NEW FAIRFIELD,
WOOSTERSHIRE,
FREDERICKSBURGH,
and PATTERSON
TIMES




The Settling of the Lower Harlem River Valley
by Horace E. Hillery, Minister of the Patterson Presbyterian Church
For biographical information on Rev. Hillery please click here.
Published as a Supplement to The Pawling Chronicle, Friday, July 28, 1933

  Two hundred and fifty years ago [1683] there were practically no settlements beyond the colonial coast line, except along the larger rivers.  About this time the surplus population began to
push into the interior regions.   
  The next hundred years (1683-1781) becomes of definite interest to Eastern Dutchess and Putnam Counties.  The first fifty years are of interest because it was a time of preparation.  The
following fifty years was marked by three waves of settlements.  This second fifty years falls into two rather sharply divided periods of thirty-five and fifteen years each.  For today, our major
interest will be upon this thirty-five year period between 1731 and 1766.   

  Nineteen thirty-three is the two hundred and fiftieth anniversary of two influences upon this section.  In 1693 a group of people pushed north from Norwalk and settled at Danbury.  Danbury
was to become the outfitting and trading center for a large area to the north and west.  Of a dozen early Danbury families, all but one were represented at some future time in the population of
this area.
  In the same year, the controversy as to the boundary line between the Dutch and English in America took a new turn.  The Dutch colony had come under the control of the British and
received its present name of New York.  The old boundary controversy now became a matter between the colonies of Connecticut and New York.  The Connecticut Boundary Commission of
1683 included Lieutenant-Governor Nathan Gold, Sr.  The "land hunger fever" of New York's early families was shared by the Gold family in Connecticut.  The third stream of influence from
Connecticut was religious.  Until the close of the first settlement period of thirty-five years except for the Quakers, practically all our religious impacts were from the official religion of
Connecticut.   
  In 1707 Lieutenant-Governor Nathan Gold, Jr., and others, received a large grant of land from the Connecticut colony.  North and south, it embraced what is now the townships of New
Fairfield and Sherman, and was to extend as far west as the colony line.  Three years later these men and one other, purchased from the Indians, not only the present bounds of these two
townships, but as far west as the proposed boundary line between New York and Connecticut agreed upon by the Commission nearly thirty years before.  This was to run twenty miles east of
the Hudson River, and would include the Oblong and a considerable section of what is now Patterson and Pawling.  Captain Gold's efforts to push the boundary settlement to an early
conclusion were not successful during his lifetime.  This delayed the sale of the land and its settlement.  The Connecticut patent to their part of this purchase was not made until 1737.  New
York's part was patented in 1761.  
  Just how soon settlers established themselves on this tract has not been determined but when in 1730 it was proposed that Connecticut cede the Oblong strip to New York, it is definitely
known that a number of squatters were already on the strip, and presumably others had taken advantage of the excellent mill sites between the Oblong and the east branch of the Croton.   

  At almost the same time that Captain Gold received this grant from Connecticut the General Assembly of the Connecticut colony (1708) called the forty-one Churches of the colony to send
delegates to a religious conference at Saybrook.  Twelve ministers and four laymen responded.  These men worked out a system of theology and government which was partly Presbyterian
and partly Congregational.  This Saybrook system was adopted by the colony as their official religious organization.  Every person in the colony was required to pay taxes for the support of this
church in the same manner as they paid their government taxes.  They were likewise compelled to attend church, absence from which was punishable with a possible fine of seventy-five cents.  
The Church of England, Quaker and Baptist opposition was immediately manifest.  Taxes paid by members of these dissenting churches were not paid to these unoffical organizations until
twenty years afterward (1727, 1729).   
  It was this official religion of Connecticut that permitted its ministers to serve these early settlements in eastern New York, and who likewise took upon themselves the responsibility of
supervising and disciplining the churches organized in this area.   

  In 1731, the year the Connecticut New York boundary line was settled, Dutchess County, of which Putnam County was then a part, had the least population of any of the twelve counties in
New York, but twenty-five years later only one country had a larger population.  The early settlers were Dutch and settled along the Hudson and along the courses of the Fishkill.  Within this
twenty-five year period, a considerable New England migration had reached as far west as the Hudson, and two Presbyterian-Congregational Churches had been established on the Hudson,
one at Fishkill and one at Poughkeepsie.     
  In the eastern part of the county New England migration was very marked.  The Oblong strip threw open more than 60,000 acres for settlement.  The year after the boundary survey, iron was
discovered in northwest Connecticut.  Two years later a forge was built.  The land hunger fever which was pushing the population into the interior was probably mild compared to the rush of
prospectors into this section.  Sale of land exempting mineral rights was written into most of the early deeds.  Rev. Elisha Kent's land purchase in 1743 excepted and reserved "mines, minerals,
and pine trees."  Fabled stories of lost mines, including most of the valued metals, passed as popular currency for more than a century.  The renewed migration from Europe did not seem to
find lodgment in this section until after 1766, [instead] Cape Cod, Rhode Island, Connecticut, Long Island, and Westchester County were represented in this early influx.   
  What is now Putnam County, plus a small but undefined portion of land, probably bounded on the north by the Fishkill was included in the South Ward (1719) or Precinct (1737)[of Dutchess
County].  It was not until 1743 that the Oblong was included in the county.  Even then officials seemed in a quandry how to deal with it.  Nearly thirty years later (1779) the Oblong strip, in what
is now Putnam County, was made into the awkard Southeast Precinct, which twenty-three years later was broken up and incorporated into the present townships of Patterson and South East.   

  This rapid influx of population through the back door of the county, soon commanded the attention of county officials.  When in 1745 the first official highways were laid out in the eastern part
of the county, they found that individual initiative had already preceded them.  Three highways and at least two bridges across the East Croton were already in use.  Also a highway from
Danbury to the mines in northwest Connecticut passed through New Fairfield, followed the Ten Mile River into New York colony at Dover and then ran back into Connecticut.  The so-called
"Danbury Highway" ran west into Putnam County, probably following what is now Federal Highway number six.  At Sodom a bridge crossed the Croton.   
  Another highway, probably leading south from Dover on the Ten Mile River-Danbury road, passed along the east side of the Great Swamp and followed the East Croton into the Oblong.  
North of Haviland Hollow this roughly follows our present State Highway number twenty-two.   
  The third highway, long since abandoned, I shall try to reconstruct.  Known as the "Woostershire Highway" or the "old road" it probably connected Danbury and Fishkill.  From Danbury via
Mill Plain or New Fairfield, it crossed the East Croton at Mill Town or De Forest Corners, then followed the west bank of the Croton and the north branch of Muddy Brook, past the Triangle
Corner at Patterson, crossed the narrow watershed leading to Whaley Lake, the headwaters of the Fishkill, and down its water course to Fishkill village.  Until after the Revolutionary War this
was the most important highway in this section.  Tradition would seem to indicate Woostershire included what is now eastern Putnam County and Pawling.   
  Between 1745-52 two important north and south highways were laid out.  One ran the entire length of the high ridge that marks the center of the Oblong.  The other ran through Carmel and
Ludingtonville.  These two highways were to become two of the most important north and south highways in the state during the following century.  Two east highways were laid out:  one from
De Forest Corners to Carmel, the other from the Oblong road on Quaker Hill west through Patterson to Ludingtonville and then north to join the main highway.  From two centers, one at Sodom
and one at the meeting house (one mile East of Dykeman's) radiated a number of short roads.  Other roads connected the main highways.   

  Claims and counter claims to the land marked every foot of Eastern Putnam County.  Without considering the merits of these claims, they are detailed because of their importance.   
  The Oblong was patented to two groups of people, one in England, one in New York.  The patent to certain interests in England preceded the colonial patent by a few weeks.  This
precipitated a legal battle which was not terminated until the Revolution.  Fortunately for the purchasers and settlers of the Oblong, their interests were linked with several influential persons in
the Colonial government.  One-half the Oblong lands in Patterson as well as considerable acreage elsewhere in the Oblong, belonged to men who were soon to become important colonial
officials (Cadwalder Colden, William Smith, James Alexander, Archibald Kenedy, and others).   
  What is now Pawling was claimed by both the Beekman and Philipse interests.  In 1758 the southern part of this claim was awarded the Philipse family, and became designated as "The
Gore."  This caused the first, though small, migration from this section.   
  Between 1753-66 the Philipse interests began a systematic effort to dispossess all claimants to eastern Putnam County and the Gore, except those on the Oblong.  In 1754 a survey was
made to determine the exact limits of the Philipse claims.  In the same year the Indians were enlisted in the French and Indian War, and their families were moved to Massachusetts during their
absence of eight years.  The land claimed by Captain Nathan Gold and others because of purchase from the Indians, was patented by New York to the Philipse interests in 1761, and the
claims of all other holders of this land were finally extinguished five years later, just a few months before the Pendergast Rebellion of 1766.   
  Squatters, prospectors, and renters and purchasers from the Indians at other times to other parts of eastern Putnam County were dispossessed by law in 1766.   
  A similar situation had developed in the holdings of the other large land owners along the eastern border of the colony.  Whether this was a concerted movement is not clear.  In the summer
of 1766 the entire eastern border of the colony flared forth in armed revolt.  In this section alone, three hundred men rallied to the standard of their leader Pendergast.  Blood was shed in front
of our old log meeting house in Patterson, and fifty captives were lodged in the meeting house until they could be transferred to Poughkeepsie.   
  A study of the names in this section before and after this revolt would indicate that there was at this time a large exit of early settlers.  Many of them followed Pendergast to the Wyoming
country.  There misfortune continued to follow them.  They suffered the devastation of the Wyoming massacre, and a broken remnant of that migration found their way back to their old homes
in this section about the time of the second upheaval in this community during the closing years of the Revolutionary War.  An equally large influx occurred.  Scotch officers returning from the
French and Indian War, Irish immigrants, and a sprinkling of Quakers, and others, became the tenants of the Robinson-Philipse family

  In religious circles Patterson has been successively designated as Woostershire; Philippi, 2nd; North Philippi; Fredericksburg (North Congregation); Franklin; and Patterson.   
  But four religious organizations appear in this section before the Revolution.  The Dutch Church did not reach the eastern part of Putnam County.  The Church of England was organized
shortly after the Pendergast Rebellion.  A Baptist minister, Henry Cary, was traditionally established on West Mountain, in "the Gore," sometime between 1730-1766.  He was possibly an early
settler who filled the immediate demand for preaching during the Great Awakening.  He preached in his own home.  Erskine's military map of 1780 shows a Baptist meeting house a quarter mile
south of this community's early center.  Unfortunately the activities of this early Baptist Church have been lost to us.  The Quaker strain dominated the two ends of the Oblong in this section,
and from there gradually reached into neighboring sections.  Even as the political boundaries of the Oblong indicated a gradual incorporation of the Oblong into the larger county and town
units, so this Quaker strain was and is expressing a considerable influence in the other churches in eastern Putnam County  Three Quaker Churches became established in this part of the
Oblong.  The Quakers about Peach Lake at first held their allegiance in the Purchase Meeting in Westchester County.  Receiving sanction for a separate organization they built a meeting
house in 1760 which is still one of the historic landmarks of this section of the country.  On Quaker Hill a similar sanction resulted in a building in 1744.  Twenty years later the second and
present meeting house was erected.  In 1783 a third Quaker organization in this Oblong strip built at what was known as Valleyville, just south of Haviland Hollow.   
  As early as 1739 the people of Woostershire in New York (probably eastern Putnam County and Pawling) applied to the East Fairfield Consociation of Connecticut for sanction and
assistance in the installation of a Rev. Mr. Terry.  Three years later the members of the Woostershire Church reported to the Consociation that they were much disturbed by the preaching of
Rev. Mr. Terry.
  The next year, Rev. Mr. John Ells, late minister of Canaan, was suggested to the Woostershire people. Three years later, when another request for a minister was made to the Consociation
from "Woostershire and the Oblong," they were advised to seek the part time service of the Rev. Mr. Thomas Lewis, pastor of the newly established Church at Sherman, and recommended to
the people of Sherman to acceed to this request if it came.  
  But it was the Rev. Mr. Elisha Kent, who was the first minister in this area, whose impress continues with considerable clearness to the present time.  He was born in Suffield, Conn., in 1704,
and was graduated from Yale at the age of twenty-five.  Three years later he was settled as pastor at Newtown.  He was the third pastor in the parish.  His predecessor had but recently
withdrawn with a considerable following and had established a new parish.  Nevertheless sixty-four male members signed the call for the Rev. Mr. Kent.  He was to receive $1,000 a year, in the
depreciated currency of the colony, and 104 acres of land.  But in consequence of the frictions engendered by the recent disruption he was required to give good security to the amount of
$2,000 that he would preach no heresy.  At the beginning of the Great Awakening the relationships of Church and State became the source of friction within his parish.  Considerable
discussion grew out of his position in the matter, and finally resulted in his dismissal.  The echo of that controversy is possibly reflected in his leadership in the organization of the Presbytery of
Dutchess County twenty years later.  
  In 1742 friction in Woostershire in New York caused the Consociation to send Rev. Mr. Kent and others to canvas the situation.  A few months lataer, John Spragg, of a "part of Woostershire:
petitioned the Consociation for a minister.  A year later Rev. Elisha Kent was settled in the New York colony.  Whether the New Yorkers followed the custion of Connecticut of paying a double
salary the first year, out of which the minister was expected to buy a farm and build a house and barn which was to become the property of his children, is not known.  At any rate in that year
Rev. Kent bought 200 acres of land in the Oblong from the New York City lawyer, William Smith.  It lay just south of what is now the old South East meeting house.  The purchase price was
$750 "currency money."  His deed included the customary clause, "excepting and reserving mines, minerals, and pine trees."  Such settlements tended to long pastorates, and that such a
settlement was made may be infered from his pastorate there of thrty-three years (1743-76).  The first meeting house was located one mile east of Dykeman.  In 1761 the second meeting
house was built just north of Rev. Kent's property, at what is now Doansburg.  The third and present meeting house was erected in 1793.  
  All the neighboring country received his itinerant ministries.  The Oblong, New Fairfield, Patterson, Carmel and Fishkill all sought to have part of his time.  Carmel was included for a few years
in "Kent's Parish," but the people at South East complained of this half time arrangement and were finally able to provide for his whole time.  
  In the not infrequent internal disturbances in the neighboring Churches, "Priest" Kent was often asked by a Church, or delegated by the Consociation, to moderate a meeting or to arbitrate
the matter.  It was such uncontrolled frictions which seemed the deciding factor in his instigating the organization of the Presbytery of Dutchess County.  
  Along with his numerous other duties, he possibly turored Joseph Peck, the licensiate, preaching at Patterson.  
  Abigal, his wife, "Ye Pious Consort of Rev. Elisha Kent," was fifteen years his junior.  She died at the early age of thirty-three (1751).  Five children of this union, a boy and four girls, grew to
maturity.  Moss, the son, was an influential person among the early settlers, and later was a member of the state legislature in its formative period.  The grandson, James, became Chancellor
of New York state.  
  A considerable group of young Scotch officers and Irish immigrants settled here about the time his daughters reached marriageable age.  Two Scotch lads and two Irish lads outdistanced the
native swains.  Three son-in-laws espoused the loyalist cause.  One was killed in battle in service of the King; one returned to Scotland; the third went to Philadelphia by way of New Brunswick,
and became the ancestor of the famous arctic explorer, Elisha Kent Kane.  

  Rev. James Davenport came of a line of ministers.  His great-grandfather, the Rev. John Davenport, was one of the founders of Connecticut.  His father was pastor at Stamford, at which
place James was born in 1710.  He graduated from Yale in 1732, and was later installed as pastor at Southhold, Long Island.  
  In temper he passed through several pronounced spiritual conflicts.  Immediate impulses tended to rule his conduct.  Whitefield said he was "one whom God has lately sent out--a sweet pious
soul."  
  When the Great Awakening swept Connecticut, the colonial legislative body sought by law to check excesses that might come from without, by prohibiting itinerant preschers from entering the
bounds of a settled parish without invitation from the resident minister.  Davenport appears to have been the most flagrant violator of this law.  He was arrested and deported from the colony.  
  In Boston he was again in the toils of the law, because of his severe and indiscriminate berating of the ministers, because they did not follow his urgency upon a particular experience of
"sanctification." But at the request of the ministers he was released from the custody of the law.  
  With the subsidence of the evangelistic fervor which marked the life of the colonies for about three years, the fervor of Rev. Davenport became more moderate.  In 1744 he publicly
apologized to the Connecticut ministers for his former denunciations of them.  
  Going forth as a missionary to the colony of Virginia, he covered 1,600 miles on horseback.  On his return he was received under the care of the East Fairfield Consociation, and became the
resident pastor of the Church at Carmel, giving them one-third of his time.  He probably included both Patterson and Yorktown in his parish ministry.  
  He assisted in the installation of "Priest" Mead at Salem.  While pastor at Patterson a son, John, (1752-1821) was born who was to follow his father in the ministry.  
  After leaving Patterson (1754) he settled in New Jersey where death claimed him at the early age of forty-seven.  His monument bears this inscription:  
                  "Oh Davenport--a seraph once in clay,
                  A brighter seraph now in heavenly day,
                  How glowed thy heart with sacred love and zeal
                  How like to that thy kindred angels feel,
                  Clothed in humility thy virtues shone
                  In every eye illustrious but thine own.  
                  How like the Master on whose friendly breast
                  Thou oft hast leaned and shall forever rest."  

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Fall Newsletter 2008,
Vol. 1, No. 2
"The Settling of the Lower
Harlem River Valley"
Horace E. Hillery, Sept. 1953