LITTLE BRITAIN—Matthew McDowell came to Little Britain about 1735. This date is given for him in his testifying in the Wawayanda vs. Cheesek-ook hearing held in Chester in 1785. Notes of that hearing are published in HISTORICAL PAPERS no. 11 of the Historical Society of Newburgh Bay and the Highlands, 1904. He bought lot number one, 150 acres, of the John Johnston patent. Later he bought lot number three. He died in 1787. His will was recorded in 1803, in which he left lot number one to his older son Thomas.
Thomas McDowell died in 1806 without a will. In the division of his property among his four sons and two daughters, the northwest corner of the John Johnston patent, a farm of seventy-five acres, was assigned to Isaac.
Isaac McDowell was born in 1789. By 1820 he had married Mary Hamilton, daughter of James and Sarah Hamilton of the tavern on the Square, had two sons and two daughters, lost his wife in 1818, had other land, and was so badly in debt that he turned all his assets and debts over to his brother, John M. McDowell and town clerk William Mulliner, giving them power of attorney to manage his financial mess and pay his debts. In those days one could not go into bankruptcy. Instead, he went to debtor’s prison. This, Isaac McDowell was avoiding. This is recorded in Goshen, Liber U. Of deeds, page 142. How long he lived on this farm we do not know. He was seventeen years old when he inherited it. When he was twenty-one years old, in 1810, his wife inherited a farm from her mother. They probably lived there, for in 1816 he rented his farm to James Alexander the weaver, who stayed there until 1828.
James Alexander brought a touch of glamour to the farm. Here he did some of the finest weaving known then in an age of many weavers, and known now by the blue and white coverlets which are collectors’ pieces. The first ingrain carpet in America was woven on this farm by one of the Alexander sons. It took a prize at the county fair. Rev. James Scrimgeour, third pastor of the Little Britain Associate Reformed Church boarded with the Alexanders for several years, so the house served as a parsonage for a while.
John M. McDowell died in 1825. William Mulliner was clerk of the town of New Windsor 1800-1823, 1824-1828. He died in 1831. We assume he was unable to continue to manage Isaac McDowell’s affairs, for in 1829 the farm was sold by Daniel McAnnally to Linus McCabe for $3000. Daniel McAnnally was a friend of the Hamilton family. This is shown by Sarah Hamilton’s mention of him in her will where she called him ‘my much respected friend."
Sarah Hamilton died in 1810. She wrote in her will, made less than a month before she died, "I also devise and bequeath unto my said daughter Mary the wife of Isaac McDowell the farm I now live on, purchased by my father (Isaac Belknap) of Neal McCarty, also the farm I purchased of Jonas Foshee contining about thirty acres of land adjoining the farm I now live on and situated in the said town of New Windsor ...I also devise and bequeath unto my much respected friend Dan McAnnally my farm containing about 51 acres of land lying in the town of Newburgh..." None of these was the tavern farm. This she left to her four children. In a letter from Martha Jane Humphrey Hannahs, granddaughter of Linus McCabe to A.V.S. Wallace, she said that Linus McCabe came from Ireland, the only one of his family to come. He taught school for some years, was thrifty, and in 1829 was able to buy the Isaac McDowell farm. He married Jane Fulton and they had four children, Thomas, Mary Jane, Harriet and Martha. Thomas bought sixty acres of land April 1, 1841 from James Stewart. It joined the Linus McCabe farm. It was another part of the original McDowell lot number one. Harriet married Daniel Conway, and they occupied her father’s farm after his death. He died in 1848 and his estate was settled by his brother in law, Thomas I. Fulton. Mary Jane married George Clinton Humphrey. One of their sons was named Goldsmith. Martha died in her late teens.
On April 1, 1870 Harriet Conway, wife of Daniel Conway sold to Mary Jane Humphrey and Goldsmith Humphrey for $7125 "the farm of which Linus McCabe deceased died seized...75 acres." On March 31, 1883 Mary Jane Humphrey of Newburgh sold her right in the farm to Goldsmith Humphrey for $1900. Goldsmith Humphrey being a grandson of Linus McCabe, knew the farm he bought, and he took great pride in it. A.V.S. Wallace in his REV. ROBERT H. WALLACE D.D. AND THE LITTLE BRITAIN COUNTY wrote thus of the Humphreys, "Mrs. Humphrey was a daughter of Mr. Nathaniel Brown. She was a superior person. The home was a delightful one and the farm was under fine cultivation and one of the most productive in the vicinity under Mr. Humphrey’s management, for he was a progressive farmer. He was in local political life, for many terms serving as a member of the town board as justice of the peace. On the death of Mrs. Humphrey and the two older children, he left the farm and conducted the Little Britain store for several years." Mr. Humphrey was an earnest Christian and an elder in the Little Britain Church.
Mr. Humphrey seems to have rented the farm for a while to Thomas Armstrong, for he began living there in 1899. On April 1, 1904, Mr. Humphrey and his second wife, Georgianna Mapes, sold it to Mr. Armstrong for $3000.
Mr. Armstrong had come from Ireland, and went back and forth several times. On one of the trips he got himself a wife, Elizabeth Armstrong by name. They were hard working farmers, and raised not only farm crops but three sons. Mr. Armstrong livened his farm work by writing poetry. One of his poems appeared in an earlier Little Britain article. He too was an elder in the Little Britain church.
Mr. Thomas Armstrong died in 1951, and the farm
came into the possession of his youngest son, T. Robert. He had
to sell part 
of it
to the government for Stewart Field housing. In 1965 he sold the
rest of it to a group that calls itself Denniston’s
Crossing, according to Mr. Arthur Mahary. The significance of
that name is hard to understand, for Denniston’s Crossing
was a milk train stop where the Ontario and Western Railroad
crossed Jackson Ave. South at the farm where four generations of
Dennistons lived. The farm is still thought of as the Armstrong
farm.
Created by Elizabeth Finley Frasier
July 17, 2005
