History of Westchester county : New York, including Morrisania, Kings Bridge, and West Farms, which have been annexed to New York City, Vol. II, Part 138

Author: Scharf, J. Thomas (John Thomas), 1843-1898,
Publication date: 1886
Publisher: Philadelphia : L.E. Preston & Co.
Number of Pages: 1286

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. II > Part 138

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What impediments the committee found in New York cannot be told, but it was three years and a half before the object was attained. Evidently ques- tions soon arose as to the validity of titles and the practicability of buying and selling land, for on Feb- ruary 1702,-

" The condition of things during these years is shown by the early deeds. Following the settlement of 1653 the town is usually described as " Bedford in the County of Westchester and province for colony ] of New York." bont loss, after application was made to Connectient for the patent, The phrase changes to " Westchester in his majistie's dominion [or teritorie of newengland." Sometimes This is abbreviated " Bedford in newengland." Then In 1693-94 we find ledford in the "province of New York," and during the same time, "in new eng- Innd." After the patent of 169;, deeds apparently drawn by Roberts triumphantly recite, " Ilelford in the County of fairfield and in the Col- ony of Connecticut." This becomes the regular form until after the final settlement of the boundary In 1700.

" The " bargen " referred to was the offer to sell Crow's vineyard to John Tomson for eight pounds, November 1, 1700.

1 Belford Records, vol. i. p. 132.

595

BEDFORD.

" The town doth order and agree yt all ye lands and meadows entered npon publick record in the town of Bedford, both by Abraham Ambler, recorder, and by Zachariah Roberts recorder, both nuder Conetient and nudler New Yorck, that it shall stand good ; that is, all the lands and medows entered upon publick record from the beginning of the town to this very day, shall stand good to them and theyr ayrs [heirs] for ever."

Very strong and emphatic was this; for it would not do to have the real estate market wait upon the un- successful committee. The next month they thought they had found a man who could help them, and on March 9, 1702, the town (firstly) received Captain Peter Mathews, of New York, as an inhabitant, and granted him a home lot upon the same conditions as other home lots were granted, and (secondly ) the town " by maigor vote doth desire, entreat and empower Cap Mathews for to git our patent and privileges con- fermed to us the town of Bedford, as soon, chep and easy as may be, and for so doeing the town doth in- gadge to give sª Mathews a gratetude of land for his chardg and peanes (pains) to his satisfaction if they are capable." But " Cap Mathews " liked a definite understanding, and on, --

" Aprell I, 1702, the town doth grant Cap. Peter Mathews, of New York, a track of land in ye bounds of Bedford, which is on the south- west corner of our purchase son west of Nonames Hill, aud on the south sid of the road that goeth from bedford to hiutson's river and so by the place whair Wampas wigwam was, and to Birum Pond-the medow and upland, ruf & smoth, in estimation three hundred ackers, which he is to have upon ye condision that he is at ye chardg to git our lands already purchased, patent and priviledges confermed to ns at New York, as it be set on file there for our confermatiou."

It did not take long for the thrifty Roberts to realize that it was a good time to get the town to vote liberal appropriations. Six weeks later, May 14th, the town granted him a good-sized tract lying along Kisco Brook and down to Kisco River, apparently covering a large part of the present village of Mount Kisco, " on condision that he goeth to New Yorck, & ioynes with and is helpful to Captain Petter Mathews to git our land yt we have already purchased, or our patent and priviledges confermed unto us at New York; and this done, then ye above sd land and medow is to be to him and his forever."

Roberts was town clerk, at this time, and appended to this resolution, evidently written at a later date and in different ink, are the words, " and in iune follow- ing Zacha : Roberts, Sen'r, went to New York and got ye town's land secured to then." But when he penned this vain boast, he must have failed to notice the next entry, in his handwriting also, from which it will be seen that on "Ogust 20, 1702," the patent was not yet secured, and, what is more to the purpose, would not be, until Capt. Mathews, the insatiate lobbyist, had another chance at the public domains. On that date the town voted that Mathews should have " aded and ioyned " to his former three hundred acres enough " to bring it up one thousand acres, he compleating the above sª patent." This proved suf- ficient stimulus, and the patent was granted April 8, 1704, by which the Connecticut patent was referred to and confirmed.

Captain Mathews, on March 28, 1705, received two hundred acres more for his " trouble and chardges in running ye patent ; " so that he probably made a sur- vey of the lines as previously run. The grantees mentioned in this patent were twenty-nine in number, and thic quit-rent to be paid annually to the crown was five pounds. But it was always reluctantly paid. In 1714 there was an arrearage of fifty pounds, for none had been paid. There is an occasional refer- ence to it in the minutes of town-meetings, and in 1791, after the Revolution, a tax of ten pounds was raised, in addition to other money on hand, to " dis- charge the quit-rents due from this town." Elias Newman and Richard Sackett were entrusted with the business, the former being both supervisor and town clerk that year. On April 7, 1795, the town voted to approve Newman's account, and " Voted to enter the Recpt for Quit-Rents on the Town Records in full length." Perhaps the town clerk, Henry Wil- son, thought liis entering the resolution a sufficient record, for the receipt does not appear; but not so tlie people, for at the annual meeting on the first Tuesday of April, 1798, the matter was again called up, and finally disposed of as follows : "Whereas, the sum of $110.30 that remained in the hands of Elias Newman, then Supervisor, of the Money Raised to Settle the Quit-Rents, due from this Town, was directed to be paid to the then Poor Master, hatlı been paid and whereas the receipt from the said New- man was ordered to be of Record, therefore voted Unanimously, that the Payment thereof bc entered of Record. Also Voted, that the final Discharge of the Auditor of this from Quit-Rents Due for the town of Bedford be Entered of Record."

The boundaries of the town have remained sub- stantially as fixed by the patent, except that a con- siderable tract lying north of the Croton River has not been included in Bedford, as it would if the patent description of " six miles square" were fol- lowed. The reason for this is, without question, found in the fact that Katonah and the other chiefs from whom our settlers bought their lands, never claimed jurisdiction north of the Croton, but that those lands were sold to the Hon. Stephanus Van Cortlandt by the Indians of that region, a little after the time when our first settlement was made.1

No official survey of the town has been made in late years, nor is any on record, so far as the writer has as- certained. The boundaries, like those of most rural towns, are not monumented, and their existence is

1 It will be remembered that in 1697 the settlers, when applying for the patent, asked to have it extend ten miles north of Stamford bounds. Perhaps some of our settlers may have " squatted " iu that region, mak- ing temporary terms with the Indians they found in possession. It is a curious circunistance that, as late as 1797, the Friends' Meeting at Golden's Bridge was referred to in the records of that body as the " Bed- ford Meeting " (James Wood, address before New York lhistorical Society, 1884), and in 1791 the town voted ten pounds to be paid "to the Commit- tee to build a bridge over Croton River, at a place called Golden's Bridge."

596

HISTORY OF WESTCHESTER COUNTY.

but a matter of tradition, handed down from father to son or from oue landholder to the next, with more or less of exaetness. So long as the land is used only for farming purposes, these limits have been found sufficiently definite. But a few years ago, in the vil- lage of Mount Kiseo, which lies in both Bedford and New Castle, it became desirable to know the exact situation of the boundary. An attempt was made in 1879, under the direction of the supervisors of the two towns, to have the line surveyed. In the absence of any official map or survey, recourse was had to a map found on file in the office of the State engineer and surveyor, described as follows :

" A map of the township of Bedford, in the County of Westchester and State of New York, in the Latt. 41º 16' North, Beginning at the S. E. corner and thence N. 15º W. 550 chains to a heap of stones at the N. E. corner ; thence S. 73º W. 338 chains to Croton River, opposite Muscoot hill, or mountain ; thence along Croton River as it runs to the N. W. corner ; thence along the cast bounds of the manner of Cortland and North Castle S. 18° 40' E. 440 chains to a heap of stones at the S. W. corner ; thence along the northerly Bounds of North Castle, the Middle Patten formerly so called, and Pound Ridge, 495 chains to the place of beginning. .. . Variation of the Compass N. 3º 35m W. from the true meridian. The above-described map of Bedford surveyed and Plotted at the request of James McDonald, Esq., of Bedford. By Charles Webb, surveyor, Stamford, November A.D. 1797."

The northern portion of the line in question was easily found. It is marked by an old and substantial stone wall, running (except for the variation of the needle) by the course given on Webb's map, which he doubtless took from it. For nearly two miles it extends right across the country, without regard to the lay of the ground, broken only by two highways, and until lately with not even a bar-way through it. The oldest inhabitants, when questioned about its origin, say, " It has always been there." It is un- doubtedly the most notable landmark in this part of the county. Tradition says it was built by order of Stephanus Van Cortlandt soon after the Van Cort- landt Manor was granted.

It can scareely be said that he " builded better than he knew ;" for he built it as the boundary line between two great provinces. It was in June, 1697, that lie ob- tained his manor grant, bounded southerly by a line beginning near the mouth of the Croton and running "due east twenty English miles." But a month previously Bedford had obtained her patent from Con- meeticut ; and so, when Van Cortlaudt's surveyor, working on his "due cast " line,1 was advaneing through Bedford, he was doubtless apprised by our settlers that he was on Connecticut soil. No use to go farther ; so he ran his line around the north side of Bedford, leaving her out of the Van Cortlandt Manor, as this ancient wall has for nearly two eentu- ries silently testified.

The wall does not extend quite so far south as where the ancient manor line intersects the town boundary; but the west line of the town is traeed

with sufficient clearness as far as the village of Mount Kisco. The lieap of stones mentioned by Webb as the "S. W. Corner " remained and was well known by those residing near, until a few years ago, wheu the stones were removed by a farmer. The spot was identified, for the purpose of the survey of 1879, but all attempts to make the manor linc, duly extended, strike that spot, were failures. Such a line falls west of the accepted boundary along that part of the town. An attempt was made, reversing Webb's course, and working from the south end, to coincide with the manor line in that way, but the line so run reached the Croton River several hundred feet east of the manor line, and parallel with it for its whole length, thus establishing, first, the correctness of the work, and second, the faet that the boundary between the two towns, as it has been accepted by the residents of both, for so long a time "that the memory of man goeth not to the contrary," cannot be a straight line, as it appears on the published maps.

It seems to the writer that this is accounted for as follows: It has been stated that the patent from the colony of New York was not obtained until April, 1704, although it was applied for in 1700, and was urged with persistenee and anxiety by the people during the time intervening. But on February 14, 1701, the West Patent of North Castle (which then ineluded the town of New Castle) was granted to Robert Walters and his nine associates. This grant, probably by error based on an imperfeet understand- ing of the boundaries of the various grants, corered nearly a quarter of the territory described in the appli- cation of the Bedford people, then pending,-that is, nearly the southwestern quarter of the town. Possi- bly this was a reason for the delay which so worried the Bedford settlers. The bounds of the West Patent (so far as they effee; this part of the story) are " bounded northerly by the Manor of Cortlandt, and castwardly by Bedford line of three miles square." This expression, " Bedford three miles square," as has been said before, meant the first Bedford Purchase, or the Hop Ground. The error of Robert Walters and his associates, therefore, was in bounding the West Patent easterly by that traet, instead of by the whole town, as described in the Connectieut Patent of 1697. Their boundary on the north, the " Manor of Cort- landt," was correct, and they, having made the error of supposing the west line of "Bedford three miles square" to be the west boundary of Bedford, natur- ally thought that the manor extended as far eastward as the old purchase. This tract of four thousand one hundred and fifty acres then was, by royal patent, situated in two towns, but as a matter of fact was a part of Bedford, and was never elaimed by North Castle. The quit-rent to the crown, payable yearly, for the West Patent was six pounds and five shillings. The people of Bedford, finding it burden enough to pay the quit-rent due by the terms of the Bedford Patent, and feeling the injustice of paying a

1 Now the boundary line between New Castle and Yorktown. U'ntil 1846 Somers extended scat !: wardt to this line.

597

BEDFORD.

share of that of the West Patent, to which, by a blunder, they were technically liable, refused to pay the latter. The quit-rent was always an unwelcome tax. Its payment was often neglected or delayed throughout the colony, and in 1762 the Colonial Assembly passed an act for collecting the quit-rents and for the sale of land, if necessary. Charles Clinton, Jonathan Brown and Elisha Budd were appointed commissioners, and Nathaniel Merritt, surveyor, under this act. On July 25, 1765, they met and laid out all that part of the above recited tract (the West Patent) which the proprietors had not sold,1 which part is, by our survey, included within the limits and bounds following : "Beginning at a heap of stones formerly set up iu the southwest cor- ner of the said piece of land, and runs thence north 193 E. 8 chains 66 links ; 75 East 140 chains; thence South 39° E. 6 chains 70 links; thence south 89º E. 11 chains 20 links to the road that leads from Bedford to North Castle; thence along said road north 61° 30' east 7 chains 28 links ; thence north 14 A 226 75° east 7 chains 50 15 13 222 A links; thence north 1 26° W. 259 chains to 12 226 a line lately run for A 2 217 the south bounds of 10 A the manor of Cort- landt ; thence along said line south 87º 4 4123 CH5] 26.40 25 26.20 28.80 38. north 144 chains to a 8 stone fence on the east A 225 side of the Widow Sut- 45.20 CHS 6 5 ton's land ; 2 thence BYPAM POND south 12º 30' east 107 50 CHS. chains ; thence south 33° 20' east 34 chains 20 links; thence south MAP OF BEDFORD. 20° 30' east 65 chains 20 links ; thence south 13º E. 35 chains 40 links; thence south 16° east 43 chains to the place of beginning, containing 4151 acres." The tract was divided into sixteen lots, advertised and sold. 9

This description and map are copied from those on file in the office of the Secretary of State, Albany. The survey, on both the south and west town boun- daries, between Bedford and North Castle,3 evidently followed the town lines as then understood, and as usage and ownership had established them during the seventy or eighty years preceding. No official sur- vey has been made since, and this is probably the most correct map of that part of the town boundary now in existence.

MILITARY HISTORY AND INCIDENTS .- The first re-

eorded military achievement of which this town was the scene occurred in February, 1684, during the Dutch and Indian War, when the Indian village south- east of the present village of Bedford was burned by Captain John Underhill, and several hundred of the Indians butchered, the pious historian of the time ob- serving, "the Lord having collected the most of our enemies there to celebrate some peculiar festival." The place was the plain below the cliff, near the old school-house. As the causes which led to this unfor- tunate event are fully discussed in another chapter it is not necessary further to refer to them here. Its re- sult was to weaken and intimidate the surviving In- - dians, so that when our settlers inade their acquaint- ance, about thirty-five years afterward, they were disposed to be friendly. Disagreements may have arisen, which threatened to become serions, and it was such a contingency, perhaps, that led the town to vote, April 15, 1700, to "agree, that if they fortify, it shall be John Holmes, Sen'rs., house, and ye house yt was Joshua Webb's, desesed." But there is no evi- dence that it became necessary to fortify, and soou after this date we find their commercial relations with the Indians unbroken.

That some of our ancestors had a desire for military glory and sought to gratify it by joining the expedi- tion which captured Louisburg, on Cape Breton Is- land, in 1745, is not very gloriously indicated by the following warrant, preserved among the papers of the ancestors of John C. Holmes, Esq., now of Lewisboro :

" Westchester County, ss. To the Constable of Bedford, Greeting : Pursenent to ye order of counsill of this Colony, you are hereby, in his maj.'s name, Required to take, apprehend all or any of ye souldiers, if to be found, that Inlisted themselves in his maj.'s service in a Expe- dition against Canada, and now have deserted sd service, and them safely convay to ye Keeper of his utaj.'s goal at Westchester who is hereby required to receive him or them into close custody, and them safely to keep until notice thereof be given to ye officers under whome they In - listed, or until some other particular orders be given concerning them. And in your so doing this shall be your warent. Given under our hands and seals, at Bedford, this 15th of September, in ye twentieth year of his maj.'s Reign, A.D. 1746.

"JOHN HOLMES. "JOHN MILLER."

The signers were probably town officers.4

In the French and Indian War, of which the Lou- isburg expedition may be considered an initial step, the town took a part. James Holmes, son of John Holmes,5 whose name is attached to the above war-

4 John Holmes was a son of John Holmes, of Beverly. It is not clear, thoughi it is likely, that he was town clerk at the date of this paper. Ile certainly was from 1732 to 1740. The office was held by Reuben Holmes from 1747 to 1750. He was succeeded by another John Holmes, who gave place again to the John Holmes in question, in 1761. Hle continued in the office until his death, by small-pox, in 1763, holding, at the same time, the positions of justice of the peace and captain in the militia. Ile was also an elder in the Presbyterian Church. Ile was succeeded as town clerk by his son, James Holmes, who held tho office till 1774.

5 The information which the said James Holmes has, regarding the life and standing in society of his grandfather, John Holmes, is quite limited, he having died, although at an advanced age, still many years since. But in respect to his father, John Holmes, he can with assurance observe that no man sustained a fairer character .- " Life of James Holmes," New Haven, 1815.

1 Obviously the " proprietors had not sold " it because they never had a good title to it.

2 The stone wall before mentioned.

3 New Castle was not taken from North Castle until 1798.

ii .- 52

598

HISTORY OF WESTCHESTER COUNTY.

rant, volunteered in 1757, being then twenty years of age, and went against Canada. In 1758 he received enlisting orders and a lieutenant's commission, and fought under Abercrombie at the battle of Ticon- deroga. The following year he was promoted to a captainey and served with reputation till the final conquest of Canada, in 1760. He then returned to Bedford, became a farmer, succeeded his father as town clerk, and was a lieutenant-colonel of militia. When the troubles between the colonies and the mother-country, which had been brewing for several years, culminated in 1775, and a Provincial Conven- tion met at New York, he was sent as member from Westchester, but did not attend. "He was looked upon with rather a doubtful eye, was suspected of being a Loyalist. Ile was a moderate man and heartily wislied for a reconciliation between Great Britain and her colonies. Ilis real sentiments were shortly put to the test. His ambition, perhaps, prevailed. War was declared, an army ordered to be raised, and Can- ada invaded. Holmes was offered a regiment. He aeeepted it, went with Montgomery, was at the siege of St. John's, at the capture of Montreal, and at the attempt to storm Quebec. The rebels being driven out of Canada, Holmes resigned his regimeut and re- turned to North Castle [Bedford].

"The campaign of 1776 being as favorable to Britain as prejudicial to rebellion, Holmes thought the war at an end, left the rebel country, took refuge within the British lines and renewed his oaths of allegiance. lle also took a pardou from the commissioners for restoring peace. He lived within the British lines until 1779, when, finding the British affairs growing worse and worse, he privately left Long Island, went into the rebel country, applied to the rebel Governor, offered to abjure his sovereign and swear allegianee to the States. Clinton, the rebel Governor, treated him with great contempt, refused to receive his sub- mission, called him a deserter from the cause and one not to be trusted. The usage, perhaps, was not im- proper for a person guilty of such tergiversation.1

The minutes of town-meetings during the Revoh- tionary period are lost, having been destroyed, as it is supposed, when the village was burned during the war. This loss is greatly to be regretted, for it would have interested us to know what action our ancestors took during those times when all the colonies were in excitement. There is no doubt that this town, a stronghold of religious liberty from the beginning,? was intensely opposed to the acts of oppression which emanated from the British Parliament, against the earnest remonstrance of its wisest and worthiest meui-

bers. Many of the men of the town went early into the service, some becoming commissioned offieers, whose commissious are still preserved by their de- seendants. Here and there, however, were Tories, friendships and families being sundered by division of sentiment-love of liberty on the one side, and de- votion to the King, or at least a halting hope of rec- oneiliation, on the other. The Loyalists, however, were not so numerous as in the lower part of the eounty, where the antecedents of the people liad been different, and where they were more exposed to British influenees. Some of them remained at home, while others abandoned their property and took ref- uge within the British lines, and sought to return after the war. But they were not welcomed. At the town-meeting, April 7, 1784, held in the new Pres- byterian meeting-house on the hill, it was "voted, that no persons that have been over to the enemy shall come into the town to reside; if any have already come in, they are to be imediately drove out. Voted, that Richard Saekett, James Trowbridge, Silvenus Reynolds, John Banks, Jun'r, Captain St. John, Eli Tyler, Gabriel Higgins, John Miller ye 34, Ezekiel Newman, Cornelius Clark, Abijah Holmes and Abram Holly be a committee to eary the above resolution into exeention."

This vigorous resolution was to some degree en- forced. Certain of the Tories were banished and their farms confiscated ; they took up their residence in Nova Scotia, while others lived and died here, but never regained the respect or eoufidence of their neighbors.

The town was on the border of the neutral ground and was in a constant state of alarm, both from the occasional presence of British sokliers and from the sudden raids of the Cowboys and Skinners. The great calamity of the war was the burning of the village by a detachment of cavalry under Lieutenant-Colonel Banastre Tarleton, July 2, 1779.

One objeet of the expedition was, probably, to capture Major Ebenezer Lockwood, of Poundridge, a member of the Committee of Safety, for whose head a prize of forty guineas had been offered, but the general purpose of it is accounted for by Sir Henry Clinton's instructions from the British ministry to make the rebellious people feel the utmost severity of war.3

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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. II, Part 138

Author: Scharf, J. Thomas (John Thomas), 1843-1898, Publication date: 1886 Publisher: Philadelphia : L.E. Preston & Co. Number of Pages: 1286

Author: Scharf, J. Thomas (John Thomas), 1843-1898,
Publication date: 1886
Publisher: Philadelphia : L.E. Preston & Co.
Number of Pages: 1286