CHAPTER X 



EARLY MEANS OF COMMUNICATION 



SLOOPS, periaugers, batteaux, and canoes constituted 

 the vehicles of communication in the early days. As 

 in all new countries, water was the natural highway; 

 and the waters of the Sound, the Hudson, and the Harlem, all 

 adjacent to the shores of the Borough, gave easy and con- 

 venient access to Manhattan Island and to the settlers near the 

 shores. Westchester Creek was navigable for sloops, and when 

 Captain de Connick and Fiscal Van Tienhoven went to eject 

 the English settlers at Oostdorp, they ascended the river and 

 creek in vessels of that class. The Bronx and the Hutchinson 

 rivers were both navigable for several miles in batteaux 

 and canoes, the former to West Farms and the latter to East- 

 chester. In recent years, the Federal Government has deep- 

 ened the channel of the latter so that heavily laden coal 

 vessels and small steamers are able to ascend at high tide as 

 far as the City Dock at Mount Vernon, contiguous to old 

 St. Paul's Church, and just over the boundary line of the 

 Boroughs 



From time immemorial, and even up to the present gener- 

 ation, a regular sloop trade was carried on from Westchester 

 borough-town to New York City. In the advertisement of 

 the Reverend Samuel Seabury, mentioned in another chapter, 



there is a paragraph which says: "Westchester is about 

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