¦^ -'A :*''ifSI''lK»S: . ",-. / • '

is >.

I. *r
it'
'-(*'¦
.C:; t3,>"l>>'^l^^v^¦
"i give tkefe Books
for th^foiindiag of a. College 'inr t/ti:s.Colo4y"

N^S^

>^^W¦^'~'!^WTOV«r.^Wrf»^,^«^^^«^¦^«^^^^

MEMOIR OF
^ILMAM KELBY
LIBRAR^N OF THE NEW YORI^' HISTORICAL SOCIETY

KY

JOpN ,PUSTIN STEif ENS

A MEMOIR OF
WILLIAM KELBY
LIBRARIAN OF THE NEW YORK HISTORICAL SOCIETY
BY
JOHN AUSTIN STEVENS

READ BEFORE THE SOCIETY, NOVEMBER 1, 1898

NE-W YORK
PRINTED FOR THE SOCIETY
1898

MEMOIR OF WILLIAM KELBY

Mr. President, Members of the Society ;
Ladies, Gentlemen :
Amid the excitements of this memorable sum
mer, whfen each day brought with it the stirring
news pf some national triumph or personal disaster,
the members of this Society, scattered in their va
cations, were shocked by the sad intelligence of
the death of its wprthy Librarian, Mr. William
Kelby, whose entire Hfe from early manhood had
been passed within its precincts and in its service — a
service in the exercise of which he was not only fa
miliar to every member, of our Society, but to those
of kindred institutions throughout the . land ; a ser
vice which is justly held to be deserving of some
thing more than a mere minute on our records.
Some memoir of this life and of this service it is
my melancholy privilege to submit ; a privilege be
cause of my long and intimate association with him
in that branch of historic research which was his daily
habit — the story of New York City from its early
Dutch beginning to its last metropolitan expansion,
William Kelby was born September 12, 1841,
at Portland, a town in County Sligo, Ireland. His
father, Thomas Kelby, and his mother, Margaret
Mathews, both belonged to what is termed the
Englishry of Ireland. The name Kelby is some
what uncommon. It is derived' from the market

town of Kelby, near Sleaford, in Kestevan, Lincoln
shire, England. They were both of that so-called
Scotch-Irish race which through the last century
was a marked factor of the American colonies, and
in the breeding of that American race which is now
beginning to take a leading part in the shaping of
the destiny of the world. The Scotch-Irish, as a
distinctive body of people, originated in the migra
tion from Scotland to the north of Ireland in the be
ginning of the seventeenth century. They settled
upon lands confiscated to the English crown during
the various rebellions of this turbulent isle. Their
home is the Province of Ulster. To this migration
was joined one from England, which settled to the
south and west of this Province and in the neigh
boring Province of Connaught, which passed under
British rule at the same period. Sligo in Connaught
is one of the most important of the seaboard towns.
These migrations from England and Scotland held
to either the Non-Conformist or the Presbyterian
faith. This hardy and independent people, whose
life for a century was a continual struggle with
their Celtic neighbors, were confirmed in their pos
sessions by Cromwell, and later by William of
Orange, as a maintenance and defence of the Prot
estant religion and of the Protestant succession to
the English crown against the Bourbon alliance of
the Roman Catholic continental powers. To the
dangers of their situation in a bitterly hostile re
gion, not less than to their origin, the Scotch-Irish
and the Englishry of Ireland alike owe those traits
of independence and tenacity which are their
marked characteristics at home and abroad; and
which were dominant in the nature and character
of our late friend.

While foreign in birth, William Kelby was thor
oughly American in training. His parents emi
grated to this country, arriving in New York in
June, 1842. Their son William was then in his
second year. They first settled at Hyde Park,
Dutchess County, in this State. Thence they re
moved to Saratoga Springs, and later crossed the
frontier to Canada West. Returning to New York
City in July, 1847, they made their permanent
home here. Here the father entered into the em
ployment of this Society. And here the son got
the beginnings of knowledge in the public schools
of the City ; the beginnings only, for in fact his ac
quirements were the result of his own self-directed
labors. For he was but sixteen years of age when
he was withdrawn from school and entered into the
service of this Society, in which his father was then
engaged. This was on the 7th of July, 1857, since
when, until his death on the 27th of July of the
present year, 1898, William Kelby was uninter
ruptedly engaged in the various services of this
institution, and in the arrangement and care of its
many treasures. In any measure of the value of
these services and of the knowledge required for
their proper performance, it must be remembered
that the New York Historical Society is not a lit
erary institution only, but a veritable museum of
antiquity and an extensive gallery of art. The
material care of these departments developed his
technical knowledge ; and their arrangement, cata
logue, and display were the occasion for a constant
research over a wide field. The great Abbott col
lection of Egyptian antiquities, with its sacred bulls,
its rich sarcophagi, its scarab ornaments, and its
thousand other relics of the days of the Pharaohs,
s

may be instanced as one of the subjects to which
he gave years of study and care. The Mexican
and American Indian collections are equally curious,
and to us as valuable. The gallery of paintings,
particularly rich in its showing of Dutch art, gave
opportunity for the acquisition of information and
the development of taste in a different, though in
part cognate, direction, as historical portraiture is
a special feature of this priceless collection, while
the paintings in the Bryan department afford study
of art in general from its renaissance in Europe.
With the help of Dunlap's History of the Fine
Arts in America, Mr. Kelby had acquainted him
self with the history of painting ; and he was famil
iar with the best examples of our art, from Pratt
and Stuart, from Smybert and Malbone, to Baker
and Huntington, many of which adorn the walls
ofthis institution, and make known to us, not only
the features and costumes of the worthies of old,
but the progress of art in this western world.
The purpose of the gentlemen who, under the
influence of John Pintard, clarum et venerabile
nomen, founded this Society was clearly set forth
in their address to the public. It was to gather
together everything that could in any manner throw
light upon the history of New York. Their own
efforts, continued during the first quarter of a cen
tury, resulted in a collection incomparably rich, and
which to-day, when early Americana, printed or
manuscript, are priceless, would be impossible of
achievement. During the early period this pur
pose of the Society, thus formulated, was strictly
adhered to. Mr. Peter Augustus Jay was urgent
in its support, saying: "A file of American news
papers is of far more value to our design than all
6

the Byzantine Histories." And Mr. Verplanck in
sisted that the Society should collect every book,
pamphlet, chart, map, or newspaper that threw
light on the history ofthe State, its cities, its towns,
or the history of its literature. These were Mr.
Kelby's fixed views, and this purpose, as originally
declared by the founders, was never lost sight of
by him.
The newspaper collection begun by Mr. Jay has
been a constant source of solicitude both as to its
preservation and its increase. Mr. Kelby had it
ever in mind as the subject of his early study. He,
and perhaps he alone, was aware of its precise con
dition and of the gaps in its files. It was to him a
personal grief that the fine Emmet collection,
which would have rounded out our files for the las
century, should have passed to the Lenox Library,
and be destined to be swallowed up by that levia
than, the new Public Library.
The beginnings of the manuscript collection are
also due to the efforts of individuals. To John
McKesson we owe the Journals of the Provincial
Congress and Convention and of the Committee
of Safety. To Robert Fulton, the Gates papers ;
and here again regret must be expressed that this
extensive and varied mass of Revolutionary docu
ments is not completed by the Letter and Order
Books of General Gates, preserved by Dr. Emmet,
to whom they came by inheritance from his distin
guished grandfather, Gates' friend and legal ad
viser. The Society's collection of manuscripts con
sists of the Alexander, de Peyster, Duer, Gallatin,
Gates, Lamb, Lloyd, McLane, Miller, Osgood,
Reed, Steuben, Stevens, and Stirling papers.
The Kemble papers, printed by the Society, are
[7]

the property of the family. The Thomson, the
Lee, and the Deane papers belong to individuals.
It was a sorrow of Mr. Kelby that the valuable
collection of Livingston manuscripts, which be
longed to the late Mr. S. L. M. Barlow, was not
secured for our library. There are papers in this
collection concerning New York in the Revolution
not to be found elsewhere.
While original documents of this character were
Mr. Kelby's delight, he, of course, made himself
familiar with all the early printed histories of the
New Netherlands and of the New York Province —
Colden's History of the Five Nations, William
Smith's New York prior to 1762, and Thomas
Jones's gossipy account of New York in the Rev
olutionary period, recently published with elaborate
notes by our learned associate, Mr. Edward F. de
Lancey, under the auspices of the Society, as well
as with the later local works of Riker and of
Thompson. But even of printed works his preference was for
those which reproduced the documents themselves,
or with notes explanatory of the text. Of these,
the most important to our New York historians
must always be Dr. O'Callaghan's great compila
tion, the Documentary History of the State, with
illustrative calendars. Here we find all the official
reports, with their careful detail of the state of the
Province in every political or economic feature, to
the London Board of Trade or to the Secretary for
the Colonies, and minutes of licenses and other
minor ordinances which throw a side-light upon the
habits of the people. On the completion of this
vast work, the Corporation of the City of New York
employed Dr. O'Callaghan to edit the City Records,

beginning with the Dutch Records of New Amster
dam, which he had translated and prepared for the
press when the exposure of the Tweed methods in
city finances stopped further progress ; although the
reading of proof had begun. These records were
later edited by Mr. Fernow, who has patiently fol
lowed in the same line of study. They were pub
lished in 1897, in seven volumes, under the title of
the Records of New Amsterdam, 1653 to 1674.
They comprise the minutes of the Court of Burgo-
meisters and Schepens. The original documents
are preserved in the dingy archive-room of the City
Hall, where Mr. Kelby passed many an hour,
through the courtesy of his friends, Mr. Valentine
and Mr. Twomey, who in turn were the respected
clerks of the Common Council, and both with some
thing of the taste of the antiquary. Here, from the
disorderly and dusty mass, Mr. Kelby culled infor
mation in vast variety : the opening of streets and
squares ; the extension of the water-front, and a
thousand details of City life ; the water-supply from
the old Tea-pump; even the civic feasts of the City
fathers, with their accompanying bonfires and pub
lic toast-drinkings on such high occasions as Guy
Fawkes' Day, the raising of a Liberty Pole, or the
reception ofa royal Governor at the Province Arms.
With Dr. O'Callaghan Mr. Kelby's relations
were most friendly. The old gentleman invariably
dropped in at the Library for a chat, and always
returned to Albany with some hint or clue to the
object of his immediate research. Mr. Fernow, I
doubt not, would gladly admit his own obligations
in the same line. And here may be noticed the
late important contributions to our stock of genea
logical information in the Calendar of Wills, 1626-
9

1836, on record at Albany, pubhshed by the Society
of Colonial Dames of the State of New York, and
compiled by Mr. Fernow ; a publication which it is
to be hoped may be followed by one similar from
our New .York Wills.
The wretched manner in which the official docu
ments of our City have been cared for, and their al
most entire inaccessibility to the general searcher,
have been a matter of painful concern to all of us who
take pride in our past. Too practical to complain
without suggesting a remedy, Mr. Kelby proposed
some years ago the appointment of a Record Com
mission, to consist of two lawyers and one layman,
to serve without salary (he willing to be the lay
member), to formulate a plan for the preservation of
all the records in the various counties of this State.
His plan, in brief, was : the Record Commissioners
to be authorized by the Legislature, in their ap
pointment, to communicate with every County Clerk
in the State, and to file with the Commissioners a
report of the records in their possession. If, as is
the case in this County, the Clerk could not make
such report, the County Clerk to receive authority
from the Commissioners to employ the necessary
clerical assistance to make a calendar of every docu
ment and record ; arranging the manuscript chrono
logically and sub-alphabetically in bound volumes.
And he further proposed that the City should erect
a fire-proof building, to be known as the Record
Building, in which every document of this County
prior to 1850 should be deposited.
Mr. Kelby's immediate aim was to get access to
the early colonial documents which are stored, as
though they were merchandise, in the lower part of

the present County Court, packed in a hetero
geneous mass, as are those also in the brown-stone
Court-House in the City Hall Park. At one time he
thought the project could be carried out, and it re
ceived the endorsement of the legal gentlemen of
the City ; but no one of them took enough interest
in it to draft a bill for the action of the Legislature —
rather a sad example of the apathy of the modern
lawyer to matters of historic interest. This is cer
tainly not the spirit which animated Jay and Benson
and Morris and Verplanck — that spirit to which we
owe our existence as a Society.
But while interested in all these various subjects,
Mr. Kelby never faltered in his fealty to his life
study — the City of New York and its history. The
one salient point in his nature was his profound love
for New York, his pride in its history, in its growth,
in its magnificence. He loved every stone in it, as
Johnson or Lamb loved London. He could re
construct it to his mind's eye at any of the periods
of its picturesque existence, with every detail of
square and street and building, from the old Bowl
ing Green, the Commons, the Gardens of Vauxhall
and the Ranelagh ; the Strand, the Maiden and
Petticoat Lanes, and the Street of the Beaver, with
their buildings of Dutch gables, to the parks, the
boulevards, and the towering structures of the
modern city ; whether when the Dutch clustered
about the old Stadt-Huys (strange mixture of tav
ern and council chamber) and traded on the Bridge,
or when the rude palisades at Wall Street divided
the city proper from the Outwards, or when the
builders ofthe City Hall in wise economy used sand
stone for the rear instead of the marble of the front

structure ; no one then supposing that the city
would outgrow that limit.
His knowledge of the City as a school-lad began
with the new era, that half-century which has just
now elapsed since the great Irish exodus after the
famine of '48 set the pace for the rapid strides which
New York has since taken. What changes in the
physical appearance and the domestic economy of
the people in this period ! Half a century ago the ne
gro enjoyed the monopoly of nearly all the in-door
and many of the out-door occupations. Every wait
er, every cook and coachman in the private houses
or hotels ; every barber, bootblack and oysterman,
and a large number of the cartmen and the steve
dores on the wharves, were of ebony hue — men of
pure African race, as the Mulatto were then rare.
It is curious to notice how this colored race grad
ually gave place to the incoming Irish, how they in
turn were in great measure supplanted by Germans ;
and these again have given way to Italian and
Asiatic successors — Chinese and Japanese. In
those ruder days the streets of the city were the un
disputed domain of the boys. Young Kelby be
came early familiar with every nook and cranny, not
only of the immediate neighborhood of his home,
but of that older New York into the history of
which he was beginning to delve.
Mr. Webster once remarked that the true sources
of history are newspapers and letters. They retain
the very flavor of the time. In these branches of
literature the collection of this Society is especially
rich, the file of newspapers of the last century — of
the New York Gazette, the Post Boy, the Mercury,
the New York Journal, and later the Packet and

the Advertiser — being nearly complete from Brad
ford's publication, in 1725, to the end of the Colo
nial period ; while its manuscript-room contains a
large mass of documents and of letters of infinite
variety. These newspapers young Kelby set him
self to index by names and subjects, a work which
for many years occupied every spare moment of
his attendance upon the visitors to the rooms of
the Society or the clerical work with which he was
charged. No one who has not seen one of the
great number of folio sheets of manuscript used in
this vast undertaking can realize its colossal pro
portions. Taking each name and subject in turn,
he followed each to the end and beyond the cen
tury, through the file of each newspaper in turn.
Thus any student following the references made on
any given subject may exhaust all the knowledge
on that subject to be gotten from the newspapers
during that entire period, covering more than one
hundred years. It is needless to say that this con
stant and reiterated study not only made Mr. Kelby
familiar with the history of the City in every minute
detail, but his manuscript notes enabled him at any
moment to refer to the authorities themselves.
These notes were his own peculiar property. Infor
mation from them he was always ready to impart,
and always cheerfully ; but that man was persona
grata indeed to whom he was willing to entrust the
manuscript notes themselves. It was my privilege
to be allowed to use these notes in the freest man
ner in a study which occupied some years — the
habits and customs of Colonial New York ; and I
am glad to acknowledge that whatever continuity
or precision I attained was due wholly to this as-
13

sistance. It was by this minute study that Mr.
Kelby became early a living cyclopedia of New
York information ; and for many years before his
death he was without question acknowledged to be
the highest authority on all that concerns the topog
raphy and the history of this City.
While every interval of duty in the rooms of the
Society was thus profitably availed of, this was by
no means the limit of Mr. Kelby's study. The ac
quisition of the fine collection of English literature
made by the late Dr. Hawkes gave opportunity for
a wider range of reading ; and as the young man's
home was in the building of which he was the cus
todian, his evenings were usually spent in drinking
deep draughts from that well of language pure and
undefiled, the; English classics. The drama espe
cially interested him. Plays, whether written or
acted, were a never-failing joy. Not the sensa
tional drama, but the good old English comedies
which then found an interpretation by that admira
ble school of actors which the Wallacks, father and
son, brought together — a band of choice spirits of
whom Jefferson is perhaps the last living represent
ative. Of books of travel young Mr. Kelby was
especially fond. With every published record of
American exploration or adventure he was familiar,
and his interest was by no means confined to those
of this continent. In these evenings of reading he
first made acquaintance with the fascinating remi
niscences which have come down to us of social
New York ; the early quaint relations of Denton,
Wooley, Lodwick, Miller, and of Kalm ; and later
the graphic pages of Duer and Benson intro
duced him to the New York of the close of the Co-
H

lonial period ; of Miller and Mitchell to that of the
first quarter of the century. Those of King and of
Francis gave an insight into the manners and cus
toms of the entire first half of this century ; while
the manuscript of de Simitiere opened a window
on the time when the site of the present Astor
House was a race-course, when the Colonial Dames
shopped in Hanover Square, and the Broadway
was gay with coaches panelled with the arms of the
gentry — the ship of the Livingstons, the burning
castle ofthe Morrisses, the lances of the de Lanceys.
The rooms of this Society have always been the
resort of those who have a genuine love for New
York. Representative among those, and retaining
many of the characteristics of their forefathers, were
John Romeyn Brodhead, the learned historian of
the New Netherlands ; Mr. Gulian C. Verplanck,
accomplished gentleman and scholar ; the Duyc-
kincks, and the late President of the Society, Mr.
Frederic de Peyster. With all of these Mr. Kelby
was personally acquainted, and from their lips he
learned the rudiments of his knowledge of the inner
life of their Holland forefathers ; and among his
friends he counted Brevoort, de Lancey, Emmet,
Andrews, Moreau, and Johnston. He was in close
correspondence also with Hildeburn and Stone, of
Philadelphia, whose lives were given up to historic
labor. Later it was his good fortune to attract the at
tention and acquire the friendship of Mr. Richard
E. Mount, a stanch friend of the Society. Of an
old New York family of English origin, which re
mained in the City during the interesting period
when it was the head-quarters of the British Army,
IS

Mr. Mount was in every sense a typical New
Yorker, a fine example of that English race which
ruled the New York Province from the day when
the doughty Governor Stuyvesant retired from the
fort at the Bowling Green to his Bowerie Farm
(on which this Society's building now stands) to
that day when the British commanders evacuated
the City in November, 1783, when New York, pass
ing from her limited Colonial influences, entered
upon her metropolitan career. One finds in the
history ofthe City three distinct periods : the Dutch,
the English — or, from its mixture of Dutch and
English population, it may be called the Knicker
bocker — and the third, the strictly American period,
when, after the Revolution, the settlement of a
large New England population gave it a new and
somewhat changed direction. It was the develop
ment of this later New York in which Mr. Kelby
took an unfailing interest ; for while it is true that
his studies were, in the main, of the Colonial times,
his love was for the New York of the present, and
his pride was its increasing prosperity and power.
It was the chimera of his hope to combine the
history of the old and the new in a colossal work
in which the story of every ward of the City should
be told, each in a great illustrated quarto, with
portraits of the magnates in every sphere of its life
and pictures of all the celebrated buildings, old and
new — a work which he acknowledged would de
mand the co-operation of a corps of writers, clerks,
and artists, but which he thought, in the increasing
magnitude of the city, might be carried out by
some great publishing house with honor and profit.
His friend, Mr. Mount, was the last of the suc-
16

cession of the great law firm of the Alexanders,
whose founder, James Alexander, was one of that
famous Whig triumvirate which led the Liberty
party ofthe last century — Livingston, Morris, Alex
ander. As such, Mr. Mount came into the owner
ship of the old legal library ; and it is interesting
here to state that the priceless copy of Bradford's
edition of the laws of New York, which be
longed to James Alexander, came to this Society
through the generosity of the Mount family. Of
robust habit and fond of out-door life, but like the
true New Yorker, always preferring a pavement to
green fields, Mr. Mount was familiar with every
landmark ofthe City's history. Much of this had
already faded in the lapse of time and the constant
evolutions of the City and of every form of its life.
It was the delight of the friends to revive the for
gotten lore, to separate the quaint truth from its
ornament of myth and legend, and to reconstruct
the past — not an easy task, when the indifference
of the busy and shifting population is held in mind.
To this association of interest Mr. Kelby brought
the knowledge derived from the study of newspa
pers and maps, Mr. Mount his family traditions and
the results of personal research. Together they ex
plored every point of topographical and local inter
est of the Dutch and Colonial periods. Even of
those thus brought to light but few now remain.
Although I have been a member ofthe Society from
1848, my own intimacy with Mr. Kelby only began
in the year 1867, when engaged in the editing of the
Colonial Records ofthe New York Chamber of Com
merce. This work included biographical sketches
of every one of the members 'of that institution,
17

from 1768 to 1783. It was prepared in the rooms
of this Library. As it was in the direct iine of that
class of research in which Mr. Kelby was engaged, he
took the greatest interest in its progress ; and it was
then that I first became acquainted with the extent
and the variety and the minuteness of his informa
tion. On my return to the City from some years'
residence abroad, this daily companionship was re
newed. It was then that Mr. Kelby opened to me
his store of countless notes, his indices to the news
paper files, and aroused in me a passion for the
Colonial history of our City — a City in which I am
proud to say I was born ; and through Mr. Kelby
I became the daily companion of Mr. Mount, a com
panionship which ripened into a friendship which
was only ended by his death.
Without Mr. Kelby this Library can never be to
me personally the same. For me he was its " in
forming soul." It cannot be otherwise than that
this is the feeling of each and all of those who look
to this Library as the source of their information.
Of these alcoves Mr. Kelby was the " familiar
spirit." The classification and arrangement of its
books having been made by himself, he was the
easy master of its details ; and a mere suggestion to
him that one was engaged on any special topic of
American history was met by a display of volumes
covering the entire subject. He had the true bibli
ographic memory — a topical memory — which knew
the nature of books from their juxtaposition, and
had an|^ intuitive perception of their contents from
their relation ; so that he would be quite sure that
on such and such shelves, and in such and such
bindings, would be found matter relating to the

subject under enquiry, though without always a dis
tinct idea of the particular matter itself; a knowl
edge, if not of the thing to be found, at least certain
as to the place where it was to be found, if at all —
a peculiar instinct which only he who has lived
among books can understand. He was in every
sense a bookman. To the erudition of the libra
rian, he added the love of books as such, indepen
dent of their contents. He revelled in the large
paper editions, with their uncut edges, their creamy
page, their clean-cut type, and the abundant margin.
He loved their outward dress as well as the inner
form. It was pleasing to note the physical satis
faction with which he would caress with affectionate
touch the soft, warm bindings of choice volumes,
and an instruction to watch the careful tenderness
with which he would cut the fresh leaves. These
are traits which are not always met with even in the
most scholarly men.
Mr. Kelby did not become the Librarian of the
Society until 1893 ; but for more than a quarter of
a century preceding, although nominally the Assist
ant Librarian and Custodian of the institution, he
was in fact the Librarian. The reasons for this
anomaly are easily understood. Married in 1864, he
had given hostages to fortune. When Mr. Moore
withdrew, in 1876, from this Society, to take charge
of Mr. Lenox's collection, the office of Librarian was
not only tendered but pressed upon Mr. Kelby ;
but he had seen the dangers of an elective office,
which the post of Librarian is in this institution, while
that of Assistant, being dependent on the Board of
Trustees, is not subject to elective caprice or in
trigue. Each one ofthe nominal Librarians who suc-
19

ceeded Mr. Moore was a personal friend of Mr.
Kelby, and no one of them would for a moment
have thought of interfering in any manner with his
technical duties or service. It is fortunate for the
institution that in Mr. Robert H. Kelby, the brother
of our late friend, now for thirty years in the em
ploy of this Society, the Library is sure of an ad
mirable successor to this office. For years this
gentleman has had the training and advice of his
brother. He has card-catalogued the entire Li
brary, and is familiar with its arrangement. With
out his aid the enquiring historical student would
be as much at sea among our alcoves as a sailor
without a pilot in a strange port. The routine of
the Library is extremely onerous. Although the
institution has a General Secretary and a Corre
sponding Secretary, the duty of reply to the endless
requests-for information from genealogical and his
torical students in all parts of the country, though
not precisely within his province, falls upon the
Librarian ; and this kind of request has enormously
increased since the organization of the various pa
triotic societies which have sprung into existence
during the last quarter of a century. The generous
gift of a fine collection of genealogies, with a fund
for its support and extension, made by Mr. Phoenix,
added a new department to the Library, in which
Mr. Kelby took a great interest and pride. In ad
dition to this correspondence, there is requisite a
constant daily examination of the catalogues of
booksellers and book auctioneers at home and
abroad. Nothing that was rare touching on Amer
ican history, and especially on New York history,
escaped the expert eye of our late friend ; and such

was the confidence in his judgment that some purse
was always open to defray the cost of any purchase
he might suggest.
His expert knowledge was well known, and his
presence at any auction sale of books was notice
of itself that something rare was to be offered.
Yet he had self-control enough not to betray his
desires, and always acquired the object of his pur
suit, unless the price exceeded his limit of value.
But he ratrely let anything escape him that was
needed to stop a gap in our New York titles. He
was on terms of intimacy with the noted booksellers,
Francis, father and son, and Woodward — as also
with our associate member, Sabin, whose knowledge
of books is not surpassed by that of any one in this
country. He took the greatest pains to complete
the collection of Gaine's Almanacs of the Colonial
period ; and I cannot forget the joy with which he
received from me the gift to the Library of a con
secutive series of the Revolutionary time — volumes
which had been the property of one of the sextons
of Old Trinity, and contained some curious burial
notes and quaint pencil sketches of the city on the
fly - leaves. He also completed the collection of
the City directories, from the first issue of 1 786 to
the present date.
He was ever on the lookout for additions to the
map and chart collection, and that of views of the
City. The scarcity of early views of New York is
a drawback to the student of its local life. The
earliest known view is in the possession of this
Society. It is an original drawing of New Amster
dam, made by Laurens Hermanz Block on board the
ship Lydia, presented to the Society by Mr. Det-
21

mold. The Burgis engraving of the City in 17 17, a
large picture, was entirely unknown until 1892, when
Mr. Kelby met with a copy, and discovered by com
parison that Bakewell's view of 1746 was but a re
production, with the dates changed, and a dedica
tion to Governor CHnton substituted for the original
inscription to Governor Hunter. David Grim's plan
ofthe City, 1 743-1 744, as well as a view showing the
extent ofthe fires in 1776 and 1778, were drawn by
him from recollection. This interesting character
lived in the City during the Revolution, and kept
the Hessian coffee-house. There is a fine portrait
of him in the possession of his family which should
be added to our gallery of old New Yorkers. There
is still another fine oil painting of New York, with
the British shipping in the Harbor, in the possession
of Mr. Goldsbrow Banyer, who is also the owner of
a curious diary of personal expenditure — an inher
itance from the British official whose name he bears.
The earliest maps ofthe City are those of 1664,
known as the Duke's and the NicoU's map of 1664-
1668. Ofthe engraved maps, the Society has copies
ofthe Bradford map of 1731, the Duyckinck map
of 1755, the Montressor map of 1764, and the Rat-
zer map of 1766. All of these have been of ser
vice in the preparation of the new colored ward
maps, in which Mr. Kelby personally assisted.
The Library has also Robertson's original water-
colors of City views made in 1798, Burton's en
graved views of 183 1, and Peabody's views pub
lished in the same year. The view of New York
and Brooklyn Heights in 1798, which belonged to
the late J. Carson Brevort, was reproduced in one of
the City Manuals, where also may be found numer-

ous views and sketches of buildings, and scenes at
various periods in our history, from rare originals or
engravings. The centennial of American Independence, in
1876, opened a new field of interest to New York
historians. Those of us who had taken interest in
the story of the Revolution were painfully aware of
the slurs which it has been the fashion of historical
writers to'"cast upon the action of New York and
New Yorkers in the long struggle for independence,
during the greater part of which it was the mis
fortune of this City to be the military head-quarters
of the British forces. The approach of the centen
nial of events of which this City and this State were
the theatre seemed an occasion to set our New
England friends right, and to show them that the
Massachusetts colony had neither monopoly of the
patriotic spirit of the country, nor yet just claim to
priority in resistance to oppression. Already Mr.
Dawson, an eccentric man, but a most painstaking
searcher after historic truth, had set forth the claim
of New York as the first to have drawn or shed
blood in open resistance to British oppression. He
had shown, in his paper on the Sons of Liberty, that
Golden Hill, not far from our City Hall, was in Janu
ary, 1770, the scene of a bloody struggle between
the Sons of Liberty and the Sixteenth Regiment of
British Foot, who had wantonly destroyed the
Liberty Pole erected on the New York commons
to commemorate the repeal of the Stamp Act;
while the Boston massacre, a street struggle ofthe
same order, was not till the month of March suc
ceeding. In 1868 the Chamber of Commerce, with
which this Society has ever been in^close alliance,
23

celebrated the beginning of the one hundredth year
of its existence. On this occasion the claim of New
York to have originated the Stamp Act Association
of 1765 (the non-importing association), which, par
ticipated in by the commercial trading ports of the
several colonies, brought about the repeal of the
obnoxious legislation, was asserted and proved.
Moreover, it was then shown conclusively that the
determining cause of the meeting of the first Con
tinental Congress of 1774 was the demand of the
Committee of Correspondence of New York for
the delegation of a body, not only charged with the
framing of acts for the regulation of trade, "but
clothed with power to enforce those regulations."
The documents on which these claims rest are in
the keeping of the Society, as also the files of Eng
lish newspapers which confirm them. With these
Mr. Kelby was familiar, and he took a lively interest
in this matter.
In 1876, at the request ofthis Society, I prepared
an elaborate sketch of the Progress of New York
in a century — a study which covered several months
of labor, in which I was constantly aided by the
elaborate notes and the advice of our friend. This
paper was printed by the Society, and has taken its
place in the line of local sketches already alluded
to. I mention this as one of the results of Mr.
Kelby's labors. In a word, my relation to the work
was that of the advocate who pleads a cause on the
brief prepared by the work and research of the at
torney in the case.
The centennial of the Revolutionary period be
gan a new phase in Mr. Kelby's career. Up to that
period his life had been circumscribed, and his asso
24

ciations restricted to those brought to him in the
daily routine of the library. The celebration of
events of which the soil of the City and of the State
of New York was the scene directly interested Mr.
Kelby, and forced him from his modest retirement
into a larger circle of acquaintance. In this new
environment, while he retained his native modesty
and dislike of personal assertion, he nevertheless
took the position to which his attainments entitled
him, conducting himself with quiet dignity in this
new sphere. But for this experience he would per
haps have never been willing to accept the post of
Librarian of the Society, which has always involved
some social obligations.
The idea of each and every one of the New York
centennials originated in this Society, and the ar
rangements for them were made here. These in
cluded an exhaustive history of each event, and a
careful examination of the scene of its occurrence.
The first of these was the anniversary of the Battle
of Harlem. The precise location and course of this
action, in which Knowlton fell, was the subject of a
long and animated dispute. The ground was gone
over by the committee in charge, together with Mr.
John Jay, who was the orator of the day. They
were accompanied by Mr. Kelby, and the site defi
nitely established on the Vandewater or Bloom
ingdale Heights. The rugged point from which
the Black Watch sounded defiance across the
Hollow way to the Continentals upon the Point of
rocks — as Lewis Morris, Jr., relates — was as yet
in all its native roughness ; and the Harlem Flats
which the Heights overlooked, now a compact
mass of buildings, were then, September, 1876,
25

a broad patch of market-gardens, with here and
there an isolated farm-house. And, to mark the
changes in New York, I may add that a quarter of
a century before I had seen the same flats and the
adjacent marshes darkened by the clouds of duck
and wild fowl as they swept southward in their an
nual migrations. Mr. Kelby supplied the brief from
which Mr. Jay prepared his scholarly address, and
later he added an exhaustive appendix to the ac
count of the proceedings published by the Society.
The accuracy of the site was again questioned.
The cumulative proof brought forward by Mr. Kel
by definitely settled the controversy ; but, with his
usual tenacity, he did not rest content until the cor
rectness of his verdict was clinched by the setting
up of a bronze tablet at Columbia University, at the
junction of the Boulevard and 1 1 7th Street, with an
inscription reciting that it was " to commemorate
the battle won on that site." This was done at his
instance by the Sons of the Revolution. It was
somewhere in this neighborhood, Mr. Kelby held,
that Knowlton and Leitch fell in the early morning;
and here it was that Washington stopped his main
advance on the retreat of the British within their
lines below the Plains. Mr. Kelby's views as to
the place of the " buckwheat field " have been since
sustained by Professor Johnston, in his Battle of
Harlem Heights. In October of this same year, at
the invitation of the Westchester Historical Society
and of Mr. Edward F. de Lancey, Mr. Kelby at
tended the celebration of the Battle of White Plains,
of which he had made a careful study.
In September, 1877, the Battle of Bemis Heights,
the most important of those contests known as the
26

Battle of Saratoga, was celebrated by the citizens
of Saratoga County on the scene of the action,
under the shadow of the trees where Morgan's
riflemen turned the tide of contest. On this occa
sion I had the honor of delivering the historical ad
dress, and Mr. Kelby accompanied me to Saratoga.
This paper was prepared in these rooms, and Mr.
Kelby was my active and efficient assistant in gath
ering the details ; it was later published under the
title of the "Burgoyne Campaign."
In 1879 Mr. Kelby was greatly interested in the
anniversary of Mad Anthony Wayne's victori
ous assault of Stony Point, and was a guest on
that occasion. Wayne was the grandson of one of
the officers of William of Orange at the Battle of
the Boyne, and Mr. Kelby was proud of him as a
representative ofthe Scotch-Irish race; indeed, the
Revolutionary characters for whom he had a special
affection were of this stock : James Duane, mem
ber of the first Continental Congress and first
Mayor of New York after the Revolution, and the
two brothers, George and James Clinton, alike dis
tinguished in the council and in the field. The last
three of these had in his eyes the additional merit
of being New York born. Next to these in his
admiration was Alexander McDougall, Scotch born,
but whose life was spent in New York; the Amer
ican Wilkes of the Stamp Act period, he later
acquired military fame as a Brigadier- General of
the New York hne.
In the year 1880 Mr. Kelby was more than ever
busy in this favorite field. Tappan was visited,
and the precise location of Washington's camp
and of the place of Andre's execution in front of
27

the lines were definitely settled ; and the historical
material used by the local committee was furnished
by him. In this summer also he visited Pompton,
in New Jersey, and travelled that inner road be
hind the Ramapo Hills screened by which Wash
ington marched and manoeuvred his forces from
King's Ferry to Morristown. Mr. Kelby's delight
in these outings was almost childish in its exuber
ance. An ardent lover of nature, his enjoyment of
this beautiful country was heightened by its historic
associations. He had prepared himself for this
journey by a careful study of the maps of Erskine
and De Witt, priceless possessions ofthis Society.
Erskine was the official geographer of the Conti
nental Army ; De Witt succeeded him. On this
occasion Mr. Kelby visited the remains of Camp
bell's famous tavern of the Revolution, and those
also of the old Ringwood iron-furnace, the chief
source of munition supply to Washington's troops.
This furnace was worked by Peter Hasenclever,
toward the middle of the last century, for a Lon
don company. Robert Erskine came out to take
charge of them in 1772. Espousing the American
cause, he was appointed geographer to the army.
His surveys, 17 76- 1780, were given to the Society
in 1845 by Mr. Richard Varick De Witt. He died
in 1780, and a monument was raised to him by
Washington's orders at Ringwood. The old resi
dence on the Erskine Manor at the furnace is now
the country-seat of Mr. Abram S. Hewitt, whose
daughters extended a graceful hospitality to Mr.
Kelby and entertained him with a recital of the
traditions of the place. According to legend, old
Peter Hasenclever lived in high state, dining to the
28

music of an imported band. The ladies of his
family, in satin and brocade, walked the alleys of
the well-ordered garden ; and it is said their ghosts
walk them now, arrayed, of course, in the self-same
satin and brocade, save one, who, in white attire,
threads the intricacies of what was once the garden
Maze. East Jersey was one blaze of golden apples
this year, and the hills were beginning to sport
their autumn coat of many colors, much to our
friend's delight. Still another series of excursions
this year was to the site of the allied camps in
Westchester County. Some original French me
moirs, with carefully drawn and colored maps of the
country, had fallen into our hands, and were the
means of re-establishing the position ofthe opposing
forces which confronted each other across the Har
lem when Washington disconcerted Sir Henry Clin
ton by his feint on the defences of New York Island.
In the autumn of 1880 Mr. Kelby was the guest of
Mr. Augustus Van Cortlandt at his home, historic
Cortlandt House, now maintained as a museum
and Colonial depositary in Cortlandt Park. The
visit had an historic purpose. Its object was to
discover the remains of the friendly Stockbridge
Indians, who were massacred by Tarleton's dra
goons, in July, 1778, at a point on the old manor
which has since retained the name of Indian Bridge.
The old sachem chief, Ninham, was later found
dead of his wounds in the Cortlandt fields hard by.
Some of the wounded took refuge in the houses of
the De Voes. The visiting party was accompanied
by the well-known antiquary, Mr. Thomas F. De
Voe, a descendant of the family. But it was found
impossible to locate the precise spot of burial, the
29

stones by which it had been marked in "the ilndian
field having been scattered or removed in the sub
sequent changes in the features of the land. The
late Mr. De Voe was a constant student in this
Library. His Market-Book is full of historic infor
mation about old New York. He was a great
friend and admirer of Mr. Kelby.
In 1 88 1 Mr. Kelby took a lively interest in the re
ception of the officers and gentlemen delegated by
the French Government to attend the ceremonies of
the Yorktown Centennial. With this function the
New York Historical Society was but indirectly
concerned. The New York courtesies were ex
tended by a commission named by the Governor
of the State, of which our honored President, Mr.
King, was the chairman. But Mr. Kelby had the
satisfaction of exhibiting to the distinguished guests
of the nation, and especially to the descendants of
the very men who fought at Yorktown, the numer
ous mementoes of the services of their ancestors
which adorn this collection. The representatives
of the family of Lafayette were peculiarly interested.
The illustrious Marquis was received by this Soci
ety in 1824, and sat beneath the portrait, taken of
himself in 1 784, in the very uniform of the Light
Infantry in which he stormed the British works at
Yorktown. The portrait was presented to this
Society by Colonel Ebenezer Stevens (who served
as Lafayette's Chief of Artillery in his expedition
against Arnold) for whom the picture was painted.
The centennial anniversaries culminated in that
memorable outbreak of patriotic sentiment which
marked the celebration of the final evacuation of
New York City, November, 1883. The idea of
30

this celebration originated in this Society. It was
carried out by an imposing committee, in which this
Society, the Chamber of Commerce, and the Mu
nicipal Government of the City were joined, and in
which other important institutions participated.
The proceedings on this occasion were printed
with elaborate historic notes, to which Mr. Kelby
made notable contribution. The various localities
were visited and the traditions gathered. Among
these localities was the old Van Cortlandt manor-
house at Croton, the residence of Colonel Philip
Van Cortlandt, who commanded a famous New
York regiment of Continentals, and who accompa
nied Washington on his entrance to the City at, the
time of its evacuation.
Mr. Kelby was most hospitably received. Mrs.
Pierre Van Cortlandt on this occasion loaned to
him the valuable collection of the Glenn manu
scripts, which were hers by inheritance. Colonel
Glenn was the Quartermaster- General ofthe North
ern Department during the Revolution. Among
these was found a letter of Captain Ten Eyck,
written at his post at the mouth of the Tappan
Creek, which recited the interview between Wash
ington and Carleton. This interview, at which the
arrangements for the evacuation of the city were
determined by the two Commanders, took place on
board the British man-of-war Greyhound, in the
stream. The letter stated that Washington re
ceived a salute of seventeen guns — no doubt the
first military salute ever given by the British to an
American Commander-in-Chief.
The literature pertaining to Evacuation Day had
already, in 1870, been gathered by Mr. Kelby, and
31

published in the Manual of the Common Council
for that year. It was later discovered that the
official British documents connected with this event,
and the manuscript minutes ofthe negotiations be
tween Washington and Sir Guy Carleton, are pre
served in the fifty-six volumes of the papers of the
Commanders-in-Chief in America, in the Library of
the Royal Institution in London. The officers of
this institution kindly answered enquiries as to many
points. It was always the hope of Mr. Kelby that
he might visit London and examine these and other
documents relating to our local history. He was
wont to say that in the British archives lay rich
nuggets of New York history. It is a wonder that
the State of New York has not obtained ere this
copies ofthis material.
The founding of the Society of the Sons of the
Revolution was an outcome of this celebration. Its
idea had been conceived and formulated in 1875 in
these rooms, and its purpose and its limitations dis
cussed and agreed upon with our late friend, who
was its first Registrar. He early saw the great ad
vantage that would accrue to historical and genea
logical societies from the impulse given by an in
stitution, the conditions of membership in which
involved a certain amount of enquiry in each of
these lines — a discernment which has been amply
justified in the success of this and the numerous
societies of kindred spirit and purpose which have
been since formed, until now there is not a period
of our history which is not represented and its
study followed by some special institution.
The centennial of the Constitution of 1789, and
of the inauguration of Washington as the first
32

President under this instrument, was the last of
these national celebrations. The Society was am
ply represented in its many Committees, and Mr.
Kelby's knowledge was in constant demand when
ever accuracy was required. And this again was
the occasion for a Sketch ofthe City of New York
at that period, which was compiled by Mr. Thomas
E. V. Smith within these walls, in great measure
from Mr. Kelby's material. Mr. Smith's contribu
tion is invaluable to the student.
With the magnificent reception of the descend
ants of Columbus, in 1893, this Society had no im
mediate concern. It was especially devised and
carried out under the auspices and at the expense
of the Chamber of Commerce alone ; but I well re
member the satisfaction with which Mr. Kelby re
ceived the request from the Chamber to name a
committee to assist in extending the formal welcome
to the great Admiral's representative, a function
performed by your honorable President with his
usual felicity and grace.
I have endeavored to show that in his pleasures
and his tastes, as in his studies and occupations.
New York was never forgotten. His walks in the
City or its suburbs, his occasional outings in the
summer season, were always turned to gain some
addition to his topographical knowledge — in the
spring to Fort Lee, on the Palisades, where the
apple blossoms and lilacs added color and fragrance
tothe charm ofthe landscape — in the autumn to the
Jersey plains, full of Revolutionary reminiscences.
And he carried this passion with him always.
The only table-talk which pleased him at the
social board was of New York; the only table-
33

deHcacies which won his favor were the product of
New York forests. New York fields, or New York
waters. Simple in his tastes as he was in his hab
its, he had the true New York love of fish and
shell-fish of all kinds. The glories of the great
South Bay, with its inexhaustible supply of ocean
products, was a theme which always aroused his
enthusiasm. Blue Point oysters fresh from their
native beds, and lobsters from the Hell Gate rocks,
were his delight ; but always at first hand ; cold
storage was his abhorrence. And these he pre
ferred when served in the open air, at one of the little
riverside gardens to be found on the Harlem River
or on some of the upper wharves ; and most enjoyed
in the company of some kindred spirit, some New
Yorker to the manner born. And for his outings
a clam-bake at Kingsbridge on the Harlem, at Stam
ford or Little Neck on the Sound, with the Long
Island poet, or on the clear waters of Shinnecock
Bay. He loved to dwell on the stories which have
come down to us of the turtle feasts of the Colony
days, and the massive dinners which Sam Fraunces
or Willett served at their taverns, with the invaria
ble accompaniment of punch and madeira, of church
warden pipes and October ale. In practice, how
ever, he restricted his indulgence to a glass or two
of our native product — Catawba or California wine.
His career was marked by ceaseless industry, an
unslaking thirst for knowledge, a thoroughness in
research, and a precision in the statement of the
results of his examination. He cared very little for
the opinions or judgments of others on any subjects
within the reach of his own study — a trait in which
he again showed the characteristics of his race.
34

His thoroughness in detail is shown in the volumes
of the Publications of this Society, compiled and ed
ited by him, and in the ample manner in which
they are indexed : the Kemble papers, the Burgh
ers and Freemen of New York, and the New York
muster-rolls, 1755 to 1765, the period of the Old
French War. In these last titles he exhausted
every source of original material, so that they are
a model in their line. He also indexed the Deane
papers, which were carefully edited by our worthy
friend, Mr. Charles Isham, who was at the time
Librarian of the Society. And as an Index-
maker he had no equal, unless Dr. O'Callaghan,
who was a master in this difficult branch of
editorial labor. To the third volume of this
series he contributed a mass of material on old
New York and Trinity Church, drawn from the
Colonial newspapers — a curious nucleus of local and
family history. And to Valentine's Manual of the
Common Council of the City of New York, a hete
rogeneous mass of valuable local information, he
furnished several series of consecutive extracts : the
troubles of the Liberty Pole, privateering, etc. In
1876 he contributed to the Evening Mail a weekly
series of consecutive extracts from the newspapers,
printed memoirs, and letters of corresponding date
of the last century, giving a daily account of occur
rences in the City and of exterior news as received.
These were accompanied by an editorial column
presenting a digest of the notes. The series ran
from March to November, closing with an account
of the fall of Fort Washington. In the course of
this labor he found occasion to correct many popular
errors. ¦ It was shown that Washington's New York
35

City head-quarters during this battle-summer were
at the Mortier mansion, later known as Richmond
Hill, and that the claim that No. i Broadway was
ever thus honored could not be sustained ; although
it served as barracks, and as a head-quarters of Put
nam when in command of the City.
Besides these printed results of his industry and
research, he left a manuscript history of the islands
in the Harbor of New York, every one of which he
had personally visited ; genealogies of the Stuyve
sant, Livingston, and Astor families, and copious
notes to the inscriptions in Trinity Churchyard,
each of which had at some period been subjected
to his critical examination ; and also notes on the
Hallock and Newton families, made during a sum
mer vacation on Long Island.
With his thorough knowledge of the Colonial
period, he could point out the sites of the town res
idences and of the Island country-seats of the early
magnates, and of every person who contributed to the
fame and honor of the City. One notable instance
of this precise knowledge was his location of the
site where William Bradford set up his first print
ing-press in this Province, in 1693. The Society
celebrated this event in 1893, and a bronze tablet
marks the spot at No. 81 Pearl Street; a second
tablet on the southeast corner of the New York
Cotton Exchange designates the place where Brad
ford printed the first newspaper in the city, the New
York Gazette, in 1725. A copy of the first year's
issue of this paper, missing from our own file, is
preserved in the New York Society Library. It
seems a pity that such a separation should continue.
Another instance of his exactness of investigation
36

was the proof that Burns' long room, where the non
importation agreement was signed in 1765, was the
long assembly-room of the Province Arms. This
tavern on the Broadway was then kept by the peri
patetic Burns, who had left his Coffee-house, which
stood on the site of the later Atlantic Gardens, and
which has been erroneously claimed as the scene of
this event by authorities well versed in New York
matters. And still another and more recent instance
was his demonstration, beyond all reasonable doubt,
that the patriot spy, Nathan Hale, was captured while
attempting to cross the British lines at the Harlem
Flats, and certainly that the place of execution was
the British artillery park near the old Dove Tavern,
at the five-mile stone on the Kingsbridge Road.
The exact location Mr. Kelby stated, in his let
ter published in the New York Sunday Herald
of November 26, 1893, as west of the Post Road
on Third Avenue, between Sixty-sixth and Sixty-
seventh Streets.
Mr. Kelby took a great interest in that quaint
department of historical literature known as Notes
and Queries. He was well acquainted with both the
English and American series, and was a generous
contributor of- hard questions and answers. Abroad
the lovers of this succinct style of information have
a special organ, but with us it has been merely a de
partment of historical magazines. Scattered through
the volumes of the several series of this character
may be found his contributions, over either his initials
W. K. or his favorite pseudonym " Petersfield," as
sumed from the location of the Society on the farm
of old Governor Peter Stuyvesant, Peter's Field.
I should be ungrateful, indeed, were I to omit to
37

mention the infinite obligation I was personally
under to Mr. Kelby during the six years that I
edited the Magazine of American History. This
magazine, founded by me in 1877, was the outcome
of long consideration between Mr. Kelby and my
self. At this time he was, indeed, " my companion,
my guide, and mine own familiar friend." During
the period of my connection with it, he was my
constant coadjutor ; and the Notes and Queries de
partment was entirely under his direction. This
magazine, during the six years referred to, was
kept within strictly historical lines. It later drifted
into what it was hoped would be more profitable
because more popular channels, and met the fate
which all special magazines must expect which are
tempted to such change of course. Personally, I
regret not having delayed the severing of my con
nection with it until the close of 1883, that I might
have completed the printing of the mass of Revolu
tionary matter which I had gathered — -a collection
which was at once dispersed, and is now lost sight
of In this regret Mr. Kelby shared, although he very
properly maintained his interest in and continued his
contributions to the publication which succeeded it.
The career of Mr. Kelby as the Custodian and
Librarian of this Society has been my theme ; in
deed, were I to out-step these limits, I should hardly
know when or where to stop in my reminiscences
of him. Justice to this theme has necessarily in
volved an account in some detail of the subjects
which were his life interest and his life study. I
have dwelt passingly upon his wonderfully retentive
memory, by which he held in ready grasp all he had
gathered in his wide field of reading and research.
38

I have mentioned his unflagging industry ; yet with
this constant application he was not easily disturbed.
His favorite place was in the fore of the Library ;
but no matter in what engaged, or how engrossed
in his labor, he would always turn aside from his
occupation to answer any query or bring down any
volume which was asked of him. And such was
his power of self- abstraction that these interruptions
never interfered with the continuity of his work.
Those not practically familiar with the duties of a
Librarian can hardly credit the extent of crass igno
rance, of even the rudiments of the subjects on which
they seek information, which applicants constantly
display. Yet even to these he was forbearing, and
I fail to remember when he showed either impatience
or annoyance in his manner. To this indulgence
to the casual enquirer he added, in the case of the
genuine student, a friendly interest in the object of
his research.
Mr. Kelby, on the 5th of August, 1864, married
Margaret Wallace, who was, like himself, of Scotch-
Irish extraction. She was of a most gentle and re
fined nature. She bore him three children : Mary
V. and Thomas Kelby, who survived him, and a
daughter who died young.
Mr. Kelby died on the 27th of July, 1898, in the
fifty-seventh year of his age, and was buried in St,
Michael's (Protestant Episcopal) Cemetery, Astoria,
Long Island.
I must close, much as I would like to linger on
these tender memories of our friend, but not close
without some personal tribute to his many admir
able traits. With something of womanly softness,
he was plain of speech ; his conversation had an
39

old-time flavor. Domestic in his habits, he was a
kind husband, an indulgent father. Of a reserved
nature and a quiet composure of manner, rarely
ruffled, he was yet of warm feeHng; and his attach
ments, though few, were lasting. Crippled by the
narrowness of his early surroundings, it was not
till middle life that his really broad nature had room
for development.
The pity of his death is that it was at the height
of his usefulness. Yet though cut off" at the very
prime of his intellectual vigor, he had already, by
his tireless industry, contributed more to the sum
of exact historical knowledge than most of those
who have reached life's allotted span. Wherever
that knowledge is esteemed and learning respected,
wherever faithfulness to the highest order of his
toric truth is understood and valued, his death will
be looked upon as a calamity. To those of us who
were within the circle of his conversation and his
friendship, it is a personal bereavement ; and his
memory will be cherished as a personal heritage.
Among these it is my privilege to be numbered.
We must console ourselves for his loss in the mem
ory of what he was. " We shall not look upon his
like again."
In conclusion, I suggest that the painting of a
portrait of Mr. Kelby be ordered for the gallery of
the Society, with a tablet reciting his service, and
as an inscription for it:
WILLIAM KELBY
LIBRARIAN WHO
FOR FORTY-ONE YEARS FAITHFULLY SERVED
THIS SOCIETY.
1898
"¦We shall not look upon his like again.''

3 9002 08866 0627

Syracuse, ^k Y
HI. MR. 21. inr

MM