USA > Connecticut > Hartford County > History of Hartford County, Connecticut, 1633-1928, Volume II > Part 19
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E. ROWLAND SILL'S HOME, WINDSOR
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The full list of names of Windsor men who have gained prom- inence at home and elsewhere would be a long one. In addition to those mentioned it would include that of Horace H. Hayden, father of American professional dentistry, who was born in the town in 1769. His first office was in Baltimore, in 1800. He was the founder and first president of the American Society of Dental Surgeons, formed in 1840, and in the same year he was instru- mental in establishing the first special college, the Baltimore Col- lege of Dental Surgery, of which he was the first president.
Dr. Elihu Tudor was the son of Rev. Samuel Tudor, who died in 1826 at the age of 93. He became one of the most distinguished surgeons in New England and a founder of the Connecticut Med- ical Society.
Oliver Phelps, born in Windsor in 1749 and at one time a resi- dent in Suffield, was deputy to Col. Jeremiah Wadsworth in secur- ing supplies for the Revolutionary armies and later was conspicu- ous in the affairs of Massachusetts. When New York ceded to Massachusetts right of preemption to 6,000,000 acres in central New York, he and Nathaniel Gorham of Cambridge in 1788 bought all the land for £300,000 and laid it out in townships. When Connecticut disposed of its lands in the Western Reserve for $1,200,000, he was the largest purchaser. He entered into many other deals around the country till collapse came. Crushed in spirit, he died in Canandaigua, N. Y., in 1809. He was the first judge of Ontario County and the first member of Congress from western New York.
Edmund Rowland Sill (1841-1887) was a descendant of Elder Brewster and of the families of Grant, Wolcott, Edwards, Row- land, Warham, Loomis and Wyllys. His father was Dr. Theodore Sill. They removed to Ohio while the son was still a boy. The son was graduated at Yale in 1861 and studied for the ministry but turned aside to accept a professorship in the University of California where he became that state's foremost man of letters.
Judge H. Sydney Hayden (1816-1896), born in Windsor (Hayden section), went to Charleston, S. C., in his early manhood and engaged in the jewelry business with his brother Augustus. Returning to Windsor a few years before the Civil war he spent the rest of his life working for the interests of Windsor and the state. For a time he was a member of the Legislature and as
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judge of probate he continued till he reached the age limit. He was a trustee of the Connecticut Hospital for the insane and of the Loomis Institute, a director in Hartford banks and vice president of the Dime Savings Bank. Instrumental in building Grace Epis- copal Church, he caused it to be named after the church he had attended in Charleston. The local water company was promoted by him while in industries he showed his interest by building the factory first used by the Spencer Arms Company. He left to Loomis Institute the Pines, fifteen acres, on the boundary of Bloomfield, for a pleasure and health resort.
Wilson's Station, railroadwise, now officially Wilson, is the village within the town which is nearest to Hartford. It can lay claim to greatest antiquity because it contains the site of the first house and the land of the Plymouth pioneers. Its special merit in the eyes of many now removing thither is the attractiveness of the sites for homes and its golf club. Its Ten-Miles Woods are now a part of Keney Park. The first brick house in Windsor was built at what is now the northern entrance to the park. Brick- making is practically the only occupation aside from agriculture and floriculture. The Community Church of Christ was one of the first of its kind in the state. The services are held in the former Baptist Church Building which was removed here from Rainbow.
Haydens is on the other side of the town, taking its name from the well known family, members of which had extensive property here. Its Social Club and building are an example of what can be done in a small community. The club began in 1887 with twenty-eight members. By having five-cent suppers every fort- night and literary exercises, at the chapel, it was able to incor- porate in 1891 with a good sum in the treasury and built a hall on land mostly given by Mr. and Mrs. Osborn. The hall was named Hillside Casino and now is finely equipped as a center of social interests.
Rainbow is on a northern bend of the Farmington where the Hartford Electric Light Company took advantage of the wonder- ful water power now utilized by the Stanley Works of New Britain, which bought of the Rainbow Paper Company, with Rain- bow Park and the adjoining farms known as Vernon Mills. For years it has been a paper-making center and Austin Dunham &
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Sons had a yarn and woolen mill (Tunxis Worsted Company) here. Here also were the state shad hatcheries, of which there now is one near the First Congregational Church in Windsor, continuing in the hope that shad may be brought back to the pol- luted Connecticut River.
Poquonock, bought of Sachem Sehat in 1635 by William Phelps, in 1649 was the second of Windsor's separate parishes. Edward Griswold and his sons and Thomas Holcomb and John Bartlett were the leaders in the migration. The settlement continued to pay the tax for the town minister till set off in 1724 when it had selected Daniel Fuller of Wethersfield for minister. It dropped him before installation because his sermons were too short, and chose John Woodbridge instead. Mr. Fuller petitioned the Gen- eral Court to secure £50 damages but the records are silent on the result. Capt. Samuel Marshall who led a company in King Philip's war was a promoter, buying land of the Indians. The first church built, in 1727, stood seventy years. Rev. Samuel Tudor of South Windsor was the second pastor but the community was an exception in that interest waned with the progress of years and the society ended with the death of its last member in 1821. Then there was irregular preaching till in 1841 a new society was formed. After that the preaching mostly was by "supplies," Rev. William Howard continuing for several years in the 1880s and there being a good attendance at the brick edifice. Rev. Victor L. Greenwood is now the pastor. Rev. E. Plunkett has the charge of the Roman Catholic parish.
Favored by location, the Farmington being navigable almost to this point, the village was selected as a good place for industries in the early 1800s. The town hall was built in 1803. Mills in Rainbow were built in 1838 and in Poquonock in 1846, previous to which Richard Niles and Elihu Marshall were making sewing silk in Rainbow, in a shop occupied in part by Samuel O. Hol- lister for making paper. There has been a succession of industrial enterprises since then, paper-making being most notable, but tobacco-raising and market-gardening are the chief reliance. The first state fish hatcheries were established here.
Hon. John M. Niles later of Hartford, born in a house built by his father, Moses Niles, grew up on his father's farm. The house is still standing, occupied and well cared for. Judge Seneca
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O. Griswold, born here in 1823, a graduate of Oberlin in 1845 and long a prominent lawyer in Cleveland, returned to the old home in 1887 and continued his career as lawyer and man of affairs, dying in 1895. He served in the Legislature and was active in promoting the tobacco industry.
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BLOOMFIELD
While Bloomfield is a separate town and while it is now very much of a suburb of Hartford, its past history associates it very closely with "Ancient Windsor." With its new residences and choice lawns and the buildings like those of the Roman Cath- olic educational institutions, one would not think of it as a farm- ing community. And yet the church at the center, the cemetery which is one of the quaintest in the matter of epitaphs, and the buildings in that locality, make one feel that after all it is a true New England rural village. Taken from Windsor, it was incor- porated in 1835. On the Central New Railroad there are stations at Cottage Grove, Bloomfield, Griffins and Barnards. In 1734 dwellers in this locality petitioned for winter church privileges at Messenger's in this the southwest part of the town. Families in Simsbury and Farmington also petitioned since they likewise were remote from the parent church.
When the petitions were granted, the settlement was named Wintonbury from the names of the three petitioning communities. A church was built in 1736 and Rev. Hezekiah Bissell was installed. The half-covenant disagreements, the "Great Awaken- ing" and other tokens of free thought caused dissension over the choice of a successor to Pastor Bissell when he died in 1783. With it all Deacon Abel Gillet (father of Senator Francis Gillette, later of Hartford and grandfather of the playwright and actor William Gillette) had thought Pastor Bissell had sided with John Hubbard in a dispute between these two worthies and had joined the "sep- aratists" who had formed a Baptist society. The Baptists built a small church in 1795 under the leadership of Rev. Ashbel Gillet, son of Deacon Gillet. Elder Gillet was most popular. His prayers were believed to be of such efficacy that he was especially desired in time of sickness, drought or other calamity. There is now a
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federated church and the resident Protestant ministers are Rev. Dana A. Lane, Baptist, and Rev. A. J. Dressler, Methodist. Sev- eral of the Roman Catholic priesthood are located with the schools of that church.
The town has good schools of its own. There is a Center Fire District which has voted to take its water supply from the Hart- ford system. In the Blue Hills section, also practically a part of Hartford, there is a Community Club, founded in 1925, for spon- soring civic improvements and promoting a feeling of good-fel- lowship.
The oldest, or perhaps second oldest Episcopal Church in the state is St. Andrew's at North Bloomfield, four miles north of Bloomfield Center. The dissensions in the Simsbury Church, over the location of the second meeting-house to be built caused this society to form. The edifice was erected on almost the pres- ent site and many of its original features have been retained to this day, including the first organ. Rev. William Gibbs, the first rector was dragged on a horse for feeding British soldiers in the Revolution and died insane in 1777. The continued exist- ence of the church is assured, not only by the devotion of its com- municants, but because many years ago Capt. Abel Adams pro- vided an endowment. On the roll of rectors is the name of Rev. Karl Reiland, rector of St. George's in New York, this having been his first charge.
LI OTHER "WINDSORS"
EAST AND SOUTH WINDSOR, THE "LOCKS," WAPPING, BROAD BROOK, WAREHOUSE POINT-TIMOTHY EDWARDS' BOYHOOD ENVIRONMENT- INVENTOR JOHN FITCH'S BIRTHPLACE-REVOLUTIONARY REMINIS- CENCES-TOBACCO-RAISING.
When wondering why two such historic Windsor settlements as those on the east and west sides of the Great River so long remained a single town, one does well to recall the incidents that molded the early Dorchester settlement and promoted the sense of loyalty and pride, and also the outstanding fact that the men on the east side were members of prominent families on the west side-looking for "more room." They continued to look for it until they met those of Tolland and Bolton, coming from the eastward and the north, seeking the same desideratum. It was not till 1653 that they got so far even as to vote for two districts of Windsor itself and not till 1667 that haltingly they went up to the General Assembly with a Wolcott (Erastus) and a Bissell (Josiah) as the east-side committee. There were many who still clung to the idea that in union there was tax strength, but the opinion that strength might be lessened by diffusion was bound to prevail when presented by able counsel. The Assembly enacted in 1668 that in accord with town vote and a proper division of "money, poor, etc.," the east side should become a separate town. Out of this East Windsor were to grow South Windsor and Elling- ton which latter was set off to Tolland County. South Windsor, though not incorporated till 1845, claims all the preceding history as her own, and it has to be so considered even at the risk of con- fusing town names, never forgetting that for over a century it was all Windsor, nor yet that East Windsor Hill is in South Wind- sor. Those somewhat preoccupied settlers who fell back upon the points of the compass in naming their new communities, spring-
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THE OLD MEETING-HOUSE, SOUTH WINDSOR Erected in 1761 and demolished in 1845
THE OLD WOLCOTT HOMESTEAD, SOUTH WINDSOR
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ing from a mother church, were not concerned that in remote gen- erations deeds and names of those of one community might be credited to those of another-as today they often are, in public print.
It was on this east side that the Dorchester party first bought as an alternative to present Windsor, but did not for years occupy, except for pasturage, because of greater danger from floods and some doubt as to the character of the Podunk and Scantic Indians. For land between the Podunk and Scantic rivers ("Nowashe"), opposite Francis Stiles' house, they paid twenty coats and fifteen fathoms. Stiles, it is recalled, was the representative of Sir Rich- ard Saltonstall who sought a large domain, and when the Dorches- ter men claimed priority on the east side, they thought to concili- ate by allowing him Saltonstall Park, 1,500 acres, running east from Enfield Rapids; when this was found to exceed their own purchased rights, the town allotted 400 acres, Stiles bought the rest from the natives and added 500 acres. The park included present Warehouse Point. Part of the proposed fence around it was built before Saltonstall abandoned the plan. Stiles' claims were approved by both Connecticut and Massachusetts in 1641-2 and later figured in the colonial boundary controversy. Governor Gurdon Saltonstall in 1717 communicated to the General Court that Massachusetts had allowed an equivalent of the 2,000 acres and he would give up the land in question if permitted to receive a like amount in lands given by Massachusetts in the boundary agreement, at the northeast corner of the colony, eastward of present Woodstock. This was allowed.
The Bissell family of ferry fame were probably the first set- tlers on the east side, near the mouth of the Scantic, but no house was built till 1659. The plantation was hardly started before King Philip's war drove the settlers back to the west side. After that the locality was known as "Windsor Farmes." Present South Windsor was a commons, each settler holding a share. The removal of Simon Wolcott to the east side in 1680 was destined to add greatly to the history of South Windsor. He was the young- est of the sons of Henry Wolcott. Considerable sidelight is thrown on ideas of the early settlers by the story of his second marriage. William Pitkin, a man of high standing, had come to Hartford from England in 1659. Two years later his sister Martha arrived
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for a visit. She was so charming and withal of such culture and ability that the settlers deliberately set about capturing her. Dr. Thomas Robbins in his book "Wolcott Memorials" coldbloodedly expresses it : "The girl put the colony in commotion. If possible she must be detained; the stock was too valuable to be parted with. It was a matter of general consideration what young man was good enough to be presented to Miss Pitkin. Simon Wolcott was fixed upon, and, beyond expectation, succeeded in obtaining her hand." The youngest of their nine offspring was Roger, whose record with that of the other distinguished descendants, is given in the Windsor section, for before his death Simon had returned to Windsor.
Thomas Ellsworth was the first to build north of the Scantic, just across in what is now East Windsor, and Edward King, an Irishman, built south of the Podunk in present East Hartford. Grist and sawmills were built on that river and were in evidence in one of their successors down to the latter part of the nineteenth century. Because of inconvenience in crossing the river was the first petition sent up for a separate church society, in 1680, but as the First Church could ill afford to lose any taxpayers, this was not granted till fourteen years later.
Rev. Timothy Edwards, son of Merchant Richard Edwards of Hartford, was called in 1694, and with him came his bride of eight days, sister of Capt. Thomas Stoughton, selectman, in whose large barn the minister gathered his flock. His father built an unusu- ally fine house for the couple a mile south of present East Windsor Hill. Mrs. Edwards was a daughter of Rev. Solomon Stoddard of Northampton and granddaughter of Windsor's first minister, John Warham. The parishioners lived along a rough path back from the swampy river meadows extending northward eight miles from Hartford's line, the minister's house about midway of it- the rough path which still is often called "The Street." East of the house was the booth where the son Jonathan, who was to became one of the world's most renowned theologians, had his hours of meditation. The church society did not organize till 1696 and Mr. Edwards was not ordained till 1698. The usual ordina- tion ball was a notably brilliant function. The church was built on a corner of the burying-ground, facing "The Street," back on the higher land from the Podunk to the Scantic, and across a
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ravine from the old palisado built as defense against the Indians. The church and palisado in Windsor were in full view.
Details are much worth while with this society, not only because of the charm and also the eccentricities of the people and the beauty of their natural surroundings, but because one gets the early environment of Jonathan Edwards. After four years of agitation, a new meeting-house was erected in 1714. As so often was the case in young communities, there was warm contest over the location, the people of the south objecting to the distance to the old site. Followed the customary appeal to the General Assembly, resulting in decision for that site. This caused the council of churches to vote again for the old site and to add that dissenters should be quiet and Christian-like, in the assurance that they should have the liberty to erect another church "when God in his providence shall put them into a capacity for it in a lawful and orderly way." The dissenters, believing that God's provi- dence had become operative, already had set up the frame of a building and, no society having been formed, voted to levy upon themselves the expense of completing the structure. The Wolcott, Loomis, Newberry, Fitch and Phelps families were among those signing the financial agreement. Jabez Colt had read a long poem at the raising of this meeting-house, a stanza of which expresses the whole spirit :
"Two miles we find in Holy Writ Sabbath daie's journies bee. O wherefore then are we compelled For to go more than three."
In desperation the Assembly was petitioned by the Dissenters for right to start a new society, but despite the eminence and tem- per of the petitioners the Assembly was unconvinced in the matter of the item of God's providence, the answer was nay and in another year there was submission to superior judgment.
The elder Edward's insistence upon dictatorial power of pas- tor and adherence to strict Saybrook platform caused harsh con- troversy and sessions of the church council in the later years of his life, subsiding only when there came the Great Awakening fol- lowing the sermons by his son at Northampton. Roger Wolcott was a leader on the church side against the seeming tyranny of the pastor. The parish had become-and long was to continue-
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the wealthiest agricultural community in the state. John A. Stoughton in 1883, in his "Windsor Farmes," contributed materi- ally for the study of this birthplace of theological theories tre- mendous in their effect and regretted that no other town (in his own day) furnished such proportional amount to the recognized means of religious instruction. He speaks-historically, not crit- ically-of their uncouth manners which irritated Mr. Edwards and to which the minister made frequent references in his dis- courses, as when he rebuked the men for not uncovering when they "met their betters in the street." When the minister's niece, Abigail Stoughton, secretly married dissolute John Moore, Jr., he finally, in his indignation, took the subject before the North Association of Ministers for Hartford County-whether mar- riages, public or private, by children, without parental consent and against parental wishes, "do bind in conscience." It was voted that the father had power to void such marriage. There followed much friction but with a final happy outcome.
In the case of Joseph Diggins, who married another Miss Stoughton, there were allegations against his habits but Minister Edwards charged that the girl's father had been opposed to the union; right of trial by the church was refused by the minister; he had given his opinion and the church need not concern itself. A long period of protest on the part of leading parishioners resulted in calling a council and the council ordered a trial by the church. Mr. Edwards argued before that body that Diggins had violated the fifth and eighth commandments, but the defendant was acquitted. On Mr. Edwards' appeal to a council, the verdict was sustained though with qualification that if Mr. Edwards could not admit Diggins to the fold, the matter should not be pressed and the defendant should apply elsewhere for membership and the privilege of baptism for his child.
Driven to it, the deacons on their own responsibility called a church meeting at which Diggins charged maladministration. This forced Mr. Edwards, in 1740, to call a council (after the Saybrook plan), which was asked to decide on the pastor's power to negative action of the church. The council dodged and those who had been bred in the principles of church self-government were left in a maze. Diggins was persuaded to withdraw his complaint and Roger Wolcott and the others wrote a rebuke to Mr. Edwards.
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Three months later Mr. Edwards read a letter to the church asking for the election of a "messenger" to a council in Hartford, and remarked that, for this time, he would let the members nom- inate. When the messenger they elected asked Mr. Edwards in regular order for certificate, Mr. Edwards refused on the ground that he, the minister, had absented himself from the church meet- ing. A contemplated protest was dropped for the minister was taken sick. Eventually a committee was chosen, headed by Wol- cott, to tell Mr. Edwards he was too old, and Rev. Joseph Perry was called to be colleague in 1755. And a covenant in accord with the old Westminster Confession of Faith was drawn up by Gov- ernor Wolcott and adopted-to be understood as the same as the General Assembly's catechism.
Mr. Edwards died in 1758, after sixty-three years of service. One of his most important services to the community was teaching the young people the rudimentaries at his home, evenings; a care- fully kept rate book showing his fees is still preserved. Despite his idiosyncracies he was greatly beloved by his people. The new meeting-house, paid for largely by the sale of tobacco, was com- pleted in 1761 near the old one and in the street. Its steeple aroused the admiration of all the countryside. Negro Doctor Primus, a famous character, said of it :
"Big church, high steeple, Proud committee, poor people."
In 1834 it was moved back to the site of the present one which replaced it in 1845. The Wolcott Memorial Chapel was given by Col. Samuel Tudor Wolcott in 1887. The church became the first of the original East Windsor when the town was divided in 1768 and the first of South Windsor when South Windsor was set off in 1846.
In this as in the other churches in the eighteenth century, singing was the cause of much discussion. A vote was taken finally to hire a singing-master so to instruct others that singing might be "performed decently and orderly." The queries in people's minds may be thus summarized : Shall there be beating of time by the hand? Shall the minister tell the timer what tune shall be sung? Shall the note be given by voice or pitch-pipe? Shall the society agree upon a certain number of tunes to be sung, and
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what ones? Shall someone be chosen to tune the Psalm? Or shall the Psalm be read?
Among the distinguished clergy of this parish were Rev. Amasa Loomis, home missionary in Ohio; Rev. Dr. Samuel Wol- cott, missionary in Syria and Palestine; Rev. Julius Alexander Reed, Rev. Dr. Samuel Robbins Brown, Rev. George C. Reynolds and Rev. Thomas Robbins who collected a remarkable library now in the possession of the Connecticut Historical Society, where he himself was to serve as librarian from 1844 till his death in 1854. Rev. Isaac Stiles, of North Haven, father of President Ezra Stiles of Yale, was a native of this town.
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