New York

Front matter

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I w

The original of this book is in the Cornell University Library.

Preface

is, the history of modern and contemporary New York ; for this is the most important and instructive portion of our history, with the possible exception of the Federalist period. But of course such a study would be entirely out of place in a book of this kind.

It has been my aim less to coUect new facts than to draw from the immense storehouse of facts already collected those which were of real importance in IsTew York history, and to show their true meaning, and their relations to one another ; to sketch the workings of the town's life, social, commercial, and political, at successive periods, with their sharp transformations and contrasts ; and to trace the causes which gradually changed a little Dutch trading-hamlet into a huge American city. I have also striven to make clear the logical sequence and continuity of these events ; to outline the steps by which the city gradually obtained a free political life ; and to give proper prominence to the remarkable and ever-recurring revolutions in the ethnic make-up of our mixed population, — a population which from the beginning has been composed of many different race-elements, and which has owed its marvellous growth more to immigration than to natural increase.

I had to content myself with barely touching on the social and political problems of the present day ; for to deal with these at any length would turn the volume into a tract instead of a history. I have no wish to hide or excuse our faults; for I hold that he is often.

Preface. ix

the best American who strives hardest to correct American shortcomings, and is most willing to profit by the wisdom and experience of other nations, especially of those that are nearest akin to us by blood, belief, speech, and law, and that are knit closest to us by the kindly ties of a former common history and common tradition.

Nevertheless, I am just as little disposed to give way to undue pessimism as to undue and arrogant optimism. Both our virtues and defects should be taken into account. For instance, there are great European cities with much cleaner municipal governments than ours; but on the other hand, the condition of the masses of the population in these same cities is much worse than it is in New York. Our marked superiority in one respect is no excuse or palliation for our lamentable falling off in another ; but it must at least be accepted as an offset. We have been favoured with some peculiar advantages, and we have been forced to struggle against other peculiar disadvantages; and both must be given due weight.

In speaking to my own countrymen there is one point upon which I wish to lay especial stress ; that is, the necessity for a feeling of broad, radical, and intense Americanism, if good work is to be done in any direction. Above all, the one essential for success in every political movement which is to do lasting good, is that our citizens should act as Americans ; not as Americans with a prefix and qualification, — not as Irish Americans,

X Preface.

German Americans, Native Americans, — but as Americans pure and simple. It is an outrage for a man to drag foreign politics into our contests, and vote as an Irishman or German or other foreigner, as the case may be ; and there is no worse citizen than the professional Irish dynamiter or German anarchist, because of his attitude toward our social and political life, not to mention his efiforts to embroil us with foreign powers. But it is no less an outrage to discriminate against one who has become an American in good faith, merely because of his creed or birthplace. Every man who has gone into practical politics knows well enough that if he joins good men and fights those who are evil, he can pay no heed to lines of division drawn according to race and religion. It would be well for New York if a larger proportion of her native-born children came up to the standard set by not a few of those of foreign birth. The two men who did most to give Brooklyn good municipal government were two mayors, one of German birth, the other of pure native American stock. My own warmest and most disinterested political friends and supporters in the city, and most trusty allies in the State Legislature, included men of Irish and German no less than of native American descent, — but all of them genuine Americans, the former just as much so as the latter. No city could wish representatives more loyal and disinterested in their devotion to the welfare of the commonwealth, — a devotion for which they were often

Preface. xi

ill rewarded. Of the last four mayors of New York, two

have been of native and two of Irish stock ; and no

political line can be drawn among them which will not

throw one Irishman and one American on one side, and

one Irishman and one American on the other. In short,

the most important lesson taught by the history of New

York City is the lesson of Americanism, — the lesson

that he among us who wishes to win honour in our life,

and to play his part honestly and manfully, must be

indeed an American in spirit and purpose, in heart and

thought and deed.

THEODOKE ROOSEVELT.

Sagamobe Hill,

Novemter, 1890.

Chapter I. Discovert And Fikst Settlement. 1609-1626

PAoa

Hendrik Hudson's Discoveries — Spirit of Exploration — Conquests of Spain and Portugal — Sea-Eovers of Holland and England — Settlements on the Atlantic Coast — Effect of Battle of Lutzen on America

— Hudson's Relations with the Indians — Exploration of the Hudson River — Adrian Block, the First Shipbuilder of America — The Fur Trade — The New Netberland Company — The West India Company — Foundation of the City — Arrival of Peter Minuit • • . 1

Chapter II

THE DnTCH TOWN DNDEB THE FIBST THREE SIBECTOSB. 1626-1647.

Purchase of Manhattan Island — New Amsterdam Founded — Physical Features of the Island — Minuit's Administration — Old- World Ideas of Colonization — The Fur Trade — Fatroons — Vassalage of Early Settlers — Early Farming — Shipbuilding — Wouter Van Twiller's Administration — The First Schoolmaster — Relations with Indians — Troubles between Dutch and English — Colonies on the Connecticut and the Delaware — Kieft's Administration — Improvements under Kief t — Immigration — Swedish Settlements on the Delaware — Indian Wars and Massacres — Foundation of Popular Government — Removal of Kieft 12

CHAPTER m.

STUTVESANT AND THE END OT DUTCH RULE. 1647-1664.

Stuy vesant's Character — Improvement of the Colony — Ethnic Features of Early Population — Incorporation of the Citj' — The Stockade on the Site of Wall Street — The Canal — Ravages by Wolves

— Early Colonial Architecture and Costumes — New Year Celebrations — Troubles with Indians — Revolt on Long Island — Religious Peisecatiou — Seizure of New Netherlands by the EugUsli • . 2S

3dv Contents.

Chapter IV

NEW AMSTERDAM BECOMES NEW TORK. THE BEGINNING OF ENG- LISH RULE. 1664-1674.

FAQK

The City Eechristened — English Rule all along the Coast — Dangers Surrounding the Settlements — Eule of Governor NicoUs — Religious Liberty — Naturalization — Race Prejudice — Aristocracy — Refusal of Right to Elect Representatiyes — The Peace of Breda — Administration of Governor Lovelace — The First Social Club — Troubles with Long Island Puritans — Prosperity — Whaling and Fisheries — Early Conception of tlie New York Exchange — English and Dutch War — Establishment of iVlails — Recapture of New York by the Dutch — Administration of Governor Colve — Cession of the City to the English — Appointment of Governor Andres 38

Chapter V. New Tork Under The Stuarts. 1674-1688

Administration of Governor Andros — Flour Monopoly — Abolition of Indian Slavery — Contemplated Invasion of New England — Recall of Andros — Administration of Lieutenant-Governor Brockholls — Internal Disturbances — Demand for a Provincial Assembly — Administration of Governor Dongan — Religious Toleration — Establishment of the Provincial Assembly — Charter of Liberties and Privileges — Self-Government Secured — Naturalization — Increased Prosperity — The Board of Aldermen — Sabbatarian Laws — Tyranny of James II.

— Downfall of Dongan — Reappointment of Andros — Accession of William III. — Fall of Andros — Union between English and Dutch Elements — Race Differences and Fusion 49

Chapter VI. The Usurpation Op Leisler. 1689-1691

Internal Dissensions — Rise of the Popular Party — Leadership of Leisler and Milborne — Religious Troubles — Seizure of the Fort by Leisler — The Popular Party in Control of the City — Machinations of the House of Stuart — Headstrong Policy of Leisler— Animosity between Leisler and the Aristocracy— Leisler's Treason — Committee of Safety — Election of the First Mayor — Congress of the Colonies— Expedition against Canada — Privateering —Waning Power of Leisler — Appointment of Governor Sloughter— Skirmish between Regulars and Militia — Execution of Leisler and Milborne

— Downfall of the Popular Party — Limited Religious Liberty . . 60

Contents. xv

CHAPTER Vn

THE GROWTH OF THE COLONIAL SEAPOBT, 1691-1720.

Wars with France — Self-Government — Shipping Industries — Privateers and Pirates — Slave Trade — Foundations of Large Fortunes — Freebooters — Governor Fletcher's Connivance at Piracy — Administration of Fletcher — Smuggling — Recall of Fletcher — Administration of Governor Bellomont — Active Measures against Pirates — Career of Oapt. Kidd — Reform of Land System — Election Frauds

— Administration of Lord Cornbury — Demands for Self-Government

— Administration of Governor Hunter — German Immigration . . 73

CHAPTER VIIL

THE CLOSE OP THE COLONIAL PEHIOD. 1720-1764,

Characteristics of Population — Religious Bodies — English the Official Language — King's College — Social Lines — Social Customs — Sports — Armorial Bearings — Dutch Festivals — Education — Constituents of New York Society — Labour — Negro Slavery — Negro Insurrection — Incendiary Fires — The ' ' New York Gazette " — 'The " Weekly Journal " — Liberty of the Press — Family Factious . . 89

CHAPTER IX.

THE UNREST BEFORE THE REVOLUTION. 1764-1774.

A New Chapter in American History — Threatened Disruption of Colonial System — European Theory of Colonization — Attitude of Colonies toward Mother Country in Matters of Defence — Verdict of History on Revolt of the Colonies — British Operations — Position of the Colonies Contrasted with that of the Federal Union of States — Classes and Parties — New York Leaders of the Revolution — The Stamp Act — Sons of Liberty — Stamp-Act Riots — Repeal of the Stamp Act— The Billeting Act— The Liberty-Pole Riots — The Tea Act and its Results — The First Continental Congress 101

CHAPTER X.

THE BETOLUTIONABT TTAB. 1775-1783.

The Second Continental Congress — Lukewarmness about Revolution — The Loyalists ~ Mob Violence — Closing of Episcopal Churches — The Straggle for Independence — Abolition of the Colonial Assembly — Washington Assumes Command in New York — Weakness of the City — British Operations against New York — The Hessians — xvi Contents.

Tory Plots — American Defeat on Long Island — Washington's Evacuation of the Citj- — Defeat at Kip's Bay — Action at Haarlem Heights— Battle of White Plains — Washington's Eetreat to New- Jersey — Victory at Trenton — Terrors of the British Occupation — Great Fires — Execution of Nathan Hale — Horrors of the Prisons — Washington's Difficulties — British Evacuation 123

CHAPTER XI.

THE FEDERALIST CITT. 1783-1800.

Depression after the Revolution — Improvements and Bebuilding — Columbia College — The New York Society Library — The State Constitution — Religious Toleration — The New York Medical Society — The " Doctor's Mob " Riots — Enlargement of Commerce — Suffrage, and Appointment to Office — Municipal Government — State Patronage — Foundation of the Federal Government — Leaders of the Federalist Party — Governor Clinton — " The Federalist "

— Procession in Honour of the Federal Constitution — New York the Federal Capital — The JeSersonian Republicans — Federal Patronage — Aaron Burr — Scurrility of the Press — Political Riots — Election of Burr to the Vice-Presidency — Downfall of the Federalist Party 142

CHAPTER Xn.

THE BEGINNING OP DEMOOKATIC BULE. 1801-1821.

Tie Vote between Jefferson and Burr — Rise of Democratic Supremacy

— The Spoils S3'stem — Family Influence in Politics — Downfall of Burr — Hamilton Killed by Burr — Fall of the Livingstons from Power — Political Bitterness — State Banks — Social Life and Customs — Municipal Regulations — Markets — Sanitary Deficiencies — Charities — Foundation of Free-School System — Scientific and Lit^ erary Societies — Literature — Beginning of Steam Navigation — The War of 1812 — Eight of Search — Privateering— European Immigration — Assimilation of the Dutch — Negro Emancipation — The " New England Invasion " 159

CHAPTER Xin.

THE GKOWTH OP THE COMMERCIAL AND DEMOCEATIO CITT.

1821-1860.

Increased Population — Constitutional Amendments — Extension of Suffrage — Negro Suffrage — Constitutional Provisions for Election

Contents. xvii

rAOB

of Officers — Material Prosperity — The Erie Canal — Steam Transportation and Electricity — Commercial Enterprise — Careers of John Jacob Astor and Cornelius Vanderbilt — The Fur Trade — The Clipper Ships of New York — Decay of Shipping — Dangers of Poverty — Increase of Immigration — The German Population — The Irish Population — Americanization of Immigrants — Growth of the Roman Catholic Church — The Cholera Epidemic — Riots — Political Parties — Roman Catholic Opposition to the Public-School System — Power of Tammany Hall — Election Frauds — Municipal Bribery — State Interference in Municipal Matters — Police Riots — Architecture — Art and Literature — European Travel and its Influence — Social Features 1T5

CHAPTER XIV.

RECENT HISTOET. 1860-1890.

Increase of Population and Municipal Territory — Outbreak of the Civil War — Secession Influences — Reawakened Loyalty — Active Support of the Federal Government — Draft Riots — Hibernian Riots — Political Corruption — Stock-Swindling — The Tweed King — Dangers of the Political System, and their Remedies — Change of Character of Immigration — Relative Strength of the Churches — Improvement in Architecture — The East River Bridge — Central Park — Clubs — Public Buildings — Charities — Cooper Union — Celebration of the Federal Constitution's Centennial — Science, Art, and Literature — Social Life — Future Prospects 201

INDEX 217

NEW YOEK

CHAPTEE I.

DISCOVERT AND FIRST SETTLEMENT. 1609-1626.

Early in September, 1609, the ship "Half-Moon," restlessly skirting the American coast, in the vain quest for a strait or other water route leading to India, came to the mouth of a great lonely river, flowing silently out from the heart of the unknown continent. The " Half-Moon " was a small, clumsy, high-pooped yacht, manned by a score of Dutch and English sea-dogs, and commanded by an English adventurer then in Dutch pay, and known to his employers as Hendrik Hudson. He, his craft, and his crew were all typical of the age, — an age fertile in adventure-loving explorers, eager to sail under any flag that promised glory and profit, at no matter what cost of hardship and danger; an age fertile also beyond measure in hardy seamen, of whom the hardiest and bravest came from England and the Netherlands. It was a period when the greatest deeds were done on the ocean by these rough heroes of cutlass and compass. They won honour by exploring unknown

^2 New Yorjc.

seas and taking possession of and subjugating unknown lands, no less than by their prowess in the grim waterfio-hts which have made their names immortal. Their small ships dared the dangers of the most distant oceans, and shattered the sea-might of every rival naval power ; and they themselves led lives of stormy peril and strong pleasure, and looked forward unmoved to inevitable death in some one of their countless contests with man or with the elements.

For a century and a quarter Spain and Portugal had not only taken the lead in, but had almost monopolized all ocean exploration and trans-oceanic settlement and conquest, while the most daring navigators were to be found in their ranks, or among the Italians who served both them and their rivals. Even at the beginning of the seventeenth century they were stiU the only peoples who had permanently occupied any portion of the New World ; and their vast possessions included all of tropical, sub-tropical, and south-temperate America. But by this time, in a hundred fights the sea-beggars and sea-rovers of Holland and England had destroyed the cumbrous navies of the Spanish king, and won from those who fought for his flag the mastery of the ocean. Spain was stiU a great power; but it was a power whose might was waning. From the time when the races of middle and northern Europe first planted their standards in the New World they have stood toward the Spaniards and Spanish Americans as aggressors. Their blows had to be parried and returned ; sometimes they have been returned with good effect, but as a whole the Spanish people have always been on the defensive, fearing, not threatening, conquest.

First Settlement, leod-mse. 3

Yet, though the career of Spain as a conquering power was thus cut short, two pregnant centuries passed by before her children lost any considerable portion of the land which she held when the ships of the English colonists first sighted the shores of America. During the early part of the seventeenth century the Atlantic coast from Acadia to Florida became dotted with the settlements of half a dozen different European nations. At irregular intervals along this extended seaboard the French, the English, the Dutch, the Swedes, as well as the Spaniards, built little forts and established small trading-towns. When the English had fairly begun to take root in New England and Virginia, the Dutch still held the Hudson, and the Swedes the mouth of the Delaware ; Acadia was still French, and Florida Spanish. It was altogether uncertain which one of these races would prove victor over the others, or whether any one would. There was at least a good chance that even the Spaniards would hold their own, and that temperate North America, like temperate Europe, would be held by many nations, differing one from the other in speech, in religion, and in blood. We have grown so accustomed to regarding America north of the Eio Grande as the natural heritage of the English-speaking peoples that we find it hard to realize how uncertain seemed the prospect at the period when colonization began. None could foretell which power would win in the struggle; and the fate of America was bound up in wars in which her future was hardly, if at all, considered. If Gustavus Adolphus had not fallen on the field of Liitzen, and had he foimded, as he hoped, a great Scandinavian kingdom encircling the Baltic, and with fleets as powerful as her armies, it may well be that the fame and terror of the Swedish name would have insured peace and prosperity to the transatlantic Swedish colonists. Had the Dutch fleets been but a trifle stronger, and had the Dutch diplomats prized Manhattan as they prized Java, the New Netherlands might never have become New York. It seemed, and was, perfectly possible in the seventeenth century, that the nineteenth would see flourishing Dutch and Swedish states firmly seated along the Hudson and the Delaware, exactly as a thriving French commonwealth actually is seated along the lower St. Lawrence.

Thus it came about that the English colonists and their American descendants not only had to tame a wild and stubborn continent, and ever to drive back from before their advance the doomed tribesmen of the forest and prairie, but also had to wrest many of the fairest portions of the domain which the English-speaking Americans inherit, from the hands of other intruders of European blood. Many of the cities of the Union bear testimony by their early history to this fact. Albany, Detroit, and Santa F^ are but three out of many towns wherein the English reaped what the Dutch, the French, or the Spaniards had sown.

The history of New York deserves to be studied for more than one reason. It is the history of the largest English-speaking city which the English conquered but did not found, and in which though the English law and governmental system have ever been supreme, yet the bulk of the population, composed as it is and ever has been of many shifting strains, has never been

English. Again, for the past hundred years, it is the history of a wonderfully prosperous trading-city, the largest in the world in which the democratic plan has ever heen faithfully tried for so long a time ; and the trial, made under some exceptional advantages and some equally exceptional disadvantages, is of immense interest, alike for the measure in which it has succeeded and for the measure in which it has failed.

Hudson, on coming to the river to which his name was afterward given, did not at first know that it was a river at all ; he believed and hoped that it was some great arm of the sea, that in fact it was the Northwest Passage to India, which he and so many other brave men died in vainly trying to discover. For a week he lay in the lower bay, and then for a day shifted his anchorage into what is now New York Harbour; his boats explored the surrounding shore-line, and found many Indian villages, for the neighbourhood seemed well peopled. The savages flocked to see the white strangers, and eagerly traded off their tobacco for the knives and beads of the Europeans. Of course occasions of quarrel were certain to arise between the rough, brutal sailors and the fickle, suspicious, treacherous red men; and once a boat's crew was attacked by two canoes, laden with warriors, and a sailor was killed by an arrow which pierced his throat. Yet on the whole their relations were friendly, and the trading and bartering went on unchecked.

Hudson soon found that he was off the mouth of a river, not a strait ; and he spent three weeks in exploring it, sailing up till the shoaling water warned him that he was at the head of navigation, near the present site of Albany. He found many small Indian tribes scattered along the banks, and usually kept on good terms with them, presenting their chiefs with trinkets of various kinds, and treating them for the first time to a taste of " fire-water," the terrible curse of their race ever since. In return he was well received when he visited the bark wigwams, his hosts holding feasts for him, where the dishes included not only wild fowl, but also fat dogs, killed by the squaws, and skinned with mussel shells. The Indians, who had made some progress in the ruder arts of agriculture, brought to the ship quantities of corn, beans, and pumpkins from the great heaps drying beside their villages ; and their fields, yielding so freely to even their poor tillage, bore witness to the fertility of the soil Hudson had to be constantly on his guard against his newfound friends , and once he was attacked by a party of hostile warriors whom he beat off, killing several of their number. However, what far out-weighed such danger in the gain-greedy eyes of the trade-loving adventurers, was the fact that they saw in the possession of the Indians great stores of rich furs ; for the merchants of Europe prized furs as they did silks, spices, ivory, and precious metals.

Having reached the head of navigation the " Half- Moon " turned her bluff bows southward, and drifted down stream with the rapid current until she once more reached the bay. The brilliant fall weather had been varied at times with misty days and nights ; and during the " Half-Moon's " inland voyage her course had lain through scenery singularly wild, grand, and lonely.

First Settlement, leos-iese. 7

She had passed the long line of frowning, battlemented rock-waUs that we know by the name of the Palisades ; she had threaded her way round the bends where the curving river sweeps in and out among bold peaks, — Storm King, Crow's Nest, and their brethren ; she had sailed in front of the Catskill Mountains, perhaps even thus early in the season crowned with shining snow. From her decks the lookouts scanned with their watchful eyes dim shadowy wastes, stretching for countless leagues on every hand ; for all the land was shrouded in one vast forest, where red hunters who had never seen a white face followed wild beasts, upon whose kind no white man had ever gazed.

Early in October, Hudson set out on his homeward voyage to Holland, where the news of his discovery excited much interest among the daring merchants, especially among those whose minds were bent on the fur-trade. Several of the latter sent small ships across to the newly found bay and river, both to barter with the savages and to explore and report further upon the country.

The most noted of these sea-captains who followed Hudson, was Adrian Block, who while at anchor off Manhattan Island lost his vessel by fire. He at once set about building another, and being a man of great resource and resolution, succeeded. Creating everything for himself, and working in the heart of the primeval forest, he built and launched a forty-fivefoot yacht which he christened the "Onrest" (the "Eestless "), fit name for the bark of one of these daring, everroaming adventurers. This primitive pioneer vessel was the first ever launched in our waters, and her keel

■was the first which ever furrowed the waters of the Sound.

The first trading and exploring ships did well, and the merchants saw that great profits could be made from the Manhattan fur-trade. Accordingly, they determined to establish permanent posts at the head of the river and at its mouth. The main fort was near the mouth of the Mohawk, but they also built a few cabins at the south end of Manhattan Island, and left therein half a dozen of their employees, with Hendrik Christiansen as head man over both posts. The great commercial city of New York thus had its origin, not unfittingly, in a cluster of traders' huts. From this obscure beginning was to spring one of the mightiest cities of any age, marvellous alike for its wonderfully rapid growth and its splendid material prosperity. From the outset the new town, destined to be the largest in the New World, mayhap even the largest in all the world, took its place among those communities which owe their existence and growth primarily to commerce, their whole character and development for good and evil being more profoundly affected by commercial than by any other influences. Even in its very founding, the direction in which the great city on Manhattan Island should develop was foreshadowed, and its course outlined in advance.

Christiansen was soon killed by an Indian. For two or three years his fellow-traders lived on Manhattan Island much in the same way as men now live at the remoter outposts of the fur-trade in the far northwest of this continent. Some kept decent and straight; others grew almost as squalid and savage as the red men in

F/KST Settlement, leos-iese. 9

whose midst they lived. They hunted, fished, and idled ; sometimes they killed their own game, sometimes they got it by barter from the Indians, together with tobacco and corn. Now and then they quarrelled with the surrounding savages, but generally they kept on good terms with them ; and in exchange for rum and trinkets they gathered innumerable bales of valuable furs, — mostly of the beaver, which swarmed in all the streams, but also of otter, and of the many more northern kinds, such as the sable and the fisher. At long intervals these furs were piled in the holds of the three or four small vessels whose yearly or half yearly arrival from Holland formed the chief relief to the monotony of the fur-traders' existence.

The merchants who first sent over vessels and built a trading-post, joined with others to form the "New Netherland Company ; " for it was a time when settlement and conquest were undertaken more often by great trading companies than by either the national government or by individuals. The Netherlands government granted this company the monopoly of the fur-trade with the newly discovered territory for three years from 1615, and renewed the grant for a year at a time until 1621, when it was allowed to lapse, a more powerful competitor being in the field. The company was a mere trading corporation, and made no effort to really settle the land ; but the fur-trade proved profitable, and the post on Manhattan Island was continued, while another was built near the head of the Hudson, close to the present site of Albany.

In 1621, the great West India Company was chartered by the States-general, and given the monopoly lo New York.

of the American trade ; and it was by this company that the city was really founded, the first settlement being made which was intended to be permanent. All the magnificent territory discovered by Hudson was granted it under the name of the New Netherlands. The company was one of the three or four huge commercial corporations of imperial power that played no small part in shaping the world's destiny during the two centuries inamediately preceding the present. It was in its constitution and history archetypical of the time. The great trading-city of America was really founded by no one individual, nor yet by any national government, but by a great trading corporation, created however to fight and to bear rule no less than to carry on commerce. The merchants who formed the West India Company were granted the right to exercise powers such as belong to sovereign States, because the task to which they set themselves was one of such incredible magnitude and danger that it could be done only on such terms. They were soldiers and sailors no less than traders ; it was only merchants of iron will and restless daring who could reap the golden harvests in those perilous sea-fields, where all save the strongest surely perished. The paths of commerce were no less dangerous than those of war.