Lyme, Jefferson, NY

Supervisors

LYME

Many years before the settlement of northern New York, all the water within Stony island and Point Peninsula was called by the Indians "Naionre," by the French Bail de Nivernois, and by the English, Hungry Bay. There are records of visits made to the shore of these waters more then two hundred and fifty years ago. As early as the middle of September, 1615, was the landing of Champlain, with his savage troops, in an expedition against the Iroquois. The army consisted of nearly two thousand red warriors, and less than twenty Frenchmen. Their canoes were left in a sheltered cove, while they pushed across the country on foot to make the attack.

About seventy years later, August, 1864 Marquis de la Barre, encamped, with eighteen or twenty hundred men, a majority of whom were French soldiers, probably on Bail de Nivernois, at a place which he designated in his journal as La Famine. The expedition was against the same Iroquois nations; but he lost nearly all his army by hunger and sickness, whereupon he consummated a treaty with a part of the hostile Indians, and returned at once to New France (Canada).

In less than another generation, Father Charlevoix, a Jesuit priest, visited the French colonies in North America, under the sanction and order of the King of France, and wrote a letter from the Bay of Famine, dated may 16, 1721. He wrote of the "prodigious" eagles, the numerous fish, and "painted" Indians, and the trees that "reached almost to the clouds.

In 1793, Simon Desjardines and Pierre Pharoux were sent out by the Castorland company, of France, to explore the six hundred and twenty-five thousand acres of land in northern New York, which had come into its possession. At New York, they were joined by M. I. Brunel, the celebrated engineer. These three men and their assistants took a bateau at Oswego and started in search of Black river. They seem to have had some trouble in finding it, and were several days about the shores of Henderson and Chaumont bays. A full account of this exploring party will be found elsewhere.

The larger portion of the waters between Stony island and Point Peninsula washes the shores of the town of Lyme. It was erected from Brownville on March 6, 1818, and named from the old Lyme, in Connecticut. It then included all of its present territory, the town of Cape Vincent, and that portion of Penet’s Square which lay west of Clayton. Cape Vincent was set off thirty-one years later. The first public meeting of Lyme township was held in March, 1818, when Richard M. Esselstyn was chosen supervisor, and John Dayan clerk; J. B. Esselstyn, Luther Brittin, and Benjamin Estes were made assessors; Elnathan Judd, John Dayan, and Joseph Rider became commissioners of highways; John M. Tremper, Thaddeus Smith, and Eber Kelsey were elected pound-masters and fence-viewers.

Adelbert A. Getman is the present supervisor, and John Combs the town clerk; the justices of the peace are (1877) George W. Rickett, Jacob Snell, Ira Inman, and Daniel C. Holbrook.

EARLY REGULATIONS

At the first town-meeting it was voted to divide the town into eight rod districts, to give $100 to the poor, and to forbid hogs to run at large without yokes around their necks and rings in their noses; if this last regulation was violated, the owner of the swine was to pay a penalty of fifty cents. Regulations were also made regarding horses and horned cattle; and the seond year (1819) $40 was voted to build two pounds, one at Cape Vincent, and the other at Claumont. It would appear, from the records that the hog law was frequently evaded, for, in 1821, it was voted that all the porkers running at large should have "a sufficient yoke around his or her neck;" and that the fines collected for each violation should be paid over to the commissioners of schools. Bounties were offered for wolves and their whelps; taxes for roads were often levied; and the poor-tax was common, $350 being voted for 1847 at a special meeting. (Jefferson County History, L. H. Everts, 1878)

Transcribed by Holice B. Young

Html by Debbie

December 26, 1999

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