Wawarsing Hamlet, New York One Place Study

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Wawarsing Hamlet, New York One Place Study

This profile is part of the Wawarsing Hamlet, New York One Place Study.

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Name

Geography

Continent: North America

Country: United States of America

State/Province: New York

County: Ulster

GPS Coordinates: 41.74985161498044, -74.34870367017355

Elevation:

History

• In 1663 the native settlement located at Wawarasinke was burned out, the same year English forces conquered New Netherland. Wawarsink refers to the change in direction of Rondout Creek (which is at Napanoch) as well as one of the bands of the Munsee tribe of Lenni-Lenape.
• In 1683 the area the Dutch had called Esopus became Ulster County.
• In 1685 Waarner Hoornbeek is thought to be the first settler of Wawarasinke.
• Ankerop was one of family heads, “chiefs,” in the Wawarsink area who successfully held portions of his lands up to 1699. ^[1]
• In 1702 a gristmill was constructed on VerNooy Kill by Cornelis Vernooy.
• In 1703 Wawarsing was part of the Town of Rochester in Ulster County.
• Before 1730 a lead mine near Nopanoch (Ellenville) was developed by Anthony Rutgers & Co.
• 1779 May 4: the Fantinekill massacre.
• In 1781 loyalist with some Iroquois attacked Wawarsing Hamlet killing 11 people.
• In 1806 Wawarsing united with Napanoch, Laurenkil, Lakawack and Grenfielt to form the Town of Wawarsing in Ulster County.
• In 1828 the Delaware and Hudson canal began operation. It was meant only as a means to get PA coal to NYC, but it fostered industry and settlements formed along its’ 108 mile route (from Honesdal PA to Kingston NY) before it was even completed. Construction began in 1825 and the canal closed in 1902.
• In 1840 the Reformed Protestant Dutch Church in Ellenville was organized using a building sponsored by the Wawarsing Church in 1826.

Population

The Wawarsing Church was organized in 1740. The Church building was located in Warwarsing Hamlet from 1745 to 1883. 1745 October 20th dates the dedication of the church and the begining of the church records. E D Witt, Abraham Bevier, Johannes Vernoy and Lourens Kortrecht were recorded as church masters that year.

	Date	Ministers of record [2]
I	1745-51	J C Fryenmoet		X	1827-8	M S Hutton, Miss to
II	1753	J Frelinghuysen		IX	1828-9	A Hoffman, Miss to
III	1754/6-7	Henricus Frelinghytsen		IIX	1829-35	Abr J Switz
VI	1766-75	D Romeyn		IIIX	1837-9	J H Duryea
V	1782-6	J R Hardenbergh		VIX	1839-41	John W Ward
IV	1789-95	Ab VanHorne		VX	1842-8	James Demarest Sr
IIV	1797-1801	Gerrit Mandeville		IVX	1849-51	D McL Quackenbush
IIIV	1802-8	Ralph A Westervelt		IIVX	1852-4	Rev J R Lente
XI	1814-25	James Murphy

	Justices of the peace
A	Cornelis DuPuy		D	Samuel Bevier	G	Elias Depue
B	Johannes Vernooy		E	Moses Depue
C	Abram Hardenbergh		F	Jacob Hoornbeeck

	others
i	Dom John H Goetschis		vi	Dom J M Goetschius		iiv	C D Westrook
ii	G W Mancius		v	Squire Andried DeWitt		iiiv	Thomas Romeyn
iii	Dom J Scheneman		iv	Moses Freligh

The parsonage at Wawarsing was sold to Lodowic Hoornbeek on 1829 Nov 14. A new parsonage was to be in Napanoch.

This volume starts with the dedication of the church in 1745 and continues to 1883. Age, damage and a missing page makes some entries irretrievable, especially for the 1760s.

Baptisms: Most of the entries in this volume are about the baptism of children. Initially children of single mothers were labeled illegitimate, but later only the father was not noted so care was taken to note why a parent was not present for the baptism, for example; they were not a member of the church. Early baptisms often recorded witnesses, but the practice was discontinued in the 1790s. Children’s baptisms for the DeWitt, Bevier, and DuPuy families usually included witnesses. Other than a drop in the 1870s the number of children’s baptisms recorded increased until the 1800s then declined to levels lower than those of the 1760s. Throughout the volume most of the children’s baptisms were for the DeWitt, Bevier, VerNooy, Hoornbeek, Oosterhout, and NewKirk families. There are some baptisms for adults when they became members and even whole families.

Membership: Except for the initial membership for which there is no record the people who joined and left the church was poorly recorded. This conclusion is come by when comparing the only membership roster of 1842 to the chronological entries. Still there are informative entries such as the group who migrated from Holland and were in Wawarsing for a time before moving on to Grand Rapids, except for one who can be located in the cemetery.

Marriages: Initially marriages recorded in the volume were not conducted at the church. Not very many marriages were recorded. There are none at all for the 1800s and 1810s, and most are for the 1830s.

The Reformed Dutch Church at Wawarsing purchased the burying ground from the VerNooy family with deeds dated 1828, 1842, and 1854.

Of the surviving monuments at this cemetery several have been damaged, fallen over or sunk into the ground. From John G Gray’s partial survey of 1899 it is evident that blank stones were used or the inscriptions were so shallow that they appeared to be blank in 1899. There seemed to have been some conservation efforts judging from some of the photos at Find a Grave.

There are two major inscription styles; date of death with age at death (d&a), and date of birth with date of death (b&d). The first style is more prevalent and earlier than the second style.

The earliest surviving monuments (with dates) are for the Low surname from the early 1700’s. From the end of the 1700’s the surnames of Bevier, DeWitt, Smith and VerNooy have surviving monuments. Use of the cemetery started to increase in the 1790’s. The cemetery reached it peak use in the 1850’s and peaked again in the 1880’s. The last burials were in the 1970’s. Looking at the ages at death show that people born in the 1840’s and 1850’s had the highest child mortality. This may be caused by the survival of later children’s monuments compared to earlier ones. Also; 23% of people born in the 1810’s died in their 70’s, 21% of people born in the 1820’s died in their 60’s, and 22% of people born in the 1840’s died in their 20’s. From the 1830’s to the 1860’s most monuments were for children under 10 years of age. After that most monuments are for people of advanced age with a decrease of monuments for young people until by the 1940’s there are none at all.

Sources

1. ↑ Reynolds, Cuyler, editor. Genealogical and Family History of Southern New York and the Hudson River Valley Volume 2, Lewis Historical Publishing Co., 1914. Benjamin Hornbeck, Pioneer (1754-1827) Jennie Hott and Richard Phares.
2. ↑ Corwin, Charles E, author. A Manual of the Reformed Church in America 1628-1922 New Jersey, the Unionist-Gazette Association, fifth edition, 1922.

• Hoes, Roswell Randall, editor. Baptismal and Marriage Registers of the Old Dutch Church of Kingston 1891.
  • (marriages 1660-1809) extract by Robert L Billard
  • (baptisms 1660-1809) extract by Robert L Billard

• Green, Richard Henry, editor. The New York Genealogical and Biographical Record Vol L, 1919.
  • Vosburgh, Royden Woodward, editor. Records of the Reformed Dutch Church of Wawarsing (baptisms)
• Green, Richard Henry, editor. The New York Genealogical and Biographical Record Vol. LI, 1920,
  • Vosburgh, Royden Woodward, editor Records of the Reformed Dutch Church of Wawarsing, (marriages & membership)

• Wawarsing cemetery survey of 1930 by Dr J Wilson Poucher and Byron J Terwilliger, and a partial survey of 1889 by John G Gray.