citymap1750_250.jpg (JPEG Image, 1204×917 pixels) – Scaled (58%).
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Detailed map from 1750
– CAA
Category Archives: Reformed Church
Schenectady, on Mohawk River, New York
Schenectady
The village and then town of Schenectady emerged from a patent to farm on the Great Flats of the Mohawk River originally granted by the Dutch in 1661. It was located beyond the western border of Rensselaerswyck.
Over the next decade, Schenectady was settled mostly by former Beverwyck residents who sought less competitive opportunities farther away from the community that became Albany in 1664. The complete list of patentees is the subject of some discussion. Union College librarian and historian Jonathan Pearson has compiled a useful list.
Over the next twenty-five years, the original patentees and their descendants built a stockaded town on the south side of the Mohawk River about eighteen miles west of Albany. Schenectady asleep on February 9, 1690 By 1680, a Dutch Reformed church had become established in the community. As part of his initiative to “royalize” the colony, Governor Thomas Dongan granted Schenectady a town patent in 1684 and a community economy began to develop on the Albany model but with a more direct connection to the farms of its immediate environs. Land north of the Mohawk also was deeded and settled. It would be known as “Scotia” (today’s village of Scotia in the town of Glenville – both commemorating the original landholding families).
All this came crashing down when French and Indian raiders destroyed the town on the night of February 9, 1690. The settlement was in shambles with its people killed, captured, or sent fleeing as refugees to the safety of the Albany fort. The Schermerhorns and others temporarily set up homes in Albany. The so-called “Schenectady Massacre” still is one of the “great,” mythical events of the community’s heritage and has been embellished in print, song, and tradition!
via Schenectady.
