USA > Connecticut > Historic towns of the Connecticut River Valley > Part 4
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In the Revolution, Saybrook did its full share with the other towns of the Colony. But more than this, Saybrook will go down to the end of time, historically, as being the place where the first attempt to produce a submarine torpedo boat was made. Although the attempt was not an entire success, the fact still remains, that the Adam of the successful submarine war vessels of the twentieth century was the turtle-like torpedo boat invented by David Bushnell, of Saybrook.
In the autumn of 1776, the ship "Oliver Cromwell " was built in Saybrook and successfully launched and ably commanded by Azarialı Whittlesey. In that year Captain Seth Warner, who stood second in command to that other grand patriot, Ethan Allen, the commander of the feared Green Mountain Boys, was authorized to raise IIO men for duty on the northern lakes, and was provided with money and given a commission.
In April, 1777, David Bushnell, who was born in the Parish,
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37
CHURCH GOVERNMENT.
now the Town of Westbrook, informed the Governor and Coun- cil that he had a plan for blowing the entire British Navy on the American coast, out of water. The Governor and Council provided every necessity for the construction and trial of the great invention. Building operations were begun at the " Ferry ", Mr. Bushnell having first proved that gun powder could be ex- ploded under water.
The Connecticut coast was more or less troubled with Tories, who gave comfort and assistance to the British ships on Long Island Sound, by furnishing them with supplies. This was par-
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THE LORD HOUSE, BUILT IN 1665.
Occupied by descendants of the builders, Dr. Kelsey and his mother, who is a granddaughter of William Lord, a soldier of the Revolution who was with Washington on his retreat across the Delaware.
ticularly true of the settlements and villages on the lower Con- necticut and especially at its mouth, where the Tories tried to run contraband out to the ships in the sound. But Saybrook slept with one eye open and the other eye on the watch. The Rev. John Edward Bushnell, minister of the Fairfield Congregational Church - but a native of Old Saybrook - gave so delightfully
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THE CONNECTICUT VALLEY.
humorous an account of, "Saybrook's only sanguinary battle of the Revolution ", in his address at the Quadrimillenial celebration of Saybrook, that it is quoted here:
A mass of contraband articles had been taken from the Tories, and a young man - William Tully - was set to watch it, in the house formerly owned by Captain John Whittelsey, still standing at the Point. On a certain night, eight Tories came to the house and demanded entranee. Tully begged to be exeused from opening the door. They broke in with- out further parley and rushed forward. Tully's flint was faithful to the trip of the hammer and struck fire. The musket ball passed through the
WHITTLESEY HOUSE, SAYBROOK POINT.
In the Revolution William Tully defended this house against eight Tories. ..
first man, and to Tully's surprise he still advanced, but the man directly baek of him dropped dead. Tully then surrounded the other six men and would have incontinently put them all to the bayonet (and did wound one of them) had they not contrived to eseape by the windows. The first man whom Tully shot finally found that the 'ball had passed through him, for he dropped dead. with one hand on the window and the other grasping a chest of tea. The retreating forees left a quarter of their number dead on the field - or floor - and a quarter of the remaining were carried
39
CAPTAIN KIDD.
away wounded in their friends' arms. It is, perhaps, noteworthy that the continental army did not lose a man.
The Tories were at another time routed by one man, this time Charles Williams. He was on the watch for Tories at the Point. One night he heard the grating of boats on the beach and sus- pecting them to be filled with Tories, he ran out and in a loud voice, ordered the guards to turn out. The Tories, not knowing that the guard consisted of but one man, pushed off and escaped from " that wretched Rebel ".
CAPTAIN KIDD.
Of the many somewhat visionary, or entirely imaginative accounts of treasure possessed by Kidd, the famous, or infamous pirate, the following is reliable for its accuracy. It was told to John W. Barber, author of Connecticut Historical Collections, by John G. Gardiner, of Gardiner's Island, about 1837. Mr. Gar- diner obtained his information from a letter belonging to Mrs. Wetmore, who was the mother-in-law of Captain Mather, of New London, commander of a revenue cutter. Mrs. Wetmore says in her letter :
I remember when very young, hearing my mother say that her grand- mother was wife to Lord Gardiner when the pirate came to Gardiner's Island. The Captain wanted Mrs. Gardiner to roast him a pig; she being afraid to refuse him, cooked it very nice, and he was much pleased with it; he then made her a present of this silk (cloth of gold) which she gave to her two daughters.
The following is an extract from an account of property belonging to Kidd and captured from him in 1699, by order of the Earl of Bellmont, captain general and governor in chief over the province of Massachusetts Bay :
Gold dust I45 OZS.
Gold bars 59134 ozs.
Gold coin 1134 OzS.
Silver, broken 17312 OZS.
Silver coin
124 OZS.
Silver bars 309 OZS.
Silver lamps and buttons, silver rings and a bag of gems. Mrs. Wet- more's letter continues :
Captain William Kidd was commander of the sloop Antonio; received a commission to cruise as a privateer, turned pirate, was guilty of murder - was taken, and carried into Boston; was tried, condemned and exe-
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THE CONNECTICUT VALLEY.
cuted - not as a privateer - but as a murderer. He was here with his accomplices a short time before he was taken; how long he remained on this Island I know not. While here, he told Mr. Gardiner where he had deposited the iron chests, which contained the treasure above described and left it in his care, with the injunction, that he must answer for it with his head. The chests were buried in a swamp on the west side of the island. There has been much digging here upon this island for Kidd's money, all along the coast. But I think it is doubtful whether there was ever any buried except that which was buried here.
WESTBROOK.
U NTIL its incorporation in 1840, Westbrook was a parish in the Town of Saybrook. It was incorporated as a distinct parish in 1724. From the great quantity of clam and oyster shells as well as stone implements, it is evident that the neighborhood of the village was for cen- turies a permanent village of Indians. The large number of half finished, and fragments, of arrow and spear heads that are still being found, to the east of the river near what is locally known as Round Hill, causes the belief that it was an Indian village for centuries. These fragments and par- tially finished specimens suggest, that they were made there and it is thought by some authorities on Indian archeology, that arrow heads were made only at permanent settlements. The operation was of a semi-religious nature and the arrow head makers were nearly equal to the medicineman in the estimation of the tribe. The Indians who lived on the shore at Westbrook, when the first settlements by the English were made, were subject to, or a part of the Pequot Tribe. After the extermination of that tribe by the settlers, in 1637, they disappeared from West- brook. The Indians living at Westbrook, after that place was settled, were a small branch of the Nehantic Tribe, from Rhode Island. They disappeared some time. during King Philip's War, in 1675 or '76. The Indian names for the territory now included in Westbrook were Menunketeset (a word that was spelled in every conceivable way in the old records) and Pochoug, which are still retained in Patchogue River and Menunketesuck Point and River.
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IVESTBROOK.
According to Barber, Westbrook was settled in 1664. Among the earlier settlers of Saybrook who had received grants of land, or had made purchases in Westbrook, where the Chapmans, Fitches, Bulls, Jacksons, Duncks and Chalkers. Olin Chalker and two brothers built three houses on the little hill at the foot of which is a brook crossing the road, which is the dividing line between Saybrook and Westbrook. The oldest of three houses is on the south side of the road, but it has been so modernized that it has no appearance of age. Directly opposite, is another house that has been abandoned for many years, and it is in a most pic- turesque state of ruin. It is almost impossible to look at it with- out regret for it suggests " home " and happiness and hospitality, surrounded as it is with a wild, tangled growth of old-time flow- ers, shrubs and trees, and its well-sweep going to decay, while the other two are simply commonplace farmhouse of the present- time.
In 1648, Saybrook divided the out-lying lands into quarters and that designated in the records as Oyster River Quarter included nearly all of Westbrook (and much more), so the record of this division of the wild lands is the first definite reference to the territory that is now Westbrook.
Mr. James A. Pratt, in his history of Westbrook, says that a few individual pioneers settled on the flats along the shore as early as 1650.
In the distribution of the land to the original proprietors, there were nooks and corners having no value then, because of lack of fertility or remoteness. That there was no particular claim to them, or dispute as to ownership, resulted eventually in their being regarded as a sort of no-man's-land. But as time passed and these pieces of land were occupied by outsiders, they began to have a value in the estimation of their actual owners. The first and second school-houses, and the first church and the parsonage, were built upon such land. This appropriation of their land alarmed the proprietors. The result was, that a Proprietors' Committee came into existence in 1723, and the General Court passed an act that common or undivided land, not disposed of by the free consent of the original proprietors, could be claimed by them as a part of their estate. The same act
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THE CONNECTICUT VALLEY.
authorized the proprietors to appoint a committee and clerk to act as their agents, with power to dispose of common or undi- vided land. This committee continued till 1838, when Jonathan Lay was the last surviving member and Jared Platt the last clerk.
Like the other shore and river towns, Westbrook had its active and prosperous ship-building days, which continued for many years after the industry had ceased in the river towns.
The first grist-mill was built by Lieutenant Samuel Jones some- time before 1690. A few years later the Grinells put up a wind- mill, not far from where the Congregational Church now stands. It was moved to the hill behind the church, where it could get more wind, and it remained there till 1800. There was a saw- mill, in 1748, on Falls River on Samuel Wright's land. It was jointly owned by Wright, Benjamin Jones, Thomas Bushnell, and Nathaniel Chapman, who took turns in using it for their own sawing, three days in each year. Before 1700, there was an iron- works at Pond Meadow, where ore obtained in Mine Swamp was smelted and made into about everything necessary to the settlers, from anchors down to nails.
For sixty years the earnest, noble men and women traveled on foot, on horseback and later, in rude carts, all the way to Old Saybrook to worship and hear the Divine commands and promises explained by their minister. In summer the journey was hard enough, but in winter, through deep snows, with an all- day service in a cold church, it was a very different matter.
In 1724, Westbrook had a population of 225 persons divided among 38 families. Their number and the distance necessary to go to attend Church, determined them to apply for permission . to separate themselves from the Saybrook society. A public meeting was held on April 13, 1724, when the people of Old Saybrook agreed, not to oppose the desire of the Westbrook portion of the society, for a separation, with a society of their own. It was agreed, that until the Westbrook people had a min- ister of their own, they should continue to pay their portion of the expense in maintaining a minister over the Old Saybrook society.
On May 13, 1724, a petition was sent to the Legislature, in Hartford, asking that Westbrook be made a separate society.
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WESTBROOK.
This petition was signed by Samuel Chapman, James Post, and William Stannard. The petition was granted, and on May 28, 1724, the First Society of Westbrook was formed with Captain Samuel Chapman, as moderator.
Immediate action was taken to secure a minister and in August, of the same year, the Rev. William Worthington was engaged at a salary of £50 and fire wood. In December, of the same year, the society voted to build a parsonage, but the minister was required to provide the glass and nails. The little community had already been at considerable expense, so the proposal to build a church seemed beyond their means. In order that money for this purpose might be obtained, they asked the Legislature to free them from paying the Colony tax for a period of three or four years. This was in the spring of 1725. Their request was refused and a similar request, made in October of that year, was also refused, but the Legislature granted them permission to form a Church and to settle an orthodox minister, with the consent of the neighboring Churches. On June 29, 1726, the Church was organized with the following members; Captain Samuel Chap- man, Abraham, James and John Post ; Jared and Thomas Spen- cer; Margaret Chapman, Lydia Grenil, Sarah Spencer, Mary Lay, Mary Denison, Sarah Brooker, and Mary Waterhouse.
Captain Chapman was a grandson of the settler, Robert Chap- man, and the son of Robert, Junior, who was one of the messen- gers from New London County to the convention which drew and adopted the Saybrook Platform. Abraham Post was a grandson of Stephen Post the settler, and Lydia (Peabody) Grenil was a granddaughter of John Alden and the charming Priscilla, whom he courted for another man and won for himself.
In January, 1726, the people voted to build a meeting-house, but it was several years before the church was completed. This delay was, seemingly, not the result of indifference or procras- tination, but of lack of money. The slow progress of the steps taken toward the building show this. On Christmas, 1727, a committee was appointed to secure sleepers and underpinning ; in May, 1728, another committee was appointed to place the sleepers, and still another for procuring glass and lead, and so on for a year or two longer. In 1730, the pulpit was built and
-
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THE CONNECTICUT VALLEY.
the lower seats put in place ; in 1733, the pulpit was provided with cushions ; the plastering was finished ; steps were made and placed in front of the door and the doors were hung on hinges and provided with means of fastening. In 1738, the galleries were finished and nothing more, in the way of work, was done till 1763, when one side and two ends were covered with oak clap- boards, which were painted a sky-blue, and window frames, with sashes furnished with glass, were put in. In 1794, the queer old square pews, with seats around the four sides, were replaced with straight pews. This church, begun in 1727, and standing for so much sacrifice, hope and determination, was taken down one hundred years later, in 1828, and a new church was built upon its site. In 1860, the second church was removed and the third built on the same site and being burnt in 1892, a fourth church was built upon the same site around which were so many precious memories.
The great number of years in which the first two ministers were in charge was quite typical of early New England. The Rev. William Worthington was born in Colchester, was grad- uated from Yale in the class of 1716, and was minister of the Westbrook Church for thirty-two years. The Rev. John Devo- tion was a graduate of Yale in the class of 1754, and minister of the Church for forty-five years.
BUSHNELL'S AMERICAN TURTLE.
East Windsor was the home of the inventor of the first steam- boat to actually run and carry passengers, and the fact that John Fitch was born there will make that town notable for all time.
Westbrook was the home of the inventor of that most feared naval weapon of the twentieth century, the sub-marine torpedo boat and the fact that David Bushnell, the inventor, was born in Westbrook, will make that town notable for all time.
It is an odd fact that that notorious appropriator of other men's ideas, Robert Fulton, who robbed John Fitch of the credit which he earned and deserved, also appropriated the ideas of David
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BUSHNELL'S AMERICAN TURTLE.
Bushnell, but did not succeed in robbing him of the credit and honor due him and his memory.
David Bushnell was born in 1742, on his father's farm which was located away from the more thickly settled portion of West- brook. At the age of twenty-seven, David's father died and while his loss was great, the death of his father proved to be a great gain to the world, for David's sense of duty was such that had his father lived, he probably never would have left the farm where his services were needed, to obtain the education he so much craved and so, doubtless, would not have thought out sub-marine navigation.
After his father's death, David disposed of the farm. At a time when boys of but fourteen were entering Yale, David, at the age of twenty-seven, prepared for Yale under the instruction of the Rev. John Devotion, the minister of Westbrook, in two years. It is probable that the idea of sub-marine explosions occurred to him while an undergraduate for, when he was graduated in 1775, he began his experiments.
The first step was to prove that gunpowder would explode under water. This was demonstrated with a wooden receptacle filled with powder. The bottle-like receptacle was submerged, with a heavy plank on top and on the plank a hogshead filled with stones, till its top was just above water. The explosion threw stones and bits of wood into the air and demonstrated just what Bushnell believed that it would. He continued his experiments till all possibility of doubt of their success was eliminated, and then began to work out plans for the "American Turtle", as the Adam of sub-marine torpedo boats was called by him.
In April, 1777, Mr. Bushnell informed the Governor and Council that he had a plan by which the entire British navy in American waters could be blown out of water. Governor Trum- bull - Washington's "Brother Jonathan ", who is to-day de- picted, with a coat of stars and "pants " of stripes, as the human emblem of Yankee Land - and General Israel Putnam, imme- diately appreciated, that if Mr. Bushnell's ideas would work the war would soon be a matter of history. They gave him every necessary encouragement and assistance. The construction of the "American Turtle " was begun at the Ferry. The hull was
1
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THE CONNECTICUT VALLEY.
in the form of two upper shells of a turtle, one above and the other below inverted. It was seven and a half feet long and probably about the same width and was only large enough to contain the courageous man who was to work it. The supply of air for the "crew " was sufficient to last thirty minutes. The greater portion of the ballast was under the keel and was so arranged that it could be lowered to act as an anchor. The motor was the man inside the boat, who worked the paddles with his feet. It was equipped with a compass, light and barometer, the latter for determining the depth below the surface. The kind of light to be used was a most troublesome matter to de- termine. With but a limited supply of air a flame could not be considered, for the air would soon be burnt up and the man would be suffocated. Mr. Bushnell's first experiment was with a kind of luminous wood which was satisfactory only if the atmospheric conditions were favorable. As a last resort he wrote to Benjamin Franklin for advice and for information in regard to the use of phosphorus. This was finally decided upon and used with success. In the bottom of the boat was a valve to admit water when it desired to descend below the surface. For return- ing to the surface, two brass force-pumps were provided for expelling the water. There were windows of heavy glass and ventilators with air pipes reaching to the surface of the water. At the stern, above the rudder, was the magazine. It consisted of two pieces of oak, hollowed, in which were 150 pounds of powder. This magazine was lighter than water so that it would rise against the bottom of the ship to which it was to be fixed. Inside the magazine was a mechanisni, arranged to be set to run for any period of time up to twelve hours. When it stopped, a lock resembling a gun lock was sprung and the 150 pounds of powder was exploded.
A brother of David Bushnell was to make the first experiment, but illness prevented, so a sergeant of one of the line regiments was given the hazardous honor. The "Eagle", one of Lord Howe's ships, of 64 guns, was chosen for the first trial, where she was lying in New York harbor, and General Putnam was on the wharf to witness the attempt. The sergeant tried to fix the screw to the bottom of the ship but did not succeed, as the screw
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BUSHNELL'S AMERICAN TURTLE.
came in contact with some iron. The sergeant's lack of experi- ence was the cause of failure. When returning to land he thought he had been sighted by the British, so he cast off the magazine, which was timed to explode in an hour. The mechan- ism worked and the explosion filled the British with consterna- tion and fear and the atmosphere with flying water. In 1777, Mr. Bushnell, himself, tried to blow up the " Cerberus ", at anchor off New London. The attempt was made from a whale boat and al- though he did not blow up the man o'war he did destroy a schooner, just astern, that the British had captured. The sailors on the schooner seeing the line attached to the magazine, drew it inboard thinking it was a fishing line. When they
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GOV. YALE'S SNUFF BOX.
drew on board the contrivance at the end of the line their interest was great, but before they could satisfy their curiosity it ex- ploded and killed three men besides destroying the schooner. It seems that Mr. Bushnell had provided for just such an occur- rence by placing wheels with iron points, on the outside of the magazine which would be revolved when the magazine was raised from the sea up the side to the deck of the vessel. The revolution of these wheels set the mechanism so that the ex- plosion would take place in five minutes after they began to revolve. Just why the " Turtle " was abandoned, after demon- strating that it would destroy vessels, is uncertain. It had accomplished a great good for the Colonies for the British were terrified. They feared that every object seen floating on the surface was one of those Yankee infernal-machines and, as a
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THE CONNECTICUT VALLEY.
result, they were not so bold in their naval operations near the coast.
Nearly every one is familiar with the historic "Battle of the Kegs" on the Delaware River, and how those same kegs filled the hearts of the bravest Britons with dread; dread of the unknown, which unmans the bravest; dread of what those wretched Yankees might do next by means of Bushnell's devilish- inventive genius.
. The kegs were arranged with an interior mechanism similar to that in the magazine of the " Turtle " only, instead of explod- ing at the end of a fixed time, they were exploded upon coming in contact with a hard object. These kegs were set afloat On the Delaware at night, that they might float down to the British ships and blow them up. It so happened that they first came in contact with the ice floating on the river and were exploded with great violence and noise, blowing up the ice and one British schooner. The explosion sent the British, like hens seeking shelter from hail, wild with terror to every place of safety to be found. They imagined every impossible thing. One of their wildest ideas being that each keg was occupied by a Yankee and that the Rebels were attempting an aqueous version of the Wooden Horse of Troy.
The British were so greatly mortified by their fright, that they offered a reward for David Bushnell, and they did not care whether he should be presented to them in the form of a man or a cadaver. The British did actually obtain possession of Mr. Bushnell without paying the reward, but the same genius which produced the "American Turtle ", helped him to make his escape. After the " Battle of the Kegs", he joined the Patriot army as a private and was captured in an engagment with the British, and placed on board one of the British frigates, in Boston Harbor. Mr. Bushnell acted the part of a person of weak mind. He was seen, one day, hacking at the rigging with a hatchet and when an officer asked what he was doing, Bushnell replied that he always had to cut the brush and clear the land in the spring. When this was reported to the commander of the ship, he directed that "the fool " should be put ashore. Bushnell and the officer who had him in charge stopped at a
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