Jacob Wandell, 1747-1827

My 4th great grandfather, Jacob Wandell, was the son of Johannes Wandell who immigrated from the Netherlands in 1737.  Johannes was the gg?grandson of the famous Dutch poet and playwright, Joost Van Der Vandel, whose statue is displayed in Vandelpark in Amsterdam.

Jacob Wandell > Miriam Olivia Wandell > Ada Clemina Hall > Horace C. Crofford > Virginia M. Crofford > Teresa Zaun Austin

Jacob was born in 1747 in Fishkill, New York.  He married Catherine Stillwell in 1770,  and they had ten children.  He became a wealthy man and owned slaves.

Jacob enlisted as a Quartermaster in the military under General Washington in 1777, and was assigned to Colonel Spencer's regiment.  His connections with the Dutch community enabled him to obtain food when the English army could not.  Jacob participated in the battles of Brandywine (September) and Germantown (October), and was with the army at Valley Forge during that terrible winter of 1777-78.  My great grandmother Ada Crofford wrote:

When Washington was at Valley Forge, my great grandfather seeing the soldiers were in much need of shoes went to Washington and told him that he had left a great quantity of hides in his tan-vat, and that they were, by that time, ready to be finished.  He offered to go home and have the hides finished, and made up into shoes, by his slaves, one of whom was a good cutter, and several could sew leather.  Washington gladly gave his permission.  My great grandfather went home, returning in due time with two great wagons loaded with shoes. 

Jacob's own home was plundered during the war.  According to Ada:

Great grandfather Wandell was rich when the revolution began.  His home was between the lines much of the time and was plundered by both sides. They had got down to one cow. One day they saw a soldier departing with her.  Great grandmother had twin babies in the cradle. Snatching them from the cradle she ran to the door with a baby on either arm.  "Stop, stop!" she cried.  "If you take her, my babies will die." The soldier stopped and looked at the babies a moment, then took the rope off the cow and went off.  

In 1780, Jacob was transferred to Colonel Goose Van Schaick's regiment where he served until the close of the war.  He was in Virginia at the Battle of Yorktown, and was apparently acquainted with Lafayette. Many years later, when Lafayette visited America (1824), he recognized Jacob during a parade in NY City and embraced him.

When the Treaty was signed in 1783, Jacob's discharge was signed by George Washington.  This relic is currently housed in Washington's Headquarters in Newburgh, New York.

General Washington's Headquarters at Newburgh, NY

Jacob moved to Havershaw, New York in 1794 and became a millwright.  He died a poor man.  He and Catherine both died on Weygant's Island, now called Iona Island, on the Hudson River.  The island was owned by the Van Cortlandt family for 200 years.  It is now part of Bear Mountain State Park.

Small island on the Hudson River where Jacob and Catherine died.

Lt. Nicholas Stillwell, Virginia colonist

My family, what would you think if I told you that one of your ancestors - my 9th great grandfather - was associated with Jamestown?

Lt. Nicholas Stillwell > Capt. Nicholas Stillwell > Nicholas Stillwell III > John Stillwell > William L. Stillwell > Catherine Stillwell > Capt. Jacob Wandell > Miriam Olivia Wandell > Ada Clemina Hall > Horace C. Crofford > Virginia M. Crofford > Teresa Zaun Austin

Lt. Nicholas Stillwell was the progenitor of the famous Stillwells of Long Island. We are direct descendants through my mother's paternal lineage.  There is a wealth of primary documentation about the Stillwell family.  It took some time to wade through it all, especially since many of them had the same first names and there were multiple spellings of the last name. Interesting, this Nicholas consistently wrote his name with the N backwards, so his writing is distinctive. He was a military man who led expeditions against the Indians, but he was also described as a pious man who "lived for the betterment of the human race."  He was loyal all his life to the Dutch people in America.

Nicholas Stillwell was born in Surrey, England in 1603.  He fled England to escape religious persecution, becoming a soldier of Elizabeth Stuart the Queen of Bohemia who was protestant. Elizabeth is called "the Winter Queen" because of her short tenure in the winter of 1619-1620.  According to tradition, he married one of her maids of honor, Abigail Hopton, in about 1630.  After the defeat of Prague, Elizabeth went into exile at The Hague, and her army disbanded.  Nicholas came to America and settled in Virginia.

[see this post for new info on the Queen of Bohemia]

He was a successful tobacco plantation owner on the York River in Virginia from 1635 to about 1646. His house and plantation were located "east of West Creek" (now Felgate's Creek) right off what is now the National Colonial Historic Parkway. From 1635 to 1639, he was a tobacco evaluator, inspecting tobacco for quality before it was shipped to England, so he likely was well known to John Rolfe. He aided Claiborne (future governor of Maryland) in the fight against the Indians in Virginia from 1644-1646.  Afterward, Nicholas left Virginia - perhaps because the "Claiborne Incident," whatever that implies, caused an unsafe situation for colonists vulnerable to attack by small groups of Indians, or maybe because Gov. Berkeley created an uncomfortable situation for certain protestant groups in Virginia.

UPDATE 5/3/2020:  Just discovered that Nicholas Stilwell also owned 200 acres in what is now Gloucester. The following two maps were found in The Descendants of Lieutenant Nicholas Stillwell, Volume I by Raymond J. Stillwell, 2010. Note the proximity to Warner Hall.

In 1646, he left for New Amsterdam, leaving his land to be taken by others.  He was one of the 20 original farm owners (Lady Moody colonists*) in Graves End. He traded a house in town for an outlying plantation. He had to prove he could defend himself from the Indians in order to obtain permission to live outside the town.  He led expeditions against the Indians during the Esopus Wars, which were localized conflicts between the Indians and the Dutch. In the years 1650-1653, he was the town magistrate.  He was a close personal friend and confidante of Peter Stuyvesant, the last Dutch governor of New Amsterdam.

Graves End, or Gravesend, NY

In 1664, he purchased land on Manhattan Island.  In 1665, he moved to Staten Island directly across the bay from Gravesend.  He received the estate of Thomas Morell by will, as Morell did not have heirs.

Nicholas died on Staten Island on December 28, 1671.  

Nicholas Stillwell owned the land on Staten Island between what is now
Jefferson and Liberty Avenues, in the area of Dongan Hills.

Line of descent:  Lt. Nicholas Stillwell > Capt. Nicholas Stillwell > Nicholas Stillwell III > John Stillwell > William L. Stillwell > Catherine Stillwell* > Miriam Olivia Wandell > Ada C. Hall > Horace C. Crofford > Virginia Crofford > Zaun
*some sources say Catherine's father was Stephen Stillwell, also descended from Lt. Nicholas Stillwell.  I'm still working on verifying this information.

Our family lines have crisscrossed through the generations, especially in our New England ancestry.  These links have not yet been proven, but there was a Richard Applegate (mom's maternal ancestor?) who married a daughter of John Stillwell (mom's paternal ancestor?).  I also found out that Jeremiah Stillwell (mom's paternal ancestor?) married Rebecca Ashton (dad's maternal ancestor?).

There is a book out now by Michael Philip Cash called Stillwell: a Haunting on Long Island. 180 five star reviews on Amazon!  There is a Stillwell Avenue in Gravesend, and the estates of some family members were well known on Long Island and in Queens.

*Gravesend was founded by Lady Deborah Moody, a leader of religious dissenters; she was the 1st female landowner.

Sources:
http://haygenealogy.com/hay/sources/britton/stillwelltree.html
http://www.wikitree.com/genealogy/STILLWELL
http://www.stilwell.uk.net/index.php/families/usa-stilwells/the-known-history.html
Various documents linked to Ancestry.com

Ossining

Ever since Nintendo Wii came out with Karaoke Revolution, I have been ridiculously in love with the song Ossining by Mike Doughty.  I never get tired of listening to it.

This is just another one of those eerie coincidences that I'm finding in my genealogy research.

The story, according to my great grandmother Ada Crofford, is that her grandfather Haight purchased a tract of land from an Indian called Old Sing Sing.  As part of the price, Old Sing Sing was promised a fresh loaf of bread every Christmas, baked by my 4th great grandmother. The old Indian would appear at Christmas time, and go off very happily with his prize.

William Haight > Miriam Haight > Miriam Olivia Wandell > Ada C. Hall > Horace C Crofford > Teresa Zaun Austin

This tract of land, once called Sing Sing, was officially named Ossining in 1901.

Nice story, right?  Historical accounts found online tell that a man named Frederick Philipse purchased the land from the Sint Sinck Indians in 1685 and incorporated it as the Manor of Philipsburg.  He leased the land to tenant farmers.  After the Revolution, Philipse was imprisoned for being a British Loyalist.  His manor was confiscated and sold at auction by the State of New York.  It became known as Sing Sing. Many of the farms were sold to the tenant farmers who had supported the American cause.  The Haights were among those tenant farmers who bought the land.  Ada's great grandfather William Haight was born in 1752 in Philipsburg; after the war, he purchased land he had been farming. His father, Samuel Haight had occupied the land as early as 1745 and purchased part of the manor from the state of New York in 1785.  According to The Settlement of Philipsburgh, by MacKenzie, Samuel and Joseph Haight were among the English families who settled in the eastern and northern part of Mount Pleasant after 1725.

In a manuscript about Deborah Sampson, there is mention of William Haight:

It is in this region* that William (also given as Willis) Haight had a tenant farm of 133 acres that was part of the extensive land holdings that made up Philipsburgh Manor. Unfortunately for Frederick Philipse III, he chose the wrong side in the Revolution. After the war his confiscated land was put up for sale by the New York State Commissioners of Forfeitures, and Haight purchased the land that he had been farming. XXX
The name Haight has many variations, the most usual being Hoyt and Hoit, with Hoite and Haite also used frequently. It was a relatively common name in Westchester.

*near where the borders of the present towns of Ossining, Mount Pleasant and New Castle intersect two miles due east of Ossining and the Hudson River.  In The Female Review it says "a place called, in Dutch, Vonhoite."

Interesting side notes:
Slaves played an important role in colonial life in this northern town.  One slave was named Charles Haight.
The Philipse Manor House still stands as a tourist attraction in what is now Yonkers.

Among the many famous people associated with Ossining:
Washington Irving "Sleepy Hollow"
Clement Moore "The Night Before Christmas"
Deborah Sampson, Revolutionary War soldier

Ossining lyrics:

Put my faith in the price of mud
And my lord shall match the pounds,
Ten thousand days and a night spelunking
Kill my years in the lightning round,
Confound it

Why not
Seek Ossining
These threes and foursomes
Abounded,

Why not
Seek Ossining
This time around?

No, not a maze, but like blazed-out inner star
Disclosed completely in a plain film canister