Lot: Thomas Clarke Farm (Original Grants and Farms)

Lot
Thomas Clarke Farm
Lot Group
Original Grants and Farms
Property Was Used in 1660 For:
Full Stokes Entry (See images below)
THE THOMAS CLARKE FARM

(Chelsea) Block Check List: 700-726-751-745-800-797-717-700. This farm comprised:

A. Part of the land granted to Mary Remmersen, widow of Gerrit Remmersen.

B. All of the land granted to Peter Jacobsen (Pieter de Groot).

C. Part of the land granted to Caspar Caster.

These were all Andros grants, signed by him just before his departure from the province. The history of the area covered by this range of patents, as far as the records show, is briefly set forth here.

April 25, 1663, Stuyvesant made a grant to Paulus Leentersen van der Grift and AUard Anthony of a tract of land north and west of the Burgomaster's bouwery, which also included some part of the Weylandt; stated to have had an area of forty or fifty morgens, about one hundred acres. This tract was surrendered when the same patentees and Cornells van Ruyven obtained grants from Nicolls for the Weylandt and the Burgomaster's bouwery.

The earlier patent undoubtedly covered the thirty acres later granted to Jellis Mandeville, together with land north of the Burgomaster's land between the road and the river. The only way to interpret this grant is to read the exceptions in the later patents. The reason for its surrender is not very clear but its reversion to the crown becomes apparent. It was not again patented until 1679-80.

The grant of July 15, 1667, of the Burgomaster's bouwery contains this clause. . . . "And there being likewise a Graunt from ye said Gouvernor unto ye said Paulus Lenderts & AUard Anthony bearing date ye 25th. of Aprill 1663 for an addiconall Parcell of Land lying on ye East & North East sydes of ye former conteyning betweene forty & fifty Margen. . . . These following lynes endorsed on ye foregoing Patent. Whereas there was an additionall peice of Land betweene 40 & 50 Margen Graunted unto ye within named Paulus Leenderts & AUard Anthony by ye late Dutch Gouvernor Petrus Stuyvesant which hath also beene Confirmed by me. These Presents Certify & Declare that ye same 40 or 50 Margen so Graunted & Confirmed as aforesaid shall from henceforth no more belong unto ye said Paulus Leenderts & AUard Anthony. . . ." — Liier Patents, II: 74 (Albany).

The Weylandt patent, Aug. i, 1668, contains this clause: "Part of which said Land was heretofore that is to say upon ye 25th. day of Aprill 1663, Graunted by Governor Stuyvesant unto AUard Anthony & Paulus Leendertse Van de Grift as an

adition to their ffarme or Bowery, but upon good Consideration they have surrendered ye same" (confirms the remainder of the Weylandt). — Liier Patents, III: 75 (Albany).

In December, 1679, Ryder surveyed the land between the Burgomaster's bouwery and the Weylandt, the Bloomingdale road and the Hudson river. In December, 1680, Andros signed patents for the several parcels within the area. The patentees had evidently been in possession earlier. Gerrit Remmersen died on his farm here in Decem.ber, 1678. The patent was issued to his widow.

A. Part of the Land Granted to Mary Remmersen

Sir Edmund Andros, Governour, etc., to Mary Rameson, widow of Gerrit Remmersen, deed. Grant dated Dec, 1680. Not found of record; recited in deed quoted below.

Conveys 140 acres of land more or less as described in the deed to Egbert Heerman.

Mary Remsen, the ancestress of the Garretson family of Long Island, was a capable, energetic woman, as the following entries from the Gerritsen or Garretson Family Record, prove (MSS. translation made by Judge Record of Newark, N. J., July, 1884, in L. I. Hist. Soc).

"In the year of our Lord 1634 was my honored father Gerrit Remmersen, born, in East Vriesland, in the town named ... In the year 1656 did my honored father Gerrit Remmersen arrive in this land. In the year 1636 was my honored mother born in Bermudas." The record recites her first marriage in 1650, the birth of five children, her arrival in this country in 16^9, the death of her first husband, William Gerritsen, in 1662, her marriage with Gerrit Remmersen in 1663, the births of five more children, between 1664 and 1675. It then continues: "In the year 1678 my father and my mother came out the bay* to York Island in a vessel named Sapockkanika. In the year of our Lord 1678, the 27t.h of December, my honored father slept in the Lord, on a Tuesday, in the morning, and was buried in Stuyvesant's church, aged about 44 years. In the year 1685, the ist of May, my honored Mother removed with her family to Gravesend. ... In the year of our Lord 1715, the ist of May, my honored Mother slept in the Lord on Monday before midnight, and was taken to the grave on Saturday to the Gravesend church yard, aged about 85 years." Therefore the date of her birth was 1630, not 1636; her first marriage was in 1650. The record is evidently from a family Bible, and seems to have been written by Samuel Gerretsen, son of Gerrit Remmersen.

MaryRameson, of King's County, of Long Island, Widdow, to Egbert Heerman, of the City and County of New Yorke, Yeoman. Deed dated Oct. 13, 1692. — Liier Deeds, XVIII: 200-203.

Conveys "All that a certain house Barne Orchard Farme or parcell of Land situate lyeing and being on the West Side of Manhattans Island in the Citty and County of New Yorke one part whereof Containeth Sixty one Acres and twenty two rods neere Clap board ffly beginning at a certain Ditch by the Rivier Side rangeing thence North Easterly thirty four degrees One hundred thirty four rods to Clap board ffly rangeing thence South easterly fifty six degrees by the Land of Johannes Couwenhoven seventy and three rods rangeing thence south westerly thirty four degrees by the Land of Casper Castersen and Peter Jacobsen one hundred thirty and four rods to the Lands of Yellous Yansen and thence rangeing by the said Yealouses Land North Westerly fifty and six degrees to the first station of the Ditch Seventy three rods the remainder of said parcell of Land [the whole] being in two parcells containing Seventy Eight Acres and three quarters Containing in the whole parcell now sold and conveyed as aforesaid one hundred thirty nine acres three quarters and seventy two rods according to the severall Surveys under the Surveyers hand made of the parcells the fifth day of December in the yeare of our Lord One Thousand six hundred and Seventy and nine by order of Sir Edmund Andros the Late Governour of this province of New Yorke. Together with," &c. "Signed with the marke of Mary Ramason." Rem Gerritsen, eldest son of Gerrit Remmersen, also signed this deed.

*Flatlands, L. I. They were both members of the Ref, Dutch Church of Flatlands in 1677. — Bergen's Early Settlers, 236.