Southampton (N.Y.)

Southampton. A town on the East End of Long Island in New York State. Officially the Town of Southampton, is located in southeastern Suffolk County, partly on the South Fork of Long Island. It has a population of about 75,000.

Southampton is included in the stretch of shoreline prominently known as “the Hamptons.” Stony Brook University has a campus in the town.

The town was founded in 1640, when settlers from Lynn, Massachusetts, established residence on lands obtained from local Shinnecock Indian Nation.

The first settlers included eight men, one woman, and a boy who came ashore at Conscience Point. By July 7, 1640, they had determined the town boundaries. During the next few years (1640–43), Southampton gained another 43 families; there are now over 75,000 people in Southampton.

From 1644, the colonists established an organized whale fishery, significant in the history of whaling as the first in New England. They chased pilot whales (“blackfish”) onto the shelving beaches for slaughter, a sort of dolphin drive hunting. They observed the Native Americans‘ hunting techniques, improved on their weapons and boats, and then went out to ocean hunting.

The first meeting house was on a hill that is the site of the current Southampton Hospital. The town’s oldest existent house is the Halsey House at 249 Main Street, which was built by Thomas Halsey, one of the first Englishmen to trade with the Shinnecocks.

Southampton has 47 public and private cemeteries, not including Shinnecock Hills Golf Club, which is claimed as an Indian burial ground that is no longer in active use.

Southampton is named after the port city of Southampton in Hampshire, England.