A modern history of Windham county, Connecticut : a Windham county treasure book, Volume I, Part 101

Author: Lincoln, Allen B
Publication date: 1920
Publisher: Chicago : S. J. Clarke publ. co.
Number of Pages: 930

USA > Connecticut > Windham County > A modern history of Windham county, Connecticut : a Windham county treasure book, Volume I > Part 101

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Willimantic Dispatch :

"Huge snowdrifts and ice-covered rails were responsible yesterday for the annuling of all traffic on the Southern division of the Central Vermont Rail- road. Two northbound trains from New London had to be switched back to

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HISTORY OF WINDHAM COUNTY

that city as it was impossible to buck the drifts successfully. The only snow plow on the southern division was called from Palmer to open the road between here and Lebanon and on the trip the plow left the iron at the state line and considerable time had to be taken to place it again on the rails.

7,000 SHOVELERS ON "N. H."

"Unceasing activity on the part of the New Haven railroad with its 7,000 shovelers throughout Wednesday night kept the main lines almost clear of the wind-driven snow, which played such havoc with the branch lines. Service between New Haven and Springfield was kept close to schedule. One tieup occurred Wednesday night at Buckland when the 5:26 from this city was stopped for four hours by drifts over five feet deep. Since this train has been freed there have been no further stoppage of passenger trains on the main lines. This same train last night was over an hour and a half late reaching Hartford.

"Branch lines from the city were in far worse condition. The line between this city and Springfield, on the east side of the river, is completely out of commission."

Stafford Springs troubles :

"Supt. Henry A. Nettleton of the local lines of the Connecticut company has granted the unusual request of the people of Stafford Springs that the interurban trolley cars do not run on Main Street in that town until the pres- ent conditions improve. Stafford people have been hit hard by the snow and ice storms. The interurban tracks, which run through Main Street to the end of the car line, are cleared of snow, and in clearing the tracks the snow has been piled high on either side of the tracks. This has thrown the snow banks into the traveled portions of the street, as the trolley tracks run through the middle of the streets. It has been practically impossible for sleighs and auto trucks to travel on Main Street in that town unless the trolley tracks are used. Another thing which has bothered officials in that place is the shortage of soft coal and many of the factories have resorted to the burning of wood to help out in the emergency. There is a plentiful supply of wood, but the carrying of same through the Main Street to the factories has been a hard task.

"Street Commissioner J. M. Leach of Stafford has appealed to Superintend- ent Nettleton to help the town out in the situation. He requested that no interurban cars be run on Main Street, leaving the street open to vehicular traffic only. Commissioner Leach said the situation was getting serious in that town, as some of the factories would be forced to close down unless wood was supplied to keep them going. Superintendent Nettleton has ordered that no interurban cars run farther than the intersection of Church and Main streets for the present.

"In the meantime the officials of Stafford will see to it that the banks of snow are levelled on Main Street to make vehicular traffic easier and allow the farmers to bring in loads of wood for the factories.

BUILDING WRECKED AT MANCHESTER

"The heavy snow and ice on the roof of a building owned by the Man- chester Lumber Company, which stood in the rear of the C. W. King Lumber Company at the north end, collapsed yesterday because of the great weight on the roof. The high winds put the finishing touches to the wrecking process."

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Around Hartford :

"More than three hundred commuters, the great majority of them young women employed by Hartford insurance companies, climbed down a railroad bank in South Wethersfield this morning and then walked more than two miles to the Wethersfield trolley line. And it was a disagreeable day for any who, because of irregular car service, elected to walk. A wind, blowing thirty-four miles an hour at times, made the chasing of one's hat a part of many a man's experiences today, and it was a cold wind-the temperature being 3º below at 7:30 when thousands were on their way to work, and it was a frigid atmosphere that assailed all who ventured forth at any time during the day.

"No Central New England trains were running today, and the milk train due Thursday night from Millerton, N. Y., was tied up on Norfolk Mountain. The New Haven road announced that it would send a plow and a crew of shovelers to its relief this afternoon. The Bryant & Chapman Company had only about a third of its normal milk supply this morning, according to W. M. Bryant, president.

" 'We restricted our deliveries to families with children, to the orphan asylum,' he said. 'The Hartford hospital reported that it had sufficient milk for the morning's use, and we hope to provide it with more this afternoon.'

"Two east-bound passenger trains, one loaded with milk for Hartford, were stalled all night in drifts on Norfolk summit.

"Four locomotives are reported 'dead' between Norfolk and Canaan.

"Only one C. N. E. train arrived here yesterday, the train from Hartford , reaching here at 2 o'clock in the afternoon. There were no trains from the West.

"A force of 150 men is clearing the snow from the tracks on the Tariffville- Springfield branch of the road.

"There were no trains through from Hartford during the forenoon. All passenger trains on the Central New England line were reported at noon to be west of Winsted."

At Springfield, Mass., February 27th :

"Trolley transportation conditions, even worse than yesterday, which were considered the worst of the winter, prevailed throughout Western Massachu- setts today, and so nearly desperate was the situation that a conference of division superintendents of the Springfield system was held here to sum up the conditions and to consider means of meeting them. Seven lines are closed and others are operating single tracks, while large gangs are battling with drifts, on inter-city. lines. Cars and plows stalled are quickly buried deep in hard-packed snow. Cars have been stalled between this city and Westfield since Wednesday."

The unfavorable conditions continued for several days, so closely was the ice and snow packed down on tracks and streets. A Middletown item, under date March 3d, said :

"Little attempt has been made on the part of the Middletown Chamber of Commerce and other organizations working for the betterment of the City of Middletown to secure the removal of the snow and ice on Main Street. The Connecticut Company has not yet removed the bulk of the ice and snow between the two car tracks on Main Street and traffic is still confined to one direction. Automobilists who desire to make a turn are required to drive up to an inter- section of streets before they can get to the other side of the street."

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A correspondent of the Springfield Republican wrote, under date March 20th : "It is not within my remembrance that the vernal equinox has ever treated us to a snowstorm of the character of the one on the job now. The blizzard of March 12, 1888, came the nearest to it."

The Stafford Press of March 20th told the following unusual story as to con- ditions in Willington, just over the Windham County line:

"Saturday, February 29th, was a day long to be remembered by all the mid-town people from east to west. In the moderature of Friday the heavy snow turned rapidly to slush and water, and all the first part of the night the rain poured, but in the small hours the mercury dropped twenty-nine degrees in an hour's time. Saturday morning people awakened to find themselves in the worst blizzard of the inclement winter. Presently the telephone began to ring, and it was learned that Mrs. Chauncy F. Reed, from the farm opposite the cemetery called Konjockety, where she and her husband are quite content, living by themselves, were in great trouble and in need of help. The drains beneath the barn had become closed by ice and snow, the water had poured in all night and the animals were almost covered with water. Mr. Reed had gone to try to release them and had not come back. To drive either a horse or a car was utterly impossible and to walk, nearly so. That did not prevent . immediate response. Howard Bligh, from the Hill, and William Parazek from the Glass Factory, were the first to reach the farm, where they found Mr. Reed in the icy water, where he had been kicked by one of the mules that he was trying to release. He was nearly insensible from pain and exhaustion, but they carried him to the house, several rods, through the tempest, and, although drenched themselves, got him rubbed dry and into a warm bed before they went back to the submerged horses, mules, cows, swine and a litter of pigs. Meantime Dr. Converse had been summoned by telephone and started in the little closed car, with his son-in-law, Mr. Cobb, who was just up from an attack of influenza. They had to shovel their way through the drifts forming at intervals along the nearly impassable roads. Here and there people not con- nected with the telephone line turned out to help them. Selectmen Ruby and Clark, B. G. Robbins and others had gone to the help of the animals. Mr. Tyler, Mr. Reed's son-in-law, being sick with influenza, was kept in ignorance of the dilemma of the family. The doctor, having walked the last part of the way, found his patient's leg badly bruised but no bones broken. It was afternoon before the animals were all rescued and cared for and the cows milked, and by that time it occurred to Mrs. Reed that, although she had been dispensing hot coffee, she had taken no breakfast herself. On Sunday B. G. Robbins was sick in bed, requiring the attendance of the doctor. Mr. Morse and Mr. White looked after the chores at Konjockety. Mr. Robbins is better and none of the other helpers are ill, although it is safe to say they all feel rather the worse for the unusual experience."

CHAPTER XXX WINDHAM COUNTY PICTURESQUE

OUR FORESTS, PAST AND PRESENT-THE STREAMS OF WINDHAM COUNTY-BEAUTY SPOTS OF WOODSTOCK-BEAUTY SPOTS OF ASHFORD-PLAINFIELD-BROOKLYN- CANTERBURY - CHAPLIN - EASTFORD - HAMPTON - SCOTLAND - STERLING -WINDHAM-NOTES OF INTEREST.

OUR FORESTS PAST AND PRESENT

By Oliver A. Hiscox

When we speak of Windham County today, we think of villages, cities, towns, large manufactory centers, well tilled farms, highways leading to all points, streams, bridges, and the iron horse pulling all manner of conveyances ; but the early settler or visitor found nothing of the kind; all this is the work of the white man. We regret that so little has come down to us descriptive of the conditions that existed at the earliest visit of the white man. The Indian trails, worn smooth by the tread of the moccasined feet of the red man, only needed to be enlarged, and bridges built at the fordways, to become the white man's highway.

The white man was not contented to live as the Indian had. The lodge or wigwam of the red, with its skin-covered roof and mud-covered floor, would not suffice. The spring of pure water, which was frequently responsible for the location of the red man's wigwam, was an asset which the early settler could not overlook. So the white man, after receiving his allotment of land, thought next of a home ;- and how sweet the name, whether the humble habita- tion of the pioneer or the more palatial residence of the millionaire. The springs of water, near which some of the first settlers built their first home, are known to this day as the "old Indian spring."

In some portions of our county, the early settlers found small patches of cleared land on which the Indians had raised corn, but the county was mainly a dense, trackless forest. The hill tops in some localities had been repeatedly burned over. This was the Indian method of clearing the land. With his stone axe or tomahawk he girdled or cut the bark all around the trunk of the tree, which would cause the tree to die in a very short time. Such burning each year would destroy every living thing and leave not only a corn field but green grass, where the deer and wild goose would come to feed, an easy prey of the red man from some convenient ambush.

The early settler judged the land to be good for cultivation, but the woods and forests were in his way. He must have cleared land and a lot of it. I repeat, his first thought was of a home and. he must build his home of the material at hand. The forest must furnish the raw material, and the log cabin of the pioneer appears upon the seene. The low lands furnished him with clay, and with the stones which he found, he constructed the huge stone chimney. In the absence of glass, oiled paper would and did do very well for

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HISTORY OF WINDHAM COUNTY

windows; but remember, he considered this only a temporary home, for he was only waiting until he or some enterprising neighbors could dam the near- est stream and erect a sawmill, as the log cabin was not to his liking.

But all our early settlers were confronted with the same problems; they must produce from the ground that upon which their families must live; and with strong hands and sturdy hearts they swung the heavy axe direct to the heart of the big oaks and pines. This cutting of the forest required patience and skill, for the trees must be fallen so as to cover the ground well over, the limbs cut off, and the logs piled up, and then in a few months when the dry season of August and September was at hand, all the neighbors would turn in for a "bee" and help burn. It was a slow trying process, this clear- ing of the land, but a few acres each year being attempted. Each year's burning and clearing had to be fenced and here again they found material at hand in the stones by which much of their land was literally covered, and they built the stone walls around the cleared lots each year. As the stones interfered with cultivation they had a two-fold interest in removing them, and to this day the different "lots" on many a Windham County farm show clearly each year's work of cutting and burning the forest. This accounts for the irregular shape and size of many of the fields.

For more than a hundred years, this cutting and burning of the forest for the purpose of clearing the land continued. By this time sawmills and tan- neries had been constructed in every neighborhood, but the standing lumber was still considered of no value. Everyone had forests to dispose of, and there was as yet no market for sawed lumber in Windham County. It was during this period that the farmer took his oxen and sled and with his boys went into the forest after saw logs and he got them too, great big ones, which he drew to the nearest sawmill. This, by the way, was not much like the sawmill of the present time, but was of the kind known as the "up and down"; that is, a saw about five feet long and five or six inches wide, held in a saw frame connected to a crank in the center, which was made to go "up and down' with considerable rapidity. Still another frame some twenty or more feet long and four or five feet wide, on which the log rested, was moved by power through the saw frame cutting off board after board.

The early sawmills were many of them located on small streams and could be used only two or three months in the spring, when there was plenty of . water, and were simply a side line for some settler who thus earned a few dollars at a time of the year when he could do nothing else. The tanner bought of the farmer the oak and hemlock bark which the farmer cut and peeled from the logs and thus saved from the stubbed logs which he often burned to get rid of them.

Imagine the consternation of the early mill man who could saw only one or two thousand feet per day, if, as is frequently done today, some customer should order 100,000 feet to be sawed and delivered in a day! But the settler got his logs sawed by waiting for the flood of water in the spring of the year; and after letting the lumber dry until fall, they built the Colonial homes that you see on the hills and in the valleys in all of our towns. Such homes are the product of our soil, and they stand today as splendid examples of the industry and skill of the sturdy race that has gone before.

In these magnificent old houses every timber, every board, in fact every- thing in the line of wood that entered into the construction of the home came

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HISTORY OF WINDHAM COUNTY

from the home wood; nothing but the glass for the windows, and the lime, were from outside of our county. The bricks were made in the neighborhood; even the nails and the long door hinges were made by the "village blacksmith," oftentimes from the bog iron ore that there are still beds of in several parts of our county. Every town boasted of a mason, who could burn a kiln of bricks, to built the huge brick oven with its arched roof that would not fall in, and the fireplaces that would draw your hat up the chimney.

This cutting and burning of the forests continued in some parts, if not all over our county until about 1830. When the manufacturing villages along our streams were just starting to grow, thus creating a demand for lumber, the farmer was quick to see that his forest-land had assumed a commercial value; and again he went to his wood lot with his boys and ox team after saw logs. He cut only the largest trees, leaving the smaller ones to grow. By this practice he did not destroy his forest; and every few years could cut over the same woods, always selecting the largest and best. In this way by natural providence he was practising forestry as recommended by forestry schools to- day. In fact he was "building better than he knew."

Much of the prosperity that came to the farmer during this period is ascribed to the fact that he was able to get from his wood lot every year a hundred or two dollars, oftentimes the only ready money that came to him in hand. This condition continued until the close of the Civil war or about 1870, when the perfection of the steam engine and the adaptation of the circular saw to the manufacture of lumber led to the thought that it was cheaper to take the sawmill into the woods than it was to take the woods to the mill. Often- times the water-power sawmill man bought or hired a steam mill and then buying of the farmer his wood land, placed his mill on the lot and proceeded to cut and saw everything in sight without a thought or care for needs of future generations. When the steam sawmill entered the woods, at least 40 per cent of our area was still of forest, much of which had never been cut over, and what was known to the lumberman as the old growth, being just as the first settlers found it, and now, for fifty years, in all of our towns, there has been one or more of the steam sawmills operating all the time.

Practically all of the old forest has disappeared. Many lots have been cut over the second time. This is especially true of the chestnut stands, as chest- nut trees on some soil will reproduce themselves in forty years, and thus it is that telephone poles and railroad ties are found at their best on land that was cut over forty to fifty years ago. The chestnut blight has forced the cutting of all the chestnut stands. Probably the largest stand of chestnut timber was what has been known as the Ashford woods, a tract of land lying partly in Eastford and Pomfret and comprising about ten thousand acres. This tract was broken in a few places by farms and by the Providence and Hartford turn- pike, now transformed into a state road. In the early days the old turnpike had quite a negro and Indian colony living contiguous to it among whom were the Bateses, Randals, Malburns, Jacksons, Lamberts and others. Large tracts of forest land still exist along the east side of the county extending into Rhode Island. The Woodstock and Thompson town line extends through a pine and hardwood forest of four or five thousand acres.

The northern portion of the county has a good sprinkling of pine, and some attempts at reforestration have been attempted in the old fields and pas- tures ; but the attitude of some of the towns in regard to taxation of forest land

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is not encouraging but instead confiscatory in operation, many such lots hav- ing been cut because their owners found it impossible as well as unprofitable to pay the high taxes. Much of the land now covered by forest, so called, is more like brush land than anything else.

Large quantities of wood could be cut in Windham County but much of it is too far from market to make it a paying proposition. Before the days of the railroad the early settlers made charcoal. This was the coal that the blacksmith used. Much of the forest land of this county is land that could not very well be used for general farm purposes. A number of cedar swamps occupy the low places. The northern portion of the county is characterized by high hills, some having an elevation of 1,000 feet, more or less isolated ; and by broad open valleys as the south line is approached.

PUTNAM FALLS

THE STREAMS OF WINDHAM COUNTY

By Oliver A. Hiscox

The northeastern part of Connecticut known today as Windham County, and known to the earliest white visitors as the Nipmuck country, meaning "fresh water," is traversed by two valleys running to the south its entire length. The western one is the valley of the Natchaug, meaning "land between the rivers," and was perhaps applied by the Indian more particularly to the land lying between the Willimantic River and the Natchaug of today. The eastern one is known as the Quinebaug Valley and is by far the larger. The name Quinebaug was applied to a pond in the southeast part of the town of Killingly, meaning "a long pond," and gave its name to the Quinebaug tribe

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of Indians and to the river which flowed through their country. This river has its source in Lead Mine Pond in the Town of Sturbridge, Mass. A river runs south from it about two miles to Mashapaug Lake in the Town of Union, Conn., meaning "great water." Thence our Quinebaug runs northerly into Massachusetts through the towns of Holland, Brimfield, Sturbridge and South- bridge, traveling a distance of nearly twenty miles and receiving the waters from fourteen natural ponds and lakes. At Southbridge it receives its first tributary from Windham County out of Hatchet Pond in the northwest part of Woodstock. This pond is said to have received its name from the fact that one of the early settlers was found dead in the pond with an Indian hatchet fast in his head. It receives also at Southbridge, Lebanon Brook, which drains the northwest part of Woodstock.

The Quinebaug enters Windham County at the northwestern corner of the Town of Thompson, running to the south part, where it receives its first and largest tributary in the French River, from the lake in Webster with the unpronounceable name. At Putnam it receives the water from Wabbaquasset Lake in Woodstock, meaning "Mat Makers," from the Wabbaquasset Indian tribe. The falls of the Quinebaug at Putnam are most interesting.

That portion of the Town of Pomfret known as the "Masamoquet Purchase" had for its eastern boundary the Quinebaug River at this place. The Indian meaning of Mashamoquet is "at the great fishing place," and the early settler found it.so, for he had only to resort to the falls in the spring of the year to get all the shad and alewives he wanted there. He caught shad by the horse load and drove through the neighboring towns, selling them for a few cents each. The building of the dam at Greenville just above Norwich has pre- vented the shad running up the river in the later years. A painting of the falls by Thomas Thurber may be seen at the Children's Home and is well worth going to see. From Pomfret the Mushamquet joins with Wabaquins Brook from the north ("this was named for Webaquin, a Wabbaquassett Indian"), joins the Quinebaug at Pomfret Landing. At Danielson the Quinebaug re- ceives an important tributary in Assawogga River, or "Five-Mile River," as the white man has liked to call it, the Indian name of Assawogga meaning "Place between" or "half way place" and was probably applied to the Indian settlement in that locality. The old Indian well is still pointed out in this locality, as is the old Indian quarry Mahumsquag from which the Indians made their corn pestles and other implements. The early white settler used the stone for whetstones, crude specimens of which may still be found in Wind- ham County farms. Whetstone Brook probably received its name from this quarry.

At Plainfield the Moosup River, an important addition was named for Moosup, a Narragansett Sachem.

Appaquag "the place where the flag grows," "the lodge covering place" is at the head of Little River in Hampton.

The western portion of Windham County is drained through a picturesque valley by the Natchaug. This is formed by the overflow of Mashapaug Lake, the largest lake in Eastern Connecticut (about twelve hundred acres). It is a singular fact that the water from this lake runs to the north in the Quine- baug and to the south in Bigelow and the Natehaug, sometimes nearly twenty miles apart, to come together just above Norwich to form the Thames River.

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A modern history of Windham county, Connecticut : a Windham county treasure book, Volume I, Part 101

Author: Lincoln, Allen B Publication date: 1920 Publisher: Chicago : S. J. Clarke publ. co. Number of Pages: 930

Author: Lincoln, Allen B
Publication date: 1920
Publisher: Chicago : S. J. Clarke publ. co.
Number of Pages: 930