In 1739, the governor of New York built a stone house here for the use of his sons. Other early settlers included Palatine Germans, whom the Mohawk had permitted to settle in exchange for gaining help with their defenses in 1712 from Queen Anne of England. Anne's government had supported immigration of the Protestant Germans as religious refugees and paid for their passage, for which they exchanged work in New York in camps along the Hudson River. As the Mohawk requested, Queen Anne ordered the construction of Fort Hunter in 1711 near Tionondoraga; that village was also known by Europeans as the "Lower Castle.