VAN NUYSE - MAGAW HOUSE



1041 East 22nd Street

	Johannes VAN NUYSE, who was born in the home of his father Joost VAN NUYSE on 
Flatlands Plain on 25 November 1763, 
was married to Nelly, daughter of Colonel Jeromus LOTT of Flatlands on 2 April 1800.

	About the same time he began to build a house on the west side of his deceased 
father's farm. Tradition says that it took him three years to finish his future home, 
so carefully was it constructed.

	The house faced the south and was large and comfortable. It bad a central hall 
with a horizontally divided door at each end and a bull's-eye over each doorway to let 
light into the second storey rooms. There was a kitchen wing on its west end. All in all, 
it made a good home for the VAN NUYSEs and their seven children:
George, 
Jeromus, 
Eliza, 
Lemma, 
Maria, 
Eleanor and Magdalena.

	Jeromus, who was born 2 January 1805 and who married Ann Eliza BRINKERHOFF, became 
the owner of the house after the death of his father on 16 October 1826. He died without 
issue and the property was sold.
	 
	Robert MAGAW bought it and moved his wife Alice DAVENPORT, whom he had married on 
24 February 1844, and their growing family into the house which was partly furnished 
with VAN NUYSE possessions.

	At his death in 1885, Robert MAGAW'S three sons (VAN BRUNT, John and Frederick) 
inherited the house and its farm which extended from Flatbush Avenue westerly to Ocean 
Avenue.

	In 1909, Frederick MAGAW sold the house to George M. HENDERSON. In 1916 it became 
the property of George C. CASE who removed its wing and moved the house to its present 
site. Dormer windows have been added but otherwise it looks as it must have when Johannes 
VAN NUYSE built it.

	The. MAGAWs were descended from a Robert MAGAW who was born in 1738, presumably in 
North Ireland, for his parents, William and Elizabeth MAGAW, emigrated from those parts 
in 1752 and settled in Carlisle, Pennsylvania.

	After Robert had attended the Academy of Philadelphia and received his degree as a 
lawyer, he, too, made his home in Carlisle.

	At the outbreak of the Revolution he was commissioned a major in the Pennsylvania 
Militia and then sent to take part in the siege of Boston, after which he was promoted 
to the rank of colonel.

	He went to New York where he helped to cover Washington's retreat from Long Island on 
the night of 29 August 1776, and had charge of the building of Fort Washington on the upper 
end of Manhattan Island. It was Colonel MAGAW who was in charge of Fort Tryon when it 
was assaulted by the British and Hessians. Of its surrender by him the Freeman's Journal of 
10 December 1776 said, 
"The commanding officer of the fort is a gentleman of great courage, and would have defended 
it as long as a single soldier remained to support it, had it been capable of defense. The 
highest honors are due to his gallant officers and the brave soldiers who were under his command."

	Having been taken prisoner, Colonel MAGAW was sent to the provost jail in the city and 
later paroled on Long Island where he spent much time in Gravesend. There he met Marritie 
VAN BRUNT (b. 9 January 1762 - d. 15 August 1800) whom he married in April 1779.

	On 25 October 1780, together with General THOMPSON, the Colonel was exchanged for a 
Hessian major general. He and his young wife then went to Carlisle to live.

	After his death on 7 January 1790, his widow returned to her father in Gravesend with 
their children, Elizabeth and Van Brunt.

Van Brunt MAGAW, who was born on 7 September 1783, married Adriantie VOORHEES in the evening 
of 2 November 1811. She was the daughter of Lourence VOORHEES of Flatbush.

Van Brunt's and Adriantie's children, all of whom were baptized in the Dutch Reformed Church 
of Gravesend, were :
Jane (b. 12 September 1813), 
Van Brunt (b. 12 October 1814), 
Robert (b. 10 June 1817), 
Lawrence V. (b. 23 February 1820) and 
Abraham LOTT (b. 25 May 1828). 
It was Robert who bought both the Joost VAN NUYSE and the Johannes VAN NUYSE houses.
Van Brunt MAGAW died 18 March 1831 and Adriantie the following April.


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