An attempt by another Englishman, also a merchant of Barbadoes, and resident of Oyster Bay, who seems to have been either a business rival, or a personal opponent of Richbell, to outwit him and the Indians has singularly enough been the means of preserving for us a perfect history of the original purchase of Mamaroneck in all its details. This man was one Thomas Revell " merchant of Oyster Bay." Finding that Richbell had obtained the Mamaroneck lands in September 1661 Revell undertook in October of the same year to buy the same lands or a part of them, from some other Indians, including Wappaquewam however, for an increased price. Richbell after getting his deed of the 23d of September 1661 applied to the Dutch Government at New Amsterdam for a "Ground Brief," and subsequently a " Transport," as the Dutch License to purchase Indian lands, and the Patent for them, were respectively termed. Governor

6 III. Col. Hist., 6G.

MAMARONECK.

Stuyvesant and his Council thereupon had the purchase as well as Revell's claim thoroughly investigated and testimony taken, and after full deliberation decided in Richbell's favor and issued to him both the " Ground Brief " and the " Transport." After the English conquest and the order directing the confirmation of the Dutch grants to their j)roprietors and before his English Patent of the IGth of October, 1668, was obtained, Richbell recorded these instruments, and he also had recorded the evidence taken before the Dutch Council, his Indian deed of June 6, 1666, confirming that of 1661, and an affidavit of another witness of the original purchase sworn to in 1665.