THE TOWN OF NEW ROCHELLE. 607 



Ambrose Si card, Jr., and Daniel Sicard to convert in moneyed rents at 

 six per cent, the forty shillings that each of them owes which make four 

 pistoles for ten acres of ground sold to them by said inhabitants, &c, 

 and begin to pay the rent from the first to the last of May of the year, 

 1694. Signed, Thauvet Ecotonneau, J. Machet, 



Theroude, Guillaume le Conte and 

 Daniel STREiNG." a 



By an act of General Assembly passed on the 24th of March, 1693, 

 which was subsequently confirmed, the manor of Pelham became one of 

 the four districts or precincts of Westchester parish. In 1702, New 

 Rochelle contributed towards the rector's maintenance and poor of the 

 parish £1 $s. In 1720 her quota had increased to ^"12 14s- \\d. At 

 a -meeting of the church wardens, vestrymen, free holders and parishon- 

 ers of ye borrough of Westchester, &c, in Westchester, 10th day of 

 January, Anno Domitii 1709-10, &c, &c, Mr. Anthony Lespinard was 

 chosen and appointed a vestryman of New Rochelle. 



The next minister of the French Reformed church of New Rochelle 

 was the Rev. Daniel Bondet, AM., a native of France. He was born 

 in the year 1652, studied theology at Geneva, and afterwards entered 

 the ministry. On the revocation of the edict of Nantes he fled from 

 France to England. 6 Here he received Holy Orders from the Right Rev. 

 Henry Compton, Lord Bishop of London, and soon after accompanied 

 the French emigrants who arrived at Boston, Mass., in the summer of 

 1686. For eight years he was employed by the Corporation for propagating 

 the Christian Faith among the Indians^ at a place called New Oxford, 

 near Boston, and was also a minister of the French congregation there 

 as appears from a letter written by him to some person in authority, 

 (probably Gov. Dudley,) complaining of the sale of rum to the Indians 

 without order and measure, and of its baneful effects — the date is lost 

 with a line or two at the beginning, but it is endorsed: Mr. Daniel 

 Be?idofs representation referring to New Oxford, July 6, 1691.^ 



a Town Rec. Lib. A., 23. 



b "Upon the revocation the rest of the ministers were allowed fifteen days for their depar- 

 ture; bat it can hardly be believed to what cruelties and vexations they were exposed," 

 "And yet," adds the English historian, "through rich mercy very few revolted; the far 

 greatest part of them escaped, either into England, Holland, Germany or Switzerland ; yea, 

 and some are now in New England." Quick's Synodicon introduction in Sept., 1686. Twenty- 

 six pounds were contributed for the relief of the French Protestants who came to New Eng- 

 land, Mass. Hist. Col., 3rd series, vol. IV., 62. "In 1693, Cotton Mather speaks of Mr. Bondet 

 as a faithful minister to the French congregation at New Oxford in the Mpwiug,'' Magnalia 

 B. C. C. 6, 32, vol. 2, p. 382, 8vo. ed., Hart, 2 vols., 1820. 



c On the restoration of Charles Second, the charter for the Promoting and Propagating of 

 the Gospel of Jesus Christ in N. E. (founded in 1649,) was renewed through the influence 

 of Mr. Ashurst and Richard Baxter, with the Lord Chancellor Hyde, and the powers under it 

 were enlarged ; for now the Corporation was styled " The Society for the Propagation of the 

 Gospel in New England and the parts adjacent in America." 



d " Soon after the revocation of the Edict of Nantes, Jos. Dudley and other proprietors, 

 brought over thirty French Protestant families into this country and settled them upon the 

 eastevmost part or end of the said tract of land, now known by the name of Oxford.' —Ox- 

 ford Town Records. 



