one of her descendants, the author of the History of the Bergen Family, says:
"The early historians of this State and locality, led astray by a petition presented by her, April 4th, 1656, (when she resided at the Walle-boght,) to the Governor and Council, for some meadows, in which she states that she is the 'first-born Christian child in New Netherlands,' assert that she was born at the Walle-boght. Judge Benson, in his writings, even ventures to describe the house where this took place. He says: 'On the point of land formed by the cove in Brooklyn, known as the Walle-boght, lying on its westerly side (it should have been easterly), was built the first house on Long Island, and inhabited by Joris Jansen de Rapalje, one of the first white settlers on the Island, and in which was born Sarah Rapalje, the first white child of European parentage born in the State.' In this, if there is any truth in the depositions of Catalyn or Catalyntie Trico (daughter of Jeremiah Trico of Paris), Sarah's mother, … they are clearly mistaken. According to these depositions, she and her husband, Joris Jansen de Rapalje, came to this country in 1623; settled at Fort Orange, now Albany; lived there three years; came, in 1626, to New Amsterdam, 'where she lived afterward for many years; and then came to Long Island, where she now (1688) lives.' Sarah, therefore, was undoubtedly born at Albany, instead of the Walle-boght, and was probably married before she removed to Long Island, there being no reason to suppose that she resided there when a single woman without her husband."
The family record gives the time of her marriage as between her fourteenth and fifteenth year. Mr. Stiles remarks:
"While, therefore, Albany claims the honor of being her birthplace, and New Amsterdam of having seen her childhood, Brooklyn surely received most profit from her; for here in the Wallabout, she was twice married, and gave birth to fourteen children, from whom are descended the Polhemuses, the Bergens, the Bogarts, and many other of the most notable families of Kings County."
At the time of Rapalje's purchase at the Wallabout it began to appear to the land speculators that Long Island was a desirable field. The Director10 himself made haste to secure the island called "Pagganck," lying close to the Long Island shore south of Fort Amsterdam. The island was thickly covered with nut-trees, which brought it the title of "Nooten" or Nutten Island. In due time this became known as "the Governor's island," and this name has become permanent.
Van Twiller's successor was not less appreciative of the value of land on Long Island, but his purchases seem to have been made in the interest of the company. In August, 1638, he bought for the West India Company land adjoining Rapalje's farm and extending between Rennegackonck Creek (at the Wallabout) to Newtown Creek, and inland to "the Swamps of Mespaetches" (Maspeth).
This important sale to Kieft, representing approximately the area of the present Eastern District of Brooklyn, was made by "Kakapoteyuo, Manquenw, and Suwvian, Chiefs of Keskaechquerem," who received "eight fathoms of duffels, eight fathoms of wampum, twelve kettles, eight adzes, and eight axes, with some knives, beads, and awl blades."
By other purchases, at Jersey City and elsewhere, the West India Company sought to extend its dominions and increase the population of the colony. The States-General gave some attention to the colony, and by a proclamation in September, 1638, the Amsterdam Chamber threw open New Netherland to trade by all inhabitants of the United Provinces and of friendly nations, "in the company's ships," with an import duty of fifteen per cent., and an export duty of ten per cent. Every immigrant was to receive from the Director and Council "according to his condition and means, with as much land as he and his family can properly cultivate," the company reserving a quit-rent of a tenth. To these inducements was added that of free passage over the Atlantic.
The favorable result of these offers soon appeared in the increased rate of immigration and in demand for land. The Director and Council soon found it to be desirable to buy more Long Island land, which they did in January, 1639. By this purchase the company secured the tract extending from Rockaway eastward to "Sicktew-hackey," or Fire Island Bay; thence northward to Martin Gerritsen's, or Cow Bay, and westward along the East River to "Vlaack's Kill"—in other words nearly all the land comprised in the present County of Queens.
In August of the same year (1639) Antony Jansen van Vaas of Saleé received two hundred acres resting within the present towns of New Utrecht and Gravesend. In November a patent was granted for "a tobacco plantation" on the beach, "hard by Saphorakan" (presumably at Gowanus) adjoining the land of Bennett. Another neighbor to Bennett came in the person of Frederick Lubbertsen, who, in May of the following year (1640), received a patent for land extending northerly from Gowanus Cove, and representing a large part of what is now known as South Brooklyn.
Lubbertsen, who had been chief boatswain to Kieft in 1638, was an ambitious and politically disposed man. Two years after this big purchase he was one of twelve men chosen by the commonalty of New Amsterdam. He did not remove to Long Island until 1653, in which year he was chosen to represent the young town of Breuckelen at the New Amsterdam convention. He became a local magistrate in 1653, served several terms thereafter, and filled other political posts.
THE FIRST BROOKLYN FERRY
As the lands of western Long Island represented by the present area of Kings County began to increase in value by increase of settlement and competition in purchase, persons who had merely availed themselves of "squatter" privileges began to see the advisability of taking out formal patents. There had been particularly numerous instances of "squatting" in the region of the Eastern District in a radius from the Wallabout inlet. Among the patents issued in 1640 was one to Abraham Rycken, for a plantation of considerable extent in this region, and in 1641 a piece of land on the East River legally passed into the possession of Lambert Huybertsen.
Adjoining the land of Joris Rapalje at the Wallabout was an extensive piece of farm land occupied by Rapalje's son-in-law, Hans Hansen Bergen. On Wallabout Bay lay the tobacco plantations of Jan and Peter Montfort, Peter Cæsar, and other farmers. Between the Bay and the East River end of the Lubbertsen purchase came the land sold to Claes Jansen van Naerden (Ruyter), Jan Mauje, and Andries Hudde, all of which was afterward sold to Dirck Janse Waertman, who held it until the sale to his son-in-law, Joris Remsen, in 1706.
Meanwhile (in 1640) the first permanent English settlement on eastern Long Island had been made by Lyon Gardiner on the island which afterward received his name. This settlement, and others which followed it, were distasteful to the West India Company, which, having secured control of the entire western end of the Island, from Cow Bay on the Sound to Canarsie Bay on the ocean side, began to regard itself as entitled to claim jurisdiction over the entire area. When in 1641 emigrants from Lynn, Mass., undertook to settle at Schout's Bay, within Queens County, they were driven off by soldiers who had been sent out by Kieft for the purpose.
The English colonists did not leave the Island, but settled at Southampton, in Suffolk County. The fact that other New England settlers, who planted Southold, were not attacked seems to show either that Kieft scarcely regarded the territory beyond the Queens County line as worth fighting for at this time, or that he came to regard the new-comers as accepting his authority.
The settlement at Southold by emigrants from New Haven was indicative of conditions within New England to which later settlements on Long Island may be attributed. The extreme severity of the Puritan religious temper found expression in distressing exactions and persecutions. Driven from England by intolerance, the Puritans, when placed in control of social and political conditions, exhibited a degree of paternalism not less despotic than that from which they themselves had suffered. And as the Puritans of England had found shelter and liberty in Holland, the victims of Puritanical intolerance in America fled to the friendly support of Dutch authority within the New Netherland jurisdiction.
In fact, shortly after 1640 the Dutch government granted favoring patents to emigrants from New England. The Rev. John Doughty and his followers were welcomed at Maspeth, and provision for other comers (among them Anne Hutchinson and her family) was made at Throg's Neck and New Rochelle.
CHAPTER III
THE INDIANS AND THE EARLY SETTLERS