USA > New Jersey > Hudson County > Jersey City > History of Jersey City, N.J. : a record of its early settlement and corporate progress, sketches of the towns and cities that were absorbed in the growth of the present municipality, its business, finance, manufactures and form of government, with some notice of the men who built the city > Part 2
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56 | Part 57 | Part 58 | Part 59 | Part 60 | Part 61 | Part 62 | Part 63 | Part 64
J. 110.
M. 129.
N. 42.
2. 99.
2
t
N.L.1.
N. 109.
2. 97.
N. 108.
157.
155.
255
149.
A. 96.
N. 107.
15L
284
156.
153.
168
Jf 95.
H.106
165.
152.
116.
147.
4.94.
N. 105.
159.
150.
161.
X 93.
J. 114.
177.
JS1.
164.
166 .
150.
163.
285.
A. 32.
N. 224.
162
00
160.
59.
153
256.
x287.
N.241.
A:33.
.
BERGEN AND BUYTEN TUYN IN 1660.
fortifications. On the first of March following Tielman Van Vleck petitioned for permission to found a village in the maize land behind Communipaw. This petition was refused. Van Vleck persisted and was again refused on April 12th. On August 16th he tried again and was success- ful. The conditions of the grant provided that the site of the new village should be selected by the Governor and Council and that it should be a spot which could be easily defended. The land was to be distributed by lot and work on each plot was to be begun within six weeks. Each person securing a lot was to send one man able to bear arms. The houses were to be in a for- tified village and the farms were to be outside.
The site was selected within a few days after the grant was made. The path from the shore led to a clearing on which the Indians raised maize. This clearing was at and around what is now the intersection of Bergen Avenue and Montgomery Street. A knoll in the woods a short distance north of this maize land was chosen for the new village. It was laid out by Jacques Cortelyou, the Surveyor of New Netherlands, and was called Bergen, meaning a place of safety. A square 800 feet on each side was cleared. Two streets intersected it at right angles and another street extended all the way around it on the .outside. A plot in the centre 160 by 220 feet, where the streets crossed, was reserved for public use. A stout palisade was
/13.
167.
N. 115.
257
286.
1. 100.
N. 103.
11
HISTORY OF JERSEY CITY.
erected on the exterior line of the outer street, and gates were placed in this at the ends of the cross streets. The village was plotted in four sections, each containing eight building lots. Each settler received one of these house lots and a farm outside of the palisade. The palisade was completed early in 1661 and the village grew rapidly. The lots were all taken and most of them were built upon at once. The houses were built of logs and had roofs thatched with cat- tails from the marshes. In a year the village became of sufficient importance to merit a sep- arate government and a local court, the first in New Jersey. It was organized in September. 1661. The cross streets are still in existence under the names of Academy Street and Bergen Avenue, and the square that formed the centre of the village is now Bergen Square.
On January, 1662, the village council ordained that a public well should be dug in the mid- dle of Bergen Square, and each resident was ordered to appear in person or by substitute to perform the labor required to dig it. The reason given for ordering the well was to prevent the exposure of the settlers in going beyond the palisade to water their cattle. The well was dug and continued in use nearly one hundred and fifty years. It was covered over about the time of the war of 1812, and a liberty pole was planted in it to celebrate the peace proclama- tion. The pole remained until 1870, when the square was paved and the well filled up. The brick work still remains buried in the ground. In December, 1662, the village officials peti- tioned the Council of New Netherlands for a minister. A subscription list, signed by twenty- five of the residents, showed that they were willing to contribute 417 guilders for the support of the minister. A log school was built on the northeast corner of the square, and the site has been used for a school ever since. It is now occupied by Public School No. 11. The log school was used for religious purposes on Sundays. The village of Bergen was founded and provided with church and school, court and separate government within two years, showing enterprise and public spirit on the part of the settlers.
The dangers from Indians caused the residents of Bergen to take turns as night-watch- men, and there was much complaint because some residents of New Netherlands had secured lots in the village and did nothing for its general good. An order was issued in November. 1663, directing non-residents to maintain one able-bodied man for each lot on pain of forfeiture of the land.
The residents of Communipaw also had trouble with the Indians, and on September 8. 1660, Cortelyou surveyed a village site on the shore. It was about 200 by 600 feet, and the northerly boundary was where Communipaw Avenue is now. They did not complete the pali- sade because the Indians for some time confined their attention to pilfering, but early in 1663 two Dutchmen were killed by Indians on the road between Communipaw and Bergen. This led to the appointment, on June 18, 1663. of a commission to complete the fortification.
Thus, there were four settlements within the present limits of Jersey City in the summer of 1663, at the end of nearly fifty years, and of these the Village of Bergen, the most recent, was the strongest and most progressive.
The early settlers were healthy. industrious men and women, endowed with physical courage to face dangers from hostile Indians and moral courage to endure hardship and privation, but they were as a rule uneducated. This fact adds to the labor of all who delve among the records of the pioneers. Their attempts to record the Indian names of the physical features of the land have left a series of names for each point of interest. These names are so diverse in orthography that different places seem to be intended. The poetic and descrip- tive nomenclature of the Indians has been lost in multisyllabic monstrosities. Another peculiarity due to lack of education is shown in their personal appellations. They ignored their family names. The son of Cornelius Baker, for example, would be christened Michael. but would be known as Michael Cornelissen, that is, Cornelius Baker's son. Cornelius himself might have been the son of a man with another name and become Baker from the fortuitous circumstance that he supplied the staff of life. Many of the settlers were soldiers who had served their time. Their passage in the company's ships and their allotment of land was a reward for faithful service. It is recorded that only three families among the earlier settlers were known by their family names, and the number of cruciform signatures among the early records gives a clue to the great diversity shown in spelling the names of persons and places. The use of the most familiar forms of spelling has been adhered to in this record for convenience.
CHAPTER II.
SEIZURE OF THE SETTLEMENT BY THE ENGLISH-A PROPRIETARY GOVERNMENT FORMED-RE-CAP- TURE BY THE DUTCH-ANOTHER SURRENDER TO THE ENGLISH-A NEW CHARTER GRANTED BY QUEEN ANNE-CLOSE OF THE SECOND COLONIAL PERIOD.
HILE the Dutch were forming small settlements around New Amsterdam, the English had founded colonies north and south of them and laid claim to all the intervening territory. New York and New Jersey had been included in several English grants prior to and after the Dutch settlement, but no effort had been made to disturb the Dutch, though the English were well informed of what they were doing.
On March 12, 1664, Charles II. granted to his brother James, Duke of York, all that part of New Netherlands lying east of Delaware Bay. On May 25th following, an expedition sailed from Portsmouth, England, to perfect the Duke's title by subjecting the Dutch to English authority. This expedition was under command of Sir Robert Carre, and his commission was dated April 26, 1664, several months before the time that war was declared by England against Holland. The fleet under Carre's command consisted of four vessels, with a land force of 300 men. Gov. Stuyvesant received information of its coming from Thomas Willet, an English- man, about six weeks before the arrival of the vessels, and orders were issued to have the colonies put in a state of defence. The people of the village of Bergen had a commission appointed to erect block houses for the protection of their town. The English appeared before they were completed.
The English fleet arrived in the bay on August 16th, and Col. Richard Nicholl, who had command of the land forces, lost no time in summoning Gov. Stuyvesant to surrender. There were a number of letters written on both sides before the end came, but the result was inevi- table. Articles of capitulation were signed on August 27th. The terms were quite favorable to the Dutch, and most of the residents of New Netherlands took the oath of allegiance to England.
While this fleet was still at sea, the Duke of York conveyed to John, Lord Berkeley, and Sir George Carteret the tract of land lying between the Hudson and Delaware rivers. In the deed it was ordered that the land should thereafter be known as Nova Caesarea or New Jersey. This was the first time the name was applied to the State. It was given out of compliment to Carteret, who had been Governor of the Isle of Jersey. Under their grant from the Duke, Berkeley and Carteret drew up a constitution for the State and appointed Philip Carteret, a brother of Sir George, as Governor. He arrived in July, 1665. Col. Nicholl, who had been appointed Governor of New York, acted as Governor of New Jersey also until Gov. Carteret came from England. Under his administration a legislative assembly was convened at Eliza- beth on April 10, 1664. Bergen was accorded two members of this assembly. They were Englebert Steenbnysen and Herman Smeeman. This was the first session of the New Jersey Legislature.
Gov. Carteret made his home at Elizabeth, and soon after his arrival issued an order to reorganize the court at Bergen. He appointed Capt. Nicola Varlett as President Judge, with Herman Smeeman and Caspar Steynmets, of Bergen, Elyas Michiels, of Communipaw, and Ide Van Vorst, of Pavonia, as assistants. The commissions bear the date of August 13, 1665. Tielman Van Vleck, the founder of Bergen, was subsequently made elerk of the court.
The oath of allegiance was administered to the inhabitants of Bergen on November 20, 1665. There were thirty-three signers. These did not include the residents of Pavonia, Paulus Hook or Cominunipaw, although these settlements were under the jurisdiction of the Bergen Court. The court granted the first liquor license on December 14, 1666, and Christian Pietersen was allowed to open an ordinary or vietualing house to entertain strangers and to retail all sorts of drink. On April 7, 1668, an election was ordered, and Caspar Steynmets and
13
HISTORY OF JERSEY CITY.
Balthazar Bayard were chosen to attend the assembly at Elizabeth to be held on May 25th ensuing.
Gov. Carteret pursued a very liberal policy in dealing with the Indians and purchased from them their rights in the land. He also ordered that all comers were to purchase from the Indians, or if they settled on land already acquired they were to pay the proportionate part of this expense. By this means he made the Indians friendly and put an end to much of the suffering which had been entailed by the cruelty and bad judgment of Gov. Kieft. Gov. Carteret confirmed the Dutch grants and deeds, and on September 20, 1668, granted a new charter to the town of Bergen. It gave religious freedom, provided a court, made provision for church and school, and confirmed all the rights the people had under the Dutch government. The territory included nearly all of Jersey City and Bayonne. Carteret also confirmed Planck's deed for Paulus Hook by patent dated May 12, 1668. The administration of Carteret was fortunate and attracted many immigrants as well as settlers from New England, and he remained governor until his death in 1682.
The war which followed the capture of New Netherlands ended with the treaty of Breda, July 31, 1667, by which each party retained the territory they had taken during the contest. This confirmed the English claim to New Netherlands. In March, 1672, war again broke out between England and the Dutch States, and the Dutch sent a small fleet to harass the English shipping on the American coast. Two Dutch admirals combined their forces in Martinique and sailed for the Chesapeake with five vessels. Their captures increased their fleet to twenty-three vessels and they then decided to retake New York. The fleet anchored in New York Bay on July 29, 1673, and took possession of the city on the next day. On August 12th, the residents of the village of Bergen were summoned to surrender. The Bergen people did not wait long in obeying the order. They surrendered very graciously. On the 18th they sent a list of their most prominent citizens with a request that the authorities of New York might select magistrates from among them. New Amsterdam had been renamed New York during the English occupancy. The Dutch again changed the name to New Orange. The newly appointed magistrates went to New Orange and were sworn in. A military company was also organized and officers appointed. The constant care of the Dutch after they regained the settlement was to prepare for a probable return of the English. The defences of New Orange were strengthened and enlarged, and the residents of the neigh- boring towns were enrolled in the militia. On December 22, 1673, the military company of Bergen was ordered to repair to New Orange. Compliance with the first order was not enforced, but on Friday, December 29th, the militia was ordered out, and when the Bergen contingent marched away there were but six men left in the town. One-third of the men were furloughed to attend to threshing grain, foddering cattle, and to maintain guard day and night to prevent a surprise which would cut them off from the city. Much preparation was made to defend the town against the English, but no attack was made and all their precautions were useless. The war was closed without becoming visible to the settlers. Peace was declared on February 9, 1674, by the treaty of Westminster. One clause in the treaty restored the country to the English. On November 10th following, the final surrender took place and Dutch rule terminated. The manners and customs, the family names and many Dutch words were so deeply impressed on the settlement that they have not been effaced even at this late date, when the few small farms and broad marshes have become solid cities with a cosmopolitan population larger than that of the Dutchman's mother country.
.
During the progress of the war Lord Berkeley sold his interest in the province of New Jersey to Edward Billinge, and later Billinge assigned to William Penn, Gawn Laurie and Nich- olas Lucas. To remove any cloud from the title which might have come from the Dutch occu- pation, Charles II. made a second grant to the Duke on June 29, 1674. The Duke then made a new grant to Sir George Carteret of the territory afterwards known as East Jersey. On July 1, 1676, by the "Quintipartite Deed," the State was divided, and Sir George received the east- ern portion in severalty. A number of transfers were made in the ownership, the last one being to a company of men who became known as the "Twenty-four Proprietors." The sale to them was confirmed by the Duke on March 14, 1683. In 1680 there were said to be about forty fam- ilies living in and around Communipaw, five families in Pavonia, about seventy families in and around Bergen, and one house on Paulus Hook.
14
HISTORY OF JERSEY CITY.
.
The government of East Jersey by the Proprietors was unsatisfactory both to the people and the Proprietors. In 1700 the people petitioned King William to take from the Proprietors the powers of Government. On April 17, 1702, Queen Anne accepted the government of the province. In the meantime the population was slowly increasing, and the common lands of the town caused a great deal of trouble. When Bergen was laid out each town lot had an outside farm to go with it. The remainder of the whole tract was common to all the residents, but the title was in the freeholders of Bergen. Land owners encroached on the common land, cut the common timber, refused to maintain the common fences, and in some instances built fences that ent off access to the water front. To remedy these and other evils the people petitioned the Queen for a new charter, and it was granted on January 14, 1714. The main feature of this charter was the power to sell the common land and to protect it. The charter failed to accom- plish the object intended. The trouble was not ended until half a century later, when the com- mon land was surveyed and allotted to the freeholders. This was an event of the greatest im- portance, as it settled the ownership of more than 8,000 acres ont of a total of 11,520 that were covered by the grant to the town and freeholders of Bergen. Every foot of land embraced in the grant was surveyed, and a field book made, which remains to this day the basis for land titles in Jersey City.
.
CHAPTER III.
CONDITION OF PAULUS HOOK AT THE BEGINNING OF THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR-ERECTION OF FORTI- FICATIONS BY LORD STIRLING-CAPTURE BY THE BRITISH-INCREASE OF THE FORTIFICATIONS- LIGHT HORSE HARRY'S BRILLIANT RE-CAPTURE OF THE FORTS-INCIDENTS OF THE WAR IN THE TOWN AND VICINITY-EVACUATION BY THE BRITISH.
URING the period between the charter by Queen Anne and the allotment of the common land in March, 1765, there was little of interest in the history of the settlers. They experienced the slow growth of farming communities. Bergen remained as the head of the small settlements that were seattered over what is now the site of the city. The people assembled for worship in the log school house until 1680, when a small octagonal church edifice was built on the corner of what is now Vroom Street and Bergen Avenue. It stood on a knoll in the corner of the graveyard, and its site still remains unbuilt upon, more than two centuries later. At the time that a more pretentious building was erected the site became a part of the graveyard and so it remains. It is now covered with the graves of the old worshippers and their descendants.
Paulus Hook was considered the least valuable section of the future city. It remained in Planck's possession until 1643, when he leased it to Cornelis Arissen. Gov. Carteret confirmed Planck's grant in May, 1668, and his heirs sold it to Cornelis Van Vorst on September 13, 1698. The consideration was £300, and the survey showed that it contained about sixty acres of up- land. This upland consisted largely of sand hills and there was but little arable land. What there was formed an outlying field in the Van Vorst farm on the mainland fronting on Harsimus Cove. Settlements had been formed at other points in what is now Hudson County and in Essex, Union and other counties west of Hudson. The other settlements outstripped those on the site of Jersey City, some of them becoming towns of importance like Newark and Eliza- beth. The colonies in New England and New York on the north, and Pennsylvania, Virginia and other points on the south, grew rapidly and developed foreign and domestie commerce of importance. The City of New York, with its fine harbor, beeame a commercial centre, and the travel from points south and west converged at Paulus Hook as a natural point for crossing the Hudson River on the way to New York. This travel made a demand for better ferry facili- ties. The first ferry was established at Communipaw at the time the village of Bergen was started. William Jansen was the first ferryman, and his landing was at what is now the foot of Communipaw Avenue. Regular boats run by him and his suecessors made trips three times a week, but the ferry was never satisfactory to the people. A new post route had been estab- lished between New York and Philadelphia early in 1764 and a regular ferry was an important part of the plan. Abraham Mesier, who owned a wharf at the foot of Cortlandt Street, in New York, and Michael Cornelissen made arrangements with Cornelis Van Vorst for a landing at Paulus Hook. The ferry was maintained, with varying fortune, by several lessees until the British occupation. The causeway that had been constructed to connect Paulus Hook with the mainland was repaired and made a charge on the ferry. A landing was built at the foot of Grand Street for the two periaguas, which made the trips across the river "as the wind served."
The ferry road followed near the line of Newark Avenne as at present laid out, but from the easterly end of Newark Avenue it extended to a point twenty feet north of York Street and 200 feet west of Washington Street. Thence it deflected to the east, crossing York Street at its intersection with Greenc Street, and thenee southerly to the ferry at the foot of Grand Street. Van Vorst laid out a small park, semi-circular in shape, at the foot of Grand Street. and the stages passed around it, after landing the passengers, in going back to the stables. Michael Cornelissen built a tavern and stables near the ferry stairs, at what is now the north- west corner of Grand and Hudson streets. The tavern faced the river and the outbuildings
16
HISTORY OF JERSEY CITY.
were back of it. There were no other buildings on Paulus Hook at the outbreak of the war. The ferry and tavern being under the same management, the boats were run in such a manner that the passengers from New York always arrived too late to catch the stage which left for the South in the morning. This compelled the travelers to remain over night in the tavern. The ferry became a valuable property almost from the beginning. In 1767 Van Vorst tried to ob- tain from the council of Proprietors of eastern New Jersey a title to the land under water. In response to his petition a survey was ordered and his offer of fro per acre was accepted, but the land was not surveyed and he never received a title. In order to increase travel on the ferry a race track was laid out around the sand hills in 1769. The first race was run on it Oc- tober 9, 1769, and it was used for racing until June 13, 1804, except during the military occupation.
The strategic importance of Paulns Hook was recognized early in the revolutionary con- test. When it became known that the British troops were preparing to leave Boston for New York, Lord Stirling, then in command of the American forces in this vicinity, took steps to put Bergen and Paulus Hook in a condition for detenee and to maintain communication with the interior. On March 18, 1776, he proposed to make a good road from Paulus Hook ferry to Brown's ferry on the Hackensack at the foot of what is now Mandeville Avenue, and to make an- other road from Weehawken to Dow's ferry on the Hackensack near the foot of Newark Avenue. The site of the old landing is now owned by the city. It was bought for the shore end of the water mains that cross the Hackensack just north of the Newark Avenue bridge.
Lord Stirling intended to employ the Bergen militia on the works. He also devised works on Paulus Hook and on Bergen Neck to prevent incursions from New York and Staten Island. He made a careful examination of the ground on March 23d and proposed to employ the Bergen, Essex and Middlesex connty militia in constructing fortifications, but it was not until the arrival of Gen. Washington that the work was begun. The fortifications were soon com- pleted and were garrisoned by the middle of June. There were three earthworks constructed, two above the ferry and one below it. The central works was known as the round redoubt. The southern works faced Communipaw Cove and the upper ones showed an angle to cover North Point and Harsimus Cove.
On June 29th the advance guard of Admiral Howe's fleet consisting of forty vessels arrived in the lower bay, and by July ist the fleet of men-of-war and transports numbered 130 sail. The Tories, who had been quiescent on both sides of the river, then hastened to declare themselves for the King, and many who had taken an active part with the patriots forsook their friends to declare allegiance to England. At that time Gen. Hugh Mercer was in command of the Ameri- can forces on the western side of the Hudson and had his headquarters in Bergen. He placed guards at the Hackensack ferries and erected an earthwork fort on the hill now bonnded by Avenues Band C, and Forty-fourth and Forty-fifth streets in Bayonne. He was much annoyed by the Tories. It was said there were only fourteen families living in Bergen from Hoboken to Bergen Point who were pronounced patriots. There were encounters between the patriots and the British at Bergen Point, but there was no attack on Paulus Hook until July 12th in the afternoon, when two men-of-war from the fleet in the bay passed Paulus Hook and gave the fortifications a broadside in passing .. They were answered from the fort, but the vessels were not damaged. That same evening Lord Howe sailed up the harbor.
Gen. Mercer had about 8,300 men at points between Amboy and Bergen. Col. Bradley's regiment was in Bergen on Angnst ist and 400 men were at Paulus Hook. The force at Bergen was known as a Flying Camp, and on August 15th it numbered 400 men. On August 28th Mercer received orders to concentrate his men to reinforce Washington who was engaged with the enemy on Long Island. The British veterans were driving the patriot army before them and help was urgently needed. Mercer put his forces in motion at once and soon had 2,500 men at Paulus Hook and 4,000 in Bergen. The British captured New York City on September 15th, and on the morning of that day two forty-gun and one twenty-gun men-of-war made an attack on Paulns Hook. The raw troops in the earthworks were not prepared for such "a tremendous firing," and Gen. Mercer, in writing to Washington on September 17th, said they had "behaved in a scandalous manner, running off from their posts on the first cannonade from the ships of the enemy." During this action two of the shots took effect on the tavern, then occupied by Verdine Ellsworth.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.