Spotswood’s stop on the Camden & Amboy Railroad, which was located in the area behind what is now the Spotswood Public Library and the Jersey Pride food store, helped to make the town a popular vacation destination for New Yorkers looking for an escape to the country. PHOTOS COURTESY OF JACK EICHENLAUB, SPOTSWOOD CULTURAL AND HERITAGE COMMISSION Standing on Main Street near the Spotswood Reformed Church is a large, older house, rather unremarkable to the passerby.
That is, until one hears what was inside.
The house once served as the home of the Rev. Hardenbergh, the minister of the neighboring Spotswood Reformed Church. Hardenbergh was a pro-North, antislavery minded individual at a time when much of the area, with its snuff mills and reliance on tobacco, supported the Southern cause.
Inside the parlor of his home is a fireplace. Normal enough, except for the secret panel behind it that hides a staircase leading to a windowless room in the attic. Local historians like Charles Hager, a Spotswood Cultural and Heritage Commission member, suspect that this room may have been a stop along the Underground Railroad that would take slaves to freedom.
Located at the corner of Vliet and Main streets, the Spotswood Hotel, formerly Vliet’s Hotel, housed a bowling alley, bar and grill and sporting goods store after it ceased to house travelers at an early date. It’s just one of many wellknown and littleknown stories from small-town Spotswood’s past, a rich history that the Cultural and Heritage Commission is working to preserve.
“We are trying to do things that would help residents realize what a great history Spotswood has,” said Jack Eichenlaub, co-chairman of the commission.
For the borough’s 100th anniversary three years ago, the commission placed plaques around town to pay tribute to the town’s important buildings — those still standing and those long gone. Spearheaded by Hager, who said he has been studying the borough’s history for decades, the plaques cover everything from the plantation of James Johnstone, the first European settler of Spotswood, located behind the Spotswood Public Library, to the Hazelhurst estate, owned by a former Confederate general who moved to the borough in the midst of Reconstruction. One of the estate’s buildings now serves as the convent for the Immaculate Conception Church. The plaques also help to trace the history of the town, from its settlement roots to its days as industrial small town and beyond.
The Cultural and Heritage Commission placed plaques like this one at locations of historical value around the borough for its 100th anniversary. One of the earliest dated markers stands at the Spotswood Veterans of Foreign Wars post on Daniel Road, commemorating the site of Lenni Lenape leader Chief Weequahola’s wigwam. Hager said the chief commonly socialized with settler Capt. John Leonard in the early 1700s and, over drinks, Leonard would have the chief sign over deeds to large tracts of land. The duo’s concept of land ownership was a little different though, Hager said. For Weequahola, it was a right to use, and for Leonard and the settlers, the land was theirs now. So, after one of the land sales, Weequahola grew angry with the captain and killed him. The citizens of Spotswood arrested the American Indian leader and brought him to trial in Perth Amboy, where he was tried and hanged.
First an iron forge that helped provide munitions to the British, the site where the American Legion now stands on DeVoe Avenue was once home to the Appleby- DeVoe Eagle Mills snuff mill, one of two snuff-makers in Spotswood. PHOTO COURTESY OF JACK EICHENLAUB,SPOTSWOOD CULTURAL AND HERITAGE COMMISSION Leonard’s heirs gained rights to the village property, and the American Indians were moved to the area near Thompson Park in Jamesburg, then to another location farther south, the last reservation in New Jersey.
The American Legion on DeVoe Avenue is also home to an important plaque commemorating the site of the old Iron Forge, where munitions were made for the British, who had the support of some early Spotswoodians during the Revolutionary War. The site, Hager said, was perfect for production, rich with bog iron and surrounded by pine trees for much-needed charcoal.
Gen. George Washington confiscated the property during the Revolution, Hager said, and later it served as the home of the Appleby- DeVoe Eagle Mills, which along with a mill on Snowhill Street produced snuff.
Spotswood also played host to the Bloomfield Mills Co., located on an island in present-day Duhernal Lake. The company created black licorice until the mill closed in the 1920s.
“We wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for the mills,” Eichenlaub notes.
And with Main Street, a major thoroughfare between East and West Jersey during the early Colonial years, Hager said that Spotswood became host to many hotels, including Van Cleef’s, which was located near the Spotswood Public Library. Early travelers from New York City would take a schooner to Perth Amboy and travel along dirt roads by stagecoach to get around the state.
“After about a day of being bumped up and down, this is how far you would get,” Hager said.
The hotels took on an additional responsibility and flourished after the Camden & Amboy Railroad, the first to operate in New Jersey, placed a train station in Spotswood. Originally carriages were pulled along by horses. The railroad connected the borough to New York City and made Spotswood a vacation destination for city dwellers, who wanted to escape to the “country,” Hager said.
For those who could afford it, there were options such as Van Cleef’s, the West End Hotel at the corner of Vliet Street, and the 300-acre Feldbaum’s Summer Resort, near the site of the present high school.
Eventually, many of these city residents enjoyed Spotswood and the area so much that they decided to move there permanently, and with time, the modern bedroom community of Spotswood developed.
And the rest is history.