70 REPORT OP THE 



cut fire wood at a place that was a mile and a half from the 

 shore. There was a house on Piney Island owned by a Mr. 

 Brown, the site of which is now a great way out at sea. Plumb 

 Island (a part of Barren Island) was once covered with fine 

 timber. There is none however there now, the greatest part 

 of the land having washed away." 



Reports on record show that Piney or the Western end of 

 Coney Island extended miles out to sea, had high dunes or 

 sand hills near the coast and was well wooded and fertile on 

 the Gravesend side. Guisbert's, or the middle Island, was 

 quite fertile, and furnished grass and pasturage to the 

 Gravesend people. It was divided into thirty-nine lots, the 

 original number of members in the Dongan charter, and large 

 quantities of hay were harvested there. It had similar dunes 

 along its sea front. Sedge Bank, or Manhattan Island, was 

 covered with Sedge grass and was of no particular value. 



A phenomenal storm occurred and one half of Coney Island 

 was washed away in a day. Its high ridges of sand that had 

 been piled up by the wind were leveled ; its inlets closed and 

 a straight beach left, which, as a whole, had been growing 

 smaller of later years. A large and threatening shoal to navi- 

 gation is steadily growing out to sea. This shoal extends 

 between Sandy Hook and Bockaway inlet, and can be readily 

 located by watching the detour' of the Bockaway boats made 

 on their trips 



Fortunately this sort of storm does not come often, not once 

 indeed in a century, but as certain conditions will produce 

 sucli terrific disturbances, and as we never know how near they 

 are at hand, it would be well to consider them in recommend- 

 ing or building a shore protection. 



The conditions that would have to exist to bring about one 

 of these coast storms are, first, the trend of the coast straight 

 ahead to the east for one hundred and fifty miles, with neither 

 promontory or estuaries to break the momentum of the waves 

 started. They would come in with increasing velocity. When 

 the highest Spring tide takes place, involving the combination 

 of the solar, lunar and sidereal influences, in conjunction with 



