In the fall of 1643, Robert Fordham and John Carman crossed Long Island Sound by rowboat to negotiate with the local Indians for a tract of land upon which to establish a new community or "town spot".
In the spring of 1644, thirty to forty families left Stamford, Connecticut, crossed Long Island Sound, landed in Hempstead Harbor and eventually made their way to the present site of the village of Hempstead where they began their English settlement within Dutch-controlled New Netherland.