Ruth Piwonkar
???.piwonka@berk.com
Kinderhook, New York
Copyright 1999

Ruth sent me this via E-Mail [Robin F.].  

I have a copy of a curious piece of family history and genealogical 
research that I will transcribe that pertains to James Livingston.  

He was a grand-nephew of Robert Livingston, First Lord of Livingston 
manor -- and likely the nephew of 'Robert Livingston the Nephew' 
so-called (to keep him distinguished from  his uncle) who also came 
to Albany, New York.  

Robert the Nephew (i.e., a nephew to Robert the First Lord / a son of
Robert's brother) married Margareta Schuyler, while Robert First Lord 
had married Alida Schuyler.

The document was sent to me at Columbia County Historical Society
as 'Christmas Greeting 1978' by one Evelyn P.  Meyers, who had evidently
done the research.  I gather that she sent copies to family and other
researchers as well.  There was no other information with it.  However,
it does seem to give some significant information -- so I copy it
out for what it is worth.  (Mrs.  Meyers seemed to think that they lived
in Kinderhook, too -- but I would question that ...  ?? But it could
be right.) 

BEGIN LONG QUOTE (autobiography):
================================

In Light of the present meagre document it may have been something 
like this with our first ancestor in America: JAMES LIVINGSTON.

They tell me I was born in the far reaching farming country around 
Rotterdam in the Low Country at the turn of the year [Jan.] 1703.  

My parents had married here and made their modest living.  I was the 
first child of this union to live.  My father, a Scottish bookbinder, 
took us to Edinburgh in March 1703 for sentimental reasons: he wanted 
his namesake baptized in the old kirk of the Covenant in Midlothian 
Parish of Edinburgh where he himself had been churched.

Generations of Livingstons had trod these streets, brought forth
fruit after their kind and died.  One had gone to fame and fortune
in the new world.  My great-grandfather, Domine John Livingston, the
eminent Scottish Divine, had preached in that church until the religious
troubles made a fugitive of him to Ireland, England and Holland.

Twice he had even tried to get to America.  My grandfather, William
Livingston [would be an older brother of Robert First Lord], lived
his long life as a merchant in Edinburgh and latterly was Clerk to
the Sessions.  He was good on the family history, as somebody every
now and then is.  He sent a summary of it to his youngest brother
in America somewhat before my time [yes, this letter survives in
the Livingston-Redmond Manuscripts], for William died in 1700.  

Of his children were two sons: Andrew and my father, James, who were
both involved in that awful Darien Disaster [which was key to Scots
immigration to New York about 1702/1703].  My father was lucky enough
to get a desk job but Uncle Andrew was a doctor and had some of the
disaster to his own person, dying long years after in a Spanish prison
in Caracas.  My father stayed on Scottish soil through all five years
of this bubble which absorbed so much of the risk of capital of our
country.  When I was a young boy, however, my father received a cash
indemniy of no great proportion but he put it by and it stood me
in good stead much later.  After this fiasco he went into bookbinding
and took his chances in Rotterdam, where so many of our kin operated.

James Livingston, my father, was just nicely launched on his business
when a little country damsel name Maria Roos came on his scene.  Her
folks lived just out in the vast hinterland about Rotterdam growing
the city's food.  The Roos fell so strangely on the old domine's ear
at my baptism that it all but unnerved him -- and that and the whiskey
that kept his old bones moving in the icy kirk.  He wrote down something
like Ruis or Ross, less heathenish.  We stayed a few weeks in Scotland
visiting my father's people and business connections.  The dour land
did for my mother.  A short time after our return to Rotterdam she
died leaving my father with a two month old bairn.  Mother's relatives
took me back to their farm for a few years until father married Sarah.

He had known her casually but when she came over to our colony [i.e,
the Scots colony at Rotterdam] the relationship deepened.  She was
that jewel of a woman who adored both her husband and his wee bairn
and I grew into the age of reason knowing no other as mother.  She
was a bit older than father but comely and not penniless.  All through
my childhood my visits to the farm were bright spots that seemed
to enhance that was born in me from my mother's side.  God knows the
Livingstons had been merchants and ministers and anything else but
farmers.  They looked upon my penchant as something regrettable.  To
say the least it was a way of life they could not teach me a thing
about; but I picked up all I need, as it turned out.  Other means
of livelihood had been tried out on me to no avail.  In my father's
shop I hated the smell of textile and glue and hated just being indoors.

The farms I had loved had been taken over by a new generation of
eldest sons.  I had a lot of thinking to do about what was to become
of me.  There were always tales of America, my father and my stepmother
having relatives who were doing well there.  I would not have to go
cold turkey.  One day at the kirk were some Palatines who were waiting
passage America.  By merest fluke I got to visit with one Catharina
Coans [Kuhn] and my fate was sealed.  It was suddenly clear to me that 
I had best to go to New York on the ship with these people.  Some of
them had relatives there too, and not so far from mine.  Catharina
was of good farm stock and that suited me to a tee.  We had plenty
to talk about.  Her Plattdeutsch was not too different in the spoken
form from Dutch.  Suffice it to say that we understood each other.

I pried loose my funds and got passage to New York on the ---------
[ship name not given].  The trip was a penance to most but I was a
veteran of the English Channel, the roughest sail in the world, so
I had sea legs.  The Palatines were headed for countrymen and relatives
up the Hudson River short of Albany.  I had written to my great uncle
Robert [no letter survives in Livingston Redmond manuscripts...] but 
had no time to wait for a rely; so I had no assurances, really.  I stuck
with the German people and Catharina.  Most of them went to Germantown,
but the Kuhns and a few others knew of some opportunities in Kinderhook,
so that is where we started life in the new world.  

The first news I had upon arrival was bad; my old uncle had died 
[Robert Livingston (First Lord) died in 1728].  I called at the 
great house but they all seemed distracted.  

Anyway, I was not a charity case but able to manage in a modest way; 
so I did not often shadow their doorstep, especially after I learned 
of all the animosity between my relatives and the Germans.  

In one part of the Kinderhook District was a parcel of lands that
people just went ahead and settled upon and farmed because no one
had ever been able to say for sure where its boundaries were.

Something was always brewing about getting a better title; but mean-
while it served us to make a living.  Seeing that hog raising was
good enough for my well-off uncle and that it was something I had
some experience in, I latch onto some wettish land between two creeks.
Nobody else challenged me; but I did speak to some Indians about it.  

This particular land was on or off the farthest edge of my uncles
tract [Livingston Manor ... ??] and there had been long dispute over
it with the patron Van Rensselaer.  However, it turned out that both
were only too glad to claim me for a settler while I raised my pigs
and wheat after marrying my little Palatine, that is.  We had posted
our banns soon after arriving here and married that same year.  I
saw little of my relatives.  They were plenty busy, as was I with
immediate concerns.  Also they were not about to cozy up to any Palatine.

They went their way and I went mine without really bad blood between
us.  In fact, they needed me, more than I needed them.  Meanwhile our
first baby, a girl, lived but a year and died.  With the rest we had
better luck.  I was still hoping to get a proper title to the land
we had become attached to.  We were good friends with all our neighbors,
sharing their trials and tribuations.  We were all in the same 
predicament and always trying to figure out ways out of it.  I had 
more education than most them and they looked up to me for that as 
well as for my independence of my lordly relatives.  

END OF LONG QUOTE (autobiography).


This is Ruth P. talking: 

I have a few observations about this.  Mrs.  Meyers did some good 
research into the background.  The land title and disputes in
Kinderhook are accurately characterized, but not known in documentation
until the 1760s-90s.  They are not known to have been going on in
the 1720s, 30s, and 40s.  James Livingston does not appear on the
1744 tax list for Kinderhook.  -- It is possible, but I have no idea
whether his coming in 1728 is a fact or a surmise.  -- You may know
more about this from the Kuhn family angle.  ** I hope this is some
new information for you Robin -- although it lacks documentation,
I think Mrs.  Meyer's 'article' probably does some solid research
-- although there must be some 'fictionalizing' that has gone on
as well.  

All for now.
Ruth P.