USA > Connecticut > New Haven County > Meriden > An historic record and pictorial description of the town of Meriden, Connecticut and men who have made it > Part 1
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GENEALOGY COLLECTION
ALLEN COUNTY PUBLIC LIBRARY 3 1833 01149 1286
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AN HISTORIC RECORD AND PICTORIAL DESCRIPTION
OF
THE TOWN OF MERIDEN, CONNECTICUT
AND MEN WHO HAVE MADE IT.
FROM EARLIEST SETTLEMENT TO CLOSE OF ITS FIRST CENTURY OF INCORPORATION.
A CENTURY OF MERIDEN "THE SILVER CITY."
ISSUED AS THE OFFICIAL SOUVENIR HISTORY BY AUTHORITY OF THE GENERAL COMMITTEE AT THE CENTENNIAL CELEBRATION, JUNE 10 TO 16, 1906.
COMPILED BY C. BANCROFT GILLESPIE. EARLY HISTORY BY GEORGE MUNSON CURTIS.
WITH PROFUSE ILLUSTRATIONS OF THE PAST AND PRESENT.
JOURNAL PUBLISHING CO., MERIDEN, CONN. 1906.
1
Copyright, 1906, by C. BANCROFT GILLESPIE.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
PART I.
1137041
CHAPTER I. PAGE. Historical Sketch of Colonies of Connecticut and New Haven. First Notices of Ter- ritory of Meriden. Disputes between the Two Colonies Relative to Dividing Line. 5
CHAPTER II.
Jonathan Gilbert, Meriden's First Landowner. Meriden Farm. Edward Higbee's In- dian Purchase. Andrew and Jonathan Belcher own Meriden Farm. Old Tav- ern and Stone House or Fort.
15
CHAPTER III.
New Haven Colony's Purchase of Land of Indians. Rev. John Davenport's Letter to Governor John Winthrop. Early Extent of Territory Included Under Name of Meriden. 31
CHAPTER IV.
Origin of the Names of Meriden and Pilgrims' Harbor. .
42
CHAPTER V.
Founding and Settling of Wallingford. Hop Lands. Dogs' Misery, Pilgrims' Harbor, Milking Yard, Falls Plain or Hanover, Hanging Hills Woods. . 52
CHAPTER VI.
Northern Half of Meriden. Purchase from Adam Puit, Indian. Dispute with Middle- town. Setting off of Parish of Meriden, 1728. 67
CHAPTER VII.
Grants of Farms to James Bishop and William Jones, Magistrates of Colony of Con- necticut. Some Old Meriden Farms.
75
CHAPTER VIII.
Further Account of Old Meriden Farms and Landowners. Capt. Josiah Robinson's Tavern.
. 88
CHAPTER IX.
Old Meriden Farms Continued. Rev. Theophilus Hall. 105
CHAPTER X.
Old Farms of Meriden Continued.
126
CHAPTER XI.
PAGE. Building of First, Second and Third Meeting Houses. Church and Parish History. 138
CHAPTER XII.
Meeting House Hill and Broad Street Cemeteries. Inscriptions and Epitaphs. . 159
CHAPTER XIII.
Life in Meriden During the Eighteenth Century. Industries. Wallingford and Mer- - iden Stores and Store Keepers. Taverns. Mining. Early Physicians. . · 209
CHAPTER XIV.
Indians. Negro Slaves and Slavery. 242
CHAPTER XV.
Witchcraft Persecutions in Wallingford. . . 254
CHAPTER XVI.
Meriden and Wallingford in the Wars. . 260
CHAPTER XVII.
Tories in Meriden and Wallingford.
290
CHAPTER XVIII.
Bangall. Further Account of Meriden Farms and Landowners. Wallingford and Middletown Boundary Disputes. Mt. Lamentation, Leonard Chester's Adven- ture. Beset Mountain. 308
CHAPTER XIX.
1806-Meriden a Town. The Village Streets. . 333
CHAPTER XX.
Early Struggles of Meriden to Become a Manufacturing Town. Success Crowns the Effort.
. 346
CHAPTER XXI.
Merchants of the Middle of the Nineteenth Century. Hotels. Places of Amusement . and Resort. Town Hall. Conflagrations. Meriden a City, 1867. Newspapers. Early Lawyers. Conclusion. 361
APPENDIX.
Lists of Representatives in the General Assembly. State Senators. Town Clerks. First Selectmen. Judges of Probate. Mayors of the City. City Clerks. . · 395
EARLY VITAL STATISTICS.
Early Vital Statistics. Marriages. Baptisms and Burials. 400
A CENTURY OF MERIDEN
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MERIDEN'S EARLY HISTORY.
BY GEORGE MUNSON CURTIS.
CHAPTER I.
A LTHOUGH the history of Meriden as a township certainly does not begin until 1806, the year of its incorporation, still the story of its set- tlement starts many years previous to that date, at a time when historic Ply- mouth was only forty-one years old and scarcely twenty-five years had elapsed since the founding of Hartford, while New Haven had little more than attained its majority.
When the white man first began to clear the primeval forests that covered the land now embraced within the territory of Meriden, Wallingford settlement had not even been thought of. It is a fact that the name of the daughter antedates that of the mother town on the colonial records by four years, for as early as 1666 the name of Meriden appears in the lists of the General Court. In all probability, no Indian village was ever located within these borders, and yet the land was claimed as his heritage by three different red men who each in turn sold it to the white man. In fact, the greater part of Meriden was bought of the aboriginal inhabitants five different times. Here the dusky savage came to follow the chase or trap the beaver and many were the hunting parties that roamed these hills and valleys.
All that part of Meriden lying north of Main street was for many years in Hartford county and, in turn, jurisdiction was claimed by the Colonial court, Wethersfield, Farmington, Middletown and Wallingford, and records of very early purchases of real estate must be searched for hither and thither, one can never be sure where. With such an uncertain lineage and such a complexity of juris- diction it would be strange indeed if some stories of the past could not be gleaned from the early records that will hold the attention of those in whose hearts there lurks an affection for the town where so many of us were born, or have placed our hearth-stones and built our homes. We may not have a continuous town his- tory of unbroken local government, but our homes have been laid in a country of lovely hills and vales, and our eyes are daily confronted by as beautiful a land- scape as can be found in Connecticut and those who have not been neglectful of
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CENTURY OF MERIDEN
the beauties that surround us love every inch of her rugged cliffs, brawling brooks, woodland paths and smiling, cultivated meadows, swelling and sinking in ever changing vistas of loveliness.
It will assist one to better understand and appreciate our early annals if, on a bright and clear day in summer, a climb is made to the summit of West Peak, or better still to the grey tower known as Castle Crag, standing on the verge of the dizzy cliff that, like a sentinel, dominates all the landscape to the west of Mer- iden.
In a vast panorama spreads the valley to the north and south, dotted with ponds, lakes, meadows, woodland and villages, and checked on the east by moun- tains and crags which distance clothes in a purple haze, half veiling the ruggedness of grim old Lamentation, Higby and Beseck, torn and rent by the storms and frosts of ages. Like a map the country lies below us, for we are more than a thousand feet above the sea. Away in the north gleams the gilded dome of the Capitol in that gentle depression which holds in its lap Hartford, Windsor and Wethersfield, washed on the east by the waters of the Connecticut and swelling in the west into the wooded slopes of Talcott Mountain, while further south and west the spreading waves of pioneer life extended the colony into the valley of the Farmington river. With a strong glass we even fancy we can see the spire of the old meeting house in Farmington peeping above the green elm. trees of the village street; near at hand, lie New Britain, Berlin, Bristol and Southington, all settled by the same movement which drew the pioneers into the lovely Tunxis valley and all for many years parts of the town of Farmington.
On the borders of Berlin and Meriden gleams like a spot of burnished silver a large lake, or pond, now used by a Hartford Company as an ice reservoir, but in those days of long ago, no pond would have met our eyes, but instead a vast mo- rass or swamp alive with beavers and water fowl and curiously called by the old Dutch name of the Fly or Vly. Just south of this pond was cleared the first set- tlement in the territory of Meriden. Glancing to the east over Meriden and the summit of Lamentation we suspect rather than see the ancient town of Middle- town, in those early days called Mattabesett, the seat of the great Sachem Sow- heag, from whose son, bearing the euphonious name of Montowese, was bought by the English of New Haven the land extending northward from its bounds up through North Haven and Wallingford as far as where Kensington avenue in Meriden winds to the northwest on its way to New Britain. Just at the foot of the steep side of the most eastern of the parallel ridges close at hand, Cold Spring pours forth its ice cold water, now almost forgotten by a generation which re- members not the attractions of the place before the Cold Spring Home or poor- house had contaminated it by its depressing association. The fame of Cold Spring was once so great that it lent its name to localize all the territory for at least two miles to the north, east and south.
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EARLY HISTORY.
On the southeast, beyond Wallingford, the range of Lamentation and Beseck Mountains stretches the bold front of its trap-rock cliffs into the town of Bran- ford, known there as Totoket Mountain; while towards the south on the horizon rise the sharp hills known as East and West Rocks and over their summits we catch glimpses of Long Island Sound, indenting the land in a little bay where the Quinnipiac river, winding quietly through this southern valley, finally pours its waters, gathered from the hills and meadows of Bristol, Southington, Meriden, Wallingford and North Haven. New Haven we cannot see, for East Rock, capped by the monument erected in memory of the dead of the Civil war, hides and shelters it from the north.
It is an historic as well as a beautiful panorama on which we are gazing and students and historians have many times told the story of Connecticut and New Haven colonies and it may seem unnecessary to give in these pages even the slightest sketch of this early history, but Meriden's earliest settlement depends so largely on the relations of these two rivals that the attempt will be made to re- fresh the memory of those who have forgotten.
In 1635 a little band of Englishmen who had but lately arrived from the mother country, began to regret their decision to reside near Boston. Resenting the re- ligious and civil intolerance of the lately settled towns in eastern Massachusetts and longing to found a commonwealth on a more liberal basis, they gathered up their possessions and turned their faces towards the Connecticut river at Hartford. Driving their cattle and herds before them they traversed on foot the long and tedious journey and by 1636 they had founded the three towns of Hartford, Wind- sor and Wethersfield. Here, under the leadership of Rev. Thomas Hooker, they laid the foundation of constitutional government in this country, for it was in Hartford that was drawn up the first written constitution of which history gives us any record.1 Hartford was the birthplace of American democracy. These three river towns were the nucleus of the colony of Connecticut and hardly an event in the settlement of America was of more importance than the cornerstone of free government laid by these early pioneers, for here grew up the theory of government "of the people, by the people, for the people,"2 that American idea of a free and equal government where every freeman in good standing is entitled to the ballot and can register his approval or disapproval of men and measures.
In 1638 another company of Englishmen landed in Boston, the most opulent of any of these early migrations across the sea. Led by the London merchant, Theophilus Eaton and the Rev. John Davenport, they were not satisfied by the con- ditions they found in the towns around Massachusetts Bay, and, in spite of in- ducements to settle in the neighborhood where they had landed, they sought for a virgin field where they could establish the religious and political ideas they had
1 Johnston's Conn. Am. Commonwealth series, p. 63.
2 Idem, p. 70
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brought with them. They finally decided on the meadows near the mouth of the Quinnipiac river as the place where they could safely try their experiment in civil government. Called at first Quinnipiac, after the tribe of Indians from whom the land was bought, the name was soon changed to New Haven. Other bands of pilgrims soon arrived and Milford, Branford and Guilford were founded and these four towns were soon welded into the colony of New Haven.
The methods of government were very different from those of the colony of Connecticut at the north. In New Haven the Bible was the constitution and no one was entitled to the ballot who was not a church member in good standing. In other words, the colony was governed by what may be called a church oligar- chy. It may readily be imagined that the commonwealth with a center at Hart- ford was speedily to become much more popular than the one located on the Sound. It grew more rapidly in territory and numbers and soon embraced the newly settled towns of Stratford, Saybrook, New London, Farming- ton, Fairfield and Norwalk, while New Haven never extended its original bounds except to settle and absorb the town of Stamford.
Here, then, were two rival colonies only thirty-six miles apart, but as widely separated as the poles in methods and theories of government. Just half way between was the territory of Meriden, a buffer as it were between two rival push- ing bands of land-hungry Englishmen.
Without doubt the oldest highway of any length in the state of Connecticut is the Old Colony road, leading from Hartford to New Haven and still bearing this descriptive name as it passes through Meriden and Wallingford. Probably there was an Indian trail occupying the same general position before the white man's advent, for, according to credible tradition and written records the Indians, although never inhabiting the valley between Lamentation and Hanging Hills, resorted hither from the vicinity of Hartford and New Haven to follow the chase. Although travel between the colonies of Connecticut and New Haven could not have been very frequent during the first few years, still the old records preserve evidences of communication between the two colonies. In 1639 letters from Quinnipiac were demanding the attention of the General Court in Hartford1 and the same year it was thought best to send to Quinnipiac counsels relative to de- fense against the Indians and Mr. Webster and Mr. Willis were dispatched on the errand.2
A few weeks later Edward Hopkins, of Hartford, set out from that town for Stratford with a drove of cattle and passed through New Haven3 and afterwards he confesses to frequent journeys over the same road when he writes "I remember with what pleasure he (Gov. Theop. Eaton) would come down the street that
1 Conn. Col. Rec., Vol. I., p. 28.
2 Idem, p. 32.
3 Idem, p. 35.
-
9
EARLY HISTORY.
he might meet me when I came from Hartford unto New Haven."1 In 1640 word was sent to New Haven of Indian depredations2 and in 1645 the New Haven court ordered a bridge built over "East River in the way to Connecticott."3 On September 13, 1649, the Connecticut Court directed Mr. Ludlow and Mr. Tayle- coat (Talcott) to ride to New Haven to-morrow to confer with Mr. Eaton relative to the Indians.4 In 1653 the New Haven court passed the following vote "for hire of horses the owner shall have from New Haven to Connecticote tenn shillings."5 These extracts show that there must have been more or less communication be- tween the two colonies which grew as the years went by and population increased. Doubtless, Rev. Mr. Hooker, of Hartford, Rev. Mr. Davenport, of New Haven, and Rev. Mr. Whitfield, of Guilford, who had been intimate friends in England, sometimes visited each other to discuss the many problems which vexed them and to devise means to overcome the wiles of the Devil, who in this new country of unbroken wilderness and terrible solitudes was cunningly devising new tempta- tions to draw the souls of the faithful from the straight and narrow way.
Consequently, the country in the vicinity of Meriden soon became familiar to many of the colonists in Hartford and New Haven and other towns. If these ancient worthies had time and inclination to admire the beauties of nature they must have been impressed as they entered the valley between Lamentation Moun- tain on the east and the gently rising Hanging Hills on the west, which, gradu- ally climbing higher and higher, with here and there great spaces of rock, grey with the frosts of ages, drop precipitously into the plain extending to the Sound. No other place on their weary journey could have compared in beauty and pic- turesqueness with this little valley. But even the beauty of hill and dale can hardly have repaid them for the hardships endured during the long and weary thirty-six miles which lay between Hartford and New Haven, with hardly a house to break the monotony of the journey. There were only two methods of overcoming this distance : one must travel afoot or on horseback over a path without bridges and with the directions blazed on the trees of the primeval forest.
The necessity for caution in following this road through the wilderness may be judged by the following extract from a letter written by Rev. John Daven- port, of New Haven, to Gov. Winthrop at Hartford, dated 6 month, 1660:
"I received a former letter from you by Mr. Bishop who, in his return from your parts hitherward, tooke a wrong path twise and was so bewildered that he lost his way from Wethersfield and lay in the woods in a very cold night and came not to us til the last day of the weeke towards noone."6
1 Mather's Magnalia, Ed. 1820, Vol. I, p. 134.
2 Conn. Col. Rec., Vol. I, p. 58.
3 N. H. Col. Rec., Vol. I, p. 188.
4 Conn. Col. Rec., Vol. I., p. 197.
5 N. H. Col. Rec., Vol. II., p. 3.
6 Mass. His. Soc. Col., 3rd Series, Vol. X, p. 37.
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Even as late as 1672 the Governor of New York in his instructions to post riders from that colony to Boston states, "You are principally to apply yourselfe to the Governors especially Governor Winthrop (at Hartford) from whom you shall receive the best directions how to form ye best Poast Road. When you think it requisite you are to marke some Trees that shall direct Passengers the best way."1 "The Indian paths were good though only two or three feet wide and in many places the savages kept the woods clear from underbrush by burning over large tracts," and doubtless the colonists followed the same method. "Thus the 'blazes' stood out clear and white in the dark shadows of the forests like welcome guide-posts, showing the traveler his way."2 And yet, always haunting one, like a ghost that will not be exorcised, was the fear of the lurking savage and wild beast ; and at any sudden noise there was a tenser strain of the nerves and a tight- ening grasp of the trusty rifle, that constant "vade mecum" of the sturdy colonist. The Rev. John Davenport, in a letter to Governor Winthrop, dated April 2, 1660, gives us a little story which illustrates the perils of the journey and which for dearth of other material may well be inserted :
"Honored Sir-I received yours by Brother Benham, whom God preserved from being drowned in his journey homeward. The river by Mr. Yale's farm was swollen high; his wife was fearful of riding through it. God provided an help for her at the instant by a passenger who traveled from Windsor to Bran- ford to Mr. Crane's, whose daughter he had married. He helped Sister Benham over a tree. But her husband, adventuring to ride through, a foot of his horse slipped, so he fell into the water, and his horse, as he thinketh, fell upon him or struck him with his foot, for he had a blow on his head. But through the mercy of God he is now well." This was doubtless at the crossing of Pil- grims' Harbor Brook, for no one could cross the Quinnipiac River when swollen, by means of a tree or log.
But they were a brave and undaunted people and notwithstanding the hidden terrors of the wilderness slowly but relentlessly the van of the settlements was constantly advancing, and as the numbers increased the question of a dividing line between the sister governments of Connecticut and New Haven began to attract attention. It is easy to imagine that, when bounds had been described only in deeds from the Indians, drawn up when limits were not considered of moment, accuracy in tracing these bounds would cause much friction. At last New Haven determined to leave no room for doubt as to the extent of her territory, and at a General Court held April 23, 1660, "the Governor desired that the bounds of a p'cel of land towards Connecticote might be sett out for the prevention of future differences that might otherwise arise betwixt us w'ch motion was approved and thereupon it was ordered yt Mr. Yale, Wm. Andrews, John Cowper, John Brock-
1 N. Y. Evening Post, Feb. 18, 1899.
2 Earle's Home Life in Colonial Days, p. 330.
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EARLY HISTORY.
II
itt, Nathaniel Merriman with the help of Mantowees, an Indian ye late pprietor shall set out the bounds wth lasting marks wch is to be done wth the first con- venyence."1
It is interesting to note that two of these men were leaders in the settlement of Wallingford ten years later, and probably their first acquaintance with that vicinity was made during their service on the committee to execute this vote of the General Court.
As soon as spring has really come we may in fancy see these men, clad in leathern doublet and breeches, accompanied by the dusky warrior, Montowese, striding along the road leading to "Connecticote," crossing the bridge lately built over the Quinnipiac, and setting their faces towards the north where in the hazy distance can be traced the dim outlines of the Hanging Hills. First, we note the sturdy form of Nathaniel Merriman, a veteran of the Pequot War of 1636 and destined later, as captain of dragoons and accompanied by his son, Nathaniel, Jr., to play his part in the great swamp fort fight of King Philip's War ; where, alas ! many of the flower of Connecticut's young manhood perished, Nathaniel, Jr., among the rest. Our veteran as he firmly strides along is now in the prime of life; born in 1614, the son of George Merriman of London, who died there in 1656,2 he early cast his lot among the New Haven planters, and when Wallingford was settled in 1670 he was one of the pioneers and until his death in 1694 was conspicuous and honored in that community. He is still represented among us by worthy and respected descendants.
Next we see Thomas Yale who came to New Haven a youth in charge of Gov. Theophilus Eaton, who had married his widowed mother, the daughter of Thomas Morton, Bishop of Chester, England. He evidently was fond of pioneer life, for when New Haven had grown to be a larger town he settled in North Haven ; he also has left many descendants among us who still maintain the prestige of his name. Then comes John Brockett, who also served in King Philip's War; he was frequently employed as a surveyor and many of the early roads in New Ha- ven County were laid out under his direction; after him comes Wm. Andrews who accompanied Gov. Eaton to New Haven at the first settlement and was for many years the keeper of the only inn in that town ; and last of all is John Cooper, a prominent man in the community, for many years manager of the iron works and frequently a representative at the General Court.
In December, 1638, Theophilus Eaton and John Davenport had bought of Montowese, the son of the sachem at Middletown, a tract of land ten miles long, lying north of a purchase previously made of an Indian sachem named Momau- gin. This purchase was added to by a subsequent deed in 1645 which has been lost. Our committee, intent on carrying out the instructions of the General Court,
1 N. H. Col. Rec., Vol. II, p. 409.
2 N. E. His. and Gen. Reg., Vol. LIII., p. 21.
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following the lead of Montowese, pass up the road through what was later Wal- lingford and over the hill by Walnut Grove cemetery until they come to Pilgrims' Harbor. Here, we fancy, some little time was consumed in crossing the brook where Lyon & Billard's office now stands, and in picking their way through the swamp which formerly made this locality almost impassable. On they went up what is now Colony street until quite to the present junction of that street and Kensington avenue.
As far as this Montowese claimed his domains had extended and here they placed "lasting marks" which would define the boundaries between Connecticut and New Haven colonies. Their work done, doubtless, they leisurely proceeded home, possibly lingering a little while on the hill where the future Wallingford was to lie.
It was not long before the General Court at Hartford had been informed of New Haven's action and although no record of debate or action appears on the minutes, we know that a protest was sent and that the action of New Haven was not suffered to pass without comment or opposition. Rev. Mr. Davenport's letter of October 30th, 1660, to Governor Winthrop was unquestionably an answer to some complaint from Hartford colony and it is well to quote those passages relat- ing to the question in dispute "Concerning the matter of the Indians, I hope Mr. Gilbert hath or will give a clear account." Nor will there be anything done by any of ours to hinder your Indians in theyre hunting. But for the purchase it was made above 20 yeares past without any seeking, on our part, upon an offer made to our Governour & Co. It was of Montoweeze that the land was bought whereby N. H. bounds extended neare unto the Cold Spring beyond Pilgrims Harbour."1
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