What's In A Name?

HICKS ISLAND

Hicks Island, near Lazy Point and Goff Point on Napeague, takes its name from an old South Fork family that has now died out.

The island, uninhabited except by piping plover, roseate terns, some gulls, and an occasional predatory fox, was in earlier days the site of at least one fish factory; a water main extended from a pumping station at Fresh Pond in Montauk to Skunk's Hole, across the beach, under Napeague Harbor, and to the island. Remnants of its foundation can still be found there.

Originally from Gloucestershire in England, the Hicks, who are said to have been Quakers, came to America in the early 17th century, and to East Hampton in about 1720.

That would have been Joseph Hicks, who is generally thought to have been the original owner of the land in East Hampton Village formerly called Hicks Street, now Gould Street, as well as of Hicks Island.

The Town Trustees must have at some point revisited the ownership of Hicks Island. In the 1866 Town Records, the Trustees were "authorized at their discretion to defend the title of the Town to Hicks Island, or to abandon the same, or to sell the interest of the Town in the same, so that the whole disposition of the Island shall be left entirely to said Trustees." The town ordered that $300 be raised in taxes for any legal action pursued by the the Trustees.

Today, Hicks Island is part of Napeague State Park.

Joseph Hicks was born in 1694; he died on April 8, 1755, at Amagansett. At least three land deeds signed by him, one to Nathaniel Huntting, another to Isaac Barnes, and another to Jacob Schellinger, are preserved in the Long Island Collection of the East Hampton Library.

Members of the Hicks family held town office over the years. Joseph was appointed a constable each year from 1735 through 1739. It was probably his son Joseph, of the fifth generation in America, who is on record as a constable in the 1760s, and great-grandson Joseph, of the seventh generation, who was appointed a beach pounder in 1814, 1818, and 1819, a sheep and swine pounder in 1815, a Napeague pounder in 1816 and 1821, and a fence viewer in 1822.

The Town Records, in addition to land allotments and public appointments, include ear marks for cattle entered by members of the Hicks family. The earliest, of Joseph entering a mark for his son Samuel, is dated 1671-72; it is probable that the date was incorrectly transcribed.

"The Hicks farm at Amagansett was sold by 'Aunt Polly' Hicks to Jeremiah T. Parsons Sr., who sold it to Charles H. Miller the whaler," according to Jeannette E. Rattray's "East Hampton History and Genealogies." Aunt Polly, who died in Amagansett in 1881 at the age of 91, was the last of the family here. M.N