USA > New Jersey > Passaic County > The discovery and early history of New Jersey; a paper read befores the Passaic County historical society, 1872 > Part 2
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inducements to colonists above set forth were judicious, as only by extraordinary offers could settlers have been attracted. Writing as early as 1624, Wassenaer (ut supra, p. 36) wisely said: "For their (the colonies') increase and prosperous advancement, it is highly neces- sary that those sent out be first of all well provided with means both of support and defence, and that being Free- men, they be settled there on a free tenure; that all they work for and gain be theirs to dispose of and to sell it according to their pleasure; that whoever is placed over them as Commander act as their Father not as their Executioner, leading them with a gentle hand; for who- ever rules them as a Friend and Associate will be beloved by them, as he who will order them as a superior will subvert and nullify every thing; yea, they will excite against him the neighboring provinces to which they will fly. "Tis better to rule by love and friendship than by force." (Ut supra, p. 36.) It would have been well if the Dutch had always cherished this as a motto, and for England if she had laid it to heart a century and a half later.
Several of the Directors of the West India Company immediately availed themselves of the extraordinary in- ducements above set forth, and with a promptness that has led to the belief that they purposely procured the granting of these concessions for their personal aggran- dizement at the expense of the Company, for the very first tracts of land taken up under this "Charter of Liber- ties," as it was fittingly called, were located by Wouter van Twiller for Van Rensselaer, Bloemaert, De Laet, and other Directors. One Michael Poulaz, or Pauw, as he is generally called, who had been in the service of the Company, in charge of a colony on the site of Jersey City (De Vries, ut supra, pp. 257, 259), "took up" that
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"section," by deed dated Aug. 10, 1630 (Whitehead's E. J., p. 17), and De Vries says called it Pavonia, whence the name of the ferry by which we cross to and from New York, via the Erie Railway. [Much erudition has been exhausted in explaining the derivation of this name. Mr. Geo. Folsom of the N. Y. Hist. Soc. derives the name thus: "The Latin of pauw (peacock) is pavo -hence the name Pavonia." But the name of the officer generally called Pauw was doubtless the familiar Dutch nickname or contraction "Pau," for Paul or Paulus. Hence the name "Paulus' Hook," by which Jersey City was most commonly known forty or fifty years ago. Hence, too, the family name Paulison, Powlson, Powel- sen, etc. It is possible, even, that Pavonia was an Indian name, though hardly probable. The Indians applied the name Arisseoh to the greater portion of what is now the lower part of Jersey City-a name perpetuated in one of the steam fire engines of that now metropolitan city. ]
Several other settlements along the river, at Hobuk, at Wihac, at Tappan, at Gemoenapogh (now Communi- paw-retaining the significant Indian termination pau, preserved in Ramapaw, Yawpaw, Pembrepow, Ramapo, etc., and possibly to be found in Om-po-ge, whence Amboy), etc., were made during the next ten or twenty years, but do not seem to have been successful in any important degree. The first colonies had all their houses built together, in a hamlet, for mutual protection, and during the day the planters went out about their farms. Occasionally the Indians would make a raid upon them, and thus the progress of the settlements was greatly im- peded. That at Communipaw was abandoned in 1651, and not re-occupied till ten years later.
The Albany Records (quoted in Whitehead's E. J., p. 49, n.) mention Dutch residents at Acquackanonk as
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early as 16401; but at that time "Acquackanonk"- spelled in a score of different ways-seems to have been the name applied to the whole country between Newark and Hackensack, from the Passaic river on the west or north to the Bergen hill on the east, including a large part of the meadows. We have no accounts whatever of the history of this neighborhood prior to 1679, when the "Acquackanonk Grant" was made by the English gov- ernment of the Province to a number of persons who may possibly have already occupied the country under the Dutch, but who are named in the deed as being from Bergen, to wit: Hans Diderick, Gerritt Gerritsen, Wall- ing Jacobs, Hendrick George, Elias Hartman, Johannes Machielson, Cornelius Machielson, Adrian Post, Urian Tomason, Cornelius Rowlofson, Simon Jacobs, John Hendrick Speare (or Spyr), Cornelius Lubbers, and Abraham Bookey. Several of these men doubtless came over from Holland, 1658-'64; Gerritsen and Lubbers probably came from Wesel, in Holland, in 1664, and tradition says Gerrit Gerritsen settled at the site of the present Broadway bridge, on the Bergen county side, in 1666. There were several Gerrit Gerritsens who came over between the years named, from different parts of Holland. "Hendrick Jansen Spiers (same as the above, doubtless) and Wife and two children" are named in the list of passengers in the ship "Faith," that sailed in De- cember, 1659, for the new world. "Cornelis Michielsen, from Medemblick," came over in the "Beaver," in April, 1659. (Doc. Hist. N. Y., Vol. 3, pp. 52-63.) The tract embraced in the above grant is now divided up into
1 [This is an error, due to a mistranslation by a Dutchman of a document in Dutch, which Mr. Whitehead obviously was excusable for accepting. Many years ago I secured a transcript of the original document, when it was found that it was not Acquackanonk that was referred to, but Accomac, Md. Note, 1912.]
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Acquackanonk, Passaic Village,1 Little Falls, all of Paterson south of the Passaic, and a large part of Cald- well. The Newark Town Records mention a commis- sion appointed in 1683 to run the line between Newark and "Hockquecanung," said commissioners being in- structed to "make no other Agreement with them of any other Bounds than what was formerly." April 6th, 1719, the line was renewed, the commissioners "present from Acquackanong Mr. Michael Vreelandt, Thomas Uriansen, Garret Harmanusen." (Newark Town Records, pp. 94, 128.) In 1693 the five counties of the Province (of East Jersey) were subdivided into town- ships, and in 1694, to raise £79 12s. 9d., Acquackanonk and New Barbadoes together were taxed £6, 15s., as much as Newark, or one-twelfth of the whole. Ac- quackanonk would hardly undertake now to pay that proportion of the tax assigned to East Jersey. In 1699, Newark, Elizabeth and Perth Amboy joined in protest- ing against a certain tax levied by the Assembly, and appealed to the town of "Acquechenonck" among others to stand by them, but we have no record of any response ever having been made. (Whitehead's E. J., pp. 160, 145; Newark Town Records, p. 113.) If the Acquack- anonk Town Records were in existence from the organ- ization of the township they would throw a flood of light on its early history, but diligent inquiry has failed to elicit any trace of them. We cannot tell when a preaching station was established at Acquackanonk; perhaps a Voorleser officiated here very early. Guilaem Bertholf served Hackensack in that capacity as early as 1689, probably, and not unlikely officiated at Acquackanonk at the same time. In 1694 the church at Acquackanonk was fully organized by the election of Elias Vreeland as 1 [Incorporated in 1873 as Passaic City.]
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Elder, and Basteaen van Gysen and Hessel Peterse as Deacons, March 18, 1694. April 16, 1695, Frans Post was chosen Deacon. May, 1696, Waling Jacobse van Winkel was elected Elder, and Christopher Steynmets Deacon. May 2, 1697, Basteaen van Gysen was re- elected Deacon. May 22, 1698, Elias Vreeland was chosen Elder, and Hermannus Gerritse Deacon. May 4, 1699, Frans Post was re-elected Elder, and Hessel Peterse was re-elected Deacon. In March, 1726, the church actually had a membership of 197, and 53 were added during the remainder of the year. In 1727, too, there were twenty-five births and baptisms in the congre- gation. (Acquackanonk Ref. Ch. Records, fols. 1-5, 109-111, 329-331.) From these data there would appear to have been 200 families, at least, in this part of the country.
This notice of Acquackanonk has been unintentionally lengthened; but perhaps it may excite some of our older families to ransack their ancient garrets, closets, boxes and barrels, in quest of material for a really full history of Acquackanonk. The writer hereof would be very much pleased to see any old deeds, maps, manuscripts or papers of any kind throwing light on this subject.
But to resume : The West India Company had in 1621 sent out Cornelius Jacobse Mey to locate colonies in the New Netherlands. He touched first at New York and called that harbor Port Mey, with all the assurance of an original discoverer; then he entered Delaware Bay, and called the respective capes, "Cape Cornelis" and "Cape Mey" (the latter retaining the name to this day), but he made no settlements. There is pretty good evi- dence that the Dutch did establish a colony here as early as 1623-6, which was massacred by the Indians, 1631. (Doc. Hist. N. Y., Vol. 3, pp. 49-50.)
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Swedes settled on the Delaware between 1631-40, retaining a precarious hold, fighting the Indians, the English and the Dutch, till at last they were expelled from their principal fort by a "foe that appeared in countless hosts, alike incomparable for activity and per- severance, and obtained possession of the fort, and the discomfited Swedes, bathed even in the ill-gotten blood of their own enemies, were compelled to abandon the post, which in honor of the victors received the name of Mos- chettoesburg." (Gordon's N. J., p. 14.) All hopes of Swedish empire in the new world were effectually dissi- pated by sturdy old one-legged Peter Stuyvesant, the doughty Governor of the New Netherlands, who raised the Dutch flag over the Swedish colony in 1655. The Dutch governed this colony by Lieutenants, who were empowered to issue grants of land, the deeds to be registered at New Amsterdam. We might say here that the Swedes bought the land of the Indians and were authorized by the crown to hold it "so long as the grantees continued subject to the (Swedish) government"; full sovereignty of the land was secured to the crown, the company paying an annual tribute to the crown, in return for which they were granted absolute sovereignty. Under the Swedish government, no deeds of land were given by the company; at least, there are no traces of any, except those which were granted by Queen Christina. The Dutch issued a great many after 1656. "No rents were in the meantime received, since all the land was neglected, and the inhabitants were indolent, so that the products were little more than sufficient for their subsistence." When the English came, the people were summoned to New York to receive deeds for their land, which they either had taken up, or intended to take up. The grants were made in the Duke of York's name; the rents were a
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bushel of wheat for 100 acres, if so demanded. A part of the inhabitants took deeds, others gave themselves no trouble about the matter, except that they agreed with the Indians for tracts of land in exchange for a gun, a kettle, a fur jacket, and the like; and they likewise sold them again to others for the same price, as land was abundant, inhabitants few, and the government not vigorous. Hence it appears that in law-suits respecting titles to land, they relied upon the Indian right, which prevailed when it could be proved. Many who took deeds for large tracts of land, repented of it from fear of the after demand of rents (which, however, were very light when the people cultivated their lands), and on that account transferred the largest part of them to others," which their descend- ants doubtless exceedingly regret. (History of Nen Sweden, in N. Y. Hist. Soc. Coll., N. S., Vol. I, p. 427.) The conditions of the Swedish grants were much the same as the Dutch "Charter of Liberties," but were more liberal, allowing unrestricted commerce and manu- factures in the new colony. Provisions were also made for the evangelization of the natives. After the Dutch conquest most of the Swedes left the country, but those who remained were left in undisturbed possession of their lands, on swearing allegiance to the new rule. (Gordon's N. J., pp. 12-14.)
In 1634 the territory between Cape May and Long Island Sound was granted by the English to Sir Edmund Ployden, and the tract was erected into a free county palatine, by the name of New Albion. He is thought to have established a puny colony on the Delaware, near Salem, about 1641, but it was crushed out by the Swedes and Dutch, and English plans for the conquest of the New Netherlands again came to naught. The Dutch at this time offered, indeed, to sell out to Ployden their West
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Jersey possessions for £2,500, which not being accepted they raised their demand to £7,000, and finally, became indifferent to any compromise, seeing that the English settlement was far weaker than their own. (Whitehead's E. J., pp. 8-9; Gordon's N. J., p. 10.)
There are vague traditions of a settlement on the Dela- ware, near Minising, by Dutch miners, as early as 1635. (Gordon's N. J., p. 10.)
Settlements were also made at Perth Amboy as early as 1651, when a large tract of land was bought of the Indians (Whitehead's Perth Amboy, p. 2), and a Dutch colony planted.
Here let us remark, that the Dutch west of the Hudson do not seem to have been particularly enterprising-not as much so as those of New Amsterdam, or New York- but this apparent want of enterprise may indeed be attributed to the lack of information on our part concern- ing the Dutch settlers in New Jersey. For one thing, we have had no such veracious chronicler as Diedrich Knick- erbocker, to do for the Jersey Dutch what he has done for the New York Knickerbockers, and 'tis to be feared the time for such an historian on our side of the Hudson hath passed. Perchance, were our Legislature as liberal as those of Massachusetts and New York, in their appro- priations in aid of historical research, the archives of the Holland government might throw a great deal of light on our early history-say prior to the English conquest of this colony-and might show that the original Dutch stock of this State was as able, active and intelligent as that of any other State or Colony in the country. It is to be hoped our Legislature will not much longer delay to procure all the available material that will throw light upon our earliest history, in the days when the sturdy Dutch "planters," as they were called, still met the
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Indian face to face among the forests or on the plantations of the New Netherlands west of the Hudson, and by patient toil made possible the glorious present that we enjoy.1
But another element was now about to be introduced among the settlers of New Jersey-an element that has left its impress upon our State not only, but upon the whole country, as a similar body of men has seldom done. The Puritans who come so near landing about New York in 1620, seem never to have lost sight of the New Netherlands, and forty years later (1661-3) we find them corresponding with the Government of New York, with a view to settling in New Jersey at the "Arthur Cull"-the Achter Koll, as the Dutch called it; i. e., behind the hills, the Navesink hills; from a corruption of these words comes the name "Arthur's Kill," applied to the river so called. (See N. Y. Col. MSS., Vols. IX and X, quoted in Newark Bi-Centennial, pp. 157-166.) These Puritans subsequently (in 1666 and 1667) settled in Newark, and their descendants have since furnished the State with perhaps a majority of the men who have been eminent in legislation and government, to say no more.
In all cases of permanent settlement up to this period the land appears to have been regularly bought of the Indians, and perhaps at fair prices, though now, of course, it would appear supremely ridiculous to think of buying all Essex county for "fifty double-hands of powder, 100 bars of lead, twenty axes, twenty coats, ten guns, twenty pistols, ten kettles, ten swords, four blankets, four barrels of beer, ten pair of breeches, fifty knives, twenty hoes, 850 fathoms of wampum, two ankers of liquors, or something equivalent, and three troopers' coats." (E. J.
1 [This hope has been realized in the generous appropriations by the Legislature, for the publication of the New Jersey Archives. Note, 1912.]
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Records, Lib. 1, fol. 69, quoted in Newark Town Records, pp. 278-9.) And certainly $250, and $70 yearly rental, would not be considered a fair compensa- tion for the territory included in Paterson, Passaic, Ac- quackanonk and Little Falls! (Whitehead's E. J., p. 49.)
THE INDIANS IN NEW JERSEY.
Just here let us speak briefly of the dusky aborigines who inhabited New Jersey ere the whites came. It is exceedingly difficult to estimate their numbers. Living as they did, it were impossible for them to support them- selves in large families or tribes close together, and hence they were doubtless continually on the move, or sending off branches of tribes to find new homes. People who lived almost entirely by hunting and fishing necessarily required extensive tracts of territory for their subsistence. A work published in 1648 (quoted in Whitehead's E. J., p. 24) says the natives in this section of the continent were under about twenty kings, and that there were "1200 under the two Raritan Kings," so that Mr. White- head estimates the Indian population of New Jersey (or perhaps East Jersey) at about 2,000, in 1650. This seems to me a low estimate, that might be safely multi- plied by five and be nearer the truth; but the data are so meagre that all figures under this head are little more than guesswork. From various writers (Wassenaer, 1624; De Laet, 1625; De Vries, 1632-43; Van der Donck, who came here in 1642, being the first lawyer in the New Netherlands, cited in the Doc. Hist. N. Y., Vol. 3, and N. Y. Hist. Coll., N. S., Vol. I, already so freely re- sorted to; also Gordon's N. J.), old Indian deeds (the Tappan, Totowa, Singack, Acquackanonk and Newark
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Patents), and local traditions, we have accounts of a few Indian tribes in this part of Jersey, as follows:
The Sanhicans, about Raritan Bay, generally well spoken of; next north the Reckawangk and Machkenti- Domi or Mechkentowoon; then the Tappaens, and two or three tribes at Esopus. We also have frequent notices of the Indians of Ackinkeshacky, Hackingsack or Acking- sack, who seem to have had dominion west of the Bergen hill to the Watchung (Garret) Mountain, north to Tappan, and southerly to beyond Newark, one Oratany being their chief or sakim in 1640. (De Vries.) West of Garret or Watchung Mountain the Pom-pe-tan or Pompton Indians probably held sway, and beyond them the Ram-a-paughs. I have not been able to ascertain whether or not any other Indian names hereabouts were names of Indian tribes. Acquackanonk, Sicomac ("Shig- hemeck," it is written in the Totowa patent, the Indians reserving it in the deed-it is understood for a burial place), Preakness, Wanaque, Yanpan, Paramus (or "Perremmaus"), Singack or Singheck, Watchung, Ma- copin, etc., are quite certainly descriptive names of places, and probably Totowa refers to the Great Falls, which were sometimes called the "Totohaw Falls" by writers of the last century. Possibly, it was the name of a tribe. Unfortunately, the person who drew up the Totowa patent studiously avoided all Indian names of places, except "Shighemeck," or we should have had much more light on this subject. The Singack and Totowa patents are similarly unfortunately defective.
All the Indians of New Jersey belonged to the Lenni Lenape, or to the Mengwe or Mingo natives, the former being called Delawares by the whites so constantly that the very name is doubtless generally supposed to be of Indian origin, instead of being the title of Lord Delaware
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or De la Warre, the first grantee of the State so called. The Muncys or Monseys were the most warlike of the Lenni Lenape, and stretched across Northern New Jersey. Their name is preserved in a little railroad station on the Northern Railroad. Probably the Minisink Indians were the same tribe. The Senecas and Mohawks also at times occupied parts of the province. The Lenape and the Mengne waged deadly war against each other for years, and the latter getting other nations to join them finally subjugated the Lenapes. Both nations were sub- sequently transferred westward, and their meagre rem- nants still survive, in part, among the Six Nations in Central and Southern New York. During the French war of 1756 the Indians took part with the French, and under the notorious half-breed Gen. Brant committed a dreadful massacre at the Minisink Valley, near Walpack, Sussex county. The New Jersey Legislature at once took steps to peaceably extinguish the Indian claims, and most of the tribes emigrated to western hunting grounds. The Indians were grateful, and the Six Nations in Convention at Fort Stanwix in 1769 in the most solemn manner con- ferred upon New Jersey the title of the Great Doer of Justice. (Judge Field's Provincial Courts of Nen Jersey, p. 5, n.) Indeed, the Indians in New Jersey were ever fairly dealt with by the whites in regard to their lands, as we have seen before and shall hereafter find. When, so recently as 1832, a few distant Dela- ware Indians claimed compensation for certain hunting and fishing privileges reserved to them by an ancient treaty, the Legislature promptly granted them full com- pensation, and thus extinguished the last Indian title to a foot of New Jersey soil or the privileges thereof. At this time an aged Delaware thus addressed the Legislature: "Not a drop of our blood have you spilled in battle; not
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an acre of our land have you taken but by our consent. These facts speak for themselves, and need no comment. They place the character of New Jersey in bold relief and bright example to those States, within whose terri- torial limits our brethren still remain. Nothing save benizens can fall upon her, from the lips of a Lenni Lenappi." (Judge, Field, ut supra.)
Wassenaer, in 1624 (cited above), has these notices of the Indian character: "They are not, by nature, the most gentle. Were there no weapons, especially muskets, near, they would frequently kill the Traders for sake of the plunder; but whole troops run before five or six muskets. At the first coming (of the whites) they were accustomed to fall prostrate on the report of the gun; but now they stand still from habit, so that the first Colonists will stand in need of protection." "All are very cunning in Trade; yea, frequently, after having sold every thing, they will go back of the bargain, and that forcibly, in order to get a little more; and then they return upwards, being thirty and forty strong." These are the Virginia Indians. Of those of the New Netherlands he says: "The natives of New Netherland are very well disposed so long as no injury is done them. But if any wrong be committed against them they think it long till they be revenged and should any one against whom they have a grudge, be peaceably walking in the woods or going along in his sloop, even after a lapse of time, they will slay him, though they are sure it will cost them their lives on the spot, so highly prized is vengeance among them." "The natives are always seeking some advantage by thieving. The crime is seldom punished among them. If any one commit that offence too often he is stripped bare of his goods, and must resort to other means another time."
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When at war, "they are a wicked, bad people, very fierce in arms." (Wassenaer, ut supra, pp. 32, 33, 39, 40.)
De Vries, De Laet and Van der Donck, above cited, all agree that the Indians were in general peaceably dis- posed toward the whites, trusted in them, looked up to them. But when a young Hackensack Indian, son of a chief, in drunken wantonness one day shot a carpenter who was at work on a house-top, near Jersey City, and the Dutch Governor furiously demanded his surrender by the other Indians, one of them with great sense replied: "that the Europeans were the cause of it; that we ought not to sell brandy to the young Indians, which made them crazy, they not being used to their liquors; and they saw very well that even among our people who were used to drink it, when drunk they committed foolish actions, and often fought with knives. And therefore, to prevent all mischief, they wished we would sell no more spirituous liquors to the Indians." (N. Y. Hist. Soc. Coll., Vol. I, p. 267.)
But the Indian is gone. His noiseless tread long ago ceased to thread the boundless forests, or to course the once great "Minisink Path," that highway from the Rari- tan to the Delaware, via the Great Notch and Singack; no more does he sail along the placid "Pesayack," in quest of the shad once so plentiful; nor does he hunt the bounding deer or moose or elk across our wild country. He is gone, and save an occasional flint arrow-head, or rudely-shapen axe, or infrequent skull, or bit of coarse pottery, he has left no trace behind him. No trace? Ah, yes! "Words are winged," says Homer, "and unless weighted down with meaning will soon fly away." The Indian has left behind him that which will never be forgotten-his local nomenclature. The musical (and I insist upon it that the Indian words are musical) names of
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