Cemeteries – Freeport History Timeline

A house is built in the vicinity of 26 Cottage Court

kip — Wed, 10 Apr 2013 05:26:13 +0000

c 1825

In 1845, a journal entry by Daniel M Tredwell describes the house as having been erected twenty years earlier by a doctor from Manhattan who was said to have been very rich and had mysteriously disappeared after three years. It was also claimed that a woman was murdered there sometime after that. Tredwell approximates the house is two hundred feet south of the Merrick Road. A private cemetery is on the north side of the road and to the west of George Smith’s homestead.

Personal Reminiscences of Men and Things on Long Island

photo c 2007

Freeport Long Island History: Lost Freeport

A ‘ghost’ is captured at the house in the vicinity of 26 Cottage Court

kip — Wed, 10 Apr 2013 06:20:53 +0000

Journal entries by Daniel M Tredwell refer to much hearsay about white vapory specters that appear in this area. The gaping abandoned house stands two hundred feet to the south of Merrick Road and the cemetery is on the north side. The area is desolate and overgrown. The next houses on the way home for Tredwell at that time would be the Carman homestead south of the road near present Long Beach Avenue and then Benedict’s poor house at Coe’s Neck Road (Bayview Avenue).

After an active winter of ghost demonstrations that become so frequent and fragrant, Jim Raynor and Tom Southard lay in ambush several times before finally entrapping a simple fellow well known in the neighborhood. The man is put on exhibition in his ghost toggery upstairs at the store of Riley Raynor, where Justice Squire Smith holds court, and he is charged with disturbing the peace.

Personal Reminiscences of Men and Things on Long Island

William Poole aka Bill the Butcher dies

kip — Sat, 25 May 2013 20:23:19 +0000

– In his home on Christopher Street in Manhattan, from a gunshot wound inflicted by Louis “Lew” Baker on February 25 at Stanwix Hall (a recently opened barroom on Broadway near Prince Street). Poole is a leader of the Know Nothing political party, a member of the Bowery Boys gang and a bare knuckle boxer.

Poole’s assassin, Baker is an associate of John Morrisey, another boxer, who was recently beaten severely by Poole during a fisticuffs battle on a wharf at the foot of Amos Street on the North River (West 10th Street on the Hudson River). Poole left the dock on a rowboat, after quickly defeating Morrisey, and a free for all ensued between both men’s gangs.

Morrisey Terribly Beaten and Left Friendless

Poole, known to throw knives from twenty feet through wood an inch thick, manages to get on his feet after being shot in the leg, abdomen and heart and throw a knife at Baker as he runs for his life. It narrowly misses Baker and solidly lodges in the door jam as he exits. Poole lives for two more weeks with the bullet in his heart. His last words on his deathbed to his sons and friends are “goodbye boys, I die a true American”.

Poole is buried in Brooklyn’s Green-Wood Cemetery (section 34, lot 9165) on March 11. His funeral is attended by 6,000 people and 6 brass bands. So many people stand on the roofs to watch the procession to the ferry, waiting to take his body to Brooklyn, it is reported that one house collapses killing four people.

– Poole is later the inspiration for the character William “Bill the Butcher” Cutting in Martin Scorsese’s 2002 film Gangs of New York

A house is noted in the vicinity of 26 Cottage Court

kip — Wed, 10 Apr 2013 05:33:44 +0000

On a Beers map of Freeport from 1873 a house belonging to Samuel S Carman is approximately 200 feet south of Fulton Street (Merrick Road). A private cemetery is directly opposite on the north side of the road.

Killed At A Cemetery Gate

kip — Sun, 22 Jul 2012 18:51:49 +0000

Man Thrown From Carriage Dies Instantly

First Presbyterian Church Cemetery is condemned and relocated

kip — Wed, 15 May 2013 01:28:05 +0000

c 1920

Located north of the First Presbyterian Church on Church Street and east of the high school on the corner of Pine and Grove Streets. A law is passed to transfer the 1,000 bodies.

Disinterments from Presbyterian Cemetery to Greenfield Cemetery – All Records

General Laws of the State of New York

Laws of the State of New York