History of Windham County, Connecticut, Part 47

Author: Bayles, Richard M. (Richard Mather)
Publication date: 1889
Publisher: New York, Preston
Number of Pages: 1506

USA > Connecticut > Windham County > History of Windham County, Connecticut > Part 47

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oreph Hutchins

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26th of October, 1846, married to Lucy R., daughter of Lem- uel Woodward, of Plainfield. Their children are: Alice, who was in 1876 married to Joseph C. Noyes, of Cincinnati, and two who died in infancy. Mr. Hutchins soon after his mar- riage settled on a farm in the village of Plainfield and for seven years followed an agricultural life. He then purchased the property which is his present home, his summers being spent in his native town and the winters in Cincinnati, where he has large interests in real estate.

Mr. Hutchins was formerly an old line whig in politics and has since affiliated with the republican party, of which he has been one of the leaders in his county. He was for several years one of the selectmen of the town, and represented his constituents in the Connecticut house of representatives for the years 1858, 1875 and 1885, and in the senate in 1887, serving on the committee on banks and constitutional amendments. Mr. Hutchins is a director of the Uncas National Bank of Norwich, trustee of the Chelsea Savings Bank of Norwich, trustee of the David Gallup Fund for the town of Plainfield, and of several personal estates. His religious belief is in har- mony with the creed of the Congregational church of which he is a supporter. He is at present trustee of the Ecclesias- tical Society Fund of Plainfield.

EDWIN MILNER .- John Milner, the father of Edwin Milner, married Charlotte Dews, to whom were born four children: Ed- win, Hannah, wife of Christopher Richardson, of Newark, New Jersey; Sarah, deceased, and John H., of Moosup, who married Mary Fidler. Edwin, the eldest of these children, was born in Horbury, Yorkshire, England, December 1st, 1842, and in his fourth year emigrated with his parents to America, landing in Boston, from whence they soon after removed to East Greenwich, Rhode Island, and resided in that borough until 1854.

In 1856 Westerly in the same state became the home of the family, where at the age of nine years the lad entered a woolen mill, and in due time became familiar with the process of man- ufacturing woolen goods. In his nineteenth year an interval was spent at school, and a thorough knowledge of the English branches obtained, after which the business of his life-that of a woolen manufacturer-was resumed. In 1863 he was employed by the Pequot Manufacturing Company at Montville, Connecti- cut, and in 1865 removed to Old Lyme, Connecticut, where under

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the firm name of John Milner & Son, he embarked in manufac- turing. Returning again to Westerly, Mr. Milner engaged with his father in the purchase and sale of wool, and in 1874, on form- ing a copartnership with D. L. Aldrich, he began the manufac- ture of woolen goods at Plainville, Richmond Switch, Rhode Island. The property was sold in 1880, and the firm became owners of the mills at Moosup, to which point he removed the following year. To this enterprise Mr. Milner has since given his attention, and by his thorough knowledge of details, brought the mills to a high state of excellence in their productions. Three hundred hands are employed in the various departments, and the woolen fabrics manufactured find a ready market in New York city.

The subject of this biography has been and is still actively in- terested in the political movements of the day, and a prominent fig- ure in the ranks of the republican party. His services have been given to the cause of protection as opposed to free trade, in which it is his belief lies the salvation of American industries. He represented his town in the Connecticut house of represent- atives in 1887, and served as chairman of the committee on state prisons. He is an earnest advocate of all measures for the en- couragement of education, and a member of the school commit- tee of Moosup. He is connected by membership with Christ Protestant Episcopal church of Westerly. Mr. Milner was on the 17th of April, 1867, married to Sarah M., daughter of Darius Harding, of Old Lyme, Connecticut. Their two children are both deceased, their son Edwin having died in his eleventh year.

HON. JAMES S. T. STRANAHAN .- The Stranahan family had its origin in the Parish of Strachan, Kincardin county, Scot- land, whence the name, which has also been spelled Strahan. Subsequently some of the members of this Strachan (now Stran- ahan) family, yielding to the inducements of King James I. to repeople that section, settled with other Scotchmen in the North of Ireland. Here their thrift, enterprise and success as farmers and manufacturers attracted wide attention, while their rigid adherence to their religious belief was equally conspicuous. They became, as it were, a new and heroic race, whose numbers were greatly augmented by the persecutions of the Stuart dy- nasty and by the rebellions of 1715 and 1745. It was natural that the prosperity of this independent and God-fearing people should

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Edwin milner

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incur the hostility of an avaricious government, and they were forced by its exactions and rigorous regulations to seek, beyond the seas, a freer verge for their religious and industrial life. They came to America, and how well they have left their imprint upon our common history, every thoughtful student knows. To them and the descendants of these Scotch-Irish the United States owe much of their glory, wealth and enterprise ..

One of these hardy emigrants to America in 1725 was James Stranahan, the founder of the family by that name in the United States. He was a prosperous and intelligent farmer, and pur- chased lands in Scituate, R. I., October 18th and November 29th, 1745, but soon after became a permanent citizen of Plainfield, Conn. In 1748 his name appears in the list of those who dis- sented from the teachings of the regular church, and he was classed among the Separationists of that part of the state. He attained the extreme age of 93 years, dying January 8th, 1792, and was buried in the cemetery at the South Killingly meeting house, where were also interred his son James, and members of two other successive generations of the family. Of the three sons of James Stranahan, John and William removed to Canaan, Columbia county, N. Y., where they became men of wealth and influence, and their numerous descendants fitly perpet- uated the family name in other states. Farrand, a son of John, was a colonel in the war of 1812, and was taken a prisoner by the British at Queenstown, Canada. He died an eminent law- yer and politician at Otsego, N. Y., in 1826.

James Stranahan, the eldest of the three sons of the emigrant to America, was born in 1735. He married Martha Corey and settled in Plainfield, where he purchased a farm in 1768, on which he died January 2d, 1808. His widow died at the same place eighteen years later. He was a revolutionary soldier, and was highly esteemed for his many good qualities as a citizen. His homestead in Windham county, a mile south of South Kil- lingly meeting house, passed into other hands more than half a century ago, and the name of the family no longer appears in the present affairs of the town; but descendants, through the marriage of a Stranahan daughter to a Parkhurst, still remain, and those removed cherish a warm feeling toward the place of nativity.

Samuel, the fifth son of James the second, following the tide of immigration, became one of the first settlers of Peterboro,

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Madison county, N. Y. He married Lynda Josselyn, of Otsego county. N. Y., March 30th, 1803, and became an active business man in his new home, owning the mills in the village of Peter- boro at the time of his death, September 8th, 1816, at the age of 38 years. In this village his son, James S. T. Stranahan, the imme- diate subject of this sketch, was born April 25th, 1808. Here he received his early education, and here, among the hills of central New York, he imbibed the spirit which stimulated him to the efforts which brought him distinction in his manhood. The early death of his father and the marriage of his widowed mother soon awoke him to the stern outlook of his youth, and he laid well the plans for his success in life. He fitted himself for the duties of a civil engineer, but abandoned this to engage in more active trade, becoming a wool merchant at Albany, N. Y. In 1832 he was induced by Gerrit Smith, the eminent philanthropist, who had known him from his boyhood, to found a manufacturing town in a township owned by him in Oneida county. This gave full scope to his powers, and called forth, at the early age of twenty-four, those faculties which made greater achievements possible in later years. The town of Florence developed from a few hundred inhabitants to a few thousand, and he was thus also brought into prominence in pub- lic life, being elected to the assembly from Florence in 1837, even though the whig party, to which he belonged, had there- tofore been in the minority. After an honorable service he removed to Newark, N. J., in 1840, where he engaged in rail- road construction and other public works. Seeking still a larger scope for his powers he permanently became a resident of the city of Brooklyn in 1844, where he has been identified with nearly every interest of public importance. To him more than any one else that city is indebted for its splendid system of public improvements. His extended services at the head of the Park Commission, serving as president from 1860 until 1882, have written his name imperishably upon the pages of Brook- lyn's history. Prospect Park, the system of Boulevards, the Ocean Parkway, the Concourse at Coney Island, all attest to his ability and intelligence. Nor was his connection with the great Brooklyn bridge and the Atlantic Dock improvement less important. They all bear the impress of his originality and his entire devotion to public interests, insomuch that he has been styled the "Baron Haussman of Brooklyn," or being to that city

J. J. A. Stranalato

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HISTORY OF WINDHAM COUNTY.

what Baron Haussman was to Paris. He was one of the few who believed in the bridge, and helped to organize the board of trustees which, under an act of the legislature, undertook the construc- tion of the bridge, and remained in the board from the com- mencement of the work up to the time of its completion, and retiring as president of the board of trustees in 1884.

While thus active in the furtherance of the improvements of his adopted city, he was not unmindful of his public or polit- ical duties. In 1848 he was elected one of the aldermen of Brooklyn, which so popularized him that his election to con- gress in 1854 was made possible in a district where there was a strong opposition by the democracy. In 1864 he was a presi- dential elector; and all through the war for the Union he strove, by example and means, to perpetuate it inviolate. In this work his wife was no less zealous, taking an active part in the great Sanitary fair, and since the war has extended her charity in other directions.

Mr. Stranahan was elected an elector-at-large in 1888, casting his vote for General Harrison. He was appointed messenger to take the vote of the state of New York, thus cast, to Washing- ton, which he claims to be the end of his public labors.

Mr. Stranahan was twice married, his first wife being Mari- amne Fitch, of Oneida county, N. Y., who died August 30th, 1866, and who was the mother of two children, Mary and Fitch James, both born at Newark. His second wife was Miss Clara C. Harrison, a native of Massachusetts, who, before her mar- riage, was widely known in educational circles in Brooklyn, and who since that event has maintained her interest in the well-being of her home, in social and religious life.

It is pleasant to record a life so actively spent as has been that of Mr. Stranahan, and his example can well be imitated by the youth of the land, for he is a self made man, and yet withal a man of the people. His success and position have endeared him to the citizens of Brooklyn and New York, and they have borne public testimony of their appreciation. One of these events, December 13th, 1888, was of unusual interest, and en- listed the presence and participation of many prominent cit- izens, whose words of praise should be well prized, but whose expressions yet fall far short of the life of James S. T. Strana- han itself, whose deeds and the public works with which he was connected will endure when praise of tongue and pen are alike forgotten.

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HISTORY OF WINDHAM COUNTY.

WALDO TILLINGHAST .- Pardon Tillinghast, the grandfather of Waldo Tillinghast, was an early resident of West Greenwich, Rhode Island, and for forty years a deacon of the Baptist church. He married Mary Sweet, of East Greenwich, to whom were born twelve children. Thomas of this number was a farmer in his native town of West Greenwich, and an ordained minister of the Six Principle Baptist church. He was three times married, his first wife being Mary Howard, of Woodstock, whose children are: Harriet S., Waldo, Henry S., Jared and Caleb E.

Waldo Tillinghast was born June 10th, 1833, in Killingly, and when a lad removed to Plainfield, where he became a pupil of both the district and high schools, and subsequently attended the Plainfield Academy. An independent and self-reliant youth, he was during the succeeding five years employed as assistant on a farm in summer and spent the winter in teaching. Remov- ing to the village of Plainfield he next engaged in storekeeping, beginning business with a cash capital of twenty-eight dollars. His mercantile venture prospered and grew in proportions un- til a large and flourishing trade was the result, begun thirty- four years from the present date, with industry and persever- ance for its foundation stone. Mr. Tillinghast is also largely en- gaged in farming, as in other successful enterprises.

As a republican he was appointed by President Lincoln post- master of Plainfield, and continued twenty-eight years in office. He was for fourteen years clerk of the probate office, and for the same period judge of probate. He was for twenty-five years a member of the town board of education, and a portion of the time one of its school visitors. He is treasurer of the Robinson & Fowler Foundry Company. Mr. Tillinghast has been for nearly forty years a member of the Baptist church of Moos- up, and for a long period superintendent of its Sunday school. He was married in 1859 to Mary A., daughter of Charles W. Crary, of Plainfield. Their children are: Frank H., Fred. W., Arthur C., and a daughter, Annie L.

CHAPTER XXII.

THE TOWN OF CANTERBURY.

Canterbury Geography .- Statistics .- Settlement of the Quinebaug Plantation .- Major Fitch .- Fitch and Winthrop Conflicting Claims .- Town Charter and Organization .- Boundary Disputes .- First Meeting House .- Dividing Line Established .- Adjusting Land Titles .- Distribution of Common Lands .- Ec- clesiastical History .- Separate Movement .- Westminster Church and Society Formed .- Restoration of Harmony .- The Methodist Churches .- Roads and Bridges .- Accident on the Shetucket .- Bridges, Dams and Floods .- Turnpike Projects and Other Highways .- Public Education .- Miss Prudence Crandall's School .- General Town Progress .- Immigration and Enterprise .- Westmin- ster Society .- Canterbury Manufacturing .- Canterbury Separate Church .- Baptists and Episcopalians .-- Packerville Baptist Church .- Packerville Growth .- Masonic Lodge .- Biographical Sketches.

T HE town of Canterbury occupies the middle of the southern tier of towns in Windham county. It joins New London county. Adjoining towns are Brooklyn on the north, Plainfield on the east, Lisbon on the south, and Scotland and Hampton on the west. Its territory is about eight miles from north to south, and an average of five miles from east to west, thus comprising about forty square miles. The northern part is hilly and exceedingly picturesque, but the southern part con- tains a great deal of low and swampy land. Much good farm- ing land is found in the town, and agriculture constitutes the principal industrial interest of the people. The town contains the post offices of Canterbury, South Canterbury, Westminster and Packerville. Its grand list amounts to $482,166. The num- ber of school children, between the ages of four and sixteen, has been at different periods as follows: 1858, 448; 1881, 293; 1887, 209. The population of the town at different periods has been: In 1756, 1,260; in 1775, 2,444; in 1800, 1,812; in 1840, 1,791; in 1870, 1,552; in 1880, 1,272. The settlement of this locality commenced about the year 1690, and it included the land which in 1692 was made a part of the town of Windham, from Norwich. In 1699, when Plainfield was incorporated, Canterbury fell within its char-

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tered limits, and so continued until October, 1703, when that town- ship was divided, and the part of it which lay on the west side of the Quinebaug river was incorporated with the name of Canterbury. The distance of this town from Hartford is forty miles; from New Haven, sixty-four miles. The town is well watered by streams running down from north through much of the town to join the Quinebaug on the eastern boundary. But beyond two or three small saw mills and the grist mill of Messrs. J. & P. Williams, the water privileges which these streams afford are not improved in this town. Besides these branches, the business concerns of the town number two or three country stores, and as many blacksmith shops, carriage and wagon manufactories, and one or two cider mills. The importance of Canterbury seems to lie mainly in the past and in the future, not much in the present.

The first inhabitants west of the Quinebaug were probably the tenants of Peagscomsuck. Rowland Jones, who purchased in 1691 four hundred acres of land on what is still Rowland's brook, was one of the first settlers here. Thomas Brooks and Obadiah Johnson also settled west of the Quinebaug, but little progress was made till 1697, when Major Fitch, with his family removed thither, digging the first cellar and erecting the first permanent habitation in what is now the township of Canterbury. With hundreds of farms and many thousand acres at his dis- posal, he selected for his residence a neck of land partially en- closed by a bend in the Quinebaug river, below the river island Peagscomsuck, which gave its name to the settlement. At the time of his removal hither Major Fitch was a little past middle age, and had been for many years one of the most prominent men in Connecticut. From early manhood he had been actively employed in civil and military affairs-helped to re-establish colonial government after the revolution of 1689; was appointed assistant in 1690; was appointed sergeant major of New London county in 1696; served as boundary commissioner and land re- viser; led military expeditions, manned forts, guarded the fron- tier, and exercised jurisdiction over the Mohegans and all their lands and interests. After the death of his first wife-a daugh- ter of Captain John Mason-he married Alice Bradford, widow of Reverend William Adams, of Dedham, and mother of Mrs. Whiting, of Windham. Nine sons and daughters accompanied him to his new home here, and soon the Indian " neck " became an attractive family seat. The social position of Major Fitch,

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and his wide business relations, drew many people around him, and his plantation at once became a place of no small conse- quence-a rendezvous for land traders, civil and military offi- cials and hordes of idle Indians. Here courts were held, mili- tary expeditions organized, and many thousand acres of land bartered away. It was the first, and long the only, settlement between Norwich and Woodstock, extending its hospitalities and accommodations to many a weary traveler. The expedition that marched to the relief of Woodstock in 1699 passed the night, both in going and returning, " at Major Fitch's farm in Peags- comsuck." A road was soon laid out from Windham to this noted establishment, and connecting with Greenwich path, formed the great thoroughfare to Providence. Kent was the name given by the major to his plantation, but the Indian ap- pellation persistently adhered to it.

Other settlers soon followed Major Fitch. Samuel Adams, from Chelmsford; Elisha Paine, from Eastham; Obadiah and William Johnson, Samuel and Josiah Cleveland, from Woburn; Thomas Brooks, Rowland Jones and Robert Green, all settled west of the Quinebaug. To encourage these settlers, Owaneco, in 1698, made over to Major James Fitch, Josiah Cleveland and Jabez Utter, the land between the Quinebaug and Appaquage rivers, extending eight and a half miles north of Norwich north line-except those lands formerly granted to Major Fitch, Solo- mon and Daniel Tracy and Richard Bushnell-"in trust for ye inhabitants now dwelling in the plantation of Quinebauge, they bearing their proportion of charge, to wit: Thomas Brooks, Obadiah Johnson, Samuel Cleveland, Robert Green, Rowland Jones and Major Fitch. The above are on the west side of Quine- baug; the intention is to promote plantation work." This con- veyance did not prevent Owaneco's selling the same land to other settlers at every opportunity. Indeed, some tracts were sold to three or four purchasers by this " flexible " and unscrupu- lous chieftain. In 1699 Owaneco sold to Obadiah Johnson and Samuel Adams all the south part of the tract west of the Quine- baug not previously appropriated. Elisha Paine bought two thousand acres in the south of the tract from Major Fitch. Tix- hall Ensworth, of Hartford, also settled on land bought of Fitch. Josiah Cleveland bought land at Wanungatuck, "both sides of Tadneck Hill," of Richard Bushnell; Solomon Tracy, Jr., took possession of the land owned by his father.

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A conflict of land claims soon arose between Major Fitch and Fitz John Winthrop and others. Winthrop having been elected governor of Connecticut in 1698, secured a patent of confirma- tion of his title to certain lands which he had bought of the In- dians. The patent to the town of Plainfield also aroused some opposition, and the ownership of land in this neighborhood was uncertain until the early part of 1703, when it was mutually agreed that a new town should be formed on the west side of the Quinebaug, to be called Canterbury, and the assembly being thus petitioned, granted a charter for the said new town. The line agreed upon and observed in the charter, as dividing the towns of Canterbury and Plainfield, followed the river down from the northern boundary of the town " to the center of Peags- comsuck island and from the center of that island due east a quarter of a mile-thence a line run straight to the south bounds of town a mile eastward from Quinebaug River." This jog into Plainfield in the southeast corner of Canterbury was made to allow the Canterbury people a share of the rich "plain " lands upon which they had been in the habit of planting in the com- mon cornfields before the town was divided. The settlers whose names appear to the agreement to make the described line the division between Canterbury and Plainfield were James Fitch, Samuel Cleveland, Obadiah Johnson, Robert Green, Josiah Cleveland, Elisha Paine, Richard Adams, Thomas Brooks, Ben- jamin Rood and Isaac Cleveland.

The young town had considerable trouble to maintain its rights against the town of Plainfield, which obtained a patent covering all the land up to the Quinebaug, and though the pat- ent was declared by the assembly to be void, yet the latter town, for a time at least, seemed to exercise jurisdiction under it. Thus the dividing line between the two towns was for many years a source of trouble, and an almost constant dispute was kept up on the subject, the particulars of which are too lengthy to be inserted here. Though Canterbury, when in October, 1703, it was endowed with town privileges, had but few inhabitants, their character and circumstances made amends for the small- ness of their number. Most of them were men of means and position, accustomed to the management of public affairs and well fitted to initiate and carry on the settlement of the new township. Most, if not all, of the residences were in the eastern part of the town, overlooking the Quinebaug valley. The priv-

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ilege of Rowland's brook, a short distance northwest from Peags- comsuck, was granted to Samuel Adams, in 1703, for building and maintaining a corn mill. The same year Obadiah Johnson was allowed to keep a house of entertainment for the public, "provided he keeps good order," and here town meetings were held and public business transacted.

No record can now be found of the first organization of the town government. The first town clerk was probably Elisha Paine, and the first selectmen William Johnson, Samuel Adams and Eleazer Brown. This absence of early records makes it difficult to trace the progress of the town at that period, but it was probably very slow for several years. The tenure of land was prejudicial to its growth and best interests. Mr. Samuel Adams at that time declared-" Before we were a town, Major Fitch, Richard Bushnell and the Tracys had swept up all the good land upon the Quinebaug with all the other good. land, wheresoever it lay, and all for a song or a trifle, so that there was nothing left but poor rocky hills and hungry land such as no wise man under Heaven would have ventured to settle upon." Land titles were obscure and conflicting, and some tracts had been sold and resold by Owaneco till it was impossible to tell who was the rightful owner, and after subduing and cul- tivating such rough lands as were left them the settlers had of- ten to pay off successive claimants or be sued from court to court to their cost and damage. With these difficulties in the way it is not surprising that Canterbury at first made but slow progress in settlement. Eleazer Brown, of Chelmsford, bought land at Wanungatuck of the Tracys in 1704. Jonathan Ashley, Ben- jamin Baldwin and Henry Smith appear among the inhabitants in 1705. Samuel Butts, of Dorchester, settled near Wanunga- tuck in 1706, and John Pelton and Jeremiah Plympton, Charles and Paul Davenport, of Dorchester, bought land in the south of Canterbury, "with buildings and fences," of Jeremiah Fitch the same year.

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History of Windham County, Connecticut, Part 47

Author: Bayles, Richard M. (Richard Mather) Publication date: 1889 Publisher: New York, Preston Number of Pages: 1506

Author: Bayles, Richard M. (Richard Mather)
Publication date: 1889
Publisher: New York, Preston
Number of Pages: 1506