USA > New York > New York City > Leslie's history of the greater New York, Volume I > Part 25
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HISTORY OF THE GREATER NEW YORK.
Carleton could hardly have permitted such a gross breach of decorum not only, but of faith. The flag must have been promptly hauled down at noon. But some over-zealous loyalist may have ent the lines. and greased the pole. A young sailor by the name of Van Arsdale soon found a way out of the dilemma; procuring nails and cleats he hammered and clambered his way up, rigged a new set of halyards. and as the stars and stripes, thirteen of each at that time. were hanled aloft, thirteen guns saluted the emblem of independence, and shouts and huzzas from the thousands of spectators and sokliers supplemented the more military honors. A few days later due honors were paid also to the civic authorities in the person of the Governor of the State. Governor Clinton, accompanied by Washington. re-
CIVIC RECEPTION TO WASHINGTON AND CLINTON.
paired to Bull's Head Tavern on the Bowery Road, near where the Bowery Theater (now the Thalia) stood later. A party of citizens on horseback assembled at Bowling Green, and with General Knox at their head rode to the Bull's Head. At the Tea Water Pump (corner of Roosevelt Street and Park Row) a party of persons on foot awaited them, and joined the procession. They formed in open ranks near the tavern, and Governor Clinton and Washington rode in between them. At the same time a large number of returned exiles had formed into a procession and marched between the ranks of the citizens. Eight persons on horseback and as many on foot preceded the Governor and General, who were also flanked by citizens mounted and on foot. Thus they marched down the Bowery, into Park Row, into Pearl to
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Wall and back to Broadway and the City Hotel (Cape's Tavern). On December 5, Admiral Digby, with the last of the troops and loyalist refugees on board his fleet, left the anchorage off Staten Island in the Lower Bay, and the last vestige of British occupation was removed from the sight and hearing of New York people.
And by that time they had also seen the last of Washington as Commander-in-Chief of the patriot army. After the military and civic receptions he had taken up his abode at his favorite hostelry on the corner of Broad and Pearl (Queen) streets, Sam Fraunce's Tavern. Here in the " Long Room," still preserved (although slight- ly the worse for the smell of beer at present), he called his officers together on December 4, 1783, for a word of farewell. In several books one may read Colonel Tallmadge's description of the heart- rending scene, and no summary can do justice to this vivid account of one who saw and felt all that belonged to the important occasion. It will therefore bear repetition here:
" We had been assembled but a few moments when his Excellency entered the room. His emotion, too strong to be concealed, seemed to be reciprocated by every officer present. . After partaking of a slight refreshment in almost breathless silence, the General filled his glass with wine, and turning to the officers said: . With a heart full of love and gratitude I now take leave of you. I most devoutly wish that your latter days may be as prosperous and happy as your former ones have been glorious and honorable.' After the officers had taken a glass of wine the General added : . I cannot come to each of yon, but shall feel obliged if each of you will come and take me by the hand.' General Knox being nearest to him, turned to the Com- mander-in-Chief, who, suffused in tears, was incapable of utterance. but grasped his hand, when they embraced each other in silence. In the same affectionate manner every officer in the room marched up to, kissed, and parted with his General-in-Chief. Such a scene of sorrow and weeping I had never before witnessed, and hope I may never be called upon to witness again. Not a word was uttered to break the solemn silence that prevailed, or to interrupt the tender- ness of the interesting scene. The simple thought that we were abont to part from the man who had conducted us through a long and bloody war, and under whose conduct the glory and independence of our country had been achieved. and that we should see his face no more in this world, seemed to me utterly insupportable." When the last hand had been pressed in this silent farewell Washington waved a final adien to the company and left the room, followed by the officers. A line of soldiers was drawn up on either side of the way from the tavern to the Whitehall Slip near by, where the depart- ing chief took his barge. As he seated himself and the barge moved away toward Elizabethtown, the General took off his hat and waved a farewell to the multitudes crowding the shores and the tops of the
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HISTORY OF THE GREATER NEW YORK.
neighboring honses. And thus for New York closed the last scene in the eventful history of the War of the Revolution.
Its position in the hands of the enemy throughout nearly the entire extent of that war, had been peculiarly trying. The fire of 1776 had swept desolation over no small part of it, and while removing many inferior honses had also robbed the city of Trinity Church and other fine structures both public and private. Over a large portion of the burned district the stricken housekeepers had been reduced to a curi- ons device for want of funds to rebuild. They stretched canvas over the pieces of wall that remained standing, and covered up the gaping holes where doors and windows had been with the same ma- terial. This gave this section of the city, running along the east side of Whitehall Street to Beaver, and west of Broadway near and above Rector, the significant name of " Canvastown," and not being of a savory reputation, the name became of somewhat the same force as that of " Five Points " at a later day, a haunt of crime and vice, a rendezvous and hiding-place of thieves and thugs.
The British during their seven years of occupation had made sad havoc among the churches of denominations other than Episcopal. If a rector of Trinity could speak of these sister bodies of Christians as " hybrid " denominations in the year of grace 1892, what could be expected of rough English soldiers in 1776? Especially when they suspected that the conflagration which destroyed Trinity had been started by the " rebels." The Huguenot Church on Pine Street was so badly damaged that it was not re-opened for worship till 1796. Great sums of money had to be spent on each of the three Dutch Churches -South (in Exchange Place), Middle (on Nassau Street). and North (in Fulton Street), before they could be used as of old. The pews of the North Church were taken out and chopped up into firewood, a floor was stretched across from gallery to gallery, and on the two stories room made for eight hundred prisoners. The Middle Church was treated in the same way, and three thousand prisoners. the result of the actions on Long Island and at Fort Washington. were crowded into it. Later the church was turned into a riding- school. The glass was knocked out of the windows, the floor ripped up, and tan-bark put in its place. The Brick Church " in-the-fields." on Beekman Street, was first made into a prison and then used as a hospital. The Friends' House in Pearl Street, and the Wall Street Presbyterian Church were also converted into hospitals, and the Hu- guenot Church was made a depot for military stores. A member of the Middle Church, Mr. John Oothout, saved the bell donated by Abra- ham De Peyster and east in Holland, by hiding it carefully in his house, so that to-day it may be heard ringing from the steeple of the church af 48th Street and Fifth Avenue.
The city was primarily under military rule as a matter of course. There was therefore a military commandant first of all. This post
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HISTORY OF THE GREATER NEW YORK.
fell happily to the lot of one whose kindly disposition and suavity of manner made him universally liked, Colonel James Pattison, of the Royal Artillery. Among his functions seems to have been the grant- ing of licenses to taverns, the prohibition of the shooting off of firearms or fowling-pieces near dwelling houses, the ordering of the collecting of moneys for the poor, and the giving of permits for lotteries. This would hardly appear to leave much occupation for a Mayor, yet that vivie functionary was also provided to attend to such other municipal affairs as escaped the hands of the commandant. David Matthews, whom we have encountered on two occasions before, engaged in no very reputable or patriotic business for a New Yorker, was appointed Mayor as soon as the British came in. Mayor Hicks, though a loyal- ist, refused to remain in office or even in the city, retiring to his farm on Long Island. Matthews held the position during the whole time of the enemy's occupation. The patrolling of troops not being deemed sufficient to keep the peace of the city, the citizens were compelled to organize a watch. Those assigned to the duty were punished with imprisonment and fines for failing to appear. Strict regulations were formulated as safeguards against brawls and fires: soldiers must be in their quarters by & p.m., and all lights and fires extinguished throughout the city by 9 p.m. Just before the British occupation, in the spring of 1776, Engineer Christopher Colles had completed his waterworks, with reservoir and pumping engine, and wooden pipes for distribution, of which more anon. But the British did not seem to appreciate this triumph of Yankee ingenuity, and the people had to go back to their brackish wells, or get the water from the Tea pump carted to their doors. Newspapers continued to be printed in the city while the soldiers were there. Hugh Gaine issued his Gazette and Mercury from the old sign in Hanover Square, but he had now completely changed its complexion to that of a Tory sheet. Riving- ton was also in town with his Royal (sometimes called Lying) Gazet- teer. In the autumn of 1775 a party of horsemen, led by the irrepress- ible King Sears, rode into town, dismounted before Rivington's shop, destroyed his press and carried off his types to New Haven. Next year he was appointed printer to the King, or public printer. under the new régime; and when the patriot cause seemed likely to succeed he began to cast anchors to windward by playing false to his present masters and sending secret information to Washington. Ile did this by binding up sheets containing it among those of the books issuing from his press. The ingenious scheme was never discovered by the enemy, and as a reward Rivington remained unmolested when other loyalists had to flee at the Evacuation. It may easily be imag- ined that Ilolt and his journal could find no safe abiding place in a city held by the enemy. He was kept moving from place to place along the Hudson as the war went on.
The military occupation and the fortunes of war were not conducive
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IHISTORY OF THE GREATER NEW YORK.
to trade. The markets, with whose location we have now growu familiar, were well supplied with provisions of all kinds from the for- tile farms of Long Island and New Jersey, but the prices were com- plained of as excessive. Fish was furnished in abundance by the neighboring waters, as also the luscious and gigantic oyster. The lobsters, however, according to a writer in 1777, once brought to the New York waters by a fortunate accident, had now been banished again as the result of the war. "Surprising as it may appear, since the late incessant cannonading, they have entirely forsaken the coast, not one having been taken or seen since the commencement of hostili- ties." There was a complete cessation of commercial transactions, and no merchant ships arrived in the harbor except such as might bring supplies for the troops. Money was scarce enough. The conti- mental currency was counterfeited by order of the military authori- ties, and industriously circulated through the surrounding country. Hugh Gaine's Gazelle contained an advertisement in its issue of April 14, 1777. to the following effect: " Persons going into other colonies may be supplied with any number of counterfeit Congress uotes, for the price of the paper per ream." A not very honorable mode of war- fare, though less fiendish than that of propagating smallpox and prison-fever. It crippled the power of Congress and its army. At the end of 1778 the " Continental " paper dollar was worth 16 cents in the north and 12 cents south. Before the close of 1780 it required ten paper dollars to make one cent. At Boston Indian corn sold for $150 a bushel. Butter was quoted at $12 per pound, tea at $90, sugar $10. coffee $12, beef $$. A barrel of flour needed a fortune of $1,575 to purchase. The patriot leader, Samuel Adams, bought a hat and a suit of clothes at the modest price of $2,000. The counterfeit-print- ing at New York had doubtless helped much to bring about this cou- dition of the American currency.
The social life of the city during this period was that of a military camp. The soldiery ruled everywhere; they even stole the hearts of maidens whose lovers were away from town fighting for country. The talented young officers took care there should be theatrical en- tertainments, in which they themselves performed the parts, and the proceeds from which were devoted to the widows, children, or female relatives of soldiers killed in the war. For the rank and file there were the coarser amusements of bull-baiting, dog-fights, and cock- tights. There were also literary exercises at the meetings of a sort of social club. At one such meeting at the house of a Mr. Deane in 1779 the fated Major Andre read a poem of his own composition. The bands were brought out at regular times and made to give open-air concerts opposite Trinity Churchyard, while gallants promenaded up and down Broadway with their ladies, or the ladies sat in the rooms of a house, especially set apart for them, facing the music. When vie- tories were gained over the " rebels," fireworks and illuminations
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HISTORY OF THE GREATER NEW YORK.
celebrated the event. On Queen's and King's birthdays, also, the town was put into gala attire by day and by night. An occasional duel between quarrelsome officers furnished a social sensation. But while the officers and soldiers took care to have a good time, the ordi- nary citizen, no matter how good a loyalist, did not get much com- fort out of the military situation. It was hard to make a living; sen- tries and prohibitions met them on every hand to hamper the freedom of their movements, to prevent even their share in the amusement going on. The people suffered greatly during the severe winter of 1779-1780. There was scarcity of food and fuel both; it was stated by some that $50 would not feed a family for two days, so dear were provisions. The Commander-in-Chief had to order the breaking up of a few transports so as to obtain firewood, while not a few persons cut up their very furniture for burning. Even Baroness Riedesel, the wife of a Hessian General, comfortably quartered at Beekman's country-seat (Fifty-first Street and Second Avenue), had experiences
1
THE BRITISH EVACUATING NEW YORK, 1783.
of an unpleasant nature during that dreadful winter. Awakening one morning "we found ourselves shut up by the snow; and in some places where the wind had thrown it together in large drifts, it was eight feet deep. We had a difficult task to provide for our dinner. An old white fowl furnished us with a broth, which, with a few potatoes the gardener gave us, served for the dinner of more than fourteen per- sons."
It is pleasant from amid the black abyss of obloquy to which should be consigned the perpetrators of the cruelties to the American prisoners, and the responsibility for which rests upon every British officer with any word of authority in New York, to rescue the names of two men who were conspicuous for their compassion. One of these
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HISTORY OF THE GREATER NEW YORK.
was Andrew Elliot. He was Lieutenant-Governor, as James Rob- ertson was Governor of the Province, by a sort of legal fiction that had a shadow of reality only in New York City, and possibly also in the counties on Long Island and Staten Island. In 1763 Elliot had been appointed Collector of the Port. and had come to reside in New York. He had a country residence at "Minto," on Fourth Avenue and Tenth Street, where the Stewart building was erected later. He sig- nalized himself by the many kind services he rendered the prisoners of war in the city. He left with other loyalists in 1783, but his prop- erty was not confiscated. In 1790 he was offered the post of Minister from England to the United States, but declined. He was a relative of the Scottish Earl of Minto. The other exception to the rule of savagery was a private citizen, Andrew Hammersley, a merchant having his store and residence on Hanover Square. He acted the part of an angel of mercy among the prisoners, giving his time to acts of philanthropy, since there was nothing for him to do in the way of business. It is well that Hammersley Square in New York perpetu- ates a name so worthy of remembrance, although the street that once bore his name does so no longer.
In view of the recent celebration of Queen Victoria's diamond ju- bilee, or sixty years' reign, it will not do to omit to notice the visit to our city of her immediate predecessor on the throne, King William IV., her bachelor uncle. He came to New York in September, 1781. as Duke of Clarence, and with no prospect of ascending the throne, as he was the second son of George III. He was then 16 years of age. and serving as midshipman on board one of Admiral Digby's vessels. but while here was quartered with the Admiral in the Beekman house on Hanover Square. There are accounts of his skating on various ponds in the city in a familiar manner with the young men of the city. One bold and perhaps a little imaginative chronicler has a thrilling narrative of Prince William skating on the Collect Pond with young Fitz-Greene Halleck, later famous as a poet, and of his being saved from falling through the ice by the embryo poet's dexterity. We learn from an autograph letter of Admiral Nelson's, then Captain of the Albemarle, one of Digby's fleet. that Prince William was still in the city in November, 1782. When George IV. ended his reign of ten years in 1830, the sailor prince ascended the throne, to make way for his niece Victoria by a not too grievously deplored departure from this life in 1837.
CHAPTER IX.
THE FEDERAL CAPITAL.
HE critical period of American history," is what Prof. John Fiske calls the years between the peace of 1783 that se- cured our independence and the beginning of Federal Gov- ernment in 1789. He cannot agree that "the times that tried men's souls are over," as Thomas Paine wrote when he heard the news of the treaty of peace between England and the United States. It was just during those years that the test was applied and endured which proved of what stuff the American patriots were made. It looked often enough as if independence or nationhood were a gift too much for them, a curse rather than a blessing, because they did not have the capacity to use it.
And first of all there was to be the readjustment of relations be- tween those who had not been of one mind in the struggle that was past. Brethren and neighbors and fellow-citizens that had stood on different sides upon the question of the assertion of rights against the aggressions of a lawful but despotic sovereign, could not again so easily amalgamate into a harmonious or homogeneous community. The sufferings in blood and in goods had been too severe on either side to make forgiveness and forbearance easy, when they were thrown once more together in the daily intercourse of town-life. In New York there was a clash of conflicting inter- ests and hatreds as everywhere else; but in no place had the Eng- lish and the Tories held sway so complete and so long-continued. In no place had the problem of the readjustment of relations been delayed till so late a date. It is stated by some authorities that in apprehension of the retaliations in store for them, over twenty-nine thousand of the loyalist inhabitants left the city with the retiring troops. One can hardly imagine how so many peo- ple of that party could have been found in the city, or how in depart- ing any inhabitants of the other party could have been left. They were given free transportation to Nova Scotia, and some aid besides in starting anew in their untried surroundings. Some of the patriot exiles began to return before the evacuation, but kept themselves very quiet then. Those with money in their pockets were enabled to make excellent bargains at the incessant auction sales or vendues going on everywhere in anticipation of the forced departure from the city. They could not generally prevail upon former slaves to pass
REFERENCES
Fu 1 Federal Hall. 21 New Quaker Meeting
8 5' Paul's Church
32 Seceder Da
3 Trinity d'
23 MMoravuin Do
I'LLNoenand
+ Old Presbyterian Do
24 The Government House
5 Exchange
25 Fly Market
6 North Church
26 Oswego Do
7 New Presbyterian De
27 Bear Do
8 .St George's Chapel
28 PeckSlip Do
29
New Do
9 St Feter's Church io College
30 Bridewell
Il Scots Pies" Church
31 City Alms House
12 Cd Dutch Church
32 Prison
19 New Dutch De
33 Hospital
14 Jews Synagogue
34 Theatre
15 Cld Quaker Meeting
35 Jews Burying Ground
16 Methodist De
36 Lower Barracks
17 Baptist De
37 Upper Do
18 German Calvit
38 New Methodist.
19 Lutheran Do Do
Church
20 French Do
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M Jones
Ferry to
Thathan-
Chatham Row
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M'Ruloers
Say Crown Print or Corlars Hook
Fifth Ward
RIVER
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First Ward
E Third
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White Hall Sup
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Soak of town feet.
RIVER
Sixth Ward
Wand
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MAP OF NEW YORK IN 1789,
NOSanH
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HISTORY OF THE GREATER NEW YORK.
again under their former ownership. These creatures seemed to have a notion that " Novy Koshee " was an El Dorado and land of freedom, and they were eager to accompany their new masters thither. Per- haps the large figure given above included persons from other parts of this and neighboring States. Throughout the war, and especially as the enemy were driven from one position after another in the coun- try. there must have been a constant influx of loyalists into the only considerable place from which the British had not been dislodged, so that the population, if large enough to bear such an enormous deple- tion, must have been a factitious one and not at all indigenous.
But yet all the Tory element was not eliminated. Some remained to take the risks of the new régime, or were perhaps sincerely desirous of falling into line with the new order of things, and trying independ- ence with the rest of the nation. There was danger of friction, how- ever, whatever might be their state of mind; it was not in ordinary human nature to bear easily with those who had actively supported or sympathized with the hirelings of an oppressive royalty. A popula- tion of twelve thousand is all we can count after the evacnation, and of these the minority were as yet " poor, despicable Whigs." But more were coming. Three years later the population has already doubled; and long before that the Whigs had been able to show the Tories that they were masters of the situation, and in disputes about titles the decision was pretty invariably on their side. Indeed, to make the case of the Tories still more precarious in all questions of citizenship and property, a bill was passed in the Assembly in 1784 disfranchising all who had adhered to the British cause; and also a Trespass Act by which all patriots who had been obliged to leave the city could bring action for trespass against such Tories as had entered or occupied their houses during the British occupation, whether honorably pur- chased or not. We need not wonder at such extreme measures get- ting the ready assent of the Assembly when we note that New York was represented in it by such lively Liberty Boys as John Lamb, Mar- inus Willett, and King Sears. There soon arose a test case, the trial and issue of which brought men to a somewhat soberer view of what was the right and wrong of things under these difficult circumstances, apart from the mere play of prejudice and party spirit, however justified in its intensity of antagonism to British adherents. Elizabeth Rutgers, a widow, had fled from New York on the approach of General Howe in 1776. Joshua Waddington, a rich Tory mer- chant, had bought the abandoned and confiscated property. Under the Trespass Act, in 1784, Mrs. Rutgers claimed the estate, and sym- pathy was universally enlisted on the side of the widow. But the court decided that Waddington was entitled to the property, both on the proper interpretation of the law of nations in general and of the terms of the recent treaty in particular. The decision was a triumph of the forensic power of Alexander Hamilton, who had boldly under-
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