Description:

Revolutionary War

Chancellor Robert Livingston Thanks Pierre Van Cortlandt for His Tribute to Livingston’s Father

 

[REVOLUTIONARY WAR ROBERT R. LIVINGSTON, Autograph Draft Letter, to Pierre Van Cortlandt, 1776, n.p.  1 p., 6.5" x 8". Expected folds; some paper loss at bottom edge not affecting text. Ex-Charles I. Forbes.

 

Complete Transcript

                                                                        1776

Sir

            I had the honour of your Letter with yr kind condolence on the death of my father & am extreamly obliged by your favourable mention of him. as his life was a continued endeavor to the deserve the good opinion of his country so the most grateful offering to his memory is the commemoration of free & good men

            The sentiments you are pleased to express of me require my most grateful acknowledgments & will I hope animate me to merrit your approbation, which I shall ever think a [record? adequate to the worthyest actions.

            My Brother has finished the powder mill & will be obliged to you for procuring him the necessary materials to render it as useful to the publick as we wish it to be.

                                                                        I am Sir your’s & the Gent of the

Committees most &c.

 

Historical Background

“Judge” Robert R. Livingston (1718-1775) died on December 9, 1775. His oldest son “Chancellor” Robert R. Livingston wrote this letter to Committee of Safety Chairman Pierre Van Cortlandt, probably early in 1776, thanking Van Cortlandt for his tribute to the elder Livingston.

 

Chancellor Livingston’s younger brother John R. Livingston (1755-1851) took over their father’s gun powder mill during the Revolutionary War, and the Chancellor seeks Van Cortlandt’s aid to “render it as useful to the publick as we wish it to be.”

 

On the afternoon of July 9, 1776, at the Court House in White Plains, New York, Colonel Pierre Van Cortlandt was both president and one of eleven deputies from Westchester County at a meeting of New York’s Fourth Provincial Congress, where they voted to approve the Declaration of Independence. Because New York’s delegation to the Second Continental Congress in Philadelphia lacked specific instructions from its Provincial Congress, it was the only delegation to abstain from the July 2 vote on the independence resolution. New York’s stance on independence was crucial, partly because of the size and strategic importance of the colony, but also because the abstention prevented the vote from being unanimous. Van Cortlandt’s and the other deputies’ votes at White Plains allowed the Declaration of Independence to be “the unanimous declaration of the thirteen United States of America.”

 

 

Robert Robert Livingston (“the Chancellor”) (1746-1813) was born in New York City and graduated from King’s College (Columbia University) in 1765. Admitted to the bar in 1770, he began a law practice and soon identified himself with the anti-colonial Whig Party. In June 1776, as a representative of New York at the Second Continental Congress, he was a member of the Committee of Five (along with John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, and Roger Sherman) who drafted the Declaration of Independence. From 1777 to 1801, he was Chancellor of New York, the highest judicial officer in the state. He also served as the first U.S. Secretary of Foreign Affairs under the Articles of Confederation from 1781 to 1783.  In 1801, President Thomas Jefferson appointed Livingston as U.S. minister to France, where he negotiated the Louisiana Purchase of 1803. He also met Robert Fulton, with whom he developed the first viable steamboat, which operated on the Hudson River.

 

Pierre Van Cortlandt (1721-1814) was born in New York City. In 1748, he inherited the Van Cortlandt Manor House and surrounding lands from his father and developed much of the land into tenant farms. He served in the New York Assembly from 1768 to 1775, then as a member of the Second Provincial Congress from 1775 to 1776 and as Chairman of its Committee of Safety in 1776. He represented Westchester County in all four Provincial Congresses and was presiding officer of the last three. He was Vice President and then President of the Constitutional Convention of the State of New York (1776-1777) and President of the First Council of Safety (1777). He served as Lieutenant Governor of New York from 1777 to 1795. During the Revolutionary War, Lieutenant Governor Van Cortlandt commanded the Third Westchester Militia Regiment as colonel and later as general. With Governor George Clinton away in military service, Van Cortlandt directed the war effort of New York’s revolutionary government. In 1787, he served as president of the New York ratifying convention for the U.S. Constitution.

 

 

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