In the year 1609, Sir Henry Hudson visited our coast in the yacht or ship Half Moon, a vessel of about eighty tons burthen. About the last of August he entered the Delaware Bay, but finding the navigation dangerous he soon left without going ashore. After getting out to sea he stood north-eastwardly and after awhile hauled in and made the land probably not far distant from Great Egg Harbor. The journal or log book of this vessel was kept by the mate, Alfred Juet, and as it contains the first notices of Monmouth county by the whites, remarks about the country, its inhabitants and productions, first landing, and other interesting matter, an extract is herewith given, commencing with September 2d. 1609, when the Half Moon made land near Egg Harbor. The same day, it will be seen, the ship passed Barnegat Inlet, and at night anchored near the beach within sight of the Highlands.

Their first impression of old Monmouth, it will be seen, was "that it is a very good land to fall in with, and a pleasant land to see;" an opinion which in the minds of our people at the present day shows that good sense and correct judgment were not lacking in Sir Henry Hudson and his fellow voyagers!

Extract from the Log-Book of the Half Moon.

Sept. 2d, 1609.— When the sun arose we steered north again and saw land from the west by north to the north-west, all alike, broken islands, and our soundings were eleven fathoms and ten fathoms. The course along the land we found to be north-east by north. From the land which we first had sight of until we came to a great lake of water, as we could judge it to be, (Barnegat Bay,) being drowned land which made it rise like islands, which was in Length ten leagues. The mouth of the lake (Barnegat Inlet) had many shoals, and the sea breaks upon them as it is cast out of the mouth of it. And from that lake or bay the land lies north by east, and we had a great stream out of the bay, and from thence our soundings was ten fathoms two leagues from land. At five o'clock we anchored, being light wind, and rode in eight fathoms water ; the night was fair. This night I found the land to haul the compass eight degrees. Far to the northward of us we saw high hills (Highland?); for the day before we found not above two degrees of variation.

This is a very good land to fall in with and a pleasant land to see.

Sept. 3d.— The morning misty until ten o'clock; then it cleared and the wind came to the south-southeast, so we weighed and stood northward. The land is very pleasant and high and bold to fall withal. At three o'clock in the afternoon Ave came to three great rivers (Narrows, Rockaway Inlet and the Raritan), so we stood along the northward (Rockaway Inlet,) thinking to have gone in, but we found it to have a very shoal bar before it for we had but ten feet water. Then we cast about to the southward and found two fathoms, three fathoms and three and a quarter, till we came to the southern side of them, then we had five and six fathoms and returned in an hour and a half. So we weighed and went in and rode in five fathoms, ooze ground, and saw many salmons and mullets and rays very great. The height is 40 deg. 30 min. (Latitude.)

Sept. 4th.— In the morning as soon as the day was light, we saw that it was good riding farther up; so we sent our boat to sound, and found that it was a very good harbor and four or five fathoms, two cable lengths from the shore. Then we weighed and went in with our ship. Then our boat went on land with our net to fish, and caught ten great mullets of a foot and a half long, a plaice and a ray as great as four men could haul into the ship. So we trimmed our boat and rode still all day. At night the wind blew hard at the north-west, and our anchor came home, and we drove on shore, but took no hurt, and thank God, for the ground is soft sand and ooze. This day the people of the country came aboard of us and seemed very glad of our coming, and brought green tobacco leaves and gave us of it for knives and beads. They go in deer skins, loose and well dressed. They have yellow copper. They desire clothes and are very civil. They have a great store of maize or Indian wheat, whereof they make good bread. The country is full of great and tall oaks.

Sept. 5th— In the morning, as soon as the day was light, the wind ceased and the flood came. So we heaved off the ship again into five fathoms, and sent our boat to sound the bay, and we found that there was three fathoms hard by the southern shore. Our men went on land then and saw a great store of men, women and children, who gave them tobacco at their coming, on land. So they went up into the woods and saw a great store of very goodly oaks and some currants, (probably huckleberries). For one of them came on hoard and brought some dried, and gave me some, which were sweet and good. This day many of the people came on board, some in mantles of feathers, and some in skins of divers sorts of good furs. Some women also came with hemp. They had red copper tobacco pipes, and other things of copper they did wear about their necks. At night they went on land again, so we rode very quiet but durst not trust them.

Sunday, Sept. 6th— In the morning was fair weather, and our master sent John Colman, with four other men, in our boat over to the North side to sound the other river (Narrows), being four leagues from us. They found by the way shoal water being two fathoms, but at the north of the river, eighteen and twenty fathoms, and very good riding for ships, and a very narrow river to the westward between two islands (Staten Island and Bergen Point,) the land they told us, was as pleasant with grass and flowers and goodly trees as ever they had seen, and here very sweet smell came from them. So they went in two leagues and saw an open sea (Newark Bay.) and returned, and as they came back they were set upon by two canoes, the one having twelve men and the other fourteen men. The night came on and it began to rain, so that their match went out; and they had one man slain in the fight, which was an Englishman named John Colman, with an arrow shot in his throat, and two more hurt. It grew so dark that they could not find the ship that night, but labored to and fro on their oars. They had so great a strain that their grapnel would not hold them.

Sept. 7th— Was fair, and by ten o'clock they returned aboard the ship and brought our dead man with them, whom we carried on land and buried and named the point after his name, Colman's Point. Then we hoisted in our boat and raised her side with waist boards, for defence of our men. So we rode still all night, having good regard for our watch.

Sept. 8th— Was very fair weather, we rode still very quietly. The people came aboard of us and brought tobacco and Indian wheat, to exchange for knives and beads and offered us no violence. So we fitting up our boat did mark them to see if they would make any show of the death of our man, which they did not.

Sept. 9th— Fair weather. In the morning two great canoes came aboard full of men, the one with their bows and arrows, and the other in show of buying knives, to betray us, but we perceived their intent. We took two of them to have kept them, and put red coats on them, and would not suffer the others to come near us. So they went on land and two others came aboard in a canoe; we took the one and let the other go; but he which we had taken got up and leaped overboard. Then we weighed and went off into the channel of the river and anchored there all night.

The foregoing is all of the log-book of Juet that relates to Monmouth county. The next morning the Half Moon proceeded up the North River (Hudson River), and on her return passed out to sea without stopping.

In the extract given above, the words in parentheses are not of course in the original, but are explanatory.

"After proceeding a hundred leagues, we found a very pleasant situation among some steep hills, through which a very large river, deep at its mouth, forces its way to the sea, from the sea to the estuary of the river any ship heavily laden might pass with the help of the tide, which rises eight feet. But as we were riding at good berth we would not venture up in our vessel without a knowledge of its mouth; therefore we took a boat, and entering the river we found the country on its banks well peopled, the inhabitants not differing much from the others, being dressed out with feathers of birds of various colors."

Historians generally concede that the foregoing is the first notice we have of the whites entering Sandy Hook, visiting the harbor of New York or being in the vicinity of old Monmouth.

The first deed from the Indians was dated 25th of 1st month, 1664. This was for lands at Nevesink, from the Sachem Popomora, and agreed to by his brother, Mishacoing, to James Hubbard, John Bowne, John Tilton, Jr., Richard Stout, William Goulding and Samuel Spicer. The articles given to the Indians in exchange for the land were 118 fathoms seawamp, 68 fathoms of which were to be white and 50 black seawamp, 5 coats, 1 gun, 1 clout capp, 1 shirt, 12 lbs tobacco and 1 anker wine; all of which were acknowledged as having been received, and in addition 82 fathoms of seawamp was to be paid twelve months hence.

Popomora and his brother went over to New York and acknowledged the deed before Governor Nicholls, April 7, 1665. The official record of this deed is in the office of Secretary of State at Albany, N. Y., in Lib. 3, page 1. A copy of it is also recorded in Proprietor's office, Perth Amboy, as is also a map of the land embraced in the purchase, and also in the Secretary of State's office, Trenton.

Two other deeds followed and were similarly recorded, and on April 8th the Governor signed the noted Monmouth Patent. This instrument gives the names of "the rest of the company." referred to in the third deed; they were Walter Clarke, William Reape, Nathaniel Silvester, Obadiah Holmes and Nicholas Davis, twelve in all, to whom the patent was granted.

One of the conditions of the Monmouth Patent was "that the said Patentees and their associates, their heirs or assigns, shall within the space of three years, beginning from the day of the date hereof, manure and plant the aforesaid land and premises and settle there one hundred families at the least.

It seemed imposible for the Gravesend men alone to induce that number of families to settle within the prescribed time, but they had warm personal friends in Rhode Island, Sandwich, Yarmouth and other places in Massachusetts, in Dover. New Hampshire, and also in different Rhode Island towns, and the stipulation was complied with.

The founders of the settlements in Monmouth were not only honorable, conscientious men in their dealings, but also exceedingly careful and methodical in their business transactions. This is shown by the very complete account, still preserved in the County Clerk's office at Freehold, of the purchase of the lands of the Indians, the amount paid and to whom, and also the names of those who contributed money toward paying the Indians and for incidental expenses in making the different purchases.

Among the purchasers were a number who had been victims of persecution for their religious faith, some had felt the cruel lash, some had been imprisoned and others had been compelled to pay heavy fines, others had had near relatives suffer thus. Among those who had suffered were William Shattock, Edward Wharton, Samuel Spicer and Mrs. Micall Spicer, his mother, Eliakim Wardell and wife, Thomas Clifton and daughter Hope, Nicholas Davis, William Reape, John Bowne (the Quaker of Flushing,) Robert Story, John Jenkins, John and George Allen, and Obadiah Holmes. And a number of others named among purchasers, some of whom did not settle in the county, had many years before been disarmed and banished from Massachusetts on account of adherence to Antinomian views.

The principal reasons that caused the founding of the settlements of Monmouth may he summed up in the following extracts:

"THIS IS A VERY GOOD LAND TO FALL IN WITH AND A PLEASANT LAND TO SEE."- Sir Henry Hudson's Log-Book, 1609.

"FREE LIBERTY OF CONSCIENCE WITHOUT ANY MOLESTATION OR DISTURBANCE WHATSOEVER IN THE WAY OF WORSHIP."- Monmouth. Patent, 1665.