The civil, political, professional and ecclesiastical history, and commercial and industrial record of the county of Kings and the city of Brooklyn, N. Y., from 1683 to 1884 Volume I, Part 60

Author: Stiles, Henry Reed, 1832-1909, ed. cn; Brockett, L. P. (Linus Pierpont), 1820-1893; Proctor, L. B. (Lucien Brock), 1830-1900. 1n
Publication date: 1884
Publisher: New York : W. W. Munsell & Co.
Number of Pages: 1114

USA > New York > Kings County > Brooklyn > The civil, political, professional and ecclesiastical history, and commercial and industrial record of the county of Kings and the city of Brooklyn, N. Y., from 1683 to 1884 Volume I > Part 60

Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).

Van Werckhoven soon proceeded to erect a house on his tract; and, as may be inferred from a suit that was afterwards brought, he also built a kind of mill. There- after, he re-embarked for Holland to procure settlers for his land, and left in charge of his grant the tutor of his children, Jacques Corteljau. But the founder of the town never saw his possessions in the New World again. Soon after he had returned to Holland, in the year 1655-6, Van Werckhoven, in the beginning of his new career, died in his native city of Utrecht ; and his enter- prise in the New World seemed likely to fail in its very inception. Indeed, the plan of Van Werckhoven, if it had been successfully carried out and thoroughly devel- oped, might have made him into a Patroon of a very large estate of ever increasing value ; and might have led to many difficulties and complications concerning the rights of settlers and the land-titles of the present day. In truth, in later times, the heirs of Van Werck- hoven did assert their claim to the title of this part of Long Island. But their pretensions were never seriously sustained; and have been regarded only as a curious bit of history, raising not the faintest cloud of suspicion on the titles of the present holders of the land.

Van Werckhoven's agent, after the death of his lord, was left without any means to found a colony; and, for some years, the Nyack tract remained as of old, with its tangled woods unbroken except by the

Indian trails and wigwam-camps. But Cortelyou, a man of scholarly attainments, a linguist, a mathema- tician, a philosopher, and a surveyor, was soon per- suaded not to let "this beautiful land" (as the tract was called by its first historian, Nicasius de Sille) lie unfruitful and without inhabitants.

The Founding of the Town .- Accordingly, in the year 1657, Cortelyou determined, himself, to procure the

Ja: Corbeljan . 157

Facsimile of Signature of Jaq. Cortelyou.

settlement of this region with sturdy colonists. On January 16th, of that year, twenty-one patents were granted by the Governor and Council-General in the Nyack Tract, of fifty acres each; together with a house- lot for each grantee. Nineteen persons each re- ceived a grant; and the two other grants, in keeping with the liberality of this people, who combined enter- prise with charity, were reserved for the poor.

The names of the founders of the new settlement are as follows :

Jacques Cortelliau, or Cortelyou; the Lord Counsel- lor and Fiscal Nicasius de Sille ; Peter Buys ; Johann Zeelen ; Albert Albertsen (Terhune) ; William Wille- mse (Van Engen) ; Jacob Hellickers, alias Swart ; Pieter Jansen ; Huybert Hoock ; Jan Jacobson ; Yun- ker (or Squire ) Jacobus Corlear ; Johan Tomasse (Van Dycke) ; Jacobus Backer ; Rutgert Joosten (Van Brunt) ; Jacob Pietersen ; Pieter Roeloffse ; Claes Claessen (Smith); Cornelis Beeckman; Teunis Joosten.

These fathers of the settlement soon began erecting houses, clearing the forest and planting crops with all the industry of their race. In memory of the ancient city on the Rhine, in the Fatherland, in which Cornelis Van Werckhoven, the founder of the enterprise, was born, and where he died at an early age, with his work but just begun, the town was named-the UTRECHT of the New World.

First Houses .- Of these founders of New Utrecht, NICASIUS DE SILLE, a Lord Councillor and Fiscal, or At- torney-General, under Governor Stuyvesant, was a man of varied attainments, " well versed in the law, not un- acquainted with military affairs, of fine character," a poet and a historian. The earliest records of the town are in the beautiful handwriting of this man, one of the most versatile of all the pioneers of the New World. His "History of the First Beginning of the Town of New Utrecht," a brief, but interesting paper, is the carliest native literature of the town; and was trans- lated into English by the late Hon. TEUNIS G. BERGEN, the worthy successor, in the annals of New Utrecht, of the virtues and attainments of Nicasius de Sille.

Of the twenty settlers of New Utrecht, RUTGERS JOOSTEN VAN BRUNT* is the only one who has male de-

* Autograph given on page 68.

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HISTORY OF KINGS COUNTY.

scendants in the town at this day; and, some of them still living on the same lands their forefathers cleared. Cortelyou, De Sille, Van Dyck and, perhaps, Terhune, are probably the only founders who have female de- scendants in the town at the present time. The Van Sicklen and Emmans families are some of the descend- ants of Jansen van Salee .*

The first house erected in the limits of the present town, was undoubtedly one which had formerly stood on the ground of Jansen van Salee, in or near the pres- ent. village of Unionville; but, of the fact, there ap- pear no authentic records. Soon after Van Werckho- ven obtained his grant, and just before he left for Holland, it appears that he erected a building or small retreat, well surrounded by palisades, as a protection against the Indians. But the first house erected in the colony of New Utrecht proper, after the grant to Cor- telyou, was one made of clap-boards; which Jacob Hel- lakers (alias Swart), tore down in Gravesend, and re- erected on his own patent of land. The first house actually built in the town was that of Nicasius de Sille.

Nicafus de Silleff

Facsimile of signature of Nicasius de Sille.

It was built, with others, for Van Brunt and Pieter Buys in November, 1657, by Jacob Hellickers, and was carefully enclosed by a high palisade around the gar- den. This house of De Sille was, for many years, a fine relic of colonial life. Substantially built, after the manner of the Dutch architects of the time (a style which has re-appeared in the designs of the architects of to-day); with its thick stone walls, its capacious fire- places, its prominent chimney, its long, rambling sort of roof of red tiles brought from Holland, its heavy beams and long rafters, and its odd windows-with their little panes of glass-this ancient colonial house, was, for nearly two hundred years, an evidence of the care, sta- bility and comfort of the early settlers of New Utrecht. Into this house Gen. Nathaniel Woodhull, a patriotic officer of the American army, in the year 1776, in the War of the Revolution, after having been inhumanly treated by British soldiers in spite of his wounds, was taken to die; and, before the old fire-place which had warmed the colonists for more than a century, the brave patriot enjoyed some comfort before his death. The site of this house was not far from the old Dutch church edi- fice and burying-ground. It was last occupied by Ba- rent Wyckoff, who inherited it from Rutgert W. Van Brunt. It was torn down in the year 1850, after having sheltered and comforted generation after gen- eration for almost two hundred years. From the primitive days of the pioneer settlers to the more luxu- rious life of the present time, this ancient building pre- served its early form intact, on the old foundations,

long after many a more modern structure had yielded to age.

At first, New Utrecht grew but slowly. The set- tlers were in constant fear of the Indians. In the year 1659, the Nyack tribe, in spite of the frequent purchases of their lands and many peace-offerings, caused so much alarm that the old house of De Sille was surrounded with a stockade. In the year 1660, in the beginning of its fourth year, the village had grown to consist of eleven substantial houses, and a block- house protected by palisades. At this time, but little more than two hundred years ago, New Utrecht was a miniature fortress in the midst of a forest through which the savages roamed more or less vindictively, and oblivious of the fact that the territory had been bought of them already three times. A striking proof that, at this time, the forest was still dense and the sava- ges treacherous and war-like, is seen in the order issued by the Governor, in the year 1661, that the whole village be well palisaded, and "the trees be cut down within gun-shot, so that men might be seen afar off."

First Town-Charter .- Towards the end of the fifth year of the existence of this village-fortress, on December 22, 1661, the first charter of New Utrecht was granted by the Governor and Council of New Netherlands; and the inhabitants were duly authorized to elect magistrates and to hold courts of justice. This charter gave municipal powers similar to those of New Haarlem and other villages settled in the New Netherlands, which were all, more or less, modeled after the self-government of the cities of Holland.

The first magistrates elected in New Utrecht were Jan Tomassen (Van Dyck), Rutger Joosten (Van Brunt) and Jacob Hellakars. Adriaen Hegeman, the schout or sheriff of the neighboring towns of Breuck- elin, Amersfoort and Midwout, was also authorized to exercise jurisdiction in New Utrecht. The town was then annexed to the district known as " the five Dutch towns of Long Island," which included Gravesend.

At about this time, Governor-General Stuyvesant made an official entry into the village ; hoisted the standard of the Prince of Orange on a high flag-staff, erected in the centre of the settlement ; and then went to the house of Rutgers Joosten Van Brunt, who gave a public entertainment ; the first public banquet re- corded in the annals of New Utrecht.

Thus the town began its life with the principle of self-government, which the Dutch had brought with them from the Fatherland, and transplanted into the New World without ostentation and without the shadow of a boast that they were the founders of liberty on the American continent.

Of the magistrates, Jan Tomassen was appointed Sergeant, and received from De Sille the gift of a halbert as the badge of his office. The same donor also presented the inhabitants with ten muskets and sufficient ammunition to protect them from the Indians.

* See page 169.

CAPT. SCOTT'S RAID UPON THE TOWN.

259

LOSSING-BARRITT

RESIDENCE OF NICASIUS DE SILLÉ, NEW UTRECHT, L. I., 1657 .- DEMOLISHED IN 1850.

For two years, thereafter, the pioneers of New Utrecht continued diligently to clear their forests and plant their crops. Secure in their position from the few marauding Indians around them, they pursued the arts of peace until the quiet state of the village was suddenly, and without warning, broken by the war- like arrival, before the gates of the palisades, on January 12, 1663, of the notorious renegade and adventurer, John Scott, and his motley followers.

Capt. Scott's Raid upon the Town .- This was no Indian raid, for the seventy horsemen and sixty infantry were clothed in civilized array. They had come in search of conquest from the eastern end of Long Island, and belonged to some of the English colonies there. There was no war then between England and Holland ; but this Scott had got hold of one of the numerous grants of Long Island in which the English had asserted rhetorical claims to undis- covered lands ; and, filled with the high-sounding words of his grant, had proclaimed himself President of the English towns of Long Island. With noise and bluster, Scott and his troop clattered through the peaceful Dutch towns of Long Island ; threatened the astonished inhabitants ; and, on the heights of Brook-

lyn, with the deep waters of the East river pro- tecting him for the time from attack from the fort, shouted his empty defiance at the soldiers of Stuy- vesant, and at the Governor himself in the distant Stadt Huys.

Into quiet New Utrecht this Puritan guerilla-band came, with all the pomp and circumstance of war, and proclaimed King Charles of England sovereign of all America, from Virginia to Boston. Into the unguarded block-house of the town, screncly resting in a time of peace, the braggart entered and boldly upset the cannon. Then, replacing one in a port-hole, which the guerrillas called "The King's Port," they fired a salute in honor of their casy victory. Jacob Hellaeckers, then a magistrate of New Utrecht, was insulted by Scott and ordered to swear allegiance to the King. This the sturdy descendant of the heroes who had fought for the rights of men in the Fatherland, refused to do. Then, with dire threats and defiant shouts, and the drawing of a sword upon the sick wife of Rutgert Joosten Van Brunt, with intimations that they would run her through with it (and they actually did pursue her, until stopped by the crowd that collected), the Puri- tan warriors sheathed their ignoble swords and retired to

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HISTORY OF KINGS COUNTY.

the eastern end of Long Island as soon as they heard of the movement of Stuyvesant's soldiers.

The details of this extraordinary attack were de- scribed under oath before a magistrate by the follow- ing people of New Utrecht : Arien Willems, Harmen Coerten, Treyntie Claes (wife of Rutgert Joosten Van Brunt), Jan Cleef, Christiaen Antonis, Jan Van Deven- ter, Jacob Hellakers, Teunis Idens, Baltasar de Voos, and Francois de Bruyne.

A letter of protest was, thereafter, directed to Scott and the English by Governor Stuyvesant, and Nicasius de Sille and commissioners were sent to interview the English. Scott was seen and interrogated as to his threats and raids. His reply was to flaunt in their faces an unsigned document which he claimed gave him title, and proved the right of the English to all Long Island, and to the New Netherlands. These bombastic speeches made but little impression upon the Dutch commission- ers, who broke up the interview with the simple state- ment that their governments in Europe would have to settle the matter. -

Thereafter, New Utrecht devoted itself anew to the gathering of the crops and the improvement of its lands. The schepens (magistrates) of the town elected at this time were Baltasar de Vos and Francis de Bruyn.

A Change of Masters .- After the vainglorious proclamations and salutes of the Puritan raiders had died away, the little town of New Utrecht had only a few months of that quiet which furnishes no food for romantic history. On December 8th, 1664, there appeared in Nyack Bay, between New Utrecht and Coney Island, a fleet of vessels bearing the flag of En- gland. There was still peace between England and Holland, to be sure ; but the cannon of a squadron were more potent than the muskets of raiders ; and, the fleet having nothing else on hand in the way of adventure more tempting, with the aid of the English of New En- gland and of the eastern end of Long Island, accom- plished successfully the piratical capture of the New Netherlands. This ignoble conquest was fitly crowned by the sale of some of the Dutch soldiers and patriots as slaves in Virginia.

New Utrecht was obliged to submit, with the other towns on Long Island, to this capture by the English, on account of the great preponderance of numbers and of arms on the side of the English; for the fleets of Holland, which but a few years before, in the war with England, had swept the English coasts and cleared the Thames to London, were all far away in the Fatherland in ignorance of English treachery. The English flag was now raised over New Utrecht, and a uew Provincial English government was organized under Gov- ernor Nicolls. A few months after the capture, in the year 1665, the Governor summoned delegates from all the Dutch towns to a convention. The delegates from New Utrecht were Jacques Corteljau, or Cortel- you, and Yunker, or Squire, Fosse, or Baltasar de Voss.

A New Town Patent .- In the year 1666, the new English government, for the sake chiefly of obtaining additional fees and perquisites, declared that all the old patents which had been granted to the Long Island towns were invalid, and ordered new ones to be ob- tained. Accordingly, in the year 1666, New Utrecht received a new patent from the Duke of York, for which the much longed-for fees had to be paid by the villagers. In the year 1668, on August 15th, Governor Nicolls issued a new patent or charter to De Sille, which confirmed the town privileges of New Utrecht. It may be inferred that the English government, at this time, had considered the propriety of giving the town another name, probably on account of its rather diffi- cult pronunciation by the English tongue; for, the char- ter recites, with gracious condescension, as though after a remonstrance or request by the inhabitants, that the town is permitted to retain its Dutch name. We shall, probably, never know how near the name of NewUtrecht came to extinction; or, what a narrow escape the native city of Van Werckhoven had from being swallowed up in the New World by the name of New Kent or Dover, or some other English town.

A copy of the new laws of the English, called "The Duke of York's Laws" (for they were framed by him and his advisers), was sent to New Utrecht and the other Dutch towns. New Utrecht was graciously allowed to elect its own clerk. But a new tenure of the land was ordered to be obtained, by the inhabitants, from the Duke; and all of them were required to bring in and surrender their old grants and obtain the new patents. It was further decreed that, after March 1st, 1665, no purchase of lands from the Indians was to be valid, un- less the Governor's leave was first obtained, and the Indian proprietor acknowledged the same before the Governor. At the same time, New Utrecht with the other Dutch towns of Long Island, was made into the district called " The West Riding of Yorkshire."

Another Change of Masters .- But the English dominion over the New Netherlands, so piratically ob- tained in a time of peace, did not continue long. In March, 1672, England and France declared war against the Republican States of Holland; and, on the morning of July 29th, 1673, after almost nine years of English rule, the people of New Utrecht awoke to behold another fleet in Nyack Bay. This time the ships bore the welcome standard of the Netherlands, unfurled in the war which the monarchs of England and France had declared against the republican states of the Father- land. With joy, the flag of Holland was again raised on the flag-staff of the old block-house of New Utrecht. The chronicles of the time relate, with much sedateness, that the people welcomed their countrymen with great rejoicing; and the Dutch fleet in Nyack Bay was crowded with the sympathizing visitors who came in boats from New Utrecht.

New Utrecht was received back into the hands of

261

TOWN-GRANTS-POPULATION-MILITIA-SLAVES.

the people who had laid its foundations, and had oceu- pied and improved its territory. On August 8th, 1673, the village formally acknowledged with great satisfaction, the old laws of the Fatherland. Governor Colve issued a new charter, and New Utrecht, and the other Duteh towns of Long Island, were formed into a new district, which is now known as the County of Kings. Francis de Bruyn, of New Utrecht, was ap- pointed its Secretary.

On the 29th of August following, Captain Kuyff and Lieutenant De Hubert were commissioned to administer the oath of allegiance to the Duteh Government to the people of New Utrecht; and, on the same day, every man in the town took the oath with great alacrity. The number was forty-one.

On the nomination of New Utrecht, the Council of War selected as magistrates, Thomas Jansen, Jan Thomassen, Hendrik Mattyssen and Jan van Deventer.

The End of the Dutch Regime .- But the war waged by England and France against Holland soon came to an end with the treaty of Westminster, entered into on February 19th, 1674. Evidently weary of war and diplomacy, the States-General surrendered their possessions in the New World, in lieu of other advan- tages in the Old. With bitter chagrin the settlers of the New Netherlands, destitute of arms, yielded to the formidable numbers of the English. Again, an English fleet anchored in Nyaek bay before New Utrecht, on the 27th and 28th of August, 1674. It immediately attacked a sloop full of cattle, which was crossing to the Neversink in New Jersey, seized all the cargo, and then took possession of all the cattle left in New Utrecht, and laid an embargo on all the grain. The end of the Dutch dominion in the New Netherlands was celebrated that night by the feast of the English squadron on the beef obtained from New Utrecht farms; and the Dutch flag never again was unfurled from the old flag-staff. It was off the present Fort Hamilton that Col. Nicoll demanded of Stuyvesant the surrender of the New Netherlands.

The Dongan Patent .- In the year 1684 the New York Council directed the towns of Long Island onee more to renew their patents. In the year 1686, New Utrecht obtained from Gov. Dongan another eharter for the consideration of six bushels of good winter wheat per year, to be delivered in New York. This annual rent continued to be paid down to the close of the Revolution; when, in 1786, the supervisor paid the State Treasurer the sum of £13, 15s, in full for all arrears, and in commutation for all future rents.

Establishment of Boundaries between New Utrecht and Brooklyn .- On February 14th, 1702, the boundaries of the town of New Utrecht were fixed, and a famous "winter white oak tree" was marked as a point on the line between New Utrceht and Brooklyn. More than one hundred and forty years afterwards, in or about the year 1845, Teunis G. Bergen, then super-

visor of New Utrecht, and Martenus Bergen, then super- visor of the eighth ward of Brooklyn, placed a mon- ument in the stump of this same white oak tree, to further mark the easterly angle of Brooklyn on the boundary line of New Utrecht.

Town-Grants, 1684 .- Thereafter, the town of New Utrecht having been purchased at least three times from the savages, (without including the numer- ous private tenures of land,) and having been favored with six different patents or government grants, each eovering about the same territory ; and having passed through four changes of government, entered upon a comparatively quiet portion of its colonial history. This continued for about ninety years, until the dissatis- faction and discontent of all the American colonies with England broke out into the War of the Revolution.

Meanwhile, the town had continued to grow in popu- lation and inerease in value. The area of arable land had been extended, and more buildings had been ereeted.

In common with the other colonists of America, the Dutch had introduced the slave-labor of Afrieans ; and New Utrecht scems, early under the English rule, to have owned a few slaves.

In the year 1675, the dwelling-house of Cortelyou and the greater part of the village was burned. At this time the assessment-roll of the town gives a valua- tion of £2,852, 10s.

In the year 1679, two Hollanders visited New Utrecht, and, in the record of their travels, have pre- served some interesting views of the domestic life of its people at that primitive time. The diary sets forth, with much quaintness and amusement, how their vessel, on entering the Narrows, was boarded by numerous Nyack Indians, with eanoes full of fruit for sale ; how they visited the wigwam of these Indians, near where Fort Hamilton now stands, and found seven or eight families of the tribe living in one hut and eating pounded maize or Indian eorn ; how they were hos- pitably received by the settlers in various plantations, where they sat down before the great fires in spacious chimney-plaees and feasted on peaches and melons, and other fruits strange or extraordinarily luseious to their Old World tastes.

The principal occupation of the people at this time seems to have been the cultivation of grain and tobacco, and the raising of eattle.

Increase of Population-Names of Inhabitants -1698 .- In the year 1698, the population of the town had inereased, from the twenty settlers of the year 1657, to the number of two hundred and fifty-nine (259), of whom forty-eight (48) were slaves.

The list of names of the people of the town in the year 1698 (about forty years after its settlement) in- eludes very many of the aneestors of the inhabitants of the present day-names still familiar to the records of the town :

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HISTORY OF KINGS COUNTY.

Pieter Cortelyou ; Aert Van Pelt; Anthony Van Pelt ; Cornelis Van Dyck ; Abraham Williamsen ; Dirck Van Sutphen ; William Jansen Van Barkeloo ;

Daryllm Jenfor Barn brack lov.14.

Facsimile of the Signature of Wyllem Jansen Von Barkelloo.

Rut Joosten Van Brunt ; Lawrens Jansen ; Adriaen Lane ; Jan Van Cleef ; Barent Joosten ; Gysbert Tys- sen; Hendrik Matthysen ; Gerret Cocrten ; Gerret Cor- nelisen (Van Duyn) ; Harman Garretsen; Denys Teu-

Casinolifsont an deine . 1490

Facsimile of the Signature of Gerret Cornelissen Van Duyn.

nissen; Cornelis Van Brunt; Joos De Baun; Cryn Jan- sen ; Matthys Smack ; Pieter Van Deventer, and others.

Militia .- About 1698 the militia of the town was organized with the following officers ; Captain, John Van Dyke ; Lieutenant, Joost Van Brunt ; En- sign, Matys Smake.

In the year 1738 the population of the town was two hundred and eighty-two, of whom one hundred and nineteen were African slaves. The names of the in- habitants during this year included the following: Van Brunt, Berry, Van Pelt, Cortelyou, Denyse, Barkeloo, Stillwell, Van Dyck, Suydam, Ditmas, and Vanderveer.

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The civil, political, professional and ecclesiastical history, and commercial and industrial record of the county of Kings and the city of Brooklyn, N. Y., from 1683 to 1884 Volume I, Part 60

Author: Stiles, Henry Reed, 1832-1909, ed. cn; Brockett, L. P. (Linus Pierpont), 1820-1893; Proctor, L. B. (Lucien Brock), 1830-1900. 1n Publication date: 1884 Publisher: New York : W. W. Munsell & Co. Number of Pages: 1114

Author: Stiles, Henry Reed, 1832-1909, ed. cn; Brockett, L. P. (Linus Pierpont), 1820-1893; Proctor, L. B. (Lucien Brock), 1830-1900. 1n
Publication date: 1884
Publisher: New York : W. W. Munsell & Co.
Number of Pages: 1114