USA > New York > New York City > The story of the city of New York > Part 6
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them. Colonel Nicolls was appointed Deputy Gov- ernor of the province when it should be taken. Under him were three commissioners, Sir Robert Carr, Sir George Cartwright, and Samuel Maverick, who were given power to erect the conquered terri- tory into an English colony. These men also bore orders to the governors of the New England colonies to furnish men and means to aid in conquering the Dutch. The fleet left Portsmouth about the middle of May, 1664, and arrived at Boston late in July. Here the commissioners made their demand on the Massachusetts authorities for aid, and also on Con- necticut by an express sent to Governor Winthrop at Hartford. Massachusetts, whose Puritan sympathies were not heartily enlisted in King Charles' cause, re- sponded tardily, but Connecticut, which had been in almost constant collision with the Dutch on her western border, gladly aided the enterprise. Mean- time peace and tranquillity brooded over New Ain- · sterdam. Not the slightest preparation had been made to receive an enemy. Of the thirteen hundred pounds of powder in the fort seven hundred were unserviceable. There were one hundred and fifty regular soldiers to garrison it, and two hundred and fifty militia, but these so heartily detested the Di- rector that they could not be depended on in an emergency. No provision had been made for a siege.
A certain merchant, one Richard Lord, of Lyme in Connecticut, sent his vessels both to Boston and New Amsterdam. He reached Manhattan from Boston, about the time the English fleet was expected
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there, and informed Stuyvesant that.it was common rumor in Boston that the fleet was intended for the Dutch. The Director and council, alarmed, began active preparations for defence, but on the heels of the merchant came a letter from the Amsterdam Chamber, saying that the English fleet need not be feared, that Charles had only sent a few ships to in- troduce Episcopacy in New England. All efforts were therefore relaxed, and a few days later the Director set out for Albany, on official business, but before he could finish it, a messenger, spurring in hot haste, reached him with news that Nicolls had left Boston for New Amsterdam, and that the city was in hourly expectation of an attack. It would be interesting could we analyze the emotions of the Director in the mad gallop back to his capital, which followed. Probably rage that both he and the Am- sterdam Chamber had been so cleverly duped by the caitiff Englishman was the ruling passion. Twenty- four hours after reaching home, as he walked the fort parapet, he saw the red-cross flag of St. George gleam in the lower bay, and caught the dim outlines of the Guinea moving up through the mist. Evi- dently the threatened English invasion was near.
Stuyvesant's faults were those of a soldier. He had also the virtues of a soldier : bravery, energy, and decision of character were among the latter. He at once determined to hold the town against all odds. And yet it seemed almost an act of madness. The fort at the Battery would protect only that point, and there was the town behind exposed to the enemy's frigates on both sides. He could mus-
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ter but four hundred men all told, and of these a number were Englishmen and not to be depended on. He had an uneasy feeling, too, that his own coun- trymen would willingly exchange his iron rule for that of the duke, if they could be assured of protec- tion. Nevertheless, he began active preparations to withstand a siege. Every third man was ordered to repair to the defences with spade, shovel, or wheel- barrow, which many refused to do. A guard was placed at the city gates ; the brewers were forbidden to make grain into malt ; the Director's slaves were set to thrashing grain at his farm, and conveying it to the fort. The frigates anchored in a cluster in the bay, and a messenger was despatched to Stuyve- sant with a summons to surrender.
"On this unexpected letter," say the burgomasters and schepens of New Amsterdam in their account of the capture to the West India Company dated September 16, 1664-"On this unexpected letter the Heer Gen- eral sent for us to determine what was to be done in the matter. Whereupon it was resolved to send some com- missioners thither to argue the matter with the General and his three commissioners, who were so sent for this purpose twice, but received no answer except that they were not come here to dispute about it, but to execute their order and commission without fail Three days' delay was demanded for consultation. That was duly allowed, but meanwhile they were not idle. They approached with their four frigates, two of which passed in front of the fort. The others anchored about Noo- ten (Governor's) Island, and sent five companies of soldiers who encamped themselves at the ferry opposite
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this place (Fulton ferry, Brooklyn), together with a newly raised company of horse and a party of new soldiers both from the north (Connecticut) and Long Island, mostly all our deadly enemies, who expected nothing else than pill- age, plunder, and bloodshed, as men could perceive by their cursing and talking."
Nicolls on his part performed his delicate mission with the tact of the accomplished soldier and courtier. On his arrival he issued a proclamation couched in the kindliest, most conciliatory terms, offering to every one who would submit, life, liberty, estate, and the fullest enjoyment of every right whether of person or property. These he scattered as fire- brands in the enemy's camp, and waited, hoping to secure the prize without incurring the odium of firing on a town filled with women and children. Meantime, while the commissioners were going to and fro, the city was in a ferment. There lay the . frigates with the black muzzles of their guns looking on the town,-silent monitors. An inkling of Nicolls' proclamation had reached the people, and they clam- ored for submission. Stuyvesant sternly refused. The city fathers counselled delay, and an urging on of the preparations for defence, that better terms might be obtained. Nicolls' formal summons to surrender had been made on Saturday, August 30th. He had omitted to sign it, and it was returned that the in- formality might be remedied, thus giving the be- sieged precious time. All day Sunday men wrought on the defences. On Tuesday morning a row-boat left the fleet and approached the city. It contained six dignified gentlemen, men of mark, the command-
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ing figure of Governor Winthrop of Connecticut, whom Stuyvesant had met in council and at fête during his memorable visit to Hartford, being con- spicuous. They were met at the wharf with stately courtesy, a salute was fired in their honor, and they were conducted to the City Hall, where Stuyvesant and his council were waiting to receive them. Win- throp broached his mission, which was to deliver a letter from Colonel Nicolls, and to urge the Director to give over a hopeless struggle, and submit to the English. Many weighty arguments were advanced with the persuasive eloquence for which the elder Winthrop was famous, but all in vain. The lion- hearted Director would defend the city to the last. On taking leave Winthrop left the letter from Colonel Nicolls. Unsealing it Stuyvesant read :
" MR. WINTHROP :- As to those particulars you spoke to me, I do assure you that if the Manhadoes be delivered up to his Majesty, I shall not hinder but that any people from the Netherlands may freely come and plant there, or thereabouts ; and such vessels of their own country may freely come thither, and any of them may as freely return home in vessels of their own country, and this and much more is contained in the privilege of his Majesty's English subjects ; and thus much you may, by what means you please, assure the Governor, from, Sir,
"Your very affectionate servant, " RICHARD NICOLLS."
It was a very timely and politic document. The burgomasters at once asked that it be read to the citi- zens, who had gathered en masse outside to hear the result of the conference, but Stuyvesant feared its
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effect on them, and refused ; a wordy quarrel en- sued ; at last the Director, in a burst of passion, tore the offending letter to pieces, whereupon Cornelis Steenwyck condemned this violence in no measured terms, and with his fellow-officials quitted the place. The people received the news with suppressed rage, and covert threats, and presently deputed three prominent citizens to call on the Director and de- mand the paper. The fragments were shown them, but they demanded the letter. Stuyvesant himself appeared before the people, and tried to reason with them, but his voice was drowned in clamorous shouts for the letter. "That," said Stuyvesant, " was addressed to the officers of the government, and does not concern the commonalty "; but the people could not be pacified, and, amid bitter curses against the company and himself, the Director with- drew and shut himself up in the fort, while Nicholas Bayard, like the accomplished courtier that he was, joined the torn fragments of the letter, and there- upon made a copy which he read to the people, and thus partially appeased them. Still the murmuring was deep and loud.
" Why should we fight for the governor and com- pany?" we can fancy them saying. " He has always treated us as children and slaves, and the company has regarded us as a mere trading post for the filling of its coffers. The English colonies have had much better treatment. Look at Connecticut on the east. What a liberal charter ! There the people elect their own governors and councils ; make their own laws. And Maryland on the south. No man there was
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THE STORY OF NEW YORK.
ever persecuted for conscience' sake ; every man has equal rights as respects property, religion, and the suffrage. Why should we fight to sustain a despot- ism, and expose our property to ruin and our fami- lies to violence ? "
So they reasoned. Meantime Stuyvesant was bus- ily penning a letter in reply to Nicolls, in which he gave an exhaustive account of the Dutch dis- covery and right to Manhattan, and emphasized their claims to it. This he sent by four of his wisest councillors. But Nicolls declined argument. " He stood on no question of right," he said. "If his terms were not accepted he must carry out his orders and attack." The delegates still wished to argue the matter, but Nicolls refused. " On Thurs- day I shall speak with you at the Manhattans," he said significantly. He was told that he would be welcome if he came in a friendly manner. "I shall come with my ships and soldiers," was the reply, " and he will be a bold messenger who will dare to come on board and solicit terms." "What then is to be done?" asked one. " Hoist the white flag of peace at the fort, and I may take something into consideration." They entreated that the ships should not fire upon the city without warning, but he denied their request that the troops should not be brought up nearer the city. " To-day I shall arrive at the Ferry," he added ;. " to-morrow we can agree with one another." On the 25th of August (old style) he landed three companies of regulars at Gravesend, and marched at their head to the Brook- lyn Ferry, where the Connecticut and Long Island
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volunteers were already massed. At the same time two frigates sailed up and cast anchor off Governor's Island. A little later the other two came up under full sail, with their ports open, and guns shotted, ready to pour in a broadside if opposition was made, and so ran past the fort, and came to anchor in the river above. Stuyvesant stood on the ramparts as they came on, feeling that the crisis had come. No doubt he remembered Governor Risingh and Fort Christina. Then he was the piper, and the poor Swedes danced ; now the terms were reversed. As the ships came on, the old soldier's ardor was aroused, and he would have ordered his gunners to fire, but at the critical moment good Domine Megapolensis laid his hand upon his shoulder. "It is madness," said he; "what can our twenty guns do in the face of the sixty-two pointed toward us on yonder frigates? Will you be the first to shed blood?" So the ships sailed by without testing the calibre of the Dutch guns. Once past, however, the governor's resolution returned, and taking one hundred men he hurried up into the city to resist any attempt of the foe to land. But there he was met with a remonstrance signed by ninety-three of the leading citizens, including the city magistrates and the clergy, urging him to accept the terms of the English and save the city from sack. Women and children came to him and begged him with tears to save them from violence. At last the grim veteran, hero of a hundred battles, gave way. "I had rather be carried to my grave," he said, but finally he ordered the white flag raised above the fort. And thus peaceably fell New Amsterdam in the year of our Lord 1664.
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The articles of capitulation were agreed on next morning. There were twenty-four of them, and they embodied in substance the terms made known by Nicolls in his proclamations and conversations with the Dutch delegates. Never were more favor- able terms offered a conquered people. Citizens of every nationality were to be secured in person, property, customs, and religion. Free intercourse with Holland was to continue. The public build- ings and records were to remain intact, and public officers were to hold over until the time came for a new election. For himself and his soldiers Stuyve- sant asked much the same terms as he had granted to Governor Risingh under exactly similar condi- tions. They were to march out carrying their arms, with drums beating, colors flying, and matches lighted, and embark on the vessel which was to convey them to Holland. This programme was fully carried out on Monday, September 8th. As Stuyvesant and his troops marched out, the forces of Nicolls and Carr entered the town and raised their " meteor flag" over the fort and public build- ings. In the council-chamber the grave burgo- masters and schepens proclaimed Nicolls Governor of the province. The fort was rechristened James, in honor of the duke, and the province was named New York for the same reason. Rensselaerwyck and the forts on the South River soon yielded, and thus, without bloodshed, England secured the whole wide territory of New Netherlands-a territory, it is but just to add, which she had always claimed, and to which she was clearly entitled by the law of
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nations. The United Provinces exclaimed loudly against the injustice of the seizure, and waged a long and bloody war with England on account of it, quite ignoring the fact that they had committed a precisely similar act in driving the friendly Swedes from Fort Christina, on the sole plea that they had settled on territory claimed by the Dutch. The grim old Director, too, was harshly blamed for
STUYVESANT'S HOUSE.
yielding up the fort-as if he had not for the last five years, by every ship that sailed, importuned the half-moribund company to send him men and muni- tions of war to put it in a proper trim for a siege. Stuyvesant went to Amsterdam and made an able defence of his course. Afterwards, as all his family and property interests were in New York, he re- turned, and, taking up his residence at his bouwery or country-seat, he lived there, for several years, an
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active and useful life, though studiously refraining from politics. His estate was a large one and cost him sixty-four hundred guilders. Its fields, sloping down to the East River, were kept in the highest · state of cultivation and stocked with the finest breeds of horses, cattle, and sheep. He had there a large, roomy house of Dutch architecture, with square stone chimneys and diamond-paned windows, which was burned in 1777, to the city's permanent loss. It was surrounded by flower-gardens and orchards of peach-, pear-, and apple-trees, in which the owner took great delight. One of his pear-trees was for many years a landmark of the city. Stuyvesant brought it from Holland on his return, and set it out in his garden. The tree lived and flourished for two hundred years ; and when the city streets were laid out through its ancient home, found itself ex- actly on the corner of Thirteenth Street and Third Avenue. There it burgeoned and fruited for many a year, never asking a penny for the golden fruit it strewed to the people so generously. At last it fell, and its clean, firm wood was cut up into mementos, and is treasured in scores of city homes to-day. Governor Stuyvesant died in 1672, and was buried in the family vault in the chapel built by himself on his farm, and which stood exactly where St. Mark's Church now stands, the original tablet of the vault being built into the east wall of the church. He whom it commemorates was a strong, heroic figure, and one may not pass it by without a thrill at the contrast between the city of to-day and that which struggled upward under his iron reign.
V.
SOCIAL AND DOMESTIC LIFE.
IF in preceding chapters we have touched but lightly on the social and domestic life of the col- onists, it was not because we deemed it unimpor- tant, but from a desire to give the reader a clear and graphic sketch of the founding of New York and of the events which, like the stairway of some noble temple, led up to its settlement. But few social amenities were possible to the early settlers. The Rev. Jonas Michaelis, the first pastor, in a letter to " his beloved brother in Christ and kind friend," Rev. Adrianus Smoutius, of Holland, gives a graph- ic account of the trials and hardships which beset the first pioneers. His letter is dated "Island of Manhata in New Netherlands, the 16th of August, 1628." At the first celebration of the Lord's Supper, he says, they had full fifty communicants - Wal- loons and Dutch. The Sacrament was administered once in four months " until a larger number of peo- ple should otherwise require." The natives he found entirely savage and wild.
" Strangers to all decency, yea, uncivil and stupid. as
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posts, proficient in all wickedness and godlessness, devil- ish men who serve nobody but the devil-that is, the spirit which in their language they call Manetto. They have so much witchcraft, divination, sorcery, and wicked tricks, that they cannot be held in by any bands or locks. They are as thievish and treacherous as they are tall, and in cruelty they are more inhuman than the people of Barbary, and far exceed the Africans."
Servants were scarce, except Angola slaves, which were "thievish, lazy, and useless trash," and there were no horses, cows, or laborers to be had for money. The rations given out at the company's store, and "charged for high enough," were hard, stale food, such as was used on shipboard, and fre- quently " this was not good." The Indians brought in fish and flesh of various kinds, but unless one had wares, such as knives, beads, and the like, or wam- pum, one could not buy. From this letter we learn that in 1628 the colonists felled much wood for father-land, that they had a grist-mill, and were building a windmill, and a "fort of good quarry stone"; that they baked brick, burned lime from oyster-shells, made salt by evaporating sea-water, and had tried to make potash from wood-ashes with- out success. "The country is good and pleasant," the letter concluded, " the climate healthy notwith- withstanding the sudden changes of cold and heat."
At the time of which we now write, however-the close of the Dutch dynasty,-New Amsterdam had become a city with many of the comforts and refine- ments of civilization. Perhaps we can best depict the people's daily life by inviting the reader to join
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us in a stroll through the city-the time a clear, cool September day in 1663. Shall we enter by this arched gate-way at Broadway and Wall Street, or by the " Water Gate," at the point where Wall Street now meets the East River front? The latter. Then we will take the river road leading through fine old forests
BLOCK-HOUSE AND CITY GATE.
from what is now Fulton Ferry into the city. At what is now Maiden Lane we come upon a footpath leading west toward Broadway, and skirting the shores of several clear-water ponds whose outlet is a little brook purling down to the East River; and here we come upon a pretty scene-a bevy of maid- ens with bare, dimpled arms, some washing linen in
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the ponds, others spreading it to dry on the green sward of the hill on the west. The path has been made by these maidens and their mothers, from which circumstance it is called Maagde Paatje- maidens' path, which when the English came to name the street was changed to Maiden Lane.
Chatting over the pastoral scene we ride on, and a few moments later, at the present line of Wall Street, come upon a blank wall of palisades, stretch- ing quite across the island to the Hudson. As in- telligent strangers we stop and survey the scene with interest. On the left, where the wall abuts on the water front, is a square block-house pierced for mus- ketry, and beyond, built out into the water, a little half-moon battery of two guns, with a sentinel in gray blouse and baggy breeches patrolling it. Before us is an arched gate-way, the key of the arch gro- tesquely carved and surmounted with a carved cupola and gilded weathercock. The wall is of palisades- beams of wood twelve feet high, imbedded three feet deep in the earth, sharpened at the upper end, and strengthened by planks nailed transversely. There are block-houses at intervals, and chevaux de frise of stumps with the roots upturned, and we find on entering that it is defended within by a sod rampart and by a fosse or ditch. A good-natured burgher whom we accost tells us that the wall is 2,340 feet long and cost 3,166 guilders, and that it was built in 1653, when the people feared an attack from the Indians and English.
A broad lane 100 feet wide flanks the wall as far as Broadway, and is lined on the south side with rude
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wooden cabins-the quarter of the chimney-sweeps and low tapsters. Numbers of the former-ragged, soot-begrimed urchins-swarm upon us with their cry of "Sweep ho!" and fight and scramble for the handful of farthings we dispense, until at length the burgher falls upon them with his cane, and drives them screaming to their dwellings. Meantime we have been riding slowly down the water-front, examining each object with the curious eye of one new to the place and people. The odd, half-moon
RIVER AND DOCK FRONT.
docks, with placid, very fat burghers seated on them, fishing and smoking; the quaint buildings with peaked, many-storied roofs, dwellings above and stores beneath ; the great stone Stadt Huys, or City Hall, with its gallows in front, the Indian canoes and the shipping in the river, all amuse and interest us. The city dock, shown on the left of the picture, with a vessel inside its piers, is at this moment a busy place.
This dock was the first built on Manhattan, the
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pioneer of our thirty miles or more of wharves. The merchants call it the "Hooft," and the river in front the " Roadstead." It is a busy place, as we have said. A fleet of scows is plying back and forth between the dock, and the great, clumsy, high- pooped ship's anchored in the roadstead. These boats are laden with various articles, according to the cargoes of the ships they are discharging. For instance, one from a "Holland ship " carries dry- goods, hardware, and groceries of all sorts, with some of those " cow calves " and " ewe milk sheep " that formed so large a part of early Dutch imports. Another from a Virginia " ketch " is laden with hogs- heads of tobacco. A third brings dried fish and English goods from the Snow just arrived from Bos- ton. A fourth is laden with savage, repulsive-looking African negroes from the slave ship White Horse, last from the coast of Angola, on their way to the slave market to be sold at public auction. A pinke from Barbadoes is loading a fifth scow with barrels of sugar and hogsheads of molasses, while the patroon of Rensselaerwyck's sloop-yacht the burghers call it-is sending ashore bales of costly furs-beaver, otter, mink, and others,-and a galley from Curaçoa costly dyestuffs, fruits, and other tropical products. Gangs of negro slaves are on the dock receiving the goods. One of these gangs, the strangers learn, is owned by Cornelis Steenwyck, a second by Pieter Cornelissen Vanderveen, a third by Isaac Allerton, and a fourth by Govert Loockerman, the four greatest merchants of New Amsterdam at this time, and the four are there in their baggy
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breeches and blue-cloth coats with silver buttons, to see that no thievery or unthrift is practised. Indeed, so careful is Cornelis Steenwyck, that he has a negro woman with needle and thread following him about to sew up any rents in bags or bales that have been consigned to him. A part of the bales, barrels, and hogsheads are rolled across the street into the mer- chants' warehouses, but the bulk of them are carted off to the five great stone warehouses of the com- pany between the present Bridge and Stone Streets. Vessels were not then allowed to come to the dock for two reasons : first, to prevent smuggling; and, sec- ond, to keep the sailors on board their ships, as com- manded by a city ordinance.
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