USA > Connecticut > Hartford County > Burlington > Burlington, Connecticut : historical address > Part 2
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The Reverend Jonathan Miller is described by one who - knew him personally as a powerful and persuasive preacher, often called upon to go to other parishes to assist in revival services. " He was an extraordinary peacemaker, often being sent for sometimes from a distance, to assist in heal- ing difficulties." He was especially esteemed as a teacher, and taught the higher branches of education to young men, not only of his own parish but from other places. We may well ascribe to his influence and the stimulus of his teaching the beginning of that quite remarkable line of ministers and educators that has gone from Burlington from its earlier days down to recent times, of which I shall speak later.
Mr. Miller was himself born in Torringford, the son of Deacon Ebenezer Miller. He was twice married and had six children. I may perhaps be pardoned for mentioning that one of his daughters, Sophia, married Captain Richard Peck of Bristol, my own great uncle, and that Jonathan Miller Peck of Bristol and his family are his descendants, the only ones, so far as I know, in this vicinity.
His later years were clouded by a terrible tragedy. When between fifty and sixty years of age, his mind began to fail until at last he could not conduct divine service in an orderly or regular manner. In 1821 he was obliged to give up the active work of the ministry, but continued to live here till his death in 1831. His disease increased and he became at times a raving maniac, though at other times he
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was lucid and appreciated his dreadful situation. There was built in his house a wooden pen or cage, to which he used to voluntarily go when he felt the attack coming upon him. It is said that often the reading to him of his own sermons, and the recalling to him of his mother's name and love, would exorcise the evil spirit and restore him to calmness.
Rev. Erastus Clapp became colleague to Parson Miller in 1823, and remained here six years; Rev. Erastus Scran- ton in 1830, and remained ten years. Under Mr. Clapp occurred the great revival of 1824, in which ninety-four were added to the church. Since then the church has had over twenty pastors, only one of whom has served over five years. Mr. Scranton said in a report in 1835 :
"It must not be disguised that most of the young men of this town, after they come of age, leave us for the great western valley, or for the neighboring towns, for the purpose, and in hopes, of bettering their worldly circumstances Hence the prospect that the congregation will increase in numbers and ability to support the gospel among them is not encouraging. But ought not we to feel that we are advancing the interest of Zion in the land, if we are raising up young men and · women to go to the far west and there aid in supporting the gospel and good prin- ciples and good morals ?" 1 6
I hope to show before I close that that claim as to the work of this church for the nation has been abundantly justified.
The first little meeting-house was soon outgrown, and in 1803 the society began plans for a new building. The Gen- eral Assembly granted a lottery in aid of this pious enter- prise ;17 even with this help the work progressed slowly, and the house was not dedicated until January 25th, 1809. I hold in my hand the original manuscript of the dedicatory sermon delivered by Parson Miller on that day. The old meeting-house was removed to Bristol, and used as a cotton- mill. It afterward became the Ingraham clock-case shop, and was destroyed by fire in December, 1904.
The second church was near the first, but north of the main road, and just east of the branch to the station. Its foundations and corners can still be plainly seen upon the ground. It was forty by sixty feet in size, the length of the building being from east to west, with a detached tower ten feet square and of considerable height at the west end ; the
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pulpit was on the north side; the south and east entrances may still be plainly seen. The church was furnished with the old-fashioned square family pews, and these were seated or " dignified " as in all the churches of the time, by a com- . mittee which assigned to the head of each family a pew suited to his official rank, wealth and social consideration.
Stocks and whipping-post stood in front of the site of the old church. Mr. Seth Keeney says :1"" The last victim, about 1830, was an old man sentenced for a petty offense. It was a cold day, and he had to stand at the post two hours before receiving his ten lashes. He complained bit- terly of the delay. He was afterward an exemplary church member." We may observe that this result does not invari- ably follow the imprisonment or fine imposed for like offenses today.
This meeting-house was taken down in 1836, and rebuilt of a little smaller size on the site where it still stands; and where with its renovation just completed it seems to have taken on again the freshness and charm of youth.
The history of other churches deserves more space than we can well give to them, especially that of the Methodist church.
Itinerant preachers of the Methodist church visited the town as early as 1787, and in 1788 a " class " was formed, of which Abraham Brooks was the first member. After 1800, services were held every other Sunday, at first in the south- west schoolhouse, and afterward when the weather permitted out-of-doors, the schoolhouse being too small to accomnio- date the worshippers. "The first camp-meeting held in Burlington was held a little west of the stone house."1"
In 1809, the church rented a large dwelling-house near the school, called the Bunnell house, tore out the partitions so as to throw the entire first story together, and finished it with pulpit and seats. This accommodated the people till 1816, when still more room was needed, and the building now standing at the center and used as a town hall was built. It was placed east of the south cemetery ; but the cemetery, which never ceases to grow though the community
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of the living may, has now extended over its former site. It is said that Smith Tuttle, who used to act as a local preacher, was buried as nearly as possible under the place where the pulpit stood at the north end of this church, and that the grave of William Marks is exactly at the southern entrance ; and I may add that the length indicated by these two grave-stones agrees with the actual dimensions of the building.
In the same year Burlington was made a circuit. For . the following twenty years this was one of the strong Meth- odist churches of the state, and was the only one for a radius of some fifteen miles. People came to its services from Bristol, Plymouth, Harwinton, New Hartford, Farming- ton and other towns. To quote again from Mr. Keeney : " There were no pews, only long benches, the men sitting on the west side and the women on the east side. The boys occupied the west gallery and the girls the east one. A tithing man also occupied the boys' gallery on occasion. Many famous ministers in the denomination preached in this old church."
But the growth of the Methodist church at large wrought to the disadvantage of this local church. Churches were established in neighboring towns, and especially the church at Bristol, organized in 1834, took a large number who had been attendants at Burlington. In 1836, finding its location no longer convenient for the majority of its congregation, the church decided to move to the center and did so, rebuilding and modernizing the building. There its services were continued for many years, but with a dimin- ishing membership and congregation. A roll of members made in 1866 shows one hundred and fifty members : one in 1877 sixty-three ; and a later one, undated but apparently made in 1887, thirty. Soon after this the local organization was abandoned, some of the people going to churches in other towns, and some casting in their lot with the Congre- gationalists. In 1892 the church building was sold to the town for a town hall.2º
After the Seventh-Day Baptists had discontinued their
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services, the church was occasionally used for preaching by Baptist ministers of the regular order. Mr. Marks says that from 1825 to 1835 preaching was held at this place fortnightly, and that a Baptist church was formed in con- nection with the one at New Hartford. Since the ruin of the old building there have been, so far as I know, no servi- ces of the Baptist church in Burlington.
I do not know of any Episcopal services in Burlington before the Revolution. Chippins' Hill was, however, a stronghold of Episcopalians, who attended service in a little church in Bristol opposite the Congregational church. They were practically all Tories in the war of the Revolution. In 1777, seventeen of them were in Hartford county jail, accused of being "highly inimical to the United States and refusing to act in defense of their country"; these men petitioned the General Assembly for relief, and after they had declared that they had been misled by "one Nichols, a designing church clergyman," and were now convinced of their error, they were permitted to take the oath of allegi- ance and go at liberty.21 Three of these, George Beckwith, Abel Frisbie and Levi Frisbie, and I think a fourth, Jared Peck, were Burlington men. The Leamings, at whose house preaching was had in 1776, were afterward notorious and active Tories.
After the war " two Episcopal clergymen of the name of Blakesley preached in the south part of the town ; after them the Rev. Mr. Nichols about 1790.""? This Mr. Nichols, the "designing church clergyman" who had led so many Bristol and Burlington people into toryism, was Rev. James Nichols of Waterbury, who carried the missionary work of his church into all this section of Connecticut. In 1792, the Episcopalians of Bristol. Plymouth, Harwinton and Burling- ton united to organize the little church near the corner of the four towns which is still called East Church."" From 1809 to 1817 Rev. Roger Searle was rector of this church. In his diary, now in the diocesan archives, there are two or more entries of holding service at the house of Squire Marks in Burlington.
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About 1810 a Universalist society was formed here, and there was occasional preaching of the tenets of that church. The exemption certificate of Ezra Way shows that even in 1797 there was at least one Universalist dissenter. In 1833 or 1834 this sociey was reorganized, and for a year or two there was occasional preaching again."
I do not know that any church building was ever built in Burlington, except the three already mentioned, the Baptist, Congregational and Methodist.
Until 1818 the Congregational church was in the fullest sense an established church in Connecticut. The General Assembly regulated its proceedings, and even its standard of faith, and its meeting-houses were built, and its ministers paid, by public taxation. By the time that Burlington was settled, the strictness of this regime had been somewhat relaxed, and persons were released from the ecclesiastical taxes of the established church, if they presented certificates that they belonged and contributed to some other church. I have already read the vote of the society to exempt the Seventh Day Baptists from minister's rates upon their fur- nishing a proper certificate. But such certificates were often used to evade taxation by those who really had no church · connection at all, and the society did not mean to be hood- winked. The following vote resulted on February 14th, 17So : "Voted, that the Ratemakers shall make Rates on all Denominations Except Churchmen and Baptis Bringing a Setificet sufficiently excuted By a none Elder and that the Collector shall tak a Coppy of all such setificets and carry them to the Prudential Committee and if they approve of the sd setificets then it shall answer to the societys Treasury so much as them Persons Rates are."
Some of these certificates are very interesting, and I will read a few of them.
To the Clark of the Sociaty of west Britton in Farmington.
These Certify that "Mr. Stephen Tayler, Sam'll J Andrus Rabort Simmons and Stephen Chapman Jr Doo Profess themselves to be strict Congregational, and have inroled there name with the Clark of this sociaty and Desired there names May be in Roled in your sociaty as such.
Given Pr order of the Chh
Certifyed Pr the Thomas Bacon Elder
Simsbury May and 1786."
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This certificate recalls the fact often forgotten that at this time the standing order of Connecticut had, by the operation of the Saybrook Platform really become Presby- terian, and its churches were indifferently called Con- gregational or Presbyterian. A few, however, had consistently protested against this departure from the old usages, and there were occasionally little groups of dissenters calling themselves strict Congregationalists.
"Bristol August 16th 1797 This may certify to whom it may concern that I do not believe and cannot assemble with the Calvinism in the Temporal sense but I subscribe and assemble and believe in the Calvinism in the Spiritual sence or universalism or the Doctrines of Christ and his Apostles that is who is the Propi- tiation for our sins and not for ours only but for the sins of the whole world.
Ezra Way."
"Bristol Dec 7 1801 This may certify that I mean to go to hear the Church and wish to be excused from paying rates to Mr. Miller.
Lury Brockway."
"Feby 1802 Joel Barnes brot a kind of writing wishing to manifest that he wishes to join with any order that have Charity Universal and Benevolence for all mankind. Test Wm Richards Clark."
"Bristol Novr 24th 1800 this may Certify that I do join a denomination called Methodist who support a Preached Gospel by Free Donation.
Ezekl Bartholomew."
"Bristol, January 2d 1804 This may certify that profess myself a Quaker and would wish to have the privilege of the law for that order.
Christopher Stone."
After several pages of such expressions of varying dis- sent, there is this pathetic entry in the handwriting of the clerk: "I cant spend time to write them all out at full length I have so many of them." Evidently the orthodox unanimity of the old Puritan days was thoroughly broken up in Burlington, as in fact it was all over Connecticut at this period.
I have spoken of the Tory element, but it was a very small minority. It would require a great deal of labor to make a list of the men of West Britain society who served on the colonial side in the War of the Revolution. Before the actual conflict broke out, Deacon Stephen Hotchkiss (who lived near the tavern and meeting houses in " Shin Hollow ") was a member of the committee of relief and of correspondence, appointed at the mass meeting in Farming- ton after the passage of the Boston Port Bill. Pres. Porter
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says that Farmington furnished men enough to make a full regiment, and I have no doubt that the West Britain parish contributed its quota. Almost every able-bodied man in the community doubtless served, going to the field when a special campaign was on, and returning home when the stress of need was over, as was the general custom in this war.
The printed State Records of December, 1776, mention Captain Abraham Pettiboue, Major Simeon Strong, Privates Benjamin Belding and Abraham Gillett as having b en with the army in New York. Abraham Pettibone was afterwards Major and Colonel in the militia, and as Colonel Pettibone he undoubtedly shared with Parson Miller and Squire Hart the distinction of chief men in the community. Col. Petti- bone had several brothers and sons, and they were probably the wealthiest family in West Britain. It is said that Petti- bone land at one time extended the entire width of Burling- ton, from Harwinton to Farmington, bounded on the north by Simsbury (now Canton) and New Hartford.
Others of whose Revolutionary service as officers or musicians I find record are : captains, Titus Bunnel (printed Titus Brumel in the official " Record of Connecticut Men in the Revolution "), Joseph Bacon, Asa Yale ; lieutenant. Stephen Hotchkiss, Jr .; ensign, John Fuller ; quartermaster and sergeant, John Gillett ; surgeon's mate, William Rich- ards ; corporals, Asa Clark, Thomas Brooks; drummer, Ichabod Andrus ; fifer, Giles Humphrey. This list may not be complete. Sergeant John Gillett is said to have been present at the execution of Major Andre. Many others commonly wore military titles ; but I think that they were mostly acquired in the militia service. As two militia com- panies used to be maintained in Burlington, the north and the south company, militia captains and lieutenants became pretty common.
It is often said that the women bear a heavier burden of suffering from war than do the men; but their names are not so often handed down to be honored therefor by future generations. The monument in your cemetery, as well as
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the name of the Bristol chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution, commemorates the tragic history of Katherine Gaylord, who was born in Harwinton in 1745, married Capt. Aaron Gaylord of Bristol in 1763, went with him to the Wyoming Valley in 1776, and after he perished in the massacre there in 1778 came back on foot with her children to Bristol. About 1800 she removed to her daugh- ter's home in the west part of Burlington, and died there in 1840.25
In 1780 New Cambridge and West Britain societies had grown to be of substantially the same size ; the road from either society to Farmington was long and difficult, and the two neighboring societies felt strong enough to assume the responsibility of independent township together, if not alone. I do not know what preliminary conferences had been had, but, in December, 1780, both societies passed resolutions favoring their being incorporated as a single town. New Cambridge claimed the big brother's share of "honor, however, and stipulated that it should always be called the first society, and have the sign-post within its limits. West Britain, as a self-respecting community, naturally declined this unequal union. In 1781 New Cam- bridge voted to "make another tryal with West Briton." A series of votes were also passed about building a town house, probably to stand midway between the two villages, and form an impartial place for town meetings. But nothing more is heard about the project until the Spring of 1785, when both societies again voted to ask for town incorpor- ation, and sent their agents to the General Assembly to ask for the necessary act. This was granted, with a provision that the town meetings should always be held alternately in the two societies. On June 13th, 1785, the first meeting of the town of Bristol was held in the meeting-house in New Cambridge.
There was an evident desire to preserve exact equality between the two societies. The first selectmen were Joseph Byington, Elisha Manross and Zebulon Peck for New Cam- bridge, and Simeon Hart and Zebulon Frisbie for West
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Britain. Joseph Byington of New Cambridge was also chosen town clerk. The majority of town officers having thus gone to New Cambridge, Simeon Hart of West Britain was chosen the first representative to the General Assembly. After that the representative to the May session was almost without exception sent from West Britain, and the one to the October session from New Cambridge. For ten years Abraham Pettibone and Zebulon Peck were regularly sent in alternation except for a single session when Simeon Hart replaced Col. Pettibone.
The place of the town-house was partly supplied by the Ezekiel Bartholomew tavern, which stood on the east side of the road between the two societies, very near to the town line. Here the town officers used to meet and transact the town business, though the town and freemen's meetings were always held in the meeting houses.
But people found it not very much easier to go from New Cambridge to West Britain, or vice versa, than it had · been to go from either to Farmington. The West Britain people pointed out in their petition for a separation that to ride from here to the top of Federal Hill in Bristol through winter drifts, attend a meeting which, with the slow methods of voting then in use often lasted till night, and then return over the long and hilly road home, made of town meeting day, which was then held in December, a pretty strenuous day. The roads were not so good as they are now, and nobody went by rail or by automobile.
After only ten years of union the West Britain society voted."that said Sociaty Would Wish to be incoperated into a Distink Town from New Cambridge," and the town- meeting also voted for a separation. But the General Assembly did not grant the request, and the two communi- ties had to endure their union fifteen years longer. At length in 1806, the demand presented by a strong commit- tee from both societies was granted, and a bill passed incor- porating the two towns of Bristol and Burlington. I have never known of any reason for the selection of either name.
In accordance with this act, on June 16th, 1806, one
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hundred years ago to-day, the people of Burlington met in town-meeting in the old meeting-house. Col. Abraham Pett- ibone had been designated as the moderator by the act of in- corporation. Caleb Matthews, Jr., was chosen town clerk, Jesse Fuller, Theodore Pettibone and Eber Smith, select- men. In 1807 Simeon Hart was elected town clerk, and held that office for eleven successive years.
So this community, having passed its infancy tied to the apron-strings of old Farmington, mother of towns, and its youth under the slightly irritating guardianship of Bristol, came to its full maturity as the independent, self-governing town of Burlington.
At the census of 1810 it had a population of 1,457. thirty-nine more than Bristol, and more than it has had at any census since. There was a steady decline of population shown by every census till 1860, when the number was 1,031 ; since there has been some recovery, the figures of 1900 being 1,218.
Meriden is celebrating to-day her one-hundredth anni- versary. When your ancestors met in their first town- meeting, the people of Meriden were also holding their first meeting. And Burlington was the larger town by more than two hundred. At Meriden to-day the constant theme · will be, "What a change from the farming community of 1806 to the manufacturing city of 1906!" Here we rather note the continuance of the old conditions. Then farming was the sole general occupation, and to-day the same is substantially true. During the intervening hundred years manufacturing establishments have been started here which have been the germs of great establishments in other com- munities. Burlington has been the spring from which great streams have taken their rise. But her rugged hills, turning the currents of travel and transportation to the north. east and south, have prevented her from herself gathering the harvests of her own watering.
The old Hartford and Litchfield stages did in fact pass through Burlington ; it is in the direct line between the two terminal towns, and stages paid more attention to distance.
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and less to grades, than do canals or railways. Seventy years ago it was the great event of the day to see the four- horse stage pull up at the center and change horses, while the travelers would dismount and stretch their legs at the nearby tavern. The stages at first run from the center southeast through "Shin Hollow" toward Farmington : but they continued to run after the railway station had been established in northeast Burlington. Mrs. Warren Bunnell recalls that after her marriage in 1858 she used to take the stage to the station, and that after discharging its passen- gers there, it passed along the river road to Unionville and Farmington. J. C. Hart say's that the stages began run- ning "about 1798."26
The West Britain grand list of 1798, of which I have a copy, shows two oil-mills, those of Catlin & Co., and of Williams & Co., one at each end of the town, and five saw- mills. Zebulon Frisbie had potash works north of the old Simeon Hart house, which must have been operated be- fore 1800. Col. Pettibone and Levi and Abel Frisbie also had tanneries in the north part of the town ; and there were the us- ual complement of grist-mills and distilleries, furnishing what were then the chief necessities of existence for animals and men respectively. In the south part of the town Gideon Smith and Bliss Hart had a clover mill for cleaning the seed, afterward run by Caleb N. Matthews.
On the stream which runs nearly north and empties near the railway station was the earliest manufacturing of any considerable size. Here was a carding mill run by Holbrook & Frisbie, from Southington, and two clock shops built by a man named Frost. Both of these must have been run- ning very soon after 1800, if not earlier. Billy Gaylord a little later had a carding mill on the same stream. The Holbrook & Frisbie mill passed into the hands of Calvin Sessions, and for a number of years he not only carded the wool, but manufactured and colored the cloth. This Ses- sions plant did not employ over six or eight hands, but a hereditary genius for manufacturing seems to have been handed down from it. Two of Calvin Sessions's sons were
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