Our Town Lindley,N.Y.

 Lt.Col. Eleazer Lindsley  and Lindsley Coat of Arms


(Composite photo made for the Steuben County Hall of Fame)

Lindley no longer has a school in the town and this is my way of letting the residents learn about the town where they live. 

The following will be excerpts from various histories about the history  of the Town of Lindley. Each historian or person writing the following information has made his own  interpretation of the facts.  Kitty

Lt. Colonel Eleazer Lindsley was born December 7th, 1737 in Morristown, New Jersey -the son of Jonathon Lindsley. He died in Lindley, N.Y. June 1,1794. He served as a Lt .Colonel. in Colonel Oliver Spencer's Regiment of New Jersey Continental Troops. He was ,also, a Second Major in the Morris County ,Militia . He married Mary Miller of Morristown N.J. He served in the New Jersey Assembly in 1780; was a Justice of Peace in 1783 and moved to Steuben County, New York in 1790.

From Men of Morris County, New Jersey  Who Served in the American Revolution.

 Barbara J. Hoskins   1979   Contribution to the Bicentennial of the American Revolution

Colonel Lindsley was associated with "The New York Genessee Land Company " and surveyed lands on the east side of Seneca Lake. The land was to be divided into large farms with lake frontage. Lindsley laid out a town 10 miles square for himself and named the place "Appletown".  "State" interference with the lease plans caused Lindsley to look elsewhere for land. He disposed of this land .(Much has been written elsewhere about the Genessee Company-Kitty)

In 1789, at the conclusion of the Indian Treaty in Canandaigua , New York in which Lindsley had been invited to participate, he purchased Township 1,Range 2 in the County of Ontario. In the spring of 1790, Colonel Lindsley with party of 37 relatives and friends, left New Jersey for a new settlement in the area that he had purchased. This settlement was known as Lindleytown or Lindsley.  In later years, the "s"  was dropped and the town today is known as Lindley.

Colonel Lindsley was elected to serve as the first representative in the New York Legislature from Ontario County.

He died in 1794.

Colonial Ancestors and Descendants by Uri Mulford  1920  Corning, N.Y.

Uri Mulford  was a direct descendant of Col. Lindsley  and Dr.Ezekiel Mulford . (This is a brief summary of what he wrote about why Lindsley left the Seneca Lake purchase and purchased the land that became Lindley.  Kitty)  


to be continued