cs 71 im Cornell University Library CS71.W585 S84 1877 Henry White and his famil olin 3 1924 029 780 461 h^nRy white and ^is: family W«WA?.^rt^ M^s^nk^ofMcan HiMoryr^^e„Mr^'^\ M.^Li^fe^'^: The original of tiiis book is in tine Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924029780461 Ein'-J'j F-Kidi/ifi Hvm ih, phlui) w pii.-i'iiwm.d'iiii: Ommiirii'i'' HENRY WHITE AND HIS FAMILY Tradition assigns to the family of White a Welsh origin. The earliest record of it, however, locates it at Denham, near Uxbridge, Buckinghamshire, England. The archives of the Herald's Office con- tain a grant of arms to the family in 1584. They are thus blazoned: Shield, azure, three roses argent, two above and one below. Crest, a lion's head couped, argent. The American branch of the family settled in the province of Mary- land at quite an early period ; the father of Henry White, the subject of this sketch, who was a Colonel in the British army, joined his uncle in that colony, emigrating from England in 1712. Henry White, according to the family account, was born in America but received his education in England. He later returned to this country and established himself as a merchant in New York, and his kinsmen in Maryland dying out he fell heir to their property. He first appears on the busy scene of colonial trade in a petition dated May 8, 1756, for leave to ship bread to South Carolina for the use of the navy. He was then acting as agent of Samuel Bowman, Jr., and Jo. Yates, of Charleston. The war with France, after a hollow truce of several years, had just broken out afresh and the authorities had imposed restrictions on the export even of home products to neighboring colonies. The trade in English goods between them was never permitted. The next year he was engaged in the importation of the usual varieties of European goods from London and Bristol, his store being in King street. On the 13th May, 1761, he married Eve Van Cortlandt, daughter oi Frederick and granddaughter of Jacobus Van Cortlandt, the founder of the younger branch of that family. The Van Cortlandt family was one of the wealthiest and most important of the colony, and the branch with which young White connected himself had largely added to its wealth and influence by intermarriage with that of Philipse, whose exten- sive manor of Fhilipsborough, in Westchester County, extended from the Harlem River on the south nearly to the south line of the manor of Cortlandt on the north, and from the Hudson on the west to the Bronx on the east. He is now- found extending his commercial operations and the owner of the Moro, a sloop whose heavy armament of ten guns indicates that she was employed in privateering, the favorite business of the time. This alliance with the Van Cortlandts secured the fortune of the young 2 HENRY WHITE AND HIS FAMILY merchant. In 1769 Mr. de Lancey declining to take a seat at the Coun- cil Board, Mr. White entered the field as an aspirant for the position, one of the highest in the gift of the Crown. His application seems to have had the support and recommendation of Governor Moore, and in March of the same year he received his commission and was sworn of the Council, a post which he retained until the close of English rule in the colony. His wealth and importance increasing, he changed his place of business to Cruger's wharf, which was for a time the favor- ite location for the shipping merchants, and later bought for his resi- dence the large house situated in Queen (now Pearl) street between the Fly Market, which was at the foot of the present Maiden Lane, and the Coffee House, which stood on the corner of Wall and what is now Water street (the exact site faced the foot of Cedar street). This house had been the residence of Abraham de Peyster, the Treasurer of the colony, and was one of the most important buildings in the city. In 1772 he became President of the Chamber of Commerce, being the fourth to reach that highest honor in this commercial city. To Henry White as one of the first merchants of the colony and a member of his Majesty's Council, the East India Company consigned the ship Nancy with the cargo of tea intended for New York. She left London at the same time as the vessels bound for Boston, Philadelphia and Charleston, but being blown off the coast by contrary winds, put into Antiqua, and did not reach the offing until the i8th April, months after the destruction of the tea which arrived by the Boston vessels, the unlading and storage of that for Charleston and the return of that for Philadelphia. The New York vessel shared no better fortune. Mr. White was forced by the pressure of opinion to decline to receive the objectionable consignment, and the Committee of Vigilance, appointed in open town meeting to prevent its landing, conducted the captain of the vessel to Mr. White's house and compelled him to engage to make all possible dispatch to leave the city and return to England with his cargo. Notwithstanding his well known English sympathies Mr. White does not appear to have had any personal difficulty with the patriots. It is probable that he was prudent enough to keep himself out of harm's way. There is no account of his having suffered any annoyance. He was in the city in the summer of 1775 when a letter of Governor Martin, of North Carolina requesting the shipment of a marquee, or field tent, and a Royal Standard, was intercepted and laid before the Committee of Safety. In I 'j']^, when the Council broke up, it appears from the letters of Governor HENRY WHITE AND HIS FAMILY 3 Tryon that he was in England. In the fall of the same year he returned to the city with the second division of the Hessian troops, and from his influence with the citizens was of great service to Governor Tryon in securing the peace of the population, discontented and chafing under the restriction of military rules. The next year he was first of a committee of four to receive donations for the equipment of provincial regiments for the King's service, and remained in the city during the war, acting as the agent of the Home Government in various ways, chiefly in the sale of captured vessels and cargoes and the distribution of prize money among the British men-of-war. On the 9th October, 1780, according to the record in the Surrogate's office, he appeared before the Surrogate to prove the will of the unfor- tunate Andr6, when he declared that he was well acquainted with the testator's handwriting. He left the city and returned to England prior to the evacuation of New York in the fall of 1783. Mr. White did not long survive the war. He died in Golden Square, London, on the 23d day of December, 1786, and was buried in the church-yard of St. James, Westminster, in Picadilly. An obituary notice in the " Gentleman's Magazine " said of him that " in public life he united the dignity of office with the respectability and integrity of a British merchant ; and during the late troubles in America exhibited a zeal and attachment to Government that was at once exemplary and appropriate." Like many others, Mr. White paid the penalty of his loyalty. Mr. White was attainted of treason to the State of New York, and his estates were forfeited by the Act of 1 779. His home in Queen street, at the time in the occupation of George Clinton, the first Governor of the State, was sold in May, 1786. Fortunately the Constitution of the State adopted at Kingston contained a wise and liberal provision that no attainder should work " corruption of blood." But the fortune of Mr. White, independent of the estates of his wife, was ample. His influence was also great in official circles. Of his sons by his wife Eve Van Cortlandt, one, Henry, remained in America. William Tryon, another, named after his old friend, the Governor of New York, was a Captain in the East India Company's service. Henry White, the eldest son, married his first cousin, Anne, daughter of Augustus Van Cortlandt. Their eldest son, Augustus, assumed the name of Van Cortlandt, and inherited a large estate at Yonkers, under his grandfather's will. Dying without issue, he devised to his brother Henry, who in turn assumed the name of Van Cortlandt. 4 HENRY WHITE AND HIS FAMILY a life interest in this estate, and, failing issue to him, a life estate to his nephew Augustus Van Cortlandt Bibby, and remainder to the eldest son him surviving. This nephew was a son of his sister Augusta, who had married Dr. Edward N. Bibby, whose father. Captain Thomas Bibby, an officer on the Staff of General Eraser, had secured an exchange after the Convention at Saratoga, and established himself in New York. Henry Van Cortlandt did not long enjoy the property ; he died without issue the year of his inheritance, when it passed into the hands of Mr. Augustus Van Cortlandt (Bibby). With the old estate, and the name maintained by careful provision, also passed " Cortlandt House," near Kingsbridge, the residence of the family, and one of the most interesting relics of the colonial period. Tlie history of this house, a view of which as it appears to-day accompanies this sketch, is full of romantic interest. The old mansion of Jacobus Van Cortlandt was destroyed by fire about 1748, when the present, a large stone dwelling-house, was erected by Frederick Van Cortlandt. Built on a plateau on the eastern slope of the river chain of hills, it commands an extensive interior view. The long and smiling vale of Yonkers stretches beneath it, and to the south- ward the placid landscape ends in the Fordham heights. The ground in front was artificially, terraced and ornamented after the old French man- ner of gardening, with large box trees and hedges, with here and there small sheets of water and diminutive fountains. The interior is not less quaint and interesting. The windows are old- fashioned and the dispositions of the upper stories odd. An air of old- time, which would have charmed the heart of Hawthorne, still per- vades the whole building, which bears its date in iron figures on its gables. In the library there are several portraits, one of the most interesting of which is of a Mr. Badcock, a friend of Mr. White, the son of the subject of this sketch. Another is the celebrated portrait of Henry White by John Singleton Copley, from which the engraving which accompanies this sketch is taken. The attitude is fine and the coloring wonderful in its fidelity. The warm flesh tints bear unerring witness to a reasonable indulgence in " generous wine that maketh glad he heart of man " and heightens nature's hues. The Philipse Manor was all historic ground. When the Provincial Convention adjourned in August, 1776, from Harlem to Fishkill, the Committee of Safety, which held daily sessions in the interim, stopped here and held an important meeting on the Manor. When New York was in the hands of the British the Hessian Jagers had a picket guard on the ground and the officers were garrisoned in the house. HENRY WHITE AND HIS FAMILY 5 Washington dined at Cortlandt House in 1781, when he made his famous feint upon the British lines, and many a skirmish took place between the patriots and De Lancey's loyal Refugee Corps, the French, and the Hessians, and here occurred the bitter struggle between the Stockbridge Indians, who had joined Washington, and the Queen's Rangers, under Colonel Simcoe. There are other details of the old house that deserve a passing notice. To the beauty of its outward surroundings and inward adornments there was added a famous cellar. The regime was that usual in the good old days of Madeira and Port when annual provision was made by cask, the old, and half old, being refilled in the order of their succession. This was the earlier fashion. Later, demijohns of famous vintages, under the name of their importers or the vessel which brought them, took the place of this primasval practice. Then the well-stored vaults held Blackburn, March and Benson, Page, Convent, White and other well- known importations of Madeira, in rich profusion ; and the " White " Port held undisputed rank. Nor must the " Resurrection " Madeira be forgotten, so called because buried during the Revolution and dug up at its close. Here the uncovering of the brilliant mahogany, and the toast of "Absent friends -and Sweethearts," was the signal for a merry bout, where convivial songs added to the charm of the occa- sion and flinching was not allowed. We have heard of a deser- ter who, seeking to escape " the glass too much," broke from the festive hall, took the porch steps at a bound, and followed down the lane by the whole company in hot pursuit, and to the cry of view-halloo " with one brave bound cleared the gate," and a five-barred gate at that. ■" Old times are changed, old manners gone ;" but stranger and friend alike still meet from the erect and stately host the same elegant cordiality, and it will be a marvel indeed if he do not find that Cortland House and the White vintages alike deserve their fame. Two of the Sons of Henry White entered the British service : the elder, John Chambers White, was commissioned in the navy, rose to the rank of Vice-Admiral of the White, and was made Knight Com- mander of the Bath, June 29, 1841. Frederick Van Cortlandt White received the commission of Ensign 19 Feb., 1781 ; was made Colonel of the First Regiment of Foot Guards (the Grenadier Guards) i Jan., 1805, and Major-General 25 July, 18 10. On the army registers his name ap- pears as Frederic C. and sometimes as Frederic Charles, but this latter is an error. Both these officers lived in London, and are now dead. Of his daughters, Ann was married to Doctor afterwards Sir John 6 HENRY WHITE AND HIS FAMILY McNamara Hayes, Bart., of Golden Square, London. They all resided in England, while Margaret, married to Peter Jay Munto of Westchester, and Frances to Dr. Archibald Bruce, lived and died in New York. Some account of Eve Van Cortlandt, the wife of Henry White and the mother of these children, may interest the reader. She is well re- membered by many of our older citizens. She was born, as entered in her father's family bible, 22 May, 1736, and died on the 19 August, 1836, in the one hundred and first year of her age, having more than completed a century of existence. She left the United States with her husband at the close of the revolution, and on her last return from Europe in 1804, occupied the house at No. 11 Broadway, her own by inheritance, till her death. This house, which stood for one hundred and forty-years, has been erroneously supposed by some of our local historians to have been the coffee-house kept by Burns in the Stamp Act period. It was not a public house until after the death of Mrs. White, when it was for some years known as the Atlantic Garden. Its site is now the station of the Elevated Railroad. Mrs. White was buried in the family vault, on Vault Hill, near Cortlandt House, on the 22d of August, 1836. Her long life embraced a period 'full of remarkable events. Born early in the reign of George II, she lived till after the coronation of Queen Victoria. As a child she heard of the final defeat of the Stuart pretender at Culloden, and among her friends were officers who had fought on that bloody field. The foundation of the British empire in India, the seven years' war and the capture of Canada, the American revolution and the Independence of the United States, were the stirring incidents of her middle age. The young prince Louis XV was on the throne when she was born ; the French revolution had swept away the monarchy, the star of Napoleon had risen and dazed the world with its glory and set in the darkness of exile, and the restoration had given way to constitutional monarchy under Louis Phillipe, before she closed her career. The packets from England had brought to her ears the news of the war of the Austrian Succession ; the thrilling story of Maria Theresa, the partition of Poland, the birth of the Prussian Kingdom, the wonder- ful reign of the great Catharine. When she first saw the light New York was a provincial town and had not crept beyond the Commons, the present City Hall Park ; they closed upon an imperial city, the commer- cial metropolis of a nation. In 1736 Clarke ruled the colony by Royal authority, in 1836 Marcy was governor of the Empire State, and General Jackson, the hero of a second war with Great Britian, was the eighth HENRY WHITE AND HIS FAMILY 7 President of the Great Republic. To few is it allotted to witness an historic panorama such as this, with its moving procession of courtiers, warriors, statesmen and sages. It is marvellous to think that she had heard from living lips the story of the passage of New York from its Dutch dynasty to the English rule, and that she lived to relate it to the present generation. JOHN AUSTIN STEVENS Note. — For many of the facts and biographical details the Editor takes pleasure in acknowl- edging his obligations to Mr. Edward F. de Lancey, of this city, a maternally great-grandson of Mr. and Mrs. White.