resolution passed by the Second Continental Co ...

toward

Chester Chester is a cathedral city in Cheshire, England, on the River Dee, Wales, River Dee, close to the England–Wales border. With a built-up area population of 92,760 in 2021, it is the most populous settlement in the borough of Cheshire West an ...

References

{{authority control Unincorporated communities in Delaware County, Pennsylvania Unincorporated communities in Pennsylvania