A history of Long Island, from its earliest settlement to the present time, Part 116

Author: Ross, Peter. cn
Publication date: 1902
Publisher: New York ; Chicago : The Lewis Publishing Co.
Number of Pages: 1188

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What resistance I made with these four hundred men against the British army, I leave to the officers who were with me to declare. Let it suffice for me to say, that the opposition of the small party lasted from half-past nine to twelve o'clock.

The reason of so few troops being on Long Island was because it was generally supposed that the enemy's Landing there was a feint to draw our troops thither that they might the more easily possess themselves of New York. I often urged, both by word and writing, that, as the enemy had doubtless both these objects in view, they would first try for Long Island, which commanded the other, and then New York, which was completely commanded by it, would fall of course. But in this I was un- happy enough to differ from almost every other officer in the army till the event proved my conjectures were just. JOHN SULLIVAN.

A DEFENCE OF PUTNAM.

The recent publication of an interesting and valuable life of Gen. Israel Putnam by W. F. Livingston has called renewed atten- tion to the hero's share in the disaster to the Continental arms on Long Island. Naturally Mr. Livingston defends Putnam from the charge so often made by contempo- raries and by later historical writers, that his military incapacity and his utter ignorance of civilized military tactics, as well as his reckless personal bravery, cost his coun- try a defeat that for a time made the pros- pects for liberty seem decidedly dark. How- ever, as the late John Fiske pointed out, the wonder is not that 5,000 half-trained soldiers

were defeated by 20,000 veterans, but that they should have given General Howe a hard day's work in defeating them. The new biog- rapher of Putnam accepts the statement of the case made by Prof. Henry P. Johnston : "As for the generalship of the day, if the responsi- bility falls on any one, it falls first on Sullivan, who sent out the mounted patrol in the first instance, and to whom it belonged to follow up the precautions in that direction. Putnam was in chief command, but nothing can be in- ferred from contemporary writers to fasten neglect or blunder upon him any more than upon Washington, who, when he left the Brooklyn lines on the evening of August 26, 1776, must have known precisely what disposi- tion had been made for the night at the hills and passes." Prof. Johnston goes on to say that the situation seems to have been the fol- lowing: "On the night of August 26th we had all the roads guarded. On the morning of the 27th Putnam promptly re-enforced the guards on the lower road when the enemy were announced. The arrangements were such that if an attack was made at any of the other points he and Sullivan were to have word of it in ample time. No word came in time from the left, for the reason that those who were to bring it were captured or surprised or failed of their duty. Hence the disaster. The dis- positions on Long Island were quite as com- plete as those at Brandywine, more than a year later, where we suffered nearly a similar sur- prise and as heavy a loss." Under this state of facts, Prof. Johnston submits that to charge Putnam with the defeat of August 27 is both unjust and unhistorical. No one hinted such a charge at the time; nor did Washington in the least withdraw his confidence from Putnam during the remainder of the campaign.

In May, 1777, Putnam was placed in com- mand of the Hudson Highlands, and contin- ued to occupy this post until the spring of 1778. Here he by no means gave satisfaction to the Commander-in-Chief, and, after being subjected to a court of inquiry, he was super- seded by General McDougall. The author of

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this book concedes that in the Hudson High- lands Putnam's military capacity was put to a severer test than at any previous period of his life. He did not appreciate how critical was the state of affairs at the time. He did not comprehend that Washington must have large re-enforcements from the northern army to prevent Howe from removing the obstructions on the Delaware and opening free communi- cation between Philadelphia and the British shipping. In addition to Hamilton's unfavora- ble report concerning Putnam, General Wash- ington received numerous complaints from in- habitants of New York State who found fault with Putnam's good nature in granting appli- cations for passports to the city. He had shown, it was said, an "overshare of complaisance and indulgence" to Tories, and many of them, un- der the pretence of urgent business, had gone into the city and given valuable information to the British General. Even the fact that Putnam had exchanged newspapers with some of the King's officers 'who had been his com- rades in the French and Indian war was com- plained of. Chancellor Robert R. Livingston, in a letter to Washington, lamented that Put- nam's patriotism would not suffer him to take the repose to which his advanced age entitled him. The Chancellor added: "Unfortunately for him, the current of popular opinion in this and the neighboring States, and, as far as I can learn, in the troops under his command, runs strongly against him."

The judgment of the court of inquiry was favorable to Putnam, who was not reinstated in his command on the Hudson, however, but was ordered to Connecticut to superintend the forwarding of troops.

THE PRISON SHIPS.

General Jeremiah Johnson communicated the following data to the "Naval Magazine" of September, 1836: "The subject of the naval prisoners, and of the British prison ships sta- tioned in the Wallabout during the Revolution, is one which cannot be passed by in silence.

From printed journals published in New York at the close of the war, it appears that eleven thousand five hundred American prisoners had died on board the prison ships. Although the number is very great, still if the number who perished had been less the commissary of na- val prisoners, David Sprout, Esq., and his dep- uty, had it in their power, by an official return, to give the true number exchanged, escaped and dead. Such a return has never appeared in the United States. This man returned to America after the war, and resided in Phila- delphia, where he died. He could not have been ignorant of the statement published here on this interesting subject. We may therefore infer that about that number perished in the prison ships. A large transport, named the "Whitby," was the first prison ship anchored in the Wallabout. She was moored near "Remsen's Mill," about the 20th of October, 1776, and was crowded with prisoners. Many landsmen were prisoners on board this vessel. She was said to be the most sickly of all the prison ships. Bad provisions, bad water and scanted rations were dealt to the prisoners. No medical men attended the sick. Disease reigned unrelieved, and hundreds died from pestilence, or were starved, on board this float- ing prison. I saw the sand-beach between a ravine in the hill and Mr. Remsen's dock be- conic filled with graves in the course of two months ; and before the Ist of May, 1777, the ravine alluded to was itself occupied in the same way. In the month of May of that year two large ships were anchored in the Walla- bout, when the prisoners were transferred from the "Whitby" to them. These vessels were also very sickly, from the causes before stated. Although many prisoners were sent on board of them, and were exchanged, death made room for all. On a Sunday afternoon, about the middle of October, 1777, one of the prison ships was burnt ; the prisoners, except a few, who, it was said, were burnt in the vessel, were removed to the remaining ship. It was reported at the time that the prisoners had fired their prison ; which, if true, proves that they

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preferred death, even by fire, to the lingering sufferings of pestilence and starvation. In the month of February, 1778, the remaining prison ship was burnt at night, when the prisoners were removed from her to the ships then win- tering in the Wallabout. In the month of April, 1778, the "Old Jersey" was moored in the Wallabout, and all the prisoners (except the sick) were transferred to her. The sick were carried to two hospital ships, named the "Hope" and "Falmouth," anchored near each other about two hundred yards east from the "Jersey." These ships remained in the Walla- bout until New York was evacuated by the British. The "Jersey" was the receiving ship -the others, truly, the ships of Death! It has been generally thought that all the prisoners died on board of the "Jersey." This is not true ; many may have died on board of her who were not reported as sick, but all the men who were placed on the sick-list were removed to the hospital ships, from which they were usually taken, sewed up in a blanket, to their long home.

After the hospital ships were brought into the Wallabout, it was reported that the sick were attended by physicians; few, very few, however, recovered. It was no uncommon thing to see five or six dead bodies brought on shore in a single morning ; when a small excavation would be made at the foot of the hill, the bodies be cast in, and a man with a shovel would cover them by shoveling sand down the hill upon them. Many were buried in a ravine on the hill ; some on the farm. The whole shore from Rennie's Point to Mr. Rem- sen's dock-yard was a place of graves ; as were also the slope of the hill near the house, the shore from Mr. Remsen's barn along the mill- pond to Rapelje's farm and the sandy island, between the flood-gates and the mill-dam; while a few were buried on the shore, the east side of the Wallabout. Thus did Death reign here, from 1776 until the peace. The whole Wallabout was a sickly place during the war. The atmosphere seemed to be charged with

foul air from the prison ships, and with the effluvia of the dead bodies washed out of their graves by the tides. We have ourselves ex- amined many of the skulls lying on time shore ; from the teeth, they appear to be the remains of men in the prime of life. A singularly dar- ing and successful escape was effected from the "Jersey" about 4 o'clock one afternoon, in December, 1780. The best boat of the ship had returned from New York, was left fast- ened at the gangway, with the oars on board. It was stormy; the wind blew from the north- cast, and the tide ran flood. A watchword was given, and a number of prisoners placed themselves between the ship's waist and the sentinel ; at this juncture four eastern captains got on board the boat, which was cast off by their friends. The boat passed close under the bows of the ship, and was a considerable distance from her before the sentinel on the forecastle gave the alarm and fired at her. The boat passed Hell Gate, and arrived safe in Connecticut next morning.

Suffice it to say, in conclusion, that here more than eleven thousand American citizens and soldiers perished, many of whose names are unknown, and whose sufferings are buried in oblivion! They lingered where no eye of pity witnessed their agony; no voice adminis- tered consolation ; no tongue could praise their patriotic devotion, or friendly hand be stretched out for their relief. Here to pass the weary day and night, unvaried, except by new scenes of painful endurance and new inflic- tions of hopeless misery. The hope of death was to them the only consolation which their situation afforded.

STORY OF A SURVIVOR OF THE PRISON SHIPS.

The Rev. Thomas Andros, of Berkeley, Massachusetts, was a prisoner on the old bat- tleship "Jersey," and related his experiences in the following graphic words :

"This was an old sixty-four gun ship,. which through age had become unfit for fur --

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ther actual service. She was stripped of every spar and all her rigging. After a battle with a French fleet her lion figurehead was taken away to repair another ship; no appearance of ornament was left, and nothing remained but an old unsightly, rotten hulk. Her dark and filthy external appearance perfectly corres- ponded with the death and despair that reigned within; and nothing could be more foreign from truth than to paint her with colors flying or any circumstance or appendage to please the eye. She was moored at the Wallabout Bay, about three-quarters of a mile to the eastward of Brooklyn Ferry, near a tide-mill on the Long Island shore. The nearest place to land was about twenty rods ; and doubtless no other ship in the British navy ever proved the means of destruction of so many human beings. It is computed that not less than eleven thousand American seamen perished in her. After it was next to certain death to confine a prisoner here, the inhumanity and wickedness of doing it was about the same as if he had been taken to the city and deliberately shot in some public square; but, as if mercy had fled from the earth, here we were doomed to dwell. And never, while I was on board, did any Howard or angel of pity appear, to inquire into or alle- viate our woes. Once or twice, by the order of a stranger on the quarter deck, a bag of apples was hurled promiscuously into the midst of hundreds of prisoners, crowded together as thick as they could stand, and life and limbs were endangered by the scramble. This, in- stead of compassion, was a cruel sport. When I saw it about to commence I fled to the most distant part of the ship.

"On the commencement of the first evening we were driven down to darkness, between decks secured by iron gratings and an armed soldiery, and a scene of horror which baffles all description presented itself. On every side wretched, desponding shapes of men could be seen. Around the well-room an armed guard were forcing up the prisoners to the winches to clear the ship of water and prevent her

sinking; and little else could be heard but a roar of mutual execrations, reproaches and insults. During this operation there was a small, dim light admitted below, but it served to make darkness more visible, and horror more terrific. In my reflections I said this must be a complete image and anticipation of hell. Milton's description of the dark world rushed upon my mind :-

'Sights of woe, regions of horror doleful, 'Shades where peace and rest can never dwell.'

"If there was any principle among the pris- oners that could not be shaken, it was their love of country. I knew no one to be seduced into the British service. They attempted to force one of our prize-brig's crew into the navy, but he chose rather to die than to per- form any duty, and was again restored to the prison-ship.

"When I first became an inmate of this abode of suffering, despair and death, there were about four hundred prisoners on board; but in a short time they amounted to twelve hundred, and in proportion to our numbers the mortality increased. All the most deadly diseases were pressed into the service of the king of terrors, but his prime ministers were dysentery, small-pox and yellow fever. There were two hospital ships near to the old 'Jer- sey,' but these were soon so crowded with the sick that they could receive no more. The consequence was that the diseased and the healthy were mingled together in the main ship. In a short time we had two hundred or more sick and dying lodged in the fore part of the lower gun deck, where all the prisoners were confined at night. Utter de- rangement was a common symptom of yellow fever ; and, to increase the horror of the dark- ness that shrouded us (for we were allowed no light betwixt decks), the voice of warning would be heard, 'Take heed to yourselves ! There is a madman stalking through the ship with a knife in his hand!' I sometimes found

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the man a corpse in the morning by whose side I laid myself down at night. At an- other time he would become deranged and attempt, in the darkness, to rise, and stumble over the bodies that everywhere covered the the deck. In this case I had to hold him in his place by main strength. In spite of my efforts he would sometimes rise, and then I had to close in with him, trip up his heels and lay him again upon the deck. While so many were sick with raging fever there was a loud cry for water ; but none could be had except on the upper deck, and but one al- lowed to ascend at a time. The suffering then from the rage of thirst during the night was very great. Nor was it at all times safe to attempt to go up. Provoked by the continual cry for leave to ascend, when there was one al- ready on deck, the sentry would push them back with his bayor et. By one of these thrusts, which was more spiteful and violent than com- mon, I had a narrow escape of my life. In the morning the hatchways were thrown open and we were allowed to ascend, all at once, and remain on the upper deck during the day. But the first object that met our view was an appalling spectacle-a boat loaded with dead bodies conveying them to the Long Isl- and shore, where they were slightly covered with sand. I sometimes used to stand and count the number of times the shovel was filled with sand to cover a dead body; and certain I am that a few high tides or torrents of rain must have disinterred them, and had they not been removed I should suppose the shore even now would be covered with huge piles of the bones of American seamen."

"There were probably four hundred on board who had never had the small-pox. Some perhaps might have been saved by in- oculation, but humanity was wanting to try even this experiment. Let our disease be what it would, we were abandoned to our fate. Now and then an American physician was brought in as a captive, but if he could ob- tain his parole he left the ship; nor could we

blame him for this, for his own death was next to certain and his success in saving others by medicine in our situation was small. I remember only two American physicians who tarried on board a few days. No Eng- lish physician, or any one from the city, ever, to my knowledge, came near us. There were thirteen of the crew to which I belonged, but in a short time all died but three or four. The most healthy and vigorous were first seized with the fever and died in a few hours. For them there seemed to be no mercy. My con- stitution was less muscular and plethoric, and I escaped the fever longer than any of the thirteen except one, and the first onset was less violent."

Another survivor of these horrors, Cap- tain Dring, wrote regarding the burial of the dead from the hulk:

"After landing at a low wharf, which had been built from the shore, we first went to a small hut which stood near the wharf, and was used as a place of deposit for the hand- barrows and shovels provided for these occa- sions. Having placed the corpses on the hand-barrows, and received our hoes and shovels, we proceeded to a bank near the Wallabout. Here a vacant space having been selected, we were directed to dig a trench in the sand of a proper length to receive the bod- ies. We continued our labor till our guards considered that a proper space had been ex- cavated. The corpses were then laid into the trench without ceremony, and we threw sand over them. The whole appeared to produce no more impression on our guards than if we were burying the bodies of dead animals in- stead of men. They scarcely allowed us time to look about us ; for no sooner had we heaped the earth above the trench than the order was given to march. But a single glance was suf- ficient to show us parts of many bodies which were exposed to view; although they had probably been placed there, with the same mockery of interment, but a few days before. Having thus performed, as well as we were

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permitted to do it, the last duty to the dead, and the guards having stationed themselves on each side of us, we began reluctantly to re- trace our steps to the boat. We had enjoyed the pleasure of breathing for a few moments the air of our native soil, and the thought of returning to the crowded prison-ship was ter- rible in the extreme. As we passed by the water's side we implored our guards to allow us to bathe, or even to wash ourselves for a few minutes ; but this was refused us. I was the only prisoner of our party who wore a pair of shoes; and well recollect the circumstance that I took them from my feet for the pleas- ure of feeling the earth, or rather the sand, as I went along. It was a high gratification to us to bury our feet in the sand and to shove them through it, as we passed on our way. We went by a small patch of turf, some pieces of which we tore up from the earth and ob- tained permission to carry them on board for our comrades to smell them! * * * Having arrived at the hut we there deposited our im- plements and walked to the landing-place, where we prevailed on our guards, who were Hessians, to allow us the gratification of re- maining nearly half an hour before we re- entered the boat.

"Near us stood a house, occupied by a miller ; and we had been told that a tide-mill, which he attended, was in the immediate vicinity, as a landing place for which the wharf where we stood had been erected. It would have afforded me a high degree of pleasure to have been permitted to enter this dwelling, the probable abode of harmony and peace. It was designated by the prisoners by the appellation of the 'Old Dutchman's,' and its very walls were viewed by us with feelings of veneration, as we had been told that the amiable daughter of its owner had kept a reg- ular account of the number of bodies which had been brought on shore for interment from the Jersey and the hospital ships. This could easily be done in the house, as its windows commanded a fair view of the landing place.

We were not, however, gratified on this occa- sion, either by the sight of herself or of any other inmate of the house. Sadly did we ap- proach and re-enter our foul and disgusting place of confinement. The pieces of turf which we carried on board were sought for by our fellow-prisoners with the greatest avidity, every fragment being passed by them from hand to hand, and its smell inhaled, as if it had been a fragrant rose."

FURMAN'S LIST OF ANCIENT NAMES OF PLACES.

Gabriel Furman, writing in the year 1824, gives the following list of ancient names upon Long Island, with the dates affixed opposite to them, of the time when they were used, viz .;

IN THE TOWN OF BROOKLYN.

1667. Gowanus, which still retains the same name.

1667. Cripplebush, which still retains the same name.

1686. Wallaboght, which still retains the same name.

1686. Marchwick, and in 1722 called Mar- tyr's' Hook, which was the point of land forming the present United States Navy Yard.

1689. Lubbertse's Neck, which was sold by Peter Corsen to Cornelius Sebringh, March 28, 1698, for £250, and Sebringh to find Corsen in meat, drink, washing, lodging, and apparel during his life. In 1690 the same place was called Graver's Kill. This place was recently known as Cornell's Red Mills, and is about five hundred feet north of the Atlantic dock.

1700. Gowanus Mill Neck, sometimes called Mill Neck, and known by this latter name in 1785. In 1680, a lot of land in this town was called an Erffe.

About the period of the Revolution the people were in the habit of distinguishing the large lots into which their farms or planta- tions were divided, by particular names, and these names they retained for many years. Thus in this town, near the road leading from Brooklyn Ferry to Flatbush, were the "Geele Water's Caump," the "Erste Caump of Der-

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rick's land," the "Kline Caump," the "Twede Caump of Derrick's land," the "Middleste Caump," the "Benen Caump," and the "Ag- terse Caump."

IN THE TOWN OF MIDWOUT, OR FLATBUSH.

1660 Canarsee Landing, Canarsee Woods, which places still retain the same names.

1679 Third Kill.

1687. Minsehoele Hole.

1698. Rush Swamp.

IN THE TOWN OF BUSHWICK.

1690. The Norman Kill.

IN THE TOWN OF AMERSFORT, OR FLATLANDS.

1636. Kaskutensukin, the westernmost flat of land of the three flats.

1646. Mutelar's Island.

1687. Stroom Kill.

1687. Jurianses Hook.

. 1687. Fries Hook.

1690. Hogg's Neck.

1694. Albertse's Island.

1695. Mayise land.

1704. Fresh Kill.

17II. Bestevaar's Kill.

1712. Craven Valley.

IN THE TOWN OF NEW UTRECHT.

1660. Nayack, which name it still retains.

1685. The Fountain at Yellow Hook.

1600. Turk's Plantation, afterwards called Bruynenbergh.

IN THE TOWN OF GRAVESEND.

1692. Hoogh Penne Neck.

1693. Gysbert's' Island.

1695. Ambrose Strand.

1697. Garretsen's Neck.

1698. Cellars Neck.

I704. Great Woods.

1718. Harbie's Gat.

1718. Brown's Creek.

1718. Robin Poyneer's Patent.

IN THE TOWN OF NEWTON.

1656. The west branch of Mespatt Kills, called Quandus Quaricus.

Dosoris, the name of a place on this island, has its origin from the circumstance of the original owner of it, as a farm, or plantation,

having obtained it through his wife, and he be- ing a scholar, called it Dos Uxoris, the Wife's Gift, which the people subsequently corrupted to its present name of Dosoris.

Quogue, in Suffolk county, is probably a corruption of the Indian name of a favorite shell-fish known to us as the clam, Quohaug- these shell-fish having been very abundant, and probably of a choice kind, as is indicated by the immense ancient shell banks in all the sır- rounding region. At this place is the only point from which the Great South Beach can be reached on foot from the mainland of the island, for the immense stretch of coast reach- ing from Fire Island to the inlet of Shinecoc Bay. In all other places you have to pass in a boat over many miles of water ; and it is this circumstance which renders a ship-wreck upon that beach in winter so frequently dreadful in its consequences from the loss of life ; for even if the crew and passengers should succeed in reaching the beach alive, they will find no shel- ter there, and having from ten to twenty miles of water to cross before thev can experience any relief, and their boats being almost in- variably destroyed or lost in the shipwreck, if the storm is very heavy and the cold severe, as is frequently the case, they perish from the exposure. It may be asked by those not ac- quainted with this beach, Why is this not pro- vided against? The answer is, It is almost, if not quite impossible to do so, the character of the beach being such, and the distance from the mainland, and the difficulties and dangers of communication often so great that men could not live there at the times when their services would be most required. The forma- tion and position of this beach is, however such that the great loss of life is usually sus- tained before the shipwrecked persons have the chance of reaching the land, from the im- mense seas thrown over them by the whole swell of the Atlantic Ocean, which, by the rapid evaporation it causes, comparatively soon chills them to death.

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A history of Long Island, from its earliest settlement to the present time, Part 116

Author: Ross, Peter. cn Publication date: 1902 Publisher: New York ; Chicago : The Lewis Publishing Co. Number of Pages: 1188

Author: Ross, Peter. cn
Publication date: 1902
Publisher: New York ; Chicago : The Lewis Publishing Co.
Number of Pages: 1188