1. James Hardie, An Account of the Malignant Fever, Lately Prevalent in the City of New-York... (New York: Printed by Hurtin and M’Farlane, 1799), p. 147.
2. Ibid., pp. 141–42.
3. Ibid., p. 49.
4. Poughkeepsie Journal and Constitutional Republican, September 25, 1798.
5. Ibid., October 2, 1798.
6. Ibid.
7. Ibid., April 4, 1797.
8. Donald Blake Webster, Decorated Stoneware Pottery of North America (Rutland, Vt.: Charles E. Tuttle Co., 1971), pp. 40–43.
9. A notice printed in the Poughkeepsie Journal and Constitutional Republican, March 19, 1794, announced: “on Saturday next, at 4 O’clock PM Capt. S. Smith, and Cap. North will sail with freight for New-York, as usual, from this place.”
10. Hardie, An Account of the Malignant Fever, p. 142.
11. This statement by the Poughkeepsie relief committee was published in the Poughkeepsie Journal and Constitutional Republican, October 9, 1798, the same issue in which appeared the announcement of the ship’s departure: “It is with pleasure we announce that captains North and Smith, sailed on Saturday last for New-York, with considerable supplies for the relief of the citizens of that distressed City.”
12. Hardie, An Account of the Malignant Fever, p. 147.
13. Ibid., p. 68. The complete entry reads: “town of Poughkeepsie, Washington and Standford, by Messieurs Wm. Emmot and James Bramble, 8 cheeses, 13 sheep and lambs, 40 1-2 bushels and a parcel potatoes, 18 cabbages, 1-2 bushel beans, 1-2 do. Beets, 6 lb. Bacon, 42 fowls, 1 ham, 4 bush. Wheat, 1 tub and 1 pot butter, 3 bbls. Indian meal, 1 do. Rye, 5 do. Flour, 2 do. Apples, 1 load of wood, 2 turkeys, 1 bushel corn, 1 do. Rye, with 50 cents cash.”
14. For more on this epidemic-driven migration, see George H. Lukacs, Poughkeepsie Potters and the Plague (Charleston, S.C.: Arcadia Publishing, 2001), which discusses the cultural history of pottery production in the Hudson Valley, and specifically Poughkeepsie, 1797–1897.
15. William C. Ketchum, Potters and Potteries of New York State, 1650–1900, 2nd ed. (Syracuse, N.Y.: Syracuse University Press, 1987), p. 46. Ketchum, p. 46, mentions a “decorated stoneware heart-shaped inkstand with well and sander which is incised on the base New York, July 12, 1773, William Crolius and which is presently the earliest known piece of marked New York State stoneware.” Ibid., p. 46. Ketchum notes that the earliest New York City map showing a pottery is “A Plan of New York, drawn about 1730. On it there appears, just south of the Little Collect and at the foot of Pottbaker’s Hill, a lone building labeled ‘potters.’” Ibid., p. 40. Clarkson Crolius is said to have “written in 1842 notes that: ‘the kiln was built in 1730 or thereabouts.’” Ibid., p. 41.
16. New York City Commercial Advertiser, August 15, 1798.
17. Hardie, An Account of the Malignant Fever, pp. 98, 125.
18. The gift appears in Hardie’s pamphlet (ibid., p. 69) under the heading “DONATION”: “October 10, 1798, Messrs. J. and N. Remmey, 162 pieces of earthen-ware.” In his grief Remmey contributed a kiln load of “earthen-ware” (pots, jugs, and dishes of redware clay), made with his own hands for the poor.
19.0 Ibid., p. 143.
20. Record of Death; Or an Accurate List, of the Names, Places of Abode, Occupations, &c. of Our Fellow Citizens, Who Have Fallen Victims to the Late Fever, since Its Commencement July 25, to October 21 as Have Been Reported to the Committee of Health and Faithfully Copied from the Register Kept by the Committee (New York: Printed for John Hill and Co., 1799).