Bayles William Harrison
Old Taverns of New York
The articles of association were signed by
Benjamin Kissam,
David Mathews,
William Wickham,
Thomas Smith,
Whitehead Hicks,
Rudolphus Ritzema,
William Livingston,
Richard Morris,
Samuel Jones,
John Jay,
William Smith,
John Morine Scott,
James Duane,
John T. Kempe,
Robert R. Livingston, Jr.,
Egbert Benson,
Peten Van Schaack,
Stephen De Lancey.
On March 4, 1774, John Watts, Jr., and Gouverneur Morris were admitted to the Society. In the exciting times preceding the Revolution the meetings became irregular, and the members of the Moot came together for the last time on January 6, 1775.
A number of gentlemen were accustomed to meet as a club at the house of Walter Brock, afterwards kept by his widow, familiarly called “Mother Brock,” on Wall Street near the City Hall. It was probably a social and not very formal club. One of the most prominent of its members was William Livingston.
In May, 1773, Francis offered Vauxhall for sale, when it was described as having an extremely pleasant and healthy situation, commanding an extensive prospect up and down the North River. The house, “a capital mansion in good repair,” had four large rooms on each floor, twelve fireplaces and most excellent cellars. Adjoining the house was built a room fifty-six feet long and twenty-six feet wide, under which was a large, commodious kitchen. There were stables, a coach house and several out houses, also two large gardens planted with fruit trees, flowers and flowering shrubs in great profusion, one of which was plentifully stocked with vegetables of all kinds. The premises, containing twenty-seven and a half lots of ground, was a leasehold of Trinity Church, with sixty-one years to run. The ground rent was forty pounds per annum. It was purchased by Erasmus Williams, who, the next year, having changed the name back, “with great propriety,” to Mount Pleasant, solicited the patronage of the public, particularly gentlemen with their families from the West Indies, Carolina, etc., and such as are travelling from distant parts, either on business or pleasure.
Francis also offered the Queen’s Head for sale in 1775. It was then described as three stories high, with a tile and lead roof, having fourteen fireplaces and a most excellent large kitchen; a corner house very open and airy, and in the most complete repair. Although Francis desired to sell his house, he stated that “so far from declining his present business he is determined to use every the utmost endeavor to carry on the same to the pleasure and satisfaction of his friends and the public in general.” He did not succeed in selling the house and continued as landlord of the Queen’s Head until he abandoned it when the British army entered the city.
The Merchants’ Coffee House Moves
On May 1, 1772, Mrs. Ferrari, who had been keeping the Merchants’ Coffee House on the northwest corner of the present Wall and Water Streets, which had been located there and been continuously in use as a coffee house since it was opened as such about the year 1738 by Daniel Bloom, removed to a new house which had recently been built by William Brownjohn on the opposite cross corner, that is, diagonally across to the southeast corner. Mrs. Ferrari did not move out of the Merchants’ Coffee House, but she took it with her with all its patronage and trade. On opening the new house she prepared a treat for her old customers. The merchants and gentlemen of the city assembled in a numerous company and were regaled with arrack, punch, wine, cold ham, tongue, etc. The gentlemen of the two insurance companies, who likewise moved from the old to the new coffee house, each of them, with equal liberality regaled the company. A few days later the newspaper stated that the agreeable situation and the elegance of the new house had occasioned a great resort of company to it ever since it was opened. The old coffee house which had been occupied by Mrs. Ferrari before she moved into the new one was still owned by Dr. Charles Arding, who purchased it of Luke Roome in 1758. He offered it for sale in July, 1771, before Mrs. Ferrari moved out of it and again in May, 1772, after she had left, when it was occupied by Mrs. Elizabeth Wragg, but did not succeed in making a sale. If it was any longer used as a coffee house, its use as such was of short duration. It was soon taken by Nesbitt Deane, hatter, who occupied it for many years, offering hats to exceed any “in fineness, cut, color or cock.” John Austin Stevens, who has written very pleasantly and entertainingly of the old coffee houses of New York, speaking of the early history of the Merchants’ Coffee House, says: “Its location, however, is beyond question. It stood on the southeast corner of Wall and Queen (now Water) Streets, on a site familiar to New Yorkers as that for many years occupied by the Journal of Commerce.” Although so positive on this point, Stevens was, no doubt, mistaken, as can be easily proven by records. However, this was the site occupied by the Merchants’ Coffee House subsequent to May 1, 1772. Stevens says that Mrs. Ferrari moved out of this house into a new house on the opposite cross corner, whereas she moved into it from the old coffee house on the opposite cross corner, and carried the business of the old house with her.
In the early part of 1772, Robert Hull succeeded Richard Bolton and continued in possession of the Province Arms some time after the British army entered the city. In the fall of 1772, the two companies of the Governor’s Guards, under the command of Lieutenant Colonel John Harris Cruger and Major William Walton, dressed in their very handsome uniforms, paraded in the Fields, where they were reviewed. They were very much admired for their handsome appearance, and received much applause from the spectators for the regularity and exactness with which they went through the exercises and evolutions. After the parade they spent the evening at Hull’s Tavern, where a suitable entertainment had been provided.
Ball on the Governors Departure
On the King’s birthday, Friday, June 4, 1773, the governor gave an elegant entertainment in the Fort, as was usual on such occasions, and, in the evening, the city was illuminated. General Gage, who was about to sail for England, celebrated the day by giving a grand dinner to a great number of the merchants and military gentlemen of the city at Hull’s Tavern. He had been in command for ten years in America, and this dinner was made the occasion of a flattering address presented to him by the Corporation of the Chamber of Commerce of the City of New York. In February, 1774, a grand dinner was given at Hull’s Tavern by the members of his majesty’s council to the members of the assembly of the province, and the next month the governor gave a dinner to both the gentlemen of the king’s council and the gentlemen of the general assembly at the same place. Shortly after this, on Monday evening, April 4, there was a grand ball given in Hull’s assembly room at which there was “a most brilliant appearance of Ladies and Gentlemen,” the occasion being on account of the departure of the governor and Mrs. Tryon for England. The different national societies held their anniversary celebrations at Hull’s Tavern. The Welsh celebrated St. David’s day, the Scotch St. Andrew’s day, the Irish St. Patrick’s day and the English St. George’s day.
By 1770, the obnoxious duties had been abolished on all articles except tea, and soon after the non-importation agreements of the merchants of Boston, New York and Philadelphia were discontinued, except as to tea, the duty on which had been retained. The New York merchants seem to have been the first to propose the discontinuance of the agreement. The Sons of Liberty met at Hampden Hall to protest against it; the inhabitants of Philadelphia presented their compliments to the inhabitants of New York, in a card, and sarcastically begged they would send them their Old Liberty Pole, as they imagined, by their late conduct, they could have no further use for it; and the Connecticut tavern-keepers, it is said, posted the names of the New York importers and determined that they would not entertain them nor afford them the least aid or assistance in passing through that government. Although Boston and Philadelphia were at first very strongly opposed to any relaxation in the agreements, they soon joined in terminating them; but the merchants and people alike determined that no tea should be imported liable to duty. The captains of ships sailing from London refused to carry tea as freight to American ports.
The Tax on Tea
On Friday morning, October 15, 1773, a printed handbill was distributed through the town calling a meeting of the inhabitants at twelve o’clock that day at the Coffee House to consult and agree on some manner of expressing the thanks of the people to the captains of the London ships trading with the port of New York and the merchants to whom they were consigned, for their refusal to take from the East India Company, as freight, tea on which a duty had been laid by parliament payable in America. At this meeting an address was accordingly drawn up which was unanimously approved by those present. In this address it was declared that “Stamp Officers and Tea Commissioners will ever be held in equal estimation.”
For two or three years the political situation had been uneventful, but early in the year 1773 it became apparent that an effort was about to be made to bring the question of taxation to an issue. The East India Company, acting as the instrument of the British parliament, arranged to send cargoes of tea to the ports of Boston, Newport, New York, Philadelphia and Charleston, at which places they appointed commissioners for its sale.
The Sons of Liberty Again Organize
The times were portentous. The people realized that Great Britain was about to test her power to tax the colonies by forcing the importation of tea through the East India Company in order to establish a precedent, and preparations were made to resist. The Sons of Liberty again organized in November, 1773, and prepared for action. They drew up a number of resolutions which expressed their sentiments and which they engaged to faithfully observe. The first of these was, “that whoever should aid or abet or in any manner assist in the introduction of Tea from any place whatsoever into this Colony, while it is subject by a British act of parliament to the payment of a duty for the purpose of raising a revenue in America, he shall be deemed an enemy to the Liberties of America.” On the back of a printed copy of these resolutions was written a letter of appeal, signed by the committee of the association, addressed to the Friends of Liberty and Trade, inviting an union of all classes in a determined resistance, and urging harmony.
At a meeting held at the City Hall on the 17th of December by the Sons of Liberty to which all friends of liberty and trade of America were invited, it was firmly resolved that the tea which was expected should not be landed.
In Boston the consignee of the tea refusing to return it to England, the vessels were boarded by a number of men disguised as Indians, the chests of tea broken open and the contents cast overboard in the water. This occurred on the 16th of December, 1773.
At a meeting held at the tavern of Captain Doran a committee was appointed to wait on the merchants who had been appointed commissioners for the sale of the East India Company’s tea and ask their intentions. They replied to the committee that, finding that the tea will come liable to American duty, they have declined to receive it. Thomas Doran had been captain of a small but fast sailing privateer, and did good service in the late French war. He had since been keeping a tavern on the new dock near the Fly Market. His house had been the usual place of meeting of the Marine Society for many years. In May, 1774, notice was given that a committee of the Chamber of Commerce would meet at the house of Thomas Doran to receive claims for bounty on fish brought into the city markets. The assembly, in 1773, had granted the sum of five hundred pounds per annum for five years, “for the encouragement of fishery on this coast for the better supplying of the markets of this city with fish,” to be paid to the treasurer of the Chamber of Commerce, and the awarding of the premiums was entrusted to that association. This was the first distribution of premiums.
The Tea-Ship Arrives
The tea-ship for New York, long overdue, was anxiously expected. In March, 1774, the Sons of Liberty were notified to meet every Thursday night at seven o’clock at the house of Jasper Drake till the arrival and departure of the tea-ship. The ships for the other ports had arrived at their destinations and been disposed of. No tea had been allowed to be sold. The ship Nancy, Captain Lockyer, with the tea for New York on board, driven off the coast by contrary winds, did not reach the port until April 18th, and the pilot, advised of the situation, refused to bring her up to the city. The people had resolved that the tea should not be landed. The captain was allowed to come up on condition that he would not enter his vessel at the custom house. He was received by a committee of the Sons of Liberty and conducted to the consignee, who, declining to receive his cargo, he at once made preparation to return. On Friday, April 22, handbills were distributed, stating that although the sense of the people had been signified to Captain Lockyer, nevertheless it was the desire of many of the citizens that, at his departure, he should see with his own eyes their detestation of the measures pursued by the ministry and the East India Company to enslave this country. Accordingly, on Saturday morning, about eight o’clock, all the bells in the city rang as a notice to the people that the tea which had been brought over in the Nancy was about to be sent back without allowing it to be landed. About nine o’clock the people assembled at the Coffee House in greater numbers than ever before known, Captain Lockyer came out of the Coffee House with the committee and was received with cheers, while a band provided for the occasion played “God Save the King.” He was then conducted to Murray’s Wharf, at the foot of Wall Street, where, amid the shouts of the people and the firing of guns, he was put on board the pilot boat and wished a safe passage. He joined his ship, the Nancy, at the Narrows, and the next morning put to sea.
Tea Thrown Overboard
On Friday, amidst all the excitement, Captain Chambers, who from information received from different sources was suspected of having tea on board his ship, the London, arrived at the Hook. The pilot asked him if he had any tea on board and he declared that he had none. Two of the committee of observation went on board, to whom he declared that he had no tea. When the ship came to the wharf about four o’clock in the afternoon she was boarded by a number of citizens and Captain Chambers was told that it was in vain for him to deny having tea on board his ship for there was good proof to the contrary, whereupon he confessed that he had on board eighteen chests. The owners of the vessel and the committee immediately met at Francis’ Tavern to deliberate over the matter where Captain Chambers was ordered to attend. Here he stated that he was the sole owner of the tea. The Mohawks were prepared to do their duty but the people became impatient and about eight o’clock a number entered the ship, took out the tea, broke open the chests and threw their contents into the river. The resentment of the people was so great against Captain Chambers, whom they had considered a friend of their rights and deserving of their confidence, that it was thought that if he could have been found, his life would have been in danger. He was, however, concealed and succeeded the next day in getting on board the Nancy with Captain Lockyer and sailed away to England.
The news of what had been done by the little tea-party in Boston Harbor, December 16, 1773, reached England on the 22d of January, 1774, and created intense excitement in London. On March 7 the King sent a special message to parliament on the American disturbances and soon after a bill was prepared providing for the closing of the port of Boston to all commerce on June 1, at the King’s pleasure, and ordering indemnification to be made to the East India Company for the tea destroyed. This bill passed both houses of parliament without a dissenting vote. The news of its passage came to New York by the ship Samson, Captain Coupar, which arrived May 12, twenty-seven days from London. By the same packet came news that General Gage, commissioned governor of Massachusetts, had engaged with four regiments to reduce Boston to submission and was to sail for his government on April 15.
Committee of Correspondence
In consequence of the alarming news from England, a notice was posted at the Merchants’ Coffee House inviting the merchants to meet at the tavern of Samuel Francis on Monday evening, the 16th, to consult on measures proper to be taken. Accordingly, a large number of merchants and other inhabitants appeared at the appointed place. The object was to appoint a committee of correspondence. There appeared some differences of opinion as to the number and composition of this committee, but the result was that fifty names were nominated, fifteen of the number to be sufficient to do business. To confirm the choice of this committee or to choose others, it was resolved before adjournment that the inhabitants of the city should be requested to meet at the Merchants’ Coffee House on Thursday, the 19th, at one o’clock.
Paul Revere, the Post Rider
In the interim Paul Revere, the famous post-rider and express, arrived on the 17th with a message from the people of Boston, urging a cessation of all trade with Great Britain and the West Indies until the port bill should be repealed. In the evening of the same day there was a large meeting of the mechanics at Bardin’s Tavern. Bardin had come to the neighborhood where he formerly lived and was keeping the house at one time kept by John Jones in the Fields, and known after that as Hampden Hall. The mechanics sided with the radical party.
At the meeting called at the Merchants’ Coffee House the merchants prevailed, as they had done at the previous meeting. The name of Francis Lewis was added to the committee and it was known as the committee of fifty-one. Gouverneur Morris, writing to Penn, said: “I stood on the balcony and on my right hand were ranged all the people of property with some few poor dependents, and on the other all the tradesmen, etc., who thought it worth their while to leave daily labor for the good of the country.” There was some opposition to the committee named, but after the meeting those who had opposed it, for the sake of union, sent in their agreement to the choice. The mechanics also sent a letter to the committee concurring in the selection.
Answer to the Boston Letter
The committee of fifty-one met at the Merchants’ Coffee House on Monday morning, the 23d, at ten o’clock for business, and after appointing a chairman, secretary and doorkeeper, and agreeing upon sundry rules for the conduct of business, the letters from Boston and Philadelphia were read. A committee composed of Messrs. MacDougal, Low, Duane and Jay was appointed to draw up an answer to the first and report at eight o’clock in the evening, to which time the meeting adjourned. At the appointed time the committee appointed to draw up an answer to the Boston letter made report of a draft of such letter, which was unanimously agreed to and ordered to be engrossed and forwarded with the utmost dispatch. On Tuesday it was delivered to Paul Revere, the express from Boston, who had been as far as Philadelphia and was now on his way back to Boston. He immediately set out on his return. A copy was ordered to be transmitted to the Committee of Correspondence of Philadelphia. “The letter proposed to the people of Boston that a Congress of the colonies should be convoked without delay to determine and direct the measures to be pursued for relief of the town of Boston and the redress of all the American grievances,” a recommendation which was accepted and resulted in the Congress which met at Philadelphia in September.
Monday evening, June 6, the Committee of Correspondence met and read and answered the dispatches brought from Boston by the express rider, Cornelius Bradford, and on Monday, the 13th, the New York Mercury stated that they were to meet again that night, when, it was hoped, their proceedings would be made public, saying “the times are critical and big with interesting events.” On Wednesday, June 15, the day on which the harbor of Boston was closed by act of parliament, a great number of the friends of American liberty in the city procured effigies of Governor Hutchinson, Lord North and Mr. Wedderburn, persons who were considered most unfriendly to the rights of America, and after carrying them through the principal streets of the city took them to the Coffee House, “where they were attended in the evening of that day, it is thought, by the greatest concourse of spectators ever seen on a similar occasion, and there destroyed by sulphurous Flames.”
The Committee of Correspondence held their meetings at the Merchants’ Coffee House during the summer. It was the center of most of the political agitation and unrest which pervaded the community. On the evening of Wednesday, July 13, the committee met and drew up a set of resolutions on the alarming situation of affairs, which were printed in handbills and distributed about the town the next morning, for the approbation of the people who were to assemble at the Coffee House at twelve o’clock on the 19th to approve or disapprove of them. It had been settled that there should be a Congress of the colonies, to meet at Philadelphia in September, and the people were at the same time to testify their approbation of the five gentlemen nominated by the committee to attend as delegates. These were James Duane, Philip Livingston, John Alsop, Isaac Low and John Jay. There was so much controversy that the men nominated declined to accept the trust until confirmed by the people. Accordingly, on the 24th an election was ordered in the ordinary manner by a poll in the several wards which was held on the 28th, resulting in the unanimous choice of the five gentlemen above named as delegates.
Delegates to Congress
About the first of September there was much excitement on account of the departure of the delegates for Philadelphia and the arrival of delegates from the New England colonies, passing through the city. On Monday, the 29th of August, John Jay quietly set out for Philadelphia to attend the congress, and on Thursday, September 1st, the four other delegates left the city for the same laudable purpose. Isaac Low, accompanied by his wife, who wished to go by way of Paulus Hook, was escorted to the ferry stairs at the foot of Cortlandt Street by a large number of citizens, with colors flying, and with music. A few accompanied him over the river with musicians playing “God Save the King.” The people then returned to the Coffee House in order to testify the same respect for the other three delegates, James Duane, John Alsop and Philip Livingston. The procession began about half past nine o’clock. When they arrived at the Royal Exchange, near which they embarked, James Duane, in a short speech, thanked the people for the honor they had conferred upon them and declared for himself and for his fellow delegates “that nothing in their Power should be wanting to relieve this once happy but now aggrieved Country.” As they left the wharf, “they were saluted by several Pieces of Cannon, mounted for the occasion, which was answered by a greater Number from St. George’s Ferry. These Testimonials and three Huzzas bid them go and proclaim to all Nations that they, and the virtuous People they represent, dare defend their Rights as Protestant Englishmen.”
The Massachusetts delegates, Thomas Cushing, Samuel Adams, Robert Treat Paine and John Adams, set out on their journey from Boston in one coach on the 10th of August and arrived in New York on the 20th. John Adams, in his diary, says: “We breakfasted at Day’s and arrived in the city of New York at ten o’clock, at Hull’s, a tavern, the sign of the Bunch of Grapes.” The arms of the province on the old sign must have been pretty well weatherbeaten to have been taken for a bunch of grapes. The best tavern in Boston and the best tavern in Hartford each hung out this sign and Adams was thus easily led into an error.
The Congress at Philadelphia
The congress at Philadelphia passed a non-exportation act to take effect on September 15, and a non-importation act to be put in force on December 1. A committee of observation or inspection was appointed in New York city to secure the strict observance of these acts. In the spring of 1775 deputies were elected in New York to a provincial congress which met on April 20, and the next day appointed delegates to represent the province in the Continental Congress which was to assemble at Philadelphia in the following May. News of the battle of Lexington, forwarded by express riders from Watertown, Massachusetts, reached the chambers of the New York committee of correspondence at four o’clock in the afternoon of Sunday, April 23. It was war. The news reached Williamsburg, Virginia, on April 28, and on the next day Alexander Purdie published it in an extra of his Gazette. In commenting on the situation his closing words were: “The sword is now drawn and God knows when it will be sheathed.”