Part 6 (1/2)
When doughty Peter Stuyvesant became Governor of New Netherland, he determined to a.s.sert Dutch authority once more on the South River, as the Delaware was called in distinction from the Hudson. As the Swedes now controlled it by their three forts, not a Dutch s.h.i.+p could reach Fort Na.s.sau without being held up at Fort Elfsborg or at Fort Christina or at the fort at Tinic.u.m. It was a humiliating situation for the haughty spirit of the Dutch governor. To open the river to Dutch commerce again, Stuyvesant marched overland in 1651 through the wilderness, with one hundred and twenty men and, abandoning Fort Na.s.sau, built a new fort on a fine promontory which then extended far out into the river below Christina. Today the place is known as New Castle; the Dutch commonly referred to it as Sandhoeck or Sand Point; the English called it Grape Vine Point. Stuyvesant named it Fort Casimir.
The tables were now turned: the Dutch could retaliate upon Swedish s.h.i.+pping. But the Swedes were not so easily to be dispossessed. Three years later a new Swedish governor named Rising arrived in the river with a number of immigrants and soldiers. He sailed straight up to Fort Casimir, took it by surprise, and ejected the Dutch garrison of about a dozen men. As the successful coup occurred on Trinity Sunday, the Swedes renamed the place Fort Trinity.
The whole population-Dutch and Swede, but in 1654 mostly Swede-numbered only 368 persons. Before the arrival of Rising there had been only seventy. It seems a very small number about which to be writing history; but small as it was their ”High Mightinesses,” as the government of the United Netherlands was called, were determined to avenge on even so small a number the insult of the capture of Fort Casimir.
Drums, it is said, were beaten every day in Holland to call for recruits to go to America. Gunners, carpenters, and powder were collected. A s.h.i.+p of war was sent from Holland, accompanied by two other vessels whose names alone, Great Christopher and King Solomon, should have been sufficient to scare all the Swedes. At New Amsterdam, Stuyvesant labored night and day to fit out the expedition. A French privateer which happened to be in the harbor was hired. Several other vessels, in all seven s.h.i.+ps, and six or seven hundred men, with a chaplain called Megapolensis, composed this mighty armament gathered together to drive out the handful of poor hardworking Swedes. A day of fasting and prayer was held and the Almighty was implored to bless this mighty expedition which, He was a.s.sured, was undertaken for ”the glory of His name.” It was the absurdity of such contrasts as this running all through the annals of the Dutch in America that inspired Was.h.i.+ngton Irving to write his infinitely humorous ”History of New York from the Beginning of the World to the End of the Dutch Dynasty,” by ”Diedrich Knickerbocker.” It is difficult for an Anglo-Saxon to take the Dutch in America seriously. What can you do with a people whose imagination allowed them to give such names to their s.h.i.+ps as Weigh Scales, Spotted Cow, and The Pear Tree? So Irving described the taking of Fort Casimir in mock heroic manner. He describes the marshaling of the Dutch hosts of New York by families, the Van Grolls of Anthony's Nose, the Brinkerhoffs, the Van Kortlandts, the Van Bunschotens of Nyack and Kakiat, the fighting men of Wallabout, the Van Pelts, the Say Dams, the Van Dams, and all the warriors of h.e.l.lgate ”clad in their thunder-and-lightning gaberdines,” and lastly the standard bearers and bodyguards of Peter Stuyvesant, bearing the great beaver of the Manhattan.
”And now commenced the horrid din, the desperate struggle, the maddening ferocity, the frantic desperation, the confusion and self-abandonment of war. Dutchman and Swede commingled, tugged, panted, and blowed. The heavens were darkened with a tempest of missives. Bang! went the guns; whack! went the broadswords; thump! went the cudgels; cras.h.!.+ went the musket-stocks; blows, kicks, cuffs, scratches, black eyes and b.l.o.o.d.y noses swelling the horrors of the scene! Thick, thwack, cut and hack, helter-skelter, higgledy-piggledy, hurly-burly, heads-over-heels, rough-and-tumble! Dunder and blixum! swore the Dutchmen; splitter and splutter! cried the Swedes. Storm the works! shouted Hardkoppig Peter. Fire the mine! roared stout Rising-Tantarar-ra-ra! tw.a.n.ged the trumpet of Antony Van Corlear;-until all voice and sound became unintelligible,-grunts of pain, yells of fury, and shouts of triumph mingling in one hideous clamor. The earth shook as if struck with a paralytic stroke; trees shrunk aghast, and withered at the sight; rocks burrowed in the ground like rabbits; and even Christina creek turned from its course, and ran up a hill in breathless terror!”
As a matter of fact, the fort surrendered without a fight on September 1, 1655. It was thereupon christened New Amstel, afterwards New Castle, and was for a long time the most important town on the Delaware. This achievement put the Dutch in complete authority over the Swedes on both sides of the river. The Swedes, however, were content, abandoned politics, secluded themselves on their farms, and left politics to the Dutch. Trade, too, they left to the Dutch, who, in their effort to monopolize it, almost killed it. This conquest by their High Mightinesses also ended the attempts of the New Englanders, particularly the people of New Haven, to get a foothold in the neighborhood of Salem, New Jersey, for which they had been struggling for years. They had dreams of a great lake far to northward full of beaver to which the Delaware would lead them. Their efforts to establish themselves survived in one or two names of places near Salem, as, for example, New England Creek, and New England Channel, which down almost into our own time was found on charts marking one of the minor channels of the bay along the Jersey sh.o.r.e. They continued coming to the river in s.h.i.+ps to trade in spite of restrictions by the Dutch; and some of them in later years, as has been pointed out, secured a foothold on the Cohansey and in the Cape May region, where their descendants are still to be found.
Chapter XIII. The English Conquest
It is a curious fact that the ancestor of the numerous Beekman family in New York, after whom Beekman Street is named, was for a time one of the Dutch governors on the Delaware who afterwards became the sheriff of Esopus, New York. His successor on the Delaware had some thoughts of removing the capital down to Odessa on the Appoquinimink, when an event long dreaded happened. In 1664, war broke out between England and Holland, long rivals in trade and commerce, and all the Dutch possessions in the New World fell an easy prey to English conquerors. A British fleet took possession of New Amsterdam, which surrendered without a struggle. But when two British men of war under Sir Robert Carr appeared before New Amstel on the Delaware, Governor D'Hinoyossa unwisely resisted; and his untenable fort was quickly subdued by a few broadsides and a storming party. This opposition gave the conquering party, according to the custom of the times, the right to plunder; and it must be confessed that the English soldiers made full use of their opportunity. They plundered the town and confiscated the land of prominent citizens for the benefit of the officers of the expedition.
After the English conquest on the Delaware, not a few of the Dutch migrated to Maryland, where their descendants, it is said, are still to be found. Some in later years returned to the Delaware, where on the whole, notwithstanding the early confiscations, English rule seemed to promise well. The very first doc.u.ments, the terms of surrender both on the Delaware and on the Hudson, breathed an air of Anglo-Saxon freedom. Everybody was at liberty to come and go at will. Hollanders could migrate to the Delaware or to New York as much as before. The Dutch soldiers in the country, if they wished to remain, were to have fifty acres of land apiece. This generous settlement seemed in striking contrast to the pinching, narrow interference with trade and individual rights, the seizures and confiscations for private gain, all under pretense of punishment, bad enough on the Delaware but worse at New Amsterdam, which had characterized the rule of the Dutch.
The Duke of York, to whom Delaware was given, introduced trial by jury, settled private t.i.tles, and left undisturbed the religion and local customs of the people. But the political rule of the Duke was absolute as became a Stuart. He arbitrarily taxed exports and imports. Executive, judicial, and legislative powers were all vested in his deputy governor at New York or in creatures appointed and controlled by him. It was the sort of government the Duke hoped to impose upon all Great Britain when he should come to the throne, and he was trying his 'prentice hand in the colonies. A political rebellion against this despotism was started on the Delaware by a man named Konigsmarke, or the Long Finn, aided by an Englishman, Henry Coleman. They were captured and tried for treason, their property was confiscated, and the Long Finn branded with the letter R, and sold as a slave in the Barbados. They might be called the first martyrs to foreshadow the English Revolution of 1688 which ended forever the despotic reign of the Stuarts.
The Swedes continued to form the main body of people on the Delaware under the regime of the Duke of York, and at the time when William Penn took possession of the country in 1682 their settlements extended from New Castle up through Christina, Marcus Hook, Upland (now Chester), Tinic.u.m, Kingsessing in the modern West Philadelphia, Pa.s.syunk, Wicaco, both in modern Philadelphia, and as far up the river as Frankford and Pennypack. They had their churches at Christina, Tinic.u.m, Kingsessing, and Wicaco. The last, when absorbed by Philadelphia, was a pretty little hamlet on the river sh.o.r.e, its farms belonging to a Swedish family called Swanson whose name is now borne by one of the city's streets. Across the river in New Jersey, opposite Chester, the Swedes had settlements on Racc.o.o.n Creek and round Swedesboro. These river settlements const.i.tuted an interesting and from all accounts a very attractive Scandinavian community. Their strongest bond of union seems to have been their interest in their Lutheran churches on the river. They spread very little into the interior, made few roads, and lived almost exclusively on the river or on its navigable tributaries. One reason they gave for this preference was that it was easier to reach the different churches by boat.
There were only about a thousand Swedes along the Delaware and possibly five hundred of Dutch and mixed blood, together with a few English, all living a life of abundance on a fine river amid pleasing scenery, with good supplies of fish and game, a fertile soil, and a wilderness of opportunity to the west of them. All were well pleased to be relieved from the stagnant despotism of the Duke of York and to take part in the free popular government of William Penn in Pennsylvania. They became magistrates and officials, members of the council and of the legislature. They soon found that all their avenues of trade and life were quickened. They pa.s.sed from mere farmers supplying their own needs to exporters of the products of their farms.
Descendants of the Swedes and Dutch still form the basis of the population of Delaware. * There were some Finns at Marcus Hook, which was called Finland; and it may be noted in pa.s.sing that there were not a few French among the Dutch, as among the Germans in Pennsylvania, Huguenots who had fled from religious persecution in France. The name Jaquette, well known in Delaware, marks one of these families, whose immigrant ancestor was one of the Dutch governors. In the ten or dozen generations since the English conquest intermarriage has in many instances inextricably mixed up Swede, Dutch, and French, as well as the English stock, so that many persons with Dutch names are of Swedish or French descent and vice versa, and some with English names like Oldham are of Dutch descent. There has been apparently much more intermarriage among the different nationalities in the province and less standing aloof than among the alien divisions of Pennsylvania.
* Swedish names anglicized are now found everywhere. Gostafsson has become Justison and Justis. Bond has become Boon; Hoppman, Hoffman; Kalsberg, Colesberry; Wihler, Wheeler; Joccom, Yoc.u.m; Dahlbo, Dalbow; Konigh, King; Kyn, Keen; and so on. Then there are also such names as Wallraven, Hendrickson, Stedham, Peterson, Matson, Talley, Anderson, and the omnipresent Rambo, which have suffered little, if any, change.
Dutch names are also numerous, such as Lockermans, Vandever, Van d.y.k.e, Vangezel, Vandegrift, Alricks, Statts, Van Zandt, Hyatt, Cochran (originally Kolchman), Vance, and Blackstone (originally Blackenstein).
After the English conquest some Irish Presbyterians or Scotch-Irish entered Delaware. Finally came the Quakers, comparatively few in colonial times but more numerous after the Revolution, especially in Wilmington and its neighborhood. True to their characteristics, they left descendants who have become the most prominent and useful citizens down into our own time. At present Wilmington has become almost as distinctive a Quaker town as Philadelphia. ”Thee” and ”thou” are frequently heard in the streets, and a surprisingly large proportion of the people of prominence and importance are Quakers or of Quaker descent. Many of the neat and pleasant characteristics of the town are distinctly of Quaker origin; and these characteristics are found wherever Quaker influence prevails.
Wilmington was founded about 1731 by Thomas Willing, an Englishman, who had married into the Swedish family of Justison. He laid out a few streets on his wife's land on the hill behind the site of old Fort Christina, in close imitation of the plan of Philadelphia, and from that small beginning the present city grew, and was at first called Willingtown. * William s.h.i.+pley, a Pennsylvania Quaker born in England, bought land in it in 1735, and having more capital than Willing, pushed the fortunes of the town more rapidly. He probably had not a little to do with bringing Quakers to Wilmington; indeed, their first meetings were held in a house belonging to him until they could build a meeting house of their own in 1738.
* Some years later in a borough charter granted by Penn, the name was changed to Wilmington in honor of the Earl of Wilmington.