THE ESOPUS WAR.

     Outrage at Esopus.—­New Indian War.—­Its
     Desolations.—­Sufferings of both Parties.—­Wonderful
     Energies of the Governor.—­Difficulties of his
     Situation.—­The Truce.—­Renewal of the War.—­The
     Mohawks.—­The Controversy with Massachusetts.—­Indian
     Efforts for Peace.—­The Final Settlement.—­Claims of the
     English upon the Delaware.—­Renewed Persecution of the
     Quakers.

The exploring party from Massachusetts, which had ascended the North river, found a region around the Wappinger Kill, a few miles below the present site of Poughkeepsie, which they pronounced to be more beautiful than any spot which they had seen in New England.  Here they decided to establish their settlement.  Stuyvesant, informed of this, resolved to anticipate them.  He wrote immediately to Holland urging the Company to send out at once as many Polish, Lithuanian, Prussian, Dutch and Flemish peasants as possible, “to form a colony there.”

It would seem that no experience, however dreadful, could dissuade individuals of the Dutch Colonists from supplying the natives with brandy.  At Esopus, in August, 1659, a man by the name of Thomas Chambers employed eight Indians to assist him in husking corn.  At the end of their day’s work he insanely supplied them with brandy.  This led to a midnight carouse in which the poor savages, bereft of reason, howled and shrieked and fired their muskets, though without getting into any quarrel among themselves.

The uproar alarmed the garrison in the blockhouse.  The sergeant of the guard was sent out, with a few soldiers, to ascertain the cause of the disorder.  He returned with the report that it was only the revelry of a band of drunken savages.

One of the soldiers in the fort, Jansen Stot, called upon some of his comrades to follow him.  Ensign Smith, who was in command, forbade them to go.  In defiance of his orders they left the fort, and creeping through the underbrush, wantonly took deliberate aim, discharged a volley of bullets upon the inebriated savages, who were harming nobody but themselves.  One was killed outright.  Others were severely wounded.  The soldiers, having performed this insane act, retreated, with the utmost speed to the fort.  There never has been any denial that such were the facts in the case.  They help to corroborate the remark of Mr. Moulton that “the cruelty of the Indians towards the whites will, when traced, be discovered, in almost every case, to have been provoked by oppression or aggression.”

Ensign Smith, finding that he could no longer control his soldiers, indignantly resolved to return down the river to New Amsterdam.  The inhabitants of Esopus were greatly alarmed.  It was well known that the savages would not allow such an outrage to pass unavenged.  The withdrawal of the soldiers would leave them at the mercy of those so justly exasperated.  To prevent this the people hired every boat in the neighborhood.  Ensign Smith then decided to send an express by land, to inform Governor Stuyvesant of the alarming state of affairs and to solicit his immediate presence.