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Mr. John Halsey, in 1797, offered to import from Hamburg two fire-engines, with long hose to convey water from the rivers to the interior of the city. His offer was accepted by the Corporation. The "long hose" consisted of several lengths, the engines generally having only one length, and depending upon the use of buckets, which, if lost, were paid for by the city.

The practice of forming a line with the engines and their hose, and so pumping through hose into one engine and thence through hose into another, and thence into a third, and so on, when the water-supply was at a distance from the fire, had not yet been adopted. The same year a new engine was bought for £130, and "the characters of the persons to belong to the same were ordered to be examined by a committee."

On the 18th of December, 1797, a committee appointed at the annual meeting of the Fire Department reported a draft of an application to the Legislature for a charter. One notable feature of this draft was the request for permission "to apply such surplus funds as may not be required for the use of disabled and indigent firemen to the purposes of extinguishing fires." On the 30th of April, 1798, the Department held a meeting at the house of Joseph Crooke, No. 259 William Street, when the committee reported that "an act to incorporate the firemen of the City of New York" had been passed on the 20th of March previous. This act provided that "all such persons as now are or hereafter shall be engineers of the Fire Department, or firemen belonging to any of the fire-engines of the City of New York, shall be, and hereby are ordained, constituted, and declared to be, and continue until the first Tuesday in April, 1818, a body politic, in fact and in name, by the name of 'The Fire Department of the City of New York.' " It contained also the following provisions:

"And be it further enacted, That the engineers belonging to the said Fire Department shall, on or before the first day of December in every year, choose one representative; each company of eighteen firemen, two representatives; and under eighteen firemen, one representative; who shall have and exercise all such powers as are hereinafter committed to them.

"And be it further enacted, That the said representatives shall choose, on the second Monday of December in every year, by ballot, out of their own body, a President and a Vice-president, and out of the whole body of the firemen, three Trustees, and Treasurer, Secretary, and Collector; that the first representatives shall be, Daniel Hitchcock, Thomas Tom, Nicholas Van Antwerp, James Parsons, Jr., William Hardenbrook, Mathias Nack, Samuel Lord, Nicholas Roome, Leonard Rogers, Cornelius Brinckerhoff, Joseph Smith, Israel Haviland, John Pritchett, James Robinson, Robert McCullen, Augustus Wright, William Hunter, Elijah Pinckney, Isaac Hatfield, Garrett Debow, Adam Pentz, John Perrin, Adam Hartell, Moses Smith, William Brown, John Lent, John Utt, Uzziah Coddington, Jr., Peter Embury, James Van Dyck, Thomas Timpson, Joseph Newton, William Degrove, William Baker, Thomas Demilt, William A. Hardenbrook, Isaac Tirboss, Henry Rogers, John Dominick, and Joseph Webb; that Daniel Hitchcock shall be the first President; that Thomas Tom shall be the first Vice-president; that Frederick Devoe, Jacob Sherred, James Stewart, John Striker, James Tylee, Benjamin Strong, Thomas Brown, Stephen Smith, and Christopher Halstead shall be the first Trustees; that Nicholas Van Antwerp shall be the first Treasurer; and James Parsons, Jr., the first Secretary; and Matin Morrison, the first Collector; to hold their respective offices and places until others are appointed in their stead, agreeable to the provisions of this Act."

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