USA > New York > New York City > History of the New Netherlands, province of New York, and state of New York : to the adoption of the federal Constitution. Vol. I > Part 53
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).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54
At Ticonderoga, Ethan Allen had captured the English garri-
470
DEPARTURE OF TRYON.
son, and was at this time himself captured and in irons, as a rebel, in Montreal. All this Tryon knew, and he therefore replied, the sanie day, to Mr. Hicks, that as the citizens had not authorized the mayor to pledge to him their assurances of security, his duty to his sovereign would not justify him in staying on shore, unless he had positive declarations of full protection under every circumstance. The mayor tells him that he would consult the committee, and adds, that people of all ranks express great anxiety that he should not leave the city. On the 17th October, the committee authorize the mayor to assure Tryon that they are not apprehensive of the least danger to his person or property, and add, he might be assured of all that protection from them and their fellow-citizens which will be consist- ent with the great principles of their safety and preservation. They declare their confidence in his wisdom; and that he will mediate to restore harmony; and express their desire that he would remain among them. Tryon's conscience told him that the Americans ought to secure him, and prevent the mischief he was plotting against them, and he got off privately to the Halifax packet, from whence he wrote again to the mayor, saying the assurances were not sufficient, and his duty had impelled him to embark and seek his safety on board a king's ship. Some time after, he writes again (from on board the Duchess of Gordon) to David Matthews, who had been appointed by him to the mayoralty instead of Mr. Hicks, at the same time advanced to the bench, as a judge of the supreme court. To Mr. Matthews he sends a paper to be made publick, in which he says, his majesty is graciously pleased to per- mit him to withdraw from his province; that he is ready to do the inhabitants any service ; that it gives him great pain to see them in such a turbulent state ; and he laments the calamities that must befall them, &c. Thus the governour took care to secure him- self on board a king's ship of war, while exercising authority on shore by the appointment of civil officers.
Charles Lee, the oldest major-general, was an English gentle- man of some fortune, and son to a colonel in his majesty's service. Charles was commissioned at the age of eleven ; so that he was almost from birth in the army. Quick in perception, and ardent in all his pursuits, he became a good scholar, and an able tactician, as far as a man devoid of prudence may be so esteemed. His first military service was under General Abercrombie, in America, and as I have incidentally mentioned, he was wounded at the defeat of that officer by the French, on the banks of Lake Champlain. Lee returned to Enrope, and in 1762 served with General Burgoyne in Portugal. Ever restless, he entered the Polish service, and had attained the rank of major-general before he returned to America, for which country he appears to have bad a sincere attachment. He, however, had rambled all over Europe ; had killed his man in
-
471
CHARLES LEE.
a duel,, and had been engaged in several others, before he again crossed the Atlantick. He was in Philadelphia in 1774, and in July of that year, Horatio Gates, then on a plantation in Virginia, wrote to him a letter of invitation, and persuaded him to buy a farm in his neighbourhood ; which, after visiting New York, Rhode Island, and Boston, he accomplished. He was now a violent anti- ministerialist, and had published several essays in defence of the colonies. Gates, in a letter to him, says, " a good bed is provided for you, two or three slaves to supply all your wants and whimseys ; and space enough about us for you to exercise away all your spleen and gloomy moods, whensoever they distress you." The farm bought by Lee, is described as containing two thousand four hun- dred acres, and is valued at thirty shillings sterling an acre. Be- sides these, he had a claim for five thousand acres on the Ohio, to be granted by warrant from Lord Dunmore. Gates advises him to be cautious in respect to Gage, and professes his own willingness to join the cause of America. Both milftary men, and long known as soldiers to each other, they were in exteriour and manner ex- tremely different : Gates was courteous, accommodating, and insinuating; with a very prepossessing person : Lee, abrupt, rude, careless, capricious, and so unaccommodating as to be very disa- greeable to the neat or the scrupulous, especially to ladies. He was always attended by his only favourites, two dogs ; who by his desire, must be at his side in the drawing-room, or at the dinner- table. At the time he entered the American service, and formally renounced his English commission and half-pay, he was supposed to be an immense acquisition to the cause ; and it was well known that Washington recommended both Lee and Gates to congress for the several commissions they bore. General Clinton, with a British force, arrived at New York, and Lee came on to that place in 1776, and was very active in throwing up fortifications in and around the town. Tryon and the commander of the king's ships in the harbour " threatened perdition to the town if the cannon were removed from the batteries and wharves ;" but, says Lee, in a letter to Gates, " I ever considered threats a brutum fulmen, and even persuaded the town to be of the same way of thinking; we accordingly conveyed them to a place of safety in the middle of the day, and no cannonade ensued. Captain Parker publishes a plea- sant reason for his passive conduct. He says, it was manifestly my intention, and that of the New England men under my com- mand, to bring destruction on this town, so hated for its loyal prin- ciples, but lie was determined not to indulge us ; so remained quiet out of spite. The people here laugh at his nonsense, and begin to despise the menaces, which formerly used to throw them into convulsions. To do them justice, the whole show a wonderful alac- rity ; and in removing the cannon, men and boys of all ages worked
.
-
472
WHITEHEAD HICKS.
with the greatest zeal and pleasure. I really believe the generality are as well affecte:l as any on the continent." The "convulsions" he alludes to, were the symptoms of terrour shown by the defence- ,less inhabitants' when the Asia fired upon the town. It was the plan of Tryon and others, to divide the colonists; therefore New York was represented as attached to England, and hated by the whigs. But the people were, as elsewhere, loyal to their coun- try. New York was found too well prepared, to yield to the force under Sir Henry Clinton, and he sailed to the south, where Lee was despatched to meet him ; and when the British appeared off Charleston, General Lee was already there in command. The defeat of the British ships of war by the gallant Moultrie, belongs to the history of the United States ; but we must observe that this added greatly to the already high reputation of Charles Lee. Lee and Gates visited Washington, at Mount Vernon, just before he went to congress ; and there, doubtless, it was proposed and settled that they should enter the service as American officers.
The family of Hicks had emigrated to New York in 1741, with other English families of the people called friends, who had previ- ously sought a refuge in Holland from religious persecution at home. These emigrants fixed themselves on Long Island, in that part since known as Queen's County, and were among the early settlers of Newtown, Flushing, Jamaica, and Hempstead. Three brothers of the name of Hicks were among these English emi- grants-Thomas, John, and Robert. From Thomas, the oldest brother, was descended the subject of this notice-Whitehead Hicks, Esq. He was born at Bayside, on the estate of his father, Judge Thomas Hicks, on the 24th of August, 172S; was educa-
ted for the profession of the law, and placed in the office of Wil- liam Smith, the most distinguished advocate of that day. Among the fellow-students of Mr. Hicks, were William Smith, junior, and William Livingston-one of the foremost champions of American liberty, and the revolutionary Governour of New Jersey. In 1750, Mr. Hicks received his license as an attorney of the City of New York. His career was successful, and he took as a partner in his prosperity, the only daughter of Mr. John Brevoort, of New York city. The predecessor of Mr. Hicks, as mayor, was John Cruger, Esq., who aided him by his friendship iu obtaining the honourable office of chief magistrate of the city : indeed, as was understood, Mr. Cruger relinquished the chair only on obtaining the gover- nour's pledge that Mr. Hicks should succeed him. On the 13th of September, 1764, Mr. Hicks was appointed Clerk of the County of Queens ; and in October, 1766, received his first commission of Mayor of the City of New York. This appointment was no less acceptable to the people, than his administration of the duties of the office was found satisfactory to the government ; for he was
.
473
LORD CHATHAM.
continued in the office to the period in which we find him interpo- sing his paternal hand between the more violent of the sons of lib- erty and the armed power, which had already commenced the work of destruction upon the city of which he was the guardian.
It must be evident to the reader, that the period of Mr. Hick's mayoralty was one of peculiar difficulty." The arbitrary attempts of Great Britain to deprive the people of the rights of English sub- jects, (attempts supported by the immediate governours of the colony and by the interested officers appointed by the crown, as well as by those who aspired to office by the favour of the ministry, or derived their supposed aristocratick dignity from an association with those whose honours flowed from the fountain of all honour -the throne,) the detested stamp act and its followers, the wrongs inflicted on the Bostonians, the insolence of the English military, all tended to madden the populace of New York ; and their mayor must have possessed uncommon prudence and talents to have been able to soothe the justly irritated, and intimidate the lawless and reckless, in so great a degree as he accomplished for the safety of the city, whose protection from external wrong and internal commotion, was the duty of his office.
In the year 1776, Mr. Hicks was appointed a judge of the su- preme court of the province ; but the struggle which had com- menced, soon caused him to retire with his family to Jamaica, on Long Island ; and on the death of his father, soon after, he took possession of his inheritance at Bayside, the place of his birth, where he died, before the termination of that strife whose com- mencement had surrounded him with difficulties, on the 4th day of October, 1780.
-
CHAPTER XXXII.
Chatham - Rivington-Livingston- Christopher Colles-Wash- ington-Schuyler.
LORD CHATHAM said in parliament, " the force of this country can crush America to atoms. I know the valour of your troops. I know the skill of your officers. There is not a company of foot that has served in America, out of which you may not pick a man of sufficient knowledge and experience to make a governour of a colony there." But when the friend of America was brought to VOL. I. 60
474
LORD CHATHAM.
the house of lords, in 1780, to protest against the thought of grant- ing peace to America on the terms proposed, he was so thoroughly convinced that the force of England could not crush America to atoms, that he relied for more aid from Germany, to reduce thesc feeble Americans to dependence on Great Britain. It seems this great statesman was little wiser in 1776, than Lord Chancellor Northington was in 1766, when he said, were the Americans with- out the protection of Britain, the little state of Genoa, or the king- dom, or rather republick of Sweden, may soon overturn them.
Chatham has had credit for opposing the mad career of the mi- nistry : he deserves it as respects his foresight of the evils their conduct would bring upon his country, but he had no predilection for America ; and showed that his opposition to the ministry was solely for the good of England. The rights and interests of Ame- rica was never thought of by the oppositionists of England, except as they foresaw in their too great invasion of them, a resistance pregnant with loss to their own country. They would have been content to tax Americans more moderately, and to keep the colo- nies in that state which allowed of billeting the pensioners and placemen, that could not be provided for in England, in good quar- ters in America. Chatham and the oppositionists deprecated war with the colonies, because they knew England must suffer ; but the ministry, the lords, the bishops, and the people, joined in the desire to punish their subjects, for daring to assume rights equal to those they claimed for themselves.
Lord Chatham opposed war with the colonies ; but when, in self-defence, they declared themselves independent states, he died in the effort to arouse the nation to continue that war until Ame- rica should by the power of England and aid of German auxiliaries, be reduced to obedience, dependence, and of course slavery.
At the commencement, Lord Chatham, who saw that the colo- nies would probably be lost to Great Britain, and all the benefits arising from holding them in a state of pupilage, shackled by navi- gation acts, prohibited from making manufactures, and liable to such taxation as England might think best, came forward from his retirement to restrain that violence which was hurrying his country to a disgraceful war. He praised the Americans and their congress, arraigned the measures of the ministry, and moved for an address to the king, besceching him to order Gage to remove his troops from Boston, by way of allaying the present ferments, and opening a way to the settlement of existing troubles. This motion was re- jected. Chatham had recently cultivated the acquaintance of Franklin, which he, when minister, had declined ; and having con- sulted the American, in regard to a bill for settling the troubles in America, brought it forward on the 1st of February. The bill was
1
-
475
CHRISTOPHER COLLES.
rejected, and both Chatham and Franklin abused for offering it to the house of lords, who would not allow it to lie on the table. The American thought, and afterwards said, such a refusal to consider a bill brought in by such a man as Chatham, made him think, that hereditary legislators were as absurd as hereditary mathematicians.
The province af Massachusetts was declared to be in a state of rebellion by parliament, and the king requested to take measures for assuring obedience. A bill was passed for restraining the trade of all the New England provinces with England, and other weak measures suggested to divide the colonies, but the news received of the unaminity of the colonies, caused this bill to be extended -to all the provinces except New York, Delaware, and North Ca- rolina. This exception was considered as a mere plan to excite the enmity of the sister colonies against the favoured provinces, and only tended to produce or cement the union when it was intended to prevent.
There is no longer any room for hope-we must fight, said Patrick Henry. We must fight, was echoed throughout the con- tinent, and preparations made accordingly.
I must mention two names less brilliant than generals, and borne by men as dissimilar in character as any leaders of the two great political parties that now divide the province of New York, James Rivington and Christopher Colles. The first, issued proposals, in March, for publishing a weekly gazette, and printed the first num- ber on the 22d of April, 1773.
He was a man of fair complexion and ample dimentions. Always, when the writer knew him, well powdered, and distinguished in his book-store or parlour.
Christopher Colles was a small man, with a singularly demo- cratick appearance. In 1774, he delivered lectures on natural philosophy ; and projected water works (which were begun to be executed) for supplying New York with good and wholesome water.
It was to be obtained from high ground to the east of the new road; that is, on the east side of Broadway, near the present intersec- tion of Leonard street; it was also to be raised from a lake or pond farther to the east, extending from what is now a part of Pearl street, to what is now Canal street : all then out of the city. This was the fresh-water, or holk, or collect, of former days. Rivingston will long be remembered as the king's printer at the time of the revolution ; and there is a street in this city named after him : but the only memorial of Christopher Colles, (a learned, meek, and benevolent gentleman,) is the portrait of a little old man, painted by John Wesley Jarvis, now hanging in the library of the Historical Society.
1
.
ز
. 476
BENJAMIN FRANKLIN.
On the 15th of June, 1775, as already stated, congress elected Washington as commander-in-chief.
It is very certain that for years before this time, many leaders in America foresaw the necessity and wished for a separation from Great Britain ; but it is supposed that Dr. Franklin was not one who desired independence for his country, and thought she would be content if wrongs were redressed and insults prevented. After his famous examination at the bar of the house of commons, in which abuse was poured out upon him without measure, the min- istry, finding themselves embarrassed, turned their thoughts to Franklin, hoping his influence was so great that he could bring about a reconciliation between the two countries. They therefore sought to mollify him, and, indeed, hoped to bribe him into their service. A lady, the sister of Lord Howe, was made use of, to draw him into a plan to be exected by her brother and the Doctor. The pretence for introducing Franklin to Miss Howe, was her de- sire to play chess with him ; and she brought about interviews with Lord Howe, who was thought of as the commissioner to bring about a reconciliation, by going to America under the doctor's guidance, and in the first place, to secure his services for the ministry.
Franklin was too wary and too honest to be tricked into the views of Great Britain ; and that country had proceeded too far in insolence and injustice to retract, which was the only way open for even a temporary reconciliation, and was too proud to apologise to colonists, although sensible of the wrong she had done them. Lord Howe condescended to flatter the American, but soon showed the cloven foot by hinting at reward. Lord Hyde and the quakers, Barclay and Fothergill, were engaged in this business ; but Frank- lin soon found that any plan which could suit him or his country was not such as the British ministry would adopt.
Englishmen, even of the present day, assert that Great Britain sincerely sought reconciliation, (and doubtless she did, upon her own terms,) but Englishmen of this day can no more appreciate the feelings or character of Americans, than they can the men of 1774.
To Howe, who was immediately known by Franklin as an agent of the ministry, the doctor was cautious in his language; but to Barclay and Doctor Fothergill, who saw the injustice and igno . miny with which America had been afflicted and assailed, he used the language of the heart. He said, he believed the ministry had wished to provoke the people of America to open rebellion ; that Great Britain might be justified to the world in military conquest and executions ; thereby indulging that rapacity which would feed upon the colonies, and that proud malignity which would punish
1
-
477
GEORGE WASHINGTON.
inferiours for daring to resist oppression and assert the rights of English subjects.
David Barclay and the worthy Fothergill were aware, and sent word by Franklin, in 1775, when he returned to Philadelphia, that the offers of the ministry were false and hollow, and that their views were, as they ever had been, to find a larger field on which to fatten their parasites.
1
Lord Howe, in 1776, though a commissioner to propose peace, was at the head of a powerful fleet ; and when Franklin again met him to talk of reconciliation, he found that his lordship and the other commissioners possessed only the power to pardon rebels on sub- mission.
I had thought that the previous actions of George Washington were so familiarly known to every American, that to bring a biogra- phical sketch of his life up to this period, would be supererogatory ; but as I have given sketches of inferiour men, when introduced as actors in this history, I have concluded that my work would not be so complete as otherwise, if I omitted a brief notice of the early life of this great man, up to the period of his arrival in New York, on his way to take command of the Americans congregating at Cam- bridge.
George Washington was the third son of Augustus Washington, and was born on the 22d of February, 1732, near the Potomac River, in Westmoreland County, Virginia-to which place his great grandfather had emigrated from England, in 1657.
The oldest brother of the family, having married a daughter of the wealthy house of Fairfax, George accepted from the rich pro- prietor of the northern neck of Virginia the appointment of sur- veyor, at the early age of eighteen, after being prevented by the fears of his mother, then a widow, from accepting a midshipman's warrant in the British navy. When, in 1751, the militia was trained for actual service, he was appointed one of the deputy adjutant-generals, with the rank of major.
· France was spreading her chain to enclose the English colonies and bind them to the Atlantic shore, by links of fortresses from Canada to Louisiana, and had already entered on ground claimed by Virginia ; and Governour Dinwiddie thought fit, by a special messenger, to demand that the encroachments should be suspended ; and he made choice of the young major for this toilsome and ardu- ous journey through the wilds to the French fort on the Ohio. In this journey, he had noted the station at the junction of the Monon- gahela and Alleghany, as a commanding military post : he had be- come familiar with Indian manners and life ; and after executing his commission so as to enhance his already high reputation, the French not desisting from their great scheme, Virginia raised a provincial regiment, and Mr. Washington was appointed lieutenant-
-
478
GEORGE WASHINGTON.
-
colonel. He advanced with two companies to the Great Meadows, a post in the Alleghany Mountains, hoping to cover the frontiers. The French were now erecting Fort Duquesne on the spot before mentioned; and a party were advancing upon the Great Meadows. Washington anticipated their movements-met, surprised, and captured them.
After his return to his stockade fort at Great Meadows, he learned from friendly Indians that the French were advancing upon him in great force; he strengthened his fort with a ditch, called it Fort · Necessity ; but before he had made such preparations as his feeble force permitted, M. de Villier, with a large body of French and Indians, from the trees and high grass, commenced an attack which was sustained all day ; when the French beat a parley, offered terms, and a capitulation was concluded.
The conduct of Colonel Washington increased his reputation for skill and courage. In the winter following, Great Britain or- dained that all officers commissioned by the king, or by his general in North America, should take rank of all officers commis- sioned by the governours of provinces, with other degrading regu- lations ; on which, Colonel Washington threw up his commission. His eldest brother dying, left the estate of Mount Vernon to George; to which he now retired. But Braddock having deter- mined to extirpate the French from Fort Duquesne, and hearing of Colonel Washington's talents and knowledge of the country, invited him to accompany the expedition as his volunteer aid-de- camp. The errours and fate of Braddock are known to every child. Colonel Washington, after having two horses shot under him, and two balls through his coat, remained unhurt, mounted on a third horse, and was the only aid of the general, who was conveyed by him and another officer off the field, mortally wounded. Ho- ratio Gates was wounded in his shoulder, and conveyed to Mount Vernon for cure.
Virginia raised more troops, and appointed Washington her com- mander-in-chief. In this capacity, he had experience of the ineffi- cacy of militia for permanent service, and exorbitant expense for any service, and struggled through the war of 1756-7-S, exerting - to protect the frontiers from the French and their Indians, thwarted in his plans by superiour officers, and unable to protect his coun- trymen from suffering by the hostility of France and the errours of Britain. At length, Fort Duquesne fell, and was called Pitt-now the great city of Pittsburgh. Hostilities ceased, and Washington, resigning his commission, married Mrs. Custis.
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.