USA > New York > Kings County > Gravesend > History of the town of Gravesend, N.Y. > Part 9
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Bay, whence they might get a conveyance to Fulton ferry and New York. This the Johnsons did, and returned to Barren Island without unnecessary delay ; and, proceeding to the spot described by Brownrigg (and to which they had gone in the early morning with Wansley to get some clothes left there), they dug ap the specie, removed it to another hiding place remote from its first location; and. by walking in the water, effaced all traces of the direction they had taken.
Meanwhile, Gibbs and his party were bargaining with Samuel Leonard, the hotel-keeper at Sheepshead Bay, when suddenly, in the presence of all, Brownrigs, declaring that he would go no further with them. de- nounced his companions as pirates and murderers, and unfolded the whole story of the Vineyard's fate. Wansley incontinently took to his heels to the woods. and Gibbs and Dawes were seized and bound by the num-keeper and his people; and Justice John Van Dyke was summoned, who promptly issued warrants for the arrest of the pirates. The one constable of the village found his hands full in guarding Gibbs and Dawes; and so Robert Greenwood, of Sheepshead Bay, volun- teered to go into the woods and look up Wansley. After an hour's scarch he found the negro, and present- ing a huge pistol, ordered him to fall on his face and cross his hands behind his back. Wansley submitted. and Greenwood, sitting astride of him, tied his hands securely, ordered him to arise, and marched him back to Leonard's hotel. After the negro had been thoroughly secured, his captor showed him the pistol (utterly desti- tute of either lock or load), with the remark that it " was just as good's any other if you knowed how to use it." Gibbs, Wausley, and Dawes were then lodged in the county jail at Flatbush.
The Johnsons had been none too quick in securing the $5,000; for, scarcely had they regained their home, when Squire Van Dyke, with Brownrigg as guide, ap- peared on the scene, and going right to the spot where the money had been deposited the day before, found it gone ! Brownrigg was then sent to join the others at Flatbush ; and from thence they were remanded to New York Bridewell. Indictments being found against Gibbs and Wansley, they were tried, and convicted on the testimony of Brownrigg and Dawes; and on the 11th of March, 1831, were sentenced to be hung ; sentence being carried into effect on the 22d of April following.
John and Win. Johnson, apprehensive of further search being made for the money, made no haste to get it home. In a day or two they were visited by agents of the insurance companies and an officer, who not only searched for the money on the beach, but thoroughly ransacked the Johnson abode from garret to cellar, without success. Having, finally, as they thought. ein- ded the vigilance of the law, John Johnson and wife planned to get possession of it without the assistance of William. Accordingly, one night, while the latter was
39
THE TRAGEDY OF THE BRIG VINEYARD.
asleep, they stole out and unearthed the treasure, and reinterred it in two parcels, one of 83,400, the other of about $1,600. Knowing how closely William would scan the beach when he discovered his loss, they made only the slightest mark to designate the new place of deposit on Pelican Beach, by tying knots on the long sedge-grass, which could be seen only by the closest scrutiny. William's indignation, when he discovered the loss, was intense ; his suspicions fell upon his broth- er, and going to New York, he informed the insurance companies, who entered suit against John for recovery of the money. The trial, which was held before Judge Dean, in the Apprentices Library, in Brooklyn, ended in John's acquittal, for want of sufficient evidence. IIe then removed to Brooklyn, and William to Canarsie. But, when John went to look for his deposit, he found only the larger sum. A high tide had swept over the site of the other ; the action of the waves had loosened the knots in the sedge-grass, and the $1,600 was lost to him forever ! In 1842 the Skidmore family, living on " Ruffle Bar," concluded to remove their house, in sec- tions, to a new site on the shore of Dooley's Bay, Bar- ren. Island. The house was accordingly taken down piecemeal, and most of it carried across the bay and piled up near its future site. The moving was not quite completed on the day appointed. On the foun- dation of their old home had been left the wooden ceil- ing of an upper chamber, in one piece or section. During the night a violent storm drove the tide up to an unprecedented height; and, in the morning, when Jacob Skidmore arose, he was surprised to find that his chamber-ceiling had been brought over by the tide, from Ruffle Bar to Dooley's Bay, without injury. Anx- ious to learn whether any other of his property had gone farther west, he proceeded along the northerly, or inside, shore of Pelican Beach, which then had become separated by a small inlet, shallow enough to be forded at low-tide, but at high-tide floating skiffs through it from the ocean to Dooley's Bay. The eastern part of Pelican Beach then had a ridge of sand-hills, while the western was as flat and level as the whole of it is now. Arrived at these sand-hills, from whence to get a view of the surrounding country, he saw none of his lumber ; and, acceding to the suggestion of his com- panion, Mr. Loring, hurried back so as to cross the in- let before the tide got too high. Taking a last look, as they did so, they noticed the shore or occan-side of Pelican Beach much washed away, and also saw his neighbors, Willett Smith and Henry Brewer, approach- ing. Smith and Brewer emme on easterly until they reached the spot where John Johnson and wife had last buried the $1,600; and here, by the storm over night, the silver dollars had been uncovered, and lay scattered along the beach. The two men lost no time in filling pockets and boots, and carried away all they could; but they could not keep their good luck to themselves, and in a day or two business was almost entirely
suspended in Gravesend, and every man who could got to Pelican Beach. The intense excitement only gradually subsided when a succeeding storm placed the location of the " find" so far to sea as to be absolutely beyond further search.
Modern Development of Coney Island .- About the year 1844 Messrs. Eddy and Hart, two New York gentlemen, leased a portion of the western part of Coney Island, and on it built a large circular platform, over which an enormous tent was erected, and the " Pavilion" at Coney Island Point sprang into existence. A dock, or wharf, was built just north of the westerly part of Coney Island, and a number of bathing-houses built on the southern shore of the Point. This was the com- meneement of what has since become familiar to many of the residents of New York and vicinity as " Norton's Point." Prior to this occupancy by Messrs. Eddy and Hart, this spot had been the home of Gilbert Hicks, who succeeded Henry Brown, the sole occupant of this part of Coney Island at about the close of the Revolu- tionary war. When Messrs. Eddy and Hart started their enterprise, Cropsey and Woglom were proprietors of one of the only two hotels of Coney Island-the ". Coney Island House," built by the Coney Island Road and Bridge Company. The other was owned and managed by that patriarch of Coney Island, John Wyckoff, Sr., formerly school-master of Gravesend, afterward hotel- keeper opposite the church in Gravesend, from whence he removed with his wife and family to Coney Island, and built what, with additions, soon enjoyed a most en- viable reputation as " Wyckoff's Hotel." The Pavilion, Wyckoff's, and the Coney Island House, with the excep- tion of the two farm-houses on the respective farms- into which the arable land had been divided-the Van Sicklen and the Voorhies farm-houses, constituted the whole of the residences on the island. But the day of development was drawing nigh; and, when Daniel Mor- rell, the toll-gatherer on the " shell-road," counted three hundred vehicles of a warm fourth of July (Sunday) driving to Coney Island, many of the staid, good peo- ple of Gravesend bewailed the existence of a place whose attractions caused such wholesale Sabbath- breaking.
In October, 1847, Dr. Allen Clarke, seeing the de- sirability of Coney Island as a summer resort, bought a piece of ground of Mr. Court Van Sieklen (by giv- ing a mortgage on it), and, just north of the Coney Island Honse, the " Oceanic" was erected, run for a season, and burned down. It was said it caught fire accidentally, and some people believed it. The property passed into the hands of Judge John Vanderbilt, who built another-a larger and a better hotel-on the site of the former, and it became a very fashionable resort; but, after a few years of varying success, it shared the connon fate of sea-side resorts-it burned down. The premises are now incorporated with those of the old Coney Island House.
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40
HISTORY OF THE TOWN OF GRAVESEND.
Another step in the development of the island was taken when Mr. Partridge, the owner of the Dye Wood Mills below Unionville, interested himself in the scheme of a railroad from Coney Island across the creek over West Meadow Bank, along "the twelve morgen," through the villages of Bath and New Utrecht, and along the new plank-road to the "new," or Fifth avenue, en- trance, to Greenwood cemetery. After many and vex- atious delays, toils and troubles, on the part of its pro- moters, The Brooklyn, Bath and Coney Island Railroad, as its incorporators called it-the "Dummy Road," as it was known to the public generally-was opened to travel. In the meanwhile Mr. Stephen H. Bogart had erected, at its Coney Island terminus, a hotel, elegant for its day and generation, which was called the "Tivoli." But Mr. Bogart died, and the hotel shared the common fate of large sea-side hotels-it burned down.
Another impetus to the development of Coney Island was the completion of the "horse-car" route to Coney Island-down the old Coney Island road, as Coney Island avenue was then called; and the building of the restaurant on Coney Island, so long kept by George Green.
About the year 1868 Mr. William A. Engeman con- ceived the idea of purchasing the interests of the two or three hundred heirs of the persons to whom, in 1766, the thirty-nine lots comprising the middle or sonthern division of Coney Island had been allotted; and, by gathering together, in his own ownership, the shreds and patches of interests, divided, subdivided and again subdivided (until in many cases the resources of arith- metical calculation were severely tasked to determine just how little any one particular person owned), to thus ultimately acquire a property on which he could erect a great family home and house. This task, it may readily be imagined, was far more easy of conception than of exeention. Many a person of less indomitable perseverance than Mr. ENGEMAN would have quailed under the difficulties attending the making of searches (in most instances amounting to complete genealogies) of thirty-nine families for one and one-fourth centuries back ; and whose members were scattered not only throughout the various States of the Union, but some of whom had found homes in such far off places as the Sandwich Islands. Energy, perseverance, and well- directed, intelligent industry, however, finally unrar- : elled the twisted mazes of family-ties, hunted for and found the scattered members, negotiated for and pur- chased their interests; and, as usual, success crowned well-directed, persistent efforts. Mr. Engeman had passed through many sad and bitter experiences in life. and found in the excitement attending this undertak- ing a relief from oppressive and alnost unsupportable ? reflections.
erty, the Brighton Hotel. property, and the Bathing Pavilion, taking in all the ground between that of Manhattan Beach and the common lands of the town of Gravesend. The Ocean Hotel was built, and in a quiet, respectable family sea-side hotel, refined guests found an agreeable relief from the noise and hubbub which even then had begun to pervade the more west- ern part of the island.
In the meanwhile the other parts of the island were beginning to feel the impetus which was crowding Coney Island into prominence as a competitor for- the patronage of the seaside-loving population of the metropolis and suburbs, in the heated summiner terms. Settlements of restaurants, lager-beer-saloons and bathing-establishments began to spring up with unwonted activity ; at first in the immediate neighbor- hood of the railroad termini, and soon from thence spreading, laterally, along-shore on either side, till, in a few years, the entire beach front was thickly studded with these aspirants for public favor. These buildings were not of the elaborate nature characteristic of the more pretentious "pavilions " of to-day. Far from it. Most of them were rude, unplaned boxes, having a door with a hole in it for light, and each furnished inside with a couple of hat-and-coat-hooks, a rude bench, and a pail of water for rinsing the feet after the bath. But they were the pioneers to what has since become a vast business during the heated days of the summer.
Then, a law was passed providing for the opening and grading of Gravesend avenue, at the expense of the holders of property on both sides of it; and the Pros- pect Park and Coney Island Railroad (Culver's) took it, without paying for it, as the location of their road. Naturally, the property-holders felt indignant at thus being compelled to open and grade a road at their own expense for a railroad company; and not even the admitted fact that this railroad is altogether the best managed and operated of all the roads to Coney Island, has enabled it to overcome this feeling.
The building of this railroad; its hotel, long known as "Cable's," at its shore terminus; the purchase, and the re-erection on Coney Island, of one of the observatories erected at the Philadelphia Centennial Exhibition, as an "observatory;" and latterly, its magnificent depot. have all combined to make this place a center of attrac- tion to a vast multitude to whom the low rate of fares charged is by no means a source of mis-comfort.
Next was the building of the Ocean Parkway, that magnificent highway from Prospect Park to the sea. (See page 172). This Ocean Parkway, and its lateral or shore branch, called the Concourse, all aided in help- ing Coney Island to a place in the public estimation.
While John I. Snedeker was host of the "Oceanic Hotel" on Coney Island (for so the old " Coney Island was a wealthy New York banker, whose sick infant
The premises were purchased, and comprise what is | House" was christened in later years), among his guests now known as the Fair Grounds, the Ocean Hotel prop-
41
MODERN DEVELOPMENT OF CONEY ISLAND.
had been ordered to be taken to the seaside for the benefit of the pure air. This gentleman, impressed with the healthfulness of the place, in a casual conver- sation with the host one evening, requested the latter to ascertain whether any property could be purchased in the vicinity, as he was anxious to purchase in so sa- lubrious a situation. Mr. Snedeker accordingly made enquiry in the village-store at Gravesend, and was di- rected to William H. Stillwell, whose long resi- dence and position as a resident civil-engineer and sur- veyor had placed him in a position to be especially fa- miliar with lands and titles in that section. This re- sulted in an interview between the latter and the bank- er, one Saturday evening, at the hotel; when the former called the attention of the latter to a tract of land which might possibly be purchased, and the next after- noon the two visited the locality. This banker was Austin Corbin, Esq., and the spot shown was "The Sedge Bank," since become famous as " Manhattan Beach." The banker, pleased with the location, took immediate steps to purchase the property, which was successfully accomplished by the agency of the other, without unnecessary loss of time, and forms the site of the Manhattan and Oriental Hotels, and the vast tract on which they are located ..
While the Manhattan Beach property was being de- veloped, the consolidation of the two railroad enter- prises produced the Brooklyn, Flatbush and Coney Is- land Railway Company (or, as it is more familiarly known, the Brighton Beach Railroad), whose hotel, so widely known, is located on a part of the "middle di- vision," purchased of Mr. Engeman, and is too well known to need particular description.
In 1878 a company was organized with Jacob Loril- lard, of New York city, as president, who purchased a lease held by William A. Engeman, of a shorc-front lot of land on Coney Island; contracted with the Dela- ware Bridge Company to build the iron pier on the site of the old one built by Mr. Engeman, and the present elegant structure is the result of their labor and in- vested capital.
While all the tracts known as the " Middle " or " En- geman's " division, and the " Sedge Bank " or " Eastern division," now Manhattan Beach, are, and have been, confessedly and concededly, private property for at least a century and a quarter ; the ownership of the remainder of the island, from a line drawn a short dis- tance easterly of the Ocean Parkway, has not been un- disputed. There are two essentially different and dis- tinct theories in relation to this matter, the proper solution of whichi depends entirely on the language of the original grants.
The original charter of Governor Kieft of 1645, and of which all the other and subsequent charters are con- firmatory, grants " To the Honoured Lady Deborah Moody, Sir Henry Moody, Barronnett. Sorg ant James Hubbard, Ensigne George Baster, their associates
heirs, executors, administrators, successors and assigns, or any they should join in association with them," a certain quantity or parcel of land, etc., etc.
Was this grant of these lands made to the town as a corporation, or to the individuals as tenants in com- mon ? If to the foriner, then so much of it as has not been heretofore set off in severalty, and assigned to in- dividuals, belongs to the town as a corporation ; while, if to the latter, then the heirs of these are the owners of so much of it as they or their ancestors have not divided as tenants in common. This latter class are usually known as the "patentee " party, and the former as the "town" party. The arguments used by each are not without weight ; and, in view of the enormous value of the property involved-a property which makes Gravesend probably the wealthiest town in the State-not without interest. The "town " party claim:
1. That the grant was made to the corporation, who, at their town-meetings, divided so much of it from time to time as their convenience required, and whatever was not so divided was retained by the corporation.
2. That all divisions and allotments of lands were made either in town-meetings or by authority of them.
3. That every known division of land is entered on the town-books as an act of the town.
4. That the town has shown from the first an unin- terrupted possession, passing repeated orders for the eare and management of them.
On the other or " patentee " side of the question, it is claimed that the grant was made to the individuals as tenants-in-common ; for
1. The charter authorized the persons therein named to form a town-it did not create, but authorized the grantees to create, a town. This implied an action by the grantees subsequent to the granting of the authority to act. The town was to be formed by the people who had received authority to form it-consequently the town could have had no existence at the time the authority to form it was given, and therefore the grant could not have been made to the town. It did not ex- ist when the grant was made.
2. The grant is made to certain persons "and any they (that is the grantees) should join in association " with them. That is, not any who should come to reside there-not all who should join them-but only those whom the original patentces should elect-should ac- cept-" should join in association with them."
3. The manifest propriety that they who had braved the toil, privations and hardship of settling a new colony, should possess that to which their time and labor had given a valne.
4. That all divisions of lands were uniformly into thirty-nine parts, or shares corresponding to the nmn- ber of original patentees-although these divisions. some sixteen in number, covered a period from 1643 (the first) to this (the date of the last division of land).
5. That their title as tenants in common in and to the
42
HISTORY OF THE TOWN OF GRAVESEND.
undivided lands, is equally as good as to the land divided-the source of title being the same in either case.
6. That although these divisions were made at town- meetings, they were so made merely as matters of con- venience, not of necessity ; and some of these meetings are expressly stated to be meetings of the proprietors; as for instance the meeting at which the arable lands on Guisbert's Island is decided to be divided, is ex- pressly declared to be a meeting " of the owners of the rights," etc.
The above is believed to be a fair statement of the case. It is proper to add that the representatives of both sides have, all along, maintained and acted on their convictions with considerable pertinacity. While the town, through various officers, has, from time to time, rented the lands ; on two occasions, at least, in 1814 and 1820, they divided all accrued rentals up to these dates respectively, among the representatives of the patentees. Wenote, also, that the records show frequent sales of "rights " and "thirty- ninths " in the individ- ual commonage, and devises of the same ; and that, at no time, has a proposition arisen for a sale of any of these lands, without an active protest against such action on the part of a corporation, looked upon as merely a trus- tee for private parties.
of the fee of the premises sought to be acquired; that the town, as their trustee, had collected rents and ex- ercised acts of ownership for so long a period that the corporation bad come to be looked on as the owner of the tract. They were joined as parties, and had the Emigration Commissioners succeeded in the scheme, a desperate legal warfare respecting the ownership of the price paid, would undoubtedly have ensned. This was avoided, however, by the Commissioners of Ap- praisal, in their report of the value of the property, placing so high an estimate on it as to far exceed the appropriation therefor, had the latter been tenfold larger than it was. And the Quarantine Commissioners abandoned the attempt of wresting from the town its most valuable property.
In 1879 Mr. William A. Engeman, one of the pioneers of Coney Island, opened a mile-track upon land which he owned at the island. It is known as the Brighton
SEA SIDE HOMEFOR CHILDREN
THE SEA-SIDE HOME FOR CHILDREN, WEST BRIGHTON BEACH, CONEY ISLAND.
Notably was this feel- ing manifested when, some years since, the Quarantine Commis- sioners of the State of New York undertook to avail themselves of the opportunity which the Legislature of the State had afforded them, of selecting Coney Island Point (Norton's Point) as a site for a quarantine estab- lishment. The Legislature had passed an act appropri- ating $50,000 toward the purchase of a site to be selected by the Quarantine Commissioners, who were also allowed to take the same, if agreement as to price could not be arrived at, by virtue of " the right of eminent domain." Of course no agreement looking to a sale of part of Coney Island for a nominal sumn to a corporation who would so use it as to destroy the value of the remainder, could be arrived at; and the Court appointed Commis- sioners to appraise the value of the lands proposed to be taken. No sooner had the initiative steps herein been taken, than a large number of persons appeared and insisted on being made parties to the proceedings; alleging that they, with others, were the rightful owners
Beach Fair Grounds. It contains a grand stand, and other adjunets considered necessary for sporting pur- poses. The meetings are continued all summer, and it is considered quite popular among the sporting frater- nity. It is the sole property of Mr. Engeman, and is very valuable.
The Sea-Side Home for Children .- The Brook- lyn Children's Aid Society is doing a noble work here during the summer months, of which a full account will be found under the head of Charitable Institutions of the City of Brooklyn.
Sea-Side Sanitarium .- After two years' effort, The Children's Aid Society of New York, have sue- ceeded in leasing lot No. 37, at Coney Island. for the purpose of erecting a sea-side sanitarimin. They pro- pose erecting a beautiful building ; which they are en- abled to do by the gift of $10,000 from Mr. D. Willis James, of New York.
43
PAUL BAUER'S WEST BRIGHTON HOTEL.
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