Albany was granted a 500 acre tract of land at "Schaghticoke" in its municipal charter of 1686. Initially, the Albany government did not follow up on its obligation to purchase the land from the Schaghticoke Indians. Instead, in 1698 Hendrick Van Rensselaer was authorized to obtain an Indian deed. In 1707, he then sold the rights to the six square-mile tract east of the Hudson River and north of Rensselaerswyck to the city of Albany. The heart of the Schaghticoke tract was desirable farmland in the Hoosick Valley about sixteen miles northwest of Albany.

In 1709, the Albany government conveyed lots to Johannes De Wandelaer, Jr., John Harmanse Visscher, Corset Veeder, Daniel Ketelhuyn, Johannes Knickerbacker, Louis Viele, and Dirck Van Vechten - all of whom went there to live. Additional plots later were granted to Martin de Lamont, Wouter Quackenbush, David Schuyler, Wouter Groesbeck, Philip Livingston, Ignace Kip, Cornelis Vandenbergh, Pieter Yates, and others. Initially, these "sales" were leases. Later, leases became ownership deeds.

Some of the first Schaghticoke landholders were younger sons of established Albany families. Others were more marginal but long-standing city people seeking a new start in the Hoosick Valley. Livingston and others obtained Schaghticoke titles for investment purposes.

Permanent settlement of the area was retarded by a bloody incident between settlers and Native peoples in October 1711 that left Albany native Captain Johannes Bradt and members of his household dead and others taken to Quebec as prisoners.

The Dutch Reformed Church at Schaghticoke dates from 1714 - although it relied on missionary service from Albany and elsewhere. The first log church was destroyed during an Indian raid. Its surviving baptism and marriage records date from 1750. A new church was built in 1760. Beginning in 1715, parish burials were made in the Knickerbocker family plot.

A base list of Schaghticoke freeholders in 1720 appears online.

With tenants farming good Hoosick Valley bottomland and paying annual rents in wheat and wood to their Albany landlord, Schaghticoke figured to become a successful agricultural enterprise. But because those farms were vulnerable to Indian attack, after 1745 the agricultural settlement did not flourish. Only the most determined settlers were able to resist the temptation to take refuge in Albany during the darkest days of the colonial wars and the War for Independence.

During the Revolution, the Fourteenth Regiment of the Albany County militia represented Schaghticoke and was commanded by Johannes Knickerbacker and then Albany native Pieter Yates.

Schaghticoke officially became a district of Albany County in 1772 and a town in 1788. The census of 1790 showed the town with a population of 1,838 including 348 slaves - a testimony to the prosperity of its established farmers. Schaghticoke became part of new Rensselaer County in 1791. A transcription of the town census for 1800 has been placed online.

Today, the Knickerbocker Historical Society preserves and interprets the history of Schaghticoke, its early settlers, and the traditions of "Knickerbocker History."

last revised: 7/13/03