Individual Details
Richard Betts
(1613 - 18 November 1713)
The following is taken from a 1906 History of Long Island:
Captain Richard Betts, whose public services appear for fifty years on every page of Newtown's history, came in 1648 to New England, but soon after to Newtown, where he acquired great influence. In the Revolution of 1663 he bore a zealous part, and after the conquest of the New Netherlands by the English, he was a member from Newtown to the Provincial Assembly held at Hempstead in 1665. In 1678, he was commissioned high sheriff of `Yorkshire upon Long Island', and he retained the position until 1681. He became a bitter opponent to Director Pieter Stuyvesant and the little town of Bushwick, which he had founded. Under leave from the Governor, the English settlers had planted their town, but were refused the usual patent, and in 1656 Richard Betts administered a severe blow to Stuyvesant by purchasing the land for himself and fifty five associates, from the Red Men at the rate of one shilling per acre. The total cost amounted to some 68 pounds which together with the sum of 76 shillings paid to the Sachems, Pomwaukon and Rowerowestco, extinguished the Indian title to Newtown.
For a long series of years, Betts was a magistrate. During this time, he was more than once a member of the High Court of Assize, then the supreme power in the province. He became an extensive landholder at the English Kills. His residence was here, in what is still known as the `old Betts house.' It is further said that here within sight of his bedroom he dug his own grave, in his one hundredth year. And from the former to the later he was carried in 1713. No headstone marks the grave, but its absence may be accounted for by the fact that his sons had become Quakers and abjured headstones.
Capt. Betts lived to be one hundred years of age. His death on November 18, 1713 was recorded by the Rev. Thomas Poyer, rector of the Episcopal Churches of Newtown, Jamaica and Flushing under Burial Notices: `Richard Betts of Newtown, age 100 at ye Kills.'
Captain Richard Betts, whose public services appear for fifty years on every page of Newtown's history, came in 1648 to New England, but soon after to Newtown, where he acquired great influence. In the Revolution of 1663 he bore a zealous part, and after the conquest of the New Netherlands by the English, he was a member from Newtown to the Provincial Assembly held at Hempstead in 1665. In 1678, he was commissioned high sheriff of `Yorkshire upon Long Island', and he retained the position until 1681. He became a bitter opponent to Director Pieter Stuyvesant and the little town of Bushwick, which he had founded. Under leave from the Governor, the English settlers had planted their town, but were refused the usual patent, and in 1656 Richard Betts administered a severe blow to Stuyvesant by purchasing the land for himself and fifty five associates, from the Red Men at the rate of one shilling per acre. The total cost amounted to some 68 pounds which together with the sum of 76 shillings paid to the Sachems, Pomwaukon and Rowerowestco, extinguished the Indian title to Newtown.
For a long series of years, Betts was a magistrate. During this time, he was more than once a member of the High Court of Assize, then the supreme power in the province. He became an extensive landholder at the English Kills. His residence was here, in what is still known as the `old Betts house.' It is further said that here within sight of his bedroom he dug his own grave, in his one hundredth year. And from the former to the later he was carried in 1713. No headstone marks the grave, but its absence may be accounted for by the fact that his sons had become Quakers and abjured headstones.
Capt. Betts lived to be one hundred years of age. His death on November 18, 1713 was recorded by the Rev. Thomas Poyer, rector of the Episcopal Churches of Newtown, Jamaica and Flushing under Burial Notices: `Richard Betts of Newtown, age 100 at ye Kills.'
Events
| Birth | 1613 | Hemel Hempstead, Herfordshire, England | |||
| Immigration | By 1648 | Ipswich, Essex, Massachusetts Bay |  | ||
| Marriage | 27 January 1649 | Ipswich, Essex, Massachusetts Bay - Joanna Chamberlain | |||
| Death | 18 November 1713 | Newtown, Long Island, Province of New York |
Families
| Spouse | Joanna Chamberlain (1630 - 1711) |
| Child | Joanna Betts (1650 - 1711) |
| Child | Richard Betts Jr. ( - 1711) |
| Child | Thomas Betts ( - 1709) |
| Child | Mary Betts ( - 1734) |
| Child | Martha Betts ( - ) |
| Child | Elizabeth Betts ( - ) |
| Child | Sarah Betts ( - 1711) |
| Father | Richard Betts (1573 - ) |
| Mother | Susanna Smyth ( - ) |
| Sibling | Sarah Betts (1615 - ) |