This man's services have been of greater benefit and advantage to the
third generation of descendants of our neighborhood than those of any
other individual, in consequence of which he ought to be held in
remembrance by our descendants, and he, together with ourselves, become
incorporated in our history as the first important originator of
education in it. In justice to the merits of Mr. White in respect of
myself, I will here state that by means of his services I have become
enabled to write this history and exhibit to its readers the information
it contains; and in addition thereto the enjoyment of other sources of
knowledge for which and all other blessings we have reason to be
thankful, not only to the individual from whom we derived the same but
also to that Being who is the originator of all our enjoyments.
The benefits we (who were of the generation mentioned) have derived from
him, consisted in the literature he taught us in our childhood and youth
at short different periods of time in the schools he kept in our
neighborhood, whereby we generally received such a portion of education
as enabled each of us to transact his own ordinary business in relation
to his dealings with others, which, in our time, had become more
necessary than what it was in the days of our forefathers, most of whom
kept no written memoranda of their dealings with each other, which in
their time (during about ninety years) was unnecessary for the greatest
part of them. In addition to these benefits we became more enlightened
and enabled to acquire additional knowledge and information by reading,
&c. Mr. White and his wife Elizabeth, came to this neighborhood in the
autumn of 1776 (as near as I can ascertain) to serve its inhabitants as
a schoolmaster and they became residents in my father's house together
with his own family, and taught school in one of its rooms during the
ensuing winter, and probably until some of their neighbors moved into it
and the construction of a fort commenced, and notwithstanding the danger
to which the inhabitants of our town became exposed by the invasion of
the Indians, he continued to live in the house during a great part of
the war, and was in it at the time when the fort was attacked.
When the enemy came in sight, he told Capt. Cuddeback that he was a
King's man, but would stand by him to help defend the fort against those
savages to the utmost of his power. (He was a warm friend of his native
country and its laws). Mr. White was in the fort during the hard winter
in the time of the war, and kept a diary from which he ascertained that
no water had dropped from the roof of the house during a term of forty
days in that winter.
I will here, before proceeding further with the history of Mr. White,
narrate how the inmates of the fort managed to sustain themselves during
the winter. When the Indians burnt the houses of the neighbors, many of
the pots were damaged by these fires. These were used for keeping small
fires in them in different parts of the fort house. Two large fires were
generally kept up in the two front rooms, and a fire in a stove in
another, and in the other room a pot with hot coals, supplied from the
fire places, was kept up to warm the room for a dwelling of some of the
oldest women. On the chamber, against the sides of the chimneys, pots
with fire were kept, supplied with hot coals from the fire places, and
also with chips and small pieces of wood.
In the northwest corner of the chamber, a small room was partitioned
off for a dwelling of Mr. White and his wife, so that in winter time
they were out of the great bustle of those who were in the house. A pot
with fire in it was also kept in his room, and sometimes a small fire
was kept in one of the foremost cellar rooms for a few soldiers. After
the snow became too deep to get wood from where it was previously got,
the men first broke a road to a large hickory tree, which stood in a
field, under cultivation, of Benjamin Cuddeback, at about one-quarter
of a mile distant from the fort. This was cut up and brought to it. The
butt log, about three feet thick in diameter, was cut through and served
for a log in each fire place. The next log contained all the knots of
its large limbs, and could not be cut through nor split with powder, and
remained there until it became rotten, long after the war ended. Next a
road was broke through the snow about the same distance of the first
road, to the Neversink river, which (in ordinary winters generally
remained open from the mouth of Basha's kill to the Delaware river,
about ten miles distant) was all frozen over with strong ice, so that
teams could pass on it.
Along the east bank of the river, trees were cut, so as to fall on the
ice, and thereby the men were enabled to get a plentiful supply of wood.
In passing to and from the river, a spring brook had to be crossed,
which in other winters generally remains open at the place where it was
crossed that winter on strong ice. Much snow blew into the brook and
coalesced with the water, and all froze together and formed thick,
strong ice, so that teams passed over it during the coldest weather in
that winter.
I will here resume my history in relation to Mr. White. A few years
before he came into the neighborhood, a school house had been built in
its central part, about twenty-five rods southwest of Capt. Cuddeback's
residence. Mr. Thomas Kyte had been employed to teach school in this
house, but, in consequence of much other business, the school was much
neglected and very little education was acquired by those he taught,
and after he quit, the neighborhood luckily obtained a good teacher by
employing Mr. White. He had emigrated into this country from England
where he had received his education, and also acquired the trade of
manufacturing ropes. He said that every youth in England (when he was
there) had to learn a trade, even the King's son, who was expected to
become heir to the Crown, had to learn a trade, and that the King, who
reigned when he was there, had been taught the trade of weaving silk.
Mr. White was a small, light-built man, very active and quick to perform
the business he transacted. The action of his mind was also quick, and
more suitable for acquiring a great amount of superficial knowledge than
to penetrate and make deep researches into sciences which are difficult
to be understood, for which a bright mind of slow action is more
suitable. He was also a man of uncommon perseverance to transact the
business of his trade, the teaching of his schools, &c., and, whenever
he was not employed in either of these, he was generally engaged in
reading or writing which he would pursue to a very late hour in the
night; and early in the morning, at or before break of day, would be up
out of bed, assist his wife to get breakfast, and resume his business.
He was very fond of association and delighted to give and receive
information, which induced him to write a great many letters to his
distant friends and acquaintances, in which he was very expert and never
at a loss for matter to make out a long letter, whenever he felt
inclined to do it.
I conclude that Mr. White had been taught in one of the best of common
schools in England, and in a very perfect manner as far as he had
progressed. He was a very eloquent reader, and could perform the same
with an air suitable to the nature of the subject on which the reading
treated. I have always considered him to have been equal to the best of
readers I have ever heard. He was also very perfect in orthography;
arithmetic he did not understand as well as some other teachers we have
had since his time. He said he had passed through the greatest part of
Dillworth's arithmetic at school, but had forgotten some of the rules
in the latter part of his assistant, which contained more arithmetic
matter than the books now generally used in our common schools. He had
some knowledge of the Greek and Latin languages, and as much of the
French tongue as enabled him to interpret the French words which were
interspersed in different parts of a book I read in school the last year
he taught in our neighborhood, and, by much reading, he had acquired an
extensive knowledge of the English tongue. He said that when at home in
his country (which he always called his home) he had free access to a
library of books, and that he had read many of them on different
subjects, whereby he had received the greatest part of his historical
and other information of different kinds.
After his last year's service in our neighborhood he retired to the
east side of Shawangunk mountain, into a neighborhood of his former
residence, where he continued a few years. During this time, and one or
two years previous to it, Moses DeWitt, a son of Capt. Jacob Rutsen
DeWitt, a resident of this neighborhood who had, in his youth, become
the best scholar in Mr. White's school, and afterwards received a small
addition thereto, became well qualified for a surveyor, and was employed
as an under-surveyor, when he was about twenty-one years of age, to run
the line between the States of New York and Pennsylvania, and afterwards
to survey some Government lands at, and in the vicinity of, Tioga Point,
and thereafter he and Maj. Hardenbergh obtained the whole business of
surveying the military lands in this State. While DeWitt was occupied
in that business he concluded to locate in the County of Tioga, and
induced Mr. White to move into it. The latter, after becoming a resident
in it, became its County Clerk. Mr. DeWitt's mind became changed in
respect to locating himself, and he settled in the County of Onondaga.
After Mr. White's term of service as County Clerk ended, he removed to
the residence of Mr. DeWitt, whose health had become impaired by
exposure in the pursuit of his business of surveying, and his
constitution continued to debilitate until he was taken with a severe
sickness, which, after a short duration, ended his days at the age of
about twenty-seven years, at which time he had acquired an estate, in
wild lands, worth about ten thousand pounds, New York currency. During
the time he was confined to his bed, Mr. White was his affectionate and
faithful attendant, but his services did not avail to prolong life, and
all hopes of enjoying the remainder of his life, together with his
friend, were ended.
After a short stay he removed from the place, which had become a
melancholy situation to him, into the County of Orange and bought a
small farm in the westerly part of the town of Wallkill, in the
neighborhood where his former friends and acquaintances, Elijah and
Elisha Reeve, Esqs., Erastus Mapes, Hezekiah Woodward, Alsop Vail and
others, lived, where he not only became so situated as to enjoy the
happiness of associating with them, but also had access, whenever
desirable, to his friends and acquaintances in his former neighborhood
on the west side of Shawangunk mountain. Mr. White had no children nor
any relatives in this country to attract his affections; these,
consequently, became more strongly directed towards those individuals
who were the most agreeable to him. He remained in the neighborhood of
his residence until death ended his mortal life, and, after his decease,
was buried in the graveyard at the Presbyterian church near Otisville.
In and by his last will he made several small bequests to his friends,
as memorials of his friendship towards them. He also directed the sum
of six hundred and twenty dollars, of the avails of his estate, to be
kept at interest, payable annually, for the purpose of paying for
preaching one sermon in each one of four different Congregations,
annually, forever, one of which was the Dutch Reformed Congregation now
in Deerpark, (formerly Mahackemeck Congregation), which appears in and
by the will to have been intended for the inhabitants of Peenpack, to
whom he had become much attached during the different periods of time
he resided in it, and consequently also for the benefit of their
descendants. [FN] He also bequeathed a few other small legacies to his
best friends in the neighborhood of his last residence.
* * * * *
[FN] The other three Churches were the Congregational Church at
Middletown, and the Episcopal and Presbyterian Churches in Goshen.
The characteristics of Mr. White exhibited indications of his having
been descended from a respectable family in his native country. He
possessed very honorable and honest principles, also those of morality
and piety, which were apparent in his transactions and walks of life,
and also in the doctrines he generally advanced when those
qualifications became a subject of discourse.