Shubal COLE

                   Historical information included in notes.



"Shubael Cole the son of Nathan was taken to the New Lebanon Shakers when his father moved there with his (Shubaels) 5 sisters. He did not remain with the Shakers many year s. How many I am unable to ascertain, having no record of the time or date of his leaving. When he left however he went into the adjoining town of Stephentown, Rensselar County & hired to a farmer as a farm hand for $6.00 per month for six or seven months of the year as he frequently related to his children in later life. That being the current wages for the best of farm hands at that time. The balance of the year he took jobs threshing grain with flails for the best price he could get, generally for every 10th bushel and his board or dressing flaxor any other work by which he could pay his way for his winter board.He continued farming by the month until in the winter of 1796 & 97. He married Lucy Farmer, a native of Great Barrington, Berkshire County, Mass. early in the year of 1795. Great Barrington was an adjoining town to New Lebanon. He continued to work by the month after his marriage. About a year or more after his marriage, desirous of owning a home for himself and prospective family. He bought of Robert Troup on New York who had an office in Albany two pieces of land in the township of Cincinnatus Tioga Co., NY containing one hundred acres more or less as represented in the deed. The description being according to deeds made by the surveyor general of the State of New York on the 21st day of July 1792 to Jerrmiah Van Renssalaer.This appears to be a tax title only and of no real value and of no avail to him. The date of this purchaseof Troupis not now definitely known nor is it known how much he paid.The title proved worthless and whatever he paid must have been a total loss. The presumption is that he did not pay very much because he had worked for so small wages he could not have accumulated much money & he had had to clothe himself & had more or less expenses to pay no doubt, but it did not cost a young man much to live respectably too in those days of economy and saving . Having failed to get some land by his first purchase he still had a desire to get him ahome & having no money to buy one he concluded to go to Albany to see if he could not l ease from the Van Renssalaer or from the heirs of the Coeymans Patent sufficient land to make him a home.The proprietors of both patents were anxious to rent their lands offering favorable terms. In his wanderings over & viewing the land he came across a man on the Coeymans Patent who held a contract for a lease for 89 1/2 acres who had cleared about9 acres of it, that is had cut off the timber & ha d built a log house on itand a log hovel for a shelter for a cow. He bought that man's contract & right to a lease for which no one now living knows how much he paid for it. The presumption isthat he did not pay much as it could not be possible that he had much to pay.However it may be that he consumated the purchase & then returned to Stephentown for his wife and baby girl Olive. The contract he bought described the land by metes & bounds as lying about 16 miles south west of the City of Albany, NY. He was to have immediate possession of the log house. Upon his return to Stephentown he made ready at once to move to his new home in the woods where his nearest neighbors would be 2 miles away. How he moved his wife and baby & the few wordly goods he then no one of his descendants now know. Suffice it to say that he got them to his mansion in the wilderness in safety. After installing them in the log mansion he journeyed to Albany to procure his lease for the 89 1/ 2 acres according to the contract he had bought which wast o be as long as water runs and grass grows at a nominal annual rental of a few bushels of wheat