A History of the City of Brooklyn and Kings County, Volume I.Ostrander, Stephen M.
History
A History of the City of Brooklyn and Kings County, Volume I.
Ostrander, Stephen M.
Brooklyn (New York, N.Y.) -- History; Kings County (N.Y.) -- History
Among the commissioners appointed to lay out the common lands was
Captain Henry Ffilkin, an influential resident of the town and an elder
in the Reformed Church. The ordinance provided specifically as follows:
"It is likewise ordered and agreed that Capt. Henry Falkin shall have a
full share with any or all the ffreeholders aforesaid, in all the common
lands or woods, in the whole patent of the Town of Broockland aforesaid
beside a half share for his home lott. To have and to hold to him, his
heirs and assigns forever. It is likewise ordered that no person
whatsoever within the common woods, of the jurisdiction of Broockland
aforesaid, shall cutt or fall any oak or chesnut saplings, for firewood
during the space of four years from the date hereof, upon any of the
said common lands or woods within the jurisdiction of Broockland patent,
upon the penaltie of six shillings in money for every waggon load
abovesaid soe cutt, beside the forfeiture of the wood soe cutt as
abovesaid, the one half thereof to the informer, and the other half for
the use of the poor of the Towne of Broockland aforesaid."
At a later town meeting[37] trustees were appointed for the common
lands, and regulations adopted respecting the cutting of timber in the
public woods. These rules were adopted to prevent the unnecessary
cutting of timber and consequent waste. Among other things it was
ordered "that no shoemaker or others shall cutt or ffall any trees to
barke in the common woods, upon the penaltie of the payment of ffive
pounds ffor every tree so cutt." It will be noticed that the orthography
of that period was quite different from that in use in the present age.
The common woodlands, amounting to about 1550 acres,[38] were surveyed
and apportioned, each house in town receiving an interest in the wood,
and being provided with means of ingress and egress from the region so
apportioned. A conveyance dated in 1705 gives "alsoe all the rights and
privileges of the common woodlands of the town of Broockland aforesaid
to said house belonging as per record of said town may appear."
When, in 1703, the improved fenced lands of Breuckelin were surveyed, it
was found that Simon Aertson was the largest real estate owner, being
the happy possessor of 200 acres.
On the 28th of March, 1704, Fulton Street, then called the King's
Highway, was laid out by commissioners appointed by the General Assembly
of the Province of New York. The commissioners to whom this duty was
assigned were Joseph Hegeman, Peter Cortelyou, and Benjamin Vande Water.
The original plan or description of the road, being interesting and
peculiar, is here inserted. It was as follows:--
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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