USA > Connecticut > Fairfield County > Fairfield > Black Rock, seaport of old Fairfield, Connecticut, 1644-1870; > Part 2
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Next to buy was a company of thirteen prominent citizens of Fairfield who acquired land for a wharf at the end of one of David Wheeler's new roads. Adjacent lots were soon sold for homebuilding or investment and the first real estate development in Black Rock proved successful.
Meanwhile David's cousin, Captain Ichabod Wheeler, had busied himself near the old family homelot at the head of the harbor. He had been given liberty by the town in 1761 to build a new wharf there, but after embarking on the venture, decided that it might be more profitable to sell shares. He there- fore reserved a one-sixth interest in the wharf, the timber, and the "well already Dugg"; and sold the other five-sixths to James Smedley, Samuel Bradley, Jr., Ebenezer Bartram, Jr., Robert Wilson, and Nathaniel Wilson. Captain Ichabod Wheeler was a shipbuilder and his son, the observant and note-taking William, tells us that he built at the Upper Wharf six vessels, all above ninety tons; one, sold to Thomas Allen of New London, who
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BLACK ROCK: SEAPORT OF OLD FAIRFIELD
went bankrupt, occasioned a loss of two hundred and sixty-five pounds-to the builder. With the others he was more fortunate.
The list of investors in the wharves and warehouses of Black Rock about this time includes all of the merchant-residents of Fairfield. Three wharves were built, including the upper wharf, near the old shipyard. The Middle Wharf, already mentioned, lay midway between these and the wharf projected by Captain Samuel Squire at "Money Beach." Each of these wharves had its store or warehouse, with sheds, chandlery, and tackle for load- ing and unloading. If we scan probate inventories for the pre- Revolutionary years, we shall find many entries indicating invested wealth on the high seas and alongshore-shares in sailing ships, and in cargoes held by merchants and sailors whose names are a roster of the contemporary Chamber of Commerce in Fairfield .*
Therefore these wharves became stormcenters with the oncom- ing of the Revolution. Angry groups gathered as each ship arrived with fresh and newly disquieting reports, supplemented by news brought by post riders galloping down from King's Highway.
The closing of Boston harbor directly affected the livelihood of every seaman. Stagnation at Boston wharves threatened starva- tion at the wharves of Black Rock. The old taverns rang with violent discussion. Men high in the colony councils,-Thaddeus Burr, Captain Samuel Squire, Gold Selleck Silliman,-were eagerly besought for authoritative information. Their personal interests hung largely in the balance, as landholders and wharf-
* Transfers of proprietorship are recorded so often that any list is incomplete. We note, however, in addition to those mentioned as pro- prietors of the Upper Wharf, these others who kept in close touch with sea- trade : Col. Abraham Gold and his brother, Captain Abel, Moses Jennings, Jonathan Lewis, Captain Job Bartram and his brother Barnabas, Hezekiah Sturges, Gershom Burr, Thaddeus Burr, Hezekiah Fitch, Dr. Francis Forgue, Samuel Sturges, Abel Wheeler, Samuel Squire, Jr., Samuel Pen- field, the three Sturges brothers, Captain Barlow, Captain Benjamin, and Captain Gershom,-and later Peter Perry of Mill Plain, John S. Wilson, Amos Wilson, Isaac Marquand, and William and Rufus Hoyt. There were many others .- cf. indices.
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HISTORICAL
owners; but their patriotism turned from King to Colony, and the town records indicate the result of their influence in Fairfield.
The year after Isaac Jarvis and young Joseph Squire marched from Black Rock to Lexington, the Connecticut coast was fortified and the commissioning of privateersmen in effect.
Fairfield maintained a nightly coast-patrol. In addition, a fort was erected on Grovers Hill to command the mouth of the harbor and protect the shipping as well as to guard the Penfield mills and bakehouse on Ash Creek, which were supplying bread to the new army.
In February, 1776, the garrison for the *Black Rock fort was authorized by vote of the Assembly that :
"twenty-five able-bodied men be raised by volunteer enlistment . . under the command of a lieutenant and two sergeants, be employed in erecting works of defense .... to have the same pay and wages as the army near Boston, and be allowed eightpence per day for their provision and support during said term."
In July, Lieut. John Mills, commander at the fort, was
"to receive two hundred pounds on account of billeting, premium for guns and blankets, and first month's pay and wages for his men."
On the ninth of August, it was voted that :
"The selectmen of the town of Fairfield take two of the colony's cannon now at the furnace at Salisbury for use of the fort at Fairfield- one twelve-pounder and one eighteen-pounder, if such may be had, if not, then two twelve-pounders, and also one ton of shot suitable for the cannon in said fort."
Apparently the eighteen pounder was not to be had, for we find no further mention of it.
The next appearance of the fort in the assembly records is dated two years later when an order on the colony treasurer was granted to David Squire in response to his memorial that :
"On or about 21 March 1778, he being sergeant of the company stationed at Battery Point, and in actual discharge of his duty in ram- ming a shot into one of the guns by the battery, the cartridge took fire, by means whereof he lost both his hands and was otherwise so greatly wounded and hurt as to lose one of his eyes."
* This fort should not be confused with Black Rock fort near New Haven, nor with the fortification erected on Grovers Hill in 1812.
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BLACK ROCK: SEAPORT OF OLD FAIRFIELD
When again we hear of the firing of the battery guns it is on the historic spring night in 1779 when the twelve-pounders shat- tered the stillness, rattled the village windows, and awoke the sleeping townsfolk who rushed out to learn that General Silliman had been captured at his house on Holland Heights. His captors, landing stealthily at the head of the harbor, had been guided up the turnpike, and had successfully made their way back with the captive general and his son. The party was safely across the break in the beach east of Fayerweather Island before the alarm could be sounded from the battery.
William Wheeler implies that his cousin and neighbor, Ezra Wheeler, could have told who guided the British: but since Ezra's name later appears as a member of the battery guard it is probable that if the rumor had any foundation, it is in the fact that Ezra's brothers, Josiah and Abraham Wheeler, were recog- nized Tories and later had their property confiscated on that account. We do not always love our neighbors, especially in war-time. Moreover entries in the Wheeler Journal are influ- enced by the age and the emotions of the journalist at the time of writing. The testimony of a seventeen-year-old must be read as such, and not as the judicial report of an unprejudiced adult.
However we may discount young William Wheeler's casual observations, we must credit him fully with his colorful descrip- tion of the events of that foggy July morning when the British anchored off the fort. Young William had gone with his father to drive cattle up to safer Toilsome Hill pasturage. He hurried back to find everyone watching from the summit of Grovers Hill above the fort the manoeuvres of the invading parties. The boat- loads at Kenzie's Point were well out of range, but the British soldiers rowing in to the mill-wharves at the mouth of the creek were raked by shot from the fort as the fog lifted. So hotly was the harbor defended that after burning the mills and bakehouse, as well as the Penfield homestead that stood back of them on Paul's Neck, the British came no nearer to Black Rock that day, but continued their destructive march north.
The next morning while Fairfield town was in flames, an attack was launched against the fort. Failing, the invaders sailed away, leaving the houses and shipping at the harbor secure.
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HISTORICAL
The historian will note that the Wheeler Journal fails to men- tion the greater battles and manoeuvres of the Revolution. Only local skirmishes are chronicled. This makes the Journal intensely human. We see the Revolution entirely through the eyes of a boy in a Connecticut village by the Sound. Military matters (except for the fort and the two British invasions) are subordi- nated wholly to obscure naval encounters. William Wheeler's perspective is limited to events within his own hearing or vision.
George Washington's Revolution was very different from Wil- liam Wheeler's Revolution,-and perhaps not much more impor- tant; for the struggle was not only between the armies in the text-books. The result was determined on a dozen frontiers by land and sea. The whaleboats of Caleb Brewster, the forays to Long Island, the Tory guerilla warfare, described in the Journal,- all weighed heavily in the final balance. The history of Black Rock epitomizes the tale told by a hundred other seaports,-of a rebellion successful because it was whole-souled. George Wash- ington's army was fed on bread from Fairfield mills and those of a dozen other patriotic towns, while British supplies were inter- cepted by a hundred impudent little privateers. Black Rock harbor was a detail of the heroic background of Yorktown.
After the Revolution, changes came to Black Rock, as pros- perity increased. Several families, burned out by the British invasion of Fairfield, rebuilt near the shore, and young men like Caleb Brewster, whose domestic plans had been postponed during their patriotic activities, married and settled down by the wharves.
The bustle along the harbor continued as ship after ship came into port, bringing molasses and rum from the West Indies, tea from China, and news from everywhere. Other smaller craft voyaged along the coast, putting in occasionally for supplies and trading. Boys of Black Rock, with or without family sanction, slipped frequently aboard and served a hard but joyful apprentice- ship at sea. In 1819, of less than one hundred inhabitants of the village, men, women, and children, it is recorded that twenty-eight men were gone as sailors, one-half of them captains.
Down by the shore, next to the old Middle Wharf, stood a tiny
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BLACK ROCK: SEAPORT OF OLD FAIRFIELD
house, occupied by Wolcott Chauncey, his wife, and their nine children. Three of the boys who splashed about the piers of the old wharf were to account heroically for themselves in history.
Isaac Chauncey, born in Black Rock in 1772, went to sea at thirteen, and when nineteen was given command of his first ship. He rose in rank rapidly, served in the navy as Captain during the war with Tripoli, afterward commanding the Brooklyn Navy Yard in peace time and the Great Lakes from 1812 to 1816. He was awarded a sword for gallantry in action and is one of the heroes buried in the National Cemetery at Arlington. His brothers, Captain Ichabod Wolcot Chauncey and Robert Chauncey, also served loyally in the Navy during the early years of the republic.
As it was during the Revolution our national history thereafter is curiously epitomized in the life of this little village by the sea.
Our first three wars were all directly caused by events which affected seafaring Americans and shipping interests on the Atlantic coast.
The Port Bill and the closing of Boston Harbor forced the issue in 1774.
Our second war-with Tripoli-was the outcome of such tales as that told by the six prisoners in 1795 in the Wheeler Journal.
Our third war-in 1812-resulted from British impressment of able-bodied seamen, continuous since the days of young Thomas Wheeler, and confirmed by anecdotes such as the Journal entry in 1806 that :
"At this time came 2 letters from Mr. Francis Forgue, now on board of a man-of-war in the English Channel-he had not been heard of in 15 years."
The war of 1812, however, began with no such popular heroics as those of 1774-5. Ship-owners and merchants who had endured loss until the fighting word was given at Lexington, murmured over war conditions in 1812. The intervening years of prosperity had softened their lives, while party dissension had affected their economic views. Was the new war with England patriotic or political ?
All this is reflected in the Journal of the boy, grown forty years
The Sarah Jane, built at the Black Rock shipyards (From the original oil painting, 1853, reproduced by courtesy of R. W. Bartram)
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HISTORICAL
older and wiser. There is no enthusiasm in William Wheeler's record of 1812-14,-only such sober items as :
"Four vessels, nearly 100 tons each, lie nose by nose in Brewster's Cove & four more at the wharves, useless by reason of the war .... This foolish & unnecessary War goes much against us-Gen. William Hull taken & this week news of 400 killed & 800 wounded on Lake Erie by the British & Indians" . ...
Even the glorious exploits of his erstwhile neighbor, Isaac Chauncy, Commander of the Great Lakes, escape mention: and it is about this time that the manuscript essays begin to show the pacifistic trends of thought which continued throughout the rest of William Wheeler's life.
One threatened invasion by two British frigates alarmed Black Rock, and on the 29th of August, 1814, Thomas Bartram deeded to Walter Thorp, Sullivan Moulton, Gershom Sturges, Abraham Benson, James Knap, Abraham G. Jennings and Nathaniel L. Green, one acre of land on Grovers Hill
"with liberty to pass & repass .... and said land is expressly sold for the purpose of defense against an enemy, either in fortification or other- wise & the land is ever to be held for that use in time of war."
This was on the height above the old battery site. An embank- ment was thrown up and defensive preparations undertaken, but the war ended, the site was abandoned, and the vessels locked in the harbor by the embargo were released.
The silver cloud of peace was darkly lined, however. West India produce dropped to half-price. There was a trade reaction after the war from which small shipping never entirely recovered.
Moreover, as Newfield (now Bridgeport) harbor on the east developed in rivalry with the old port of Fairfield, there was justice in Timothy Dwight's observation in 1822 that :
"Notwithstanding the excellence of the harbor and the convenience which it furnishes for commerce, Black Rock has long been neglected."
He adds :
"Business is now commencing .. with a fair promise of success."
The promise was never fulfilled. Presently ships that always had sailed from Black Rock wharves, cleared from Bridgeport.
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BLACK ROCK: SEAPORT OF OLD FAIRFIELD
Black Rock sea-captains were promoted to larger vessels that docked at New York, Boston, Providence, and Baltimore.
Sporadic industrial and business ventures mark the history of Black Rock during the rest of the century,-the old shipyard con- tinued to serve sloops and schooners: a wagon shop and a cooperage were maintained for several years. The wharves still were used.
Manufacturing developments swung Bridgeport into ever- increasing prosperity, however, and swept prosperity from Fair- field harbor. When in 1870 an act of legislature extended the Bridgeport boundary to Ash Creek, only a few protesting voices were raised in Fairfield town meeting.
Upon the old lot where once Thomas Wheeler settled, a turpen- tine factory reared its tall chimney. Near the site of the old fort on Grovers Hill, a summer hotel was built. These in their turn have passed. Grovers Hill is a "residential development," and the upper wharves are soon to be included in the plans for a new boulevard that will connect Bridgeport with Black Rock across Fayerweather Island.
Black Rock is no longer a quiet village, no longer a seaport, -- it is merely a "district," -- and with the coming of the boulevard, the sentimental historian will be honked at sharply or advised to park elsewhere. Meanwhile we have a few leisurely moments to share the historic past with William Wheeler.
HOMESTEAD or WILLIAM WHEELER . BUILT 1790
WILLIAM WHEELER
Schoolteacher, Philosopher, Diarist
Had William Wheeler been born in eighteenth-century London and exposed to the literary vicissitudes and stimuli of the period, he might have become another Goldsmith. His career, postponed a century and a half, might have been that of a Walter Winchell or a Franklin P. Adams.
Accepting him as he actually found himself, among the sur- roundings which he was to chronicle, we discover him as a delightful diarist, noting from his boyhood the events of village life, and later summing up his meditations in a series of amusing essays, and leaving a journal historically and humanistically invaluable.
He was born July 12th, 1762, the second child and elder son of Ichabod and Deborah (Burr) Wheeler. Captain Ichabod Wheeler was a builder of ships at the old Upper Wharf in Black Rock: but like most of his neighbors, experienced in the vagaries of an income wrested from the sea, he depended for the support of his family upon the farming of his inherited acres. Upon his farmlands young William toiled, early and late, and the essay upon Agriculture which he wrote in after years is no amateurish dissertation, but a practical treatise.
In 1780, William began to tutor for entrance to college, and from 1781 to 1785 he attended Yale, observant and critical. His comment upon the ultimate value of his college training is terse and strangely prophetic of modern educational heresies.
His school-teaching venture in Norfield (now Weston) was punctuated by a poignant love affair with an unknown damsel (the asterisks are his own). Thereafter he returned to Black
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WILLIAM WHEELER
Rock and in 1800 married Rhoda Parrit (or Parrott). The rest of his days were spent in his simple "saltbox" next his father's old house.
The death of his wife in 1808 left him with two small children, William, who was to survive him, and a daughter, Eliza, whose death was to leave her father heartbroken. His frequent refer- ences to "E." as his companion on countryside rambles, and entries made in her handwriting in his journals, show the close com- panionship between father and daughter and his appreciation of her literary ability. His tribute to her (June 15, 1839) is masterly in its terse sincerity. He lived until the 28th of January, 1845, continuing to enter notes in the Journal within two months of his death, although the last entry in his handwriting (October 4th) shows that his mind was weakened by age and illness. The preceding year-1843-when he was eighty-one years old he records that he "filled my barn with hay both sides ... labour'd every day myself (per favour) .. " Until the last he continued to interest himself in local and national events.
William Wheeler left as memorials eleven volumes in manu- script which narrowly escaped destruction during a ruthless New England housecleaning, but were rescued by Elizabeth H. Schenck. She quoted liberally from his writings in her "History of Fair- field," and gave the books to the Connecticut State Library at Hartford, where they are available to the persistent antiquarian who seeks original sources.
It is from these half-forgotten manuscripts that the following pages have been arranged.
The original books are catalogued inconsecutively in two series. The first series -- of five folio volumes-include :
Vol. 1. Conclusion of Journal, 1839-1845, with an insert of miscellaneous notes.
Vol. 2. Notes on Biblical texts and sermon-essays.
Vol. 3. A Journal / for / The town of Fairfield / or An Exact & impartial Account/ of the most/ Material Transactions / from the first Settle- ment thereof / till/ the/ Present Time.
(This has been quoted, almost in entirety. The date of the last entry is 1814.)
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BIOGRAPHICAL
Vol. 4. Miscellaneous Notes, including a dissertation on Old Age and Youth, surprisingly modern in style and content.
Vol. 5. Miscellaneous Information, jotted down at different times and ranging from diseases and their treatment to the repairing of ships.
The six smaller volumes of Series 2 include :
Vol. 1. Diary and Journal 1740-1835, repeating much of the detail of the larger and earlier volume and carrying the record forward. The entries in this book are annotated by Eliza Wheeler.
Vol. 2. Wm. Wheeler/ 1825 / Nov. 20/ Text Book/ Close Thinking is the foundation/ of every good Action/ .. Read and Understand.
"With all thy gettings-Get Wisdom"-Solomon.
This volume, planned as an autobiography, includes an amusing preface and ten chapters : Agriculture, Collegian, Schoolmaster, Revo- lutionary War, Friendship, Longevity, Religious Friends, Enemies, Religion, Reading Books.
From the first four chapters and the sketches "In Fairfield Burial Ground" is drawn much of the material used to supplement Journal entries in the succeeding pages of this book.
Vol. 3. A continuation of similar notes on various subjects especially the horrors of war and the benefits of peace.
Vol. 4. An alphabetical, biographical notebook which soberly includes within one page entries concerning St. Simon Stylites, Sir Philip Sidney, and "Wm. Smith (New York)-he introduced the curiosities of the City to the daughter, E. We should remember the favours sheren to our children."
Vol. 5. Wm. Wheeler Sen. / March / 1831. Miscellaneous Notes.
Vol. 6. Hints-By Wm. Wheeler-1833. Notebook. "Few can read much-None can read every author-Hence the necessity of this essence of Writing all that is written in this Book has been written before-it is somewhere-Why then look till you find it-But, good Reader, it is like a needle in a haystack, the profit will not compensate for the Search-
"But Man & Woman must act young, consequently must act igno- rantly-A few wish to know the right way-for these I write-whether well-Judge ye." Quotations and notes from a wide scope of reading.
There is something of Thoreau in William Wheeler's intense concentration upon everyday happenings, and his application of small philosophies to a large plan of existence. His sense of pro- portion is, however, more rational than that of the sage of Walden.
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WILLIAM WHEELER
Thoreau wrote of Massachusetts hills as prototypes of the Himalayas. William Wheeler saw his surroundings always as part of a village picture,-a village typical of every such village, never going far abroad for comparisons or similes. Although he travelled widely in his reading, he was content to consider him- self a settled farmer. His only chronicled voyage occurred in 1789 on one of the many ships that he watched for eighty years clearing from Black Rock harbor. The entry is in Vol. 3, Series 1 :
Dear Correspondent
Boston, July 21st, 1789.
The gales breathed fair as night spread o'er We danced a jig on the floor Good Rum's the stuff,-with plenty on't You're sure no other props to want For Custom's Law has long since been "Wash well the Pot e'er meat's put in-"
Holm's Hole lies in the Vineyard-Gayhead so named from the red, white & yellow oker on a high bank seen at a great distance. Tar- pawlin Cove lies on the opposite side of the Vineyard, found on one of the Elizabeth Islands and has a fine pasture, but very little grain or fruits except berries of which there is abundance.
Over Wm. Loring : "Loring expird in prime of life And left this humble clay And calmly steerd his single Boat To yonder world of Day-"
On Monday P.M. loosing Sails The following night passd o'er the Shoals With trembling light of Silver Moon The placid face of Ocean shone A wrinkle scarce deformd his brow As we his peaceful bosom plow And scarce the soft southwestern gales Fill the white expanding sails But tho the Cape was 12 miles off We plainly heard the thund'ring Surf In storms the waves that lash the strand Are heard near 40 miles from land
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BIOGRAPHICAL
Next morn a Grampus whale upheaves His broad black back from seagreen waves When I from Larbord side of Ship Some shot & ball at him let slip
Long Wharf, 2000 feet in length with 70 stores
The prospect from the water 2 miles long with 300 sail of shipping. The prospect from Beacon hill the most majestic of any in America Charleston bridge } mile long 40 feet broad, has 40 lamps, built in 1787, expence 15,000 pounds. Toll for every foot passenger .....
It will be noted that several of the Journal entries written in early days burst spontaneously into poetry-or at least into rhyme. There is never any affectation in these verses, nor are they set to any meticulous measure. They are part of the continuous evidence that the writer enjoyed his Journal so happily that he used it as an emotional outlet-sometimes in studied prose, some- times in expletive,-and sometimes in random conjecture.
There is little occasion to analyze William Wheeler's character, nor to subject his life to microscopic observation. He regarded himself in the light in which he doubtless wished posterity to view him-as a Connecticut farmer and schoolteacher, living a life typical of his time,-not wealthy but well content.
His notebooks were not ambitious. His humble hope was to preserve a few memoranda of the days in which he lived for the information of later generations. This he did, generously.
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