USA > Connecticut > Hartford County > Hartford > Colonial history of Hartford, Connecticut > Part 32
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2 "Seymour Papers: Madam Richards's Land," in Boardman Collection, State Library, Nos. 138-146.
8 The term messuage (messuagium) was applied to a dwelling-house, when taken in connection with and including all adjacent outbuildings and the lands belonging thereto. The owners of several often applied the term "capital messuage" to the one he occupied. A manor-house was a capital messuage, and the terms were sometimes used interchangeably. Thomas Richards had other properties that were rented.
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the heirs.1 Madam Richards was not an agreeable person with whom to transact business. Nor did she appreciate the faithful stewardship of her tenant, Captain Thomas Seymour. He finally induced Jonathan and Isaac Sheldon of Northampton to join with him in purchasing the estate. It was conveyed to them in 1715. Ten years later, the daughters, Joanna Brooker and Mary Evitt of Boston, released to Jonathan and Isaac Sheldon their interest in "One Certain Mansion or Dwelling house," with the home- lot of one acre and several other tracts of land. The con- sideration was £1108. A statement of Captain Seymour concerning this transaction implies that the house and buildings were then out of repair. Mr. Isaac Sheldon, having acquired the whole of this homestead, made it his residence until his death in 1749. He was a man of some means and standing. He was chosen a deacon in the Second Church, where his children were baptized.2 The inventory of his estate is missing. His will mentions his house, but does not assist in identifying it. The homestead descended to his son Isaac, who died in 1786. In his inventory rooms are named that correspond reasonably well with those in Major Richards's house. Again the "space-chamber" is mentioned.3 His widow had a right in the "space ways and stairs," as also in the garden south of the house. Thus this homestead passed to the heirs of his daughter Elizabeth,
1 Mrs. Joanna Richards subsequently married Dr. John Cutler of Boston. The younger daughter, Mary, married Benjamin Evitt, and died intestate in 1743. Joanna Richards, in 1720, married William Brooker, he having executed an ante- nupital agreement to give her the control of her property. In 1759, Joanna Brooker, being then a widow, made a will in which, after sundry legacies to her kindred, she remembered the "Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts," King's Chapel in Boston, and gave the residuum of her estate to the Selectmen of Boston for the relief of poor widows and sick people. She died the same year. Her estate amounted to something over £1600. The real estate in Connecticut was bequeathed to the children or legal representatives of Edward Dodd, Gent. of Hartford.
2 Dea. Isaac Sheldon, b. Aug. 26, 1686, was the son of Isaac and Sarah (Warren) Sheldon. He is said to have married, Ist Elizabeth Pratt of Hartford, who d. in Sept. 1745, ae., 53. He married, 2nd, June 26, 1746, Theoda, eldest daughter of Jonathan and Martha (Williams) Hunt. Dea. Sheldon's children, all by his first wife, were, Elizabeth (Marsh), Sarah (Woodbridge), Isaac, Daniel, Joseph, Rebecca and Hannah.
3 The contents were: "1 Bedsted & Bed, 1 pr Pistols & Holster, 1 pr Saddle Bags, 1 do Portmanteau, 1 Gun, 1 New Saddle, 1 Womans Saddle."
1
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THE COLONIAL HISTORY OF HARTFORD
the wife of Joseph Woodbridge, and mother of Mr. Sheldon Woodbridge. It seems probable, therefore, when judgment is based upon the historical evidence, that the ancient house made famous by its peculiar construction, was that erected by Major James Richards, with subsequent alterations and improvements. The price paid for the property by Mr. Sheldon indicates that there was exceptional value in the buildings upon it. Major Richards was very wealthy, with a large acquaintance throughout New England, an estate in County Norfolk, England, and decided aristocratic in- clinations. He made several voyages to the mother country and was often in Boston with his family. It would have been natural for him to erect a manor-house. Upon a close acquaintance with Deacon Sheldon, he does not seem to have been a man for such a venture. He valued lands above houses, and acquired, by frugality and enterprise, large tracts of the former. Such a man would hardly have torn down one of the most pretentious mansions of its day, to erect in the same place a counterpart of it. He doubtless found it in need of repairs, which he and his son made with- out unnecessary expense. In the recent destruction of this ancient house, the original frame was seen to be very old, as were the chimneys at either end. The north wall stood as originally built. Its bricks were of early date and laid in clay. On the other hand, the wall at the south end of the house had been rebuilt, the bricks being laid in lime mortar. At this time, tie-anchors were used. It is conjec- tured that this rebuilding was done about 1721, which is the date upon an old hand-made brick in the author's possession. Both walls had been carefully pointed with mortar, appar- ently several times. The stones of the cellar wall were mostly of red sandstone, from the quarry at the lower falls of the Little River, only a few rods distant. The panelling was of exceptional quality, but comparatively modern, as were the dormer windows of the third story. The door in the south wall, afterwards closed up, furnished an exit from the hall into the garden on the south side of the house, and the southern windows admitted the winter sunshine. About the house there were once buttonwood trees. On the east, at no great distance, was an orchard, planted originally
THE RICHARDS-SHELDON-WOODBRIDGE HOUSE
*
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by Governor Edward Hopkins. There was a well, also, near the house. As the town votes indicate, the barns and outbuildings were on the north, where the cattle had access to the clear water of the riveret. Restore all these features of the surroundings in the imagination; adorn the picture with shrubs, vines and flowers, from an old English garden - then you have, as nearly as may be, a historical representa- tion of an ancient mansion of Hartford, which the records encourage us to term a "manor-house" - a homestead with an ancestral interest for many of the Seymour and Sheldon families.
There are still standing within the limits of the colonial town, a number of houses that were erected about the middle of the eighteenth century. Some that were older, have been destroyed during the last thirty years, though pictures of them have been preserved in the "Taylor Collection." 1 The fact is, however, that any catalogue is quite incomplete, because we look merely for mansions. It should include those smaller buildings, or parts of them, that are hidden away behind modern structures. Some of these are of brick, and were once dwelling-houses. The old-time custom of moving houses to adapt them for further use, has also taken some out of the environment that gave them a charm. If we deal merely with the house, our field of interest is limited. In the study of ancient homesteads, the records contribute materially, both to the scope of investigation and the relia- bility of the results.
Such a story may be told of the Captain Jonah Gross homestead, included within the early boundaries of the meeting-house yard, and now in the midst of Hartford's business life. The southern bound of that yard was Clement Chaplin's house-lot, as seen in the Plan of Hartford in 1640. At an early date, the town granted, on the south side of this yard, two parcels of land. That on the west contained two roods, and was owned at our earliest record by William
1 This collection of photographs of old Hartford houses was made, in anticipa- tion of their destruction, by the late Mr. Samuel Taylor, a resident of this city nearly all his life, and it is now in the possession of the Misses Taylor, 30 Charter Oak Place, Hartford.
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Hubbard.1 East of this, was a rood owned by Thomas Hubbard, who sold to John Morris. The latter conveyed it, in 1665, to John Mitchell, with "a mefuag or Teniment Standing thereon." At that time, the grantee appears to have had land on the east, which was increased in 1667, by the town's grant of the "peice of Ground that hee hath now fenced in for his hay yard." In 1672, he received a further grant of land against his house, and he moved out to a line with his neighbor.2 John Mitchell was a barber by trade. He had the first shop that we know of in that locality.3 He also had the honor of impounding any hogs that were found in the highway or commons, "not sufficiently ringed." In 1683, he died. His inventory mentions "the New houfe" in which he had lived. He left some estate to his widow, a son and five daughters. The son, John Mitchell, occupied the homestead for a dozen years. He was the town's brander of horses and kept the record book. In 1694, he made a voyage to Barbadoes, and died there the following year. His widow Elizabeth Mitchell continued in the homestead. Her daughter Sarah, a spinster, sold this property in 1705, to John Butler, a shoemaker, being about two roods with a dwelling-house. On August 10, 1708, John Butler conveyed the same to Jonah Gross. He was the son of Simon Gross of Hingham, Mass., and was born there April 2, 1683.4 His father was a "boatman," and the son also followed the sea. This purchase of the Mitchell homestead is our earliest acquaintance with Captain Gross in Hartford. He was then master of the sloop "Diamond alias Tryal." In 1709, a libel was filed against him and the sloop was seized.5 Three years later, he was transporting provisions to Boston in his vessel. For the Colony, he carried "3 bbls porke, 86 bushels Indian Corn, 26 bushels wheat & 3 bushels of Rye." In
1 Original Distribution, pp. 180, 511; Hartford Land Records, 2: 221; 3: 187; 4: 216.
2 Original Distribution, pp. 180, 511, 374; Hartford Town Votes, I: 153, 167.
3 His inventory has the folowling items: "In the fhop one Looking glass - 0-6- 0"; "By Rafors, Combs, fiffers, a Bafon, a hair brufh & Bottle - 0-16-0." The "Houfe, barn & home lot" were valued at £35. He also kept three cows, a horse and two swine.
4 MS. Gross Genealogy, by Charles E. Gross, Esq.
5 Conn. Col. Rec., V: 149.
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the autumn of 1712, he kept his sloop in waiting for a week, to fulfill an engagement with Cornelius Peck for a voyage to South Carolina, out of which a lawsuit arose. It was probably to raise funds for some voyage that he transferred his homestead, in 1715, to Elizabeth Wadsworth, a "mantee maker," who returned it two years later. He married March 13, 1717-18, Susannah, daughter of Samuel Howard, by whom he had children Samuel, Susannah, Lucretia, Rebecca and Lorenzo. These were all baptized in the First Church, where he had owned the covenant in 1720. The town gave him liberty, in 1722, to build a vessel where the selectmen should appoint. Thereafter for twenty years, he was one of Hartford's most prominent sea captains, engaged largely in the coast trade. He had an adventurous voyage in 1741. Having mortgaged his homestead to John Austin, probably to secure the means, he sailed for some unknown port. The sequel is best told by his pastor, Rev. Daniel Wadsworth. July 14, 1742 - "This day Jonah Gross came Home, he was taken by ye Spaniards May 30, 1741 and carried to Porto Valla from there to Leguvia, from thence over Land to Crokus and kept in prison there till sometime in april Last and then released. May god give him a thankful heart for his deliverance." July 15. "This day . .. rejoyced at the return of one of my people from Captivity." 1 The debt of £250 to John Austin was paid, and the homestead released. In 1745, his sloop the Rebeckah was doubtless one of the transports engaged by the Colony for the Cape Breton expedition. It was his last voyage. Ere he sailed, he had, in his will, committed his "body to the grave either in the land or sea," but his resting place is unknown. Proba- bly he died at Cape Breton of the sickness that carried off more than one-quarter of the troops.
We attribute to Captain Gross the erection of a brick house near the west end of his lot, soon after the above marriage. This house, afterwards known as his "mansion," is still standing, as the records prove, on the corner northeast of the entrance to Bond's restaurant, in the rear of Central Row. It is about nineteen feet square and two and one-half stories high. The roof has the steep pitch then common.
1 Wadsworth's Diary, p. 87.
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THE COLONIAL HISTORY OF HARTFORD
Windows that were originally small have been enlarged. The door that entered it through a leanto kitchen on the west has long since been closed. A well was near at hand, with outbuildings and a mulberry tree. On the east the house looked out upon the garden. After the death of Cap- tain Jonah Gross, this homestead experienced various for- tunes. The widow conveyed it to her son Samuel Gross, a mariner, reserving the use of certain rooms.1 He sold forty- five feet on the east end in 1750, to his brother-in-law, Dr. Roderick Morrison.2 The land was increased by a grant from the town.3 In 1754, Captain Samuel Gross died, intestate and without issue. In his inventory, this house and land were valued at £2400, in the currency of that date.4 One-third was set off to the widow, Amy Gross. She sold it to her mother-in-law, Susannah Gross, who died in this homestead in 1762. The residue was divided among the decedent's three sisters, Susannah Morrison, Lucretia the wife of Daniel Sheldon, Rebecca the wife of Abijah Clark, and the younger brother, Lorenzo Gross. In 1765 the latter died in the homestead, unmarried. It was this divided interest in the property, which continued until 1824, that prevented the destruction of the old house.5 The brick addition on the north, and probably that next on the east, were improvements made by William Gove who acquired the Sheldon interest in 1781, and conducted a store there.
The early house of Susannah Gross Morrison is also stand- ing, though in another location. Its story is a fitting con- clusion to a chapter that might be indefinitely extended. Roderick Morrison was a brother of Normand Morrison of Hartford. Both were well-known physicians in their day. On January 16, 1744-5, Dr. Roderick Morrison married Susannah, the daughter of Captain Jonah Gross. They had five children of whom Roderick, alone, survived the perils of infancy. Having acquired, in 1750, the east end of the Gross
1 Hartford Land Records, 7: 457.
2 Ibid., 8: 302.
3 Ibid., 8: 7.
4 This inventory has the interesting and surprising item: "one fountain Pen 2s ."
5 Hartford Land Records, 10: 318; 12: 426, 510; 13: 19, 32, 68, 417, 467; 15: 344; 16: 319; 17: 458; 20: 102; 42: 448, 449, 451; 43: 145.
.
HOUSE OF CAPTAIN JONAH GROSS
HOUSE OF DR. RODERICK MORRISON, 1750
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homestead, now the corner of Central Row and Prospect Street, Dr. Morrison tore down certain buildings thereon and erected a large gambrel-roof house. Here he resided, conducting his medical practice and the sale of drugs. His remaining years were few. On January 14, 1755, his inter- ment occurred in the old burying-ground. His widow became, several years later, the third wife of Lieutenant Joseph Phelps of Hebron, who died June 16, 1764. She soon married Colonel Samuel Gilbert of the same town, a distinguished man in his day. After his death, having con- tracted the matrimonial habit, she married in 1775, as his second wife, Nathaniel Chauncey of Middletown, and herself departed in peace in 1795.
1
At the death of Dr. Morrison, his home was bequeathed to his widow and son Roderick. They sold it, July 16, 1765, to Colonel Samuel Gilbert, her husband. Sylvester Gilbert conveyed it, in 1778, to Peter Verstille, who kept a store there. From his administrator it passed, in 1784, to Captain John Chenevard. His son John Chenevard Jr., lived there, and, in 1803, received it by deed of gift. From his estate, Henry Seymour secured it in 1821, and the next year sold it to Jonathan Ramsey.1 In 1829, Henry L. Ellsworth was engaged in the improvement of Central Row property. Having acquired this house and lot from Mr. Ramsey, he petitioned the Common Council for permission to remove the old gambrel-roof house to a new location on Prospect Street, "next north of the house lot of Thomas S. Williams, Esq.," and make alterations in it.2 His request was granted, and the Roderick Morrison house, now over one hundred and sixty years old, was placed in its present location, north of the Connecticut Humane Society building.
This ancient house, when it stood on the corner of Central Row, south of the Market Place, and was owned by Colonel Samuel Gilbert, was the home of Thomas Green, the founder of The Connecticut Courant, before his removal to New Haven. The following advertisement in that journal establishes this fact: "To be sold, or let, A good convenient Dwelling-Houfe
1 Ibid., 8: 302; 11: 467; 12: 414; 13: 372; 15: 438; 16: 131; 24: 326; 38: 157; 42: 214; 48: 166; 49; 361. See also The Hartford Times, Nov. 8, 1912. 2 Common Council Records, Book C, p. 342.
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and Garden in Hartford near the Court Houfe, well fituated for any kind of Bufinefs, lately occupied by Mr. Thomas Green. For further Particulars, enquire of Samuel Gil- bert of Hebron, or the Printer hereof. N. B. The one Half of faid Houfe will be let, to any Perfon who fhall not incline to hire the whole." 1 Moreover, in 1830, George Goodwin, then seventy-four years of age, who had been connected with the Courant from his boyhood, was called upon to testify as to the property where Parsons Theatre now stands. He then stated that he had "lived when an apprentice in the House lately owned by Jona Ramsey, South of the Old Market." 2 So it was in this house that George Goodwin lived with the family of his master while he was preparing for his life work. The alterations that have been made in the building can easily be traced. It has been divided into two tenements, the rear portion has been added, and the gambrel-roof has given place to a third story. Probably, it was here also, that Thomas, the son of Thomas and Desire (Sanford) Green, was born in 1765. He was one of the founders of The Middlesex Gazette of Middletown. His baptism, on August 17, 1766, had been recorded at Christ Church in that town. In 1799, he became the partner of his father in the publication of The Connecticut Journal of New Haven. He died in 1825, aged 60 years. This house has associations, therefore, with the early days of The Connecticut Courant, and that remarkable family of printers, of which its founder was a member.
1 The Connecticut Courant, Feb. 8, 1768.
2 "Report on the Petition of Samuel Olcott" in State Street Papers, City Clerk's Office.
CHAPTER XX
INCORPORATION OF THE CITY
IN the year 1784, five cities were incorporated in Connecti- cut. The General Assembly, at its January session, granted such privileges to New Haven and New London, and, at its May session, to Hartford, Middletown, and Norwich. These are now, by many years, the oldest municipalities in New England, for Newport, incorporated that year, soon abandoned the experiment.1 New York and Albany were made cities in the seventeenth century. Philadelphia fol- lowed in 1701. Richmond, Va., was incorporated in 1782, and Charleston, S. C., the next year. These five constituted the sisterhood of American municipalities, when the number was augmented by five others, brought forth, as it were, at one birth in Connecticut. None of this latter group had over four thousand inhabitants within the territory incor- porated. All of them had conducted in their ships before the Revolutionary War, a limited trade, which had made them acquainted with commercial life. We have no evi- dence that in any of them, except New Haven, this or any other reason had suggested the expediency of incorporation. The inference is that a movement originated in that town which spread to others. This could not have been due to any popular whim; nor did it arise from any jealousy among them. It had sufficient grounds to furnish the inhabitants in all of them with substantial reasons for seeking some departure from their ancient town government, in order to meet the conditions with which they were all confronted at the close of the Revolutionary War. As early as 1771, action had been taken in New Haven toward incorporation. A committee had then been appointed to consider the matter; but it never reported. This purpose was revived
1 R. I. Col. Rec., X: 30, 217, 233, 234.
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THE COLONIAL HISTORY OF HARTFORD
in 1783. No doubt some local antagonism between "The Town-Born" and "The Interlopers" of New Haven was involved in the movement, but this has not been discovered in Hartford.1 The real issue arose out of the liberal, ambi- tious and progressive spirit of those who had long been engaged in commercial affairs. In the discouraging condi- tions that followed the Revolutionary War, this spirit was manifest in all of the five towns concerned. It demanded a corporate agency more enterprising than the town system could afford. To examine this development in the incorpora- tion of the City of Hartford, is the writer's purpose. Thus the ancient town made its escape from the ultraconserva- tive, narrow and often sordid opinions that had grown up in colonial times.
During the Revolutionary War, no hostile party of the enemy set foot within the bounds of Hartford. It furnished a large quota of soldiers for the army; and the sacrifices of its inhabitants were equal to those of any community in Connecticut. Members of its prominent families were engaged in the struggle, either in a civil or a military capacity. Prisoners of war were incarcerated in its jail. They were often seen in its streets, on parole, which an inland location was thought to render comparatively safe. There is evidence also that Hartford was a favorite resort for soldiers, some of whom were sick, or convalescing from wounds. It is well known that at certain times of inactivity, soldiers were allowed liberal absences, when better food and care were needed than the army could provide. At one time, some of Connecticut's militia were sent home to procure their daily bread. Provisions were often gathered at Hartford. Wagon- loads of supplies were continually being dispatched thence to the seat of war, or were tarrying for the night at its inns. Thus, throughout the war, the town was in the ferment of patriotism from other causes than the periodical gathering of the General Assembly, meetings of the Council of Safety and the important conferences, which were held by General Washington or his messengers at the home of Colonel Jeremiah Wadsworth. The effect of these conditions upon
1 The Republic of New Haven, by Dr. Charles H. Levermore, in Johns Hopkins Historical Studies, 1886.
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the inhabitants was marked. It helped to strengthen the influence of certain patriotic leaders in the town's councils. There was developed among those who were most active, a hopeful energy in public affairs. The value of united effort, which had not been characteristic of colonial times, had an opportunity to prove itself in the midst of difficulties. Men who had been engaged in business recognized their common cause in the solution of problems, which peace would inevitably propound. Indeed, the Revolutionary War, like many another in history, created a new type of man, more progressive than those of colonial times. To him it was given to meet the issues of American independence.
The close of the war found Connecticut greatly impover- ished. The financial burdens of the inhabitants had been heavy. The demands that had been made upon this state for provisions, are said by Governor Trumbull to have been "vastly beyond" her just proportion. Other states, not so favorably located for uninterrupted continuance of agri- culture, could not furnish the supplies that were repeatedly asked of "Brother Jonathan." Payment was usually made in a depreciating currency, which involved financial loss and caused discontent. Connecticut had also borne the cost of defending her own sea-coasts, an expense which the national government was unwilling to assume. In 1783, when the commutation or pension issue, and the proposal to grant Congress the right to lay an impost tax were under discussion, the people throughout the state were anxious and depressed, as they confronted the payment of an enor- mous debt, which, it was thought, would fall largely upon their agricultural interests. It was this situation that led to the creation of the progressive party of that day, and summoned the patriotic to action. They all saw that the state's brighter prospects lay in the revival of her commercial life. Money was very scarce, but, as Connecticut yankees, they knew that an export trade would bring it back. Thus merchants, whose business had been ruined by the war, reopened their warehouses, and sea captains began to make ready their vessels, which had bleached in the sun for years. This movement originated in New Haven, and Roger Sherman, who had been chairman of the committee in 1771
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