USA > Connecticut > Litchfield County > Torrington > History of Torrington, Connecticut, from its first settlement in 1737, with biographies and genealogies > Part 30
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family descent, and cultivated always, as being the proper bearing of a citizen, and especially a public man of business, but in consequence of this courteousness of manner, he was judged by a certain class, to be seeking for public favor at the expense of principle and sub- stantial character, and thereby did him most decided injustice. Such judgment is founded upon the supposition that a man of true princi- ple and honorable character must have the manners of a boor, flout- ing his personal prejudices and ill temper against everything and everybody, like a spoiled child who was never taught to curb its own resentment or ill feeling. Not so with the well bred man, who considers that the community has some demands on him in render- ing it cheerful, animating, and elevating, and therein such fulfill the law of the great teacher, to live for others, not alone for themselves. The general's manner was the same at home as elsewhere, and there- fore exhibited the real spirit and character of the man, and he had his reward in part, although he did not do it for the reward ; for, pro- bably, but few men in the town at the time received as much cordial good feeling, from the community as he, and at the present time, he is spoken of with special admiration by nearly every one.
In military service he rose to be major general of the state militia, and as such, was the delight of the community and the county. His soldierly bearing on horseback, his prompt, energetic, and elegant manners as a commanding officer, were pleasing and animating to those who served under him, and to the multitude who assembled on training days to witness the parades.
It is evident from these facts that there is an inherent sense in most persons, that good manners are not only agreeable but of much importance, and when cultivated as a duty, and an ennobling princi- ple, carry with them a power for good so invaluable, that every citi- zen should seek to promote them by all possible ability and cultivation. This is the more evident as the oldest people take great pleasure in speaking of those persons who manifested these qualities most pro- minently in their lives. Mrs. General Sheldon and Ulysses Fyler, of the older people, are spoken of in this respect with much enthu- siasm. There were doubtless many others, but those who knew them well are also departed. General Abernethy manifested more specially the ideal old time gentleman more fully, probably, than any other of as recent a date as he, and such examples give some idea of what many of the pilgrim fathers were in regard to this noble quality.
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BIOGRAPHIES.
REV. HIRAM P. ARMS, D.D.,
Was born at Windsor, Ct., June 1, 1779; a descendant in the fifth generation of William Arms of Deerfield, Mass. He was fitted for college under John Adams, LL.D., at Philips academy, Mass., and after graduation in 1823, studied theology under the instruction of Profs. N. W. Taylor, D.D., E. T. Fitch, D.D., and J. W. Gibbs, LL.D., and was ordained pastor of the Congregational church at Hebron, Ct., June 30, 1830; dismissed October 10, 1832, to ac- cept a call to Wolcottville, where he was installed February 6, 1833. Here he labored with ordinary success three years and was dismissed July 6, 1836, to accept a call to the First church in Norwich Town, Ct., where he was installed August 3, 1836. Here he has continued to labor to the present time, receiving frequent and unmistakable evidences of affection and respect from his people.
On February 20, 1873, being then seventy-three years of age, he resigned the active duties of his pastorate, but continued to reside among his people as pastor emeritus. During his active pastorate he received to membership in the church five hundred and sixty-nine members.
On resting from the active duties of the ministry, his people gene- rously gave him a life annuity amounting to near twelve hundred dollars, which was invested in the Continental Life Insurance com- pany, on the failure of which his people continue generously to pro- vide for his wants.
He has been twice married ; first to Lucy Ann Wadhams of New Haven, September 12, 1824. She died July 3, 1837. His second wife was Abby Jane Baker of New York, to whom he was married September 12, 1858, who is still living.
Seven children are living ; five sons and two daughters, all married, and he is honored in counting in his own family twenty grand child- ren. The evening of his life he is passing pleasantly, in a quiet home, among a kind and affectionate people, and this evening, it is believed, is but the prelude to the morning that shall be.
REV. JOHN D. BALDWIN
Was born in North Stonington September 28, 1806; studied at New Haven, but was not a graduate ; studied theology at New Haven ; was licensed by the New Haven West association in 1833; was
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HISTORY OF TORRINGTON.
ordained pastor at West Woodstock, September 3, 1834, and dis- missed July 25, 1837 ; was pastor of North Branford from Jan. 17, 1838 to July 3, 1844. He preached in Torringford at intervals in 1845, and received a call to settle, February 28, 1846, which he de- clined. He was pastor at East Putnam from April 29, 1846, to September 17, 1849, when a bronchial difficulty compelled him to retire from the ministry.
He represented Killingly in the legislature of 1849, and as chair- man of the committee on education introduced the measure which established the Normal school, and was one of the three commis- sioners who located and organized it. In 1849 he became owner and editor of the Hartford Republican ; in 1851, became editor of the Boston Commonwealth, afterwards the Telegraph, and held his posi- tion until the summer of 1857. Early in 1859, he purchased the Worcester Daily and Weekly Spy, which he owned many years. He was elected to congress from Massachusetts in November 1862; was twice rechosen, serving six years, and then declined re-election ; but returned to Worcester and engaged still as a journalist. Two funeral sermons delivered by him have been printed. He furnished articles for the Christian Spectator, and the North American Review. A volume of his productions, entitled Raymond Hill and Other Poems, was published by Ticknor and Fields. His work, Pre-Historic Nations, was published first in London and then in New York.
DR. ERASTUS BANCROFT,
Son of Noadiah and Jerusha (Loomis) Bancroft, was born Oct. 27, 1782. He studied medicine with Dr. Elijah Lyman, and as a student was not considered peculiarly forward or ready in acquiring the knowledge of medicine, but made ordinary progress. He com- menced practice in Wolcottville in 1817, and very readily secured much confidence in his practice, and though Dr. Jarvis followed Dr. E. Lyman, in 1818, Dr. Bancroft secured so much of the patronage of the town, that there seemed to be but little need of others, and Dr. Jarvis removed to a larger field. Dr. Bancroft proved himself a skillful and successful physician ; especially so in the treatment of fevers. He was a man of much common sense, relying, not upon old formulas, because they were old or because they were written, but would have his own thinking in spite of pre- judices, whims, religion or the " devil." He was the personification of neatness, always dressed in his ruffled bosom shirt and other things
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BIOGRAPHIES.
to match. When he rode in his carriage he sat erect, and stylish, as if ready for any emergency. He was not large in person but very energetic, active, and of quick decision and application. He occupied a small building as his office on the south side of the bridge on Main street, east of the street, near the river ; the building has been re- moved and the office of Mr. Ladd's livery stable occupies the site.
Dr. Bancroft's good sense took the form of skepticism as to the prejudices, whims and notions of the people, and he used, sometimes, to indulge himself in laughing at them, when among his most trusted friends. He repeated a number of times, a mistake he made when he began to practice, which he said was the making of his fame, as a physician, among the people. He had made a prescription for a patient, in the western part of the town, and supposed the case of no danger and but little importance. In the night he was sent for in great haste, and he obeyed the summons without delay. He found the patient in a very critical condition, and recognized at once that it was the medicine he had given through mistake and not the disease. He applied his skill with great earnestness, remaining with the patient some twelve hours and succeeded in the restoration. This was re- ported as a wonderful cure, " and so it was," said the doctor, " damn it, I liked to have killed her."
Another case he had attended some years, sometimes giving a little medicine, but generally concluding that all the trouble was in the want of energy of the person. This he had tried many times to stimulate, and to prevail upon the woman to go at the work of the house, and thus forget, and dispel the imaginings of her own mind, but all was to no purpose. On being called again, he examined the case carefully, saw nothing only as before, and suddenly took a pail of water and threw the whole of it on the woman, and rapidly left, it being dangerous to stay longer. The woman speedily recovered her health.
The doctor was gentlemanly, considerate, and attentive, yet abrupt, peculiar, queer, and sometimes severe to the extent of justice. From him the cynics and fault finders sometimes, received their just due ; he frequently putting in the words, " devil" or " damn it," spoken very rapidly and as if unknown to himself, but sometimes very ap- propriately, if ever allowable.
A description of the doctor is given in a book called The Shady Side, under the name of Dr. Gale, which some of the doctor's oldest acquaintances say is a good representation of him. The scene is
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laid at the minister's house where there was real illness, and where a number of persons are represented as calling to give their advice and " set matters right."
" Dr. Gale entered as the deacon's wife departed. Finding his patient in tears, he turned abruptly back to the kitchen, and ordered Polly to ' call the par- son.' A rough man was Dr. Gale ; tempestuous often, yet sensible. Christ- ian principles he did not profess, but humane feeling he seldom lacked.
' Parson Vernon !' said he, 'I give it up.' You may get your wife home to her father's as soon as possible, if you mean to have her well. I can't cure her here. Your religious folks haven't a grain of sense to spare. A pretty fool I make of myself, to come here and order sedatives, and rely on quiet, when some old woman, who was made without nerves, will bolt in, and upset it all !' And the doctor went off in a bluster.
Mrs. Nobles had stopped to report her interview to Mrs. Elton, and the two ladies stood at the gate as the doctor returned with quickened step. They stopped him to ask if there was any thing more alarming at the parsonage. He growled a ' no need of any thing more,' which they construed into vexation with his patient. Whereupon, they proceeded to lament that ministers should take for their wives, such feeble, inefficient women ; and, especially that Millville should be so unfortunate in this respect.
The doctor was in no gentle mood, and he gave them a blast which they were sorry to have provoked. 'Feeble women !' said he ; 'feeble women ! What makes 'em so ! They've a right to be feeble, with a vengeance ! Wonder any of 'em live ten years ; pulled about hither and thither, and kept on short al- lowance ! You expect her to do half enough to earn her husband's salary, with your confounded societies ! It's contrive, and cut, and stitch ; and then you set her to praying, and talking, and reforming ; and she must be dragged out here and there ; and at home, there's no peace for the calls and the tea-drinkings, to say nothing of the fault findings. Mrs. Vernon, now, is not inclined to be sickly. Good, fresh constitution, but she's worn and low, and you don't give her any chance to get up."
' But,' interposed Mrs. Nobles, 'you'll allow, doctor, that Mrs. Vernon is very nervous ? '
' Nervous, ' said he, contemptuously, 'I wish the women knew what they mean by that. '
Mrs. Elton ventured, 'if she had more hopefulness and courage, doctor.'
You don't know her,' said the doctor, less fiercely. 'She's none of your milk-and-water ladies. She has all the hope and courage there is in the house ;' and he turned away. Looking back, however, with a sudden thought ; another explosive burst of words followed. ' If I'd been a minister (no danger ), but if I had, I'd ha' lived a bachelor all my days, before I'd ha' married a wife for the parish. '"
MRS. ELIZA CURTISS BASSETT,
Daughter of Dea. Job and Eunice (Cowles) Curtiss, married Rev. Archibald Bassett, who was born in Derby, March 21, 1772 ; was graduated at Yale college in 1796 ; was ordained pastor at Winches- ter, May 20, 1801, and dismissed, Aug. 27, 1806 ; was pastor at
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BIOGRAPHIES.
Walton, Delaware county, N. Y., from 1807 to 1810, and resided there preaching in the region and helping his brethren in revivals, as opportunities were afforded, and died, April 29, 1859, aged 87 years. She died Jan. 19, 1868.
OWEN BROWN,
Son of Capt. John and Hannah (Owen) Brown, married Ruth, daughter of Gideon Mills at Simsbury, Feb. 11, 1793. He was a tanner, and settled in his business in Norfolk, Ct., and removed to Torrington in the spring of 1799, and purchased and settled on the place now known as the John Brown place. The dwelling house was built in 1776, and is still standing, but unoccupied. It was a well built and thoroughly finished house, at the time, being ceiled with pine lumber, the beams projecting below the ceiling, but planed smooth or cased, so that the whole interior was in its day a very comfortable, and good class of dwelling.
The house is located in the western part of the town, three miles from Wolcottville, on a road very little traveled ; six miles from Litchfield, and ten from Winsted. The farm is not of an average good quality, for the town, is pleasantly located, but very secluded from public travel. The special reason why Mr. Brown bought it, seems to have been that as a farm it was cheaper than many others, and had on it a brook that he thought would answer for tanning pur- poses. On this brook, west of the house some distance, on the north side of the east and west road he built his tannery and shoe shop, all of which are now gone. Here he worked at his trade six years, ac- quiring considerable reputation, and sustaining high honor as a tanner and business man.
Owen Brown was the fifth in descent from the pilgrim, Peter Brown who came to America in the Mayflower in 1620, and inherited the puritan character in its genuine traits and purest forms.
He was a man of keenness of perception and remarkable wit and good humor. His brother John, was deacon of the church in New Hartford many years and was highly esteemed in his office, and as a Christian man. Judge Frederick Brown, another brother, was a man of the same noble character, clearness of intellect, and was judge of the court a number of years in Hudson, Ohio.
Owen Brown possessed great firmness of religious character and yet great kindness of heart. He never was absent from church as illustrated in a remark as he was about to leave the town he made to
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HISTORY OF TORRINGTON.
Deacon Hinsdale : "We have met fifty-two times a year, but may not meet many more." He removed to Hudson, Ohio, in 1805, and after being there a year or two came back on business, and spent the night at William Whiting's, a near neighbor. In the morning when ready to leave he said : "Neighbor; Whiting, we have loved each other as brothers and I want our families to know each other when we are cold." They shook hands and parted in tears. Mr. Brown was a great reader, and thinker, and he often entertained the young men while sitting in his shoe shop, by requesting them to read such pieces as he selected, and by giving them statements of what he had read. While making shoes, he often prevailed with Oliver Bancroft to read, and it was this reading in Mr. Brown's shop that led him to the love of literature, and to become a printer at Hartford where he spent an honorable life.
Mr. Brown was a very upright, honest man as to business transac- tions. This, many had occasion to know as his occupation led him to dealings with many persons, both near home and at a distance.
From Torrington he removed to Hudson, Ohio, where he reared his children ; among them he that was to be the hero of the nation, . Capt. John Brown, of Kansas and Harper's Ferry fame. In Hudson, Owen Brown lived the same noble, useful, and honorable life.
In reply to a question by the author of this book the Rev. Doctor Fairchild, president of Oberlin college, wrote as follows :
" Owen Brown, father of Capt. John, was a trustee of Oberlin college from 1835 to 1844, and then resigned in consequence of his growing infirmities. He was much esteemed by his associate members for his practical wisdom and staunch integrity. He was a man of few words because a painful habit of stammering made it almost impossible for him to speak, but every word was valued.
His residence was at Hudson, the seat of Western Reserve college. One of his daughters, Florilla, afterwards wife of Rev. S. G. Advie, graduated here, and went with her husband to Osawatomie, Kansas, in the days of the first settlement of Kansas, and died there in 1865. A son of Owen Brown was also a student here, several years. John Brown himself, once performed a service for the college in surveying and reporting on lands given to the college in Western Virginia by Gerrit Smith.
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JOHN BROWN.
MEMOIR OF JOHN BROWN.
Though there have been so many men of this name in all parts of the world which the Anglo-Saxon race inhabit, it will readily be known which one of them merits the great space given him in these pages. We tell the story of a man who made his plain name known all over the world, and who will be remembered, when it may be that Torrington and all its history shall be forgotten, save the single fact, that a hero was born there.
JOHN BROWN, of Kansas and Virginia (born at Torrington, May 9, 1800, died at Charlestown, West Va., Dec. 2, 1859), was the grandson and namesake of Captain John Brown of West Simsbury, a revolutionary officer, who died in the army of Washington. He was also the sixth in descent from Peter Brown who came over in the Mayflower in 1620. Of the English ancestors of this Peter Brown, little is known. He was unmarried when he landed at Plymouth in January, 1621, but within the next thirteen years he was twice mar- ried, and died (in 1633) leaving four children. This we learn from that most unquestionable authority, the History of Plymouth Plant ation left behind him in manuscript, by William Bradford, who succeeded Carver in 1621, as governor of the colony, and died in 1657. Writing about 1650, Bradford says : " Peter Brown married
twice. By his first wife he had two children, who are living, and both of them married, and one of them hath two children ; by his second wife he had two more. He died about sixteen years since." It is supposed that his first wife was named Martha, and that Mary and Priscilla Brown were her daughters, and the two who are men- inned by Bradford as married in 1650. In 1644 they were placed in the care of their uncle John Brown, a leading citizen of Duxbury, where also Peter Brown settled a few years after landing at Plymouth. John Brown did not come over with his brother, but a few years later, and out-lived him many years. Peter Brown died in 1633, and his inventory of estate was presented on the 14th of October that year. He settled £15 on his two daughters by the first marriage, Mary and Priscilla, and left the remainder, no very large sum, to his widow and her children. Of these Peter Brown, born in 1632, was the younger.
This cccount of John Brown has been prepared by F. B. Sanborn, Esq., of Concord Mass., expressely for this work.
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HISTORY OF TORRINGTON.
He was the ancestor of John Brown, and removed from Duxbury to Windsor, Conn., at some time between 1650 and 1658, where he married Mary the daughter of Jonathan Gillett.
Peter Brown the Pilgrim, is said to have been a carpenter, but from what part of England he came is not known. His home in Duxbury was but a few miles from Plymouth, and not far from the hill where Miles Standish built his house, and where the Standish monument is now seen. Brown was, no doubt, one of the soldiers of Standish, in his miniature campaigns against the Indians. He was probably one of the Separatists (often called Brownists from another person of that name) who lived for some years in Holland with Brewster, Bradford and thegood minister of Leyden, John Robinson, of whose life and character Bradford gives such graphic sketches. The picture drawn of the Leyden pastor might serve very well for Captain Brown himself, as we knew him in his Kansas and Virginia expeditions, when he had his small band of chosen men about him, and was their pastor as well as their commander. Bradford says of John Robinson -and so might it have been said two hundred and forty years later of John Brown :
His love was greate towards them, and his care was all ways bente for their best good, both for soule and body; for besides his singular abilities, in divine things (wherein he excelled), he was also very able to give directions in civill affairs and to foresee dangers and inconveniences; by which means he was very helpful to their outward estates, and so was every way as a common father unto them. And none did more offend him than those that were close and cleaving to themselves, and retired from the commone good ; as also such as would be stiff and rigid in matters of outward order, and invey against the evills of others, and yet be remiss in themselves, and not so careful to express a vertuous conversation.
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Peter Brown the Pilgrim never lived in Salem, as has sometimes been said, nor any where in New England, save in Plymouth, and afterwards in Duxbury. His son Peter, who emigrated to Wind- sor, Conn., lived to be nearly sixty years old, and died at Windsor, March 9, 1692, leaving an estate of £409 to be divided among his thirteen children. Of these children, John Brown, born at Windsor, Jan. 8, 1668, married Elizabeth Loomis in 1691, and had eleven children. Among these were John Brown (born in 1700 and died in 1790), who was the father and the survivor of the revolutionary. captain, John Brown, of West Simsbury. He lived and died in Windsor, married Mary Eggleston, and Captain John Brown, just mentioned, the grandfather of our hero, was his oldest son, born Nov.
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4, 1728. He married Hannah Owen, of Welsh descent, in 1758. Her father was Elijah Owen of Windsor, and her first ancestor in this country was John Owen, a Welshman who married in Windsor in 1650, just before young Peter Brown came there from Duxbury. A few years afterwards an Amsterdam tailor, Peter Miles or Mills, came over to Connecticut from Holland, settled in Bloomfield, near Windsor, and became the ancestor of John Brown's grandmother, Ruth Mills, of West Simsbury. Thus three streams of nationality, English, Welsh and Dutch, united in New England to form the parentage of John Brown.
He was the oldest son of Owen Brown, who was one of the eleven children of John Brown, the revolutionary captain and of Hannah Owen his wife. This large family was brought up in severe poverty by the mother, who lived to see most of her children well established in life. One of them became a judge in Ohio, another, John Brown of New Hartford, was a man much esteemed in that town, and for many years deacon of the church there. One of the daughters was the mother of Dr. Humphrey, for some years president of Amherst college. Owen Brown was bred to the trade of tanner and shoemaker, the same which he taught his son John. He followed this trade while living in Torrington, which was his home for only five or six years. He was born and bred in Simsbury (what is now Canton), was married there to Ruth Mills, daughter of the old minister, Rev. Gideon Mills, on the IIth of February, 1793 ; then removed to Norfolk, where his oldest child was born, July 5, 1798, and from there came to Torrington one year later. He lived in the old house, still standing, " a mile northwest of the meeting house," which is represented in the accompanying picture. In this house John Brown was born, at the date already mentioned, and there his brothers Solomon and Oliver Owen Brown were born, in 1802 and 1804. In 1805 Owen Brown migrated, with his children and others of his family, to the Western Reserve of Ohio, and settled in the town of Hudson, of which he was one of the principal settlers. In that wilderness John Brown spent his childhood and youth, though his early recollections extended also to his home in Connecticut. This will appear from a very curious paper written by him two years before his death, in which he mentions many incidents of his childish years. Although it has several times been printed, it is due to the reader, who may never have seen it, that a paper
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