The Kayaderossera Patent (or ''Kayaderosseras Patent'') was a grant of land made by

Anne, Queen of Great Britain Anne (6 February 1665 – 1 August 1714) was Queen of England, Scotland and Ireland from 8 March 1702 until 1 May 1707. On 1 May 1707, under the Acts of Union, the kingdoms of England and Scotland united as a single sovereign state known as ...

in 1701 to thirteen subjects. The patent included comprising most of what is now

Saratoga County Saratoga County is a county in the U.S. state of New York, and is the fastest-growing county in Upstate New York. As of the 2020 U.S. census, the county's population was enumerated at 235,509, representing a 7.2% increase from the 2010 popul ...

and parts of Montgomery,

Schenectady Schenectady () is a city in Schenectady County, New York, United States, of which it is the county seat. As of the 2020 census, the city's population of 67,047 made it the state's ninth-largest city by population. The city is in eastern New Y ...

, and

Fulton Fulton may refer to: People * Robert Fulton (1765–1815), American engineer and inventor who developed the first commercially successful steam-powered ship * Fulton (surname) Given name * Fulton Allem (born 1957), South African golfer * Fult ...

Counties. The grantees were Nanning Hermance (or Hermanse, also called Nanning Visscher), Johannes Beekman,

Rip Van Dam Rip Van Dam ( – 10 June 1749) was the acting governor of the Province of New York from 1731 to 1732. As one of the leaders of the republican liberal (or "country") party, Van Dam confronted the subsequent royal governor William Cosby. Early l ...

, Anne Bridges, Johannes Fisher, John Tudor, Javis Hooglandt, John Stephens, John Latham, and Stephen Broughton. Negotiations with the Mohawks and the

French and Indian War The French and Indian War (1754–1763) was a theater of the Seven Years' War, which pitted the North American colonies of the British Empire against those of the French, each side being supported by various Native American tribes. At the ...

delayed the process, and the lands were not surveyed until 1771. The surveyors divided the patent into twenty five ''allotments'', and each allotment was subdivided into thirteen lots of approximately equal size. The grantees "drew lots" to determine ownership of individual lots within each allotment.

Precedents

The Kayaderossera Patent was the largest of a series of such grants in the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. The Van Schaick Patent granted all of the current town of

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and a large section of Half Moon to Anthony Van Schaick in 1687. The Appel Patent in 1708 granted land north of the

Mohawk River The Mohawk River is a U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map accessed October 3, 2011 river in the U.S. state of New York. It is the largest tributary of the Hudson River. The Mohawk f ...

extending back a distance of three miles to William Appel. The Saratoga Patent granted land bordering the Van Schaick Patent north along the

Hudson River The Hudson River is a river that flows from north to south primarily through eastern New York. It originates in the Adirondack Mountains of Upstate New York and flows southward through the Hudson Valley to the New York Harbor between N ...

to Colonel

Peter Schuyler Pieter Schuyler (17 September 1657 – 19 February 1724) was the first mayor of Albany, New York. A long-serving member of the executive council of the Province of New York, he acted as governor of the Province of New York on three occasions ...

, Robert Livingston, and others.

Land purchase

Prior to issuing a patent the colonial government required evidence that the land had been legally purchased from its native owners. Samuel Broughton negotiated an agreement with the Mohawks, represented by the sachems Joseph, Hendrick, and Cornelius, apparently representatives of the three clans. In 1702 when the deed was actually signed, however, Cornelius failed to appear and two other representatives signed in his stead. This later formed the basis of litigation by the Mohawks contesting the patent. The legalities were finally settled in 1761 with a negotiated settlement. Nineteenth century histories identified Joseph as ''Ter-jen-nin-ho-ge'' and Hendrick as ''De-han-och-rak-has'' More recently Hindraker, Snow. and Sivertsen have identified Hendrick as '' Tejonihokarawa'' (Tay yon’ a ho ga rau’ a) representing the Wolf Clan. Hindraker and Sivertsen identify Joseph as ''Dehanochrakhas'' of the Bear Clan, and Sivertsen identifies Cornelius or Cornelis as ''Tirogaren'' representing the Turtle Clan. The patent signed by Governor

Cornbury Edward Hyde, 3rd Earl of Clarendon (28 November 1661 – 31 March 1723), styled Viscount Cornbury between 1674 and 1709, was an English aristocrat and politician. Better known by his noble title Lord Cornbury, he was propelled into the forefr ...

in 1708 originally comprised .

Survey

In 1762 Christopher Yates and John Glen of Schenectady, and Thomas Palmer of Orange County were appointed to conduct the survey of the patent. The surveyor Charles Webb performed the actual survey, which was completed and filed on December 18, 1770. As of 2012 many deeds in Saratoga County still include a phrase such as ''"part of Lot 3 in the subdiv of Lot One in the Eighteenth general allotment in the Patent of Kayadesessera"'' at the beginning of their property descriptions.

References

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Precedents

Land purchase

Survey

References

Further reading