USA > Connecticut > New London County > Norwich > History of Norwich, Connecticut: from its possession by the Indians, to the year 1866 > Part 41
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Dear Madame,
Your Obed't & most
Mrs. Knox, - Boston.
Humble Serv't, B. ARNOLD.
It should excite but little surprise that an ambitious, extravagant man, with fiery passions and very little balance of moral principle, should betray his friends and plunge desperately into treason. In this case it might almost have been expected and foreseen. Yet the dark shades in Arnold's character have doubtless been exaggerated, and the sum of his misdeeds needlessly enlarged. For instance, it has often been said that at the burning of New London, he accepted the hospitality of a lady, who, trusting to a former friendly acquaintance with him, ventured to remain in the invaded town, and that he ordered the flaming torch to be applied to the premises as he rose from the dinner-table. No such incident is known to have occurred. Arnold dined that day with some old shipping friends of tory proclivities, no lady being present, and though the house was afterwards burnt, it was by the spread of the flames from other quar- ters, and not by Arnold's order.
Benedict Arnold died at Brampton, England, June 20, 1801, aged 60. His second wife was Margaret, daughter of Edward Shippen, Chief Jus- tice of Pennsylvania. She survived her husband, and died in London, Ang. 24, 1804, aged 44.
Capt. Oliver Arnold, of Norwich, the uncle of Benedict, died in 1781. He had long been an invalid, and left his family with but little for their support. To these relatives Benedict was always liberal, and even after
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his exile, made them occasional remittances. The oldest son, Freegift, he assisted in obtaining a good classical education, and designed him for one of the professions ; but the young man joined himself to the Sons of Liberty, entered into the naval service, under Paul Jones, and after fighting bravely, came home with a ruined constitution, to languish and die. The other son, Oliver, had a peculiar talent for making extempora- neous rhymes, which seemed to flow from him without premeditation, in all the ease of common speech, so that his casual remarks and answers to questions would often run in a jingling measure. Many of these familiar rhymes were formerly current in the neighborhood. They were mostly of a local and transient character. An example of more general interest, which has been often quoted, is the following.
In a bookseller's shop in New Haven, Oliver Arnold was introduced to Joel Barlow, who had just then acquired considerable notoriety by the publication of an altered edition of Watts' Psalms and Hymns. Barlow asked for a specimen of his talent; upon which the wandering poet imme- diately repeated the following stanza :
" You've proved yourself a sinful cre'tur'; You've murdered Watts, and spoilt the metre ; You've tried the Word of God to alter, And for your pains deserve a halter."
Oliver was also a sailor and a patriot, and cordially despised the course taken by his cousin Benedict, in betraying his country.
In his habits he was roving and unsettled, absenting himself from home in long and vagrant rambles, from one of which he never returned. Ac- cording to report, he was found dead by the wayside on a road little fre- quented, in the northern part of New York.
Three daughters of Capt. Oliver Arnold, sisters of Freegift and Oliver the rhymester, died aged, but unmarried, the last of the family in Nor- wich. The brothers Benedict and Oliver, with their wives, and six child- ren of the former and four of the latter, were interred near the center of the old burial-lot, but mostly without inscribed grave-stones.
GEN. JABEZ HUNTINGTON.
The Committee or Council of Safety, appointed to aid the Governor in the recess of the Assembly, entered upon its duties in May, 1775. It consisted at first of nine persons, of whom three were Huntingtons from Norwich, viz., Hon. Jabez Huntington, an assistant, or member of the upper house ; Samuel Huntington, Judge of the Superior Court for New London county ; and Benjamin Huntington, Esq., a prominent lawyer, and then representative from Norwich. At the same time, another Jabez
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Huntington was sheriff of Windham county, and another Benjamin Hunt- · ington was the town clerk in Norwich.
Gen. Jabez Huntington was the son of Joshua, who has been heretofore mentioned as the first considerable merchant of Norwich, and the only one of his sons that left any posterity. He was born Aug. 2, 1719. His mother was Hannalı, daughter of Jabez Perkins. He graduated at Yale College in 1741, and soon afterward entered largely into commercial pur- suits, securing a handsome fortune, principally by trade with the West Indies.
He commenced his patriotic career in 1750, when he was chosen to the Colonial Assembly. For several years he presided over the lower house as speaker, and afterwards was a member of the council. On the break- ing out of the Revolutionary war, he lost nearly half of his property, either by capture of his vessels, or from other circumstances connected with that calamitous period.
In the early part of the war, he was an active member of the Council of Safety, one of the two Major-Generals of the militia, and after the death of General Wooster in May, 1777, he was appointed sole Major- General of the State forces. This was an arduous position, demanding wisdom, integrity, and a mind fertile in expedients and resources. It required his constant attention, and although Gen. Huntington never took the field himself, in actual service, yet the exertions he made for his coun- try, connected with the exciting events of the day, and the pressure of private business, destroyed his health. He was obliged to retire from public affairs in 1779, and the last seven years of his life were passed under the gloomy shadow of real and imaginary suffering, mental and bodily. He died Oct 5, 1786.
Gen. Huntington's first wife was Elizabeth Backus, sister of the Rev. Isaac Backus of Middleborough, Mass. His second wife was Hannah, daughter of Rev. Ebenezer Williams of Pomfret. He had five sons and two daughters,-the latter happily connected in marriage with Col. John Chester of Wethersfield, and Rev. Joseph Strong, colleague and successor of Dr. Lord in Norwich. His five sons settled around him, establish- ing their homesteads in his immediate vicinity ; though shortly after the death of his father, the oldest of them, Gen. Jedidiah, removed to New London .*
* The house built by Jedidiah in 1780, was subsequently the residence of his brother Ebenezer. The other houses of the Huntington group are more ancient. One was the inherited homestead of the family. The next oldest was erected before 1740. The fine elms in its front were set out by Zachariah Huntington, who died in 1761. Joshua Huntington, his son Zachariah, his grandson Andrew, and the late Wolcott Hunting. ton, comprising four generations, have successively occupied and died in this house.
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GEN. JEDIDIAH HUNTINGTON
Was born at Norwich in 1743, and graduated at Cambridge in 1763, on which occasion he pronounced the first English oration delivered in that college at commencement. Settling near his father in his native place, he engaged with him in mercantile pursuits, but soon became noted as one of the Sons of Liberty, and an active captain of the militia. He entered with spirit into all the measures of his townsmen in resisting oppression, and soon after the skirmish at Lexington, marched to Boston with seventy men, where he remained for most of the season on duty. He was afterwards appointed Colonel of the 8th Connecticut regiment, which was raised and drilled under his orders. This regiment was the best equipped of any in the colony, and was distinguished by a Britislı uniform, the Governor and Council having appropriated to them a quan- tity of English red-coats taken in a prize vessel. John Douglas of Plain- field was lieutenant-colonel.
In the summer of 1776, Col. Huntington's regiment was stationed with the main army in the vicinity of New York. In the battle of Long Island, Aug. 27th, his men fought with desperate bravery. After the action, six captains, six lieutenants, twenty-one sergeants, two drummers, and 126 rank and file, were missing .* Those who were taken prisoners endured great hardships, and few ever returned to their homes, most of them dying in the noted sugar-house and prison-ship at New York, of disease and starvation.
In 1777, Col. Huntington was advanced to the post of Brigadier-Gen- eral, which office he held during the war, and at the close of it received the appointment of Major-General.
After the war, he was constantly employed in civil affairs. On the decease of Prosper Wetmore, high sheriff of New London county, in 1788, he was appointed his successor, and the same year had the office of State Treasurer conferred upon him. The manner in which this latter appointment was announced in the papers, gives a rather pompous list of his honors :
" Major General Huntington Esq. Vice President of the order of Cincinnati, High Sheriff for the county of New London, Judge of Probate for the district of Norwich, first Alderman of the city of Norwich, one of the Representatives of the town in the State Legislature, and one of the State Electors, is now appointed by the General As- sembly Treasurer for the State of Connecticut."
Most of these offices were soon relinquished for a new appointment. Upon the organization of the custom-house system, under the Federal
# Hinman's Records of Rev. War, p. 89.
27
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government, Connecticut was arranged into three districts, New London, New Haven, and Fairfield. To the first of these districts, which included the commerce of Connecticut river and of the coast from thence eastwardly to Rhode Island, Gen. Huntington was appointed collector. He removed to New London, and entered on the duties of his office August 11, 1789. From that time till his decease, almost thirty years, New London was his home. He held the office under four successive Presidents, and died Sept. 25, 1818, aged 75. Agreeably to a direction contained in his will, his remains, which before the will was opened had been deposited in New London, were disinterred, carried to Norwich, and laid in the family tomb.
Gen. Huntington was a man of small stature and sedate temperament, but of great energy, steadiness, and dignity ; very neat and precise in his personal appearance, and polished, thoughi reserved, in his demeanor. He made a profession of religion at the age of twenty-three, and his conduct through life was that of a consistent Christian. He was a man of prayer, active in the promotion of religious objects, liberal in his charities, and a zealous friend of missions. He was one of the first members of the Amer- ican Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, and continued active in its concerns till his death. His last will commences with these words, "My soul has long been consecrated to my Creator, Redeemer and Com- forter."
General Huntington was twice married. His first wife was Faith, the oldest daughter of the first Governor Trumbull. She died Nov. 24, 1775, leaving an only child, the late Jabez Huntington, Esq., President of the Norwich Bank. By his second wife, Ann, daughter of Thomas Moore, he had seven children.
Andrew Huntington, the second son of Gen. Jabez, served during the earlier stages of the war as an agent or commissary to provide clothing, arms and food for Connecticut regiments. He was afterwards engaged in merchandise and the manufacture of paper.
Joshua, the third son of Gen. Jabez, threw himself into the volunteer ranks at the first boom of the Lexington alarm, and served as a soldier at the siege of Boston, and during the campaign of 1776 in New York and New Jersey. He was subsequently employed in the commissary depart- ment. In the later years of the war he was the agent of Wadsworth & Carter of Hartford in supplying the French army at Newport with pro- visions. He had also the charge of all prizes sent by the French navy to Connecticut, consigned to their agents, Wadsworth & Carter. His mili- tary rank at the close of the war was that of colonel.
Eben intimplong
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In 1789, he was appointed county sheriff, and retained the office till his death in 1821.
Col. Huntington had but one child, a daughter, who married Hon. Frederick Wolcott of Litchfield.
GEN. EBENEZER HUNTINGTON.
Ebenezer, the fourth son of Gen. Jabez, was a member of Yale College, and within two months of completing his course when the battle of Bunker Hill was fought. He and other ardent young patriots of his class asked permission of President Daggett to leave the institution and enlist as vol- unteers in the army that was gathering at Boston. Being refused, they decamped in the night, hastened to Wethersfield, where there was a recruiting station, enrolled their names, and were soon on duty at the heights of Dorchester.
Mr. Huntington was at first threatened by the College faculty with the loss of his degree, but ultimately, as he was under no previous censure, he was allowed to graduate with his class in 1775.
In the army he rose by successive promotions to the rank of colonel, and took part in several of the most remarkable contests of the war. After his commission as captain of a company in October, 1776, he lived with the army, and was ever at his post in camp and field, losing no time in long furloughs for rest and recreation. Subsequent to the evacuation of New York, his regiment was stationed on the Hudson, at Fort Lee, Tarrytown, and Tappan Bay. In 1778 he was sent in command of a battalion to Rhode Island to operate against the British, who then held possession of Newport. He afterwards joined the main army and partici- pated in several severe engagements with the enemy. At the siege of Yorktown, he served a part of the time as volunteer aid to Gen. Lincoln, and in that capacity witnessed the magnificent spectacle of the surrender of Cornwallis to the soldiers of liberty .* He remained on duty with the army till the troops were disbanded, having served through the whole war from April, 1775, to May, 1783.
General Huntington retired from the army to the peaceful pursuits of merchandize. But his experience and tact in military evolutions and dis- cipline made it desirable that he should be retained in the home service. In 1792 he was appointed Major-General of the militia of the State, an office which he held more than thirty years, under six successive Gov- ernors.
* In Trumbull's historical picture of the surrender of Cornwallis, Gen. Huntington is represented in the group of American officers, his portrait having been taken by the artist from life.
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In 1799 he was appointed by President Adams, at the recommendation of General Washington, a Brigadier-General in the United States army, raised upon the apprehension of a war with France. In 1810, and again in 1817, he was elected member of Congress. He died June 17, 1834, in the 80th year of his age.
General Huntington was noted for his fine manly form, and military deportment. He was twice married. His first wife was Sarah Isham of Colchester; his second, Mary Lucretia, daughter of Gen. Samuel Me- Clellan of Woodstock.
Zachariah, the fifth son of Gen. Jabez Huntington, was too young to take part in the Revolutionary contest, but he attained a high rank in the militia, and was endowed by nature with many soldier-like qualities,-a commanding person, a voice of great compass, firmness of purpose, and habits of great precision and accuracy.
It is seldom that five such distinguished men as the brothers Hunting- ton appear in one family, all living to an age ranging from seventy to eighty-six years.
JOSEPH TRUMBULL, Commissary.
When the war commeneed, Norwich had on her roll of inhabitants no one of fairer promise or of more zealous devotion to the cause of liberty than Joseph Trumbull. He was the oldest son of Governor Trumbull, and born at Lebanon, March 11, 1737, but had been for twelve or fifteen years a resident in Norwich, taking an active part in the business, the municipal affairs and patriotie proceedings of the town. In 1775, he was appointed the first Commissary-General of the American army, an im- portant and honorable office, but bringing with it a crushing weight of perplexity, labor, and responsibility. He devoted himself with unremit- ting ardor to his duties, and was soon worn out by them. In July, 1778, he came from Philadelphia with a desponding heart and a broken consti- tution. His father and other friends gathered around him, and after a few days of rest, he was carefully removed from his home in Norwich to his father's house in Lebanon, where he died July 23d, aged 42.
The hopes of his friends, who expected much from his talents and integrity, and whose affections were fondly fixed upon his person, were blasted by his untimely death. In the eulogy pronounced at his funeral, great praise is awarded to his abilities, his patriotism, and his moral worth, and it is added, "In all the winning and agreeable arts of life, he had no superior." These qualities account for the tender attachment of his friends, and the lamentations that were uttered on his death.
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COL. JOHN DURKEE.
Could the life of this able and valiant soldier be written in detail, it would form a work of uncommon interest. Only the outlines can now be recovered, but they are of a nature that indicates a career full of adven- ture and a character deeply imbued with patriotic resolution. He was an actor in the French and Indian wars, in the stamp-act excitement, in the Wyoming settlement and conflict with the Pennamites, and in many of the stirring scenes of the Revolution.
John Durkee was a native of Windham, but settled early in life at Norwich. He served upon the frontier, against the French, in several distinct expeditions, and afterwards held the rank of major in the militia. He kept an inn, cultivated a farm, and was often engaged in public busi- ness. After the repeal of the stamp-act, he became interested in the pur- chase made by the Susquehannalı Company in Pennsylvania, and was one of the forty pioneers sent out by the company in 1769, to take possession of the Wyoming Valley. Robert Durkee was also of the company, and the first fortress erected by these emigrants was called Fort Durkec.
Against this seanty band of settlers, the Pennamites or Pennsylvania claimants of the valley soon appeared in considerable force, and an obsti- nate contest for the possession of the territory ensued. Major Durkee was at one time carried to Philadelphia as a prisoner, but when released, returned to the scene of conflict. After a long and stormy experience, the Connecticut party so far prevailed as to keep possession of their set- tlements.
Wilkesbarre-a name compounded from those of John Wilkes and Col. Barré, English politicians who had warmly espoused the American cause in the days of the stamp-act-was one of the towns founded by the Con- necticut emigrants. As Durkee had been a strenuous partizan on the side defended by these English orators, and was a leader of high author- ity in the Connecticut party, it is quite probable that the town is indebted for its name to his suggestion and influence .*
Major Durkee afterwards returned to Norwich, and the trouble with England deepening and gradually overshadowing the land, he relinquished the idea of removing to the western wilderness. His brother Robert remained at Wyoming,f and was subsequently one of the victims of Indian barbarity in the fearful slaughter of July 3, 1778. His name is on the commemorative monument in the Wyoming Valley.
Major Durkee was promoted to the command of a regiment, and took part in the battles of Long Island, Harlem Heights, White Plains, Tren-
* One of the nephews of Major Durkee had the given name of Barre.
t They were cousins and brothers-in-law. Robert's wife was sister to Col. John.
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ton, and Monmouth. He was also with Gen. Sullivan in the expedition against the Six Nations. But his health gradually failed, and in 1780 he resigned his command, and was succeeded by Lieut. Col. Thomas Grosve- nor of Pomfret.
He died before the return of peace, May 29, 1782, in his 54th year. One of his sons, a youthful volunteer, aged 17 years, died in 1777, of wounds received in fighting for his country .*
Col. Benjamin Throop was another gallant officer who served in the regular army. He enlisted as first lieutenant in April, 1775; was pro- moted by successive steps to the rank of colonel, and continued in the service to the end of the war.
Col. Zabdiel Rogers, of the State militia, was often called out during the war. In 1775, his regiment was sent with others from the State to the city of New York. It was afterwards several times ordered to the western border line of Connecticut. In 1781 he was on duty at Rye and Horseneck.
The brothers Christopher and Benajah Leffingwell, belonging to the State militia, were often summoned to the sea-coast upon an alarm of invasion, or to take a turn in manning the forts and batteries. In 1777, Benajah Leffingwell, then captain of a company, performed a tour of duty in Rhode Island.
Christopher Leffingwell was an early and active member of the com- mittee of correspondence, and eminently useful in rousing the spirit of the people, and in devising ways and means by which the common cause might be benefited.
He was a grandson of the second Thomas Leffingwell of Norwich, and died Nov. 27, 1810, aged 76 years. His life through its whole length was active, useful, and prosperous. It falls to the lot of few men in pri- vate life to benefit a community so largely as Norwich was profited by the enterprise of Col. Leffingwell.
Capt. David Nevins enlisted early in the contest for liberty, and lived long to witness its happy results. He was first employed as the confiden- tial messenger of the Norwich committee of correspondence, one of those voluntary patriotic agencies that managed the whole business of the Rev- olution in its earlier stages. His personal activity and daring spirit, com-
* Out of twenty recruits that enlisted from Norwich in the company of Capt. Na- thaniel Webb of Windham, (Durkee's regiment,) from 1776 to 1778, engaging to serve during the war, only four were over 20 years of age, Webb's Orderly Book.
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bined with trustworthiness and ardent participation in the popular cause, peculiarly fitted him for the work. But the battle of Lexington carried him from all minor employments into the army. He joined the 8th com- pany, 6th regiment, which was organized on Norwich Green in May, 1775, and was its color-bearer on Dorchester Heights.
He remained with the army during the siege of Boston, the occupation of New York, and the retreat through the Jerseys, returning home in the winter of 1777. He did not, however, relinquish the service of his coun- try, but was several times again in the field upon various emergencies during the war.
Capt. Nevins was born at Canterbury, Sept. 12, 1747, and died in New York, Jan. 21, 1838, aged 90. He had twelve children. The late Henry Nevins of Norwich, Russell H. and Rufus L. Nevins, brokers of New York, Samuel, James and Richard Nevins of Philadelphia, and Rev. William Nevins, installed pastor of the First Presbyterian Church of Baltimore in 1820, were his sons. His wife was Mary, oldest daughter of Russell Hubbard .*
Capt. Jedidiah Hyde, son of the Separatist minister, born in 1738, left his farm and family-a wife and eight children-to enlist among the first recruits in the cause of liberty. After the war he removed to Vermont, and about the year 1788 established himself at Hyde Park in that State, which place derives its name from him. He died in 1825. By two wives he had fifteen children, all of whom lived to enter the married state, and became heads of families.
Capt. James Hyde, of Bean Hill, who married Martha Nevins, and Capt. James Hyde, of the West Farms, whose wife was Eunice Backus, were both engaged in the Revolutionary contest ; the former on the land, and the latter on the sea. Capt. IIyde of the army was a man noted for his gentleness and philanthropy, yet he enlisted early, fought bravely, and served to the end of the war. Great must have been the hatred of Brit- ish tyranny, that moved such a spirit to rush into the battle-field. He was afterward a Methodist local preacher.
* The mother of Capt. Nevins was a daughter of Col. Simon Lathrop, who fought at Louisburg in 1745. His father, whose name he perpetuated, was supposed to be of Scotch origin, but came from Massachusetts to Connecticut, married Mary Lathrop, and settled in Canterbury on a farm of 300 acres given her by her father. About ten years after his marriage, he was accidentally drowned in the Quinebaug river, as else- where in this work related.
He left five children : Capt. David, above mentioned ; Samuel and Betsey, who died unmarried ; Mary, who married Nathan Lord of Lord's Bridge, Lisbon ; and Martha, wife of Capt. James Hyde of Norwich.
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