OLD TOWN ROAD. When the first settlers came to Southampton
in 1640, they followed an Indian trail from North Sea to that part of the
Village called today Old Town. The site of their first homes in marked near the
Southampton Hospital. These homes were probably cellars dug in the ground with
rafters overhead covered with boughs or sod. Twenty men and their families with
all “Their worldly goods” made their way through the forest, built their homes
and their church, and lived there eight years.
Of these twenty only the names of Howell, Sayre, Walton,
Halsey, and Terry are found in Southampton today. A little later came Bishops,
Burnetts, Cooks, Fosters, Goldsmiths, Hands, Herricks, Hildreths, Jaggers,
Moores, Piersons, Posts, Raynors, Rogers, Roses, Smythes, Wells, and Whites.
These inhabitants outgrew the settlement around Old Town Pond, and in March,
1648, held a town meeting to consider “A town plot and home accommodations that
shall be most suitable to the comfort, peace, and welfare of this plantation.”
MAIN STREET. The Main Street of Southampton retains to this
day divisions made at that time, although many changes have been made in the
ownership—home lots of three acres. Each house holder’s portion was: --his
house lot, twelve acres of farm land, about thirty-four acres of meadow and
upland, and a certain number of shares in undivided common land. These shares
were given according to the amount of money a man had pad toward the expenses
of the settlement. All this land except the Indian fields had to be cleared.
The woodland north of the village was divided into The North and The South
Division and each man was given his share.
MEETING HOUSE LANE. After the Main Street, or Town Street,
as it was called then, Meeting House Land was opened. The oldest church Meeting
House stood near the present rear entrance of the Southampton Hospital.
TOYLESOME LANE. The road from the old town to the new was
“The Land called Toylesome,” and opposite its entrance on the Main Street was
Horsemill Lane. Just when this was closed, we do not know. What fun it would be
to be able to walk down Main Street to the beach and point out the houses where
the first settlers lived. This is possible for old maps show who owned the land
in those early days. Thomas Sayre lived north of the present library.
JOB’S LANE. Job’s Lane, “opened 1664,” was then the cow path
down which young Job Sayre drove his cows every morning to pasture. Walking
south, the Presbyterian parsonage stands on exactly the same plot of ground
that was allotted for the house of “Ye Minister,” in 1648. The second church
building stood just across the street from the minister’s house, and in the old
graveyard we may still read the names of some of the earliest inhabitants. The
old house called the Hollyhocks is the oldest of the original houses remaining
and was built by Thomas Halsey about 1660. On the opposite side of the street,
the house now owned by the Daughters of the American Revolution was built about
1790 by the Foster family. The old Mackie house, which is across the street
from the Episcopal church, was built by John Mackie who came from Scotland and
copied, in shingle, the stone house he had left in Dundee.
YE MILL PATH. Ye Mill Path (we call it Bridgehampton Road
today) was the road to Edward Howell’s watermill. The mill was built in 1644,
and is still standing, and from it Water Mill Village takes its name.
THE ROAD TO WICKAPOGUE. The Road to Wickapoque is one of the
early ones. The name is first found in the division of land in 1688, “Thomas
Goldsmith at the end of his home lot, the rest by Goodman Halsey’s a
Weequapoug.” The name means “at the end of the pond or waterplace,” and the
Ponds of Wickapogue are there still as they were in 1688.
LITTLE PLAINS ROAD. The Little Plains were fields where the
settlers tilled their land. Always in the early days, one man stood watch while
the others cultivated the fields, Each man took his turn. Little Plain was
bounded on the east by Old Town Pond, on the west by Town Pond (Lake Agawam),
on the north by Frog Pond, and on the south by the beach. This tract of land
was originally three lots deep north and south. The ocean has encroached upon
the land so much since the settlers came, that Frost Pond is now under the
water. I can remember heading my grandfather say that the hitching posts that
stood north of the beach banks when he was a boy are now in the breakers.
GREAT PLAINS ROAD. The Great Plain was farm land west of
Town Pond (Agawam). It was called also the general field. First Neck, Cooper’s
Neck, Halsey’s Neck, and Captain’s Neck were parts of it and are kept in our
memories today by the road bearing their names.
OX PASTURE ROAD. The Ox Pasture was in two divisions—north
and south, and its use is known today by its name. Ox Pasture Road was its
southern boundary and the main highway to Shinnecock, its north.
Let us walk through the village to trace the old streets. It
will not be hard. As we have seen Main Street follows the same course today
that it did in 1648. When it was laid out, most of the people lived in the
south end of the town. We can trace, if we will, in many places the three acre
home lots, and if we look in Howell’s Early
History of Southampton, we can find a map that will show us where Edward
Howell, the leader of the little colony, lived. We can trace the path where Job
Sayre drove his cows to the pasture by the Town Pond. We can find the place
where the wife of Thomas Halsey was murdered by the Indians. We can walk with
the people on Sunday morning to their Meeting House. We can go with the
children on Monday morning to their schoolmaster, Richard Mills. We can see the
settlers at work on the Little Plains, the watchman standing on guard to give
the alarm if anything goes wrong. Perhaps we see a man riding down the mill
path with his bags of grain to be ground into flour at the watermill or a man
building his house from forest trees in the new part of the town called Jagger
Lane. If we follow the trail to North Sea, we may meet an Indian. Fortunately,
the Shinnecock Indians are friendly to the white settlers, for we must go to
North Sea.
NORTH SEA ROAD. North Sea Road is the only way to reach the
port where Captain Daniel Howe’s sloop lands, brining new settlers from the
Mainland.
***from The
Southampton Press
Southampton’s oldest thoroughfare is the North Sea Road,
called in our earliest records “the North Sea Path.” This has been made forever
sacred by the feet of those earliest colonists as they made their way through
the dense forest to the ridge of land overlooking the ocean to the north of Old
Town Pond, where they made their first settlement. The Indians living on fish
and game, made their habitations around the creeks and bays of the north shore
as we learn from the shell helps and the mounds which have been unearthed at
various times in more recent years. When the settlers landed at North Sea they
found it the camping ground of the Sachem of the Shinnecocks. The Indians knew
the place where they could grown the best corn and had cleared land just north
of the beach banks. The patch which the colonists trod on that eventful day in
June, 1640, was without doubt the trail long made by the Indians to their
planting land by the ocean. The vessel which brought the settlers from Lynn was
to return, making three trips a year, brining inhabitants and goods, and for
many years North Sea Harbor was the only outlet for the little colony in its
isolation. The path hither soon became a well worn road. For 150 years North
Sea was the port of entry for Southampton and fell into disuse only after Sag
Harbor, (the harbor of Sagg) became a growing port. In 1726 we find a record
when at a Town Meeting a complaint was brought that the road was too narrow,
and a very definite description is given: “Beginning at Southampton Street one
highway leading to ye harbor at North Sea, goes down by the house that was
Heathcotes and is now the Townes.” This latter is the old North End Burying
ground and the highway was laid out six poles wide all the way to John Rose’s
at North Sea.
The forest through which our colonists found their way so
long ago has remained unbroken these nearly 300 years, except for the axe of
the woodsman who felled the trees for firewood and left the wood to grow for
another generation and more. William Henry and Joseph Kiah have perhaps without
intention become the pioneers of
the home development with has so recently overtaken the North Sea Path.
The State of New York during this past year has added the crown
to this new development with the building of the concrete [highway?] which can
now speed our way so smoothly and joyously; and in another five years or less,
will have disappeared ,except in memory, the shady oaks through which we drove
so contentedly our farm teams to the beach at North Sea.
THE MAIN STREET
Southampton’s Main Street was laid out in 1648, eight years
after the first settlement at Old Towne. This for many years is known in the
records as “Ye Towne Street,” and it was on this street that a “home-lott” of
three acres was apportioned to each settler, with farm land in out lying
districts. On March 27th, 1648, “It is ordered that ye whole town
shall be called together at ye settings of ye sunne to consider of a Town plot
of such home accommodations as may be most suitable to ye comfort, peace and
welfare of this plantation.” The “home-lotts” were laid out and taken up on
both side of the street, beginning at the planting land at the Little Plains
and extending north, “three acres to every 50 pound lot or share, to every man
his proportion according to his taking up.”
The homes built along this street were no longer the rude
cabins of the earlier settlement. Though of the utmost simplicity of design
they were sturdy and substantial and a number of these have lasted on within
the memory of the present generation.
“The Hollyhocks” built 1662, remains with its southern gable
still unchanged, to remind us of the homes first built along “Ye Towne Street,”
In the hall of the Library entrance to the Colonial Room,
may be seem a framed copy of the map of Southampton’s “Towne Street.” This map
was compiled by Historian William S. Pelletreu and on it is indicated the home
plots with the names of their successive owners, from the first laying out until
very recent years. It is interesting to note that the surveys of today are
still based on the boundaries established in that earliest laying out of the
Towne Street.
HILL STREET OR SHINNECOCK ROAD. This street was laid out as early
as 1650 and later became a part of the main highway running east and west down
Long Island, which was known in Colonial days as “the King’s Highway.” Until
very recent years, Hill Street, or “up the Hill,” as it was often called, was
most appropriately named, for the road from the foot of Job’s Lane rose quite
sharply and the grade was very much up-hill. The land on which stand the Irving
Garage and the adjoining buildings was the hill where stood the windmill, which
for 170 years ground the grist for the community, and was an outstanding
landmark for miles around. With the moving of the mill (1888) and the disposal
of the soil, a new level was created, and in 1906 the village so grade and
improved the street that the name is now only a reminder of its earlier
outlines. Hill Street fortunately has remained the wide thoroughfare so well
suited to our modern needs.
WINDMILL LANE. Windmill Lane dates back to the earliest days
of the settlement, and is known in the early records as “Ye Weste Street.” A t
that time the Town Pond extended low and swampy as far north as the higher
land, which in recent years we know as Bowden Square. To avoid the water which
in times of freshet was close up to the higher land on the west, the road for
some time lay along the ridge. The present name is derived from the windmills
which at various times through the years have occupied this higher land. The
most prominent of these, built in 1713, stood on the corner of the lane and
Hill Street. This mill is now in the garden of the Summer home of Mr. and Mrs.
Arthur B. Clafflin on Shinnecock Hills.
Another mill which stood to the north of this is now the
Summer home of ex-Congressman Lathrop D. Brown, on the cliff overlooking the
ocean at Montauk Point. It was on “Ye Weste Street” that the first school house
was built in 1664. This was a building 15 by 20 feet and stood a short distance
south of the plot where 225 years later was built the Union School (1889). The
first schoolmaster---Jonas Houldsworth—was to receive 30 pounds per annum with
[?] 12 days in the year for his own “particular occasions.” Here for many years
the county courts were held, and through the first little old school house has
been several times replaced, each in a different location, children of the
village have ever since been going to school on Windmill Lane.
JAGGAR LANE. The short street connecting Main Street and
Windmill Lane is one of the very old streets of the Village. This was a lane
through the home-lott granted to John Jaggar in 1651. The settlers whose
farmland was to the west of the Town Pond very early felt the need of a nearer
approach than to pass to the end of the swamp at Bowden Square. This lane
across John Jaggar’s lot was established in 1653 and originally wound up over
the hill crossing “ye West Street and coming out on Hill Street” before
reaching the entrance to First Neck Lane, which was laid out in 1644.
This was very early in the history of the village, some
years before the building of the mill and the lowering of “Ye Weste Street,”
and Job’s Lane had not yet been opened.
During the years since, this little street has been known by
various names, memories of those who have lived beside it-Hunting Lane, Captain
George White’s Lane, Seymour’s Lane, and in the Village book (1908) we notice
it is called School Street. When the Village Trustees, a few years since,
renewed the street signs they returned quite appropriately to the name of the
original owner through whose land the lane was first made.
NARROW LANE. We find a new sign along our highways, one we
have not seen until recently, although the street it designates has been an
open thoroughfare since the very early days of the village. Although connecting
two important localities, yet is has remained so seemingly remote and so little
used that it has escaped, until recently, the notice of the village fathers,
who are seeing to tit that the streets of Southampton are so carefully and
attractively marked. As we drive along our highways, the quaint old name are
particularly in evidence and add a charm and distinction in keeping with its
history, for Southampton will soon be celebrating it 300th birthday.
This little street, true to its name, is at present quite
isolated but it is destined in the near future to become a much-used
thoroughfare. In Vol. V., pp. 178, 232, of the Town Records, we find that in
1676 Richard Howell sells to Obadiah Rogers “one-half acre of my Close land at
Wicapogue, bounded west by land of Thomas Jessup, north by Obadiah Rogers,
south by highway, and is to run north and south quite through the length of my
said Close.” Dated October 14, 1676.
The notes added by W.S. Pelletreau, to whose careful
transcriptions we owe six volumes of Southampton Town Records, tell us that the
strip of land above is the Narrow Lane on the north side of Wickapogue Street.
The home of Thomas Jessup is the property long since occupied by Moses
Phillips, and on which his family still reside. Richard Howell was a son of
Edward Howell, the leader of the Southampton colony. Obadiah Rogers was a son
of William Rogers, who in 1645 was granted as his “home-lott” the land on “Ye
Towne Street” for a number of years occupied by the late Samuel L. Parrish.
From the record
it is very plain that the narrow strip of land was purchased by Obadiah Rogers
to afford a right-of-way to the land he owned just north of Richard Howell, and
it was no doubt continued by him and adjacent owners out to the “King’s
Highway,” or “the road to ye Watermill.” The lane may be as little used as in
those early days when Obadiah Rogers drove his oxen hither to his farm land,
and in driving through the lane one can easily imagine one’s self back in that
early time, so isolated and shut away it seems from the present Southampton. We
soon return to this however, as we approach the Frankenback gardens, and glad
also of a swifter passage than that furnished by the equipment of an earlier
day.
Let us cherish these ancient localities and keep alive the
names given them so long ago, by those who laid for us such sure foundations.
POND LANE. In the year 1675, when the “Towne” purchased from
John Cooper his house and lot for the use of the minister, an allotment of 30
acres of land in the ox-pasture was also made, these “to remain forever to the
use of the ministry in this Towne.” The “Home-lott” is still the Presbyterian
parsonage, and the land in the ox-pasture is known to us as the Summer home of
the late Salem H. Wales.
This is one of several pieces of land which in the records
is called “Parsonage land,” and it was expressly stated that cart-way should be
left beside the Town Pond for passing to and fro and for the watering of
cattle.
In 1701, “It is ordered James Cooper and Joseph Fordham
shall take up fence from the old pound and carry it and set it up by Mr.
Whiting’s cow-pasture, adjoining to the John Foster’s Close and Isaac Halsey’s,
leaving a good highway between ye fence and ye Town Pond, for ye inhabitants of
ye and Towne to cart, drive and water their creatures, and to find more fence
so to finish and enclose said cow-pasture at ye said Towne’s charge.” The
highway established at this time was to be 8’ poles in width between the fence
and the pond. “Mr. Whiting” was the Rev. Joseph Whiting, sixth minister in the
Church—1683-1723. John Foster’s Close is now the property of the Hon. Elihu H.
Root. The narrow lane on the south and joining Ox-Pasture Road is first
mentioned in 1676.
In the record of the Town survey of 1852, we find the road
leading from the Country Road in Hill street to and along the Town Pond to
First Neck Lane, near the house of John White, “laid out but not described of
record.” The road by the pond was at this time narrowed to five rods. In 1888,
after Mr. Wales had purchased the property, some changed were again made in the
frontage on the pond. It was about this time that the Indian name Agawam was
recalled for the Town Pond and it is interesting to be reminded that when Mr.
Wales desired a name for his newly acquired property he used the name of “The
Ox-Pasture.”
The name on the sign-posts of that highway as above
described read “Pond Lane” and the date of its opening is coincident with that
of the Parsonage allotment in 1675.
When the land on the pond ceased to be “parsonage land” we
have still to discover, but until recent years the front along the pond has
been common land used by the people for their pleasure and necessities. On the
south hill of the “Parsonage land” were the big “try-kettles where the [whale
blubber was boiled] in days of steamships, whales were much more numerous along
the coast than now and the off-shore whaling was one of the earliest industries
established by the settlers. It was an exciting time in the village when the
rally sounded and everybody hastened to the beach to see the manning of the
whale-boats and to watch the crews start off for the chase. It was a lively
time also, when the crews returned and the monster lay on the beach (and
sometimes more than one). The small boys as well as many others did not leave
the beach until the whale was cut up and the blubber carted, and sometimes
floated, down the pond to be tried out in the big kettles on the hill. Until
recent years a point of land ran well out into the pond directly opposite this
hill.
This was the swimming place for the boys in Summer and a
harbor for the skaters in Winter. The Point was also convenient during the ice
harvest and an ice house stood on the hill near the try-kettles, within the
memory of several whom we have interviewed.
The pond north of the Point was thick with lily-pads and
further north as far as Job’s Lane was a flaggy swamp. On this swampy land for
a number of years was the little old shop where drinks were sold by one known
as “Old John Ware.” Across the lane on the hill, which lately has been leveled to
give place for the American Legion Community Building was a small liberty pole
and an old cannon where the “boys” were wont to celebrate on patriotic occasions.
One 4th of July morning, we were told, John Ware poured into the
cannon such a charge of powder that it blew itself to pieces and the windows in
the shop were shattered, as well as in neighboring places. As a pleasant
contrast to the above we like to remember the well-kept cottage—still standing,
but beyond recognition in its concrete covering—where lived Phyrrhus Concer and
his wife Rachel. To the little dock just opposite on the pond was moored the
sailboat in which every day in Summer—except Sundays—Phyrrhus made as many
trips to the ocean as the wind would allow, ferrying the Summer boarders and
others to the bathing beach—but the story of Phyrrhus is a narrative by itself.
After the Summer residents began to build their homes along
the Pond the sailboats became numerous and many a half-holiday was spent in
watching the boat races up and down the Pond. (Has anyone forgotten the Bennett
Catamaran?) After motors were used there was trouble for the propellers were
constantly mixed up with the grass, which the swans in recent years were
imported to diminish.
Courtesy Lizbeth Halsey White Files,
Southampton Historical Museum Archives and Research Center
