History of Westchester county : New York, including Morrisania, Kings Bridge, and West Farms, which have been annexed to New York City, Vol. I, Part 181

Author: Scharf, J. Thomas (John Thomas), 1843-1898, ed
Publication date: 1886
Publisher: Philadelphia : L.E. Preston & Co.
Number of Pages: 1354

USA > New York > Westchester County > History of Westchester county : New York, including Morrisania, Kings Bridge, and West Farms, which have been annexed to New York City, Vol. I > Part 181

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After the return of this writ, and on the 21st of March, 1701, letters patent were issued; the lands of Colonel Heathcote were erected into the lordship and Manor of Scarsdale. The letters, however, con- tained an express provision that nothing therein contained "shall be construed, deemed or taken to give the said Colonel Heathcote any further title or jurisdiction within the said White Plains until the same shall happen to belong to the said Caleb Heath- cote." 6

Soou after this, Colonel Heathcote purchased of certain Indians their rights to the lands embraced in his patent. With this exception, he did nothing further to perfect his title to the White Plains; but lic persistently refused the solicitations of the Rye people to relinquish his claims, and thereby remove the cloud upon the title to this coveted inheritance.

After long years of delay, Daniel Brundage and Joseph Hunt, on the 28th day of June 1721, presented a petition 7 to the Governor, praying for a warrant of survey of the White Plains, and a warrant was issued the same day. 8 No report of a survey having been made, the sauro parties, on the 7th day of December, 1721, petitioned for a new warraut of survey to em- brace the whole of the White Plains apou which the following order was issued. :

"New York, Decr. ye 716, 1721 .- Onlered that a Warrant do issue to the Surveyor-General for surveying all lands nngranted by tho Crown in and about the White Plains, and that he describe and ascertain the pre- tensions of Daniel Brundage and Samuel llunt in and about the same.

! Westchester County Records A, page 2338.

" Council Minutes V, page 47.

Westchester County Records B, page 371.

4 Westchester County Records F, pages 74 und 170.

5 Council Minutes, Albany.

G Book of Patents, Albany, vol. vii. page 226.

7 Land Papers, Albany, viii. page 4.

8 Land Papers, Albany, viii. page 45.

720

HISTORY OF WESTCHESTER COUNTY.

The potitioners giving notice of the time of the said survey to all Pat- entees whose grants they are informed joyne to the said White Plains." " W. BURNET." 1

On the 21st day of December 2, 1721, Joseph Budd, John Hunt and sixteen others present their petition to the Governor, setting forth

"That by virtue of a licenso from the Government of Connecticut, they and those under whom they claim, did purchase from the Indians a tract of land called White Plains, the same at the time of the purchase being deemed and esteemed to lye within the Government of Connecticut, by virtue of which purchase your petition- ers were, for a considerable time, in possession of the said land under the Government of Connecticut, and until said time as the same was found to he within [the bounds of the Government of New York, since which time they have con- tinued in possession of and made great improvements upon the same, and they being desirous to secure the same lands and their improvements thereon to themselves and their heirs nul- der such interests, provisions and restrictions as to your Ex- cellency and Council shall be thought fit; Therefore, humbly pray his Majesty's Letters Patent to them, their heirs and assigns, for the said tract of land, and that such methods may he ordered as your Excellency and Council shall think fit for ascertaining the limits and bounds of the said tract and of the several possessions of your petitioners. And your peti- tioners will ever pray, &c."

On this petition is indorsed,-

" The Petition of Josephi Budd, et al., being read ye 21st Decr., 1721 Is referred to the Gentl. of the Council or any five of them." 2

The same day the Couneil reported that they had considered the matter of the peti- tion and directedthat a warrant should issue to the surveyor-general to survey the tract in question and make return thereof, with a map of the tract, and furthermore that all parties claiming any lands which are patent- ed, adjoining thereto, should have notice of the survey, with the time and place of begin- ning the same.3

Before the issuing of this warrant a re- port ' of survey, made by Robert Crooke, dep- uty surveyor, was filed (December 23, 1721), which is valuable as being more definite and specific in courses, distances and monuments than the Colden survey and report subse- quently made under the last-mentioned order and incorporated into the patent.

No action appears to have been taken on this report of the Couneil, made December 21, 1721, until the 10th of January following, when a warrant was issued, reciting all the material statements in the petition, and di- recting the surveyor-general " to survey the said White Plains ; and in his return thereof to ascertain and des- cribe the particulars of the claims of the petitioners, with a map of the said tract, and that the said petition- ers give timely notice of said survey to all patentees whos grants they are informed joyne to the said White Plairs."

This warrant was indorsed by Cadwallader Colden, surveyor-general to William Foster, deputy surveyor, who proceeded to execute it. He completed the sur- vey and made his report, in which he first describes the land generally, as in the patent ; afterward he bounds the traets by streams, monuments, courses and distances. He also made a map of the White Plains, a copy of which is here shown.

FÅR

ANTHONY MILLERS

CHRIS. YECMANS

ROAD TO PHILIPS MILLS

SAM: HORTON

JAS. TRAVIS

OANS BRUNDIGES

DAN' LANE

Ank

JOHN HYATS

GEO. LANE.

MOSES KNAPF

RV ... .. LAST CHICSTLR.

JOSEPH PURDYS

CALEB NYATTS

JOHN HOITS

SAMS HOITS

SAML HUNTS MILL

ROAD TO MAMARONECK.

SAM' HUNT!

SAM- MERRITS Br

HUMPHREY UNDERHILL.

ROAD TO HUDDS NECK.

ROAD TO RYE.

MAP OF WHITE PLAINS IN 1721.5

EXPLANATION.

A-Caleb Ilyatt's.

N-Jolın Ilyat's.

B-Joseph Purdy's. O-Daniel Lane's.

C-Iluniphrey Underhill's. P-Samuel Ilorton's.

D)-Samuel Merrit's.

Q-Christopher Yeoman's.

E-Samuel Hunt's. R-Anthony Miller's.

F-Sammel Hunt's Mill.

G-Samuel Hoit's.

H-Jol Iloit's.

I-George Lane's.

K-Daniel Brundige's.

L-James Travis's.

M-Moses Knapp's.

S & T-Daniel Brundige's bound trees.

U-The beginning of Mr. Bridges' patent.

V-The bound tree between Um- phrey Underhill and Samuel Ilunt.

5 Copy of a map of White Plains found in the office of the Secretary.

1 Land Papers, Albany, viii. 89.

2 Land Papers, Albany, viii. page 91.

3 Land Papers, Albany, viii. page 91.

4 Land Papers, Albany, viii. page 92.

------

ROADTO HUDSUNGFERRY

721

WHITE PLAINS.

a-Road to Mamaroneck. b-Road to East Chester.

c-Road up to the woods.

d-Road to Hudson's ferry.

e-Road to Phillips' mills.

f-Road to Bedford. g-Road to California patent.

h-Road to Rye.

i-Road to Budd's Neck.

The report of William Foster, 1 and the interesting map made from his survey, were filed February 21, 1722. On the 24th of the same month the matter of the petitioners was brought before the Council for consideration, when the proceedings took place of which the following is a partial report : 2

" At a Committee of the Council liell at New York, Feb'y 24, 1721-2, Present, --

" Capt. Walters. Coll. Beekman.

Mr. Ilarrison. Mr. Colden.

)Ir. Van Dam.

Mr. Lewis Morris, Jr.

" The Committee proceeded upon the Surveyor General's return of the claims of Joseph Budd & al. in the White Plains Purchase, Referred to them.

"The Committee unanimously chose Francis Harrison, Esy., their chairman.

" Resolved that all parties concerned be called in. Then all parties attending were heard as to their several claims. The parties withdraw- ing, the several papers relating to the affair were read."

The proceedings at this meeting related solely to the claims of Hunt and Brundage. The committee met again on February 26th,3 when the Hunt and Brundage claims were passed upon and confirmed, as shown on the map. The following resolution was then adopted :

" Resolved, yt ye Remaining part of ye White Plains after the lauds of Ilunt aud Brundage be laid out according to ye former Resolution, be granted to Joseph Budd, John lloit, ('aleb Hyat, Humphrey Underhill, Joseph Purdy, George Lane, Daniel Laue, >loses Knapp, John Ilorton, David Horton, Jonathan Lynch, Peter Hatfield, James Travis, Isaac Covert, Benjamin Brown, John Turuer, David Ogden aud William Yeomans, saving to all persons any Right web they may have withiu the sd Tract of ye White Plains, founded upon ye title set forth in ye Petition of the above-named Persons Praying for a Patent of ye land now in- tended to be granted.

" Resolved, that the Quit Rent be conformable to his Maties Royal In- structions."

On the same day (February 26, 1722), the chairman, Francis Harrison, reported that the committee had considered the claims of all the parties concerned in the White Plains, and after setting forth the rights of

of State at Albany, in vol. viii. of Land Papers, p. 124, and entitled "Return of a survey of the White Plains, Feb. 24, 1721-2. Also, survey for Hunt and Brundige and dated March foll. Read and referred to ye Gentl. of ye Council or any five of them."

The return, accompanying the map states that, " Pursuant to a warrant dated January 11th, 1721, endorsed to William Forster, Deputy surveyor, he surveyed the Bouuds of ye White Plains as they were shown to him hy Joseph Budd, Jolin Hoit, L'inphrey Underhill, George Lane, Moses Knap and Caleb llyatt, and they were as follows :

" Beginning at a large white oak tree marked with several letters, where two brooks falls iuto ye west branch of Momaroneck River ; thence by marked trees to Brunxes river near to where a small brouk falls into said river, hy a hush of Alders, some of which are marked ; thence up Brunxes river to an Ash tree nbont 17 chains above Anthony Miller's Fulling Mill, and thence by marked trees to a white oak near Loug Meadow Brook ; then down suid Brook to where it falls iuto Momaro- neck River, and then down said River to the place where ye west Branch falls into the river, and theu up the said Branch to ye white oak where we began-Containing 5225 acres, after 5 per ceut. deducted for Roads." 1 Land Papers, Albany, viii. page 124.

: N. Y. Col. MISS., Ixiv. page 29.

3 N. Y. Col. MSS., Ixiv. page 30.

Hunt and Brundage, recommended "That the re- maining part of the White Plains, after the lands of Hunt and Brundage be laid out as before mentioned, be granted to Joseph Budd, John Hoit" and the others named in the above resolution, subject to the saving clause therein contained. The report is in- dorsed, "March ye 1st, 1721-2. Reported and approved of by the Council, J. S. Bolin, D. Cl. Coun." +

In compliance with this report, Cadwallader Colden, the surveyor-general, " laid out for Joseph Budd, Jolın Hoit " and the others,

" A certain tract or parcel of land, situate, lying and being in the County of Westchester, and is commonly known by tho name of White Plains. Beginning at a large White-oak tree, marked with several let- ters, where two brooks fall into the West branch of Mamaroneck river, and ruus thence by marked trees to Brunxes River, near to the place where a small brook falls into the said River by a bunch of Alders, some of which are marked. Thence up the stream of Brunxes River to an oak-tree about seventeen chains, above Anthony Miller's fulling-mill. Tlience by marked trees to a White-oak marked, near Long Meadow Brook. Thence down the stream of the said Brook to the laud huid out for Daniel Brundage ; thence along his fiue to the said Long Meadow Brook ; tlience down the stream of the said brook to the place where it falls into Mamaroneck River and down the stream of said River to the land granted to Christoplier Bridge ; then along his lines and the lines of the land laid out for Samuel Hunt to Mamaroneck River; then down the stream of the said River to the place where the West Branch falls into the said River, aud then up the stream of the said West Branch to the place where it began, containing four thousand four hundred and thirty five acres, with all allowauce for highways.

"Given under my hand, at New York, the tenth day of March, in the eiglitlı year of his Majesty's Reign, Anno Dom. 1721. "CADWALLADER COLDEN, Sur. Genl."

On the 13th day of March, 1721-2, a royal patent was granted to Joseph Budd and the other persons named in the preceding resolutions and in the report of the surveyor-general, which letters patent recited the petition of Budd and his associates, and the pro- ceedings subsequent thereto, and granted, ratified and confirmed unto the said petitioners,-(naming them), their heirs and assigns, " All that said tract or parcel of land situate, lying and being in the County of Westchester, which is commonly known by the name of the White Plains," and described as in the report of Cadwallader Colden, surveyor-general.5

For forty-five years the marks and monuments indi- cating the boundaries of the White Plains purchase had been carefully renewed and preserved.6 For twenty years Colonel Heathcote had persistently re- fused the solicitations of the Rye people for an ad- justment of the differences growing out of his un- founded claims. Now that Heathcote was dead, and his powerful influence with the Governor and Council no longer stood between the people and their rights, it only remained for them to submit to the excessive exactions of the Governor and Council before their territory should be finally confirmed to them. Three times were they compelled to make surveys of their goodly land, -three times required to notify the owners of adjoining lands that such surveys were about to be

+ Land Papers, vol. viii. page 126.

5 Book of Patents, Albany, vol. viii. page 450.

6 Baird's Rye, 156.

722

HISTORY OF WESTCHESTER COUNTY.

made, and all to furnish pretexts for oppressive eliarges by the officers of the Governor's Council. But at length the royal patent was obtained and the loug controversy was ended; the eloud that had so long hung, like an evil omen, over the title to the White Plains,-forever disappeared, and the sun of prosperity once more shone brightly on the land and its people. Many of the most enterprising citizens of Rye removed to White Plains, and at the present day some branches of nearly all the ancient families are more numerously represented in White Plains than in the parent settle- ment.

The patent was obtained for the benefit of all the owners of the White Plains lands, although but one- half of them were named as patentees; and in order to establish the rights of the other owners, the paten- tees executed a conveyance to Joseph Horton, Sr., Joseph Horton, Jr., John Travis, James Travis, Jr., Solomon Yeomans, John Hyat, Thomas Travis, Jon- athan Purdy, Monmouth Hart, Abraham Smith, Robert Travis (son of Philip), Daniel Horton, Jona- than Horton (son of Jonathan Horton), Nathaniel Baylie, Caleb Horton, John Rockwell, Samuel Merritt and Still John Purdy, in which their rights were deelared, and whereby the patentees quit- claimed "to the said grantees, their several and separate heirs and assigns forever, all sueh right, title, interest and demand as the said grantors, or any of them, have, by virtue of said patent, in or to the lands heretofore laid out to the said grantees, and the proportionate share of such lands as are yet nndi- vided." This conveyance bears date January 18, 1722, and is recorded in Westchester County register's office, in Liber G of Deeds, page 393. It is from the parties to this instrument that all the titles to the White Plains lands are derived, and through them the chain of title to mueh of the real property in the town may be traced, link by link, from the aboriginal proprietors to the present owners.

At the time this patent was issued Broadway, with its home-lots, had long been established. The old honse bnt lately torn down, north of Mr. William R. Browu's, was then owned and occupied by Daniel Brundage. It was erected prior to 1697 by Samuel Odell. George Lane-"gentleman "-removed from Rye to White Plains as early as 1714; his house was on what is now the Squire place, and his brother Dan- iel lived opposite, near the present residence of Elisha Horton, Esq. ; Moses Knapp's house was on the road in front of the Mitchell homestead; James Travis occupied a house on what is now Mr. Tilford's place.

The old Jacob Purdy honse, standing to-day on Spring Street, between Mott and Water Streets, was built by Saumel Horton, a son of Joseph Horton, and grandson of Barnabas Horton, the first of that name in this country, who settled in Southold, Long Island, about 1640.

On the rising ground east of the residenee of Mr. Onderdonk, on North Street, was the house of Joseph

Purdy, and a few rods further east was the house of Caleb Hyatt, both prominent in the carly history of the town. Caleb Hyatt, with his brother John, re- moved from Rye to White Plains about 1715. John Hyatt's house stood near the present residence of Mr. Charles Horton.

Humphrey Underhill's house was on the west side of Mamaroneck River, some distance north of the North Street road; his was one of the first houses ereeted in White Plains, probably before 1694, as in October of that year Mrs. Ann Richbell procured a warrant from the Governor to survey the easternmost bounds of her lands. The surveyor, Augustine Gra- ham, proceeded along the west bank of Mamaroneek River until he came to the "improved land claimed by Humphrey Underhill, where the said Underhill, with three others, with guns, stones and staves did obstruct the execution of his Excellency's warrant." Mr. Underhill was a man of high standing in the estimation of his townsmen, and Dr. Baird supposes he was a son of the famous Captain John Underhill.

On the hill west of Humphrey Underhill, and near the road, stood the house of Samuel Merritt ; about a quarter of a mile north of Merritt's, and near the present residenee of Mr. Seymour, was the house of the patentee Samnel Hunt; he had a tract of three hundred and eighty aeres, and a mill on Mamaroneck River, easterly from his house. Northerly, on the same North Street road, were the residences of John and Samuel Hoit, active men in town affairs, who in 1726-27 were leaders in building the Presbyterian Chureh.

On the north side of the road crossing Bronx River, near Mr. Champanois' residenee, was the house of Christopher Yeomans; Anthony Miller lived where the Misses Tompkins' house stands, north of the cemetery, and his fulling-mill was on the brook, south of the house. These were all the houses in White Plains at the date of the patent, and all the ocenpants were men of sufficient education to read and write.

So rapidly did the population inercase, that, in 1725, the inhabitants assumed an independent or- ganization, eleeted officers and proceeded to man- age their own affairs. Some of the good people had held office in Ryc before removing to White Plains, and official positions, either civil or military, were re- garded, in those days, as posts of honor to which all good citizens should aspire. The first in importance and most lasting in tenure was the position of clerk ; and for fifty consecutive years the duties con- neeted with that office were discharged by Caleb Hyatt.

In 1726 the Rev. John Walton, a graduate of Yale College, and a lay preacher, purchased a farm which was bounded on the north by the road to Dobbs Ferry, which ran a few feet north of the present Presbyterian Church, and on the south by land then of Jonathan Lane, now of Elisha Horton, and the

FMG

" RIDGELAWN." RESIDENCE OF L. V. SONE, WHITE PLAINS, N Y.

723

WHITE PLAINS.

south side of Railroad Avenue. Mr. Walton was a man of great activity. On the Sabbath he preached; during the rest of the week he devoted himself with energy to the carrying on of divers secular enter- prises. He donated the land where the Presbyterian Church now stands ; and it was mainly through his efforts that a church was erected there in 1727.

The houses of the first settlers were small, and of but a single story. The furniture was scant and sim - ple; each room, even the kitchen, contained a bed; a cupboard held the household dishes, which were mostly wooden; a few only, of pewter, were kept and handed down as heirlooms from generation to gener- ation. Several wooden chests did double duty as re- ceptacles of the family bedding and clothing, and as chairs, which, if not remarkably comfortable, were at least solid and substantial; these, with a rude bench or stool, constituted the furniture of an ordinary farm-house. Carpets there were none, even on the spare room; but excellent feather-beds and pillows, the pride of every good housewife, were never want- ing. A great fire-place, ten or twelve feet wide and three or four feet deep, formed one side of every kitchen, which was also the sitting-room of the fam- ily. In the best room the family Bible was carefully kept and daily used. The clothing was no less sim- ple and durable than the furnishing; all linen and woolen clothing was home-made, spun and woven in the house; garments of leather, made chiefly from the skin of the bear or other wild animal, were in common use.

The life of the settlers was one of constant toil the father, with his stalwart sons, cleared the forest and tilled the virgin soil, while the busy wife and daughters, in addition to the daily cares of the house- hold, spun the yarn and made the garments for the family. Little or no money was to be found any- where; those articles which their own industry and skill did not supply were obtained by barter, chiefly of cattle and wood.

One of the first acts of this little community was to build a school-house. When it was raised and where it stood are interesting questions to which the utmost research does not vouchsafe answers. At any rate, it had grown old or dilapidated in 1737-8 ; for at a meet- ing of freeholders held in that year it was resolved that "the publie pound should be where the old school-house stood." The new school-house was built on the highway, at the northwest corner of the Squire place, and remained there nearly a century.

It was a fundamental law of the New Haven juris- diction "that the sonnes of all the inhabitants shall " be learned to write a ledgible hand as soone as they "are capable of it." And when, in 1664, the New Haven colony came under the jurisdiction of Connec- ticut, the law still read much the same,-

" The Select men of every town and precinct where they dwell, shall have a vigilant eye over their brethren and neighbors, to see, first, that none of them shall sutter so much barbarism in any of their families as

not to endeavor to teach, by themselves or others, their children and ap- prentices to read the English tongne, under penalty of twenty shillings for each neglect therein."

It was under the influence of such wholesome laws that the founders of White Plains erected the first school-house in which their children were to be edu- cated ; and it is but justice to this intelligent people to say, that the public records prove that, with very few exceptions, the proprietors of White Plains could both read and write. And yet it is of these people Colonel Heatlicote wrote, from Scarsdale, under date of November 9, 1705,-

" I dare aver that there is not a much greater necessity of having the Christian religion preached any where than amongst them ; many, if not the greater number of them, being a little better than in a state of heathenism." 1

At another time (1704) he writes,-

" When I first came among them (1692) I found it (Westchester) the most heathenish county I ever saw in my whole life which called them - selves Christian, there being not so much as the least marks or footsteps of religion of any sort, Sundays being the only time set apart by theni for all manner of vain sports and lewd diversions."

The Rev. Mr. Pritcher also, who, by the warrant of that imbecile aristocrat, Governor Cornbury, had been put in possession of the dissenting church property in Rye, writes, in 1704,-

" I must not omit to inform you that his Excellency, my Lord Corn- bury, is pleased to show an nnparalleled zeal for the carrying on of that great and glorious design of propagating the faith and settling the Church as well in this as in others of His Majesty's plantations, thereby rescning them from the grossest ignorance, stupidity and obstinacy, and therein righting them in those damnable and dangerous tenets which have been imbned and instilled into their poor, unwary, deluded souls by blind, ignorant and illiterate guides."

It may not be significant, but it is certainly worthy of note, that in the large volume of these letters, la- boriously collected by Mr. Bolton, we find so much mention of propagating "the faith," and "the Church," and so little of propagating the Gospel,-so frequent requests for prayer-books and catechisms, and so very few for Bibles.

These reproachful accusations should have been allowed to sleep in oblivion, but when we read in an historical discourse in our day, that it was " this moral condition of things which led to the pas- sage, on the 24th of March, 1673, of the act entitled, ' An Act for settling a Ministry and raising a main- tenance for them, in the city of New York, counties of Westchester, Richmond and Queens,' " a brief state- ment of the facts, in relation to the passage of this law and its subsequent enforcement, seems proper.

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History of Westchester county : New York, including Morrisania, Kings Bridge, and West Farms, which have been annexed to New York City, Vol. I, Part 181

Author: Scharf, J. Thomas (John Thomas), 1843-1898, ed Publication date: 1886 Publisher: Philadelphia : L.E. Preston & Co. Number of Pages: 1354

Author: Scharf, J. Thomas (John Thomas), 1843-1898, ed
Publication date: 1886
Publisher: Philadelphia : L.E. Preston & Co.
Number of Pages: 1354