USA > New York > Orange County > Monroe > Chronicles of Monroe in the olden time : town and village, Orange County, New York > Part 2
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When he is surveying lots 68 and 69 he speaks of a high mountain which he calls Mount Bashon, and the pond near by, but he does not name the pond. Mom- basha may be only a corruption of Mount Bashon. The Long Pond he names as such. The body of water north of it he calls the Pond with a round island in it; so that it is more properly Round Isl- and Pond. The pond commonly called Duckcedar is Tuxseto on the earliest map of the region. The origin of the name is probably Indian.
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Chronicles of Monroe in the Olden Time.
Bald Hill, near the present village of Monroe, is so called in the Field Book, probably from some outcrop of slate rock on its side, free from timber, giving it the appearance of baldness.
Lot 43, containing 276 acres, was situated "on a sudden bend of the 'Ramerpo.'" It contained "100 acres of barren and very bad stony land in ye N. E. side of it, and in ye N. W. end. The rest of it is good land. There is some low land and good swamp in some places upon ye River. I take it to be equal to any other middling lot, for it has plowland and meadowland sufficient for a settlement." This and lot No. 16 are the site of the present village of Mon- roe, while the bend of the Ramapo has been enlarged into the village mill-pond.
Over on the ridge not far from Hazard's Pond he came to land which he pronounced very poor. He was seeking some tract suitable for a parsonage. But one evening he broke off, dissatisfied, and said he should seek for land somewhere else. Shortly after- ward he happened upon a piece which he numbered 24, a lot of 150 acres, which he selects for a parson- age, and calls it " a choice good lot." This was held by the Presbyterian Church in this place as a glebe until the year 1804, when it was exchanged for a part of lot 16 at the village of Monroe, containing 58 acres.
A few additional extracts from the Field Book will not be uninteresting. For the selection of many of these items I am indebted to the courtesy of Civil Engineer Fred. J. Knight.
Page 306, Clinton says : "Being all abused by the rain, he built a wigwam."
Page 301, he mentions his first observation of the
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The Field Book and Survey.
influence of iron ore on the needle. This was in lot 4, one of the large mountain lots, afterward Green- wood. He finds similar traces of iron in lots 9 and 10.
Page 321, he refers to a meadow which had been "dammed by beavers." When he came to lot 54 he found a negro named Solomon Peterson, who had built a hut there. Here, near a swamp, he had cleared a piece of land. The entire lot comprised 263 acres, and on it were two free negro settlements. (See page 269, lot 54.) This is the Samuel Webb place.
In surveying lot 61, he came upon the cabin of Casper, a free negro, settled here by Hendrick Nan- derlinden near a heap of stones, in a cleared field, near a brook named Paskak. Page 222, on lot 62, he comes on the settlement of Ari King, purchased from this same Nanderlinden, and with improvements made by the latter. This is the Jeptha Clark place, and 61 is the Samuel Bull place. In running the line at lot 69, he came upon the stone house and cleared land of Abraham Hoppers. These lands he formerly pur- chased from Dr. Johnston. "I did not run the line lest he should stop us, by what we were informed of others. Therefore to avoid an unnecessary quarrel we did not mark it." This lot is in what is known as Dutch Hollow. The small stream through it was called Saddle River. Through it ran the road from Goshen to Ramapo.
He mentions an Indian settlement on lot 52, the place of the late Dr. G. M. Roe, where peach and pear trees were seen. On page 234 he alludes to corn- fields. Several times he took refuge in wigwams, which also he repaired. Indian paths are mentioned, some indistinct, crossing the Clove to Wawayanda, Haverstraw and Ramapo. In lot 64, easterly from
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Chronicles of Monroe in the Olden Time.
Bull's mills, was another Indian settlement. He lodged at wigwams near Sugarloaf. On pages 338 to 345 he speaks of the road from Goshen to Stirling, and on page 34 of a path from Hazard's to Ramapo, " scarce noticeable it is so seldom used."
The surveyor laid out the tract in fourteen large lots, containing about 5000 acres apiece, and 106 smaller lots containing 150 acres. A part of these lots was included in the county of Rockland when that county was organized. Lot 43, on a bend of the Ramapo, which he speaks of as barren, is the site of the village of Monroe.
Lot 44 was the Letts farm, in which was a round island with a hassocky point running down to it.
Lot 61, the S. S. Bull farm, contained a pond which he designates as Second Pond. Mombasha is simply the pond near Mount Bashon. Lot 35 is the D. V. Howell place, on which was a great Bald Hill well timbered on the northwest side, while the rest was barren. This was the late glebe of the Pres- byterian Church. The first lot set apart for that pur- pose was the farm of the late Andrew Van Valer, which was so stony in one spot that an Irishman declared the old de'il was carrying stones in his apron and spilled them out to spite the deacon.
The copy of the Field Book from which these ex- tracts have been made was the property of the late David Lynch. It is now owned by Major T. B. Brooks.
CHAPTER III.
DISTRIBUTION OF THE LANDS. MAPS OF LOTS.
AT FTER the survey the lands were allotted to the members of the company owning the patent. We find different names from those of the original patentees. Now they are reduced to six, and are as follows: John Chambers, Philip Livingston, John McEvers, Catherine Symes (wife probably of Lan- caster Symes), William Smith and James Alexander. Chambers and Livingston were members of the Legis- lative Council, as was also William Smith, who was at one time Chief Justice, and then Governor of the State, in 1701. The family seat is in the neighborhood of Haverstraw. James Alexander was also called Lord Stirling because of a claim upon an earldom and estates of that name in Scotland. He owned a beau- tiful estate at Ringwood, was one of the company forming the Stirling Iron Company, and was father of Lord Stirling, who took such an active part as a general officer in our War of Independence.
We would remark in passing that the map-makers of the county have not done this town nor themselves justice in their attempts to represent the boundaries of the patent. In the map published in 1859 by Corey and Bachman of Philadelphia was the first serious mistake. The surveyor seems to have mis-
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Chronicles of Monroe in the Olden Time.
taken the scale of the old map of the patentees. He started out by making his lots too large on the east, which had the effect of pushing them all bodily the distance of about two lots or more too far to the west. When he came to lay his map of the patent on his map of the town, " the bed was shorter than that he could stretch himself on it, and the covering narrower than that he could wrap himself in it." The result was that he had to omit the whole tier of lots that touch the foot of Sugarloaf and Goosepond Mountains, while he was forced to change the entire shape of others. Hence the map is useless so far as finding the location of lots and patent lines is con- cerned, and is in constant conflict with all the ancient deeds and surveys of the place. The atlas of Orange County published by Baskin and Burr of Newburg repeats the errors, and unfortunately puts them in more permanent form. It is hoped that some one of Monroe's own sons will some day make the needful correction and produce a map of the town worthy of its ancient reputation.
The map published in this volume is a beginning of better things. It is a facsimile of the handiwork of Civil Engineer Fred. J. Knight, made expressly for this work.
In glancing over the old maps and noticing the dis- tribution of the lots, we find that a large proportion of them, some forty-five, are marked with the name of William Smith. He bought the Cholwell and the Ten Eyck portions, each being the one half of a seventh of the patent, and still another similar por- tion audited to J. Berger and wife. This circum- stance explains the origin of the name given to that part of the tract, namely, Smith's Clove, Upper and
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Distribution of the Lands. Maps of Lots.
Lower. It is an error to suppose that it derived its name from the famous cowboy of that name who put the bar sinister on its fair escutcheon.
At the time the survey was made, other parts of the county of Orange had been cleared, and a numer- ous population was flowing in upon them. In 1731, which was a few years earlier, there were 1969 persons in the county. New Windsor was occupied about that time, Newburg was laid out in 1719, while Christo- pher Denne, one of the Cheesecock patentees, located a residence for himself on the Otterkill as early as 1712, and sent Sarah Wells, an adopted daughter, under the care of three friendly Indians and several young carpenters, with cows and dogs and imple- ments, upon a sloop, by way of the river, to New Windsor, to proceed across the country to his settle- ment. He and his wife started the next day, and came by way of the Ramapo, at whose falls he stopped, reaching the Otterkill one day later than Sarah Wells and her escort. Shortly after she met with a young English mason named William Bull, from Wolverhampton, to whom she was married at Greycourt Inn, by Friends' ceremony. They after- ward located on a tract of land purchased from Chris- topher Denne, on the Wawayanda Patent, built a stone house still standing, and called the place Hamp- tonburgh. Here they raised a family of twelve chil- dren, from whom sprang the several branches of the Bull family which settled in different parts of Monroe and Chester, and helped develop the wealth, enter- prise and intelligence of those towns.
CHAPTER IV.
INDIANS AND INDIAN NOMENCLATURE.
AT the time of the survey this section of country was a wilderness inhabited by the aborigines and a few white men who seem to have squatted upon the land. Clinton several times mentions his meeting with the settlements and wigwams of the former. He took refuge more than once in wigwams, some of which were deserted, which he repaired. He found a settlement upon the Dr. G. M. Roe place, on which were growing peach and apple trees. Another settlement was at Sugarloaf, where he spent a night. These Indians were friendly. Hendrick Hudson found them so when his little ship, the Half Moon, ascended the Hudson River, until his crew gave them fire-water, and quarrels occurred, and then war. They danced their war-dance, or kintekaue, on the top of Shawangunk or Dans Kammer. After several mas- sacres of the whites about Kingston, the Indians were subdued and a treaty of peace was made.
The Indians of this region were of the Algonquin family, the Lenni-Lenape or Delaware tribe, and the Minsies subtribe. The dominion of the Delawares extended from Kingston to Georgia, south, and from the Atlantic to the Mississippi. Their castle was at Philadelphia. North of Kingston were the Six Tribes. East of the North River were the Mohegans, also a
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Indians and Indian Nomenclature.
branch of the Algonquins. Their language was a very perfect one, although unwritten. Rev. George Eliot was the first to reduce it to writing. He found it difficult, because he desired to inculcate Christian and moral ideas, and had to build up his words of many syllables to clothe them, especially in translating the Scriptures. Thus, to express repentance it required nine syllables, and sinful lusts could be appeased with no less than thirty-three letters.
The Algonquins had musical ears and softened the gutturals and harsh consonants into such euphonious words as Wyoming, Wissahickon, Minisink, Manhat- tan, Monongahela, Mamakating. They had stronger expressions for the rugged features of nature, as Schunemunk, Shawangunk. It is of interest to trace the meaning of some of these Indian names ; for, like other geographical names, they sometimes reveal a bit of history, ethnography or sociology. Thus, Wyo- ming means "broad fields"; Coxsackie means "owl hooting"; Minisink, "many islands "; Seawanhaka, "place of wampum-making"; Manhattan, " bad chan- nel," referring to the East River; Shawangunk is " white man's mountain." Shunam was a contemp- tuous expression for the white man; Schunemunk signified "the mount of the signal-fires," because the Indians had a castle or palisaded fort on the east end. Onk always means "high land," and auk and haka signify " place," while pogh signifies " stream " or "river": thus, Potomac is the "river of the tomahawk." Ramer is "many "; hence Ramer-po is "the many- watered."
Mombasha has been one of the moot points in Monroe history ever since the first survey. Clinton gives us no help, for he simply mentions a pond with
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Chronicles of Monroe in the Olden Time.
a high mountain near by, which latter he designates Mount Bashon. Most historians so call the pond or lake. Even the Heine Club accepts that designation. Mombasha then becomes a corruption. But we re- mind the advocates of this theory that Dr. Eager mentions the burial of an Indian brave at Mombacus somewhere in this vicinity. A learned German schoolmaster translated the word, "King of Min- erals." Ruttenber makes basha mean "death," and derives the name from a battle or a cemetery. Some- times we have leaned to the opinion that the female sachem Basha Bashika, whose name is given to a kill or stream further west, may have been the Debo- rah of this region. But further researches give as its meaning, "the ensign of bloody battle," mom meaning "pain, agony," and basha, "the ensign of battle." See "Dictionary of the Delaware Language," by M. S. Henry, in Franklin Library, Philadelphia, Pa.
Tuxedo is another obscure name. The vulgar pro- nunciation is Duckcedar. Dr. Eager claims this is correct, and the vulgar have corrupted it into Tux- edo. He says it was so named because of the ducks and cedars that abound there. Others suppose it to be of Spanish origin, like Toledo, even claiming there is an estate on Long Island with similar name. But the difficulty is, there was no Spanish settler in the region. Clinton calls it "Tucseto," and so do the
earlier maps. Let us try our Indian measuring-line upon it. Tuck, in Algonquin, and even in Chinook jargon, means "fresh water." Thus the North River was called Mohicannituck, the "flowing water of the Mohegans." Pawtuxet is applied to the falls of the Merrimac, and means "leaping fresh water." The terminal in Tuxedo we regard as a verbal one, and
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Indians and Indian Nomenclature.
means "flowing," so that Tuxedo, according to our theory, is the "lake of clear flowing water": rightly named because of the cascade by which the water entered it, and the natural fall mentioned by Clinton by which it left it. Clinton speaks of its fine water- power, and a valuable meadow that must not be over- flowed by raising the water too high.
The term "Cheesecock," applied to the patent, yields even more satisfactory results if regarded as an Algonquin word. Residents of Monroe once imagined it was borrowed from some English Lord Cheesecock, but there was no record of any such person. When we apply our etymological test to it, it gives a different result. Chis in Algonquin is "high," and kauk is "land." Thus, Pas kauk is "burnt land "; Montauk is "the land of the oaks "; Mount Kis ko or kauk is "the mountain of upland." So Cheese cock, or better, Chis kauk, is the Patent of the Highland, as its very contents demonstrate.
The Indians of this tract were generally disposed to be friendly, so long as the white man kept his word with them; and we read of no complaint under the Cheesecock Patent; but under the Minisink Patent the Indians were not paid for their lands which early began to be settled. Wrongs under the Penn Treaty exasperated this same tribe, the Min- sies or Lenape, who had their fort at Philadelphia. Hence the incursions upon the frontier settlements along the Susquehanna and Delaware up to Port Jervis and beyond. Minisink suffered terribly. Homes were burned, women and children butchered, cattle driven away, till the region was nearly depop- ulated. Block-houses were built to protect the few who were brave enough to resist. At the close of
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Chronicles of Monroe in the Olden Time.
the French and Indian War the Indians were paci- fied by paying them for their lands, and they re- mained friendly until the Revolutionary War, when the Tories stirred them up, and the English sent agents among them to engage their arms against the patriotic frontiersmen. During the years 1778 and 1779 the whole frontier was ablaze with the flames of war. The Tory element gave it peculiar horror, because neighbor betrayed neighbor, and even brother a brother. Brant and his Tory allies had their camp at Oghkawaga, now Binghamton. They per- petrated the twin massacres of Wyoming and Mini- sink, deeds of cruelty burned into the memory of the nation. The latter of these raids aroused the whole region about Minisink, and an expedition was promptly fitted out to punish the savages. They were under the command of Colonel Hathorn and Lieutenant-Colonel Tusten. The brave band plunged into the forest as far as the mouth of the Lacka- waxen, and there fell into an ambush prepared by Brant and the Tories. The Spartan band fought bravely till ammunition failed, when the scene closed with a butchery from which only about thirty es- caped. This was the historic battle of Minisink, commemorated by a monument at Goshen containing the names of the brave martyrs of Liberty. The date of the battle was July 22, 1779.
Monroe, being situated so far from the frontier, did not suffer directly from these incursions of the In- dians. The strain upon Monroe and drain of men was in the direction of the Highlands, where the fiercest struggle was with the flower of the English army, which was doing its utmost to control the navi- gation of the Hudson.
CHAPTER V.
PHYSICAL FEATURES.
B EFORE we speak of the early settlement of this tract, it is well to glance at some of its physical features, and see what inducements it held out to settlers, and how they were likely to shape their des- tiny ; for the very character of a people depends upon their environment. The lines of the Patent were so indeterminate on account of the contiguity of other patents, that they had to be settled by arbitration, both on the northwest and along the Jersey line, where a "gore line" was claimed reaching to Tuxedo. But when these lines were adjusted it left the town nearly the shape of a trapezoid. The three rectangu- lar sides impinged, on the southeast, upon Rockland ; on the northwest, upon Cornwall, and Highland on the north, touching Blooming Grove, and on the west Warwick, the apex just reaching the Jersey line. The tract consists of "upland and meadow," as the Patent describes it. The valley of the Ramapo en- ters on the south - the only direct route on this side of the Highlands near the river to the north. The valley widens at Greenwood, and divides into two, called "Cloves " -the Upper and Lower Smith's Clove. These are hemmed in by lofty mountains : Highlands to the southeast; Schunemunk to the north-
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Chronicles of Monroe in the Olden Time.
west; Bellvale Mountain on the west; and Southfield Mountains on the south. These valleys swell up into knolls and ridges with noble prospects and inviting sites for homes and hamlets. The mountains break from ridges to single peaks between which nestle vales as quiet and restful as many in Scotland. Indeed, the region has been called the Trosachs of America, be- cause so like the same in Scotland.
In travelling through this region, scenery of sur- passing beauty strikes the eye of the tourist; and if he be an artist, he will want to place his easel or use his kodak. But his æsthetic taste will not seldom revolt at the uncanny names which the early settlers gave to lakes beautiful as Windermere or Loch Katrine. The entire water system of the town is remarkable. The Indian Ramapo, or "many waters," well expressed the fact. The stream of that name rises in the Round Island Pond, a most beautiful sheet of water, where the Indian youth raced their canoes to win their dusky brides; but now the re- sort of their fair successors from every part of the county. The wooded island called Chestnut Island, and the sunny sloping shores, offer sites for cottages and villas of rare beauty. This spot is really the water- shed of the level portion of the town; for the Long Pond, or Walton Lake, as it has been more euphoni- ously called, lies but a few feet away, and yet sends its waters through Craigville and Chester, furnishing a mill-seat for the former, and domestic supply of water for the latter, and then empties into Murderer's Creek, now Moodna, and so reaches the Hudson far away from the water of its neighbor, the Ramapo. This latter furnishes seats for many mills and fur- naces, so great is its fall. It receives the waters of
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Physical Features.
Mombasha at Southfield, where it affords valuable mill-power. This lake is about two miles from Mon- roe village. While it is picturesque in surroundings, it presents the remarkable phenomenon of floating islands which break away of their own accord and carry their masses of tangled bushes wherever the wind steers them. The abundance of fish in this and other lakes invites the disciple of Izaak Walton to cast his line and lot here.
A club-house has been built on the border of this lake, making it a very popular resort. Mr. Geo. R. Conklin has bought a number of acres in this vicinity, and is building beautiful cottages, so that it is becoming quite a villa. Water-works are built here, for the water of this lake supplies the village of Monroe. A fine road has also been laid out, which will connect this lake with its rival the Tuxedo, and make one of the most picturesque driveways in the country.
Another confluent of the Ramapo is Wild Cat Brook. It brings down the waters of the mountains below Southfield, over the rockiest of beds, and rushes out near the site of the old saw-works. It is full of speckled beauties, and has given us more than one enjoyable outing. Tuxedo Lake is another source of supply of this remarkable river. Charles Clinton refers to it in his Field Book, speaking of a fine marsh in the neighborhood, and the fitness of the lake to furnish power, but advises not to raise the water too high and spoil the marsh or meadow. He calls it Tucseto.
After passing through various forms of spelling and definition, from the vulgar Duckcedar of Eager to the fanciful Truxillo of Ruttenber, it has settled down to that of Tuxedo, which is the lake of fresh
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Chronicles of Monroe in the Olden Time.
sparkling water, full of fish, with picturesque rocky shores adapted to just what it has been made, a park for residences and every rural and athletic sport. It was laid out by Pierre Lorillard in 1885, who fenced it in and stocked it with deer and wild boar, and other game, making it, with its villas, club-house, and church, one of the most beautiful parks on the Atlantic slope.
But we have not begun to exhaust the lake system of Monroe in the mention of these lakes; for the whole region of the Highlands is covered with them. Wherever you drive or walk, they burst upon your view suddenly on a mountain-top, in a forest or dell, where least expected. From Summit Lake up in the northeast corner, there is a continuous chain of lakes all the way down past Greenwood to the Ramapo, where most of them empty. There are Two Ponds, Echo, Carr, Cedar, Niggar, Cranberry, Slaughters, and others, till we are lost amid their commonplace names. They belong to a limestone region, the waters of which have dissolved out the mineral and left these picturesque basins, beside which mountaineers love to dwell, and sportsmen to camp.
Poplopens Pond is named after a warrior of that name, who had his castle on its banks. The pond flows through a creek of that name, and empties through Buttermilk or Highland Falls into the Hudson. Woodbury Creek rises in Hazard's Pond, now Crom- well Lake, on the banks of which is a fine hotel kept by Oliver Cromwell - a most delightful resort. The stream furnishes the power for the tannery and grist- mill at Highland Mills, flows past Woodbury and joins the Moodna made famous by N. P. Willis' resi- dence and writings.
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Physical Features.
The geology of Monroe has an important bearing upon its settlement and history. It is one of the principles of physical geography that the physical features of a country largely influence its morals. People of effeminate tastes gravitate toward warm alluvions like the valley of the Jordan, but the men of grit choose more elevated plateaus, where there are flints, sand, lime and iron. Such regions furnish the master minds and heroes of the world. Provi- dence destined this region to be the abode of no
mean race. The more mountainous portions of the town would be classified with the azoic period of the world's construction ; the rocks being mostly of the primary class. The Highlands are part of the great Appalachian range which forms the eastern framework of the continent-the earliest with the Rockies to be lifted out of the primeval ocean. Monroe is literally old Monroe,
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