USA > New York > Ulster County > Kingston > The history of Kingston, New York : from its early settlement to the year 1820 > Part 33
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One night when Mr. Low came home he said to his wife, "Becky, they are going to arrest that man in the morning as a spy ; leave the back door unlocked, as they will come very early." He said he would not sleep any, and when they went to bed he spread Mrs. Low's gown out and laid on it. He did get asleep, however, and she then slipped her gown from under him and made her way quietly up-stairs. She found her guest sitting up and writing ; he had a brace of pistols and a sword lying on the table, and his boots standing on the floor at the side of him. As soon as he saw her he came up to her and said in a whisper, " My good little Dutchwoman, I am a British spy. I have heard all that was said, and will get away and be off." She said to him, " Prom-
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ise me one thing, that you will not burn Kingston." He said he could not do that, but he would promise that " that house would not be burnt, and the family would not be injured." He told her if he got away safe he would write to her. (But she never heard from him.) He offered her a bag of gold, but she refused to take it. She then left him and slipped quietly to bed without having aroused her husband or being missed by him.
Very early in the morning the men came, passed very quietly up-stairs, to find " the bird flown." They soon came down, making a thundering noise.
As soon as it was known that the British were coming up the river the women and children in the family were sent to Hurley. After they were there Mrs. Low told her husband that she wanted to wash. He told Peter, their colored man, to harness up the team and take Mrs. Low to town. While she was at the house a woman came in and said the British were on the plains. She then called Peter, and when he came to the house with the team she got in the wagon ; the British were then coming round the church corner, firing the buildings as they came. She looked round, and recognized the first man on horseback as her lodger. Mrs. Low thought their house had not been fired, but had caught by sparks from other buildings.
This statement is given as it was told by Mrs. Low herself to her daughter, the mother of Benjamin Newkirk, one of the oldest and a highly respected inhabitant of this city.
This family tradition seems to explain the exemption of the barn from the general destruction. If that had been fired, consid- ering the inflammable material in barns at that season of the year in a farming community, it is not probable that it could have escaped ; and adjoining the burying-ground, unless the wind was from the north, there was no dangerous exposure.
A woman and her daughter, at the time of the burning of King- ston, had been boarding for some time with a widow lady, Mrs. Cornelia Low, at her house standing at the southeast corner of Wall and John streets. When it became apparent that Kingston was the objective point of the British, marked for destruction, and Mrs. Low commenced preparations for the removal of her goods, this lady told her that she was the wife of a British officer, and would stay and protect her property from destruction, and urged her not to move anything. Mrs. Low placed no confidence in her protecting power, and, in the first place, buried the best part of her china in the garden. The next day she had a wagon at the door loaded with her choicest furniture, and her daughter Catharine on horseback, with a tea-caddy containing her silver spoons, ready to depart for a place of safety, when her brother John came and in-
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sisted upon putting everything back in the house, saying that he did not believe the British would burn the village.
Mrs. Low and her daughter went to Kyserike to a brother's and left everything behind, and this British officer's wife in charge.
When the red-coats came this woman, true to her word, pro- tested against anything being touched, claiming exemption and protection as the wife of a British officer. Her plea was of no avail ; they hooted her and said, " You will all claim to be British officers' wives now." They seized her chest, drew it into the street, broke it open, and rifled it of everything that was valuable ; tired the house, and dragged the daughter away with them, the mother following with screams and cries. Finally when they reached the plains, where the Academy now is, they tore the earrings out of the daughter's ears and let her go.
This statement comes direct, substantially as above related, from the grandmother of the writer, who was the person on horse- back ready to leave with the spoons.
To digress, it may be said the result of this protection was very similar to that of Robert R. Livingston on the opposite side of the river. There were then some sick British officers staying at Mr. Livingston's under parole and nursed by the family. When the British were marauding on that side of the river Mrs. Livingston made preparations to remove what goods she could. The officers then advised her not to do so, and offered to protect the property. She did not feel it safe to rely on their promises. She caused to be piled what furniture they could upon a couple of carts, and the last load was not out of sight when she turned around to see the dwelling in flames.
Gratitude and kindness have saved many lives from the toma- hawk and scalping-knife, and buildings from the savage torch, but they made no impression upon the wearers of the British red-coats in that day.
Some years ago, when improvements had been commenced and were in progress upon some of the table-land rising above Ponck- hockie, the workmen exhumed, about three feet below the surface, twenty-nine six-pound cannon-shot in a heap, and a straggling one a short distance from the rest. By the balls was a decayed stump. A few yards from this spot were found four wrought-iron axles of a gun carriage, about a foot below the surface. The balls were coated with rust, and the axles hardly oxidized.
Those things were found on a table-land somewhat higher than the Ponckhockie level, and the trace of a breastwork at that time was distinctly visible. This was undoubtedly the locality of the breastworks hereinbefore referred to as erected and manned by a
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few of our militia, and stormed and taken by the detachments landing at Ponckhockie.
It may be a relief from the dull prose of history, and not en- tirely inappropriate, to close this chapter with a short but beauti- ful extract from one of Cooper's novels, "The Pioneers," in which his hero. Leatherstocking, after describing the beanties of the Otsego Lake and its surroundings, proceeds to say : "'I have travelled the woods for fifty-three years, and I have made them my home for more than forty, and I can say that I have met but one place that was more to my liking, and that was only to eye- sight and not for hunting or fishing.'
"' And where was that ?' asked Edwards.
"' Where ! why, up on the Catskills. I used often to go up into the mountains after wolves' skins and bears; once they bought me to get a stuffed painter ; and so I often went. There is a place in them hills that I used to climb to when I wanted to see the carryings-on of the world that would pay any man for a barked shin or a torn moccasin. You know the Catskills, lad, for you must have seen them on your left as you followed the river up from York, looking as blue as a piece of clear sky, and holding the clouds on their tops as the smoke curls over the head of an Indian chief at a council fire. Well, there is the High Peak and the Round Top, which lay back like a father and mother among their children, seeing they are far above all the other hills. But the place I mean is next to the river, where one of the ridges juts out a little from the rest, and where the rocks fall for the best part of a thousand feet, so much up and down that a man standing on their edges is fool enough to think he can jump from top to bottom.'
"' What see you when you get there ?' asked Edwards.
"'Creation,' said Natty, dropping the end of his rod into the water and sweeping one hand around him in a circle ; 'all creation, lad. I was on that hill when Vaughan burnt 'Sopus, in the last war, and I seen the vessels come out of the Highlands as plain as I can see that line scow rowing into the Susquehanna, though one was twenty times further from me than the other. The river was in sight for seventy miles under my feet, looking like a curled shaving, though it was eight long miles to its banks. I saw the hill in the Hampshire Grants, the highlands of the river, and all that God had done or man could do as far as eye could reach. You know that the Indians named me for my sight, lad, and from the flat on the top of that mountain I have often found the place where Albany stands ; and as for 'Sopus ! the day the royal troops burned the town the smoke seemed so nigh that I thought I could hear the screeches of the women.'
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"' It must have been worth the toil, to meet with such a glori- ous view.'
"' If being the best part of a mile in the air, and having men's farms and houses at your feet, with rivers looking like ribands, and mountains bigger than the vision seeming to be haystacks of green grass under you gives any satisfaction to a man, I can recom- mend the spot.'"'
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CHAPTER XIX.
FROM THE BURNING OF KINGSTON, 1777, TO THE CONCLUSION OF THE WAR, 1783.
L - EAVING the sufferers at Kingston for a time, presumably J erecting temporary protections for themselves and their fam- ilies, the attention of the reader will be called to some movements and operations of the military.
After the burning of Kingston, and as soon as Governor Clin- ton's army arrived, he concentrated his forces at Hurley, and his plan and intentions are best developed by the extracts from letters which follow.
On the 17th of October, 1777, he wrote to General Gates as follows : "Yesterday afternoon about four O'clock, the enemy took possession of and burned the town of Kingston. For want of a proper number of troops no effectual resistance could be made. I have now the body of men under my command which marched from New Windsor to my assistance, and shall immediately pro- ceed to the ruins of Kingston, which the enemy have abandoned. I have sent off a party of Light Horse to reconnoitre, and shall act in such manner as the motions of the enemy may direct."
The following is appended to the letter as a postscript : " A prisoner, who is by no means intelligent, says that the enemy are two thousand strong commanded by Gen Vaughan."
On the 18th he wrote from Hurley to General Putnam as fol- lows : "I am this moment favored with yours of this morning. There is nothing new happened in this quarter since I wrote you yesterday. The enemy is 8 or 10 miles above this burning away. But as there are no capital settlements there, on this side the river and the situation of the country such, as with my present force I cannot advance opposite to them with safety to my artillery, I mean at present to continue where I now am in front of the most valuable settlements and where the stores and effects from Kingston are removed. I imagine the enemy will not proceed much higher up the river, and that on their return, they will attempt to lay waste the places they have passed going up, after our troops are drawn from them."
On the 21st of October Governor Clinton wrote to General Gates,
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describing the situation so fully that although quite lengthy, it is inserted entire.
"HURLEY 2 MILES AND A HALF FROM KINGSTON Oct 21 1777 " DEAR SIR
"I have repeatedly done myself the Honor to inform you of my situation, and think it my duty again to do so, that if any of those consequences should happen, which may now be easily fore- seen, the blame if any may not lie at my door.
" When I undertook at the request of Gen Putnam, to put myself at the head of a body of men to protect the western shores of Hudson River, and to throw myself between the enemy and your army, should they proceed up the river, I represented to him in strong terms the situation of this part of the country, thinly inhabited, and the interior part unsettled, and separated from all assistance by a chain of mountains. In consequence of which representation, he agreed to let me have 3000 men, if the Eastern Militia should come in as he expected they would, of which num- ber however he hath not sent four hundred. I then clearly saw that it would be impossible for me, to protect the country, unless I could be reinforced from the Northern Army, which from your letter I had reason to expect ; I wrote also to Gen Dickinson of New Jersey upon the same subject, and I am informed that he, notwithstanding the exposed situation of his own State, has ordered six hundred men to my brother's assistance at New Wind- sor. Kingston hath been destroyed merely because I have been so deceived in my expectations of assistance, that it was impossible to take measures for its security.
"I am now, sir, at the head of little more than one thousand men. to cover the most valuable part of the county of Ulster.
" The enemy have lain still yesterday, and the day before, with a strong southerly wind, from whence it is evident, that a knowl- edge of Burgoyne's fate hath changed their intentions against Albany. If they land in force, I must either retreat, or sacrifice . my few men and lose seven very valuable pieces of field artillery. If I retreat, this whole country will be ravaged and destroyed, and that at a season of the year when the Inhabitants (who are warmly attached to the American cause) will want time to provide cover for their families against the inclemencies of the ensuing winter.
" While we act merely on the defensive, two thousand men on the river will find full employment for twelve or fifteen. But if four thousand are left to cover Albany, two thousand here, and two thousand on the other side of the river, it will be by no means impracticable, to recover the passes in the Highlands, in which case the greater part of the army, now along the banks of the river,
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may be brought to act offensively against the enemy and perhaps render the present campaign decisive in our favor.
"Col. Malcolm, who is the bearer of this letter, will do himself the honor of stating and explaining to you my ideas upon this subject ; and you will do me a particular favor, if in answer to this, you will inform me what I am to expect, and what is expected from me.
" I am Dr Genl with particular esteem " Your most obt servant " GEO CLINTON " To the Honbl Maj Gen Gates, Albany."
If General Vaughan had in truth intended to proceed up the river to Albany, the plan was abandoned upon receipt of the confirma- tory news of Burgoyne's surrender. He then, after having partially satiated the cruelty of his nature by burning and destroying what residences and private property he could reach, proceeded down the river on the 23d of October, and after anchoring over night opposite Kingston Point, joined the British forces in the High- lands the evening of the 24th.
After the enemy had thus returned from their marauding ex- pedition the troops were withdrawn from this section and pro- ceeded to New Windsor.
The convicted spy, Taylor, was executed by order of the gov- ernor at Hurley, in the presence of his troops, on the 18th of October.
The Council of Safety, after the burning of Kingston, convened at the house of Andrew Oliver, in Marbletown. The president, Pierre Van Cortlandt, and ten members were in attendance.
After attending to some business in reference to the discharge of some prisoners, some under parole and others in confinement, they passed the following preamble and resolution :
" Whereas the late destruction of the town of Kingston, and a vast number of dwelling houses, improvements, grain, and fodder, on each side of Hudson's river, by a cruel, inhuman, and merciless enemy, has deprived many persons and families, the good subjects of this State, of shelter and subsistence for themselves and their cattle, Calamities which by the blessing of God on the fruits of this land, those, who have not shared in so uncommon a misfor- tune, are enabled in a great measure to relieve, Resolved therefore that it be and it is hereby most earnestly recommended to the several and respective general and district committees of the Counties of Ulster, Dutchess, Orange and Westchester to make or cause to be made a proper, and proportionate distribution of the aforesaid distressed persons and families and their cattle, to the
L
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OLIVER HOUSE, AT MARBLETOWN.
end that they may all be provided for, as the circumstances of the country will permit ; and it is hereby most strenuously urged on all those, who have not shared with them in their afflictions, to receive the aforesaid persons, families and cattle, and furnish them with shelter and subsistence at a moderate price."
The Council of Safety continued in session at Marbletown for a time, when they adjourned to Hurley, Ulster County. They held regular sessions at Hurley until the 17th of December, when they adjourned to Poughkeepsie, where they continued until the 7th of January, 1778, when the Provincial Convention, consisting of the members of the Senate and Assembly of the State, commenced their sessions at Poughkeepsie in joint convention.
The citizens of Kingston, after the burning of their homes, together with their outbuildings, in which were stored the gather- ings of their harvest and their other crops, were, of course, put to very great straits in regard to all the comforts of life. Without a shelter, except such as might be afforded temporarily through the
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compassion and hospitality of friends, many built huts and tem- porary abodes with the materials they could gather. As the buildings originally were principally of stone, and many of them with kitchen additions projecting out in the rear, some were able to finish that part off with temporary roofs, so as to make them, to some extent, comfortable for the winter, others made temporary additions or lean-tos against the standing walls, and a few made temporary covers or huts in the best way they could for shelter,
HOUSE AT HURLEY WHERE COUNCIL OF SAFETY MET.
making preparations for the restoration of their buildings the fol- lowing spring and summer. Judging from the old ruins and old neglected cellars, which could be seen in different parts of the village when the writer was a youth, many buildings after the fire were entirely abandoned and never rebuilt.
The winter was employed by those who were able to do so in preparing timber for permanent reconstruction the ensuing year. They had much trouble in procuring boards and neces- sary sawed material by reason of their scarcity, and that ex- . plains a portion of Mr. Livingston's letter, which will soon be referred to.
.
The committee of Kingston, in order to obtain some relief for
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the inhabitants, on the 9th day of February, 1778, addressed a communication to the governor as follows :
" To his Excellency George Clinton Esq Governor and Com- munder in Chief of the State of New York
" The humble address of the Committee of Safety and Observa- tion of the town of Kingston shews-
" That in the dispute raised between America and the King of Great Britain touching and concerning taxation, America held that such taxation was unjust and illegal, and unwarranted by the Con- stitution of Britain, and soon entered upon and into measures to prevent such illegal taxation. Kingston unitedly joined in and seconded the measures taken to prevent the expected oppression by early embarking in the cause of liberty. Their persevering and continued exertions in support thereof have undoubtedly incurred the bitterest resentment of the enemy, and to vent such resentment the expedition up the North river was determined upon and the destruction of Kingston thereby effected to the great loss and damage of the inhabitants.
" Many of the sufferers would fain build who are discouraged by the enormous prices of materials and labor. They have always supported the cause with proper spirit, have always submitted to the present government, cheerfully turned out their number of men on all detachments and those ordered to be raised to re-enforce the army, and always acted with spirit and resolution whatever might be the situation circumstances and difficulties.
" The committee therefore conceive it to be their indispensable duty to address your Excellency in behalf of the sufferers of King- ston and ask that your Excellency will be pleased to interest your- self in devising means whereby the poor sufferers may obtain relief. Their spirit to rebuild the town is good, but their abilities weak. Assistance for that purpose would be exceedingly agreeable and greatly revive the drooping spirits of many of the poor sufferers.
" The Committee may it please your Excellency conclude by praying that your Excellency will use all your influence and inter- est to obtain relief for the poor sufferers of Kingston
" By order of the Committee " ANDRIES DE WITT JUNR Ch'n"
To which petition the governor replied as follows :
"POUGHKEEPSIE 17th Feb'y 1778 " Andries De Witt Jun Ch'n
" SIP. I have received the address of the Committee of King- ston dated the 9th instant respecting the distresses of the inhabit- ants of Kingston and the aid required to enable them to rebuild the 21
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town. You may rest assured, gentlemen, that whatever may be in my power to render them shall not be withheld but most cheer- fully afforded. I have already suggested to sundry members of the Legislature the propriety of rebuilding the Court house and gaol at publie expense and have reason to hope it will be done. I have likewise mentioned the propriety of exempting such number of artificers as, shall be necessary from military drafts and duty, providing they agree to work at rebuilding the town for reasonable wages, which likewise I hope I shall be enabled to do.
** *
* *
" I am with due respect
" Your most obed't serv't " GEO. CLINTON"
Subsequently orders were issued in military matters on the 30th of May, and again on the 23d of July, 1778, exempting from service in the militia, or upon drafts for the time being, the two companies of militia of the town of Kingston, and such persons as . were actually employed in rebuilding the town.
During the season some were fortunate enough to get their houses finished, others completed only a section for habitation, some finished off their rear kitchens, leaving the main building untouched, and a few abandoned their ruins to their fate.
The first meeting of which we have any record after the fire was the meeting for the annual election of trustees and other officers, held on the first Tuesday of March, 1778, only a few months after the fire, at the house of Mr. Tobias Van Steenbergh, Jr. This is evidence that that house was then standing. The meetings were continued there until the 2d day of October.
On that day an order was made to have the lead which was stored in Mr. Low's barn run into bullets.
This is looked upon as circumstantial evidence that those two buildings were not, in fact, burned.
As previously stated, for the alleviation of their distress, the citizens of Kingston received considerable assistance from abroad. The letter of Robert R. Livingston, the Chancellor, referred to above, was dated March 1st, 1778, addressed to the trustees of Kingston, and was as follows :
" GENT
: "The inconvenience I daily experience from the destruction of my house, and the ravages of the enemy, serve only to increase my sympathy with the inhabitants of Kingston, and animate my desire, in proportion as they lessen my power, to contribute to their relief as liberally as I wish. My inattention to my private
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affairs for three years past, and the disaffection of my tenants, who have during this controversy very generally withheld their rents, put it out of my power to contribute, what might perhaps be of more immediate use to my distressed friends at Kingston. Yet, I flatter myself, that my present proposal may meet with their approbation, and be attended with permanent advantage, and in this view I am induced to make it. I mean a grant of 5000 acres of land, in any part of Hardenbergh's patent, that falls to my share-which I promise to make to the Trustees for the use of the Inhabitants thereof under the following restrictions. 1st to be taken in a regular square, 2nd not to be located in Woodstock or Shandaken, nor at any other place, on which a settlement has been made, -and that the location be made within three months from the date hereof, and a survey returned in order to perfect the grant. This land the Trustees will dispose of, in such way as will be most advantageous to the suffering inhabitants of Kingston.
" As I have been informed, that many of them have been dis- appointed in not being able to procure boards, I have prevailed upon my mother, to suffer Mr Saxe to dispose of all but her third, which she reserves for her own use. I shall be happy if this, or anything else in my power can in the least contribute to the case or convenience of those whose attention to me early in life entitles them to my friendship, and who are more endeared, by the gener- ous cause in which they suffer
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