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 7

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 7

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BEGINNING OF THE REVOLUTION.

£4; goats, one year, 8s .; sheep, one year, 6s. 8d .; hogs, one year, £1. These were the priees fixed for the guid- ance of the town authorities in receiving produee, ete., in payment of taxes. Produce in place of a cireulating medium continued in use till about 1700, when money had become sufficiently abundant for the require- ments of trade. Board was 5s. per weck; meals, 6d. each; lodgings, 2d. per night; beer, 2d. per mug; pasture per day and night, 1s .; labor per day, 2s. 6d.

Previous to 1793 no post office was established on the island and no mail was earried on it. A Scotehman named Dunbar rode a voluntary post as early as about 1775. This was in violation of the law, but the neces- sity of the case eaused the offense to be winked at. The people on the west end of the island were supposed to receive their letters from the post-office in New York, and those on the east end from New London. Even as late as 1835, FURMAN says, the mail stage left Brooklyn for Easthampton no oftener than once a week, and mail packages were often left and taken at designated plaees, such as a particular rock or a box nailed to a tree. Hotels were few then, and the hospitalities of the pco- ple living along the route through the island were always readily extended to the few travelers who passed over it.

During the last decade of the seventeenth eentury, the seas of the Indies were infested with pirates, who preyed upon the eommeree of all nations. In 1695, the celebrated Captain William Kidd, an Englishman, was commissioned by the King of England, and furnished by an association in that country with a ship and erew, to go in quest of the pirates. He sailed in 1696, and came to the coast of America, where for a time he did good service. At New York he took an addition to his crew, sailed to the East Indies and turned pirate. After ravaging the eastern seas he returned to the coast of South America, and pursued his piratical course to the West Indies ; and thence, after a career of robbery and piracy, eame to the shores of Long Island. In 1699 he landed at Gardiner's Island (Easthampton), and in the presence of the owner, John Gardiner, under injunctions of secrecy, buried a large amount of treasure, which was afterward recovered by the commissioners of the Earl of Bellemont, one of the association, who sent Kidd forth. The frecbooter was apprehended, sent to England, tried, convicted of murder, and hung in chains at Execution Doek.

His career has been the subjcet of mueh romance and more superstition. It was believed that he buried much treasure besides that which was recovered; and the shores of Long Island have, again and again, been thoroughly searched and exeavated by curious people, often with absurdly ridiculous eere- monies, but no treasure was ever known to reward their labors.

CHAPTER V.

BEGINNING OF THE REVOLUTION-POLITICAL ATTITUDE OF THE THREE LONG ISLAND COUNTIES.

I T was on Long Island that the first protest against taxation without representation was made. In 1691 the first, permanent Assembly of representa- tives of the people was established, and this was the first step in the direction of a free government in the colony of New York. The Colonial governors had possessed very large-almost absolute-power, and that power had sometimes been arbitrarily exercised. The people's money had been used at the diseretion of the governors, and, it was believed, had often been misap- plied and embezzled. On application, in 1706, to Queen Anne, the Assembly was authorized to appoint a treas- urer to receive and disburse all money which was raised under its authority, and it accordingly " assumed general control of all the finanees by making specific appropri- ations." In 1711 the Assembly denied the right of the Couneil (which was elaimed) to alter revenue bills, asserting that the power of the Council flowed from the pleasure of the prinec, personified by the commission of the governor ; but that the power of the Assembly, in relation to taxes, flowed from the ehoiec of the people, who could not be divested of their money without their eonsent.

From this time forward there was almost eonstant struggle between the crown, through its representatives the governors, on one side, and the people, through their representatives the Assembly, upon the other. The governors sought to vex and coeree the Assembly into eomplianec with their demands, or to punish what they considered contumacy and contempt by frequent prorogations and dissolutions. Under the absurd pre- text that the colony had been planted and sustained in its infaney by the mother country, the right of almost absolute control over it afterward was claimed. The conflict eontinned, with the result of constantly calling the attention of the people to the subject, and leading them to investigate the principles which lie at the foun- dation of just government, and the sources whence the powers of so-called rulers are derived. Thus they came to know and appreciate the value of their rights, and thus was nurtured and developed the spirit of resist- ance to the exercise of a power which they had come to believe had no just foundation. This conflict, between the spirit of liberty and the eneroaehments of arbitrary power, culminated in the resistance, on the part of the colonies, to the oppressive acts of the Crown and Parlia- ment of Great Britain that inaugurated the Revolution.

It must be remembered that, during all this eonflict the inhabitants of Long Island constituted a large pro- portion of the colony ; and, even in 1787, more than one- fifth of the tax of the State was assessed to the counties

GENERAL HISTORY OF LONG ISLAND.

of Kings, Queens and Suffolk. The people of Long Island were as strongly opposed to the encroachments of the Crown as were those of other portions of the Colony ; but, by the force of circumstances, many were, or pretended to be, loyalists during the revolutionary struggle. Some, through fear of personal hardship, or loss of property, were induced either to remain inactive or to join the British cause. Others, and in no incon- siderable number, found, in their assumed loyalty, the opportunity of despoiling their neighbors and of bene- fitting themselves. The part taken by each of the three counties was singularly characteristic of the national traits and affiliations of those by whom they were respect- ively settled. The Suffolk County people, descendants of the original Puritans, in whom resistance to oppres- sion was an instinct, promptly presented a rebellious front to the invader. Says FIELD: "Out of its whole population of freeholders aud adult male inhabitants, numbering 2,834 between the ages of sixteen and sixty, only 236 were reckoned as being of loyalist proclivities. The enrolled militia of the county exceeded 2,000, of whom 303 officers and privates were in the ranks of Colonel Smith's regiment, the best disciplined and armed on the island. It was the only one which could be con- sidered in any form to have survived the shock of the 27th of August, and only a small part even of this body ever did service after that fatal day." In Queens County, with its mixed Dutch and English population, the loyal sentiment was always largely in the ascendant ; though there is but little doubt that the rebel feeling would have become dominant had circumstances favored. "The whole force of the Whigs which could be mustered under arms was insufficient to overawe their loyalist neighbors. Seventeen hundred and seventy able-bodied men among her citizens were enrolled on the roster of her militia, while only 379 were by the most stringent measures induced to appear in arms." Meetings were held in the different towns and districts, at which reso- lutions were adopted expressive of sympathy with the popular cause ; and committees of correspondence, as they were termed, were appointed to represent them in county conventions and to devise such measures as the welfare of the eountry seemed to demand. After the Declaration of Independence by the Continental Congress and the approval of this action by the Provin- cial Congress, the enthusiasm of the Whigs in this part of the island rose to a high pitch. Public demonstra- tions were made ; and, in one instance at least, the effigy of George III. was publicly hanged and burned.

But the Dutch population of Kings County were very averse to engaging in the rebellion, which, from the first, promised to entail upon them serious conse- quences and probable ultimate failure. At a meeting of committees from the several towns of the county, held at Flatbush, in April, 1775, for the purpose of appointing delegates to a General Provincial Conven- tion, the town of Flatlands desired to "remain neutral ;"

and the subsequent attendance of the delegates of some of these Kings County towns was so irregular, and their zeal so lukewarm, that the Convention felt obliged to request their more regular attendance.

CHAPTER VI.

THE BRITISH OCCUPATION OF LONG ISLAND-RAIDS FROM THE MAINLAND-SMUGGLING-SERVICES AND DEATH OF GENERAL WOODHULL.

0 N June 11th, 1776, the British army, which had a short time previously evacuated Boston, where it had been closely besieged by the Americans, sailed from Halifax for New York harbor. The strategic importance of this point had long been appa- rent to the British commander, and it had been foreseen by Washington that this would be the next point attacked. The plan of the British campaign was to possess New York and Long Island with an army of about 35,000 men ; then to ascend the Hudson river and effect a junction with an army of some 13,000 that was to pass the lakes, penetrate to the Hudson and descend that river. The eastern provinces were thus to be divided from the middle and southern, and active operations were at the same time to be carried on at the south, and thus the rebellion was to be crushed in a single campaign. The failure of the southern campaign before the arrival of Howe at New York and the inter- ruption of the Canadian army at the lakes, frustrated the British commander's plan for the speedy subjuga- tion of the rebellious colonies.

(A brief account of the Battle of Brooklyn, Aug. 27, 1776, may be found in the General History of Kings County.)

The defeat of the American forces in this battle removed the restraint which had kept in check the strong feeling of loyalty in Kings and Queens counties, and in the following autumn about fourteen hundred inhabi- tants of the latter county signed a declaration of loyalty and petition for protection. And when the people of Kings County found the island-and especially that portion of it which they occupied-abandoned by the American forces, it was not strange that they eagerly accepted the opportunity of withdrawing from a strug- gle in which they had no heart, and of seeking the mercy and protection of the now dominant power of England.

STILES says: "On the 7th November, 1776, a large number of the freeholders and people of the county-availing them- selves of Lord Howe's recent proclamation of security of person and property to those who should remain peaceably upon their farms-submitted a very humble and loyal address to his Lordship, wherein they state that, 'reflecting with the tenderest emotions of gratitude on this instance of His Majesty's paternal goodness, and encouraged by the affec- tionate manner in which His Majesty's gracious purpose hath been conveyed to us by your Excellencies, who have thereby

BRITISHI OCCUPATION OF LONG ISLAND.

evinced that humanity is inseparable from that true mag- nanimity and those enlarged sentiments which form the most shining characters,' they beg leave to represent that they have all signed the oath of allegiance.

" The submission of the rank and file was soon followed by that of a majority of the leaders; and the militia of the county, in January, 1777, further testified their 'loyalty to their sovereign and zeal to the constitution' by voluntarily contributing the sum of £310 8s. toward the expense of a new battalion, at that time recruited by Colonel Fanning.

" After the evacuation of Brooklyn, the British, Hessians, Tories and refugees had unlimited range over Long Island, and were quickly joined by 'neutrals' and 'fence gentry.' Most of the Whigs were absent with the army ; their wives, children and aged people alone remained at home, and their dwellings became the prey of these wretches who robbed friend and foe alike. The negroes, also, became their willing aiders and abettors, and frequently guided them in their pre- datory expeditions. The loyalists were all ordered to attend at British headquarters, at Bedford, to be registered ; after which they were directed to wear a red badge in their hats, as a protection and token of loyalty. They obeyed with ludicrous alacrity, and straightway the loyal badge flamed from every hat and cap in the county. Many ladies wore scarlet ribbons, while all the negroes, of course, were royalists and bedecked their hats with scarlet rags : and females even dispensed with their flannel petticoats to supply the unpre- cedented demand for cloth of the requisite hue.

"The protection afforded to the people by the royal authori- ties was paternal only in its severity. Long Island and the vicinity of New York City were kept under the most rigorous military rule. Elections, except annual town meetings, were not allowed; the civil courts were suspended; and their functions arbitrarily dispensed either by a king's justice or a military officer. A sort of police court was opened in New York at the Mayor's office ; and, in 1780, a similar oue at Janiaica, for the greater convenience of the Long Island peo- ple. The ferry at both the New York and Long Island side was placed under military guards ; every market boat had to have a yearly license from military headquarters ; and no farmer or other person could transport any provisions or goods to or from the city without a written pass either from the Mayor's office or from the colonel in command at Flat- bush. The prices of wood and of all commodities and farm produce was regulated by proclamation ; and the farmers. their wages and servants, were liable, at any time, to be im- pressed into the King's service, at a stipulated price. Wood- land and brushwood, and even fences, were remorselessly cut down by the British to be used for fuel and the building of fortifications ; and, when the wood wasat length exhausted, and the inhabitants began to be straitened for want of it, the Hessians dug up the meadows for peat, despite the expos- tulations of the astonished and indignant Dutch farmers, who before long, however, had toadmit that their unwelcome guests had, in this respect, rendered them a great service. The whole district occupied by the troops in Kings County was a common, and most of the land remained unfenced until the British left the country. In the winter season every vil- lage was filled with British soldiers, wagons, etc., billeted most summarily in private houses or cantoned in temporary huts."

ONDERDONK says concerning this: "Billeting of Soldiers .- During the summer British troops were off the island on active service : or, if a few remained here, they abode under tents ; but in winter they were hutted on the sunny side of a hill, or else distributed in farmers' houses. A British officer, accompanied by a justice of the peace,

or some prominent loyalist, as a guide, rode around the country, and from actual inspection decided how many sol- diers each house could receive, and this number was chalked on the door. The only notification was : 'Madam, we have come to take a billet on your house.' If a house had but one fireplace it was passed by, as the soldiers were not intended to form part of a family. A double house for the officers, or single house with a kitchen for privates was just the thing. The soldiers were quartered in the kitchen, and the inner door nailed up so that the soldiers could not intrude on the household. They, however, often became intimate with the family and sometimes intermarried. The Hessians were more sociable than the English soldiers, and often made little bas- kets and other toys for the children, taught them German and amused them in various ways ; sometimes corrupting them by their vile language and manners. Any misconduct of the soldiers might be reported to their commanding offi- cers, who usually did justice ; but some offences could not be proven, such as night-stealing or damage done the house or to other property. As the soldiers received their pay in coin they were flush, and paid liberally for what they bought, such as vegetables, milk, or what they could not draw with their rations. These soldiers were a safeguard against rob- bers and whaleboat men. Some had their wives with them, who acted as washerwomen, and sometimes in meaner capa- cities.

"From a perusal of the orderly book of General Delancey, it appears that he used every means to protect the persons and property of the inhabitants of Long Island from the out- rages of British soldiers. They were not allowed to go more than half a mile from camp at daytime (and for this purpose roll was called several times during the day), nor leave it under any pretext after sundown without a pass ; but now and then they would slip out and rob. On the 11th of June, 1788, Mr. John Willett, of Flushing, was assaulted at his own house, at 11 o'clock at night, by persons unknown but sup- posed to be soldiers from having bayonets and red clothes. who threatened his life and to burn his house. The general offered a reward of $10 to the person who should first make the discovery to Major Waller ; and a like reward for the dis- covery of the person who robbed Mr. Willett on the 9th of June of two sheep, a calf and some poultry, as he was deter- mined to inflict exemplary punishment and put a stop to practices so dishonorable to the King's service. Again, March 9th, 1778, Mrs. Hazard, of Newtown, having complained that the soldiers of the guard pulled down and burnt up her fence, that was near the guardhouse. the general at once issued an order to the officer that he should hold him answerable there- after for any damage done the fences. So, too, if a soldier milked the farmers' cows, he should be punished without mercy ; nor should he go in the hayfield and gather up new mown grass to make his bed of. Generally the farmers were honestly paid for whatever they sold. For instance, April 23d, 1778, they were notified to call on Mr. Ochiltree, deputy commissary of forage at Flushing, with proper certificates and get payment for their hay."

In January, 1777, the American prisoners in New York were paroled and billeted on the people in Kings County. One of these, Colonel GRAYDON, writes :

"The indulgence of arranging ourselves according to our respective circles of acquaintances was granted us, and Lieu- tenant Forrest and myself were billeted on Mr. Jacob Suy- dam, whose house was pretty large, consisting of buildings which appeared to have been erected at different times. The front and better part was occupied by Mr. Theophilus Bache and family from New York. Though we were generally

GENERAL HISTORY OF LONG ISLAND.

civilly enough received, it cannot be supposed we were very welcome to our Low Dutch hosts, whose habits were very par- simonious, and whose winter provision was barely sufficient for themselves. They were, however, a people who seemed thoroughly disposed to submit to any power that might be imposed on them ; and whatever might have been their pro- pensities at an earlier stage of the contest, they were now the dutiful and loyal subjects of King George III. Their houses and beds we found clean, but their living extremely poor. A sorry wash made up of a sprinkling of bohea and the dark- est sugar, on the verge of fluidity, with half-baked bread (fuel being very scarce) and a little stale butter, constituted our breakfast. At our first coming, a small piece of pickled beef was occasionally boiled for dinner, but to the beef, which was soon consumed, there succeeded clippers or clams ; and our unvaried supper was suppaan or mush, sometimes with skimmed milk, but more generally with buttermilk blended with molasses, which was kept for weeks in a churn, as swill is saved for hogs. I found it, however, after a little use, very eatable, and supper soon became my best meal. Their religious, like their other habits, were unostentatious and plain ; and a simple, silent grace before meat prevailed at the table of Jacob Suydam. When we were all seated he suddenly clapped his hands together, threw his head on one side, closed his eyes, and remained mute and motionless for about a minute. His niece and nephew followed his exam- ple, but with such an eager solicitude that the copied attitude should be prompt and simultaneous, as to give an air of absurdity to what might otherwise have been very decent."

Officers and soldiers "lorded it" over the people ; and, as a natural consequence, insubordination arose among the slaves, who ran away or became less respectful to their mas- ters whom they saw so humbled before the British officers. When we add to this the carousing, gambling, profanity and other camp vices which were introduced into the hitherto quiet villages by the presence of large bodies of troops, we can see that the people of Long Island were not to be envied. It is true that farmers flourished on British gold, obtained for such of their produee as had been spared them by marauders ; but, with few opportunities for its investment, they were obliged to keep it by them and were often robbed. The churches, also, except those of the established faith, were freely occupied as prisons, hospitals, storehouses, and bar- racks for troops ; some were even wantonly destroyed.

During the remainder of the Revolution, in order to insure the doubtful loyalty of a portion of the inhabi- tants, British troops, whose ranks were increased by enlistments from among the tories, were sta- tioned at different points on the island, and against the lawlessness of these there was no protection. Robbery was still carried on by marauding gangs under the guise of Whig or tory partisanship ; and frequent raids were made by parties of Continental troops from the Connec- tient shore of the Sound, although nothing occurred which can justly be dignified by the name of a battle. A few of these affairs may be mentioned here. In November, 1776, three or four hundred troops crossed from New Haven to Setanket, where a sharp skirmish was had with a detachment of General Howe's troops. Eight or ten of the British troops were killed, and 23 prisoners and 75 muskets taken.

In April, 1777, an expedition was planned by General Parsons, the object of which was to destroy a quantity

of forage and provisions that had been collected at Sag HIarbor. For that purpose a party of two hundred men, under Colonel Meigs, crossed the Sound from New HIaven on the 23d of May, in whaleboats. They secreted their boats about three miles from Sag Harbor, marched to the village, arriving at 2 a. m .; impressed guides, by whom they were conducted to the quarters of the eom- manding officer, whom they captured; forced the out- post by a bayonet charge and proceeded to the wharf, where in three-fourths of an hour, although under the fire of an armed schooner, one hundred and fifty yards away, they burned twelve brigs and sloops, one hun- dred and twenty tons of hay, and a quantity of grain, and destroyed ten hogsheads of rum and a quantity of merchandise. They also killed six of the enemy, took ninety prisoners, and returned after an absence of a little more than twenty-four hours without the loss of a man. For this service Congress presented a sword to Colonel Meigs, and General Washington in a letter com- plimented General Parsons.

In August, 1777, General Parsons organized an expe- dition of about one hundred and fifty men to break up a British outpost at Setauket, where a Presbyterian church had been fortified by surrounding it with an embankment six feet in height, and plaeing swivels in four of the gallery windows. After an engagement of two or three hours, with the loss of only four men, Gen- eral Parsons withdrew, fearing his retreat might be cut off by the capture of his sloop and boats. It is a nota- ble fact that one of the volunteers in this expedition, Zachariah Green, was twenty years after installed as minister of this same church.

In the autumn of 1780, Major Benjamin Tallmadge planned and successfully executed one of the most andacious exploits accomplished on the island during the war. At Smith's Point, Mastic, on the south side of the island, an enclosure of several acres had been made, triangular in form, with strongly barricaded houses at two of the angles, and a fort, ninety feet square, protected by an abattis, at the other. The fort was completed and garrisoned by about fifty men, and in it two guns were mounted. On the 21st of November Major Tallmadge embarked at Fairfield, Conn., with eighty dismounted dragoons, and landed at 9 in the evening at Mount Sinai, where the boats were secured. They attempted to cross the island, but a rain storm drove them back to their boats and kept them till 7 the next evening, when they again set out. At 3 the next morning they arrived within two miles of the fort (which was called Fort George), and arranged to attack it simultaneously at three points, which was done. A breach was made, the enclosure entered, and the main fort carried at the point of the bayonet, with- out the firing of a gun, the two other attacking parties mounting the ramparts at the same time with shouts. They were fired on from one of the houses, but they forcibly entered it and threw some of their assailants

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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 7

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