1811

By the previous year, congregant Henry Bonesteel had donated a plot of land for a church building, located about ¾ mile east of our present location, "on a small rise of ground north of the modern route 212 and overlooking the Sawkill where it twists by the present-day golf club, which was at that time a mill on the stream."(1)

The official pastor (on a rotating basis) was Reverend Joseph Prentiss (sometimes spelled Prentice), 32, who also acted as pastor on a rotating basis at the Episcopal Christ Church in Hudson. Rationalists such as the previous pastor and founder, Rev. Frederick Henry Quitman, 51, pictured here, who had prevailed upon Pastor Prentiss to take over the pulpit in Woodstock, felt that any ordained clergyman--Episcopal, Methodist, Presbyterian, Baptist, Congregationalist, and (presumably) Lutheran--could be an interchangeable pastor for any one of those congregations.

There is some evidence that the church was holding services in German and English on alternate Sundays.(3)

Reverend Quitman was still pastor of St. Peter's Church in Rhinebeck. He also served on a rotating basis a small Lutheran congregation that had four pews set aside for them at Trinity Episcopalian Church in Athens. Reverend Quitman was also president of the New York Ministerium (the synod), and he was working on a new catechism in the English language.

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Region historian Alf Evers(4)

The typical official arrangement under which the tenant held his land was the "three-life lease": A tenant would be permitted use of Livingston land for three generations, and after the grandson of the original tenant died, the lease "fell in"--that is, the land would revert to a Livingston landlord. (For this reason, a tenant typically build a wood frame house or a rough log house, rather than the stone houses like those found in the Hurley or Marbletown lowlands.)

The Livingston landlord expected the tenants to increase the value of the land by clearing it, cutting the trees to feed the sawmill he had built on the Sawkill near the present-day golf course, and hauling the resulting boards and planks to the Hudson to supply the manufacture of gunstocks, houses, and ships. Stipulated in the typical lease was an annual rent of fifteen to twenty bushels of wheat per hundred acres, plus three or four "good fat hens" and from one to three days' work with team on the common land. A tenant could sell his leasehold, but he had to pay the landlord one-sixth of the sale.

Livingston--through his agent John Wigram, pictured here, the town supervisor who resided on Wigram Lane (Rock City Road) near the barn now known as Parnassus Square, and who farmed there with the help of his slaves--initiated several legal proceedings against recalcitrant tenants whom he considered scofflaws and trespassers, those who failed to pay rent and who cut the landlord's timber for sale as boards, shingles, and other uses. Livingston "regarded the tenants' own shiftlessness and dishonesty as responsible for most of their troubles."

The life of the tenant on Livingston land was not especially easy. The men worked at subsistence farming, they hunted, they logged, they produced maple sugar, they did part-time blacksmithing, and--with wood harvested from the still-large Woodstock forests (much of it belonging to the Livingston landlord, its harvesting thus constituting trespassing)--they produced charcoal and made such wood products as shingles and barrel and hogshead staves. In the late spring or early summer they peeled hemlock bark used for tanning, piling it in the woods and in the winter hauling it by sledge to smelly tannery of John C. Ring in the heart of Woodstock hamlet. (A few Woodstock tenants were sawmill operators [on sites reserved by the Livingston landlord] or tavern owners.)

Women cooked and baked in fireplaces, washed on the rocks beside a stream, sewed and spun flax and wool, churned butter, gave birth to children and then cared for them, and helped with the farm work, especially at harvest and slaughtering times: They made soap from ashes and animal fats, they dried apples, they pickled and preserved.

Samuel Stilwell's fully incorporated (by the state legislature) Woodstock Glass Manufacturing Society, operating in present-day Shady, just over the boundary from Livingston land, advertised for "five thousand cords of Furnace wood for which cash will be paid." A few months later they advertised window glass for sale "by the Box or single pane at the Woodstock Glass Factory…" They added:

Wood choppers take notice!
Constant employ may be had at the above Fact
ory and a liberal price given in cash
For chopping wood by the cord or acre.(5)

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Quoted in ibid., pp. 126. (Close)

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Dr. Jacob Brink of Lake Katrine, known in Woodstock and its environs as a "white witch" and "conjurer," was often called upon to deal with the black magic of reputed witches in the area. He was frequently called upon to contend with the "Mink Hollow witch," Becky Demilt (or Demill), reputed to be tall and thin, with black hair and snow-white skin, walking on a club foot adorned with three stockings and riding a black stallion.

New Paltz slave Isabella Bomefree, 14, originally of Hurley, worked very hard to please her master, John J. Dumont. Mr. Dumont was a reasonably kind master (beating her only infrequently), but his wife was a severe and very hard-to-please taskmistress. Here is how abolitionist Olive Gilbert, the literary mouthpiece of Isabella (in later life known as Sojourner Truth), recorded Isablla's description many years later of her relationship with her master:(6)

[She] became more ambitious than ever to please him; and he stimulated her ambition by his commendation, and by boasting of her to his friends, telling them that "that wench" (pointing to Isabel) "is better for me than a man--for she will do a good family's washing in the night, and be ready in the morning to go into the field, where she will do as much at raking and binding as my best hands." Her ambition and desire to please were so great, that she often worked several nights in succession, sleeping only short snatches, as she sat in her chair; and some nights she would not allow herself to take any sleep, save what she could get resting herself against the wall, fearing that if she sat down, she would sleep too long. These extra exertions to please, and the praises consequent upon them, brought upon her head the envy of her fellow-slaves, and they taunted her with being the "white folks' nigger."… At this time she looked upon her master as a God; and believed that he knew of and could see her at all times, even as God himself. And she used to confess her delinquencies, from the conviction that he already knew them, and that she should fare better if she confessed voluntarily: and if anyone talked to her of the injustice of being a slave, she answered them with contempt and immediately told her master. She then firmly believed that slavery was right and honorable.

With financial help from New York State (an advance of $10,000 [$119,900 in 2006 dollars]), developers in Sullivan County cleared obstructions such as rocks and waterfalls from the Neversink to enable the rafting of lumber down to market. Unfortunately, a number of men were killed trying to raft the turbulent stream.

The New York State legislature passed a law permitting corporations (that is, limited-liability stock companies) to engage in manufacture. Lobbyists interested in protecting small privately owned tanneries, such as those on the Sawkill and Woodstock's Tannery Brook, managed to get tanning operations excluded from the act.

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James Madison (Democratic Republican), 60, was President. The newly elected 12th Congress was in session. A dollar in that year would be worth $11.99 in 2006 for most consumable products.

There was a great reluctance among American farmers to use the newfangled iron plow, because of their notion that iron would poison the soil. Good old American farmers continued to struggle with wooden plows.

Food sold to the public in the markets was often adulterated. For example, pickles were treated with copper to look green; bogus "China tea" was concocted from dried thorn leaves colored with poisonous verdigris; pepper was often mixed with mustard husks, juniper berries, pea flour, and storeroom sweepings.

One of the principal "necessaries" that settlers in the West used to get the Indians in debt (forcing them to cede more land) was liquor, which produced a pleasing sensation of well-being; even though often followed by most unpleasant headaches and nausea as the Indian recovered from the debauch. Some of the decoctions sold to them were brewed by methods dreadfully heartless, for the traders cared nothing for the well-being of the Indians. One recipe for "Injun whiskey" illustrates the standards(7):

Take a barrel of lake or river water, add three plugs of chewing tobacco and five bars of soap, stir half a pound of red pepper into the mixture, throw in some dead leaves, and boil until the liquid turns brown. Then add two gallons of alcohol and two ounces of strychnine, stir thoroughly, strain, and bottle.

After a few drinks of the stuff, you could prop Indians up in the corners as if they were paralyzed, unable to close their eyes.

U.S. customs duties fell precipitously to half the 1806 level because of the loss of trade with the United Kingdom and France.

Tensions with the British (and the Indians)

Meanwhile, Shawnee leader Tecumseh, 43, organized an Indian gathering of some 5,000 on the banks of the Tallapoosa River in Alabama, exhorting them with these words(8):

Let the white race perish. They seize your land; they corrupt your women, they trample on the ashes of your dead! Back whence they came, upon a trail of blood, they must be driven.

Warrior, your father, General Harrison, offers you a seat.

My father! The Sun in my father, and the Earth is my mother. She gives me nourishment, and I repose on her bosom.

Soon afterward Harrison defeated some 1,000 Shawnees under Tecumseh's brother, Tenskwatawa, 43, known as the Prophet, in the Battle of Tippecanoe at Tenskwatawa's headquarters (Prophetstown). British arms were found on the battlefield in the wake of the Shawnee retreat, so the citizens of Vincennes, Indiana, resolved:

This combination headed by the Shawanese prophet is a British scheme.

(Westerners were very unhappy because of an agricultural depression, basically caused by the difficulty of getting their products to market. They blamed the British, however.)

Western "War Hawks" in the new 12th Congress, with the slogan "Free Trade and Sailors' Rights," protested British interference in American shipping and demanded U.S. action against perceived British encouragement of Indian uprisings. Many were newcomers to Congress, having won in the 1810 midterm elections on a hawk program. The War Hawks included Representative John Caldwell Calhoun of South Carolina, 29 (pictured on the left), and Representative Henry Clay of Kentucky, 34 (pictured on the right), who was elected Speaker of the House. Representative Felix Grundy of Tennessee, three of whose brothers had been killed in clashes with Indians, argued that the House of Representatives should declare war against the United Kingdom; he advocated ousting the British from North America, in particular to wipe out the Indians' base in Canada. Speaker Clay proclaimed:

We are asserting our right … to export our cotton, tobacco, and other domestic produce to market. … I prefer the troubled ocean of war … with all its calamities … to the tranquil and putrescent pool of ignominious peace!(10)

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Quoted in Garraty, John A., The American Nation: A History of the United States, New York: Harper and Row, 1966, p. 194, and Athearn, Robert G., ed., American Heritage Illustrated History of the United States, vol. 4, A New Nation, New York: Choice Publishing, 1988, pp. 344-345. (Close)

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Federalists, opposed to the growing tensions with the United Kingdom, continued protesting the commissioning of regular army officers to command local militias, the discrimination against New England commerce, and the neglect of coastal defenses. Some Federalists even urged secession.

The charter of the Bank of the United States lapsed. State banks eager to take over its business lobbied against rechartering, pointing out that most of its stock was controlled by Englishmen. The little state banks began to extend credit recklessly.

The Knickerbocker of New York City defeated the Invincible of Long Island in a rowing race.

The New Madrid earthquake, centered around New Madrid, Missouri, rocked the Mississippi and Ohio Valleys; its shocks were felt over a 300,000-square-mile region (as far away as Detroit, Baltimore, and Charleston); the Mississippi River was turned to foam between St. Louis and Memphis, with its current running upstream for hours. The Earth's surface rose or sank between 5 and 25 feet over a 30,000-square-mile region. Aftershock tremors continued for months.

John Chapman, 36, known as "Johnny Appleseed," continued distributing Swedenborgian religious tracts and apple seeds to settlers in the Ohio Valley. A small, wiry man with "eyes that sparkled with a peculiar brightness," he had a reputation for loving children and all living creatures, even mosquitoes. He made friends with all the Indians he encountered. He traveled barefoot, dressed in cast-offs or a coffee sack. He liked to read to settlers from the New Testament, calling it "news right fresh from heaven."

Louisiana slave insurrection

Marie Dorion, an Iowa Indian woman, led a fur-trading expedition to Oregon.

The skipper of the Tonquin, a vessel of John Jacob Astor's fur trading company, established the trading post of Astoria at Cape Disappointment, the mouth of the Columbia River.

The steamboat S.S. New Orleans, launched by Nicolas Roosevelt, sailed from Pittsburgh down the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers all the way to New Orleans in 14 days. Regular service was set up between New Orleans and Natchez, Mississippi; the fare was $18 downstream and $25 upstream ($216 and $300, respectively, in 2006 dollars).

Work began on constructing the Cumberland Road from Cumberland, Maryland, westward, in spite of all the obstructionist tactics of states' rights forces in Congress. This route eventually would become U.S. 40.

Arts and culture in America: Specifics

Painter Washington Allston painted The Poor Author and the Rich Bookseller; and architect Charles Bulfinch designed the Collonade Row buildings in Boston.

Popular periodicals included Christian's Magazine and Niles' Weekly Register.

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Russian adventurers landed at Bodega Bay in California and built Fort Ross as a trading post for sea otter skins.

Struggles for Latin American independence

The Captain General of Caracas formed a junta and declared the independence of Venezuela, renouncing all allegiance to the puppet government that Napoleon had set up in Spain; the junta invited all Spanish colonies to revolt, and a commission was sent to enlist British support. The commission included Simón Bolívar, 28 (see his picture [from the University of Texas Portrait Gallery] on the right). Creole Francisco de Miranda, 55, assumed leadership of the revolutionaries. Juan Domingo Monteverde began military action against Spanish forces, and Bolívar joined him.

José Artigas wrested from Spain the Banda Oriental in Uraguay.

José Miguel Carrera toppled the conservative junta in Santiago, Chile.

Cartegena in the Viceroyalty of New Grenada (Colombia) declared independence from Spain.

The Mexican revolutionary forces of Creole priest Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla (see his picture on the left) were crushed by Spanish troops under Felix Maria Calleja del Rey in the Battle of Calderon Bridge near Guadalajara. Hidalgo was captured, tried, and executed.

King George III, now blind, grieved the loss of his favorite daughter, Amelia, so much that he lapsed at last into permanent insanity. The British Parliament passed the Regency Bill, replacing the King with his son George, Prince of Wales, 49, as Regent.

Hampden Clubs were established to extend the franchise in England.

A British bullion report advocated the intrinsic value theory of money: Money is a measure of labor performed; governments can obtain money only by taxing or by borrowing; printing excess banknotes cheats creditors and causes inflation.

Great schism

Luddite disturbances

Napoleonic Wars

Austria was financially bankrupt, but a new civil code was introduced there.

Napoleon made his baby son, Napoléon François Joseph Charles, King of Rome and Duke of Reichstadt.

Peninsular Campaign: British and Allied forces under Sir Arthur Wellesley, Duke of Wellington, 42, defeated the French in the Battle of Fuentes de Oñoro, but Wellington admitted: "If Boney had been there, we should have been beaten." General William Carr Beresford led the British and Portuguese to defeat the French under Marshal Nicolas Jean de Dieu Soult in the Battle of Albuera.

Russian forces seized Belgrade.

Swiss climber Johann Rudolf Meyer scaled the Jungfrau (13,668 feet) in the Alps.

Egyptian revolution

British colonial expansion

British naval captain Philip Beaver surveyed the eastern coast of Africa.

Two Portuguese half-caste explorers completed their 9-year crossing of the African continent.

Chang and Eng, male "Siamese twins" connected at the chest, were born in Melange, Siam. When King Rama II heard of it, he feared that this was an evil omen and ordered the twins put to death. The twins somehow escaped execution, however.

World science and technology

Scots physicist Sir David Brewster published his findings on polarized light; English scientist Sir Charles Bell published New Idea of the Anatomy of the Brain, distinguishing between the sensory and the motor nerves; English astronomer Friederich William Herschel, 73, argued that a nebula is a protogalaxy; Italian physicist Count Amadeo Avogadro, 35, proposed that equal volumes of different gases contain the same number of molecules; French chemist Bernard Courtois, 34, isolated iodine; French mathematician Siméon Poisson published Traité de Mécanique; and German physician Samuel Hahnemann, 56, published a catalog of homeopathic remedies.

World philosophy and religion

Arts and culture in the British Isles

World arts and culture

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