Honorable, Wise and Very Valiant Sir,
      Honorable General Pieter Stuyvesant Greeting!
    Your Honor's favor of the 18^th has been duly received, but whereas some trouble has arisen here, I request the inhabitants to give further information, who, it seems, have immediately hired a yacht, to give your Honor a detailed report of it; although I shall always obey your Honor, your Honor will please to answer me by the bearer hereof, that I may govern myself accordingly. I remain Your Honor's faithful servant and subject
Actum Great Sopez                                      DIRCK SMITH.
22^d Septbr 1659

      To the Honorable, Wise and Very Valiant, His Honor, General Pieter Stuyvesant at N. Amsterdam.
    To the Honorable Director General Pieter Stuyvesant.
    I, Dirck Smith, Ensign of the Company, beg to inform your Honor, that I have not refused to obey your Honor's orders, but have executed them in every way and respect and after receiving the Hon^ble General's letter on the 20^th I prepared myself to leave here with eighteen men for the Manhattans. The inhabitants kept me on account of a commotion among the savages and there were no yachts here, except the one, by which I received your Honor's letter and which sailed up the river. As on the 20^th at night between ten and eleven some savages raised a great noise and yelling under the fort, whereupon Dirck de Goyer, Marten Hofman and Gillis de Necker alarmed me and the guard, I commanded the Sergeant to take 9 or 10 men and directed him to go out by one of the gates and return by the other one and not to molest anybody, but to see, what was to be done; the Sergeant sent a man back to me, saying that a crowd of savages was there and Jacob Jansen Stoll came to the guard, saying, I will go, give me four or five men; he thereupon took

four or five men, namely Jacob Jansen van Stoutenburgh, Tomes Higgens, Gisebert Philips, Evert Pelts, Jan Artsen, Berent Hermsen; His Honor, the General, may at any time inquire of these inhabitants, whether I have given any other command, as to shoot, fight or beat, but the one to see, what mischief was brewing there outside of the Fort. After their return, I asked them, who had ordered them to fire and they said, the savages had shot first and Jacob Jansen abusing the Ensign violently, said: We wanted to slap their mouths, for the dogs have vexed us long enough, and Jacob Jansen said, I know very well what orders I had from the Hon^ble General and how they have sat here all in the Fort for eight days and could not get out, for they lie in the bushes all around and how they have skirmished against them during twice twenty-four hours and they have fired with innumerable brand-arrows into the grain attacks and the barn, the barn of Hap being however covered with planks the corn was, God be praised! saved, but they killed the horses and cattle, of the Hon^ble General's three, of Evert Pelts' three, of Tomas Clabbert's* four and at the date of this letter we have got back one prisoner, who ran away from them. I have asked this returned captive, Harmen Hendricksen, how strong they may have been, he said in answer to me, that they must have counted over four hundred and thought that our prisoners were all still alive and how badly they were off, for they had to lie every day under the blue sky, as they had long intended this; if we had not had some cannons here, not one of us, large or small, should have escaped.
    On the 20^th inst. when I received orders from the Hon^ble General to come down with so many men, Jacob Jansen and Thomas Clabbert went to the Strand and hired one of the yachts, which were to go up the river, to make their report to the Hon^ble General and after having dispatched their letter they wanted to go back to the Fort, numbering together 13 able-bodied men, the Sergeant with five men, Thomas Clabbert, Jacob Hab, a carpenter, Abraham by name, Pieter Dircks and his man, Evert Pelts' boy, Lewies, the Frenchman. At the tennis-court near the strand they allowed themselves to be taken prisoners. Thomas Clabbert was exchanged for a savage, and a soldier came back, who run away during the night: and ten are still in captivity and they have actually declared war and do not want to know anything of peace, as the inhabitants can testify. We have still an Indian prisoner and so far, thanks to God, no one else has been wounded but two and Buerties' son is killed. The wounded have recovered rapidly. I cannot write any more for the time is too short. His Honor La Montagnie has sent Kit Davit with a Maquas Indian from Fort Orange, to hear how matters stand here and will assist us, if your Honor approves. I have been ready to come with my men at any time, but no yachts have been here. I remain                      Your Honor's servant till death
                                                       DIRCK SCHMIT.
    To the Noble Honorable Director General Petrus Stuyvesant this is to be given.
Anno 1659 the 29^th Septbr.
                      Manathans

Source:

Brodhead, John Romeyn, Documents Relating to the Colonial History of the State of New York, Vol. XIII, Albany, Weed, Parsons & Co., Printers, 1881, pp. 114-115.