USA > New York > New York City > The Memorial History of the City of New York: From Its First Settlement to the Year 1892, Volume III > Part 47
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1 Font Hill, a mile and a half below Yonkers, on the banks of the Hudson, was the former home of Edwin Forrest, the American tragedian. From its architecture it was known as Forrest's Castle,
and from the highest of its six towers superb views were obtained. It was eventually sold to, and is now occupied by, the Convent and Academy of Mount St. Vincent. EDITOR.
MISTET OF JEW-WIRE
With of the Bestored Down Chowa and a brief metary of the epar tikus of the mowir ting given by the secretary of the Ammin Bible Simy.
In laying ne sonoerewar. Bishop Edmund S. Juks thus mland to its own: "Education is to be promoted. therefore there is a tea free wheelgros sister and temperance are to be advanced and here we have a kontorerom: the salvation of immerall souls is car and is view, and there will be a chapel in the white; and as ta poral blessings will be an object. here will be scoremondotoxes for the sick and needy." The building was dedicated on the Lich of Jme 15%,-a large brick edifice fronting seventy-five feet on the street. forty five feet in depth, and five stories high. On the ground bor were school-rooms, and in the upper stories model teazabeats for twenty families, who paid no rent on condition of keeping the ball- ing clean. There was a chapel seating five hundred persons, and adjoining it a dwelling-house for the missionary. The cost of the original building, which has been largely added to within recent years, was $36,000.
The efforts of these ladies, and of others working toward a similar end, quickly transformed the character of the Five Points and its neighborhood. As a leading journal remarked at the time of the demolition of the old brewery, "What no legal enactment, what no machinery of municipal government could effect, Christian worden have brought about quietly, but thoroughly and triumphantly. . .. The great problem of how to remove the Five Points had engaged the attention of both the legislative and executive branches of the city government, and both had abandoned the task in despair. It iss to the credit of the Methodist Episcopal Church that it was the first to enter the then unpromising field, and it will be an imperishable ho
For to the Ladies' Home Missionary Society of that church that ith them the idea originated, and by them has been so successfu Ily carried out."
The Five Points House of Industry is an institution having the same object as the mission, but working on somewhat different line nes. It was founded by the Rev. L. M. Pease, who was, as we have statedel the first missionary appointed to the Five Points. This gentlemsa differed with the promoters of the movement as to the best metho the ods of gaining the desired result, and, severing his connection with th wn Ladies' Mission, founded an institution in which he could put his ow : of theories into practice. His theory was, that the wretched outcasts the Five Points were most of them so from necessity, and not fror Om choice, and that they should be aided to help themselves, while, at the The same time, their spiritual and moral instruction should not be ne lected. He first hired two houses in the locality, and with his famil y
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GRAPHS AND RAILROADS, THEIR IMPULSE TO COMMERCE 439
up his residence in them. He opened a school; he became a facturer, and gave the wretched women of the locality work and 3 at making shirts. In a short time both school and mission were under the patronage of the Protestant Episcopal Church of the ision. By May, 1851, the mission comprised eight houses, with imodations for one hundred wenty souls, and had become rer for good in that benighted borhood. It was incorporated $54, the first trustees being es Ely, Henry E. Remsen, ge Bird, Edward G. Bradbury, ibald Russell, Thomas L. Charles B. Tatham, William ornell, and George C. Waters. le year 1856 a building well ;ed to the purposes of a mis- house was erected on Worth ; near Centre, and there the icent work of the society is carried on.
January, 1849, the New-York Academy, which was later ided into the present Univer- - of the City of New-York, first d its doors to the youth of the city. The school building was a ous structure of brick, four stories high, with a peaked roof and er-windows, situated on the corner of Lexington Avenue and ty-third street. To enter this excellent institution the candidate be fourteen years of age, a resident of the city, have attended f the city grammar-schools for at least twelve months, and must an examination in the branches taught in these schools. The Academy had its inception in an application of the Board of ation to the legislature of 1847 for a law authorizing the estab- ent of a free college or academy in the city for those pupils who een educated in the common schools. The act was passed May 7, with the proviso that it should be submitted to the electors , city for acceptance or rejection. On being submitted on June 7, 19,404 votes were recorded in favor of, to 3,409 against the ire, and the act became a law.
iam Augustus Muhlenberg, D. D., was Philadelphia in 1796, and was ordained a ยท of the Episcopal Church in 1817, preach- hiladelphia and later in Lancaster, Pa. He St. Paul's School at Flushing, Long Island, remaining as its head until 1846, when he
assumed the rectorship of the Church of the Holy Communion in New-York. Dr. Muhlenberg wrote a number of well-known hymns, including "I would not live alway " and "Shout the glad tidings," and was the author of many books, tracts, and essays. He died in 1877. EDITOR.
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440
HISTORY OF NEW-YORK
In 1853 the Children's Aid Society, an organization that has dor workshop in Wooster street, whe- - re the boys could earn an hone == st penny at useful work; but this proved a failure, owing to th competition of private firms the same business. It next turned -f its attention to the newsboys the city, an uncared-for, home less, reckless, jolly band of litt] e Ishmaelites, but shrewd, ener. getic, persevering, and not de void of instincts of honor an = manliness. Mr. Brace first se - Jany find cured a loft in the old "Sun building, and fitted it up as a dormitory for the boys, charging them six cents for a bed, six cents for breakfast, and five cents for tea, with a bath gratis. From this small beginning in March, 1854, grew the present Newsboys' Lodging-house, one of the institutions of the city. An industrial school for girls, evening schools, Sunday meetings, girls' lodging- houses, and the placing of children in good homes in the West, are other forms of labor of this most excellent society. In this same year (1854) the corner-stone of the present St. Luke's Hospital was laid with appropriate ceremonies. This admirable in- stitution, which is soon to be removed to Westchester County, had been projected as early as 1846 by the Rev. Dr. William A. Muhlen- berg, rector of the Church of the Holy Communion, and had been incorporated in 1850, with Dr. Muhlenberg as its pastor and superin- tendent. Another excellent charity was established in 1851-the Demilt Dispensary, whose building on the corner of Second Avenue and Twenty-third street is one of the charitable landmarks of the city. At a meeting held in March, 1851, and attended by a number of benevolent people, it was resolved to provide a medical dispensary for 1 Jenny Lind, from whom the original of the above portrait was received, always cherished pleasant recollections of her visit to New-York. When I saw her for the last time at a famous re- ception given in London to Mr. and Mrs. S. C. Hall, the renowned singer spoke of the enthusiastic welcome extended to her in our city, and she re- called many American friends. EDITOR TELEGRAPHS AND RAILROADS, THEIR IMPULSE TO COMMERCE 441 the northeastern section of the city, and a committee was appointed to carry the resolution into effect. Two years before there had died in New-York two unmarried sis- ters, named Sarah and Elizabeth Demilt, who had bequeathed $20,000 to the three dispensaries then existing in the city. The residuary legatee of the two ladies, George T. Trimble, now came to the com- mittee and offered to give from what he had received of the estate $5,000 to the proposed dispensary, provided it should be called the Demilt Dispensary. This was agreed to, and the dispensary was accordingly established and named. The substantial build- ing was finished in March, 1853. , In 1852 the Young Men's Christian Association was formed in New York, in imita- tion of that already existing in London. At the meeting for organization, the Rev. Gregory T. Bedell, then rector of the Church of the Ascension, and later Bishop of Ohio, presided, and the Rev. Isaac Ferris, D. D., pastor of the Dutch Re- formed Church in Market street, delivered an address. A large Chopsut- 1 number of members were at . once enrolled, among them Hon. Henry Arnoux, Dr. Howard Crosby, Alfred S. Barnes, William E. Dodge, Professor Elie Charlier, Theodore Dwight, Morris K. Jesup, D. Willis James, and many other equally well-known citizens. New-York society was pleasantly moved in September, 1850, by the arrival of Jenny Lind, the Swedish songstress, who appeared in Cas- tle Garden under the management of Phineas T. Barnum. . A large and brilliant audience greeted her there, and sat spellbound under the magic of her voice. Afterward she made a triumphal progress through the principal cities of the United States. Castle Garden, the fortress of Revolutionary times, had been some years before turned 1 This portrait represents the venerable Hun- garian of past fourscore and ten, as he appeared at the period of his visit to New-York; for, like Irving, he prefers to be represented in early or middle life. Writing under date of October 17, 1892, Kossuth says: " As you may imagine, I have no particular wish to see the ruins of my earthly frame conveyed in your pages." He continues : " I am sorry to hear that Mayor Kingsland and Judge McCurdy have passed away; we are all travelling in the same direction, and my wish is that my friends should reach the end of their journey less disap- pointed in the object of their lives than I shall be when my hour comes and I shall pass away, an exile from my native land. . .. I still remember vividly William H. Seward, and everything con- cerning the life of this most able statesman in- terests me." EDITOR. 442 HISTORY OF NEW-YORK into a summer garden and used for the reception of distinguished visitors. Lafayette had been received there in 1824, President Jack- son in 1832, President Tyler in 1843, and Louis Kossuth, the eloquent and devoted Hungarian patriot, there met in December, 1851, his first generous and heartfelt welcome to America. A public reception was tendered him upon his arrival; immense throngs cheered him again and again, and he was escorted by all the local troops to the City Hall, where they passed in review before him. A few days af- terward, on the 16th, the interior of Castle Garden witnessed a re- markable scene-that of the great Kossuth meeting-when the First- Division of the National Guard, in full uniform, with side-arms, ap- peared there, together with an excited multitude of citizens. The spacious building was elaborately decorated, and Kossuth's appear- ance on the stage was the signal for a wild burst of enthusiasm ; so deeply did the American people sympathize with him and his coun- try's wrongs. Having a thorough knowledge of American history, and being singularly gifted as an orator, his theme, which was a plea for substantial aid for Hungary, and a picture of her sufferings, as well as an appeal for the interference of the United States in her be- half, met with extravagant applause. Resolutions of sympathy for Hungary were adopted by the meeting, and a committee was named to solicit subscriptions for the relief of that country. Castle Garden was later made a concert-hall, and in 1855 was changed into a depot for the reception of immigrants. In 1891 the depot was removed to Ellis Island, which was purchased from the State in 1808 for $10,000. The year before Jenny Lind's arrival, the old Park Theater, one of the landmarks of the American stage, took fire (December, 1848), and was totally consumed. Just before the doors were opened a file of play-bills hanging near the stage was blown against a gas-jet, and, taking fire, communicated the flames to the stage scenery; and in a few hours the leading theater of New-York, for half a century the pride of its citizens and a fountain of many happy memories, was a mass of smoking ruins. It was opened in January, 1798, and nearly all the prominent actors from that date to 1848 had appeared upon its boards. George Vandenhoff, John Brougham, Mrs. Brougham, Ma- cready, Forrest, Ole Bull, the Seguins, Charles Kean, and Anna Cora Mowatt were among those who had made the old Park famous. In May, 1850, the attention of the citizens was directed to arctic exploration by the fitting out of an exploring expedition by a New- York merchant-Henry Grinnell-to go in search of Sir John Franklin and his party. Sir John had left England in May, 1845, in two vessels, the Erebus and the Terror, to seek a northwest passage to the Pacific; and after having been spoken in Baffin's Bay some two months later, had never been heard of since. The British government TELEGRAPHS AND RAILROADS, THEIR IMPULSE TO COMMERCE 443 and Lady Franklin had sent out rescuing expeditions which returned without tidings. Mr. Grinnell now proposed to assume the quest, and incidentally to prosecute discoveries in the neighborhood of the north pole. He offered two of his vessels, hap- pily named the Advance and the Rescue, to the government for the search. The latter ac- cepted the gift, and the Navy Department ap- pointed Lieutenant Edwin J. De Haven, U. S.N., to the command. The expedition left New- York on May 22, 1850, and returned September 30, 1851, having been nearly a year and a half in the frozen solitudes. No traces of Sir John or of his men were found, but important ad- ditions to the world's knowledge of the arctic regions were made; Grinnell Land, the large body of land separated from Greenland by Smith's Sound, having been discovered, named, and placed on the chart. A second search expedition was fitted out by Mr. Grinnell and George Peabody in 1853 in the Advance, under Dr. Elisha Kent Kane, which did not succeed in its main object (the fate of the unfortunate explorer and of his men still remaining one of the mysteries of the north), but it accomplished more than years of previous arctic explo- ration had done in securing the first trustworthy evidence that an open sea existed around the pole, and mapping out its coast-line. It also explored the interior of many unknown lands. These discov- eries awakened such interest in the public mind that the American Geographical Society was shortly organized in New-York, with the object of "collecting and diffusing geographical and statistical information."1 It is among the most prosperous societies of the city. During the period under consideration the project of a pleasure park worthy of the city was conceived and well advanced toward completion. The matter was first broached by Andrew Downing, the celebrated landscape-gardener, in a letter to the "Horticulturist," written from London in the autumn of 1850. In this letter Mr. Downing described the extensive parks of London, enlarging upon their beauty and utility, and calling the attention of the citizens of New-York to the fact that the metropolis could not then boast of a single park worthy of the name. The letter provoked a great deal of quiet discussion among all classes of citizens, and at length Mayor Kingsland, on May 5, 1851, sent a message to the common council, 1 This society was incorporated in 1854, the cor- porators being George Bancroft, Henry Grinnell. Francis L. Hawks, John C. Zimmerman, Archi- bald Russell, Joshua Leavitt, William C. H. Wad- dell, Ridley Watts, S. De Witt Bloodgood, M. Dudley Bean, Hiram Barney, Alexander I. Cotheal, Luther B. Wyman, John Jay, Alexander W. Bradford, Edmund Blunt, Cambridge Livingston, Henry V. Poor, and J. Calvin Smith. George Bancroft was elected the first president. 444 HISTORY OF NEW-YORK urging that suitable provision for the health and pleasure of the citi- zens should be made by establishing a spacious public park in the up- per wards of the city. The common council acted promptly on the recommendation. Securing authority from the State legislature, it purchased nearly all the ground now included in the Central Park. Commissioners to purchase the land, examine titles, and adjust con- flicting interests were appointed by the Supreme Court in the autumn of 1853, those so appointed being William Kent, Michael Ulshoeffer, Luther Bradish, Warren Brady, and Jeremiah Towle. These gentle- men were engaged on their delicate task for nearly two years, but early in 1856 forwarded their completed report to the Supreme Court, which accepted it. The comptroller then advised the common coun- THE NEW-YORK CRYSTAL PALACE. cil (February 5, 1856) that since by law the awards to the owners of the land, and the expenses of the commissioners, must be made imme- diately on the acceptance of their report, it was necessary for the common council to make an appropriation to meet such expenditure. The sum of $5,028,844.10 was accordingly appropriated. The later history of the park will be given in subsequent chapters. On July 4, 1853, the first World's Fair ever held in America was opened in New-York by President Franklin Pierce with imposing ceremonies. The exhibition was held in the famous Crystal Palace, a beautiful edifice constructed wholly of iron and glass, cruciform in shape, and with a lofty translucent dome rising from its center. Thirty-nine thousand square feet of glass and 1250 tons of iron were used in its construction. It stood in the open space between the dis- tributing reservoir and Sixth Avenue. In this beautiful gallery the largest and most notable collection of paintings and sculpture ever TELEGRAPHS AND RAILROADS, THEIR IMPULSE TO COMMERCE 445 seen in New-York was exhibited in connection with the fair. The exhibition remained open for several months, and was visited daily by throngs of interested people from all parts of the Union, as well as from foreign countries. The palace was reopened as a permanent exhibition on May 14, 1854, but the exhibition was not successful. In 1853, the Clearing House Association, one of the most important financial institutions of the city, was formed, and on October 11 of that year opened its doors for business at No. 14 Wall street. It had a mem- bership of fifty-two banks, representing a capital of $46,721,262. During this period, the growth of New-York city in population, wealth, commerce, and territorial expansion was steady and rapid. Her population in 1840 was 312,700, her foreign com- merce a little over $100,000,000. In 1850 her population was 515,547, an increase of 202,847 during the decade. By 1855 it had risen to nearly 630,000. Her foreign commerce in 1850 was $260,000,000, an increase of $160,000,- 000 over 1840. By 1855 it had grown to $323,000,000. To accommodate the shipping engaged in this vast trade and in internal commerce, it had one hun- SOLDIERS' MONUMENT.1 dred and thirteen piers stretched along a water-front of some thirteen miles, fifty-five on the Hudson River front, and fifty-eight on the East River. Sixteen hundred and eighteen buildings were erected in 1849. Fifteen public markets supplied the citizens with food at this time, distributed as follows: Catharine, foot of Catharine street, founded in 1786; Washington, in Washington street, between Fulton and Vesey ; Gouverneur, corner of Gouverneur and Water; and Greenwich, cor- ner of Christopher and West streets,- all opened in 1812; Centre, in Centre street, between Grand and Broome, opened in 1817; Essex, in Grand, between Essex and Ludlow, 1818; Fulton, at the foot of Ful- ton street, and Franklin, at Old Slip, both opened in 1821; Clinton, filling the square between Washington, West, Spring, and Canal streets, and Manhattan, in Houston, corner of First, both opened in 1821; Chelsea, on Ninth Avenue at Eighteenth street, and Tompkins, on Third Avenue between Sixth and Seventh, founded in 1828; Jef- 1 This handsome monument of brown freestone was erected in the churchyard by the vestry of Trinity parish in 1852, in consonance with a gen- eral desire of the citizens to commemorate the American patriots who died in British prisons in New-York city during the Revolutionary war. It faces Broadway, and is placed directly opposite Pine street. EDITOR. 446 HISTORY OF NEW-YORK ferson, on Sixth Avenue, corner of Greenwich Avenue, 1832; Union, junction of Houston and Second streets, 1836; and Monroe, junction of Monroe and Grand streets, opened in 1836.1 New-York at this period had also become a great manufacturing center, the census of 1850 giving her a total of 3387 manufactories LA GRANGE TERRACE, OR COLONNADE ROW, IN LAFAYETTE PLACE. employing 83,620 persons, producing manufactured articles to the value of $105,218,308, and employing a capital of $34,232,822. The city at this date extended to Thirty-fourth street on the north, and from river to river, although there were many open spaces. Bloom- ingdale, Manhattanville, and Yorkville were then isolated villages in a rough, sparsely settled quarter. Bond street, Washington Square, and East Broadway constituted the fashionable quarter of the city. 1 For further details of markets, the reader should consult Thomas F. Devoe's "Market Book." . . CHAPTER XII PREMONITIONS OF THE CIVIL WAR 1855-1860 EVER had New-York seemed more peaceful or more pros- perous than in the opening of the year 1856. It had not yet attained the metropolitan greatness of the present time: it was still a provincial city, compared to the chief European capitals, London and Paris. Some unseen cause weighed upon its progress and kept it in a kind of vassalage to Europe. Yet its growth had been comparatively rapid; its population in 1856 was about 630,000;1 its commerce flourished with unusual vigor; its fine ships and able seamen contended almost equally with those of Eng- land for the mastery of the seas. The city had grown rapidly from its early limits below Canal street to the once rural district from Fourteenth to Twenty-third and Thirty-fourth streets. Some fine houses had been built on Fifth Avenue, and instead of the red brick and the London style that had been used until now on Broadway and around St. John's Park and Washington Square, brownstone was in- troduced to give an air of gloomy dignity to the streets of New-York. It was to become a city of brownstone. In 1856 we should miss many of the conveniences that surround us to-day. The slow stage still traveled its weary way along Wall street and Broadway; the street-cars were just coming into use. No vision of rapid transit, no dream of an elevated railway, had yet dawned upon our patient citi- zens: a trolley-road in those happy days would have seemed a mira- cle, and a telephone a gift from above. Who could have fancied, in 1856, that he might one day converse at ease with his friends in Bos- ton, or send his messages by telegraph around the world; that he could speak to his antipodes in China, and bargain with the merchants of Australia from his office in New-York ! In 1856 the suburbs of the city still retained many of their rare at- 1 The following curious estimate of the popula- tion of New-York, made by Mr. John Pintard at the opening of the century, fourscore and ten years ago, cannot fail to be read with interest : "By the enumeration of the inhabitants of this city recently published, the progress of population for the last five years appears to be at the rate of 25 per cent. Should our city continue to increase in the same proportion during the present cen- tury, the aggregate number, at its close, will far 447 448 HISTORY OF NEW-YORK 1 tractions. Bloomingdale was still not unworthy of its name, and where now great blocks of houses cover the land, gardens bloome and fair landscapes of river and shore opened from Burnham's ane Claremont. Harlem was a quiet country town, shut off by a long rid de or sail from its ruling center; there was yet no city beyond the Har lem River - only country-seats, an scenery of rare beauty." In those ear days each citizen lived in his ons home, and not in an apartment ; ten ment-houses had begun their odious career, but the great blocks of apart- ments that now form the chief trait of New-York's domestic life were wholly unknown. The flat or apartment-house was the invention of the Roman com- mons: it was revived in Edinburgh and Paris, and has within twenty years covered New-York with a crowded pop- Lamm Dr. Beckmann ulation. It cannot be said that our city in 1856 was a model of neatness; in fact, its odors and its malaria might rival those of a medieval capital. Its politicians paid little attention to the comfort and health of the people. The mayor was Fernando Wood; the aldermen were no longer reputable; political influence often shielded great criminals ; bribery was common ; the worst class of the population often carried the elections of New-York. Fortu- nately, the State was in the hands of a higher order of politicians; a King or a Clark was governor. A metropolitan police was provided for New-York and Brooklyn, and Mayor Wood, who had garrisoned the City Hall and attempted rebellion, was forced to obey the law. 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.