History of the state of New York Vol I, Part 61

Author: Brodhead, John Romeyn, 1814-1873. 4n
Publication date: 1871
Publisher: New York : Harper & Brothers
Number of Pages: 844

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1656. 30 May. New Am- sterdam ferring to the company's instructions, declined ; and De affairs. Sille, the new provincial fiscal, was commissioned as city 26 June. schout. In the following autumn, the municipal govern- 7 Nov. ment again applied to the Amsterdam Chamber for further privileges. Stuyvesant himself, however, now saw the ne- cessity of some change, and the burgomasters and sche- pens were allowed an enlarged criminal jurisdiction, in 21 Dec. cases of " minor degree." New police regulations were adopted ; and, for fear of the savages, a patrol was estab- lished during divine service. The number of children at Public the public school having greatly increased, further accom- school. modation was allowed to Harman van Hoboken the school- master. A survey of the city, made by Captain De Ko- Survey and population ninck at the request of the authorities, showed that there of the me- were, at this time, one hundred and twenty houses and tropolis. one thousand souls in New Amsterdam .*

Opposition to the excise at Beverwyck continuing, De 13 May. Decker was ordered to arrest such of the tapsters as refus- Bever- Excise at ed to pay, and convey them to New Amsterdam. One of wyck. them was accordingly lodged in Fort Orange until the sloop 24 May. should be ready to sail. The prisoner escaping, however, fled to the patroon's house ; and Van Rensselaer, going down to the capital, protested against Stuyvesant's exac- tions. The West India Company had not fulfilled its ob- 20 June. ligation to protect the inhabitants. On the contrary, the selaer pro- Van Rens- colonists had thrice come to the assistance of the compa- Stuyve- tests to ny's officers ; once during the French and Indian war, sant. again in the troubles with New England, and lately dur- ing the outbreak of the savages around Manhattan. 'T'he colonie had always been the first to purchase the friend- ship of the Indians, and its proprietors had borne all the

* Alb. Rec., iv., 206, 218 ; xi., 424 ; xiii., 268, 302-319 ; xv., 166; New Amst. Rec., ii., 341, 363, 377. 433, 467-488, 640, 690 ; O'Call., ii., 322, 540. Van Tienhoven and his broth- er soon afterward absconded from the province. There was formerly a street outside of the wall. known as " Tienhoven's" street ; but the name is now extinct.

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HISTORY OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK.

1656. 27 June.

CH. XVIII. expense of ministers and officers of justice. It was, there- fore, unjust for the company to appropriate the excise and demand tithes. Stuyvesant, however, pronounced Van Rensselaer's protest to be "frivolous," and fined him twen- ty guilders for making such "absurd assertions." By the eighteenth article of the "Freedoms and Exemptions" of 1629, the patroon's colonists, after ten years, were as much bound as the other inhabitants of New Netherland to con- tribute to the public revenue. As Van Rensselaer him- self was the instigator of the opposition of the " contuma- cious tapsters," he was ordered to give a bond in three thousand guilders for their appearance at New Amsterdam, or else remain there himself under civil arrest.

Renssela fined, and ordered to give bond.

6 July.

7 August. Tapsters convicted.

A proclamation was soon afterward issued, forbidding the removal of crops in any town or colonie within the prov- ince until the company's tithes had been paid. The au- thorities of Rensselaerswyck refused to publish this pla- card; but the tapsters were sent down to New Amsterdam. They pleaded that they had acted under the orders of their feudal superiors. This defense, however, was overruled ; and one was fined two hundred pounds, and the other eight hundred guilders.

Measures had been taken, in the mean time, to build a new church at Beverwyck, in place of the small one which had been used since 1643. The court at Fort Orange ap- propriated fifteen hundred guilders, and the proprietors of Rensselaerswyck subscribed one thousand. A site was chosen in middle of the highway, at the intersection of what were long known as Yonker's and Handelaar's Streets, and afterward as State and Market Streets. The corner- stone was laid, in the presence of the authorities and the inhabitants, with appropriate ceremony, by Rutger Jacob- sen, one of the oldest magistrates of the colonie. The work went rapidly on; and the inhabitants subscribed twenty-five beavers, worth about two hundred guilders, to purchase an oaken pulpit in Holland. The Amsterdam Chamber added seventy-five guilders to this subscription ; and, the next year, presented Domine Schaats and his con-

New church at Bever- wyck. 2 June.

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PETER STUYVESANT, DIRECTOR GENERAL.

gregation with a bell " to adorn their newly-constructed CH. XVIII. little church."

1656.

De Decker, being about to return to Holland, now re- signed his office as vice-director at Fort Orange. La Mon- 28 Sept. La Mon- tagne, one of the provincial council, was appointed as his tagne vice- director at successor, and Johannes Provoost was made secretary. Fort Or- The vice-director lived in a two-storied house within the ange. fort, the upper floor of which was used as a court room. One of the most important duties of the provincial officers was the oversight of the large fur trade which was now Fur trade. concentrated at Fort Orange, from which post, and from its neighborhood, upward of thirty-five thousand beaver and otter skins were exported during the year 1656 .*

Upon receiving the official ratification of the Hartford 22 August. treaty by his government, Stuyvesant wrote to the com- correspond- Fruitless missioners of the United Colonies, expressing his joy at the New En- ence with gland. peace between Holland and England ; renewing his prop- osition for a union and combination between the Dutch and English colonies ; asking for the appointment of a time and place to exchange the ratifications ; and urging that the New England governments should detain "all persons of no note or qualification," coming from New Netherland without a proper passport, and promising to do the like in return. The commissioners replicd that they desired the 27 Sept. continuance of peace ; expresscd no wish for a "nearer union ;" passed the boundary question by, with an insinu- ation that the Dutch had no right to claim jurisdiction over " the English plantation at Oyster Bay ;" complained of Stuyvesant's treatment of John Young of Southold, " when

* Alb. Records, iv., 233, 239, 268 ; x., 68 ; xi., 409-499 ; xiii., 72, 221-223 ; xviii., 83; Renss. MSS. ; Fort Orange Rec .; Let. of Domine Schaats, 26th June, 1657 ; O'Call., ii., 307-310 ; Munsell's Alb. Reg., 1849 ; ante, p. 375, 538, 539. The site of this church, in which Schaats ministered for many years, was, until within a short time ago, partly inclosed by an iron railing in the centre of the street, in front of the Albany Exchange. In 1715, a new church was erected around the walls of the one built in 1656, so that public wor- ship was suspended only three Sundays. In the windows of this new church werc in- serted panes of glass, on which were painted the coats of arms of most of the old Dutch families of Albany. There they remained until the church was demolished in 1806. The old octagonal oak pulpit is now in the attic of the North Dutch church ; and a fragment of the little bell, which bears the inscription " Anno 1601," is still preserved. Margaret, one of the daughters of Rutger Jacobsen, who laid the corner-stone of the church of 1656, was married in 1667 to Jan Jansen Bleecker, who emigrated from Meppel in 1658, and who was the ancestor of the Bleecker family in this state.

R R

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HISTORY OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK.

CH. XVIII. he came peaceably to trade at the Manhattoes ;" and ended 1656. their repulsive letter by declaring that the Dutch "as yet have made no satisfying resignation of Greenwich."*

24 October. Lutherans at New Amster- dam.

The Lutherans at New Amsterdam now informed the director that their friends in Holland had obtained from the West India Company a promise that there should be the same toleration in New Netherland "as is the practice in the Fatherland under its estimable government ;" and as they expected a clergyman to arrive the next spring from Holland, they hoped they should no longer be inter- rupted in their religious exercises. The petition was con- sidered in council, and it was determined to ask, by the next vessel, the " further interpretation" of the West In- dia Company. In the mean time, however, the ordinance against public conventicles must be executed.

8 Nov. Ordinance enforced against the Baptists a Flushing.

At Flushing, where the people had been for some time without any ordained clergyman, the ordinance was severe- ly enforced. William Wickendam, "a cobbler from Rhode Island," coming there, began to preach, and " went with the people into the river and dipped them." This soon came to the director's ears, with the additional intelligence that William Hallett, the sheriff, had "dared to collect conventicles in his house," and had permitted Wickendam to preach and administer sacraments, " though not called thereto by any civil or ecclesiastical authority." Hallett was therefore removed from office, and sentenced to a fine of fifty pounds, or, in default of payment, to be banished. Wickendam was fined one hundred pounds, and ordered to be banished. As he was poor, and had a family, the fine was remitted ; but he was obliged to leave the province.t

29 Dec. Affairs at

The English settlers at West Chester having sent to Oost-dorp. New Amsterdam a double nomination of magistrates for the next year, Captain Newton, Secretary Van Ruyven, and Commissary Van Brugge were directed to go there and ad- minister the oath of office to the three persons selected, and the oath of allegiance to the actual inhabitants. Embark-

* Hazard, ii., 363-365 ; Hutchinson, i., 189; Trumbull, i , 228, 229.

+ Alb. Rec., xiii., 140, 274-277 ; Cor. Classis Amsterdam ; O'Call., ii., 320, 321 ; Doc. Hist. N. Y., iii., 106.

627

PETER STUYVESANT, DIRECTOR GENERAL.

ing early in the morning in an open boat, the commission- CH. XVIII. ers passed safely " through Hell-gate, and by the fast-an- chored Brothers, to the kill in front of Oost-dorp." It was 30 Dec. 1656. late on Saturday evening when they arrived ; and as they wished to return to New Amsterdam the next day, they asked that the inhabitants might be summoned to meet early in the morning. But the Puritan settlers "were in no way so inclined ;" and the commissioners were obliged to tarry over Sunday. Secretary Van Ruyven, attending 31 Dec. service, found a gathering of about fifteen men and twelve women. - There was no clergyman. "Mr. Baly made a prayer, which being concluded, one Robert Bassett read a sermon from a printed book composed and published by an English minister in England. After the reading, Mr. Baly made another prayer, and they sung a psalm and separa- ted." The next day the new magistrates were sworn in, 1657. and most of the inhabitants took the oath of allegiance, dur- 1 Jan. ing their residence in the province. On their return to New Amsterdam, the commissioners submitted a report to the council, embracing several points in which the English set- tlers felt aggrieved ; and a dozen muskets and a quantity 3 Jan. of ammunition were sent to Oost-dorp, as the savages were lowed to Arms al- becoming insolent, because the inhabitants having submit- itants. the inhab- ted to the provincial government, Pell, who had purchased the land from them, required that they should either re- turn his money, or " free him from the Dutch nation." *.

For a long time, as we have already seen, the cities of Holland had possessed certain municipal privileges, and their burghers had enjoyed certain peculiar rights. In 1652, a modification of the old system was adopted at Great and Amsterdam; and its burghers were divided into the two burgher- Small classes of "Great" and " Small." All those who paid five Amster- right at dam. hundred guilders were enrolled as Great burghers. They had the monopoly of all offices, and were exempted from attainder and confiscation of goods. The Small burgh- ers paid only fifty guilders, and had only the freedom

* Alb. Rec., xv., 8 ; Doc. Hist. N. Y., iii., 921-926 ; O'Call., ii., 315, 316 ; Bolton's West Chester, ii., 161.

628

HISTORY OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK.

CH. XVIII. of trade and the privilege of becoming members of the guilds .*

1657.

This example was soon followed in New Amsterdam. Its inhabitants, while they welcomed all who came in- tending to make New Netherland their permanent home, were exceedingly jealous of itinerant traders ; and it had become the established law that those who wished to en- gage in commerce must keep "fire and light" in the prov- ince. Manhattan, too, had been declared, in the charter of Freedoms, to be the emporium of New Netherland, and had been invested with the important privilege of "sta- ple right." The residents, however, found that their me- tropolitan immunities were constantly infringed ; and ev- ery year larger numbers of "Scotchmen," or peddlers, came over, who, proceeding at once into the interior, finished their trade, and returned to Europe without contributing any thing to the advantage of the country. The burgomas- ters and schepens of New Amsterdam, therefore, address- ed a petition to the director, setting forth these circum- stances, and asking that, in consideration of the burdens which the citizens were obliged to bear, and the loyalty they had always exhibited, they should be favored with " some privileges." As the "burgher right" was "one of the most important privileges in a well-governed city," they prayed that no persons except city burghers should be al- lowed to carry on business in the capital, and none but " settled residents" to trade in "any quarter hereabout, without this place."

1 22 Jan. Petition of ities of New Am- sterdam for burgher privileges.

30 Jan. Concession of Great and Small burgher -. right.

The provincial government considering the petition fa- vorably, ordained that " the arriving traders," before sell- ing their goods, should " set up and keep an open store within the gates and walls" of New Amsterdam, and ob- tain from the burgomasters and schepens the Common or Small burgher-right; for which they should pay twenty guilders to the support of the city. "In conformity to the laudable custom of the city of Amsterdam in Europe," a

* Wagenaar's Amsterdam, i., 583; iii., 141-161 ; ante, p. 453. This distinctive sys- tem, however, not working well, was abolished in 1668.

629

PETER STUYVESANT, DIRECTOR GENERAL.

Great burgher-right was also established, " for which those CH. XVIII. who may request to be therein shall pay fifty guilders. All such, and such only, shall hereafter be qualified to fill all 1657. the city offices and dignities ; II., be exempt for one year and six weeks from watches and expeditions ; and, III., be free in their proper persons from arrest by any subaltern court or judicial benches of this province." At the request of the municipal authorities, the present and future bur- 2 Feb. gomasters and schepens, and the director, counselors, cler- tion. Amplifica- gymen, and military officers, with their male descendants, were declared to belong to the class of Great burghers. Great The class of Small burghers was to include all natives and Small burghers. all who had resided in the city a year and six weeks, all burghers who had married or should marry the daughters of burgh- ers, all who kept stores or did business within the city, and all salaried officers of the company. Thus absurdly imi- tating an invidious policy, which the mother city was soon obliged to abandon, Stuyvesant attempted to establish in New Amsterdam that most offensive of all distinctions, an aristocracy founded on mere wealth .*

In the mean time, the West India Company, embarrass- ed by its losses in Brazil and Guinea, and heavily in debt to the city of Amsterdam for the aid which it had afforded 1656. in fitting out the South River expedition, had offered to Offer of 12 Feb. transfer to its burgomasters and schepens Fort Casimir and the lands in its neighborhood, where the city might estab- city of Am- lish a colony. The proposition was received with favor, 3 March. sterdam. as soon as the States General had ratified the Hartford treaty. Beside the hope of more effectually securing the Dutch possession of New Netherland, a nobler motive was presented. Hundreds of Waldenses, escaping from the - persecutions of the Duke of Savoy, had fled for refuge to Amsterdam. There they were cordially received ; and the city government, not content with giving them an 29 March. asylum, liberally appropriated large sums from its treas- 30 June. ury for their support. With such materials, the city of

* New Amst. Rec., ii., 704, 722-724, 741-745 ; iii., 267-272 ; Alb. Rec., vii., 389-392 ; xv., 54 . ante, p. 194, 243, 489. See also Kent's City Charters, 243-246.

lands on the South River to the

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HISTORY OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK.

CH. XVIII. Amsterdam now undertook to found a colony of its own in New Netherland .*

1656. 12 July.

An agreement was soon made, by which, for the sum of seven hundred thousand guilders, the company transferred to the city of Amsterdam all the Dutch territory on the South River, from the west side of Christina Kill to the " Boomtje's Hook," now corrupted into " Bombay Hook," City's col- at the mouth of the river. This region was named ony at New Amstel. " Nieuwer-Amstel," after one of the suburbs belonging to the city, between the River Amstel and the Haerlem Sea. Six commissaries were appointed by the burgomasters to manage the colony, who were "to sit and hold their meet- ings at the West India House on Tuesdays and Thurs- Conditions. days." A set of " conditions" was drawn up, offering a free passage to colonists, lands on the river side for their residence, and provisions and clothing for one year. The city engaged to send out "a proper person for a schoolmas- ter, who shall also read the holy Scriptures in public and set the Psalms.". The municipal government was to be regulated " in the same manner as here in Amsterdam." The colonists were to be exempted from taxation for ten years ; after that time they should not " be taxed higher than those who are taxed lowest in any other district un- der the government of the West India Company in New Netherland." Specific regulations were adopted with re- spect to trade; and besides the recognitions payable to the West India Company on goods exported from Holland, four per centum was to be paid in New Netherland.t

16 August.

All these arrangements were ratified and confirmed by the States General, upon condition that a church should be organized and a clergyman established as soon as there were two hundred inhabitants in the colony. Prepara-

* Hol. Doc., xv., 1, 2, 117, 118, 191 ; Commelin's Amsterdam, 115-117; Wagenaar's Am- sterdam, i., 594 ; Lambrechtsen, 63-65 ; Report of Mr. Sidney Lawrence to the Senate of New York, 3d February, 1844, Sen. Doc., No. 42, page 6.

t These " conditions" are appended to the second edition of Van der Donck's Descrip- tion of New Netherland, which was published this year ; ante, p. 561, note. Transla- tions are in Hazard, ii., 543 ; i., N. Y. H. S. Coll., i., 291 ; ii., 1, 238 ; O'Call., ii., 328. Ab- stracts are in S. Hazard, Ann. Penn., 220 ; Dunlap, ii., Appendix, xii. Dunlap errs in dating them in 1623, and in making them refer to New Amsterdam.

631

PETER STUYVESANT, DIRECTOR GENERAL.

tions were immediately made to organize the colony, of CH. XVIII which Jacob Alrichs, an uncle of Beck, the vice-director at Curaçoa, was appointed director. Martin Kregier, of 1656. Jacob Al- richs di- New Amsterdam, upon Stuyvesant's " good report," was

rector. commissioned as captain of a company of sixty soldicrs, 5 Dec. and Alexander d'Hinoyossa, who had formerly served in Brazil, was made lieutenant. Ordinances were also pass- 9 Dec. ed requiring the colonists to take an oath of allegiance to the States General, the burgomasters of Amsterdam, and the director and council of New Netherland, and likewise to promise faithfully to observe the articles which defined their duties and obligations to the city. These, among other things, required them to remain four years at New Amstel, unless they gave satisfactory reasons for leaving, or repaid, within the proper time, the expenses incurred on their account.

The West India Company informed Stuyvesant of all 19 Dec. these arrangements, and instructed him to transfer the ter- instruc- ritory which the city had purchased to Alrichs on his ar- Stuyve- tions to rival in New Netherland. At Forts Christina and New sant. Gottenburg, " now called by us Altona and the island of Kattenberg," he was to maintain for the present a small garrison. " The confidence which we feel," they added, " about the success and increase of this new colony, and of which we hope to see some prominent features next spring, when to all appearance large numbers of the exiled Waldenses, who shall be warned, will flock thither as to an Walden- asylum, induces us to send you orders to endeavor to pur- ses. chase, before it can be accomplished by any other nation, all that tract of land situated between the South River and the Hook of the North River, to provide establishments for thesc emigrants."*

About one hundred and sixty-seven colonists embarked 25 Dec. in three vessels-the Prince Maurice, the Bear, and the tion of col- Embarka- Flower of Guelder-and set sail from the Texel on Christ- onists. mas-day. Evert Pietersen, who had passed a good exam-

* Hol. Doc., viii., 138-177 ; xv., 6-10, 119, 121, 184, 191-203 ; Alb. Rec., iv., 223 ; xviii., 400 ; S. Hazard, Ann. Penn., 223, 225, 226 ; Lambrechtsen, 649.

Company's

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HISTORY OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK.

CH. XVIII. ination before the Classis, accompanied the emigrants as 1656. schoolmaster and Zieken-trooster, "to read God's word and lead in singing," until the arrival of a clergyman. A storm separated the squadron ; and, after a long voyage, the Prince Maurice, with Alrichs, Kregier, D'Hinoyossa, Van Sweringen the supercargo, and most of the emigrants 1657. on board, struck about midnight on the south coast of Long Island, at a place called " Sicktewacky," or Secon- tague, near Fire Island Inlet. The next morning, the crew and passengers escaped through the ice to a barren shore, " without weeds, grass, or timber of any sort to make a fire." The shipwrecked emigrants were visited before long by some of the neighboring Indians, by whom Alrichs sent a letter to Stuyvesant imploring help.

8 March. Shipwreck on Long Island. 9 March.

12 March.

Yachts were immediately dispatched from New Amster- dam, and the director went in person to the scene of the dis- 20 March. aster. The emigrants and most of the cargo were brought in safety to New Amsterdam, where the other vessels had 12 April. 'Transfer of mir to Al- richs. meanwhile arrived. In a few days, Stuyvesant, in obedi- Fort Casi- ence to the company's orders, formally transferred to Al- richs " the Fortress Casimir, now named New Amstel, with all the lands dependent on it, in conformity with our first purchase from and transfer by the natives to us on the nineteenth of July, 1651, beginning at the west side of the Minquas, or Christina Kill, named in their language Sus- pencough, to the mouth of the bay or river included, named Boomtje's Hook, in the Indian language Canaresse, and this as far in the country as the limits of the Minquas' land." 17 April. Colonists sail to the South Riv- er. 21 April. New Am- stel organ- ized. A vessel was immediately chartered, and Alrichs sailed for the South River, with from one hundred and twenty-five to one hundred and eighty emigrants. Upon his arrival at Fort Casimir, Alrichs received from Jacquet a surrender of his authority, and the government of the colony of New Amstel was formally organized .*

The region north of Christina Kill remained under the jurisdiction of the West India Company, in obedience to

* Alb. Rec., xii., 405-411 ; xv., 124, 125 ; S. Hazard, Ann. Penn., 229-233 ; O'Call., ii., 335; Lond. Doc., iv., 173; N. Y. Col. MSS., iii., 344; Letter of Classis of Amst., 25th May, 1657 ; Montanus, 124; Doc. Hist. N. Y., iv., 131 ; ante, p. 529.

633

PETER STUYVESANT, DIRECTOR GENERAL.

whose orders the name of Fort Christina was changed to CH. XVIII. that of " Altona." It had been Stuyvesant's intention to . continue Jacquet in command of this territory ; but com- 1657. Altona. 20 April. plaints of his misgovernment having been made by Aller- Jacquet ton and others, the director ordered him to transfer the succeeded by Hudde. company's effects to Hudde. This was done ; and Jacquet, 24 May. on his return to Manhattan, was arrested and prosecuted .*

During the first few months of Alrich's directorship, New Amstel prospered. In the absence of a clergyman, the re- ligious instruction of the colonists was superintended by Evert Pietersen the "Voorleezer," who had accompanied them from Holland. The Classis of Amsterdam, however, 9 March. soon commissioned Domine Everardus Welius, a young Welius. Domine man of much esteem " in life, in studies, in gifts, and in conversation," to take charge of the congregation ; who sailed for the South River in company with about four 25 May. hundred new emigrants. On their arrival, a church was 21 August. organized, of which Alrichs and Jean Williams were ap- New Am- Church at pointed elders, and Pietersen " fore-singer, Zieken-trooster, stel. and deacon," with a colleague. The municipal govern- ment was now remodelled ; the town was laid out; build- ings were rapidly erected ; industry promised success ; and thirty families were tempted to emigrate from Manhattan to the flourishing colony of New Amstel,t

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History of the state of New York Vol I, Part 61

Author: Brodhead, John Romeyn, 1814-1873. 4n Publication date: 1871 Publisher: New York : Harper & Brothers Number of Pages: 844

Author: Brodhead, John Romeyn, 1814-1873. 4n
Publication date: 1871
Publisher: New York : Harper & Brothers
Number of Pages: 844