Here she was agreeably surprised to find a few English people who had been living some distance above the Fort, opposite the lower end of Blackwell's Island, but who were at the time of her coming huddled under the walls of the Fort under the terror of the prevailing Indian wars.
A consultation between the Moody party and the Manhattan Island wanderers from New England resulted in the appointment of a committee to select a new site for a settlement. The choice fell upon the Gravesend region, for which Kieft gave a patent in the summer of 1643.
The circumstances under which Gravesend was settled were thus of a promising character, for the party was made up of people who, like Lady Moody, were seeking permanent homes, and were likely to make temperate and energetic citizens. The leader in this band of pioneers was a woman of exceptional force and refinement.
"For sixteen years," says Stiles, "she went in and out among the people, prominent in their councils, and often intrusted with important public responsibilities, which prove the respect and confidence of her associates. She seems also to have enjoyed the friendship of Governor Stuyvesant, who several times sought her advice in matters of great public importance. Even the nomination of the three town magistrates was, on one or two occasions, intrusted by the Director-General to her good judgment. He also availed himself of her kind offices, on another occasion, in quelling an incipient rebellion, raised by some of her English associates against the Dutch authority."
Whether the name Gravesend was derived from the town of the same name on the Thames, or from the Dutch town Gravensande, is not known, but the stronger reasons are offered for the latter supposition.
Thus, at the close of the Indian wars the meagre settlement of Breuckelen had for company within the area of the present county the hamlets at Flatlands and Gravesend, the farms at the Wallabout, possibly a habitation at Flatbush, and some trading quarters and modest houses at the Ferry. New Utrecht, Bushwick, Williamsburgh, and New Lots had yet to be settled formally, though squatters, the date of whose coming is impossible to set, began, as soon as the Indian hostilities ceased, to enter upon desirable pieces of land wherever this could be done without local opposition.
The settlement which received the name of Breuckelen was made in the maize region lying between the Wallabout and Gowanus—the latter the place of the first purchase (by Bennett and Bentyn) within the present limits of the city. Portions of this tract were taken by settlers under the Dutch patents from the West India Company. In July, 1645, Jan Evertsen Bout settled here. He was followed a few months later by Huyck Aertsen, Jacob Stoffelsen, Peter Cornielessen, Joris Dircksen, Gerritt Wolfertsen, Cowenhoven, and many others. They located themselves on the road leading from the Ferry to Flatbush, which was then the most important place. A village was formed, which had for its central point the present location of Smith Street and Fulton Avenue.
Henry C. Murphy, writing from Holland at the time of his sojourn as American Minister to that country, describes the Breukelen of Holland as a very old place, containing about 1,500 inhabitants. The houses were old fashioned, and the streets irregular. The people seem to lack thrift and enterprise. The Dutch church was an imposing edifice. Mr. Murphy's impression of the place was not pleasing. Outside of the village he found comfortable dwellings, surrounded with flowers and duck ponds, and everything in perfect neatness and order. On one side of the village was the park, a place laid out with walks and shrubbery, and containing about half an acre of land. He crossed the bridge which spans the Vecht, which connects the two communities, Breukelen Nijenrodes and Breukelen St. Pieters. He speaks of the view as charming. The Vecht is about 100 yards wide, and its waters flow lazily along. "The name Breuckelin," he says, "means marshland." This is the meaning given by the Dutch authorities. Mr. Murphy quotes from one author who says the name has the same origin "as maarssen, merely from its marshy and watery turf lands;" and although the name is spelled on ancient documents and letters Bracola, Broecke, Broeckede, Broicklede, and Broeklundia, they all indicate the same origin. Mr. Murphy draws a striking comparison between the character and situation of the two places, showing a wonderful similarity and appropriateness of name, arriving at the conclusion that it was selected on account of the corresponding conditions of the two places. As the Holland Brooklyn was spelled in a variety of ways, so, too, Mr. Murphy says, it has been with our own fair city. He states that the record shows it to have been called Breucklyn, Breuckland, Brucklyn, Broucklyn, Brookland, and Brookline. It was during the close of the last century that its orthography became fixed as Brooklyn.
The circumstances attending the settlement of Breuckelen as a town were associated with a critical turn in the affairs of Kieft's administration.
Kieft's tyrannical methods of government, a form of self-willed procedure absolutely grotesque in many respects, had been sufficiently recognized before the Indian war. After his infamous blunder at Corlaer's Hook his unpopularity increased. Before the war began, Kieft had been compelled to call a Council of Twelve13 from the people. The Twelve, being chosen by the people, constituted the first illustration offered in New Netherland of representative government. This board, soon after the war began, was abolished in a peremptory way; and not long afterward Kieft undertook once more to call upon its advisory aid. When the board objected to certain taxes (on wine, beer, brandy, and beaver skins), he remarked that he still was master, and published his proclamation levying the tax, with the statement that this was done by advice of the council chosen by the commonalty.
To these elected representatives of the people such acts naturally were intolerable, and it was not surprising that they should set themselves to secure the removal of Kieft. A memorial sent to the West India Company asked for his recall and for the introduction of the system of government prevailing in Holland. The College of Nineteen made a report upon the case to the States-General, mentioning incidentally that the colony, started as a commercial enterprise, had cost the West India Company, over all profits, more than 550,000 guilders. The resulting reform considerably modified the theory if not the practice of government in New Netherland. The College of Nineteen decreed a "Supreme Council" for New Netherland. Government was placed in the hands of a council consisting of the Director, a Vice-Director, and a Fiscal. The people were to have a right to representation in the council, such being desirable "for mutual good understanding, and the common advancement and welfare of the inhabitants."
In the code of general instructions which the West India Company had sent for the guidance of the Provincial Council, those in authority were urged "to do all in their power to induce the colonists to establish themselves in some of the most suitable places, with a certain number of inhabitants, in the manner of towns, villages, and hamlets, as the English are in the habit of doing." It was pursuant to the policy of this code that Bout and his associates declared their intention to "found a town at their own expense."
It fell to the people who were to organize the town of Brooklyn to choose schepens;14 and at this first election they selected as their representatives Jan Evertsen Bout and Huyck Aertsen. Bout was a well-to-do farmer and one of the original settlers. In 1646, he was chosen a schepen to decide questions which might arise in Breuckelen. He took a patent from Governor Kieft "of land at Marechkaweick, on the kill of the Gowanus, as well the maize land as the wood land, bounded by the land of Huyck Aertsen." It adjoined the land of Van Cowenhoven, and embraced within its limits the mills which were designated as Frecke's and Denton's. Those mills, situated near each other, are vividly remembered by many Brooklyn citizens. They were reached by a bridge from Butler street. Crossing over the bridge and passing the first mill the road wound around the water's edge.
The commission from the Colonial Council read, as follows:—
"We, William Kieft, Director General, and the Council residing in New Netherland, on behalf of the High and Mighty Lords, States-General of the United Netherlands, His Highness of Orange, and the Honourable Directors of the General Incorporated West India Company. To all those who shall see these presents or hear them read, Greeting:—
"Whereas, Jan Evertsen Bout and Huyck Aertsen,