HISTORY OF WEST POINT.

CHAPTER I.

EARLY GRANTS OF THE LANDS AT WEST POINT.-TITLE ACQUIRED BY THE UNITED STATES BY PURCHASE-COMMISSIONERS SETTLE THE BOUNDARIES. FURTHER PURCHASE BY THE UNITED STATES.JURISDICTION CEDED BY THE STATE OF NEW YORK.-EARLY IMPORTANCE OF THE CONTROL OF THE HUDSON DURING THE REVOLUTION.-RESOLUTIONS OF THE CONTINENTAL CONGRESS, MAY 25, 1775.-APPOINTMENT OF COMMITTEE BY THE PROVINCIAL CONGRESS, AND RESOLUTIONS OF THE LATTER, AUGUST 18, 1775.

THE United States tract at West Point includes 2,105 acres of land, the title to which was secured by purchase, as herein described.

West Point proper was originally granted to Captain John Evans; but, having been vacated by him, it was afterwards reassumed and held by the English Crown.

On May 17, 1723, by Royal Letters-Patent, a tract, including the northern portion of the Point, and embracing 1,463 acres of land, was granted to Charles Congreve, upon the condition that, within three years, he or his heirs or assigns should settle and cultivate at least three acres for every fifty acres of land described in the grant. The first settlement at West Point may therefore date from this period. On March 25, 1747, another portion of the Evans grant, adjoining the southwest corner of the Congreve patent, and embracing 332

acres of land, was patented to John Moore, on like condition of settlement within three years.

The patent of Congreve having been purchased in later years by Moore, was conveyed by will, together with the Moore patent, to his son, Stephen Moore, merchant, of Caswell County, N. C.

It appears that a petition was presented to Congress by the latter, praying that the United States would purchase West Point, which had already been so long occupied for public purposes. On this petition General Hamilton, then Secretary of the Treasury, made a favorable report, June 10, 1790.

He quoted the opinion of General Knox, the Secretary of War, as set forth by him in a report to Congress, dated July 31, 1786, that West Point is of the most decisive importance to the defence of the Hudson River, for the following reasons:

First. "The distance across the river is only about fourteen hundred feet, a less distance by far than at any other part.

Second. The peculiar bend, or turn of the river, forming almost a re-entering angle.

Third. The high banks on both sides of the river, favorable for the construction of formidable batteries.

Fourth. The demonstrated practicability of fixing across the river a chain or chains, at a spot where vessels in turning the Point invariably lose their rapidity, and, of course, their force, by which a chain at any other part of the river would be liable to be broken."

These considerations, together with the difficulty [at that time] of taking West Point by siege; its being within a single night's sail of New York, and its importance