Old Taverns of New York

by W. Harrison Bayles

The city wall, above mentioned, was a line of palisades straight across the island along the northerly side of the present Wall Street, passing through the present Trinity Churchyard. On the inside of the palisades was an embankment and a ditch. It was built in the year 1653, when England and Holland were at war and New Amsterdam was threatened by the New England colonists. Through this line of defence there were two gates, the land-gate at the present junction of Broadway and Wall Street and the water-gate at the river road or present Pearl Street.

Peter Cock’s Troubles to Obtain a Wife

Peter Cock added much to the piquancy of the gossip of the taverns and the town when, in 1653, probably no longer a soldier, he brought suit against Annetje Cornelissen Van Vorst, claiming the fulfillment of a promise of marriage. The case occupied the time and attention of the Court of Burgomasters and Schepens at a great many sessions, statements and counter-statements being presented to the Court, who, considering the case too large for them, sent it, with the papers, to the Director and Council for their decision. It was sent back to the Court of Burgomasters and Schepens, with a recommendation to appoint a committee to examine the papers and report. The final decision, pronounced May 18, 1654, was that the promise was a binding contract. From this decision Annetje appealed, but it was confirmed. In some way Annetje obtained a release, at any rate, she married November 11, 1656, Claes Jansen Van Purmerendt, a tobacco planter of Paulus Hook. Peter consoled himself with another Annetje, for on June 13, 1657, he married Annetje Dirks, of Amsterdam.

In 1661 Annetje Cock was a widow and in control of the tavern which Peter Cock had left. She asked permission to build a new house on the southeast corner of the lot, which request was refused, as it would be too near the fort. Her husband had contracted for the building of a house on the lot, which she claimed was voided by his death, and wished to make a new contract with others, but the court decided that the old contract was binding. A new house was built which was kept by her as a tavern for many years.

A Dutch Tavern

The taverns of New Amsterdam were probably modeled somewhat after those of Holland, for the Dutch were a people who stuck to the customs of the fatherland. The description of a Dutch tavern, from the journal of one of our citizens who visited a part of the Netherlands where customs have not changed for centuries is here given.

“It was the business of the good vrow or her maid to show up the traveller, and open the doors in the smooth partition of the box which was to receive his weary limbs for the night, and which otherwise he might not be able to discover, and after he crept into it, to come back again and blow out the candle, and in the morning to draw the curtains of the windows at the hour he fixed to rise. There was generally one room in which all the guests were received, and where there was a pleasant reunion in the evening, and all the visitors ate, drank and smoked. It had, in one corner, a closet, which, when opened (and, honestly, it was not unfrequently opened), disclosed sundry decanters, glasses and black bottles; and, on one side of the room, a rack in which were suspended by their bowls a score or two of very long pipes, each one inscribed with the name of a neighbor or owner. This was the room of Mynheer the landlord. He had no care beyond this; mevrow was the head of the house; she attended to all the wants of the guests, and gave them the information which they might desire. She was always on the spot as when, with a ‘wet te rusten,’ like a good mother, she bade you good night, and when, with a ‘hoo-y-reis,’ like an old friend, she bade you good-by.”

In the contract for building the ferry house on the Long Island side of the East River for Egbert Van Borsum in 1655, provision was made for bedsteads to be built in the walls as described above. Thus an apartment could be made to accommodate several travellers at night and yet, in day time, present a neat appearance and be used as a public room. Provision was also made for the closet or pantry, for it was a source of profit.

A few years later the Ferry Tavern of Van Borsum had acquired such a reputation, to which the culinary art of Annetje, his wife, greatly contributed, that it became the resort of the best citizens when they wished for something extra good, and of the officials of government, as we find that a bill rendered by Van Borsum in February, 1658, for wine and liquor furnished the Director and other officers was ordered to be paid.

A Grand Dinner