Vanderveer-Cortelyou House

Constructed: c. 1787 – demolished c. 1950
Builder: Captain Cornelius Vanderveer
Historic town: Flatbush
Modern neighborhood: Flatbush
Modern address: 412 East 25th Street (today the site of an apartment building)

Built on the east side of the highway that ran through Flatbush not very far from the Flatlands boundary line (roughly the intersection of Newkirk and Flatbush Avenues).
Built by Captain Vanderveer for his son Garret on farmland in the family since the 1600s.
Garret’s daughter Lemma Ann married into the Cortelyou family in 1815 and inherited the house on her father’s death.
Lemma Ann was an artist whose water colors survive in a descendant’s Brooklyn house.
Moved in the late 19th century about a block east and reoriented to the street grid at the location on East 25th Street, in the rear of the Cortelyou Club. Later demolished in the early 20th century.
Cornelius Vanderveer was a captain in the Flatbush Militia during the Revolutionary War. Captured by General Corwallis on August 22, 1776, Vanderveer was released on the condition that he would not again take up arms against the British, but during the war, he helped the American cause by secretly sending money to New York Governor George Clinton. After the evacuation by the British in 1783, a - Liberty Pole was erected in Flatbush, and the flag which was hung to it had been made by a group of Flatbush women who met in Captain Vanderveer’s home on the farmsite.

For more information, see The Brooklyn Daily Eagle.

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