USA > New York > Bronx County > The Bronx and its people; a history, 1609-1927, Volume I > Part 32
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Not long after this my Lord (Cornbury) requested me to go and preach at East Chester; accordingly I went (tho' some there had given out threatening words should I dare to come), but tho' I was there very early and the people had notice of my coming, their Presbyterian minister, Mr. Morgan, had begun service in the meeting-house, to which I went straitway and continued the whole time of service without interruption, and in the afternoon I was permitted to perform the Church of England services, Mr. Morgan being present, and neither he nor the people seemed to be dissatisfied, and after some time of preaching there after- wards they desired me to come oftener, and I concluded to minister there once a month, which now I have done for about three years, and Mr. Morgan is retired into New England.
New England Puritanism suffered a decline in the population of New York and Westchester as a result of the antagonism of Cornbury ; but with the accession of the house of Hanover to the English throne in 1714 persecution of the Puritans in America came to something like an end. On November 22, 1728, the Rev. William Tennent settled at East Chester and began to rebuild Puritanism in the county. He re- moved to Bedford on May 1, 1720, and remained until August, 1726, preaching in all the townships. When Methodism divided the churches of the colony into antagonistic forces he became one of its leaders. An impetuous revival of faith occurred which was guided by Thomas Smith of Rye and Samuel Sackett at Bedford. Tennent and his ad-
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herents were excluded from the Synod of Philadelphia in 1741, in the absence of the entire Presbytery of New York. The excluded Method- ists rallied around the Presbytery of New Brunswick, and in 1745 it combined with the Presbytery of New York in erecting the Synod of New York, all of the churches of which were in sympathy with the Methodists. In 1752 the Rye Church united with the Synod and thus all the original Puritan churches of New York, organized in the seven- teenth century, were combined in one compact synodical organization. On November 29, 1769, Mr. De Witt offered in the Assembly a bill "to exempt the inhabitants of the counties of Westchester, New York. Queens and Richmond from any taxation for support of the Ministers of churches to which they do not belong." And this was finally passed with amendments applying it especially to persons not in communion with the Church of England.
Indian and Other Currencies-And now to pass on to more material matters. The Dutch pioneers on Manhattan found it convenient to adopt the currency of the Indians, who took the common periwinkle, called by them "Meteauhock," found in great quantities along the shores, and having broken it so as to secure the thick portion at the stem, made beads about the size of a straw and a third of an inch in length. This was the white sewant of least value. A black bead of the same descrip- tion was made from the large round clam called the "quahaug." These beads were woven into belts, and divided into pieces of different values. Four beads counted for a stuyver, or two for a cent, and a beaded string a fathom long was valued at four guilders, equivalent to $1.66. Sewant was commonly measured by spans, and the Indians, in their traffic with the Dutch, always chose as traders their men who could cover the greatest length between finger and thumb. But counterfeits sprang up, and the currency in course of time became debased. The Indian money was even imported from Europe, where imitations were made of porcelain, but this base article could not impose on the natives and the counterfeit failed as speculation. The "good splendid sewant of Man- hattans" was the genuine article and passed in all the Indian country roundabout, for the island of Manhattan and the neighboring sections were the great minting places of the Indians. Up the North River, in Westchester and elsewhere, sewant had its legal tender value well defined until so many broken, unstrung and badly made pieces came into circulation that the Dutch government-coin being scarce at the time-was obliged to find a new currency. Beaverskins supplied the deficiency and became the next flat money of the day. This was an article less subject to fluctuation and was divided into "whole beavers" and "half beavers," the former being rated at about three dollars. What little of the Dutch currency was in circulation was known as "Hollands."
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In contracts for sale and purchase of real estate and personal property, the distinctive sorts of payment were usually expressed; and if not stated, it was understood that sewant was the consideration. There were certain sorts of contracts, however, such as ocean freights, in which, by the customs of the merchants, it was implied that payment was made in beavers. On account of the debasement of the sewant currency, the council ordered in May, 1650, that six white or three black sewants should pass for one stuyver, which was reckoned at half a cent, and the base strung sewant, eight white or four black for one stuyver.
Legislation on the matter of legal tender was at that time not well understood. Many people refused to accept the base sewant until in the following September the council enacted "that the base strung sewant should be received by every one without distinction, in payment for small daily and necessary commodities in housekeeping, and that it should be current as follows : For twelve guilders or under, all may be paid in base strung sewant; from twelve to twenty-four guilders, half base and half good strung sewant ; and in larger sums agreeably to the agreement between buyer and seller." In 1658 the rate was again altered to eight white and four black of the good sewant for one stuyver. The colony was suffering from a superabundant and depreciated cur- rency, which was intrinsically worthless. Beavers, which had an actual value apart from that which legislation could place upon them, appre- ciated until they were rated at sixteen guilders each; and, as a matter of course, provisions and household necessaries followed the great upward movement of the currency which kept anything like an even ratio with real money. Shopkeepers, tapsters, brewers, bakers, grocers, and workingmen charged a difference of eighty, ninety or a hundred per cent between sewant and beaver in taking pay for their goods or their labor. The council struggled bravely to enhance the value of the sewant by resorting to the fiction that values can be controlled by arbitrary enactment. Its next law, which was passed on November 11, 1658, was "that the brewers, tapsters, bakers and other shopkeepers and common grocers, should sell the daily necessary family commodities to the buyers at their different prices, to wit, silver money, beavers and sewant: as for instance, the brewers should deliver one barrel of good beer for ten guilders (about $3.80) in silver money, according to the Holland value of fifteen guilders in beavers, the beaver at eight guilders to twenty-two guilders ; in sewant, eight white of four black for a stuyver."
Drink and Food-It is testimony to the drinking customs of the Dutch families that beer and wine were estimated by the law as neces- saries of which no household should be deprived by exorbitant or fluctuating prices. The cost of the malt liquor was made little enough in the ordinance of 1658, and it was equally accommodating in providing
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that French wine should cost no more than eighteen stuyvers or nine cents the pint in silver money ; Spanish wine no more than twenty-four stuyvers, and brandywine only five stuyvers for a gill. Yet these prices, which were official, so to speak, were subject to the competition set up by the smugglers, whose illicit trade in the harbor and for a long distance up the Hudson had much to do with stocking the bars of the tapsters and the cellars of the manorial lords, besides furnishing the Indians and slaves with the cheap liquors that incited them to riot, "whereby," says the ordinance of October 26, 1656, "almost all the calamities occur." This omnibus enactment proceeded after the smug- glers with a stinging thong. Five hundred guilders was the fine fixed for the first offense, and the forfeiture of the "barque, yacht, boat or canoe" the owner whereof attempted to evade the custom officers, for the second. Still the rewards of the prohibited trade were so tempt- ing that the many seamen engaged in it continued to run the gauntlet. They brought their cargoes to the numerous secure nooks in the river- shore in Westchester County, and when the contraband goods were once unloaded and run into the back country, they might defy detection. In pursuing the smugglers the council did not omit to pay attention to various frauds perpetrated by lawful traders. The comprehensive enactment aimed at the smugglers also embraced a fulmination against the bakers. It obliged them "at least once or twice a week, to bake both coarse and white loaves of bread, both for Christians and Indians, at the established price and weight of one double coarse loaf, eight pounds, for fourteen stuyvers," and smaller loaves in proportion. The double white loaf was required to weigh two pounds, and to be sold for eight stuyvers. In case of light-weight bread, or over-charges, the bread was forfeited and the baker fined twenty-five guilders for the first offense, fifty for the second, and for the third six hundred guilders and absolutely prohibited from conducting the business. No bakers were permitted "to sell any bread made of sifted bran, whether at whole- sale or retail, to Christians or Indians; but the bakers of coarse bread may make their coarse bread of the ground grain as it comes from the mill." It was further enacted that in consequence of "the many frauds in baking and tapping," "no person shall follow the business of baking and tapping without first having made application to those of the magistrates in their respective districts, and having procured from the same or their authorized agents a license for that business," which was to be renewed quarterly. The criminal law was rigorously administered in colonial days and its penalties were almost ferociously harsh. About the time of the settlement of New York, hanging was succeeding be- heading in the northern European countries as the means of executing those convicted of capital crime, and it was not long before the hangman
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became one of the officials of the colonies. His methods were far more brutal and painful than those which a more humane civilization has devised. Instead of the modern trap, or other appliances designed to dislocate the vertebra of the convict, the old-time gibbet was merely two uprights with a cross beam, from which depended the rope and noose. He was driven under it in a cart, the noose fastened about his neck and the cart driven off, leaving him to perish slowly of strangula- tion. Such malefactors were always hanged in chains and their bodies left swinging in the irons for months, a supposed ghastly and terrible warning to evildoers. Sometimes the hangman would jump upon the shoulders or swing from the feet of the victim in order to expedite the strangling process.
Offenses and Punishment-The whipping post, the stocks, and the pillory, were instruments of punishment for lesser offenses. They were part of the judicial equipment of every county town or seat of govern- ment, and stood conveniently near to the courthouse or jail, for in the early days both were usually situated in one building. Punishment by the pillory was much the more severe, the victim being in a standing position; but even that by the stocks was painful, and it was not un- common for men to swoon under the agony of either the pillory or the stocks. But while the colonists followed European precedent in the in- fliction of rigorous penalties, and their laws embraced many statutory crimes now abolished, they made no use of such instruments of torture as the rack, wheel, thumb-screw, or pincers, found in all European prisons. Even the ducking stool does not appear to have been used outside of New England. It will thus be gathered that the government of New Amsterdam, which exercised jurisdiction over the valley of the Bronx and in Westchester County, went a long distance in the details of everyday life, and was almost microscopic in its purview of the incidents of trade and personal relations. While this is true it was to a large extent a liberal government. Modern criticism may take exception to its religious intolerance, but it has been claimed that that was more apparent than real. The Dutch settlers on Manhattan and above on the Hudson were soon joined by English Puritans, Huguenots from Rochelle, Waldenses from the Piedmont country of France, German Lutherans and Anabaptists, Swedes and Irish and Walloon Catholics. They lived together amicably, because the Dutch trend in the new country was in the direction of tolerance, whatever might have been the jealousy between creeds in the old.
Revolutionary Incidents in Lower Westchester-Incidents that oc- curred in Westchester County during the War of the Revolution reveal much of the methods and habits of the people of the time and the kind
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of environment in which they lived. The phlegmatic Dutchman who occupied the Livingston house at Dobbs Ferry at the time was tempor- arily frightened away by the hum of cannon-balls about his premises. When in 1777 General Lincoln made the place his headquarters he piled four barrels of gunpowder in a little shed in the rear of the house, answering the proprietor's remonstrances with the remark that "it was a good dry place for it." After the army marched away the Dutch- man found that the barrels contained nothing but sand, and had been placed there as a ruse to deceive the enemy if any spies should happen to be prowling about. At Dobbs Ferry also General Washington en- tertained the Duc de Lauzen, Count de Rochambeau, Steuben and others of the distinguished foreign officers who had come to his aid, on July 6, 1781. Alexander Hamilton presided, and his graceful manners and witty speech provoked general interest. There also Washington and Sir Guy Carleton and their respective suites met to arrange for the evacuation of New York by the British. On the sequestration of the Philipseburgh Manor the property was purchased by Peter Van Brugh Livingston, and it thence took his family name. The Roger Morris house, at the most elevated point of Harlem Heights, where the steep, rocky right bank of the Harlem River slopes gently to the southwest, was built in 1758 for the man whose name it bore after that time. He was, as has been already noted, a captain in the British army, and in the year in which the house was built married Mary Philipse, for whose hand Washington is said, on more or less good authority, to have been an unsuccessful suitor. "A lively fancy," observes one com- mentator, "may be permitted to call up his emotions when, in September, 1776, as commander-in-chief of the American Army, he made the residence of a woman who had rejected him his headquarters, or when, in July, 1790, as President of the United States, he revisited it, she and her husband being attainted fugitives from the home which the new government had confiscated. The wealthy Frenchman, Stephen Jumel, bought it, and his wife adorned it with an exquisite taste and lavish hand. There she lived until her death in 1865; there, in the days of her widowhood, she married Aaron Burr, and it was over this' very valuable estate that her heirs wrangled until the courts disposed of it."
During and after the fight at Chatterton Hill General Washington had his headquarters in the Miller house at White Plains, which until recent- ly was in the possession of the Miller family by whose name it continued to be known. He was frequently at the Birdsall house in Peekskill, which was one of the first buildings erected in the village. It was a favorite tavern and was repeatedly visited by the officers when the allied armies, under Washington and Rochambeau, menaced the English
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positions in and about New York. It stood on the old post road and continued to be kept as a tavern. Near by could be seen remains of the old fort which crowned the elevated position at the mouth of the Highland Gorge.
There were a number of localities in the Westchester region, as appears from some Revolutionary papers, which there has been later a difficulty in identifying. Thus Washington in his order-book under date of October 24, 1782, directs :
"The tents being too cold for the accommodation of the sick, the regi- mental surgeons will send no more to the flying hospital, but have such as are hospital patients sent to the huts at New Boston."
On the night of May 13, 1781, Lieutenant-Colonel Greene, the hero of Red Bank, was killed at his quarters on the Croton River, near the site of the present dam, by a party of De Lancey's corps. Paymaster Thomas Hughes, of the American Army, who was in the house at the time, contrived to escape. A letter describing the action, written a few hours afterwards, he dates at Rhode Island Village. Both New Boston and Rhode Island Village are places not easily located by the modern mind.
Old Time Taverns-The old time taverns above the Harlem had their records worthy of preservation. One of the most celebrated of these taverns was the "Blue Bell," concerning the location of which also there has been a good deal of speculation. Charles A. Campbell thus indicates it in a quotation from an old chronicle :
"The holy sacrament was administered to the Huguenots of New Rochelle four times a year, viz. : Christmas, Easter, Whitsunday, and the middle of September. During the intermissions that occurred the com- municants walked to New York for that purpose. Prior to their de- parture, on a Sunday, they always collected the young children and left them in the care of their friends, while they set off early in the morning and walked to the city barefooted, carrying their shoes and stockings in their hands. About twelve miles from New York at a place since called the Blue Bell there was a large rock by the roadside covered with cedar; here they stopped for a short time to rest and take some refresh- ments, and then proceeded on their journey till they came to Fresh Water Pond, within the bounds of the city. Here they washed their feet, put on their shoes and stockings, and walked to the French Church (the old Église du St. Ésprit in Pine Street), where they generally arrived by the time service began."
Another writer has identified the tavern with the house on the east side of the King's Bridge road, "opposite the old yellow house now standing south of One Hundred and Eighty-first Street," and added that it was directly east of Fort Washington, and was demolished about
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1820. To support his statement against those other people who urged that it was on the west side of the highway, the writer quotes at length from the reminiscences and other papers of Isaac M. Dyckman and Balzius Ryer. He contends that the mistake arose from the location or another antique house about half a mile south of the "Blue Bell," a house which was on the west side of the road and was destroyed by fire about 1846. The "Magazine of American History" for November, 1881, reviews all this testimony and draws the deduction that the colonial tavern was on the west side, but that some time after 1802, the first hostelry of the name having been abandoned in 1787, Blaze Moore revived the old sign of the "Blue Bell" at a tavern which he kept on the east side. Lossing's gossip of this venerable house of refreshments accepts the west side theory and makes it a structure that, when he wrote, was still standing and occupied as a dwelling. He quotes Cad- wallader Colden who, in October, 1753, wrote to his wife of having rested at it on a journey to New York, when it was "very well kept by a Dutch- man named Vanderventer, and our food and lodgings were very com- fortable." Tradition has it that General Heath occupied it for his headquarters in October, 1776, and that Washington and Lee met there on the morning when they followed the American Army and journeyed together to The Bronx. It was the headquarters of the Hessian Colonel Ralle after the assault on Fort Washington. One of his aides fell in love with the pretty sister of young Vanderventer, and promised to remain in America if she would marry him. Her mother and Ralle favored the union, and despite the opposition of her brother they were married in Ralle's own room by his chaplain the night before his departure from the "Blue Bell." The young husband was made prisoner by Washing- ton at the battle of Trenton, and refusing to be exchanged took the oath of allegiance to the Unites States and settled in New Jersey. On Oc- tober 24, 1783, Washington stood in front of this tavern to review the troops as they were marching into New York. There he confided to the care of Major Robert Burnet, commanding the rearguard, a young deserter from the British Army, who had secretly married an Amer- ican girl at the "Blue Bell" on the preceding day. Thus at least on two occasions had the venerable inn in Revolutionary times been the scene of a clandestine wedding.
There were a number of other ancient houses on the Kingsbridge Road concerning which interesting particulars have been preserved. There was, for example, the "Cross Keys" a very old stone house at about what is now One Hundred and Sixty-fifth Street, for a long time the only survivor of the outward Revolutionary inns. It was traditionally one of Washington's stopping places and its name came from the il- lustration on its sign board. One of its proprietors in the time of the
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Revolution was David Wares. Then there was the Dyckman House, the only real Dutch farm that remained for a long time on the road, standing not far from the twelve-mile stone, and built by Jacob Dyck- man, as we are told by Isaac M. Dyckman, the later representative of the Dyckman family at Kingsbridge, just after the close of the war, the earlier Dyckman homestead having been burned by the enemy. This later Dyckman has been described as a very wealthy and enter- prising man, who was the projector of a bridge across the Harlem River, sometimes called by his name, and he is said to have owned the land on which the large hotel at Kingsbridge later stood. The old one stood on about the same foundation and was burned down in the middle of the last century. Before that it was remembered as being kept by James Devoe. General Heath in his "Memoirs" speaks of it as Hyatt's Tavern. This was in 1777. Devoe subsequently hired it to one Jacob Hyatt, and it appears to have been known for some time as Dyckman's Tavern from the fact of the Dyckman ownership.
Then there was the McComb House, at Kingsbridge, long the property of Joseph Godwin, which is said to have been used as a tavern during the time of the Revolution, and where it is said Mrs. McComb was accustomed to point out to her guests one of the upper rooms as once the sleeping room of Washington. Dr. Bibby, of Cort- landt House, has put on record that the property was purchased shortly after the War of Independence from the heirs of Eden Metcalf by Alexander McComb, of New York, the father of Alexander McComb, of the United States Army. In addition there was the "Century House." It was for a long time the oldest farmhouse standing on or near the Kingsbridge Road. It was on the bank of the Harlem River and belonged to the old Nagle family, original landowners of that part of the island contemporaneously with the Dyckmans. Its date, marked on a stone inserted in the front wall, was, 1734.
There were two "Black Horse" inns of more or less celebrity. That of the Colonial and Revolutionary period was situated near McGowan's Pass, and was still standing in 1812. The second was built in 1805 near the Tabby Hook Landing, or what later became Inwood Street, and was the half-way house for the Albany coaches between their starting-point in New York City and the first change at Yonkers. Henry Norman was its builder and original proprietor, and when Mrs. Crawford, a widow, kept it, a sign bearing the figure of a black horse, swung from a pole in front of the door. Neither the inn nor the land on which it stood had many owners. In 1740 John Schuyler, Jr., Philip Schuyler, Stephen Bayard, Jr., and James Stephenson had it by letters patent from the king of England; from them it passed to John Livingston, who sold it, with all its rights and titles, "except to gold and silver mines,"
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to Johannis Seckeles. Seckeles sold it to Henry Norman, and he in turn to a Dyckman, and the latter to the Flint family.
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