THE VOORHEES HOMESTEAD... 
IN THE CELLAR OF WHICH TRADITION SAYS: A HESSIAN SOLDIER WAS BURIED


	"8 miles to Brockland Ferry," says the old milestone in front 
of the VOORHEES homestead on Neck Road,  Gravesend. The old stone 
was placed there under the English provincial government, and about 
it hangs a romance. One hot day in midsummer a young British officer 
rode out to Gravesend to place the mile-post. He asked for a drink of 
water at the farm-house, and a lovely girl gracefully served him. 
Love at first sight is an old story, with new charms revealed at each 
repetition; and in the case of the young officer and the winsome maiden 
it resulted in marriage and a journey to far-away England, where, they say, 
in a noble house. hangs a picture of the milestone in front of the homestead 
from which the English noble-man brought his beautiful bride.

	The house is said to have been built more than two centuries ago by one 
John Coerte VOORHEES, son of the first VOORHEES who came to Gravesend. 
Though little is known of the early history of the home-stead, it came 
into local prominence at the time of the Revolutionary War, when Stephen VOORHEES 
joined the American army. On learning that the British were coming, 
General Washington ordered all supplies to be destroyed, all grain burned 
in the fields, and the cattle killed. For many years after the enemy swept 
through that part of Gravesend, back on a lonely road of the town were 
great piles of the bones of cattle bleaching in the sun, and the townsmen 
as they passed the white heaps gazed silently on the remnants of their stock, 
and wondered when the weary days would pass that had brought an enemy to 
destroy their crops and their livestock. 

	The Patriot officers, when they warned the people to kill their cattle, 
allowed Mrs. VOORHEES to keep one cow, that her baby might have milk; 
and for safety's sake the lady concealed it in her house. Not long afterward 
a Hessian came prowling about for beef; and, discovering the cow that the thrifty 
Mrs. VOORHEES had concealed, he'started to drive it off, when Mr. VOORHEES, 
who had been separated from his regiment in the battle of Brooklyn and had 
hastened home, interfered. 

	Words led to blows, and the Hessian was killed. Fearing lest the 
other members of the army would discover the loss of their companion 
and search for him, the VOORHEES; the tradition runs, buried the dead 
man in their cellar. Mr. VOORHEES hastened by night to join the American army.




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