USA > New York > Nassau County > Long Island; a history of two great counties, Nassau and Suffolk, Volume I > Part 13
USA > New York > Suffolk County > Long Island; a history of two great counties, Nassau and Suffolk, Volume I > Part 13
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56 | Part 57 | Part 58 | Part 59 | Part 60 | Part 61 | Part 62
On July 12, 1781, American and French forces attacked Lloyd's Neck near Huntington but were driven off. A successful attack on Fort Slongo, near Smithtown, was made October 3 of the same year by Major Lemuel Trescott, plans of the British fort having been supplied by Lieutenant Henry Scudder of Huntington. The place was captured and burned and twenty-one prisoners, including two captains and a lieutenant, together with a quantity of munitions, were taken back to Connecticut.
Captain Caleb Brewster of Setauket staged what has been referred to as the final skirmish of the war and certainly the war's last whaleboat engagement, for it took place on December 7, 1782, just seven days after the preliminary treaty of peace had been signed. With the idea of attacking a body of British troops stationed at Huntington, Major Tallmadge had collected an American force at Stamford. When three British vessels were sighted a short distance off the Connecticut shore, he detailed the intrepid Brewster to take these ships, using several whaleboats. Brewster was seriously injured in this engagement but captured two of the ships, the third escaping towards Huntington. Although fears for Brewster's life were felt for several months thereafter, he recovered and lived to the ripe old age of eighty.
Whaleboat warfare on Long Island was not just a series of raids into enemy territory. As the. Revolution continued, the whaleboat became the means of an illicit trade which eventually reached such proportions and viciousness that the military authorities of both sides tried to eradicate it. Just as privateering in earlier days had devel- oped into piracy, so whaleboat warfare opened the way to the exploitation of civilian friend and foe alike and finally made robbery, assault and murder common occurrences.
In the early days of the war refugees from the island to New England were frequently given official permission to return at their own risk for personal reasons, such as to visit relatives and if possible to obtain supplies for themselves and fellow exiles who were often in dire need. The island, being in English hands, was not deprived as was New England, of those foreign goods which all through colonial days had been especially desired in the new world. Frequently a whaleboat returning from the island brought tea and other imported luxuries which New Englanders had not been able to obtain since the outbreak of the war.
It was soon discovered that certain whaleboatmen were doing a thriving business in supplying these articles in American territory at exorbitant rates. This however was not the worst of the matter. In order to continue supplying the ever growing demand, some of the whaleboatmen began robbing the island's civilians and when necessary bribing the local authorities to keep their hands off.
96
LONG ISLAND-NASSAU AND SUFFOLK
Tory whaleboatmen were not long in joining in the profitable trade nor were certain of the military and naval forces who happened to be in convenient positions.
As the system expanded, no Long Island home, whether that of Tory or Whig, was safe from the marauding bands which almost nightly fell upon the island and roamed its highways with little fear of official interference. . With no interest in the war or its out- come except as a means of serving their own purpose these bands stopped at no crime in the course of collecting their cargoes of booty. More than one such cargo was allowed to pass unchallenged through British and American lines as bribery became rife. Occasionally the robbers, having paid for protection, were permitted to proceed only far enough to be themselves robbed.
There was no honor among these thieves who made a virtue of deception. While most Long Islanders fought valiantly and in many cases sacrificed their all for the American cause, a relatively few whaleboat operators gave the island a very black name with both the British and American high commands, neither of whom suc- ceeded in destroying this illicit trade while the war lasted.
As has been pointed out by Mather, however, the war itself was fought by both sides along lines little removed from those of the illicit traders. General Parsons as early as December 1776 pro- claimed that "to encourage the brave and spirited to enter the service, the General promises them all the plunder they shall take from the enemy, to be equally divided among the officers and men according to their pay," while the Connecticut courts at one time made a decision that private property within the lines of the enemy was liable to be plundered by any subject of the United States.
Long Islanders maintained one of the most effective spy systems of the war to assist the American cause. Mather names Captain Caleb Brewster of Setauket, Lieutenant Henry Scudder of Huntington, Dr. William Lawrence and Silvanus Dicherson as members of this system. In the "Secret Record" of Sir Henry Clinton, the British commander, which came to light about 1875 and appeared in part in The Magazine of American History during 1883-84, a Nathaniel Ruggles of Setauket operated with Brewster. Another mentioned by Clinton was one Johnson of Lloyd's Neck. Two of General Wash- ington's letters to Major Tallmadge, printed in The Refugees of 1776 (1913) show that the Major was head of the spy system on Long Island.
Morton Pennypacker's excellent book, General Washington's Spies on Long Island (1939), contains the most conclusive material on this subject. The necessity of maintaining a secret service here was emphasized by the failure of Nathan Hale's initial attempt to carry dispatches through the enemy's lines. Hale was captured near Huntington and as every schoolboy knows became the young nation's most hallowed martyr. His death determined Washington to establish a spy ring to constantly cover New York and Long Island and, in the words of Pennypacker, "so well did he succeed that for 150 years, or until 1929, the details of this work remained unknown."
97
THE WARS WITH ENGLAND
Abraham Woodhull and Robert Townsend, who signed their correspondence respectively Culper Senior and Culper Junior, were the active heads of this ring while Major Benjamin Tallmadge, who more directly represented Washington in the exchange of messages, signed himself Mr. John Bolton. Tavern Keeper Austin Roe and Captain Caleb Brewster were the chief messengers, the former by horse and the latter by whaleboat. Jonas Hawkins was among others who occasionally carried messages and, according to Kate W. Strong's
(From watercolor by Cyril A. Lewis, President, Nassau County Art League) Raynham Hall, Oyster Bay, Associated With Many Incidents of the Revolutionary War, then the Home of Robert Townsend, one of Washington's Spies
True Tales, Nancy Strong assisted by using her clothesline on which to hang garments in such arrangements as to warn and otherwise inform members of the ring.
Townsend, whose family home, Raynham Hall, at Oyster Bay was being used by the British as officers' headquarters, lived in New York where he posed as a reporter for the Royal Gazette whose publisher was the unsuspecting James Rivington, the King's Printer. In this role, completely trusted by his employer, Townsend had little difficulty in obtaining timely information from the British officers with whom he and Rivington associated. Roe, a skillful horseman, frequently visited New York from his home in Setauket ostensibly to purchase supplies for his tavern but carrying messages back and forth. His was a particularly dangerous assignment for in New York he was obliged to contact Townsend who handed him reports of British plans written in invisible ink for delivery to Abraham
L. I .- I-7
98
LONG ISLAND-NASSAU AND SUFFOLK
Woodhull in Setauket after riding some fifty miles through enemy- held territory.
Having arrived at Setauket, which he did many times during the war, Roe would attend to his cattle which were pastured on land adjacent to his home and that of Woodhull. Somewhere in this field he would leave the despatches where Woodhull in the course of his chores would retrieve them, take them into his house and, with his own report to Washington which he signed Culper Senior, prepare the telltale papers for the next leg of their journey.
By glancing at Nancy Strong's clothesline and decoding the message there displayed, he would learn not only whether Caleb Brewster was awaiting him but in which of six nearby creeks his whaleboat lay hidden. To this creek he would make his way and deliver the papers to Brewster who in turn would cross the sound to Connecticut and pass the package on to Major Tallmadge. The latter would also prepare a report before sending them to Washing- ton's headquarters in the Hudson Valley by way of a relay of dragoons posted every three miles throughout the New England countryside, mounted and ready to ride as the precious parcel reached them. This system, with few variations, continued to operate for the duration of the war.
To appreciate the risk taken by its members, one need only realize that death was the penalty imposed upon spies by the Americans and British alike as demonstrated by the hanging of Nathan Hale by the British and the subsequent hanging by the Americans of Major Andre. The latter had been stationed at Oyster Bay and had been a frequent visitor at the Townsend homestead, Raynham Hall, in that north shore village before his capture while arranging for Benedict Arnold's treasonable delivery of West Point to the British.
But besides the death penalty meted out to spies, the British had a means of punishment for other prisoners which often proved as fatal as the rope. This was the maintenance of several condemned hulls in the East River which were used as prison-ships. According to one source, more than eleven thousand Americans died of neglect, disease and starvation on these floating prisons during the war.
Although a general peace was publicly proclaimed in New York April 9, 1783, it was not until September 3 of that year that the permanent treaty was finally signed at Paris. Less than three months later, on November 25, the enemy officially evacuated, leaving New York and Long Island in such physical condition that many years were needed to erase the marks of destruction and neglect. It took even longer, however, to eradicate the hatred which had been engendered between Tories and Whigs, especially those Whigs who had been forced into exile and who had been returning to their ruined farms since 1780 when Britain began withdrawing her troops from the eastern part of the island in vain attempts to stem American successes elsewhere.
Many Long Islanders who had been comfortably well off before the war drove them into exile, returned penniless and in debt.
99
THE WARS WITH ENGLAND
Fertile farms from which they had been forced to flee following the Battle of Long Island had become unproductive from neglect and abuse. Property seized for occupational purposes by the enemy and later abandoned had frequently been appropriated by squatters who could not now be ousted by returning owners without resort to costly litigation. Thus economic chaos added to the misery on Long Island.
"Much of this suffering and loss," declares Mather, "might have been avoided if the enemy had paid the obligations to which he was committed by giving receipts for property that had been taken." But while the enemy failed to make good for damages done to prop- erty in the counties which they had occupied, this same area was taxed one hundred thousand pounds with which to compensate other sections of the State for damages done by the American forces there employed. Long Island's share of this obviously unjust tax levy was thirty-seven thousand pounds.
Post war suffering was not, however, sustained by the Whigs alone. As many of them had been forced to flee the island in 1776, so during the final stages of the war and for several years there- after great numbers of Tory families chose to migrate to Canada, the West Indies and even to England itself to escape persecution, abandoning homes which had come to them through generations of forebears. As a matter of fact, according to Daniel M. Tredwell (Personal Reminiscences), the adoption of the Declaration of Inde- pendence on July 4, 1776, had decided a considerable number of British sympathizers to at once leave Long Island and establish new homes beyond the States.
Greater numbers hurriedly left the island and other parts of the country beginning early in 1782 when the fortunes of war first showed a decisive turn against England. Migrations by 1883 had reached the proportions of an exodus. That year some three thousand Tory refugees, made up largely of Long Islanders, reached the mouth of the St. John River in New Brunswick and in what was virtually a wilderness founded the city of St. John. Two thousand additional refugees, according to Tredwell, sailed from Huntington Bay several months later to make their homes in and around St. John. Colonel Gabriel Ludlow of Hempstead served as the city's first mayor from 1783 to 1795.
This city became the distributing point in the populating of much of the Canadian border country. Here, declares Tredwell, writing in 1912, "we find distributed some of the best blood of Massachusetts, Connecticut, Long Island, New York and the Eastern States. We trace the names of Seaman, Hicks, Denton, Hewlett, Carman, Dorlan, Tredwell, Platt, Hendrickson and others scattered over Prince Edward Island, Halifax, Annapolis Royal and many other points, all of whose ancestors were presumably exiles from the States."
It has been estimated that more than one hundred thousand inhabitants of the United States took refuge in parts of Canada at the close of the Revolution. Unlike most of the refugees from Long Island to New England in 1776, these later refugees to foreign
100
LONG ISLAND-NASSAU AND SUFFOLK
soil did not return. The persecution of those Tories who remained in the States was no less severe than that which had been meted out to the Whigs who continued to live on Long Island during the war. Confiscation of Tory property was only one means of punishment. Many individuals were fined, some imprisoned and others banished. Not for some years after the Revolution were the property rights of those who had been branded as Tories officially recognized. The wave of reprisal reached its crest on Long Island.
The reconstruction period on the island was beset with still other troubles. An area in which illicit trade had so long flourished was not immediately cleansed of this profitable pursuit. And now divested of possible pretense to patriotic service, it appeared in its true light of piracy, highway robbery and murder. Armed gangs sailed the island's waters attacking cargo boats or landed at isolated points to rob homes and those who travelled the roads without adequate protection. It was this intolerable condition which hastened the re-establishment of militia units throughout the island, and gave impetus to the creation of local law enforcement groups.
Perhaps the most outstanding event for the western part of the island during this period was President Washington's tour of 1790. This and several previous visits to the island are concisely covered in the following especially prepared article :
WASHINGTON ON LONG ISLAND Leslie Elhoff
On February 4, 1756, a young colonel, commander of a Virginia regiment, set out on horseback from that southern commonwealth for Boston, Massachusetts, to see General William Shirley, commander of the King's forces in America, on official business. The youth was George Washington, then in his twenty-fourth year. Accompanied by his aide-de-camp, Captain George Mercer, and by Captain Stewart of the Virginia Light Horse Cavalry, together with several servants, Washington spent ten days in New York and, it is believed, rode the length of Long Island to Greenport and crossed the Sound to New London, Connecticut. The diary of one Joshua Hempstead (1711- 1758) of New London records the crossing while tradition has it that the travelers stopped at the inn of Lieutenant Booth at Greenport.
Twenty years later, on August 22, 1776, General George Washing- ton, as Commander-in-chief of the Continental Army, visited Long Island to survey the battle positions of his sorely pressed troops. This was the day before the British made their landing in Brooklyn. During the disastrous battle which followed, Washington maintained quarters in the home of Philip Livingston on what is now Brooklyn Heights and remained in the area until the night of August 29 when he staged the brilliant evacuation which saved the untrained Ameri- can army.
The next visit of Washington to Long Island is mentioned in his diary under date of October 10, 1789, when he was living at the corner of Cherry and Dover streets in lower Manhattan where the cable
101
THE WARS WITH ENGLAND
anchorage base of Brooklyn Bridge is now located. His diary reads : "I set off about 9 o'clock in my barge to visit Mr. Prince's fruit gardens and shrubberies at Flushing, on Long Island," accompanied by Vice-President Adams, Governor George Clinton, Senator Ralph Izard and Major William Jackson. Robert Prince's nurseries, estab- lished in 1737, were in 1789 reputed to be the largest in the country. They did not measure up to Washington's expectations, however, for he wrote: "The shrubs were trifling, and the flowers not numerous." He nevertheless purchased some of Prince's fruit.
In 1790 President Washington made his memorable tour of Long Island. The entry in his diary for Tueday, April 20, reads: "About 8 o'clock (having previously sent over my Servants, Horses, and Carriage) I crossed to Brooklyn." From the Ferry he followed Jamaica road (now Fulton street) and turning right through what is now Prospect Park soon reached Flatbush from where, having greeted the people, he continued on to New Utrecht.
Having here dined at the house of a Mr. Barre, whom he described as obliging but with little else to recommend his place, Washington next passed through Gravesend and took the King's Highway to Jamaica and the tavern of William Warne which he described as "a pretty good and decent house" and where he spent his first night. The site of this tavern is now that of the Jamaica Theatre on Jamaica avenue, nearly opposite Kings Park in which, behind the Rufus King mansion, still stands the old farmhouse of Washington's day.
The President's diary reports Mr. Barre as saying that the oat crop in the vicinity of New Utrecht did not exceed 15 bushels to the acre but that Indian corn yielded 25 to 30 bushels, and rye still more. The soil was described as a rich black loam throughout Brooklyn and as far as Flatlands from where to Jamaica it became more sandy but good and productive. The trees were chiefly hickory and oak mixed with locust and sassafras with a great many cedars in some places. As far as Jamaica Washington drove constantly within sight of the "sea" (Jamaica Bay).
On Wednesday, April 21, Washington proceeded to "South Hemp- stead" (now Hempstead), skirting the south edge of the Plains whose fruit trees, he wrote, "do not thrive well." The diary continues: "We baited in South Hempstead (10 miles from Jamaica), at the house of Simmonds, a tavern, now of private entertainment for money." It was long thought that Washington here referred to the Sammis tavern, which stood until 1929 at the northeast corner of Fulton and Main streets, but research shows that in 1790, on the corner diagonally opposite Sammis', stood Simmonson's tavern which students now believe was where he stopped to dine.
From Hempstead Washington turned south, drove about five miles to the South road (now Merrick), thence eastward, again in constant sight of the "sea" (South Bay) and finally reached "one Ketchum's which had also been a public house but, now a private one,-received pay for what it furnished" and proved to be "a very neat and decent one." It stood just east of Amityville. That second day's drive, still along the South road, ended at Sagtikos Manor, then the home
102
LONG ISLAND-NASSAU AND SUFFOLK
of Judge Isaac Thompson which though a private house furnished lodging and meals for pay. The present owner and occupant of this imposing structure, Robert David Lyon Gardiner, a descendant of both Judge Thompson and Lion Gardiner, recently showed the writer the room in which Washington slept, still containing the bed and furniture of that day.
Leaving Sagtikos Manor about eight o'clock Thursday morning, April 22, Washington drove eastward along the South road to "one Greens distant 11 miles." This typical colonial farmhouse at West Sayville, still in excellent condition, is the present home of John Pettit Greene Bates, a descendant of Washington's host of 1790. From here Washington drove to Hart's tavern, the site of which is on the north side of Montauk highway at the westerly entrance to Patchogue. He wrote that the soil between Hempstead and this point became more and more sandy and less productive as he travelled eastward.
After a meal at Hart's, Washington turned northward, crossed the island through Coram and finally reached Setauket to spend his third night at the inn of Captain Austin Roe, described in the diary as "tolerably decent" and with "obliging people in it." It stood at the corner of Main street and Bayview avenue from which site it was moved a few years ago to a neighboring hilltop on Old Post road where in perfect condition it is owned and occupied by the author, Wallace Irwin and his wife. Recently they showed the writer the former tap-room in which Roe and other American spies held secret sessions during the Revolution. In another room over an imposing fireplace mantel hangs a painting by the Irwins' son showing Washington's visit of 1790.
The area between Patchogue and Coram Washington described as covered with low scrubby oaks and "ill thriven pines" of about two feet in height, the land becoming more fertile and productive, however, from Coram to Setauket.
On Friday morning, April 23, the President bid farewell to the people of Setauket and turned back towards New York. At Smith- town, he halted "and baited the horses at a widow Blidenberg's (Blydenburgh) a decent house," about ten miles from Setauket. From there the same day he drove on to Huntington, to dine opposite the village green at the widow Platt's which stood until 1860. He spent the night at Oyster Bay at the "private and very neat" house of Mr. Young which, now the property of Dr. S. L. Craig, still stands at the junction of Cove Neck road and route 25A, opposite the Young burying ground in which lie the remains of another great President, Theodore Roosevelt.
Washington described this fourth day's drive from Smithtown as through some five miles of white sandy unproductive soil which became good near Huntington and on to Oyster Bay.
Leaving Young's before six o'clock on Saturday, April 24, he breakfasted at Roslyn at Henry Onderdonk's residence, now the Washington tavern, where he was shown the Onderdonk paper mill and himself made a sheet of paper which was preserved by the Onder- donk family for many years.
103
THE WARS WITH ENGLAND
From Roslyn the route led to Flushing where Washington dined before driving on through Newtown and Brooklyn to the ferry and reaching Manhattan before sundown. All the President's stops on this memorable journey are now marked so that they may be easily recognized.
WAR OF 1812
Although the United States and France were on the brink of war at the turn of the century, an unhappy circumstance which was fortunately averted, England continued to be America's chief nemesis for many years following the Revolution. Her policy of impressing American seamen to serve on British ships, together with a number of retaliatory embargoes instituted by both countries, finally caused the disastrous War of 1812 which, notwithstanding the assertions of some historians, ended in no victory for either nation but in a draw. As a matter of fact, Thompson calls this second conflict a continuation of the Revolution.
As in the war for independence, Long Island was again made the base of English operations on this side of the Atlantic, but, this being predominantly a naval war, the island was spared the burden of enemy occupation although the British fleet was stationed for many months in east-end waters to blockade Long Island Sound and other shipping lanes into New York. Thus the island's whaling industry and its coastwise trade, which had steadily increased since 1783, were again completely destroyed for the time being while many local ships found sanctity far up the Connecticut River. Meanwhile, lying help- less under the enemy's guns, east end communities and farms were subject to frequent foraging raids by enemy troops.
Fortunately for Long Island, England chose other parts of the country to invade. Here, however, the war was carried on none the less by a considerable number of Long Island ships turned privateer and fleets of whaleboats which constantly harassed the British squadron at anchor in Gardiner's Bay.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.