USA > New York > New York City > History of the city of New York : its origin, rise, and progress. Vol. I > Part 4
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For some days afterward Hudson spent his time in examining the shores, sounding the waters, and bartering with the Indians. The latter were closely watched, but manifested no knowledge of the fatal affray by which John Coleman had lost his life. On the 11th the Half Moon was cautiously guided through the Narrows, and anchored Sept. 11. in full view of Manhattan Island. How little Hudson dreamed that it would one day become the home of Europe's overflowing population ! His mind was occupied with visions of a different character. He was encouraged to believe that he had at last found the passage to Cathay ; for the river stretching off to the north was of such gigantic proportions as to dwarf almost to insignificance the comparative streamlets of the eastern continent ! He determined to proceed at all hazards ; but the wind was ahead, and he could move only with the flood tide, hence it was not until the 14th that he commenced the ascent of the.
Sept. 14. river in earnest.
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HISTORY OF THE CITY OF NEW YORK.
If Hudson had been a trained detective he could not have been sharper- eyed in his observations of the country along his route than his circum- stantial journal indicates. The Indians hovered about his vessel, anxious Sept. 1' to trade their produce for the buttons, ornaments, and trinkets of
the sailors. On the 17th he anchored at a point just above the present city of Hudson, and the next day accompanied an old Indian chief to his home on the shore. It was a circular wigwam, and upon the Englishman's entrance, mats were spread upon the ground to sit upon, and eatables were passed round in a well-made red wooden bowl. Two Indians were sent in quest of game, and returned with pigeons. A fat dog was also killed, and skinned with sharp shells. Hudson was served to a sumptuous repast, but he declined an invitation to spend the night with his royal host, and the Indians, supposing it was because he was afraid of their bows and arrows, broke them in pieces and threw them in the fire.
Sept. 23. They proceeded on their way up the river for a few days, but at last navigation became obstructed, and a boat was sent eight or nine leagues in advance to measure the water. "Seven foot and unconstant soundings " deterred the bold mariner from proceeding far- ther. He had gone as far as he could, and Asia was not yet. There are conflicting opinions as to the precise point reached by the Half Moon, but it is generally supposed that it attained about the latitude of Castle. Island, just below Albany.
The glowing description which Hudson gave of the country and its re- sources was incorporated in an elaborate work by the Dutch historian De Laet, one of the directors of the West India Company some years later. Hudson wrote " that the land was of the finest kind for tillage, and as beautiful as the foot of man ever trod upon." He made himself, it seems, very agreeable to the natives. On one occasion he persuaded two old Indians and their squaws, and two maidens of sixteen and seven- teen years, to dine with him in the cabin of his vessel, and said that " they deported themselves with great circumspection." At another time he treated some of the sachems to wine until they were merry, and one of them was so very drunk that he could not leave the Half Moon until the next day.1
Hudson commenced his return on the 23d, and, eleven days afterwards, " went out of the mouth of the great river," and sailed for Europe. On the 7th of November he arrived safely at Dartmouth, England, where he was detained by the English authorities, who denied his right to enter
1 At this very moment the eminent French navigator, Champlain, was upon the waters of the lake which bears his name, and within one hundred miles of Hudson.
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HUDSON'S DEATH.
into the service of a foreign power. He forwarded a report of his adven- tures to the Dutch East India Company, with a proposal to change six or seven of his crew and allow him to try the frozen seas again. His com- munication did not reach Holland for several months, and his employers were ignorant of his arrival in England. When they were at last ap- prised of the fact, they sent a peremptory order for him to return with the Half Moon. He would have obeyed, but the arm of the English law withheld him. The vessel, however, was sent with its cargo to Holland.
The Muscovy Company made immediate arrangements to avail them- selves of Hudson's valuable services, and fitted out another expedition to the north seas. The expenses were defrayed by private English gentle- men, one of whom was Sir Dudley Diggs. Hudson sailed towards the northeast again until the ice obstructed his progress, then proceeded westward, and after many trials and hardships discovered the bay and strait which have immortalized his name; but his superstitious crew greatly magnified the dangers by which they were surrounded, and at last arose in open mutiny. They placed their heroic commander in a small boat, to drift helplessly over the dreary waste of frozen waters, which are, alas ! his tomb and his monument. To fully appreciate the character of such a man as Henry Hudson, we must never lose sight of the fact that the real hazards of those early voyages were exceedingly great, and the imaginary perils infinite. Even now, after the lapse of nearly three centuries, we cannot dwell upon his tragic fate without mourning that such a life could not have been spared to the world a little longer, and that he who accomplished so much for posterity should have had so slight a comprehension of the magnitude of his labors and discoveries.
The aristocratic Dutch East India Company regarded all Hudson's reports with indifference. They had a great aversion to America, and ignored it altogether. They had been coining wealth too long and too easily from the immense profits on their India goods to be interested in anything short of the Orient. They actually sent again two vessels to the North in 1611, to explore among the icebergs for a direct route to Asia, hoping to soften the edge of former disappointments.
But there were traders in the Netherlands whose eyes were opened to a hidden mine of wealth through the skins with which the returned Half Moon had been laden. Furs were much worn in the cold countries of Europe, and the Dutch reveled in the costly extravagance. These furs were obtained mostly through the Russian trade. From sixty to eighty Holland vessels visited Archangel every year, agents were stationed at Novogorod and other inland towns, and a brisk traffic was kept 1610.
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HISTORY OF THE CITY OF NEW YORK.
up with ancient Muscovy. The wise Russian Emperor had courted this prosperous commerce, but had laid a duty of five per cent on all imported goods, and allowed an equivalent amount to be exported duty free. Whoever exported more than he imported paid a duty of five per cent on the difference.1
If the same and similar goods could be obtained in the New World in exchange for the veriest bawbles, and command a remunerative market at home, it was a golden opportunity. At all events, it was worth an inves- tigation. A partnership was organized, and a vessel fitted out and laden with small wares. A portion of the crew of the Half Moon 2 were secured, and the ship was placed under the command of an experienced officer of the East India Company. Hudson River was again visited, and a cargo of skins brought back to Holland. The account of the voyage was published, and the friendly disposition of the Indians much descanted upon.
It was at a period when the press everywhere was teeming with pam- phlets of travel and descriptions of the earth as far as known. Geogra- phy was becoming with some few a life-study, and every added grain of knowledge was seized with avidity.
England had already begun to think seriously of planting colonies in the New World. The timid James I., perplexed to know how to provide for the great numbers of gallant men of rank and spirit who had served under Queen Elizabeth both by sea and by land, and who were out-of employment, had permitted a company to be formed in London for the purpose of settling Virginia, and in 1606 granted it a patent which eni- braced the entire Atlantic coast from Cape Fear to Nova Scotia, ex- cepting Acadia, then in actual possession of the French. Many of the impoverished noblemen immediately embarked for their new home, and had been tilling the fertile soil of Virginia for three years prior to the discovery of Manhattan Island. These general facts were well known in Holland, and the States-General in 1611, through Caron, their ambassa- dor at London, made overtures to the British government to join 1611. them in their Virginian Colony, and also to unite the East India trade of the two countries. But the statesmen of England were unfavor- ably inclined towards either project. Their reply was, " If we join upon equal terms, the art and industry of your people will wear out ours." 3
1 Richesse de la Hollande, I. 51. Muilkerk. McCullagh's Industrial History.
2 Heckewelder, New York Hist. Soc. Coll. Yates and Moulton.
3 Winwood's Memorial, III. 239. Extract of a letter from Mr. John Moore to Sir Francis Winwood, the English ambassador at the Hague, dated London, December 15, 1610. Corps Dip., V. 99-102. Grotius, XVIII. 812. Van Meteren.
33
TRADERS AT MANHATTAN.
During the summer of 1611, Captain Hendrick Christiaensen, while returning from a voyage to the West Indies, where many Dutch vessels obtained salt every year, necessary for curing herrings, found himself in the vicinity of the "great river," the Hudson (which the Belgian Dutch called " Mauritius," in honor of the Prince of Orange), and but that his ship was heavily laden would have ventured in. As soon as he arrived in Holland he entered into a partnership with Adriaen Block; they chartered a small vessel, took goods on commission, and sailed for Man- hattan. The Indians were glad to see them, and they had no difficulty in freighting their craft with skins. They also persuaded two young In- dian chiefs, Orson and Valentine, to accompany them to Holland.
Block wrote a long and graphic account of his voyage, which was pub- lished and circulated in all the Dutch cities. Its object was to awaken public interest in the American fur-traffic. The two Indians were taken from place to place to create a sensation, and with pretty good success. Erelong three wealthy merchants, Hans Hongers, Paulus Pelgrom, and Lambrecht Van Tweenhuysen, formed a partnership and equipped two vessels for Manhattan. They were the Fortune and the Tiger, and were intrusted to the command of Christiaensen and Block. Presently some gentlemen in North Holland sent two vessels to trade at Manhattan. One of them, the Little Fox, was commanded by Captain John de Witt, an uncle of the celebrated Dutch statesman who was grand pensionary of the Netherlands in 1652. The other was the Nightingale, and was in charge of Captain Thys Volckertsen. Within three months the owners of the Fortune and the Tiger sent out a third vessel, commanded by Cap- tain Cornelis Jacobsen May, who ten years later was made Director-Gen- eral of New Netherland. Their success was flattering, for the Indians were captivated by the trinkets which were offered in exchange for skins.
It is worth noting that from the very first the admirable commer- cial position of Manhattan Island indicated it, as if by common consent, as the proper place where furs collected in the interior 1613. could be most readily shipped for Europe. Christiaensen, having won the confidence of his employers, became a legally appointed agent, and by means of trading-boats visited every creek, bay, river, and inlet in the neighborhood where an Indian settlement was to be found. He often took, also, long journeys into the country on foot, and was everywhere treated by the savages with kindness and consideration.
One clear cold night in November the Tiger took fire at its anchorage, just off the southern point of Manhattan Island, and Block and his crew escaped with much difficulty to the shore. The vessel burned to the water's edge, and as the other ships had all sailed for Holland there was 3
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HISTORY OF THE CITY OF NEW YORK.
no possible hope of any assistance from white men before spring. Block accepted the situation like a true philosopher, and erected four small habitations on the island at about the present site of 39 Broadway. Of their architecture we have no means of information, but they were doubt- less of the wigwam family. The Indians were hospitably inclined, bring- ing food out of their abundance, and the sailors were enabled to exist with comparative comfort until spring. Block was a plain man, of no incon- siderable tact and capacity. He had been bred to the law, but had de- serted his profession to study the science of navigation. He must have had a versatile genius, for he set himself at work with great energy to construct a new vessel upon the charred remains of the Tiger.1
Burning of the Tiger.
It was an arduous undertaking with the slender materials at command. Indeed, it requires considerable stretch of the imagination, in this age of mechanical luxury, to understand how such a feat could have been ac- complished at all. But it is one of the facts of history, and early 1614. in the spring of 1614 the justly famous yacht of 16 tons' burden was found seaworthy, and launched in the waters of the Upper Bay.
It was significantly called the Restless. Block set forth in it to explore
1 Plantagenet's New Albion. Brodhead, 48, note. Breeden Raedt aen de Vereeinghde Nederlandsche Provintien contains a statement made by the Indians, that "when the Dutch lost a ship we provided the white men with food until the new ship was finished." De Laet says : "To carry on trade with the Indians our people remained all winter." De Vries repeats the same. A record of the burning of the Tiger exists in the Royal Archives at the Hague under date of August 18, 1614.
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DESCRIPTION OF MANHATTAN ISLAND.
the tidal channels to the east, where no large ships had yet ventured. He passed the numerous islands, and the dangerous strait called Hell Gate, and to his amazement found himself in a " beautiful inland sea," which ex- tended eastward to the Atlantic. He was the first European navigator, as far as we have any precise knowledge, who ever furrowed the waters of Long Island Sound.
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About the same date, Captain May again reached the American shores and, hovering along the eastern and southern boundaries of Long Island, proved that it was indeed an island. Finding his business soon transacted at Manhattan, he visited Delaware Bay, and bestowed his name upon its northern cape. Block, meanwhile, interested himself in the peculiari- ties of the southern coast of Connecticut, and sailed up the great Fresh River as far as where the city of Hartford now stands.1 He then pro- ceeded to Cape Cod, where he unexpectedly met Christiaensen. After some discussion they finally exchanged vessels, and Block sailed for Hol- land in the larger and safer craft of his comrade, while Christiaensen con- tinued to make explorations along the coast in the Restless.
Thus was Manhattan Island again left in primeval solitude, waiting till commerce should come and claim its own. To the right, the majestic North River, a mile wide, unbroken by an island ; to the left, the deep East River, a third of a mile wide, with a chain of slender islands abreast ; ahead, a beautiful bay fifteen miles in circumference, at the foot of which the waters were cramped into a narrow strait with bold steeps on either side ; and astern, a small channel dividing the island from the mainland to the north, and connecting the two salt rivers. Nature wore a hardy countenance, as wild and untamed as the savage landholders. Manhattan's twenty-two thousand acres of rock, lake, and rolling table-land, rising in places to an altitude of one hundred and thirty-eight feet, were covered with somber forests, grassy knolls, and dismal swamps. The trees were lofty ; and old, decayed, and withered limbs contrasted with the younger growth of branches, and wild-flowers wasted their sweetness among the dead leaves and uncut herbage at their roots. The wanton grape-vine swung carelessly from the topmost boughs of the oak and the sycamore, and blackberry and raspberry bushes, like a picket-guard, presented a bold front in all the possible avenues of approach. Strawberries struggled for a feeble existence in various places, sometimes under foliage through which no sunshine could penetrate, and wild rose-bushes and wild currant-bushes hobnobbed, and were often found clinging to frail footholds among the ledges and cliffs, while apple-trees pitifully beckoned with their dwarfed fruit, as if to be relieved from too intimate an association with the giant
1 De Laet. Mass. Hist. Coll., XV. 170. Brodhead, I. 57.
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HISTORY OF THE CITY OF NEW YORK.
progeny of the crowded groves. The entire surface of the island was bold and granitic, and in profile resembled the cartilaginous back of a sturgeon. Where the Tombs prison now casts its grim shadow in Center Street, was a fresh-water lake, supplied by springs from the high grounds about it, so deep that the largest ships might have floated upon its surface, and pure as the Croton which now flows through the reservoirs of the city. It had two outlets, -small streams, one emptying into the North, the other into the East River.
It was not an interesting people whom the Dutch found in possession of Manhattan Island They have ever been surrounded with darkness and dullness, and we can promise very little entertainment while we call them up before us, with all their peculiarities of life, language, and garb, and with a few touches sketch them as a whole. They were tall, well made, broad of shoulder and slender in the waist, with large round faces, mild black eyes, and a cinnamon complexion. The distinguished scholar, Dr. O'Callaghan, says : " It was first supposed that this color was the effect of climate, but it has since been discovered to have been produced by the habitual use of unctuous substances, in which the juice of some root was incorporated, and by which this peculiar tinge was communicated to the skin of the North American Indian." They lived in huts which were built by placing two rows of upright saplings opposite each other, with their tops brought together and covered with boughs. These dwellings were skillfully lined with bark to keep out the cold. They were often large enough to accommodate several families ; but it must be remembered that each Indian only required space enough to lie down straight at night, and a place to keep a kettle and one or two other housekeeping articles. Windows and floors were unknown; fires were built on the ground in the center, and the smoke escaped through a small aperture in the roof.
The Indians never located permanently, but moved about from one place to another, selecting such points as were naturally clear of wood. The men understood the use of the bow and arrow, and spent much of their time in hunting and fishing. They made fish-lines of grass or sinews, with bones or thorns for hooks. Wigwas was a process of fishing after dark, similar to that termed bobbing at the present day. They gathered shell-fish and oysters in great abundance, so that, wherever the land has been found covered with the débris of shells, it has been regarded as a certain indication that an Indian village once existed there. The Dutch found one such locality on the west side of Fresh-Water Pond, which they named Kalch-Hook, or Shell-Point. In course of time this name was abbreviated into Kalch or Collech, and was applied to the pond itself.
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CUSTOMS AND DRESS.
The women, as usual among uncivilized nations, performed most of the field-work. The savages raised large quantities of corn and patches of tobacco, and even pumpkins were cultivated in a rude, primitive way. They used sharpened shells for knives, and with them cut down trees and constructed canoes. Although they had no tables nor ceremonies of eating, they were by no means indifferent to the quality of their food. It is even reported by some of the Dutch pioneers in the wilderness that much of their cookery was very palatable. Yockey was a mush made of pounded corn and the juice of wild apples. Suppaen was corn beaten and boiled in water. Succotash was corn and beans boiled together. Corn was often roasted upon the ear. Fish and meat were boiled in water, un- dressed, entrails and all; dog's flesh was one of their greatest delicacies. Hickory-nuts and walnuts they pounded to a fine pulp, and, mixing it with water, made a popular drink. Supplies for winter they lodged under ground in holes lined with bark. But, like the South American Indians, they had no letters, and had never broken in a single animal to labor. They conveyed their ideas by hieroglyphics, like the ancient Egyptians, and were extremely superstitious.
Of dress both sexes were extravagantly fond. The mantle of skins worn by the men was often elaborately trimmed. The hair was tied on the crown of the head, and adorned with gay-colored feathers. The hair of the women was dressed very much like Guido's picture of " Venus adorned by the Graces." It was sometimes braided, and sometimes flow- ing loose down the back with the appearance of having been crimped. The same style may now be seen in some recent paintings made by artists who have visited the Southwestern Indians, and it is not unusual in the pictures of the old masters and in the busts of the Grecian sculptures. A highly ornamented petticoat, made of whale-fins and suspended from a belt or waist girdle, was very costly. Its value is said to have been equal to eighty dollars of our currency. Chains of curious workmanship, some- times only a collection of stones, were much worn upon the necks of both men and women, and wrought copper was suspended from their ears in'a very Oriental manner.
Gold was regarded by them with contempt on account of its color. Red and azure were their favorite hues. Wampum was their money, while at the same time it was used as an ornament for their persons. It consisted of small cylindrical beads manufactured from the white lining of the conch and the purple lining of the mussel shells. The purple beads were worth just twice as much as white beads. From a circulating medium among the Indians, it became the recognized currency of the early white settlers, and the Dutch called it sewan. In like manner, a
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HISTORY OF THE CITY OF NEW YORK.
species of shells are used at the present day as money in the interior of Africa.
Public affairs were managed by a council of the wisest, most experi- enced, and bravest of their number, called sachems. They had no salary nor fees, to make office an object of ambition. Authority was secured by personal courage and address, and lost by failure in either of those quali- ties. Law and justice, in our acceptation of the terms, were unknown to them. When a murder was committed, the next of kin was the avenger. For minor offences there was rarely ever any punishment. Prisoners of war were considered to have forfeited all their rights of manhood, and towards them no pity or mercy was shown. With excessive thirst for ex- citement and display, war became their common lot and condition. The whole tendency of their lives and habits was to that point, and to be a great warrior was the highest possible distinction. They had crude and confused opinions respecting the creation of the world and a future exist- ence, and held vague ideas of a discrimination between the body and soul, but to all systems of religion they were entire strangers. Such was the race which gave way to modern civilization.
On Block's return to Holland,1 with the Fortune (Christiaen- Sept. 1. sen's vessel, which he had exchanged for the Restless), his patrons received him with enthusiasm, and made immediate preparations to avail themselves of a new feature of governmental favor towards enterprising trade.
The States-General, anxious to encourage the foreign commerce March 27. of Holland, in January, 1614, had granted a charter to an associa- tion of merchants for prosecuting the whale fishery in the neighborhood of Nova Zembla, and for exploring a new passage to China. One of the directors of this new company was Lambrecht Van Tweenhuysen, one of the owners of Block's vessel, the Tiger. The importance of a similar grant of privileges to those at whose expense new avenues of trade were being opened in the vicinity of Manhattan was almost immediately dis- cussed. A petition to that effect was sent to the States.2 The States recommended it to the general government. On the 27th of March the following was entered upon their records: " Whosoever shall from this
1 A story has been many times repeated, how Captain Samuel Argall of Virginia, while returning from an inglorious expedition against the French colony at Acadia, in November of 1613, stopped at Manhattan and compelled the Dutch who were there to submit to the king of England. Such may have been in accordance with the facts, for it would have been in keeping with Argall's coarse, self-willed, and avaricious character ; but it is not supported by authentic state papers.
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