USA > New York > New York City > History of the city of New York : its origin, rise, and progress. Vol. I > Part 12
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Feb. 24. A few days after, there was a Shrovetide dinner-party at the house of Jan Jansen Dam, the governor being present ; and nearly every person in the company became merry with wine. The chief topic of conversation was the Indians. Secretary Van Tienhoven, at the sug- gestion of Dam, Adriaensen, and Planck, drew up a petition to the gov- ernor, urging in the name of the "Twelve Men" an immediate attack upon the defenseless savages, " whom God had thus delivered into their hands." The paper was no sooner read, than Kieft, in a significant toast, an- nounced approaching hostilities. His next move was to dispatch Van Tien- hoven and Corporal Hans Steen to Pavonia, to reconnoiter the situation.
Consternation quickly took the place of hilarity. Dominie Bogardus hastened to the governor, sharply reproved him for his "hot-headed rashness," and foretold certain consequences. The usually unmoved and dignified Dr. La Montagne pleaded with Kieft excitedly, for a postpone- ment of his terrible purpose. "Wait, for God's sake," he exclaimed,
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GENERAL UPRISING OF THE INDIANS.
" until the arrival of the next ship from Holland !" Captain De Vries raised his voice in anxious entreaty, and also in persuasive argument. He told Kieft that the petition was not from the "Twelve Men "; only three had signed it; all the rest were opposed to such a dangerous pro- ceeding. Words, however, were thrown away upon the obstinate govern- or. He had made up his mind. De Vries walked home with him, and talked incessantly ; but Kieft only smiled, and under pretense of showing the Captain his new parlor, which he had just completed, asked him into the hall upon the side of the house, where the soldiers could be seen pre- paring to start for Pavonia. "My order has gone forth," he said, " and cannot be recalled."
The story of that night is a blot upon the pages of New Netherland's history. It was the most shocking massacre that ever disgraced a civil- ized nation. Sergeant Rodolf crossed with his troops to Pavonia, and butchered eighty Indians in their sleep, sparing not a woman or a child. It makes humanity blush to record such an atrocious deed. Another band of troops marched to Corlear's Hook, and murdered forty Indians who were encamped there. Not one was spared, and every cry for mercy was unheeded.
De Vries sat all night by the kitchen fire in the governor's house, with an aching heart. The shrieks of the hapless victims reached his ears from Pavonia, while a solemn stillness settled over New Amsterdam. All at once an Indian and his squaw appeared in the doorway, and, overcome with terror, asked him to hide them in the fort. They lived near Vries- endael, and had escaped in a small skiff. As De Vries rose to meet them, they exclaimed, "The Mohawks have fallen upon us !" "No," said De Vries, pityingly, "no Indians have done this; it is the work of the Dutch. It is no time to hide yourselves in the fort "; and leading them to the gate, he directed them towards the north, and watched them until they disappeared in the woods. Feb. 26.
The extraordinary conquerors returned at sunrise with thirty prisoners and the heads of several of their victims. Kieft praised them for their valor, and there was much shaking of hands and many con- Feb. 27. gratulations.
The following day, a party of Dutch and English went over to Pavonia to pillage the stricken encampment. In vain the soldiers on guard warned them of the consequences. Dirk Straatmaker and his wife were both killed by some concealed Indians, whose wigwam they were robbing, and several others very narrowly escaped with their lives.
Stimulated by the success of this discreditable exploit, some of the Long Island settlers sought permission of the governor to attack the
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HISTORY OF THE CITY OF NEW YORK.
Indians in that neighborhood. De Vries and Dominie Bogardus and Dr. La Montagne remonstrated with so much earnestness, that Kieft finally refused to consent, on the ground that the Long Island Indians were " hard to conquer," but added the unfortunate proviso that "if they proved hostile, each man might resort to such means of defense as he should see fit." Before long some covetous persons, in punishment for an injury which they claimed to have sustained, robbed the Indians of their corn. Three of the latter, while defending their property, were killed. It needed only this crowning act of injustice to fill the measure of Indian endurance. Eleven tribes immediately united and declared war against the Dutch. The result, as may well be imagined, was terrible beyond description. The swamps and thickets were full of vindictive savages, watching opportunities to slay and plunder. From the shore of the Housatonic to the valley of the Raritan, death, fire, and captivity threatened unspeakable horrors. In one week the smiling country was transformed into a frightful and desolate wilderness. The rich and the poor, the strong and the helpless, the old and the young, shared the same fate. Blood flowed in rivers ; and, what was often
worse, children were carried into hopeless captivity. Those who March 1. escaped fled to the fort, where the valiant governor remained safe from all possible bodily harm, but where he was obliged to listen to the fiery wrath of ruined farmers, childless men, and widowed women, who were soon united in a common purpose of returning to Holland. Not knowing
what else to do, he proclaimed a day of general fasting and prayer. March 4. But while the people humbled themselves before their Maker, they held their chief magistrate strictly accountable for their calamities. In alarm, he tried to moderate the popular feeling by taking all the unemployed men into the pay of the company, to serve as soldiers for two months.
One incident deserves special notice. The Indians, in their work of destruction, attacked Vriesendael, burned the barns, killed the cattle, and were preparing to destroy the beautiful manor-house of De Vries. His people had all gathered there for safety, as it was constructed with loop- holes for musketry. Suddenly the same Indian whose life De Vries had saved, on the night of the Pavonia massacre, came running to the scene, and so eloquently declaimed to the savages of the goodness of the " great chief," that they paused in their work, expressed great sorrow that they had destroyed so much already, and quietly went away.
De Vries was full of indignation with the governor, and said to him, with fire flashing from his eyes, "It was our own nation you murdered when you sent men to Pavonia to break the Indians' heads ! Who shall now make good our damages ?"
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OVERTURES FOR PEACE.
Kieft saw his error, but it was too late. Willing to make what amends remained in his power, he sent a messenger with an overture of peace to the Long Island Indians, which they rejected with scorn. Standing afar off, they derided the Dutch, calling out, " Are you our friends ? You are corn thieves."
When this report was brought to New Amsterdam, the people were so maddened that they talked of deposing Kieft and sending him in chains to Holland. He tried to exculpate himself by fastening the blame of the Pavonia massacre upon Adriaensen and others, whose advice he pretended to have followed. This was one drop too much for the unprincipled Adriaensen, who had lost all his valuable property since the war com- menced, and was not disposed to shoulder any of Kieft's sins. He there- fore armed himself, and rushed into the governor's room, intending to kill him on the spot. But strong men were present, and the would-be assassin was seized, disarmed, and imprisoned, and on March 21. the sailing of the first vessel was sent to Holland, notwithstanding the open resistance of his friends.
Early on the morning of March 24, three Indian messengers March 24. from the great chief Penhawitz approached Fort Amsterdam, bearing a white flag. None had the courage to go forth and meet them, but De Vries and Jacob Olfersten. The Indians said they had come to ask why some of their people had been murdered, when they had never harmed the Dutch. De Vries assured them that the Dutch did not know that any of their tribe were among the number. They then asked De Vries to come with them and speak to their chief, and he fearlessly consented. They conveyed him and his companion in their boat to a point near Rockaway, where they arrived towards evening, and found the chief with two or three hundred warriors near a village of some thirty wigwams. De Vries was hospitably entertained in the royal cabin, and feasted with oysters and fish. About daybreak he was conducted into the woods, where sixteen chiefs were assembled in a circle, and being placed in the center, the chief speaker among them began to enumerate their wrongs. He charged the Dutch with having repaid their former kindness with cruelty ; told how the Indians had given them their daugh- ters for wives, by whom they had had children; and accused them of murdering their own blood in a villainous manner. De Vries inter- rupted him, and begged the chiefs to go with him to the governor and make peace. They were not at all disposed to do so, but De Vries urged them, and his well-known character for justice and honor inspired them at last with confidence, and they repaired to their canoes. Kieft received them gladly, and concluded an informal treaty; but they were not satis-
8
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HISTORY OF THE CITY OF NEW YORK.
fied with their presents, and grumbled among themselves afterward.
Through their aid and influence, a truce was also effected with March 25. some other faithless tribes ; but harmony was by no means re- stored, for both the Dutch and the Indians were smarting from their injuries. The farmers planted their June corn in constant fear of death. Indeed, peace seemed about as full of terror as war.
July came. The summer was hot and dry. Men crept about like July 20.
guilty creatures, and went from place to place, when possible, in bands. An old Indian chief met De Vries one day, and, in response to the cheerful greeting of the popular patroon, said that he was melancholy. Upon being asked the cause, he said that his young men wanted war with the Dutch; that the presents given them were not sufficient recom- pense for their losses. He had added presents of his own in vain. One had lost a father, another had lost a mother, and so on, and they clamored for revenge. He begged De Vries not to walk alone in the woods, for fear some Indians who did not know him might kill him. De Vries escorted the chief to Fort Amsterdam, where he told the governor the same things ; but it was without results. The chief was sorry, but said he feared he should not long be able to quiet his tribe.
Soon afterward, there came a rumor that Pacham, the crafty August 7. sachem of the Tankitekes, was visiting all the Indian villages, to arrange for a general massacre of the Dutch; and, as if to corroborate its truth, several trading-boats on the North River were attacked and plun- dered, nine men killed, and one woman and two children carried into captivity. The alarm was so general, that Kieft summoned the people together for advice. " Eight men" were chosen this time by the popular voice, to counsel with the governor. They were Jochem Pietersen Kuy- ter, Jan Jansen Dam, Barent Dircksen, Abraham Pietersen, Thomas Hall, Sept. 13.
Gerrit Wolfertsen, and Cornelis Melyn. Their first official act was to eject Jan Jansen Dam from their board, and appoint Jan Evertsen Bout in his place. The result of their first deliberation Sept. 16. was a renewal of hostilities with the river Indians, and a resolu- tion to maintain peace with the Long Island tribes.
But the war-whoop sounded almost immediately in another di- Sept. 20. rection. The Weekquaesgeeks stole upon the estate of Annie Hutchinson, at Annie's Hoeck, and murdered her with all her family and people, save a sweet little granddaughter of eight years, whom they carried into captivity. They then proceeded to Vreedeland and attacked Throgmorton's settlement, laying it waste and killing every person whom they found at home.
Lady Deborah Moody, who had been "dealt with " by the church at
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A TIME OF DREAD.
Salem "for the error of denying baptism to infants," had settled, in the month of June, at Gravesend. Thither the savages hurried in their insane thirst for blood. But the settlement was defended by over forty brave men, and the Indians were obliged to retreat. They went from there to Doughty's settlement at Newtown, where were eighty or more in- habitants, who fled to New Amsterdam, leaving everything belonging to them but the bare land to be destroyed. A few days later, the Hackin- sacks made a night attack upon Van der Horst's colony, on Newark Bay, and destroyed the plantation, driving the little garrison, who for a time made a determined resistance, into a canoe, by which they Oct. 1. escaped to New Amsterdam. The Neversincks caught the infection, and killed some traders near Sandy Hook. The yacht had just reached New Amsterdam with the tidings, when a nearer calamity appalled every heart. Jacob Stoffelsen had married the widow of Van Vorst, Pauw's former superintendent, and lived at Pavonia. He was a favorite with the Indians, and felt secure in his home. They came to his house, how- ever, one afternoon, and having sent him on some false errand to Fort Amsterdam, they killed his wife and children (except the little son of Van Vorst, whom they took off with them), destroyed all his property, and murdered every white inhabitant of Pavonia. The next day Kieft went with Stoffelsen to see De Vries, and earnestly entreated him to follow the Indians and ransom the boy. Being the only man who dared venture into the haunts of the savages, he finally consented, Oct. 2. and secured the child's freedom.
Thus New Jersey was left in the possession of its aboriginal lords. Melyn, on Staten Island, hourly expected an assault, and was fortified to the extent of his resources. The only tolerable place of safety was Fort Amsterdam, and into it women and children and cattle were hud- dled promiscuously, while husbands and fathers mounted guard
on the crumbling walls. The whole available fighting force of Oct. 5. the Dutch was not over two hundred men, besides fifty or sixty Eng- lishmen who had been enrolled into service to prevent their leaving New Netherland. This army was under the command of Captain John Underhill; and it was necessary that they should keep guard at all hours, for seven allied tribes, numbering about 1,500 warriors, were likely to descend upon them at any moment.
Just at this juncture, the province lost one of its leading men, and the Indians their best friend. De Vries had had no sympathy with war ; he now found himself ruined in consequence of it, and, bidding adieu to the governor with the portentous assurance, " Vengeance for innocent blood will sooner or later fall upon your head," he embarked on a fishing- vessel and sailed for Europe.
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HISTORY OF THE CITY OF NEW YORK.
CHAPTER VIII.
1643-1647.
APPEALS FOR ASSISTANCE.
CONFISCATION OF SHOES. - THE DOOMED VILLAGE. - TRIALS FOR WANT OF MONEY. - ACTION OF THE WEST INDIA COMPANY. - KIEFT'S QUARRELS. - THE WAR ENDED. - THE GREAT INDIAN TREATY OF PEACE. - MINERALS. - THE NEW SCHOOL. - ADRIAEN VAN DER DONCK. - VAN RENSSELAER'S DEATH. - THE NEW GOVERNOR. - STUYVE- SANT'S RECEPTION. - GOVERNOR STUYVESANT. - MRS. PETER STUYVESANT. - MRS. BAYARD.
THE front line of progress is never uniform. We can indeed assert. T with truth that New Netherland generally advanced; but an inti- mate acquaintance with its early history shows that at many points it was stationary ; and now we have come to one where it actually receded, until the only wonder is that the province under that style and power did not become entirely extinct.
Indian wars are never invested with any of the fleeting splendors. which embellish other armed conflicts. They add no luster to the pages of history. They furnish little philosophy or instruction. We have in this instance no military skill to chronicle, no marshaling of hosts, no clash of serried columns. A sense of helplessness, an atmosphere of terror, an indefinable dread, take the place of heroism and romance as usually pictured with the shock of battles. The "Eight Men" whom the people of New Netherland had chosen to think and act for them appealed to their English neighbors at New Haven for assistance in their great distress. The reply was cool and courteous, but decidedly negative. It was embodied in these words, "We are not satisfied that your war with the Indians is just."
Just or unjust, they must all perish now without relief. So Oct. 24. they told the whole agonizing story in a most eloquent letter to the Amsterdam Chamber, praying for immediate and decisive help.1 This document is supposed to have been penned by Cornelis Melyn, who
1 The Eight Men to the Amsterdam Chamber, Col. Doc., Vol. I. 138, 139.
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APPEALS FOR ASSISTANCE.
was a man of no mean ability, and who seems to have fully appreciated the mistaken policy of the governor. The winter was setting in with unusual severity. The small, worthless straw huts around the fort were the only shelter which could be given to the homeless suffer- Nov. 3. ers who had fled from the tomahawk and scalping-knife. The fort itself was in no condition to meet the emergency of the hour ; and provisions and clothing were wholly inadequate to the demand. As help from Holland must come slowly, if, indeed, it came at all before spring, expeditions were planned against some of the Indian villages, the chief object of which was plunder. Meanwhile the "Eight Men " sent to the States-General a bold complaint of the neglect of the West In- dia Company. They said, " We have had no means of defense provided against a savage foe, and we have had a miserable despot sent to rule over us."
About the middle of November, a colony of English emigrants, Nov. 16. headed by Robert Fordham, arrived at Hempstede, Long Island, and settled on land which was granted them by Kieft. Their houses were hardly ready for occupation when suspicions of treachery fell upon
WARST
Group, showing Holland Fashions.
Penhawitz, the sachem of the Canarsee Indians, who since the truce in the spring had, to all outward appearance, been friendly. Fordham sent a message of this import to the governor, who, without waiting to ascertain the truth of the charge, dispatched one hundred and 1644. twenty men, under the command of Dr. La Montagne, Cook, Jan. 2. and Underhill, to " exterminate " the Canarsees. They sailed in three
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HISTORY OF THE CITY OF NEW YORK.
yachts to Cow Bay, and proceeded to the two Indian villages. The savages, taken by surprise, made little resistance, and one hundred and twenty were killed, while the assailants lost but one man. Two prison- ers were taken to New Amsterdam and put to death in the most revolt- ing manner. One, frightfully wounded by the long knives with which Kieft had armed the soldiers instead of swords, at last dropped dead while dancing the death-dance of his race. The other, shockingly muti- lated beforehand, was beheaded on a millstone in Beaver Lane, near the Battery.
The winter was one of the darkest and most disheartening March 8. ever known to the colonists. Food was doled out with a sparing hand, and famine seemed ever near. Many had not sufficient clothing for their necessities. One of Van Rensselaer's vessels, laden with goods for his store in Rensselaerswick, chanced to arrive, and Kieft, applying to Peter Wynkoop, the supercargo, tried to buy fifty pairs of shoes for his soldiers. The man declined to trade, and Kieft, in great anger, ordered a forced levy, searched the vessel, and, finding a large supply of ammunition and guns, not included in the manifest, confiscated its whole cargo.
The shoes obtained were immediately put to use. Underhill had just returned from Stamford, where he had been reconnoitering the strength and position of the Connecticut Indians in that vicinity, and Kieft sent him back with one hundred and fifty men to "exterminate " them.
The word "exterminate " was incorporated into all his orders in March 11. such cases. The party went in yachts to Greenwich, and then marched over the country through the snow, arriving about midnight at the doomed Indian village. It was a clear, cold night, and March 12. the moon shining on the snow rendered it nearly as light as day. The village contained three rows of wigwams, and was sheltered in a nook of the hills from the northwest winds. The savages were not asleep, but merrily celebrating one of their annual festivals. The Dutch soldiers surrounded the place, and charged upon them, sword in hand. They made desperate resistance; but every attempt to break the line of the troops failed, and in one hour the snow was dyed with the blood of nearly two hundred of the Indians. Having forced the remainder into their wigwams, Underhill, remembering. Mason's experiment on the Mystic, resolved to burn the village. Straw and wood were heaped about the houses, and in a few moments red flames were shooting into the sky in every direction. The wretched victims who tried to escape were shot, or driven back into the fiery abyss, and not one man, woman, or child was heard to utter a cry. Six hundred fell that night. Of those who,
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TRIALS FOR WANT OF MONEY.
blithe and happy, crowded the little village at nightfall, but eight were left to tell the fearful story to their countrymen. None of the troops were killed, and but fifteen wounded. They bivouacked on the snow until daylight, and then returned, like Roman conquerors, to Fort Am- sterdam. For their " brilliant victory," Kieft proclaimed a day of public thanksgiving.1
Wishing to turn loose the few cattle they had all winter been March 31. stabling in the fort, the governor, as soon as the snow went off, issued an order for the building of a fence across the island from the North to the East River, on the line of the present Wall Street. While a number of men were engaged in its construction, a few tribes April 15. of Indians, worn out, it is presumed, with being hunted like wild beasts, came to the fort and entered into a treaty of peace. But the tribes nearest the town, and consequently those most dreaded, kept aloof.
By this time, the "Eight Men" had received from the Amsterdam Chamber a response to their letter, but not the sorely needed funds which had been expected. The financial condition of the company had been for some time on the decline, for the subsidies and other sums due from the provinces had never been promptly paid in; and, not being supported by an extensive trade, their military and naval triumphs had, on the whole, cost more money than they had produced. In 1641, the shaking off of the Spanish yoke by the Portuguese, in which Holland had assisted, made it apparent that the company would in the end lose Brazil; a long series of quarrels with the Directors had just induced Count John Maurice, one of the ablest rulers of the seventeenth century, to leave that South American province in disgust ; and through many causes bankruptcy was already threatening the proud corporation. A bill of exchange which Kieft drew upon the Amsterdam Chamber, the pre- vious autumn, came back protested. Pressing need drove him to the dangerous alternative of taxing wine, beer, brandy, and beaver-skins. The " Eight Men " opposed the measure with all their strength, but without avail. The brewers, upon whom the tax fell most June 21. heavily, refused to pay it, on the ground of its injustice; they were arrested, and their beer given to the soldiers.
In July, a vessel containing one hundred and thirty Dutch July 15. soldiers, who had been driven by the Portuguese out of Brazil, came into port, having been sent to the relief of the New-Netherlanders ; and Kieft immediately dismissed his English auxiliaries, and billeted
1 This affair is supposed to have taken place on Strickland's Plain. Doc. Hist. N. Y., IV. 16, 17.
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HISTORY OF THE CITY OF NEW YORK.
the new-comers on the citizens. As they were half naked, he enforced his excise laws, to get the means to clothe them. His conduct engendered private as well as public quarrels ; and there were prosecutions daily and without number, which of course engrossed his attention; for the governor, it must be remembered, was judge as well as jury. Indians prowled about the town, committing thefts every night, often killing persons less than a thousand paces from the fort. The "Eight Men."
tried to improve matters, but they had little power, and Kieft was
Aug. 6.
deaf to their counsels and suggestions. A committee from them went in person to him at one time, and remonstrated so loudly in regard to his negligence respecting the war, that he sent a party of soldiers to the north ; but they soon returned, having accomplished nothing but the murder of eight of the savages.
Thus that terrible summer passed in civil anarchy, and every
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