Aug 10
Michael Pauw, one of the four Patroons of New Netherlands, purchases
Staten Island from the Indians. It forms part of the province
of Pavonia, but it soon reverts to the West India Company.
Oct 1
Patroon Killian van Rensselaer signs a copartnership agreement
with Samuel Godyn, Johannes de Laet, Samuel Bloemmaert, Adam Bissels,
and Toussaint Moussart.
City
Mapmaker Johannes de Laet publishes Beschryvinghe van West-Indien
, using the names Manhattes, N. Amsterdam, and Noordt River for
the first time. ** A house is built within the fort enclosure
for the director-general. ** The ship New Netherland is
built by the West India Company. Nicknamed the "great ship"
it weighs 800 tons.
State
Amsterdam pearl merchant Killian van Rensselaer, the first patroon,
founds Rensselaerwyck, on lands he purchased from the Mahican
Indians, on the upper Hudson River. Receiving a grant for the
land from the Dutch West Indies Company, he begins recruiting
immigrants. The first shipload arrives. ** The first crops are
planted at Fort Orange (Albany). ** The Pavonia patroonship is
granted. ** John Winthrop of the Massachusetts Bay Colony has
a ship, Blessing of the Bay, built and sails it to Long
Island to buy wampum from the Dutch.
City
Peter Minuit is recalled to Holland when he refuses to ban the
private fur trade.
Mar 19
New Amsterdam director-general Peter Minuit is recalled to Holland
because of privileges he awarded patroons. He is succeeded by
Bastiaen Jansz Krol, as acting director.
City
The first public beer brewery is set up early in the year by Minuit.
New England
The English capture the Dutch vessel Eendracht at Plymouth.
March
Wouter van Twiller, a nephew of Kiliaen van Rensselaer, arrives
in New Amsterdam in the Soutberg accompanied by close to
100 soldiers, the first regular troops in the colony, to replace
Bastiaen Jansz Krol as director-general.
City
Adam Roelantsen arrives in New Amsterdam, founds the first school
in the colony. ** Five stone workshops are built near today's
Whitehall Street. ** Van Twiller settles at Bossen Bouwerie, becoming
the first European settler in the future Greenwich Village. **
A tile-roofed brewery is erected.
Dec 11
Dutch barber-surgeon Harmen Meyndertsz van den Bogaert, sent by
an officer at Fort Orange (Albany) to explore the area where the
Mohawk flows into the Hudson, notes flooding at the site of an
Indian village on the southern bank.
Dec 12
Ice flows prevent the party from crossing to the northern bank
of the Mohawk.
City
Roeloff and Annetje Jans begin building a farmhouse. They will
accumulate land over the next two years that will form the nucleus
of Trinity Church's holdings.
Mar 10
The Grand Assembly Treaty of Taagonshi (between Iroquois &
Dutch) signed.
Apr 22
The northwest end of Long Island (Queens) is settled by the Dutch.
City
Jacob Stoffelsen is hired to oversee the Dutch West India Company's
slaves. ** The colony has traded 60,000 beaver pelts, with a worth
of 400,000 guilders.
England
Henry Alexander, son of the Earl of Stirling, is granted a patent
for "matowack or Long Island" by the Council for New
England".
Apr 26
Lord Alexander appoints James Farret to represent his North American
lands. Farret is allowed two islands for himself. He calls one
Robbins Island. The other is known as Mr. Farret's Island (later
Shelter Island).
Oct 5
The first Long Island patents are granted, in today's Brooklyn.
Dec 6
English colonial governor Sir Edmund Andros is born in London
to Amice Andros - royal bailiff of Guernsey - and his wife.
City
The Dutch begin settling further out on Nieuw Amersfoort (Long
Island), moving into Brooklyn's Flatbush. Governor Wouter Van
Twiller begins purchasing Long Island land from the Lenape, at
what will become the Red Hook and Gowanus neighborhoods of Brooklyn.
Over the next two years he will acquire 15,000 acres. The Indians
will remain in the area for many years. ** The West India Company
grants D. P. De Vries part of Staten Island. ** Partners Andries
Hudde and Wolphert Gerritsen break ground for a farm at the future
site of Flatbush.
State
The Delaware name Sewanhacky (place of shells), used to denote
Long Island, first appears, in Dutch deeds for land on the western
end of the island.
May 3
Lion Gardiner buys an island from Manhassets sachem Poggaticut
and his wife Awaw, for ten coats. He names it Isle of Wight (later
Gardiner's Island).
Sep 2
Amsterdam merchant Willem Kieft (Willem the Testy) replaces Wouter
van Twiller as Director of New Amsterdam.
City
The Dutch buy Minnahannock Island in the East River from the Canarsie
Indians and begin raising hogs there, naming it Hog Island. It
later becomes Roosevelt Island. ** The Dutch settle on Long Island
at Flushing. Local Matinecocks help them make it through the first
winter. ** Englishman Thomas Foster receives a royal grant for
600 acres on Alley Creek, off Long Island's Little Neck Bay, displacing
local Matinecocks Indians. The area will later be named Douglaston.
** Great Barcut, or Great Barn Island (later Ward's Island) is
bought by Van Twiller. ** Patroon Michael Pauw sells Pavonia (parts
of Staten Island and New Jersey) to the West India Company.
State
The patroonship of Killian Van Rensselaer now encompasses land
24 miles by 48 miles, covering most of the future Albany and Rensselaer
counties.
Apr 22
New Amsterdam governor Willem Kieft and the Privileged Trading
Company grant a lease for a tract of and near Fort Amsterdam to
former governor Wouter Von Twiller, to be used for cultivating
tobacco. It will become Peter Stuyvesant's bouwerie (farm) in
1651.
May 15
Jan Gybertsen stabs New Amsterdam gunner Gerrit Jansen in a brawl,
killing him; New York City's first murder.
May 18
Henry, Lord Alexander, dies in Stirling, Scotland.
June
The New Amsterdam council hires Nicholaes Coorn as company sergeant
for Fort Amsterdam. He will eventually be broken to private and
two other soldiers will 'ride the wooden horse' (corporal punishment),
for various crimes and infractions.
Jul 20
Andries Hudde is given a goundbrief (grant) for land located at
today's Harlem.
Sep 21
The Treaty of Hartford (Connecticut) gives the Pequot Indian territory
to the Connecticut Valley towns, disperses the survivors amongst
the Narragansetts, Mohicans and Long Island's Montauk. The Montauk,
as nominal allies of the Pequot, are forced to pay an annual tribute
governor of New Haven.
Nov 1
Queens County is created from the North and West Ridings of Yorkshire,
on Long Island. ** Sir William Alexander, father of the
late Lord Alexander, inherits his son's patent for Long Island.
City
The Dutch establish a cattle market, on the site of today's Bowling
Green. It lasts for nine years. ** The Flatbush farm owned
by Andries Hudde and Wolphert Gerritsen now contains a house,
barn and hayrick. Andries Hudde sells Gerrit Wolphertsen 100 acres
of land in Brooklyn. ** The population has remained close
to 400 for the last dozen years or so. ** Local Mespaetches
(Lenape) Indians sell Brooklyn land to the colonists that will
become Bushwick, Greenpoint and Williamsburg. ** An ordinance
is passed forbidding adulterous relations with heathens and blacks.
** The court of sessions of the North Riding of Yorkshire
(today's Queens County, minus Newtown) is established at Jamaica.
** Willem Kieft replaces Wouter Von Twiller as director
general. Kieft begins buying Lenape Indian land in today's Bronx,
Queens, Staten Island and Jersey City. He establishes a system
of ground-briefs, deeds for people taking up residence in the
colony. ** The Dutch begin referring to all land west of
Albany as Terra Incognita. ** Ferry service between Manhattan
and Brooklyn is established.
Delaware
The New Sweden Company (Swedish West India Compan<¬)=ÄMinuit
and f;Æ settlers to the Delaware River to build Fort Christina
(Wilmington), introducing log cabins to the Americas. New York
governor Kieft strongly disapproves of Minuit's actions.
1639
Feb 10
Staten Island's owner David Pietersz De Vries starts a plantation
there.
Apr 30
A three-day Hudson River flood forces residents at Fort Orange
(Albany) to camp in the woods until the water subsides.
Aug 20
Mr. Farret's Island becomes Shelter Island.
New Amsterdam
The Manatus Map (probably drawn by either Andries Hudde or Johannes
Vingboons) is published, detailing the greater New York area,
and showing Lenape longhouses in Brooklyn. ** Jonas Bronck buys
nearly 500 acres of land in the future Westchester County. **
Members of the Iroquois, Lenni Lenape (Delaware) and the Mohican
tribes are now residing on the Hudson. ** The Dutch West India
Company purchases the area known today as the Bronx, to ease future
overcrowding. ** Slave quarters are reportedly established to
the north of town, across from Hog Island.
State
John Scrantom and other settlers buy the future site of New Guilford,
Connecticut, from the Indian sachem Menunkatuc. Scrantom's descendant
will become a Rochester pioneer.
Netherlands
The Dutch West India Company relinquishes its monopoly on the
North American fur trade, permitting colonist to enter the trade.
© 2002 David Minor / Eagles Byte