Huddlestone.

State Convention at Poughkeepsie.

Patriot Pledge.

Federal Constitution.

The Federalist.

Huddlestone, the famous spy, who was captured upon Wild Boar Hill, near Yonkers, in West Chester county, was tried, condemned, and hung at Poughkeepsie in April, 1780. The place of his execution was upon a verge of the plain on which the town stands, known as Forbus's Hill. I have heard the late venerable Abel Gunn, of Poughkeepsie, who was a drum major in the Continental army, speak of Huddlestone and of his execution. He described him as a small man, with a large head and thick neck. He was accompanied to the scaffold by the county officers and a small guard of militia enrolled for the purpose.

The state Convention to consider the Federal Constitution assembled at the Vankleek House, in Poughkeepsie, on the 17th of June, 1788. There were fifty-seven delegates present, and Governor George Clinton was chosen the president of the Convention. In that Assembly were some of the most distinguished men of the Revolution, and the debates were of the most interesting character. In no state in the Union was hostility to the Federal Constitution more extensive and violent than in the state of New York. Forty-six of the fiftyseven delegates, including the governor, were anti-Federalists, or opposed to the Constitution. The principal advocates of the instrument were John Jay, Alexander Hamilton, and Robert Livingston. Mr. Hamilton had been a leading member of the National Convention that framed the Constitution, and also one of the principal writers of the Federalist.' He felt the responsibility of his situation, and the Convention readily acknowledged the value of his judgment. He was perfectly familiar with every topic included in the wide range which the debates embraced, and he was nobly sustained by his colleagues, Jay and Livingston. The hostile feelings of many of the anti-Federalists gradually yielded, and on the 26th of July the final question of ratification was carried in the affirmative by a majority of three votes. A little more than a mile below Poughkeepsie, on the bank of the Hudson, is the residence of the late Colonel Henry A. Livingston, a grandson of Philip Livingston, one of the the city of New York, called to consider the alarming state of public affairs, formed a general Association, or fraternized, to use a popular term, and adopted a pledge. The Association and pledge were approved by the Provincial Assembly, and copies of the latter were sent to every county in the state for signatures. The following was the form of the pledge:

"Persuaded that the salvation of the rights and liberties of America depend, under God, on the firm union of its inhabitants in a rigorous prosecution of the measures necessary for its safety; and convinced of the necessity of preventing anarchy and confusion, which attend the dissolution of the powers of government, we, the freemen, freeholders, inhabitants of being greatly alarmed at the avowed design of the ministry to raise a revenue in America, and shocked by the bloody scene now acting in MASSACHUSETTS BAY, do, in the most solemn manner, resolve never to become slaves; and do associate, under all the ties of religion, honor, and love to our country, to adopt, and endeavor to carry into execution, whatever measures may be recommended by the CONTINENTAL CONGRESS, or resolved upon by our Provincial Convention for the purpose of preserving our CONSTITUTION, and opposing the execution of the several arbitrary Acts of the British Parliament, until a reconciliation between Great Britain and America, on constitutional principles (which we most ardently desire), can be obtained; and that we will in all things follow the advice of our General Committee respecting the purposes aforesaid, the preservation of peace and good order, and the safety of individuals and property."

The list of signers, and the names of those who refused to sign in Poughkeepsie, have been preserved. The number of signers was two hundred and thirteen; the number who refused to sign was eighty-two. A list of the names of the signers, and those who refused to sign, in the various precincts in the county, may be found in Blake's History of Putnam County, p. 102–143 inclusive.

1 When the Constitution, adopted by the National Convention, was submitted to the consideration of the people, extensive and violent opposition was observed, founded principally upon the undue jealousy with which the doctrine of state rights was regarded. The friends of the Constitution saw that general public enlightenment upon the subject was necessary to secure the ratification of the instrument by the requisite number of states to make it the organic law of the republic. To this end Jay, Hamilton, and Madison commenced a series of essays in explanation and vindication of the principles of government. They appeared successively every week in the New York papers, between October, 1787, and the spring of 1788. The whole work, which is called The Federalist, consists of eighty-five numbers. Mr. Jay wrote six numbers,* Mr. Madison twenty-five, and Mr. Hamilton the residue. They had a powerful effect upon the public mind, and contributed largely to the success which finally crowned the efforts of the friends of the Constitution. *Mr. Jay and other gentlemen armed and placed themselves under the command of Colonel Hamilton, to suppress a riot in New York known as The Doctors' Mob. He was nearly killed by a stone thrown by one of the rioters, and was confined to his bed for some time. He had written the fifth number of the Federalist essays when that event occurred. He recovered in time to write the sixty-fourth.

The Livingston Mansion.

Henry A. Livingston, Esq.

Kingston, or Esopus.

Its Dutch Name.

signers of the Declaration of Independence, and son of the late John H. Livingston, D.D., president of the College of New Brunswick. It was built by his paternal grandfather, Henry Livingston, in 1714, and is a fine specimen of a country mansion of that period. The situation is delightful, completely imbosomed in venerable trees, and far removed from the bus

THE LIVINGSTON MANSION.

2

tle of the highway.' The late occupant, in the exercise of his good taste and patriotism, preserved the old mansion from the invasion of modern improvements, and kept up that generous hospitality which marked the character of the " gentleman of the old school." Even the orifice in the side of the house, under the piazza, which was made by a cannon-ball fired from one of the British ships that conveyed the troops up the river, who burned Kingston, seventy-two years ago, is preserved with care, and shown to visitors as a token of the spite of the enemy against active Whigs. The last time I visited the mansion

the late proprietor was living, possessing apparently all the vigor and cheerfulness of a man of fifty, though then past three score and ten years. In the room which contained his valuable library I passed several hours, copying the portraits of John and Mary Livingston, the parents of Robert Livingston, the first emigrant of that name to America; and also an interesting genealogical tree, illustrative of the family growth and connections, which Colonel Livingston kindly placed at my disposal. I have referred to these before, and they will be found in another part of this work.

I left Poughkeepsie at ten in the evening, and reached Kingston village, ninety-three miles north of New York, a little past midnight. The landing is upon a rocky island separated from the main land by a morass, crossed by a causeway. It is nearly three miles from the village, which lies upon an elevated plain several miles in extent, and is surrounded by high hills on all sides except toward the Hudson. On the northwest the Catskill range rises grand and beautiful, and far enough distant to present an azure hue. I think I never saw a more imposing display of distant mountain scenery than is presented at Kingston, toward sunset, when the higher peaks and bold projections cast their long shadows over the agricultural districts below, reflecting, at the same time, from their southwestern declivities, the mellow light of departing day.

Kingston was settled by the Dutch as early as 1663, as appears from an account of troubles between the white settlers and the Indians there, and was called Wiltwyck-literally Wild Witch, or Indian Witch. The Dutch built a redoubt upon the bank of the creek, near the ancient landing-place. The creek was called Redoubt Kill, or Creek, and is now known by the corrupted name of Rondout Creek. The Esopus Indians then occupied the beautiful

3

1 Since my visit the quiet and beauty of the place have been invaded by the Hudson River Rail-road, which passes within a few feet of the mansion, and in whose construction the beautiful cove has been destroyed, and some of the venerable willows, planted by the first owner, have been uprooted. In our country the beautiful has but a feather's weight in the scale against the useful.

2 Colonel Livingston died June 9th, 1849. Although living in the retirement of a gentleman of wealth and leisure, he often consented to serve the public in offices requiring judgment, industry, and integrity. He was a member of the state Senate one term; and it is a remarkable fact that he was never absent a day from his post in the Senate Chamber or in the hall of the Court of Errors. He will long be remembered in Poughkeepsie as one of its best citizens.

3 Benson's Memoirs, in the Collections of the New York Historical Society, vol. i., part ii., p. 119. BB

Early Settlement at Kingston.

Indian Troubles.

The Huguenots.

Formation of the State Constitution.

flats extending from the creek northward nearly to the present town of Saugerties, and, becoming dissatisfied with their white neighbors, resolved to destroy them. For this purpose they fell upon the settlement while the men were abroad in the fields, and killed or carried off sixty-five persons. The survivors retreated to the redoubt, and the Indians began to erect a stockade near it. A message was sent to Nieu Amsterdam (New York), and Governor Stuyvesant immediately forwarded a body of troops, under Martin Crygier, who drove the Indians back to the mountains. During the summer, parties of the Dutch made inroads among the hill fastnesses, destroyed the Indian villages and forts, laid waste and burned their fields and stores of maize, killed many of their warriors, released twenty-two of the Dutch captives, and captured eleven of the enemy. This chastisement caused a truce in December, and a treaty of peace in May following.

1663-4.

The Dutch settlement at Kingston received a valuable accession, toward the close of the century, by the arrival of a company of Huguenots,' who, after the revocation of the Edict of Nantes, fled from persecution to America. They were a fragment of the resolute Christian band of eight hundred thousand who escaped from France into Holland, Germany, Switzerland, and England. They settled in the fertile valleys of Ulster and Orange, but that repose which they coveted was a long time denied them, for the Indians, jealous of the encroachments of the pale faces, harassed them continually. The school of suffering in which they had been tutored before leaving Europe had given them patience and perseverance, and they succeeded in planting the Gospel of Peace in the midst of the heathen, and gave many hardy sons to do battle in the council and the field for American independence.

Kingston and the neighboring region suffered much from the Indians and Tories during the Revolution, for this was emphatically a Whig district; and when Kingston became so presumptuous as to harbor rebel legislators, it was marked for severe chastisement by the enemy. In 1776, after the adoption of the Declaration of Independence, the General Assembly of New York changed its title from the "Provincial Congress of the colony" to the "Convention of the Representatives of the state of New York.' The Assembly was to meet in the city of New York on the 8th of July, the special object of the session being the forming of a state Constitution. But before that day arrived, the fleet of Admiral Howe, with a British army, appeared near Sandy Hook, and the new Congress assembled at White Plains, in West Chester county, twenty-five miles from the city. At the moment of meeting it received intelligence of the adoption of the Declaration of Independence, and its first act was to approve that measure by a unanimous vote. On the 1st of August a committee was appointed to draw up and report a Constitution. John Jay was the chairman of the committee, and the duty of drafting the instrument was assigned to him.

During the autumn the labors of the Convention were greatly disturbed by military events. The enemy had taken possession of New York city and island; had spread over the lower

1 These people occupy a conspicuous place in the history of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, and, as will be observed hereafter, formed an essential element in the machinery of our Revolution, particularly in the Carolinas. On the 26th of August, 1572, the festival of St. Bartholomew, seventy thousand Protestants were butchered in France by royal and papal authority. Terrible persecutions continued until 1598, when Henry IV. issued an edict, called the Edict of Nantes, granting toleration to his Protestant subjects. For nearly a century this edict was in force, but in 1685 Louis XIV. revoked it, and persecutions began anew. This cruel and injudicious policy lost France eight hundred thousand of her best subjects, who were Protestants, fifty thousand of whom made their way to England, where they introduced silk weaving, the manufacture of jewelry, and other elegant employments then monopolized by France. Of those who settled in Ulster county the names of twelve are preserved, whose descendants are numerous, and among the most respectable citizens of that and Orange county. The following are the names: Lewis Dubois, Andre Lefevre, Louis Bevier, Hugues Frere [Frear], Christian Deyo, Jean Hasbrouck, Anthony Crispell, Isaac Dubois, Abraham Hasbrouck, Pierre Deyo, Abraham Dubois, Lyman Lefevre.

2 The following are the names of the gentlemen who composed that committee: John Jay, John Sloss Hobart, William Smith, William Duer, Gouverneur Morris, Robert R. Livingston, John Broome, John Morris Scott, Abraham Yates, Jr., Henry Wisner, Sen., Samuel Townsend, Charles De Witt, and Robert Yates. James Duane was subsequently placed on the committee, and, Mr. Jay being absent when the draft of the Constitution was reported, it was submitted to the Assembly by him.—Journal of the Convention, p. 552 and 833.

Completion and Adoption of the Constitution. Its Character.

Subsequent Constitutions.

Effects of a Mixture of Races.

part of West Chester county, and expelled the American troops, and Washington and his army had fled before them to the Delaware. The Convention migrated from place to place, and held brief sessions at Harlaem, White Plains, and Fishkill in Dutchess county. At the latter place the members armed themselves for defense against the British or Tories who should assail them.' Finally they retreated to Kingston, where they continued in session from February, 1777, until May of that

1777.

It was

was finally adopted on the 20th of April.

It is a document of great merit, and exhibits a clear apprehension of the just functions of government, which distinguished the mind of its author. Its preamble sets forth explicitly the cause which demanded the erection of a new government; and its first article declared that no authority should be exercised in the state but such as should be derived from, and granted by, the people. Great wisdom was manifested in all its provisions for regulating the civil, military, and judicial powers of the state. It was highly approved throughout the country, and English jurists spoke of it in terms of praise. Under it the government of the state was organized by an ordinance of the Convention, passed in May, and, as we have noticed, the first May 8, session of the Legislature was appointed to be held at Kingston in July. This Constitution remained in force, with a few amendments, until 1823, when a new one was formed by a state Convention. This, in time, was submitted to the action of a Convention to revise it, and a third was formed and became law in 1846.

1777.

In the history of these movements toward perfecting the organic law of the state of New York is developed much of the philosophy of that progress which marks so distinctly the career of our republic. From the old Dutch laws, sometimes narrow and despotic, but marked by a sound and expansive policy, to the enlightened features of the Constitution of 1846, we may trace the growth of the benevolent principles of equality, and a correct appreciation in the public mind of human rights. "We may see," says Butler, "in the provisions of our several Constitutions, the effects of the intermixture of the different races: the Dutch; the English, Scotch, and Irish; the French, Swedes, and Germans; the Anglo-American from the eastern colonies, from whom our people have been derived. To this cause, and to the great number and diversity of religious sects and opinions which have flowed from it, may especially be ascribed the absolute freedom and perfect equality in matters of religion, and the utter separation of the Church from the State, secured by these instruments."

1 Lives of Gouverneur Morris and John Jay.

2 This house, the property and residence of James W. Baldwin, Esq., was used for the session of the state Convention in 1777. It is built of blue limestone, and stands on the southwest corner of Maiden Lane and Fair Street. It is one of the few houses that survived the conflagration of the village.

3 Popular elections for members of the Legislature were held in all the counties except New York, Kings, Queens, and Suffolk, which were then in possession of the enemy. George Clinton, then a brigadier general in the Continental army, was elected to the offices of governor and lieutenant governor. The former office he held by successive elections for eighteen years, and afterward for three years. Pierre Van Courtlandt, who was president of the Senate, became lieutenant governor; Robert R. Livingston was appointed chancellor; John Jay, chief justice; Robert Yates and John Sloss Hobart, judges of the Supreme Court; and Egbert Benson, attorney general.-Journals of the Convention, p. 916-918.

Outline of the Constitutional History of New York, a discourse delivered at the annual meeting of the New York Historical Society, in 1847, by Benjamin F. Butler, late attorney general of the United States.

Marauding Expedition up the Hudson.

October 6,

Kingston (or Esopus), being the capital of the state when Sir Henry Clinton 1777. gained possession of the forts in the Hudson Highlands, was marked by the conqueror for special vengeance. Having demolished the chevaux-de-frise at Fort Montgomery, the British fleet proceeded up the Hudson; the massive iron chain was not yet stretched across the river at West Point. All impediments being removed, a flying squadron of light frigates, under Sir James Wallace, bearing three thousand six hundred men, under the command of General Vaughan, sailed up the river. They were instructed to scatter desolation in their track, and well did they perform their mission. Every vessel upon the river was burned or otherwise destroyed; the houses of known Whigs, such as Henry Livingston, at Poughkeepsie, were fired upon from the ships; and small parties, landing from the vessels, desolated neighborhoods with fire and sword. They penetrated as far northward as Kingston, where they landed on the 13th of October. The frigates were anchored a little

1777.

above the present landing on Kingston Point, and a portion of the invaders debarked in the cove north of the steam-boat wharf. Another division, in small boats, proceeded to the mouth of Esopus (now Rondout) Creek, and landed at a place a little northeast of Rondout village, called Ponkhocken Point. The people at the creek fled, affrighted, to Marbletown, seven miles southwest of Kingston, and their houses were destroyed. The two divisions then marched toward the village, one by the upper road and the other by the Esopus Creek Road. Near the house of a Mr. Yeoman, who was in the army at Stillwater, they

seized a negro, and made him pilot them directly to the town. The detachments joined upon a gentle eminence near the village, a few rods south of the Rondout Road, and, after a brief consultation, proceeded to apply the torch. Almost every house was laid in ashes, and a large quantity of provisions and stores situated there and at the landing was destroyed. The town then contained between three and four thousand inhabitants, many of whom were wealthy, and most of the houses were built of stone." Warned of the approach of the enemy, a few saved their most valuable effects, but many lost all their possessions, and were driven back upon the interior settlements upon the Wallkill. Governor Clinton, with the members of the Legislature, was there, and efforts were made to raise a sufficient number of militia for the protection of the town, but without success. The enemy, however, fearing their wanton cruelty would bring the people in mass upon them, hastily retreated after destroying the village. A detachment crossed the river and marched to Rhinebeck Flats, two miles eastward, where they burned several houses; and, after penetrating northward as far as Livingston's Manor, and burning some houses there, they rejoined the main body, and the fleet returned to New York.

4

This wanton and apparently useless expedition excited great indignation. It was supposed that the destination of the enemy was, according to arrangement, Albany, and a junction with Burgoyne, then hemmed in by Americans at Saratoga, and anxiously awaiting the

A detail of this event, and a drawing of the remains of the chain now at West Point, will be hereafter given.

2 This view is from the road, looking north. An attempt was made by a soldier to burn the house, but so rapid was the march of the invaders that the flames had made but little progress before the troops were far on their road to the village. A negro woman, who was concealed under some corn-stalks near, extinguished the flames. The house is about half a mile from the river, on the right side of the road from the landing to Kingston village.

3 Governor Clinton, writing to Captain Machin on the subject of erecting works for the defense of Kingston, says, "I do not conceive it necessary to inclose the town, as the houses are stone, and will form (if the windows are properly secured) good lines of defense."

4 Rhinebeck Flats village is in Dutchess county, about seventeen miles north of Poughkeepsie. It was eminently a Whig place during the Revolution. There was the residence of the widow of General Montgomery, who had been killed at Quebec two years before, and of many of her numerous relatives, the Livingstons, all of whom were friends of the patriot cause.