The third house on the estate was built in 1748 by Frederick the son of Jacobus, who acquired by the will of his father the "farm, situate, lying, and being in a place commonly called and known by the name of Little or Lower Yonkers." This house, which was modelled after the Philipse Manor House at Yonkers, is still in a fine state of preservation. Since 1897, it has been used as a public museum, in charge of the Colonial Dames of the State of New York.
The room fitted up as a museum was occupied by General Washington on the occasion of his visit to the house in 1783. This room is also pointed out as the scene of the death of Captain Rowe of the Hessian jaegers, who was severely wounded near the house. When he realised that he could not recover, he sent in haste for the young woman who had promised to marry him, and he died in her arms.
Other famous visitors were Rochambeau, Admiral Digby, and William Henry, Duke of Clarence, who became King William IV of England. Admiral Digby, after his departure, sent to Augustus Van Cortlandt, the owner of the house, two wooden vultures, which he had captured from a Spanish privateer. These vultures are now in the museum.
The old house was the centre of important military operations during the Revolution. Washington fortified eight strategic spots in the vicinity of Kingsbridge, and when he withdrew before the British occupied the fortification, a number of Hessian jaegers were quartered in the Van Cortlandt House. To the north of the house was the neutral ground for which the two armies continually struggled for possession. In 1781, when Washington was about to withdraw his army to Yorktown, he directed that camp-fires be lit on Vault Hill, the site of the Van Cortlandt family vault. By this stratagem he succeeded for a time in deceiving the enemy as to his movements.
Since the building of the Broadway subway Van Cortlandt Park has been so easy of access that the number of visitors to the historic spot has rapidly increased.
XXIII
THE HASBROUCK HOUSE, NEWBURGH,
NEW YORK
WHERE THE CLOSING DRAMA OF THE REVOLUTION
WAS STAGED
During the entire period of the Revolution the country about Newburgh was an important centre of military operations. West Point was fortified in 1776, that the British might not be able to carry out their design of separating New England from the middle colonies. Many officers had their headquarters within a few miles of these fortifications. Lafayette was at the Williams House, three miles north of Newburgh, while Generals Green, Gates, and Knox were at Vail's Gate, four miles south of the town. General George Clinton was at Little Britain, and General Anthony Wayne was in Newburgh.
Washington's first stay in the vicinity was at Vail's Gate, New Windsor, in the winter of 1779-80. His longest sojourn, however, was in the house which Jonathan Hasbrouck built in 1750 and enlarged in 1770. The best description of this substantial one-story stone house at the time of Washington's residence there is contained in the "Memoirs" of Marquis de Chastellux, who was the guest of the Commander-in-chief on December 6, 1872: