Page:Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography (1889, volume 6).djvu/283

Rh TAN SCHAICK, Gozen, soldier, b. in Albany, N. Y., in January, 1737 ; d. there, 4 July, 1787. His father, Sybrant, was mayor of Albany in 1756-'61. Gozen was appointed lieutenant in the expedition against Crown Point in 1756, in which the French and Indians were defeated at Sabbath Day Point, became captain in 1758, took part in the expedi- tions against Fort Frontenac and Fort Niagara, and was appointed major of a New York regiment in 1759. He became lieutenant-colonel of the 1st New York regiment in 1762, participated in the battle of Ticonderoga, and received a severe wound on the cheek from a French musket that led to a cancerous disease of which he finally died. At the beginning of the Revolution he became colonel of the 2d New York regiment, and on 22 Nov., 1775, he was appointed to command the 1st New York battalion. A few weeks later he was sent on an expedition to Cherry Valley to protect the inhabitants from the incursions of the Indian chief, Joseph Brandt, and did good service during this campaign and the subsequent ones. At the battle of Monmouth he acted as brigadier-general under Lord Stirling. In 1779 he was appointed to head a select detachment, with which he destroyed the Onondaga settlements. For that service con- gress gave him a vote of thanks. He was a rigid disciplinarian, his regiment being one of the best in the service, and his patriotism was freely shown in sacrificing his fortune to the public good.

VANSITTART, Henry, British naval officer, b. in Bisham Abbey, Berkshire, England, in 1779 ; d. in Woodstock, Canada, in 1844. He entered the navy in 1791, was made a lieutenant in 1794, and assigned to the command of the sloop "Hermes" in 1798. During the ensuing year he was employed in convoying merchant vessels to and from British America, and in 1800 he captured several of the enemy's armed vessels on the Ja- maica station, where, in the following year, he obtained post rank in the " Abergavenny," of fifty-four guns. He was engaged in 1803 in block- ading the rivers Elbe and Weser, and in February, 1804, sailed for the Jamaica station, where he was actively employed during the succeeding four years. While off Havana, in the summer of 1806, on board his frigate, the " Fortunee," he succeeded, with the aid of an armed schooner, in capturing two Spanish gun-boats and twenty merchant ves- sels. Among others that the " Fortunee " took during her cruises in the West Indies were the French privateer " Le vautour " and the French armed schooner " Le grand Juge Bertolio." He was afterward employed on channel service and in the Mediterranean, and in October, 1811, cap- tured the famous French privateer " Le Vice- Ad- miral Martin." He was made a rear-admiral, 22 July, 1830, and vice-admiral, 23 Nov., 1841. In 1834 he removed to Canada, bought an estate near Woodstock, and was instrumental in erecting churches and school-houses.

VAN TWILLER, Wouter, or Walter, gover- nor of New Netherlands, b. in Nieukirk, Holland, about 1580; d. in Amsterdam, Holland, after 1646. He was a clerk in the warehouse of the Dutch West India company, and, having married a niece of Killian Van Rensselaer, was employed by the latter to ship cattle to his colony on Hudson river. Van T wilier made two voyages to this country in that service, and was somewhat acquainted with the geography of New York and the condition of its affairs, so that through Van Rensselaer's influ- ence he was chosen in 1633 by the West India company governor of New Netherlands, sailing for Manhattan in the ship " Soutberg." He was inexperienced in the art of government, slow in speech, incompetent to decide important affairs, and obstinate in minor matters. His chief busi- ness seems to have been to maintain the commer- cial operations of the West India company, but no sooner had he arrived than he was involved in quarrels with the English. In 1632 the Dutch purchased from the Indians lands near what is now Saybrook, Conn., erecting thereon the arms of the states-general, and on 8 July. 1633, the West India company bought the ground on which the city of Hartford now stands, erecting a fort which they called the House of Good Hope, and defending it with two cannon. In October, 1633, the Massachusetts colony laid claim to all the river and country of Connecticut, under the grant of the king of England. Van Twiller wrote a "courteous and respectful letter" to Gov. John Winthrop, requesting that the matter be settled by the home authorities, meanwhile urging that un- til these proper persons could determine what should be done, the Plymouth colony refrain from settling there. But a few days later one William Holmes, with a resolute crew and a com- pany of Indians who had been the original pro- prietors of the soil, sailed up the river, and, though threatened by fire from the Dutch cannon, reached the present site of Windsor and erected there the first house that was built in Connecticut. Van Twiller served a process on Holmes as soon as he heard this news, and a few weeks afterward be- sieged the trading-house with seventy soldiers, but was forced to withdraw and leave the English in peaceable possession. The next year he concluded an advantageous treaty of peace with the Raritan Indians. Meanwhile he spent large sums of money in internal improvements, built a handsome house for his own use and several for the officers of the colony, laid out a cemetery, and changed the name of the town from Manhattan to New Amsterdam. He also bought large tracts of land, including Governor's island and Blackwell's island, stocked them with cattle, and became one of the richest land-owners in the colony. In 1635 a party of colonists from Point Comfort, Va., under command of George Holmes, sailed to the Delaware, with the intention of settling there, but was forced to surrender to the Dutch fort, and sent as prisoners to New Amsterdam. Van Twiller reshipped them "pack and sack for Point Comfort. He was again unsuccessful the same year with the Massachusetts colony. John Winthrop the younger tore down the arms of the state-general at Saybrook and took possession of the settlement, naming it for Lord Say and Lord Brook, and, although Van Twiller sent a sloop to dislodge them, Winthrop would not suffer them to land. Notwithstanding his losses in Connecticut, the fur-trade increased during the last years of Van Twiller's administration, and the Dutch opened a profitable commerce with New England. His private extravagances, however, induced the vice-director, Lubbertus Van Dincklager, to comElain of him to the home authorities, and David >e Vries having derided them for the " folly of promoting a fool from a clerkship to a governor-ship simply to act farces," Van Twiller was removed, and in September, 1637, was succeeded by William Kieft. He returned to Holland, and in 1644 became a guardian to Johannes, the eldest son of the patroon Van Rensselaer and was involved in controversies with the West India company, who described him as an " ungrateful man, who had sucked his wealth from the breasts of the company which he now abuses."