USA > Connecticut > New London County > A modern history of New London County, Connecticut, Volume I > Part 18
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whatsoever .- In witness whereof we have hereunto set to our hands this 6th of June, Anno 1659.
UNKOS OWANECO ATTAWANHOOD
Witness hereunto, John Mason, Thomas Tracy.
This deed is recorded in the Country Booke, August 20th, 1663: as attests John Allyn, secretary. The bounds of this tract, as more particularly de- scribed in the first volume of the Proprietors' Records, were as follows:
The line commenced at the mouth of Trading Cove, where the brook falls into the cove; thence W. N. W. seven miles to a Great Pond (now in the corner of Bozrah and Colchester), the limit in this direction being denoted by a black oak marked N that stood near the outlet of "Great Brook that runs out of the pond to Norwich river," thence N. N. E. nine miles to a black oak standing on the south side of the river (Shetucket), "a little above Maw-mi- ag-waug"; thence S. S. E. nine miles, crossing the Shetucket and the Quine- baug, and passing through "a Seader Swamp called Catantaquck," to a white oak tree, marked N. thirteen rods beyond a brook called Quo-qui-qua-soug,
the space from the Quinebaug to this tree being just one mile and fifty-eight rods ; thence S. S. W. nine miles to a white oak marked N, near the dwelling- houses of Robert Allyn and Thomas Rose, where Norwich and New London bounds join ; thence west on the New London bounds, crossing the southern part of Mr. Brewster's land, two miles to Mohegan river, opposite the mouth of Trading Cove brook where the first bounds began.
Such were the bounds, as reviewed and renewed in October, 1685, by an authorized committee, accompanied by the two sachems and some of the chief men of Mohegan. The former deed of 1659, with the boundaries thus described and explained, was then ratified and confirmed by "Owaneca, sachem of Mohegan, son and heire unto Vnchas deceased," and "Josiah, son and heire unto Owaneca," in a new deed, signed by them October 5th, 1685, witnessed by John Arnold and Stephen Gifford, and acknowledged before James Fitch, assistant.
The southern boundary line, it will be observed, is nine miles in length, two east of the river, and seven west, without counting the breadth of the Thames, and the length of Trading Cove to the mouth of the brook, which would make this line nearly ten miles long. This is explained in the deed to be designed as a compensation for "the benefit and liberty of the waters and river for fishing and other occasions," reserved to the Indians.
Of the original so-called "thirty-five proprietors," Miss Caulkins writes as follows :
Who were the original proprietors of Norwich? The current statement that they were just thirty-five in number is based upon the authority of his- torians writing more than a century after the settlement. Dr. Trumbull in his "History of Connecticut" gives this number, relying, it is supposed, upon a list furnished in 1767 by the Rev. Dr. Lord, pastor of the First Church of Norwich. Dr. Lord's manuscript is extant. He says: "The town of Norwich was settled in the spring of 1660: the Purchase of sd Town was made in ye month of June, 1659, by 35 men."
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He then gives a list of the names, which includes several who were minors at that time, and one at least (John Elderkin) whose earliest grant at Norwich was in 1667.
Laying aside, therefore, all subsequent statements and recurring to the oldest records remaining at Norwich from which these abstracts must have been derived, it is found that the original records were very deficient in giving dates to the early grants. Resolutions passed at different periods in the town meetings refer to this defect.
In 1672 a new record of lands was made under direction of the town authorities, by James Fitch, Jr. It was commenced May Ist of that year, and the book contains a registry of the town lands and grants, "so far as copies of said lands were brought in by the inhabitants." The number of land-owners recorded is seventy-eight, three or four of whom were non- residents. In 1681 the inhabitants declaring themselves sensible of a defi- ciency in their original records, appointed three of the first-comers, Thomas Leffingwell, Thomas Adgate, and John Post, to search for the original dates of former acts and grants, but nothing appears to have been done under this commission.
May 3d, 1684, Christopher Huntington, recorder, at the request of John Olmstead, who, he says, "desireth to have the primitive date set to his record of land, which hath not been done heretofore for the want of an orderly dating by the first recorder, Mr. Birchard," ascertains the true date, and affixes it under his signature-"which date we find out of an antient wrighting which respects our purchase interest, and right, to be in the yeare of our Lord upon the 30th day of June 1659." Again, December 18th, 1694, the town, after adverting to their former negligence in the record of proprietary lands, nominated a committee of six men "to search out and do the best they can to find the names of first purchasers, and what estate each of them put in, and report to the town."
The striking fact is here disclosed that in little more than thirty years after the settlement, the number of the first proprietors, the amount of each one's subscription, and the names of all the purchasers, were not generally known and could not be determined without some difficulty.
No report of the last commission is recorded. Not long afterwards, Capt. James Fitch was employed in the same business. He began a new registry of lands, copying original records where he could find them, stating bounds as they then existed, and affixing dates as nearly accurate as could be ascertained. It is from this registry that the various lists of the thirty-five proprietors have been gathered. Home lots, that seem to have constituted original grants, not having been alienated or purchased, were in general dated November, 1659. But the whole number that appears to be included under this date, either expressly or by implication, is thirty-eight, and it is difficult to decide which of these should be rejected, so as to leave the number just thirty-five.
The following list comprises those against whom not only nothing is found to militate against their being ranked as first proprietors, but, on the contrary, the records either prove conclusively, or favor the idea, that they belonged to that class: Rev. James Fitch, Major John Mason, Thomas Adgate, Robert Allyn, William Backus, William Backus, Jr., John Baldwin, John Birchard, Thomas Bliss, Morgan Bowers, Hugh Calkins, John Calkins, Rich- ard Edgerton, Francis Griswold, Christopher Huntington, Simon Huntington, William Hyde, Samuel Hyde. Thomas Leffingwell, John Olmstead, John Pease, John Post, Thomas Post, John Reynolds, Jonathan Royce, Nehemiah Smith, Thomas Tracy, Robert Wade.
HEAD OF THE GREEN, NORWICH, IN 1836. BUILDING ON LEFT WAS THE OLD COURT HOUSE AFTERWARD THE ACADEMY: THAT ON THE CORNER. A TAVERN. THE CHURCH EDIFICE IS THE "MEETING HOUSE OF THE ROCK," THE FIRST CHURCH IN THE SETTLEMENT.
REVOLUTIONARY WAR OFFICE, LEBANON; CONNO.
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Others having original home-lots and all the privileges of first pro- prictors were : Thomas Bingham, John Bradford, John Gager, Stephen Gifford, Richard Hendy, Thomas Howard, Thomas Waterman, John Tracy, Josiah Reed, Richard Wallis.
Of this second class, Bingham, Gifford, Howard, Reed, Tracy and Water- man, were probably minors when the plantation commenced. They were all married between 1666 and 1670. inclusive, and were all living, except Howard, in 1702, when a roll of the inhabitants was made in reference to a division of land which distinguished the surviving first proprietors from the list of ac- cepted inhabitants. Bingham, Gifford, Reed, Tracy and Waterman were enrolled with the latter, which would seem to settle the point that they were not original proprietors.
Most of these names, however, are necessary in order to make up the charmed number thirty-five. From the position these young men took, and the prominence of their descendants in the history of the town, they seem to have a higher claim to be ranked as proprietors than some of the earlier class. Hendy and Wallis, for instance, of whom we know little more than their names, and, accepting the six minors, we are brought back to the time-honored prescriptive number, thirty-five. Stephen Backus, another minor, became a proprietor in the right of his father, William Backus, who died soon after the settlement.
The Town-plot was laid out in a winding vale, which followed the course of the rapid, circuitous Yantic, and was sheltered for the greater part of the way, on either side, by abrupt and rocky but well-wooded hills. A broad street or highway was opened through this valley, on each side of which the home-lots were arranged. A pathway was likewise cleared from the center of the settlement to the Indian landing place below the Falls of the Yantic, near the head of the Cove, following the old Indian trail from Ox-hill to Yantic ford. This path, called by the settlers Mill-Lane, was the most eligible route by which the effects of the planters could be conveyed. In some places the forests had been thinned of their undergrowth by fires, to afford scope for the Indians in their passionate love of the chase, and the beaver had done his part towards clearing the lowlands and banks of the rivers. A few wig- wams were scattered here and there, the occasional abodes of wandering families of Indians at certain seasons of the year, who came hither for sup- plies of fish, fruit, or game; and the summits of some of the hills were crowned with disorderly heaps of stones, showing where some rude defense had been constructed in the course of their wars. But in every other respect the land was in its natural wild state. It was a laborious task to cut down trees, to burn the underbrush, to mark out roads and pathways, to throw temporary bridges over the runs of water, and to collect materials for building.
The home-lots comprised each a block of several acres, and were in general river-lands, favorable for mowing, pasture and tillage. Here lay the prime advantage to be gained by a change of residence, the first proprietors being, with scarcely a single exception, agriculturists and farmers.
Of the coming of the settlers from Saybrook, no better description has
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been given than that of Rev. Dr. Lewellyn Pratt, delivered at the two hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the founding. He says:
I presume that I have been selected to speak this opening word in the public services of this 250th anniversary, as a native and representative of the old town of Saybrook. I am to remind you of "the rock whence ye were hewn and the hole of the pit whence ye were digged."
As we all know, the band of pilgrims who came here in 1659-60 came for the most part from Saybrook. An independent colony had been established there under the leadership of Gov. John Winthrop the younger. It was a colony animated by great expectations. The importance of the location at the mouth of the great river, the prospect and the purpose of building there a large city, and the hope that many prominent men would soon follow, made it an attractive spot to enterprising souls. That settlement was begun in 1635, the same year that Hooker brought his colony through the wilderness to Hartford. Lion Gardiner, an engineer who had seen service under the Prince of Orange in the Netherlands, was induced by Governor Winthrop to come to fortify the place, to lay out the ground for a city, and to "make preparation for the reception of men of quality" who were soon to follow from England. He remained four years and was succeeded by Col. George Fenwick, and he in turn by Maj. John Mason. During the first years, trouble- some years of defence against the frequent assaults of the Indians, the settle- ment had for its center and principal feature the fort which Gardiner had built at the first. About this were clustered the houses, and in this, in the Great Hall, was the gathering place for defense, for transaction of business, and for worship. No church was formed at first, for it was principally a military post, and the chaplain of the post. Rev. John Higginson, was the spiritual guide of the colony. Col. George Fenwick, after the failure of "the men of quality" who were expected to join him in the enterprise, transferred his colony, in 1644, to Connecticut, and soon after, saddened by the death of his wife, Lady Alice, returned with his children to England, and Maj. John Mason was persuaded to receive the investment and to make Saybrook his home. There he remained as leader for twelve years.
Under his administration the colony thrived, and a more extended settle- ment was made north, east and west. In 1646 a church was formed, and the Rev. James Fitch, who had studied with the Rev. Thomas Hooker and who was recommended by him, became pastor, and Thomas Adgate deacon. Mr. Fitch's ministry, whom Trumbull speaks of as a "famous young gentleman" (he was in his twenty-fourth year when he was settled), proved to be a very happy and successful one. Notwithstanding the hostility of the Dutch and the Indians, the plantation grew by the moving in of choice families, some of them from Windsor and Hartford, attracted in part by the popularity of the young preacher. We have meager records of that period, but it seems to have been one that promised well for the settlement, which was now assuming the consequence of a real plantation and becoming something more than a military post.
After a lapse of fourteen or fifteen years, however, we find that a check is to be given to this progress, the intimation of which is clearly marked by this order of the General Court of Connecticut, dated May 20, 1659: "This court having considered the petition presented by the inhabitants of Seabrook, doe declare yt they approve and consent to what is desired by ve petitioners respecting Mohegin, provided yt within ye space of three years they doe effect a Plantation in ye place prpounded."
We would like to know more of his petition and of the list of names
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signed to it, but no copy has been preserved. The order speaks of the "in- habitants of Seabrook," which seems to imply that a majority proposed to remove ; and the fact that Mr. Fitch, their pastor, decided to come with them, also lends color to that view. It is doubtful, however, if the majority actually came. Mr. Fitch may have recognized the greater need of those who were to go into new conditions and who would require his experience and counsel in the organizations they must effect. Apparently, it was not regarded as the removal of the church, although its pastor and deacon came-Saybrook has always dated the organization of its church in 1646, and Norwich 1660- but in all probability the younger and more enterprising of the colony came, and the loss to Saybrook was most seriously felt. For several years, till 1665, the colony and church that were left behind were in a disheartened state.
Many reasons have been surmised for the removal, some of them too frivolous to be accepted, as that which has been so often repeated-that these Norwich pioneers, with Major Mason and James Fitch at their head, were "driven out by the crows and blackbirds that destroyed their corn." We may imagine many reasons; among them, perhaps, was the disappointment that the men who had planned to settle at Saybrook and who would have given peculiar character and standing to that colony had failed to come; and even their representative, Colonel Fenwick, had lost heart in the enterprise and abandoned it. Then, there were the inducements which the friendly Indians here held out and the offer of a large tract of land for settlement.
The peculiar beauty of this section, with its wooded hills, its fertile plains and running brooks, attracted them. The pioneer spirit appealed to them, was in their blood, as in all the colonies at that time. They must go some- where. So Hooker had come to Hartford, Pynchon to Springfield, Roger Williams to Rhode Island, Jonathan Brewster to Windsor and Brewster's Neck. Probably this Norwich colony had as reasons for the removal some like those given by Hooker's company in their petition for permission for removal to Hartford, which were: I. "Want of room where we are." 2. "The fruitfulness and commodiousness of Connecticut and the danger of having it possessed by others." 3. "The strong bent of our spirit to remove thither." Probably the "bent of their spirit" was the motive more potent than either of the others of them or both of them together.
The act of the General Court of May, 1659, which I have quoted, made as its condition that the settlement must be made within the three years there- after. Apparently no time was lost ; and the advance guard came in the sum- mer of 1659, followed by the remainder of the company the next year.
It was a valiant and goodly band of well-to-do folk of good ancestry, that had been trained by strong leaders, such as Winthrop, Fenwick, Gardiner, Mason, Higginson and Fitch, had been inured to service in a new country, had already attained to a well ordered life under a constitutional government. and were united under the restraining and refining power of the Christian faith. This colony did not begin in a random way, like so many of the early settlements or like so many of the later frontier ventures, by receiving acces- sions of restless adventurers from this quarter and that till it gradually grew into stable form and condition : it came upon the ground a town and a church. The people were not a miscellaneous company thrown together by chance, needing to be trained and assimilated, but an association carrying their laws as well as their liberties with them; not strangers, each seeking his own advantage, staking out his own claim and defending it by arms; but a band of God-fearing men and women united into a brotherhood each bound to act for the common good. They were not mere fortune hunters or buccaneers coming to wrest their speedy gain and then retire, but founders of a civilized N.L .- 1-9
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and Christian state in which they could establish homes, and which they could bequeath to their children as a priceless inheritance. They were looking forward to permanence and a future, and they knew that steady habits, manly toil and fine fraternity of feeling must enter into that to make it stable. All the enactments and procedings of those early days reveal a community in which good order, decorum of manners, self-respect and high ideals prevailed. The Christian church was the unifying bond and the guide of their lives. They were cheered and strengthened by the constant charm of its promises, and the rigor of the wilderness and the privations of frontier life were soft- ened by its hopes. I do not know how much they thought of the names they were to transmit. I think some of them would have smiled at the coat-of- arms and the kind of heraldic glory with which they have been crowned, and would have been incredulous of the "genuine" heirlooms that have been handed down; but they did aim to lead honest and honorable lives and to make a community in which it would be safe and wholesome for their children to grow.
It was sifted seed that was brought by Winthrop to his first settlement; and it was sifted again when Fitch and Mason brought it here. Who they were, how they fared, what hostages they have given to history in the lines of noble descent, we are to hear in the days that are to follow. It is a goodly story-the orderly life of those early days; then, the patriotic spirit of the time when the nation was born; then, the enterprise of this later time. Nor- wich, proud of her ancestry, of the achievements of her sons and daughters, of her well-earned name, and of her lines running out to the ends of the earth, comes to her quarter millennium with devout gratitude to Him who brought us here and who has sustained us. And it surely is not amiss, while, standing by their graves, we honor the memories of those heroic men and women and congratulate ourselves on our heritage, to remind ourselves that
"They that on glorious ancestors enlarge Produce their debt instead of their discharge,"
and, that though these have witnesses borne to them through their faith, "God has provided some better thing for us, that apart from us they should not be made perfect."
Of the life of Captain John Mason, Miss Caulkins gives a full outline so far as it is known :
Every memoir of Mason is obliged to take him up at the prime of life, for of his birth, parentage, and early years, no certain information has been obtained. When he first appears in history, he is in the English army under Sir Thomas Fairfax, fighting in the Netherlands in behalf of the Dutch patriots, against the bigotry and tyranny of Spain.
He is supposed to have emigrated to this country in 1630, with Mr. Warham's company that sailed from Plymouth, England, March 20th, and arrived at Nantasket May 30th of that year. But this cannot be stated with absolute certainty, as he has not been actually traced on this side of the ocean before December, 1632, when he was engaged in a cruise with John Gallop, under a commission from the Governor and Magistrates of Massa- chusetts to search for a pirate called Dixy Bull, who had for some time annoyed the coast with petty depredation. He was then called Lieutenant Mason, but soon afterward attained the rank of captain. In 1634 he was one of a committee appointed to plan the fortifications of Boston Harbor, and was specially employed in raising a battery upon Castle Island.
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In March, 1635, he was the representative of Dorchester to the General Court, but in the latter part of the same year or early in the next, removed with the major part of Mr. Warham's people to the Connecticut Valley. Here the emigrants planted themselves on the western bank of Connecticut river, above Hartford, and founded the pleasant and honorable town of Windsor.
With the residence of Captain Mason at Windsor, all the stirring scenes of the Pequot war are connected. This was the great event of the early his- tory of Connecticut, and the overshadowing exploit of Mason's life. He was instrumental in originating the expedition, formed the plan, followed out its details, fought its battles, clinched, as it were with iron screws, its results, and wrote its history. This war was begun and ended when Connecticut had only 250 inhabitants, comprised principally in the three towns of Hartford, Wethersfield and Windsor. Out of these Mason gathered a band of seventy men, and, passing down Connecticut river, landed in the Narragansett coun- try, and being joined by a band of friendly Indians, marched directly into the heart of the hostile territory, assailed the Pequots in their strongest fortress, destroyed it, laid waste their dwellings, and killed nearly half of the whole nation. This expedition occupied three weeks and two days. The skill, prudence, firmness and active courage displayed by Mason in this exploit were such as to gain him a high standing among military commanders. From this period he became renowned as an Indian fighter, and stood forth a buckler of defence to the exposed colonists, but a trembling and a terror to the wild people of the wilderness.
In 1637 he was appointed by the General Court the chief military officer of the colony, his duty being "to train the military men" of the several plan- tations ten days in every year : salary, forty pounds per annum. At a later period (1654) he was authorized to assemble all the train-bands of the colony once in two years for a general review. The office was equivalent to that of major-general. He retained it through the remainder of his life, thirty-five years. and during that time appears to have been the only person in the colony with the rank and title of major.
When the fort at Saybrook was transferred by Colonel Fenwick to the jurisdiction of the colony, Mason was appointed to receive the investment, and at the special request of the inhabitants he removed to that place and was made commander of the station. Here he had his home for the next twelve years.
The people of New Haven were not entirely satisfied with their location, and formed a design of removing to a tract of land which they had purchased on the Delaware river. In 1651 they proposed this matter to Captain Mason, urgently requesting him to remove with them, and take the management of the company. This invitation is a proof of the high opinion his contempo- raries had formed both of his civil and military talents. The offers they made him were liberal, and he was on the point of accepting, when the Legislature of Connecticut interfered, entreating him not to leave the colony, and declaring that they could by no means consent to his removal. Finding that his presence was considered essential to the safety of Connecticut, he declined the offers of New Haven. If he went, there was no one left who could make his place good; neither had New Haven any person in reserve, who could fill the station designed for him, and therefore the projected settlement never took place. The active disposition of Mason, however, never lacked employment. There was scarcely a year in which he was not obliged to go on some expedition among the Indian tribes, to negotiate, or to fight, or to pacify their mutual quarrels. At one time, his faithful friend Uncas was in danger from a powerful league of the other tribes, but the seasonable prepara-
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