History of Westchester county : New York, including Morrisania, Kings Bridge, and West Farms, which have been annexed to New York City, Vol. I, Part 182

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 182

Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).

A few months previous to the passage of this act there arrived in New York Benjamin Fletcher, with a commission as Governor (recalled in 1698 to answer numerous charges of mal-administration), and Caleb Heathcote. The Governor came with special instruc- tions to introduce the Book of Common Prayer among the Presbyterians, Huguenots and Dutchmen,

1 Bolton's "Church History," 158.

724

HISTORY OF WESTCHESTER COUNTY.

where, perhaps, James II. would have been glad to have introduced a Mass-Book.1 Governor Fletcher proposed to the Assembly " that provision be made by law for the settlement and support of an able min- istry," but the majority of the Assembly were Disseu- ters and not inclined to aid him in his schemes.

At the next following session of the Assembly the Speaker, Mr. James Graham, who had the drawing of all their bills, so managed the title and iuduction of this one, that, although it did not do very well for the Dissenters, yet it did not appear to make any conces- sions to the Church, and the honest, simple-minded Dissenters, not suspecting the fraud and trickery of the Governor, passed the bill as above entitled. As Colonel Lewis Morris wrote, in a letter to the Propa- gation Society, "It was the most that could be got at the time, for had more been attempted, the Assembly had seeu through the artifice, and all had been lost."

The bill having become a law, the Governor in- sisted that there was no ministry but of the Church of Eugland, and declared that under this act, all lands in towns, that had been set aside for ministers' par- sonages or for meeting-houses, became vested iu the English ministry.2

Colonel Morris relates a conversation which he heard between the Governor and a dissenting minis- ter at the time this act of the Assembly was talked of. The minister said "that the intention of the Legislature was to raise a maintenance for a disseut- ing minister, all the Assembly but one being Dis- senters, aud knowing nothing of the church, and that being the intention of the law-makers, was the mean- ing of the law, and he hoped the Dissenters might enjoy what was so justly their due, or at least not be deprived of it without due course of law." I told him the Legislature did not consist of the Assembly only, but of the Governor and Council joined with them ; and I believed it was most certain the Goveruor never intended to settle a dissenting clergy.3

In the spring of 1695, the Assembly, in explanation of the act, declared that churches have power to call a dissenting Protestant minister, and that he be maintained as the act directs ; but the Governor re- jected this interpolation of the Assembly, and decided that the act applied solely to the Episcopal ministry.4

Governor Fletcher was so occupied with schemes for money-making that he neglected the affairs of the church, and in 1698 he was recalled to answer for his misconduct. Fletcher's successor was the kindlier Earl of Bellamont, an Irish peer, with a sound heart and honorable sympathies for popular freedom; his death, however, interrupted the short period of harmony in the colony.5

Bellamont was succeeded in 1702 by Lord Corn-

bury, a disreputable cousin of Queen Anne, who only escaped jail by quitting the kingdom. Cornbury was as zealous iu behalf of the church as he was destitute of any sense of public or private virtue. His zeal was not for religion, but for the established Church of England. To him a Dissenter was intolerable, un- worthy of mercy or even of justice. The act of 1693 had not been oppressively enforced against the Rye people until after the arrival of Lord Cornbury ; but now, with a willing, nay even anxious, Governor, Colonel Heathcote could reveuge himself upou this people for thwarting him in his attempt to include the White Plains within his pateut.6 He had been ten years in this country, and the dissenting clergy of Rye had not been interfered with ; it was not until after 1701 that he declares that " these people are heathenish Sabbath-breakers and without religion of any sort."

Rye submitted quietly to these exactions for the support of the English clergy, but the White Plains people refused to pay, and only did so when threat- ened with being sold out or imprisoned under exe- cution. This forced tax upon the slender weans of the dissenters continued until the War of the Revolution; and a history that ignored the relig- ious element in that war, or placed a low estimate upon the moral forces that stood behind and sustained the opposing parties in that great struggle, would be false and worthless.

The year 1729 brought with it an important acqui- sition to the wealth of the White Plains in the arrival of Moses Owen, who purchased the farm then lately owned by the Rev. Edmund Ward, embracing all the land between Railroad Avenue and Spring Street west of Broadway, excepting the church grouuds. The new-comer was soon honored with the office of " Pounder," and for more than thirty years he held various positions in the town. He built the house afterwards occupied by William Barker for more than half a century prior to his death. This house is still standing, in good condition, on Spring Street, near the old Purdy house. The Owen farm passed by will to Moses Owen, Jr., who covered it with mortgages, under which it was divided into two parcels and after- wards sold.

From 1730 to 1740 the leaders in White Plains affairs were Caleb Hyatt, Sr., Caleb Hyatt, Jr., Francis Purdy, Moses Owen, Gabriel Lynch, James Gedney, Daniel Knapp, George Merritt, John Turner, Jacob Griffin, Samuel Hunt, Daniel Cornell, Robert Travis, Jona- than Purdy, Dauiel Horton aud George Lane.

From 1740 to 1750 some of these names disappear from the records of the annual meetings, and new names take their places and become prominent. Such are Peter Hatfield, William Anderson, Johu Hosier, Joshua Hatfield, Abraham Hatfield, Benjamin Knapp, Elisha Hyatt, Henry Purdy, Samuel Thorn, Nehe- miah Tompkius, John Ray and Bartholomew Gedney.

13 Bryant, 26.

2 " Doc. History of New York," vol. iii. page 245 ; Bolton's "Church History." xvi.

3 Bolton's " Church History," xvii.

4 Bolton's "Church History," xvii.

5 Bryant 31.

6 Patent, 1701.

"ROCKY DELL FARM." RESIDENCE OF J. REYNAL, WHITE PLAINS, N. Y.

725

WHITE PLAINS.

The freeholders were careful to keep a record of the bounds and limits of the lands of each owner, and two of the citizens best qualified for that purpose were appointed to prepare such a record. In 1751 the first record had become worn and torn, and Caleb Hyatt was allowed twelve shillings for copying it in a new book.

In the last year of this decade there came to the town from Woodbury, in Connecticut, Dr. Robert Graham, a young physician of genius and enterprise, son of the Rev. John Graham, a Scotch clergyman, who was himself the son of one of the Marquises of Montrose. Dr. Graham, in 1749, purchased the farm on which Mr. Samuel Faile now lives. He at once became interested in the welfare of the town, and for more than thirty years was the ruling spirit in all matters of public interest. His energy, enterprise and learning, inspiring the people with new vigor, soon raised White Plains to prominence in the county.

In the records of proceedings at the annual meeting's for the next ten years we find some newnames, among them that of Isaac Oakley, from Westchester, who, in 1746, purchased the farm now known as the Asylum Farm. Another was Monmouth Hart, a son of Mon- mouth Hart, of Rye Neck, whose farm was east of the present residence of Bartholomew Gedney. He was a great-grandson of Edward Hart, one of the early settlers of Flushing, Long Island (then called by the Dutch "Vissengen"). Edward Hart, whom Governor Stuyvesant arrested and imprisoned as the author of a spirited remonstrance against an order of Stuyves- ant, which required the people of Vissengen to cease giving countenance to the Quakers. It was about the same time that John Fisher, the first of that family, settled in White Plains, on the south side of the road leading east out of Broadway, near the cemetery ; he died in 1771. Another name that appears prominently about this time was that of Joseph Lyon, who lived in North Street ; his ancestors early came to Ryc from Stamford.

It was chiefly through the efforts of Dr. Robert Graham that the court-house was built in White Plains, and the courts removed thither from West- chester. He gave to the county the land upon which the court-house was erected, by deed to John Thomas, of Harrison, then a member of the Colonial Assembly, through whose assistance in that body the change from Westchester was effected. White Plains then soon became a business centre. Two hotels for the accommodation of guests and travelers were opened, and the first country store was built and stocked by Doctor Graham. This store stood opposite the court- house, and here the people, for more than half a cen- tury, gathered to discuss politics and to sell their sur- plus produce.

The old French War, which terminated in 1760, had drawn heavily on the town of Rye, both for men and money. A list of twenty-four names is given by Dr.

Baird in his " History of the Town of Rye" (p. 213), many of them members of families then living in White Plains, and most of them young men under thirty years of age: as for example, Ezckiel Brun- dage, aged twenty-seven; Joseph Merritt, twenty- four; Abraham Lyon, twenty-two; Joseph Merritt, twenty-thrce; Ezekiel Merritt, twenty-three ; Samuch Lane, twenty-two; John Lounsbury, twenty; Val. Lounsbury, twenty-one; John Budd, twenty-seven ; Abraham Haight, seventeen; Reuben Lane, sixteen ; Nathaniel Haight, seventeen ; Caleb Sherwood, nine- teen ; Joseph Haight, twenty; Elisha Merritt, eigh- teen ; Peter Merritt, nineteen. For many years the stories of that French and Indian War furnished en- tertainment for many households, as they spent the long winter evenings gathered about the great open fire-places. This war brought with it a heavy debt, the payment of which, while it severely taxed the resources of the people, proved valuable as teaching them how great was their strength in emergencies, a knowledge that was of inestimable benefit to them in the conflict with the mother country that soon followed. The mother country, also seeing, from the payment of this debt, that the colonists were capable of meeting such heavy liabilities, was led to impose the burdens from which her colonies revolted.

We now approach the time of that conflict of prin- ciples which preceded and produced the Revolution. In twelve of the thirteen colonies it was a contest for the maintenance of chartered rights and privileges; the other colony, New York, was a conquered province, over which the King might exercise such authority as he thought fit, and the conflict in that colony was for the rights of its people as Englishmen. And it seems to be a well-established fact that New York was the first of the colonies to point to freedom and independence in tones distinct and elear.

The uprising in 1764-call it mob, if you will- against the impressing of four fishermen, and the gathering of the people as one man on the 1st day of November, 1765, in opposition to the stamps, which are often spoken of as the first steps toward revolution, were long antedated by a religious controversy which was certainly not without its influence in preparing the people for the great events soon to follow. Lead- ing Presbyterians had formed an association bearing the name of the " Whig Club," in organized opposi- tion to the Church of England and the English gov- ernment.

In the year 1719 Thomas Smith, with three other Scotch-Irish Presbyterians, purchased a piece of land on Wall Street, upon which to ereet a church edifice. They subsequently applied for a charter of incorpora- tion, to secure to them their estate for religious wor- ship, but were defeated by the violent opposition of the Church of England. After years of unsuccessful solicitation, the land was finally conveyed to the moderator of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland, upon which the Church of Scotland de-

726

HISTORY OF WESTCHESTER COUNTY.

clared that the property was held for the purposes for which it was originally purchased and designed.

The opposition of the Church of England, instead of crushing out the Presbyterians, stimulated them to increased efforts, and developed a force that eventu- ally drove English sway from the country. Much that is entertaining and instructive in regard to these men and their followers may be found in the " The Sons of Liberty in New York," by Henry B. Dawson, Esq., a book that should be in every district school library, instead of being a rare volume found only in our best libraries. These Presbyterian Sons of Liberty were William Smith, Sr., William Smith, Jr., William Livingston, John Morin Scott and others. Of this con- flict there was an interested witness in White Plains, for the Rev. John Smith, of that town, was a brother to the one and an uncle to the other of the Smiths. It is of these Presbyterians that a learned historian has said : " The first voice publicly raised in America to dissolve all connection with Great Britain came, not from the Puritans of New England, or the Dutch of New York, or the planters of Virginia, but from the Scotch-Irish Presbyterians." 1

The central location of White Plains, with its court- house, made it a convenient place for public assem- blages of the people; and the Revolutionary events connected with this town will ever retain a promi- nent place in American history. The conflict seemed rapidly approaching in 1774, and soon entered into and divided the family circle. A marked instance of this is found in the family of Jonathan P. Horton, who was himself a determined Loyalist, while some of his sons were among the most active Whigs who fought in the vicinity of the " Neutral Ground." ? In striking contrast to this is the following notice, taken from Rivington's Gazette of April 20, 1775, of a mar- riage in a more united family : " March 28. This evening was married, at the White Plains, West- chester County, Mr. Gabriel Purdy, youngest son of Mr. Samuel Purdy, to the agreeable Miss Charity Purdy, daughter of Mr. Joseph Purdy, both of that loyal town. What particularly is remarkable in the affair is this, the guests consisted of forty-seven per- sons, thirty-seven of whom were Purdys, and not a single Whig among them."

This day (March 28, 1775) was a memorable one in the history not only of White Plains, but of West- chester County. Public notice had been given of a meeting of persons from different districts of the county to consider the most proper method of taking the sense of the freeholders of the county upon the expediency of choosing deputies to meet the depu- ties from other counties for the purpose of electing delegates to represent this colony in the General Congress to be held in Philadelphia on the 10th day of May then next. At this meeting it was recom-

mended that a convention be held at White Plains on the 11th day of April then next. at ten o'clock in the forenoon, at the court-house. On the day appointed, a numerous body of freeholders of the county assem- bled at the court-house, chose Lewis Morris for their chairman, and appointed eight persons, or a majority of them, to act as the deputies of this county for the purpose aforesaid.

A few days after this meeting, a protest, bearing date the 13th of April, 1775, signed with over three hundred names, appeared in Rivington's New York Gazette, in which it was stated that on the 11th of April the friends of government met at the house of Captain Hatfield, and at about twelve o'clock walked to the court-housc, where they found the other com- pany collected in a body ; that the friends of the gov- ernment then declared that they had been called to- gether for an unlawful purpose, and they would not contest the matter with the others by a poll, but that they came only with a design to protest against all such disorderly proceedings, and to show their detes- tation of all unlawful Committees and Congresses ; that then, giving three huzzas, they returned to Captain Hatfield's, singing as they went, "God save great George, our King ;" after which, the following protest was drawn up and signed :

" We, the subscribers, freeholders and inhabitants of the County of Westchester, having assembled at White Plains in consequence of certain advertisements, do now declare our honest abhorence of all unlawful Congresses and Committees, and that we are determined, at the liazard of our lives and properties, to support the King and constitution, and that we acknowledge no representatives but the General Assembly, to whose wisdom we submit the guardianship of our rights and priv ileges."

The following names appended to this declaratiou show that the Tory faction of White Plains was well represented : "J. P. Horton, Daniel Oakley, William Davis, Wm. Anderson, Captain Abraham Hatfield, Gilbert Horton, Joshua Gedney, John Hyatt, Nehe- mialı Tompkins, Bartholomew Gedney, Isaac Purdy, Elijah Purdy, Gilbert Hatfield, Gabriel Purdy, Thos. Merritt, John Gedney, Monmouth Hart, Timothy Purdy, Thomas Barker, Elijah Miller, William Bar- ker, Jr., Samuel Purdy, James Kniffin, Joseph Hart," etc.

On the 8th day of May, 1775, a meeting of the freeholders of Westchester County was held in White Plains, and Gouverneur Morris, Lewis Graham, James Van Cortlandt, Stephen Ward, Robert Graham, Daniel Dayton, John Holmes, Jr., and Wm. Pauld- ing were chosen delegates from this county to the Provincial Convention of the Province of New York.

Enlistments for the army immediately commenced, and Ambrose Horton reported fifty-six able-bodied men, July 26, 1775. The commissions for the officers, -Isaac Hatfield, captain ; James Varian, first lieu- tenant ; Anthony Miller, second lieutenant ; and John Falconer, ensign-were issued September 13, 1775.

1 5 Bancroft, 77.

2 Sabine's " Loyalists, " ii. page 532.

727

WHITE PLAINS.

On the 14th of February 1776, minute-men to the number of nineteen, among whom were Benjamin Lyon, Stephen Sheley, Micali Townsend, James Varian, Samuel Crawford, Isaac Oakley, James Brun- dage and Robert Graham, met at White Plains for the purpose of electing officers, and made choice of James Varian for captain, Samuel Crawford for first lieutenant and Isaac Oakley for second lieutenant.

The Provincial Congress of this State, which had been in session in New York, adjourned on the 30th of June, 1776, to the court-house in White Plains ; and on the 9th of July, while assembled here, the Declaration of Independence was received and read in front of the court-house by John Thomas, Esq.

The battle of White Plains occurred on the 28th of October following. The details of that battle, and of the subsequent burning of the Court-house and the principal dwellings in the village, form part of a chapter which ap- pears elsewhere in this work, written by a masterly hand, and will not be attempted here.

General Howe's retreat from White Plains was mysterious and unaccountable ; command- ing a magnificent army of veterans, splendidly equipped and flushed with success, why should he retreat? The question was discussed by Washington and his council of officers without arriving at any satisfactory answer.

When Howe returned to England his con- duct here was investigated by a committee of Parliament, but he refused to explain further than to say that he "had political reasons." The question remained unanswered until tlfe publication, in 1879, by that laborious his- torian, Edward F. de Lancey, of " The History of New York during the Revolutionary War, by Thomas Jones," in which it appears that one William Demont, the adjutant of Colonel Magaw, the commander of Fort Washington, on New York Island, on the 2d day of Novem- ber, 1776, passed undiscovered out of the fort and into the camp of Lord Percy, at Harlem, carry- ing with him plans of Fort Washington and full information as to the garrison, and placed them in the hands of the British officer. Percy, of course, sent the information to Lord Howe at White Plains ; the latter suddenly changed his plan of attacking Washington, and on the 4th of November prepared to march to Fort Washington, which he captured on the 16th of that month.

Within five months after the formal declaration of our independence the last vestige of the American army had been driven from the island of New York, and that place remained in possession of the British until the close of the war. During the war the Brit- ish lines extended a few miles into Westchester

County. The lines of the American army first stretched across the county at White Plains, and gradually receded to the Croton River. That portion of the county between the two armies was then, and ever. since has been, known as the "Neutral Ground." This portion of Westchester County was the battle- ground of the disaffected, the prey of both friend and foe; scenes of cruelty and bloodshed unknown in civilized warfare marked these partisan engage- ments, and in defense of their homes, some of her valiant sons exhibited instances of personal bravery

MAMARANECK RIVER.

BRANCH OF

MILL POND

MAP OF WHITE PLAINS IN 1776.1

aa-Stage road from Bennington to New York.

bb-Road to Rye town. ff-Called the White Plains street.

cc-Road to town of Mamaroneck. gg-Road to town of Harrison.

dd-Road to landing called Rye Neck.

EXPLANATION. ee-Road to Dobbs Ferry across the North river.

hb-Road to town of Greenburgh.

1 The following indorsement is on the original of this map at Albany.

BRONX.

728

HISTORY OF WESTCHESTER COUNTY.

ii kk-Roads for private uses.

4. Cassaway Brook.

5. Golden Pine Brook.

6. American Encampment in 1776.

7. British Encampment in 1776.

2. Court-house.

3. Property of Presbyterian So- ciety.

unsurpassed in ancient or modern times. Others, at- taching themselves to the British side, were known as "Cowboys," and were engaged in plundering the people between the lines, of their cattle and other property. Others again, were known as "Skinners," and professing allegiance to the American side, lived chiefly within the patriot lines. Both of them, Cow- boys and Skinners, were treacherous, rapacious and cruel. No region in the United States was so har- assed and trampled down as this debatable ground. Hostile armies marched and countermarched over it, and its ruined condition eloquently portrayed the horrid desolation of war. In almost every family of

Isaac Gedney, a Tory ; the circumstance being brought to the notice of Burr, he commanded them to return every article to its owner.

During the summer of 1781 the French army eu- camped in Greenburgh and White Plains; the left wing, composed of Lauzun's Legion, covered Chat- terton's Hill and the White Plains. The head- quarters of Lauzun, the commandiug officer, were iu the Falconer house, which stood ou the corner of Broadway and Lake Street, in front of Mr. Slosson's residence ; the house is now standing next south of Mr. Hand's beautiful home. Lauzun was celebrated for the elegance of his person and manners; he was a general favorite and one of the bravest of men. Like many other officers in the allied army, he af- terwards became engaged in the French Revolution, and perished under the guillotine.

At the close of the war business of all kinds, which had been long abandoned, was resumed ; a new court-house was built, and White Plains, by an act of the Legislature, became an independent town. With but few exceptions, new men became leaders in town af- fairs. In 1788 John Barker pur- chased the Owen farm, which extended on the west side of Broadway from the Presbyter- ian Church to Railroad Ave- nue, and in 1796-97 he repre- sented the county in the As- sembly. In 1799 Dr. Archi- bald McDonald moved into the town, having purchased the property on the corner of Broad- way and Spring Street ; and for many years thereafter the sons of John Barker and of Archi- bald McDonald were active in town and county politics.

THE MILLER HOUSE. Washington's Headquarters, White Plains.

the old residents there linger traditions that vividly illustrate the perils, torture and trials of that gloomy period.

The distress and suffering of the people, however, was not all inflicted by the "Cowboys " and "Skin- ners ;" the soldiers of the regular army were also guilty of plundering the inhabitants in the neighbor- hood of the camp. When Colonel Aaron Burr as- sumed command of the forces at White Plains, in the autumn of 1778, he established strict discipline with- in and security without the camp. Soon after his ar- rival, some soldiers had made their tent more com- fortable by beds and bedding taken from the house of

Richard Hatfield, a native of the town, was for many years the foremost man in every enterprise, whether it was organizing and incorporating a church or presiding at a town-meeting.

About 1795 Edward Thomas, a lawyer, located in town, on the Squire place ; he was appointed surro- gate, but died in 1806. In that year Minott Mit- chell, a young lawyer from Connecticut, settled in White Plains, and for half a century was active in every project to benefit the town and county. For a quarter of a century he was town clerk, and during that time the town was at no expense for his official or legal services.

Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.

History of Westchester county : New York, including Morrisania, Kings Bridge, and West Farms, which have been annexed to New York City, Vol. I, Part 182

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