May 2004 - Jonathan Kidney's Obituary
This venerable citizen, known and respected here through several generations, revered for his worth, his exemplary life, and his laborious diligence, has gone to his rest full of years; at the advanced age of nearly four score years and ten.
JONATHAN KIDNEY [Johannes, Roelof, John/Jan], says the Evening Journal, was born in this City [Albany, NY], where he has resided for eighty-eight years. He was consequently one of the oldest connecting links between the past and the present. He has sustained through life a blameless reputation, and died, as he I lived, greatly beloved by his descendants and universally respected by all who knew him. Mr. Kidney served his time as a Blacksmith and followed the business always.
To the just tribute of the Evening Journal to his private character, we add briefly some of the principal incidents of his life:
At the age of 17, Mr. Kidney was drafted as a militia-man, under Gen. Schuyler, in 1777. His division was at first ordered to Fort Edward; but soon fell back upon Saratoga. Afterwards we hear of him at Bennington, in both engagements at that place. Again, upon the intelligence reaching that place of the expected battle with Burgoyne, he was ordered back to Saratoga, but did not arrive there until after the battle.
The most eventful period of his life was that which followed. He was one of a party who embarked at New Haven, Conn., in a privateer vessel. With the entire party he was taken prisoner by the British, and placed on board the Jersey Prison ship at the Wallabout. He was confined there some six months, at the expiration of which he was released, but in a weak state, from the tyrannical and barbarous treatment he received. He traveled on foot from Jersey City to Newburgh, where General Washington had his headquarters, not being able to accomplish more than five miles a day. He there received assistance, by order of the Commanding General, and took passage in a sloop for Albany.
Mr. Kidney took an active part with the friends of George Clinton, Robert Yates, Samuel Jones, Abraham Ten Eyck, Gen. Peter Gansevoort, Chancellor Lansing, and other prominent anti-federalists, against the adoption of the U. S. Constitution in 1788; and he participated in the high scene of excitement and collision which in this City followed the attempt of the federalists of that day to celebrate the event. To the day of his death, as we are informed, he held in possession the cannon which on that occasion was planted in Green Street, to dispute the passage through it of the procession headed by Gen. Schuyler, Stephen Van Rensselaer, and their friends [This story will be told in greater detail in a future story of the month]. The venerable Isaac Denniston is now the only survivor of those who witnessed that conflict.
A patriot of the Revolution, he was ever earnest in what he regarded as synonymous with the principles and duties of that great epoch, and throughout his life was a decided and consistent democrat.