History of Westchester county : New York, including Morrisania, Kings Bridge, and West Farms, which have been annexed to New York City, Vol. I, Part 55

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 55

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HISTORY OF WESTCHESTER COUNTY.

" ror and dismay are to assault us, all the British " navy shall knock down our pompous cities ; thou- " sands and tens of thousands of forces are to crimson " o'er the spacious plains with blood; Canadian big- " otry and persecution is to pour in upon us from ." the North ; the Indians, with horrid barbarity, are " to torment ns from the West; and perhaps pesti- " lence and Spaniards from the South .- This, ye sor- " did mortals, is the true picture of your base hearts ; " this is the scene, on which you could feast your " eyes with rapture, provided the rocks and the " mountains might cover you .- But now let me tell " you, that were all this possible, there are fifteen out " of twenty, throughout this vast continent, all Free- " dom's sons, whose blood is neither contaminated " with paltry bribe, or coward fear; who would face " all this terror, rather than sell their birthright for a " mess of pottage, or be a means of transmitting mis- " ery and infamy to their posterity.

" But, O ye men of Cortlandt, let us for a moment " view the windings of that arch serpent which hath " beguiled you; with what pleasing sensations, he " surveys your fine fields, your harvests, and your " herds ; and how he commends and admires the "trickling drops that pour down your brows; no " doubt these are delicious charms to him ; yet, one " thing on your part, is absolutely necessary ; and " that is, your loyalty, only establish that, and he can " easily take care of the rest of your business .- With " what elegance of stile he describes your fertile " plains, your splendid cities, your noble towers, and " the oppulence of your marts, which has poured all " the riches of the globe into your laps! and all this, " tliro' the paternal indulgence of a tender mother. " But he has neglected to inform you, that, for these " 12 years past, this kind mother has become a " monster! Like the cruel ostrich, she has forsaken " her young oncs ; with the fierceness of a tyger, shc " lays waste our own fair inheritence, and dashes " her sons against the stones !- Shakspeare makes " Hamlet express himself thus ; 'But, I am pigeon " ' livered, and lack gall to make oppression bitter.' " Whether it is the lack of gall, or the lack of sensi- " bility, that makes you callous to that bitter oppres- " sion that now surrounds you, I will not determine ; " but for creatures, that are said to wear the image of " the Dcity, to be so lost to every noble sentiment " that ornaments the man; must bespeak the most " amazing apathy .- Then let me conjure you, to rise " from your lethargy, assume the dignity of freemen ; " smite the serpents that have spread their poisons " round you; burn your associations; and with " dauntless intrepity, join the sons of freedom, who " are the only temporal guardians of the human race. " B. E."

No further attempt to answer this Address nor to counteract the effects of the Association appears to have been made until late in the Spring, a long time after the farmers throughout the Manor had com-

menced their work of ploughing and sowing and planting, when the following letter, signed by "AN "INHABITANT," was published in Gaine's New- York Gazette : or the Weekly Mercury, No. 1236, NEW-YORK, Monday, June 19, 1775.

" TO THE INHABITANTS OF THE MANOR OF CORT- " LANDT, NEW-YORK. " MANOR OF CORTLANDT, May 19, 1775. " GENTLEMEN :

" The dangerous innovations and in- " fringements attempted by certain mercenary Min- "isterial tools and infamous traitors (in this Manor) "to their Country, who assume to themselves the " name of Loyalists, on the liberties of their fellow- " subjects, liave greatly alarmcd the impartial friends "of Liberty herein. A fool, says an author, has "great need of title; it teachcs men to call him "Count and Duke, and to forget his proper name of " Fool.

" In a day when American pulse bcats high for "Liberty; when it is the subject of almost every " public paper, as well as topic of discourse, it might " justly have been expected that no American wonld " be so hardy as to violate the rights of his fellow- " subjects ; and if any such monster should appear "in this land of Liberty, that there would not be " wanting advocates for so glorious and important a "cause, as to expose those of its members who are " trampling on the sacred rights of the people.

"I have waited with great impatience, expecting " that some able hand would have undertaken the "benevolent task to warn you to beware of the con- " duet of some of the basest villains that ever dis- " graced any society, and draw the attention of the " inhabitants to its danger ; but finding that although "now some months are elapsed since the commence- "ment of the measures of these traitors, &c., yet none " has appeared to sound the friendly alarm to the " very indolent inhabitants, I have attempted what " I so ardently wished might have been done by some " more able hand. While we are straining every " nerve to baffle foreign attempts to enslave us, surely "it must be very criminal in the descendants of "Britons, who ought to love life and liberty alike, to " be so assiduous in exerting themselves to enslave " their fellow-snbjects.

" It may not be improper to inform you, Geutle- "men, of the springs and motives which induce these " principal movers to forget their duty to God, their "fellow-countrymen, and their posterity.

"They, anxious to secure to themselves and their " posterity power and authority, and to engross some " offices or pensions from or under the Crown, have " made a sacrifice of all public virtue on the altar of " self-interest. This desperate spirit it was that in- " duced these traitors or mercenary hirelings to exert " their influence to bring about the detestable meas- " ures proposed by a certain paper handed about here

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THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION, 1774-1783.

"last Winter, entitled ' The Loyalist's Test.'1 But, "happily for this Manor, this very dangerous scheme " was disconcerted by some lovers of Loyalty and "Liberty. For the men who would make such in- "roads on the liberties of the people, as they were "aiming at, to gratify their thirst for power, and give " Administration a high idea of their influence in this " Manor, would, from the same principle, exert every " nerve of influence to carry any ministerial mandate "into execution, at the expense of the liberties of " their fellow-countrymen.

"Can any judicious American son of liberty behold " these traitors of their Country withont the utmost " abhorrence, by whose influence the more illiterate " and those who are unacquainted with the principles " of the present dispute, are so besotted as to resign " their liberties into the hands of the most ambitions "and designing fellows, who are aiming to make a " merit with the Ministry by enslaving their fellow- " countrymen, and to aggrandise themselves and "their posterity ? Surely he cannot. If Charles the " First deserved the axe, and James the Second the " loss of his Kingdom, for changing the Constitution, "and thereby trampling on the rights of their sub- "jects, I leave yon, my Countrymen, to judge what "punishment would be adequate to the crimes of "these loyalists and their tools, who are aiming at " the same by a sacrifice of all public virtue and the " liberty of their Country.

Ax INHABITANT."

With the publication of this letter, the Manor of Cortlandt probably elosed its literary labors, in the cause of either party, since the work of the successive seasons occupied the entire attention of the Tenantry, and the Proprietors, also, found other subjects which commanded their attention ; but the great body of the farmers, on the Manor, like those in the neigh- boring County of Duchess, continned to be conser- vative and withont sympathy with those who were in rebellion, to the end of the War.

During the greater portion of the period in which had occurred the various transactions of which men- tion has been made, herein, the General Assembly of the Colony of New York had not been permitted, by the Colonial Government, to meet for the considera- tion of the public affairs and for the transaction of the public business of the Colony ; but a large proportion, it not a majority, of the Members of the House, in their individual characters, were known to have sym- pathized, to a greater or lesser extent, with the less radical portion of the party of the Opposition, in the Colony, while the Committee of Correspondence of the House, in which was vested, ad interim, nmuch of the authority of the House, was also known to have united with the local Committees of Correspondence, in New York and elsewhere, in proposing the conven-

tion of a Congress of all the Colonies, for consultation and advice, in the matter of the great grievances to which the Colonies were said to have been subjected, unconstitutionally, by the Parliament and the Minis- try of Great Britain. It was a matter of deep con- cern, therefore, both in the Colonial Government and among the Colonists, generally, when, on the tenth of January, 1775, that body was permitted to assemble, in an Adjourned Session ; " and, in the absence of more exciting occurrences and in view of many anx- ious hopes that that Assembly, which had not been concerned in any of the extraordinary occurrences of the preceding twelve months, might, possibly, become instrumental in restoring harmony between the Mother Country and the Colonies-" most ardently " desired by all good men " 3-the eyes of all careful observers, in Europe and America, were directed, wistfully, toward the little chamber, in the old City- Hall, in Wall-street, in the City of New York, in which that General Assembly was assembled.

The members of that Assembly, as was well-known, like the body of the Colonists whom they respectively represented, were of the confederated party of the Opposition, and, to a man, antagonistic to the Colo- nial policy of the Home Government; but, also like their constituents, they were divided-in some in- stances, they were radically divided-in their views and in their inclinations, concerning the manner in which that opposition should be presented and through what instrumentality it should be exercised. A portion of those members, respectable in character and ability, but a minority in numbers, led by George Clinton, Philip Schuyler, and Peter R. Livingston, asserting its continued loyalty to the Sovereign, its desire to effect a redress of the grievances under which the Colonies were laboring, and its hope that a reconciliation between the Colonies and the Mother Country might be secured, nevertheless, fell back on the Congress and on the line of action on which the Congress had determined, notwithstanding the well- known tendency toward Revolution of all which that Congress had done, and notwithstanding, also, the equally well-known effects of that action, because of its ill-concealed encouragement of Insurrection if not of Rebellion, on a large portion of the Colonists, throughout the Continent, and on the Home Govern- ment. Another portion of those members, equally respectable in character and ability, constituting a large majority of the House, and led by Isaac Wil- kins, James De Lancey, and Crean Brush, was not less opposed to the Colonial policy of the Home Gov- ernment, nor less decided and sincere in its opposition to that policy, nor less desirons of effecting a redress of the grievances under which the Colouies were said to have been suffering, nor more hopeful that a recon-

Journal of the Issembly, Die Martis, 10 ho., A. M., the luth January, 1775.

Resolution of the House of Representatives of Massachusetts, inviting a I Meeting of Deputies, in a Congress of the Continent, June 17, 1774.

1 Vide pages 13, 44, 45, ante.

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HISTORY OF WESTCHESTER COUNTY.

ciliation between the Colonies and the Mother Coun- try might be effected ; but it also maintained, in op- position to the minority of the House and more con- sistently with the uuiform profession of loyalty to the Sovereign and of respect for the fundamental principles of the Constitution, in both of which all, the minority as well as the majority, professed to be in harmony, that a removal of the causes of the dis- affection and a restoration of harmony between the excited disputants could not be secured by the use of such means as the Congress had recommended and authorized, no matter by whom organized and con- trolled ; and that, for those well-defined purposes, it would be preferable to adopt and employ only those means which would give offence to no one, and only those instrumentalities concerning which there could not be raised any question of their legitimacy nor of their entire fitness, within the law, for the due promo- tion of the great ends for which, alone, all professed to be contending. The first-named portion of the mem- bers, was, evidently, determined to force the Assembly into the line of the radical portion of the party of the Opposition, for no other purpose, however, than that of increasing the moral weight of that particular fac- tion of the party, in its desperate struggle for the possession of the controlling power, in political affairs, within the Colony; and this, too, notwithstanding that success in such determined effort could only re- sult in destroying the one remaining body, legally constituted and entirely unsmirched by any associa- tion with any less legally constituted body, through which the Home Government could be reached, offi- cially, in whatever action should be taken in behalf of "the common cause ; " 1 and notwithstanding, also, that the supporters of the Congress, in the event of their success, would, thereby, destroy a most powerful instrumentality, then preparing to labor, independ- ently, in a line which whilst parallel to that already occupied by the Congress itself, was, nevertheless, for the accomplishment of the great purposes for secur- ing which that Congress had been originally proposed and was subsequently organized, and was, then, among other less desirable purposes, through its own appointed instrumentalities, apparently laboring. The last-named portion of the members, uot less deter- mined than the other, resolutely maintained that the Assembly should remain entirely independent from all those popular Committees and Congresses which had been moving and laboring, during the preceding year, in lines of action which they had respectively approved, cach for itself, for the common purposes ;

1 " The Ministry alledged that the Congress was no legal body, and " none could be heard in reference to their proceedings, without giving " that illegal body some degree of countenance ; that tlicy could only " hear the Colonies through their legal Assemblies and their Agents prop- "erly authorized by then, and properly admitted here ; that to do "otherwise would lead to inextricable confusion and destroy the whole " order of Colony Government."-(Annual Register for the year 1775, 56.) Sec, also, Parliamentary Register (Almon's) i., 115, 116, 124.

and, with equal resolution and consistency, it evi- dently determined, also, that the Assembly should take no official action on any of the occurrences of the preceding year, except such as should be brought before it, officially, or such as might have arisen from some prior actiou of the Assembly itself; and, more important thau all else, it determined that, with all the weight of its legitimate and official authority aud influence and with all the personal influence of its individual members, but after a fashion and in terms of its owu selection, and without any violation of offi- cial or individual propriety or of the Laws of the Land -- especially without officially recognizing the existence of any other opposition to the Ministry or the existence of any other organized body which had been, which was, or which might become, similarly employed-it would vigorously oppose the obnoxious Colonial policy of the Home Government, earnestly seek a redress of the serious grievances under which the Colonies were then laboring, and houestly en- deavor to effect that honorable aud permanent recon- ciliation of the Colonies and the Mother Country, which all factions, and all parties, and all sects, and all classes of society, throughout the Colony, professed to consider necessary and desirable; and which, some in one manner and some in others, each faction for itself, they were eudcavoring to secure, for the common weal.2

The County of Westchester was ably represeuted on the floor of the Assembly, in the persons of Col- onel Frederic Philipse and Judge John Thomas, who represented the body of the County; Pierre Van Cortlandt, who represented the Manor of Cortlandt ; and Isaac Wilkins, who represented the Borough of Westchester. Of these, Thomas and Van Cortlandt were of the minority of the Assembly, of which mention has been made; and Philipse and Wilkins

2 There is no subject connected with the history of the United States which, from the beginning until now, has been more systematically and recklessly falsified than the political character of the members of that Assembly, the influences which controlled that body, and the action which it took, on the great political questions of the day.

Notwithstanding there was not a member of the party of the Govern- ment in the Assembly, Murray (Impartial History, i., 434) Lossing (Field Book, ii., 793) and, with his characteristic indirectuess and malignity Bancroft (History of the United States, original edition, iv., 208. 209, 214, 211, 212, etc. ; the same, centenary edition, iv., 455, 456, 457, etc.) stated or insinuated that the "friends of the Government," or "the Tories," were in the ascendency and controlled it.

Notwithstanding the Despatches of Lieutenant-governor Colden to the Home Government, which are (and have been, since 1775) accessible to everybody, abundantly prove that the Colonial Government possessed no more influence, which it could exercise over the Assembly, than was pos- sessed by any other political opponent,-that, in fact, that body was not in harmony with the Government, and acted adversely to the hopes of the, Government-Murray, (Impartial History, i., 434) History of Civil War in America, Dublin : 1779, i., 68; Soule, (Histoire des Troubles, i., 129 ;) etc., assert that whatever action was taken by the House, was under the influence of the Lieutenant-governor of the Colony.

The action, on the great questions of the day, which the Assembly took, from day to day, tells its own story, wherever it is known, and stamps the brand of infidelity to their duties, as historians, on by far the greater number of those who have undertaken to discharge those duties, on these particular subjects.

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THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION, 1774-1783.

were of the majority of that body, which has been already described; and because of the prominent parts which those Representatives of that County respectively took, in the debates concerning the momentous questions which were considered and determined in that Assembly, and because of the ills which befell thrce of those Representatives, because of what they had respectively said and donc in that Assembly, there is no portion of the history of rer- olutionary New York which possesses a deeper inter- est to those who are of the Westchester-county of more recent days, than that which relates to the action taken by that General Assembly of the Colony of New York, on the political grievances under which the Colony was then said to have been laboring, on the Colonial policy of the Home Government through which those alleged grievances had been inflicted on the Colonies, on the means which were best adapted to the redress of those alleged grievances, and on its employment of those means for that purpose.

Although the Assembly had been prorogued to meet on the tenth of January, 1775, the members from the distant Counties were not present on that day, nor on several succeeding days; and, on the twentieth of that month, a "Call of the House" was ordered to be made on the seventh of February ensu- ing ; and the Clerk of the House was ordered to write to the absent Members, to require their punctual attendance on that day,1 both factions of the House evidently understanding that that particular " Call of " the House " carried with it, in honor if in nothing else, the additional provision that no leading question which was likely to be brought before the Assembly, during that Session, should be thus introduced, until after that "Call " should have been made, agreeably to that Order." It appears, however, that the minority was strengthened by the arrival of two of the absen- tees, within a few days after the "Call " had been ordered and nearly a fortnight before the day on which it was ordered to be made-at which time, too, it appeared to the minority that it had temporarily acquired the control of the House-and the majority was surprised, on the twenty-sixth of January, by

1 Journal of the House, " Die Veneris, 10 ho., A.MI., the 2 th January, " 1775."

9 " It was some Days before a sufficient number of Members got to Town " to make a House, and there are still twelve of their number absent, " which has occasioned the House to put off the farther consideration of " their Important Business to the 7th of next Month, at which Time "they have ordered all their Members to attend."-( Lieutenant-goreruor Colden to the Fart of Dartmouth, " NEW YORK, 21 January, 1775.")

In the Lieutenant governor's Despatch to the Earl of Dartmouth, dated on the first of February, 1775, it is stated that the Call of the House referred to was made on a Motion offered by the minority of the House, for what was supposed would be beneficial to its purposes ; and when it is remembered that the majority already possessed the control of what- ever was brought forward, it will be seen that that majority not only had no occasion to make such a Call, but, also, that, when it consented that such a "Call" should be made, it had entire confidence in its con- tinued supremacy, even when the entire strength of each of the two fac- tions should have been brought into the House, an instance of its temer- ity which, very nearly, became disastrous to it.

the introduction of a Resolution, submitted by Col- onel Abraham Ten Broeck, of the Manor of Rens- selaerwyck, to "take into consideration the Proceed- "ings of the Continental Congress, held in the City "of Philadelphia, in the Months of September and " October last."

Under any circumstances and in any assemblage, there would be aroused an earnest, if not an angry, opposition to any movement which was covered with as much of bad faith and dishonor as was seen, sur- rounding the Resolution which Colonel Ten Broeck had thus submitted in violation of the honorable understanding, between the two factions, which had been entered into when the "Call of the House " was agreed to, by both; and, in the instance under con- sideration, "a warm debate ensued," between the rival factions of the Assembly, which was followed by a call " for the Previous Question," submitted by Colonel Philipse, of the County of Westchester, on which, agreeably to the parliamentary usage of that period, the House was carried from the consideration of the Resolution which was then before it, to the consideration of that "previous question," whether the question on the original Resolution should then be taken, in other words, if that original Resolution should not, then and there, be absolutely rejected, without being permitted to linger until another day, in the hands of an adverse majority. By a vote of ten to eleven, the House determined that the question on Colonel Ten Broeck's ill-timed Resolution should not "be now put," thereby entirely defeating the minority, in its certainly dishonorable attempt to force a consideration of the proceedings of the Con- gress, on the Assembly, in open violation of its own particular undertaking, and at the expense of its own honor.3

Very reasonably, although the welcome act was done by those who were not of the " friends of the "Government," the result of that early struggle in the General Assembly of the Colony, on such a momen- tous question, was very acceptable to the Colonial Government+ as well as to the Ministry, at London ; 3 and, from that date until this, separated from the no- tives of the majority of the Assembly who had thus rejected the Resolution, and from the other acts of the series, in opposition to the Government, of which

3 Journal of the House, " Die Jovis, 10 ho., A.M., the 26th January, "1775 ;" Lieutenant governor Colden to General Gage, " NEW YORK 29th "Jany 1775 ; " the same to the Earl of Dartmouth, " NEW YORK Ist Feby "1775 :" the same to Governor Tryon, " NEW YORK, Ist Feby, 1775;" the " same to Admiral Graves, "NEW YORK 20th Feb, 1775."

4 The venerable Lieutenant-governor of the Province was evidently in excellent spirits, from that result, when he wrote the Despatches tu Gen. eral Gage Hind the Earl of Dartmouth, which were referred to in the last preceding Nute.

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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 55

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