USA > New York > Westchester County > History of Westchester County, New York, from its earliest settlement to the year 1900 > Part 7
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DISCOVERY AND PRELIMINARY VIEW
New York State. To our mind, after a careful study of the records of the voyage, it scarcely admits of doubt that the " Half-Moon's " arrival above Spurten Duyvil is to be assigned not to the first but to the sec- ond day of its progress up the stream.1
Leaving his anchorage below Spuyten Duyvil on the morning of the 14th of September. 1609, Hudson traversed on that day the entire Westchester shore, en- tering the Highlands before nightfall. The record of the day's sail- ing is thus given in duet's Journal: " In the morning we sailed up the river twelve leagues . . . and came G to a strait between two points, ... and it (the river) trended north by one league. . . . The river is a mile broad; there is very high land on both sides. Then we went up northwest a league and a half, deep water; then northeast five miles; then northwestby north two leagnes and a half. The land grew very high and moun- tainous." The " strait THE " HALF-MOON" LEAVING AMSTERDAM. between two points," where they found the stream " a mile broad," was manifestly that portion of the river between Verplanck's and Stony Points. Continuing his voyage, Hudson sailed until he reached the site of Albany, where, finding the river no longer navigable, he was constrained to turn back, emerging from the Highlands into the West- chester section about the end of September. Here for the first time since leaving the Lower Bay blood was shed. The ship was becalmed
1 Wood, In his account of the Discovery and Settlement of Westchester County, in Scharf's Ilistory, accepts Brodhead's date; but Dr. Cole.
in his History of Yonkers in the same work (ii., 4t. reviewing the statements In Juet's Jour- nal, derides upon the 14th of September.
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HISTORY OF WESTCHESTER COUNTY
off Stony Point, in the " strait " described by Juet, and the natives, animated solely by curiosity, came out in their canoes, some of them being received on board. The occupant of one of the canoes, which kept " hanging under the stern," was detected in pilfering from the cabin windows, having secreted " a pillow and two shirts and two bandaliers." Whereupon the " mate shot at him, and struck him on the breast, and killed him." The visitors now fled precipitately, those on board the " Half-Moon " jumping into the water. A boat was low- ered from the ship to recover the stolen property, and one of the In. dians in the water had the temerity to take hold of it, at which " the cook seized a sword and cut off one of his hands, and he was drowned." It is difficult to characterize the shooting of the Indian thief otherwise than as wanton murder, and this whole episode stands to the serious discredit of Hudson and his companions. At Spuyten Dnyvil the next day was fought the historic encounter with the Indians of that local- ity, who, harboring bitter resentment because of Hudson's attempted forcible detention of two of their people on his journey up-stream, now met him with a fleet of canoes and most valorously gave him battle. The details of this fight have been given in our chapter on the Indians, and need not be repeated here. It is noticeable that the only san- guinary incidents of Hudson's exploration of the river occurred along the Westchester coast.
Sailing away from the scene of this bloody conflict, the " Half Moon " passed out of the Narrows on the 4th of October, just one month and a day after its arrival in the Lower Bay, and proceeded direct to Europe, reaching the port of Dartmouth, England, on the 7th of November. The English anthorities, reluctant to concede to Ilolland the right to Hudson's important discoveries, detained the vessel for several months on the strength of its commander's British nativity, and though it was ultimately released to its Dutch owners Hudson himself was not permitted to return to the Netherlands. As we have seen, he embarked under English patronage the next year upon another chimerical adventure after the northwestern passage, and ended his career in 1611 as a miserable castaway on the shores of Hudson's Bay. The " Half-Moon " was destined for a somewhat like melancholy fate, being wrecked five years later in the East Indies.
By the delimitations of its charter granted in 1602, the Dutch East India Company was excluded from all commercial operations in America: and accordingly no steps were taken by that corporation to develop the promising country found by Henry Hudson. But the alert and enterprising private traders of Holland were prompt in seeking to turn the new discoveries to profitable uses. While Hudson and his ship were held at Dartmouth, that is, during the winter of
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DISCOVERY AND PRELIMINARY VIEW
1609-10, an association of Duteb merchants was organized with the object of sending out a vessel to these lands, and for a number of years voyages were annually made. Of the first ship thus dispatched Hudson's mate was placed in command, having under him a portion of the crew of the " Half-Moon." These early private undertakings were mainly in connection with the fur trade, which offered especial advantages on the shores of the Hudson, where at that period fur-bearing animals, notably the beaver and otter, were very nul- merous. So abundant, indeed, was the beaver in this part of the country that for a long period of years beaver-skins formed one of the principal items in every cargo sent to Europe. A representation of the beaver was the principal feature of the official seal of New Netherland.
SEAL OF NEW NETHERLAND.
In 1612 a memorable voyage was made to Hudson's River by Henry Christiansen and Adrian Block, two Hol- landers, in a vessel which they owned jointly. They returned with a goodly cargo of furs, carrying with them to the home country two sons of Indian chiefs, by one of whom Christiansen, several years sub- seqnently, was murdered on a Hudson River island. In 1613, with two vessels, the " Fortune " and the " Tiger," they came back. Chris- tiansen, commanding the " Fortune," decided to pass the winter on Manhattan Island, and built several houses of branches and bark. Upon the spot where his little settlement stood (now 39 Broadway ) the Macomb mansion, occupied by Washington for a time while President, was constructed ; and the officers of the Netherlands- Ameri- can Steamship Line are now located on the same site. Block's ship. the " Tiger," took fire and was completely destroyed while at her an- chorage in the harbor. This great misfortune operated, however, only to stimulate the enterprise of the resourceful Dutchmen, who forth- with, in circumstances as unfavorable for such work as can well be conceived, proceeded to build another, which was named the " On- rust," or " Restless," a shallop of sixteen tons' burden, Jaunched in the spring of 1614. With the " Restless " Block now entered upon an ex- ploration almost as important as Hudson's own, and certainly far more dangerous. Steering it through the East River, he came sud- denly into the fearful current of Hellgate, whose existence was pre- viously unknown to Europeans, and which he navigated safely. Pass- ing the mouth of the Harlem River, he thoroughly explored the West- chester coast along the Sound and emerged into that majestic body of Jand-Jocked water. To Block belongs the undivided honor of the
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HISTORY OF WESTCHESTER COUNTY
discovery of Long Island Sound, which had never before been entered by a European mariner. Indeed, it was assumed up to that time that the coastline north of the eastern extremity of Long Island was con- tinuous, and the separation of Long Island from New England is not indicated on any of the maps of the period. Block sailed through the Sound to Cape Cod, discovering the Connectient River and the other
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conspicnous physical features. The name of Block Island, off the coast of Rhode island, commemorates this truly distinguished dis- coverer, and his momentous voyage. A highly interesting result of Block's achievement was a chart of the country, which he prepared and published, here reproduced in part. Although the outlines in certain respects, particularly in the case of Manhattan Island, are ex- tremely ernde, they are surprisingly faithful in the parts representing his individual responsibility. It will be observed that the general
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DISCOVERY AND PRELIMINARY VIEW
trend of the Westchester coast on the Sound is traced almost exactly.
Returning to Holland in the fall of 1614, with the " Fortune," hav- ing left the " Restless" with Christiansen, Block at once became a beneficiary of an attractive commercial offer which had been pro- claimed some months previously by the States-General, or central government, of the Netherlands. He and his companion Christiansen were by no means the only seekers of fortune in the splendid realms made known by the captain of the " Half-Moon." Other trading ex- peditions had gone there, and interest in the resources of this quarter was becoming quite active. To further promote such interest, and to arouse fresh endeavor, the States-General, in March, 1614, issued a decree offering to grant to any person or number of persons who should discover new lands a charter of exclusive privileges of trade therewith. Upon Block's return there was pending before the States- General an application for the coveted charter by a strong organiza- tion of merchants, which was based upon Hudson's discovery and the representation that the hopeful organization was prepared to make to the region in question the number of voyages conditionally required in the decree. On October 11, 1614, Block submitted to the States- General, at The Hague, explicit information of his discoveries, and a charter bearing that date was accordingly granted to him and a nun- ber of individuals associated with him (of whom Christiansen was one), comprising a business society styled the New Netherland Com- pany. This company had for its formally defined aim the commer- cial exploitation of the possessions of Holland in the New World, to which collectively the name of New Netherland was now applied. It was in the same year and month that New England was first so called by Prince Charles of Wales ( afterward Charles I. ).
The grant of the States-General establishing the New Netherland Company, after naming the persons associated in it-these persons being the proprietors and skippers of five designated ships,-describes the region in which its operations are to be carried on as " certain new lands situate in America, between New France and Virginia, the sea- coasts whereof lie between forty and forty-five degrees of latitude, and now called New Netherland." The range of territorial limits in lati- tude thus claimed for Ilolland's dominion on the American coast is certainly a broad extension of the rights acquired by the discoveries of Hudson and Block, and utterly ignores the sovereignty of England north of the Virginian region proper. On the other hand, the entire coast to which Holland now set up pretensions had already been not only comprehensively claimed by Great Britain, but allotted in terms to the corporate ownership and jurisdiction of two English companies. In 1606, three years before the voyage of Hudson and eight years be-
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HISTORY OF WESTCHESTER COUNTY
fore the chartering of the New Netherland Company, the old patent of Sir Walter Raleigh having been voided by his attainder for treason, James I. issued a new patent, partitioning British America, then known by the single name of Virginia, into two divisions. The first division, called the First Colony, was granted to the London Company, and extended from thirty-four degrees to thirty-eight degrees, with the right of settlement as far as forty-one degrees in the event that this company should be the first to found a colony that far north. The second division, or Second Colony, assigned to the Plymouth Company, embraced the country from forty-one degrees to forty-five degrees, with the privilege of acquiring rights southward to thirty-eight de- grees, likewise conditioned upon priority of colonization. Through- out the long controversy between England and Holland touching their respective territorial rights in America, it was, indeed, the uniform contention of the English that the Dutch were interlopers in the in- terior, and that the exclusive British title to the coast was beyond question.
Attached to the charter given by the States-General to the New Netherland Company was Block's " figurative map," already alluded to. The grant accorded to the company a trade monopoly, which, how- ever, was only " for four voyages, within the term of three years, com- mencing the 1st of January, 1615, next ensuing, or sooner." During this three years' period it was not to be " permitted to any other per- son from the United Netherlands to sail to, navigate, or frequent the said newly discovered lands, havens, or places," "on pain of confisca- tion of the vessel and cargo wherewith infraction hereof shall be at- tempted, and a fine of 50,000 Netherland ducats for the benefit of the said discovers or finders."
No obligation to settle the land was prescribed for the company. and, indeed, this charter was purely a concession to private gain-seek- ing individuals, involving no projected aims of state policy or colonial undertaking whatever, although wisely bestowed for but a brief pe- riod. Under the strictly commercial regime of the New Netherland Company other voyages were made, all highly successful in material results, the fur trade with the Indians still being the objective. That the scope of operations of these early Dutch traders comprehended the entire navigable portion of the Hudson River is sufficiently evidenced by the fact that two forts were erected near the site of Albany, one called Fort Nassan, on an island in the river, and the other Fort Orange, on the mainland. It is hence easily conceivable that not in- frequent landings were made by the bartering Dutchmen at the va- rious Indian villages on our Westchester shore in these first days of Hudson River commerce.
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DISCOVERY AND PRELIMINARY VIEW
On the 1st of January, 1618, the charter of the New Netherland Company expired by time limitation. Application for its renewal was refused, and from that date until July, 1621, the whole of New Nether- land was a free field for whomsoever might care to assume the ex- pense and hazard of enterprises within its borders. This peculiar con- dition was not, however, due to any flagging of interest in their Ameri- can possessions on the part of the Dutch government, but was an in- cident of a well-considered political programme which was kept in abeyance because of the circumstances of the time, to be launched in the fullness of events.
The twelve years' truce between Holland and Spain, signed in 1609, was now drawing to its close. The question of the continuance of peace or the resumption of war was still a doubtful one, contingent
VIEW OF AMSTERDAM, HOLLAND.
upon the ultimate disposition of Spain, for the people of the Nether- lands were resolved in no case to accept anything but absolute inde- pendence. In the eventuality of war it would become a partienlarly important part of Dutch policy not merely to provide for the protec- tion of the new provinces in America and their prospective inhabit- anis, but to cope with the formidable Spanish maritime power in American waters, and as far as possible prey upon the rich commerce of Spain with that quarter of the globe and even wrest territory from her there. To this end it was more than idle to consider the recharter- ing of a weak aggregation of skippers and their financial sponsors as the sole delegate and upholder of the dignity and strength of the re- public in the western seas. If hostilities were to be renewed it would be indispensable to institute an organization in connection with New Netherland powerful enough to encounter the fleets of Spain on at
64
HISTORY OF WESTCHESTER COUNTY
least an equal footing. A perfect pattern for such an organization al- ready existed in the Dutch East India Company. The creation of a West India Company on similar lines to meet the expected need was the grand scheme of statecraft which caused the States-General to reject the solicitations of the worthy traders of the New Netherland Company for a continuation of their valuable monopoly.
This was, moreover, no newly devised plan. In 1604, two years after the establishment of the East india Company, and long before the first appearance of the Dutch flag on the American coast, the concep- tion of a West India Company was carefully formulated in a paper drawn up by one William Usselinx and presented, progressively, to the board of burgomasters of Amsterdam, the legislature or " states " of Holland province, and the States-General of the nation. In this docu- ment Usselinx proposed the formation of "a strong financial corpora- tion, similar to that exploiting the East Indies, for the fitting out of armed vessels to attack the fleets of Spain and make conquest of her possessions in the American hemisphere."1 But it was deemed inex- pedient to sanction such a venture at the time.
Upon the termination of the twelve years' truce, in the spring of 1621, and the revival of the war between the two countries, the Dutch statesmen had the details of the much-cherished West Indian Com- pany enterprise thoroughly matured, and on the 3d of June of that year the charter of the new corporation, comprising a preamble and forty-five articles, was duly signed. The subscriptions to its stock, which was required by law to be not less than seven millions of florins ($2,800,000), were immediately forthcoming. But although the ex- istence of the company dated from July 1, 1621, it was some two years before its charter took complete effect, various disputed points not be- ing immediately adjustable. Twelve additional articles were subse- quently incorporated, the whole instrument receiving final approval on the 21st of June, 1623.
The Dutch West India Company, to whose care the conversion of the American wilderness into a habitation for civilized man was thus com- mitted, and under whose auspices European institutions were first planted and organized government was erected and for many years administered here, was in its basie constitution a most notable body, partaking of the character of a civil congress so far as that is practi- cable for an association pursuing essential mercantile ends. It had a central directorate or executive board, officially styled the assembly of the XIX., which was composed of nineteen delegates, eighteen be- ing elected from five local chambers, and the nineteenth being the
I Van Pelt's Hist. of the Greater New York, i. 9.
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DISCOVERY AND PRELIMINARY VIEW
direct representative of " their High Mightinesses, the States-General of the United Provinces." The five local chambers were subordinate bodies which met independently, embracing shareholders from Am- sterdam, Zeeland, the Meuse ( including the cities of Dort, Rotterdam, and Delft ), the North Quarter (which comprised the cities of North Holland outside of Amsterdam), and Friesland. The controlling in- fluence in the company was that of the City of Amsterdam, which at first sent eight and later nine delegates to the Assembly of the XIX. The spheres of trade marked out for and confirmed to the company, " to the exclusion of all other inhabitants or associations of merchants within the bounds of the United Provinces," comprehended both the Atlantic and the Pacific coasts of the two Americas, from the Straits of Magellan to the extreme north, and, in addition, the African coast from the Tropic of Cancer to the Cape of Good Hope.
The rights and powers vested in the corporation fell short of those of actual independent sovereignty only in the particulars that the more weighty acts of the company, as declarations of war and conelu- sions of peace, were subject to the approval of the Dutch government, and that the officers appointed to rule distant countries, and their un- derlings, should be acceptable to the States-General and should take the oath of fealty to the Netherlands republic. "To protect its com- merce and dependencies, the company was empowered to erect forts and fortifications; to administer justice and preserve order; maintain police and exercise the government generally of its transmarine af- fairs; declare war and make peace, with the consent of the States- General, and, with their approbation, appoint a governor or director- general and all other officers, eivil, military, judicial, and executive, who were bound to swear allegiance to their High Mightinesses, as well as to the company itself. The director-general and his council were invested with all powers, judicial, legislative, and executive, sub- ject, somte supposed, to appeal to Holland, but the will of the com- pany, expressed in their instructions or declared in their marine or military ordinances, was to be the law of New Netherland, excepting in cases not especially provided for, when the Roman law, the imperial statntes of Charles V., the edicts, resolutions, and customs of Patria- Fatherland-were to be received as the paramount rule of action."1
One of the primary aims in the construction of this mighty corpora- tion being to establish an efficient and aggressive Atlantic maritime power in the struggle with Spain, very precise provisions were made for that purpose. " The States-General engaged to assist them with a million of guilders, equal to nearly half a million of dollars; and in case peace should be disturbed, with sixteen vessels of war and fonr-
1 De Lancey's Hist, of the Manors of Westchester County (Scharf, i .. 42)
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HISTORY OF WESTCHESTER COUNTY
teen yachts, fully armed and equipped-the former to be at least of three hundred and the latter of eighty tons' burden; but these vessels were to be maintained at the expense of the company, which was to furnish, unconditionally, sixteen ships and fourteen yachts, of like ton- nage, for the defense of trade and purposes of war, which, with all merchant vessels, were to be commanded by an admiral appointed and instructed by their High Mightinesses."
And this magnificent programme of naval aggression was no mere wordy ornamentation woven into the prosaic context of a matter-of- fact commercial agreement for flattering effect. The West India Com- pany, with its ships of war and armed merchantmen, under brilliant commanders, scoured the Spanish Main, capturing many a richly freighted bark of the enemy, and, not content with the prizes of the high seas, it dispatched expedi- tions to attack the Spanish terri- torial possessions in the Antilles and South America, which pro- creded from conquest to conquest. By its energy and prowess, in the name of the republic of the United Netherlands, was begun in the first half of the seventeenth cen- tury the work of dismemberment of the vast Spanish empire in the New World which now, at the close of the nineteenth century, has been so gloriously completed by the arms of the republic of the United States. On the South American mainland Brazil, a province of Portugal, at that time tributary to Spain, was conquered DUTCH WINDMILL. and held for several years as Dutch territory, and the country known as Dutch Guiana, where the flag of Holland still floats, also yielded itself to these merchant princes of the Netherlands. In addition numerous West India islands were taken. A celebrated episode of the company's naval operations during the war was the capture of the Spanish " Silver Fleet " (1628), having the enormous value of $4,600,000 in our money. The financial concerns of the corporation prospered exceedingly as the result of these and other successes. In 1629 a dividend of fifty per cent. was declared, and in 1630 a dividend of twenty-five per cent.
As we have seen, the status of the West India Company's organiza-
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DISCOVERY AND PRELIMINARY VIEW
tion was not exactly settled until 1623, and although it nominally en- joyed exclusive dominion and trade privileges on the shores of the Hudson from the 1st of July, 1621, no steps were taken to colonize the land in the as yet unperfected state of its affairs. Before coming to the era of formal settlement under its administration it is necessary to complete our review of what is known of the history of the ante- cedent years.
It is certain that the separate voyages undertaken hither by various adventurous men between 1610 and 1623 resulted in no settlement of the country worthy of the name. We find no record of any transpor- tation of yeomen or families to this locality for the announced object of making it their abode and developing its resources. Although there is no doubt respecting the utilization of Manhattan Island in more or less serious trading connections at an early period, the history of the first years of European occupation is involved in a haze of tradition and myth. From the vague reports given by different voyagers, in- genions and not over-scrupulons writers constructed fanciful accounts of pretended undertakings and exploits in this quarter, which, how- ever, being presented in sober guise, have had to be subjected to methodical investigation. All historical scholars are familiar with the famous Plantagenet or Argall myth. In 1648 a pamphlet was pub- lished in England, with the title, " A Description of New Albion," by one Beanchamp Plantagenet, Esq., which assumed to narrate that in the year 1613 the English Captain Samuel Argall, returning from Acadia to Virginia, "landed at Manhattan Isle, in Hudson's River, where they found four honses built, and a pretended Dutch governor under the West India Company of Amsterdam," and that this Dutch population and this Dutch ruler were forced to submit to the tre- mendous power of Great Britain. The whole story is a sheer fabrica- tion, and so crude as to be almost vulgar. Yet such is the continuing strength of old pseudo-historical statement that we still find in com- pendions historical reference works of generally authentic character mention of Argall's apocryphal feat of arms-the " first conquest of New Netherland by the English,"-usually accompanied, albeit, by the discreet "(?)" conscientiously employed by such faithful com- pilers in cases of incertitude.
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