He Once Admired Aaron Burr

See more about John Maunsell here

The magazine of American history with notes and queries


"One of his [Lt.-Gen. John Maunsell's] most marked characteristics was his affectionate interest in all connected with him, including his wife's relatives. One of her sisters, Mrs. Watkins, had been left a widow with a dependent family. The British commanders had found her house on Harlem Heights useful, and had kept it in order during the war, so that she had a roof over her head when peace returned."

"A letter from the general, addressed to her [Mrs. Watkins] 'at the Rev. Mr. Benjamin Moore's, New York, dated London, December 14, 1783,' is interesting as showing...his admiration for Colonel [Aaron ] Burr, who had recently married a niece of Mrs. Maunsell's — Theodosia, widow of Colonel Prevost of the British army; a sentiment which, it is needless to say, the honest veteran had occasion to change."

Map...Battle of Harlem Heights at the Library of Congress

A reference to John Wakins of Harlem Heights was found in the "Annals of the Van Rensselaers in the United States":

She [Ann Dunkin] was the only daughter of Robert Henry Dunkin of Philadelphia, and Elizabeth, daughter of John Watkins of Harlem Heights. Her father was dead, and, although her home was in Philadelphia, where her grandmother, Mrs. Ann Dunkin, resided, she spent much of her time with her grandmother, Mrs. Watkins, at Harlem, and with her great-aunt at the same place, the widow of Lieutenant-General Maunsell. 

Source

From the blog, Daytonian in Manhattan:

"In 1841 renowned naturalist and illustrator James John Audubon purchased 20 acres of the former estate of British Colonel John Maunsell, which had been enlarged by his nephew John Watkins.  Audubon erected a home here where he lived with his family until his death in January 1851."