History of Westchester county : New York, including Morrisania, Kings Bridge, and West Farms, which have been annexed to New York City, Vol. I, Part 92

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 92

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Of these several requisitions, one Battalion of seven hundred and fifty men was called from the Colony of New York, for the Canadiau service; 11 and for the rciuforcemeut of the Army at New York, that Colony was required to furnish three thousand men.12 All were to be taken from the Militia of the respective Colonies ; all were to be "engaged " only " to the first " day of December next, unless sooner discharged by "Congress ; " and the pay of the men was to commence on the days on which they respectively left their homes. 13

+ Elijah Hunter was evidently an ambitions man. In addition to the Commission, referred to in the text, he managed, on the twenty-first of November, 1776, to obtain the command of the Sixth Company of the Second, or Van Cortlandt's, Regiment of the New York Line, in the Continental Army of 1776-77, (Historical Manuscripts, etc .: Military Com- mittee, xxv., 761 ;) and he retired from the service, fifteen days afterwards, (Historical Manuscripts, ete .: Military Committee, xxv., 851, 854, XXXY., 321;) contenting himself. theneefortb, as we shall see, hereafter, with hankering after authority to continne the persecution of his peaceful neighbors, wbieh Ezekiel Hawley had previously failed to seenre. ( Vide pages 350-353, ante.)

5 Of Riebard Sackett, Silas Miller, and Jeremiah Lounsberry no other mention than this appears to have been made, ou the military records of the Colony or State. It is probable they were stars of the smallest magnitude.

6 Journal of the Provincial Congress, "Die Mercurii, 9 ho., A.M., May "29, 1776."

7 Journal of the Continental Congress, "Saturday, June 1, 1776."

8 The same, " Monday, June 3, 1776."

9 Ibid.

10 Ibid.

11 Journal of the Continental Congress, "Saturday, June 1, 1776."

12 The same, " Monday, June 3, 1776."

18 Ibid.

1 Journal of the Provincial Congress, "Die Martis, 10 ho., A.M., Muy 21, " 1776."

2 Vide pages 276, 277, ante.

3 Members of a Committee for Westchester-county-Historical Manuscripts, ete .: Miscellaneous Papers, xxxviii., 309.

365

THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION, 1774-1783.

Of the nine Provincial Brigadier-generals which these requisitions would bring into the service, one was assigned to the Colony of New York ; 1 and, as will be seen, hereafter, a lively canvass for the place was im- incdiately commenced by John Morin Scott, of the City of New York, and by the President of the Pro- vincial Congress, Brigadier-general Nathaniel Wood- hull, of Suffolk.

These several requisitions, with an elaborate appeal from the President of the Continental Congress, were laid before the Provincial Congress of New York, on the morning of the seventh of Juue; 2 and on the afternoon of the same day, a Committee who had been appointed for the purpose, during the morning ses- sion, made a Report, apportioning the requisitions which had been made by the Continental Congress on the Colony of New York, in due proportions, on the several Countics, the number apportioned to Westchester-county having been three hundred men.3 On the following Sunday afternoon, the levies which had been made on Westchester and Orange-counties and Suffolk were ordered to constitute one Battalion ; and, for that Battalion, Westchester-county was ordered to appoint or nominate, one Colonel, four Captains, four First Lieutenants, and four Seeond Lieutenants.+

Although the Provincial Congress was "of opinion " that the several levies," apportioned on the different Counties, " consisting of volunteers, would be mnost " advaneive of the public service, yet " it evidently knew that volunteers could not be had, even under such a stress of eircumstanees as then existed and in so " glorious a eause ; " and drafts from the respective Regiments, in each County, were also provided for, in instances where deficiencies should be found; and every possible measure was employed, to secure the armament and general equipment of the men.5

Information had no sooner been received by the Provincial Congress of New York, that a Brigadier- general was to be appointed by that body, for the command of the four Battalions which were to be raised in New York, than it was announced "the "Congress conceived it necessary towards carrying "the several Resolutions and requisitions of the "Continental Congress into execution, to appoint a "Brigadier-general and a Major of Brigade of the "Militia of Westehester-county " -. the Congress did not reveal in what that declared " necessity " existed, however; and as those offices had been created on the twenty-second of the preceding August 6 and had not been oeeupied, during the entire intervening per-

iod, while neither pay nor emoluments were derivable from them, it is very evident that that Brigadier- general and that Major of Brigade became a "neces- "sity," very suddenly, and only when a contingent possibility appeared that they, if they were already in place, might receive the appointments to the new- created offiees of the same respective ranks, in the Brigade of Militia which the Continental Congress had ealled into the service of the Continent, with the honors, the pay, the emoluments, and the increased social and politieal influences which they would eer- tainly ensure. Not a moment was lost, therefore- the Congress was not even permitted to refer the letter from the President of the Continental Congress and the exceedingly important enclosures which it covered, to a Committee, for consideration and report -when, with indecent haste, some ready made Cer- tificates which had evidently been kept on hand, ready for immediate use, whenever they should be needed, were laid before the Provincial Congress, showing that, in the opinion of the enlightened County Committee, in Westehester-county, Lewis Morris was just the man for a Brigadier-general's command, and that Lewis Morris, Junior, could not be exeelled as a Major of Brigade. With such in- telligent judges of military matters and of the re- quirements of those who were to command and handle large bodies of soldiers, as were seen in the rustic Committee of the County of Westchester, 1776-77, and with Gouverneur Morris, the step-brother and uncle of the two ambitious Westchesterians, present, and direeting the work, how could the Provincial Con- gress do less than to elect them ? The record says, " the Congress conceive it necessary towards earrying " these Resolutions of the Continental Congress into " execution, to appoint a Brigadier-general and a "Major of Brigade of the Militia of Westchester- "county ; and Lewis Morris, Esqr., being thought the "most proper person for a Brigadier-general of the "Militia of that County,7 and having been recom- " mended by the County Committee, for that pur- " pose, and Lewis Morris, Junior, Esqr., having been "also formerly recommended by the said Committee " for an appointment, to be the Major of Brigade of " the Militia of that County ;

" RESOLVED : That Lewis Morris, Esqr., be ap- " pointed Brigadier-general of the Militia of the " County of Westchester, and that Lewis Morris, "Junr., Esqr., be appointed Major of Brigade of the " Militia of the said County."

The Secretaries were ordered to engross the Com- missions ; and that, properly attested, those Commis- sions be "sent to those gentlemen with all possible

1 Journal of the Continental Congress, " Monday, June 3, 1776."

2 Journal of the Provincial Congress, "Friday morning, 9 ho., June 7, "1776."

3 Journal of the Provincial Congress, " Die Veneris, 4 ho., P.M., June 7.

" 1776."

4 Journal of the Provincial Congress, " Sunday afternoon, June 9, 1770." 5 [bill.

o Vide page 278, ante.

7 As the Militia Bill which the Provincial Congress had adopted on the twenty-second of August, 1775, had massed " the Militia of the Counties "of Duchess and Westchester" [into] "one other Brigade," it would seen that Duchess-county ought to have been consulted, in this mat- ter, but, very evidently, it was not.

366

HISTORY OF WESTCHESTER COUNTY

" despatch,"1 although the Offices were only those of the Militia, not in active service and, with a small ex- ception, not likely to be so. The "despatch " was " necessary," however, since a full-fledged Brigadier- general would be a more imposing candidate, when the election should be held for the Brigadier-general of the four Battalions who had been called into the service of the Continent ; and it was uot a character- istic of the Morris family to be backward when its own interests required attention and action, at the front. We shall see, hereafter, how well this well-laid scheme was counter-schemed by more astute aspirants; how General Lewis Morris reaped all his military houors, what there were of them, in the Militia of Westchester-county ;2 and that Brigade-major Lewis Morris, Junior, secured all the laurels which he pos-essed, as an Aide of General Greene, a place for which he was indebted to the personal favor of that Officer.

Two days after the unseemly movement of the Morrises, [June 9, 1776,] the Provincial Congress pro- ceeded to the election of a Brigadier-general for the command of the three thousand men who had been called from the Militia of New York, for the rein- forcement of the Continental Army, under General Washington, who was then in that Colony; but General Lewis Morris, notwithstanding his artful- ness-that species of " art" of which his step-brother, Gouverneur, had written to Mr. Penn, in May, 1774-was not even mentioned-even Westchester- county indicated that he was not a favorite, beyond a known limit; and its Deputation in the Provincial Congress did not pander to his inordinate ambition. The canvass was, indeed, confined to two candidates, John Morin Scott, of the City of New York, one of that celebrated "triumvirate" of the earlier periods of the Revolution and a lawyer of the highest stand- ing, and " General " 3 Nathaniel Woodhull, of Suffolk, a veteran of the French and Indian War, and, at the time now under notice, President of the Provincial

Congress. The canvass was evidently conducted, as we have already stated, with spirit; but the influence of the Counties of Westchester, New York, Tryon, Charlotte, and Albany, in behalf of Scott, was too great to be overcome by that of the Counties of Orange, Suffolk, Duchess, and Ulster, for Woodhull, the Counties of Richmond, Kings, Queens, Cumber- land, and Gloucester having been absent; and the former was thus elected,4 admirably filling the political demand, but not, in the slightest degree, promising to make the Brigade efficieut or useful, as soldiers-like other lawyers, some of them within our acquaintance, the uniform of a General was attractive to him; he secured an office of distinction ; and he continued to occupy it, until, on the establishment of the new form of Government, after having been defeated in his canvass for the office of Governor, he was trans- ferred into the more comfortable, if not the more profitable place, of Secretary of State, which he occupied until 1789, and was succeeded by his son, who held the place until 1798.

On the following day, [June 10, 1776,] the Provin- cial Congress elected the Field-officers of the Regi- ment in which the levics from Westchester-county were to be enrolled ; and Samuel Drake, who was then commanding the skeleton Regiment of Westchester- couuty Minute-men, in the Continental Service,5 was elected Colonel; John Hulbert, of Suffolk,6 was electcd Lieutenant-colonel ; Moses Hetfield, of Or- angc-county, was elected Major.7 The Line-officers of the Regiment and the other details of its organiza- tion of the Regiment will be uoticed, hereafter.

A matter of particular interest to the inhabitants of Westchester-county occurred during the session of the third Provincial Congress ; and it may properly be mentioned in this narrative.

It will be remembered that, on the suggestion of General Lee, a Magazine of Provisions was ordered to be established, in Westchester-couuty; that the Delegates from that County were authorized to pur- chase, on the account of the Provincial Congress, the Pork and Beef which were desired; that, subsequent- ly, Colonel Gilbert Drake, the Chairman of the County Committee and one of the Deputies from the County, so managed the affair that all the purchases

1 Journal of the Provincial Congress, "Friday morning, 9 ho , June 7, "1776."

2 Bolton said Lewis Morris was "a Brigadier-general in the Conti- "nental Army ;" and in his arrangement of the words, if they mean anything, that he held that Office before he was sent to the Continental Congress of 1775, (History of Westchester county, original edition, ii., 312; the same, second edition, ii., 428 ; ) but we find no competent evidence of the truth of the former statement ; and evidence is not necessary to show the entire uutruth of the latter.

3 Nathaniel Woodhull appears to have been a Colonel of the Suffolk Militia, who was "recommended or nominated to our Deputies in Pro- "viucial Congress for a Brigadier-general," by the Committees of the western Towns in Suffolk, in a meeting held at Smithtown, on the sev- enth of September, 1775, (Historical Manuscripts, etc .: Military Returns, xxvi., 216 ;) but a very careful examination of the Journals of the Pro- vincial Congress and of its Committee of Safety, from that date until the earliest mention of him as a " Brigadier general" which we have seen, has failed to produce the slightest evidence of his election to that or any other military authority, heyond his Colonelcy. We incline to the opinion, therefore, that, although he commanded the Suffolk and Queens Militia, it was only as the senior Colouel, or Colonel-commandant; and that he was only a "General," "hy courtesy, " as it was called.

4 Journal of the Provincial Congress, "Sunday Morning, June 9, 1776." 6 Vide pages 328-330, ante.

6 It is doubtful if he ever joined the Regiment, (Colonel Henry B. Liv- angston to the Committee of Arrangement, "FISHKILL, 24 Novr., 1776;"') and he resigned, on the ninth of December, 1776, (John Hulbert to the Committee of Arrangement, " FISHI KILL, December 9, 1776.")

William Goforth, who had served honorahly iu Canada, was elected to the vacancy, (Minutes of the Committee of Arrangement, " FISHKILL, "Jany 13, 1777 ;") hut, in February, he declined to continne in the place, (Philip Van Cortlandt to the Committee of Arrangement, "FISHKILL, "Feby. 25, 1777.")

7 Moses Hetfield was Captain of the Company of Minute-men, at Go- shen, in September, 1775 ; (Historical Manuscripts, etc .: Military Returns, xxvi., 133;) in February, 1776, he was nominated as First Major of the Regiment of Goshen, (the same, xxvii., 77 ;) to which office he was suhse- quently appointed, (the same, xxvii., 135.)

367

THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION, 1774-1783.

of Flour, Beef, and Pork, with all the golden oppor- tunities for personal profits which were thus afforded, were concentrated in his own hands; that there were. consequently, rival purchasing Agent-, by whom and by the shrewd farmers, the prices of those articles were so greatly advanced that the Committee of Safety was constrained to interfere; and that, after the various buyers, on the account of the Congress, had thus secured their several harvests of the official plunder, the authority was suspended, the Magazine, very soon after, being declared unnecessary ; 1 and the provisions which had been bought, at high prices, were thrown on the market again, for such prices as, under such circumstances, could be obtained for then, from the Contractors aud Commissaries of the Continental Army.2 Uuder the Rules of the Provin- cial Congress, the accounts and the vouchers had to be audited, before the former could be closed; and Colonel Gilbert Drakc, who had endeavored to super- sede his associates, in making the necessary pur- chases, could not produce a sufficient amount of those vouchers to balance his accounts-he had received three thousand pounds, in money ; fifty pounds of that sum he could uot account for; he was mean enough to hesitate, when the missing fifty pounds were officially called for, preferring, rather to go down to posterity, through all time, as a defaulter ; 3 and the matter was laid before the Congress, to be patched up, in some way which would spare him from paying the one hundred and twenty-five dollars, which had disappeared, he did not know how.

The subject was one of those which, by hook or by crook, the Secretaries of the Provincial Congress were apt to pass, without making an official record of them ; and we have found no mention of it, on the Journal of the Provincial Congress, uutil a special Committee who had been previously appointed " to " take into cousidcratiou the case of Colonel Gilbert " Drake, relative to a loss of fifty pounds he sustained "in receiving and paying out the monies deposited in " his hands, for the purpose of purchasing and laying " up in store a certain quantity of salted Pork, pur- " suant to an Order of the late Provincial Congress," made its report, on the fifteenth of June. In that Report, the facts were duly recited, very much to the depreciation of the vindictive Colonel's manliness, although it recommended that he be allowed for his loss, and that he be also compensated "for his other " services," the latter having been asked for, by uo others of the Deputies who had also traversed the County and had made similar purchases and had been contented with what they had respectively made, iu the

operations. The Congress declared, as its opinion, "that Colonel Gilbert Drake sustained a loss, which "accrued in receiving and paying out the public "money, in purchasing Pork, by order of the late " Provincial Congress," without, however, assuming the loss referred to; and then it voted the gallant Colouel, " the sum of seventy pounds, as a compensa- " tiou for his services, expenses, and commissions, in " purchasing the said Pork, as aforesaid," and leaving him officially "whitewashed," with twenty pounds and what, besides, he had made in the operations, snugly secured in his pocket-book. It was proven, in that instance, that influence was useful, eveu among " patriots ; " and the Chairman of Westchester- county's County Committee, in the same instance, found it well to have been a Drake.+

As we have already stated," the third Provincial Congress was alarmed by the entrance of General Howe into the harbor of New York, and precipitately dis- banded, without a formal adjournment, although it had previously provided for a reassembling of the Deputies, at the Court House, in the White Plains, on the following Tuesday, [July 2, 1776.] As it did not thus resume its work, it ceased to exist; and, whether for good or for evil, the third Provincial Congress and all which it did and all which it failed to do became subjects of history.

The latter half of the year 1776 was one of the most eventful periods in the history of America, if not in that of the entire civilized world ; and in the great drama of political and military eveuts, teeming with immediate interest and with ultimate import- ance, and occupying only that short half-year, Westcliester-county, in New York, and those who were, then, within the limits of that ancient County- the peaceful and industrious farmers whose homes were there, as well those strangers, armed or uuarmed, who had gone into the County, uo matter for what purpose-occupy places which were, then, as con- spicuous as, since the close of that period, they have been well-known, from one extreme of Christendom to the other.

On the second of July,6 General Howe and tlic army which he commanded, whose entrance into the harbor of New York, a few days before, has beeu already noticed, occupied Staten-Island-Richmond- county-with the military and naval forces which he had brought from Halifax, say seven thousand, five hundred, and fifty-six, rank and file, including those

1 Vide pages 333-335, ante.

2 Journal of the Provincial Congress, "Die Mercurii, 9 ho., A.M., An- "'gust 14, 1776."

3 Gilbert Drake seemed to care very little for the respect of poster- ity ; and his ill-conduct iu the management of his monetary dealings with others, after the establishment of the Peace, led the Grand Jury lo indict him, on a charge of extortion, (Records of the Court, in man- uscript, County-clerk's office, at the White Plains.)

4 Journal of the Provincial Congress, "Die Sabbati, A.M., June 15 " 1776."

5 Vide page 338, ante. 6General Howe's Observations on a pamphlet entitled Letters to a No- bleman, 47.

See, also, General Howe to Lord George Germain, " STATEN ISLAND, 7th "July, 1776; " General Washington to the President of the Continental Congress, " New-York, July 3, 1776."

7 Vide pages 339, 340, ante.

368

HISTORY OF WESTCHESTER COUNTY.

who were sick ; 1 and, as has been already stated, the inhabitants of that beautiful island, remembering the sentence of outlawry which had been pronounced against them, by the Provincial Congress, and the multiplied outrages to which they had been sub- jected, on warrants of the same body, by those who claimed to be the special defenders of the Rights of Man; and being, also, relieved from apprehensions of a renewal of their sufferings, "testified their "loyalty by all the means in their power," furnishing the new-comers with "fresh Provisious, Carriages, " Horses, etc.,"2 and meriting, from him, the high praise which General Howe awarded to them, in his despatchies to the Home Government.3

It is proper that we shall say, in this connection, that General Howe, on his arrival at Sandy-hook, on the twenty-fifth of June, had been met by Governor Tryon and many others, "fast friends to Govern- "ment," from whom he had received "the fullest "information of the state of the rebels," and of their situation and defences, in the City of New York and on Long Island. His inquiries, concerning the face of the country between Gravesend and Brooklyn and concerning the military works which had been thrown up, had afforded information which had been so entirely satisfactory that he had determined to land the Army, at Gravesend, immediately, and to move, from that base, without the slightest delay and with only the small effective force which was then under his command, on the insufficient works which, at that early day, had been constructed in Kings-county. For the prosecution of that purpose, two days after the arrival of the Fleet and the Army, at Sandy Hook, [July 1, 1776,] the former had been moved up to Gravesend-bay, now so universally known to New Yorkers as one of their Summer resorts, in order that the troops might be landed, at daybreak, on the following morning, [July 2, 1776,] and, thence, make the first movement in the Campaign, against the insignificant works and yet more insignificant force which, at that time, werc clustered around Brooklyn.4

1 General Howe's Observations, 45,

2 General Howe's Observations, 50.

3 General Howe to Lord George Germaine, "STATEN ISLAND, 7th July, "1776." General Howe's Observations, 50.

4 General Washingtou's means for obtaining intelligence were very defective-how should it have been otherwise, among those whom the Provincial Congress had soured by the outrages inflicted on them or on their neighbors and friends? He was not informed of the arrival of General Howe, until three days after it had occurred ; and then only through information received through a prisoner, whom the Schuyler, armed sloop, had captured.

On the same day on which that intelligence was received by him, General Washingion wrote to the Continental Congress : " I could wish "General Howe and his armament not to arrive yet, as not more than " a thousand Militia have come in, and our whole force, including the " troops at all the detached posts and on board the armed vessels, " which are comprehended in our Returns, is but small and inconsider- "able when compared with the extensive lines they are to defend and, "most probably, the Army that he brings. I have no further intelli- "gence about him than what the Lieutenant " [ Davison, of the armed " sloop Schuyler] "mentions ; but it is extremely probable his accounts "and conjectures are true," (General Washington to the President of the

It is not now known, if it was ever known, what the result of that early movement of the Royal Army would have been, had General Howe's purposes been duly executed ; but there can be little doubt that, with no more than the small force which was then under his command and with the reinforcements which an early success would have surely brought to him, from Richmond, Kings, and Queens-counties, the insufficiently armed and ill-appointed handful of half-hearted men whom General Washington com- manded or endeavored to command, would have been entirely overcome; and that, thereby, the physical strength of the Rebellion would have been surely broken.5 But "the bright designs" of God had been directed to an entirely different end; and the up- lifted hand of General Howe fell, harmlessly, with- out striking the meditated and well-aimed and powerful blow-during the night, after the Fleet had anchored in Gravesend-bay, and while the prepara- tions for landing the troops, at the approaching day- break, were in progress, and while the soldiery, smarting under the disgrace which had befallen it, at Boston, was eagerly preparing to recover its pro- fessional respectability, in an encounter, in the field, with those by whom it had been, there, humiliated, somebody, history does not say whom although intel- ligent conjecture undoubtedly supplies the informa- tion, approached the commanding Geueral with "particular information of a strong pass, upon a "ridge of craggy heights, covered with wood, that lay "in the route the Army must take, only two miles " distant from the front of the enemy's encampment " and seven from Gravesend, which the rebels would " undoubtedly occupy before the King's troops could

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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 92

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