USA > New York > Schenectady County > Schenectady County, New York : its history to the close of the nineteenth century > Part 7
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The renewal of the stockades, which, made of pine logs, lasted but five or six years, became very burthensome to the inhabi- tants of the village after its destruction in 1690. Having built a new fort in 1690 they were ordered to renew the palisades in 1695. On this occasion Reyer Schermerhorn refused to cut and draw his proportion of the logs. It may be because living at the mills, he thought himself exempt from this burthensome service, or that his quota was too large. Thereupon Justice Johannes Sanders Glen fined him twelve shillings, but as he continued contumacious Governor Fletcher, on the 9th of April, 1698, directed the sheriff of Albany county to bring him before the Council in New York to answer for his conduct. On the 30th he appeared before the council and "stood upon his vindication," whereupon he was "committed to answer at the next Supreme Court, and Colonel Courtlandt was desired to take bond with sureties for his appearance, and that he be of good behav- iour in the mean time."
In the winter of 1695-6 the garrison at Schenectady consisted of a detachment under cominand of Lieutenant Bickford, from the com- panies of Captain James Weens and Williams Hyde, stationed at Albany. "On the Ioth of January, about 12 o'clock at night the whole guard, except one deserted, and others to the number of six- teen, broke through the northwest blockhouse next the water side." (Benne Kil).
" They drew the guns of both powder and shot. The Lieutenant about two o'clock, discovering their desertion, notified by express Colonel Richard Ingoldsby at Albany, and with ten volunteers of the inhabitants and eleven soldiers started in pursuit. The sergeant and seven red coats soon gave out and were left behind. At four in the afternoon the Lieutenant and his fourteen men came up with the sixteen deserters, ordering them to lay down their arms. They
65
DESERTERS SHOT.
answered with a volley, and both sides continued to fire until five of the deserters were killed and two wounded, when the remainder sur- rendered."
These facts were stated by Lieutenant Bickford in his account of the affair to Governor Fletcher, of March 9th. In closing his dis- patch he says: "Here is a strong and regular fort built by the inhabitants with foot works and a stone magazine fit for this garri- son." The following were the volunteers from Schenectady who accompanied Lieutenant Bickford in his hazardous enterprise : " Har- man Van Slyck, Ensign of the train bands of Schenectady, and Gerrit Simons Veeder, Peter Simons Veeder, Albert Veeder, Gerrit Gysbert (Gysberts Van Brakel), Jan Danielse Van Antwerpen, Dirck Groot, Jonas DeRoy, John Wemp, Daniel Mutchcraft (Mascraft) and Thomas Smith."
At a court martial held in Schenectady April 21st, the survivors of the deserting party were accounted guilty and condemned to be shot.
But out in the suburbs and in remote Casligione, as Niskayuna was called, on the bouwlands of what is now Rotterdam and in Glenoilly, the musket was as necessary as the plow and no man dare leave his family alone. As we shall see throughout three-quarters of the following century Schenectady was on the frontier and until the close of the Revolutionary war was garrisoned, fortified, and the rendezvous for the fighters of the Valley.
In the Colonial Documents in the State Library at Albany, are to be found little scraps of cheerful incidents that show the terrors of that situation where eternal vigilance was not only the price of liberty but of life. We quote some of them.
In April, 1690, an attack was made on the feeble settlement at Canastagione where eight or ten people were killed by the French Indians, " which has made the whole country in an aların and the people leave their plantations."
Of this attack Leisler wrote to Governor Treat of Connecticut, April 19th, as follows :
"It happened the last Sabbath day, at Niskayuna, 12 miles from Albany. The people there gathered all in one house and kept watch, the said French and Indians, finding in the night the house empty,
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SCHENECTADY COUNTY: ITS HISTORY.
and perceiving their retreat, were in a swamp, the people going in the morning, each to their houses, were surprised, nine Christians, two niegroes were killed and captured, which must have encouraged the enemy to further attempt, if not prevented by a vigorous attack in Canada."
About this time, the summer of 1691, the Indians took prisoner, one Cornelis Clatie at Niskayuna. " At the end of June, two men went over the river at Niskayuna to inake hay upon Claas (Janse Van Boekhoven's) DeBrabander's land, the most dangerous place in all the Province. Some French Indians surprised them, killed one and took off his skull. What became of the other we know not. The other people that were mowing the hay upon Claas DeBraban- der's Island, that now belongs to John Child, heard three guns go off and went to the river side, but saw no one. The canoes were there. We sent a party with horses who found one of the men lying in the water at the shore side. Such was the aların that the people did not dare stay on their farms, and there was also danger of the crops not being harvested."
· In February came an alarm from Albany to Governor Fletcher that " 350 French and 200 Indians had come within 36 miles of Schenectady."
In September, three French prisoners, being examined at New York, said that last summer (1692) the French of Canada "had a design to fall upon Albany and Schenectady and the Mohawk coun- try, but first to take Schenectady where they resolved to build a fort. Their design failed."
The low condition of Schenectady is plainly shown by the follow- ing petition, so impoverished had the poor people become, that a pal- try tax of only £29 and 7 shillings was considered too great a burden for the whole township to bear.
" To his Excellency, etc., etc.
The humble petition of the inhabitants of Schenectady in the county of Albany,
HUMBLY SHOWETH :
That your Excellency's petitioners have received inany great dam- ages and losses by the French and their adherents, by murdering of
67
A PETITION FOR RELIEF.
their Majesty's good subjects and burning their habitations and cattle, etc., and daily great charges and trouble with the Indian soldiers and their wives and children, as lately about 300 of these were here twenty-one days before they inarched toward Canada, destroying our grain, etc., in our plantations, that our winter maintenance for our poor families is much shortened to our ruin having many poor widows and children from the out places here to secure their lives ; as also the magistrates, etc., of Albany have allotted to us to pay towards the tax of £315 for our part £29 and 7 shillings which seems to our poor condition very hard, not knowing how to raise it, being constrained to plant together that we cannot (lose) that little what we have left, etc.
Whereupon your petitioners humbly implore your Excellency for a redress, and that we may be freed of all taxes till the war is ended and your excellency, further assistance with soldiers, etc., for a defense against the enemies, etc.
(No signature).
Petition granted " nemine contradicente " II October, 1692."
In July the French attacked and burnt the castle of the Oneidas ; the Onondagas finding themselves too weak to cope with them, burnt their castles and retreated. There was a great alarm at Sche- nectady lest the French should move down and attack the village.
September 17th, 1696. " About ten days ago a skulking party of French Indians killed a man and wounded another near Schenec- tady."
England with all her power and resources, four times outnumber- ing with the Five Nations, her noble allies, all her French and Indian enemies shamefully neglected the protection of the brave Hollander whose hope and courage never failed him after the first shock of his awful disaster was over. She would not fortify. Report after report was made of the shabby defenses at Albany and Schen- ectady. Imperative orders came again to Schenectady commanding the suffering, poverty-stricken people to build forts and stockades. Ryer Schermerhorn, a sturdy, brave and independent Dutchman as ever lived, rebelled and suffered.
The century closed in gloom. A pall was over the poor little town. But in the two centuries to come she was to attract the attention of
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SCHENECTADY COUNTY: ITS HISTORY.
history with the continuous story of heroism, in the hour of danger to awaken the admiration of Christendom with her sturdy courage, to be unequalled in her devotion to the King of England, to be patient and long-suffering under wrong and neglect, to be in the day of the Revolution the most loyal little town in the State, to awaken amusement when as though tired out she went to sleep for years, to rouse astonishinent when in this day she is advancing in population and business prosperity far beyond any city in the State, outstripped in rapid growth by comparatively few on the continent.
CHAPTER IV.
SCHENECTADY IN BORDER AND THE OLD FRENCH WARS-1700 TO THE REVOLUTION.
The morning of the eighteenth century woke very dark and lowering over the unhappy town. The Englishman had not exhib- ited the prescience or exercised the wise judgment of the cautious Hollander in his dealings with Schenectady's Indian neighbors. The Jesuit had been getting in his fine work on the imaginative credu- ality of the ungentle savage. The Mohawk was not proof against his blandishments. The trinkets of this earth were dangled before his eyes, the devil's own ruin was freely traded to him by the French- men, and the priest with rosary, cross and his fascinating ceremonial began to wean away the great Five Nations, and the poor town could no longer rely with such perfect faith on her dusky and faith- ful allies. As an enemy the Indian is treacherous, and all around the borders of the City of Niskayuna and the bouwlands and Woes- tina (the wilderness) as West Rotterdam was called, assassinations were very frequent at the very gates of the city. "So bold had the enemy become," writes Col. Glen, "that French and Indians cap- tured an Onondaga Chief at the north gate. Twice the number of the attacking party went after them and drove them away. The
69
ROSTER OF MILITARY.
Mohawks were neglected by the English. The French Jesuit was a new and a willing martyr to the faith of his adoration. Schenectady aroused, clamored for aid, and in 1715 had two military companies on foot consisting of about sixty men, including officers. We give here the list of the names of the men of the two companies :
Capt. J. Sanderse Glen, Lieut. Gerret Symer Feeder, (Veeder).
Lieut. Jan Wemp,
Lieut. Arent Brat,
Lieut. Barent Wemp,
Corp. Evert V. Eps,
Corp. Theunis V. de Volge,
Corp. Manus Vedder,
Abraham Glen,
Pieter Vrooman, Jr.,
Gysbert V. Brakel,
Helmus Veeder,
Eheunis Swart,
Joseph Teller, Jr.,
Dirck Groot,
Jacob Swits, Sander Glen,
Sweer Marselus,
Cornelis Van Dyck,
Claes Franse, (V. D. Bogart)
Jacob Schermerhorn,
Barent Vrooman,
Myndert Wimp.
Jacob Teller,
Jan Dellemont,
Andries V. Pette,
Jacob Flipse, (Philipse).
Jan Marselus,
Welm Hael, (Hall).
Robert Etts, (Yates).
Joseph Vedder,
Cornelis V. Slyck,
Cornelis Viele,
David Marenus,
Jocobus Peck, Jr., Abraham D. Graef, Peiter Danyelse, (V. Antwerpen).
Phillip Philipse,
Symon Folkertse Feeder, (Veeder). Jacob Vrooman,
Pieter Quinzey.
Jelles Van Vorst,
Abraham Groot,
Cornelis Slingerlant,
Jan Baptist V. Eps,
Arent Danyelse, (V. Antwerpen).
Hendrick Vrooman, Jr., Jan Schermerhorn, Symon Toll,
Willen Marenus, Class V. Putte, Jr.,
Jacob V. Olinda,
Nicolas Stensel, Arent Samuel Brat,
Symon Groot, Marte V. Slyck,
6
70
SCHENECTADY COUNTY: ITS HISTORY.
John Peck,
Jellis Fonda,
Capt. Harine V. Slyck,
Lieut. Hendrick Vroomnan,
Lieut. Jacob Glen,
Wilm Brouwer, Pieter Mebie,
Sergeant Joseph Teller,
Sergeant Gerret V. Brakel,
Sergeant Folcket Symonse, (Veeder).
Philip Groot.
Corp. Jacob V. Ghyselinge,
Corp. Andreas de Graaf,
Corp. Harme Veeder.
Johannes Vrooman,
Jan Barentse Wemp,
Abraham Meebie,
Jan Vrooman, Jr.,
Harme Vedder, Jr.,
Cornelus Van der Volge,
Jonetan Stevens,
Benyemen V. Vleck,
Arent Van Putte,
Marte V. Benthuysen,
Jacobus Vedder,
Samuel Hagadorn,
Wouter Swart,
William Teller,
Jeremy Tickstoon,
Wouter Vrooman,
Sander Flipse, (Philipse).
William Coppernol,
Jan Danyelse, (V. Antwerpen),
Hendrick Hagedorn,
Esyas Swart,
Peter Vrooman,
Joseph Clement,
Harme Flipse, (Philipse.)
Arent Schermerhorn,
Robert Dwyer,
Jacob Meebie,
Nicklas Stevens,
Myndert Van Ghyselinge,
Peter Bouwer,
Joseph Marenus,
Peter Clement,
Victor Putman,
Adam Smith,
Daniel Toll,
John Feerly,
Bartholomew Picker, Jr.,
Joseph Van Eps.
It will be observed that many new Dutch names appear. But two English names appear in the whole list, Robert Ets, that being the nearest that Robert Yates, who came here in 1711 with his father, Abram Yates, could spell his name in Dutch, and John Smith. The
Hendrick Flipse, (Philipse) Wilm Daes, Symon Swits,
Arenout deGraef,
Tyerck Franse, (V. D. Bogart.)
Isaac de Graaf, Philip Bosie,
7I
NEGLECT OF GOVERNMENT.
Vanderbogarts, who have figured in every war, border, French and Indian and the Revolution, were called in old documents " Franse," and there has always been a Franse Van De Bogart in this city, until a quarter of a century ago. Van Antwerp was called Danielse and Dan Van Antwerp has been here in namne at least for two hundred years. The descendants of these families are living among us to-day.
For the entire first half of the century Schenectady furnished sol- diers to the Englishinen's war. The French were far inferior in numbers, by far the weaker nation, but they were untiring, vigilant and cruel. Their raids were frequently undertaken and carried out with an energy, fearlessness and rapidity that struck terror through- out our valley. With indignant surprise we look back on the story of that day, at the strange lethargy of England, and the wonderful alertness of her enemy, and that, with less than one-twelfth of her power in men, munitions and money, her enemy could strike blows in every quarter that evinced inexcusable neglect on the part of her powerful foe. All this captivated the savage, bred in himn a profound and terror stricken respect for his smart and agile enemy, that often converted him to an ally of the winner in this bloody brigandage. The burgher, brave and sturdy as he was, was unnerved by the neg- lect of his government, and the dangers that hovered around him by night and day in field and by fireside. If he had been caught nap- ping one awful night in the close of the seventeenth, he was wide awake in the eighteenth century. It was his turn now to call on his comatose protectors to guard their frontier, and to call attention to defenceless towns, decaying forts and rotten barricades. Some idea of his life in the midst of enemies, firing on him from ambuscades by day, and hanging around his premises with gun and tomahawks by night, can be gathered from items picked up at random from the Colonial manuscript at Albany.
No family was safe unless protected by blockhouse or palisade ; no man was exempt from military duty save by age or infirmity. In Schenectady and Albany each able-bodied man kept watch and ward every third or fourth night. French and English reports alike, give sad accounts of shocking barbarities practiced on both sides, by
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SCHENECTADY COUNTY: ITS HISTORY.
skulking parties of savages and white men. The following exam- ples, among many others taken from French reports, clearly show the cruelties practiced by these two Christian nations, who rewarded their savage allies in proportion to the number of scalps returned.
" April 20th, 1746, a party of fourteen Iroquois belonging to the Sault St. Louis, commanded by Ontassago, the son of the grand chief of that village who sojourned at Fort St. Frederic (Crown Point) made several scouts to Sarasteau (Saratoga)."
"May 24tlı, 1746, a party of eight Abenakis of Missiskony has been fitted out, who have been in the direction of Corlard (Schenec- tady) and have returned with some prisoners and scalps." It was probably in this raid that John Groot of Schenectady was captured. He died in Quebec Nov. 20th, 1746.
" May 27th, 1746. An equipped party of eight Iroquois of Sault St. Louis, struck a blow near Orange, and brought back six scalps."
" A party of Abenekis of Missiskony struck a blow near Orange, (Albany) and Corlard, (Schenectady) and brought some prisoners and scalps."
"June 2, 1746, an equipped party of twenty-five warriors of the Sault, and three Flatheads who joined the former in an expedition to the neighborhood of Orange, and who returned with some scalps."
"June 3, 1746, equipped a party of eighteen Nepissings who struck a blow at Orange and Corland (Schenectady)."
" June 19th, 1746, equipped a party of twenty-five Indians of Sault St. Louis, who struck a blow near Orange (Albany). One or two of the Indians were wounded. They brought away some scalps."
"June 20th, 1746, equipped a party of nineteen Iroquois of the Sault St Louis, who went to Orange to strike a blow."
" March, 1747, there came into prison at Quebec a Dutchman from Schenectady and a woman from Saratoga."
"In the spring of 1746, Edward Cloutman and Robert Dunbar, (son perhaps of John Dunbar of Schenectady, if so he was born in Albany Nov. 20th, 1709), broke prison at Quebec 23d of October, 1746, and escaped. Dunbar was taken not long before, as he was scouting on the 'Carrying Place,' and his loss was greatly lamented
73
INDIAN ATROCITIES.
as he had performed the most important service as a ranger, ever since the war commenced."
" May 7th, 1746. The inhabitants along the Mohawk river have left their settlements so that we are now reduced to great distress. As we wrote in our last, if a very considerable force be not immedi- ately sent to have neither inen, money nor warlike stores."
" P. S. Just now is news come that a house and barn are burnt at Canastagione (Niskayuna), and four men carried off or killed."
About the same time, Simon Groot and two of his brothers were butchered, three miles from the village of Schenectady. The enemy burnt their buildings, killed their cattle and destroyed their other effects. They were discovered while doing this mischief by the set- tlers on the opposite side of the river, who knew some of the Indians, particularly Tom Wileman, who had lately removed from the Mohawk country to Albany.
It was doubtless to this raid that Smith refers in his history of New York. He says :
" One hundred and six men were detached from Schenectady. The track of the Indians was discovered by the fires they had made, and they were pursued above Schenectady. At the house of one Simon Groot they had murdered and scalped a boy, taken one inan prisoner, plundered and set fire to the house, and shot a man in attempting to escape by swimming over the river."
It was a school of terrible experience; its history written in bloody text on every mile of land around and beneath us. It had its grand results as many of the awful lessons of carnage have. A race of fighting men was reared here, whose splendid courage was the inspiration of their children and their children's children in heroic defense of their King, and the independence of these United States in the days of still sterner battles that were rapidly drawing near.
New England through the genius of historian and poet has drawn upon herself the attention of scholars and readers all over the world. The story of Pilgrim and Puritan, and a grand story it is, fills the school-book, and challenges the attention of the student of history the world over. But no valley in America has been inade redder
74
SCHENECTADY COUNTY: ITS HISTORY.
with the blood of heroic men than this. No hills have looked down on more scenes of horror and heroism than the Heilderbergs. No river in all this broad land flows through a valley richer in the record of patriot and martyr, to Catholic and Protestant faith, of loyalty to King George and George Washington, than the grand old Mohawk around us.
Despite of wars and rumors of wars, of strife and bloodshed, all of which was engendered in Europe over the quarrels of monarchs that interested the burgher not one iota, while it made him fight all the time, the town grew and trade was always good. The land in the flats was unequalled in production of the staples of life. It was the best corn land then known on earth. Grain was plenty and to be obtained for trinkets and rum, both always plenty in the hands of the white man.
A new fort was built. After the second fort had been cccupied about fifteen years, 1690 to 1705, the block houses were abandoned (as barracks only) and Queen's " new fort " was built at the east angle of the stockade. This was the " Old Fort," about which all the traditions of the people cluster. It was at first simply a double or triple stockade, 100 feet square, with bastions or block houses at the angles. In 1735 it was rebuilt in a more substantial manner with timbers on a stone foundation. The four curtains were about seventy-six feet each and the four bastions or blockhouses twenty- four feet square.
In 1754, at the beginning of the French war, it contained one six and one nine pounder on carriages, but no "port holes in the cur- tains to fire them."
From the recollections of a Sexagenary, in the State library, we gain further description as the Fort was seen in 1757.
" Schenectady or Corlar, situated on the left bank of the Mohawk river, is a village of about 300 houses. It is surrounded by upright pickets flanked from distance to distance. Entering this village by the gate on the Fort Hunter side, there is a fort to the right which forms a species of citadel in the interior of the village itself. It is square, flanked with four bastions or demi-bastions, and is con- structed half of masonry and half of timbers piled over the other
A SECOND PETITION. 75
above the masonry. It is capable of holding 200 or 300 men. There are some pieces of cannon as a battery on the rampart. It is not encircled by a ditch. The entrance is through a large swing gate, raised like a drawbridge. By penetrating the village in attack- ing it at another point, the fire from the fort can be avoided."
" After the Earl of Loudon had resigned to Gen. Abercrombie, the command of the ariny, which had reduced Oswego, my father, then a young man, was called to Schenectady by sudden business."
" That place was then fortified. It had the shape of a parallelo- gram, with two gates, one opening to the eastern, the other to the northern road and was garrisoned by fifty or sixty soldiers."
On the 15th of October following, the inhabitants of Schenectady again petitioned the Governor to build a fort in the village, signed by Daniel Campbell, Arent Bratt, Abrahaın Glen and others.
The open space on which this fort stood, at the junction of Ferry, Front and Green streets, was about 264 feet more than 200 feet, extending from the Episcopal church yard to Green street.
The fort was built nearly in the center of this plat, the south wall extending across Ferry street, three feet south of the north corner of the parsonage house.
The well of the fort was in the middle of the street, three feet south of the north corner of Mr. James Sander's house.
Mr. Nicholas Veeder, who died in Glenville in 1862, aged 100 years, said that this fort was about twenty feet high and built of hewn timber, that it was taken down in the Revolutionary War, and the timber used in the frame of soldiers' barracks built on land of Johannes Quackenbos, at the south corner of Union and Lafayette streets. The village then had an armament of iron cannons and swivels, the largest of which were the "Lady Washington " and the "Long Nine Pounder," which were placed in the streets so as to command the gates. In digging trenches for water pipes in 1871, the south wall and well of the fort were discovered.
The new fort called Queen's Fort, after Anne, their Queen of Eng- land, was garrisoned at the time of its building in 1704.
The palisades on the west side of the village stood about 100 feet back from Washington street, but on the 29th of July, 1704, Gover-
.
76
SCHENECTADY COUNTY: ITS HISTORY.
nor Cornbury issued the following order for removing them to the bank of the Benne Kil :
" You or either of you are hereby required as early as the weather will permit, that next spring to cause the stockades set upon the west side of the town of Schenectady, to be removed from the place where they now stand, and be set up as near the river as the ground will permit, and hereof you are not to fail.
Given under my hand at Schenectady this 29th day of July, 1704.
To JOHANNES SANDERS (GLEN),
ADAM VROOMAN."
To understand the significance of this order, it should be remem- bered that since the destruction of the first fort in 1690, the ground lying west of Washington street had been outside of the west of the second fort. By the year 1704, the " Queen's New Fort " had been erected in the east corner of the village, at the junction of Front, Ferry and Green streets, the Governor therefore orders the removal of the west line of the second fort by setting back the stockades to the bank of the Benne Kil, the land along Washington street revert- ing to the original owners.
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