USA > New York > Westchester County > Rye > Chronicle of a border town : history of Rye, Westchester county, New York, 1660-1870, including Harrison and the White Plains till 1788 > Part 8
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' At a town meeting in Rye, January the last day, 1699-1700, the town doth agree and give liberty that any person living in the said town that wants land to work upon, may take up lands and improve them the space of ten years, anywhere in the town bounds, provided it be not prejudicial to the said town or any particular person therein ; and to return it to the said town again ; provided they keep and maintain good sufficient fence about the lands they shall so take up during the space of ten years aforesaid ; and Hachaliah Brown, and George Lane, senior, are appointed to make out the lands to any person that shall take them up as aforesaid.' 2
Under this act, lands were taken by several individuals in the yet undivided tract of Will's Purchase. Robert Bloomer, in 1701, took five acres, 'lying on the lower end of the Hogpen Ridge, being near the lower falls of Blind brook.' 3 Here was located the mill long known by his name. In 1707, ' the town granted unto Robert Bloomer jun. the stream of Blind brook at the falls of the said brook, to erect a mill or mills, with this proviso, that the said Bloomer does accomplish the said mill within the space of ten years; but if not, the stream to return unto the town again.' 4
In 1708, the town appointed a committee ' to search the records concerning Will's two purchases, and to bring their report in to the next town meeting.' 5 And in the following year the first division took place. 'This 11th day of April, 1709,6 the lots laid out in Will's purchases, were drawn for.' The division was on a liberal scale. Each allotment was of thirty-eight acres. February 18, 1711, ' the second division of lots laid out in Lame Will's two purchases' occurred. These were situated higher up, and on the
1 Town and Proprietors'-Meeting Book, No. C. p. 6. 4 Ibid. No. G. p. 22.
2 Ibid. p. 10.
3 Ibid. p. 14.
5 Ibid. p. 32. At the same meeting, the town granted to Timothy Knapp, who ap- parently had taken lands under the act of 1699, ' that he shall have his proportion of land in Will's two purchases on the lower end of Hachaliah Browne's wolf-pit ridge -when it shall be laid out.'
6 Rye Records, vol. B. p. 162.
60
MOVING OUT INTO THE WOODS.
east side of the colony line.1 A third draught of seven-acre lots followed.2
The proprietors of Will's purchases numbered thirty-four.3 The list comprises the names of nearly all the proprietors of Pen- ingo Neck, who were evidently interested in both these acquisi- tions.4 But the companies were quite distinct ; and there were several of the proprietors of the more recent purchases who liad no rights among those of the former. Occasionally, it seems, they met together to consult upon matters of common interest. Thus, -
‘ At a meeting held in Rye by the Proprietors of the Neck of Ape- quamas and Peningo Neck and the purchasers of the White Plaines and Will's purchasers, June the 15th, 1715, Justice Browne, David Ogden, Justice John Hoyt, Richard Ogden, Samuel Purdy, George Lane, jr., are chosen to take the care and the whole management of surveying the town's bounds of their lands to the best of their discretion, and to call out any person or persons in managing of the same.' 5
At each division of lands, the shares were distributed by lot, the numbers commencing at the upper end of the portion divided and proceeding downward.
The ' layers out ' of these lands appear to have had a laborious and responsible task. Their surveys were of course of a very gen- eral kind. The number of acres in the tract and in each allot- ment were rudely determined by the eye or by guess ; not by any exact measurement. But it must have been rough work to do this, in the wild forests and the tangled swamps, where as yet no path had been made. Some of the settlers were evidently regarded as peculiarly fitted for this business, and as eminently to be trusted. Isaac Denham, John Brondige, and the Justices, Deliverance Brown and Joseph Purdy, were repeatedly chosen.6 The 'lay- ers out' received as their compensation an additional appropria- tion of land. In the division of the White Plains purchase, this amounted to one hundred and ten acres .?
There was a tract of land adjoining the lower part of ' Will's first purchase,' but not included in it, which was held by the pro- prietors of Peningo Neck. This was the tract between Blind Brook and the Ridge Road, south of the road to Park's mill. The lower portion of this tract was called BRUSH RIDGE, and the upper
1 Rye Records, vol. B. p. 160 (back).
3 Ibid. vol. B. p. 162.
5 Records of Town Meetings, p. 15.
7 Records, p. xiv.
2 Rye Records, vol. B. p. 66 (back.)
4 Records of Town Meetings, p. 15.
6 Records, vol. B. pp. ix., xxii., 80.
61
RIDGES ALONG BLIND BROOK.
part BRANCH RIDGE. The lots on Brush Ridge were divided about the same time that the first division of Will's Purchase oc- curred. The allotments were of eight acres each.1 Those on Branch Ridge, a continuation of the same tract, laid out in 1713, were of five acres each.2 A considerable part of the land on these ridges was bought up, a few'years after the divisions, by Samuel Brown, 'bachelor,' -a son of Deliverance Brown. He thus came into possession of a farm of over one hundred acres, upon which he lived, as it seems, in his lone bachelorhood ; for he desig- nates himself as 'Samuel Brown of Brushie Ridge.' 3 The beauti- ful slope upon which these lands were located, -the eastern bank of Blind Brook and its branch, -is now a part of the farms of Messrs. Wilson, Minuse, Park, and others.
The changes in the ownership of ' Will's first purchase ' have been fewer, probably, than in any other part of the town: A large portion of it which came at an early day into the possession of the Brown family is now the property of S. K. Satterlee, Esq. Repre- sentatives of the Merritt, Studwell, Sherwood, and other ancient families of Rye, are still among the owners of the upper portion of this tract.
1 Records, vol. B. p. 20.
2 Records, vol. C. p. 93, etc. Town-meeting Book, No. G. p. 20.
3 The pains taken in those days to spell badly, have an illustration in this name, which became corrupted from Brush to 'Brushshey's ' Ridge. Records, C. 99.
CHAPTER VIII.
· TOWN MATTERS IN OLDEN TIMES.
'Each state must have its policies. Even the wild outlaw, in his forest walk, Keeps yet some touch of civil discipline.'
TOWN offices, in the olden time, were posts of honor and rewards of merit. The good people of Rye appear to have had enough of these in their gift to gratify any reasonable number of aspirants. About the year 1700, when there were sixty persons paying county rates, we find them making choice of the following officers : a Supervisor ; five Townsmen or Selectmen ; a Constable ; a Town Clerk or Recorder ; two Assessors ; two Listers; two Pounders ; two Fence-viewers ; three Sheep-masters ; and a Collector. With a Justice of the Peace, besides two Deputies to the General Court, and any number of ' layers out ' of public lands and roads, to say nothing of the captain, lieutenants, ensigns, and sergeants, of the ' train-bands ;' there seems to have been official business of some sort or other, for nearly every member of the little commonwealth.
The town clerk was perhaps the most important of these vil- lage worthies. Certainly his office was of the most permanent tenure. Only two persons filled it during the first three quarters of a century. John Brondige was probably chosen to this office in the early days of the settlement. We find mention of him as town clerk in 1678. He remained in office probably till the time of his death, in 1697, and was succeeded by Samuel Lane, who was town clerk until 1736. Our most valuable records, there- fore, are in the writing of these two men.
The town clerk, besides keeping a record of the proceedings at the town meetings, was required to enter in a book provided for the purpose a statement of the bounds and dimensions of every man's land. Each grant, sale, or mortgage of land must likewise be thus recorded, in order to be of force.1 These records for the town of Rye were kept, prior to the Revolution, in three folio
1 Public Records of Connecticut, vol. i. p. 552.
63
THE RECORDS.
volumes, which are still preserved, in tolerably good condition. Our most important records, however, are those of the town meet- ings. These were kept, unfortunately, not in bound volumes, but in books composed of forty or fifty leaves perhaps, rudely stitched together, and in material and aspect suggestive of the times when writing-paper was scarce and poor. The oldest of these records have within a few years past disappeared. They related to the doings of the first thirty or thirty-five years, - from the foundation of the town to the year 1697. Mr. Bolton, however, who had access to these documents when preparing his county and ecclesi- astical histories, has preserved many interesting facts which he gathered from them. Some accounts of town matters are also interspersed among thie land records which fill the bound volumes. Here, too, the Indian deeds for all the territory purchased by the proprietors and the town are carefully engrossed.1
.
At the first town meetings, the number of freeholders was per- haps twenty-five or thirty. Eighteen of these were proprietors, and had exclusive control of the common lands within the first purchase on Peningo Neck. All other lands not yet distributed belonged to the ' town in general,' or the whole body of inhabit- ants qualified to vote. These also possessed the right to admit or exclude new-comers into the settlement. All the plantations at that day were very careful to exercise this right.2 Our lost records are said to contain some curious examples of the mode in which the village fathers received applicants for the privileges of citizenship among them. The following extract, which occurs in the land records, illustrates the action of the proprietors and the town respectively, in making grants to new members : . -
' At a town-meeting held in Rye November the 23, 1686, Benjamin Collyer hath by grant from the proprietors of Peningo neck a certain house lot which was formerly Thomas Jefferies. . . . And the town doth further give and grant unto Benjamin Collyer a privilege of all 1 One of our oldest documents is the Brander's Book, or Record of Ear-marks. This record was kept in conformity with an act passed by the General Court of Connectient, in 1686, entitled ' An Aet for preventing of frand concerning horses.' It required that a place should be assigned in each plantation where horses should be branded; and that a brander should be appointed, who should 'make, and keep the true record of all such horse kind whh shall be presented to them . .. entering the same in one hook to each plantation.' A solemn oath to be taken by the brander, was prescribed. (Public Records of Connecticut, vol. iii. p. 205.) The Brander's Book at Rye consists of a volume of leaves stitched together (pp. 1-24), the entries run- ning from 1715 to 1796. The first seven pages are in Samnel Lane's writing. Earlier marks are scattered over the town records.
2 The General Court ordered that ' Intruders into Plantations ' should be put in the stocks. (Public Records of Connecticut, vol. ii. p. 66.)
64
TOWN MATTERS IN OLDEN TIMES.
out lands undivided which belongeth to the town in general, proportion- ally to an estate of fifty pound.' 1
The value here put upon an estate at Rye appears to have been the usual estimate of the property of a freeholder. The following statement shows the population, and the estimated property of the inhabitants for the time during which the town was subject to Connecticut. It is made up from the 'Lists of Persons and Es- tates ' kept by the General Court : -
Persons.
Ct. Rec.
1665
25 2
ii. 28
Estates. £1211 00 00
1666
32
ii. 49
1547 10 00
1667
36
ii. 72
1721 00 00
1668
45
ii. 94
2174 00 00
1669
50
ii. 117
2403 10 00
1670
41
ii. 137
1950 12 00
1671
42
ii. 160
1979 15 00
1672
43
ii. 186
2031 00 00
1673
37
ii. 210
1767 05 00
1674
41
ii. 236
1944 00 00
1675
40
ii. 264
1909 01 00
1676
32
ii. 290
1591 00 00
1677
38
ii. 320
1789 00 00
1678
44
iii. 17
2122 00 00
1679
48
iii. 36
2361 00 00
1680
49
iii. 67
2274 00 00
1681
50
iii. 86
2415 00 00
1682
50
iii. 106
2612 00 00
1683
47
iii. 126
2339 00 00
1698
56
iv. 265
3136 18 00
1699
60
iv. 297
3306 00 00
1 Town Records, vol. B. p. 3.
2 From 1665 to 1675, the number of 'persons' is not given in the Public Records of the colony, though the list is entitled a list both of ' Persons' and of ' Estates.' The figures therefore in the first column, for those ten years are conjectural ; but they are based on the proportion of £48 to £50 to an estate, which is that observed in the complete lists for the subsequent years. From 1676 to 1683, and in 1698 and 1699, the lists contain the number of persons also. The average value of an estate in the years 1676-83, is about £48 ; in 1698-99, it rises to £50.
The fluctuation in the population of the place is noticeable and significant. It rose to fifty ' persons ' within five years from the settlement, and then decreased ; the lowest figures being reached in 1673 and 1676. These were the years of the Dutch invasion and of King Philip's War. See Chapter VI.
Reference is made in the third column of the above table to the Public Records of Connecticut, which have been published in four volumes from 1635 to 1706.
65
TOWN MEETINGS.
The ' persons ' here enumerated were male inhabitants of adult age, paying taxes upon an estate of fifty pounds each. Ministers of the Gospel, deputies to the General Court, and some others, were exempted. The foregoing figures may be taken to repre- sent approximately the number of families in the town.
The town meeting of those days was a very different affair from that of our times. Besides electing officers, the inhabitants had · a great variety of matters to talk over and determine. We give some examples, without attempting to classify the subjects.
The prevention of damages by cattle was an important matter to be considered. Frequent orders were given concerning the building and repair of fences. 'At a town meeting held March, 1672, it was agreed that the first of April following should be taxed of all persons and young cattle and horses, unless it be such as are wrought, and that they henceforward should goe out on the first of April, and whatever person hath not his fence up by that time shall forfeit five shillings a rod.' 1
The town not only hel thed right to receive or exclude inhabit- ants, but it also regulated the disposal of lands belonging to per- sons removing from the town. 'All lands within the township,' the law required, ' shall be tendered to sale to the town before any other sale be made of them to any other than the inhabitants of that towne where they ly.' 2 The object of this provision was, of course, to prevent unsuitable persons from acquiring rights in the town by such purchase.
On the fifteenth of December, 1689, a bounty of fifteen shillings was ordered to be raised by a town rate, for the killing of wolves.3 One mode of destroying these animals was by entrapping them in wolf-pits. Several of these existed in this neighborhood. The ridge overlooking the village, where Park Institute now stands, was known as early as 1690 by the name of Wolf-pit Ridge or Plain.
Persons were appointed at town meetings, to look after the boundaries of public lands. These were preserved, in a very rude and imperfect manner, by means of marked trees. From time to
1 Fuller regulations were enaeted at a later day. At a town meeting held June 3d, 1706, it was ordered that all division fences should be made four feet and a half high, ' being of pine Rayles well and substantially erected.' Walls or hedges, or any other partition judged sufficient by the fence-viewers, were to be considered equivalent to such a fence. It appears from this aet that individuals were allowed to inelose por tions of land for pasture in the common field
2 Public Records of Connecticut, vol. iii. p. 187.
3 Town Records, vol. A., quoted by Bolton, History of Westchester County, ii. 23.
6
5
66
TOWN MATTERS IN OLDEN TIMES.
time the marks required to be renewed. As early as 1680 we read of the ' old marked trees.' As there were several such divid- ing lines that ran across the tract between Blind Brook and Byram River, and separated the several purchases from each other, it must have been no easy task to trace them and keep them up.
In 1733, Samuel Purdy, Robert Bloomer, and Daniel Purdy were appointed a committee ' to regulate and renew the bound marks of lots in Will's Purchase, to the eastward of the colony line, begin- ning at Thomas Sutton's land and going northward along said line.'] This southern limit of Will's second purchase is the present boundary of the town of Rye in that direction.
Public lands were sometimes given away by the town. Not however in the lavish way in which they were often disposed of by other towns ; but generally in small parcels and on particular occa- sions. Indeed, the town as such does not appear to have had much land to give away, so long as the proprietary bodies existed and kept the management of their large possessions in their own hands.
The town gave permission for the opening of taverns, erecting of mills, etc.
March 3, 1696. 'Samuel Lane and Joseph Lyon, are, or either of them [is] permitted to build a fulling or grist mill upon Blind brook, above the town, provided they choose their location in three weeks, and build the fulling mill in three years.'
' March 24, 1697-8, Joseph Horton is chosen by the towne of Ry to keep a house of entertainment for travlers for the year insuing.'
' At a town meeting held in Rye March the 5th day 1705 the town hath given and granted unto Samuel Hunt of Rye the streame of Memoranuck river at the falls of the said river above Humphery Underhills to erect and bould a grist mill or mills upon the said streme and the said Samuel Hunt is to grind the towns cornn for the fourteenth part and the said Samuel Hunt is to bould the said mill or mills within the space of two years from the date hereof. And if the said Samuel Hunt shall at any time [fail] to keep the said mill in repair fit to grind above two years together then the said streme is to return to the town again.'
April 16, 1712, 'the towne hath by a voat granted unto Richard Ogdin the priviledge of the strem in Byram river between the lower going over and the country rode to erect and bould a mill or mills provided the said Ogdin doe bould a mill or mill [dam] in the space of one year from the date hereof.'
The regulations concerning sheep and cattle were very frequent and particular.
1 Rye Records, vol. B. p. 143.
67
TRUSTEES.
' At a meeting held by the inhabitants of Peningo Neck in Rye, February 24, 1703-4,' sheep masters are chosen ' to agree with a shepherd and to take care of the flocks to let them out if any pre- sents to hire them and to take care of the rams and to take care for yards for the flock when they are not let out.' Rams are not to be let loose on the commons from August 15 to November 5. In 1708 the proprietors agree to lay out a new sheep pasture, con- sisting of all the lands yet undivided below a line from the branch of Blind Brook to Gunn Brook. In 1714 the town orders that ' no sheep between Memoronuck river and Byram river shall have liberty for the year ensuing to goe upon the commons or upon any land belonging to any particular man unfenced from the first of May till the last of October but what shall be put under the care of a shepherd or shepherds which shall be chosen by the said towne ; and every particular man whose sheep shall goe on the commons or upon unfenced lands as above said shall pay his pro- portion unto the shepherd or shepherds which shall be hiered as above said according to the number of his sheep.'
Where the town meetings were held we do not learn, until the year 1738, when it is mentioned that the meeting took place 'at the school house near the Church in Rye.' The probability is that this had been the place of meeting for some previous years. As early as 1708, notice of a special meeting of the town was given by ' a warrant from a Justice of the Peace sett upon a signe post nere the Church four days before the meeting.'
The Selectmen presided on these occasions. ‘ At a lawful town meeting held in Rye, April 1, 1713, the town hath past a voat that the townsmen hath and shall have for the futer liberty and full power to putt all towne voats to voat in all townings to the best of their descretion, only the choice of the towne men the justices are apointed to put to voat.'
As early as 1705, the town chose Trustees or Overseers of the town, whose functions are thus described : -
' To take care of the towns Lands and intrests rights priviledges in Land in the towns bounds of Rye and to doe their indeavour in defend- ing the said towns rights and interests in Lands belonging to the said township of Rye and likewise to keep and secure our possession of our township in Lands by all lawfull means and ways whatever they can devise or [execute] in Law whatsoever from time to time as occasion shall require against any parson or parsons whatsoever claiming any right title or intrest against the towns intrest or any part thereof and the towne doth give these trustees over overseers full power to raise mony
68
TOWN MATTERS IN OLDEN TIMES.
in the said town as they shall have occasion in pursueance of their trust from time to time to sell or mortgage undivided Lands or other ways as they shall see best within their said year.'
The charges that might arise the town agreed to ' disburse by equall proportion, and alsoe to have equall proportion of Lands thereby recovered.'
This action was evidently taken in view of the serious encroach- ments upon its territory which the town had already suffered, and the danger of further losses unless vigorons efforts should be put forth to maintain its rights.
Justice was administered by a magistrate, known at first as the Commissioner. In 1697-98, the General Court of Connecticut substituted for this office that of Justice of the Peace. These functionaries were alike appointed by the government. They were invested ' with magistraticall power within the limits of the respective Townes where they lived ;' and were impowered ' with the Selectmen of the town, or any two of them, to hear and deter- mine any action that should be presented before them for tryall to the value of forty shillings.' The first Commissioner appointed for Hastings at Rye, in 1663 and 1664, was Mr. John Budd. He was followed by Lieut. Joseph Horton, in 1678. And in 1698, pending the return of the town to Connecticut, the General Court appointed to the office of Justice of the Peace, then newly created, Mr. Deliverance Brown, who was continued in office by the pro- vincial government of New York, and remained justice till the year 1716.1
It is said that the early settlers of New England towns were fond of litigation. 'A case in court was, with some men, little more than a customary part of the year's business.' Rye, we presume, was not free from this weakness. Such at least is our impression, upon opening the earliest extant volume of records. The first half dozen pages of this book are taken up with records of ' executions.' Several suits are referred to, of the date of 1678 and after. These suits were tried at the County Court at Fair- field. Execution is granted to sundry persons, and levied by
1 The nature of this office, and its powers under the provincial government, are thus described by William Smith, the historian of the province : 'Justices of the peace are appointed by commission from the governors . . .. Beside their ordinary powers, they are by acts of Assembly enabled to hold courts for the determination of small causes of five pounds and under ; but the parties are privileged, if they choose it with a jury. They have also a jurisdiction with respect to crimes under the degree of grand larceny. Any three of them, one being of the quorum, may try the criminal withont a jury, and inflict punishments not extending to life or limb. - History of New York, vol. i. p. 369, App.
69
PETITION FOR LETTERS PATENT.
Lieut. Joseph Horton or by the constable. Robert Bloomer appears as defendant in most of these cases, but in his turn enters a com- plaint for defamation. It was not all peace and harmony, we infer, in the small community on Peningo Neck.
We are sorry to say also that an occasional entry upon our records makes known the connubial infelicities that prevailed in some dwellings ; the community is warned in set terms not to ' sell, barter or trade, directly or indirectly ' with the wife of the signer. These entries are probably copies of notices that had been duly posted to be read by the little public in the usual place.
For the punishment of trivial offences, they had the stocks and the whipping-post. Our notices of these interesting objects are seanty, but sufficient. The town in 1739 and two subsequent years elected a 'public whipper.' Thomas Rickey and Samuel Bumpas were the persons chosen to this office. They do not appear to have distinguished themselves in any other capacity. Of the stocks, mention is made but seldom. In the records of the Vestry of Rye, we find the following item, under the date of March 6, 1770: -
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