When Minuit Came to Manhattan

...On August 18, 1616, these merchants were styled "directors of New Netherland" in a resolution by the states-general of the Dutch Republic, while two years earlier, on October 11, 1614, in another resolution of the states-general, the name "New Netherland" was first applied to the Hudson River country and adjacent territory north and south of it...

...It is quite probable that very soon after engaging in the fur trade along the Hudson River, these various merchants, for the purpose of freighting ships, had entered into a copartnership—forestalling thus by two centuries John Jacob Astor's American Fur Company...

...The other ship, the Fortune, of which the renowned Cornelis Jacobsen May was captain, belonged to three members from the old Dutch city of Hoorn...

...As it was necessary to spend considerable time in collecting the furs, a number of buying-agents were permanently stationed in the country, so that the ships would not have to wait too long for a full cargo...

...Wassenaer, who is the only historian of the earliest agricultural settlement of Manhattan and New Netherland, writing during February, 1624, says: "For the purpose of building up a colony within this nation a ship was fitted out under a commission from the West India Company, and freighted with families...

...The various firms, united for the New Netherland trade, were referred to in the same document as "the United Company of Merchants...

...This positively fixes the agricultural founding of New Amsterdam in 1625, and prior to the political founding, through the arrival of the first directorgeneral, Peter Minuit.' It is an important point because, after the agricultural settlement, the cattle needed attendants and it is probable that all of the forty-five people, who crossed with the cattle ships, remained permanently settled on Manhattan...

...Nothing daunted, on February 12, 1620, the company proposed to the states-general to colonize New Netherland with the English dissenters, then living mostly at Leyden...

...Dingman Versteeg, in his contention that not the Belgians, nor the Walloons, nor the French Huguenots, but rather the Dutch deserve the credit for the founding of New Netherland and the chartered city of New Amsterdam...

...In the spring of 1623 the equipment of "a ship with colonists" was ready...

...From other sources we know that these Walloons, who did not learn to speak Dutch, as some of their younger ones, could not adapt themselves to their cosmopolitan environment, where, only twenty-five years later, the chronicles speak of "no less than eighteen nationalities, divided into almost an equal number of religious sects...

...These Walloon refugees were certainly not colonists especially selected for the specific purpose of colonizing New Netherland, or Manhattan...

...two months afterward a fly boat was equipped carrying sheep, hogs, wagons, ploughs, and all other implements of husbandry...

...Argall departed, a new manager of the fur trade arrived later, and the whole matter was forgotten...

...Netherland Company, in 1614, had a substantial fort built at the head of the Hudson near the mouth of the Mohawk, which territory produced the most abundant and best furs...

...These were the Pilgrim Fathers, who in December, 1620, founded Plymouth Colony in New England, after the states-general at The Hague had decided to decline taking any action...

...After his return to Amsterdam, he entered into a partnership with the famous Adriaan Block, engaging Captain Ryser and his ship for a voyage to the Hudson River fur country...

...The description thereof shall be presented in the beginning of the seventh volume, as this part cannot contain it...

...Thereupon, both entered the employ of a company of Amsterdam merchants trading with this country...

...While Christiaensen probably was visiting the South River (Delaware) country, Block had entered the Hudson River...

...The company, though it had lost the monopoly, continued its trade and on October 4, 1618, even petitioned the states-general for "the continuance of their charter for some years longer to trade exclusively" for the furs of New Netherland...

...Nowise discouraged, Block immediately set to work building another vessel, a yacht of sixteen tons burden, which he named the Onrust (Unrest) and which was finished in the spring of 1614...

...It may be well to set forth some of the main conclusions of the researches of Mr...

...It therefore saved the company the trouble and expense of recruiting at large their needed colonists...

...Willem Usselinx, a former Antwerp merchant, who after 1585 had taken up his residence in Holland, was the chief and untiring advocate of the proposed West India Company...

...Before entering upon his regular trips to these parts, Christiaensen, upon returning home with a valuable cargo from the West Indies, had intended visiting Manhattan...

...This being done, the ship sailed up to the Maykans [Mohicans] forty-four leagues, and they built and completed a fort named Orange, with four bastions...

...Various causes retarded its formation until at last, on June 3, 1621, the states-general at The Hague granted it a charter...

...Versteeg has pointed out, subjects of the Netherlands, to which country they had emigrated, like the Pilgrim Fathers, from countries where they were hampered in the free exercise of their civil and religious rights—countries which they gladly forsook for the moral liberal surroundings of the seventeenthcentury Netherlands...

...It is therefore very probable that warehouses had been built on Manhattan for the southern part of the country, and at the head of the Hudson River long before the construction of the more substantial forts...

...For one thing, the opponents of the West India Company in its chartered territory could much more easily concentrate their power, and were much more resolved to oust it, than they were in regard to the East India Company, whose territories were situated more outside the general field of concentrated ambitions...

...At the time of their application to the West India Company to be sent to New Netherland, these settlers were, however, as Mr...

...At about the same time two petitions had been presented, one for the extension of the monopoly of the New Netherland trade, the other to "leave the trade entirely free...

...The company would have been obliged to engage Dutch or other settlers, if the Walloon refugees had not been available at the time...

...but the wreck of a Monnickendam ship in this neighborhood restrained him, and he decided not to risk his ship and cargo...

...They had, in 1613, equipped for common account at least five ships, four of which were Amsterdam vessels...

...This first concentration of colonists brought Manhattan's population, at the beginning of Peter Minuit's governorship, up to about two hundred and seventy, nearly all men, except for the women among the families which came with the Eentfracht in 1623, and the New Netherland in 1624...

...Then, writing under date of April, 1624, Wassenaer resumes the narrative, giving the full story of the expedition as follows: "The West India Company, being chartered to navigate these rivers, did not neglect to do so, but equipped in the spring [of 1623] a vessel of 130 lasts called the Nieu Nederlandt, whereof Cornelis Jacobsen May, of Hoorn [in North Holland] was skipper, with a company of thirty families, mostly Walloons, to plant a colony there...

...They had completed arrangements with Walloon families, soon to be conveyed to Manhattan...

...Versteeg, as a Dutch contribution toward the settlement of this important question...

...while four years afterward, on August 29, 1620, New Netherlands boundaries, in a petition to "leave the trade in peltries free," were extended from "the thirty-fourth to about the fiftieth degree"—more than three times larger a territory than in 1614...

...Two years later, on account of further discoveries, the bounds were extended two degrees further south...

...It probably stood and served until 1626, when Kryn Ferdericks, a military engineer, began the erection of a new fort about which the Reverend Jonas Michaelius, Dutch Reformed minister, in his letter of August 8, 1628, says: "They build here a new forteresse, not so much as a protection against attacks by the savages, which, with God's help, we need not fear much from now on, as against ennemies from the outside...

...Here, at Manhattan, in the fall of 1613, his ship was burned...

...The fact that there may not have been any white women here does not detract from the permanency of the settlement...

...During those early years there were no independent settlers, or "freemen," as they were called...

...Having been returned to this country, Orson, a few years later, was the cause of Christiaensen's death...

...Thus established by the parliament of the Dutch Republic, the Dutch West India Company launched itself upon an expectant world, with the rival London Chartered Companies as the greatest spectators...

...The captain of this new vessel was probably Hendrick Christiaensen, noted as one of the earliest continuous visitors to these shores, and the first trades-director, a few years later, for the New Netherland Company...

...In regard to preaching in French, which has been given as a proof of a Huguenot majority within the population of New Amsterdam, the preacher, the Reverend Michaelius, previously quoted, in his letter of August 11, 1628, stated that "a portion of the Walloons are going back to the Fatherland, either because their years here are expired, or because some are not very serviceable to the company...

...The argument has always been that some of the early settlers of New Netherland were originally subjects of countries outside the Netherlands...

...Authorities may differ about the meaning of the word "settlement," or about the exact year when such a settlement was made on Manhattan Island...

...But the incident shows that Manhattan was permanently settled by the Dutch at least as early as 1613...

...The "pretended Dutch governor," doubtless none other than the chief agent for the fur trade, signed a certificate of submission, which was forwarded to Virginia and there recorded in the archives...

...That no mention was made May 5, 1926 THE COMMONWEAL 717 at the time of the erection of a fort on Manhattan Island shows that the warehouse here was strong and in good condition...

...After this one voyage the partnership between Block and Christiaensen was dissolved...

...The Dutch company became a success in many respects, though extremely adverse conditions very early hampered its advance...

...It was not until 1630, after the issuing of the "privileges and exemptions," that independent colonists, as well as the Patroons, settled and took up land for cultivating purposes...

...When the company, after 1639, had relinquished its monopoly of the fur trade and other commerce, the free settlers—farmers, mechanics, industrial workers, fur traders, merchants, boatmen, and a host of others, flocked into the country and rendered its colonization a lasting success, long before New Amsterdam became New York City...

...After the expiration of the charter of the New Netherland Company in 1618, the intercourse between Holland and New Netherland gradually altered...

...Meanwhile, Captain Cornelis Hendricks, of Monnickendam and the Onrust, had not been idle...

...This was the reason, after many minor adversities, of the loss to Holland of northern Brazil in 1654, and of New Netherland in 1664...

...Immediately after its official incorporation, the New...

...In their sloops and yachts these agents visited the chief fur-producing sections along the Hudson, provided with seawan and various articles of European manufacture with which to barter for the furs...

...The success of the colonization being assured, the directors of the company in Amsterdam, in the spring of 1625, sent over, through the agency of Peter Evertsen Hulft, horses and cattle, as well as a large number of hogs and sheep...

...After Block, in that ship, had finished exploring Long Island Sound and neighboring coasts, and had put Hendricks in command of the Onrust, the latter set sail for the South River (Delaware) where, besides making important discoveries and "whilst trading in sables, furs, robes, and other skins," he also ransomed from the Minquaes, or Ogehage, tribe of Indians, three agents in the employ of the New Netherland Company— giving for them "kettles, beads, and merchandiser' One of these rescued was probably Kleyn Claasje, or Claas Martensen Van Roosevelt, the ancestor of the Roosevelt family...

...The Dutch Republic and England were frequently at war during the seventeenth century, and the Anglo-Dutch war from 1651 to 1653 indirectly contributed to the loss of Brazil...

...A considerable number of the Walloon population of the Spanish Netherlands, which now are called Belgium, had found a refuge in the seven provinces of the Dutch Republic, like fugitives from many other lands...

...They sailed in the beginning of March and directing their course by the Canary Islands, steered toward the Wild Coast [Guiana] and gained the west wind, which luckily took them in the beginning of May into the river called first Rio de Montagnes, now the River Mauritius [North River, or Hudson River...

...Other points along the Hudson River and its branches were covered by trading yachts, operating from Manhattan...

...Nor did this temporary submission have any effect on the Dutch occupancy...

...All of the colonists, farmers as well as traders and mere adventurers, Walloons as well as Dutch, during the first six or seven years of the agricultural settlement were in the employ of the West India Company...

...But none differs with the eminent Dutch historian, Mr...

...s, for instance, the Dissenters, pilgrims from England, and the Jews from Spain and Portugal...

...This phase of the historic question is worth emphasizing because repeated attempts have been made of late to divide this credit among other nationalities...

...For the preservation of the collected furs and of the European merchandise, as well as for the accommodation of the agents when not on trading trips, suitable buildings had to be erected at some central point...

...It was on October 11, 1614, that this company received a charter, granting them the exclusive trade for three years on "certain new lands situated in America, between New France and Virginia, the sea coasts whereof lie between forty and forty-five degrees of latitude and now called New Netherland...

...They forthwith put the spade in the ground and began to plant, and before the yacht Maeckereel sailed, the grain was nearly as high as a man...

...The free traders, it is worthy of note, gained the day, and until 1622 the trade with New Netherland remained untrammeled...

...This fort was called Fort Nassau, and preceded Fort Orange, in the same region, by about nine years...

...Their High Mightinesses, as the states-general then were called, took no action in regard to the petition...

...While the Dutchmen with Block were busy constructing the yacht, Manhattan received a visit from Captain Samuel Argall, of Virginia, who found here "four houses built, and a pretended Dutch governor," whom he summoned to submit to English authority...

...A year later, in November, 1626, after the arrival of the director-general, Peter Minuit, we find Wassenaer, having received fuller information, continues the history of the settlement, and at the same time gives further particulars about the cattle: uIn our preceding discourse mention was made of New Netherland and its colony, planted by the West India Company, situated in Virginia on the river called by the French, Montaigne, and by us, Mauritius [the Hudson River] and that some families were sent thither out of Holland, now increased to 200 souls...

...WHEN MINUIT CAME TO MANHATTAN By FRANCIS J. WAHLEN THE tercentenaries of New Amsterdam and the purchase of Manhattan Island from the Indians are to be celebrated this year in New York City from May I to July 4. The actual date of the arrival of Peter Minuit, sent out from Amsterdam in Holland by the directors of the chartered West India Company, his landing on Manhattan, and subsequent inauguration as the first governor of New Amsterdam, is generally accepted as having been May 4, 1626...

...Ever since the formation of the East India Company in 1602, voices had been raised in Holland for the erection of a West India Company, which was to accomplish in America what the East India Company was so splendidly achieving in the Orient...

...However, the early Virginian archives were destroyed by fire, so this document is no longer in existence...

...A number of these Walloons were there when the West India Company was looking about for settlers for their New Netherland colony beyond Manhattan...

...After the discovery of the Hudson River by the crew of the Halve Maen, in 1609, a company of Amsterdam merchants, encouraged by the reports of Hendrick Hudson and his Dutch mate, dispatched, in 7i6 THE COMMONWEAL May 5, 1926 1610, a ship to trade with the natives for the furs of which the reports had contained such glowing accounts, and samples of which, conveyed across the sea by the Halve Maen, had aroused the mercantile instinct of the Dutch...

...Captain Block was given command of the Tyger, and Christiaensen was put in charge of the Fortuyn...

...The following year all the other agricultural settlements, throughout New Netherland, were broken up for a time (until the system of groups-colonizing, under Patroons) and the farming population removed to Manhattan, while only a small company of fur traders, twenty-six in all, remained at Fort Orange...

...The charter to the West India Company, of June, 1621, was not comprehensive enough, and two years later, on June 21, 1623, the states-general finally amplified the original, though the provisional directors had not waited for this to enter upon the business of the company...

...Nothing definite is known about the success of this venture other than that Christiaensen took back with him two young Indians, Orson and Valentine, "sons of the principal sachem there...

...and afterward some ships, one with horses, the other with cows, and the third with hay...

...Seven years later, in 1620, Captain Thomas Dermer, another Virginian, visited the island and had a conference with its Dutch traders "about the state of that coast...

...This new fort was not finished until 1635...