Craft Masonry in Albany County, New York - Onondaga and Oswego ...

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http://www.nysm.nysed.gov/albany/bios/b/abbgd7351.html
Abraham Bloodgood was born in Flushing, Long Island in 1742. He was the son of Francis and Mary Doughty Bloodgood. By the
late 1760s, he had relocated to Albany - probably living with his older brother James Bloodgood.
By 1770, he was running a sloop on the Hudson River between Albany and New York and was carrying cargoes for Sir William
Johnson and others. He was one of a few Albany skippers who ventured beyond the inland waterways. A cargo manifest for his
sloop, the Olive Branch, which he sailed to the West Indies (Antigua) in November 1770, described the variety of exports he carried
for a number of Albany-based businessmen.
In 1773, he married Albany native Elizabeth Van Valkenburgh - the widow of Thomas Lynott. Over the next two decades, seven of
their children were baptized in the Albany Dutch church.
These Bloodgoods made their home along the Albany waterfront. Abraham contributed money to the crusade for American liberties,
served as bailsman for several individuals during the war, and later was awarded a land bounty right in conjunction with the Albany
County militia. His first ward property began appearing on city assessment rolls in 1779. In 1781, he was identified as an innkeeper.
By 1790, his substantial brick home along lower State street was an Albany landmark.
After the war, he served in Albany fire companies, stood with other Albany residents in opposition to the Federal constitution, and
was appointed "clerk" in Albany in 1797. Additionally, he owned a portion of the tract of land that later became the city of Ithaca. He
was a slave owner but began freeing them in 1794. In 1800, his Albany household still housed three slaves.
Abraham Bloodgood filed a will in May 1797. It left Elizabeth to administer his estate and provided for its partition after her death. He
died in February 1807 and was buried from the Presbyterian church.
Elizabeth Van Valkenburgh was born in 1745.She was the daughter of Albany carpenter Jacobus and Margarita Radcliff Van
Valkenburgh.
She married newcomer Thomas Lynott [q.v.] about 1765. The couple had two daughters before his death in 1770. She was among
the beneficiaries of his estate. She then married newcomer skipper Abraham Bloodgood in 1773. Over the next two decades, seven
of their children were baptized in the Albany Dutch church.
The Bloodgoods lived on the Albany waterfront where Abraham was among the most prominent mariners and also an innkeeper.
Elizabeth was a slaveholder in her own right. In 1801, she freed Diana, who was born a year earlier to her slave, Rose.
Abraham Bloodgood died in 1807. His will gave her control of his estate during her widowhood. After Bloodgood's passing, she
moved in with her children as her name did not appear on subsequent lists of Albany householders.
Elizabeth filed a will in 1822. It left her household items to her daughter Rachel. Widow Elizabeth Van Valkenburgh Lynott
Bloodgood died on July 21, 1823. She had lived almost seventy-eight years.
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Richard Cartwright, Union No. 1; (a Tory)
http://www.nysm.nysed.gov/albany/bios/c/ricartwright6508.html
Englishman Richard Cartwright was early Albany's most notable innkeeper. Born in London, England about 1720, as a young man
he emigrated to America. He first appeared as a frontier trader with Albany as a base of operations. By 1743, he had married Albany
native Hannah Beasely [Beasley] - the daughter of an English soldier turned schoolteacher. Most of their eight children were
baptized in St. Peters Anglican Church where both parents were prominent members. At the same time, the couple were frequent
sponsors at the Albany Dutch Church.
More and more from his Albany home, Cartwright peddled sundries to settlers and shipped out their farm and forest products. He
also made wines and benefitted from dealings with the Albany corporation and Sir William Johnson - a long-term patron. Within two
decades, the one-time drifter had become a successful and well-connected Albany businessman.
But by the 1760s, Cartwright had opened a tavern on Albany's Southside. It soon became a focal point for English speaking people
in the region. The tavern quickly became an inn - widely known as "The King's Arms." It offered boarding and stabling for those in
Albany on business or passing through to the post-war frontier. Postal service, land and lottery sales, and a range of other business
were conducted across Cartwright's tables. Albany's first Masonic Lodge also met there where Richard Cartwright was the lodge
master.
Prominence apparently bred misplaced trust as, by 1770, Cartwright's unfulfilled investments left him "ruined" and facing the
prospect of debtors prison. He wrote to Sir William Johnson that "neither extravagance or neglect have brot. this load of misfortune
on me." He offered his comfortable new home for sale to satisfy his most "merciless" Manhattan-based creditor. Coupled with
personal illness, by the eve of the Revolution Richard Cartwright had suffered a serious reversal of fortune. As storm clouds
gathered, he contemplated leaving Albany altogether.
Although the first public meeting of the Albany Committee of Correspondence was held at "The King's Arms," everyone knew that
Richard Cartwright considered himself an Englishman and a supporter of the crown. As his tavern became more and more the
resort of pro-British personages, he came under scrutiny particularly following an incident of June 1776. By the following May, he
had been identified as "suspicious," brought before the committee, and upon refusing to sign a loyalty oath, was threatened with
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