Clermont State Historic Site

Here at Clermont, we love Halloween. It's a good thing too, because it takes some 10 weeks to plan our vary popular Legends by Candlelight Ghost Tours. Beginning sometime in August, when almost everyone else is still beach umbrellas and summer vacations, we are already thinking orange and black. Or red and black. Or maybe black and white... It's so hard to choose.

In short, we are already making plans for Halloween.

Decorating the mansion for Halloween takes quite a bit of planning. You see, we work hard to keep it all looking appropriate for the 1920s, and that means researching the right look and where on earth to get the right products. Luckily for us, the aesthetic for the 1920s called for tons of crepe paper, streamers, and balloons, all carefully put together to form hanging confections of decoration.

After eight years, we've gotten pretty good at it, and we're starting to get more into it. Last year, we worked around a Edgar Allen Poe theme with "The Raven." Quotes posted above doors and windows complemented our many feathered ravens (okay, they were really crows--but it's pretty hard to find affordable decorative ravens right now).

This year, we were inspired by this image:

And voila! our theme is now a Commedia dell'Arte Masquerade with Harlequins, Columbinas, Pierrots--all filtered through the lens of the 1920s. It turns out these were pretty popular costumes beginning in the first part of the century, and they show up a lot during the period if you know what you're looking at. The diamond motif can be found all over Halloween imagery of the period, and the pom poms, neck ruffs, and masks were usually enough to give the viewer the desired impression.

So now it's just putting our plan into action: finding fabrics and paper, making pom poms and neck ruffles. There is so much left to do!

*Clermont's Legends by Candlelight Ghost Tours will take place on October 16 & 17, 23 & 24 this year. Tickets are $10 for adults $5 for children or Friends of Clermont. Reservations open October 1st. Call early to get your spot as our tours do fill up! (518) 537-4240

Comic books and historic homes.

At a glance, there aren’t a lot of correlations between the two; comics are low brow, for the masses, easily accessible and disposable. Historic homes are protected, cherished, definehighbrow and are for those who can afford the ticket price. They draw polar opposite crowds, but they aren’t as unrelated you may think! They are both national treasures. Comic books are one of the five “purely American” art forms (alongside jazz, musical theatre, mystery novels and the modern banjo) and carry major cultural value.

The first comic book was published in New York City in 1934. Famous Funnies was a truly American spectacle, the product of first generation high school drop outs who used their talents in design, drafting and writing to create a literary art form that was accessible to the masses. Using the ideals of hard work and skilled craftsmanship they had inherited from their parents, young hopefuls like Will Eisner and Walt Disney created a market that was instantly successful.

By the end of World War II, more than a third of all comic book readers were adults. Stories had matured with the first crop of readers, who had spent their dimes as kids in the 30s and had grown up to serve their country in Europe and the Pacific. By the early 1950s, 20 different comic publishers were producing nearly 650 different titles a month in genres such as superheroes, comedy, crime noir, mystery, sci-fi, and romance. They employed over a thousand writers, inkers, artists, letterers and editors—many of them women and people of color—who had turned to comics because their ideas would be unwelcome in other spheres of publishing and entertainment.

But the good times wouldn’t last. The comic book success story was an American dream come to fruition that was ultimately failed by the same America that produced it.

In 1952 Senator Joseph McCarthy began probing the artistic community for communists. Anyone who read as “other” was accused of having communist ties. The comic book industry, filled with social minorities creating stories about crime, sex and violence, was an easy target.

Comics were burned in the streets by churches and boy scouts. Publishers shut their doors. Thousands of people lost their jobs, over 900 of them branded communists and blacklisted from ever working in the arts or entertainment industries again. Heavy censorship under the Comics Code Authority restricted the once free art form and public stigma drove down sales. Comic books were defanged and defamed in their birthplace.

But comic books weren’t going down without a fight! While publishers like DC, Marvel and Archie Comics continued publishing books neutered by the Comics Code Authority, underground comic scenes popped up across the country. Uninhibited by public stigma or pressure from politics and advertisers, they continued to produce books with mature themes, giving them away or selling them at conventions. This tradition exists today, with yearly Alternative Comics and Zine conventions in cities across the country, not to mention webcomics.

Drawing by Kevin Nordstrom

How might the Livingstons feel about being represented as comic book characters? We don’t know. Janet and Honoria Livingston were not part of the first crop of comic book readers in the 1930s and 40s, they were in their 20s when Famous Funnies appeared in newsstands. Their ancestors would have been aware of political cartoons (and probably none too happy about appearing in one). But through Livingstons Get Inked we are looking to bridge a gap in American culture using their stories. In recent years, museums are looking for new and creative ways to connect with the community and squash public stigma about who museums are for. Comic books are a valuable teaching tool; earlier this year we implemented a short comic about the Livingston’s dog Punchy as a preliminary teaching aid for visiting elementary school students. The comic has been wildly successful; even though they read the book the day before, students remembered facts and were enthusiastic to see the artifacts that Punchy the dog introduced them to.

Through Livingstons Get Inked, we are appealing to young adults, an audience who make up more than 70% of all comic readers and whose visitation all museums are looking to cultivate. The panels were created by independent comic artists from across the country who are using their art and story-telling skills to bring new life to cherished Livingston stories. We hope to inspire new interest in our history and continue bridging the societal gap between high and low culture.

*Livingstons Get Inked opens in Clermont's Visitors Center on October 3rd, 2015. It can be viewed throughout the month of October from Wednesdays through Sundays 11am to 4pm.

**Author Emily Robinson is Clermont's Education Assistant and holds a bachelors in Fine Art. Her work has been featured in Clermont's education materials and will be on exhibit as part of "The Livingstons Get Inked."

If you've been here, you've seen; you just might not realize it. Clermont is home to one of the oldest black walnut trees in New York State. Depending on who you talk to you, it might be the oldest, the second oldest, or possibly the third oldest.

Either way--it's old! It's been estimated that it's somewhere around 240 years old, which means it was a little sapling when Margaret Beekman Livingston was watching her house get rebuilt in 1778.

This monster of a tree reaches its craggy branches up over the towering roof of the mansion's South Wing, offering shade in the summer, and dropping great big green-coated walnuts down from the sky every fall (Honoria used to wear a hard hat near there when she got older to protect her head!). It is natural landmark and one of the first things you see when you come walking down the Lilac Walk on your way to the house. It's a bit of a natural wonder to stand at the foot of it and realize how very big it really is.

We love this tree. But it's a living thing, and well--it's getting old. Almost every year, we have the tree examined by arborists to ensure that it is still safe, and we know that it's life is running out. The time will come when the tree will have to be removed for safety's sake.

Thinking about this made me think about looking for the tree in historic documentation. What history can you find about a tree?

The easiest image to spot was this one from around 1908 to 1910. Alice photographed her newly-turned patch of dirt that would become the Spring Garden, and there is our old friend the Black Walnut. Even over 100 years ago, it is tall enough to tower above 5 stories of house (since it sits on level with the basement).

Some 30 years earlier around 1775, the second-story addition to Clermont's south wing had not yet been built. The walnut tree stands proudly shading the bedrooms below it while someone--maybe John Henry?--relaxes on a bench overlooking the river.

Now we are treading into territory where photographs are few. The only photo I have of the house in the 1860s id from the wrong angle, and you can't see the tree at all. Nevertheless, if you're will to trust a drawing, there is an image from around the same time that may show the black walnut, tall and proud off the southern corner of the house. In the 19th century, it was clearly old, but not quite the Grande Dame that it is now.

My last possible "spotting" is from the 1790s. A drawing by a visitor captured a clutch of trees off the mansion's south corner. Could one of these possibly be our Black Walnut tree? Was it once surrounded by other walnuts waving in the breeze and dropping little bombs on passers-by every fall? I like to think so.

So there you have it--the history of a tree. There is something a little comforting in following the history of our tree friend--even if we know that we will have to let go in a few years.

For a long time all I knew about Clermont Livingston was that he was named after the house and that he kept a very detailed garden journal.

Clermont Livingston (pronounced like "Clement") was the head of Clermont the estate from 1844 when his father died and officially through his own death in 1895--though during the last few decades, the family mansion was largely occupied by his children and their families, while he moved over to neighboring Arryl House. I have long thought of Clermont through his son's eyes, since at Clermont we focus a great deal on that generation. But of course he wasn't born old, and he is best connection to our Victorian-era past.

He was the privileged son of a wealthy NY statesman, the inheritor of the lost Steamboat legacy (the monopoly was broken in 1824), and the grandson of a founding father. There was a lot of family pride.

Clermont in 1796, overlooking the Hudson River

But Clermont grew up to be much more reserved than other Livingston heads of household. He was the only head of Clermont who never obtained a public office. Who was this guy? And why is era of leadership at Clermont the quietest in our records?

Clermont, the boy, was born in 1817 and grew up splitting his time between the Livingston estate on the Hudson River, Albany, and presumably New York City. By the time he was born, his parents had lost four of his elder siblings, all under the age of five, and two years later in 1919 his teenage sister Mary died as well. The surviving siblings that Clermont grew up with were:

-Margaret, 9 years his senior
-Elizabeth, 4 years his senior
-Emma, 2 years old, but died in 1828
-Robert E., 3 years younger
-Mary (again), 6 years younger

Betsy Stevens Livingston
was Clermont's mother

When Clermont was 12, his mother Betsy passed away at the age of 49.

At some point his father married Marry C. Broome, perhaps a contentious decision considering that Mary (b. 1810) was actually younger than his oldest daughter Margaret (b. 1808), and there are a few indications of weak relations which I'll mention later.

So Clermont's early tween years were marked by some pretty big upheavals. Though certainly not uncommon for the time, the death of sister, followed quickly by that of his mother, and then accepting a new step mother couldn't have been easy for a kid. Nevertheless, a little collection of 9 letters from his bachelor years suggest that Clermont had built some pretty close relationships with friends and family.

In 1835, at age 17 he was corresponding with his brother-in-law Edward Ludlow (Elizabeth's husband) about finding a housekeeper for their New York home, current events, and sharing gossip about neighbors and acquaintances. He also kept up with his older sister Margaret, but he complained that Elizabeth did not write him directly. Margaret's letters to her younger brother were newsy and familiar. She referenced New Year's Day Visiting (interestingly using her sister Mary's first name, but giving the formal and distant title of "Mrs. Livingston" to her step mother). She lamented that there was not enough snow for sleighing. She bid her brother write her about their activities in Albany, where their father was a New York State senator. And she updated him on her day-to-day:

I have been very busy hunting up little knick nacks for the children's stockings, dressing dolls so Christmas day was a very merry one for the children, during the holidays they do nothing but play, at this moment there is such a noise that I scarcely know what I am writing about...and just now [they] nearly upset the ink stand over this paper..."

He talked about riding steamboats to and from Albany with his younger brother Robert in the summer to make "a few perchase's (sic)." And cousin Edward Macomb reminded him of a promise Clermont'd made last fall when riding the steamboat up from New York that he'd be groomsman at an upcoming wedding. Edward assured Clermont that although he did not yet know who the bridesmaids would be, "they will be without doubt very charming."

Clermont's relationship with Edward seems to have been one that was a little less formal than the ones he shared with his sisters. The reference to "charming ladies" suggests a shared interest in women, and in a letter the next month (in February after the wedding) Edward described a "delightful dinner party at Mrs Gates" where "each gentleman had a fair lady on his right and left..." While Edward was planning to move to Washington for business, he mused, "I have had many pleasant days at your delightful residence & hope to have many more." Oh--and by the way, there's another wedding coming up in April, "when I suppose we shall have the pleasure of seeing you again."

Although the year is uncertain, Clermont responded to a "Ned" in February--and it seems possible that it was to Edward Macomb--when he wrote lamenting the news that "Strats" had "been so soon allured by the charms of the fair sex to desert the ranks of the bachelors." He then wrote a little ditty, expecting his friend to set to music himself. The slightly ribald poem ended with the lines:

Now on Matrimony's stream he floats
May he in short have his sport
Beneath the shade of the petticoats

And he signed it "Bunderbus."

By far the most jovial letters came from Clermont's friend William Tallmadge. I can't seem to find anything about this young man, but he seems to be a peer who knew Clermont from their time in Albany, where Clermont's father served in state government. He may even have been related to contemporary Albany statesman and abolitionist James Tallmadge Jr., but I can't be sure.

Anyway, William was full of jokes, and his letters are tinged with a youthful and good-natured sarcasm. "This City is as void of news, as Connecticut is of Democrats," he wrote in April of 1838. He too gossips about the interesting ladies in their acquaintance: "I saw Miss Caroline King yesterday in the street, she continues to look very handsome, and was particularly interesting..." "Miss Boswick is very well at present." And he signs off his letter of April 27 remembering his care for Clermont's parents and then, inexplicably, "Give my best respect to friend Robert and tell him not to hang himself."

Subsequent letters continue to reference young ladies. "Miss Skinner has just arrived in town and of course I shall treat her as she ought to be, she will visit our house this evening, and if you were here we might make quite a pleasant party..." he wrote in July of the same year..

The two shared more than just an interest in The Ladies though. When William took ill in 1840, Clermont's letter revived and comforted him: "I assure you...I have never received a word from a friend which gratified me so much..." It seems the friends had made plans for yet another excursion to Saratoga Springs, but Tallmadge's "Billious attack" made him too weak and sick to join his friend. Even sick, though, William was not without jokes:

Clermont Livingston eventually
grew his own "astonishing whiskers."

How is Mr. Robert, is he flourishing - has he that huge pair of whiskers you were speaking about - if he has, tell him to keep them until I come up. I have a pair that may astonish the natives in your part of the country.

Clermont's life was not all ladies. Both Margaret and Tallmadge mention Clermont being busy with his studies (although Margaret follows it up with "dancing in the evening").

Clermont continued to live with his father, at least through 1840; letters to him from his friend Tallmadge were address care of his dad Edward P. Livingston. But he sometimes stayed with his sister Elizabeth and her husband Edward Ludlow in New York City, where the night life was surely more interesting. Ludlow's letter to his brother-in-law in 1835 or 1840 (the two years in this timeframe in which December 10th, fell on a Thursday) indicated that he hoped Clermont and younger brother Robert would come stay with them again that winter. And later in 1841, Clermont spent the Christmas holidays there again.

When Clermont's father died at the end of 1843, it was time to settle down. Edward P. Livingston died intestate, making the process of sorting the estate decidedly more complex. There seems to have been some confusion about what belonged to the step mother Mary Broome and what should have gone to Clermont's younger sister Mary. Although the Widow Mary had taken a sizable inventory of household goods, little or nothing was left for the 21-year-old daughter. If the relationship with the Livingston children's step mother had been strained before, having to engage the legal consultation of cousin Livingston Livingston (no, it's not a typo. That's really his name) three months later probably didn't help matters. For the record, cousin Livingston said Mary the Widow should have given a lot more to Mary the daughter.

In 1844, it seems that Clermont's youth was done, and it was time to settle down and become a gentleman farmer. He got married that year to his pretty cousin Cornelia Livingston from Oak Hill and got down to the business of running the estate. He saved his family estate from the Anti-Rent mess by selling off some land. He saw to it his little sister Mary was taken care of (since her step mother was gone by now), and became the de facto head of the Livingston family at Clermont.

But of course, there was much still ahead of him.

When Clermont Livingston inherited Clermont the estate from his father in 1844, it seemed like he was set up to become a country gentleman with a cozy little family life. Instead of pursuing a public legal career, as the past four generations of Livingston men had done, Clermont snuggled into his childhood home like a warm security blanket. He married a Livingston cousin named Cornelia that same year, and their first daughter Mary (called "Mamie" by her family) was born the next year in 1845. A son, John Henry (known as "Johnnie"), followed in 1848.

But that was to be the sum total of his children, and Clermont's marriage was cut short when his wife became ill. He moved the family for some time to New York City in the hopes of getting better care for her there, but Cornelia died from a "prolonged and painful illness" in 1851.

"Johnnie" and "Mamie"
around 1851 or 1852

The family returned to the Hudson Valley for comfort. It is during this time that his son John Henry remembered his father as a sort of aloof figure who sat by day reading on his sofa in the shady dining room. The widower began keeping his detailed farm journal, with almost-daily entries about the temperature, wind direction and speed, even the barometric pressure. He buried himself in the success of his crops, detailing which did well where, and when the fruit was ready to eat.

Sylvan Cottage, where Clermont's
children were schooled with the
DePeyster children.

They struck up a routine for daily life. Clermont engaged a teacher for his children and set up a little school for them and their dePeyster cousins. According to John Henry, the routine was strict. The children rose early, did their homework by 9am and headed off to school. The dePeysters "always came late and never did their lessons, but we always had the best of times," he recalled later.

Clermont and his second wife Mary

Somewhere between 1860 and 1862, Clermont found a new partner. Mary Colden Swartout Livingston had lived next door for years in Arryl House married to his cousin Montgomery Livingston. But Montgomery had died 1855, and the two seem to have gotten married, although she was still referred to in letters from the children as "Mrs. Swartout."

Johnnie as a teenager,
headed for Columbia University

School ended at the little cottage by the estate's gate not long after Mamie got married in 1864 to none other than her classmate Frederic dePeyster. Her Oak Hill grandmothers practically swooned with joy that the 19-year-old's husband-to-be was someone she'd known so long and that he was a local who would not move the girl far away.

The next April, already down two students in his school, Mr. Wolf the tutor had to say goodbye to his employer of eight years. Clermont's oldest son Johnnie was 17 and ready to leave the cozy little cottage school for college at Columbia University. Before he left, Mr. Wolf wrote a heartfelt letter saying he'd enjoyed working with the children and found Mr. Livingston an "appreciative" employer (we should all be so lucky!).

Believed to be
Catherine Hammersly

Just before Christmas 1865, Clermont had his first granddaughter, also named Mary--but called "May" by the family to distinguish her from the other two Marys. Three years late in 1868, he got a grandson, whom his daughter dutifully named "Clermont."

Johnnie was married too in November of 1871. His bride was Catherine Livingston Hammersly. He went on his honeymoon traveling around Europe in 1872, amusingly at the same time as Mamie and her husband were enjoying an extended European getaway themselves. Their letters home to "Papa" describe hotels and crossings and adventures.

Catherine Livingston

After all this excitement, loss began to visit the family almost all at once. Johnnie's wife Catherine died shortly after giving birth to the latest granddaughter in the family (of course named Catherine, after her mother) in 1873. Then not long after, in 1874, Clermont's oldest granddaughter May died as well, followed by Mamie's husband Frederick that same year. The loss is made especially poignant by 9-year-old May's early attempt at letter-writing, preserved by her grandfather:

January 31st, Saturday [1874]

Dear Grandpapa,

I want to know whether the little creek is open. How is Pussie and Hannah? and Sport? We are going to have Goodhue to dine with us today and Johnnie Pole too. What are you doing?

Clermont and Mary "May" dePeyster
around 1869 or 1870

How is Ninnie? How are you and what are they all doing? We are going to the theatre next Saturday. I am well. Clermont is pretty well. We have a nice time Clermont says to say we play cards and dominos before breakfast with Grandma. Clermie and I send our love to your and Aunt Annie and Aunt Emily.

Your affect
Granddaughter
May

Only two years later, Mamie died as well, leaving eight-year-old Clermont as the last standing member of the family. And sometime during all of this, Clermont's wife Mary Swartout died too, leaving Clermont Sr. a widower twice over.

Emily Evans Livingston

And so the Livingston family was left to regroup again. Clermont Sr. began vacationing in Bar Harbor and at some point remarried a woman whom the family called "Aunt Annie." He made updates to the family mansion, adding a towering mansard roof. Johnnie pursued his legal career in New York. Baby Catherine was sent to her maiden Hammersly aunts, and Clermont the little boy became Uncle Johnnie's charge at some point.

When John Henry married Emily Evans in 1880, something happened to the family dynamic that caused a permanent rift. There isn't any record of it in Clermont's surviving documents, and descendants are still scouring family histories.

When Johnnie remarried, Clermont changed his will so that the Livingston mansion would go to his granddaughter Catherine, skipping over his son. The mansion remained Johnnie's for life, but nevertheless he took his daughter, nephew, and new wife to live in Philadelphia for a while--far away from his father and any strife at his childhood home. The family seems to have come back to the Hudson Valley for somethings--at the very least, they made some stylish new updates to the mansion's main rooms, but the estrangement seems to have been a deep one. But we don't know why.

What happened that made Clermont Sr. so mad? Why did he essentially cut off his only son? Some descendants think it likely that Clermont Sr. wanted to make sure his granddaughter Catherine (a "true" Livingston) would inherit the home, instead of any potential children that Emily might have had. The Livingston pride in their ancestral family home is not to be underestimated. There are also some unpleasant suggestions that Clermont disliked his new daughter-in-law intensely and others that his relationship with his son was strained and critical. None of these can be completely confirmed or denied. Perhaps if his grandson Clermont had survived, the problem may have been solved differently, but the boy had died suddenly in 1889.

Either way, the intrigue was not put aside when Emily died in 1894 (leaving Johnnie a widower twice over, just like his dad). Even with her out of the picture, the will continued to dictate that the family's estate would be given to Catherine (who was now going by "Kitty" and spelling her name Katharine).

Clermont passed away in 1895, leaving behind the muddy confusion of inheritance and estate management and all the rest of it.

Two years later, in 1897, twenty-four-year-old Katherine formally sold the mansion back to her father for one dollar "in consideration of love and affection," According to her children, this was "over the objections of her father" so perhaps Johnnie had accepted his father's will after all.

Henry Beekman Livingston was a jerk. That is an undeniable fact. His terrible treatment of his wife, children, servants and slaves was well documented. His military career nearly came to an early end because of a personal dispute with another officer and it did end in what was essentially a temper tantrum.

He was also a hero of the Revolutionary War. At the Battle of Monmouth, the last major battle of the war fought in the north, Henry may have very well saved the entire army from a crushing defeat.

In the fall of 1777 the Revolution had achieved a great victory at Saratoga, in which Henry played no small part as the colonel of the 4^th New York Regiment, but also a difficult defeat when the British army under General William Howe took Philadelphia. After a mission to New York City to deliver a scolding letter to General Henry Clinton for the raid into the Hudson Valley (that ended with the destruction of Clermont), Henry joined his regiment and the rest of the Continental Army in winter quarters at Valley Forge.

Henry’s men suffered that winter from a lack of food and clothing. Henry pleaded for both from Governor George Clinton and his brother Robert, the Chancellor. Unlike many of the army’s officers Henry stayed with his men all winter. Toward the end of the winter his entire regiment was moved out of their huts at the main camp and placed in tents because of rampant sickness. Henry himself fell sick.

As spring came Henry and his men’s health improved. They began to train under the direction of the recently arrived, Baron Friedrich Wilhelm Augustus von Steuben (at right). In short they became professional soldiers.

In June of 1778 Henry Clinton, now commanding the main British Army, decided to abandon Philadelphia. George Washington decided to pursue him and make sure the British got back to New York City as quickly as possible. Before they marched the best officers and men in the army were chosen and formed into ad hoc battalions to serve as an advanced corps for the army under the command of General Charles Lee. Henry was given command of a battalion of 380 men.

After four days of marching in brutal heat Lee’s command finally made contact with the rear guard of the British Army on June 28, 1778. Lee gave the order to advance but almost immediately gave orders to retreat. Lee, had only recently been released from British custody having been captured in 1776, was at best to scared to risk a fight or at worst a traitor.[i]Many of the battalions fell apart as the men fled in a disorganized mob. Henry, however, held his men in line and led them in an organized retreat. This brought them under British fire but neither were the British able to pursue the retreating American army. Henry’s battalion major was killed. His lieutenant colonel succumbed to the heat.

The Marquis de Lafayette rode up with orders for Henry to take his men and screen the artillery the Americans had now brought up to fire on the British. Henry reluctantly took the “weak and faint” survivors of his already battered battalion into their new position. As Henry shouted encouragement to his men a British musket ball passed through his thigh. He remained on his feet though, either through sheet meanness or because he knew his battalion had no other officers who could command it.

Henry and his “picked men” stood their ground until a full 1/3, or around 127 of his original 380 men were dead, wounded or had collapsed from the heat. His force found itself flanked on both sides. Henry faced a rapid retreat, most likely unorganized and leaving the wounded to the dubious care of the British. Before he could give that fateful order though Washington appeared on the field with the main body of the American Army. The British army was soon driven off.

That evening as American troops were still harassing the last remnants of the British Army, Henry was given temporary command of General Enoch Poor’s brigade. He only lamented that they did not come into action again against the enemy as he would have taken “ample revenge”.

The Battle of Monmouth was over. The army was battered and bruised but Washington and his men held the field. They had proven that they could be trained to fight like professional soldiers and they had shown they could stand against the British Army.

Three days after the battle Henry wrote a letter to his brother Robert describing the battle as he saw it.[ii]It certainly reads more like a battle report to a superior officer than a letter to a brother. He closes by promising to write to the rest of the family when he has time and tells Robert he only wrote to him to prevent “their being annoy’d”.

All in all Henry Beekman Livingston did not have a good war. He frequently found himself in the thickest fights or under the most extreme conditions. It is entirely possible that his experiences in the war combined with his preexisting bad attitude contributed to his frequently brutal behavior after the war. Perhaps like the rest of his generation, he should be remembered as a full person, not simply a tenacious battlefield commander nor simply the pariah he became.

[i]Lee was probably a traitor. Information found in William Howe’s papers indicates that Lee gave the British a plan for beating the American Army.

[ii] A copy of this letter was obtained by from The David Library of the American Revolution. The original is in the Rutgers University Alexander Library.

Katharine Livingston Timpson has been the subject of much discussion here at Clermont lately. Katharine's split with her father, John Henry Livingston took her out of the country in 1905, where geography and time misted over many of the details of her life.

But ever since her great-grandson donated a collection of family portraits from England, and then we got reconnected with her grandson in America, we've been unearthing her nearly-lost history. Most recently we were thrilled to have the inheritance of Clermont itself cleared up for us.

You see, Katharine's grandfather Clermont Livingston (at left) was the estate's owner during the latter half of the 19th century. His will dictated that the estate be given to his only surviving child, John Henry. At some point, however, he changed the will to pass the estate to his granddaughter Katharine, bypassing his son, but leaving him life tenancy and spawning a century-worth of rumors as to why.

After he died in 1895, Katharine gave Clermont back to her dad (okay--so actually she sold it to him for $1), but given the up-and-down nature of their relationship, the timing is everything.

If the relationship was in the rocky period of the 1920s, did John Henry push his oldest daughter--who was after 1900 well-established with her own house and a sizable trust fund--into returning the house to him so that it could go to his youngest girls? Or if it was before 1905, was the relationship was in a good spot when Katharine (at right) sold her childhood home back to her father, and what was the motivation?

After Katharine's grandson found Grandfather Clermont Livingston's will, some of these questions could finally be answered. Clermont's will did indeed first give the house to his son John Henry, but the will was changed just months after he married his second wife Emily (at left). So it seems most likely that Emily was--as supposed--the sticking point between father and son. As a non-Livingston, the possibility of her inheriting Clermont if John Henry pre-deceased her would have been unacceptable.

Looking further into the documents, our friend found us the answer: Katharine sold the mansion back to her father in 1897 "in consideration of love and affection." A letter from Katharine's son reported that she did this over her father's "protests" so perhaps at the time John Henry had accepted his own father's decision. Father and daughter had just spent several years together enjoying some international travel (at right in India) so you might imagine that their relationship was in a good place.

So it was after:
--the death of Emily, Katharine's "charming" step mother
--a whole bunch of international travel together
--Clermont was renovation with a new wing and a fancy veranda

And it was before:
--John Henry married his 3rd wife (whom Katharine did not like)
--John Henry's 2nd and 3rd daughters were born
--Katharine got married, had children, and moved away.
--Katharine's finances took a nosedive in the 1920s

Was this before or after John Henry refused his daughter's marriage to an Austrian navy man? Now that, I just don't know.

Much later, after her father's death in 1927, Katharine (at right) attempted to get the sale of the estate reversed, saying that it had been made "under duress." That's in direct conflict with the "consideration of love and affection," but after 30 years, Katharine's trust fund had practically run out, and she had five children's futures to secure. It could be that the pressure lead her to remember the sale with different eyes.

I suppose not all the mysteries are cleared up, but at least now the chronology is clear.

On Saturday, April 23, the rolling hills and river views at Clermont State Historic Site will be alive with the sounds of music and laughter, the smells of hot food, and the brilliant colors of hand-dyed yarns. The Chancellor’s Sheep & Wool Showcase will run from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Tickets are just $8 per car. Friends of Clermont members pay $6 per car.

The Showcase, one of the historic site’s oldest and most popular annual festivals, has become a springtime tradition for many in the area. For the first time, the showcase will welcome the hip family band Dog OnFleas. This quirky band plays honest, loose, and ingenious music for kids and their adult counterparts. Clermont’s music stage will also welcome back Tamarack, playing traditional folk and Celtic music all morning.

More than two dozen independent vendors have registered for the shopping concourse. Shoppers will be able to find richly-colored knitted and felted shawls, sweaters, and mittens. There will also be a vibrant array of yarns, roving and fiber supplies, along with clever and useful craft accessories. Booths bursting with handmade jewelry, pottery, and soaps will tempt guests from every corner.

Clermont’s demonstrations are the centerpiece of the Showcase, illustrating how wool goes from sheep to shawl. Gather around farmer Fred DePaul as he shears three sheep throughout the day, explaining the history and technique that goes into the task. Herding demonstrations with the highly-trained border collies of Wild Goose Chase will take place on the historic sheep fold in the afternoon, and the members of the Elmendorf Spinners Guild will be at work all day long.

The Showcase is a great place for children, with stories and crafts happening all day long. Children can print their own tee shirts with Indian wood blocks or sign their name to the 2016 Showcase Quilt project. It’s also a great place for them to meet their first sheep!

For more information about the Sheep & Wool Showcase, to volunteer, or for other questions about the Clermont, please call (518) 537-4240 or email Kjirsten.Gustavson@parks.ny.gov.

Clermont State Historic Site features the mansion, formal gardens, scenic Hudson River views and miles of hiking trails. The Friends of Clermont is a private, non-profit educational corporation, founded in 1977 to support and supplement the museum education and historic preservation programs at Clermont State Historic Site. Designated a National Historic Landmark in 1973, Clermont is one of six historic sites and 13 parks administered by the New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation in the Taconic Region. For more information on New York State Parks, please visit our websites at www.nysparks.com or www.FriendsofClermont.org.

Even though our mailing adress is "Clermont Avenue," Clermont is excellently situated on Woods Road, an enclave of the Livingston family for generations. To our north and south, hidden behind the dense trees are homes built by the Livingston brothers and sisters. Have you ever wondered what they look like? Thanks to our friend--and fellow Woods Road resident--Conrad, now you can find out!

Schoolfield Country House:

The Woods Road Estates: A Primer

Villa Camerata, one of the homes the
Livingstons rented in Italy.

In the early 1920s, the Livingston family spent some five years in Europe, enjoying travel and making sure the two daughters Honoria and Janet got a "Cultural Education." While they were gone, the Livingstons on their staff to run Clermont's farming operations and care for the buildings. It was not an uncommon situation. Wealthy estate owners often had several properties that they traveled between, as well as occasional long vacations, meaning that trusted servants were in charge while they were away. These estates housed small communities of trusted workers who each had their own lives and stories intimately connected with the property.

In 1926, when the Livingstons were ready to return to the United States, they were looking for a new farm manager. That's how we meet John Rall.

"My dear Rall," wrote John Henry Livingston on October 24th, 1926, "I was very glad indeed to hear from Miss Nelly that you are able to come to me." And he immediately launched into the instructions: keep dry leaves away from the house (a fire hazard the Livingstons knew about all too well), fill the wood shed, and be sure to add "a great deal of kindling." John Henry left specific instructions for filling the ice house without driving across the lawn so as to prevent damaging the grass. He ordered an old horse--"Dan"--put down and then reiterated that no harm was to come to the lawn by driving across it while filling the ice house. John Henry was feeling pretty serious about his grass.

Rall owned a farm in nearby Germantown and was an experienced farm manager. He had worked for the Clarkson family in that capacity for some ten years before and was also apparently familiar with Clermont from past work. So he would have been well-prepared to oversee the several hundred acres of Clermont estate that remained by the 20th century, including orchards, vegetable and flower gardens, livestock, hay fields, about five barns, and two or three cottages.

By mid-November, he and his family had moved into Sylvan Cottage, near Clermont's west gate. He was to earn $85 a month, plus coal, milk, and use of the cottage. His wife raised chickens and ducks there for extra income. She sold them for eggs and meat ($1 per bird in 1928) to neighbors, including other wealthy estate owners like the Clarksons and the Hawkins.

Sylvan Cottage. This photo was found in the Rall Collection
at Clermont and most likely shows his family. note the enclosed yard
to the right, possibly where Mrs. Rall was raising fowl.

At Clermont, Rall joined a small staff. This was not the old days with 6 or 7 house servants, plus outdoor workers. The Livingston staff had shrunk over the past few decades, which was happening to a lot of households along the Hudson River and elsewhere. Rall's closest neighbor on the estate was likely Clarence Jones, who by 1930 lived with his wife and two sons in Clermont Cottage (at right), just around the corner of a one-lane dirt road that lead down the mansion. An African American man from South Carolina, Clarence was the butler, ultimately in charge of all responsibilities pertaining to the mansion.

John Rall immediately set about the winter duties of the estate. Along with Floyd Smith, Brown, and Downing (?)--three other Clermont workers--he drained the water from the mansion's pipes in preparation for winter. Even though the Livingstons were returning to America, they were headed straight to their Aiken, South Carolina house the Band Box, and Clermont's main house would remain unoccupied for the winter. Clarence headed down south with the Livingstons with them as part of his duties. Floyd moved into Clermont Cottage while he was gone. Rall hired day workers and cut ice off the little pond, bought some supplies for the horses, and everyone at Clermont presumably hunkered down for the winter.

But at the end of January, John Rall received word that his boss, Mr. Livingston had passed away suddenly from influenza. Mrs. Livingston was in "shock," and Mr. Livingston's firm and experienced orders were replaced by a kind of flurry of confusion from his widow. The letter is a particularly poignant one so I'm including a full transcript here:

Dear John,

I enclose the cheque for you for [January] & the other bills. The shock of Mr. Livingstons death is too dreadful for us--He was as nearly perfect as one could be. There is only one thing that helps, & that is to know he was well & active & happy almost to the end, & was spared a long illness & suffering- I had flu, & he got it just as I was getting well, & at first we never dreamed it [would] go wrong, but suddenly, pnuemonioa developed & in a few hours he just stopped breathing, without pain & peacefully. I dont know how we can go to Clermont without him, but he wanted us to, so we shall-- I hope so you can rent or sell you farm and stay with me--Mr Livingston wanted you- & it [would] be such a help to me if you could -

Yrs Sincerely

A.D. Livingston

Mrs. Livingston began struggling to find the additional garden help that the estate would need when they returned, asking Rall's help since she was still in Aiken.

I shall have another man for this summer and would take Raymond from April 1st if he wanted to come for the summer but I cannot have any one this year who wants high wages--$80 is all I could think. Can Raymond [Rifenburg] drive a car?

A fireplace in the Sylvan
Cottage front room

Mrs. Livingston asked if Mrs. Rall would be able to take on some of the estate's other work: laundry, butter making, milk, raising the chickens and eggs. She asked Rall to stay on, suggesting that he was already thinking of leaving. Had this been a winter-only arrangement from the beginning or had the Rall family changed their mind when Mr. Livingston died?

Mrs. Livingston was trying to catch up on all of the little details her husband had always taken care of. "Please get what help you need for the wood, so there is plenty--I did not know could not do it alone..." "Can you start vegetable in the green house, & is it time to send you the seeds? Do you know about planting things, I dont know anything!"

It wasn't quite true that Mrs. Livingston didn't know anything; she was an avid flower gardener who wouldn't let anyone so much as prepare the beds before she returned from South Carolina. She repeated this order several times, just to be sure. It seems likely that her extensive experience with flower gardening made her particularly aware of the value of Rall's expertise with fruits and vegetables.

By the end of February, Rall had made his decision to leave. "I am so sorry you think you cannot stay, but I understand how you cannot unless your farm is sold," wrote Mrs. Livingston.

"The Ford Car"

Nevertheless, Rall would help her find some staff to work the estate. it was a flurry communications: A chauffeur was still needed. Raymond was almost taken on, but he wouldn't drive the car. In March Raymond was instead being considered to care for the animals and barns, but he didn't know how to care for the vegetable gardens. Mrs. Livingston engaged someone from South Carolina to come up and care for the building maintenance, but she still needed someone to drive the car for her. Brown could move into Sylvan Cottage after Rall and his family moved out--but then that fell through for some reason. Brown was out.

By March things were still not settled, and Mrs. Livingston was beginning to sound a little desperate. Who was going to move into Sylvan Cottage? She couldn't bear to have a stranger in the position. What if Raymond moved in? Even if she had to buy her vegetables, instead of growing them at Clermont, maybe that would be better. She needed someone to care for the animals and the water pump and watch for fires... The confusion had her "much upset."

Honoria's husband Rex, painting in the 1930s

A few days later, Rall had the situation straightened out for her. A telegram arrived from Mrs. Livingston on March 26 or 27 that just said "Telegram received very glad to have Claude same terms as Brown."

And just like that, Rall was extricated from Clermont. Claude moved into Sylvan Cottage. Floyd had to move back out of Clermont Cottage so Clarence could move in. There was still no one to drive the car or cut the lawn, but Rall seemed to be largely absolved of the responsibility of finding anyone. By the end of March, he was back on his farm in Germantown. Mrs. Livingston didn't even know the address. She sent him a letter of gratitude, but had to simply send it to the Germantown post office and trust them to get it to him.

By 1931 Sylvan Cottage was empty again. This time it was slated to become the home for Mrs. Livingston's newly-wed daughter Honoria and her husband. Mrs. Livingston's other daughter Janet eventually took up mowing the lawn. Apparently it was a bit of a family novelty; there are several photos of Janet on a lawn tractor.

The little archival box that houses the Rall Collection at Clermont provides an interesting window into life for non-Livingstons at Clermont. Even though it's too bad that we don't have any of Rall's correspondence back to the Livingstons, we do get a picture of how boss and employee interacted, how tasks were divied up, and just how many men were caring for the property during the time. Clermont and the other estates along the Hudson Valley were important on a daily basis, not just to the families who owned them, but the men and women who were there for work, building relationships with the people, animals, buildings, and grounds.

As someone who's been working at the site for ten years now, I can totally identify with those people.

John R. Livingston in later years

Of Judge Robert R. Livingston’s four sons John R. Livingston is perhaps the most forgotten. His oldest brother Robert helped to found this country. His next brother Henry found success as a soldier. Even his younger brother was a famous politician, serving in congress and on Andrew Jackson’s cabinet. But John is typically known merely as a merchant.

John was born in 1754. He was the third son of Judge Robert R. Livingston and Margaret Beekman Livingston, and their seventh child overall. When the Revolutionary War broke out John served briefly under his brother-in-law, Richard Montgomery’s command during the expedition against Canada in 1775. He also served briefly at Fort Edward during the summer of 1777.

Most of John’s time during the war was spent as a merchant. In 1776 he took over his father’s gun powder mill and soon built a second to supply gunpowder to the army. He spent a great deal of time in Boston during the war, buying and selling various war materials.

But what if there was more to young John? What if he had a cruel streak like his brother Henry?

In 1879 a nearly century old manuscript was published by the New-York Historical Society as A History of New York during the Revolutionary War, and of Leading Events in Other Colonies at That Period. It contained the following disturbing passage:

When the news of the unlucky affair at Trenton arrived at New York, Erasmus Phillips, Esq., Captain of Grenadiers in the 45^thRegiment, was there. He immediately set off to join his regiment in Jersey. He was attended by a servant only. As he passed through Princeton he was observed by three persons who were concealed in a house at that place. The house stood upon the road. The Captain was to pass the door. When he came directly opposite, the three assassins fired, and lodged three bullets in his body. He instantly fell from his horse dead. The servant escaped. One of the party who committed the murder, his name shall be mentioned, was a John Livingston, one of the sons of Robert R. Livingston, late one of the Judges of the Supreme Court of the province of New York. This barbarian, in public company, in Middletown, in Connecticut, boasted of this murder as an act of heroism, a noble achievement; and so little remorse had he for his cruel act in which he had taken a principal part that he declared “That Captain Phillips made one of the handsomest corpses he had ever beheld. We stripped him “says he “of all of his clothes and left him naked in the street. I thought” added he “that I should have been obliged to have cut his head off, to get at his diamond stock buckle, but I effected my purpose by breaking his neck, and turning his head topsy-turvy.” This he concluded with a broad laugh, taking off his own stock, and saying, “Behold the buckle, it was worth the pains of breaking a dead man’s neck for.”

Whoa.

Let’s look first at the dead man. Captain Phillips was a captain in the 35^th Regiment of Foot, not the 45^th. In a history of the regiment compiled in 1873 he is listed as murdered on January 2, 1777 “by some of the country people apparently” although other sources list him as having died the next day at the Battle of Princeton. His will was executed in July of that year and is in the collection of New York Historical. So he definitely existed and died although the how is still in the air.

As for John, while he would certainly not be called scrupulous, he does not seem to have been a killer. His business deals often trended toward shady but I could not find any contemporary evidence that he was accused of murder in 1777. He traveled to Rhode Island in late 1776 on a business trip but it seems unlikely that he would have been in Princeton, a British-held town, on January 2 in order to murder Phillips. Also, as Princeton was garrisoned by the British army it seems unlikely that the three shots that killed Phillips would have gone uninvestigated long enough to strip the dead man and break his neck.

A pleated neck stock without its buckle

So where does this accusation come from? Thomas Jones, the author of A History of New York during the Revolutionary War, was a loyalist who prior to the war had been a Supreme Court Judge along with Judge Robert R. Livingston. In 1779 the Act of Attainder stripped Jones of all his land on Long Island and forced him to flee to England along with his wife. His wife, by the way, was Anna DeLancey of the DeLancey family who had been bitter political opponents of the Livingston family for years. So Jones is perhaps not the most unbiased source. In the same book he referred to Chancellor Robert R. Livingston as a “violent partisan”.

There is one more twist in the publication of the manuscript. The editor in 1873 was Edward Floyd DeLancey, a descendant of the same rival family.

Did John R. Livingston murder a British officer for his neck stock? Probably not. The rivalry between the Livingstons and the DeLancey family was well-known, possibly even bitter enough to merit a smear campaign of this nature. But maybe it's John R.'s somewhat shady connections, both during the war and after, make him vulnerable to a story like this.

The sounds, tastes, and smells of the Colonial era will converge at Clermont State Historic Site in Germantown this July 4^thduring the site’s Old-Fashioned Independence Day Festival. From 2 to 10 p.m., the site will host a lively event with a little something for every member of the family. From 2 to 6 p.m., the museum will be surrounded by hands-on experiences taken from daily life of the 18^thcentury. Visitors will be able to sample all kinds of activities, from grueling laundry to polite tea parties, drilling and firing demonstrations by Revolutionary War reenactors, as well as a chance to meet George Washington on his horse! Afterward, from 7 to 10 p.m., the grounds will be alive with the blues played by the Willie Amrod Band, until the evening is capped off with a beautiful view of the Saugerties fireworks over the Hudson River. Hot food will be available for sale from the Jennings-Willets American Legion Post #346, Sweet Central Express and the Lunch Box. Free hayrides are available from 2:30 to 4:30 p.m. It’s a full day of activities for only $10 per vehicle or $8 for Friends of Clermont. Visit Clermont State Historic Site’s Facebook page for a complete schedule of activities.

In honor of Clermont’s important Revolutionary War history, Clermont staff and volunteers will be dressed in historic costume while they demonstrate the skills and chores of 18^th century life. Visitors can sit down with Clermont’s most famous matriarch Margaret Beekman Livingston for a polite tea party or they can sniff a stew as it cooks over a camp fire for the afternoon. Visitors are invited to try hand-cranking fresh ice cream and enjoy free samples of historic flavors, donated by Stewarts Shops. Children can even try on historic costume or take part in a spying experience, including secret laundry messages and book codes. Storyteller Tom Hanford will delight children with his interactive musical experience, including richly-painted puppets and opportunities for children to participate on stage!

The mansion will be open for free self-guided tours, from 2 to 6 p.m. Children’s contests start at 5:15 and will include a three-legged race, cherry pit spitting, and Grinning for Cheese. A live reading of the Declaration of Independence at 6:00, punctuated by a black-powder gun salute, will complete the 18^th century demonstration.

When evening arrives, Clermont’s grounds will be alive with classic rock and blues as the Willie Amrod Band rock the grounds and guests spread out their picnic blankets to await a view of the Saugerties fireworks after sunset. With hot food close at hand by the Lunch Box, ice cream from Sweet Central Express, plenty of room to run, and easy-out parking, this is a great venue for families to see the fireworks show. Music begins at 7 p.m. The site will close its gates when parking is full, so the public is encouraged to come early to ensure access to a spot.

This event is made possible in part by a generous donation from Stewart’s Shops of New York and the Natural Heritage Trust.

For more information, please call Kjirsten at (518) 537-4240.

Clermont State Historic Site is located at 1 Clermont Avenue in Germantown, off Route 9G. The Historic Site features the mansion, formal gardens, scenic Hudson Riverviews and miles of hiking trails. The Friends of Clermont is a private, non-profit educational corporation, founded in 1977 to support and supplement the museum education and historic preservation programs at Clermont State Historic Site. Designated a National Historic Landmark in 1973, Clermont is one of six historic sites and 15 parks administered by New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation in the Taconic Region. For more information please visit our website at www.nysparks.com or like us on Facebook.

Robert R. Livingston
Not a good guy to mess with

Over the course of about two decades the Livingston family destroyed two men. By the end of 1804 one of the men was dead and the other was a shell of his former self who would never return to the political power he once had. The two men were, of course, Alexander Hamilton and Aaron Burr.

Chancellor Robert R. Livingston disliked Alexander Hamilton for a long time. Possibly as far back as 1777 when Hamilton insisted there was no way the British would attack the Hudson River Valley from New York City and discouraged Washington from sending troops to aid in the defense of the River despite the Chancellor’s belief that the redcoats would march north. The British army of course did march north and they burned down the Chancellor’s house.

Alexander Hamilton
messed with Robert R. Livingston

In 1784 with the war over and the difficult process of building a nation ahead of them the Chancellor and Hamilton once again found themselves at odds. Hamilton was pushing a national bank based on purchasing the debt accumulated by the states during the recently ended war. Livingston opposed the plan. He favored a land bank in which capital would be provided to people based on mortgages. I don’t really want to delve deep into the economic theory of the two ideas because that is the job of an economist so to put it simply Hamilton favored an economy based on credit and Livingston favored an economy based on land. The Chancellor mustered all his influence in 1784 and again in 1786 and managed to have Hamilton’s plans blocked.

George Washington's first inauguration

In 1789 after the Chancellor swore George Washington into office as President he expected a high ranking position in the federal government, possibly a Supreme Court position or a cabinet post. He was sorely disappointed. Hamilton, who still held Washington’s ear, managed things so that the Chancellor was only considered for the post of minister to Great Britain which Livingston could not accept because he did not want to leave the country while it was still in its infancy or a fairly low ranking loan officer position which the Chancellor could not take as it was below him.

This one was of many cracks that developed in the relationship between Livingston and Federalist leaders. In 1790 when Hamilton pushed his economic plans again, Livingston once again stood against him. Livingston even went so far as to pull out his old pen name "Cato". In December of that year he called the plan a “public injustice” although the plan was eventually approved.

Aaron Burr, sir.

Philip Schuyler
Caught in the crossfire

The following year when Aaron Burr ran for the Senate as a Democratic Republican against the Federalist incumbent Philip Schuyler, he had the vigorous support of Chancellor Livingston who sided with the emerging New York Democratic Republican party. Schuyler was Hamilton’s father-in-law, a former general in the Continental Army and a former ally of Livingston’s. The Chancellor had actually supported Schuyler in the first gubernatorial election that he lost to George Clinton. Schuyler became a victim of Livingston’s anger at Hamilton. Many people in New York assumed that Burr’s election was “the fruit of the Chancellor’s coalition with the Governor [George Clinton]”. By punishing the Chancellor in 1789, Hamilton had created a powerful enemy in New York.

Not that George Clinton

This George Clinton

Over the next few years the Chancellor slid even more into the Democratic Republican camp. In 1791 he met with Thomas Jefferson and James Madison in New York City before the pair set out on a trip through New York ostentatiously to study the flora and fauna but in reality shoring up political support. A correspondent reported to Hamilton that “There was every appearance of a passionate courtship between the Chancellor, Burr, Jefferson and Madison” In fact the Chancellor fell so far to that side that Washington would not consider him as Secretary of State when Jefferson resigned despite the fact that Jefferson was pushing for his nomination. He had become too critical of the administration, particularly of Hamilton.

The Reynolds Pamphlet: Have you read this!?
Never gonna be President now.

Hamilton also helped damage his own reputation over the next several years. In 1795 he resigned as Treasury Secretary although he was still a close friend and advisor of Washington. In 1797 much of his public standing dissolved with the publication of the Reynolds Pamphlet, in which Hamilton divulged information about an affair he had had in 1791 and 1792 with a married woman named Maria Reynolds and her husband’s subsequent blackmailing of Hamilton.

John Adams
Guys can I be president again?
Sit down John.

Soon the election of 1800 rolled around. The Federalist Party ran incumbent president John Adams and Charles Cotesworth Pinckney. Hamilton was not a fan of Adams and still had enough power to draw enough votes away from Adams that he would not be returned to the presidency despite the fact they were nominally of the same party. However this

Charles Cotesworth Pinckney
Was also there in 1800.

completely destroyed his reputation among Federalists. He would never hold another important office. The Democratic Republicans ran Thomas Jefferson and Aaron Burr with the idea that Burr would come in second to Jefferson and they would serve as president and vice president. They had considered running the Chancellor for the vice presidential spot because he would almost certainly draw votes away from Adams, but they chose Burr because it was felt he would garner more support in the south. When the electoral votes were counted Burr and Jefferson were tied for first. The decision then went to the House of Representatives, where Edward Livingston served. Burr asked Edward to carry a message to Congress that he would in fact like to be president. Many found this open campaigning for the position distasteful and after thirty six ballots Jefferson was chosen as president and Burr vice president.

Tune in next time to find out what the Livingstons did to Burr!

John Armstrong
The last living representative to the Continental Congress
such a contrarian that he refused to die
until he had been photographed

This will make a whole lot more if you read Part 1 first!

At this point another Livingston in-law stepped in to make Aaron Burr’s life miserable. John Armstrong who was married to the Chancellor’s sister Alida, and was a lifelong trouble maker. During his time in the army Armstrong had been responsible for writing the letters that became known as the Newburgh Conspiracy. They called for the officers of the army to assemble and demand their missing back pay from Congress. Only an emotionally devastating speech by George Washington kept this from becoming a full on mutiny. In 1792 he published a series of satirical essays about his own brother-in-law, the Chancellor, when Robert was running for governor.

To reitterate this is a man who made a room full of
angry, hardened army officers weep by putting on his glasses

Armstrong and his ally DeWitt Clinton began viciously attacking Burr. In New York they worked to ensure that Burr’s friends and allies did not receive government jobs handed out by the Council of Appointment. It soon became very dangerous to be associated with the Burr name. Even the Chancellor who was used to political maneuverings was a bit shocked at how thoroughly Armstrong and Clinton destroyed Burr.

DeWitt Clinton, George Clinton's nephew

Not that George Clinton! Go read Part 1.

In 1804 the two men arranged a deal to drive Burr out of politics completely. Through a series of negotiations and favors it was arranged that George Clinton would run for both vice president and governor that year. He would win the governor’s seat and then resign it when he was elected vice president. The state Senate would then fill the vacant chair with the Chancellor who would return from France to take the job. On February 25, 1804 the plan started to go into action. At the Democratic Republican caucus Aaron Burr received exactly zero votes to be returned as a vice-presidential candidate.

The plan was put in danger though when George Clinton refused to run for governor of New York. He was replaced by Morgan Lewis, another brother-in-law of the Chancellor’s. Lewis had been a soldier, fighting in several iterations of the Northern Army throughout the Revolutionary War. He married Gertrude Livingston during the war and became a lawyer after the war. By 1801 he had become the Chief Justice of the New York Supreme Court but was largely unknown outside of legal circles.

Morgan Lewis
Third choice of his party but still whooped
Aaron Burr.

Nevertheless, when the votes were counted Lewis had won by more than 8,700 votes, the largest margin of victory in a New York gubernatorial race to that point.

Burr found himself facing the apparent end of his political career. When his term ended in March of 1805 he would have nowhere to go. He began to search about for someone to blame for his failures over the course of the last year. He focused on Hamilton and in particular a letter in the Albany Register in which Dr. Charles DeKay Cooper claimed to have heard Hamilton express a “despicable opinion” of Burr. A series of letter passed between Burr and Hamilton which lead to the anger between the two men only growing. Burr demanded a public apology for what Hamilton had said but Hamilton feared that apologizing would take away the last shred of respect anyone held for him. On June 11, 1804 the two broken but proud men faced each other, rather than any of the members of the Livingston faction who had played important roles in both of their downfalls, across the dueling grounds of Weehawken, New Jersey. There guns barked.

The exact moment Hamilton realized he had thrown away his shot

The next day Hamilton was dead and Burr was on his way to South Carolina. He eventually returned and finished his term in Washington. He then went into the Louisiana Purchase (recently completed by the Chancellor) and managed to get himself into trouble there. He went to Europe briefly but returned and lived the last few years of his life in New York City, never holding any type of political office again and occasionally having to use an alias.

The alias worked but he was never a master of disguise

The Livingston’s were nonplussed by the duel. The Chancellor returned from France the following year having doubled the size of the country. He went on to great success in agricultural pursuits and with the invention of the steamboat. Edward Livingston went on to be mayor of New York, a congressman and senator from Louisiana, Secretary of State under Andrew Jackson and Minister to France. John Armstrong was a senator and later became Secretary of War during the War of 1812. Morgan Lewis served out his term as governor. When the War of 1812 broke out he returned to the army and was promoted to major general. After the war he found success in more intellectual pursuits, serving as the president of the Historical Society of New York and helping to found New York University.

The role that Hamilton and Burr’s personalities played in their duel cannot be over stated. Both were very proud and stubborn men. Ultimately it was their personalities that brought them to Weehawken. Events of the time contributed significantly to their dispute, events which were in part orchestrated by the Livingston family. Perhaps if Burr had not been so rash in challenging Hamilton he would have found himself facing Armstrong or another Livingston who had helped to end his time in government.

For more information see:
Fallen Founder: The Life of Aaron Burr by Nancy Isenberg
The Democratic Republicans of New York by Alfred F. Young
Alexander Hamilton by Ron Chernow

Margaret Beekman Livingston
"Molly Pitcher ain't got nothing on me" (probably not a real quote)

By now you’ve surely read our previous post about Judge Robert R. Livingston’s gunpowder mill, well some newly discovered information has changed our view about who had the gunpowder mill rebuilt and ran it following the mill’s explosion and the Judge’s untimely passing.

According to an account book that belonged to Margaret Beekman Livingston, now in the collection of Princeton, she paid G. Steenbergh a little over £3 on February 17, 1776 for work at the powder mill. That same day she paid £1.3.0 to another man for twelve barrels for the powder mill. Samuel Green received £6.5.0 for his work at the powder mill on February 20, 1776. In March Hendrick Levy earned £1.12.8 for his work on the gunpowder mill.

These few payments seem to go against the previous information that her son John had the mill rebuilt. He must have taken over the rebuilt mill at some later date. Margaret Beekman Livingston, in the months after the deaths of four of the most important men in her family ensured that the American army would have the gunpowder it needed to fight the British, further proof that the Livingston matriarch was probably the toughest person to ever walk the halls of Clermont.

Benedict Arnold
Traitor

The story of Benedict Arnold’s treasonous actions at West Point is so well known that the man’s very name is synonymous with traitor in the United States. He planned to turn over the fort at West Point along with all the soldiers stationed there to the British in exchange for a great deal of money and a commission as a British officer. But how did Arnold get command of the exact position the British needed him to give up? The answer is his wife.

Peggy Shippen Arnold
She looked so innocent

Arnold married Margaret Shippen (commonly known as Peggy) of Philadelphia in in 1779. Almost immediately she helped him contact the British to begin arranging the terms under which he would turn his coat. Their contact was a former suitor of Peggy’s, Major John Andre, whom she had met while the British occupied Philadelphia in 1777 and 1778. In a touch of irony for the Livingston family, Andre had been captured by General Richard Montgomery at Fort Saint Jean in Canada in 1775. Had he not been released later in a prisoner exchange perhaps none of what followed would have happened.

John Andre, self portrait done shortly before he was hung

Peggy also began making friends with important Americans in the city in order to further her husband’s aims. One of these men was Chancellor Robert R. Livingston. Livingston was a fan of Arnold’s before Peggy got involved. His brother-in-law Montgomery had fought with Arnold in Canada. His brother Henry had praised and in turn been praised by Arnold for actions at the Battles of Saratoga. Livingston thought Arnold was a competent and active officer and much superior in comparison to Israel Putnam, for instance, who the Chancellor spent most of 1778 trying to have removed from the army for his inactivity. In February of 1780 when Arnold’s court martial sentence for corruption was sent to Congress for approval the Chancellor was one of only three members of Congress to vote against it.

Peggy and the Chancellor spent a great deal of time together in Philadelphia. By the summer of 1780 he was convinced that Arnold was the man to command West Point, which was one of the most tactically important positions in the country as it commanded the Hudson River but for the Livingstons represented the only real barrier between their land and a repeat performance of the destruction wrought by the British army in 1777. On June 22, 1780 the Chancellor, long accustomed to providing welcome military advice to the General, wrote to George Washington:

A French Plan of West Point in 1780
nary a stream or a swain to be seen

“I might presume so far I shd beg leave to submit it to your Excellency whether this post might not be most safely confided to Genl Arnold whose courage is undoubted—who is the favourite of our militia, & who will agree perfectly with our Govr”

General Philip Schuyler of Albany also put threw his support behind Arnold to command West Point and soon Washington responded to the Chancellor that he would give command of the fort to Arnold at the first opportunity which came in August of that year.

The Chancellor’s closeness with Peggy Arnold had not got unnoticed though. On September 4, 1780 Arnold’s sister Hannah wrote him a gossipy letter, now in the collection of Harvard, from Philadelphia that included the following warning:

Robert R. Livingston
dangerous companion

“As you have neither purling streams nor sighing swains at West Point, tis no place for me; nor do I think Mrs. Arnold will be long pleased with it, though I expect it may be rendered dear to her for a few hours by the presence of a certain chancellor; who by the by, is a dangerous companion for a particular lady in the absence of her husband. I could say more than prudence will permit, I could tell you of frequent private assignations and of numberless billets daux, if I had an inclination to make mischief. But as I am of a very peaceable temper I’ll not mention a syllable of the matter.”

It is important to note here that Arnold’s sister was a bit of a busy body. No one else has ever accused the Chancellor of anything more than flirtation with pretty ladies. Furthermore it Arnold probably knew and encouraged Peggy to spend time with the Chancellor as it furthered his goals.

Arnold was now in command of West Point though and events began to happen very quickly. On September 20, 1780 Andre came up river on the Vulture to make the final arrangements with Arnold. They met on September 21. On September 22, a distant cousin of the Chancellor’s, Col. James Livingston was in command at Verplanck’s Point. He took offense to the Vulture idling in the river in front of his post and ordered his men to open fire with a small cannon. They holed the Vulture several times forcing her to fall back down the river. Andre could no longer return to New York City by river and was forced to try to go overland. He was captured and documents he carried revealed the entire plot. On September 24 Arnold slipped aboard a British ship. Peggy was sent to New York City to join him a few days later. Andre was hung as a spy on October 2.

In the immediate aftermath of the revelation some accused both Schuyler and Livingston of being involved with the plot to turn over West Point to the British. Both men had pushed for Arnold to receive the post and some no doubt remembered how close Peggy and the Chancellor had been in Philadelphia. Washington however refused to believe that either man could have had anything to do with the plot and the matter was dropped.

In the mid to late 19th century Clermont or John Henry Livingston
purchased this candelabrum depicting the capture of Andre which
now resides in the library of Clermont State Historic Site

The letter from Hannah Arnold to Benedict Arnold can be viewed on Harvard’s website here

A transcription of the letter from the Chancellor to George Washington can be viewed here

For more information see

Secret History of the American Revolution by Carl Van Doren

Treacherous Beauty: Peggy Shippen, the Woman Behind Benedict Arnold’s Plot to Betray America by Mark Jacob and Stephen M. Case.

This small collection of mini-
ature portraits proved to be just
the beginning.

It all started almost three years ago, when a Livingston family member arrived from England with a surprise donation of several miniature portraits from Katharine Livingston Timpson's family--his family.

Katharine Livingston Timpson
and her first two children:
Theo and Kay

Katharine, John Henry's daughter from his first marriage, was a favorite of her grandfather, and briefly inherited Clermont before selling it back to her father for one dollar. After a split with her father around 1905, Katharine and her family moved to England, bringing with them the furnishings, jewelry, letters, and pictures that surrounded their daily lives. Many of her grand children and great grandchildren still live there, and many of Katharine's belongings have been passed down to them.

Maizeland, Red Hook, NY

Over the past few years, her descendants have spent hours photographing her belongings that remain in their possession, painstakingly sending us image after image via email: pictures of her house in Red Hook, called Maizeland, where her first two children grew up, pictures of her jewelry and clothes--even a rare picture of the inside of Clermont! Over and over again, I kept yelling "wow!" and my office neighbors would have to come over and see what we'd received this time.

Clermont's study, possibly 1890s
This photo made all of the staff so excited,
I have to admit, I stood up and did a little jig.

After more than two years of this, the most exciting email of all arrived in my box:

Photos were sent in advance, showing
us what kind of things we needed to
be prepared for.

Our friend was coming back again--this time with his luggage stuffed full of photographs and belongings for donation to Clermont. His timing couldn't have been better. With a new curator of collections on staff, we were ready to take on the incredible amount of work that goes with any donation. This was even more important when we started getting photos of what was coming over, because we realized that the total could be over 1,000 artifacts!

On Memorial Day weekend, we got to work, checking in one artifact after another and frequently just marveling over the trove that was in my office. Some of the biggest revelations from the collection were three previously-unknown photographs that showed the interior of Clermont. New views of the study, the dining room, and the drawing room will give us new insight into the mansion's Victorian-era appearance. Still others were touching reminders of the bonds of family, like a bible embossed with Katharine's mother's name. Even some day-to-day items were part of the donation, like a little tub of rouge with a fancy-sounding French label.

It took more than two days for three staff members to catalog the 700 photos and several hundred three-dimensional artifacts by hand. Submitting items for acceptance into a museum collection is a big deal. Not only does the object need to be historical, it also needs to meet the museum's Collections Policy, a document that gives clear guidelines for what a museum can take in. Just because we think an object is neat doesn't mean we're allowed to accept it. Among other qualifications, it has to have a clear provenance to the Livingston family--especially those who lived at Clermont.

A bible with Katharine's mother's maiden
name embossed on it. Catharine was John
Henry's first wife

Once we had everything recorded, it was to be submitted to the Collections Committee for approval. This body helps New York State historic sites monitor their incoming donations to make sure that they are appropriate for the museum, but in this case, we had little doubt they would be accepted.

But the work doesn't end there! Each individual item still has to be cataloged and housed in archival-quality storage. A curatorial assistant had to be brought in for this massive project, which is expected to extend for five weeks. And once everything is cataloged, then we can do what we really like to do with our collections--exhibit them so you can come and see!

Katharine was an amazing and an interesting woman of her time. But without the thousand or so artifacts we're still sifting through, we'd never know her that way. Each piece that was accepted for our collections helps us to understand she and her children as human beings, and we look forward to sharing that with you the public. Why? Because seeing historic people as real people with thoughts and feelings and make-up and babies and family photos is what makes history something you can relate to. And really that's our whole goal here.

We'll keep you updated as we get ready to unveil this daughter of Clermont next spring!

Edward Hyde, Earl of Clarendon and Viscount Cornbury is perhaps the most maligned royal governor that the colony of New York ever had. His reign from 1702 to 1708 was marked with greed, bribery and rampant misuse of public funds. Yet the thing he is most remembered for is this:

That’s right. If one was to believe the rumors then Lord Cornbury really liked to dress in women’s clothes. Some historians believe that Cornbury truly did parade around New York in full gowns. Other historians believe this was a started to discredit the governor by his political rivals in New York, chief among them Robert Livingston, 1^stLord of Livingston Manor.

Lord Cornbury as he would like to be remembered

Livingston had been a fan of Cornbury’s when he first arrived in the colony, writing “My Lord is Extrem hearty to redresse all grievances, we must reckon it a duble mercy that God has been pleased to send him at this juncture.”[i]

Cornbury soon lost Livingston’s support though. After a harrowing trip to England that involved being briefly seized by French privateers and set adrift, Livingston spent about three years getting his accounts settled and getting his offices confirmed by the Queen. When he returned home in 1706 he found that the colonists were united against Cornbury who had been badly mismanaging the colony. When Livingston presented his commission as Secretary for Indian Affairs to Cornbury, Cornbury refused to recognize it despite Queen Anne’s signature. Cornbury apparently preferred to keep the money due to Livingston for his own use.[ii]

Robert Livingston: Started from the bottom now he's here

In June of 1707 Robert Livingston wrote to William Lowndes of the Treasury;

William Lowndes of the Treasury.
Nothing to do with the story but he had 25 legitimate kids.
So good for him.

“Tis said he is wholly addicted to his pleasure…his dressing himself in womens cloths commonly [every] morning is so unaccountable that if hundreds of spectators did not daily see him it would be incredible.”[iii]

Livingston's letter was the first in a series of letters to officials in England describing Cornbury’s odd habit. Later that year Lewis

Morris, ancestor of Chancellor Robert R. Livingston’s good friend Gouverneur Morris and owner of the Morrisania estate in the Bronx wrote his own letter. It said:

“The scandal of his life is…he rarely fails at being dresst in Women’s cloaths every day, and almost half his time is spent that way, and seldome misses it on Sacrament day, was in that garb when his dead Lady was carried out of the Fort, and this not privately but in face of the sun and in sight of the Town. But I’ll not enter into his Privacies, his Publick Vices are scandalous enough.”

Lewis Morris
A real big wig in colonial New York.
See what I did there?

In 1709 Morris wrote about Cornbury again:

“...that is his dressing publiqly in womans cloaths Every day and putting a stop to all publique business while he is pleasing himself with that peculiar but detestable magot.”[iv]

It should be noted that Morris was also an opponent of Cornbury’s. Cornbury had suspended Morris from the New Jersey provincial council. Morris was not reinstated until Cornbury was done as governor.

The last about the governor’s dressing habits came from the pen of Elias Neau, a Huguenot refugee turned merchant and catechist. Neau wrote:

“My Lord Cornbury has and dos still make use of an unfortunate Custom of dressing himself in womens cloaths and of exposing himself in that Garb on the Ramparts to the view of the public; in that dress he draws a world of Spectators about him and consequently as many Censures, especially for the exposing himself in such a manner all the great Holy days and even in an hour or two after going to the communion.”

Neau went one step further than the other writers and commented on Cornbury’s style as well:

“I am assured that he continues to dress himself in women’s cloths, but now tis after the Dutch Manner.”[v]

Not only was Cornbury dressing like a woman but he was dressing like a Dutch woman, not even a good English woman!

Historian Patricia Bonomi assures us that the rumor of Cornbury’s cross dressing did not gain much traction in England or elsewhere in the colonies, yet some people did hear of it. A merchant from Boston wrote to an associate in New York;

Baron von Bothmer
Very interested in how certain English people dressed.

“Muliebri Veste uti (women’s clothing), is instanced in as against the Law of Nature. It has been reported that a certain Gentleman at N. York used to practice that abomination. I should be glad to know the certainty of it.”[vi]

Several years later Hanoverian diplomat Baron von Bothmer wrote that he had heard that Cornbury “thought it was necessary for him, in order to represent her Majesty, to dress himself as a woman.”[vii]

So it is at least possible that a royal governor of New York dressed like a woman. Perhaps he enjoyed it or, as Bothmer suggested, perhaps he took his job representing Queen Anne in the colonies a little too seriously. It is also possible that he was just an unpleasant man brought down in part by the combined efforts of Robert Livingston and a few other colonists whom he had offended. Either way Cornbury was replaced by John Lovelace, 4^th Baron Lovelace in 1708. Cornbury returned to England, spent some time in debtors’ prison and was briefly an envoy to the court of Hanover. He died in 1723.

As you wish
Frequent Clermont Blog reader Cary Elwes is apparently descended from Lord Cornbury

[i]Bonomi, Patricia U. The Lord Cornbury Scandal p59

[ii]Leder, Lawrence H. Robert Livingston p 200-202

[iii]Bonomi The Lord Cornbury Scandal p 158

[iv]Bonomi The Lord Cornbury Scandal p160

[v]Bonomi The Lord Cornbury Scandal p 161.

[vi]Bonomi The Lord Cornbury Scandal p 162

[vii]Bonomi The Lord Cornbury Scandal p 17

Mississippi River icon

It is hard to imagine the Mississippi River without its iconic steamboats beating their way up and down stream. Even Mark Twain once wrote, of the steamboats on the Mississippi; “When I was a boy, there was but one permanent ambition among my comrades in our village on the west bank of the Mississippi River.That was, to be a steamboatman.” But before all of those boats began to ply the waters there must have been a first steamboat on the river. What was the story of that boat? Why are you reading about the Mississippi River on the Clermont Blog?

Robert R. Livingston, had probably been
planning this for years.

Within days of the first successful voyage of the North River Steamboat in 1807 Robert Fulton and Robert R. Livingston’s thoughts had turned to spreading their new form of transport to the Mississippi River. Fulton wrote “I think it would be well to write to your brother Edward to get information on the velocity of the Mississippi, the size and form of boats used, the number of hands and quantity of tons in each boat, the number of miles they make against the current in twelve hours, and the quantity of tons which go up the river in a year. On this point beg him to be accurate.”

Robert Fulton
For once not the craziest part of the story

It took Fulton and Livingston four more years to complete their plans but in 1811 they began construction of the New Orleans at Pittsburgh. They had added another partner to the endeavor in the form of Nicholas J. Roosevelt, a distant uncle of Theodore Roosevelt. Roosevelt had helped Fulton and Livingston in the construction of the side mounted paddle wheels for the North River. In Pittsburgh he supervised the construction of the new boat which would be 146 feet 6 inches long and 32 feet 6 inches wide. The engine was built in New York and carried in pieces overland to Pittsburgh because there were no facilities for constructing such an engine in the city at the time.

The steam boat made its first successful test trip around Pittsburgh on October 15, 1811. Just five days later, on October 20 the New Orleans set out for New Orleans. Aboard her were Nicholas Roosevelt who would act as captain for the trip, his extremely pregnant wife Lydia and their first daughter. Nicholas Baker was the engineer for the trip and Andrew Jack was the pilot. There were also six deck hands, two maids for Lydia, a cook, a waiter and a large Newfoundland dog named Tiger.

A large Newfoundland Dog. Newfoundland Dogs have webbed feet which
makes them excellent swimmers.

On October 28 the New Orleans docked at Louisville. The steamboat would have to wait at Louisville nearly a month before the water rose high enough in the Ohio River to allow the boat to traverse the Falls of the Ohio, which were more like a series of shallow rapids than an actual waterfall. During the wait Roosevelt took the steamboat on several small excursions including a return to Cincinnati to prove that the boat could travel upstream. On October 30 Lydia Roosevelt gave birth aboard the New Orleans to a son they named Henry.

The New Orleans enters the Mississippi

They departed Louisville in late November to make their way over the Falls and after stopping to resupply into the Mississippi River. It was hoped that the Mississippi River would be relatively easy to cruise down. Andrew Jack had experience on the river and knew the channel well.

It was not an easy cruise to New Orleans.

On December 16, shortly after the New Orleans had entered the Mississippi, the New Madrid earthquake hit. This earthquake, which was actually an extended period of severe tremors, has been estimated up to an 8.0 on the Richter scale basically reshaped the Midwest. The entire channel of the Mississippi was erased, the course of the river changed dramatically. For about an hour after the most severe tremors the river actually ran backwards. Jack, the pilot, had no idea where he was and soon found himself navigating the boat over areas that only hours before had been fields or forests. Whole sections of the shore were dropping into the river, islands appeared and disappeared. Tiger the dog would often give warning of a fresh tremor by putting his head in Lydia’s lap before it hit.

The New Orleans had to navigate a river full of obstacles and unknowns after
the earthquake

A few days after the worst of the tremors the New Orleans arrived in New Madrid itself. Houses had fallen into the holes that opened in the ground. Many people asked to be taken aboard but the steamboat had neither the space for all the refugees or the means to supply them.

The New Orleans finally arrived in New Orleans on January 10, 1812. It had spent a total of 259 hours cruising on the trip and averaged 8 mph. The time announced for the trip did not include all of the time lost stopping to wait for the right conditions or for other reasons.

In less than two weeks the New Orleans set out on the first voyage along the route that Livingston and Fulton had envisioned for it, New Orleans to Natchez and back. The ship could make 3mph upstream and 10mph downstream meaning she could complete a round trip every three weeks. Fulton and Livingston began to sell stock in their steamboat which realized a profit estimated to be about $20,000 in its first year in operation. Edward Livingston also helped his brother and Fulton get a monopoly on steam travel in the territory. Violating the law would mean having to pay Fulton and Livingston $5,000 for each violation and forfeit any unauthorized steamboats to them.

The Chancellor did not live long enough to enjoy the monopoly on the river to its fullest; he died in 1813. The New Orleansmet its end in July of 1814. She snagged a log or some other obstruction near Baton Rouge which punctured her hull. The ship sank but her engine was removed and used in a later vessel of the same name.

In 1989 author Clive Cussler and his National Underwater and Marine Agency (NUMA) set out to try to find the final resting place of the original New Orleans. They surveyed the shore and were able to come up with a “ballpark” location for the boat but unfortunately the Army Corps of Engineers had laid a steel and concrete revetment mattress over the site in 1971 to help control erosion. This made finding an exact location using various forms of metal detectors impossible.

1911 "replica" of the New Orleans
I mean they are both boats...

Sources:

NUMA Expeditions New Orleans www.numa.net

A Critical Account of the Beginning of Steamboat Navigation on the Western Rivers of the United States, Pittsburg Legal Journal, Vol 59 No. 42 (21 October 1911) pp 570-591

The Rambler in North America by Charles Joseph Latrobe 1832-1833

The Sea Hunters II by Clive Cussler and Craig Dirgo G. Putnam’s Sons 2004

Not that George Clinton

That George Clinton
Yes I know I've done this joke
before but its still funny

When the Constitutional Convention adjourned in Philadelphia the fight to create a unified country out of thirteen individual states was far from over. In every state another convention was to be held where the leaders would decide whether or not to ratify the new Constitution. Influential individuals were still rife with fears left over from the Revolution; fear of a standing army, fear of a strong central government and fear of loss of control. New York was not exempted from these fears, in fact anti-federalist ideas may have been held even stronger by members of New York’s ratification convention as they had vivid recollections of the long British occupation of New York City and bitter fighting in a significant portion of the state. Chief among the anti-federalists was New York’s long time governor George Clinton.

Alexander Hamilton,
Not really important to the story but his name gets
the hits

The Constitution had many valiant defenders in New York, including Alexander Hamilton. Hamilton was not alone in these efforts though. He was ably joined by John Jay on the Federalist papers but on the debate floor it was Robert R. Livingston who became a force of nature although he receives almost no credit for his efforts.

Chancellor Robert R. Livingston
Smarter than you, richer than you and he knows it.

Livingston had not been in Philadelphia to help draft the Constitution although his name had been considered as a delegate. He had come to realize the importance of a strong central government during his time in the Continental Congress and as Secretary for Foreign Affairs. Following his time has secretary Livingston had returned to New York to reassert himself as the Chancellor of New York, a role which had been challenged while he was out of the state.

In Poughkeepsie, where the ratification convention was held, Chancellor Livingston quickly became notorious among the anti-federalists for converting their members to the federalist cause. He was known to single out members of their faction and take them to a tavern, sometimes with Jay or Hamilton, and ply them with food and drink until they had converted them to the federalist side. The anti-federalists simply had no one with the near bottomless purse of the Chancellor who could treat delegates in that fashion.[i]

Livingston’s influence was best shown on the floor of the debate though. He spoke frequently in a sarcastic and condescending tone about specific tones as well as the idea of anti-federalism in general. Melancton Smith was a frequent sparring partner of the Chancellor’s. Smith insisted that a federal system would be dominated by the aristocracy who would be by their very nature corrupt, or intemperate in his words. To this the Chancellor replied:

Melancton Smith
Perhaps sparring partner is too strong,
maybe verbal punching bag?

“Will he presume to point out to us the class of men in which intemperance is not to be found? Is there less intemperance in feeding n beef than on turtle; or in drinking rum than wine? I think that the gentleman does not reason from facts.”

He went on to ask, rhetorically, who would lead the country in Smith’s world;

“But who in the name of common sense will he have to represent us? Not the rich; for they are sheer aristocrats. Not the learned, the wise, the virtuous for they are all aristocrats.”[ii]

This sentiment echoed a point he had made in an oration to the New York Society of Cincinnati on July 4^,1787 when he said;

“Can it be thought that an enlightened people believe the science of government level to the meanest capacity? That experience, application, genius and education are unnecessary to those who are to frame laws for the government of the State.”[iii]

Clearly the Chancellor favored a strong central government led by the best society had to offer dedicated to what was best for the country as a whole. On June 24, 1788 Livingston found himself in the odd position of having to clearly explain the role of the senate to his fellow delegates after their status came up in the debates. He said;

“The Senate are indeed to represent the State governments; but they are also the representatives of the United States, and are not to consult the interest of any state alone but that of the union.”[iv]

During the debates the Chancellor rarely let an opportunity pass to make a point without belittling anti-federalism. Once he compared anti-federalist arguments to “children blowing bubbles.” Later when disputing a point started with “let us see if we cannot, from all this rubbish, pick out something which may look like reasoning.” He could not.[v]

When many anti-federalist insisted that the individual states should control separate military forces the Chancellor was forced to illustrate how ridiculous that idea was;

“How is Congress to defend us without a sword? You will also keep that. How shall it be handled? Shall we all take hold of it? I never knew, till now, the design of a curious image I have seen at the head of one of our newspapers. I am now convinced that the idea was prophetic in the printer. It was a figure of thirteen hands, in an awkward position, grasping a perpendicular sword. As the arms which supported it were on every side, I could see no way of moving it, but by drawing it through with the hazard of dangerously cutting their fingers.”[vi]

If anything the Chancellor seemed to enjoy the enmity he earned from the antifederalists. When his tactics were questioned because they seemed to arouse so much hatred toward him he reportedly said “that if he had no wit himself, he had been the occasion of wit in others…”

Not even family was safe from the Chancellor’s barbs. When a cousin, Gilbert Livingston, argued a point with the Chancellor, Livingston turned to the rest of the assemblage and said;

John Jay
A long time friend of the Chancellor until he
wasn't but that's a story for another day

“that my worthy kinsman across the table, regardless of our common ancestry, and the tender ties of blood, should join his dagger to the rest, and compel me to exclaim in the dying words of Caesar, “And thou, too, Brutus.””[vii]

Thoroughly rebuked, when the time came to vote on the Constitution, Gilbert voted with the Chancellor.

New York’s delegates were still debating when word reached them that New Hampshire had ratified the Constitution. This meant that enough states had ratified the document that it could take effect. The Chancellor took the floor and declared “The confederation was now dissolved.” In short, there was no going back.

In the end it was the Chancellor’s friend (at least at that point) John Jay who finally moved that the body vote to accept or reject the Constitution. After a final attempt to delay by the anti-federalists the Constitution was ratified in New York on July 26,1788.

The Chancellor can be seen in his judge's robe carefully orchestrating the hand shake between
George Clinton and Alexander Hamiliton

[i]Dangerfield, George Chancellor Robert R. Livingston of New York, 1746-1813 p 224

[ii]The Debate on the Constitution Bernard Bailyn ed. P777-778

[iii]Livingston, Robert R. An Oration Delivered Before the Society of Cincinnati at the State of New York in Commemoration of the Fourth Day of July. p.10

[iv]The Debate Bailyn p 792

[v]The Debate Bailyn p 837

[vi]Elliot’s Debates Volume 2 p 386.

[vii]Elliot’s Debates Volume 2 p 394-395

Themes Like a Good Idea: Decorating for Clermont's Historic Halloween

Livingstons Get Inked: Clermont’s Tribute to an All-American Art Form.

The Black Walnut Tree: Trying to Find the History of a Tree

The Man Named After the House: Clermont Livingston, part 1

The Man Named After the House: Clermont Livingston, Part 2

More Than a Just a Jerk: Henry Beekman Livingston and the Battle of Monmouth

Katharine and Clermont: A Descendant Solves an Old Mystery

Sheep & Wool Showcase at Clermont April 2016

From Our Fellow Bloggers: The Hidden Estates of Woods Road

Well Served: 20th Century Servants at Clermont

Was John R. Livingston a Murderer?

Old-Fashioned July 4th Festival at Clermont

Dance Puppets Dance: The Livingston Family and the Hamilton-Burr Duel Part 1

Dance Puppets Dance: The Livingston Family and the Burr Hamilton Duel Part 2

Margaret Beekman Livingston and the Gunpowder Mill

Dangerous Companion: Chancellor Robert R. Livingston and the Traitor's Wife

Katharine Comes Home: An Exciting New Donation from a Livingston family Descendant

Lord Cornbury's Dress

The River Ran Backwards and Other Adventures of Robert R. Livingston's First Steamboat on the Mississippi River

"The Gentleman Does Not Reason From Facts": Chancellor Robert R. Livingston and the Fight to Ratify the Constitution in New York