Anti-Rent War

Poster announcing an Anti-Rent meeting in the town of Nassau

The Anti-Rent War (also known as the Helderberg War) was a tenants' revolt in upstate New York during the early 19th century, beginning with the death of Stephen Van Rensselaer III in 1839.

Van Rensselaer, who has been described as having "...proved a lenient and benevolent landowner", was the patroon of the region at the time, and was a descendant of Kiliaen Van Rensselaer, the first patroon of the Manor of Rensselaerswyck. The patroons owned all the land on which the tenants in the Hudson Valley lived, and used feudal leases to maintain control of the region.

The Anti-Rent War led to the creation of the Antirenter Party, which had a strong influence on New York State politics from 1846 to 1851. Stephen III's will directed his heirs to collect outstanding rents to apply to the estate debts. Tenant farmers resisted.

The first mass meeting of tenant farmers leading to the Anti-Rent War was held in Berne, New York on July 4, 1839. In January 1845, one hundred and fifty delegates from eleven counties assembled in St. Paul's Lutheran Church, Berne to call for political action to redress their grievances.

Trials of leaders of the revolt, charged with riot, conspiracy and robbery, were held in 1845. Participants as counsel in the trials included Ambrose L. Jordan, as leading counsel for the defense, and John Van Buren, the state attorney general, who personally conducted the prosecution. At the first trial, the jury came to no conclusion. During a re-trial in September 1845, the two leading counsels started a fist-fight in open court. Both were sentenced by the presiding judge, Justice John W. Edmonds, to "solitary confinement in the county jail for 24 hours." At the conclusion of the trial, one defendant, Smith A. Boughton, was sentenced to life imprisonment. After the election of John Young as governor, who had the support of the Anti-Renters, he pardoned Boughton.

For further information on how the following years convinced landed proprietors to sell out their interests, see Anti-rent movement and downfall.

People involved

• Lawrence Van Deusen, president of the Anti-Rent Association of Albany County, New York.

See also

• Anya Seton's novel Dragonwyck (1944) is set during the Anti-Rent War.
• The cello rock band Rasputina made a song about the Anti-Renters called "Calico Indians", the song is part of their 2010 album, Sister Kinderhook.

Further reading

• .
• .
• .
• .
• .