History of Westchester County, New York, Volume 1. Frederic Shonnard

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      During the first fifteen or so years after the beginning of the colonization of New Netherland there was no attempt at settlement north of the Harlem River, so far as can be determined from the records that have come down to us. The earliest recorded occupation of Westchester land by an actual white settler dates from about 1639. At that period at least one man of note and substance, Jonas Bronck, laid out a farm and erected a dwelling above the Harlem. That he had predecessors in that section is extremely improbable. The entire Westchester peninsula at that time was a wilderness, inaccessible from Manhattan Island, except by boat. The colony proper, as inaugurated by the few families of Walloons, who came over in 1623, and as subsequently enlarged by gradual additions, was at the far southern end of Manhattan Island, where a fort was built for the general security, and where alone existed facilities for trade and social intercourse. To this spot and its immediate vicinity settlement was necessarily confined for some years; and though by degrees certain enterprising persons took up lands considerably farther north, steadily pushing on to the Harlem, it is most unlikely that that stream was crossed for purposes of habitation by any unremembered adventurer before the time of Bronck. Certainly any earlier migration into a region utterly uninhabited except by Indians, and separated by water from all communication with the established settlements, would have been an event of some importance, which hardly could have escaped mention. We may therefore with reasonable safety assume that Bronck, the first white resident in Westchester County of whom history leaves any trace, was the first in fact, and that with his coming, about the year 1639, the annals of the civilized occupation of our country begin.

      The little colony of Walloons landed on Manhattan Island by the ship " New Netherland " in the spring of 1623 was, as we have seen, only one of several infant colonies planted on the same occasion and governed by a director of the Dutch West India Company, who had his headquarters in Delaware Bay. The first director, Cornelius Jacobsen May, was succeeded at the expiration of a year by William Verhulst, who in 1626 was replaced by Peter Minuit. Previously to Minuit's appointment little effort had been made to give a formal character to the administration of the local affairs of New Nether land, although the interests of the settlements were not neglected. In 1625 wheeled vehicles were introduced, and a large importation of domestic animals from Holland was made, including horses, cattle, swine, and sheep. Moreover, some new families and single people, mostly Walloons, were brought over.

      With the arrival of Peter Minuit, as director-general, on May 4, 1626, the concerns of the colony first came under a carefully ordered scheme of management. The settlements in New York Bay were now made the seat of government of New Netherland. The director-general was to exercise the functions of chief executive, subject to the advice of a council of five members, which, be sides acting as a legislative and general administrative body, was to constitute a tribunal for the trial of all cases at law arising, both civil and criminal. There were two other officers of importance — a secretary of the council and a schout-fiscaal. The latter performed the combined duties of public prosecutor, treasurer, and sheriff. There was no provision for representative government, although it was customary in cases of considerable public moment to call in some of the principal citizens as advisers, who in such circumstances had an equal voice with the members of the council. Of this custom the directors sometimes took advantage in order to place the responsibility for serious and perhaps questionable acts of policy upon the citizens. The conduct of Director Kieft in entering upon his course of violent aggression against the Indians, which resulted in great devastation in our county, was given the color of popular favor in this manner.

      In the early months of Minuit's administration the Island of Manhattan was purchased from the Indians " for the value of sixty guilders," or $24. The same ship which carried to Holland the news of this transaction bore a cargo of valuable peltries (including 7,246 beaver skins) and oak and hickory timber. The first year of Minuit's directorship was also signalized by the dispatching of an embassy to New England, partly with the object of cultivating trade relations with the Puritan settlers, but mainly in connection with the rival English and Dutch territorial claims. Thus at the very outset of systematic government by the Dutch in their new possessions the controversy with England, destined to be settled thirty-seven years later by the stern law of the stronger, came forward as a subject requiring special attention.

      It should not be supposed that the settlement on Manhattan Island at this early period enjoyed any pretensions as a community. Indeed, it had scarcely yet risen to true communal dignity. According to Wassanaer, the white population in 1628 was 270. But this number did not represent any particularly solid organization of people composed of energetic and effective elements. The settlers up to this time were almost exclusively refugees from religious persecution, who came for the emergent reason that they were without homes in Europe — mostly honest, sturdy people, but poor and unresourceful. The inducements so far offered by the West India Company were not sufficiently attractive to draw other classes to their transatlantic lands, and the natural colonists of the New Netherland, the yeomen and burghers of the United Provinces, finding no appearance of advantage to offset the plain risks involved in emigration, were very reluctant to leave their native country, where conditions of life were comfortable and profitable much beyond the average degree. This reluctance was alluded to in the following strong language in a report made to the States-General by the Assembly of the XIX. in 1629: " The colonizing such wild and uncultivated countries demands more inhabitants than we can well supply; not so much through lack of population, in which our provinces abound, as from the fact that all who are inclined to do any sort of work here procure enough to eat without any trouble, and are therefore unwilling to go far from home on an uncertainty."

      It accordingly became a matter of serious consideration for the company to devise more effective colonizing plans. After careful deliberation, an elaborate series of provisions to this end was drawn up, entitled " Freedoms and Exemptions granted by the Assembly of the XIX. of the Privileged West India Company to all such as shall plant any colonies in New Netherland," which in June, 1629, received the ratification of the States-General. As this document «as the basis upon which the celebrated patroonships, including the patroonship of Yonkers, were founded, a brief summary of it is in order.

      Any member of the West India Company who should settle a " colonie " (i.e., a plantation or landed proprietorship) in New Netherland was entitled to become a beneficiary of the Privileges and Exemptions, but that right was withheld from all other persons. The whole country was thrown open under the offer, excepting " the Island of Manhattan," which was reserved to the company. A colonie, within the meaning of the document, was to be a settlement of " fifty souls, up wards of fifteen years old," one-fourth to be sent during the first year and the remainder before the expiration of the fourth year. Everyone complying with these conditions was to be acknowledged a patroon of New Netherland. The landed limits of the patroonships were extensible sixteen English miles " along the shore — that is, on one side of a navigable river, or eight miles on each side of a river — and so far into the country as the situation of the occupiers will permit"; and the company waived all pecuniary consideration for the land, merely requiring settlement. Upon the patroons was conferred the right to " forever possess and enjoy all the lands lying within the aforesaid limits, together with the fruits, rights, minerals, rivers, and fountains thereof; as also СКАЧАТЬ