The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1897-07-08
ACOL0 NY OF CRIMINALS
A Curious New York Tribe of Un--
known Origin.

New York Times: Within a few
miles of Kingston, n. Y, are a series
of spring lakes upon the shores of
which live a peculiar people utterly diff
ferent from the other white stock about
them. so different that their very origin
is lost in obScurity. They are outlaws
and criminals, and from them sprang
the Abe Buzzard gang and other noto-
riOuS malefactorS called by various
tribal names, but are best known in
Ulster county as ''Binnewaters," taking
their name from the neighborhood in
which they live. They are also known
as ''Kisers'' and "Slouters," and a set
Element of them on the Platz noun
tains, at Pang Yang, are knoyn as
''Pang rangers" They are also known
as .'f<laerwouters,' or ''Clearwaters,
''Millers" and nipples" these being
dominant family names. Whether these
names, which are also borne by some
of the most respectable families in the
country named, have been adopted by
these people, or whether they are de-
generates from the same family root
is only theory. Yet it is believed they
had taken these names in the early
days of the colony because they were
servitors of the people who bore them.
Among them is the name Robinson. al
though the Robinsons are not of the
pure Binnewater breed.
The Binnewaters have been from the
earliest history of the colony the Veri-
est outcasts of society. To touch them
was contamination, and for a young
man to marry among them was con-
sidered as grave or even graver curse
than to form a mesalliance with a ne
gro A man who would do this was i'm
mediately ostracised by all mis- former
friends and mourned for as dead by
his parents and relatives.
These people being outcasts were re-
duced to the most mental labor to gain
a livelihood but as they were not in
love with work at any time they never
would work when there were hen
roosts that might be easily robbed, or
fish in the lakes. Basket making is
their only industry, and at this they
are experts.
The marriage relation, where it ex
listed, and in perhaps a majority of
cases, was taken up without the FORM
ality of lawful ceremony, to be dis
solved at pleasure by either man or
woman, and rested very lightly among
these people. So lax have been the
morals OF these people that there is
hardly family among them which, if
it rose to the dignity of coat of arms,
would not be compelled TO have the bar
sinister cross its field several times.
For a young unmarried woman to be-
each child to own a separate father,
was nCt considered any Particular Of
Tense among her own kindred. and was
no bar to her ultimate marriage to
some other man. who would father her
offspring. Men have been known to
sell their wives to other men, and the
women to go with their new masters
without protest. a man named Kerr is
said to have valued his wife so lightly
that she was sold TO another man for
half dollar.
People so lax in their morals with
their own color could not be expected
OF course to remain strictly within
their own color. Whole families, run
ming through several generations. have !
not only the faint of African blood in
them. but Mohican Indians as WELL and |
this mixture of races has been so |
worked over and over again, that whole |
groups of families have become as
swarthy as the darkest Italians. 1t is /
a popularity of these people that in !
many cases their young women are be- |
pretty. Their hard life and !
the terrible usages which they are sub |
jeeted soon cause them to fade. Whis- |
ky also does its part in their destruc- /
ton.
The common way 10 account for |
these strange people is that in the early /
days of the settlement of the country /
by the Dutch they were the emptyings
of the jails and warehouses of Holland, |
which were sent TO this country as
bondSmen to the settlers, and who. I'M
til their bond was worked out. were not
allowed to accrue land, and perhaps
not then. II is believed that among
them were many VINO bound themselves
out TO the Dutch West India company
for the purpose of being allowed free
passage to the new country. When
their bond was worked out many of
them doubtless Joined the criminal ele-
nent, who remained practically as
serfs. After the war of independence
-hey became in every way their own
masters, and while many went away
and perhaps became good, industrious,
citizens, the major paTi or
hem retained and gave loose rein to
he hereditary criminal tendency born
n them. The fact that they exchange
visits with the SlOuters in Schoharic,
ne Pochuckers in New Jersey and the
Sang HANGERS, nearer home. and that
hey flee to those places when threat
med with arrest. proves the common
,Figin of all the various tribes.
The number of these strange people
has greatly diminished since the civil
var. The Waikiki Valley railroad has
ut through the heart OF their settle
nent and has acted on it like a drain
m swamp land. The Delaware & Hud-
on canal has also scattered them up
nto Pennsylvania. The public and
sunday schools have also carried havoc
.rlong the tribes by teaching the young
olks TO read and that they can rise
lbove their condition if they will. Many
ire improved now. and in another half
century, perhaps, the genuine Binne-
water will have disappeared. ]
METEOROLOGICAL RECORD. {