HISTORY OF BROOKLYN. 35

the services of an interpreter—one George Baxter was appointed English Secretary” with a handsome salary.

A public ferry was, by this time, permanently established between Manhattan and Long Island. The landing-place on the New Amsterdam side was at the present Peck Slip, where was a ferryhouse, kept by Cornelis Dircksen (Hooglant) the ferryman. The landing-place on this side of the river was at the foot of the present Fulton-street, Brooklyn, near which Dircksen also owned “a house and garden.” Southwardly from “The Ferry,” along the present “Brooklyn Heights” and the East River shore, stretched the farms of Claes Cornelissen van Schouw (Mentelaer), Jan Manje, Aandries Hudde, Jacob Wolphertsen (Van Couwenhoven), and others; while Red Hook had become the property of ex-Governor VAN TWILLER.

Religious persecution was, at this time, driving from New England, many pure-minded and gifted men, who found in New Netherland the toleration denied them by their own country and brethren. Thus, courteously treated and favored With liberal patents of land from the Dutch Government, the Rev. John Doughty, with his followers, settled at Maspeth (now Newtown) on Long Island; Throgmorton settled at Throg's Neck, Westchester County; and the celebrated Anne Hutchinson and her family, driven from New Haven, found refuge at New Rochelle.

On the South River, by the combined efforts of the Dutch and Swedes, who, in this, made common cause, the English were effectually cleared out; but, on the Connecticut, the Dutchman was sorely pressed to hold his own against the colonists of Massachusetts.

The year 1643 was to New Netherland, as to New England, “a year of blood.” Indian uprisings and “rumors of wars” were on every side. Anxiety and terror hung like a cloud over Fort Amsterdam and the neighboring settlements. An Indian murder at Hackensack was followed by a descent of the dreaded Mohawks upon the River tribes, which sent the latter rushing for refuge to the vicinity of the white settlements at Vriesendael, Pavonia, and even Manhattan Island, whereat “Corlaer’s Bouwery”, few Rockaway Indians from Long Island, with their chief Nainde Nummerus, had already established their wigwams. Had the