Chria's Cl.u'c!., rdl.am. g^^^^j^ |. ^ jj^^ Sound.a
Prior to the Revohition, Pelharn formed a portion of the old manor of that name, which originally embraced nine thousand one hundred and sixty-six acres. The name itself is of Saxon origin, and compounded of the two words Pel (remote) and IIa7n (mansion.)^ The former, being the ancient surname of the manorial proprietors, affords us a very good reason for its adoption in connection with the last. -» ' .
The Indian appellation of these lands has not been preserved. Its early mhabitants appear to have been a tribe of t!ie Mohegans called Siwanoys, whose possessions extended, it is well known from Norwalk to the neighborhood of Hell2:atc. From the Indians, this tract of land (with others adjacent) passed to the Dutch West India Company, A.D. 1640. In the year 1642, .Airs. Anne Hutchinson, to avoid the bitter persecutions of the Puritans, lied here for protection, and commenced a plantation. Neal, the Puritan historian, asserts that " Mrs. Hutchinson being turned
a Pelham is situated teu miles south of the village of White Plains and distant 140 miles from Albany. -- DisturneWs Gazetteer.
t Pelham is the name of a lordship in Herefordshire, England, and recorded to have been part of the possessions of ^Valter de Pelham, A.D. 1293.
Vol. I. . i}o
514 HISTORY OF THE
out into the wide world, went first with her disciples to Rhode Island, but not liking to stay there she removed with her family into one of the Dutch plantations culled Hebgate, where within a little while, the Indians murdered her and her whole family, to the number of sixteen persons.^ Chandler in his criminal trials, says, '' the whole family of the Hutchinsons removed beyond New Haven to Eustchester in the territory of the Dxitch^^^ O'Callaghan observes, that " the greatest terror prevailed everywhere," (arising from the Indian war then raging,) Pavonia, Achter Col, the greater part of Manhattan, and most of Long Island were in the hands of the Indians, now consisting of seven different tril es, amounting, it was estimated, to fifteen hundred warriors.