[EDIT: I believe that this is "Daniel Melancthon Tredwell (1825-1921)
was an American businessman and bibliophile from Brooklyn, N.Y.,
who wrote about life and history on Long Island."]


On May 6, 1993 Helen Silvey posted to All on Prodigy:

SUBJECT: CARMAN, L.I.
 
PERSONAL REMINISCENCES OF MEN AND THINGS OF LONG ISLAND     
Part One by Daniel M. Tredw[e]ll, Charles Andrew Ditmas Publ.  350 Fulton St.,
Booklyn, NYC.pp. 36-7:                      
...We have also some historical sermons and orations useful in their way,
but too special to be available to the historian.  we also have FURMAN'S
NOTES, Publ. in 1824, but they relate chiefly to Kings Co. and Brooklyn. 
The above    
works have begotten a thirst in us for more of the details of Long Island
history, to obtain which involves laborious research amongst the town and
county records and appeals to private papers and documents and to the
unwritten traditions and legends with the experiences of the oldest
citizens.  
  
  All these sources must be exhausted, and Thompson in his pioneer work has
given satifaction and laid out the field for his more elaborate successor. 
                          
Tuesday, Oct 15, 1839.                                      
  Went with father this day to the sheep parting to bring  home our sheep
that had been turned out on the plains last spring.   
                                                  
  The Hempstead Plains is one of the most marked features of Long Island. 
This tract of territory, being sicteen miles in length and containing
sixty-four square miles, has a prairie-like appearance, and it is the
common pasturage  ground for the town of Hempstead.  By a strange
misconception the soil was deemed by the early settlers too poor for
cultivation, and yet the secretary grass grew in  some places to the height
of four feet.  In 1670 Denail Denton says:  "There is neither stick nor
stone, and it produces very fine grass, which makes excellent good fodder
for winter, but is is more especially valuable for pasturage." 
                                                
  Sheep raising was followed from the earliest settlement of the town of
Hempstead.  The sheep were branded or marked and pastured in common upon
the Great Plains.  This common  pasturage was carefully guarded, as shown
by an act of June 17, 1726:   
                                                
  "To prevent the setting on fire or burning the old grass on Hempstead
Plains, done by certain persons for the gratification of their own wanton
temper and humors, an act was passed and a committee appointed to take
charge of this matter and with power to arrest all persons whom they       
suspected of mischief.  Captain John Tredwell, Mr. James Jackson, Mr.
William Cornwell, Nathaniel SEAMAN, Benjamin  SEAMAN, Obadiah Valentine,
Thomas Williams, Peter Titus,  Henry Willis, John Pratt, CALEB CARMAN,
Nathaniel Townsend, John Tredwell, Jeremiah robbins, Thomas Powell, Samuel
Jackson, Thos SEAMAN and John Mott were appointed such     
committee to enforce the law against transgressors."  
      
  The sheep parting was a very simple institution on its first introduction
in this country.  But on Long Island, in consequence of the great interest
taken in stock, it became a great public doing.   
                             
  There is a footnote re a general Town meeting, 3d day of April, 1733. 
mentions names Peter titus, Thomas Wiliams, John Jackson, Junior, John
Smith, rock Senior of the north side, John Dosenboro, Isaac Jarman, Col
Tredwell.  (At one  time I mentioned there were 2 Smiths, one built his
home against a rock so he became Rocksmith, this must be the rock Senior
referred to above.  H.S.) 
                                
   P. 87:                                             
  Sheep were not introduced in the town as early as cattle. In 1643 there
were not over sixteen sheep in the whole  colony of N.Y.  They were fed on
the great plains under the care of a shepherd, whose directiosn were not to
let them go over half a mile in the woods for fear of being lost, or     
destroyed by wolves.  Noone was allowed to take away any,  even his own
sheep, from the common flock, or kill it but in the presence of two
witnesses.
                              
  Every owner had an earmark for his sheep, which was recorded in the town
books.  These marks were bought and sold; ingenuity was exhausted in
devising new ones.  There were sheep stealers who have been known to alter
these marks.  In the fall the sheep were pounded by the pounders into pens
agreed upon at the town meeting.  In 1710 the pens were at Isaac Smith's,
at Herrick's, at another time at Success, perhaps by reason of the
convenience of having water at hand.  After the sheep had been pastured on
the plains during the summer, on an appointed day in October or November, the owners
met for the parting.  
                 
  On April 1, 1845, the town meeting appointed the last Monday in October
for sheep parting.  The sheep tenders severally arose early on that day and
commenced driving in the sheep from the outskirts of the plains to a large 
central pen, then each owner selected his own by the ear mark...   
                                                  
p.304:                                                      
...The very atmosphere of the east end of Long Island is full of marine and
Indian legends.  The Montauk Indians who occupied the territory in their
day were a proud and warlike sub-tribe of the Algonkins, and many queer    
     
traditions concerning them have been preserved.  On the Sag Harbour Road,
north of East Hampton, is a spot called Whooping Boy Hollow.  At this place
an Indiand chief's son  was brutally murdered many years ago, and ever
since, after dark are frequently heard there the screams of a child for  
help.  Many of the people about here have full faith in this  story.  
                                                    
  East from East Hampton is a remarkable Lebanon cedar tree, whose flat
table-like top is a mass of foliage, and the great strength of its outlying
branches can support thirteen persons at one time.  Why the magic number? 
"This tree,"  says Payne, "is immortalized by the old tale of an Indian   
massacre and miraculous escape."  This seems to be another version of the
Fort Pond, or Kongonok legend.  In old colonial times near this place an
Indian pow-wow was held at which the Devil presided.  (So said the Puritan
whites.)  Two Puritans, however, smuggled themselves into the banquet and
they succeeded in making it so unconfortably hot for the Devil that he quit
the feast and the salvation of three souls marked by his satanic majesty
for destruction were saved.     
                                                 
  The following instance, however, appeals to us a remarkable coincidence: 
Twenty-six graves in the East Hampton burying ground tell a tale of
suffering with a humane and merciful setting.                              
                     
                                                            
 pp. 304-5                                           
  On the night of January 19, 1858, during a fearful snowstorm, the clipper
ship "John Milton" of 1,500 tons burden, from the South Pacific bound for
N.Y., was wrecked at this place.  She had a crew of twenty-six persons, all
of whom perished during the night, and their bodies were found scattered
along the beach the next morning.  The performance of the sacred act of
gathering their bodies and giving them a repectable burial redounds to the
glory of East Hampton.  

  From East Hampton to Montauk Point a history of the south beach would be
a continuous tale of horrors.  The coincidence which impelled the relation
of the above catastrophy is, that, as John Milton, the poet and philosopher
was not permitted through political interposition to reach the shores of
Long Island; 200 years later the noble ship bearing his name, came to an
inglorious end at the very spot destined for Milton's home and final
resting place.  So terrific was this storm that not a vestige of the ship 
"John Milton" was to be seen the next morning.
              
  ...Tuesday, April 15, 1873.                               
  After finishing our labors at East Hampton, the Faust Club Committee took
their departure for Fire Place ...distance of about forty miles ...Fire
Place, also known historically as Stauket South, Conetquot and more
recently as South Haven ...It is a group of dwelling houses, Suffolk club
house, schoolhouse, church, a public house and many mills clustered about an
artificial lake on the CARMAN River.  Historians and georgraphers had sadly
confused CARMAN'S and Conetquot Rivers, using indifferently one for the
other...  
          
pp.331-2                                                    
  The first white settlers in the village were from Stamford, Conn.  They
had emigrated from Hemal, Eng., in the early part of the sixteenth century.
 The natives (Indians) sold the territory of Hempstead to the Rev. Robert
FORDHAM  and John CARMAN, in 1643.  As it was under Dutch jurisdition, a
patent was obtained from Gov. Keift in 1644 .

. . The first arrival consisted of between thirty and forty families. 
Among the early settlers were Richard Gildersleeve, Edward Thurston,
William Raynor, the Rev. Richard Denton, Matthew Mitchell, Robert Coe, the
Rev. Robert Fordham, JOHN CARMAN, Andrew Ward, Jonas Wood, John Ogden and Robert
Jackson . . . 
                             
  ...The history of its churches, the Pres. and Epis. dates back to the
first settlement of Long Island.  As the name of the Presb. Ch. is
"Christ's First Church,: history states that it is probable that to this
church is due the honor of being the first Presb. congregattion established
in  America....In 1662 the services of Rev. Robert FORDHAM were secured... 
                                                
   End                                                      
                              

                                        

Helen, Sacramento
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Its not the size of the ship, its the size of the waves.
LITTLE RICHARD       
										  	       	helen.silvey@bbs.macnexus.org
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