New Utrecht Brooklyn

Dutch settlement

In 1643, Anthony Janszoon van Salee, a half-Dutch, half-Moroccan son of a pirate and a resident of New Amsterdam, obtained a patent for a tract of land exceeding 200 acres on western Long Island from the Director General of New Netherland. This tract ran along the Bay opposite Staten Island, mostly remaining undeveloped until 1652 when Cornelius van Werckhoven assumed control. Van Werckhoven, a surveyor born in Utrecht, Netherlands, and a principal investor in the Dutch West India Company, took over the land. Following Van Werckhoven’s demise in 1655, Jacques Cortelyou, acting as guardian for Werckhoven’s children, was granted permission to sell lots of the land to establish a town. Twenty lots were laid out, and Cortelyou named the settlement Nieuw Utrecht after Werckhoven’s hometown.

Nicasius de Sille, an attorney from Arnhem, Gelderland, was among the first to purchase a lot. He constructed a house using locally available stone, topped with red roof tiles imported from the Netherlands. De Sille relocated to New Utrecht from his former residence in New Amsterdam, situated at the lower part of the island near the present intersection of Broad Street and Exchange Place. Serving as an advisor to Governor Petrus Stuyvesant and as a “schout fiscal,” a combination of sheriff and district attorney, De Sille compiled a “List of the Inhabitants of New Amsterdam” in 1660, at Stuyvesant’s request. The names and addresses on this list corresponded to the houses depicted on the Castello Plan.

Upon the erection of a defensive palisade wall around the town of New Utrecht on western Long Island, more residents began to settle there. In 1657, New Utrecht was granted village status, and in 1661, Governor Peter Stuyvesant provided New Utrecht with its own charter. New Netherland was subsequently seized by the English in 1664, who renamed it the Province of New York.

New Utrecht Cemetery and Reformed Church

Initially, residents of New Utrecht attended Dutch Reformed religious services in Flatbush. However, they established the New Utrecht Cemetery in 1654. In 1677, they chartered the New Utrecht Reformed Church to serve the local congregation. The first church was built in 1700, and the second, which still stands today, was constructed in the 1830s using bricks from the original building. Both the church and the cemetery have been designated as National Historic Landmarks.

In 1856, a yellow fever outbreak spread from Staten Island to the inhabitants of Bay Ridge and Fort Hamilton in western Long Island. To honor Dr. James E. DuBois and his assistant Dr. John L. Crane, who died while combatting the outbreak, a monument was erected in 1910 within the New Utrecht Cemetery.

The church received landmark status in 1966, while the parish house and cemetery were granted the same designation in 1998. Additionally, both the church and the cemetery are listed in the National Register of Historic Places, highlighting their significance in American history.

Revolutionary War

During the American Revolution, New Utrecht served as a significant location for British operations during the Battle of Long Island. General Howe, upon landing on Long Island in August 1776, made the old Cortelyou mansion his headquarters. Additionally, the Nicasius di Sille house was utilized for treating the mortally wounded American General Nathaniel Woodhull, though it was later demolished in 1850.

The bluff on which Fort Hamilton was constructed in the 1820s was previously occupied by the homes of Denyse Denyse, Abraham Bennett, and Simon Cortelyou. During the British bombardment on August 26, 1776, the Bennett and Denyse dwellings were struck by enemy shots. Throughout the British occupation from 1776 until its end, Patriot sympathizers traveled by fishing boats at night across The Narrows to meet with compatriots in Staten Island and New Jersey.

In the War of 1812, the US Army initiated the construction of Fort Diamond on Hendrick’s Reef, an island offshore the southern tip of what is now Bay Ridge. Renamed Fort Lafayette in 1825 to honor the Marquis de La Fayette, a hero of the American Revolution, the fort’s existence came to an end in 1960 with the construction of the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge, which required its destruction. The former foundation site of the fort is now occupied by the Brooklyn-side bridge pillars.

In 1894, the “Winter Society,” a literary club, established the Free Library of the Town of New Utrecht. Subsequently, New Utrecht was annexed by the City of Brooklyn on July 1, 1894, and later became part of the consolidated City of New York on January 1, 1898.