Southold Map
Southold is one of ten towns in Suffolk County, New York, United States. It is located in the northeastern tip of the county, on the North Fork of Long Island. The population was 20,599 at the 2000 census. The town also contains a hamlet named Southold, which was settled in 1640.
Southold was settled in 1640 and in most histories is reported as the first English settlement on Long Island in the future New York State although Lion Gardiner established a manor on Gardiners Island in East Hampton a year earlier in 1639. The Dutch had settled around Albany, New York in 1615 and at Manhattan in 1625.
English Puritans from New Haven Colony in Connecticut settled in Southold on October 21, 1640. Under the leadership of the Reverend John Youngs, with Peter Hallock, the settlement consisted of the families of Barnabas Horton, John Budd, John Conklin, William Wells, John Tuthill, Thomas Mapes, Richard Terry, Matthias Corwin, Robert Akerly, Zachariah Corey and Isaac Arnold. They had purchased the land in the summer of 1640 from the group of Lenape who lived in the territory they called Corchaug. Settlers spelled the Indian name of what became Southold as Yennicott.
Nearby cities include Bridgehampton, Water Mill, Jamesport, Sagaponack, Southampton.