A history of Long Island, from its earliest settlement to the present time, Part 31

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

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In reviewing all the evidence thus placed before us it seems impossible to arrive at any other conclusion than that Kidd made two grave mistakes,-the first in touching British ships, and the second in being found out. If ever a licensed pirate was sent adrift that pirate was William Kidd. Even the lines we have quoted from Macaulay show that he was sent forth with a commission under the Great Seal of England in his pocket to prey upon the high seas and to return as large a dividend as possible to those who invested in the en- terprise. It was a joint stock speculation, nothing more, and Kidd was induced by the necessity, to use a modern phrase, "of making money for his stockholders," to capture any

fat prize which came in his way. Money could not be made fighting pirates, as Ma- caulay admits, and it had to be made some- how. Financially Kidd was a success. He brought home on the San Antonio alone £14,000, more than enough to recoup his stockholders, principal and interest, and there were besides vague stories of other treasure, fabulous in amount, which lay in the hold of the vessel when she first anchored in Gardi- ner's Bay. But the hue and cry had gone forth, Kidd had certainly passed over the boundary between right and wrong which his patrons had vaguely laid down, and the honest shipping interests of the world arose against him. Being the executive head of the en- terprise, he was made to furnish an example, with several of his sea companions accom- panying him as ballast.

The matter was made the occasion of a memorable debate in Parliament in which Somers and the rest of the syndicate were held up as partners of the piratical Adventure, who gave the protection of the Great Seal to their own nefarious business enterprise, men wlio invested a thousand pounds each and expected to get back tens of thousands when the expedition should return "laden with the spoils of ruined merchants." It was made a question of the life or death of the Ministry of the day, but the friends of the syndicate prevailed, and the owners of the Adventure were indorsed by a vote of 189 votes in the House of Commons against an opposition of 133. And so ended the Parliamentary story of the Adventure. When the vote was cast Kidd ceased forever to be a factor in politics and his memory is now popularly enrolled only in the long gallery of notorious enemies of society. His name became a synonym for mur- der and rapine, was used by mothers to frighten their children, and all sorts of evil deeds and wanton cruelties were fixed upon him by the ballad-mongers, who found in the legends of his career a rare field for their crude imaginations.

Long Island is full of stories of Captain

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HISTORY OF LONG ISLAND.

Kidd, very few of which contain much more than a bare modicum of truth. Mr. W. D. Stone, of the New York Commercial Adver- tiser, once wrote an article on the pirate, in which he told about all of the Long Island traditions which could readily be substan- tiated. He said :

It is beyond doubt true that Long Island contained several of his hiding places. "Kidd's Rock" is well known at Manhasset, up on Long Island, to this day. Here Kidd is sup- posed to have buried some of his treasures, and many have been the attempts of the cred- ulous in that section to find the hidden gold. There is also no doubt that he was wont to hide himself and his vessel among those curious rocks in Sachen's Head Harbor, called the "Thimble Islands." In addition to the "Pirates' Cavern," in this vicinity, there is upon one of these rocks, sheltered from the view of the Sound, a beautiful artificial exca- vation in an oval form holding, perhaps, the measure of a barrel still called "Kidd's Punch Bowl." It was here, according to the tra- ditions of the neighborhood, that he used to carouse with his crew. It is also a fact beyond controversy that he was accustomed to anchor his vessel in Gardiner's Bay. Upon one occa- sion in the night he landed upon Gardiner's island and requested Mrs. Gardiner to pro- vide a supper for himself and his attendants. Knowing his desperate character, she dared not refuse, and fearing his displeasure she took great pains, especially in roasting a pig. The pirate chief was so pleased with her cook- ing that on going away he presented her with a cradle blanket of gold cloth. It was of velvet inwrought with gold and very rich. A piece of it yet remains in the possession of the Gardiner family, and a still smaller piece is in my possession, it having been given to my father, the late Col. William L. Stone, by one of the descendants of that family.

On another occasion, when he landed upon the island, Kidd buried a small casket of gold containing articles of silver and precious stones in the presence of Mr. Gardiner, but under the most solemn injunction of secrecy. * * He appears to have disclosed the fact of having buried treasure on Gardiner's island, for it was demanded by the Earl of Bellomont and surrendered by Mr. Gardiner. I have seen the original receipts for the amount, with the different items of the de-

posits. They were by no means large, and afford no evidence of such mighty "sweep- ings of the sea," as has been told of by tra- dition. Of gold, in coins, gold dust and bars, there was 750 ounces ; of silver, 506 ounces, and of precious stones, 16 ounces.

The account mentioned by Mr. Stone as describing the jewels found in Captain Kidd's treasure box buried on Gardiner's island reads as follows :

A true account of all such gold, silver, jewels and merchandise late in the possession of Captain William Kidd which have been seized and secured by us pursuant to an or- der from his Excellency, Richard, Earl of Bellomont, bearing date July 7, 1699:

Received the 17th inst. of Mr. John Gardi- ner, viz .: OUNCES.

No. I. One bag of gold dust .. 633/4

No. 2. One bag of coined gold. II

And one in silver. 124

No. 3. One bag gold dust. 243/4

No. 4. One bag of silver rings and

sundry precious stones. ... 478

No. 5. One bag of unpolished stones.

121/2

No. 6. One piece of crystal, rings,

two agates, two amethysts

No. 7. One bag silver buttons and lamps

No. 8. One bag of broken silver 1731/2

No. 9. One bag of gold bars. 3531/4

No. IO. One bag of gold bars. 2381/2

No. II. One bag gold dust. 591/2

No. 12. One bag silver bars. 309

SAMUEL SEWALL,

NATHANIEL BYFIELD,

JEREMIAH DUMMER,

ANDREW BELCHER,

Commissioners.

H. G. Onderdonk, of Manhasset, speaking of Kidd's Rock, mentioned in the passage quoted from Mr. Stone, says :

The celebrated "Kidd's Rock" just east of Sands' Point stands upon the shore of a small island at the northeasterly extremity of Cow Neck. This is a very large stone, equivalent to a cube of about 2,000 feet, and under it tra- dition says the notorious Captain Kidd con- cealed vast amounts of the treasures accumu -

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CAPTAIN KIDD AND OTHER NAVIGATORS.

lated by his numerous piracies. The immense rock has been on all sides dug around, under- mined, excavated, blasted and wrought with various charms and incantations by super- stitious or visionary persons who have here repeatedly searched for Kidd's treasures, but all in vain. There is a similar large boulder, called Millstone Rock, at Manhasset, a quar- ter of a mile southeasterly from the Friends' meeting-house, which contains 24,000 cubic feet, as measured by Dr. Mitchell and Cap- tain Patridge, and there formerly was another of similar size, on the Haydock property near the head of Cow Bay. But this latter has disappeared, having been blasted and broken up into fencing stone. Boulders of so great a size are an anomaly on Long Island.

East of these, other boulders seem to have popularly rejoiced at one time or another un- der the name of "Kidd's Rock," and the one last referred to was recognized by B. F. Thompson, the historian of Long Island, as the one in his day best entitled to the desig- nation. But then, as we have said, almost every likely spot on Long Island, as well as on Gardiner's Island, Block Island and even the coast of New Jersey, has been reputed as the hiding place of Captain Kidd's miglity treasure. To recover them many a diligent search has been made, many an expedition or- ganized, many a divining rod manipulated ; but all to no purpose. If any treasure was hid- den it has been forever lost; but the more likely solution of the matter is that none was hidden, and that all the wealth at Kidd's con- mand was actually recovered by Bellmont's agents.

Gabriel Furman gives us a vague account

of another redoubtable pirate whose home was near Fort Neck and whom he called Captain Jones. Nothing is known apparently as to the career or the deeds of this marauder, but pop- ular tradition gave him a rather doubtful character and told how when he was dying a large black crow, a sure emissary of Satan, settled above his bed and watched until the vital spark fled, when it made its escape through a hole in the west end of the house and departed to realms unknown. The hole through which the bird passed could never af- ter be stopped up, according to popular tradi- tion, although Furman, who saw the house in 1827, did not vouch for the truth of this by personal investigation. The building was then uninhabited and hastening to ruin, so the ex- periment would have annoyed nobody and its result would have been satisfactory to future historians whichever way it went. But prob- ably Furman was too good an antiquary to attempt to disturb an old legend, so he simply contented himself with "passing it on." How- ever, he visited the burial place of the pirate, a grave "about half a mile south of the house in a small piece of ground surrounded by a11 earth wall. The tombstone is of red free- stone. The ground also contains the graves of his wife, his son, and his son's wife. There are no other persons buried there but these four. It is quite a solitary spot."

Surely pirate was never more honored! To die quietly in bed! An emissary of a prince to watch his passage, a grave among his own kin, and a red freestone tomb! An honest mariner could hardly expect more !

CHAPTER XV.

THE ANTE-REVOLUTION STRUGGLE.

N a rough and ready way the position of Long Island regarding the senti- ment which culminated in 1776 in separation may be stated by saying that Suffolk county was Whig in its sympa- thies, while Queens and Kings were the op- posite. In other words, one might draw the old line on the map of the island from Oyster Bay to Great Island and find that to the east of that line the people were in favor of in- dependence, while to the west the loyalist spirit reigned. Of course, there were many exceptions. Kings and Queens held their Whig citizens, plenty of them, and Suffolk might have produced a small army of Tories ; but in a general fashion the boundaries thus given hold good for the time, say about 1765, when the troubles with the home Govern- ment began to reach the acute point. In mak- ing this distinction I do not desire to intimate that the loyalists were blind to the faults of the system to which they were attached. That there were faults, and grievous faults, even the most devoted loyalist of the disinterested variety would confess; and up to a certain point in the struggle they were as outspoken and imperative in their demands for redress as the most violent Whig could suggest. They only stopped short at separation, and although the hard logic of events has demonstrated that they were wrong and proved conclusively that separation was the only cure for the evils which then threatened the people in Britain as well as those in the colonies, it seems un- necessary to tax them with all the sins in the calendar of crime on that account.

In fact Long Island, east and west, main- tained a constant struggle for political liberty long before. Several instances of this spirit will be found recorded elsewhere in this work, but one or two may be mentioned most fitting- ly here to demonstrate more clearly the views entertained by the people and the spirit which animated them. In 1669 the towns of Hemp- stead, Jamaica, Oyster Bay, Flushing, New- town, Gravesend, each presented petitions to Governor Lovelace when that dignitary sought by virtue of his own power to levy a special tax. In their petition the people deplored their exclusion from any share in legislation and asked to be permitted a voice in the mak- ing of the laws by which they were to be gov- erned, "by such deputies as shall be yearly chosen by the freeholders of each town and parish." The petitions practically produced nothing, but the fact that they were made, and gravely considered, are significant when we remember how summarily old Peter Stuy- vesant a few years previously had broken up a meeting of the lieges and told them not to let him hear any more of such business. Dr. Prime says ("History," page 78) : "The first assembly of deputies that the representation of royal power condescended to convoke for consultation, the year after the surrender of the province to British arms, was held at Hempstead March 1, 1665, and (with the ex- ception of two) was composed entirely of rep- resentatives from the several towns of the island. The first legislative assembly, con- vened in 1683, was not only procured through the remonstrances and demands of Long

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THE ANTE-REVOLUTION STRUGGLE.

Island, more than any other part of the col- ony, but was in a great measure made up of its representatives. The first speaker of that body was either then, or afterward, a resident of the island, and the same office was after- ward held by one of its representatives six- teen out of twenty-one years."

A significant hint of the reverence of the people for royal authority in the abstract is found in the following extract from Bergen's "Early Settlers of Kings County :"

Joores Van Nestus (may be intended for Joris Van Ness), with John Rapalie, Joris Danielse Rapalie, Isaac Remsen, Jacob Reyerse, Aert Aersen (Middagh), Theunis Buys, Gerrit Cowenhoven, Gabriel Sprong, Urian Andriese, Jan Willemse Bennet, Jacob Bennet and John Messerole, Junr., were fined ten shillings each for defacing the King's arms in the County Court House on the evening of September 14, 1697, as per court record. From this it may be inferred that these residents of Brooklyn failed to have that respect for their "Dreade sovereign" which loyal subjects were expected to entertain.

It is curious to read some of these names in the light of after events in connection with such a contemptuous disregard for the sacred- ness of royal insignia.

It is generally agreed that the first direct move, although not then so intended, against the royal authority was made in the same tavern at Brushville, near Jamaica, where af- terward General Woodhull, the hero of Long Island, received the wounds which resulted in his death. It was kept by Increase Carpenter, who afterward figured prominently in the Tory ranks. The meeting held in his place seems to have been quite an informal gather- ing when the news was received of the action of the British Parliament in declaring the port of Boston closed in retaliation for the doings of the Boston Tea Party. The de- liberations in the tavern, however, resulted in the issuance of a notice to the freeholders of Jamaica urging them to meet in the old court-house in that village and consider the

condition of affairs. That meeting was held on December 7, 1774, and passed a series of resolutions as follows :

I. To maintain the just dependence of the colonies upon the Crown of Great Britain, and to render true allegiance to King George.

II. That it is our right to be taxed only by our own consent, and that taxes imposed on us by Parliament are an infringement of our rights.

III. We glory to have been born subject to the Crown and excellent Constitution of Great Britain; we are one people with our mother country, and lament the late unhappy disputes.

IV. We sympathize with our brethren of Boston under their sufferings.

V. We approve the measures of the late General Congress at Philadelphia.

VI. We appoint for our committee of correspondence and observation Rev. Abra- ham Keteltas, Waters Smith, Captain Ephraim Baylis, Captain Joseph French, William Lud- lam, Captain Richard Betts, Dr. John Innes, Joseph Robinson, Elias Bailis.

This was a most significant document, breathing profound loyalty to the mother coun- try yet not yielding one iota of what the meet- ing regarded as among inalienable rights, and it failed not to go on record as in hearty sym- pathy with those of the colonists who, for upholding these rights, had fallen under the ban of the British authorities. Had the British Government weighed such expressions even then the crisis of 1776 might have been averted or at least postponed, although in reviewing the history of the world since then we can- not escape the conviction that it was well for the sake of popular liberty that pig-headed- ness rather than statesmanship ruled Great Britain for the moment.

The men who organized and attended the meeting seem to have formed part of a colony of New England people, by birth or descent, who had settled in Jamaica. Those named in the Committee on Correspondence were after- ward more or less prominent in the move- ment for independence. Ephraim Bailey, in

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HISTORY OF LONG ISLAND.

fact, became notorious as one of the most bit- ter and cruel of the persecutors of the local Tories. French was afterward elected to the Provincial Congress, but declined to serve, be- cause he was convinced that the majority of the freeholders of Jamaica did not want to be represented in that body. Perhaps the most remarkable member of the committee was the Rev. Abraham Keteltas, of whom Dr. Prime writes: "He was born in New York, December 26, 1732, and graduated at Yale in 1752. He was first settled at Elizabethtown, New Jersey, September 14, 1757, and dis- missed in 1759. He removed to Jamaica, where he occupied a farm and spent much of

OLD LIBERTY POLE AT VAN PELT MANOR.

his time in preaching to the vacant congre- gations on the island and elsewhere. He was a man of strong mind and extensive and varied learning. He often preached in three different languages-Dutch, French and Eng- lish. He was chosen a member of the con- vention of 1777 that formed the first Con- stitution of the State of New York. Being a zealous and devoted patriot, he was pe- culiarly obnoxious to British rage and was therefore obliged to leave the island during the war. His property was taken possession of, his mansion defaced, his timber destroyed and his slaves taken and enlisted as soldiers of the King. He was a man of strong feel- ings and independent spirit. From some dis-

satisfaction, in 1764 or 1765 he withdrew from the presbytery of New York and de- clined the jurisdiction of the. Presbyterian Church. He continued, however, to bestow his services where needed until the close of life, and he is still remembered (1845) by the surviving few in many of the churches of the island. He died September 30, 1798, at the age of sixty-five years."

Before following the progress of the move- ment for freedom on Long Island, it may not be out of place to review, briefly, the progress of events in the country generally, which led to many meetings such as that we have just chronicled and finally ended in the complete independence of the Colonies. In 1763 the long war which had been waged between Britain and France for the possession of the North American Continent was settled by a formal treaty of peace in which France ceded all its territory north of the St. Lawrence to its "ancient enemy." It retained the peninsula of Florida, but soon after transferred it to Spain and the French empire in the New World came forever to an end. The colonists as we have seen took a loyal part against France in this memorable contest, and it is a pity that the patriotism aroused by sacrifice and blood did not meet with a better reward at the hands of those in authority in London than inspiring the notion that such devotion could be made a source of revenue. The withdrawal of the French from the scene left the colonists free to work out their own des- tiny, and it was not long before their mettle was put acutely to the test.

From the beginning of the Colonial sys- tem in America the home Government had imposed taxation on the people, as was right and proper. They had to be defended against Indians and Spaniards and Frenchmen. At first there was nothing to tax except the products of the soil, but as the country ad- vanced in population and these products in- creased in value the navigation acts were steadily extended until they became oppres- sive. Almost from the time a colony was

185

THE ANTE-REVOLUTION STRUGGLE.

numerically strong enough to form a local leg- islature it appealed against the right of the Parliament in England to impose Colonial taxes without the Colonists' consent, against taxes levied by royal representatives for purposes in which they had no concern, and out of which it was impossible for them to get any benefit ; and the long list of dissolute and incapable nonentities sent over to repre- sent the King's Sacred Majesty contains but few names of men who were likely either willing or fit to govern for the sake of the governed, or for any other purposes than their own personal profit and aggrandizement. Rulers like Bellomont and Cornbury were alone sufficient to incite and justify rebellion.

But the question of taxation without rep- resentation, or rather of taxation without con- sent, was the question which underlay the en- tire struggle in America. Bit by bit as the country advanced the navigation laws became more and more oppressive. "The open door" was unheard of. No goods could be imported except in English vessels manned by English sailors ; all exports must go to England or to some port belonging to the Crown; tobacco, cotton, sugar, for instance, intended for France had to be sent to England and then reshipped ; free trade between the colonies was prohibited ; every advantage was given the British manu- facturer at the expense of his American cousin ; the American producer, at the mercy of the English merchant, could only receive what the latter was willing to pay ; the English claimed and exercised a full and crushing mo- nopoly over American commerce, and any cf- fort looking to its extension was met by new levy, a vexations addition to the existing laws. Such were some of the restrictions imposed upon the colonies, and they were submitted to for several reasons. Great Britain was simply carrying out the recognized Colonial policy of the time ; the Colonies were too muchi scattered to resist, the imposts and annoyances were not felt by the majority of the Colonists directly, only one class felt the full force of the imposition ; and although the entire pop-

ulation had to contribute to the taxation thus imposed, the contribution was made in an in- direct and therefore unnoticed way. Indirect taxation has ever been the favorite system for the levying of imposts, especially those likely to arouse discontent. It still prevails in Amer- ica, and is the cause of most of the municipal maladministration which is so pronounced a blot upon our system of local government.

But the abuse got in time out of the stage of indirect taxation. In 1763 Lord Grenville introduced in Parliament, and had passed, as an amendment to a sugar bill, a resolution that "It be proper to charge stamp duties on the colonies and plantations." Franklin, who was then agent of the Commonwealth of Pennsyl- vania in London, appealed against this new imposition, but the best that resulted from a series of conferences was that the Colonies must bear an increased share of the taxes, but were given a year in which to devise some way less obnoxious than the proposed stamp duties by which the increased revenue might be raised. In America the proposal at once excited hostile comment and protests were sent to London from the various Colonial assem- blies. But they proposed nothing to take the place and yield the expected revenue of the proposed stamps, and Grenville adhered to his determination. In 1765 he introduced the Stamp Act and it was passed by Parliament. It was deemed an equitable measure all round, and, with their clearer eyesight dimmed by the general sentiments of approbation they heard around, even the American agents, even Franklin, did not seem to understand that their constituents across the sea would do aught but grumble and submit. So Great Britain prepared the stamps and appointed the stamp collectors, who were to begin business in October, 1765.

The news raised a howl of disapproval throughout the Colonies, and nine Colonial assemblies sent delegates to New York to meet in a Continental Congress in the old City Hall in Wall street, to consider the situation. That Congress passed some clear-cut resolutions

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HISTORY OF LONG ISLAND.

which fully expressed the views of the people. These held such doctrines as, "No taxes have been or can be constitutionally imposed upon the people of these Colonies but by their re- spective legislatures ;" and, "All supplies to the Crown being free of the people it is un- reasonable and unconsistent with the spirit of the British Constitution for the people of Great Britain to grant to his Majesty thie prop- erty of the Colonists."

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A history of Long Island, from its earliest settlement to the present time, Part 31

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