In Disbrow's deed of May 22, 1661, to the lands between the Byram River and Blind Brook, mention is made of "the bounds of Hastings on the south and southwest," which indicates that at that early date the island village had already been inaugurated and named. The following list of all the inhabitants of Hastings (the second town organized in Westchester County) whose names have come down to us is taken from Baird: Peter Disbrow, John (Joe, Thomas Stud well, John Bndd, William Odell, liichard Vowles, Samuel Ailing, Robert Hudson, John Brondish, Frederick Harminson, Thomas Applebe, Philip Galpin, George (Mere, John Jackson, and Walter Jackson. It will be observed that all these, with one exception (Clere), are good English names. This settlement, only one hour's sail from Greenwich, was too far removed from New Amsterdam to excite the jealous notice and protest of Director Stuyvesant, although it lay considerably to the west of the provisional boundary line marked off in the articles of 1 <;.">(>. Its founders apparently removed there with no other object than to secure homes and plantations, holding themselves in readiness, however, like those of Westchester, to come under the Connecticut government in due time. The oldest Hastings town document that has been preserved is a declaration of allegiance to "Charles the Second, our lawful lord and king," dated July 26, 1662. At the same period when the people of

HISTORY

WESTCHESTER

COUNTY

Westchester were informed that their territory belonged to the Colony of Connecticut, and instructed to act accordingly, like notification was sent to Hastings. Early in 1663 the townsmen, at a public meeting, appointed Richard Yowles as constable, who went to Hartford and was duly qualified. John Budd was selected as the first deputy to the Connecticut general court, which body, on the 8th of October, 1663, designated him as commissioner for the Town of Hastings with " magistraticall power." The Island of Manussing, only one mile in length, was in the course of two or three years found inadequate for the growing requirements of the colonists, and they began to build up a new settlement on the mainland.