New York Challenged – The City’s Response to Crisis and Change from Colonial Times to Present Peter Schaghen, Letter to the Directos of the Dutch West India Company, 1626 Peter Schaghen was the representative of the States General to the Dutch West India Company. In the late summer of 1626 he reported the arrival of a ship from New Netherland. In his report he announced the purchase of Manhattan Island for the value of 60 guilders (the equivalent of $24 in 1846). The Schaghen letter is the earliest reference to the purchase of the island which would become the center of New Netherland. The original of this document is held by the Rijksarchief in The Hague.

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High and Mighty Lords,

Yesterday the ship the Arms of Amsterdam arrived here. It sailed from New Netherland out of the River Mauritius on the 23d of September. They report that our people are in good spirit and live in peace. The women also have borne some children there. They have purchased the Island Manhattes from the Indians for the value of 60 guilders. It is 11,000 morgens in size [about 22,000 acres]. They had all their grain sowed by the middle of May, and reaped by the middle of August They sent samples of these summer grains: wheat, rye, barley, oats, buckwheat, canary seed, beans and flax. The cargo of the aforesaid ship is:

7246 Beaver skins
1781/2 Otter skins
675 Otter skins
48 Mink skins
36 Lynx skins
33 Minks
34 Weasel skins

Many oak timbers and nut wood. Herewith, High and Mighty Lords, be commended to the mercy of the Almighty,

Your High and Mightinesses' obedient,
P.Schaghen

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