Dutch and English on the Hudson: A Chronicle of Colonial New York

The Common Council offered pardon and a reward of one hundred pounds to any conspirator who would reveal the story of the plot and the names of the criminals involved. Under the influence of this offer one Mary Burton, a servant in the employ of Hughson, the tavern-keeper, accused her master, her mistress, their daughter, and a woman of evil reputation known as Peggy Carey, or Kerry, as well as a number of negroes, of being implicated in the plot. She said that the negroes brought stolen goods to the tavern and were protected by Hughson, who had planned with them the burning and plundering of the city and the liberation of the slaves. On this unsupported evidence Peggy Carey and a number of negroes were condemned to execution, and under terror of death, or encouraged by the hope of pardon, these prisoners made numerous confessions implicating one another, until by the end of August twenty-four whites and one hundred and fifty-four negroes had been imprisoned. Four whites, including Hughson and Peggy Carey, were executed; fourteen negroes were burned at the stake; eighteen were hanged, seventy-one transported, and the remainder pardoned or discharged.

Accusations were also made that the Roman Catholics had stirred up the plot; and persons of reputation and standing were accused of complicity. The effect of the popular panic, which rendered impossible the calm weighing of evidence and extinguished any sense of proportion, is seen in the letters of Governor George Clarke. On June 20, 1741, he writes to the Lords of Trade as follows:

The fatal fire that consumed the buildings in the fort and great part of my substance (for my loss is not less than two thousand pounds), did not happen by accident as I at first apprehended, but was kindled by design, in the execution of a horrid Conspiracy to burn it and the whole town, and to Massacre the people; as appears evidently not only by the Confession of the Negro who set fire to it, in some part of the same gutter where the Plumber was to work, but also by the testimony of several witnesses. How many Conspirators there were we do not yet know; every day produces new discoveries, and I apprehend that in the town, if the truth were known, there are not many innocent Negro men… I do myself the honor to send your Lordships the minutes taken at the tryal of Quack who burned the fort, and of another Negro, who was tryed with him, and their confession at the stake; with some examinations, whereby your Lordships will see their designs; it was ridiculous to suppose that they could keep possession of the town, if they had destroyed the white people, yet the mischief they would have done in pursuit of their intention would nevertheless have been great… Whether, or how far, the hand of popery has been in this hellish conspiracy, I cannot yet discover; but there is room to suspect it, by what two of the Negroes have confessed, viz: that soon after they were spoke to, and had consented to be parties to it, they had some checks of conscience, which they said, would not suffer them to burn houses and kill the White people; whereupon those who drew them into the conspiracy told them, there was no sin or wickedness in it, and that if they would go to Huson's [Hughson's] house, they should find a man who would satisfy them; but they say they would not, nor did go. Margaret Keny [Kerry] was supposed to be a papist, and it is suspected that Huson and his wife were brought over to it. There was in town some time ago a man who is said to be a Romish Priest, who used to be at Huson's but has disappeared ever since the discovery of the conspiracy and is not now to be found.

Later in the summer the Governor recorded his suspicions as follows:

We then thought it [the] Plot was projected only by Huson [Hughson] and the Negroes; but it is now apparent that the hand of popery is in it, for a Romish Priest having been tryed, was upon full and clear evidence convicted of having a deep share in it… Where, by whom, or in what shape this plot was first projected is yet undiscovered; that which at present seems most probable is that Huson, an indigent fellow of a vile character, casting in his thoughts how to mend his circumstances, inticed some Negroes to rob their Masters and to bring the stolen [goods] to him on promise of reward when they were sold; but seeing that by this pilfering trade riches did not flow into him fast enough, and finding the Negroes fit instruments for any villainy, he then fell upon the schemes of burning the fort and town, and murdering the people, as the speediest way to enrich himself and them, and to gain their freedom, for that was the Negroes main inducement… The conspirators had hopes given them that the Spaniards would come hither and join with them early in the Spring; but if they failed of coming, then the business was to be done by the Conspirators without them; many of them were christen'd by the Priest, absolved from all their past sins and whatever they should do in the Plott; many of them sworn by him (others by Huson) to burn and destroy, and to be secret; wherein they were but too punctual; how weak soever the scheme may appear, it was plausible and strong enough to engage and hold the Negroes, and that was all that the Priest and Huson wanted; for had the fort taken fire in the night, as it was intended, the town was then to have been fired in several places at once; in which confusion much rich plunder might have been got and concealed; and if they had it in view too, to serve the enemy, they could not have done it more effectually; for this town being laid in ashes his Majesties forces in the West Indies might have suffered much for want of provisions, and perhaps been unable to proceed upon any expedition or piece of service from whence they might promise themselves great rewards; I doubt the business is pretty nigh at an end, for since the Priest has been apprehended, and some more white men named, great industry has been used throughout the town to discredit the witnesses and prejudice the people against them; and I am told it has had in a great measure its intended effect; I am sorry for it, for I do not think we are yet got near the bottom of it, where I doubt the principal conspirators lie concealed.

With the collapse of the excitement through its own excess, ends the history of the great negro "plot." Whether it had any shadow of reality has never been determined. Judge Horsmanden, who sat as one of the justices during the trials growing out of the so-called plots, compiled later a record of examinations and alleged confessions whereby he sought to justify the course of both judges and juries; but the impression left by his report is that panic had paralyzed the judgment of even the most honest white men, while among the negroes a still greater terror, combined with a wave of hysteria, led to boundless falsification and to numberless unjustified accusations.

CHAPTER XIV

SIR WILLIAM JOHNSON

The story of the French and Indian wars on our border does not fall within the scope of this chronicle; but in order to understand the development of New York we must know something of the conditions which prevailed in the province during that troubled epoch. The penurious policy pursued by the Dutch and continued by the English left the colony without defenses on either the northern or southern boundaries. For a long time the settlers found themselves bulwarked against the French on the north by the steadfast friendship of the "Six Nations," comprising the Mohawks, the Oneidas, the Onondagas, the Cayugas, the Senecas, and the Tuscaroras; but at last these trusty allies began to feel that the English were not doing their share in the war. The lack of military preparation in New York was inexcusable. The niggardliness of the Assembly alienated successive governors and justified Clinton's assertion: "If you deny me the necessary supplies all my endeavors must become fruitless. I must wash my own hands and leave at your doors the blood of innocent people."

When the Indians under the leadership of the French actually took the warpath, the colonists at last awoke to their peril. Upon call of Lieutenant-Governor De Lancey, acting under instructions of the Lords of Trade, all the colonies north of the Potomac except New Jersey sent commissioners to a congress at Albany in June, 1754, to plan measures of defense and of alliance with the Six Nations.

Albany was still a placid little Dutch town. Mrs. Grant of Laggan in Scotland, who visited Albany in her girlhood, wrote of it afterward with a gentle suavity which lent glamour to the scenes which she described. She pictures for us a little town in which every house had its garden at the rear and in front a shaded stoop with seats on either side where the family gathered to enjoy the twilight. "Each family had a cow, fed in a common pasture at the end of the town. In the evening they returned all together, of their own accord, with their tinkling bells hung at their necks, along the wide and grassy street, to their wonted sheltering trees, to be milked. At one door were young matrons, at another the elders of the people, at a third the youths and maidens, gaily chatting or singing together, while the children played around the trees, or waited by the cows for the chief ingredient of their frugal supper, which they generally ate sitting on the steps in the open air."

The court-house of Albany to which the commissioners journeyed by boat up the Hudson, is described by Peter Kalm, a Swedish traveler and scientist, as a fine stone building by the riverside, three stories high with a small steeple containing a bell, and topped by a gilt ball and weather-vane. From the engraved print which has come down to us, it seems a barren barrack of a building with an entrance quite inadequate for the men of distinction who thronged its halls on this memorable occasion.

In this congress at Albany, Benjamin Franklin from Pennsylvania and William Johnson of New York were the dominating figures. The famous plan of union which Franklin presented has sometimes made historians forget the services rendered by this redoubtable Colonel Johnson at a moment when the friendship of the Six Nations was hanging in the balance. Though gifts had been prepared and a general invitation had been sent, only a hundred and fifty warriors appeared at Albany and they held themselves aloof with a distrust that was almost contempt. "Look at the French!" exclaimed Hendrick, the great chief of the Mohawks. "They are men. They are fortifying everywhere; but, we are ashamed to say it, you are all like women – bare and open without any fortifications." In this crisis all the commissioners deferred to William Johnson as the one man who enjoyed the complete confidence of the Six Nations. It was he who formulated the Indian policy of the congress.

He had been born in Ireland. His mother was Anne Warren, sister to Captain Peter Warren, who "served with reputation" in the Royal Navy and afterward became Knight of the Bath and Vice-Admiral of the Red Squadron of the British Fleet. Captain Warren was less than a dozen years older than his nephew, whom he regarded with affectionate interest. He described him as "a spritely boy well grown of good parts and keen wit but most onruly and streperous," and the sailor added: "I see the making of a strong man. I shall keep my weather eye on the lad."

The result of this observation was so favorable that the captain, who was on station in America, sent for William Johnson to come out and aid him in the development of a real estate venture. A large tract of land near the Mohawk River had come into Warren's possession, and as a sailor Warren naturally found difficulty in superintending land at what was then a week's journey from the seacoast. "Billy" was his choice as an assistant, and the boy, who was then twenty-three years old, left the Old World and in 1738 reached the new plantation where his life-work lay before him. For this he was admirably equipped by his Irish inheritance of courage, tact, and humor, by his study of English law, and by a facility in acquiring languages which enabled him to master the Mohawk tongue in two years after his arrival in New York.

The business arrangement between Captain Warren and his nephew provided that Johnson should form a settlement on his uncle's land known as Warrensbush, at the juncture of Schoharie Kill and the Mohawk, that he should sell farms, oversee settlers, clear and hedge fields, "girdle" trees (in order to kill them and let in the sun), purchase supplies, and in partnership with Warren establish a village store to meet the necessities of the new colonists and to serve as a trading-station with the Indians. In compensation for his services he was to be allowed to cultivate a part of the land for himself, though it is hard to imagine what time or strength could have been left for further exertions after the fulfillment of the onerous duties marked out for him.

A few years after his arrival at Warrensbush he married a young Dutch or German woman named Catherine Weisenberg, perhaps an indentured servant whose passage had been prepaid on condition of service in America. Little is known of the date or circumstances of this marriage. It is certain only that after a few years Catherine died, leaving three children, to whom Johnson proved a kind and considerate father, in spite of an erratic domestic career which involved his taking as the next head of his household Caroline, niece of the Mohawk chief Hendrick, and later Molly Brant, sister of the Indian, Joseph Brant.

Molly Brant, by whom Johnson had eight children, was recognized as his wife by the Indians, while among Johnson's English friends she was known euphemistically as "the brown Lady Johnson." She presided over his anomalous household with dignity and discretion; but it is noticeable that Johnson, who was so willing to defy public opinion in certain matters, was sufficiently conventional in others, as we learn from a description of the daily life of the legitimate daughters of the house. While Mohawk chiefs, Oneida braves, Englishmen of title, and distinguished guests of every kind thronged the mansion, and while the little half-breed children played about the lawns and disported themselves on the shores of Kayaderosseras Creek close at hand, "the young ladies" lived in almost conventual seclusion.

The grim baronial mansion where this mixed household made its dwelling for many years, was called variously Mount Johnson, Castle Johnson, and Fort Johnson. It was built in 1742 with such massive walls that the house is still standing in the town of Amsterdam. In 1755, when the Indian peril loomed large on the horizon, the original defenses were strengthened, a stockade was built as a further protection, and from this time on it was called Fort Johnson.

Owing perhaps to Johnson's precautions and the Indian's knowledge of his character, the fort was not attacked and its owner continued to dwell in the house until 1762, when, having become one of the richest men in the colony, he built on a tract of land in Johnstown a more ambitious, and, it is to be hoped, a more cheerful mansion known as Johnson Hall. This house was built of wood with wings of stone, pierced at the top for muskets. On one side of the house lay a garden and nursery described as the pride of the surrounding country. Here Johnson lived with an opulence which must have amazed the simple settlers around him, especially those who remembered his coming to the colony as a poor youth less than thirty years earlier. He had in his service a secretary, a physician, a musician who played the violin for the entertainment of guests, a gardener, a butler, a waiter named Pontiach, of mixed negro and Indian blood, a pair of white dwarfs to attend upon himself and his friends, an overseer, and ten or fifteen slaves.

This retinue of servants was none too large to cope with the unbounded hospitality which Johnson dispensed. A visitor reports having seen at the Hall from sixty to eighty Indians at one time lodging under tents on the lawn and taking their meals from tables made of pine boards spread under the trees. On another occasion, when Sir William called a council of the Iroquois at Fort Johnson, a thousand natives gathered, and Johnson's neighbors within a circuit of twenty miles were invited to assist in the rationing of this horde of visitors. The landholders along the Mohawk might well have been glad to share the burden of Sir William's tribal hospitality, since its purpose was as much political as social and its results were of endless benefit to the entire colony.

At last the Indians had found a friend, a white man who understood them and whom they could understand. He was honest with them and therefore they trusted him. He was sympathetic and therefore they were ready to discuss their troubles freely with him. As an Indian of mixed blood declared to the Governor at Albany in speaking of Sir William: "His knowledge of our affairs, our laws, and our language made us think he was not like any other white but an Indian like ourselves. Not only that; but in his house is an Indian woman, and his little children are half-breed as I am."

The English therefore were peculiarly fortunate in finding at the most critical stage of their political dealings with the Indians a representative endowed with the wisdom and insight of Sir William Johnson. Unlike the French, he did not strive to force an alien form of worship upon this primitive people. Unlike the Dutch, he insisted that business should be carried on as honestly with the natives as with the white men. Unlike his fellow-countrymen, he constantly urged adequate preparation for war on the part of the English and demanded that they should bear their share of the burden. In a written report at the Albany congress he strongly recommended that inasmuch as the Six Nations, owing to their wars with the French, had fallen short both in hunting and planting, they should be provided with food from the English supplies. Finally he testified to the sincerity of his convictions by going to the war himself and rendering valuable service first as colonel and later as major-general. After the Battle of Lake George, Johnson was knighted by the King and received a grant of £5000 from Parliament. In the same year he was appointed by the Crown "Agent and Sole Superintendent of the Six Nations and other northern Indians" inhabiting British territory north of the Carolinas and the Ohio River.

Johnson is described by one who saw him about this time or somewhat earlier as a man of commanding presence, only a little short of six feet in height, "neck massive, broad chest and large limbs, great physical strength, the head large and shapely, countenance open and beaming with good nature, eyes grayish black, hair brown with tinge of auburn." His activity took every form and was exerted in every direction. His documents and correspondence number over six thousand and fill twenty-six volumes preserved in the State Library. Nor did these represent his chief activities. He was constantly holding councils with the native tribes either at Fort Johnson or at the Indian camps. It was he who kept the Mohawks from joining in Pontiac's conspiracy which swept the western border; it was he who negotiated the famous treaty at Fort Stanwix in 1768. In the midsummer of 1774 he succumbed to an old malady after an impassioned address to six hundred Iroquois gathered at Johnson Hall.

He was one of the fortunate few whose characters and careers fit exactly. He found scope for every power that he possessed and he won great rewards. His tireless energy expressed itself in cultivating thousands of acres and in building houses, forts, and churches. He dipped a lavish hand into his abundant wealth and scattered his gold where it was of the greatest service. He loved hospitality and gathered hundreds round his board. He was a benevolent autocrat and nations bowed to his will. He paid homage to his King, and died cherishing the illusion of the value of prerogative. He was fortunate in his death as in his life, for he was spared the throes of the mighty changes already under way, when the King's statue should be pulled down to be melted into bullets, when New York should merge her identity in the Union of States, and when the dwellers along the banks of the Hudson and its tributaries should call themselves no longer Dutch or English but Americans.

BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE

The student who has the courage to delve in the Documents relative to the Colonial History of the State of New York, the Documentary History of the State of New York, the ecclesiastical records, the pioneer journals, and the minutes of early city councils, will not only reach the fundamental authorities on the history of the settlers on the Hudson, but will find many interesting incidents of which the dull titles give no promise.

If the reader prefer to follow a blazed trail, he will find a path marked out for him in reliable works such as The History of New Netherland by E. B. O'Callaghan, 2 vols. (1855), The History of the State of New York by J. R. Brodhead, 2 vols. (1871), The Narratives of New Netherland, admirably edited by J. F. Jameson (1909), New York, a condensed history by E. H. Roberts (1904), John Fiske's Dutch and Quaker Colonies in America, 2 vols. (1899), and William Smith's History of the Late Province of New York (first published in 1757 and still valuable).

Many histories of New York City have been written to satisfy the general reader. Among the larger works are Mrs. M. J. Lamb's History of the City of New York, 2 vols. (1877; revised edition, 1915, in 3 vols.), Mrs. Schuyler Van Rensselaer's History of the City of New York in the Seventeenth Century, 2 vols. (1909), James G. Wilson's Memorial History of the City of New York, 4 vols. (1892), and Historic New York, 2 vols. (edited by M. W. Goodwin, A. C. Royce, and Ruth Putnam, 1912). Theodore Roosevelt has written a single volume on New York for the Historic Towns series (1910). In his New Amsterdam and its People (1902), J. H. Innes has brought together valuable studies of the social and topographical features of the town under Dutch and early English rule. I. N. P. Stokes's Iconography of Manhattan Island (1915) is calculated to delight the soul of the antiquarian.

One who wishes to turn to the lighter side of provincial life will find it set forth in attractive volumes such as Colonial Days in Old New York by A. M. Earle (1915), The Story of New Netherland by W. E. Griffis (1909), In Old New York by T. A. Janvier (1894), and the Goede Vrouw of Mana-ha-ta by M. K. Van Rensselaer (1898).

Most rewarding perhaps of all sources are those dealing with the biographies of the prominent figures in the history of the State, since in them we find the life of the times illustrated and personalized. E. M. Bacon in his Henry Hudson (1907) gives us a picture of the great mariner and the difficulties against which he strove. The Van Rensselaer-Bowier Manuscripts, edited by A. J. F. Van Laer (1908) show us through his personal letters the Patroon of the upper Hudson and make us familiar with life on his estates. J. K. Paulding in Affairs and Men of New Amsterdam in the Time of Governor Peter Stuyvesant (1843) makes the town-dwellers equally real to us, while W. L. Stone's Life and Times of Sir William Johnson, 2 vols. (1865), shows us the pioneer struggles in the Mohawk Valley. In the English State Trials compiled by T. B. Howells, 34 vols. (1828), we read the story of the famous pirate Captain Kidd, and find it more interesting than many a work of fiction.

Among the autobiographical accounts of colonial life the most entertaining are The Memoirs of an American Lady by A. M. Grant (1809), A Two Years' Journal in New York, etc. by Charles Wolley (1902), and The Private Journal of Sarah Kemble Knight, the record of a journey from Boston to New York in 1704 (1901).

Further bibliographical references will be found appended to the articles on Hudson River, New York, and New York (City), in The Encyclopædia Britannica, 11th edition.

notes

1

For further details of the appearance of the Half Moon, see E. H. Hall's paper on Henry Hudson and the Discovery of the Hudson River, published by the American Scenic and Historic Preservation Society (1910).

2

See the monograph by Augustus H. Van Buren in the Proceedings of the New York Historical Society, vol. xi, p. 133.

3

Van Twiller's advocate, W. E. Griffis, quotes the Nijkerk records in proof that Van Twiller was born on May 22, 1606, which would fix his age at twenty-seven when he was sent out to the colony. The editor of the Van Rensselaer-Bowier manuscript states that Kiliaen Van Rensselaer was born in 1580, that his sister, Maria, married Richard, or Ryckaert, Van Twiller and that the Wouter of our chronicles was their son and therefore Van Rensselaer's nephew. We are the more inclined to accept the year 1606 as the true date of Van Twiller's birth because the year 1580, previously accepted by historians, would have been the same as that of the birth of Kiliaen Van Rensselaer himself, and because, according to the author of the Story of New Netherland, Maria Van Rensselaer was betrothed in 1605. Otherwise we should find it almost beyond credence that a youth of twenty-seven should have been so suddenly promoted from the counting-house at Amsterdam to the responsible post of Director of New Netherland.

4

Brodhead, History of the State of New York, vol. 1, p. 337 (note).

5

In 1657 the burgomasters and schepens were authorized to create a great burger-recht the members of which should be in a sense a privileged class. It was set forth that "whereas in all beginnings some thing or person must be the first so that afterward a distinction may take place, in like manner it must be in establishing the great and small citizenship." For which reason the line of great burghers was drawn as follows: first, those who had been members of the supreme government; second, the burgomasters and schepens of the city past and present; third, ministers of the gospel; fourth, officers of the militia from the staff to the ensign included. The privileges of this caste were open to the male descendants of each class; but as they could be secured by others outside the sacred circle on payment of fifty guilders it is difficult to understand wherein the exclusiveness lay. The small burghers were decreed to be those who had lived in the city for a year and six weeks and had kept fire and light, those born within the town, and those who had married the daughters of citizens. A payment of twenty guilders was exacted of all such. This effort to promote class distinctions was soon abandoned. In 1668 the distinction was abolished and every burgher, on payment of fifty guilders, was declared entitled to all burgher privileges.

6

Bellomont was commissioned Governor of Massachusetts and New Hampshire, as well as of New York.