lem his house, with all his effects, were burned. After the close of the war he was called to the six churches in Kings county, having for his colleague Rev. Peter Lowe. He officiated in the Dutch language, and Mr. Lowe in English.

Dominie Schoonmaker died May 24, 1824, aged eighty-seven years, and with his death the official use of the Dutch language in the pulpits of the Dutch Reformed churches of Kings county ceased.

On June 28, 1805, the ground was purchased on which the recent church stood, and in 1807 the third church edifice was erected. It was built of blue stone, with heavy walls painted a dark lead color, it had a tower in the eastern front, and stood near the road. Galleries were on three sides, but the building had very limited accommodations. The people came largely from the country, and are described as driving to church in long green wagons. A chapel was built in Middagh street in 1811, to accommodate the inhabitants of the village. In 1834 the corner-stone of the fourth church was laid by Abraham A. Remsen, senior elder. Addresses were made by Rev. Maurice W. Dwight, pastor, and Rev. Thomas De Witt, D.D., of the Collegiate Church, New York. The edifice was dedicated May 5, 1835.

Rev. John B. Johnson, of Albany, became the pastor of the church in 1805. While stationed at Albany he was selected to preach the funeral sermon of General Washington, on February 22, 1800. Succeeding pastors and the dates of their coming are: Rev. Selah S. Woodhull, 1806; Rev. Ebenezer Mason, June, 1826; Rev. Peter B. Rouse, October 13, 1828; Rev. Maurice W. Dwight, grandson of President Edwards, of Northampton, Mass., May 26, 1833; Rev. Anson P. Van Giesen, Nov. 1, 1855; Rev. Alphonso A. Willets, June, 1860; Rev. Jos. Kimball, Nov. 21, 1865; Rev. Henry R. Dickson, Oct. 28, 1875; Rev. David N. Vanderveer, D.D., Sept. 15, 1878.

Among a number of historical relics possessed by the first church society are two silver cups with the following inscription:

Anno 1684, den 3 October

heeft Maria Baddia aen de Kerke
Van Bruekelen Lervert een

Zilvert beecker om het

Aboutmael mjt Te Delen.

Char D Baker

H

MINOR TOPICS

AN EXTRAORDINARY INDIAN TOWN

EDITOR OF THE MAGAZINE OF AMERICAN HISTORY:

The student of American colonial history finds many a difficulty which he cannot resolve. At one time there are conflicting statements of authors, and the novice is unable to decide which is right. Anachronisms crop out of which no account is taken, and how shall he determine the truth when modern collators agree in the incidents? The time is changed, or the agents do not coöperate, and there is a reasonable doubt if the original record is not apocryphal and the writer “a fraud.” Such thoughts arise on reading a "Journey to the Cherokee Mountains," recorded in The Natural History of North Carolina, by John Brickell, M.D., Dublin, 1737. He says: "The latter end of February, Anno Domini 1730, we' set out on our intended journey, being in number ten white men and two Indians, for our huntsmen and interpreters." They took the usual outfit of horses, implements, and provisions. "They met with no human specie all the way," or incident worthy of record, except "sleeping on beds of moss under the shade of a tree, near the fire," till fifteen days out, at six o'clock, they discovered a large party of Iroquois Indians, in a town with a State-House, war-captains, and councilors. "The King asked him how his brother (the governor) did?" They lodged two days in one of the King's houses, near the centre of the town, and on benches covered with skins. The rest of the buildings were in a confused order-no regular streets nor shops, or even handycraft trade among them. There was a great number of men and women "and boys and girls stark-naked." Brickell "asked of the King to see his Quiogozon or Charnel House. It was the largest one we ever beheld." They traveled four days further west, over two ridges of mountains, and saw one Indian, who fled, and "in thirty-two days arrived among Christians." There is no place of departure or destination given; no notice of the origin or purpose of the expedition; no responsibility or report to any public authority or appointing power-solely a private enterprise, with no valuable results.

How vastly superior in all particulars were the bold marches of Lederer into the same regions. Yet this expedition stands forth as an important event in the early history of the Province, and is thus noticed by Governor Martin in his History of North Carolina," vol. ii., pp. 1–8. "Dr. John Brickell was sent by Governor Burrington to the Western Indians, and set off from Edenton the latter part of February, 1731, with ten white men and two Indians." He tells the story of the journey as recorded by Brickell, and their return, and "in thirty-two days reached the settlements of white people." This record is accepted and fully

indorsed in the recently published, comprehensive, and exhaustive "Narrative and Critical History of America, vol. V., chap. v., p. 301, by Professor Wm. I. Rivers," as conferring especial distinction on the times. He says: "One service, however, he (Governor Burrington) rendered, in conciliating the Indians on the Western border. To this end he sent Dr. John Brickell with a party of ten men, and two Indians to assist them. The account (Brickell's) of the expedition adds to our knowledge of the condition of that remote section of the province as the interesting work of Lawson (I.) does with respect to other sections."

The amount of "conciliation of the Indians," and of "increased knowledge of the country," appears in the record, and is very meagre. By a collation of dates we will assume that Brickell set out the 25th of February, 1730. The outward journey occupied twenty-one days, and the return thirty-two days-the sum, fifty-three days, extending to April 18, 1730. We are sure in regard to the year, as he says, p. 108: "There were two Buffalo calves taken in the year 1730 by some of the planters on the New river; whether transported to Europe or not, I know not, as I left the country very soon after." New River is a small stream in Onslow County, on the coast, where the presence of an historical buffalo is not known. It is well, also, to note the dates given by Governor Martin, vol. II., p. 1.

Burrington was appointed governor in England, April 29, 1730. He reached North Carolina in the middle of February, 1731; qualified as governor February 25, 1731, which was the earliest date he could issue a commission; called the legislature to meet April 13, 1731, and needed authority from it to do such an act.

It seems, then, Brickell had accomplished his journey eleven days (between the 18th and 29th of April, 1730), before the governor was appointed in England, near ten months before he arrived in North Carolina; and, more, Brickell left the country the year before the governor came.

We look in vain for proof that these two dignitaries had any official relations, were in North Carolina together, or that they ever met or heard of each other.

The records of Governor Burrington's administration of some three years contain no mention of Brickell or his expedition, or they would have been quoted by Martin or Rivers. On the contrary, the evidence of the only competent witness, Brickell, proves an alibi for himself, and an absolute negative in each particular. It seems difficult to account for the confused statements of Governor Martin, and, more so, for their adoption by Professor Rivers. If the latter has ever carefully read and compared Lawson and Brickell, we cannot account for his literary judgment in placing them so nearly on a level. Other American writers have done the same, and it is not too much to say that Brickell has been a stumblingblock to historians for just one hundred and fifty years.

Now that Professor Rivers, most conspicuously of all, stands forth as his champion, he has indirectly become responsible for the existence of this permanent and populous town of Iroquois, some five hundred miles from their native seat, in 1730! The "Sinnegars," or Senecas, were known in these parts, before the treaty of 1751,

only when on the warpath against the Catawbas, Saponas, and other southern tribes, or stimulating the Tuscaroras, as in 1711, to indiscriminate murder of the whites.

We find no mention by any one of the numerous writers on the Six Nations of such a distant migration and peaceful residence of a large town of the Iroquois, at this or any other period of their history. OLIVER P. HUBBARD

NEW YORK, September 9, 1887.

HARVEY BIRCH NOT ENOCH CROSBY

Editor of MAGAZINE OF AMERICAN HISTORY:

A letter from Mr. James E. Deane, in your July issue, taking exception to my calling attention to Miss Cooper's complete demolition of the myth that Enoch Crosby was the original of her father's great creation, “Harvey Birch," published in the Atlantic for February, 1887, requires only a word or two. It seems Mr. Deane is the publisher of a new edition of Barnum's Spy Unmasked, in which this Crosby myth was first produced, in 1828, seven years after the publication of The Spy of Cooper, and which, he states, "has unfortunately drawn this fire of adverse criticism," meaning my comments in the May Magazine of American History. Mr Deane is mistaken, for not till after my article was published did I know of the existence of his reprint, which, he says, is "probably the only edition printed within the past fifty years." Mr. Deane is evidently not aware of the fact that five editions of the book have been printed, the last of which was issued in New York in 1864. I think a sixth edition was also published in Philadelphia, but of this I am not certain. I have, since Mr. Deane's reply to my article, obtained and examined a copy of his reprint, and find that he has "followed copy" truly, giving Barnum's unfortunate "conclusion" in full, for which he deserves credit. It is evident from the reprint that Mr. Deane religiously believes that Enoch Crosby was "Harvey Birch," and that Mr. Cooper merely described his adventures and actions during the Revolution in The Spy. Hence he republished the Barnum book with additions, and a genealogy of the Crosby family, by William S. Pelletreau, to perpetuate the glory of Crosby. This genealogy, it seems, was also published by Mr. Pelletreau himself in the April number, 1877, of the New York Genealogical and Biographical Record, in which he says "that Crosby was the hero" (of The Spy) "admits of no doubt." Miss Cooper however, expressly says, and her information came from her father, that "every incident in the book," except what was stated by John Jay, "was invented by Mr. Cooper."

If my brief article has served to call attention to Mr. Deane's reprint I have no objection, but it also has called attention to Miss Cooper's irrefragable evidence of its worthlessness as truth. Crosby was simply one of many spies employed at the same time, did his duty, and was paid for it, and that is all. Neither he himself, nor Barnum, nor Mr. Deane, nor Mr. Pelletreau say, or dare to claim, that Enoch Crosby refused gold for his services from John Jay.

GUY HATFIELD, of Scarsdale.

ORIGINAL DOCUMENTS

Memorandum of the Route pursued by Colonel Campbell and his column of invasion, in 1779, from Savannah to Augusta; with a Narrative of occurrences connected with his march, and a record of some of the military events which transpired in that portion of the Province of Georgia during the War of the Revolution.

[From the original Manuscript in the Abertaff collection.]

Annotated by Colonel Charles C. Jones, Jr., LL.D.

AUGUSTA, GEORGIA.

[Continued from page 258.]

The Town of Ebenezer is settled by Germans and contains 20 odd houses. There was a kind of a silk manufactory established here, but it never arrived to any great perfection.

From Ebenezer to Trytlands, or the Two Sisters, is 10 miles.

After passing

*"Colo Campbell with the troops under his command arrived from Cherokee hill at Ebenezer the 3d of Jany without any oposition or difficulty, except that of repairing the Bridge upon the Creek that covers one flank of the town. There was at that time a post established here, and some works thrown up. A quantity of provisions, ammunition, some Artillery and small Arms were ordered to be, with all possible expedition, brought from Savannah to this place to supply as well such troops as might be stationed here, as others that might proceed into the upper part of the Province, or to furnish some Companies of Militia with such of these Articles as they were in need of, if they were thought deserving of that encouragement and Confidence.

In the months of March and April this post was made very strong with additional Redoubts and Artillery, for it was always considered that it ought to be made one of the principal posts because a Chain of Communication across the Country and the Ogeechee river might have its right flank well fixt and secure at Ebenezer, while its left might extend to and be covered by the Garrison of Sunbury.

These posts it was suposed would secure the lower part of the Province and protect its Inhabitants against the Incursions of plundering partys sent by the Rebels from the upper Country or from South Carolina. The two Creeks and swamps that cover of the circumference of this post have made it naturally very strong, and whatever was thought necessary to be added from Art, the Engineers executed before the troops crost to Carolina, for it was not intended to maintain any posts higher up the Country while the province continued in its present State. The troops that lay here during the Summer were very sickly, and upon that account the place is since said to be unhealthy in that time of year."

The home of John Adam Treutlen, a patriot and a man of mark, who was elected the first Republican Governor of Georgia.

"This post was established the 4th of January. Two bridges in the Swamp leading to the