USA > New York > New York City > History of the city of New York, Vol. II > Part 13
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Among the oldest of the religious societies was that of the Friends, whose first place of worship was erected in Green near Liberty street about 1706. This was rebuilt and enlarged in Liberty street in 1802, and afterward transformed into the seed store of the well-known Grant Thorburn. The second meeting-house of the denomi- nation, erected in Pearl street, in 1775, was taken down in 1824, to make room for other buildings.
The Jews had a synagogue in Mill street-the street is now blotted out of existence-a neat stone edifice erected in 1730, nearly on the site of the small frame building which they occupied at first as a place of wor- ship. The Moravians had a church in Partition, now Fulton, near William street, erected in 1751, of which
SACHAROFONECUL.SV
St. Patrick's Cathedral, corner of Mott inl Prince Streets.
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the Rev. Benjamin Mortimer was pastor. The only Catholic church in the city was St. Peter's in Barclay street ; a brick building erected in 1786. The next in order was St. Patrick's Cathedral, on the corner of Mott and Prince street, which was opened for service in 1815. This was burned in 1866.
The only library in the city was the Society Library, incorporated in 1772, a sketch of which we have already given. This was located in the library building in Nas- sau street opposite the Middle Dutch Church, then con- sidered an architectural ornament to the city.
The Custom House was in the Government House, erected on the site of the old fort, in the place of the present Bowling Green Row. The Post-office was kept in the house of the postmaster, General Theodorus Bailey, on the corner of William and Garden streets, * in a room from twenty-five to thirty-five feet deep, with two windows fronting on Garden street, and a little ves- tibule on William street containing about a hundred boxes. An extension was afterwards added in Garden street, but it remained in the same spot until 1827, when it was removed to the basement of the new Exchange in Wall street. In 1844, it was transferred to the Middle Duteh Church in Nassau street, where it still remains.
Three banks were at this time in operation ; the Bank of New York, chartered in 1791, with a capital of $950,000, with Matthew Clarkson as president ; the
* This house was also the residence of Sebastian Bauman, the first postmaster of the city subsequently to the Revolution, appointed to the office by General Wash ington.
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United States Bank, incorporated in the same year, with a capital of $10,000,000, with Cornelius Ray as presi- dent, and the Manhattan Bank, incorporated in 1799, with a capital of $2,050,000, with Daniel Ludlow as president. The Insurance Companies were three in number ; the New York Marine Insurance, incorporated in 1798 ; the Mutual Fire Insurance, incorporated the same year, and the Washington Fire Insurance, incor- porated in 1801. Both the banks and the insurance companies were all located in Wall street.
Seven daily papers were now issued in the city-the New York Gazette and General Advertiser, published by Lang & Turner ; the New York Evening Post, published by William Coleman and edited by M. Burnham ; the American Citizen, published by James Cheetham ; the Commercial Advertiser, published by Zachariah Lewis, and edited by J. Mills ; the Public Advertiser, edited by Charles Holt ; and the Mercantile Advertiser, published by Ramsay Crooks ; besides the New York Weekly Museum, published every Saturday by M. Harrison ; and two medical journals, the one published quarterly and the other semi-annually ; together with the Church- man's Magazine, by T, & J. Swords. This house, which commeneed business in 1787, continued in existence till 1859, under the various titles of Stanford & Swords, Stanford & Delisser, and Delisser & Procter, and is notable for having been the first publishing-house established on a permanent basis in the city ; though books were issued occasionally from the presses of Gaine, Rivington, Hodge, Loudon, and other of the newspaper proprietors.
Three stages sufficel for the wants of the travelling
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community-the pioneers of the army of omnibuses of the present day. One of these ran to and from Green- wich, one to and from Harlem, and one to and from Manhattanville. The first stopped at Baker's Tavern on the corner of Wall and New streets ; while the others started from the Bull's Head, on the site of the Bowery Theatre.
GEET
The Park Theatre.
The only theatre in the city at the beginning of the present century was the Park, built in 1798, and opened three nights in each week. This theatre was burned in 1820, rebuilt and reopened in the following year, and burned again for the last time in 1849, when its site was covered with warehouses. This fronted the Park, from which it derived its name, between Ann and Beekman streets, and long retained the theatrical monopoly of the
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city. Among those opened in the course of the next half century were the Chatham, erected in 1824, and growing out of the Chatham Garden, kept by Mr. Bar- rere ; the New York, now the Bowery, built in 1826 at the Bull's Head ; and the Lafayette opened in 1825 in Laurens near Thompson street, under the manage- ment of Mr. Dinneford. Beside these, were the Broad- way and Mount Pitt Cireuses, the latter situated in Grand street, opposite the upper end of East Broadway ; the American or Scudder's Museum, opened in 1810 in the New York Institution, once the Alms House, in Chambers street ; Peale's Museum in Broadway, oppo- site the Park ; the Chatham Museum established some
AMERICAN MUSEUM
An
American Museum, at the North end of the Park.
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time after by John Scudder, the son of the proprietor of the American Museum ; the Rotunda, erected in 1818 in the east corner of the Park, with its entrance on Chambers street, designed for the exhibition of paint- ings, and many more.
The markets of the city were four in number-the Exchange Market at the foot of Broad street ; the Oswego Market in Broadway at the head of Maiden Lane ; the Old Fly Market, which in 1822 gave place to the present Fulton Market ; and the Hudson or Bare, now Washington Market, between Fulton and Vesey streets. This curious appellation is thus accounted for by a contemporary of the times. After the great fire of 1776 had destroyed the greater part of the houses in that part of the city, it was thought advisable to estab- lish a market there for the accommodation of the work- men who were building up the burned district. But the market-house was finished long before the streets about it were rebuilt and settled ; as there were few purchasers, the venders fell off, and thus in a very little time the strange anomaly was presented of a fine market-house bare of provisions. The present Washington Market- house was erected and opened in 1813.
There were two ferries to Brooklyn, one from Fly Market Slip near the foot of Maiden Lane, and the other from Catherine Slip ; one to Paulus Hook, now Jersey City ; one to Elizabethtown Point; and another to Staten Island. The ship-yards were between Catherine street and Corlaer's Hook and between Corlear's Hook and Stan- ton street, in the part of the town then called Manhattan Island, and regarded as quite beyond the limits of the city.
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The Fire Department consisted of a single engineer, who received his appointment from the Common Council and who was invested with absolute control over the companies, engines, and all else that pertained to the organization ; a number of firewardens, commissioned by the same authority to inspect buildings, chimneys, etc., and to keep order at fires ; and several voluntary compa- nies under the direction of a foreman, assistant and clerk of their own choosing. A few engine-houses had been built; the greater part of the hooks and ladders, buckets, etc., were deposited for safe keeping in the City Hall. Several of these pioneer companies continued to retain their organization until the substitution of the paid for the volunteer Fire Department system was effected.
The militia consisted of a single division under the command of Major-General Stevens. The United States Arsenal was at the junction of the Old and Middle Roads, now Madison Square, while the State Arsenal was situated at the junction of Chatham and Centre streets. In the rear of the Government House, near where formerly stood the lower barracks, was the old arsenal, yard, where a quantity of military stores was deposited, and to which, from time to time, curious relics made their way, well worth the attention of antiquarians. It was from the rubbish heaped up in this place that the mutilated statue of Pitt was unearthed after the Revo- lution.
The manners and customs of the citizens, now sixty thousand in number, were still very primitive. The Dutch language continued to be used largely in the city ;
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very many of the signs over the stores were in Dutch, and in Hudson Market, the resort of the farmers from New Jersey, a knowledge of the language was abso- lutely indispensable. The lower part of Pearl street was at this time the fashionable part of the town, though Barclay, Robinson and William streets were beginning to dispute its claims. Each citizen swept the street in front of his own house twice a week ; and the bell- man came around every day with his cart for garbage. The streets were lighted by oil lamps. Coal was almost unknown ; hickory wood was the principal article of fuel. The milkmen traversed the streets early in the morning, bearing a yoke on their shoulders, from which tin-cans were suspended, shouting : "Milk, ho !" in token of their coming ; and water from the celebrated Tea Water Pump on the corner of Chatham and Pearl streets, was carried about in carts, and retailed at a penny a gallon. The chimneys were swept by small negro boys, who went their rounds at daybreak, crying : "Sweep, ho ! sweep, ho ! from the bottom to the top, without a ladder or a rope, sweep, ho !" with numerous variations.
Numerous quaint customs and street cries were in vogue at this comparatively modern time, all of which have now passed away, and are known to us only through tradition. A strange mosaic of different nations, with its successive strata of Dutch, English and French, New York was truly a composite city, gathering floating material from every nation under the sun wherewith to form and mold a new people, which should embrace the whole universe within the scope of its sympathy, and
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vie with its adopted tongue in its broad and cosmo- politan character. Fit language, indeed, is the English for such a nation ; as yet a mass of crude material, gathered from the lexicons of every dialect that sprung from the confusion of tongues, to be molded by time, and use, and the master-hand of genius, into a sym- metrical form, perfect because all-comprehensive, and fitting to become a universal language-the only tongue that should be spoken by the people of a New World.
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CHAPTER XX.
1801-1825.
Progress of the City-War of 1812-Politics of New York-The Canal Celebration.
ONE of the first events that marked the mayoralty of Edward Livingston, was the construction of the Man- hattan Water-works, the forerunner of the magnifi- cent Croton Aqueduct and Reservoir of the present day. There had always been a scarcity of good water on the island. The spring of the celebrated Tea Water Pump in Chatham street was excellent, but this would not suffice for the wants of a whole city ; and the water of the other wells and pumps, which were scattered in profusion over the island, was almost unfit for use. The initiative step toward supplying the city with water had been taken in 1774 by Christopher Colles, who had constructed a reservoir at the public expense on the east side of Broadway, between Pearl and White streets, * into which water was raised from large wells sunk on the
* These grounds comprised about two acres, and were purchased by the corpora- tion of Augustus and Frederick Van Cortlandlt, at the rate of six hundred pounds per acre.
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premises and also from the Collect, then distributed by means of wooden pipes throughout the city. These works were completed in the spring of 1776, and placed under the superintendence of Mr. Colles ; but the supply proved insufficient, the water was of an inferior quality, and in the ensuing foreign occupation of the city, the enterprise was neglected, then finally aban- doned, and the citizens returned to the wells of their ancestors, which still continued to be located in the middle of the streets. In 1798, the subject was again taken into consideration, and a report having been made by Dr. Brown, affirming the impurity of the water on the island, Engineer Weston was directed by the corpo- ration to investigate the matter, and report upon the most feasible method of bringing in water from the mainland. He recommended the raising of the Rye Ponds to a reservoir in Westchester County, the mills to be located on the Bronx River, where the surplus water would be used in raising the water, which would thence be carried to the Harlem River in an open canal, then conveyed across the river through an elevated iron pipe to a reservoir, where it would be filtered and then distributed through the city. After some discussion, the matter culminated in the formation of the Manhattan Water Company with banking privileges. This com- pany obtained a grant from the corporation of the grounds formerly occupied by Colles, and, erecting a reservoir in Chambers street, between Broadway and Centre street, a locality then considered far out of town, pumped water into it from wells sunk in the vicinity, whence it was distributed, by means of bored logs,
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NOPR- CO
Reservoir of Manhattan Water Works in Chambers Street.
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through the city. But this water proved both scarce and bad ; the company, neglecting the ostensible pur- pose of its organization, soon turned its attention almost exclusively to banking affairs, and thus lost the con- fidence of the community, and it was not long before the new works were voted a failure.
A new City Hall was determined on about the same time, and in 1802, a premium was offered for the best plan, which was awarded to Messrs Macomb and Mangin.
City Hall and Park.
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On the 20th of September, 1803, the corner-stone of the new edifice was laid in the Park by Mayor Livingston, in the presence of the corporation and the few of the citizens who had not fled from the yellow fever, which at this time was prevailing in the city. This edifice, which is too well known to our readers to require from us a detailed description, was finished in 1812, at a cost of half a million of dollars. The front and both ends were built of white marble from the quarries of Stock- bridge, Massachusetts ; for the Chambers street front, red sandstone was used from motives of economy, it being thought that the material of this side was of little consequence, as so few citizens would ever reside on that side of the town.
In 1803, Edward Livingston resigned his office, and De Witt Clinton was appointed mayor in his stead. Clinton was a native of the State of New York and a resident of the city from early youth, having been the first graduate of Columbia College after its change of name. Few of her sons have contributed more largely to the glory and prosperity of the city. Under his auspices, the Historical Society was founded, the Public School Society instituted, the Orphan Asylum estab- lished, the City Hall completed, and the city fortified for the war of 1812. He continued in the mayoralty with two years' intermission until 1815, when he resigned it to enter public life on a more extended seale as governor of his native State, and to mature the gigantic scheme of canal-navigation, which won for New York the proud title of the Empire State, and for its projector the lasting remembrance of posterity.
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The charter election of November, 1803, was warmly contested by the two opposing parties. Since the last election, two new wards had been added to the city, and this change gave the republicans strong hopes of success. The contest resulted in favor of the fede- * ralists, who carried the First, Second, Third, Fourth, Eighth, and Ninth Wards, the two latter by a small majority, leaving the Fifth, Sixth, and Seventh in the hands of the republicans. The result was accounted a gain by the latter, who now added the Fifth Ward to the Sixth and Seventh which they had carried uniformly since the election of 1800. This was the dawning of success ; in the election of the following year, some changes in the franchise regulations having opened the polls to a larger number of voters, they succeeded in elect- ing their candidates in all the wards excepting the First and Second. In 1805, they carried the Second Ward, also, by a majority of two, and thus gained undisputed ascendency in the city government. The First Ward clung persistently to the fortunes of the federal party until 1820, when the republicans, for the first time, suc- ceeded in electing their candidate for alderman by a small majority.
The violent political disputes of this period gave rise to a fatal duel between two of the most prominent citi- zens of New York ; Alexander Hamilton, who, though born in the West Indies, had been a resident of the city from early youth, and his political antagonist, Aaron Burr, at this time the third Vice-President of the United States. The quarrel arose in political antagonism. In the State election of 1803, Burr, who had lost the con-
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fidence of the republican party, had been nominated for governor by the federalists, in opposition to Morgan Lewis, and, although the latter were at this time the leading party in the State, was defeated by his opponent by a large majority. This defection in the federal ranks he attributed to the influence of Hamilton, then the most prominent man in the party, who had denounced him in caucus as an unprincipled politician and warmly opposed his election ; and, smarting under the influence of his defeat, he sent him a challenge, to which Hamilton demur- red at first, then afterward accepted. At sunrise on the 11th of July, the parties met on a plateau on the Jersey shore, about half a mile above Weehawken. Hamilton was mortally wounded at the first fire, and fell, discharg- ing his pistol in the air. He was conveyed across the river to the house of Mrs. Bayard, over the site of which Horatio street now passes, where he breathed his last on the afternoon of the following day. The fatal result of this affair caused the deepest sorrow, not only in the city but throughout the whole country. Hamilton had been the bosom friend of Washington, his talents were of the highest order, he was a consummate statesman, and his moral character was without a stain. Few men stood higher than he in the esteem and confidence of the com- munity, and even those who had been his bitterest polit- ical opponents regarded his loss as the greatest evil that could happen to a community-the loss of a man of unblemished integrity from off its stage of action. His remains were escorted, on the 14th inst., by a large pro- cession to Trinity Church, where the funeral oration was pronounced by Gouverneur Morris, and the body interred
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The Grange, Kingsbridge Road. The Residence of Alexander Hamilton.
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with military honors in the cemetery of the church. A monument was afterward erected over his grave by the Society of the Cincinnati, of which he was a member ; while the St. Andrew's Society, to which he also belonged -his father having been a Scotchman, an indispensable requisite to membership in this society-caused a mon- ument to be erected over the spot on which he fell.
On the first of November, 1804, the foundation of the present Historical Society-a body to which, more than all others, the city of New York is indebted for the preservation of those documents and records which alone can preserve her true history to the world-was laid in the picture-room of the City Hall by eleven persons, who organized themselves into a society, and choosing De Witt Clinton as the first president, pledged themselves to use their utmost efforts to collect whatever might relate to the natural, civil, literary and ecclesiastical history of the United States in general, and of the State of New York in particular. The foundation of this society was chiefly due to the instrumentality of Judge Egbert Ben- son and John Pintard, Esq. The association soon grew into favor, and its numbers increased slowly, but steadily. For some time, the meetings continued to be held in the City Hall, where the first historical festival of New York was held on the 4th of September, 1809, the two hun- dredth anniversary of the discovery by Hendrick Hudson of the island of Manhattan. In the same year, the society removed to rooms in the Government House, where it remained until the demolition of the building, in 1815 ; after which it located itself, first on the corner of Broadway and Chambers street, then in the Stuyve-
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sant Institute, and afterward in the New York Univer- sity, whence it removed for the last time in 1857 to the new library building on the corner of Second Avenue and Eleventh street, which, for convenience and tasteful ele- gance, ranks second to none of the libraries of the city.
The same year was marked by one of those terrible fires which were wont to ravage the city periodically before the introduction of fire-proof buildings, together with an efficient Fire Department. The conflagration broke out on the 18th of December in a grocery store in Front street, and raged with fury for several hours, burning the old Coffee House on the corner of Pearl and Wall street, the scene of so many patriotic gather- ings in the days of the Revolution, with many other of the old landmarks of the city. Forty stores and dwell- ings were destroyed by this fire, which was supposed to have been the work of an incendiary. The loss of property was estimated at two millions of dollars.
The following year witnessed the initiatory movement of a noble institution which, matured and perfected, is destined to be the crowing glory of our country-the Free School. The credit of this is due chiefly to some members of the Society of Friends, who, aided by the efforts of De Witt Clinton, obtained the incorporation of the Public School Society, in 1805, with Clinton as its first president. The first school, No. 1, was opened on the 17th of May, 1806, in Madison near Pearl street, with forty scholars, the instruction being gratuitous to some and ahnost nominal to all. Not content with thus placing the means of education within the reach of every one, the society did more ; it employed persons to go
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St. George's Church
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NEW YORK FREE SCHOOL.
First Public School House.
about the city and gather the destitute and untaught children into the schools that they might receive the needed instruction. The experiment proved successful, and soon won the public approval, at first withheld or cautiously bestowed on the innovation. In 1808, the cor- poration donated the old State Arsenal, on the corner of Chatham street and Tryon Row, to the society, on condi- tion that they should educate the children in the Alms House ; and, in 1811, School No. 2 was built in Henry street, on ground given by Colonel Rutgers. The pioneer school was afterwards removed to William street, where it long stood numerically at the head of our public schools.
The society continued to flourish and rapidly to increase the number of its houses until 1842, when a new school law was passed, providing for the establish- ment of Ward Schools, to be wholly gratuitous and supported by taxation. The two systems continued to work together harmoniously under the supervision of
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a Board of Education until 1853, when the Public School Society resolved to make over their property to the corporation, and- to relinquish their charter, which was accordingly done. Fifteen of the trustees were admit- ted into the Board of Education for two years, the remaining eighty entered the local boards, and the ven- erable Public School Society passed out of existence. Yet its name will ever be honored by the friends of education as the efficient pioneer of public instruction. From the single school with its forty scholars have sprung up between two and three hundred schools, beside the Free Academy, now the New York College, estab- lished in 1847, for the purpose of placing a univer- sity education within the reach of every youth of the city.
Of a different nature but not less important was the event which marked the year succeeding the organiza- tion of the Public School Society-a year which will ever be memorable in the annals of our city for the suc- cessful introduction of steam navigation. In 1798, Chancellor Robert R. Livingston had received from the Legislature, as the discoverer of this new power, the exclusive right of steam navigation in all the waters within the limits of the State for twenty years, provided that within twelve months, he should produce a boat, the average speed of which should not be less than four miles an hour. This he failed to do, and the grant remained in abeyance until 1803, when, having made the acquaintance of Robert Fulton in France, and aided him in some encouraging experiments, he obtained a renewal of the monopoly for the twenty years ensuing, on condi-
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