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The Revolutionary War Years"Then came a party [of Tory raiders] that plundered all my Neighbours without distincon whigs and toreys indeed I must say that the toreys where plund most...One of them asked me if I Could say That I was not the daughter of Coll Cortland the damnaition rebel, I told him I was his daughter but that I would not be Call'd a rebel by him nor no one because I did not know what a rebel was, he bid me to hold my tongue with the same Curses, and Level'd his musket on his hand as he would run me through with his baynet, I then told him to begone or he should suffer for his behaviour."
— Cornelia Van Cortlandt Beekman to Pierre In 1776, their domestic and economic security shattered by the American Revolution, Pierre, Joanna, and their children abandoned the manor house, their home for the past twenty-five years. The manor was tenuously positioned on "Neutral Ground," a demilitarized zone between British-held Manhattan and the largely Patriotic upper Hudson Valley. The divided allegiances of Westchester County residents resulted in nothing less than civil war. Pierre's active role as a Patriot leader in New York and his son Philip's commission as an officer in a Patriot regiment probably led Van Cortlandt to move his family and portable possessions behind Rebel lines for safety. Only one Van Cortlandt braved the perils of Westchester County during the Revolution. Daughter Cornelia Van Cortlandt Beekman and her husband Gerard stayed at a relative's house in Peekskill, staking out their claim and guarding family holdings as best they could. Rather, like a war correspondent, Cornelia vividly described the destruction in letters to her father. Patriots and Tories plundered farms indiscriminately, no matter what the political sympathies of the owners. Even Pierre's esteemed status as second in command of New York's rebel government did not stop Patriot marauders from pillaging his property. In one dramatic incident, Tory raiders forced their way into Cornelia's home. When she challenged them, they called her "a Rebel Bitch," among other insults, and further taunted her by filching her silver as she stood there. Compared to neighbors whose farms and fields were burned, Cornelia got off lightly. Of all her family, Cornelia Van Cortlandt Beekman would best remember how war was waged in Westchester County. During these years of upheaval, the Van Cortlandts scattered. Joanna and some of the children migrated from Croton to Peekskill to Rhinebeck, and then to Amenia, in the mid-Hudson Valley. Pierre was elected New York's first lieutenant governor in 1777. Son Philip served as an officer in the army. He fought at the battle of Saratoga, endured winter at Valley Forge, and took part in the siege of Yorktown, the battle that concluded the war. Daughter Catherine Van Cortlandt Van Wyck spent the early part of the war in New Jersey awaiting the birth of her first child and then joined here family in New York. Pierre Jr. attended Queen's College, now Rutgers University. Except for Stephen, whose untimely death from a "malignant sore throat" took place in 1775 when he was only fifteen, all of the Van Cortlandts managed to survive the war. -by Kathleen Eagen Johnson
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