Benjamin Alfred Brown, ^

Benjamin Alfred Brown, ^

Male 1784 - 1813  (29 years)


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  • Name Benjamin Alfred Brown  [1, 2, 3, 4
    Suffix
    Birth 25 Sep 1784  Fireplace, East Hampton, Suffolk, New York, United States Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Gender Male 
    Burial Bellport (Woodland Cemetery), Brookhaven, Suffolk, NY Find all individuals with events at this location  [5
    Death 5 Nov 1813  Drowned off Fire Island, Suffolk, New York, United States Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Death 5 Nov 1813  the Atlantic Ocean (off Fire Island) Find all individuals with events at this location  [5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11
    • CAUS: from drowning in a fishing incidentHe was one of eleven men from Fire Place who drowned in a fishing incident in the Atlantic Ocean off of Fire Island, opposite Fire Place Neck.
    Burial Woodland Cemetery, Bellport, Brookhaven, Suffolk, New York, United States Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Person ID I1040  My Genealogy
    Last Modified 1 Mar 2024 

    Father Capt Gersham Brown, >,   b. 28 Jan 1747, Suffolk, New York Colony, British Colonial America Find all individuals with events at this locationd. 22 Sep 1801, Brookhaven, Suffolk, New York, United States Find all individuals with events at this location (Age 54 years) 
    Mother Mary Miller, >,   b. 1746, East Hampton, Suffolk, New York, United States Find all individuals with events at this locationd. 1 Nov 1802, Brookhaven, Suffolk, NY Find all individuals with events at this location (Age 56 years) 
    Marriage Abt 1768  Suffolk, New York Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Family ID F5155  Group Sheet  |  Family Chart

    Family Mary Ann Leek, ^,   b. 20 Aug 1789, Suffolk, New York, United States Find all individuals with events at this locationd. 2 Apr 1843 (Age 53 years) 
    Marriage Abt 1806  Brookhaven, , New York Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Children 
     1. Mary Ann Brown, ^,   b. 5 Feb 1807, Fire Place (now Brookhaven Hamlet), Brookhaven, Suffolk, NY Find all individuals with events at this locationd. 8 Jan 1896, Center Moriches, Suffolk, New York, United States Find all individuals with events at this location (Age 88 years)
     2. Alfred Benjamin Brown, ^,   b. 2 Sep 1808, Fireplace, Suffolk, New York, United States Find all individuals with events at this locationd. 16 Feb 1895, Brookhaven, Brookhaven, Suffolk, NY Find all individuals with events at this location (Age 86 years)
     3. Samuel Brown, ^,   b. 2 Oct 1810, Fire Place (now Brookhaven Hamlet), Brookhaven, Suffolk, NY Find all individuals with events at this locationd. Yes, date unknown
     4. Dorothy A. Brown, ^,   b. 6 Dec 1812, Fire Place (now Brookhaven Hamlet), Brookhaven, Suffolk, NY Find all individuals with events at this locationd. 25 May 1834, {Fire Place (now Brookhaven), Brookhaven, Suffolk, NY} Find all individuals with events at this location (Age 21 years)
     5. Samuel Brown,   b. 2 Oct 1810, Brookhaven,, New York Find all individuals with events at this location
    Family ID F564  Group Sheet  |  Family Chart
    Last Modified 27 May 2025 

  • Sources 
    1. [S13] Long Island Genealogy Surname Database, online [http://longislandgenealogy.com ], http://www.longislandsurnames.com/genealogy/getperson.php?personID=I01231&tree=Brown.

    2. [S13] Long Island Genealogy Surname Database, online [http://longislandgenealogy.com ], http://www.longislandsurnames.com/genealogy/getperson.php?personID=I4579&tree=Tooker.

    3. [S89] International Genealogical Index: Individual Record (Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints).

    4. [S332] Compiled by Gary Robert & Lynn (DiClemente) Brown, "Brown Family of England and Brookhaven,"; , Personal Collection (copy), .
      6. Benjamin Brown, b. in Middle Island, Sept 25, 1784; drowned with ten other men off Old Inlet opposite Bellport, Nov. 5, 1813. This inlet through the Great South Beach, was then known as "New Inlet" and "Smiths Inlet" and has been closed for over a hundred years. His body was recovered and buried in Fire Place and later moved to the Bellport Cemetery.

      [He] m. Mary Ann Leek or Leeke. She was b. Aug 20, 1789; d. Apr. 2, 1843. She was probably a Middle Island woman. Children as given in the family Bible formerly owned by the late T. Leverett Brown:
      1. Mary Ann, b. Feb 5, 1807; d. Jan 8, 1896. M. Benjamin Tooker, probably of Moriches, L.I., N.Y. by whom she had four children. He died and she m. 2nd, Elihu Hawkins by whom she had a son.
      2. Alfred Benjamin, b. Sept 7, 1808. See below.
      3. Samuel, b. Oct 2, 1810. He moved away, probably to New Yor or Brooklyn where he died. M. Susan L. Robinson. No record of any children.
      4. Dorothy (Dolly), b. Dec 6, 1812; d. of consumption, May 25, 1834.

    5. [S28] Osborn Shaw, History of Brookhaven Village: A paper written by Mr. Osborn Shaw of Bellport for the Fireplace Literary Club, and read by him at the Brookhaven Free Library, October 5th, 1933. (Unpublished manuscript (transcription this site). 1933), https://brookhavensouthaven.org/historical-sketches/osborne-shaws-history-of-brookhaven-fire-place/#1617950826433-58c3a081-6562.

    6. [S13] Long Island Genealogy Surname Database, online [http://longislandgenealogy.com ], http://www.longislandsurnames.com/genealogy/getperson.php?personID=I3982&tree=Barto Also http://www.longislandsurnames.com/genealogy/getperson.php?personID=I4582&tree=Tooker.

    7. [S42] monument, Woodland Cemetery, Bellport, Brookhaven, Suffolk, NY ();.

    8. [S80] Stephanie Bigelow, Bellport and Brookhaven: A Saga of the Sibling Hamlets of the Old Purchase South. (Bellport-Brookhaven Historical Society. 1968), p. 5.
      "A major tragedy that affected the people of Fireplace occurred on Friday, November 5, 1813. A crew of eleven fishermen went through Smith's Inlet [Old Inlet] to fish from a "dry shoal" several hundred yards out in the ocean. While busy with their nets they did not notice that their boat was insecure and had floated away. It had been caught in the current running through the inlet as the tide began to change. As the water deepened over the sandbar, the men called for help, but none heard or came, and all were drowned. Six widows were left. One had said she was sure she had recognized her husband's voice shouting for help, but no one had believed her. The men were William rose, Isaac Woodruff, Daniel and Lewis Pearshall, Benjamin Brown, Nehemiah Hand, James and Henry Homan, Charles Ellison, James Prior and John Hulse."

    9. [S40] George Borthwick, The Church at the South: A History of the South Haven Church (Mattituck, N.Y. : Cutchogue Presbyterian Church, 1989.. Written c. 1940 in manuscript form.), p. 180-181.
      ... eleven men, namely, William Rose, Isaac Woodruff, Henry Homan, Charles Ellison, James Prior, John Hulse, Daniel and Lewis Parshall, Enjamin Brown, Nehemiah Hand, and James Homan went off South Beach in their small boat to fish. Accordingo the tradition, the men landed on the sand bar several hundred yards off shore, which at low tide is above water, to shake the sea-weed out of their nets, and hauled their boat upon the sand. They carelessly failed to anchor it, with the result that in the darkness they did not see that the rising tide was washing around it and lifting it, until finally a wave carried it off the bar. When they made the discovery that their boat was gone, and felt the tide rising about their feet, they began to shout so loudly that they were heard across the Beach and Great South Bay by people on the mainland at Brookhaven. It was a beautiful, calm night. One woman went to her neighbor's and remarked that she thought that something was wrong at the Beach as she was sure she had heard her husband's voice. It has always been a mystery why a rival fishing crew, which that night was in a house on the Beach, did not hear the men's cries and rescue them. One tradition declares that a man who had heard the shouting of the stranded fishermen, broke into the house to ask them to get the men. They evidently had been drinking, for one man drunkenly replied in answer to the intruder's plea: "Damn'em, let 'em drown." All eleven were drowned, and the next morning there were eight widows in the parish of South Haven.

    10. [S100] Long Island Star (Brooklyn, NY) 17 November 1813, as quoted in: Parshall, James Clark. The History of the Parshall Family from the Conquest of England by William of Normandy, A.D. 1066, to the Close of the 19th Century. Syracuse: Crist, Park and Parshall.
      Melancholy Occurrence — Rarely, indeed, has it been our painful duty to record a more melancholy occurrence than one which recently took place in that part of Brooklin [sic, Brookhaven] called Fire Place. On the evening of Friday, the 5th instant, eleven men, belonging to that village, went to the South Shore with a seine for fishing, viz: William Rose, Isaac Woodruff, Lewis Parshall, Benjamin Brown, Nehemiah Hand, James Horner, Charles Ellison, James Prior, Daniel Parshall, Harry Horner and John Hulse. On Saturday morning the affecting discovery was made that they were all drowned. It is supposed the whole party embarked in one boat, and went out to the outer bar, a distance of two miles from the shore, and which at low water is in some places bare, but that by some accident the boat was stove or sunk, and the whole party left to perish by the rising of the tide, which, at high water, is eight or ten feet on the bar. The boat came on shore in pieces, and also eight bodies. The six first named have left families. Long will a whole neighborhood lament this overwhelming affliction, and the tears of the widow and orphan flow for their husband, father and friend.

    11. [S101] Long Island Forum: journal (http://genealogycds.com), August, 1946. p. 149ff.