USA > Connecticut > Litchfield County > Winchester > Annals and family records of Winchester, Conn.: with exercises of the centennial celebration, on the 16th and 17th days of August, 1871 > Part 2
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Though not acceeded to, and probably not expected to be, the propo- sition became a basis of negotiation.
At the October Session, in 1724, the Assembly appointed a committee to examine the claims of the towns, to receive propositions, and to report. " The Committee," in the words of Dr. Trumbull, "found it an affair of great labor and difficulty to examine the claims, and obtain such conces- sions and propositions as they judged reasonable, or as the Assembly would accept. After laboring in the business nearly two years they made their report. The Legislature, wishing to preserve the peace of the colony, and to settle the lands as expeditionsly as might be, on the report of their committee resolved, (May Session, 1726), " that the lands in controversy should be divided between the colony and the towns - that the colony should have the western, and Hartford and Windsor the eastern division."
The line of division coincided with the dividing line between Cole- brook, Winchester, and Torrington, on the east, and Goshen and Norfolk on the west.
The township of Litchfield was conceded to the two towns, and their grants to New Milford and to Benjamin Fairweather were confirmed. The survey of the new township north of Litchfield was abandoned, and the area absorbed in other townships afterward laid out.
The territory conceded to Hartford and Windsor embraces the towns of Colebrook, Hartland, Winchester, Barkhamsted, Torrington, New Hartford, and Harwinton, making an area of 291,806 acres, to which is to be added the township of Litchfield, with an area of not less than 35,000 acres.
The territory reserved to the colony embraced the towns of Canaan, Norfolk, Cornwall, Goshen, Warren, and about two-thirds of Kent, making not far from 120,000 acres.
To the excess of area conceded to the two towns is to be added the advantage of location in considering the concession made to them by the Assembly, in order to quiet their tumultnous spirit, and secure a speedy settlement of the only remaining unoccupied territory of the Colony. Yet, the concession of this splendid domain was so unsatisfactory to the two towns that the ratification of the compact was not perfected until August 30, 1729, when a patent of one moiety of the 145,303 acres was duly issued to Hartford, and of the other moiety to Windsor.
The lands being surveyed and divided into townships, Hartford and Windsor proceeded to a dissolution of partnership by deeds of partition dated February 11, 1732, by which the inhabitants of Hartford became the sole owners of Hartland, Winchester, New Hartford, and the eastern
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14
ANNALS OF WINCHESTER.
half of Harwinton, and the inhabitants of Windsor of Colebrook, Bark- hamsted, Torrington, and the western half of Harwinton. A law of the Assembly was enacted, providing for a subdivision by each of the towns among its taxable inhabitants, of their individual rights, by assigning to each his whole interest in one or other of the townships. The law also provided that the land-owners of each township should have a corporate existence as "proprietors " of the respective towns, with powers to survey and allot to each individual his pro rata share, according to the lists of 1720, of the land in the township to which he was assigned.
Under this enactment the seven proprietary townships were so orgall- ized as to constitute each tax-payer of Hartford and Windsor on their lists of 1720, or their heirs or assigns, a proprietor of an undivided share, in proportion to his list in some one of the townships ; and the quantity of land to which each was entitled on subdivision was at the rate of more than three acres to the pound of his list.
CHAPTER II.
" PROPRIETORS OF WINCHESTER."
IN the preceding chapter we have briefly detailed the events which resulted in settling the title of the western lands and vesting the township of Winchester in a proprietary body. It would seem as if, on this con- summation, after a controversy of more than forty years, our proprietors would at onee have organized and opened their lands for sale or settle- ment ; but it appears they were in no haste to do so. In 1744, May 14, eight years after Hartford and Windsor had made a division of their ill- gotten territory, the proprietors of Winchester were called together, and were organized by choosing William Pitkin as moderator, and Thomas Seymour as clerk and register of deeds.
The names of individual proprietors, and the amounts set to them, was made out in these words :
Here follows a list of the names of the original proprietors of the township of Winchester, in the county of Hartford, with the severall sums annexed to their names by which the respective rights and shares of sd. proprietors of the township of Winchester afores'd are to be apportioned and holden or divided to and amongst them, their heirs and assigns, according as the same is sett and apportioned in the deed of partition made of that part of those lands called the Western Lands, which was sett out to and among the inhabitants of Hartford, viz .:
£. s. d.
E. s. d.
Wm. Pitkin, Esq., Heirs, .... 251 : 0:0 Joseph Keeney, 44: 0:0
Mr. Richard Lord's Heirs, .... 161: 0:0
John Porter,. 33: 0:0
Rev. Mr. Thos. Buckingham,. 100: 0:0
William Cole,.
52: 0:0
Wm. Whiting, Jun.,. 21: 0:0
Capt. Thos. Seymour,. 206: 0:0
Peter Pratt, 41: 0:0
Joseph Wells' Heirs, 20 :10 :0
Nath'l Jones, 39 : 10:0 Sam'l Church's Heirs,. 31: 0:0
Dan'l Smith, 23: 0:0
Stephen Andruss, .. 35: 0:0
Sam'l Burnham, 24: 0:0
Henry & John Arnold, 93: 0:0
Thos. Hopkins,. 97 : 0:0
Wilterton Merrill,
134: 0:0
Jacob Merrill's Heirs,. 64: 0:0
Thos. Burr,.
91: 0:0
Aaron Cook's Heirs, 171: 0:0
Col. Wm. Whiting,
35: 0:0
John Pratt, Jun., 55:10:0
Capt. Jos. Wadsworth, 44:10:0
John Ensign,. 38: 10:0 Mr. John Whiting, 125: 0:0
Win. Roberts, Jun., Heirs, ... 29: 0:0
John Pellett, .. 21: 0:0
Joseph Easton,. 40: 10:0
Wm. Williams, 105 : 10 : 0
Tim. Phelps' Heirs, 71 : 0:0 John Cole, 40: 0:0
16
ANNALS OF WINCHESTER.
£. s. d.
£. s. d.
Thos. Wells,
79:10:0
Thos. Whaples, 26:10:0
Joua. Barrett,
49: 0:0
Ephraim Tucker,
32: 0:0
Thos. Pellett,. 46: 0:0
John Hazletine,.
21: 0:0
Jos. Keeney, Jun. 49: 0:0
Richard Seymour,.
61:10:0
Isaac Kellogg,
48: 0:0
William Day,
23: 0:0
Richard Olmsted,
73: 0:0
Jolın Goodwin,
52 : 10:0
John Shepard, 64:10:0
Jolın Williams' Heirs, 46: 0:0
Jona. Oleott,. 41: 0:0
William Pratt,. 31: 0:0
Ensign Nath'l Goodwin,. 124:10:0
Jacob Webster's Ileirs,. 38: 0:0
James Ensign, 121: 10:0
Mr. John Haynes' Heirs, 121: 0:0
Edw'd Dodd's Heirs,
22: 0:0
John Benjamin, Jun., 18: 0:0
Thos. Judd's Heirs,
61:10:0
Thos. Burnham's Heirs, 51: 0:0
Eben'r Webster,. 38:10:0
Jona. Bull,.
44: 10:0
Thos. Day's Heirs,
38: 0:0
Jona. Ashley,.
52: 0:0
Jas. Bidwell's Heirs,.
18 : 0:0 John Pantry,
109: 0:0
John Skinner, 138: 0:0
Caleb B. & Thos. Bunce's H'rs, 115: 0: 0 Joseph Cook,. 77: 0:0
Josep Root,. 1: 0:0
David Forbes, 75: 0:0
Jos. Sedgwick, 28: 0:0
James Williams, Jun.,. 43: 0:0
Jona. Burnham,. 21: 0:0
John Burnham, Jr.,. 30: 0:0
Richard Goodman,
77: 0:0
Sam'l Burr,
45: 10 : 0
Caleb Watson,.
21: 0:0
Jos. Farnsworth,.
25: 0:0
Lem'l Deming's Heirs,.
15: 0:0
John Butler,.
29: 0:0
Obadiah Spencer,. 161: 0:0
John Easton's Heirs,
90: 0:0
Thos. Dickinson's Heirs,. 51: 0:0
Charles Kelsey,
38: 0:0
Aaron Cook's Heirs,, 51:10:0
Samuel Spencer,
60:10 : 0
John Kellogg's Heirs,. 54: 0:0
29: 0:0
John Abby,
27: 0:0
James Porter,.
27: 0:0
Phebee Russell,.
8: 0:0
Richard Gilman,.
58: 0:0
Ozias Goodwiu,. 78:0:0
Caleb Benton,
41:10:0
Ichabod Wadsworth, 62 : 10:0
John Camp's Heirs,
2: 0:0
Tim. Porter,.
52: 0:0
Rev. Mr. Benj. Coltou,
00: 0:0
John Kilborn, 51: 0:0
Thos. Burr, Jun.,.
51:10:0
Joseph Gilbert,
53: 0:0
Jonathan Tayler, 27:10:0
Sam'l Hubbard,.
25: 0:0
Thos. Day, Jr., Heirs, ..
18: 0:0
Thos. Hosmer,
193: 0:0
Richard Burnham, Jr., .. 56: 0:0
After an interval of more than six years, another meeting was called and held at Hartford, October 8, 1750, which appointed a committee "to proceed to and view the lands, and make report to the next meeting; and to warn the Indians not to set fire on any of the lands, upon peril of suf- fering the penalties of the law in case they so do." .
The next meeting, held in January, 1751, voted, "That whenever twenty proprietors should signify their wish to proceed to the settlement of the township, the clerk should call another meeting." The next meet- ing, held in October, 1753, appointed a committee to form a plan for dividing and settling the township, but without result. More than two
Thos. Meekin's Heirs, 24: 0:0
Joseph Butler, 66: 10: 0
Thos. Burnham, Jr., Heirs, ..
James Poisson, 18: 0:0
17
"PROPRIETORS OF WINCHESTER."
years later, January 22, 1756, another committee was raised, to view the lands, survey and renew the bounds and corners thereof, and to report to the next meeting a plan of laying out and settling the same. The plan reported and adopted at the next meeting, November, 1757, was to lay out two acres on the pound to each of the proprietors, in two divisions ; and that Col. Samuel Talcott, Capt. Thomas Seymour, William Pitkin, Jr., and Mr. John Robins, Jr., be a committee, before the next meeting, to adjust and make up the interests of each of the proprietors, for the more speedy settling and laying out of said two divisions ; and in January, 1758, a committee was appointed "to make and draw a lott for the proprietors, for their precedence and succession in laying out the two divi- sions in manner and form following, viz .: By making so many uniform papers as there are to be allotments, and on each of said papers write the name of the proprietor to have his share or allotment governed or laid out by said draft, and in a just and proper manner cause said papers to be drafted out of some covered instrument, as Providence shall direct the lotts, No. one, two, three, &c., in order as they come out, and make a return thereof to the proprietors under their hands ;" and any proprietor owning by purchase or otherwise, to have all his rights added together in one allotment.
The committee was instructed to divide the township into six tiers, running northerly and southerly, parallel with the eastern line of the township: the first five to be one mile and six rods wide (including a reservation for a six-rod highway, northerly and southerly, where it will best accommodate), and the sixth, or westernmost tier, so broad as to take up the rest of the land. They were then to begin at the southwest corner of the township, and lay out the lot first drawn by lines at right angles to the tier lines, and so proceed northward, in course, as the lots were drawn (each lot containing one acre to the pound of the proprietor's interest) not less than three and a-half miles, unless the next lot will extend more than three and three-quarters miles northward ; and then begin at the south end of the next tier east, and then to proceed northward, as in the first tier ; and then to proceed with the third tier east in the same manner.
In laying out the second division, the committee were to begin at the northeast corner of the township, and lay out the first lot to the same proprietor who had the first allotment in the first division; and then to proceed southerly, laying out lots to the proprietors of the corresponding lots in the first division, in successive tiers, of the same extent southward as those in the first division were to extend northward.
In the first division the committee were instructed to locate the rights of Caleb Beach, Landlord Mott and his son Mott, and of Ebenezer and Joseph Preston, so as to take into their allotments the lands and buildings then occupied and improved by them. They were also to reserve, in the 3
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18
ANNALS OF WINCHESTER.
second division, two mill lots of six acres each - one on the Still river, embracing the Gilbert Clock Company's works, and the other " The Old Forge Privilege," on the lake outlet, now owned by the Winsted Manu- facturing Company.
On the fourth Monday of May, 1758, the committee reported their action, and exhibited a plan of their survey and allotments of the two divisions to a meeting of the proprietors, which was accepted and ordered to be recorded.
The third and final division of lands in the township was ordered in November, 1763, and the committee reported their laying out of the same December 1st following; which report was accepted and ordered to be recorded. The undivided land in the northwest, or Danbury quarter, was laid out in three half-mile tiers, and one tier of one hundred rods, running northerly, from the first division lands to Colebrook line, parallel with the west line of the town and reaching easterly to the third or west- ernmost tier of the second division, and allotments of one acre to the pound were made on a new drawing of lots, beginning at the southerly end of the westernmost tier and proceeding northerly to Colebrook line ; then beginning at the north end of the second tier and proceeding to the south end, then proceeding northerly on the third tier, and returning southerly on the one hundred-rod tier to its southerly end. The remain- ing allotments were made on the west, south, and east shores of Long Lake, so as to appropriate all the undivided lands of the township, except a section about a mile square at the southeast corner of the township, afterwards taken on execution by parties who had made the "Old North Road," by order of the General Assembly, - and known as the " Henshaw Tract."
Reservations of six-rod highways were made, running northerly and southerly, "where they would best accommodate," in all the tiers ; and located reservations, four rods wide, were made easterly and westerly, at irregular intervals, across the tiers ; but the reservations in the aggregate fell far short of the requirements of the town.
So far as the general plan and mechanical execution of this survey is concerned, it seems excellent. The tier lines - except a blunder in their bearings in the first division - were accurately laid out and well defined. The lines of marked trees between the lots and on the tier lines, are still readily found and traced, wherever the primitive forest remains. The center bounds, with stones containing the initials of the original owners, are generally still to be found in sections outside of the villages. But the system of triple division of owners' rights operated very unfairly on the small proprietors, and this injustice was aggravated by the width of the tiers on which the rights were laid. This operation may be illustrated by examples.
19
"PROPRIETORS OF WINCHESTER."
Joseph Root had a proprietary right of one pound on the list of 1720 It entitled him to three acres of land. One of these was set to him unless he had sold his right to some larger proprietor, in a strip of land in the first division, one mile long and half a rod wide ; another acre in the second division, of the same dimensions, and the third acre in a strip half a mile long and one rod wide. John Camp's heirs had a two-pound interest, which in like manner was allotted to them in two detached strips of one rod wide and a mile long, and a third of two rods wide and half a mile long. In this way all the small proprietors found their allotments made in three detached driblets, instead of in one saleable plot ; and only eighteen out of one hundred and six proprietors had allotments in parcels of one hundred acres or more.
The reservations for northerly and southerly highways could be located within each tier, where the road would best accommodate, but the located reservations for easterly and westerly highways could not be used unless the nature of the ground was adapted to a traveled road. As a conse- quence of this, so hilly and precipitous is the territory of the town that scarcely one of these reservations has been opened for public travel, and not one in its whole extent. The result is that probably no town in the State has afforded as little encouragement to its settlers in the matter of highways.
In another respect there was a meanness in the allotment of the land which it is to be hoped is unparalleled. It had been the uniform custom of township proprietors to make a liberal reservation of lands to aid the settlers in the support of the gospel and of common schools. Our step- fathers gave not a rood of land for support of schools, at home or abroad, and as to religious endowments, they allotted three hundred acres each to two of their own resident clergymen, who, not being subject to taxation could not regularly come in for their shares of the ill-gotten spoil.
CHAPTER III.
PHYSICAL CONFORMATION.
THE physical conformation of the township was so forbidding as to offer few inducements to settlers, especially to the dwellers on the rich mead- ows and uplands of the Connecticut Valley. At all events, not one of the original proprietors ever came to occupy his new domain. The intervale lands of the township along the streams were narrow and lean, hemmed in by abrupt hills, mainly abounding with rocks of all sizes, projecting above the soil. Mountain ridges, with precipitons cliffs, ran through the town in northerly and southerly directions. The forests made up the deficient size of their trees by their number and variety. The lordly pine was rare. The hemlock predominated in the eastern section, and the sugar-maple and beech in the western. The chestnut, though in few parts of the town so frequent as others, was the patriarchial tree. majestic in size, and venerable in age. Many of them are still to be found from four to five feet in diameter at the butt, while the stumps of others show a still larger size. The birch, ash, bass, white wood and black oak everywhere abounded. The hickory and white oak were rare. The elm grew to some extent on the intervale lands. Beneath the hem- lock forests, thick and almost impenetrable growths of lanrel, or calmia, were often found covering many acres. The shores of ponds and marshes were lined with thorny vines, as impenetrable as the chaparral of more southern latitudes.
The mountain ridges are low continuations of the Green Mountain ranges, generally precipitous on the eastern side, and sloping westward. The first of these forms nearly a continuous range through the town, parallel with its eastern boundary, and a mile distant therefrom, with only one opening of less than a half mile, where east and west roads are practicable. A second range, more irregular in its direction and less continuous, borders.the west side of the two lakes, and extends north- ward to Colebrook. Spurs of this range occupy a considerable portion of the northwest or "Danbury Quarter " of the town. Picturesque views, some of them of great beauty, are obtained from every mountain summit. The highest elevation in the town, west of Long Lake, in the old Winchester parislı, commands a view of the Talcott and Bolton
21
PHYSICAL CONFORMATION.
Mountains in the east, and the mountains of Berkshire in Massachusetts, and the Taconic range in New York.
The geological formation is wholly primitive, and mainly of Gneiss rock in contorted strata, generally dipping westward, at a considerable angle. Pure granite occurs in veins and boulders in the western portion of the town. Veins and boulders of fine-grained gneiss, colored by an intermixture of epidote, and well adapted to building purposes, are found in the eastern section. Ill-defined veins of limestone are found on the extreme eastern border, but not in quantity or quality to make them available. Metallic veins are unfrequent.
A vein. of specular magnetic oxide of iron, near the top of Street Hill in the northeast part of the town, was partially worked late in the last century, and abandoned.
The ore was bloomed at a forge in Colebrook, and found to produce a good quantity of bar iron. Other veins, or heds, of larger size, in the same vicinity, are so impregnated with sulphur as to be worthless. These veins were traced by Doctor Percival, in a southwestern direction, to the highlands in Putnam County, N. Y., where they have been exten- sively worked for smelting in the blast furnaces at Cold Spring on the Hudson.
Recently a very rich specular ore has been found in the Danbury section of the town, bordering on the Connecticut Western Railroad. The location has been explored by Professor Hall, of Albany, who describes it as an imperfect vein or bed in the contorted Gneiss Rock, which promises to grow wider as the shaft is carried downward. It is between three and four feet thick at the surface, descending into the hill nearly perpendicularly, and trending easterly and westerly. The ore is free from admixture of sulphur or other deleterious substances, and a large portion of it will yield from eighty to ninety per cent. of metal. It is held by joint-stock owners, whose explorations have, as yet, been very imperfect. Its location at a high point of hill, sloping rapidly down to Mad River and the Connecticut Western Railroad, gives it a high prospective value. Indications of this, or other veins of similar quality of ore, are frequent in the adjacent region.
Minerals are rare in this formation. Garnets and schorl are occasion- ally found. Quartz crystals, of considerable size, but imperfect forma- tion, are found in a decomposed vein, near the Dugway School House and elsewhere. Rose quartz, in beautiful specimens, but not in situ, have been found in the borough of Winsted. Large and beautiful specimens of flesh-colored feldspar, with crystalline faces well defined, have been thrown out from the rock cuttings of the Connecticut Western Railroad .*
* For description of the geology of this region, see " Percival's Survey," page 119, and onward.
22
ANNALS OF WINCHESTER.
The soil of the township is mainly a reddish, gravelly loam, adapted to grasses, corn, oats, and potatoes, but not to other cereals. Clay lands are found occasionally on the higher ridges. The alluvial along the water courses is generally sandy loam of little fertility. Nearly all of the lands are devoted to dairy and stock-raising purposes. The smoother dry lands, where not choked with stones, are occasionally broken up and subjected to a rotation of potato, corn, and oat erops, perhaps more to improve their grass-growing capacity than for direct profit. Milk for the New York market is the staple product, save in the vicinity of the villages, where market products are in demand.
Springs of the purest water everywhere abound, and rarely is a dwell- ing to be found, out of the borough limits, which has not its aqueduct.
Long Lake extends from near the Torrington line northerly, a distance of three and a half miles, and forms the dividing line of the two parishes for that distance. It is surrounded by mountainous ridges on the eastern and western shores, and at the northeasterly end pours its waters over eleven factory wheels, down a ravine, into Mad River, distant half a mile from its outlet, and one hundred and fifty feet below its surface, in the center of West Winsted village. It is alike the pride and the source of the prosperity of the town.
In June, 1771, the proprietors of Winchester granted to Richard Smith, the proprietor of the "Old Forge," at Robertsville, a right "to draw off or lower the Long Pond in Winchester one and a half feet, for the benefit of his iron works, during the pleasure of proprietors." During the same year, David Austin became the owner of the land at the ontlet of the lake, and soon after built a grist-mill and saw-mill on the premises now owned by the Henry Spring Company, and with the con- currence of Mr. Smith lowered the channel of the outlet, and erected a dam and bulkhead, so as to raise the surface of the lake some four feet, and to draw the water through a gate at the bottom of the channel, thus securing a reservoir six feet in depth over the whole lake surface, and controlling the drawing and closing of the bulkhead gate at his own pleasure. The uncontested exercise of this right for a long series of years secured to him a good title to control the water of the lake. This individual control, and a prudent drawing of the water during working days, and working hours only, almost threefolds the working power of the stream running night and day through the week. The seasons when a regular supply of water, during the whole year, has failed, have been very rare indeed. It is this certainty of a regular supply, alike in flood time and drought, which has attracted manufacturing enterprises, and sustained them in successful operation.
In 1806, or 1807, the frail wooden dam which raised the water above its original level, gave way on the east side of the bulkhead, during a
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23
PHYSICAL CONFORMATION.
spring freshet. The danger of an outflow, most disastrous to the works on the stream, and the village at the foot of the hill, was imminent, but the disaster had been apprehended, and a good working force of men and teams was on the ground when the break occurred. Hardly had the rush of water through the breach begun, when a tree trunk was floated to the breach, and securely fastened at each end. Spars and plank from the neighboring mill were at hand, and a temporary dam was forthwith improvised by the use of swingling tow, straw, and gravel. During the following summer and fall, a solid causeway, between two substantial stone walls, and wide enough for a roadway, was laid down and raised to a safe height, some three rods outside of the original dam, and a new bulk- head of a permanent character was erected on the line of the causeway. This raised the high-water line about one foot higher than before.
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