USA > Connecticut > Hartford County > Farmington > Farmington town clerks and their times (1645-1940) > Part 5
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Farmington Town Clerks and Their Times
homesteads. The mill lane ran down from the Town Path be- tween the former home of Miss Elsie Deming (the Thomas Hart Hooker house inherited from Thomas Hart) and the south line of the Porter School land, the lane being still easily discernible. Farm land was yielding well as inventories of the early estates show a great wealth in farm, meadow and pasture land with flocks and herds for all needs. The settlers were real- izing the advantage of retaining every acre of this large terri- tory. They had town meetings where it was disclosed that the ownership of some of the land was in doubt and committees were appointed to search the records and ascertain the owners.
The body of the proprietors was formed in 1672 and the first Divisions of land mapped out. The first maps drawn of the Divisions, with lots for each proprietor and intersecting high- ways were not always practical as might be expected when one realizes the difficulties of those years. Later in the eighteenth century volumes of the land records were devoted to the sale and exchange of this highway land in order to make the high- ways more passable (one of them, it was found, went over the side of a cliff into Cherry Brook below). Funds from the sale of this highway land also provided a welcome revenue for schools in the town.
There were brief journeys to Hartford, for trading and for matters to do with the Colonial Court, but for the most part they lived very much together. That they did so, with constant thought of common good, and with so little to break the mo- notony of hard work and few outside interests, is in itself an indication of their great moral stamina and genuine religious convictions. It may have been that because of this, the urge to move on to another wilderness came to them oftener than if there had been more relaxation and diversion in their life. For as early as 1680 families under Richard Seamor were mov- ing on to Great Swamp where by 1705 the Christian Lane settle- ment had grown into a colony of log houses with a fort and church. William Burnham was their first minister and was given extensive lands as an inducement to go there. The well dug for these first families in 1680 is still in use on Christian
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Ensign John Hart
Lane, and has been credited in the past with unusual healing qualities.
The Charter from King Charles second to Connecticut in 1685 was the last proof needed to confirm in legal phrasing the lands granted to Farmington in 1645.
Captain John Hart died in Farmington November II, 1714, aged 60 years. His eldest son John inherited the homestead, lived there and bequeathed it to his second son, John.
This old house, recently purchased and extensively restored by Mrs. Annie Burr Lewis, is approximately 240 years old, so it would seem extremely likely that our Ensign John Hart built it after inheriting the original house from his grandfather Deacon Stephen Hart. The first house would have been ancient and primitive by the time Ensign John married and had his family. Many architects have visited this house, famous for its divided stairway, enormous fireplaces, and particularly for its intricate doorway and ornamentation. One New York archi- tect readily found an Indian tribal motif in the design over and around this beautiful front door. Indians were everywhere about these early settlers, and might have furnished a ready inspiration for their own decorations. Thus we find that the homestead with the original house built by Deacon Stephan was given by him to his son John, who lost his life in the burning of his own home. The homestead then went to John second who probably built a new house there - the present building - and he bequeathed it to his son John known as Deacon. His son John also inherited the homestead and after locating in Cornwall sold the homestead in 1765 to Amos and Solomon Cowles. Before 1800 John and Chauncey Deming had pur- chased the homestead, the Thomas Hart Hooker place next north, and the grist mill on the Farmington River. This property remained in the Deming family for about 125 years.
TRAINING THE YOUNG GROWTH
Thomas Bull
1690-1704
A FIGURE that captures one's fancy in the years 1660-1708 is that of Deacon Thomas Bull. His father was the famous Cap- tain Thomas Bull of Hartford, equally fearless in the face of Indians on the war-path, or a would-be governor from England. For thirty years he was the strong right arm of the colonists in Hartford and at Saybrook. Much of the courage, both in war and peace, of Deacon Thomas was a direct heritage from his father.
Deacon Thomas lived in Farmington on land inherited from his father on the "ould road leading to the mill" now Colton Street, and the homestead lot is still known as the Bull lot. The site of his house may be found by diligent searching just beyond the new home of Miss Elsie Deming. His near neighbors were the Samuel Cowles family with their seven sons, who lived in the house now owned by Miss Margaret Brady. This house was built about 1697.
Deacon Thomas Bull was "chosen for Recorder of Lands as Towne Reggester" December 8, 1690. His writing is large, strong, with big round letters, just as one could visualize him. A strong, honest man.
Although we find that Deacon Thomas Bull served as town clerk and register at various times in the latter part of the seventeenth century, the record of his election is the first we find of the official election of such a town officer. He was first elected in 1690 and served, sometimes with Ensign John Hart and Mr. John Hooker, until 1704, when Hooker succeeded him.
At the town meeting which first elected Thomas Bull, other business of importance in proper management of the town was
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"Their was chosen for Constabol John Norton Junr. and for townes men Stephen Rote, John Orton and John Lee and for fence vewers William Lows (Lewis) and Stephen Hart Samuel Wadsworth Thomas Barns and for survoirs of hyways John Clark and Jacob Brumson for chimny vowors James Lowas Simon Wrotham and for hawards Matthew Woodruff and Samuel North.
At the same meeting there was chosen to the ofice or work of Towne measurer Capt. John Standly Ens. Thomas Hart.
Att the same meetinge there was chosen to be added to the Commity of Souldior Lotts with Ens. Thomas Hart Sgt John Judd Sgt Thomas Porter Samuel Gridley.
Att the same meetinge there was chosen to keep good order amonge the boys in the gallery in the meetinge house Samuel Brumson.
Att the same meeting their was chosen Capt. John Standly to be added to the Commity about the finishing the Schoolehouse. Att the same meeting ther was chosen for the pound keeper Samuel Porter sun of Thomas."
"Att a Towne meeting held att ffarmington December 22, 1690 the town by voatt granted ten pounds as a town for the in- cordigment of a Schoole for half a year.
Att the same meeting their was chosen as a Committye to hier a man to teach school half a year and to see what children shall be sent which Comitty are Capt. Standly Ens. Hart Sergt Judd Decon Bull.
Att the same meetinge ther was chosen for an ordinary keeper Samuel Newel."
Thomas Bull's life was full of adventure, happiness, work, anxiety and sorrow. True love started on its troublesome course with him and Esther Cowles March 4, 1669, when, with the announcement of their coming marriage, one Benjamin Waite petitioned the Colonial Court at Hartford before Governor Winthrop, Captain John Talcott, Leftenant John Allyn, Mr. Henry Wolcott and Mr. Anthony Hawkins, Assistants, that this marriage should not take place.
The record gives us an intimate picture: "Benjamin Waite having publiquely protested against Thomas Bull, Jun., and
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Farmington Town Clerks and Their Times
Esther Cowles, their proceedings in reference to marriage, and manifested his desires that authority would not marry, or any ways contract in order to marriage, them the said Thomas and Esther, the Court desired the said Waite that he would manifest his reasons to them and produce his proofs of any right or clayme that he hath to the said Esther Cowles, but he refused to attend to any such thing at this time; the Court did there- fore declare to the said Benjamin Waite, that they did not judge it reasonable to restrain Thomas Bull and Esther Cowles from marriage till the next term of this Court in September next and therefore, if the said Waite doth not make good his clayme and prosecute it to effect between this and the 7th day of April next (to which day this Court will adjourn) they will no longer deny them the said Thomas and Esther marriage." That the claim was not further prosecuted is shown by Thomas and Esther being married April 29, 1669. They lived on the Bull homestead on Back Lane, now Colton Street.
Their children were John who died in 1705, leaving six sons, of whom Thomas Nehemiah and John were each given ten pounds by their grandfather's will, and Samuel, Jonathan and David; and daughters Sarah who married Josiah Hart 1713-14 and Susannah Porter. The two children who were namesakes of their parents died tragically. Thomas died August 15, 1689, aged 17 years and Esther died three days later aged 15 years. Their mother, Esther, died two years later on April 17, 1691 at the age of 42 years. The same year Deacon Thomas married Mary (Cheever) Lewis, widow of Captain William Lewis who had died the previous year. Deacon Thomas Bull died in 1708. His son David inherited the homestead and passed it on to his own son.
Deacon Bull had been one of the early settlers and in the fifty or more years here had seen the dream of the first-comers fulfilled in well-built houses and barns, well-governed com- munity and the second church building and school house well established. The townspeople had expanded the original settle- ment and were settling and cultivating outlying territory. Courageously but cautiously they were continuing to enlarge their town for the coming generations.
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Thomas Bull had done his full share in this effort. He had a prosperous farm and was by profession a gun and silver-smith, also working in iron as the occasion required.
His account book gives lists of iron work done for the church doors and public stocks. He made guns and swords for local and colonial trade and the pikes which guards carried in their sentry duties.
He found time to serve his church and town as deacon, con- stable, selectman, tax collector, assessor, town clerk and school committeeman. The record he left shows that he possessed personal courage, quiet dignity, and honor among his towns- men.
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John Hooker
1704-1740
THREE OF the Rev. Thomas Hooker's children made their homes in Farmington in those first early years of the settlement of church and township. Mary Hooker, eldest child, who had cared for her mother, walking the many miles of the journey from Cambridge to Newtown through the wilderness, married Roger Newton, the young Harvard student who studied the- ology in her father's home in Hartford, and came to Farmington with him to found the first church here. Her sister Sarah was willed a farm by Governor Edward Hopkins who had been a lifelong friend of both Thomas and Susannah Hooker. Here were held some of the first church services, alternating with Roger and Mary Newton in holding the first services in their houses.
Soon after Roger and Mary Newton left Farmington for the pastorate in Milford where they lived and served the first church there until their deaths, Samuel Hooker came to Farm- ington as the second pastor of this church and lived in the home of his sister Mary Hooker Newton at the south end of the Town Path, about opposite "the lane leading to the Pequabuck Meadow." Samuel was the younger of two sons of Thomas Hooker, the other son John having remained in England. Con- sequently, all by the name of Hooker come from Samuel. He married Mary daughter of Captain Thomas Willett, prominent in the early history of Massachusetts and the first mayor of New York City. The Rev. Samuel Hooker died here November 6, 1697, at the age of sixty-four years and is buried in the Main Street Cemetery. He served Farmington as pastor for thirty-six years. He left a numerous family, numbering nine sons and two daughters. Of these sons John Hooker was des-
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John Hooker
tined to serve this town with great honor for over fifty years. He was born February 20, 1664-5, and November 24, 1687, mar- ried Abagall Standley, daughter of John Standley. The union of these two foremost families was an important social event. The new home of John Standley on High Street was open even to the parlor for the occasion, with the bridegroom's father performing the ceremony and the Judds, Roots, Lees, Steeles, Wadsworths, Porters, Hookers, Moores, Lewises all invited and dancing and dining. The great Standley homestead and barns must have been taxed to capacity with guests and their servants and horses.
A year later John Hooker bought five acres of land with a dwelling-house, orchards, barns and gardens on Main Street from John and Philip Judd. This is the site of the house now occupied by Mr. and Mrs. Ernest Hyde Cady. They believe that the present house is part of the original house. The records show no new house on this land and the architectural details are similar to other houses in Farmington built at that time. John Hooker had a brother Roger, who died April 28, 1698, aged thirty years, "being very weak in body yet sound of mind." Roger gave his house and shop in Hartford to Mary Stanley daughter of Nathaniel and Sarah (Boosey) Stanley to whom he was engaged to be married. All of his Farmington goods and chattels, consisting of merchandise ranging from bear skins and blankets to spoons and kettles he gave to his brother Nathaniel. On December 23, 1698, Nathaniel married Mary Stanley and in April of the next year they went to live in the new Hooker homestead on Main Street. Here two of his chil- dren were born. In the distribution of his estate Nathaniel received "the dwellinghouse which was his father's."
The children of John and Abagall Hooker were Roger, named for the brother who had died, and to whom his father John gave the homestead. In his will John Hooker spoke of his son Roger "with whom I now dwell who hath for some time been the staff of my age." Hezekiah, John Joseph where the other sons and the daughters were Abigail who married Nathaniel Hart, Mary who married Samuel Hart and Sarah who married Matthew Hart. The three sisters who married the three brothers later
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lived in Berlin. The fourth daughter, Ruth, married Asahel Strong as her first husband, and as her second, Solomon Whit- man.
John Hooker was elected Town Clerk of Farmington in 1704 and served without interruption until 1740. Previous to 1700 he had served eight years at various times, making a total of forty-four years, longest in point of service of any of the twenty- three town clerks in three hundred years.
The exquisite and letter-perfect handwriting of those forty- four years never varied in slant or shading. John Hooker must have been a man of great poise, perception and intelligence. He had the title of "Mr." prefixed always to his name and was held in great honor by the Rev. Samuel Whitman, who always waited church until Mr. John Hooker had arrived and been seated.
He had received a good education, no doubt being taught, with his brothers and sisters and other children in the town, by his father, Rev. Samuel Hooker. He was for many years the chief magistrate of the town, and was judge of the Superior Court of the colony from 1724 to 1732. He represented the town in the General Court, was clerk of the assembly two ses- sions, and speaker six sessions. In 1723 he was chosen assistant, and for eleven years was re-elected.
Meanwhile, with increasing ease in living conditions, but with still no outside diversions, the townspeople were beginning to be restless. The inevitable differences of opinion as to church and town government arose. Disputes as to the legality of town elections and strong factions in town politics kept properly elected officers from holding office. Their independence of pride and spirit followed them to church, where they vehemently disagreed as to matters of religious procedure and leadership, so that in May, 1702, the Colonial Court sitting in Hartford ordered: -
"The town of Farmington labouring under great difficulties in reference to the calling and settling of a minister among them and other ecclesiastical concerns, certain of the inhabitants made their addresses to this Assembly praying advice and relief; in answer whereunto this Assembly doth order and direct them
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John Hooker
to seek councill and help from the reverend elders hereafter named, viz: the Revered Mr. Abraham Pierson, Mr. James Noyes, Mr. Taylor, Mr. Noadiah Russell, Mr. Samuel Russell and Mr. Thomas Ruggles, or any five of them, whome this Assembly doth desire to be helpful to them and (unless the said inhabitants shall agree among themselves to call and settle a minister) to nominate and appoint a minister for them. And in case the minister so nominated and appointed by the said revered elders will undertake the worke, this Assembly doth hereby order that the said inhabitants of Farmington shall entertain him for one year, and also pay to him such sallerie as hath been usuall and customary among them.
"This Assembly being informed that great differences are arisen in the town of Farmington about the choice of town officers, to put an issue to such differences and that the affairs of the town may not suffer, this Assembly doth order that Mr. John Hooker, Samuel Gridley, John Wadsworth, Samuel Cowells, and Daniel Andross, shall be townsmen for this present year, and the said townsmen and all other officers that are chosen and sworn shall continue in their places for the terme aforesaid and they are confirmed so to doe."
Despite the explicit orders of the General Assembly in 1702. only occasional visiting ministers occupied the pulpit, or a layman read the Psalms. Ezekiel Lewis, son of Captain William, preached occasionally. No minister was regularly appointed and received until Samuel Whitman accepted the invitation to this church in 1706. His salary was "100 pounds with house, firewood, parsonage in Pequabuck Meadow and forty acres of land."
It was during Mr. Whitman's pastorate here that the second meeting house was built, with a bell and later a clock. Here again a discussion centered over the manner of singing the psalms, also the adoption of the half-way covenant. This latter was adopted but discontinued after Mr. Whitman's death. The vote of the singing of the psalms showed how serious this matter was:
"April 7, 1724, It was proposed whether they should continue the present way of singing or would admit of
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Farmington Town Clerks and Their Times
regular singing. May 9, 1724 voted, to take a year's time to consider whether regular singing should be tried or not.
March 1726-7. Voted, that we do declare our full satisfaction with the former way of singing psalms in this society, and do ernestly desire to continue therein."
Samuel Whitman lived in an old square house on the north- east corner of Mountain Road and Main Street, since torn down and now the site of "New House" of the Porter School. He led in civic as well as religious matters until his death in 175I, loved and honored by all.
Opposite the Skull and Bones fraternity house in New Haven stands Whitman Memorial Gate, erected in honor of Reverend Samuel Whitman, one of the first fellows of Yale.
During these years from 1702 to 1740, great strides were being made by the inhabitants in their efforts to cultivate and improve the town. Their lands were portioned out to them in the various outlying sections of the town, with promise of all manner of development, even to the possibility of ore in the hills to the south. Temporary homes in these outlying districts had proved so satisfactory and the land so fertile they had become permanent and churches and forts, schools, cemeteries and mills were rising in localities where now are Berlin, Bristol and Southington. These towns did not legally separate from the mother town until after the Revolutionary War, but farms and industries were growing.
Meanwhile, in Berlin, for the past fifty years, an energetic settlement had taken root and was showing signs of healthy growth. Sergeant Richard Beckley was there as a pioneer settler, in 1660. Jonathan Gilbert was granted three hundred fifty acres there in 1661 and kept a famous tavern, called "Half Way House." One of his daughters married Captain Andrew Belcher, a wealthy Boston merchant, who, with what he bought and what was granted him, soon had a thousand acres there. He developed this land as best he could, laying out highways, building walls and houses and inviting thereby newcomers from Farmington Village to the "Great Swamp" parish. It was on a
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John Hooker
portion of one of these highways, soon known as Christian Lane, where the first log houses, church, and log fort were built. Here was dug by hand the well to supply the settlement. The well is still flowing, and at various times has been credited with magical healing qualities.
The town of Farmington voted Richard Seymour one pound in 1686-7 for his efforts in establishing this fort at Christian Lane. Soon other Farmington families living there were those of Captain Stephen Lee, Sergeant Benjamin Judd, Joseph Smith, Robert Booth, Anthony Judd, Isaac Lewis, with branches of the Root, Cowles, Lankton, Norton, Porter, Hooker, Stanley, Hart and Gridley families taking great tracts of land to the south and west. Their great houses are still stand- ing, in Hart Quarter or Stanley Quarter or Beckley Quarter, and one can readily visualize the immense red barns which once surrounded them.
Soon the need of a local church was felt in the Great Swamp settlement, as the number of families increased and the incon- venience of traveling the long miles to Farmington seemed needless. The first application for a society in Great Swamp was refused by the Farmington church members, until at a town meeting held September 28, 1705, they were allowed the privilege of forming their own society there "provided that they shall, for their own proportion of labor in the highways, maintain the passages and highways they have occasion for as also that they shall, at no time, endeavor to surprise their neighbors, by endeavouring to obtain of the General Assembly other advantages, in which the town in general may be con- cerned, without first acquainting the town therewith, nor chal- lenge any interest in the sequestered lands for the maintenance of the ministry there."
To the Right Honorable and Worshipful General Assembly sit- ting at New Haven the IIth day of October, 1705, they petitioned for a settlement and confirmation of a society at a place called "Great Swamp." "The principal and only moving cause of this our humble petition is the remoteness from any town, whereby we are under great disadvantage for our soul's good by the ministry of the word, and in that your humble petitioners may
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Farmington Town Clerks and Their Times
be under better advantage to set up and maintain ye worship & ordinance of Jesus Christ, in that desolate corner of the wil- derness, we humbly request that your honors will please annex into our bounds, for the only use of said society, all those lands that are between our bounds southward and Wallingford bounds northward, for the benefit of the taxes of said lands for ye support of ye public charge, of said society. ... " The signers all bore names famous in the settlement of Farmington, doing as their fathers had done, hewing out, the hard way, their future homes. Camp says in his History of New Britain that "there can be little doubt that some of the most prominent men of the place already contemplated the organization of a distinct town on the principal road from Hartford and Wethersfield to New Haven."
Their petition was granted and the "Great Swamp" Society was organized. In 1722 the General Assembly passed a resolu- tion changing the name of Great Swamp or Farmington Village to Kensington. Another inevitable division from this latest society was the swiftly growing settlement at New Britain, which was officially established as an ecclesiastical society in 1754. All of these divisions remained a part of Farmington township, no setting off occuring until after the War of the Revolution. During these years of prosperity and increasing expansion with its 'resultant ease and trend towards at least greater comforts in living, if not luxury, the townspeople might constantly divide from their parent town or parent family, but when national difficulties arose in later years, they were one close clan. All came back to the old home town and agreed with- out a dissenting vote as to action to be taken.
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