USA > New York > Albany County > Albany > Early records of the city and county of Albany, and colony of Resselaerswyck, Volume 3 > Part 2
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1 Ducts Rel, to Col. Hist. N. Y. 1:454.
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NOTARIAL PAPERS I AND 2, 1660-1696
their High : Might : has the right to grant safe-guards, by which evil- minded persons, as mentioned in the remonstrance of the Directors, might gain an advantage over them and under cover of which they can withdraw themselves from the allegiance and jurisdiction of the Company : it is contrary to the charter, which places the manage- ment of the Company's affairs in general into the hands of the Assembly of the XIX, while that of New Netherland, by resolution of the XIX, has been entrusted to the Department of Amsterdam ; therefore, notwithstanding a safe-guard has been granted, proceed- ings, as authorized by law, may there be instituted against Dinck- lagen, Cornelis Melyn, Dirck van Schelluyne, Jacob van Couwen- hoven and all others." No sooner, however, had the news of Stuyvesant's action reached Holland, than a petition was presented to the States General by Jan van Buren, firewarden in the service of the states of Holland and West Friesland, and Dirck van Schoonder- woert, notary at the Hague, respectively father-in-law and uncle of Dirck van Schelluyne, to have the latter restored in the exercise of his notarial functions, whereupon that body on April 27, 1652. passed a resolution to write to the director general and council to maintain the said Schelluyne in his office and right. This seems to have had the desired effect for on November 22 and December 1, 1652, we find him attesting two Indian deeds for land on Long Island to Cornelis van Werckhoven, although the West India Com- pany in a letter to Stuyvesant, dated June 14, 1656, wrote that they had refused to approve these deeds partly because they "were executed privately before Notary Schelluyne, contrary to the Com- pany's orders." The next year, 1653, New Amsterdam obtained an independent city government and affairs began to take a more favorable turn for Van Schelluyne.
On November 11, 1653, he was with other "principal burghers and inhabitants" of New Amsterdam summoned by the burgo- masters and schepens to devise some means whereby the public expenditures might be paid, and on the 22d of December of the same year, on a "petition presented by Dirck van Schelluyne, Notary Public," the burgomasters and schepens gave for answer " that the petitioner may proceed in his case according to his order, and if he be subjected to any molestation therein, he shall address himself to the Burgomasters and Schepens, who will in such case protect him the same as any other burgher." Soon after even Direc- tor Stuyvesant seems to have been more favorably disposed toward him, for on February 6, 1655, " The necessity for a High Constable (Concierge) to enforce executions in civil cases having been
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EARLY RECORDS OF ALBANY
brought before the meeting of the Supreme Council (in the absence of the Director Genl., Petrus Stuyvesant ) by Fiscal Cornelius van Tienhoven, Therefore, taking into consideration the proposal of the said Fiscal made on the 17th Decbr. 1654, present the Honble Director General, and Council . the Supreme Council by and with the advice and consent of the Burgomasters and Schepens of this City, have nominated and appointed Dirck van Schelluyne to the said office, who appearing at the meeting has taken the proper oath, on the following commission and instruction, saving entire the oath taken as notary at the Hague."1 Van Schelluyne resigned his office on November 3. 1656, giving as the reason for his resig- nation that " my circumstances do not any longer allow me to con- tinue in the City's service as Bailiff." lle was succeeded on November 4th by Mattheus de Vos, a notary public who had been admitted to practice on the 4th of April of the same year. the increase of population of New Amsterdam which shortly before had necessitated the creation of the board of orphan masters having apparently also made it necessary to appoint addi- tional notaries. Van Schelluyne seems thereafter to have confined himself to the performance of his notarial duties and on February 5. 1658, he and Johannes Nevius, Mattheus de Vos and Pelgrom Clock took the oath prescribed by the ordinance regulating the fees of notaries and clerks. This ordinance, which was passed on January 25, 1658," is of great importance as regards the regulation of the notarial practice in New Netherland. Stating in the pre- amble that the director general and council by their own experi- ence and the complaints of others are convinced that excessive fees are charged by secretaries, notaries and clerks " for writing all sorts of Instruments, to the serions, yea nearly intolerable, onerousness of the Judgment and Costs of court; some being so far seized by avarice and greed that they are ashamed to render a Bill, or specifi- cation of the Fee they demand, but ask, if not extort, the amount from parties in gross," this ordinance provides as follows:
" That from this time forward, no man shall undertake to draw up or to write any public Instrument, unless he be commissioned or licensed thereto by the Director General and Council, as Secretary, Notary or Clerk, which commissioned or licensed person is bound to content himself with such Fee as is established therefor by the
1 Sce Records of New .Amsterdam, 1:282-84
2 \ complete translation of this ordinance is in Laws and Ordinances of Nowe Netherland, p. 329-33.
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NOTARIAL PAPERS 1 AND 2, 1660-1696
Director General and Council, and to renew every year, on the 5th of February, the oath which he has taken, precisely to submit to and obey the Ordinance enacted, or hereafter, according to circum- stances, to be enacted, on the subject of Secretaries, Notaries, Clerks and such like officers, in conformity to the following :
First, all Secretaries, Notaries, Clerks, or such officers, shall keep a correct Register or Journal, wherein people may see immedi- ately, if necessary and when required, whatever has been executed before them, and for which they demand such Fee, and place it on their account.
Secondly, no Secretary, Notary, Clerk, or any such officer, shall demand from any person any money in advance, or ask or take any present, or be at liberty to compound or agree with anyone about a Fee and pay for writing yet to be earned on pain of for- feiture of office and Fifty guilders fine, by such as may be found to have acted contrary hereunto.
Thirdly, the Secretary, Notary, Clerk or officer shall sign with his own hand all Instruments executed in his presence, and seal them, when required, with his signet, providing that he receive for his seal six stivers in addition to the legal Fee.
Fourthly, Secretaries, Notaries, Clerks and such like officers shall be bound, when required, to give a discharge or receipt for the earned and paid Fee, to be made use of when necessary.
Finally and lastly, all Secretaries, Notaries and Clerks shall be bound to serve the Poor and Indigent, who ask such as an Alms, gratis and pro Deo; and may demand and receive from the Rich, the following Fees." Whereafter follows a long list specifying the fee to be charged for each kind of instrument, with the final statement " No disbursements for Drink, or any other extraordinary Presents, Gifts, or Gratuities shall be brought into any account, or demanded or collected by the Secretaries, Notaries, Clerks or such like officers."
Whether Dirck van Schelhuyne under the provisions of this ordi- nance found the office at New Amsterdam no longer profitable, or saw in them a renewed evidence of the spirit of oppression and wished to some extent to free himself from the jurisdiction of the director general and council, certain it is that in the summer of 1660 he accepted the secretaryship of the colony of Rensselaerswyck which had become vacant by the death of Dirck van Hamel and in connection therewith began to practise his profession as a notary at Beverwyck. As stated at the beginning of this preface, the record of his notarial activities runs from August 17, 1660, to December
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EARLY RECORDS OF ALBANY
4, 1004. At the end of that period he was still secretary of Rensse laerswyck, a position which he seems to have held till 1665, when Governor Richard Nicolls consolidated the court of the colony and that of the former village of Beverwyck and Van Schelluyne was appointed secretary of Albany, his first official act in that capacity being dated the first of September 1665, old style, and his last act August 9. 1668, Whether between these dates he continued to act as a notary is not known, but hardly likely, first, because there is no notarial protocol for that period and, secondly, because Van Schel- luyne on December 10, 1668, submitted to the magistrates at Albany a commission as notary from Governor Francis Lovelace, with request to be admitted to practice, which was granted. Though the entry in the court minutes states that he took " the usual oath of fidelity," it is doubful whether even then he practised his profession for any length of time, since he moved soon after to Niskayuna,
where on June - 2 1607, he had received a gift of land from the Indians, for and in consideration of " seuerall freindly & good offices performed by him towards them as also for pains taken in writing y" proposalls, Articles & other matter heretofore past betwixt them & y" English & Dutch at Albany," Dirck van Schel luyne obtained a patent for this land on May 10, 1608, in which the land is described as a "Certaine parcell of Flat Lands or Plaines upon yr Maine lying & being about North west from Albany neare unto ye Maquaes Ryver or Creeke on y" East syde thereof stretch- ing from y" path wrh goes to M' Curlaers fatlands or plaine to y" Creek or Kill wch is ye North bounds of yr Land belonging to Maritien Damen including all ye Land or Ground lying within y." Compasse of 3" said plaines or belonging thereanto, weh said parcell of flattland or plaine being parte of that Land weh by yr Natives is Commonly called & knowne by J" name of the Canastigiones." Soon after the receipt of this grant Dirck van Schelluyne disappears from view, the last mention of him occurring in the Mbany court minutes under date of May 27, 1600, in connection with an action brought against him by Jeremias van Rensselaer, in which the plain- tiff sets forth that he has caused the court messenger and schout to serve an attachment against the person of Dirck van Schelluyne and to summon him, but that " in spite of this attachment the said Schelluyne has departed." The wife of Dirck van Schelluyne was Cornelia van Buren, by whom he had at least two sons, Cornelis. who in 106; was apprenticed to Hendrick Bries, the shoemaker, and
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NOTARIAL PAPERS 1 AND 2, 1660-1696
who received a patent for a parcel of land for a tannery without the north gate of Albany, and Tielman, who is said to have returned to Holland in 1670 .
How the records of Dirck van Schelluyne ultimately came into the possession of the county of Albany, is not known, but unless they were after his death turned over to the secretary, of which there seems to be no evidence, it is not unlikely that they were entrusted to the care of Adriaen Jansen van Ilpendam, for purposes of refer- ence in connection with his official duties, and afterwards turned over with his records to Secretary Robert Livingston, of which more will be said later.
The career of this second notary public, Adriaen Jansen van Ilpendam, though less eventful, is hardly less interesting than Schel- luyne's, being one of long and faithful service ending in tragic death. The name of Van Ilpendam first appears in the records of New Netherland under date of February 10, 1647, as that of one of the witnesses to the baptism of Pieter Swart, in the Reformed Dutch Church of New York. On August 19, 1649, Adriaen Keyser made out a certificate, stating that Van Ilpendam received no part of his father's estate, but on the contrary "kicked it away with his foot," an expression meaning that he renounced the right of succes- sion, probably because the estate was incumbered with debts. The next day, Van Ilpendam gave a power of attorney to Sibout Claessen to receive whatever was due to him by inheritance from relatives at Leyden, and in this power of attorney he is described as " at present schoolmaster here on the island of Manhatans." Though evidently poor, he seems to have been well connected in Holland and there is every reason to suppose that he was a brother of Jan Jansen van Ilpendam, the commissary at Fort Nassau, on the Delaware river, whose widow on August 16, 1647, executed a power of attorney to Johannes de Laet at Leyden to settle her late husband's accounts with the West India Company. Adriaen van Ilpendam, who appears to have been a private master at New Amsterdam, left that place in 1650 or 1651, and came to the colony of Rensselaerswyck, where he succeeded Evert Noldingh as schoolmaster and taught for some time. He afterwards moved to Beverwyck, where in February 1652, he is referred to as clerk of the burgher company. On October 25, 1653, he received from Governor Stuyvesant a patent for a lot and garden at Beverwyck, which property, with the house thereon, he sold two years later to Adriaen Gerritsen van Papen- dorp, purchasing himself on February 28, 1656, the house, lot and garden of Jochem Wesselsen, the baker, for 1300 guilders. He paid
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EARLY RECORDS OF ALBANY
this sum in 1657 and the same year was the highest bidder at the sale of the brickyard of Madam Johanna de Hulter, the daughter of Johannes de Laet, who had recently become a widow and was on the point of returning to Ilolland, where she afterwards married Jeronimus Ebbingh. During all these years and as late as September 1660, Van Hpendam seems to have taught school. Then, for a number of years, nothing is heard of him, till suddenly, on Decem- ber 11, 1668, we find him and " divers others, his Matles sworn subjects of the Dutch nation, inhabitants of New Yorke in America," petitioning the king of England for permission to sail with the ship " King Charles " to New York, the petitioners setting forth that relying on the grant of October 23, 1667, allowing three Dutch ships yearly to trade and traffic to and from New York, they had transported themselves into Holland during the past summer and freighted the ship " King Charles," which by order in Council of November 18, 1668, recalling his Majesty's permission, was detained at the Texel. Permission to sail having been granted, Van Hpendam returned to New York and there secured from Governor Francis Lovelace a license to practise as a notary public. Just how he had acquired the necessary legal knowledge for this office is not clear, but as his disappearance from the records in 1660 coincides with the arrival of Dirck van Schelluyne as secretary of Rens- selaerswyck, there is a possibility that for some years he acted as the latter's assistant or clerk and so trained himself for his later duties. During all the years that Van Ilpendam served as a notary in Albany, he seems to have enjoyed the respect of the community in which he lived. He continued to officiate during the brief period of Dutch reoccupation of the province in 1073-74, and on the arrival of Governor Edmund Andros he was confirmed in his office. Though in his official capacity he took part in all the important legal transactions of the period, nothing appears to have happened that affected him person- ally in any unusual way. Though the population of Albany increased, the official business of Van Upendam, as he grew older. seems to have become less and toward the end of his life, in letters to Mr Dammas Gublewaghen, secretary of the city of Haarlem, and Madam Sybingh, which have been preserved among his records. we find him repeatedly complaining of lack of money. Being in the habit of writing to these persons in connection with the collection of the interest on certain legacies left to him by relatives in Holland. he states in a letter of October 2, 1085, that he is now past of years of age and no longer able to earn much and therefore almost entirely
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NOTARIAL PAPERS I AND 2, 1660-1696
dependent on the interest which is due to him. These financial cares seem to have preved on his mind and finally, not long before July 29, 1686, almost at the very time of the chartering of Albany as a city, which to him may have meant further curtailment of his busi- ness as thenceforth nearly all records were kept in English style, he committed suicide by hanging. On the date mentioned Jacobus de Beavoise (or de Beauvois) presented to the governor and council a petition " for possession of two houses & lots in Albany, late the property of Adrian Johnson van Elpendam (a suicide), the peti- tioner being a relative." Having on the 12th of August following proved to the satisfaction of the council that he was the nearest relative, the said De Beauvois, on August 16, 1689, gave a deed for the property to Johannes de Wandelaer, in which deed he is described as " Jacobus de Beauvois of Breuckelen, L. I., cooper, only son & heir of his dece'd Moyr Sophia Lodesteyn, & by her decease heir at law of his dec'd cousin Mr Adriaen van Ilpendam. as appears by testimony of Jacob Tyse van der Heyden & Johannes de Wandelaer, dated 22 Aug. 1686, sworn before Pr Schuyler, magistrate of this City." As for the records of Adriaen van Ilpendam, which run consecutively from July 12, 1669, to February 23, 1686, they passed into the possession of Jan van Loon, late coroner of the city, who on November 27, 1688, was ordered by the city magistrates to turn them over to Secretary Robert Livingston. This order, however, was not immediately complied with, for on June 24, 1701, the following resolution was passed by the mayor's court: "Since often complaints are made by diverse persones for want of certain writteings or other instruments writt by Mr Adriaen van Elpendam, late Notaris Publiq, now in hand of Mr John van Loon, alledging that they can not obtain such writteings from him, ye Gentn doe therefore require ye sd John van Loon to deliver to this Court on ye 22d of July next, all such deeds, writteings and other Instruments as he hath in hands, from sd van Elpendam, belonging to any Person or Persones, which he is in no ways to omit dated ye day and year aforesaid." On the date specified Van Loon again failed to turn over the papers, whereupon the court resolved " that a warrant be issued to sd van Loon to appear at ye next Mayors, to be held on ye 5th of Aug. ensueing, to deliver s' writte- ings according to ye late Resolution. N.B. Having had no oppor- tunity to send ye sd warrant before ye 5th of August, is therefore inserted in sª warrant to appear on ye 2d of Sept. next." For some reason Van Loon once more failed to deliver the papers at the appointed time, but under date of January 20, 17012, we read in
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EARLY RECORDS OF ALBANY
the mmutes: " This day appeared before this Court Mr John van Loon, and bath delivered into the office all such papers as he hath in his hands writt by Mr Adriaen van Elpendam relateing yr pub lick, and thereby declared upon oath that he had no more such in his custody." Though in these minutes nothing is said about the records of Dirck van Schelluyne, it is not impossible, as suggested above, that they were included among Van Ipendam's papers, a supposition which would be entirely natural if it could be definitely shown that Van lpendam had for a time acted as Van Schelluyne's clerk and taken over his practice in 1600.
Jan Juriaensen Becker, the third notary public whose papers are printed in this volume, was a man of rather different type from either Van Schelluyne or Van Mpendam and had a checkered career. The first information we have about him is contained in a 1.etition of August 24, 1656, in which he prays the director general and council for a salary as clerk at Fort Casimir, afterwards called New Amstel, on the South or Delaware river. Though this petition was granted. Becker seems to have been tempted to add to his income by engaging in the lucrative business of selling brandy to the soldiers of the garrison and to the Indians. This brought him into trouble with the authorities. In a letter of November 8, 1659. to Director Stuyvesant, Wilhelmus Beeckman, vice director of the colony of New Amstel, writes: " Coming back to Altena with our Sergeant from the aforesaid court-martial I found most of our soldiers intoxicated. I was told, that Jan Becker has at different occasions offered liquor to the fellows upon their accounts, which [ have forbidden. Yesterday, an hour after evening the neighbors of Jan Juriaensen came and complained of the great noise made by drunken savages," Again, on January 14. 1060, Beeckman writes: " I have to inform your Noble Worship again of the irregularities of Jan Juriaen Becker in selling strong drinks. He incites the oldiers to drunkeness, as he offers to sell them brandy on account or to give them credit and some, principally of the new men, have already spent for drinks 2 or 3 months' wages, before they have been here 6 or 7 weeks, while he takes their bond, wherein is set forth, that he had advanced such a sum for the necessaries of life. I have secretly warned him not to do it, whereas they often come to the Fort at night singing and boisterous, also several times quarrels among them have been caused; nevertheless it was continued and I have finally been compelled, to forbid him not to sell any more strong drink by the small measure. Yet it goes on still, though recently." March 1. 1000, Fiscal Nicasius de Sille was sent to the
NOTARIAL PAPERS I AND 2, 1660-1090
South river to prosecute the persons guilty of a murder committed upon three savages and in connection therewith he was instructed to inquire into the conduct of Becker and his wife and to examine Commissary Beeckman " why the said Jan Juriaensen Becker is not, for his assistance, employed as secretary or clerk, for which he was expressly sent and engaged. If he discovers any evidence, proof and sufficient reason for the one or the other he is to bring here the said Becker, that further proceedings and measures may be taken against him according to law and his deserts." The answer to this had already been given in the above-mentioned letter of January 14. 1660, in which Commissary Beeckman says: " I dare not let him come near to my papers, especially to copy letters and other things, for he is only a tell-tale: he does not perform any other service here, than to read aloud on Sundays, which I can have done by the Sergeant or any other. If your Honor required him at another place, I can, under correction, miss him here very well." De Sille evidently found sufficient evidence against Becker to war- rant him in bringing the latter to New Amsterdam, for on April I, 1660, Becker was indicted there for selling brandy to the savages, the fiscal demanding " that Jan Jurriaensen Beckker be brought to the place, where sentences are usually executed, be put there into the pillory with a brandy-measure around his neck and also be sentenced to pay a fine of five hundred guilders according to the Placats and to be banished this province, but be kept in prison pro- visionally, until your Honble Worships' sentence or finding shall be executed." On April 12, 1660, the defendant denied " upon the true word of a man, that in contempt of your Noble Honorable Worships' placats he has sold brandy to the savages, much less made a profession of it. whereby he should, since a long time, have become notorious." He also offered a joint affidavit of three wit- nesses setting forth that liquor was openly sold to the savages in the colony of New Amstel as well as in and near Fort Altena and " that if the poor inhabitants of the colony did not sell or barter liquor to the savages for Indian corn, meat or other things, they would perish from hunger and distress." The director and council do not seem to have been very deeply impressed by this defense for they kept Becker provisionally imprisoned and on April 26th sen- tenced him to the payment of a fine of 500 guilders and degrada- tion from his office as clerk and reader, at the same time ordering him and his wife as quickly as possible to break up their household and to remove from the South river, and furthermore to pay the
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EARLY RECORDS OF ALBANY
costs of the trial. This sentence, however, like so many others found in the court records of New Netherland, seems to have been passed largely in terrorem, for when on May 3d Becker presented A petition stating that this sentence would cause his total ruin. it was decreed that for reasons the petitioner was "relieved of the fine, provided that he arranges with the llonhl Fiscal for the costs and mises of the law." This marks the end of the first period of Becker's career. In accordance with this sentence he was forced to leave the South river and established himself at New Amsterdam, where on August toth he presented to the director general and council the following petition to keep school :
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