History of Fairfield County, Connecticut : with illustrations and biographical sketches of its prominent men and pioneers, Part 38

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton) comp. cn
Publication date: 1881
Publisher: Philadelphia, J. W. Lewis & co.
Number of Pages: 1572

USA > Connecticut > Fairfield County > History of Fairfield County, Connecticut : with illustrations and biographical sketches of its prominent men and pioneers > Part 38

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Shortly after, his brother, Capt. Sterling Sherman, was admitted as a partner, with additional capital, and the business was continued successfully up to 1814, a period of seven years in all. At the close of the second war, commonly known as the war of 1812, the political and international situation was not favorable for mercantile and maritime pursuits in this country, and there followed for Mr. Sherman a year of enforced

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quiet, which completely cured him, as he said, "of ever wishing to spend any part of his life in idleness."

In December, 1810, he married Maria, the eldest daughter of Stephen Burroughs, Jr., and purchased the house, then recently built, on the northeast corner of Main and Gold Streets, which was the only home of his married life of fifty-three years.

In 1815 he joined his father-in-law in the grocery, grain, Boston and New York coasting business, which was successfully continued up to 1831, with the ex- ception of an interval of four years in partnership with Capt. Johu Brooks, Jr., in the same line of bnsi- ness. The firm of Burroughs & Sherman owned a number of vessels, and built theschooner "Nassau" for a Boston coaster. During her second year this vessel was sent in command of Capt. Lent M. Hitchcock, under charter of some merchants from New York, to Saiut Stephens, on the Tombigbee River (Alabama). On this trip, June, 1817, she was the first American vessel to enter the port of Mobile after it came into the possession of the United States. She continued to run to Mobile under the same command, with good success about four years, when the trade had increased so much as to require larger vessels.

In 1832, Mr. Sherman retired from active commer- cial life, but not from active usefulness. Indeed, he never ceased to be useful. While physical strengtlı remained he was busy, according to the principle ex- pressed in his journal: "I believe it best for me to exercise myself in some honest and useful employ- ment as long as health will permit."

As early as the year 1819, Mr. Sherman had been appointed justice of the peace, and this office he re- tained after his retirement from business, and until 1851. In the same year of his withdrawal from mer- eantile business he became town clerk, and held the office sixteen years by successive annual elections. He was also town treasurer twenty-two years by the aunual suffrages of his fellow-citizens, and during this period his office was headquarters for convey- ancing, aud indeed all public business. Later he was for a time judge of Probate and recorder of the city.

He seenied reluctant to take part in the adminis- tration of the city government. Having once been elected alderman he declined to qualify, as is sup- posed, from a disinclination to attend the evening sessions of the Common Council, often very much pro- tracted, yet he was not wanting in interest iu muni- eipal affairs. In the trying times of 1844 he was a member of the council of safety, appointed by the city to advise in all matters connected with the city bonds issued for the benefit of the Housatonic Rail- road Company. Mr. Sherman was the secretary of the council, and the meetings were generally held in his office. The records of the council are extant.

To these and other duties Mr. Sherman added an agency for procuring pensions for Revolutionary sol- diers and widows of deceased soldiers. From the absence of early records the establishment of these

claims by the requisite proofs frequently involved an amount of investigation and persevering labor alinost incredible. He never undertook doubtful cases. His papers were always made out with great care and clearness, and it came to be understood that their special reliability was recognized at the pension office in Washington. This was all the more true as Com- missioner Edwards, who so long and ably administered the Pension Bureau at this period, knew his personal worth.

That he was a most industrious man is amply at- tested by voluminous records, original deeds and other conveyances, wills and documents, which are preserved in the archives of the town of Bridgeport, the Bridgeport Probate District, and the private box of nearly every property-holder of his time in this vicinity. Yet, though so busy and so efficient, those who knew him well remember his quiet manner, and how, if he ever hasted, he seemed to illustrate the maxim, "Make haste slowly."

This part of our sketch would not be complete or just without allusion to the last contribution made by Mr. Sherman, for the benefit of those who should come after him. His long life in this community and his extensive personal acquaintance, his familiarity with the church and parish records, his respect for his own ancestry -already noticed -and his genealogical studies, his intercourse with and fondness for old peo- ple, his extensive business intercourse, his investiga- tions for the establishment of pension claims, his experience in connection with the settlement and distribution of estates, all coutributed to furuish his observant and retentive mind with a fund of in- formation regarding the early settlement and history of Stratfield and Bridgeport. He could give the exact location of the old family homes, aud mucli about the descendants, the settlement of the New- fields (now the city of Bridgeport), the rise and prog- ress of business, the business firms, how composed, how located, and whether successful or otherwise, etc. No one had attempted to cover the field, and no one living could do it as he could, and unless by him committed to paper, at his decease it was certain that very much would be inevitably lost. This considera- tion was frequently urged upon him for years without success. After liis retirement from public business, to the quiet of an office improvised under the domestic roof, the situation seemed favorable, and his cousent to enter upon the work was gained. The plan was laid out for him, and he entered upou it timidly, as he said "his early education was defective, and had not qualified him to write history," but his interest and his confidence grew as he progressed. The result was not a complete history, but the embodiment of a mass of fact and valuable information of great value. To those who would study the early history of Bridge- port and Stratfield, or their families, " Esquire Sher- man's Recollections" are a necessity, and every pass- ing year they increase in value.

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HISTORY OF FAIRFIELD COUNTY, CONNECTICUT.

Mr. Sherman's religious convictions conimenced early in life. They were grounded on the Word of God, were pronounced, and influenced his whole being. He and his estimable wife together united with the Stratfield church, the church of his fathers, in 1812. Though modest and retiring, here, as in secular matters, his worth was thoroughly appre- ciated and his services sought. In 1830 he was elected to the office of deacon, and continued in active service until 1858. He was for a long period upon the Society (or Parish) Committee, and its most active member. He was also clerk and treasurer of the church. The responsibility and labor involved in this connection added very materially to his daily cares and duties. As to how they were met, his pas- tor in his funeral discourse bears this testimony : "In the heart to sce the house of God prosper, and thought- fulness for widows, for the poor and bereaved, he was without fault. Many a child of sorrow has called him blessed." He was not ambitious for wealth. This is apparent from his carly voluntary retirement front mercantile business, also from the firm Chris- tian principle which led him to decline, when a young man, to sell liquor by the glass, and this long before the temperance reformation, while it was customary and entirely respectable to do so. It was urged upon him, and visions of wealth were painted before his eyes. But he was inflexible, and would have no share in a traffic which was injurious, which he saw to be wrong, whether others did or not.

Having acquired a moderate competency, he seemed only desirous of earning by his useful labors enough to provide for his moderate family expenses and dis- bursements for religious and charitable purposes. These latter probably seldom, if ever, fell short of the Scripture rule of one-tenth of his income. He often remarked that "it was a very nice thing to live right;" and again, that Agur understood the matter pretty well in his prayer; "Remove far from me vanity and lies. Give me neither poverty nor riches; feed me with food convenient for me," etc. In his own estimation, he had not much religion to speak of. But his life told, and, referring to it, it was well said in the funeral discourse before quoted : "One exemplary, faithful, kind, peaceable, loving, practical Christian life, sustained to the last-such as our lamented and venerable friend has led in this community-is worth to the cause of God and truth and human salvation, more than all mere head ortho- doxy,-the spasmodic piety, the exhortations and con- versations, which are so common and so cheap in every place,-all put together-a thousand fold. Such a life is a 'living cpistle' written not with pen and ink, but with the finger of God. Men can- not help reading it, nor can they help believing it.

"So lived and labored

ISAAC SHERMAN, And rested Nov. 23, 1863."

ROWLAND B. LACEY.

If one were to choose a proper title for the biogra- phy of the subject of the present sketch, no fitter one could be found than "Record of a busy and exceed- ingly useful life." Rowland Bradley Lacey, only son of Jesse and Edna (Munson) Lacey, was born at Easton, Conn., April 6, 1818, and comes from excel- lent New England stock, being connected upon his mother's side with the family of President Stiles, of Yale College, and directly descended from John Haynes, the first Governor of Connecticut colony, and his wife, Mabel Harlakenden. Upon his father's side he is descended from John Lacey, an early set- tler of Stratfield Parish, and Deacon David Sherman and Deacon Henry Rowland, both of whom were pillars in the ancient First Church. His great- grandfather, Edward Lacey, son of John, removed to North Fairfield, now Easton, in 1756, and was one of the founders of that town. His grandfather, Zachariah Lacey, son of Edward, was a Revolu- tionary soldier, who served under Washington at the time of the evacuation of New York, and after- wards commanded a small guard which was stationed for a time upon Fairfield beach. Rowland Lacey was brought up upon his father's farm in Easton, receiv- ing the usual common-school education of the day. When fourteen years of age he was sent to a select private school, taught by Eli Gilbert, in Redding, Conn. At the early age of fifteen and a half years he commenced teaching a district school in his native town ; and in the summer of 1834, and the following winter, taught the large public school upon Redding Ridge, many of the pupils being quite as old as their youthful preceptor.

Among those who attended this school were Mr. Henry Sanford, of this city ; Sheriff Aaron Sanford, of Newtown; Henry B. Fanton, of Danbury, and others. The next year was passed as a pupil at Easton Academy, after which, in April, 1836, at the age of eighteen, he removed to Bridgeport. This place was then only a small village of some three or four thousand inhabitants, with very few of the public improvements now possessed. There were no parks, no sewers, no gas, a very scanty supply of public water, and flagged sidewalks only in a portion of three or four business streets. The principal public buildings were the Bridgeport and Connecticut banks and the wooden Sterling Hotel on Main Street, then just completed.

Mr. Lacey's first occupation in Bridgeport was that of assistant postmaster. This place he held, at first under Stephen Lounsbury, and afterwards under Smith Tweedy, for nearly four years, with an interval of about six months in 1838, which were spent in study at Easton Academy.

On the opening of the Housatonic Railroad,-one of the very first roads of the country,-in December, 1839, Mr. Lacey took a position in the transportation department, and as agent at Bridgeport bore a large

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share of the responsibilities of operating the road. For several years during the winter season this was the only steamn line between New York and Albany, and the traffic was very heavy, taxing to the utmost not only the meagre facilities for handling freight, etc., but the mettle and resources of the management. The duties intrusted to Mr. Lacey, however, were faitlı- fully and successfully performed until March, 1844, when he voluntarily withdrew, not without the re- monstrances and expressed regrets of Alfred Bishop and other leading men connected with the road. In taking leave of the railroad business, he had the sat- isfaction of feeling that not only had his services been highly prized by the company, but that no mis- take or negligence of his had ever been the occasion of injury to either life or property. The immediate reason for his making the change was an unsolicited proposition upon the part of Messrs. Harral & Cal- houn that he should take the position of book-keeper in their saddle-factory.

This was at that time one of the leading manufac- turing establishments in Connecticut, doing a large and remunerative Southern trade, and having a ware- house in New York and a branch establishment in Charleston, S. C. Mr. Lacey soon became assistant manager of the manufactory, and so familiar with all the details, both of the saddle trade and the office business, that new hands who did not know to the contrary supposed that he had been brought up to it. In 1853 he became a member of the firm of Har- ral, Calhoun & Co. In 1858, after the death of Mr. Harral, the firm was reorganized under the name of Calhoun, Lacey & Co., and in 1863 the title was again changed to Lacey, Meeker & Co. The late war was almost a fatal blow to the saddlery business, the chief market for which was in the South. Not only did it cause immense losses, but it demoralized and impov- erished the market, so mueh so as to render attempts to continue the business unprofitable, if not disastrous.

Between the years 1840 and 1850, Mr. Lacey was connected with the old volunteer fire department, as private member and as foreman of Company No. 1, and assistant engineer. In 1848 he drew up and pro- cured the passage of a very full and explieit ordinance for the organization and government of the depart- ment. Previous to this time the several companies had been entirely independent of each other, and anything but harmony had prevailed. Under the new system the government was vested in a board of engineers, discipline was enforced, and the result was exceedingly advantageous in all respects. This plan continued in force until the adoption of the paid sys- tem in 1870.

Another field in which his influence has been felt is the Common Couneil, to which he was elected in 1848, 1852, 1853, and again in 1864.

About the year 1870 there was felt by leading citi- zens of Bridgeport to be a need of a better system of keeping the eity aceounts. Accordingly, at the re-

quest of Mayor Morford and other prominent gentle- inen, Mr. Lacey visited New Haven and Hartford, Newark, N. J., and Springfield, Mass., in order to examine the methods of keeping the public accounts in use in those cities. From information thus ac- quired he drew up the present financial system, which, after having been revised, and in some respeets elab- orated, by Francis Ives, Esq., was adopted by the Common Council, Feb. 20, 1871. At the same time he was appointed city auditor, an office which he has filled with eminent ability and faithfulness to the present time, having been thrice re-elected to it,-viz., in 1874, 1877, and 1880. The original appointment was made under a Democratic administration as a non-partisan one, and has always had the support of leading men of both parties. As auditor of the city, all matters of finance and accounts pass under his inspection, and no bills or claims ean be paid without his examination and approval. He has also been connected almost constantly during the above period with the street and sewer departments, as the clerk and man of business of the board of road and bridge commissioners, and as secretary of the Park commis- sioners. In addition to other services performed, all the men in both of these departments are paid their weekly wages by him personally, a matter of no small responsibility and labor. In all these transactions there has been a remarkable freedom from error, and the books and accounts have been kept with aceuracy and eare.

Mr. Lacey has also introduced system into the ac- eounts of the town of Bridgeport, and sinee 1876 las had the management of the town sinking fund, which at the present time (October, 1880) amounts to over $100,000. From his large experience, his services are frequently in demand to apportion the cost of sewers and pavements, and in faet, in so many forms does his work appear, that he has sometimes been accused of running the entire eity government. He is con- tinually called upon for advice and for data concern- ing city and town matters, both by residents of the place and by correspondents from abroad. In 1873 he commeneed the compilation of the "Municipal Register," a work of several hundred pages, contain- ing lists of city officers, public documents, financial statements, etc., together with historical information of great interest. This work has been published an- nually to the present time, and is invaluable as a work of referenee.

From a very early period Mr. Lacey has taken a deep interest in the eause of education. On first coming to Bridgeport, when he was only eighteen years of age, his "spirit was stirred within him" at the low condition of the public sehools. He addressed several communications to the newspapers upon this topic, and unaided obtained the services of Prof. J Orville Taylor, of Albany, the common-school chan- pion of the State of New York, to lecture here upon the subject. As the fruit of these efforts, the old

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HISTORY OF FAIRFIELD COUNTY, CONNECTICUT.

wooden building, inappropriately known as the High- school house, was demolished, and a substantial brick structure, at No. 200 State Street (now occupied for business purposes), took its place, and the services of such teachers as George W. Yates, and afterwards of Emory F. Strong and others, were secured.

Another subject in which Mr. Lacey has always been interested, and which in fact might be called his hobby, is the early history of this place and of its in- - habitants.

Concerning the old families here his knowledge is varied and exceedingly accurate. It was at his sug- gestiou that his father-in-law, Deacou Isaac Sherman, a life-long resident, wrote out a valuable series of ar- ticles, embodying his own early recollections, together with many facts that had been handed down from the first settlers. These articles, revised and corrected by Mr. Lacey, were published after the decease of Es- quire Sherman.

The historical papers of the " Municipal Register" have already been alluded to, and meution ought also to be made of the many excellent and judicious obit- uary sketches from Mr. Lacey's pen which from time to time have been kindly contributed to the columns of our local newspapers when the ranks of our leading citizens have been thinned by death. These sketches have always been read with interest, though few be- sides the immediate friends of the deceased have been aware of their authorship, nor even they of the labor involved in their preparation. The biographies of the Rev. Heury Jones, Sherman Hartwell, and Isaac Sherman in the present volume, are from his hand.

As might be supposed, the services of a gentleman so well qualified have been in request iu various posi- tions of financial responsibility. He is at present a director in the Bridgeport National Bauk and iu the Bridgeport Mutual Insurance Company, also trustee in the Mechanics' and Farmers' Savings Bank, and his aid is often sought in the making of wills and in the management of estates and property, in such ca- pacities as executor, administrator, conservator, or trustce.

For several years he was a director in the Moun- tain Grove Cemetery, aud was on the committee for the first reappraisal of the lots. The old Stratfield Ceme- tery also, which has been used as a burying-place for more than two hundred years, has lately been placed under the charge of a committee, of which Mr. Lacey is the treasurer and active member, and by his in- strumentality improvements are being made in the grounds.

With so many public duties devolving upon him, Mr. Lacey has been necessarily much absent from home, but he has always been an affectionate hus- band and father.

His first wife was Jane E., daughter of the late Isaac Sherman, Esq., of this city. They were mar; ried Nov. 17, 1841, but the union was dissolved by her death, April 5, 1857. His present wife, Mrs. I

Elizabeth R. Boardman Lacey, was a daughter of the late Sherman Boardman, Esq., of Hartford. The date of their marriage is April 14, 1859. The children by the first marriage were (1) Mary Louisa, whose first husband was the late Maj. Ezra D. Dickerman, but who is now the wife of Samuel S. Hunter ; (2) Edward Rowland, deceased; (3) Henry Rowland, deceased ; (4) David Sherman, now in business in New York City. Miss Henrietta Boardman Lacey is Mr. Lacey's daughter by his second marriage.

In politics, Mr. Lacey in his early years was a mem- ber of the old Whig party, and a great admirer of Daniel Webster and Henry Clay. During the war he was an earnest Union man, and since its close he has acted with the Republican party, and may be elassed as a conservative Republican, though he has mauy warin friends in each of the two political parties.

No sketch of the subject of this biography would be complete that did not give more than passing notice to the religious principles which are the foun- dation of his whole character,-the solid rock upon which the entire structure rests. Mr. Lacey was born and educated a Congregationalist of the Puritan type, yet, from early association with Christian people of other denominations, has always been catholie and liberal in his seutiments, though firmly adhering to the faith of liis forefathers. About the year 1827 he was one of the original scholars in the first Sunday - school formed in the town of Redding, the Sunday- school then being a new iustitution. Mr. N. H. Lindley, now of this city, was his teacher in this school, but in his fifteenth year Mr. Lacey himself became a teacher. Previous to this time, May 6, 1832, at the age of fourteen years, he had made an open profession of religion, and united with the Congrega- tional Church in Redding, a step due to the influence and the early religious instruction of a devoted Christian mother, more than to any other human source.

In July, 1837, he became a member of the First Congregational Church of this city, with which he has ever since been identified, both as deacon, to which office he was elected Aug. 30, 1850, and for a number of years as clerk and as treasurer of the church. From 1837 to 1850 he was a member of the choir. For many years he has also served in one or more of the following capacities : society's treasurer, member and chairman of society's committee, Sun- day-school teacher, librarian, superintendent of Sun- day-school, and teacher of a Bible class. His heart is iu the Sunday-school work, and he considers himself as enlisted for life to serve this cause in some capacity.

In connection with Henry W. Chatfield, now of New York, Mr. Lacey solicited and raised most of the funds for building the house of worship now oc- cupied by the First Church, aud was also a member of the building committee for the erection of the chapel adjoining.

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History of Fairfield County, Connecticut : with illustrations and biographical sketches of its prominent men and pioneers, Part 38

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton) comp. cn Publication date: 1881 Publisher: Philadelphia, J. W. Lewis & co. Number of Pages: 1572

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton) comp. cn
Publication date: 1881
Publisher: Philadelphia, J. W. Lewis & co.
Number of Pages: 1572