Theodore Roosevelt (1858–1919). New York. 1906.
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| Colve the director of the province. Colve was a rough, imperious, resolute man, a good soldier, but with no very great regard for civil liberty. The whole province was speedily reduced. The Dutch towns along the Hudson submitted gladly; but the Puritan villages on Long Island were sullen and showed symptoms of defiance, appealing to Connecticut for help. However, Colve and Evertsen, backed up by trained soldiers and a wellequipped squadron, were not men to be trifled with. They gave notice to the Long Islanders that unless they were prepared to stand the chances of war they must submit at once; and submit they did, Connecticut not daring to interfere. The New Englanders had been willing enough to bid defiance to, and to threaten the conquest of, the New Netherlands while the province was weakly held by an insufficient force; but they were too prudent to provoke a contest with men of such fighting temper and undoubted capacity as Evertsen and Colve, and the warhardened troops and seamen who obeyed their behests. |
| Colve ruled the internal affairs of the colony with a high hand. He made the citizens understand that the military power was supreme over the civil; and when the council protested against anything he did, he told them plainly that unless they submitted he would summarily dismiss them |