“His was an interesting career, and I am glad to be able to present some of its salient features, which may enjoy at least the merits of novelty. He was born in Belfast, and becoming involved in the Cromwellian wars, his family was dispersed, his two sisters first flying to Holland for refuge, where they afterwards died. They were followed by Lewis, who upon their death applied to the West India Company at Amsterdam and was by them sent to New York. In the Directors’ letter to Director Stuyvesant and his Council (June 14, 1656), they notify the latter: ‘In the ship _Blauwe Duiff_ (Blue Dove) goes also over Thomas Lodewicksen, carpenter, for whom the Company, too, paid the fare, on condition of his remaining in New Netherland for three years, or if he leave before he must refund the passage money to you in Holland coin or its equivalent.’ The _Blauwe Duiff_ arrived here September 5, 1656. Lewis appears to have gone to Albany (then Fort Orange) for in 1658 he was in partnership there with Reynier Wisselpennigh as carpenters and builders and they sued the local church for 270 guilders for building the ‘Doop-huysie’ (baptistry) and received the full amount. In 1661 his partner and he had differences over the cost of fitting out a sloop they were building. He must have come to New Amsterdam shortly thereafter, as the court records here show. In the meantime he had married, in Fort Orange, Geesje Barents. “On October 17, 1662, Reiner Wisselpenninck brought suit against ‘Tomas, the Irishman’ in the Mayor’s Court at the City Hall, to recover a balance of six beavers due for a half-interest in a bark, and two beavers for a barrel of tar. Defendant counterclaimed and plaintiff had judgment for three beavers only. On May 29, 1663, certain tobacco contained in the bark of ‘Thomas, the Irishman’ and belonging to Samuel Etsal was attached in a suit against the latter. Hendrick Zanzen Smith sued Gysbert Frerickzen October 2, 1663, and in that action an attachment was levied on moneys belonging to defendant in the hands of ‘Thomas, the Irishman.’ “In June, 1663, Director Stuyvesant sailed from Manhattan to Wildwyck (Kingston) on Lewis’ yacht, and on the 15th of the month while lying in the ‘Long Reach’ (North River) he sent a message to the magistrates at Fort Orange, in the course of which he noted ‘this is written in haste on board of the Irishman’s yacht.’