Peter of New Amsterdam: A Story of Old New York

It may interest you to know that our fort was well armed, having mounted and ready for service, eight bombards, by which I mean heavy cannon with wide, flaring mouths; six culverins, or exceedingly long, slim guns with handles on either side for carrying; and seven serpentines, these last being thin, long guns with grooves on the inside to throw the shot in a whirling manner. As missiles for the serpentines, two balls were chained together, being sent among the enemy in such way that they swung round and round, oftentimes inflicting much damage.

The palisade, which had been built straight across the island while the savages were thirsting for our blood, was to me a wonder in those days when Master Tienhoven gave me an opportunity for strolling about the town.

It was made of cedar logs full twelve-feet high, and less than a quarter-mile back from the fort, stretching across the island for a distance of nearly twenty-five hundred feet. Here and there, say every three hundred feet, was a small fort built of logs, where the soldiers could be protected while beating back an enemy, and at the water's edge on the river to the eastward, was what is called a half-moon battery, set well out into the stream, where were mounted two guns.

The same kind of fortification stood at the other end of the palisade, on the shore of that river discovered by Master Henry Hudson, and near each battery was a gate giving entrance to the town, while an arch with heavy barriers, formed with much ornamentation of carving, stretched across the Broad Way.

Following this palisade was a wide lane, along which were built the huts of the slaves, servants, or people who were poor because of being lazy.

VILLAGE LAWS

It was on this palisade that I read the first of Director Stuyvesant's messages, and during that stroll I saw so many of them that I can even now repeat the words. They ran like this, and, to my mind, it would have been well if Master Kieft had given his attention to the same matter:

"Whereas, we are informed of the great ravages the wolf commits on the small cattle; therefore to animate and encourage the proprietors who will go out and shoot the same, we have resolved to his island, on this side Haarlem, shall be promptly paid therefor by them, for a wolf twenty florins, and for a she-wolf thirty florins in wampum, or the value thereof."

When the farmer's bell tolled from the belfrey of the church within the fort, all the gates in the palisade were closed, and no person might enter or leave the city from that time, which was nine of the clock in the evening, until sunrise of the next morning.

I have heard it said that there were many living beyond the palisade who claimed that this was all too early for them to leave the houses of their friends in the town, when there for a visit of pleasure; but I hold to it that he who would remain out of his bed longer than that is little better than a night-brawler, because of honest people being ready for sleep when the day's work is at an end.

OTHER THINGS ABOUT TOWN

A thing which displeased me, though perhaps I was easily put out by anything Director Stuyvesant did, was that he should have set up the gallows in front of the stone tavern built by Master Kieft, after it had been turned into the town hall.

To me that instrument of justice was a blot on the fair building, even though it be something necessary in all towns; the whipping-post and the stocks seem to be there by right, and do not cast such a horror upon him who passes them, but to have ever in sight that which had been built for the taking away of men's lives is, in a way, brutal.

The hooft, or city dock, was ever a pleasant lounging place to me, particularly when there were many ships in the roadstead. It was pleasing to sit there idle, thinking Master Tienhoven was poring over my accounts when the day was so fair that one enjoyed being in the sunshine, and to watch the ships or the small boats that flitted to and fro. It was enough to make one believe that in the days to come this New Amsterdam of ours might grow to be even as large as Amsterdam in Holland.

Then could I, and all others who had a part in the building of the town, look back with pride upon our life-work, save that in it should be something of shame and crime, as in the case of Master Kieft, who, I may say here, was drowned in a shipwreck on his way back to Holland to answer to the Company for his misdeeds.

But there was at times one matter which gave me pain at the city dock, and that was whenever there arrived a vessel laden with black men, who had been stolen from Africa. With such a scene in view I had no desire to linger.

It so chanced that I went there on a certain day when the _White Horse_, a slave ship that came more than once to our town, was sending ashore a throng of forlorn looking negroes to be exposed for sale, and there was so much of suffering and heart-sickness in the scene that I went back to the storehouse, glad to stay with Master Tienhoven rather than see the misery which I could not cure.

A VISIT OF CEREMONY

Before Master Stuyvesant had ruled over us many months, he went in great state to meet the governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony at some place in the Connecticut Colony, and if all that was said regarding the matter be true, he did what he might to persuade the Englishmen that he was of vast importance in this New World.

He journeyed on the ship _Black Eagle_, taking with him no less than eight servants, four trumpeters, and twelve soldiers, and I wonder much whether those people who had built here in America such towns as Salem, Plymouth, and Boston, were greatly impressed because the chief magistrate of New Amsterdam, where were living no more than fifteen hundred persons, could not go abroad without a following of twenty-four men, to say nothing of the secretaries, the clerks, cooks, and jacks-of-all-trades whom I saw flocking on board the ship.

I was told that Director Stuyvesant went to meet the chief men of the eastern colonies to talk with them about the threatenings of the Indians, and as to what should be done in regard to sending to their owners runaway slaves, and concerning other such like matters; but how the different affairs were settled, I never heard.

At all events, Master Stuyvesant came back in the same high and mighty state as when he left us, after having been absent near to two weeks, and in the meantime had made many enemies in New Amsterdam, for there were not lacking those who claimed he was trying to make friends with the English for some purpose of his own, when all his time should have been spent in behalf of the West India Company.

NEW AMSTERDAM BECOMES A CITY

It was in the year 1652 that the town we had built was made a city, with a charter straight from Holland, and our people rejoiced because of its being possible at last, after so much of misrule, for them to have some voice in affairs.

According to this charter, the freemen of our new city were to select a schout, four burgomasters, nine schepens, which last were what in England would be called magistrates – and a council of thirty-six men whose duty it would be to advise with the Director on all affairs concerning the public welfare.

There was great rejoicing in New Amsterdam when Stoffel Mighielsen, the town crier, made this announcement, and I dare venture to say that on the night the news was made public, but little attention was paid to the farmer's bell by those who lived outside the palisade.

On every hand you could hear men giving joy to each other because of the time's having come when the Director would no longer have absolute power over all in the town, but must be guided by those who were to be elected by the ballots of the people, and following such rejoicings was ever the question as to when the election would be held.

There was much talk as to who should be chosen to fill the offices, and all with whom I spoke declared that they were not to be influenced by anything Master Stuyvesant might say; but would pick out such men as could stand up honestly for the rights of all, instead of bending like slaves to the whims of the Director.

MASTER STUYVESANT MAKES ENEMIES

Because of our people's being so excited over this opportunity to have a part in the affairs of the city, you can well fancy what discontent, which swelled almost to open mutiny, was among us when Master Stuyvesant boldly announced that there would be no election. He had decided, so he said in that high and mighty voice of his, that he would appoint the city officers himself, without vote of the people, and this he did, naming those men whom he knew would sneeze when he caught cold.

Of course there were many vain threats made, and much whispering in dark corners, the purport of which might have been construed into open mutiny, had Director Stuyvesant or any of his following overheard the stealthy conversation. The whipping-post, and even the gallows, stood too conveniently at hand, while Big Pieter, the negro executioner who had charge of the public floggings, was ever ready to adjust a noose, or swing with vicious force the thongs of the whip.

Many a time did I hear threats which would have sent him who made them straight to the gallows, had they been repeated in the government house; but the people were cautious, not minded to risk their necks for the common good, and, so far as I can tell, Director Stuyvesant never knew how near he was to a hornet's nest, when he took it upon himself to throw aside one of the greatest privileges of New Amsterdam's charter.

I doubt if it would have disturbed him much even had he known of the discontent, for he ruled, as the saying is, with a rod of iron, and seemed to think that there was never one, or an hundred, of the common people to whose mutterings he need take heed.

But for that act of his, I question if our men of the city would have stood so calmly by when the English fleet came to capture New Amsterdam, turning out of office every Dutchman. Director Stuyvesant would have found more by his side in that bitter hour, when he was the same as driven from the land, if he had kept the promise made when he first arrived, to govern the people of our town as a father governs his children.

But it is not for me to speak of the English yet, for there is much to tell concerning what was done by the Dutchmen, before Colonel Richard Nicolls anchored off the battery with the guns of his fleet trained upon us.

ORDERS FROM HOLLAND

We had settled down to the belief that while Director Stuyvesant ruled us with an iron hand, neither allowing the people nor the West India Company to interfere with his wishes, he was improving the city, when orders came from Holland which aroused us all to the highest pitch of excitement.

The West India Company had sent positive commands that the Swedes, whom Master Minuit had settled on South River, were to be driven out from their posts, and there was not a Dutchman in New Amsterdam who did not burn with the desire to have a hand in the driving; as if this big country of America were not large enough for all the Swedes and the Dutchmen that might want to live in it.

Now you must know that when Master Minuit was made governor of the Swedish people on South River, there had already been built there a fort by the Dutch, which was called Casimer. This the Swedish people captured and changed its name to that of Trinity. When Master Minuit came, he built a fort on the river above Trinity, and named it Christina, in honor of the Swedish Queen.

They were not bad neighbors, these Swedish people whom the Queen had advised to make a home in the New World. They minded their own business far better than did either the Dutch or the English, and were at peace with the savages, dealing honestly by them and treating them as if they were equals; therefore, why the West India Company should want them driven out of the New World was more than I could then, or can yet, explain to my own satisfaction.

However, the order had come that these people, who had been harming no one, be deprived of the homes which they had built in the wilderness, and there was in my mind the belief that Director Stuyvesant was only too well pleased to receive such commands.

MAKING READY FOR WAR

Straightway there was much marching to and fro by the soldiers; and great scurrying by the seamen, who were at once set about carrying cannon and ammunition aboard the vessels, for Master Stuyvesant had decided he would fit out a fleet of no less than seven ships.

The trumpeters were sent up and down the land to every Dutch farm and settlement calling for those who were willing to aid in driving out the Swedes, to present themselves at the fort that they might be drilled and equipped, and many there were who obeyed the summons.

Those were idle days for me. No one thought of trading, and if peradventure a solitary Indian did venture into the city with a bundle of furs, he saw so much in the way of war-like preparations, that he scurried away, forgetting his desire for beads or cloth, to tell his people that the Dutch of New Netherlands were making ready to drive every other person off from the face of the earth.

Master Tienhoven no longer visited the storehouse, because of being busy with taking down the names of those who would join Director Stuyvesant's army, and I was at liberty to wander at will around the fort, if I but kept a watchful eye over my quarters, in case any came who was brave enough to venture in for trade where was so much of military preparations.

More than once I said to myself that if Master Minuit could have been spared to the Swedes, our people would not have an easy task of driving them away; but I knew, from word brought a long time before, that he was no longer in this world; therefore, perhaps, Director Stuyvesant would be able to work the will of the West India Company.

AN UNEXPECTED QUESTION

That I should be counted as among those to accompany the expedition, never once had lodgment in my mind, until Master Tienhoven came to me the day before the fleet was to sail, asking if all my preparations for the voyage had been made.

I was in a maze of perplexity because of the question. He who has charge of a company's goods is supposed to remain where he can keep them under his hand, more particularly in time of war, and for me to be pinned to Master Stuyvesant's coat sleeves not only seemed useless, but positively foolish.