History of New London county, Connecticut : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Part 103

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton)
Publication date: 1882
Publisher: Philadelphia : J.W. Lewis & Co.
Number of Pages: 1317

USA > Connecticut > New London County > History of New London county, Connecticut : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men > Part 103

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1 Miss Caulkins says it ran by the head of Poquonnoc River.

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HISTORY OF NEW LONDON COUNTY, CONNECTICUT.

donated the land on this beautiful summit, and the year 1887, just two hundred and fifty years from the overthrow of Sassacus and his stalwart warriors, has been by many designated as the time for erecting this memorial, under the auspices of the New London County Historical Society.

It may be interesting to know that the Fish and Burrows families, who by purchase or land grants first occupied the hill and region where the Pequot battle was fought so long ago, are still largely its proprietors, their lands having been transmitted by succession, without recourse to deeds, to the present time, as the records of the Probate Court will show. The Avery, Packer, Allyn, and Morgan lands and others have been transmitted in the same way. A part of the unique-looking house and the farm now (1881) owned and occupied by our town clerk, James D. Avery, Esq., of Poquonnock, is the same house which was built and occupied by the first settler, Capt. James Avery, two hundred and thirty years ago, a part of the house having been built in 1652.

In addition to the early families which settled Gro- ton already named, we may add those of John Spicer, two families of Smith,-Nehemiah and the well-known John,- John Bennett, Edmund Fanning, Edward Culver, branches of the Gallups, Stantons, and Wil- liams families, Anthony Ashbey, Walter Buddington, 1679; Josiah Haines, 1696; Deacon John Seabury and William Walworth, 1690; and John Davie, 1692. These settlers continued to be, as we have said, within the corporate limits of New London, and there with great regularity at first they returned to worship on Sundays. Several of them continued to be honored by New London as town officers,-selectmen, justices of the peace, constables, etc.,-and as deputies to the General Court. They also retained their influence and honors in ecclesiastical affairs, and bore their proportion of the burden of taxation in the mother- town.

This new settlement par excellence occupied Indian fighting-ground, and when King Philip's war broke out (1675) its active sons seemed to spring instinct- ively upon the field of battle. Their promptness and energy command admiration. In looking over the list of volunteers we are struck with the recurrence of the familiar family names of Avery, thrice repeated, Morgan twice, Colver thrice, Fanning thrice, Bill, Stark, Watrous, Packer twice, Park twice, Spier, Gal- lup, Billings twice, Larrabee, Fish, and Latham. Their work accomplished, they returned to their peace- ful avocations.

But as we approach the close of the seventeenth century we begin to see among the East Side settlers greater self-reliance, more independence, and an openly-expressed desire to be a separate township.

Their meeting-house at Centre Groton, then just passably completed, and their Central Public School, at the same place, under Master Barnard, were evi- dences of the coming ecclesiastical and civic inde-

pendence. Their idea seems to have been, in the se- lection of the Four Corners, sometimes called Poquon- nock (upper), or, as it is called of late years, from its post-office, Centre Groton, to bind together the settlers of the northern and southern, the eastern and western portions of the settlement on the East Side in a con- venient centre, which possibly might be, as they hoped, a populous village. The location was well calculated for it. It was a spacious plain, accessible from all sides, except where the rugged spurs of Candlewood Hill frowned upon it from the east. But whatever might have been the dreams of the sturdy pioneers, the population mostly clustered around the borders of the town instead of the centre.

The name of the new town seems to have been a subject of discussion, but finally that of Groton was decided upon, probably in honor of Governor Win- throp's English home in Suffolk County, for Mr. Winthrop had grants of some of the best lands in the new town, and was, with his tenants, admitted to be freemen of the town. But several attempts were made to have the name changed, and the dele- gates from the town to the General Court were in- structed to favor a change to East London or South- wark. The General Court, however, took little notice of their fickleness, possibly not believing in indulging young children or towns in having their own way.

What the population of New London was at this time, or what was the population of Groton even, cannot now be certainly determined. The inhabitants of Groton were probably about two hundred and fifty souls, for we find the number of freemen three years later but sixty-five, which would indicate perhaps a larger total.

The following officers were chosen at the first meet- ing of the new town, in December, 1705: Townsmen or Selectmen, Samuel Avery, Samuel Fish, Nehemiah Smith, James Morgan, and George Gere ; Town Clerk, John Davie; Constable, Jonathan Starr; School- master, John Barnard.

The schoolmaster, we shall see, was not forgotten ; for at a town-meeting held May 28, 1706, it was voted that ten acres of land be laid out to the north of the meeting-house at the Centre, upon which a house was soon after erected as a dwelling-house for Master Barnard and family, the same to be used for school purposes for the Centre district until a school-house could be built.

It was also voted that the schoolmaster shall have the improvement of the ten-acre lot in addition to his salary. It was further voted "that the present schoolmaster shall this year keep his school in five several places, viz. : first, at Samuel Avery's ; second, at Sergt. Fish's ; third, at Lieut. Morgan's ; fourth, at Robert Allyn's (or in that neighborhood) ; and lastly at Sergt. Bill's. It was decided and voted that a school-house should be built on the school-lot at the Centre, and that the dimensions be eighteen feet square. The next year, 1707, it was voted that Mr.

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John Barnard be employed for two years from date, and that the town should be divided into four parts or school districts, and that a school be kept one-half a year in each district, going around in two years, and that the inhabitants of each district should by vote decide the place where the school should be kept for each school term ; and here the district boundaries are recorded in full. The town was again divided into five districts in 1709, and Master Barnard's own home upon the ten-acre school-lot was to be the place where the Centre school should be kept. Two com- mitteemen in each of the other four school districts were chosen to locate the school for the half-year en- suing, and to see that the patrons " provide the mas- ter's diet."

As the first town clerk was liberally educated, and was foremost in laying these first foundations of the school system of the town, which has ever since been, to a laudable extent, the pride of Groton, we give a sketch of him, as first given in the Connecticut Gazette in 1880, viz. :

"Among the noted historical characters that have arisen in or were identified with this town, that of John Davie, its first town clerk, afterwards Sir John Davie, is not the least. He was the son of Humphrey Davie, of Hartford, and graduated at Harvard Col- lege in 1681. He married a Hartford lady, the daughter of James Richards, of that colonial town, and she was sister of Governor Saltonstall's wife, and this Miss Caulkins conjectures was the reason why he purchased lands in New London, for we find him set- tled on a Groton farm which had been already culti- vated as early as 1693. His first child, Mary, was born at Poquonnoc, June 13, 1693. Six children in all were born on this Groton farm, three sons and three daughters ; for he writes with his own bold hand upon the town records, after giving the name and date of each, 'These were all born in the town now called Groton.' "

We learn these further facts from Miss Caulkins' history :

"In 1694, Davie was one of the landholders to whom the Assembly granted letters patent enlarging the territory of the New London settlement or colony. The same year he took a prominent part in building the second meeting-house in New London, being one of the building committee, which shows the activity of the man in public affairs. He had been previously appointed rate-collector and selectman for the East Side. He took a prominent part in the measures which resulted in the agreement to let the East Side become a separate township, by a vote passed in town-meeting Feb. 20, 1705; and at the Assembly, the same year, an act of incorporation was passed. After Mr. Davie had been town clerk about two years, and was one day hoeing corn on Poquonnoc plains in company with John Packer, in the midst of a strife as to which of them should prove the faster, sud- denly a messenger appeared at the end of the row

and inquired of the barefooted men, with their trous- ers rolled up, which was named Davie, and upon being told he was congratulated in these words: 'I salute you, Sir John Davie.' The messenger had been sent him by his brother-in-law, Governor Saltonstall, and tradition has it that the town clerk came out ahead of Packer, winning in the hoeing-match, and that he did not deign to speak to the new-comer until he had won the wager. This same John Packer afterwards, at Davie's request, visited his old friend the baronet in England, and they had a good time together.

" Mr. Davie was among the few liberally-educated men of that day that helped found the settlement and township of Groton, and left the impress of his cul- ture upon the community. He contributed freely to the building and temporal prosperity of the new church which arose at Centre Groton almost simulta- neously with the incorporation of the town, and aided in settling Mr. Barnard as the permanent school- teacher and the Rev. Mr. Woodbridge as their min- ister. Mr. Davie gave the Groton Church a silver service-set for the communion, and was one of the early benefactors of Yale College, and were he alive to-day it would be uncertain whether he would wear the crimson or the blue at the regattas between Har- vard and Yale. Possibly he would wear the crimson on one side for his Alma Mater, and the blue on the other for his foster-daughter. Sir John Davie soon went to England, and to his estates in Creedy, county of Devon, where he succeeded his uncle of the same name, but he never forgot his American relatives and friends, for he not only showed his beneficent feeling towards the school, the college, and the church, but through Governor Saltonstall he made gifts while living to his relatives in various colonies. The spirit of enterprise and zeal in the cause of education which animated the first town clerk seemed to have characterized all the first settlers and founders of the town."

The town, however, solemnly and earnestly, by vote in town-meeting, unanimously protested against the removal of the college from Saybrook to New Haven. At this time more than a generation had passed away since the first settlers came across the great Pequot River, and a new set of names began to take the place of the honest pioneers. We will here introduce the list of freemen, who were all permanent landholders, as we find them recorded, titles and all, on the town records, A.D. 1708: Capt. James Avery (at this time over sixty years old), Capt. James Morgan (died 1712), Capt. John Avery, Lieut. John Morgan, Mr. Ephraim Woodbridge, Mr. George Gere, Robert Gere, Zachariah Main, John Morgan, Jr., Sergt. Ne- hemiah Smith, James Morgan, Jr., William Morgan, Deacon John Seabury, James Avery, Jr., Sergt. Philip Bill, Lieut. Samuel Fish, Deacon Andrew Lester, John Bailey, Sergt. Richard Williams, Joshua Bill, John Burrows, John Williams, John Burrows, Jr., James Packer, John Avery, Jr., William Bailey,

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HISTORY OF NEW LONDON COUNTY, CONNECTICUT.

Ralph Stoddard, John Culver, William Stark, Ensign Samuel Avery, Josiah Haines, Joseph Bailey, Thomas Starr, Edward Avery, Ebenezer Avery, Jonathan Avery, Andrew Kenienm, Thomas Dunbar, Richard Packer, Lieut. John Fanning, Christopher Avery, Edward Spicer, Mr. John Allyn, Robert Allyn, Thomas Bailey, Jonathan Lester, Samuel Bill, Jona- than Starr, Joseph Culver, Samuel Lester, Gersham Rice, John Barnard, John Po, Ensign Luke Packer, William Williams, Richard Williams, Humphrey Da- vie, Edward Fanning, John Shaw, Jonas Williams, John Allyn, Robert Allyn, Jr., and Isaac Lamb.

In 1712 we find the following additional names : Carey Latham, Samuel Packer, Peter Crary, Samuel Whipple, Samuel Fish, Jr., William Leeds, Samuel Morgan, Samuel Avery, Jr., Nathaniel Avery, Wil- liam Bailey, John Bailey, Jr., Samuel Burrows, Rob- ert Burrows, Jeremy Burrows, Walter Budington, Na- thaniel Brown, Nathaniel Bellows, Walter Budington, Jr., Gideon Cobb, Robert Crary, Abraham Chester, John Cook, John Culver, Jr., Joseph Culver, Jr., James Culver, Andrew Davis, John Fanning, Jr., Edwin Fanning, Isaac Fox, Moses Fish, Isaac Gere, Jeremiah Gere, Edward Hemans, John Leeds, Jas- per Latham, John Latham, Joseph Latham, Samuel Morgan, Thomas Lamb, Samuel Newton, William Pool, Luke Perkins, Gersham Rice, Aaron Stark, William Stark, Jr., Stephen Stark, Benjamin Spring- er, Robert Stoddard, Jonathan Smith, Nicholas Treat, Daniel Tyler, Henry Williams, Stephen Williams, Peter Williams, Gabriel Woodmancy, Valentine Wightman, John Wells, and Joseph Wells.

During the admission of all these freemen Samuel Avery, Esq., was the moderator of the several town- meetings, and, since the return of John Davie to the old country, Nehemiah Smith town clerk. From the preceding list many of the families of Groton are still able to derive their direct descent. The population, it is evident, must have had a wholesome increase to account for the accession of so many landholders within the space of four or five years.

There seems to have been nothing very remarkable in the history of the town during the few years that followed. They were piping times of peace. They enjoyed an occasional bear-hunt in the region of Gungewamp, or followed a stray wolf into Candle- wood or Lantern Hill, or neighboring swamps. Foxes had always been plenty among these hills, and the town paid a remunerative bounty for their destrue- tion.

In the wars of the colonies with the foes of the mother-country Connecticut had borne her part, and Groton, always prompt in defense of the country and the honor of the State, had furnished her full quota. Her train-band captains and companies held them- selves ever ready to take the field where duty called or honor led them. They had a difficult problem to solve with reference to the remnant of the Pequot tribe of Indians, as we have had occasion to see.

Among the last of these was the controversy in re- spect to jurisdiction of the sequestered lands.

Capt. James Packer inherited this dispute from his father respecting the extent of his lands towards Noank. The dispute had been commenced before the removal of the Pequots, the Indians being parties, and was now continued by the town. Vote after vote was taken, and committee after committee was sent to settle it, but in vain. An appeal had to be made to the General Assembly, and A.D. 1735 a compromise was effected by disinterested commissioners appointed by the Legislature, who met at Capt. Packer's house. " This," says the historian, Caulkins, "was an occa- sion of great local interest. On the 5th of August, when the commissioners-Maj. Timothy Pierce, Mr. West, of Lebanon, and Sheriff Huntington, of Wind- ham-left New London on their way to view the contested premises, they were accompanied by forty mounted men from the town, and they found their train continually increasing as they proceeded. On the ground a large assembly had already convened. The neighboring farm-houses of Smiths, Burrows, Fish, Niles, etc., were filled to overflowing with guests. This is mentioned as exhibiting a character- istic of the times." Capt. James Packer, the principal actor in this affair, was then honorably acquitted of any fault and his proper bounds fixed. He was a large land-owner, and a militia captain, selectman, representative in the Assembly, etc. He was, unfor- tunately, in extreme old age burnt to death in his barn, which was consumed A.D. 1765.

Norwich had formerly bounded the town on the northwest, and in 1734 a committee, consisting of En- sign William Morgan, Jonathan Starr, and Luke Per- kins, was appointed and empowered to settle the boundary, which was not fully effected until four or five years later. About the same time Messrs. Samnel Allyn and Dr. Dudley Woodbridge were appointed to go before the General Assembly to ask for and se- cure a ferry across the Thames River from Ralph Stoddard's, in Groton, to John Comstock's, in New London. This resulted in the establishment of Gale's Ferry.

The road from Centre Groton to the meeting-house, centre of the North Society, was completed in 1735, and the Flanders highway, from the foot of Fort Hill northerly to Stark's Hill, in 1748.

The town had a curious way of distributing its al- lotment of the colonial statutes. The number re- ceived from the colonial authorities was twenty-two, and the vote for their distribution gave one to any freeholder whose list amounted to one thousand pounds; but any freeholder of less than the sum named could have one as long as any were left undis- tributed, provided he and his neighbors whose com- bined lists amounted to that sum united in asking for him a copy ; so that every neighborhood could have access to a law book, to be held in possession by the favored custodian until the town otherwise di-

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rected. Such a distribution of the compilation of A.D. 1750 was carried out in 1752.

After the more ravenous beasts ceased to trouble the settlers they frequently offered bounties to en- courage the destruction of mischievous animals and birds. We refer to the record. In 1715 we find the following :

" Whereas, ye money ye law allows for killing wolves is found by com- mon experience to be too little, for, commonly there are employed twenty or thirty men, who often spend two or three days about it, and then sometimes swamp them and do not kill them. Such things ye inhabi- tants of other places have considered, and added considerable money (bounty) to what the law allows.

" Therefore, the inhabitants of this town are desired to add ten shillings for killing a wolf, and three shillings for swamping a wolf or wolves; but six shillings if he be killed ; and three shillings for killing a grown fox or wild cat, or eighteen pence for a young one, and two pence a head for crows ; and a half penny for black birds, which was voted."

In 1739 five shillings were offered for every twenty old crows, and three shillings and fourpence for every twenty blackbirds. In 1747 five shillings per head were offered for old foxes, three shillings per head for young ones, and sixpence per dozen for gray squir- rels. In all cases the heads were to be shown to at least two selectmen, while those officials and their families were prohibited from obtaining bounties on their own account. No small Swartwouts or Star Route speculators were to be encouraged in those days.

We have alluded to the building of the first meet- ing-house at Centre Groton. The town-records con- cerning the minister's rates and the seating of the people in their place of worship are copious. One agrees to fit up a particular seat if he has permission. Here is a sample vote in answer to a petition dated 1712. The petition of Deacon Morgan, Deacon Sea- bury, and others was, "That the town would be pleased to grant to them ye hinder short seat and a part of ye long seat in ye northwest corner of ye meeting-house to make a pew for our wives, and in so doing you will oblige your friends to serve."

Rev. Ephraim Woodbridge's claims or petitions for an exchange of lots or a grant of more land, or whatever they happened to be, were nearly always courteously granted, and these benevolent acts show the estima- tion in which their first pastor was held. His salary at first was eighty pounds a year, and was afterwards increased to ninety pounds. There was then a sepa- rate collector for the minister's rates, and his annual receipt is found written in full and signed with his own hand on the town records. As there is a separate paper on ecclesiastical matters, this sketch touches only upon such as pertain to the town. And here we may say that though Groton was subject to the minister's rates, like other towns, and did not take kindly to the interference of the State in church mat- ters, there was less friction than in most other towns, because the standing order, with such leaders as the Rev. John Owen, were men of liberal sentiment, and showed sympathy for those that were, in addition to church rates, conscientiously supporting a church of their choice by voluntary contributions. The Bap-

tists early took root in the soil, establishing their church half a year before the town was incorporated, and the two denominations grew up harmoniously together.

We have already introduced the first town clerk, and noticed John Davie when he left to take posses- sion of his estate. Justice Nehemiah Smith, as he was called, being a magistrate, was chosen as his successor, as will be seen in the table of town clerks. He was also a townsman, and the selectmen or towns- men generally met to transact business at the town clerk's office. In 1718, Samuel Avery was chosen town clerk, and held the office till Lieut. Christopher Avery succeeded him; and when he got to be a col- onel, then his son, Christopher Avery, Jr., took it.

He was succeeded, as the table will show, in 1768 by William Avery, who also held the office of select- man and moderator as well. And as we are naming officers, it may be interesting to posterity to know who successively held these offices of trust. Commencing with the organization of the town, they succeeded, as townsmen or selectmen, about as follows, the figures denoting the number of times they held the same office or were one of the five, and sometimes seven, selectmen, their quaint titles being retained, viz. : Samuel Avery (2), Capt. James Avery (19),-father and son,-Justice Nehemiah Smith (6), John Davie (1), Capt. John Avery (5), Capt. John Morgan (5), Lieut. Samuel Fish (8), John Allyn, Sr. (1), Thomas Starr (3), Capt. James Morgan (8), William Latham (2), Samuel Whipple (2), Zachariah Main (1), Josiah Haines (1), Robert Gere (1), Ralph Stoddard (1), Ensign Philip Bill (1), Capt. James Packer (5), John Bailey (1), Christopher Avery (6), John Bur- rows (2), Capt. Jonathan Starr (14), William Morgan (9), Capt. Moses Fish (8), Joshua Bill (3), Daniel El- dredge (3), Thomas Chipman (2), Ben. Adam Gallup (17), Luke Perkins (12), Deacon Humphrey Morgan (4), Capt. William Williams (4), Col. Ebenezer Avery (6), Robert Allyn (4), Capt. Nathan Smith (5), Capt. John Chester (1), Ebenezer Allyn (1), Robert Gere (10), Capt. John Burrows (7), Lieut. John Stanton (1), Capt. Joseph Morgan (7), Solomon Morgan (3), Silas Deane (4), Deacon John Hurlbut (6), Hubbard Burrows (4), Benjamin Avery (2), Nathan Avery (1), Capt. Jabez Smith (2), Dr. Dudley Woodbridge (1), Nathan Niles (6), Capt. Jasper Latham (1), Ensign Thomas Mumford, Jr. (9), Ensign Jonathan Latham (5), Benjamin Gere (2), Lieut. Thomas Fish (5), Simeon Avery (5), Capt. Ralph Stoddard (4), Na- thaniel Palmer (1), Capt. Joseph Starr (4), Col. Na- than Gallup (3), John Spicer (3), Capt. Jonathan Fish (3), Nathan Crary (2), Capt. Daniel Williams (3), David Avery (2), Capt. Ebenezer Ledyard (5), Solomon Perkins (2), Ensign Joseph Packer (3), Capt. Stephen Billings (4), Amos Gere (2), Col. William Ledyard (1), Thomas Ap Niles (1), John Bellows (1), Capt. Thomas Fanning (2), Samuel Allyn (2), Daniel Avery (3), Isaac Gere (3), Deacon Peter Avery (4),

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HISTORY OF NEW LONDON COUNTY, CONNECTICUT.

Lieut. Robert Allyn (4), Capt. Elijah Avery (1), Amos Prentice (2), Elisha Williams (1), Robert Gere, 2d (3), Thomas Avery (4), Nathaniel Niles (2), Christo- pher Morgan (2), Ensign Isaac Avery (3). This brings us to the close of the Revolutionary war.

CHAPTER XL.

GROTON-(Continued).

WAR OF THE REVOLUTION.

DURING this period a choice selection from these names will be found upon the roll of the Assembly from this town. We will hasten to show the patriotic part Groton also took in the agitation which preceded the battles of Concord, Lexington, and Bunker Hill, and the heroic action of her sons at Bunker Hill and during the entire war for independence, culminating in the battle on Groton Heights. We have already said that the town of Groton was settled by men and women that took an interest in the cause of educa- tion, and their successors, at the dawn of the Revo- lution, took a deep interest in the progress of liberty. They viewed with just indignation every measure of repression adopted by Great Britain tending to cur- tail independence of thought and action among the colonies. The presence of such men as Ebenezer, John, and William Ledyard, Silas Deane, Thomas Mumford, and the young men of the Avery, Morgan, Gallup, Allyn, Gere, Packer, Burrows, Billings, Fan- ning, Niles, Williams, Fish, Starr, Latham, Perkins, Stoddard, Hurlbut, Chester, Eldredge, and other families in the frequent town-meetings of Groton accounts for the bold and patriotic spirit which every- where animates their public meetings. To begin with the year 1774, when the colonies were greatly excited by successive acts of Parliament, and especially by the act of Parliament which shut up the port of Bos- ton, we copy the records, mostly verbatim, to justify the claim we make of enlightened patriotism in our country towns, and of this town in particular. At a town-meeting held in Groton on Monday, the 20th day of June, A.D. 1774, William Williams, Esq., moderator,-

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History of New London county, Connecticut : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Part 103

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton) Publication date: 1882 Publisher: Philadelphia : J.W. Lewis & Co. Number of Pages: 1317

Author: Hurd, D. Hamilton (Duane Hamilton)
Publication date: 1882
Publisher: Philadelphia : J.W. Lewis & Co.
Number of Pages: 1317