Quarterly Bulletin of The New-York Historical Society VOLUME XVIII (April, 1934-January, 1935) and Annual Report for 1934

The New-York Historical Society !935

THE NEW-YORK HISTORICAL SOCIETY QUARTERLY BULLETIN VOL. XVIII APRIL, 1934 No. 1

HON. JOHN ALSOP (1724-1794). Bequest of Mary Rhinelander King, 1909. : 170 CENTRAL PARK WEST PUBLISHED BY THE SOCIETY AND ISSUED TO MEMBERS THE NEW-YORK HISTORICAL SOCIETY, 170 CENTRAL PARK WEST (Erected by the Society 1908) Wings to be erected on the 76th and 77th Street corners

OFFICERS OF THE SOCIETY

For Three Years, ending January 8, 1935

PRESIDENT FOREIGN CORRESPONDING SECRETARY JOHN ABEEL WEEKES ARCHER MILTON HUNTINGTON

FIRST VICE-PRESIDENT DOMESTIC CORRESPONDING SECRETART ROBERT E. DOWLING ERSKINE HEWITT

SECOND VICE-PRESIDENT RECORDING SECRETARY ARTHUR H. MASTEN B. W. B. BROWN

THIRD VICE-PRESIDENT TREASURER R. HORACE GALLATIN GEORGE A. ZABRISKIE

FOURTH VICE-PRESIDENT LIBRARIAN WILLIAM D. MURPHY ALEXANDER J. WALL THE STUYVESANT FAMILY BIBLE BY MAJOR EDWARD VAN WINKLE Formerly Recording Secretary of the Holland Society of New York

Family Bibles containing records and dates and signatures are always of interest to particular families; when the people recorded in them are of importance, they interest others as well, for their contributions to genealogy and history; and when the Bibles are rare editions, they become a study for bibliographers. The Stuy­ vesant Family Bible here pictured and described exemplifies to an unusual degree this three-fold interest. The writer, used to the frequent sights of our most ancient treasures, and trained by service to seek them, views this book as the most fascinating in history of ownership of any book yet found, connected with New Amsterdam. He acquired it in Summit, New Jersey, where, on Saturday, June 27, 1933, it was sold with the personal effects of William Oakley Raymond at public auction. During his re­ searches, since the Stuyvesant Bible came into his possession, the writer has corresponded about it with more than one hundred and fifty librarians and Bible collectors. This Stuyvesant Bible is known officially as the Leiden 1636—37 Bible. It is folio size, measuring ten by sixteen by five inches, and weighs approximately thirteen pounds. It shows unmistakable signs of long and severe use. Several pages in the front of the book are altogether or partly missing, including the title page; and several pages in the back of the volume are missing or torn. It is the first edition of the version authorized by the States General, which became the standard Bible of the Dutch Reformed Church, corresponding to Luther's version in Germany, and the King James Bible in England. Even the Remonstrants, the bitter theological opponents of the translators, after a careful official examination of the version, adopted it for their own use. The Synod of Dort (Dordrecht), in 1618-19, resolved to prepare a new Dutch version of the Scriptures from the original languages, and laid down the rules for the work.1 Six translators 1 N. Henlopins, Historie van de Nederlandsche Overzettenge des Bybels, 1777. 3 k, , V"**s?* ^i^- * ^Mte lllilliiM H

w a; w >^fe if 1 I | o pF .til P

O JO o >I o o

M H K!

STUYVESANT FAMILY BIBLE, PRINTED IN LEIDEN, 1636-37. Owned by Major Edward Van Winkle. QUARTERLYBULLETIN 0 were appointed: for the Old Testament, Jan Bogerman, President of the Synod and Pastor of Leeuwarden; Willem Baudart, Pastor of Zutphen; and Gerson Bucer, Pastor of Veere in Zeeland; for the New Testament, Jacob Roland, Assessor of the Synod and Pastor of Amsterdam; H. Faulelius, Pastor of Middleburg; and Peter Cornelii, Pastor of Enkhuysen. Faulelius and Cornelii died before the work began, and their places were filled by Anthony Waloeus, Divinity Professor at Leiden, and Festus Hommius, Secretary of the Synod and Pastor at Leiden. G. Bucer and J. Roland died during the progress of the work, and the former's place was filled by Anthony Thysius, a Leiden professor. This action of the Synod required the sanction of the States General, which granted funds for the special task and released the translators from their ordinary duties. Hence the translation of the Old Testament was begun in 1628, and that of the New Testament in 1630. The translators worked under a supervisory committee, one for each Testament chosen by each of the Prov­ inces to which the translation as it progressed was submitted for approval. The first draft was completed in 1632, and the final revision in 1635. The printing was done by Paulus Aertsz Van Ravensteyn for the widow and heirs of Hillebrant Jacobs of Wouw, Regular Printers for the States General. The States General gave the privilege to print the book on December 11, 1632-, and on June 10, 1637, approved the printing. In accord­ ance with the directions of the Synod, the Apocrypha were placed in a separate section at the end of the volume. At the time authority was given to print the Bible, by the National.Synod of the Reformed Church, the father of Governor was a member of that Synod, from Scherpen­ zeel.2 He was the Reverend Balthazar Johannes Stuyvesant, who had matriculated at the University of Franeker, on May 22, 1605, and had been ordained in 1609. It takes no imagination to realize that those responsible for authorizing the printing of this Bible would obtain one of the first printed copies; so, in all prob­ ability, this Stuyvesant Bible was one of the first to come off the 2 Alma R. Van Hoevenberg, "The Stuyvesants in the and ," in The New York Historical Society Quarterly Bulletin, X, 4, April, 1926. O THEN. EW-YORK HISTORICAL SOCIETY press. The original subscription list would doubtless show the Reverend Balthazar Stuyvesant's name well up on the list. Such a list was in existence in 1777, at the University of Leiden, but Dr. J. E. Kroon, the present Librarian there, writes that they now have no subscription list for the first Bible after the Dordrecht Synod. The Bible was printed at Leiden, just three miles from the Stuyvesant home at Alphen on the Rhine. At the time it was in press, Peter Stuyvesant was in South America. He was ap­ pointed Director of the Islands of Curacao, Buenaire, Aruba, and their dependent islands, off the coast of Venezuela, under a com­ mission from the States General of the United Provinces, dated July 28, 1643, which is in the National Archives at the Hague. In an attack on the island of St. Martin, in 1644, he was shot in the leg, and invalided home for surgical treatment, and for the final amputation of the lower part of his right leg. It requires but little imagination to picture his homecoming. ' Upon his ar­ rival, physically disabled, at Alphen, on the Rhine, between Leiden and Gouda, he found that his mother had died, that his father had married again, and that he, too, had died. His stepmother had a younger sister, Judith De Vos Bayard, who took an interest in Peter, nursed him back to vigorous manhood, and gave him sufficient courage to ask her to be his wife. They were married, and set off together for New Amsterdam. In order to compare the Stuyvesant Bible with others printed at Leiden in 1636, a diligent search was made in the United States, in Great Britain, and on the continent of Europe. Thus far, only three other copies have been found. There is no copy of this: edition in the , none in the New York Public Library; none in the possession of the American Bible Society. One copy was located in the British Museum, London, through Dr. H. M. Lydenberg, Assistant Director of The New York Public Library. A second copy was located through Dr. J. E. Kroon, Bibliothecaris of the Library of Leiden University, in that Library. A third copy is owned by The New York Historical Society, one which formerly was in the possession of the Reverend Warmoldus Kuypers, and which was presented to the Society in 1882 by Mrs. Jane dePeyster Cooper. A comparison of the writer's Stuyvesant Bible with the Bible at the New York His- QUARTERLYBULLETIN 7 torical Society, and with some photographs of the Bibles in London and Leiden, shows that they are apparently of three different print­ ings, with differences in typography and in decorations. It is im­ possible as yet to make a complete bibliographical study of these differences, nor is that the purpose of this article. For the present, until the writer can take his Bible over to Europe, to compare it

iuni'c^Cfl v~ -f$24 M W&*rw* ™y™^ive}-ej

m

. FAMILY RECORDS WRITTEN IN THE STUYVESANT BIBLE BY GERARDUS STUYVESANT (1691-1777). with the Bibles there, suffice it to say that in all four Bibles the title pages are identical, and they have the same dates for the privilege, authorization, approval of translation, and license by the States General. The Kuypers Bible owned by The New York His­ torical Society, seems to agree with the British Museum copy in folio numbering and in the colophon: "Tot LEYDEN, Ghedruckt by Paulus Aertsz van Ravensteyn. do. Io. c. xxxvi." The Stuy­ vesant Bible agrees with these in the folio numbering, but on the 8 THE NEW-YORK HISTORICAL SOCIETY last page of the Book of Revelations, instead of the above colo­ phon, there is a large and elaborate design of a cherub with an overflowing horn of plenty in each hand. On the corresponding page in the University of Leiden copy there is a small scroll design, with an open book and the printer's monogram. But even after this bibliographical puzzle is solved, the real interest in the Stuyvesant Bible centers in the intimate records written in longhand in the book. These are principally in the handwriting of Gerardus Stuyvesant (i 691—1777), grandson of Director-General Peter Stuyvesant. This Gerardus Stuyvesant was City Magistrate for thirty years, "Out Ward Alderman" of for thirty-three years, from 1722 to 1755, and Deputy Mayor, 1735 and 1747. The English translation of the entries made in Dutch (as shown in the illustration), is as follows: 1722 is married Gerardus Stuyvesant with Judith Bayard on 5 March; 1722 the 1 October is born our first son, Nicholas Willie Stuyvesant. June 6, 1724 is born my second son Petrus Stuyvesant. 1726 the 20 June is born my third son Gerardus Stuyvesant. 1727 the 13 October is born our fourth son Petrus Stuyvesant. October the 5th, 1751, my house wife rests in the Lord, Judith Stuyvesant.

In another place in the Bible there is a record written, in Dutch, which translated reads: "Peter Stuyvesant, October the 13, 1727, is born at one hour in the morning." This son, who at first wrote his name "Peter," according to the English usage, was in-

xua-ntS QUARTERLYBULLETIN 9 fluenced by his father to write it "Petrus," to perpetuate the name of his ancestor, the Director-General, and a memorandum to that effect, dated New York, July 17, 1748, is recorded in the Bible. In 1764, Petrus Stuyvesant (1727—1865) married Margaret Liv­ ingston, and they had a daughter, Cornelia, born in 1767. She married , of Albany, and died in Trenton, New Jersey, February 24, 1825. Dirck Ten Broeck's signature appears in the Bible, so he was evidently the owner after his wife's death, until he died in 1832. For the next few years, there is no in­ formation as to the whereabouts of the Bible. Shortly after 1850, the Stuyvesant Bible was found in the possession of William Lewis Raymond, Esquire, counsellor-at-law, residing in Summit, New Jersey, with offices in New York. He was at one time Consul at Leeds, England, appointed by Abraham Lincoln. The Bible was left in 1913, to his son, William Oakley Raymond, an architect, who sold it to the writer, the present owner.

ADDRESS BY THE HONORABLE JAMES W. GERARD

The Honorable James W. Gerard will address the Society on the evening of May 1, 1934.

MEMBERSHIP

The following were elected members of the Society: Honorary member: The Honorable Mieczyslaw Marchlewski, Consul General of Poland. Life member: Howard M. Canoune. Annual members: John Wyckoff Mettler and Professor Nel­ son P. Mead. Associate member: Henry Benson Adriance. 10 THE NEW-YORK HISTORICAL SOCIETY

LETTERS TO JOHN ALSOP, 1775 Mr. Gherardi Davis recently gave the Society some extremely interesting letters written to the Honorable John Alsop (1724— 1794), which constitute source material for the history of New York City in the troubled, uncertain year 1775. Twenty of these letters were written to Alsop from New York City, between May 10 and October 19, 1775, when he was a delegate from New York to the Second ; and eight were sent to him in November and December, 1775, by his fellow-delegate, Francis Lewis (1713—1803), who remained in , at­ tending the sessions of Congress, after Alsop had returned to New York. Twelve of the letters are from Christopher Smith of New York City and Jamaica, , who evidently looked after Alsop's mercantile interests during his absence; three are from the firm of Curson & Seton (Richard Curson and William Seton), and two were written by Peter Keteltas. These correspondents be­ longed to the mercantile class, and were moderate in politics. Peter Keteltas expressed the opinion of others in his group when he wrote to Alsop from New York, on May 23, 1775 : "Hope the Congress will see cause to petition the King Again; and I wish it could be in a soft strain and abate of their Demands rather than Involve the Continent in a Cruel War, which will be the destruction of our province at Least." These are principally business letters, and contain news of arriving and departing ships; rumors of troops embarking for America, with conjectures as to their destination; and questions of the advisability of removing families and possessions from New York City to a place of greater safety. Christopher Smith (and, to a lesser extent, Peter Keteltas, also) were concerned over the tea situation. The Association drawn up by the First Continental Congress in October, 1774, forbade the importation of tea after December 1, 1774, and prohibited its purchase or consumption after March 1, 1775. Smith and other merchants in New York and Philadelphia had supplies of tea on hand, which they had im­ ported before the adoption of the . Hence, in May and June, 1775, and on into October, both Smith and QUARTERLYBULLETIN 11

Keteltas were writing to Alsop, expressing the hope that an excep­ tion might be made by the Second Continental Congress, allowing merchants to sell tea, particularly as it was on these very tea merchants that Congress and the local'committees had to rely for supplies of arms and ammunition. Christopher Smith wrote on June 5, 1775: "Pray how Can the Congress Expect to be Supply'd with the Sinews of Warr, when the only People that are Used to Intro- duc[e] those Articalls, are Deprived from Selling an Articall they so much were Incouraged to Import to prevent the same from England which would have paid a duty."

Peter Van Brugh Livingston wrote to Alsop on June 28, 1775, as President of the New York Provincial Congress, asking him to purchase 2852 blankets in Philadelphia for the troops raising in New York, as none were obtainable in New York City. On July 12, Commissary Peter T. Curtenius asked for information about the possibility of procuring at Philadelphia, 120 drum-heads, 400 spades, 170 pieces of raven's-duck for tents, and 100 pieces of osnaburgs. The letters from Francis Lewis to Alsop, written in Phila­ delphia in November and December, 1775, relate chiefly to sup­ plies for the Northern Army and for the troops at Cambridge. On'November 28, 1775, for example, Lewis wrote that he had just dispatched towards Albany, wagons carrying stockings, felt hats, woolen caps, leather breeches, shoes, waistcoats, and watch- coats. But as he had heard that the soldiers in Canada were adequately clothed, he advised sending the clothing to Colonel Mifflin, the Quartermaster-General, for the use of the Continental regiments wintering at Cambridge, Massachusetts.

RECORDS OF THE TONTINE COFFEE HOUSE ASSOCIATION On March seventh, Mr. James T. Horn presented to the Society thirteen volumes containing original manuscript records of the Tontine association of New York City, for the years 1791 through 1871. The earliest volume includes the "proposals for 12 THE NEW-YORK HISTORICAL SOCIETY building on a Tontine Plan a house to be used as the Coffee House of the City of New York"; together with the minutes of the organizing meeting held on March 30, 1791, and the signatures of the original subscribers. According to the Tontine plan, a nominee was designated for each share, on whose life the share depended. Originally there were two hundred shares. With the money sub­ scribed, the Tontine Coffee House was erected on the corner of Wall and Water Street (replaced in 1855 by the Tontine Build­ ing) . One of the early account books contains all the expenditures for building and furnishing it, from 1791 through 1793. These manuscript volumes, show that profits from the Coffee House property were divided each May among the owners of those shares of which the nominees were still living. On May 1, 1843, there were eighty surviving nominees. The association was dissolved in November, 1870, when the nominees on whose lives the shares depended were reduced to seven, and then, in accord­ ance with the Constitution of 1794, all the property of the asso­ ciation became vested in the "Persons then entitled to the shares standing in the names of the seven Surviving nominees." The affairs of the Tontine were administered by a shareholders, of which Frederic De Peyster was for many years the chairman. At the end, there were only two shareholders en­ titled to serve on the executive Committee, because of the consti­ tutional requirement, limiting its membership to residents of New York City. These two members were Messrs. Frederic De Peyster and William T. Horn. It is the latter's son, Mr. James T. Horn, who has given these manuscript records to the Society. The thirteen volumes comprising his gift are as follows: one volume of minutes of meetings of the subscribers to the Tontine Coffee House, 1791, 1793—1804, together with records of dividend payments, 1794—1803; one ledger, 1791—1816; one receipt book, 1792—1816; one account book of expenditures in building and fur­ nishing the Tontine Coffee House, 1791—1793; one account book, 1817—1871, of the Committee of the Tontine Coffee House (and Building) ; three volumes recording payments of annual dividends, 1805—1855; two volumes of copies of transfers of shares, 1797— 1870; and three volumes of minutes of the Committee of the Tontine Coffee House (and Building), 1813—1871. QUARTERLYBULLETIN 13

GIFTS

The following is a partial list of gifts received by the Society in the past three months: From Mr. Hevlyn D. Benson, a one-page manuscript contain­ ing the family record of Henry M. Close, written by Samuel Close, postmaster of Greenwich, Connecticut. From the Burns Society of New York City, the Minute Book of that Society, 1871-1931. From Mr. Edmund Bramhall Child, 31 valentines of the 1870's, 18 theatrical programs, 3 theatrical posters, 9 photographs of actresses, 113 trade cards, 20 tickets for lectures, etc., 1858— 1864, and the Westchester County Journal, for March 31, 1865. From Mrs. Antoinette Drummond Doran, a manuscript gene­ alogical chart, made in 1794, of the descendants of Killian . From the Hon. Henry P. Fletcher, a facsimile of Elias Bou- dinot's interesting letter to his wife, dated New York, April 24, 1789, describing Washington's arrival in New York City for his first_inauguration as President. From Mrs. Thomas K. Gale, the manuscript diary of David M. Prall (c. 1799-1848) of New York City, describing his jour­ ney from New York to Niagara, in July, 1821. From Mrs. Irving McKesson, a bill of A. J. Henderson at the City Hotel, New York City, in 1844; eleven valentines and two birthday cards dating from the middle of the last century; four early 19th century pamphlets, and two hundred and six pieces of Continental paper currency, 1775—1781. From Mr. Gherardi Davis, besides the letters to John Alsop, described above, a one-dollar bank note of the Bank of Columbia, Hudson, N. Y., 1814; and a three-dollar bank note of the Phenix Bank of New York City, 1817. 14 THE NEW-YORK HISTORICAL SOCIETY

From Mr. Henry Pearl Talmadge, a winter dress uniform, an overcoat, a summer dress uniform, and a fatigue uniform, worn by him as a private in Company K, 7th Regiment, N. G. N. Y., from 1870 to 1877; together with epaulettes, 3 pairs of gloves, white duck spats, a linen cross-belt with plate, 2 belt-plates, 2 gray cloth hats, 2 shakos, a cartridge box, and a leather knap­ sack.

THE CENTENARY OF LAFAYETTE'S DEATH, 1834-1934 Exhibition In commemoration of Lafayette's death, on May twentieth, one hundred years ago, the Society has arranged, in the north and south galleries on the main floor, an exhibition which will be con­ tinued throughout the month of May. Included in the exhibition are letters written by Lafayette; objects which he used to own; two oil paintings, busts, and engraved portraits; broadsides, pam­ phlets, and biographies published during his lifetime or shortly after his death; invitations and other memorabilia connected with his visit to New York City in 1824—25. Lectures The centenary commemoration was fittingly inaugurated on the evening of March sixth, by a lecture on Lafayette's birthplace, the chateau of Chavaniac, given by Madame Le Verrier, hostess at Chavaniac. Madame Le Verrier told about the purchase and restoration of the chateau by a committee of Americans, as a shrine to Lafayette, and of the school for children there, which makes it a very vital memorial. She showed many pictures of Chavaniac and its gardens, and of the very interesting moun­ tainous country which surrounds it. Members of the Society and their friends will again have an opportunity of honoring Lafayette's memory on Tuesday evening, April third, when Dr. William Mather Lewis, President of La­ fayette College, will lecture before the Society on Lafayette in America. MEMBERSHIP

Membership requires the nomination and recom­ mendation of a member. Members, on their election, pay an initiation fee of Twenty Dollars, which includes dues for the current year; and annually thereafter Ten Dollars as dues; or a life-membership fee of One Hundred Dollars, in lieu of all other dues and fees. The contribution of Five Thousand Dollars to the funds of the Society shall entitle the donor to be elected a Patron of the Society in perpetuity. The contribution of One Thousand Dollars shall en­ title the donor to be elected a Fellow for life.

While the Society is freely enjoyed by the public, it has always been maintained without public funds, endowments constituting its main support. Additional funds are earnestly solicited in order that the usefulness of its collections may be augmented and many plans realized in the service it can render the public.

<£

FORM OF A BEQUEST

I give and bequeath to "The New-York Historical Society," founded in the year 1804, and incorporated by the Legislature of New York in the year 1809, the sum of dollars. EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE

FIRST CLASS—FOR ONE YEAR, ENDING THIRD CLASS—FOR THREE YEARS, ENDING 1934 1936 LEONIDAS WESTERVELT W. GEDNEY BEATTY ARCHER M. HUNTINGTON ERSKINE HEWITT HIRAM SMITH JAMES LENOX BANKS

SECOND CLASS--FOR TWO YEARS, ENDING FOURTH CLASS—FOR FOUR YEARS, ENDING '935 1937 AUGUSTUS C. HONE SAMUEL V. HOFFMAN DEWITT M. LOCKMAN ROBERT E. DOWLING HENRY PARISH JOHN HILL MORGAN SAMUEL V. HOFFMAN, Chairman ALEXANDER J. WALL, Secretary [The President, Vice-Presidents, Recording Secretary, Treasurer, and Librarian are members of the Executive Committee.]

STANDING COMMITTEES

COMMITTEE ON FINANCE COMMITTEE ON ANNIVERSARY GEORGE A. ZABRISKIE ARCHER M. HUNTINGTON R. HORACE GALLATIN DEWITT M. LOCKMAN ROBERT E. DOWLING ERSKINE HEWITT

COMMITTEE ON LECTURES COMMITTEE ON BUILDING B. W. B. BROWN ROBERT E. DOWLING LEONIDAS WESTERVELT GEORGE A. ZABRISKIE ERSKINE HEWITT B. W. B. BROWN

COMMITTEE ON LIBRARY AND MUSEUM COMMITTEE ON FINE ARTS ALEXANDER J. WALL DEWITT M. LOCKMAN ARTHUR H. MASTEN WILLIAM D. MURPHY WILLIAM D. MURPHY JOHN HILL MORGAN

COMMITTEE ON PUBLICATIONS COMMITTEE ON PLAN AND SCOPE ALEXANDER J. WALL R. HORACE GALLATIN R. HORACE GALLATIN JAMES LENOX BANKS HENRY PARISH JOHN HILL MORGAN

COMMITTEE ON MEMBERSHIP HIRAM SMITH AUGUSTUS C. HONE GEORGE A. ZABRISKIE HOURS Library and Museum 10 A.M.-5 P.M. Week days; Holidays 1-5 P.M. Annex 4 West 77th St. 1 to 4 P.M. Saturday Buildings Closed—Christmas, New Year's, July 4th, Thanksgiving and the month of August; Annex closed June to September.