Home / Bolton, Reginald Pelham. Indian Paths in the Great Metropolis. Indian Notes and Monographs, Vol. II, No. 7. New York: Museum of the American Indian, Heye Foundation, 1922. / Passage

Indian Paths in the Great Metropolis

Bolton, Reginald Pelham. Indian Paths in the Great Metropolis. Indian Notes and Monographs, Vol. II, No. 7. New York: Museum of the American Indian, Heye Foundation, 1922. 312 words

Barren island, or Equendito, which is also contiguous to the tracts of meadow, had been already disposed of by another transaction, in the previous month of April, and on Mill island, also adjoining, the family of Captain John Schenck had been settled for ten years, at Avenue V and East 62d street. We may therefore reasonably presume that the village (50) to which the natives clung, as shown by a later deed, at least* until 1684, was known as Shanscomacocke. The site was then included within the tract known as Makeopaca, which in that year was confirmed to the inhabitants of Gravesend. By this deed, natives of the Gravesend district, who we may assume to have been those still resi-

AND MONOGRAPHS

INDIAN PATHS

dent on the Gerritsen basin village-site, confirmed the sale of the northern part of the area which was included within the township of Gravesend. The bounds of Makeopaca, "a great cleared space," are carefully detailed, and evidently included all of the area within the township (north of the line of the Gravesend Neck road, and of Lake lane) which had not been specifically included in those prior deals by which the site of the village, the Narrioch neck (69), and Mannahanning, or Coney island, had been secured by the white settlers. Makeopaca began at "the most eastward end of the beach called by the Indians Moeung, or "black miry place," that is, at the head of Harway basin, where the old Beach lane reached Gravesend bay. It extended eastward along the Gravesend Neck road as far as Strome kill, or Gerritsen basin, thus taking in the village-site at that place (50) . Passing up this creek the bounds extended "from the head of said creek through the middle of the meadow [between Avenues P and Q], till they come to a white oak tree standing by the Flatland