Long Islanders are defined by their waters, and it was the same for those living there in 1776. It was just about the only way to transport food, supplies and information that was vital to the American Revolution.
WSHU’s Sabrina Garone spoke with Town of Brookhaven Historian Barbara Russell. She says there’s a lot of Long Island history that’s missing from the textbooks.
WSHU: What is Long Island like during this time? And this might sound like a silly question, but is the Town of Brookhaven and Suffolk County even established at this point?
BR: The Town of Brookhaven was established in 1655, and the county not too much later. It was predominantly agricultural, rural. Suffolk County did exist, and most of its towns. Travel, as you can imagine, was kind of difficult. Roads were mostly dirt, so it was horse and wagon or water — certainly to travel north to Connecticut across Long Island Sound, to the East End, and to the west end towards the present city. Our founding settlers in 1655 all came by water to what's now the little hamlet of Setauket. I believe one came from the Town of Southold, and the others from Connecticut. It was also important for commerce. An early Brookhaven story is that we did not have a mill here, and we would take our corn and wheat over to Connecticut to have it ground. And unfortunately, on one of the return trips, a few of the settlers drowned. So by the mid-17th century, we had to build a mill right here in Setauket by the original settlement.
WSHU: I want to hear a little more about the founding of the Town of Brookhaven. I'm surprised to hear you say that it was established before Suffolk County. Could you tell me more?
BR: Well, we still have the deed from 1655. I believe it was seven settlers, and they were looking for land. They bought approximately 35 acres between what's now Stony Brook and Mount Sinai from the Native Americans, which were called the Setalcott. That's where the name Setauket comes from, so that's how Brookhaven got started.
WSHU: And to jump ahead to the American Revolution, are people in the Town of Brookhaven involved or are they just going about their day-to-day? Is there a lot of enthusiasm on Long Island?
BR: We were getting ready! We had a local militia. You've probably heard the name William Floyd — he lived down in what's now Mastic in Suffolk County, and he was a delegate to the Continental Congress in Philadelphia. As a matter of fact, he's one of four signers of the Declaration of Independence from New York, and the only one from Suffolk County. Even though news traveled a lot slower than it does now, but people were aware.
Think about the Battle of Long Island, also known as the Battle of Brooklyn because that's where it took place. After that, the British occupied New York and Long Island for eight years. So Long Islanders have a unique story to tell. We really became the bread basket for New York City. We had an ample supply of livestock, food growing. And the British soldiers who were here supposed to purchase this, I think they didn't always purchase it. There are many, many stories on Long Island of people questioned as to why they were traveling here or there. Many of our residents in Brookhaven had to leave Long Island for safety, including the family of William Floyd and many others. Many of them went to Connecticut.
WSHU: That's interesting, why Connecticut?
BR: Easy to get to. Only about 20 miles across the Sound, and you couldn't go through New York City, because that was all British occupied, too. Just another example of how important the water was.
WSHU: Are there any stories you could share that people might be surprised to learn about Brookhaven during this time? Some things that get overlooked in the history books?
BR: You probably have heard about the Culper Spy Ring — and it did get overlooked for many, many years — that operated on Long Island. It was started by Benjamin Tallmadge, a native of Setauket. He became a patriot solider, and once the British took over New York, there was no way for General Washington to get information. He was in Westchester, he was in New Jersey, and Tallmadge set up a ring. They needed information out of New York City — what was the size of the troops, what were the plans for the troop movements? It got information out of New York City, out to Long Island, and then across the Sound, and then it would be taken by courier to Tallmadge.
Now, how did they get this information back and forth from New York to Setauket, which is a good 60 miles? One of the ways was there was a man in Setauket who ran a tavern, Austin Rowe. And he had a reason to go into the city, to get supplies for his tavern. And he would bring the information out, stash it, and it would be delivered to a boatman who came across Long Island Sound in a whale boat to take it to Connecticut.
The entire story is really fascinating, and it pretty much stayed on Long Island for many, many years until a few books were written about it and brought this story out in the open. You know, in New York State history, you always hear about the Battle of Saratoga, but the books never covered the Culper Spy Ring. Hopefully there will be more things that come out. What else don't we know? What else haven't we studied? Like I said, when Brookhaven was settled in 1655, there were Native Americans here. What was their role? Did some of them travel with these families that left Brookhaven? Were they left here to run these farms? There's still a lot we don't know and hopefully a lot of this will come out.
WSHU: That brings me to my next question — I wanted to ask you about the importance of knowing our local history. Not just our state, but really zooming in on our town, or Suffolk County. Could you speak to that a little more?
BR: If you don't know the history, you don't know how we got where we are. Someone might say to me, "is it really true that we had a World War I army camp in Brookhaven?" Yes, it was known as Camp Upton, and it's what we know today as Brookhaven National Laboratory. If you only know it as Brookhaven Lab, you don't know how it really started. The post-World War II history with the suburban sprawl — people are amazed that students used to have to travel 20 miles to go to high school. This was not that long ago! There's so much history here on Long Island, you don't have to go back to 1655. You can go back to 1955 and see the difference. It's not just Revolutionary history — it's agricultural history, Native American history, socio-economic history. Whatever your interest is, there's a history to learn about on Long Island.
