He retired January 16, 1866, after continuous service for five years, rising from the pike to the highest command, never deserting the Union flag for a day, fighting thirty-four battles without losing one where he was in independent command. He lived to see the first year or two of the World War, residing at the age of ninety with a married daughter at Duisberg in the Rhinelands. His services to the Union were forgotten and his pension was cut off. Rear Admiral Hugo Osterhaus, retired in 1913, is his son. He was born in Belleville, June 15, 1851, and resides in Washington.
Palatine Declaration of Independence.
Palatine Declaration of Independence.—The history of the Tryon County Committee, identified as it is with the events in New York State immediately preceding the Revolution and throughout the latter, and commemorating as it does the name of General Herkimer, is the more interesting for being probably the first, and surely among the first, to make a declaration of independence in anticipation of the formal Congressional announcement of the break with Great Britain of July 4, 1776. The claim of priority is conceded by William L. Stone in his work on the “Life of Joseph Brant-Thayendanegea,” (1830) the Indian chief who proved himself the scourge of the New York and Pennsylvania frontier settlers. Stone in Volume I, p. 67, says:
It is here worthy, not only of special note, but of all admiration, how completely and entirely these border-men held themselves amenable, in the most trying exigencies, to the just execution of the laws. Throughout all their proceedings, the history of the Tryon Committees will show that they were governed by the purest dictates of patriotism, and the highest regard to moral principle. Unlike the rude inhabitants of most frontier settlements, especially under circumstances when the magistracy are, from necessity, almost powerless, the frontier patriots of Tryon County were scrupulous in their devotion to the supremacy of the laws. Their leading men were likewise distinguished for their intelligence; and while North Carolina is disputing whether she did not in fact utter a declaration of independence before it was done by Congress, by recurring to the first declaration of the Palatine Committee, noted in its proper place, the example may almost be said to have proceeded from the Valley of the Mohawk.
“The Minute Book of the Committee of Safety of Tryon County, the Old New York Frontier” (New York: Dodd, Mead & Co., 1905), contains the minutes of the meeting at which this German American Declaration of Independence was adopted. The names, reduced to their German originals, leave no doubt of the racial character of the majority of the members. The declaration adopted August 27, 1774, begins with these words:
Whereas the British Parliament has lately passed an Act for raising a Revenue in America without the consent of our Representatives to abridging the liberties and privileges of the American Colonies and therefore blocking up the Port of Boston, the Freeholders and Inhabitants of Palatine District in the County of Tryon aforesaid, looking with Concern and heartfelt Sorrow on these Alarming and calamitous conditions, Do meet this 27th day of August, 1774, on that purpose at the house of Adam Loucks, Esq., (Lux) at Stonearabia and concluded the Resolves following, vizt.
King George is acknowledged the lawful sovereign, but
3. That we think it is our undeniable privilege to be taxed only with our Consent, given by ourselves (or by our Representatives). That Taxes otherwise laid and exacted are unjust and unconstitutional. That the late Acts of Parliament declarative of their Rights of laying internal Taxes on the American Colonies are obvious Incroachments on the Rights and Liberties of the British subjects in America.
Sympathy is expressed with the people of Boston, “whom we consider brethren suffering in the Common Cause,” and that “we think the sending of Delegates from the different Colonies to a general continental Congress is a salutary measure necessary at this alarming Crisis,” etc.
Section 5 of a resolution adopted nine months later, at a meeting of the Palatine Committee, May 21, 1775, expresses the declaration in even more specific form, as follows: