MIDDLETOWN a Biography

MIDDLETOWN A Biography -By FRANKLJN B. WILLIAMS Member of the Historical Society of Middletown and the Wallkill Precinct, Author of "Sources of Orange County History" PUBLISHED BY Lawrence A. Toepp Middletown, N. Y. 1928 COPYRIGHT 1928 BY LAWRENCE A. TOEPP Printed in 1'14 United States of Amtrita /;y The Whitlock Press, Inc. Middletown, N.Y. Preface The fact that the history of Middletown has been neg lected, rather than that it is not sensational nor of strategic importance to the nation, is responsible for the widespread belief that the story is without interest and significance. This is the first systematic attempt to comprehensively relate Middletown's history. Doubtlessly it has the usual shortcomings of a pioneer effort. Many months have been spent gathering and arranging the material, much of which appeared serially in the Middletown Times Herald in 1927 as "A Biography of Middletown." All previous histories, manuscripts and other available sources have been utilized. Credit is due Hasbrouck's 1857 directory, and the Ruttenber and Clark Orange County history. Old residents have sup plied much information. The fact that the greater part of new material was obtained from careful examination of several thousand old newspapers explains the absence of references. All facts, nevertheless, have been authenticated. Thanks are due to Hon. William T. Doty, Hon. Charles J. Boyd, John Wilkin, Esq., and Mr. Ferris M. Pronk who have read and corrected manuscript and proof. The form of arrangements has been selected as the most suitable to narrate the general story in an interesting and uninterrupted manner. The main problem has been one of elimination and condensation. It is neither seemly nor wise to laugh at the fads and foibles of the past, of which every generation has its varie ties. It is well to remember that those who move through these pages, whatever their dress or manners, were men and women. Little effort has been made to point out the philosophy of the history of Middletown. The reflective reader will de rive much of value. FRANKLIN B. WILLIAMS. Contents Preface . 1 Contents . 3 I The Pioneers, Earliest Times until 1815 ...... 5 II The Hamlet, 1816-1840 ..................... 29 III The Village, 1840-1865 . 38 IV Super-Village, 1865-1888 .................... 64 V The City, 1888 to the present ................ 76 VI Military, The Wars and Militia .............. 84 VII The City's Growth, Population and Streets .... 92 VIII Schools, Lyceum, Libraries, Hospitals......... 106 IX Fire Department. 123 X City Government, Officials ... : .............. 130 XI Personalities . ..... 136 XII Churches and Cemeteries . ....... 145 XIII Organizations . " . 168 XIV Miscellaneous: Newspapers, Sports, Post Office, Banks, Bibliography ................... 175 I. The Pioneers (Until 1815) INTRODUCTORY To trace intelligently the early growth of the city of Middletown, it is necessary to have at least an outline back grou~d to bring the facts into proper relationship and prormnence. The modern history of this region, necessarily, starts with the discovery of, or at least the navigation of, the Hud son River by the intrepid Dutch navigator whose name it bears, in 1609. It was 75 years later, however, before the first settlement was made in the county, that of Patrick MacGregorie and his fellow Scotchmen, who in or before 1684, settled on Plum Point, in the present town of New Windsor at the mouth of the Moodna, Murderers Creek or Otterkill, as the stream is variously known. The next authentic settlement was made in the Never sink and Delaware valleys about Port Jervis, both in New York and New Jersey, early in the 1690s. There is a tradi tion that this settlement was founded many years earlier, but the matter is immaterial in this connection. General settlement of the county followed. Newburgh ,vas founded early in the 18th Century. Goshen was a suf ficient center of population to support a church as early as 1720. Farms and homesteads soon dotted the fertile Wall kill valley about Montgomery and settlers poured into the Warwick region. Orange County had been established in 1683, but it was not until years later that it was given a full county govern ment, for the simple reason that when it was established there were practically no people in it (it then included Rock land County, which had been settled at Haverstraw for sev eral years.) Orange County extended north only as far as the southern boundary of the present town of Wallkill, so that Middletown, as first settled, was in Ulster County. 5 THE PATENTS The city of Middletown lies on land which was once the property of the Indians. The manner in which the land was bought by the white men is an interesting story. When Orange County land was purchased from the Indians, there were no settlers in the region. The real es tate dealers and wealthy speculators who bought up great tracts of territory were unacquainted with the land which they bought. It had never been surveyed. Parts of it had never been trod by white men. The plots were purchased in a hap-hazard manner, with boundaries of various por tions overlapping so that quarrels ensued. Theoretically, at least, Middletown was in the Minisink Patent. The Minisink Patent was granted August 28, 1704, to Benjamin Aske, Derick Vandenburg, Lancaster Syms, Daniel Honan, J. Cholwell, Hendrick Ten-Eycke, Philip Rokeby, who were also Wawayanda patentees; Ann Bridges, who was the widow of Dr. Bridges, below mentioned; and Matthew Ling, Ebenezer Wilson, Philip French, Stephen de Lancey, John Corbett, Caleb Cooper, William Sharpas, Robert Milward, Thomas Wenham, John Person, Petrus Bayard, Peter Fanconier, Henry Swift, Jarvis Marshall and George Clark. It is claimed that these men never paid the Indians for the land, and got them to sign the deed when they were drunk. This the savages gave as a reason for fighting in the French and Indian War. This huge tract of land, almost large enough to be a county within itself, started somewhere in Ulster County at a point to the north east of "Bashe's Land," ran west to the Delaware, south to Great Minisink Island, east to Wawayanda, thence to the Evans patent, and thence to the starting point. Its territory is now included in Orange, Sullivan, and Ulster Counties. To the south was the Wawayanda Patent, granted April 29, 1703, to Doctor John Bridges, Hendrick TenEycke, Der ick Vandenburgh, John Cholwell, Christopher Denn, Lan caster Syms, Daniel Honan, Philip Rokeby, John Merritt, Benjamin Aske, Peter Mathews and Cornelius Christianse. These men had purchased the land from twelve Indian pro prietors, whose names are long, and to us, meaningless, so need not be repeated. The deed is dated March 5, 1703. The land included "certain tracts or parcels of vacant land named Wawayanda and some other small tracts or parcels of land, being bounded on the eastward by the high hills of the Highlands and the patent of Capt. John Evans on the north by the division line of the counties of Orange and Ulster [which ran south of Middletown], on the westward by the high hills to the eastward of the Minisinks, and on the south by the division line of the provinces of New York and East Jersey." The Tract so carelessly described in- 6 eluded all of the territory in the present towns of Warwick, Goshen, Chester, Minisink and Wawayanda with some left over. The approximate boundaries of the early patents, together with the location of the Minisink Angle, in which is Middletown (M), may be seen from the above map. To the right is the Hudson River, to the west the Delaware. (After Ruttenber). Considering the careless method of buying land, it was inevitable that there should be boundary disputes. One among many, such a quarrel broke out between the owners of lands in the Minisink and Wawayanda patents. Details are strangely lacking. Of the settlement of the fight, E. M. Ruttenber, authority on the early history of Orange County, says only: "In the subsequent adjustment ...... a portion of the territory claimed by the Wawayanda patentees was cut off, while on the west an angle was formed, known as the Mini sink Angle, embracing a tract of 130,000 acres." Middletown stands in the Minisink Angle, the position of which can easily be seen by referring to the accompany ing map. WALLKILL PRECINCT Middletown originally stood in Ulster County, which then also included Newburgh and New Windsor, as may be '1 seen from the accompanying map. Middletown remained in Ulster until 1798, as will be later mentioned. Wallkill Precinct, in which Middletown stands, was erected by act of the Colonial Assembly, December 17, 1743. At that time the precinct contained a huge tract of land, including the present towns of Wallkill, Crawford, Mont- ...... --.. - .. .....,. ... , , " .,-- I ~ , ✓ I ,.-'1 I ' I The above map shows the location of the old Orange-Ulster boundary line in relation to the present outline of the county and its townships. gomery, and portions of Hamptonburgh and Mount Hope. The subsequent peeling of the town to its present size need not be told in detail here, inasmuch as Middletown has always remained in the old township. In 1772 Wallkill was divided in two, the eastern half, containing the present towns of Montgomery and Crawford becoming known as Hanover Precinct. Following the Revolution Wallkill Pre cinct became a township, and at later dates portions of it were pared off to form with other territory, Mount Hope and Hamp_tonburgh. Original Wallkill is shown in the accompanying map. The original Wallkill Precinct act is of considerable interest. It is titled: "An Act to divide the Southern part of the County of Ulster into Precincts, and to enable the corporation of Kingston and the manor of Foxhall to choose and elect one supervisor more, and for regulating the super visors and assessor within the said county." 8 The precinct was bounded for the most part, by the lines of early grants, which are unintelligible to anyone except an experienced surveyor, perhaps, or someone who has intensely studied the matter, and, it may be, not even to them.

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