Richmond County Standard (NY) 1882 #21 Newspaper dated 4/15/1882 BEGIN Daniel Lake - a native of Staten Island and a former resident of Southfield died at his residence in West Hoboken, NJ on the 11th of April, in the 77th year of his age. The funeral took place from his late residence on Thursday afternoon at 5 o'clock the Rev. Jas. Egbert of the Presbyterian Church of Hoboken officiating and the internment was had yesterday morning in the Moravian Cemetery at New Dorp. He was buried by the side of his wife, a most estimable woman and a daughter of John Beatty, of New Dorp and who died in 1874. Mr. Lake never had any children. He was a son of Dan'l W. Lake a well known farmer and miller near New Dorp. The surviving members of the family are Mrs. David J. Tysen of Southfield and Mrs. Hyde of New York and his brothers, Dr. James Lake of Richmond and Arthur Lake, living near the old homestead and owning and operating his father's mill. Mr. Daniel Lake was a sail maker and rigger by trade and carried on business at Buffalo and other ports on the Great Lakes for many years; when finally retiring from business he settled down in Hoboken and built the homestead where he ended his days. Through his business and real estate transactions he acquired a large fortune. END Collections of the New York Genealogical and Biographical Society Vol IV Staten Island Church Records 1909 BEGIN Register of Marriages copied by Rev. David Moore from his Private Records for his son Richard Channing Moore. 1803, March 31. Daniel Lake, Mary Gifford 1841. Nov. 22. James S. Lake, single, native of St. Island, son of Daniel Lake, dec. Jane J. Mercereau, dau. of Josua Mercereau, dec. Md. at minister's in presence of John Fountain, the step- father of bride, & John Lake & others 1842. Dec 28. David M. Mersereau, single, carpenter, native of St. Island, son of Daniel Mersereau Annette V. Lake, dau. of Daniel Lake, dec. Md. at Parsonage Records of the United Brethren Congregation, Commonly Called Moravian Church, Staten Island, NY Marriages. By Rev. Frederick Moering. 1824 Oct 23 Barnt Seaman, } belonging to Daniel W. Lake Margaret Price, } Colored & md. by his permission Deaths. Lake, Daniel, d. 6 Oct., 1835. END From: Barbara Ribling Date: Thu, 13 Nov 2003 03:15:34 -0800 BEGIN The following information is from the records of St. Andrew's Protestant Episcopal Church, Richmond Co., Staten Island, NY. These church records include many familiar surnames - Stillwell, Van Dyke, Van Pelt, Wood, etc. I am copying those entries for surnames LAKE and LAKERMAN (and variations of those). MARRIAGES 1803, Mar. 31 Daniel Lake & Mary Gifford END Date: Mon, 01 Mar 2004 14:56:56 +0000 From: janetbritton@att.net BEGIN http://www.silive.com/news/advance/index.ssf?/base/news/1078064133170840.xml Slave's bill of sale was an unsettling discovery Former Islander stumbles upon a document in Vermont which showed his ancestor was a slave owner Sunday, February 29, 2004 By ROBERT H. NUTT FAMILY TREE TRACED I've only been a Vermonter since 1985, having moved from New York. So I was surprised to read the seller's name in the document: "William B. Gifford of the County of Richmond." Staten Island, where I was born, where my family, on my mother's side, had lived since 1660. Where, indeed, there were Giffords in our family tree. It was a stationer's form, about eight by 12 inches, headed "Know all Men by these Presents." Printed with blank spaces for the names of seller and purchaser and other details, it was dated "the sixteenth day of June in the year of our Lord, one thousand eight hundred and nine." Gifford was selling to one "John Bullus of the City and County of New York" -- Manhattan -- "a certain Negro Man aged twenty-six years or thereabouts." His name was Tom and he went for $375. William B. Gifford of the County of Richmond was my great-great-great-grandfather. I already knew a little about him. Our family had always referred to him as a Revolutionary War hero. Family records, however, did not even hint at slaves or slavery. So my 15 minutes in that antiques store had an unintended consequence; our family hero, however laudable, was not by today's standards quite the paragon we'd imagined. He had been born in Ireland in 1750 and graduated from the University of Dublin in 1773. Emigrating to America shortly before the Revolution, Gifford settled in New Jersey in what was then called Elizabethtown. He joined the local militia in 1776, four months before the Declaration of Independence, siding with the colonials against the Crown -- perhaps because he was Irish. Across the Kill van Kull, on Staten Island, Tory sympathies held sway. Gifford fought in a number of crucial engagements, including the Battle of Monmouth, rose to the rank of major, was wounded, captured and then exchanged for a British officer as was the courtesy of the day. By war's end, he had served on the staffs of several generals, including Washington, and was present at Washington's farewell address to the army at Fraunce's Tavern in lower Manhattan. Major Gifford married, was widowed, remarried and settled on Staten Island. The eldest of his eight children, Mary, married my great-great-grandfather Daniel Lake of New Dorp in 1803. At that time the major owned and operated the Rose and Crown, a tavern on New Dorp Lane famous in its day for hosting veterans of the war. It's easy to speculate that Gifford acquired Tom with the tavern. But why he sold Tom in 1809 history can't tell us. Five years later, Gifford was dead at age 64. [Former Staten Islander Robert Nutt is a freelance writer and part-time editor of the Dartmouth Alumni Magazine. He once served on the boards of Historic Richmond Town and Staten Island Academy.] Copyright 2004 SILive.com. All Rights Reserved. END