Notable Knickerbockers

  His father was Colonel Johannes Knickerbacker II, son of the first Knickerbacker to settle in Schaghticoke.  Johannes married Elizabeth Winne (pictured above), daughter of William Winne and Maria De Wandelaer. They had 14 children, eleven of whom survived to adulthood. Those children gave them 102 grandchildren.

 Johannes served in the Army of the Revolution and was at the surrender of General Burgoyne at Saratoga. He subsequently represented the County of Rensselaer in the State Legislature. However, he is remembered mostly for building the Knickerbocker Mansion (circa 1780) in Schaghticoke.

 Johannes passed away in 1826. Elizabeth, his wife, died one year later.

                     
      Abraham and Mary Ann (Hale) Knickerbacker
                        Renovator and Redecorator
                                (Portraits reproduced by permission of Dr. William Kelly Simpson) 

 Abraham took possession of the Knickerbocker Mansion upon his father's death in 1826 and lived there until his own demise in 1869.

 Abraham's second wife was Mary Ann Hale. Their marriage produced four children. Their youngest son, Henry, inherited the Mansion after Mary Ann's death.

 The year 1827 was a pivotal year for the Knickerbockers and the family homestead because New York State emancipated its slaves on July 4^th.

 The Knickerbacker's slaves had lived and cooked in the Mansion's basement. They were replaced by white servants who required different living and working arrangements.

 To address this change, Abraham had a wooden annex attached to the Mansion's western facade. The annex contained a new kitchen and a sleeping loft for the domestics.

 Even more significant was the reconfiguration of the rooms on the first floor of the western side of the Mansion. In addition to being structurally renovated, Mary Ann redecorated the Mansion's interior.

 Abraham willed the Mansion to his widow. He also deeded the Knickerbocker Family Cemetery to his sons and nephews.

 Herman resided in Schaghticoke, where he dispensed such generous hospitality that he became known as the "Prince of Schaghticoke."

 He was elected to the 11th congress as a Federalist, and served from May 22, 1809, until March 3, 1811. In 1816, he was elected to the New York State Assembly, and also eventually filled the office of Rensselaer County judge.

 Herman married three times. All three of his wives were heiresses from prominent families.

 His first wife was Arietta Lansing of Lansingburgh, a descendant of the Van Rensselaers. She and Herman were the parents of five children.

 His next wife was heiress Rachel Wendall of Albany. This match produced five children.

 His third wife was Mary Buell of Connecticut. They were the parents of four offspring.

Herman died in Williamsburg, New York, on January 30, 1855.

Washington Irving
The First "Knickerbocker"?

 While serving as a young lawyer, Herman Knickerbocker met and was befriended by Washington Irving. 

 Irving visited Herman in Schaghticoke several times over the years.

 Irving wrote his satirical A History of New York using the pen name Diedrich Knickerbocker.

 He used his friend Herman's last name, but was the first person to spell it with an "o" in the third syllable.

 This arguably makes the fictional Deidrich (in reality Irving) the first Knickerbocker by default.

 Herman was referred to by Washington Irving, as "My cousin, the congressman" in his History of New York State.

 When Herman visited the White House, Irving introduced him to President Madison as "My cousin, Diedrich Knickerbocker, the great historian of New York."

 The Knickerbocker, founded in 1833, was the most influential literary publication of its time. In 1834, Washington Irving had joined the staff at a salary of $2,000 a year and would stay on until 1841.

Joseph Foster Knickerbocker
"Poet of the Vale"

 Joseph Foster Knickerbocker (1824-1882) was the son, and only child, of Abraham Knickerbocker and his first wife, Laura Sturges.

 He suffered from a birth defect which stunted the growth of his arms.

 Joseph was an eccentric recluse who never married and spent his 1ife writing poems and essays, and delving into family and 1ocal history.

 His historical writings were error laden.

 Despite his physical handicap Joseph produced several published works. His most notable work being the poem,   A Vision of the Arch of Truth (1875).

 In 1876, Joseph had an elaborate lynch gate (pictured above) constructed at the end of the Mansion's front walk to commemorate the poem.

 The carvings in the gate were inspired by the poem's theme.

 Joseph has the distinction of being the last Knickerbocker to reside in the Mansion year round.

Reverend David Buell Knickerbacker
Bishop of Indiana

 David Buell, was born in Schaghticoke, New York, on February 24, 1833. He was the son of Congressman Herman Knickerbocker and his third wife, Mary Buell.

 He spelled the family name traditionally with an "a" in the third syllable.

 He was graduated from Trinity College in 1853 and the General Theological Seminary in 1856. In the latter year he was made deacon.

 He was ordained as a priest on July 12, 1857.

 He spent his entire clerical life, until becoming bishop, in Minneapolis, Minnesota, first as a missionary and later as rector of Gethsemane parish.

 Having been elected the third bishop of Indiana, he was consecrated at St. Mark's, Philadelphia, October 14, 1883.

 During his long residence in Minnesota he founded six parishes, St. Barnabas Hospital (1871) and the Sheltering Arms Orphanage (1882).

 In the autumn of 1864, he visited the Chippewa Indians as one of a board of emissaries appointed by the Secretary of the Interior.

                              
                   Herman Knickerbocker Viele
                                    Novelist

 Born in 1856, Herman's great grandmother was Kathlyne Knickerbocker, daughter of Johannes Knickerbocker III.

 Although he is best known as a writer, he began his career as a civil engineer, following in his father's footsteps.

 Fired in part, no doubt, by love of adventure, in the early 1870s he went to the Rocky Mountains and practiced his profession in a mining camp.

 Later he went to Washington and was engaged in designing and building the new part of the capitol city.

 Never very robust, his health broke down and he was forced to lay aside his career as an engineer.

 He then devoted himself to writing, producing many novels and poems during his career.

 One of his more highly acclaimed works was The Last of the Knickerbockers, a Comedy Romance (1901). The novel documented an ambered preservation of a phase of New York Society that was vanishing, and that soon after vanished absolutely.

 One contemporary critic described it as a work that would "outlive long, I am confident, the great mass of the fiction of Vielé's day." 

 Herman passed away in 1908.