History of New London county, Connecticut : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Part 66

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 66

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Richard Kirby, adm. 1721.

Thomas Knowles, adm. 1710.

Joseph Knowlton, accidentally killed, 1718; “ no estate but two cows."

Mary, daughter of Thomas Knowlton, a member of the church in 1709.

In 1709, Samuel Ladd, from Haverhill, Suffolk Co., Mass., purchased land of David Hartshorn, "on the hill beyond Thomas Hide's farm." Adm. 1710.

Nathaniel Ladd was selectman in 1721, but in 1729 had removed from the town.

David Ladd, another earlier settler at the West Farms, married Mary Waters. His family, and that of Capt. Jacob Hyde, were linked together by a triple marriage of their children. The three brothers, Sam- uel, Ezekiel, and Joseph Ladd, married the three sisters, Hannah, Ruth, and Silence Hyde, both par- ties in the natural order of seniority, and each of the sisters at the age of nineteen years.

Ebenezer Lamb married, May 6, 1690, Mary Arm- strong.

David, Isaac, and John Lamb were residents about 1718. John died Aug. 16, 1727.

Isaac Lawrence owned the church covenant in 1700; was adm. 1702. Isaac Lawrence, Jr., had four children baptized at dates from 1711 to 1718.

Richard Lee, adm. 1705; died Aug. 7, 1713 ; left widow, Sarah, and nine children, the oldest son, Thomas, forty years of age; Richard, thirty-four ; Joseph, thirty-two ; and Benjamin, thirty.

Samuel Loomer, of the parish of New Concord, adm. Sept. 13, 1726.

Cyprian, a younger brother of Rev. Benjamin Lord, settled in Norwich about 1720, and married, in 1725, Elizabeth Backus.

Low. The only person of this name found on the records is David, adm. 1709 ; died Feb. 10, 1710, aged twenty-three. His estate was settled by Thomas Lef- fingwell. The low semicircular headstone that marks his grave is one of the oldest in the town plot ceme- tery.

Ebenezer Lyon, 1722.

" Abial Marshall, of Norwich, and Abiah Hough, of New London, were married Nov. 18, 1708." Their oldest son, the second Abial Marshall, died in Bozrah, Dec. 1, 1799.

John Meach is on a list of 1698.

Ebenezer Metcalf, from Dedham; married, in 1702, Hannah, daughter of Joshua Abel, of the West

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Farms, and had five children baptized, extending to 1711. He was on the roll of inhabitants in 1718, but removed to Lebanon, and there died Nov. 5, 1755, aged seventy-six. He was a descendant of Michael Metcalf, who had lived at Norwich, in England, but emigrated to this country with his wife and nine children in 1637 and settled at Dedham.

Stephen Merrick married Mercy Bangs, Dec. 28, 1671, he being twenty-five and she twenty years of age. Mercy and Apphia Bangs were twin daughters of Edward Bangs, of Plymouth colony, and were married the same day,-Apphia probably to John Knowles.

Stephen Merrick came to Norwich about 1672. He was a constable in 1681, and appointed county mar- shal or sheriff in 1685.

Grants of land were made to William Moore in 1677 and 1682. He had land also at Potapaug and "over the river at a place called Major's Pond." He married the relict of Thomas Harwood in August, 1677, and twenty years later removed to Windham.

Morgan. Two of this name are found early at Norwich and left families there, William and Peter. William was probably son of William and Margaret (Avery) Morgan, of Groton (born 1697).

Peter was a son of John Rose-Morgan, of New London, born in 1712. His wife was Elizabeth Whit- more, of Middletown, and his house stood under the hill, upon the site afterwards built upon by Rev. Joseph Strong, and now the residence of D. F. Gul- liver, M.D. Peter Morgan removed to the Great Plain.

Moseley, or Maudsley. The earliest notice of this name is found in the baptismal record :

" Increase and Sarah, children of Increase Mauds- ley, bap. 6 : 9 : 1715," that is, Nov. 6, 1715.

Increase Moseley, the father, died in 1731.

Increase, the son, born May 18, 1712, married, in 1735, Deborah Tracy, of Windham, and removed about 1740 to Woodbury, settling in that part of the town which is now Washington. He there sustained various offices of trust and honor, representing the town in the Legislature for some fifteen successive years, but removed to Clarendon, Vt., in 1781, and there died May 2, 1795.

His son, the third Increase Moseley in direct suc- cession, probably born also in Norwich, settled in Southbury, and was a colonel of one of the Connec- ticut regiments during the Revolutionary war.

Rev. Peabody Moseley, son of the first Increase, was born at Norwich in 1724. He was a Baptist clergyman, but about the year 1780 joined the Shaker society of New Lebanon.

Elisha Munsell, 1720. Elisha, Jr., 1721. The latter was on the list of Separatists in 1748.

James Norman, adm. Dec. 20, 1715. He was cap- tain of a vessel, kept also a shop of merchandise, and in 1717 was licensed to keep a house of entertain- ment. He died June 28, 1743.

John Ormsby, adm. Dec. 20, 1715; died July 11, 1728. His relict, Susannalı, died in 1752.

Joseph, adm. 1720; wife Abigail united with the church in 1721.

Daniel Palmeter, adm. 1724.

The inventory of Joseph Pasmore, of Norwich, was exhibited in 1711, comprising a Bible, psalm-book, sword, articles of apparel, and twelve acres of land.

Benjamin Peck, adm. 1700. The church record gives the name ; of eight children of " brother Benja- min Peck" that were baptized from 1703 to 1718. He died in 1742. Joseph, his eldest son, born in 1706, was father of the late Capt. Bela Peck, of Nor- wich.

The ancestor of this family was Henry Peck, of New Haven, whose twin sons, Joseph and Benjamin, were born Sept. 6, 1647.

John Pember, adm. 1722, son of John and Agnes Pember, of New London. He married in 1716, Mary, daughter of Thomas Hyde, and settled at West Farms, where he died in 1783, aged eighty-five.

Samuel Pettis, adm. 1727.

George Phillips, adm. 1726.

Jonathan and Ebenezer Pierce, adm. 1712.

Elizabeth, wife of John Pike, baptized Aug. 5, 1711; son John baptized 1712, and other children onward to 1723.

Samuel Pitcher, supposed to be a son of Andrew, of Dorchester, had son Benjamin baptized in Norwich, March 20, 1714. He was one of the selectmen in 1721, but in 1735 removed to Woodbury, Conn. A part of the family remained, and the name has been continued in the town to the present day.

Matthew Polly, 1719, probably from Woburn.

Abigail, wife of Daniel Polly, died June 8, 1725. Joshua Prior, a householder in 1733.

Samuel Raymond, of Norwich, and Lydia Birchard, of Lebanon, were united in marriage March 6, 1717. They had sons Samuel and Daniel, the former born Dec. 25, 1720.

Nathaniel Richards, an inhabitant in 1716.

Andrew, adm. 1727.

Samuel Roberts, 1678, son of Hugh Roberts, an early settler in New London. He came to Norwich as a house-carpenter in company with John Hough. These two men were often associated in work, and called themselves near kinsmen, the mother of each being a daughter of Hugh Calkins. The first school- house in Norwich of which we have any notice was built by John Hough and Samuel Roberts, and paid for in land in 1683. They were the master-builders of many early houses in the town plot,-the regular, substantial houses that followed the temporary habita- tions of the first encampment.

Samuel, son of Samuel Roberts, was born May 9, 1688.

Theophilus Rogers, 1720; a native of Lynn, Mass., and reputed to be a descendant of John Rogers, the Smithfield martyr. He had studied physic and sur-

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gery in Boston, and settled at Norwich in the practice of his profession. He died Sept. 29, 1753. Two of his sons, Ezekiel and Theophilus, were physicians, and two others, Uriah and Col. Zabdiel, were conspic- uous as active citizens and patriots of the Revolu- tionary period.

Thomas Rood was an early settler upon the out- lands of the township. His wife, Sarah, died in March, 1668, and he in 1672. Nine children are re- corded, the dates of birth ranging from 1649 to 1666, but the place of nativity is not given.

Thomas, Micah, Samuel, and George Rood are on the roll of inhabitants in 1702. Micah obtained some local notoriety on account of a peculiar variety of apple that he brought to market, which was called, from him, the " Mike apple," and has since been more extensively propagated. It is an early species, has a fair outside, an excellent flavor, and each individual apple exhibits somewhere in the pulp a red speck, like a tinge of fresh blood. Several fanciful legends have been contrived to account for this peculiarity. Micah Rood died in 1728, aged about seventy-six.

In 1693 the proprietors granted to George Rose- brough "three or four acres of land, where his house stands." No other reference to the name has been observed.

Jonathan and Nathaniel Rudd, brothers, came from Saybrook. The former settled east of the She- tucket, and the latter at the West Farms. It is prob- able that they were sons of that Jonathan Rudd who was married at Bride Brook in the winter of 1646-47.

Nathaniel Rudd married, April 16, 1685, Mary, daughter of John Post. His homestead was in that part of the West Farms which is now Bozrah. He died in April, 1727, leaving an estate valued at £689.

Daniel Rudd, one of the sons of Nathaniel, born in 1710, married for his second wife (July 1, 1745) Mary Metcalf, a daughter of the Rev. Joseph Met- calf, of Falmouth, Me. . She had previously been living with her relatives in Lebanon, to which place she came from her far-off home, according to tradi- tion, in a three-days' journey, riding on a pillion be- hind Capt. James Fitch. Her son, Daniel Rudd, Jr., born June 10, 1754, married Abigail Allen, of Mont- ville, who died Jan. 20, 1857, wanting only a few months of being one hundred years of age. Lucy Rudd, one of the daughters of this couple, married, first, Capt. Henry Caldwell, of the United States Marines, and second, Maj .- Gen. Henry Burbeck, an . officer of the Revolutionary war and of that of 1812. Gen. Burbeck died at New London, Oct. 2, 1848, aged ninety-five. His relict, Mrs. Lucy Burbeck, is still living. It is a singular coincidence, occurring, it is presumed, very rarely in the history of families, that Mrs. Burbeck's father, Daniel Rudd, and her husband, Henry Burbeek, were born on the same day, June 10, 1754.

Sabin, often upon early records written Sabiens. Isaac, adm. 1720.

Thomas Sluman married, December, 1668, Sarah, daughter of Thomas Bliss; constable in 1680; died 1683, leaving a son Thomas and five daughters. His relict married Solomon Tracy. Thomas Sluman (2) was on the roll of 1702.

Mark Smallbent died Dec. 26, 1696 ; left two young daughters; estate, £143.

Andrew, son of Philip Spalding, was baptized July 15, 1722.

Starr. Samuel, son of Jonathan, of Groton, mar- ried Ann, daughter of Capt. Caleb Bushnell, in 1727, and settled in Norwich.

Amos Stickney, 1725.

Thomas Stoddard, a resident in the parish of New Concord, 1708; present at a church-meeting in 1714.

Samuel Story and wife were received into the church in 1722. They came undoubtedly from Ipswich. The inventory of his estate, taken in 1726, has among its items " a wood-lot in Ipswich." He left a numerous family : five sons who were living are noticed in his will, the children of Ephraim, deceased, and six mar- ried daughters, viz., Elizabeth Hidden, Mary An- drews, Dorothy Day, Hannah Nolten, Anna Proctor, and Margaret Choate.

John, son of John Swetland, was baptized in 1708; another son, Joseph, in 1710. The family, in all probability, dwelt near the western bounds of the town, within the present area of Salem.

Joseph Tenny, adm. 1723.

Thomas Todd died Aug. 29, 1727. He owned one- third of a sloop called the "Norwich." His relict, Martha, married a Lathrop.

Ebenezer Thomas, adm. 1727. He owned lands in Duxbury, and was probably son of Jeremiah Thomas, of Marshfield, born Nov. 1, 1703. Ebenezer, Simeon, and Thomas L. Thomas, active men of business during the latter part of the century, were his sons. He died Oct. 16, 1774.

Mary, wife of Joseph Tubbs, received adult bap- tism in 1718.

Jonathan Walker, adm. 1722.

Robert Warren, a resident in 1713; selectman in 1721.

John Way, adm. 1722.

John Welsh, adm. 1705; died 1728; estate, £333; inventory presented by his son John.

Daniel White, adm. April 30, 1723. He married Elizabeth Ensworth, June 10, 1723, and died Sept. 9, 1727, leaving a wife and three small children. Es- tate, £407.

Jonathan Whitaker, 1710. He married, in 1718, Abigail Lambert.

Daniel Wightman, 1727.

Joseph Williams, adm. 1702; Charles, of Preston, 1687.

John Willoughby, 1718.

Joseph, adm. Dec. 5, 1721. He afterwards pur- chased a farm in the North Parish of New London.

Thomas Wood, a resident in 1716.

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Ebenezer, adm. Dec. 2, 1718; married Mary Rudd, March 12, 1718.

Isaac Woodworth, adm. 1705; died April 1, 1714, leaving wife, Lydia, and nine children between the ages of eight and twenty-seven.

Moses, adm. 1719 ..

CHAPTER XXI.

NORWICH-(Continued).

The Landing-Weequaw's Hill-Early Votes-Ship-yards-Highways- Chelsea-The Parade-Pioneer Homes-Old Settlers-Hotels-Streets -Commerce-Early Business Men-The First Druggist, Dr. Daniel Lathrop.

FOR seventy years after the settlement of the town what is now the city of Norwich was technically a " sheep-walk," used by the inhabitants of the eastern part of the town for pasturing sheep and cattle. The location was first known as Weequaw's Hill, Rocky Point, and Fort Hill. Miss Caulkins says,-

The reservation extended from No-man's Acre to the mouth of the Shetucket, and was inclosed with a general fence. A cartway through it was allowed, and in 1680 "a pair of bars" connected with this cartway was maintained by the town, near the She- tucket, and another pair below the house of John Reynolds. The whole space between Yantic Cove and the Shetucket was a wilderness of rocks, woods, and swamps, with only here and there a cow-path or a sheep-track around the hills, where the trunk of a fallen tree thrown over a brook or chasm served in lieu of a bridge. Not only in the spring floods, but in common heavy rains a great part of East Chelsea and all the lower, or Water Street, up to the ledge of rocks on which the buildings upon the north side of that street are based, were overflowed; and even in the dry season these parts of the town were little better than swamps. What are now only moist places and slender rills were then ponds and broad, impetuous brooks.

In January, 1634, a committee was appointed to lay out and bound for the town's use sufficient land for a public landing-place and a suitable highway connected with it, after which they passed the follow- ing restrictive decree :

April, 1684. " It is agreed and voated that the rest of the ungranted and unlayed out land at the mouth of Showtuck shall be and remain for the benefit of cattle-watering, and never to be disposed of without the consent of eight or ten of the familys at the east end of the towne."

It was not long, however, before this act became a dead letter. Sites at the water's edge were soon in great demand for commercial purposes. These were prudently doled out by the town in plots of three or four rods each. In 1686, Capt. James Fitch, the first of these grantees, was allowed sufficient land near the water-side to accommodate a wharfand warehouse. Not long afterwards, Capt. Caleb Bushnell obtained a simi-

lar grant. These facilities were near the mouth of Yantic Cove. It was here that the wharfing, building, and commercial enterprise of Norwich Landing be- gan.

1692. A committee appointed by the town to go with John Elderkin . and to state a highway to the old Landing-place, with conveniency also for a warehouse.

October, 1694. Mr. Mallat, a French gentleman, desiring liberty of the town that he might build a vessel, or vessels, somewhere upon our river, the town grant the said Mr. Mallat liberty to build, and also grant him the liberty of the common on the east side of Showtucket River to cut timber for building.

Mallat's ship-yard is supposed to have been at the Point. It was not long occupied, and the fee of course reverted to the town.

In 1707 a vote was passed of the following em- phatic tenor :

"No more land to be granted at the salt water, and no way shut up that leads to the salt water."

The first masters of vessels at the landing of whom we obtain any knowledge were Capts. Kelley and Norman. These, in 1715, were engaged in the Bar- badoes trade.

May 11, 1715. Capt. Kelley in the Norwich sloop sailed for Barbadoes. Sept. 8. Capt. Kelley sailed for Barbadoes.

Dec. 13, 1716. Capt. Norman sailed.1

Capt. Kelley very soon established a regular ship- yard at the Landing, the town granting him the ne- cessary facilities.

Jan. 10, 1716-7. Joseph Kelley, shipwright, has free liberty to build vessels on the Point, where he is now building, the town to have the use of his wharf.

[This grant was not revoked till 1751.]

The same year Caleb Bushnell applied for a situa- tion by the water-side convenient for building vessels, which was granted by the following vote :

Dec. 3, 1717. The town grants to Caleb Bushnell 20 feet square upon ye water upon the west side of the rockie Point at ye Landing-place.

Between 1721 and 1724, similar grants of "twenty feet square on the west side of Rockie Point" were made to Simon Lothrop, Joshua and James Hunting- ion, and Daniel Tracy, a sufficiency for the town's use being reserved on which they were not to encroach. These were all enterprising young men, just entering into business. Simon Lothrop afterwards purchased the Elderkin rights on Yantic Cove and at the falls.

April 20, 1723. The town grants liberty to Capt. Caleb Bushnell to set up and maintain two sufficient cart-gates across the highway that goeth to the Little fort.

Feb. 25, 1724. Voted to build a town wharf at the Landing-place.

Liberty is granted to Lient. Simon Lothrop to build a wharf at the Landing-place at his own charge, provided it shall be free to all mortals.

1734. Permission granted to Lient. Simon Lothrop to build a ware- house on the side hill opposite his dwelling-house, 30 feet by 20, to hold the same during the town's pleasure.

The limited extent of these grants shows that they were highly prized, and that but few such privileges could be obtained. A narrow margin of level land at

1 Diary kept at New London.

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HISTORY OF NEW LONDON COUNTY, CONNECTICUT.

the base of water washed cliffs .comprised the whole accommodation.

With the exception of these footholds upon the water's edge, the land lay in common. Along the cove and around the falls the woods and waters were reeking with rank life, both animal and vegetable. The rock ledges were the haunts of innumerable ser- pents; the shores were populons with water-fowl, the river with shoals of fish. The young people from the farms around Norwich, when haying was over, came in parties to the Landing to wander over the hills, eat oysters, and take a trip down the river in canoes or sail-boats.

In 1718 there was a division of proprietary lands called the forty-acre division. In 1726 the undivided lands that remained were mainly comprised in two sheep-walks. A public meeting was called in which the names of the proprietors of each were distinctly declared and recorded, in order to prevent, if possible, all future "strifts and lawsuits." The East Sheep- walk, of nine hundred acres, more or less, was divided into shares of twenty acres each, and ratified and con- firmed to forty-two proprietors, mentioned by name, or to those who claimed under them. The West Sheep-walk, by estimation seven hundred acres, was in like manner divided and confirmed to thirty-seven proprietors.

Rev. John Woodward and Rev. Benjamin Lord were admitted on the footing of original proprietors, as were also the representatives of the carliest class of accepted inhabitants, viz .: Bushnell, Elderkin, Roath, and Rood of the east end, Abel and Arm- strong of the west. To these were added Moses Fargo of the west and Edward King of the cast, cach al- lowed a half-share, making seventy-nine in all, who were acknowledged as representatives of the original grantees of the town plot. From this division it was understood that farmers out of the town plot, and all persons not claimants under the first grantces, were excluded.

Israel Lothrop and James Huntington were the town agents in making the division of the East Sheep- walk. The lots extended along the water from the Shetucket ferry to the cove, reserving a highway through them two rods wide. A second tier was laid out in the rear of these, and so on. Each share was divided into tenths, and the tenths into eighths, and distributed apparently by lot. It is expressed in the records by making a pitch, as thus : "Capt. Bushnell made his pitch for his portion of the sheep-walk" at such a place.

The titles to land in this part of Norwich are de- rived from these forty-two proprietors of the cast end, and the dates begin at 1726. After this division houses and inhabitants increased rapidly, and in the course of a few years Rocky Point became a flourish- ing hamlet and trading-post, called in common par- lance The Landing, but gradually acquiring the name of New Chelsey, or Chelsea Society.

The earliest householders at the Landing of whose residence there we find any certain account were Daniel Tracy, Benajah Bushnell, and Nathaniel Backus. A little later Capt. Joseph Tracy and Capt. Benajah Leffingwell were substantial inhabitants, and Caleb Whitney kept a public-house. Boating was brisk in the river, and small vessels were built and sent away for sale.

Among those who were efficient in opening avenues of trade and bringing business to the new port, nonc were more conspicuous than Capt. John Williams and Capt. Joshua Huntington. The former resided with his family at Poquetannock, and the latter in the town plot, but each had a wharf and warehouse at the Landing, and here was their place of business. Capt. Huntington occupied the Point, near Kelley's ship-yard. It was by heirship from him that this lo- cality went into the Bill family, Capt. Ephraim Bill having married his only daughter, Lydia.

Great are the changes that have been made around the water-line of Norwich port. All the sharp angles and projecting rocks, the trickling streams and gul- lies, have disappeared. Central wharf spreads out far in advance of the old town wharf and the water- line where Fitch and Bushnell had their first conven- iences ; and the granite ridge at whose base Kelley built his coasting craft, and the Huntingtons, Bills, and others had their warehouses, has been leveled to a platform occupied by the freight depot and other accommodations of the railroad.

The division into freeholds gave a powerful impe- tus to the growth of the Landing. Trade became suddenly the presiding genius of the place. Those merchants who had been so fortunate as to obtain situations upon the water's edge entered at once into commercial pursuits. From a report prepared by au- thority in Connecticut, to be laid before the Lords Commissioners for Trade and Plantations, probably before 1730, we learn that four sloops were at that time owned in Norwich and engaged in the West India and coasting trade, viz. : "Martha and Eliza- beth," forty tons; "Success," forty tons; "Olive Branch," twenty-five tons ; "Mary," twenty tons.1

Not long afterwards the Norwich traders sent a sloop and a schooner to Ireland. As these we suppose to have been their first adventures across the ocean, every item relating to them is interesting. They probably sailed in company, but the schooner re- turned without her consort.

"7 Nov. 1732 .- The Norwich scooner, Nath: Shaw master, came in from Ireland."-Hempstead's Diary.

The sloop was under the charge of Capt. Absalom King, and appears to have been owned by himself

1 Hinman's Antiquities, p. 352. The date of the document is not given, but it was undoubtedly between 1720 and 1730. The whole number of vessels in the colony was forty-two, the largest of which was a brigan- tine of eighty tons, owned at New London. They were mostly small sloops. New Haven and New London had each five ; Hartford and Nor- wich four.

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and those who sailed with him. They sold the craft in Ireland, probably in accordance with the plan of their voyage, as vessels were then frequently built in the river, where timber was plenty, and sent else- where for a market. The crew embarked for home in the schooner with Capt. Shaw, but during the voy- age five out of the fifteen persons on board died of the smallpox. Among the victims was Capt. King, who died in mid-ocean, Sept. 3, 1732.

Capt. Absalom King came to Norwich from South- old, L. I., and had been for several years in the West India trade. His wife was Hannah, daughter of John Waterman. His youthful widow married, Nov. 8, 1733, Benedict Arnold.

This is the earliest notice that we find at Norwich of Benedict Arnold, a Rhode Island emigrant, whose name, when afterwards borne by his son, became synonymous with treason and apostasy. No intima- tion is given of the causes that brought him to Nor- wich, but he appears to have been at first a seaman, and it is not improbable that some connection with Capt. King in that capacity first introduced him to the town and afterwards obtained for him the favor- able notice of the bereaved wife. He and his brother Oliver are both distinguished by the title of captain.

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History of New London county, Connecticut : with biographical sketches of many of its pioneers and prominent men, Part 66

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