Stuyvesant's Pluck
The ire of the governor was fiercely kindled by the revolutionary movement in his capital. He stormed and threatened, but prudently yielded to the demands of the people that he should issue a call for another convention, and so give legal sanction for the election of delegates thereto. These met in New Amsterdam on the 10th of December, 1653. Of the eight districts represented, four were Dutch and four were English. Of the nineteen delegates, ten were of Dutch and nine were of English nativity. As this was the first real representative assembly in the great State of New York in its infancy--now an empire containing about five million souls--it seems proper to give here the names of the delegates, and the districts they represented. They were as follows:
From the capital (New Amsterdam), Van Hattem, Kregier, and Van de Grist; from Breucklen (Brooklyn), Lubbertsen, Van der Beeck, and Beeckman; from Flushing, Hicks and Flake; from Newtown, Coe and Hazard; from Heemstede (Hempstead), Washburne and Somers; from Amersfoort, (Flatlands), Wolfertsen, Strycker, and Swartwout; from Midwout (Flatbush), Elbertsen and Spicer; and from Gravesend, Baxter and Hubbard. Baxter was the English secretary of the colony, and led the English delegates.
The object of the Convention was to form and adopt a remonstrance against the tyrannous rule of the governor. It was drawn by Baxter. After expressions of loyalty to the States-General, it proceeded with a statement, under six heads, of the grievances endured by the colonists. It was a severe indictment of Stuyvesant for mal-administration or bad management of public affairs. The paper was signed by all the delegates and sent to the governor, with a demand for a "categorical answer" to each of its heads.
Stuyvesant met this severe document with his usual pluck. He denied the right of some of the delegates to seats in the Convention. He denounced the whole thing as the wicked work of the English, and doubted whether "George Baxter, the author, understood what he was about." He wanted to know if there was no one among the Dutch in New Netherland "sagacious and expert enough to draw up a remonstrance to the director and council," and severely reprimanded the city government of New Amsterdam for seizing "this dangerous opportunity for conspiring with the English [with whom Holland was then at war], who were ever hatching mischief but never performing their promises, and who might to-morrow ally themselves with the North," meaning Sweden and Denmark.
The Convention was not to be silenced by bluster or threats. They told the governor by the mouth of Beeckman, of Brooklyn, that if he refused to consider the several points of the remonstrance, they would appeal to the States-General. At this threat the governor took fire, and, seizing his cane, ordered Beeckman to leave his presence. The plucky ambassador folded his arms and silently defied the magistrate. When Stuyvesant's wrath had subsided, he politely begged the representative to excuse his sudden ebullition of passion and receive assurances of his personal regard. But he was not so complaisant with the Convention as a body. He ordered them to disperse on pain of his "high displeasure." He said, "We derive our authority from God and the Company, not from a few ignorant subjects; and we, alone, can call the inhabitants together." The Convention executed their threat by sending an advocate to Holland, with papers, to ask the reforms which their enumerated grievances demanded.
In the midst of these domestic troubles, the tranquillity of Stuyvesant's foreign relations was disturbed. Governor Printz had returned to Sweden, and in his place was John Risingh, a more warlike magistrate, who came to the Delaware with some soldiers under the bold Swen Schute. They soon appeared before Fort Cassimer and demanded its surrender. "I have no powder; what can I do?" said Bikker, the commander, to the Dutch residents, who fled to the fort for protection. Bikker went out an hour afterward, leaving the gate of the fort wide open, and shook hands with Schute and his men, welcoming them as friends. The Swedes fired two shots over the fort in token of its capture, and then blotting out its Dutch garrison and its name, called it Fort Trinity. The surrender occurred on Trinity Sunday, 1654.
When news of this event reached Stuyvesant, he was enraged and perplexed. He was expecting an attack from the English. They did not come, and the governor prepared to wipe out the stain on Belgic prowess by that "infamous surrender." After a day of fasting and prayer, and after a sermon on the first Sunday in September, the following year (1655), seven vessels, carrying more than six hundred soldiers, sailed from New Amsterdam for the Delaware, under the immediate command of Stuyvesant. His flagship was The Balance. Some of his civil officers, and the pastor of the church, were with him. They landed on the beach between Fort Cassimer and Fort Christina near Wilmington. An ensign with a drum was sent to demand the surrender of the former. Schute complied the next day, and in the presence of Stuyvesant and his suite, he drank the health of the governor in a glass of Rhenish wine. So ended the bloodless expedition against Fort Cassimer; and before the end of the month, the conquest of New Sweden was accomplished. Like Alfred of England, Stuyvesant wisely made citizens of the conquered, and they became loyal friends of the Dutch.