Prominent families of New York; being an account in biographical form of individuals and families distinguished as representatives of the social, professional and civic life of New York city, Part 24

Author: Weeks, Lyman Horace, ed
Publication date: 1897
Publisher: New York, The Historical company
Number of Pages: 650

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The Reverend Howard Crosby, the father of Mr. Ernest H. Crosby, was the son of William B. Crosby, and was born in New York City February 27th, 1826. Graduated from the University of the City of New York at eighteen years of age, he entered upon educational work, and at the age of twenty-five was professor of Greek in his alma mater. In 1852, he was elected president of the Young Men's Christian Association, and in 1859 became professor of Greek in Rutgers College, New Brunswick, N. J. While holding the latter place, he studied theology and was ordained pastor of the first Presbyterian Church of New Brunswick. In 1863, he resigned his pastorate and professorship to become the pastor of the Fourth Avenue Presbyterian Church, of New York City, and for nearly thirty years was one of the most prominent figures in the religious, educational and reform movements of the metropolis. From 1870 to 1881, he was chancellor of the University of the City of New York. He was a member of the American Committee for the Revision of the Bible, and later one of the commissioners appointed to revise the New Testament. In 1873, he was moderator of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church, and in 1877, a delegate to the Pan-Presbyterian Council at Edinburgh.

The activity of the Reverend Dr. Crosby in reform and benevolent enterprises kept him much before the public. In 1877, he was one of the founders of the Society for the Prevention of Crime, and was its first president. He was a strong advocate of the license system for restricting the liquor traffic in the interests of temperance, and in 1888 was a member of the State Committee to revise the liquor laws. His literary work was abundant and learned, and included commentaries on several books of the Bible, a volume of lectures, Lands of the Moslem, the Œdipus Tyrannus of Sophocles, with notes, a Life of Jesus, Social Hints, and numerous review articles, tracts and pamphlets. He received the degree of D. D. from Harvard in 1859 and the degree of LL. D. from Columbia in 1871.

In addition to the illustrious ancestors already noted, Mr. Ernest Howard Crosby has descent from William Floyd, signer of the Declaration of Independence, who was his great-grandfather. His uncle was William Henry Crosby, professor of Latin and Greek in Rutgers College, vice- president of the New York Bible Society, and long engaged in literary pursuits. His cousin is Colonel John Schuyler Crosby, soldier of the Civil War and on the frontier, United States Consul to Florence, Governor of Montana and First Assistant Postmaster-General.

Mr. Crosby devotes much time to philanthropic and reform work, following in the footsteps of his distinguished father. He is a lawyer, served in the New York Legislature, 1886-89, and was appointed by President Benjamin Harrison Judge of the International Court in Alexandria, Egypt, in 1889. That position he resigned in 1894, and he then returned to the United States. Mr. Crosby married Fanny Kendall Schieffelin, daughter of the late Henry Maunsell Schieffelin, of New York. The city residence of Mr. and Mrs. Crosby is in Fifth Avenue, and their country place is Grassmere, in Rhinebeck-on-Hudson.

I45

JOHN SCHUYLER CROSBY

D ESCENDED on his mother's side from the Schuylers, a family which came from Holland in 1645, having extensive grants of land in what is now Albany, Rensselaer and Schenectady counties, where their influence with the Indians of the Six Nations, and the leading part they took in the French and Indian Wars, as well as in the Revolution, made them prominent in the early history of America, on his father's side Colonel Crosby's family were among the earliest of New England settlers. His great-grandfather, Ebenezer Crosby, was surgeon of Washington's Life Guards. His son, William Bedloe Crosby, the New York philanthropist, married Harriet Clarkson, granddaughter of William Floyd, a signer of the Declaration of Independence. Clarkson Floyd Crosby, Colonel Crosby's father, their son, served in both branches of the Legislature, and married Angelica Schuyler, daughter of Colonel John Schuyler and Maria Miller.

Colonel John Schuyler Crosby was born September 19th, 1839, at Quedar Knoll, near Albany, N. Y., the country seat of five generations of Schuylers, and was educated at the University of the City of New York. At the outbreak of the Civil War, he received the commission of Second Lieutenant in the First Artillery. He was in the Army of the Potomac under McClellan, served on the staffs of Banks, Canby and Sheridan, and was brevetted four times for distinguished gallantry, being wounded once. His services in carrying despatches through the enemy's country to Admiral Farragut, secured special mention by President Lincoln. After the War he was Adjutant-General under Sheridan and Custer, and he resigned in 1871.

In 1863, he married Harriet Van Rensselaer at the old Van Rensselaer Manor House, near Albany, Mrs. Crosby being the youngest daughter of General Stephen Van Rensselear, the last patroon of Rensselaerwyck, and a great-granddaughter of General Philip Schuyler and Alexander Hamilton. Colonel and Mrs. Crosby have two children, a son, Stephen Van Rensselaer Crosby, a Harvard graduate, an all-around athlete and well-known football player, who married Henrietta Grew, of Boston, and a daughter, Angelica Schuyler Crosby.

Since Colonel Crosby left the army, he has occupied several important positions in civil life, among them, Governor of Montana, Assistant Postmaster-General in the administration of President Arthur, Consul at Florence and School Commissioner of New York City. For some years Colonel Crosby's residence has been divided between New York and Washington, and cruising all over the world. The Metropolitan, Union, Knickerbocker, Tuxedo, St. Nicholas in New York, and the Metropolitan and Country clubs in Washington, are a few of his many clubs. His travels have been more than usually varied. In 1859, he crossed South America from Valparaiso to Montevideo. Colonel Crosby has been presented at the courts of St. James, Constantinople and Rome. King Victor Emmanuel gave him the order of the Crown of Italy, with rank of Chevalier.

Among the patriotic American orders of which he is a member are the Loyal Legion, the Grand Army and Sons of the Revolution. He was an originator of polo playing in America and an early member of the famous Westchester Club. As Governor of Montana, he was interested in protecting the Yellowstone Park from trespassers and preserving the large game of the Northwest, and took part in hunting trips with Generals Sheridan and Custer, and President Arthur. Prominent in yachting, and one of the oldest members of the New York Yacht Club, he was an actor in one of the saddest events in the history of American sport. The official letter of June 30th, 1877, in which Secretary John Sherman transmitted to Colonel Crosby a gold medal of the first class for life saving, recounts the disaster to Commodore William A. Garner's yacht Mohawk, which foundered off Staten Island on July 20th, 1876. Colonel Crosby was a guest aboard, and after rescuing Edith May he returned to the cabin of the sinking yacht and attempted to rescue Mrs. Garner and Miss Hunter, who with Commodore Garner and several others were drowned. He escaped when the vessel was under water. Secretary Sherman said : "In sending you this medal, the highest recognition of your conduct the Government can give, it is felt that no words can add distinction to the splendid gallantry which the token seeks to commemorate and honor."

146

STEPHEN VAN RENSSELAER CRUGER

I NVESTIGATION has shown that the name of Cruger probably originated as Cruciger or Cross- bearer, and that the ancestors of the family were settled in Germany, Holland, Denmark and England. Sir Philip de Cruciger, from whom the English branches trace descent, accompa- nied Richard 1. on his crusade. In England the name was long connected with the City of Bristol, many of the family holding important offices there from the time of Henry VIII.

John Cruger came to America in 1700 and was an alderman of New York from 1712 to 1733, becoming Mayor in 1739, and holding that office until his death, in 1744. In 1703, he married Maria Cuyler, 1678-1724, daughter of Major Hendrick Cuyler, of Albany. Henry Cruger, 1707- 1780, their second son, was a member of the Assembly from 1745 to 1759, and subsequently a member of the Council of the Province. He went to England in 1775 and died there. His brother, John Cruger, second of that name, 1710-1791, was Mayor of New York from 1756 to 1765, and from his pen came the Declaration of Rights and Grievances of the Stamp Act Congress in 1765. He also organized and was first president of the New York Chamber of Commerce.

Henry Cruger married first, Hannah Slauter and second, Elizabeth Harris, of Jamaica, West Indies. One of his sons by his second wife was Henry Cruger, 1739-1827, second of the name, who was educated in Kings College, New York, and in 1757 engaged in business in Bristol, England, being Mayor of that city in 1781. In 1774, he was chosen to represent Bristol in the British Parliament, as a colleague of Edmund Burke, and was again elected in 1784. About 1790, he returned to his native city, and in 1792 was a member of the New York Senate. He married three times and has numerous descendants. Nicholas Cruger, 1743-1800, the fourth son of Henry and Elizabeth (Harris) Cruger, was the great-grandfather of the subject of this article. Born in

New York, he was a merchant here and in St. Croix, West Indies.

His estate in New York,

known as Rose Hill, then in the suburbs, is now in the centre of the city. He was the patron of Alexander Hamilton, who served in his counting house and came to New York at his instance, and he was also a friend of Washington. In 1772, he married Anna de Nully, 1747-1784, daughter of Bertram Pierre de Nully, of St. Croix, and his wife, Catharine Heyliger, daughter of General Pierre Heyliger, Governor of the Danish West Indies. Bertram Pierre Cruger, 1774-1854, the eldest son of this marriage, was born in St. Croix and married Catharine Church, daughter of John B. Church, of New York, and his wife, Angelica Schuyler, daughter of General Philip Schuyler.

John Church Cruger, 1807-1879, the eldest surviving son of Bertram Pierre and Catharine (Church) Cruger, was the father of Colonel Stephen Van Rensselaer Cruger. His residence was Cruger's Island, in the Hudson River, and he married first, Frances A. Jones and second Euphemia White Van Rensselaer, daughter of General Stephen Van Rensselaer, the last patroon of Rensselaer- wyck. The only child of John Church Cruger's first marriage was Eugene Cruger, 1832-1867, who married Jane Marie Jauncey, and had three sons, William Jauncey, Eugene G. and James Pendleton Cruger.

Colonel Stephen Van Rensselaer Cruger is the eldest child and only son of John Church and Euphemia White (Van Rensselaer) Cruger. He was born in New York, May 9th, 1844, and was educated here and in Europe. At the beginning of the Civil War, he entered the army as First Lieutenant of the One Hundred and Fiftieth New York Volunteers. He took part in the Gettysburg and Atlanta campaigns, was severely wounded at the battle of Resaca, and retired from the army with the brevets of Major and Lieutenant-Colonel. After the war, he was for several years Colonel of the Twelfth Regiment, N. G. S. N. Y. Colonel Cruger has been engaged in the real estate business and is connected as a director or officer with many large corporations. He is the senior warden of the Trinity Church Corporation and a trustee of the New York Public Library. He married Julie Grinnell Storrow. His residence is in East Thirty-fifth Street, and his country place in Bayville, Long Island. He is a member of the Metropolitan, Tuxedo, Knickerbocker, Union League, Union and other clubs.

147

MRS. GEORGE WILLIAM CURTIS

H I ENRY CURTIS was the Puritan ancestor of the family of which the late George William Curtis was the best known modern representative. The original emigrant of the name arrived in Massachusetts in 1635 and settled in Watertown, removing later to Sudbury. He married Mary Guy, daughter of Nicholas Guy, who came from Upton Gray, near Southampton, England. Their son, Ephraim Curtis, who was born in Sudbury, in 1642, was one of the first settlers of Worcester, Mass., and for gallantry in an Indian fight in 1675 was made Lieutenant of the militia of that town. John Curtis, one of his descendants, born in Worcester in 1707, was a Captain in the French and Indian War, and George Curtis, the father of the late George William Curtis, was a great-grandson of Captain John Curtis. George Curtis was born in Worcester, Mass., in 1796, and became a prominent business man in Providence, R. I. In 1839, he removed to New York, and was president of the Continental Bank. He married Mary Elizabeth Burrill, daughter of James Burrill, Chief Justice of Rhode Island and a United States Senator for that State.

George William Curtis, the second son of this marriage, was born in Providence, R. I., February 24th, 1824. He was educated at schools in Massachusetts, removed with his family to New York, and spent a year in mercantile life. In 1842, he joined the Brook Farm Association in West Roxbury, Mass. In 1846, he went to Europe, studied in the University of Berlin and traveled in the East. In 1850, he returned home and published his first book, Nile Notes of a Howadji. He joined the staff of The New York Tribune and published other works. From 1853 to 1857, he was the editor of Putnam's Magazine, and after the latter date was connected with Harper's Monthly Magazine and originated the famous Editor's Easy Chair in that periodical, which he contributed to it from 1858 until his death; from 1861 onward he was political editor of Harper's Weekly. During some years, Mr. Curtis also appeared in public as a lecturer. He took an active and brilliant part in politics and was a delegate to many Republican National Conventions from 1860 to 1884. He frequently refused public offices, including the English and German Missions offered him by President Hayes, but accepted that of a Regent of the University of New York in 1864. In 1871, he was appointed, by President Grant, a member of the Civil Service Commission, and became chairman of that body, with which civil service reform originated, a cause to which he gave his unfaltering support. He died in August, 1892, having exercised a greater influence upon American public opinion than any man of letters of this period.

Mrs. George William Curtis, who was born Anna Shaw, married her distinguished husband in 1857. She is the daughter of Francis George Shaw and his wife, Sarah Blake Sturgis. Her grandparents were Robert Gould Shaw, who married Susan Parkman, and, on the maternal side, Nathan Russell Sturgis, whose wife was Elizabeth Parkman. In the two preceding generations, her paternal ancestors were Francis Shaw, a merchant of Boston, who, in 1770, with Robert Gould, founded the town of Gouldsboro, Me., and his son, Francis Shaw. Robert Gould Shaw, 1776-1853, was born in Gouldsboro and was a merchant in Boston after 1789. His eldest son, Francis George Shaw, 1809-1882, was a student in Harvard in 1825, but entered business life before he graduated, and retired in 1841. After 1855, he resided on Staten Island, was dis- tinguished by his philanthropy and published translations of a number of French works. The only son of Francis G. Shaw was Colonel Robert Gould Shaw, who was killed in the Civil War while leading the Fifty-Second Massachusetts Regiment at Fort Wagner, S. C. He married Anna Haggerty, daughter of Ogden Haggerty, of New York. The other daughters of Francis G. Shaw are Susannah, who married Robert B. Minturn, Jr., Josephine (Shaw) Lowell, widow of General Charles Russell Lowell, and Ellen, widow of General Francis C. Barlow.

The children of Mr. and Mrs. Curtis are Elizabeth Burrill Curtis and Frank George Curtis, M. D., a practicing physician in Newton, Mass., who married Ruth W. Davison. Mrs. Curtis resides in Bard Avenue, New Brighton, Staten Island, and has a country place in Ashfield, Mass.

148

E. HOLBROOK CUSHMAN

O NE of the energetic promoters of the exodus of the Pilgrims from Holland to America in the seventeenth century was Robert Cushman, who was born in Kent, England, about 1580. With John Carver, he was active in bringing about the emigration of the Pilgrims to Holland, whom he afterwards joined at Leyden, and was one of the first to engage in negotia- tions with the English authorities for the transfer of his coreligionists to the New World. In 1617, he went to London with Carver to arrange with the Virginia Company for such a settlement in that part of the New World. The plans came to naught, however, because the King would not grant that liberty of conscience demanded by the proposed Colonists. In 1619, Robert Cushman and Elder Brewster renewed the negotiations, this time with success, and Cushman and Carver arranged the details for the voyage.

Robert Cushman was the business man of the enterprise. He chartered the Mayflower, was assistant governor of the company, and when the Mayflower sailed remained behind in England to take charge of the financial interests of the Pilgrims. In 1621, he visited Plymouth, but returned again to England, where he died in 1625. Thomas Cushman, the only son of Robert Cushman, was born in England in 1608, and died in Plymouth, Mass., in 1692, in the eighty-fourth year of his age. He married Mary, daughter of Isaac Allerton, was a close friend of Governor William Bradford, and ruling elder of the church on the death of Elder Brewster in 1649. His wife died in 1699 at the age of ninety-nine years, one of the last surviving members of the Mayflower company. A monument to the memory of Robert Cushman, his son Thomas and other early members of this pioneer family was erected several years ago, on Burial Hill, in Plymouth, by their descendants.

Thomas Cushman and his wife, Mary, were the American ancestors of the Cushmans in this country who trace their family line to the pre-Revolutionary period. One of the descendants was a pioneer settler of Otsego County, N. Y. His fifth son, Don Alonzo Cushman, was born in Coving- ton, Ky., October 1st, 1792, and died in New York City, May 1st, 1875. Brought up on his father's place, and educated in the local school, in 1805 he entered business in Cooperstown, N. Y. After several years he came to New York, where in 1810 he secured a position in a store. Five years after he became senior partner of the firm of Cushman & Falconer, which afterward became D. A. Cushman & Co., and so remained until Mr. Cushman's retirement, in 1855.

Early in life, Don A. Cushman became interested in real estate investments in New York City, and was a pioneer in the development of Chelsea Village as an urban residential district. He acquired considerable property there, built many houses, established his own dwelling-place on Ninth Avenue opposite the Episcopal Theological Seminary, and was more instrumental than any other single individual in making that section of the city one of the fashionable residential localities of half a century ago. In 1815, Mr. Cushman married Matilda C. S. Ritter, daughter of Peter Ritter, of New York. He had a family of thirteen children. Of his daughters, Mary Matilda Falconer became the wife of Philip F. Pistor; Catharine Fitter married N. B. Smith, of New Orleans; Caro- line E. married James Talman Waters, and Angelica B. married George Wilcoxson, of Nyack. Three daughters died while young.

Mr. E. Holbrook Cushman, son of Don Alonzo Cushman, was born in New York in 1832. He has retired from business and is principally engaged in caring for the large real estate holdings of the family. He lives in West Twenty-second Street and is a member of the New York Athletic and the Mendelssohn Glee clubs. Archibald Falconer Cushman, his brother, is a Columbia College graduate, a practicing lawyer, and a member of the Columbia Alumni Association and the Church Club. Another brother, William F. Cushman, is also a graduate of Columbia College, and engaged in the practice of medicine. James Stewart Cushman, who was the fifth of the six sons of the family, died in 1894. He was a well-known stock broker and one of the original members of the Gold Exchange.

149

WILLIAM BAYARD CUTTING

S EVERAL generations of the Cutting family have been eminent citizens of New York. Their ancestor, the Reverend Leonard Cutting, who was of English birth, took orders in the Church of England and, coming to America, had parishes at New Brunswick, N. J., Hemp- stead and Oyster Bay, Long Island, and in 1765 was a tutor and professor in Kings, afterwards Columbia College. In 1766, he established a school at Hempstead, which became a noted institution. His wife was a daughter of John Pintard, an alderman of New York in 1738, and a representative of a family of Huguenot descent which had settled at New Rochelle.

William Cutting, their only son, graduated from Columbia College in 1793 and became an eminently successful lawyer, being associated in practice with F. R. Tillou. He was Sheriff of New York County in 1807-08. He was also closely identified with his brother-in-law, Robert Fulton, in successful experiments in steam navigation, and secured the franchise for a term of years of the ferry between New York and Brooklyn at the foot of the present Fulton Street. He died in 1820. Gertrude Livingston, his wife, whose sister married Robert Fulton, was the daughter of Walter Livingston and Cornelia Schuyler, daughter of Peter Schuyler, and a niece of Chancellor Livingston. Walter Livingston was the son of Robert Livingston, of Livingston Manor, the head of that notable family, and was a member of the Assembly and its Speaker, a Regent of the University, County Judge and a trustee of Columbia College. His father was the eldest son of Philip Livingston, who, in turn, was the eldest son of the first Robert Livingston.

The descendants of William and Gertrude (Livingston) Cutting have been prominent pro- fessionally and socially in New York and have intermarried with many other distinguished families. Fulton Cutting, their fifth son, was the father of Mr. William Bayard Cutting. Fulton Cutting's wife was Justine Bayard, daughter of Robert and Elizabeth (McEvers) Bayard. Her paternal grandfather, William Bayard, who married Eliza Cornell, was of a race which had occupied a conspicuous position in New York since the days of the Dutch settlement, while her maternal grandfather, James McEvers, whose wife was Ruth Hunter, bore the name of a family also of great social importance.

Mr. William Bayard Cutting, born in New York January 12th, 1850, is a conspicuous representative of his family in this generation. He is a graduate of Columbia College and also took the degree of LL. B. in the law school of that institution. While engaged in the practice of the legal profession, he has devoted considerable time to the cause of reform in the city's adminis- tration, taking a leading part in movements to that end. He has also been a Civil Service Commissioner of New York City. He resides in Fifth Avenue, with a country place, Westbrook, Oakdale, Long Island. He is a member of the Metropolitan, Union, University, Century, Church, A + and Riding clubs, and the Downtown Association. He married Olivia Murray, daughter of Bronson Murray and his wife, Anne E. Peyton, her grandparents being James B. Murray and Maria Bronson. His children are William Bayard, Jr., Justine Bayard, Bronson Murray and Olivia Cutting.

Among other sons of William Cutting, the Honorable Francis Brockholst Cutting attained particular prominence in the last generation, being a lawyer of high reputation and a Member of Congress 1853-55. He died in 1870, his sons being Heyward Cutting, who died in 1876, General William Cutting, who died in 1897, and Brockholst Cutting, who died before his father. The sons of Brockholst Cutting were William Cutting, Jr., who resides in Madison Avenue, and Francis Brockholst Cutting, second of the name, who died in 1896. Another brother of Fulton Cutting, was Robert Livingston Cutting, an eminent banker and socially distinguished, who married Juliana De Wolfe, daughter of James De Wolfe, of Bristol, R. 1. His sons were Robert Livingston Cutting, second of the name, who married Judith E. Moale, and left two sons, James De Wolfe Cutting and Robert Livingston Cutting, the third of that name; and Walter Cutting, who married Madeline C. Pomeroy and has three children, Walter Livingston, Juliana and Madeline Cutting.

150

THOMAS DE WITT CUYLER

N O American family has a more honorable record than that derived from Hendrick Cuyler, who was born in Amsterdam, Holland, in 1637, came to Beverwyck, near Albany, in 1664, with his wife, Annetje Schepmoes, and was Major of cavalry in the French War. His eldest son, Johannes Cuyler, married Elsje, daughter of Dirk Wessels Ten Broeck, in 1684. The second son, Abraham Cuyler, married Caatje Bleecker, of New York, and had numerous descendants. Maria, the eldest daughter of Hendrick Cuyler, married John Cruger, Mayor of New York. Rachel Cuyler, the next daughter, married Myndert Schuyler, and from them many of the Schuylers and de Peysters are descended. Johannes Cuyler was the ancestor of the branch of the family now under consideration. He was a merchant and Mayor of Albany. He had twelve children, who were the ancestors of families living in New York, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia and Georgia. Cornelius Cuyler, his eldest son, married Cathalyra Schuyler, and their son, born in 1740, was a loyalist in the Revolution, removed to England and was made a baronet.

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Prominent families of New York; being an account in biographical form of individuals and families distinguished as representatives of the social, professional and civic life of New York city, Part 24

Author: Weeks, Lyman Horace, ed Publication date: 1897 Publisher: New York, The Historical company Number of Pages: 650

Author: Weeks, Lyman Horace, ed
Publication date: 1897
Publisher: New York, The Historical company
Number of Pages: 650