Marker text:
| 2000 acres settled in 1766 by William Gilliland (1734-1796) first named Janesburough, later Port Gilliland. AA port for lake shipped goods c1820-1900 |
The Friswell patent encompassed 2,000 acres at the mouth of Mill Creek (Salmon River) in the southeast corner of the Town of Plattsburgh. It included some 9,000 feet (1.7 miles) of Lake Champlain frontage and is an important portion of the Town. The Friswell Patent was set out and surveyed for John Friswell, late a Lieutenant in the British Navy at the reduction of Quebec in 1759, by order of the Province of New York on May 6, 1765.
William ("Will") Gilliland, then a merchant in New York City with dreams of manorial land holdings, immediately bought the Patent from Friswell. Will settled it in September of 1766 just a little over a year after he, with his band of mechanics, farmers, craftsmen and domestic help, had settled Willsborough, in what became Essex County.
Will named the area at the mouth of the Salmon River Janesborough, which included the lands in both the Friswell and adjacent Stuart Patents. By 1845 the name Port Gilliland came into use to identify the area until shortly after 1900.