USA > New Jersey > Sussex County > Hardyston > Hardyston memorial : a history of the township and the North Presbyterian Church, Hardyston, Sussex County, New Jersey > Part 5
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Of his grandfather, Robert Ogden, but little is known by the present generation, except that he was one of a long line of pious ancestry.
His father, Robert Ogden, Sr., resided at the old borough of Elizabeth, N. J., and filled with ability and fidelity, several offices of honor and trust ; among others, that of Surrogate for the Coun- ty of Essex. He was one of the King's counsellors, and for sev- eral years speaker of the House of Assembly.
During the war of the Revolution, he was one of the three who composed the Patriots' Committee of Vigilance for the town. During the struggle, he retired to Sparta, in the County of Sussex, where he continued a life of usefulness, to both church and state, until the year 1787, when he died, at the full age of three score years and ten.
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HARDYSTON MEMORIAL.
Robert Ogden, Jr., was born at Elizabethtown, on the 23d of March, 1746. He entered the college of New Jersey at the age of sixteen, and graduated in 1765, at the age of nineteen years. While a member of College, he united with William Patterson, Luther Martin, Oliver Ellsworth and Tapping Reeve, in the for- mation of the Cliosophic Society, then known by the name of the " Well-Meaning Society."
He chose the profession of the law, and pursued his prepara- tory course under the direction of that distinguished jurist and eminent statesman, Richard Stockton, one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence.
Having completed his term of clerkship, Mr. Ogden was ad- mitted to the bar, and received " a license to practice law in all the courts of New Jersey, on the 21st June, 1770."
In April, 1772, Governor Franklin showed his confidence in his ability and integrity by appointing him " One of the Surro- gates of New Jersey, in the room and stead of his father Robert Ogden, Senior, resigned."
He opened his law office at Elizabethtown, and soon acquired an extensive and lucrative practice, and the name par excellence of the " Honest Lawyer." In such esteem was he held that, within ten years after his admission to the bar, he was called to the degree of Sergeant-at-Law, then held by twelve only of the most. learned and upright counsellors.
During the war with Great Britain he took an active and efficient part, and by his energy and means contributed much to the establishment of American independence. In patriotism and valor he was not surpassed even by his brother, General Matthias Ogden, who was wounded at the storming of the heights of Quebec, and subsequently distinguished for military skill and per- sonal daring in many battle-fields of the Revolution. But Prov- idence denied to him the honors of the field. His right arm hav- ing been disabled by a fall in childhood, he could neither wield a sword nor handle a musket, but he rendered good service in the capacity of Quartermaster and Commissary of stores. He gave his time and his talents, spent his money and pledged his credit freely to supply the suffering army of Washington with subsist- ence, clothing, horses, and transportation. His readiness and abil- ity to do this will be shown by the following incident: His brother, Captain Aaron Ogden, afterwards Colonel, and Governor of New Jersey, one of the aides-de-camp of General Lafayette, was summoned to the tent of that distinguished and beloved patriot and friend of American liberty. On his appearing at the tent, the Marquis said, " Captain Ogden, have you a good horse ?"
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" No, sir," replied the Captain, "but my brother Robert has." "Get one," said the commander, "and select twenty-five men as escort. Let them be well mounted, and equipped in the best manner, and report to me at twelve o'clock, for a delicate and in- portant service." At the hour named, Captain Ogden, with the escort, appeared mounted and equipped as ordered. He was then instructed to bear a flag of truce to the British officer in command at Paulus Hook, with the verbal message to Sir Henry Clinton, whose headquarters were in the city of New York, proposing to exchange Major Andre for the traitor Arnold. This proposition, as is well known, was rejected ; but the gallant Captain who bore it, and the Commissary who furnished the horses and equipments, then so important in the impoverished condition of the country, alike received the commendations of Lafayette and Washington.
After the establishment of American independence, Mr. Ogden resumed his profession at Elizabeth, and practiced law with great success, until the state of his health required his removal to a place beyond the influence of the sea air; and he retired to a farm in Sussex, [spring of 1786] which on the death of his father descended to him. There he lived in dignity, but not in idleness. There he increased the fertility of the soil, and cultivated the graces of the head and of the heart. There he acted the part of a wise counsellor, and of a warm and an efficient friend. There he became a ruling elder, and one of the chief supporters of the Sparta Church ; representing it in nearly every church judieatory, and being almost a standing commissioner to the General Assem- bly.
Having no ambition for political distinction, he declined all public offices. And, except in the representation of the county in the State Legislature, on one or more occasions, he adhered to the maxim, " The post of honor is the private station." At the close of his life, not forgetting his Alma Mater, he left a legacy to the college of New Jersey, which was more than a tenth part of the residuum of his estate, reduced in value as it was by great and general commercial depression.
The last year of his life he spent with one of his daughters [Mrs. Mary Haines] at Hamburg, in the county of Sussex, and died on the 14th of February, 1826, a few days before the com- pletion of his eightieth year, in the Lawrence house.
Mr. Ogden was a fine scholar, and kept up his classical read- ing, and was delighted with the exercise, now so generally in dis- use, of capping verses of Greek and Latin poetry ; a pleasure, however, in which in the later part of his life, he could seldom indulge for the want of a competitor.
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Ilis taste for English literature was also marked, and his let- ters and all his writings exhibit much strength of thought, and are decidedly Addisonian in style. To the close of his life he was of a most cheerful temper, and a delightful and instructive companion. He especially enjoyed the society of the young and made them seek and enjoy his. He reared a large family of children and left a very numerous posterity, who have moved in various spheres in different sections of our country ; many of them eminently suc- cessful in public and private life ; and many now walking in the pions steps of their ancestors, realizing the truth of the promise, " I will be a God unto thee and to thy seed after thee."
Mr. Ogden's pay for subsistence furnished the army was much of it in Continental money (worthless at the end of the war), which was kept in an old trunk in a garret until finally scattered and lost. His house in Sussex Co. is still standing. It was built by Mr. Hoagland. When asthma drove him from the sea-board, he relinquished to his brother Aaron a fine law practice. They exchanged properties, and he received lands in Sussex county, for others in Elizabethtown and vicinity. His final re- moval to Sussex was near the spring of 1786. A deed from his father, Robert Ogden, Sr., conveys ten acres of land for the con- sideration of £250 proclamation money of New Jersey. The de- seription says : " All that Messuage, Tenement & Tract of Land on which the said Robert Ogden Junior now lives, Beginning at a stake on the west side of the Road leading to the New Meeting House."
In the fall of 1776 he was obliged to remove his family to Morristown for safety from the raids of the British troops and Tories who came over from Staten Island. In 1777 he took them to Turkey, now New Providence, in Union county, where he resided until near the close of the war. His first wife was Sarah Platt, daughter of Ebenezer Platt, of Huntington, L. I. Their children were Elizabeth Platt, wife of Colonel Joseph Jackson, of Rockaway; Robert Ogden 4th, who removed to New Orleans, a lawyer of distinction and Judge of the Supreme Court of Louisi- ana ; Mary, wife of Elias Haines; Jeremiah, drowned in Elizabethtown creek, and Sarah Platt, wife of Cornelius Dubois, of New York. Mrs. Ogden died two hours after the birth of this
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child. Mr. Ogden was about to try a case before the court in Newark when a messenger came with the sad announcement, and he fainted in the court room. His second wife was Hannalı Platt, sister of his first wife. Their children were Rebecca Wood Platt, who married Doctor Samuel Fowler, of Franklin Furnace; Ilan- nah Amelia Jarvis, wife of Thomas C. Ryerson, Judge of the Supreme Court, of Hamburg, and afterwards of Newton ; Phebe Henrietta Maria, 2d wife of Judge Thomas C. Ryerson ; Zophar Platt ; William Henry Augustus, and John Adams. One of his latest gifts to the Sparta church was the silver communion set, presented just before his removal, in May, 1821, to Franklin, where he made his home with his son-in-law, Dr. Fowler, until his grandson, Daniel Haines, came to Hamburg with his widowed mother, Mary Haines, when he went to live with them. He had been au Elder of the church for forty years.
GENERAL MATTHIAS OGDEN, son of Robert 2d, born Oct. 22d, 1754, inherited his father's Elizabethtown residence which he made his home. Ile was appointed Lieutenant-Colonel of the First Regiment New Jersey Line, December, 1775; was wounded in storming the Heights of Quebec, December 31st of the same year ; distinguished throughout the war, and made Brigadeir Gen- eral by brevet. IIe was cut down in the prime of life, and amid prevailing lamentation was buried with every token of honor and affection. His tomb is in the Elizabethtown church yard, and reads :
" Sacred to the memory of General Matthias Ogden, who died on the 31st day of March, 1791, aged 36 years. In him were united those various virtues of the soldier, the patriot, and the friend, which endear men to society. Distress failed not to find relief in his bounty ; unfortunate men, a refuge in his generosity.
If manly sense and dignity of mind,
If social virtues liberal and refined,
Nipp'd in their bloom, deserve compassion's tear, Then, reader, weep; for Ogden's dust lies here.
Weed his grave clean, ye men of genius, for he was your kinsman.
Tread lightly on his ashes, ye men of feeling, for he was your brother."
AARON OGDEN, son of Robert Ogden 2d, was born Dec. 3d
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1756. He was carefully educated, graduating at Princeton Col- lege in 1773, in his seventeenth year. In the winter of 1775 he joined a volunteer corps at Elizabethtown, and was one of the party who captured a transport lying off Sandy Hook. The men embarked in shallops and row boats, boarded the ship and made her their prize. She proved to be the Blue Mountain Valley, of three hundred tons, loaded with coal, flour and live stock for the British troops at Boston. A resolution of Congress commended this exploit.
Ogden joined the regiment, commanded by his brother Mat- thias, and actively participated in the battle of Brandywine. At Monmouth he was Brigade Major and acted as Aide to Lord Stir- ling. By Washington's personal direction, at the most critical moment of the day, he rode forward to reconnoiter, and from his report, Washington ordered the advance which determined the action. In the charge made and the pursuit of the enemy, he bore a conspicuous part. When night came on, instead of sleeping he wrote a tender, filial letter to his father, detailing the incidents of the day. We may mention his heroism at Springfield, when his horse was shot under him ; and his saving of Maxwell's Brigade, when a large British force from New York came over by Staten Island to destroy it. Hle gave timely notice to the threatened command, but was severely wounded in the breast from a bayonet stab by a British sentinal. In 1779, he took part in the expedi- tion of General John Sullivan against the hostile Indians. Soon after he was appointed Captain of a company of Light Infantry in the corps of Lafayette. He was with Lafayette in Virginia and covered his retreat, when the young Marquis had nearly fallen into the grasp of Lord Cornwallis. He was commended by Gen- eral Washington for " having with his company gallantly stormed the left redoubt of the enemy," at Yorktown. A warm friend- ship grew up between him and Lafayette ; and upon the latter's visit to America long afterwards, he gave honorable mention of his esteem for Ogden and his services.
When dismissed from the army with the other officers at Newburg, he resolved to study law, and carried out this reso- Intion by coming to Sussex, and spending the winter at his father's
EARLY SETTLERS AND THEIR FAMILIES. 59
house in Ogdensburg, where he devoted his time assidnously to Blackstone. He was licensed as an attorney in September, 1784, the regular period of study, no doubt, being shortened in consid- eration of his military services, and he was received upon his examination. He was afterwards admitted a counsellor, and in 1794 made Sergeant-at-Law. In 1797, he was appointed Colonel of the 15th U. S. Regiment, when war with France was contem- plated. He was chosen U. S. Senator in 1801, for two years, fill- ing an unexpired term. In 1812, the Federal party, having the ascendency in the State, the Legislature chose him Governor. While in this office, President Madison nominated him as a Major- General, with the intention of giving him the command of the forces operating against Canada, and his nomination was unani- mously confirmed by the Senate. With reluctance he declined this high honor, thinking that his obligation to the party which elected him precluded him from acceptance. With great modesty he expressed his opinion that he could serve the national cause better as Governor of New Jersey than as a general on the field.
Ile engaged in the building and running of steamboats, and sunk much of his means in the business and in contentions with rivals. In 1829, he removed to Jersey City, and in the winter of that year was arrested for debt in New York city and thrown into the old Provost prison, which still stands in the City Hall Park, and is now called the IIall of Records. Esteeming the debt unjust and his imprisonment a wrong, he declined the offer of friends to settle the claim. The story of his arrest was carried to Albany, where a law was passed forbidding imprisonment for debt of a Revolutionary soldier and directing his immediate release. So the trusted Aide of Washington, the companion of Lafayette, and President of the Society of Cincinnati, had the prison doors opened for him. Congress gave him a pension, and created for him the position of Custom House officer at Jersey City. The State of New Jersey donated lands to him along the river shore, which proved of no great profit then, but in recent years these have risen to immense valne. IIe died at Jersey City in 1839, at the age of eighty-three.
ELIAS OGDEN, the youngest son surviving childhood of Robert
1
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2d, born November 9th, 1763, inherited his father's homestead. Ile was a man of great business capacity, carried on farming ex- tensively, and engaged in the manufacture of iron. His forge was located npon the Wallkill, two miles above Franklin Furnace, and he brought liis ore from the Ogden mine upon the monn- tain. IIe died at the Haines house, in Hamburg. while on a visit to Mr. Sharp, March 31st, 1805. His wife died shortly after, and his family of young children were left to the care of their relatives. His son, Matthias Hatfield Ogden, was an Elder in Sparta Church, and removed to Hamburg in 1832. IIe was clerk for the Hamburg Manufacturing Company, and lost largely by their failure. He was Justice of the Peace, and a use- ful citizen. He had talent for singing, gave the young people in- struction in vocal music, and led the choir in the Presbyterian meetings at the North Church and Hamburg. His home was the house which the late Dr. William II. Linn purchased and renod- cled. While living here he lost several of his children by small- pox, which the elder son had contracted when a clerk in New York city. Ile lived to a good age, 77 years, dying in Wisconsin whither he had removed, January Sth, 1870. William Anderson, another son of Elias Ogden, continued to live in the homestead after his father's death. Henry Warren, son of Elias Ogden, was Captain in the Navy, and highly distinguished for bravery and seamanship. Thomas Anderson, youngest son of Elias Ogden, was a Presbyterian minister; graduated at Princeton College 1821, and Princeton Theological Seminary. A portion of Ster- ling Hill, where are the richest zinc mines, fell to his inheritance. His father's executor sold it for five dollars per acre, that he might meet the expenses of his education. The value of the mines was not then appreciated. He was licensed by Presbytery which met in Hamburg Church ; became pastor at Abingdon, Va., and after- wards at Halafax, Va .; was missionary in Mississippi for many years, and died at Elizabeth.
Southampton, Long Island, was settled by men of Plymouth Colony, Mass. Governor Winthrop, in his journal, states that abont forty families, finding themselves straightened, left the town of Lynn, with the design of settling a new plantation. They in-
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vited Rev. Abraham Pierson, of Boston, to be their minister. The Dutch had claimed Long Island and made their settlements on its western end. In 1636, King Charles I, regardless of the Dutch claims, gave to William Alexander, Earl of Stirling, a patent for Long Island, and the islands adjacent. The Earl gave a power of attorney to James Farrel to dispose of his lands on Long Island. The Lynn colony was formed, and an agreement was made with Farrel, dated April 17th, 1640, for eight square miles of land to be located in any part of Long Island, and the amount to be paid to the Earl was to be fixed by Governor John Win- throp, of Mass. In consideration that the country was a wilder- ness, and that the Indians pretended to have some claims to their native soil, four bushels of Indian corn, to be paid annually at Sonthampton on the last day of September, were considered suffi- cient to liquidate the debt. Captain Daniel How carried the col- onists to their place of destination in his vessel, and the settle- ment at Southampton was effected in June, 1640. An amicable arrangement was made with the Indians, and their rights in the eight miles square of land were purchased for sixteen coats, and three score bushels of Indian corn, with an agreement to defend the Indians from the violence of other tribes.
The colonists had not long since emigrated from England. They were young men, some of them from Northampton, others from Buckinghamshire and Lincolnshire ; but the majority com- ing from Southampton, they gave this name to the new town. Men of sterling worth and of the best class of English settlers. they formed their church organization before leaving Lynn, and erected their house of worship the second year of their settlement at Southampton.
Young BENJAMIN ILAINES was among the first arrivals from Lynn to Southampton, and is named in the original list of set- tlers. He had recently emigrated from England, and married Johanna, daughter of John Jennings, at Sonthold. His third son was James, born 1662, and died 1721, whose grave is in the "Ilay ground yard," at Bridgehampton. Benjamin's grandson, Stephen Haines 1st, born 1704, removed in 1725 to Elizabeth- town, where his son, Stephen Haines 2d, was born in 1733.
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STEPHEN HAINES 2d, by his patriotic efforts, rendered him- self very obnoxious to the British, who, after the battle of Long Island, held New York and Staten Island. From the latter place boats filled with armed men would come over to make raids upon the Jersey inhabitants. One night when Stephen Haines and his wife were asleep in their bedroom on the ground floor of their dwelling, they were awakened by the tramp of horses outside. English troops, guided by tories, who knew the place well, had come over for his apprehension. He sprang from his bed to the window, but only to find it guarded by a sentinal. He passed through another room to the kitchen, thinking to escape by that door. It also was guarded, as well as every window. There was a back kitchen with rather an obscure door, and by that he made his way to the open air. On the west of the house was a corn field, with the dry stalks standing. He sought to gain this hiding place, but was discovered as he was about to spring over the fence, and a man rushed upon him with a bayonet crying, "Surrender, or die!" He was taken prisoner and marched off barefoot and in his night clothes. He had three miles to walk in this way, and was then sent fifteen miles by water to New York where he was imprisoned in the dreadful pen the British had made of the old sugar house, which stood in Nassan street. The hardships he endured were very great, but he survived, while many died. He was captured in the fall of the year, and was not released until after the battle of Monmonth, June, 1778, when the numerous captures by Washington made the British glad to effect an ex- change of prisoners.
Stephen 2d's oldest son, JOB HAINES, was twenty years old when the war broke out. He was a private among the "Jersey Blues," but was detailed to transport merchandise from Philadel- phia. It was a great task to bring a loaded wagon at that time from such a distance. He had just arrived from one of his toil- some trips and was asleep in his own bedroom, when the house was surrounded. Some informer had notified the British of his return. His only sister, Joana, had been extremely wakeful since her father's capture, and hearing the tramp of horsemen, sprang to her brother's door, awakened him, and hurried him into
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a smoke closet connected with the kitchen chimney, where the family meats were eured. She locked the door and took the key. Pretending to be asleep, she did not rise until the troopers poured into the house, and then was a long time finding a light. At their order she took them through the house, opening every other door but the one to the smoke closet. They showed much disappoint- ment, and went away cursing the Tory who had lied to them.
The second son, ELIAS HAINES, was at that time eleven years old; but, boy as he was, he soon had a man's responsibility in the care of their house and cattle. Their horses were stolen, and only an ox team was left. Pickets were stationed in the vicinity of Elizabethtown to warn the people of the coming of their oppres- sors. Whenever the warning gun was heard, it was Elias's duty to put the oxen to the sled, and with the remaining members of the family and some of their goods, to start through the back lane to reach a small retired house they owned at "Sodom," where they could be concealed until the invaders were gone.
Elias became a merchant in New York, and had business transactions which frequently brought him to this county, where he was well known. He supplied the early stores with many of their goods, and dealt with the iron men. He sometimes visited the house of Robert Ogden 3d, and, in 1800, married his second daughter, Mary. Their house stood fronting the Battery, in New York, near what is now the corner of White Hall and South streets. With partners, he formed the design of a settlement in Florida, and obtained from the Spanish authorities the " Aredondo Grant." IIe spent much time and money in the enterprise, but the breaking out of the Seminole war drove off the settlers, and after the territory came into the possession of the United States, the Government refused to re-establish them in their rights, or recognize the grant given by the Spanish authorities. Elias died October 11th, 1824, at Elizabethtown.
Incident given by the late Mrs. Henry T. Darrah :
" Miss Joanna Haines was my father's sister, and was an only daughter in a family of four brothers, Job, Elias, Stephen and Daniel. Joanna grew up a beautiful young girl, with clearly cut features, a fine blue eye, transparent complexion with the blush of the rose on each cheek. My aunt, being an only daugh-
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ter, was indulged in a dainty wardrobe. Many of her dresses had been imported by special order from England. She wore high heeled shoes, which were made to her measure in London. I have myself seen some of the relics. Her great band box, which fastened with a lock and key, had brought across the ocean her beaver hat, trimmed with gold lace and black ostrich feathers.
" One day a party of Hessians rode up to the house, went into the kitchen, the pantry, and cellars, and finding edibles to satisfy their voracious appetites, they searched for booty to carry off. They went into my aunt's room, ransacked her bureans. went through her 'chest of drawers,' took the sheets from the bed, and piled in all they could carry away or make of most advantage to themselves. She followed them from room to room, remonstrating, pleading and begging for her treasures. Two of the inen took each a huge pack upon his back, and when they had reached the front door, up rode to the verandah a fine looking British officer. The young girl went to the front of the piazza and, with the loquacity of a woman, and the eloquence of an injured person, told her trouble. ITe smiled and said 'you shall have all your goods back again if you will grant me a favor. I want you to give me one kiss with your lips, and let me imprint a kiss upon your beautiful cheek." Her modesty and maidenly nature rebelled ; but she cast her eye on the two huge bundles, thought of the immensity of her loss, lifted her blushing face to the English officer's and sealed the compact. Ile immediately reprimanded the marauders in their own language, made them return the articles and bade them never to enter that honse again."
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