USA > New York > History of the state of New York. Vol. II, Pt. 2 > Part 24
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534
HISTORY OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK.
Char. XI. could be alleged against him, as it had been charged again ..
1689. his immediate superior. It was certain that, next to An- dros, the only chief representative of the English crown in the dominion was its Lieutenant Governor Nicholson. Bia this was disregarded by the Boston mutineers, whose object was to break that dominion into its old pieces. Their in prisonment of Andros was really only a cloak for " See sion." Massachusetts did not like union, unless she could control that union, as she had done for many years after the old colonial confederacy of 1643. She pined for a sep- arate local government, like that which she had enjoyed un- der her perverted and abrogated charter. It was very gall- ing to her that, in common with other British American col- onies, she should be subjected by her king to the authority of a governor general. Although but a subordinate English colony, not claiming sovereignty, but imploring royal char- ity, she determined to revolt :- and so she seceded.
Massachu- sotts the author of "seces- sion."
20 April.
27 April.
A " Council of Safety" assumed the government of Mas- sachusetts, and hastened to cashier the officers of the king's regular companies, and to withdraw the garrisons which Andros had established in Maine. Major Brockholls, Lieu- tenant Colonel MacGregorie, and Captain George Lock- hart were sent to Boston from the Maine garrisons. They were all New York officers; and Peter Schuyler served as lieutenant of Captain Lockhart's troop of horse on duty at Albany the previous winter .* The Boston notion of " se- cession" quickly spread throughout the dominion of New England. Plymouth-as Wiswall wrote to Hinckley-did not like "to trot after the Bay horse." Rhode Island cer- tainly had no sympathy with the persecutors of Anne Hutch- inson and Roger Williams. Connecticut-which had so adroitly coquetted with Massachusetts and New York-did not wish to be joined with either. New York, always im- perial, abhorred a political connection with the New En- gland colonies. New Jersey followed placidly in the wake of New York. And so, in the spring of 1689, all the con- stituent colonies which formed their sovereign's dominion of New England were ripe to adopt the "most sanctified" Massachusetts idea of "secession."
Plymouth does not like " to trut after the Bay horse."
Secession triumpha.
* Williamson, 1., 590. 503; Col. Doc., fff., 615, 324; Maine II. S. Coll., v., 234, 395 ; N. Y. H. S. Coll. (15GS), 266; Col. MISS., xlviii., 120, 121, 122; Andros Tracts, i., 147-173.
£
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555
SIR EDMUND ANDROS, GOVERNOR GENERAL.
Plymouth boldly reinstated her former Governor Hinck- Ciar. XI. ley, and went on in her old system of administration. Chief Justice Dudley, on his return from holding court at South- - 22 April. 1689. old, on Long Island, was arrested at Narragansett and tak- 21 April. ? Dudley ar-
en a prisoner to Boston. The freemen of Rhode Island rested. resumed their old charter government, and replaced their 1 May. former magistrates. One of the copies of the charter of Connecti -. Connecticut was brought out of the hollow tree at Hart- boldened. ford, and Robert Treat, the former governor, with his asso- ciates, resumed the functions they had surrendered eighteen ? May. months before. A few weeks afterward a Convention met at Boston, which, instead of entering on "the full exercise" of the old charter government, merely reinstated the mag- 21 May. istrates chosen in 1686, provisionally, until orders should come from England. A vessel now reached Boston with 26 May. news of the accession of William and Mary ; yet the Brit- ish sovereigns were not proclaimed in Massachusetts. Three days afterward Sir William Phipps arrived with the delay- 20 May. ed dispatches from Whitehall directed to Andros. Finding that the governor, whom he had intended to "secure," was already in custody, Phipps, instead of sending them to Nich- Phipps's olson, feloniously opened the letters addressed to Andros Boston. felony at and to Secretary Randolph on public business, which, among other things, contained the official proclamations. The same afternoon William and Mary were proclaimed at Boston king and queen, "with greater ceremony than had been known." Emboldened by the advice of Phipps, the usurp- ing authorities of Massachusetts determined that Andros, 27 Juze. with Dudley, Randolph, Palmer, West, Graham, Farewell, and Sherlock, his most obnoxious subordinates, should be kept close prisoners without bail. But Brockholls, Mac- Gregorie, Jamison, and others, who were at first impris- oned, appear to have been discharged .*
* Col. Doc., ill., 574, 575, 575, 581, 582, 583, 5S7, 535, 616. 124; Col. Rec. Conn., ill., 245, 250, 25, 455-459, 403-466; R. I. Rec., ill., 255, 206-269 ; Arnold, i., 512, 512; Plymouth Rec., vi., $05, 200; N. Y. H. S. Coll. (1965) ; Mass. II. S. Coll., xxxv., 190-202, 301; Maine II. S. Coll., i., 196; v., 271 ; Williamson, i., 523; Mather, Mag., i., 150; il., DSS; Force's Tracts, No. 9, p. 9-12, 18; No. 10, p. 5, 4; Hist. Mag., vi., 9- 14; Hutch. Mass., i , 371-358, 413; Coll., 56S, 571, 575; Chalmers's Annals, i , 429-431, 460, 470; ii., 24-26, 51: Rev. Col., i., 209; Grahame, i., 353, 320; Bancroft, il., 447-45); iii., 71, 72, 73; Barry, 1 .. 201-507; Trumbull, i., 376, 377; Palfrey, ilf., 531-595 ; ante, 543. It is remarkable that Mr. Palfrey suppresses the accounts given by Randolph and French (Col. Dor., ilf., 552, 553, 5-7, 553) of the behavior of Phipps on board the " Prudent Sarah," in which he came from England, and afterward on shore in Beton.
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05.2
HISTORY OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK.
Thins, without the knowledge, and against the purpose of King William, his " Dominion of New England" was " dis- united." That dominion had lasted just eight months aft- er the annexation of New York and the Jerseys to New En- gland. By the "secession" of Massachusetts, a loyal but perhaps reluctant union was dissolved, and the most preten- tious English colony became the first practical exponent in North America of that doctrine of "State Rights" which afterward produced so much national disorder. Yet, in all the insurrectionary movements in New England, there was no intent to revolt from the mother country. The colonial subjects who deposed Andros did not claim the right to frame their own local goverments. On the contrary, ve hemently protesting their loyalty to the crown, they sought to obtain from their actual sovereign a restoration of the charters which former English kings had granted to them. Local corporate privilege under royal authority, and not universal popular freedom, was the object desired, and in the mutiny to regain it, the selfish lust of oligarchy was more apparent than devotion to the genuine principles of civil liberty .*
The insurrection in Boston was wholly owing to Phipps and Mather's intrigue in London, which prevented the dis- patch to Andros of William's orders in January. Had The white those orders been sent to him at once, as intended, there would have been no revolt in Massachusetts. The Prot- estant Governor of New England was too loyal a colonial officer to hesitate in obeying the directions of the head of his home authority. William and Mary would have been dutifully proclaimed as soon as the English royal Council's dispatches reached Andros, and the dominion of New En- gland would not have been broken up by rebellious seces- sion. The orders of the Privy Council were duly forward- ed to Virginia, where William and Mary were promptly Virginia. proclaimed at Jamestown. The case of Maryland some- what resembled that of New England. Lord Baltimore, be- ing in London, received the Council's orders there, and in- structed his deputies in Maryland to proclaim the new sov- creigns. But his directions were delayed by accident or design, and in April John Coode headed a Protestant asso-
* Col. Doc., in., 581, 525; Chalmers, Rev. Col., i., Int., S., xi., 200 ; Annals, Il., 25.
Icconsist- rney of the B -ton re- volt.
affart Very
2) April.
1
£
557
SIR EDMUND ANDROS, GOVERNOR GENERAL.
ciation, which soon overthrew the proprietor's government, CHAr. XI. and carried on a usurped authority for some time with "predatory tyranny." Penn, who was also in England, re- 16S9. ceived similar orders, which, like Baltimore's, were not for- August. July. Maryland warded, and the goverment of Pennsylvania was adinin- and Penti- istered in the name of King James until the following No- sylvania. vember, when William and Mary were proclaimed."
When the first news of the revolution in England reach- February. ed New York, its provincial affairs were administered un- der Andros by Nicholson, the lieutenant governor, and the three royal resident counselors, Phillipse, Van Cortlandt, and Bayard. The other New York members of the Coun- cil were absent from the metropolis-Brockholls in Maine, Baxter in Albany, Younge at Southold, on Long Island, and Palmer near his chief in Massachusetts. Nicholson, the Nichol:co. lieutenant governor of the dominion of New England, was a soldier and a martinet, quick and irascible, a good subor- dinate, but hardly equal to responsible command ; natural- ly a sycophant ; professing to be a Protestant English Epis- copalian, yet not troubled by inconvenient sectarian seru- ples ; cheerfully kneeling among a Roman Catholic crowd while the popish mass was celebrated in the tent of King James, in his camp on Hounslow Heath, in the summer of 1686. This outward conformity to a ritual, which no gen- tleman accidentally present would refuse to accord, did not prove Nicholson to be a Roman Catholic. But it showed him to be a courtly English Episcopalian ; and his timely genuflection told against him now, when the most trivial circumstances were distorted by popular credulity. Over many a Delft-ware teacup in the little society of New York the rumor went from mouth to mouth ; and the verdict of the burghers and their wives, who compared notes every Sunday after hearing Domine Selyns expound the Heidel- burg Catechism in the Dutch church, was very damaging to the lieutenant governor's reputation as a good Protestant.
Frederick Phillipse, one of the royal counselors, with Phillipse. fourteen years' experience in the office, was only remarka-
* Chalmers'a Ann., i., 373, 374, 381-384, 431, 651, 667 ; ii., 13-20, 37, 38; Rev. Col., i., 202 -006; Burk, ji., 306, 307 ; Anderson's Col. Church, il., 991, 382, 400, 401 ; Doc. Hist. N. Y., il., 19, 95, 126, 140, 150; David's Day Star, ST-105: Peun. Col. Rec., i., 301-305, 341 ; Proud, 1., 345 ; Dixon, 202, 268 ; Grahame, it., 50, 31, 365-350 ; Bancroft, ii., 245 ; iii., 30, 81; An-
. dros Tracts, ii., 275; ante, 537.
HISTORY OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK.
Dayerd.
Bayard's captains
roy. ... ble for being the richest and the dullest man in New York. Stephen van Cortlandt, another counselor, was the mayor of the metropolis, and a brother-in-law of Peter Schuyler, the mayor of Albany. Being a gentleman, he was reputed to be an aristocrat, and his genial sacrifice of hat and wig the last August at the city carouse for the birth of the Prince of Wales marked him as a very loyal Conservative. Nicholas Bayard, the third resident royal counselor, was a nephew of Stuyvesant, and, like Phillipse and Van Cort- landt, was an opulent man, according to the modest stand- ard of those days. He had long official experience, and. 1 having served as mayor, was now colonel of the city regi- ment of train-bands, of which the captains were Abraham de Peyster, Johannes de Bruyn, Gabriel Minvielle, Charles Lodwyck, Nicholas W. Stuyvesant, and Jacob Leisler. For more than twenty years Bayard and Van Cortlandt had been elders and deacons of the Reformed Dutch Church, of which their more quiet colleague Phillipse was also a communicant. With Nicholson, these were the three Prot- estant citizens who governed New York in subordination to the governor general of the dominion of New England."
96 Apel.
Seeing that the news of the landing of the Prince of Or- ange in England " troubled the Papists very much," Nich- olson and his council, being " jealous" of Plowman, the Ro- Anteset man Catholic collector, ordered him to bring the public moneys in his hands, amounting to nearly twelve hundred pounds, into the fort, "in a strong chest made on purpose." The next month "the surprising news" of the insurrection at Boston, and the imprisonment of Andros, reached New York by Ensign Vesey, of Braintree. Had the governor succeeded in his attempt to embark in the Rose frigate, and come in her to the metropolis, the course of events would have been very different. His vigor and experience would certainly have prevented what followed in New York. But Nicholson and his three counselors, without instructions from their imprisoned chief, in great consternation direct- ed Mayor Van Cortlandt to convene the Aldermen and Common Council of the city, " to advise together what best is to be done for his Majesty's service, and the quieting of
* Col. Doc .. iff., 534. 589, 645, 650 ; Doc. Hist., ii., 4, 17, 244; Hutch. Masz., i., 285; N. Y. II. S. Coll. (1SC3), 203; ante, 451, 516, 549,
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559
FRANCIS NICHOLSON, LIEUTENANT GOVERNOR.
the inhabitants of this place, in this dangerous conjuncture CHAP. XI. and troublesome time." The next day it was reported that France was at war with England and Holland, and the mi- 1689. litia officers were called into council. By this " General 27 April. Conven- Convention for the Province of New York," it was resolved tion of offi- that the city should be fortified. As half the regular sol- cers called. diers in the garrison had been sent to Maine, Nicholson, " to prevent all manner of doubt and jealousies," himself pro- posed that a part of the city militia should mount guard in the fort. The inhabitants accordingly took their turns in 28 April. watching, under the command of Colonel Bayard. As there was no time to lay taxes, and as the merchants began "to dispute the customs," Nicholson also proposed that the rev- enue from the first of May should be applied to the city 20 April. Fortifica- fortifications ; and this " was thankfully accepted of." The tions, person who showed the greatest dislike to this arrangement was Captain Leisler, who, having a cargo of wine on board a ship, the customs on which amounted to a hundred pounds, refused to pay any duty, alleging that Collector Plowman, " being a papist, was not qualified to receive it, denying the then power to be legal." The justices and military officers Justices of Kings, Queens, Westchester, Richmond, and Bergen coun- ed. summon- ties, and Colonel Andrew Hamilton, of New Jersey, having been summoned, all appeared, and "promised to do their endeavour to keep the people in peace." A watchman was stationed at Coney Island, to give an alarm if more than three ships together should come within Sandy Hook. Let- ters were also written to Albany and Ulster, recommending 30 April. the officers there to keep the people in peace and exercise the militia. The nearest royal counselors of the dominion, Winthrop, Treat, Allyn, Younge, Pynchon, and others, were Royal counselors invited to come to New York and assist with their advice. donotcome from other But none came ; and none wrote answers except Smith, colosies. Clarke, and Newberry, of Rhode Island."
Nicholson and his three associate counselors now dis- patched a letter of condolence to Andros at Boston, and 1 May. asked him to send back the New York records. They also letter tothe Boston reb- wrote to the "Gentlemen" in power there, hoping "that his els.
* Col. Doc., ill .. 575, 576, 591, 522, 636, 637, 630, 610, 667, GAS, 725: iv., 200 ; Doc. Ilist., ii., 17. 13. 029. 944, 945; Whitehead's Last Jersey, 122 ; Hutch. Masz., i., SSA, note; N. Y. M. S. Coll. (1565), 243-243; ante, 552.
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HISTORY OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK.
.ate. At. Excellency and the rest of the officers may be restored to their former stations, or at least have liberty to come hith- er. For this part of the Government, we find the people in general inclined to peace and quietness, and doubt not the people will remain in their duties." This was certain- ly a reasonable request of the lieutenant governor. Al- though Massachusetts insurgents had overthrown the gov- ernment of Andros within the old borders of that colony, they had no right to prevent him from exercising his com- mission within the rest of the dominion of New England, and especially in New York, which desired his presence. But those insurgents well knew that if the governor gener- al should resume his authority in Fort James, there would be an end to New England " secession." So Bradstreet and Winthrop, in behalf of the Massachusetts " Committee of Safety," wrote back to Lieutenant Governor Nicholson and his New York counselors that Sir Edmund would not be released, and they inclosed a printed copy of Mather's declaration of 18 April as the justification of their action."
11 May. Baton reb- ris trucu-
This Boston "Declaration" had already excited the New York people at the eastern end of Long Island. The coun- ty of Suffolk displaced their civil and military officers and chose others. Queens and Westchester did the same. Word now came to them from Leisler that Nicholson meant to betray the fort at New York "to a foreign power." So delegates from Southampton, Easthampton, and Hunting- ton were sent to New York, " to demand the Fort to be de- livered into the hands of such persons as the country shall choose." The Long Island militia who had been with Don- gan at Albany now became clamorous for their pay, and some eighty of them met in arms at Jamaica. The New York city men who had been drafted did the same, and the Council ordered all to be paid off, which quieted the up- Nicholson. roar. The delegates from Suffolk were told that each coun- ty might send a man or two to join with the authorities in New York, and letters were accordingly dispatched to in- vite them ; " but none came."+
S May.
and tionb- led by Bos-
S May. Artion of 11 May,
The lieutenant governor and his associate counselors now * Col. Dec., iii., 592, 640; Hatch. Masa., i., 393-396 ; Force's Tracts, iv., No. 10, 6-13; N. Y. I. S. Coll. (1865). 230, 251; Hist. Mag., v1., 10-14; ante, 551.
t Col. Doc., ill., 523, 577, 502. 609; Doc. Ilist., ii., 227; Wood, 109, 110; Hutch. Masz., i., CS5, note; N. Y. H. S. Coll. (1809), 252, 230 ; (ISGO), 247, 24S.
561
FRANCIS NICHOLSON, LIEUTENANT GOVERNOR.
wrote to the British secretary of state and the Plantation CHAP. XI. Committee, regretting the want of intelligence from En- 1689. gland ; describing the rebellious secession of Massachusetts, 15 May. Rhode Island, and Connecticut from the king's dominion ; Nicholson's report to and declaring that, although "the seed of sedition had been William. blown from thence to some of the outward skirts of this Province," and that " libels and falsehoods" had been prop- agated from Boston against Sir Edmund Andros, which would excite the Canadians to ruin "all the English settle- ments on this continent," yet that New York, although de- prived of "its free course of justice" by the imprisonment of Judge Palmer at Boston, and deploring its fatal annex- ation to New England, was "inclined to rest at peace and quiet 'till orders do arrive." These letters were intrusted to John Riggs, " a servant of Sir Edmund Andros," who, coming from Boston to New York, was persuaded by Nich- olson to convey them at once to England. Riggs was ac- Riggs and companied thither by the Jesuit Father John Smith, who England. had performed the service of his church under Dongan.
But Innis, the Episcopalian chaplain at Fort James, not instructed by his bishop, continued to read the authorized prayers of his religious " denomination" for the Prince of Wales ; and that the dethroned King of England might be victorious over his enemies."
George Wedderborne now came from Boston to New 18 May. York, with verbal instructions from the imprisoned govern- verbal or- Andros's or general of New England, directing Lieutenant Governor Nicholson. dery to
Nicholson to intimate to the Council " the unjust proceed- ings of the people in Boston, by keeping his Excelleney pris- oner, and the other gentlemen, upon frivolous pretences of their own, without any shadow of reason ;" and desiring that Councilors Hamilton, of New Jersey, and Smith, of Long Island, should be sent "to Boston, with commission to demand his Excellency and the other gentlemen to be at liberty, that they may come amongst you." But Hamilton and Smith both excused themselves from going to Boston 22 May. on a fruitless journey, because " they did think it not ad- visable in these dangerous times to act any further, for fear it would bring" New York " in actual rebellion." So Nich-
' Col. Doc., fli .. 374-576, 585. 593, 633, 547 ; Doc. III-t., il., 244; N. Y. II. S. Coll. (1969), 27, 20, 253-966 ; Andres Tracts; Chalmers's Ann., 1., 591; ii., 27, 29 ; Palfrey, iii., 5:5, 550.
II .-- NON
Smith goto
HISTORY OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK.
warst dem and his council, " seeing the uproars in all parts of the Government," thought it "most safe to forbear acting in the premises till they see the minds of the people better satisfied and quieted." The citizens of New York contin- ned meanwhile to work on her fortifications, under the di- rection of Colonel Bayard, until one Joost Stoll, an ensign 2: May. of Captain Leisler's company, and some others, presented to their commanding officer an " unsigned and ill penned" petition demanding that all papists should be disarmed. It was also noised about that Staten Island was full of roam- Lother in New York. ing papists, who threatened to burn the metropolis; that discharged Irish soldiers were coming from Boston to garrison Fort James; and that Dongan had fitted out an armed brigantine " for some warlike design." No explana- tions would satisfy the aroused populace of New York. There were ridiculously few Roman Catholics living in the province ; and only seven disbanded soldiers came from Boston, who, with the others in the citadel, made twenty- two in all, among whom were some " old cripples." But. to avoid all jealousies," Ensign Russell, of Fort James, and Major Baxter, who had come down from Albany, being avowed Roman Catholics, were suspended from their com- 1:1-4 1! mands and allowed to leave the province. Baxter went at once to join Dongan, who was staying in the "Neversincks," at the house of Captain Andrew Bowne, of Monmouth, in East New Jersey, preparing to sail for England in his brig- antinc."
Brauer and xung nded.
The crisis was at hand in New York. Hitherto there had been little or no sectarian intolerance within the pror- ince. Certainly its preponderating Protestantism was in je parle no danger from the sparse Roman Catholics who shared with others its long-cherished freedom of conscience. Yet their presence in New York was made the excuse for the events which followed. The example of Massachusetts, in scceding from the royal government of New England, had doubtless some influence. But the leading idea in New York was intense devotion to its old stadtholder, the Prince of Orange, who had delivered England from her Roman Catholic king. There was no suggestion of misgovernment
' Col. Doc .. iff., 593, 632. 637, 640; Dee. Ilist., f., 4, 16, 17, 18, 214 ; N. Y. H. S. ColL. (1935), 203-267, 284-256; Col. Rec. Comn .. it, 4/1; Whitehead's E. J., 133; ante, 5 7.
i 1
1
563
FRANCIS NICHOLSON, LIEUTENANT GOVERNOR.
against Nicholson and his counselors in New York, as there CHar. XI. had been against Andros and his counselors at Boston. New York did not want a sectarian oligarchy, as did Massachu- 1689. setts. But her Dutch people were so honestly attached to William that they doubted the sincerity of the officials of the dethroned James, although those officials were all Prot- estants -- Nicholson an Episcopalian, and Phillipse, Bay- Excess of ard, and Van Cortlandt members of the Dutch Church.
religious feeling.
In popular movements trifles become momentous. Hen- ry Cuyler, the lieutenant of Captain De Peyster's militia company, whose turn it was to do duty at Fort James, or- dered one of his men to stand as a sentinel at the sally- 30 May. port. The sergeant of the regular soldiers in garrison ob- jected that the lieutenant governor had given no such direc- tions. Upon Nicholson's return, late at night, the incident was reported, and Cuyler was summoned to attend him in his bedchamber. Irritated at this breach of military disci- pline, the lieutenant governor demanded, " Who is com- Nicholson mander in this Fort, you or 1?" Cuyler answered that he insulted. had acted under Captain De Peyster's orders. In a pas- sion, Nicholson replied, "I would rather see the town on fire than be commanded by you," and -- seeing in his cham- ber a stalwart corporal, Henry Jacobsen, who had accom- panied his lieutenant thither as interpreter, with a drawn sword-he seized a pistol, and ordered them both ont. The next morning the story was buzzed all over town, with the 31 May. usual vulgar exaggeration. It was reported and generally The story ní-repre- believed that the lieutenant governor had threatened to Ser York sonted in burn New York, and it was added that he meant to mas- sacre those of its inhabitants who should come to worship in the Dutch church in the fort the next Sunday. The ab- surdity of this rumor seemed to give it greater currency. No contradiction could satisfy the people. They would have it that Nicholson and his Dutch counselors werc all "Papists." The flight of James from England, it was ar- gued, had destroyed " all manner of Government" in New York, and there were not wanting noisy demagogues to work up popular credulity with the scoundrel industry of political adventurers of their class .*
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