Morning journal and courier., 1881-04-18
In the Middle of Hell Gate.

A Family that Has Lived There on A Rock for One and Twenty Years. Mrs. Caroline Gibson died at her home on Big Mill Rock, in Hell Gate, two weeks ago to-day. Passengers on the Sound boats for many years have noticed the little island formed by the lifting of rock above the wa ter just north of the smaller rock on which. under a tent shaped cover of boards, Gen. Newton keeps in store the dynamite which he uses for blasting purposes. Big Mill Rock has an area of 150 or 200 square feet, and is crowded with peach trees. A frame house, weather stained and of moderate dimensions. and barn still smaller, which serves as a house for score more of fowls are the only buildings on the island. Sandy Gibson, a fisherman and waterman of much local fame settled on Mill Rock about the year 1860. He earned his living by catching and selling bass and Holsters, and by taking per sons fishing or conveying them from one shore to the other. He died in June, 1872, aged so years.
 Mrs. Caroline Gibson was his widow. He was native of Bushwick, and she of this city. The pair had seven children, two sons and five daughters One of the sons, David died shortly after the death of his father. Three of the daughters married respectively John Smith of Greenpoint, and Oliver Hib- bard and Marston Dunlap of this city. The remaining son, Tyler, still lives on the rock with his two unmarried sisters, who do dress making. He catches and sells Holsters and otherwise follows the occupation of his father. He is thirty-nine years of age, and perhaps the most trusted of the Hell Gate watermen. He knows every point of the river, and will safely make any point of it on the foggiest night. He is frequently called upon to take residents of Astoria across to their homes at hours and seasons when the ferryboat is not running. He has saved at least half dozen persons from drowning. He is an angular, brown faced, beardless man, who wears spec tacles on account of near sightedness. and who utters with difficulty dozen words in an hour.
 His mother was active, cheerful little woman, who found plenty of work and rec reation in her circumscribed home. She was nearly seventy-fve years of age when she died. Her funeral occurred on the Sunday following her death. The body was taken to New York in a rowboat her children follow ing in another, and was buried from the Bap- tist church in Eighty-third street, near Sec ond avenue
 The peach trees on Big Mill Rock were set out by Sandy Gibson. They have achieved fine growth, and the fruit they bear is boast of the owner, who has so much more than he needs that he gives quantities of 1t every summer as presents to his numerous friends. The habitation Is held by the family under the squatters' law, and there is little likelihood that they will ever meet with in reference in it's possession. .-Neao York Sun.
 George Washington's Ghost.
 Josiah Quincy, in his "reminiscences in a current number of the Independent, says:- s'The scene of my fathers only ghost story if so it may be called-was laid at Mount Vernon; and this alone was sufficient to make the occasion memorable to boy. The chamber in which his uncle had died was as- signed by Judge Washington to his guest; the host, he withdrew, mentioned the ru- nor that interview with Washington had been granted to some of it's former occupants. If this were true, my father pondered the possibility that he might befound worthy to behold the glorifed spirit of him who was so revered by his countrymen. And during the night he did see Washington and this is all I have to say about it. If gave the particulars, I should feel bound to give 8 full explanation of them by Dr. Hammond, or some other expert cerebral illusions; and this would occupy too much space for an episode. It may be worth while to say that nothing my father saw, or thought hersaw, was useful in confirming his faith in a spiri- ual world His assurance in this matter perfect. He believed that brain action (if this is the correct expression) was at times set up in us by friends no longer in the flesh and that his own life had been guided by these mysterious infuences' D