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Inquireing further after news they told me that six days agoe three Christians and two Shan'wans Indians who went about fifteen months agoe with Arnout Vielle into the Shan'wans Country were passed by the Mennissinck going for Albany to fech powder for Arnout and his Company: and further told them that s Arnout intended to be there wth seaven hundred of ye said Shan'wans Indians loaden wth beavor and peltries att y time ye Indian Coarn is about one fout high (which may be in the month of June.)

The Mennissinck Sachems further s" that one of their Sachems & other of their Indians were gone to fech beaver & pelteries which they had hunted: and having heard no news of them are afraid yt ye Sinneques have killed them for ye lucar of the beavor or because ye Mennissinck Indians have not been with ye Sinneques as usial to pay their Dutty, and therefore desire y' your Excell will be pleased to order y' the Sinneques may be told, not to molest or hurt ye Mennissincks they being willing to continue in amity with them.

In the afternoon I departed from ye Mennissincks: the 8th the 9th & 10th of Feb. I travilled and came att Bergen in y morning and about noone arrived at New Yorke.

This is may it pleas your Excell. the humble reporte off your Excellency's most humble servant

ARENT SCHUYLER Endorsed, Reporte of Capt Arent Schuyler his message to the Mennissinck Country. Feb. ye 10th 169

Letter from Governor Hamilton of East Jersey, to Governor Fletcher of New York.

[From Papers of F. J. Paris in New Jersey Historical Society Library Vol. C, Private Papers No. 5, and Vol. D, p. 77.]

To his Excellency BENJAMIN FLETCHER and the honourable their Majesties Council of the province of New York

Feb: 13 1694

WHEREAS in the Time of Coll. Dongan the Surveyors of New York and the Jerseys Did, by a consent of the Respective Gov", meet to ascertain the Stationary points, from whence the Division Line betwixt New York and the Jerseys was to be drawn Conform to the Deeds Granted by the then Duke of York to the Proprietor of the Jerseys, that the Boundarys of Each province might be the better known. And whereas, in pursuance of the Said order, the Respective Surveyors went out and affixed a Station on Delaware River in 41° 40' Latitude and another on hudson's River in 419 which is (Conform to a Map made by the Surveyers) Due west from ffredirick Phillipse's Lower Mills; but tho' the Stations were fixed, yett the Lines were not drawn.

May it please your Excellency,

That whereas I am now making a detachment of our men for the frontiers, out of the Respective Counties, and that there are Several plantations near the Line of partition, which pretends Exemption from any detachment, as being in another Government: and perhaps use the Same Shifts to York Government: Your Excellency to clear this point, would please give order to the Surveyer, to Join with our Surveyers at a certain day, to mark out the Line from the Said Station on Hudson's River as far as there are any plantations.

Your Excies most obedient Servant
AND: HAMILTON

Minutes of the Council of New York.

[From Papers of J. F. Paris in New Jersey Historical Society Library Vol. A p. 83.]

ATT A COUNCIL held at Fort William Henry the 22th of February 1693

Present His Excell Ben Fletcher &ca

Fred Philipse

rs

John Laurence

Esq

Steph Cortlandt Esq Will. Pinhorne Gab. Menvielle Coll Andrew Hamilton Governour of the Jerseys having desired that the line of Partition between the Province of East Jersey and this Province from the Station formerly agreed unto by the Surveyers of both Governments may be Run and marked to ascertain the right of some Plantations and Settlements neere the line who at present avoid the paying of Taxes or dutyes to either Government.

Ordered Coll: Stephen Cortlant Coll: Nicholas Bayard William Nicoll Esq' and William Pinhorne Esq be a Committee of this Board to consider of an Answer thereunto against thursday next.

Instructions of the East Jersey Proprietors to Thomas Gordon.

[From the Original Draft in the Library of the New York Historical Society.] Instructions to Thomas Gordon."

MR. THOMAS GORDON

The necessity we find the proprietors affairs ly

Thomas Gordon

1 THOMAS GORDON, of Pitlochie, Scotland, was among the arri vals in 1684 which added so materially to the advancement of East Jersey in population

and enterprise. He brought with him his wife, Hellen, of the family of Stralogh.

under, that an Agent go home' to represent the state of them' and' being well assured of your integrity and ability We have therefore unanimously made choice of you to undertake a voyage to England to that intent.

1o In respect Eliz. Town has made an Appeal home & may in likelyhood misrepresent the trueth of that tryall you who know the whole state of the affair can best obviat objections.

If they insist upon the verdict you may inform the props matter of fact: of the fallacy of the Jury, that all were parties illegible] & contributed to make up

and four children, and established himself at first upon a plantation on Cedar Brook, in the vicinity of what was known, afterward, as Scotch Plains, from having been settled by the countrymen of Mr. Gordon. It now bears the name of Fanwood. Before the close of 1687 his wife and all four of his children died. He had become a proprietor before he left Scotland and soon had assigned to him many important positions. In 1692 he was appointed Deputy Secretary and Register for the Proprietaries, by Wm. Dockwra, their Chief Secretary in London. The same year he was made Clerk of the Court of Common Right, Register of the Court of Chancery and one of a Commission for the trial of small causes at Perth Amboy. In 1693 he was appointed Judge of Probate, and in 1694 made an officer of the Customs at Amboy. The respect and estimation in which he was held by the Proprietors at that time was manifested by his being sent to Engiand in 1695 with the nstructions in the text. He remained abroad three years, having with him, it is presumed, Janet Mudie, whom he made his second wife before his embarkation. In 1698 he was appointed Attorney General of East Jersey, and in December, 1700, was again invested with the duties of Judge of Probate; a substitute having been appointed during his absence. In 1702 Dockwra having been superseded, Mr. Gordon was appointed to succeed him as Chief Secretary and Register of the Proprietors. In addition to these and other offices of a local character, he represented Amboy and the County of Middlesex in the Provincial Assembly from 1703 to 1709, part of the time acting as Speaker. He was appointed one of Gov. Hunter's Council in 1709, and at the time of his decease held the same situation under Gov. Burnet. From June, 1710, to March, 1719, he was Receiver General and Treasurer of the Province. His name will be found connected with all the most important events of his time, and he seems to have been unusually worthy of the eulogistic inscription on his tombstone in the church yard of St. Peter's Church at Perth Amboy; whither was transferred, a few years since, from the old public burial place, the tombstone of his first wife. He died April 28th, 1722, in the 70th year of his age, leaving three sons, Andrew, Thomas and John, and three daughters, Mary, Euphemia and Margaret.-See Whitehead's Contributions to the Early History of Perth Amboy, &c.

ED.

The original draft, which is all in the handwriting of Andrew Hamilton, opens with The confidence we have in your integrity and ability:" which words were erased after the next two corrections were made.

*** Affairs" erased and them substituted.

3" Have" omitted.

Mr Nicols fees & if the verdict is insisted upon Its only for the prop's to state themselves the appellants and that they join issue with them' vid. whether the D. grant to S G. Carteret in July 1674 was good or not tho' after the surrender of these parts by the Dutch upon

[illegible.]

Ob. If they should represent a hardship put upon them in respect there is a greater quit rent imposed upon them than they were to pay by the patent they had of Coll Nicols

Ans. Besides that that patent is void the Duke from whom he derived his power haveing sold the province several months before that grant. The quit rent of that patent is indefinite & refers only to such Quit rent & services as it should legible be established in other of the Dukes Colonies. Let it then be Considered under what quit rent Staten Island Long island & the Bulk of the Lands in York governm' were settled by the same Coll Nicolls after the date of the Eliz. patent it will be found to amount to the p acre demanded by the prop

Ob. If it be objected that there is some town in Long island that pays but a lamb a year quit rent, & several great tracts of Land given by the late gov's may be for an Indian arrow or a fat buck.

Ans. There is no reason that they should Cull out any particular place in Long Island to be the Standard but the settlements in generall, becaus perhaps those places that payes a fat lamb might have given some valuable Consideration to the gov's for the time being which Eliz. never did. Nor is it to be taken as a measure at which Quit rent govs have let land of late which being farr backwards & inconvenient was hardly worth asking for. And therefor the proper adjusting

1 The lines between the bars originally written "that the most it would amount to was [illegible] the prop" to apppeal and that the props try the title with them.

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