The following contribution is from Ray E. Hollenbeck <mailto:hollenbeck49@earthlink.net> . A Bit of Revolt In 18th Century Albany Source: "Dutch Uncles and New England Cousins" by Wilson Ober Clough, 1977 The Livingston manor was an important fact on the east bank of the upper Hudson. The patent of its founder, Robert Livingston, had been reaffirmed by Governor Hunter in 1715, upon which Livingston took his seat in the Colonial Assembly as representative of his Manor and its tenants, including some HALLENBECKS. A legislative decision, however, permitted the freeholders of one portion of 6,000 acres, centering around the Linlithgo Church and called "The Camp," to vote for their own representative. Among residents there was one ANDREW GARDNER, who moved there by 1720. He had served for a time with Livingston's militia, for Livingston maintained a small armed force. In 1752, one William Bull and 57 others, tenants on the Manor lands, petitioned the General Court of Massachusetts Bay Colony for permission to settle on some still unoccupied lands not far from Sheffield. The Robert Livingston of this period (3rd generation) was much disturbed, for the boundary line was still in dispute, and the implication for him was that the petitioners, though still his tenants, were hoping to become freeholders without moving, simply by being in Massachusetts. In a Memorial to the then Governor of New York, he pointed out that his Manor reached to the Taquanack Mountains. Nineteen miles and thirty rods east of the Hudson, that his claim rested on Indian deeds of years before, and that one David Ingersoll of Sheffield had been "{very industrious in seducing" his tenants by promises of land, so that they were evading their lawful rents. Indeed, he says, seven New England men and "four of your Memorialists tenants sons" (sic) had surveyed land ten miles in length and four broad and started a tree-fence around it, though said land had been settled by Livingston tenants for 60 to 70 years. Governor Clinton, thereupon, in July of 1753, signed an order for the arrest of certain rioters, including some HALLENBECKS. Though the many HALLENBECKS of this region make identification a bit precarious, we may say that WILLIAM JANS CASPERSE HALLENBECK (1672-1754), and wife, daughter of DIRCK VAN VECHTEN, was a freeholder on the 1720 lists of Claverack, and that his brother CASPER JANS CASPERSZ HALLENBECK, across the river at Loonenberg, was the father of Johannes Clauw's wife, Maria. WILLEM had a number of children, including sons JAN (born 1701), SAMUEL (1703), and MICHAEL (1707). JAN was listed as a freeholder in 1720 Claverack; but, land being limited for many sons, the others appear as tenants on the Livingston Manor. WILLEM and JAN were also linked, as was Andrew Gardner, with the Linlithgo Church,begun about 1722, and the Loonenberg Church. MICHAEL, according to Livingston later, had been a tenant "above thirty years," i.e., since about 1725-28. A still later map of the Livingston Manor shows a HALLENBECK near the Massachusetts line. Now the Governor of Massachusetts got into the dispute, accusing Livingston of acting arbitrarily and not awaiting settlement of the border question, and even of sending sixty men on the land of one Loomis, to destroy his wheat and corn. He added also that "MICHAEL HALLENBECK a Dutchman . . . had been apprehended and closely confined in Dutchess Gaol (it is said to be a dungeon), and most unexceptional Bail refus'd." Governor Shirley therefore protested personally, since the Massachusetts legislature had asked him to "write very particularly," to protect the "common rights of any or all of his Majesty's subjects." He therefore asked "this man's enlargement upon good Bail." Governor Clinton replied that MICHAEL and others had already escaped, and that no bail had been asked, but that he would report. His report of Sept. 25, 1753, states that one Vandeursen and son had been forcibly transported to Massachusetts and rioters ordered arrested, especially for the same MICHAEL HALLENBECK. In 1755 a further outbreak occurred. Sheriff Yates of Albany, having been sent to arrest one Thomas Whittney, had been seized by Robert Nobel and fifteen or twenty men, and taken to a jail in Sheffield. Among the rioters were WILLIAM S. HALLENBECK (son of SAMUEL), MICHAEL, and WILLIAM J. (son of JAN?). MICHAEL appears to be the ring leader, for in March of 1755 Livingston is writing to Governor DeLancey that "MICHAEL HALENBECK (sic) of Tackanick in my Manor has taken a Commission of his Excell'cy Governor Sherley for Capt of malitia (sic) at Tackanick," and has started training men. MICHAEL, upon questioning, said he had been offered such but would not take it. Yet Livingston's men found I the house of JAN HALLENBECK (probably MICHAEL's son) "about 800 yards distant," three New England men, armed; they also reported that Robert Noble's house had loopholes, like a fort, for firing. Also strongly protested was a raid on Livingston's iron works at Ancram, apparently by New Englanders. In May of 1755 JOHN HALENBAKE (sic) writes David Ingersoll a note to inform him that Livingston is building a fort at Taconnet (sic); at which Ingersoll presents Hallenbeck's affidavit to the effect that his house is on disputed land, and that one Tom Connor with 30-40 men came to his Uncle John's house (JAN, son of WILLEM) with swivel guns, knocked a hole back of his chimney and placed one gun there, otherwise disturbed his buildings and said they were building a fort there, and that Livingston would come with 100 men. JAN's brother and sister, DIRCK and CORNELIA, 19 and 17, testified to the same, as also Uncle John's sister-in-law, wife of Robert. (Was this Robert Noble?) To this Livingston replied that JAN HALLENBECK's lease had expired two years earlier, and that he had been advised to move, but was permitted to remain a year to gather crops; but that he had remained and replanted, though he had a place near Sheffield. Besides, Livingston was disturbed by armed men from Massachusetts who frightened his tenants. A glance at the present boundary line of Massachusetts where it touches Connecticut, just east of Ancram, will show a curious jog, probably a result of this same quarrel. What happened later is not too clear. JAN and MICHAEL HALLENBECK, brothers, are found around 1756 in Egremont, Mass., and I seem to have read somewhere that MICHAEL was once a sheriff in Great Barrington. Yet MICHAEL's progeny appear later to be across the river around Athens; and his son ABRAHAM married a Catherine Clow. Robert Noble was arrested again twenty years later, as well as in the interim, but no further HALLENBECK seems involved. Around 1795 a petition with some 214 signers asked for an investigation of the Livingston claims, but the New York Assembly reported against it, despite the petition's protest that his tenants were not to be regarded as slaves or vassals. Yet the rent wars of 1848 show how long the patroon system did continue. _____ Return to Hollenbeck Genealogy <http://members.aol.com/Rdkone/hollenbeck.html>