So HISTORY OF THE COUNTY OK WESTCHESTER. 



his humble petition for damages, to His Excellency, George Clinton, Esq., 

 Governor in and over the State of New York, Vice- Admiral of the Navy 

 of the same, ebruary 2Sth, 1 7SS, he sets forth " that your petitioner 



in the beginning of the late war between Great Britain and America, 

 employed Minor HiUiard to hire for him a plantation in New England, 

 which he said he did for £2$ per annum. The British fleet then lay at 

 Staten Island ; it was expected the first invasion would have been at 

 New York, which prevented your petitioner moving on the said planta- 

 tion. He waited to see how the contest would go between the fleet and 

 city; but instead of attacking New York, the Admiral sent three armed 

 ships up the Sound early one morning, and came to anchor off City 

 Island, where your petitioner then lived; they sent three of their boats on 

 shore with about one hundred men, who took your petitioner and all 

 his family prisoners ; killed and destroyed his creatures, and plundered 

 many things, all of which they carried off and never paid for, &c." " He 

 then complains of Capt. Brown, of the guard ship Scorpion, who, in the 

 beginning of the year 1779, ordered him to cut his wood on Jesse Hunt's 

 Island, and at no other place — threatening to burn down his house in 

 case of refusal, as the men-of-war and refugees cut their wood there. 

 The island being then in the possession of the British, and Col. Benja- 

 min Hunt had a protection for the island from General Howe and Gov- 

 ernor Tryon, the British commanders refusing him permission to supply 

 himself with necessaries from New York for his family use; neither 

 would they permit him to ship his produce for that place, threatening to 

 sink his boats if he dared to go to the rebels. He thereupon came to 

 New York and purchased property of Nicholas Bayard, Esq." 



Benjamin Palmer, one of the principal proprietors of the island, was 

 the second son of William Palmer, of Westchester, who died sometime 



in April, 1676/ Benjamin Palmer married daughter of Under- 



hill Barnes, of Philipsburgh, in this county, by whom he had a daughter, 

 who married Ware Branson. The latter married secondly a daughter 

 of Henry Ritter, who was the grand mother of Richard E. Mount, Esq., 

 of New York. 



In 181 8, Nicholas Haight and Joshua Huested owned nearly the 

 whole island, together with Rodman's Neck and the Marshall estate. 

 Upon the 1st of January, 1819, Nicholas Haight and Mary, his wife, 



a From original MSS. presented by Richard E. Mount, Esq., to the N. T. Eistorical Society, 

 b Will dated June 2, 1670. Will and adraint. Surrogate's office, X. V. Inventory, April 

 26th, lt>76. No. l. ut. supra. His other children were Joseph, Samuel, Obadiah, Thomas, 

 Spicher, and a daughter Martha. Palmer complains that he n as 1 itrusti ii by ail the pro- 

 prietors to keep the plan and boots and other papers concerning said Island, and had them 

 iu hie possession all the time of the war between England and . and had never lost 



the plan, the books or the papers, in all the troubles, although himself and family were driven 

 from one place to another like fugitives on earth. 



