A Girl’s Life Eighty Years Ago

39. Rensselaer Westerlo and his sister Catherine Westerlo, who afterwards married Mr. Woodworth. Their mother was Catherine Livingston, oldest daughter of Philip, commonly known as the “Signer,” he having been one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence. Miss Livingston had first married Stephen Van Rensselaer, Patroon of the Manor, and by him had had three children: Stephen, who succeeded his father; Philip, mayor of the city of Albany; and a daughter. Mrs. Van Rensselaer remarried Dominie Westerlo.

41. Oliver Kane, a merchant of New York. He married, at Providence, Rhode Island, May 22, 1803, Miss Ann Eliza Clarke, daughter of John Innes Clarke.

43. General Henry Knox was a general in the American army during the Revolution. He entered it at the beginning of the war as a captain of the Boston Grenadiers. He was the first Secretary of War of the United States. He married the daughter of Secretary Flucker. General and Mrs. Knox grew to be enormously stout and were perhaps the largest couple in the city of New York at the time when Washington was inaugurated as first President of the United States. General Knox’s home was at Thomaston, Maine.

44. General Pinckney of South Carolina had served in the American army. He had two daughters, one of whom married Col. Francis K. Huger.

45. Hodgkinson made his first appearance in New York as Vapid. He was born in Manchester, England, 1767; his father was an innkeeper named Meadowcraft. Young Meadowcraft ran away from home, took the name of Hodgkinson, and joined the stage. His wife, to whom he was married on his arrival in America, by Bishop Moore, was Miss Brett of the Bath Theatre. She died in New York of consumption, September, 1803. Mr. and Mrs. Hodgkinson received $100 a week for their services, which was the highest amount yet paid to any two performers in America.

46. This Joseph Jefferson was the grandfather of the present Joseph Jefferson.

47. Mr. and Mrs. William Codman. Mrs. Codman was a Miss Coffin. William Codman had at that time an insurance office at No. 28 South Street, New York.

48. Mrs. Henderson and Miss Denning were daughters of William Denning, a well-known New York merchant.

49. Columbia Gardens were on the corner of Broadway and Prince Street.

50. Mt. Vernon Gardens, afterwards called Contois’s Gardens, were on the northwest corner of Broadway and Leonard Street.

51. Mrs. Delafield was a Miss Hallett. She married, December 11th, 1784, Mr. John Delafield, an Englishman, who had arrived in New York in 1783. They had twelve children. Among them were Major Joseph Delafield, who married Miss Livingston; Mr. Rufus Delafield married Miss Bard; Dr. Edward Delafield married Miss Floyd; Henry Delafield married Miss Munson.

52. Malbone, a celebrated miniature painter. He was born at Newport, Rhode Island, and when very young showed great taste for painting. He travelled about the then known portions of the United States, painting portraits of people in Charleston, Boston, Philadelphia, New York, etc., many of which are now in existence. His price for painting a head was $50. He died of consumption in Savannah, May 7, 1807, in the thirty-second year of his age.

53. Lucia, Zilpah, and John were the children of Genl. Peleg Wadsworth. Zilpah afterwards married Stephen Longfellow, and was the mother of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. Genl. Wadsworth lived at Hiram, on the Saco River.

54. Dr. William Moore was a celebrated physician of New York. He married Miss Sarah Fish and had by her a numerous family. Among them being Nathaniel Moore, President of Columbia College, and Dr. Samuel Moore, also a favorite physician.

55. He was returning from his mission in London, where he had been Minister to the Court of St. James from the United States.

56. Nicholas Low, a merchant in New York. Among his descendants are Mrs. Eugene Schuyler and the wife of M. Waddington, at present ambassador to the Court of St. James from France.

57. Mr. Watson was at this time a widower with one son, James Watson. This son became a great beau in New York society, but died unmarried and insane.

58. William Henderson, who had married Sarah Denning.

59. George III of England.

60. Bethlehem. This is a place originally settled by a religious sect called Moravians. They were famous for their schools,—one for boys kept by the Brothers, and a girls’ school kept by the Sisters. Young ladies were sent to Bethlehem from New York, Philadelphia, and distant parts of the country, to receive their education at this place. In a letter from John Adams to his daughter, dated Monday, Feb. 10th, 1823, he speaks of it: “I have seen a remarkable institution for the education of young ladies at Bethlehem. About 120 of them live under the same roof. They sleep all together in the same garret. I saw 120 beds in two long rows in the same room. The beds and bedclothes were all of excellent quality and extraordinary neat. How should you like to live in such a nunnery?”

61. The yellow fever having broken out in New York, the city was deserted by all who could leave it. Even the business was transacted in the neighboring village of Greenwich, which is now incorporated in the city itself and its boundaries lost in the surrounding streets. The following advertisements have been copied from the “Evening Post,” Thursday, Aug. 25, 1803, as being of interest, as the advertisers were not only well-known New Yorkers, but personal friends of Mrs. Bowne:—

Woolsey & Rogers’ Counting House is removed to No. 28 Courtlandt Street.

Removal. William Codman has removed his Counting House to the N. E. corner room in the 2nd Story of the City Hotel, Broadway.

John G. Bogart, Attorney at law & Notary Public, has Removed his office to the House of Judge Livingston, No. 37 Broadway, near the Custom House.

John Murray & Sons have removed their Counting House to Mr. Murray’s country seat on the Harlem Road, 3 1–2 miles from town.

[This was at Murray Hill, about the corner of 37th Street and Fifth Avenue.]

The Editor being obliged to be absent from town a few days, the discussions respecting yellow fever will, of course, be suspended for a little time.

62. Mr. Boyd, Mrs. Bowne’s brother-in-law, had been in England for some months and was now expected to return to his home.

63. Mrs. Boyd, Isabella Southgate.

64. Beau Dawson, Mr. J. Dawson of Virginia. He had been sent out by President Jefferson in April, 1801, as bearer of the Treaty or Convention between France and the United States as ratified by the latter. The ship in which he sailed was wrecked and the Treaty lost, although the envoy was saved. Another treaty was drawn up and dispatched as soon as possible, but there was great annoyance at the delay.

65. Highlands. The hills about West Point on the Hudson are so called. The road from Peekskill to Garrison’s over the hill called “Anthony’s Nose” is particularly steep and stony. The Beverly Farm, which was owned by Mr. William Denning, lay in the midst of these hills. The house is still standing and is almost unaltered.

66. To Miranda Southgate, or, more likely, to Octavia. (M. K. L.)

67. From Octavia Southgate to Mrs. Southgate.

68. Mr. Newbold and Mr. Philip Rhinelander were well-known New Yorkers. The latter married, December 22, 1814, Miss Mary Colden Hoffman.

69. Mr. Jephson was an Englishman who had lately arrived in New York.

70. John Duer married Miss Anne Bunner October 19, 1804, and his brother, William Duer, soon after married Maria Denning. Mr. Rhinelander engaged the two Miss Duers to the wrong men. Fanny married Beverly Robinson, and Sally married, March 10, 1805, John Witherspoon Smith, and died July 10, 1887, in the one hundred and first year of her age.

71. Mrs. Kane’s “charming little girl” became Mrs. James King of Albany, and the mother of many well-known New Yorkers.

72. Lady Temple was the daughter of Governor Bowdoin, and had married Sir John Temple. Their daughter, afterwards Mrs. Winthrop, was the mother of the Hon. Robert C. Winthrop. She was long the reigning belle in Boston.

73. Mr. and Mrs. Bogert were intimate friends of Mr. and Mrs. Rufus King’s, and they occupied adjoining places at Jamaica.

74. Mrs. Heyward was Mr. and Mrs. Rogers’ daughter. She married Mr. Heyward of South Carolina. Miss Heyward married Mr. Cutting of New York, and was the mother of Messrs. William, Heyward, and Brockholst Cutting.

75. Wolsey Rogers married, Thursday evening, December 1, 1807, Miss Susan Bayard.

76. Harriet Clarke, a daughter of John Innes Clarke of Providence, and sister of Mrs. Kane.

77. Mrs. Oliver Kane had married, at Providence, R. I., May 22, 1803, Mr. Oliver Kane, merchant of this city. Her children were Mrs. King of Albany, Mrs. William Russel, Mrs. Nicholsen, John, De Lancey, and Miss Lydia Kane.

78. Mrs. Gilbert R. Livingston (Martha Kane), a sister of Oliver Kane. Her children were Mrs. Henry Beekman, Mrs. Codwise, Mrs. Constable, the Rev. Gilbert R. Livingston, and James Kane Livingston.

79. Mrs. Fish (Miss Elizabeth Stuyvesant) had married, April 30, 1803, Colonel Nicholas Fish. This daughter was Mrs. Daniel le Roy. The Hon. Hamilton Fish and Mrs. Richard Morris were also children of Colonel Fish’s.

80. Pauline Porter, daughter of Paulina King and Dr. Aaron Porter of Portland, had married Edward Beecher.

81. Mary King Porter, her sister, married Nathaniel Coffin of Saco.

82. Horatio Southgate married his first wife, Nabby McLellan, September 29, 1805. Mrs. Bowne is here alluding to her sister Octavia’s engagement to William Browne.

83. Robert Murray, Mr. Bowne’s nephew.

84. Frederic Southgate, her youngest brother.

85. John, Charles, and James King, sons of Rufus King, Mrs. Bowne’s cousins. James was at that time at Harvard College.

86. Mrs. Gillespie (Amelia Denning). This daughter died when a very young girl of a putrid sore throat.

87. Walter Bowne, Jr. Eldest child of Walter Bowne and Eliza Southgate.

88. Kitty Bayard married Duncan Campbell. Her sister Susan had married Woolsey Rogers, December 1, 1807.

89. Mary, oldest daughter of Robert Watts and his wife Lady Mary Alexander, married Dr. Romaine, who left her a widow after a few years of married life. At the age of seventy-three Mrs. Romaine married her first love, Peter Bertram Cruger, a widower with eight children. Miss Watts’s engagement to Dr. Romaine was a surprise to her friends, who knew of her attachment to Mr. Cruger.

90. John Alsop King, oldest son of Rufus King and his wife Mary Alsop. John A. King was twice governor of the State of New York. He married in 1810 Mary Ray. Charles King, the second son of Rufus King, for some time President of Columbia College, New York. He married twice: first, Miss Gracie, and for his second wife Miss Low, the daughter of his father’s intimate friend Nicholas Low.

91. Miss Fairlee was the daughter of Major Fairlee of the British army, who was a noted wit. Many anecdotes are told of his odd sayings. One of them was, that being on his death-bed he was told by his physician to take yeast as medicine. “What for?” said the Major; “to make me rise?” Miss Fairlee married Cooper the actor.

92. The wife of the French General Moreau. They came to the United States in 1805, but he returned to fight with the Allies, and was killed in 1813, some say by a bullet aimed by Napoleon himself.

93. Mrs. Stevens was Miss Rachel Coxe, of Philadelphia, and had married Colonel Stevens, of Hoboken, New Jersey.

94. Miss Lyde married Jonathan Ogden. Among her children were Mrs. Robert Goelet, Mrs. Dominick Lynch Lawrence, and Mrs. Joseph Ogden.

95. Mrs. John Lawrence.

96. Ralph Izard and his wife, the granddaughter of Etienne de Lanci, a Huguenot nobleman who came to this country in 1686. Mr. Izard had been appointed Commissioner from Congress to the grand-duchy of Tuscany, and had performed other important diplomatic services. He was one of the first United States senators from South Carolina. Mrs. Mannigault’s husband was the grandson of Mr. and Mrs. Izard. She was related to the Misses Watts of New York, and for their sake was particularly attentive and kind to their friend Mrs. Bowne. Mr. and Mrs. Heyward were the parents of the celebrated beauty Miss Elizabeth Heyward, who married James Hamilton.