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VIEW OF ALBANY FROM BATH .
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U.s ANNALS OF ALBANY. ug
BY JOEL MUNSELL.
VOL II.
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SECOND EDITION.
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SEEN BY PRESERVATION SERVICES
DATE
ALBANY :
JOEL MUNSELL, 82 STATE STREET. 1870.
D
OF TORONTO
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1 89 UNIVERSITY
PREFACE.
A second edition of this volume of the Annals of Albany having been called for, opportunity has been taken to in- troduce a large portion of the city records belonging to this period, that are missing in the volumes at the chamberlain's office, but which exist in the state archives at Hartford, Conn., where they were probably conveyed by Robert Liv- · ingston, in the time of the troubles with Leisler. They were found and translated by Dr. E. B. O'Callaghan, and published in the Documentary History of New York. There are still other important documents at Hartford, that belong to our city records, which remain unpublished. An omission has been made of the portion of Dutch church baptisms which was in the first edition, because they will be more perfectly printed, entire, either in a separate volume, or in a future volume of the Historical Collections of Albany, which is published in continuation of this series of annals. A more complete index than the one in the first edition has been made. Otherwise than in these particulars, the contents of the volume have been very little changed.
April, 1870.
CONTENTS.
Page.
Wampum,
1
Colony of Rensselaerswyck, .. 8
Description of Albany, and manners of the inhabitants, 48
Return of Abercrombie's army, . 55
Charter of the city of Albany, 56
The city records, . 82
Glossary, 270
Philip Pietersen Schuyler, 272
Commission of Gerrit Swart of Rensselaerswyck, : 273
A governor's marriage license, 1732, . 277 Indian disturbances, 278
The Fuyck, . 279
Form of oath to the patroon, 280
Game, .
281
List of freeholders in the city of Albany and manor of Rensse- laerswyck, 282
Notes from the newspapers, 1771-1790, 284
Lancasterian school, 304
Ancient funeral custom, 307
The Dutch language, 308.
Dutch names for Albany and vicinity, 311
Origin of Yankee Doodle, 312
Salmon in the Hudson river, 314
Castle island, .
316
Indian names of Albany and vicinity, 317
Dutch names for the fish in our river, 319
Albany Academy medals, 320
Annals for the year 1849-50, 324
Statistics : city finances, 355
assessor's valuation, 360
vi
Illustrations.
Page.
The mayor's statement on the financial condition of the city, 362 Taxes for city government, 364
Pauperism in Albany, 365 366
Comparison of taxes for 1849 and 1850, .
Albany and Schenectady rail road, 367
Albany and West Stockbridge rail road, 368
Basin excavation, 368
Barley trade of Albany, 369
Hills and Creeks, . 370 Index, 371
ILLUSTRATIONS.
View of Albany,
frontispiece.
Wampum, . 1
Peter Stuyvesant, 13
Jeremias Van Rensselaer, 47
St. Peter's church (Episcopal), . 48
Pieter Schuyler, . 64
View of portion of North Market Street, 287
Title page first Albany almanac, 290
Lancasterian school, 304
Salmon of the Hudson, 314
Caldwell mathematical medal, 321
Van Rensselaer classical medal, 322
James H. Armsby, president County Medical Society, . 351
ANNALS OF ALBANY.
WAMPUM.
This article, more frequently called sewant in the pages which follow, particularly in the old city records, is said to be derived from wampi,' signifying in the Massachusetts Indian language, white, the color of the shells most frequent in wampum belts. It was strung, and sometimes formed into a broad belt, to be worn as an ornament. One of the sea coast terms of the Algonquins for this article was peag,2 and it is frequently called wampumpeage. It was the first money in use in New Netherland and in New England.3 Seawant was the generic name of this Indian money, of which there were two kinds ; wompam, commonly written wampum, which signifies white, and suckhanock, sucki sig- nifying black. Wampum or white money, was originally made from the stem or stock of the meteanhock or periwin- kle ; suckhannock, or black money, was made from the in- side of the shell of the quahaug, commonly called the hard clam. Specimens of a similar article are numerous in the Indian cemeteries of this state, formed of bone and mineral. The material from which the figure here given is copied, is the red pipe- so much valued; it itudinally, and was
stone of the west, is perforated long- evidently worn about the neek and breast, like the modern article of wam -. The Indians had various kinds of ornaments strung
pum.
1 Encyclopedia Americana, article Wampum.
John Josselyn says : " Their beads are their money ; of these there are two sorts, blue and white ; the first is their gold, the last their silver. These they work out of shells so cunningly, that neither Jew nor devil can counterfeit them."- Old Indian Chronicle, 58. Schoolcraft's Notes on the Iroquois, p. 244.
$ Gabriel Furman, in Gowans's Bibliotheca Americana, 1, 42. Annals, ii. 1
2
Wampum.
in a like manner, some of which were worn for a defense against witchcraft. This, also, was formed of the red pipe- stone of the Coteau du Prairie, west of the Mississippi, and its disinterment from Indian graves in the state of New York, denotes an early traffic or exchange of the article, Mr. Schoolcraft thinks. Other species, assuming a great variety of shapes, and formed of as many kinds of material, including native copper, seem to have been worn with the object of producing a jingling sound, or to inspire fear by the tread.
The manufacture of wampum by the Indians, before the appearance of Europeans, was necessarily laborious, with the rude implements which they employed. They broke off about half an inch of the purple color of the inside of the shell, and converted it into beads.1 These before the intro- duction of awls and thread, were bored with sharp stones, and strung upon the sinews of animals, and when inter- woven to the breadth of the hand, more or less, were called a belt of seawant, or wampum. A black bead, of the size of a large straw, about one-third of an inch long, bored longi- tudinally and well polished, was the gold of the Indians, and always esteemed of twice the value of the white; but either species was considered by them, of much more value than European coin. An Indian chief, to whom the value of a rix dollar was explained by the first clergyman of Rens- selaerswyck, laughed exceedingly to think the Dutch should set so high a value upon a piece of iron, as he termed the dollar. Three beads of black, and six of white, were equi- valent, among the English, to a penny, and among the Dutch to a stuyver. But with the latter the equivalent sometimes varied, depending upon the finishing of the seawant. Sea- want was also sometimes made from the common oyster shell, and both kinds made from the hard clam shell.
The use of wampum was not known in New England un- til it was introduced there in 1627, by Isaac De Razier, se- cretary of New Netherland, while on an embassy there to settle a treaty of amity and commerce between the two colo- nies. He carried with him wampum and goods, and with them purchased corn. To this introduction of wampum into New England, Hubbard attributes all their wars with the
Gowans's Bibliotheca Americana, 1, 42.
3
Wampum.
Indians which afterwards ensued. "Whatever were the honey in the mouth of that beast of trade, there was a deadly sting in the tail. For it is said they (the Dutch) first brought our people to the knowledge of wampum-peag; and the ac- quaintance therewith occasioned the Indians of these parts to learn the skill to make it, by which, as by the exchange of money, they purchased store of artillery, both from the English, Dutch and French, which proved a fatal business to those that were concerned in it." 1
Although the general distinction of this seawant was black and white, yet that in use in New England was black, blue and white ; and that of the Iroquois of a purple color.2
1 Hubbard's History of New England. -
2 Wampum is a sort of a shell found on the New York coast ; they are burgos or periwinkles, some of which are white, others violet, verging towards black. The white are of little value ; the violet more in demand, and the more they incline to black the higher are they esteemed. Wampum, for state affairs, is shaped into small cylinders, a quarter of an inch long, and proportionably thick. They are worked into two forms, strings and belts. The strings consist of cylinders strung, without any order, one after an- other, like the beads of a rosary. The belts are wide sashes, in which the white and purple beads are arranged in rows and tied by little leathern strings, whereof a very pretty tissue is formed. Their length, width and color are in proportion to the importance of the affair to be negotiated. Ordinary belts consist of twelve rows of 180 beads each.
These belts and strings of wampum are the universal agent among the Indians, serving as money, jewelry, ornaments, annals, and for registers ; 'tis the bond of nations and individuals; an in- violable and sacred pledge which guaranties messages, promises and treaties. As writing is not in use among them, they make a local memoir by means of these belts, each of which signifies a particular affair, or a circumstance of affairs. The chiefs of the villages are the depositaries of them, and communicate them to the young peo- ple, who thus learn the history and engagements of their nation.
In addition to the name gaionne, which is most used to signify these belts, the Indians gave them, also, that of garihoua, which means, an affair ; that of guauenda, as a speech or message, and gaianderensera, which implies greatness or nobility, because chiefs only are competent for the great affairs treated by belts ; they it is who furnish the belts and strings, and it is among them that they are divided, whenever presents are made to the villages and an- swers are given to the speeches of ambassadors .- Doc. Col. Hist., x, 556, note.
4
Wampum.
A string of this shell money, one fathom long, varicd in price from five shillings, among the New Englanders, to four guilders among the Dutch, or one dollar and sixty-six and a half cents of our present currency. The process of trade was this ; the Dutch and English sold for seawant to the Indians of the interior, their awls, knives, combs, scis- sors, needles, looking-glasses, hatchets, guns, black cloth, and other articles of aboriginal traffic, and with the seawant bought the furs, corn and venison from the Indians on the seaboard, who also with their shell money bought such arti- cles from the aborigines residing farther inland ; and by this course the white men saved the trouble of transporting their furs and grain through the country. Thus, by this circu- lating medium a brisk commerce was carried on, not only be- tween the white people and the Indians, but also between different tribes among the latter. So much was this the circulating medium, that the colonial governments found it necessary to make regulations on the subject. In 1641 Gov. Kieft and his council, in view of the fact that a vast. deal of bad seawant, " nasty rough things imported from other places, " was in circulation, while the " good, splendid sea- want, usually called Manhattan's seawant, was out of sight, or exported, which must cause the ruin of the country !" therefore, in order to remedy the evil, it was ordained that all coarse seawant, well stringed, should pass at six for one stuyver only, but the well polished at four for a stuyver, and whoever offered or received the same, at a different price, should forfeit the same, and also ten guilders to the poor.
The Connecticut Code of 1650 ordained " That no peage, white or black, bee paid or received, but what is strunge and in some measure strunge sutably, and not small and great, uncomely and disorderly mixt, as formerly it hath beene."
Massachusetts colony passed a law in 1648, declaring that wampumpeag should pass current in the payment of debts to the amount of forty shillings; the white at eight for a penny, and the black at four for a penny, "if entire, without breaches or spots ; except in payment of county rates to the treasurer." This law was repealed in 1661, yet seawant continued to form a part of the circulating medium of the colony for a long period afterward.
5
Wampum.
The wampum currency appears sometimes to have been measured by the fathom, in New England. The Pequot Indians, in the year 1656, paid as a tribute to the united colonies of New England 215 fathoms of wampum ; of which amount Thomas Stanton, the agent among the Indians, was paid 120 fathoms for his salary, and the remaining 95 fa- thoms, together with 51 fathoms at New Haven, in all 146 fathoms, was divided among the united colonies, according to the number of males enumerated in the year 1655, in the following manner, being the first distribution of public mo- neys in the good old time of our history.
To Massachusetts, 94 fathoms.
Plymouth,
18 fathoms.
Connecticut,
20 fathoms.
New Haven, 13 fathoms.
The governor and council in the city of New York, in 1673, made an order, declaring that by reason of the scarcity of wampum, that which had hitherto passed at the rate of eight white and four black pairs, for a stuyver or penny, should then pass at six white and three black pairs for a stuyver, " and three times so much the value of silver." At this period there was little " certain coin in the govern- ment " of N. York, and wampum readily passed as change for current payment in all cases. This seawant, or wam- pum, was the only Indian money ever known in North America ; it was not only the money of the Indians, but also the ornament of their persons. It distinguished the rich from the poor, the proud from the humble. It was the tribute paid by the vanquished to those, the Five Nations for instance, who had exacted contribution. In the form of a belt it was sent with all public messages between the Indian tribes, and preserved as a record of all public trans- actions among the aboriginal people. If a message was sent without the belt, it was considered an empty word, unworthy of remembrance. If the belt was returned it was a rejec- tion of the offer or proffer accompanying it. If accepted it was a confirmation, and strengthened friendship, or effaced injuries. These shells, indeed, had more virtue among the Indians, than pearls, gold and silver had among Europeans. Seawant was the seal of a contract, the oath of fidelity. It satisfied murders, and all other injuries, purchased peace,
6
· Wampum.
and entered into the religious as well as the civil ceremonies of the aborigines. A string of seawant was delivered by the orator in public council, at the close of every distinct proposition made to others, as a ratification of the truth and sincerity of what he said, and the white and black strings of seawant were tied by the pagan priest, around the neck. of the white dog suspended to a pole, and offered as a sacri- fice to Thaloughyawaagon, the upholder of the skies, the god of the Five Nations.1
The article continued to be manufactured in different parts of the state of New York until a comparatively recent period. Smith2 mentions, that a short time previous to writing his work, several poor families at Albany made their living by its manufacture. Burnaby 3 mentions that in jour- neying from Philadelphia to New York, he passed through Staten Island, and had an opportunity of seeing the method of making wampum, the process of which he thus describes ; " It is first chipped to a proper size, which is that of a small oblong parallelopiped, then drilled, and afterwards ground to a round smooth surface and polished. The purple wam- pum is much more valuable than the white ; a very small part of the shell being of that color." In the summer of 1831, several bushels of wampum were brought from Baby- lon, on Long Island, and the person who had them, stated that he had procured them for an Indian trader, and was in the habit of supplying those traders with wampum. The best wampum is at this day manufactured on Long Island, to be sent to the western states and territories, for the purpose both of a circulating medium, and of conventions and treaties. 4
Wampum is also manufactured at the present day in Ber- gen county, New Jersey, for the Indian traders of the far west.5 It has been manufactured by the females of that re- gion from very early times, of the thick and blue part of the sea-clam shell. The process is simple, but requires a skill at- tained only by long practice. The intense hardness and brittleness of the material render it impossible to produce
See Yates and Moulton's History of New York.
2 History of the Province of New York.
3 Travels through the Middle Colonies in North America, 1760.
4 Gowans's Bibliotheca Americana, I, 41.
5 Barber and Howe's Historical Collections of New Jersey, p. 72.
7
Wampum.
the article by machinery alone. It is done by wearing or grinding the shell. The first process is to split off the thin part with a light sharp hammer. Then it is clamped in the sawed crevice of a slender stick, held in both hands, and ground smooth on a grindstone, until formed into an eight- sided figure, of about an inch in length, and nearly half an inch in diameter, when it is ready for boring. The shell then is inserted into another piece of wood, sawed similarly to the above, but fastened firmly to a bench of the size of a common stand. One part of the wood projects over the bench, at the end of which hangs a weight, causing the sawed orifice to close firmly upon the shell inserted on its under side, and to hold it firmly, as in a vice, ready for drilling. The drill is made from an untempered handsaw. The operator grinds the drill to a proper shape, and tempers it in the flame of a candle. A rude ring, with a groove on its circum- ference, is put on it; around which the operator, who is seated in front of the fastened shell, curls the string of a common hand-bow. The boring commences, by nicely ad- justing the point of the drill to the centre of the shell ; while the other end is braced against a steel plate, on the breast of the operator. About every other sweep of the bow, the drill is dexterously drawn out, cleaned of the shelly particle by the thumb and finger, above which drops of water from a vessel fall down and cool the drill; which is still kept revolv- ing, by the use of the bow with the other hand, the same as though it were in the shell. This operation of boring is the most difficult of all, the peculiar motion of the drill rendering it hard for the breast; yet it is performed with a rapidity and grace interesting to witness. Peculiar care is observed, lest the shell burst from heat caused by friction. When bored half way, the wampum is reversed, and the same opera- tion repeated. The next process is the finishing. A wire
about twelve inches long is fastened at one end to a bench. Under and parallel to the wire is a grindstone, fluted on its circumference, hung a little out of the centre, so as to be turned by a treadle moved with the foot. The left hand grasps the end of the wire, on which is strung the wampum, and as it were, wraps the beads around the fluted or hollow circum- ference of the grindstone. While the grindstone is revoling, the beads are held down on to it, and turned round by a flat
8
Wampum.
piece of wood held in the right hand, and by the grinding soon become round and smooth. They are then strung on hempen strings, about a foot in length. From five to ten strings are a day's work for a female. They are sold to the country merchants for twelve and a half cents a string, always command cash, and constitute the support of many poor and worthy families.
The value of sewant about 1660, in Rensselaerswyck, in payment of taxes, was twelve white and six black to the stuyver, which is a little less than two cents.
The collections in the church were mostly in sewant, of which they had in the treasury at one time about 13,000 guilders in amount. It was a depreciated currency, however; a guilder in sewant being but about twelve and one-half cents in gold, or about one-third of a guilder, which was nearly forty cents.
9
Colony of Rensselaerswyck.
COLONY OF RENSSELAERSWYCK. [From O' Callaghan's History of New Netherland, Vol. 2.]
1646 to 1664.
Johannes Van Rensselaer, heir to the patroonship of Rens- selaerswyck, being a minor at his father's decease, the care of his interests devolved on his uncle Johannes Van Wely, and Wouter Van Twiller,1 executors to the last will and testament of the first patroon, who immediately rendered fealty and homage for the colonie to their high mightinesses, in the name and on the behalf of their ward.
The immediate management of this estate was entrusted to Brant Arent Van Slechtenhorst of Nieukerke in Guilderland, who was appointed director of the colonie, president of the court of justice, and superintendent of all the bouweries, farms, mills, and other property belonging to the patroon, at a salary of seven hundred and fifty florins ($300) per an- num, to reckon from the date of his arrival out, together with a house, four milch cows, two horses, four morgens of tillage and four morgens of pasture land. He was specially charged to uphold, maintain and defend the freedoms and privileges with which the colonie was invested, to promote the interests and advance the settlement of Beverwyck and its immediate neighborhood, and to acquire by purchase the lands around Katskill, for the greater security of the colonie, inasmuch as the colonists, through a notion of acquiring pro- perty in that quarter, were forming companies or associations to remove thither and abandon Rensselaerswyck. He was further ordered to explore the country for minerals, and to report to his superiors in Holland whatever success might crown these labors. Thus commissioned and instructed, the newly appointed director sailed with his family and servants for Virginia. He proceeded thence in another vessel to the Manhattans, where he landed after a passage of four months and finally arrived in the colonie in the latter part of March.
1 Van Twiller died in Holland in 1656, or 1657. Van Wely died 19th March, 1679, aged 82 or 83 years.
-
-
10
Colony of Rensselaerswyck.
His son, Gerrit Van Slechtenhorst, was to act as officier or schout-fiscaal, at a salary of six hundred florins ; but he filled the office only two months, when it was merged in that of the director.1
From the moment that colonies began to be planted by patroons in New Netherland, the directors of the Amsterdam Chamber became jealous of their existence and opposed to their continuance. They considered them injurious to the settlement of the country and the increase of its population.2 By the repurchase of Pavonia and Zwanendaal in 1634, they took the earliest means to check the evil. In the prosecution of their policy, they endeavored to induce the patroon of Rensselaerswyck to cede to them his rights, privileges and possessions also; but having failed in effecting this, they now changed front, and determined to circumscribe a jurisdiction and weaken a power which they could not buy off, and which they wished to destroy. Gen. Stuyvesant and Brant Van Slechtenhorst were the champions of these hostile inte- rests and opposing views. The former claimed to be supreme ruler of the whole country, irrespective of the special rights and feudal privileges granted, as well by the charter of 1629, as by the civil law, to the local authorities of independent fiefs. The latter, thoroughly conversant with the immuni- ties claimed for manors and municipalities in continental Eu- rope, recognized the exercise of no authority within his limits save that of his patroon, or such as was approved and sanctioned by his legal representatives. Whatever orders or placards the director-general might issue were, he maintained, null and powerless, unless so endorsed and countersigned by his commander and executed by the officers of his court. It was easy to foresee that pretensions so opposite could not
1 Gerrit Van Slechtenhorst married Aeltje Lansing, by whom he had four children, viz: Hellegonda, Gerrit, Rachel, and Gouda, He was one of the commissaries of Schenectady in 1672, after which he removed to Kingston, Ulster Co., where he died 9th January, 1684, N. S. The other children of Brant Van Slechtenhorst, were Mar- garet and Alida. The latter was born in Beverwyck, and married Gerrit, son of Goosen Gerritsen Van Schayck, by whom she had no issue. She lost her husband 11th November, 1679, after which she married Pieter Davitse Schuyler, son of David Schuyler.
" Alb. Rec., IV, 199,
11
Colony of Rensselaerswyck.
fail to lead to collision, and Slechtenhorst had not been much more than a month at his post when an explosion took place.
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