April, 1775 to September, 1776 115 



Borough became a hotbed of Toryism. Another element 

 which added to the loyalty of the inhabitants to the crown was 

 the influence of the clergy of the Church of England ; and from 

 the pulpits of St. Peter's at Westchester, St. Paul's atEast- 

 chester, and St. John's at Yonkers, the doctrine of passive 

 obedience was preached by Rectors Seabury and Babcock 

 with no less fervor than in the days of Laud and the Star 

 Chamber. 



On August 20, 1774, a meeting was called at the borough - 

 town of Westchester for the purpose of electing delegates to 

 a county convention to be held at White Plains on the twenty- 

 second of the same month, for the purpose of selecting a rep- 

 resentative to the general Congress to meet in Philadelphia on 

 September first. Henry B. Dawson says 1 that this meeting 

 was controlled by a single master-spirit, Colonel Lewis Morris, 

 who, instead of convening the meeting for an honest expression 

 of opinion from the freeholders and inhabitants, many of whom 

 were his own tenants, or for the honest promotion of the best 

 interests of the colony, used it "as a preparation for the return 

 of the Morris family to place, authority, and influence in the 

 political affairs of the Colony, from which, through the con- 

 trolling influence of the De Lanceys, it had been, for many 

 years, entirely excluded." The meeting adopted a set of 

 resolutions which, after proclaiming allegiance to the King, 

 proceeded to criticise the unconstitutional acts of his Majesty's 

 government in taxing the colonies without their consent, to 

 sympathize with the distressed people of Boston on account 

 of the closure of their port, to call upon the colonies to stand 

 together for unanimous action, and to advise the action of a 

 general congress to take steps for a redress of their grievances. 



1 "The American Revolution," in Scharf's History of Westchester County, 

 vol. i. 



