5°8 ' HISTORY OF THE COUNTY OF WESTCHESTER.
The above purchase, (together with other sales, from the Indians.) was confirmed to Philipse by his Excellency, Thomas Dongan, Governor of the Province, on the 23d of December, 1684. The whole were subsequently included within the Royal Patent of Philipsburgh. From the Indian grants and royal patents, we proceed to give our readers a brief account of the Philipse family, collected from the best authorities and original manuscripts still extant.
Frederick Philipse or (as the name was spelt at that early period) Vreedryk or Vrederyck Felypsen, was a native of Bohemia," while others say of Bolswert or Bolsward, in West or East Friesland, Holland, a small town near Wiewerd, where he was born, A. D. 1626. His father was the Honorable Viscount Felyps, of Bohemia, who sprang from the ancient Viscounts of that name and country.''
The early members of this family took an active part in favor of the Reformers, John Huss, and Jerome of Prague; and even after the burning of the former in 141 5 they still adhered, like the rest of his followers, to their master's doctrines, and engaged with John Zioka, a Bohemian knight, in 1420 (who put himself at the head of the Hussites) in throwing off the despotic yoke of Sigismund who had treated some of their brethren in the most barbarous manner. For their religious opinions the Felyps suffered severely both in person and property, being finally compelled to fly, for better security, to Bolsward in East Friesland. d From MSS. in the hand-writing of the late Hon. John Jay (himself a descendant of Eva Philipse, while his wife, Sarah Livingston, was a grand-daughter of Annetye Philipse) we learn " that the first ancestor of this family who settled in this country was Frederick Flypson, and that he was a native of Bohemia, where his family, being Protestants, were persecuted.