It is the stone house with a fame ell on the corner of Little Britain and Mt. Airy Roads. A For Sale sign has just been posted. We hope the new owner will treat it with the tender loving care it deserves. Little Britain has lost too many of its historic houses in the last two years in spite of efforts to save them from M T A bulldozers. Wealth is not all in money. Historic heritage can enrich our town if we save houses such as this one.
The farm once had fifty-six acres and was known for years as the Youngblood place. It has an intricate history. John Youngblood of Montgomery was a grandson of Johannes Jung Blot, a Palatine, who had come to Montgomery, not from the Newburgh Palatines, but probably from West Camp in Ulster County. He was the first elder in 1732 of the German Reformed Church, which later joined the Dutch Reformed denomination, and is now known as the Brick Church. Grandson Johannes, or John, had a large family and bought farms for them. In New Windsor, he bought in 1836 the Thomas Belknap farm, the last owner of which was Joseph J. Solowinski. M T A has destroyed the house. His son John probably lived there. On April 5, 1845 he sold it to Job J. Drake and on the same day bought from Drake 11.20 acres on Little Britain Road and proceeded to piece together another farm for his son John. This is the piece of the farm on the south side of the road.
On May 10, 1845 he bought 29.59 acres from Samuel Cleland. This was on the north side of the road. It had been the Mooney farm.
On Nov. 27, 1849 he bought a very small piece, too small for the deed to give the size, from James Van Keuren.
This all that John Youngblood of Montgomery bought for his son John of Little Britain. On April 27, 1871 one eighth of an acre was bought from William R. Weed. The 1950 map of Orange County has the name J. Youngblood on the farm. The 1864 map of New Windsor has Nathaniel Youngblood, 56 acres.
What happened to John? Nathaniel was one of his sons. In 1858 he bought 15.38 acres from William R. Weed, bounded by Henry VanDuzer, Joseph Tilton and William Sayre. This was the northern part of the 56-acre farm. The older John Youngblood made his will in 1850 and gave "to son John’s children the farm on which son John now lives in the town of New Windsor subject never the less to the maintenance of my son John and his wife during their natural lives." By 1864 Nathaniel, one of the said children, was in charge of the whole farm. His father, born in 1807, lived till 1881. He is buried in the Little Britain cemetery, also his wife Rachel Brink of Shawangunk, 1814-1888, and three of their many children.
The small piece from James Van Keuren has some interest. He had bought Sally Ann Humphrey’s little home in 1840. She evidently had money troubles. James Van Keuren was the complainant in a suit, and bid it in for $200. He sold it in 1849 for $275. As nearly as has been discover, it was on the north side of the road and near the road, and surrounded by the Cleland piece. Joseph Vesely was asked if there was any sign of a foundation near where the barn used to be. He says a cellar hole can still be seen west of the barn site, and there is a lilac bush. Sally Ann Humphrey, daughter of Robert and Eleanor Humphrey, was born in 1784 and died in 1867. She is buried in Little Britain cemetery. We wonder where the old lady lived from 1840 to 1867.
The part of the farm north of Little Britain Road had about 45 acres and a barn close to the road. The lines are all blotted out now. The Air Force took it when it expanded small Stewart Field during World War II. Just as with Stewart Field expansion now, so also then. Much land and some buildings that were taken were never used. Where the barn stood, and its farm, are just wasteland.
The purchase from Job J. Drake on the south side of the road is more interesting to us now. It measured 11.20 acres. It had been the farm of Angus McCoy. On the 1798 New Windsor property list he is named Ananias McCoy, size of house not given, "joins land of Enos Chandler and on the road to New Windsor, 10 acres, poor."
Job J. Drake had bought two small pieces from James Mooney, April 1, 1820. The description of both pieces is not definite. Grant Bowers is mentioned as a boundary of one piece. That could put it on the south side of the road, and account for the 1.20 acres to bring the 10 acres up to 11.20, but the Mooney farm was on the north side of the road. So the difference may be by a new survey.
Angus McCoy lived about across the road from Sally Ann Humphrey. Probably the small frame ell of the Vesely home was his whole house. But the 1850 map of Orange County shows another house on the property, further west. Bert Finley says he heard his grandfather Sears say many years ago that he once lived in the house to the west. And it must be the house where A.V.S. Wallace said that Archibald Craig, a weaver, lived. At his funeral his pastor used the appropriate text, "Swifter than a weaver’s shuttle." The 1798 property list gives the dimensions of most of the houses. No house is described on Angus McCoy’s little farm. So that is no help in telling just where he lived. We are assuming the frame ell was his house, and if so, he had a snug little frame house, brick lined, the floorboards wide and a big fireplace with Dutch oven.
He too had money troubles. May 6, 1829 Job J. Drake bought from Henry Miller and Samuel Nichols, overseers of the poor of the town of New Windsor with the consent of four justices of the peace, Charles Ludlow, Joseph J. Houston, Daniel Moores and William Mulliner, Esquires, a ten acre parcel of land lately occupied by Angus McCoy. He paid $500.
The date on the stone part of the Vesely house is Jan. 1830. Since Job J. Drake bought the Angus McCoy property in 1829, he had to be the one who built the stone house. It is not always this easy to be sure of the history of a house.
The Youngbloods owned it 1845 till 1889. Youngblood names appear a number of times in the records of the Little Britain ASSOCIATE Reformed Church.
The children of John Youngblood, Nathaniel, George, Mary E., Josephine, Margaret J., Sarah F. and Celia sold the farm to James Campion in 1889. Bert Finley says that when the aqueduct was being built, Mr. Campion and his fine team of white horses worked on it.
The Campion heirs lost the property. Edward Pierson acquired it in 1911 for $3500. He sold it in 1917 to Andrew Vesely and John Hacunda for $3250. Edward Pierson generally made a better deal than that.
In 1922 Andrew Vesely became sole owner.
In 1935 the Veselys sold six acres at the south to Mary Stone, and in 1937 she sold to Barbara Mason.
So now six acres of the little farm that belonged to Angus McCoy, Job J. Drake, the Youngbloods and the Campions belong to the Masons, and five to the Veselys.
The front entrance porch was added in 1943 but the rest of the house dates unchanged from 1830. It ought to live on. Little Britain’s history is the pride of its people.
Created by Elizabeth Finley Frasier
February 22, 2004
