|
Part 2: Great explorers, Revolutionary generals, and-my forefathers?
By Ben Ellison — Spring 2006
So it was that on our way back to North Cove we found the somewhat rundown street corner where our forefathers once docked their trading sloops. It was funny, really, as the river is now several long blocks away, but bittersweet, too, as just to the north is Ground Zero, the ultimate reminder that most everything in this world is subject to change.
We'd noticed along the way, particularly among all the workers taking a break in the old Trinity Church graveyard at the end of Wall Street, that we weren't the only ones finding comfort in the midst of all this history.
UPRIVER DISCOVERIES
While there's no trace whatsoever of 18th-century Ellisons on Manhattan, we knew we'd find them 50 miles upriver, which made the already intriguing cruise all the more so.
The passing reality of modern fast ferries, sightseeing boats, tugs, and yachts melded with imagined Native American canoes, Revolutionary-era warships, and stately paddle wheelers. Henry Hudson may have been disappointed in failing to find a way to India, but he did enthuse about the "North River" as a magnificent highway into the rich interior of the continent. You don't need much imagination to see how right he was, and still is. There was a moment on the grand stretch, where the Hudson Highlands climb almost straight up on both sides, when there were loaded barges both ahead of and behind us and long trains running along both banks.
This same steep geography made West Point an essential defensive fort during the Revolution, and the flatter, more habitable Newburgh area above the Highlands-accessible by river, but protected by a fort-was the perfect place for Generals Washington and Knox to billet their armies for long periods of the war.
John Ellison's sons had come upriver earlier, built docks, homes, and a flour mill, and had a nice trade going with their dad in the city and the West Indies beyond. In the tradition of the day, the generals moved in with the fancier local homeowners, and that's why Jesse and I got to visit a 1754 stone house called General Knox's Headquarters State Historic Site, advertised as a place to "see how the Ellisons lived 200 years ago."
Which, of course, was a tremendous thrill for us two Ellisons, even as we took in the reality that the family had "owned" 13 slaves, the most in town, at the time of the 1790 census. But we also knew that a paternal name is very much a genealogical fluke. My DNA is a mere 1/512th that of the John Ellison who stepped ashore at the Battery in 1688, and Jesse's just 1/1,024th. It was neat to learn from the Knox Site curator that John came ashore as an impoverished carpenter, but the truth is that there are probably hundreds of people as related to him as I am-some, I'm sure, who would surprise us.
>> Next page >>
Part 3: Hudson River Page
1,
2,
3,
4,
5,
6,
7,
8
|
