USA > New York > Dutchess County > Address delivered Wednesday, 28th November, 1866 : in Feller's Hall, Madalin, township of Red Hook, Duchess Co., N.Y. > Part 1
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REYNOLDS HISTORICAL GENEALOGY COLLECTION
3 1833 01083 5145
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ADDRESS
Delivered Wednesday, 28th November, 1866, IN FELLER'S HALL, MADALIN, TOWNSHIP OF RED HOOK. DUCHESS CO., N. Y. BY Brevet Maj .- Gen. J. WATTS DE PEYSTER (S. N. Y.), TPON THE OCCASION OF THE
INAUGURATION OF A MONUMENT FRECTED BY " THIS IMMEDIATE NEIGHBORHOOD. . TIVOLI-MADALINO TO HER
DEFENDERS
WHO LOST THEIR LIVES IN SUPPRESSING THE SLAVEHOLDERS' REBELLION AND IN SUSTAINING THE GOVERNMENT THE PEOPLE, FOR THE PEOPLE. BY THE PEOPLE."
TWO HUNDRED COPIES PRINTED AS MANUSCRIPT FOR PRIVATE DISTRIBUTION
BY ORDER OF THE "Soldiers' Monument Association."
Rev. JAS. STARR CLARK, Madalin. President Soldiers' Monument Association. GILES COOKE, Cooko's Mills. Secretary. JOHNSTON LIVINGSTON, Esq., Tivoli, Chairman of the Inauguration Committee.,
NEW YORK :
1867.
1753315
ADDRESS Delivered Wednesday, 28th November, 1866, IN FELLER'S HALL, MADALIN, OWNSHIP OF RED HOOK, DUCHESS CO., N. Y., BY Brevet Maj .- Gen. J. WATTS DE PEYSTER (S. N. Y.), UPON THE OCCASION OF THE
INAUGURATION OF A MONUMENT ERECTED BY " THIS IMMEDIATE NEIGHBORHOOD. (TIVOLI-MADALIN.) TO HER
DEFENDERS
WHO LOST THEIR LIVES IN SUPPRESSING THE SLAVEHOLDERS REBELLION AND IN SUSTAINING THE GOVERNMENT OF THE PEOPLE, FOR THE PEOPLE, BY THE PEOPLE."
Two HUNDRED COPIES PRINTED AS MANUSCRIPT FOR PRIVATE DISTRIBUTION BY ORDER OF THE " Soldiers' Monument Association."
Rev. JAS. STARR CLARK, Madalin, President Soldiers' Monument Association. GILES COOKE, Cooke's Mills. Secretary.
JOHNSTON LIVINGSTON, ES., Tivoli, Chairman of the Inauguration Committee.,
NEW YORK :
1867.
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PRAYER AT THE DEDICATION OF THE SOL- DIERS' MONUMENT. TIVOLI, NOV. 28, 1866, BY REV. G. LEWIS PLATT, A. M., RECTOR OF ST. PAUL'S CHURCH.
O Almighty God, the Sovereign Ruler of the uni- verse, who bast ordained that man must live in com- munities and states, who buildest up kingdoms and ·empires, and pullest down principalities and power-, we thank Thee that we are privileged still to live un- der the protecting shield of that Government one and undivided, that was founded by our forefathers. We thank Thee that the example of their noble manhood. coupled with our necessity, has animated so many of our fellow-citizens, when that Government was in peril, to go forth to battle, that the blessed heritage of our free republic might be preserved to us, and transmitted to those who come after us. We thank Thee that we are permitted to-day to show our regard for the citizen-soldier, who answers the call of his country, and who, doing his duty manfully, returns to live among us, bear ng, in many instances, the honor- able marks of battle. May we ever respect thein for their work's sake, and may our hearts ever be warm towards them, and the hand of kindness never be turned away from them. Specially we thank Thee that Thou hast put it into our hearts to erect a lasting tablet to commemorate the noble self-devotion of those of our neighborhood and friends who fell in this war to preserve the Union. We would fittingly honor them to-day; yet in honoring .hem we do re- member that we can but honor ourselves It is indeed a privilege to award them the mneed of praise. In doing it we lift our own manhood to a higher level ; .. and we trust and pray that the monument. now in fitting words to be dedicated to their honor may stand to tell our children's children and those who follow them. who among us nurtured the tree of human liberty with their heart's blood, and who hence deserve to be had in lasting remembrance May their zilded names stand in the gaze of many generations ; may their memories be cherished as long as liberty, justice and manhood are maintained among us, and may the example of their self-devoted- ness be repeated. if need be, in the coming years, that a people's government may be perpetuated We pray Thee, O God, heal our land. Give all citizens understanding hearts. Bless our rulers Give wis- dom to all in authority Still the turbulence of pax sion, and in Thine own good time, clear away the clouds that -till hang over our national norizon : and may all be settled upon the best and surest founda- tions, that peace and justice, prosperity and piety may henceforth prevail throughont our country. Hear u- from Heaven, Thy dwelling-place, and answer Isin peace. We ask through Jesus Christ our Lord. to whom, with God the Father and God the Holy Spirit be all honor, glory and praise, now and for- ever. AMEN.
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ADDRESS.
-" Who dies in rain Upon his country's war-fields and within The shadow of her altars ?- -Feeble heart ! I tell thee that the Voice of Patriot blood, Thus pour'd for Faith and Freedom, hath a tone Which from the night of ages, from the gulf Of Death shall burst and make its high appeal Sound unto Earth and Hearen !"
Friends. Neighbors, and Fellow-citizens :
I looked forward to my preparations of an Address, in connection with such a solemn and interesting occasion, as a privilege and an honor. For nearly one and a half centuries my race has been connected with this township. Rcade Hoek derives its name from a near connection of my family whose blood flows in my veins. My grandmother's home stood in your midst, before the first Revolutionary war was even the basis of a dream. My great-grandfather lived within the town limits when the Indian still encamped upon his clearings, and the wild beasts. which have disap- peared from our midst, still nightly prowled about his dwelling and his betterments. "Therefore. to address the people of this portion of the upper district of the town of Red Hook. in relation to the part which its inhabitants played during the most momentous period of our country's life. is a very proud and happy duty for a member of their community. This is especially so in my case, whose fathers spake to your fathers when the Frenchman was still their most dangerous eneniy und the shores of this river were the seat of a. Dutch colony. To speak to this my. our people, in remembrance of their patriotic dead. should be an inspiring theme : it is an honorable and grateful duty-it almost scems like speaking of my own .-
It is very doubtful. considering the state of parties in this district. if any. territory of like population, similarly situa- . ted. sent forth anything like the same number of its patri- otic sons to the battle-field.
You will be astonished when it is told, and can be shown from official reports, and private data, that nearly one- sixth of our population (about 3.300 in all), were present or represented in the field, at one period or another of the war. . Red Hook. in person or by substitute, between 15th April. 1861. when ABRAHAM LINCOLN called for his first levy of 75.000 men. and 20 April. 1866. when ANDREW JOHNSON declared that the war bad ceased, had nearly, if
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not altogether, 510 representatives under arms and under fire.
This is the more remarkable and praiseworthy since this township is not like a frontier district in which the menace of invasion compels its men to seize their weapons to prevent the plunder of their property and the contla- gration of their dwellings; and to avert from their families those worst injuries which war can inflict. In such a case the first law of nature. self-preservation, echoes the sum- mons to arms ! It is not like a great seaport town into which immigration pours its needy adventurers or foreign poor, to enlist under the temptation of bounties, which are wealth to the working classes of the Old World. It is not like a city or large town filled with those Arabs of the streets. to whom the privations of a soldier's life are positive comforts and even luxuries. in comparison to the risks and hardships of their every-day existence. It is not like a newly-settled district exposed to the inroads of the savage, to whose inhabitants custom has rendered military service almost second nature. and danger has made the rifle and the hunting-knife as familiar tools as the imple- ments of husbandry.
No, dear friends. our district. was like none of these : it was remote from danger : the foot of war could never trample its fields. Nor were our people like those classes to which I have referred, They were peaceable and in- dustrious countrymen. To them the summons to arms would have proved no invitation had it not been the voice of their country, the voice of a dear and endangered country, which appealed to their honest sentiments and their brave enterprise, their love of liberty. and their patri- otism, calling upon them to go forth and peril their lives upon the battle-field, and to risk their health in the camp and in the hospital to maintain freedom, and to extend the blessings of liberty and to preserve that glorious country which less than a century ago was a strip of settlements clinging to the shores of the Atlantic-a ribbon of culti- vation and civilization, which has grown broader and broad- er under the impulse and protection of liberal institutions. until its western edge is silvered by the surf of the Pacific. and the influence and majesty of those institutions shed their light eastward and westward over the whole world.
Well might PARODIE chaunt-
" Our country :- 'tis a glorious land ! With broad arms stretch'd from shore to shore, The proud Pacific chafes her strand, She hears the dark AAtlantic roar ; And nurtur'd on her ample breast. How many a goodly prospect lies In nature's wild st grandeur drest, Enamell'd with the loveliest dyes."
Or as BERANGER, the French poet of Freedom, sang-
" Thou seest European, far and near . Upon this strand, whence joyous shouts resound, Thou seest, free from pain or servile fear,
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Peace, Labor, Law and Charities abound. Here the oppressed a Refuge find from strife ; Here Tyrants bid our deserts teem with life. Man and his Rights have here a Judge divine. O'er all the Earth, O day of triumphs thine !"
To the majority of the people of this district the infernal. agencies which had been at work for over sixty-three years (since 1798), to enlarge the SLAVE-POWER and produce SE- CESSION, were either entirely unknown or misunderstood. Many of those who. for a long succession of years, had voted. indeed, with the party which fostered those South- ern leaders who brought on the Rebellion, had not the remotest idea of their treasonable views or intentions. The mass of the Northern pro-slavery voters were totally un- aware of the individual meanness. the vileness of the measures, or the enormity of the criminality of those who, engineered the working out of the plot which plunged our country in blood and tears and debt. Free themselves, and happy among themselves, the Northern people could not understand the degradation of the sentiments or the fierce- ness of the prejudices which Slavery unavoidably and nat- urally engendered. Except in rare cases, they could not comprehend the persecutions to which our Northern: settlers had been subjected in slave-holding and slave- breeding States. Few could be made to believe that liberal ideas, such as we were accustomed to speak of without restraint. and opinions such as we daily inter- changed. were forbidden within the area wherein the crack of the slave-driver's lash found continual echo in the slave- driven's agonized crv. Southern orators. with the cunning of the evil one himself in their hearts, and arguments de- rived from the same father of lies on their lips, had been permitted to come North and pour forth freely the poison of their deliberate and unmitigated fabrications. Among our frank and loval people. unaccustomed to such specious and brazoned falsehoods. they passed for honesty and truth. Few, very few, even of their opponents, who had not been conscientious ear and eve-witnesses of the true state of affairs, could understand that such barefaced perversions of patent facts, that such treasonable wiles, and that such fearfully atrocious misrepresentations, could. indeed. be falsehoods, inexcusable except to minds permeated with disloyalty. treason. hatred to the laborer, to the poor white, to free thonght, to open discussion, filled with contemptu- ous ignorance of the DIGNITY OF LABOR.
Few could be brought to believe at that time when, on. the 2d of December, 1859, HENRY A. WISE ling JOHN BROWN, that the Virginian Governor bung him for a polit- ical object. and not in vindication of the violated laws of bis State. WISE hurried his pre-judged victim to the gallows with such a vindictive hate as to call forth the re- monstrance of one of the wickedest of Northern politicians in the Southern interest. FERNANDO WOOD himself, urged upon HENRY A. WISE the impolicy of the poor old man's
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execution ; but WISE was inexorable. The hanging of JOHN . BROWN was the immolation of a human being to secure political supremacy, and minister to personal eleva- tion. It was the deliberate sacrifice of life to propitiate that class or party who, since the nomination of FREMONT, had adopted as their fundamental principle to rule in the Union, or to destroy the Union. The basis of their plan was Treason : its result was to be. and conld be, nothing less than the overthrow of liberal institutions, the degrada- tion of the. just-now generally acknowledged. dignity of 'free labor, the death-blow to liberty in its last asylum. this our country. this the world's refuge. a New World.
- On the 24 of December. 1859, JOHN BROWN and his as- sociates suffered as felons. Even the reckless Virginian . hotspur did not dare to try them as traitors ; they died like heroes-they perished like martyrs for freedom !
The South, which hoped to profit by their death. by their execution suffered' irretrievable damage. JOHN BROWN, by dying as only heroes and martyrs can die, awoke the North to looking npon slavery in its horrible, blood- stained. innmoral blackness of deformity. The judicial murder of Jons BROWN elected ABRAHAM LINCOLN.
" Cut down his corpse, trample the martyr's mound : But lo ! the seed 's scarce planted in the groundi, When, forth, prolific, sprouting blades appear,
Thousands on thousands in the coming ye .. Whose blosoms, scarlet, Wo are Waste and War ;- From lakes to gulf, from Ocean's shore to shore ;- But as their fruit the world astonished saw Freedom , ecured and reestablished law !"
Our homekeeping Northern rural population. and still unawakened Northern masses, could not see through this atrocious plot. or imagine the extent of its deep-laid prep- aration. One thing, however, the majority proved that they could understand. From their boyhood up they felt that they were free men and free men's children. They knew that they were citizens of a great country. and they had learned to love and honor their free Fatherland. That country had an emblem, appropriate and indicative, and they loved and honored that emblem. That emblem, or symbol of our Might and Rights, was our Flag-the Na- tional banner-" Old Glory !" as the soldiers termed it. Well might they term it " Old Glory." for its short-lived history of eighty-four years had crowded into its pages a long-lived succession of glories such as centuries npon centuries of existence had not accumulated in the annals of any other nationality. Well might the poet pour forth his enthusiastic salutation to that flag. the first banner which ever waved over a truly free people :
" Flag of the free heart's hope and home, By angel hands to valor given ; Thy stars have lit the welkin dome And all the hues were born in heaven !
. And fixed as sonder orb divine.
That'saw thy banneied blaze unfurled, -
Shall the proud stars resplendent shine, The guard and glory of the world !"
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New as the fact may be to many present. the National banner. as we now behold it, was not, however, the flag il r which the Signers of our Declaration of Indepen- dence deliberated and resolved, or the first opening cam- paiens fof 1776-1777) of the Revolution were fought. Its galaxy of stars, significant of harmony. and its alternation of stripes, indicative of purity and valor, the whole ex- pressive of an everlasting union, like that of a heavenly "stellation-equality of rights, purity of intention. and invincible determination to defend all that of which our flag is emblematical-were not conceived. and combined, and adopted. until nearly a year after our Independence had been declared.
The Stripes and the Colors. it is true, had long since Iwen connected with New England and New York. The settlers of New England, east of the Connecticut, brothers. cotemporaries. or descendants of the men who establided England's invincible commonwealth, sailed 166 years ago under a flag of thirteen stripes, exactly like our own, with a ral cross in the field instead of the stars ; and the settlers of the New Netherlands, west of the Con- nectient. sprung from the loins of the indomitable free citizens of the United States or Provinces, commonly known to ns as Holland. marched, conquered and navi- gratul under the same ; Red. White and Blue," disposed in horizontal stripes.
But it was under the folds and colors of a similar repre- sentative flag. bearing the same relation to " Old Glory " which the child bears to the man, that from Bunker's Hill to the cast. and at Quebec to the farthest north. a WARREN from Massachusetts. and a MONTGOMERY from this very town, fought like heroes and died like the martyrs, to whose honor Red Hook has contributed and raised a memorial.
" Here, glorious WARREN, thy cold earth was seen, Here spring thy laurels in immortal green ; Dearest of chiefs that ever prest the plain
In Freedom's canse, with earthly bonors slain ; Still dear in dea'h, as when before our sight You graced the Senate or vou let the fight.
The grateful Muse shail tell the world your fame, And unborn realms resound. the deathless name."
There the revolutionary soldier and general of Red Hook,
" With enger look. conspicuous o'r the crowd And port majestic, brave MONTGOMERY strode, Bired his triel binde, with honor's call elate, Claim'd the first field and hasten'd to bis fate."
Under a like representative flag WASHINGTON, from once honorable but lately traitorous Old Dominion. and honest. unselfish. tower-like SCHUYLER, from the neighbor- ing County of Albany. who saved our State in 1777. had won imperishable honor, an I fulti led the highest duties of . patriots, soldiers. statesmen and citizens.
On the 14th of June. 1777. eighty-nine years ago, the Stars and Stripes were born.
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" Old Glory " first saw light on that never-to-be-forgotten 14th of October. 1777, when on the shores of our own ma- jestic river the sun looked down upon the greatest triunph ever achieved by freemen over oppressors-upon the greatest success ever won by a citizen soldiery over vet- erans and barbarian allies.
The Stars and Stripes were first unfurled to float over the " Surrender of Saratoga.".
" When sad BURGOYNE, in one disastrous day, See future crowns and former wreaths decar, His banners furled, his long battalions wheel'd To pile their muskets on the battle-field."
This incomparable success. the thirteenth decisive vic- tory in the history of human progress, won for us the al- liance nud assistance of France. This capture of the magnificent royal army determined the fate or result of the Revolution, and set up for ever in a blaze of glory the pil- lars of our nationality.
But, friends and neighbors, when I thus call your atten- tion to that Surrender of BURGOYNE. it is not alone for the purpose of announcing to you the first display of the national flag. That triumph is one of the brightest among the many military achievements of this, our, the EMPIRE STATE. The military sagacity and calm common sense of a New York general and farmer. PHILIP SCHUYLER. and the fearless tenacity of New York farmers and woodsmen troops so checked and harassed BURGOYNE that the latter, an able commander. felt he was whipped long before he reached, and fought, and laid down his arms at Saratoga.
--- " Those gallant yeoman " New York's " peculiar and appropriate sons, Known in no other land. Each boasts his hearth And field as free as the best lord his barony, Owing subjection to no human vassalage Sare to their "God " and law. Hence they are resolute Leading the van on every day of battle, As men who know the blessings they defend.
New York troops bore the burden and heat of the day, and although New England co-operated, nobly co-operated, and helped to complete the work, our deliberate New York leader and onr sturdy New York men paved the way to success and insured it, hoping against hope, but never re- laxing their efforts : compelhng fortune by their indomita- ble-tenacity and laborious energy, their self-sacrificing patriotic determination.
....
---** Such were SARATOGA's victors-such The Yeoman Brave. whose deeds and death have given A glory to her skies, A music to her name "
Yes, it is a proud thing for New Yorkers to be able to say, pointing to our Stars and Stripes, that the Flag made in pursuance of the resolution of Congress of the 14th of June, 1777, made public on the 3d of September. 1777, first gave its Stripes to the caresses of the winds. and its . Stars to kindle in the sun on New York soil. on that de- cisive day winch was the baptismal epoch of these free
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United States of America. And New York State has proved worthy of the honor, for she sent forth 473.443 (500.000 to 600,000, B. M. S. Alby) men to maintain, preserve, restore, and consolidate the Union.
Thenceforward in every quarter and in every colony it was equally the emblem of Liberty and of Victory. WASH- INGTON perfected his great work under it at the North, "and in the Centre. and under the same " Old Glory,"
" GREKNE rose beside him emulous in arms, Ilie genius brightning as the danger warms, In counsel great, in every science skill'd, l'ride of the camp and terror of the field,"
and completed the deliverance of the South.
Meanwhile, in the midst. that same glorious banner witnessed at the same point where MCCLELLAN commenced bis inglorious career. that Surrender of Yorktown which should have inspired him or any other Northern leader with the force and will to enmlate the wisdom. the energy and the success of that Father of his Country, who. on the banks of the York River, 19th of October, 1781, saw England's ablest general and best veteran army, lay down its arms before our Continental Line and farmer-soldiers. The war-worn English banners saw,
· " Flags from the forts and ensigns from the fleet,"-
which had waved over so many conquests and victories, and had ruled through so many centuries,
" Roll in the dust and at "'olumbia's feet."
" Here Albion's crimson cross the soil o'erspreads, Her Lion crouches and her Thistle fades ; Indignant Erin rues her trampled Lyre, Brunswick's pale Steed forgets his foamy fire, Proud Hessia's Castle lies in dust o'erthrown, And venal Anspach quits her broken crown."
Banners invested with the glories of seventeen hundred years, bowed in defeat and capitulation, to that new-born Flag exactly four years old.
. Need I more than refer to the Second War of In- dependence so full of honors to that dear old flag, young in years, but old in triumphs. Did it not float over PIKE, dying in the arms of victory, at Little York (now Toronto), (27th April, 1813) ; over the invincible BACKUS, at Sackett's Harbor, on Lake Ontario (29th May, 1813); over PERRY, on Lake Erie (10th Septem- ber, 1813): and over HARRISON, at the Thames (5th October, 1813) : over SCOTT, at Chippetca (5th July, 1814), where iny uncle GEORGE. WATTS, of the Dra- goous, preserved a life so valnable to his, our coun- try; over " I'll try-sir !" MILLER, at Lundy's Lane (25th July, 1814) ; over the indomitable BROWN, at Fort Erie (3d Angust-21st September, 1814); over IZARD, MACOMB and Woor, victorious at Plattsburgh (1st-12th September. 1814), over the British Gen- eral. PREVOST, envious of succeeding where BUR- GOYNE had failed ; over the glorious MACDONOUGH, the second victor in a combat of fleets on Lake Cham-
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plain (11th September, 1814) ; over "OLD HICKORY." at New Orleans (8th January, 1815); and over the fearless ARMISTEAD, at Baltimore, to whose gallant de- fence of Fort Mellenry (13th September, 1814,) the country owes that gem of National songs, the "Star- Spangled Banner.'
Yes, indeed, " Old Glory !" Through ifty years of triumph, at New Orleans, at the farthest Soath ; in Mexico, at the Aztce capital : at Buena Vista in the wild, midland gorges of the Continent; and in Cali- fornia, at the farthest West ; a JACKSON. a SCOTT. a. TAYLOR and a KEARNY had fought and conquered in the light of its stars. And then, within five years at Springfield (10th August, 1861), at the West: at Stannah, on the Tennessee (about April, 1862), at Chantilly, at the East (1st September, 1862); and before Atlanta, at the South (22d July, 1864) : a Lyos. a SMITH, a STEVENS and another KEARNY and a MePnEnsos had fought like heroes, and had die I like soldiers under its folds.
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