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Wallabout Bay is small body of water in Upper New York Bay
Upper New York Bay

Upper New York Bay, sometimes called Upper New York Harbor or the Upper Bay, is the northern area of New York Harbor inside The Narrows....
 along the northwest shore of the New York City
New York City

The City of New York is the List of United States cities by population in the United States, while the New York metropolitan area ranks among the List of urban areas by population....
 borough
Borough (New York City)

New York City is one of the largest cities in the world, and it is segmented into boroughs for various reasons. A borough is a unique form of government which administers the five fundamental constituent parts that make up the History of New York City ....
 of Brooklyn
Brooklyn

Brooklyn is one of the five Borough of New York City, located at the western end of Long Island. An independent city until its consolidation with New York in 1898, Brooklyn is New York City's most populous borough, with 2.5 million residents, and second largest in area....
, between the present Williamsburg
Williamsburg Bridge

The Williamsburg Bridge is a suspension bridge in New York City across the East River connecting the Lower East Side, Manhattan of Manhattan at Delancey Street with the Williamsburg, Brooklyn neighborhood of Brooklyn on Long Island at Broadway near the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway ....
 and Manhattan bridges
Manhattan Bridge

The Manhattan Bridge is a suspension bridge that crosses the East River in New York City, connecting Lower Manhattan with Brooklyn on Long Island....
, opposite Corlear's Hook on Manhattan
Manhattan

Manhattan is one of the five borough of New York City, located primarily on Manhattan Island at the mouth of the Hudson River.With a United States Census of 1,620,867 living in a land area of 22.96 square miles , Manhattan, coextensive with New York County, is the most population density county in the United States, w...
 to the west, across the East River
East River

The East River is a tidal strait in New York City. It connects Upper New York Bay on its south end to Long Island Sound on its north end. It separates Long Island from the island of Manhattan and the Bronx on the North American mainland....
. It is now the site of the Brooklyn Navy Yard
Brooklyn Navy Yard

The United States Navy Yard, New York - better known as the Brooklyn Navy Yard or the New York Naval Shipyard - is an American shipyard, located in Brooklyn, northeast of Battery Park on the East River in Wallabout Bay, a semicircular bend of the River across from Corlear's Hook in Manhattan....
.

Wallabout became the first spot on Long Island settled by Europeans in May 1624, when several families of French-speaking Walloons
Walloons

Walloons are a Romance-speaking people partly from Germanic origin and Celtic origin; in any case a melting-pot speaking French language, living in Belgium principally in Wallonia, more generally the inhabitants of Wallonia....
 opted to build homes there, having come across on the Dutch ship New Netherland
New Netherland

File:Seal of new netherland.jpgNew Netherland, or Nieuw-Nederland in Dutch, was the seventeenth-century colonial province of the Republic of the Seven United Netherlands on the Eastern Seaboard of North America....
.

Starting in 1637, the Wallabout served as the landing site of the first ferry
Ferry

A ferry is a form of transport, usually a boat or ship, used to carry passengers and their vehicles across a body of water. Ferries are also used to transport freight and even railroad cars....
 across the East River from lower Manhattan.






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Wallabout Bay is small body of water in Upper New York Bay
Upper New York Bay

Upper New York Bay, sometimes called Upper New York Harbor or the Upper Bay, is the northern area of New York Harbor inside The Narrows....
 along the northwest shore of the New York City
New York City

The City of New York is the List of United States cities by population in the United States, while the New York metropolitan area ranks among the List of urban areas by population....
 borough
Borough (New York City)

New York City is one of the largest cities in the world, and it is segmented into boroughs for various reasons. A borough is a unique form of government which administers the five fundamental constituent parts that make up the History of New York City ....
 of Brooklyn
Brooklyn

Brooklyn is one of the five Borough of New York City, located at the western end of Long Island. An independent city until its consolidation with New York in 1898, Brooklyn is New York City's most populous borough, with 2.5 million residents, and second largest in area....
, between the present Williamsburg
Williamsburg Bridge

The Williamsburg Bridge is a suspension bridge in New York City across the East River connecting the Lower East Side, Manhattan of Manhattan at Delancey Street with the Williamsburg, Brooklyn neighborhood of Brooklyn on Long Island at Broadway near the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway ....
 and Manhattan bridges
Manhattan Bridge

The Manhattan Bridge is a suspension bridge that crosses the East River in New York City, connecting Lower Manhattan with Brooklyn on Long Island....
, opposite Corlear's Hook on Manhattan
Manhattan

Manhattan is one of the five borough of New York City, located primarily on Manhattan Island at the mouth of the Hudson River.With a United States Census of 1,620,867 living in a land area of 22.96 square miles , Manhattan, coextensive with New York County, is the most population density county in the United States, w...
 to the west, across the East River
East River

The East River is a tidal strait in New York City. It connects Upper New York Bay on its south end to Long Island Sound on its north end. It separates Long Island from the island of Manhattan and the Bronx on the North American mainland....
. It is now the site of the Brooklyn Navy Yard
Brooklyn Navy Yard

The United States Navy Yard, New York - better known as the Brooklyn Navy Yard or the New York Naval Shipyard - is an American shipyard, located in Brooklyn, northeast of Battery Park on the East River in Wallabout Bay, a semicircular bend of the River across from Corlear's Hook in Manhattan....
.

History

The Wallabout became the first spot on Long Island settled by Europeans in May 1624, when several families of French-speaking Walloons
Walloons

Walloons are a Romance-speaking people partly from Germanic origin and Celtic origin; in any case a melting-pot speaking French language, living in Belgium principally in Wallonia, more generally the inhabitants of Wallonia....
 opted to build homes there, having come across on the Dutch ship New Netherland
New Netherland

File:Seal of new netherland.jpgNew Netherland, or Nieuw-Nederland in Dutch, was the seventeenth-century colonial province of the Republic of the Seven United Netherlands on the Eastern Seaboard of North America....
.

Starting in 1637, the Wallabout served as the landing site of the first ferry
Ferry

A ferry is a form of transport, usually a boat or ship, used to carry passengers and their vehicles across a body of water. Ferries are also used to transport freight and even railroad cars....
 across the East River from lower Manhattan. Cornelis Dircksen, the lone ferryman, farmed plots on both sides -- near to where the Brooklyn Bridge
Brooklyn Bridge

The Brooklyn Bridge, one of the oldest suspension bridges in the United States, stretches 5,989 feet over the East River, connecting the New York City borough s of Manhattan and Brooklyn ....
 now spans -- to best employ his time on either bank of the river.

A feudal
Patroon

A patroon was a landholder with manorial rights to large tracts of land in the 17th century Dutch colony of New Netherland in North America . By charter of 1629, the Dutch West India Company first started to grant this title and land to some of its invested members....
 system of land tenure
Land tenure

Land tenure is the name given, particularly in common law systems, to the legal regime in which land is owned by an individual, who is said to "hold" the land....
 was suspended in 1638, and the small settlement became a colony
Colony

In politics and in history, a colony is a Territory under the immediate political control of a state. For colonies in antiquity, city-states would often found their own colonies....
 of freeholder
Freeholder

A freeholder can refer to:* one who holds title to real property in Fee simple* Freeholder of county government in the State of New Jersey*A proprietor who holds a piece of land outright and has the right to lease, rent or sell as he pleases....
s: after a ten-year period of paying the Dutch East India Company
Dutch East India Company

The Dutch East India Company was a trading company, which was established in 1602, when the States-General of the Netherlands granted it a 21-year monopoly to carry out colonial activities in Asia....
 a tenth of their yield, colonists would own their farmland. ("Bruijk" means "to use" and "leen" means "loan" in Dutch.) The humble "Bruykleen Colonie" expanded out from the Wallabout to become the city of Brooklyn.

The area was the site where the infamous British prison ships moored during the American Revolutionary War
American Revolutionary War

The American Revolutionary War , also known as the American War of Independence, began as a war between the Kingdom of Great Britain and Thirteen Colonies on the North America, and ended in a global war between several European great powers....
 (most infamous of which was the HMS Jersey), from about 1776-1783. Over 10,000 soldiers and sailors died due to deliberate neglect on these rotting hulks, more American deaths than from every battle of the war combined. Though their corpses were buried on the eroding shore in shallow graves, or often simply thrown overboard, local women collected remains when they became exposed or washed onshore and many more were discovered with the development of the area and expansion of piers. The nearby Prison Ship Martyrs' Monument
Prison Ship Martyrs' Monument

The Prison Ship Martyrs' Monument is erected in Fort Greene Park, in the New York City borough of Brooklyn, consisting of a -wide granite staircase and a central Doric column in height....
 in Fort Greene Park
Fort Greene Park

Fort Greene Park is a municipal park in Brooklyn, New York, comprising 30.2 acres .The park includes the high ground where the Continental Army built Fort Putnam during the American Revolutionary War....
 houses remains of the prisoners and overlooks the site of their torment and death.

The bay eventually became the site of the Brooklyn Navy Yard
Brooklyn Navy Yard

The United States Navy Yard, New York - better known as the Brooklyn Navy Yard or the New York Naval Shipyard - is an American shipyard, located in Brooklyn, northeast of Battery Park on the East River in Wallabout Bay, a semicircular bend of the River across from Corlear's Hook in Manhattan....
.

Gabriel Furman, in his (1824), traces the name from the Dutch "Waal bocht" or "bay (or bight) of the Walloons", referring to the original French-speaking settlers of the local area.