USA > Connecticut > Litchfield County > Plymouth > History of the town of Plymouth, Connecticut : with an account of the centennial celebration May 14 and 15, 1895 : also a sketch of Plymouth, Ohio, settled by local families > Part 28
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SAMUEL R. TERRELL.
Samuel R. Terrell, now in his sixty-ninth year, has been steadily in the employ of the Eagle Lock Company for many years. He is a respected citizen and an honor to his town. He enlisted as a private in Company D, 19th Regiment, C. V. I., afterward 2d Connecticut Heavy Artillery, August 7, 1862, serving three years. He was a good soldier, and while on duty was one of the cleanest and best got up men in the regiment. As such, he was rewarded at one time by receiving a furlough of twenty days. Mr. Terrell was very deaf and in consequence was considered unfitted for a soldier, but nevertheless, performed his duties well and faithfully. He was in the defences and went to the front with the regiment, assisting in tearing up the rail- road at North Anna, and was in several skirmishes. He was with Charles Guernsey, of Plymouth, when he was wounded, June 22, 1864, and assisted in taking him off the field. Mr. Terrell is holding his own and bids fair to live to a ripe old age.
GAIUS FENN.
Gaius Fenn, son of Jason and Martha Fenn, was born in Plymouth, June 29, 1784. He invented and obtained a patent
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Algelon H. Taylor
Dr. W. W. Wellington.
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for the Fenn faucet about ISIo, and with his brother, Jason Fenn, Jr., manufactured them in a two-story shop which stood on Town Hill about fifty feet south of the house now owned by Jason C. Fenn, the wood-house now used by Jason C. Fenn being made from timbers from said shop. In connection with the " Fenn Faucet" were also made round picture and looking glass frames, molasses gates, candlesticks and tumblers, the metal used being pewter, or fifty pounds block tin to 200 pounds lead. The tool used to form the inside of the tumbler is still on the premises. The faucet business was removed to New Haven, afterwards to New York, where it was carried on by the Fenn family up to 1859, and now wherever and by whom made they bear the name of " Fenn's." Gaius Fenn died April 7, 1854.
ELAM FENN.
The memory of Elam Fenn will always be cherished by the community to which he belonged. He was born June 26, 1797, the youngest but one in a family of nine children. His parents were Jason and Martha Potter Fenn. He was mar- ried February 13, 1816, to Lydia, daughter of Timothy Atwater. Mrs. Fenn died February 3, 1873, and eleven years later, Aug- ust 21, 1884, was followed by her husband. Mr. Fenn lived to a ripe old age and died in the same house where he was born. The aged couple celebrated their golden wedding February 13, 1866. Four persons were present who attended the original ceremony fifty years before. Mr. Fenn lived an upright Chris- tian life and was one of the original forty-nine who organized the Congregational Church in Terryville. Of his home, now owned by his son, Jason C. Fenn, Rev. L. S. Griggs has written :
" Town Hill, so called, is a widely extended, irregular, ele- vation of land, occupying a large area in the central portion of the town. It lies a little to the south of a direct line between the village of Plymouth Center and that of Terryville in the same town, two miles distant to the east. Ascending this hill by a road which crosses the highway at a point about a half mile west of Terryville, soon after reaching the broad upland at the sum- mit, we come to a dear, old, red house, on the left, standing thirty feet or so back from the road. As we write, here lies the deed by which Joab Camp conveys to Jason Fenn (both of the town of Watertown and parish of Northbury), several 'pieces or parcels of land, with the dwelling house and barn standing thereon '-this very house. The date of this deed is the ' first day of April, in the year of our Lord, 1784, and of the Independ- ence of America, the eighth.' A portion of the covering put on a hundred years ago still remains in a good state of preservation -whitewood clapboards fastened with wrought iron nails. (The nails were made by hand, of iron purchased in Sharon, and brought to the vicinity in the form of rods, bent so as to be con- veniently carried on horseback). Red-lovingly, warmly, dur- ably red-is this house, according to the ancient custom of house
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Gaius Fenn.
Jason Fenn.
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painting. Erect and firm it stands, with two-storied front, some- what modernized in window and chimney and piazza, but in form without and within much the same as of yore. With low ceilings, divided midway by broad board-cased beams projecting downward, the rooms of this old house stoop toward their occu- pants in cosy proximity.
" Added interest is given to the premises on which this house stands by the fact that the first minister of this town, Rev. Mr. Todd, in 1739, had his home upon them. In a lot on the slope northeast of the house, is the indentation in the ground, which marks the site of his home, now only a depression in the hillside. In 1876, the centennial of our country's independence, an elm tree was planted by one of the pastors of the town, upon that home site of the first pastor. At the present time there remains an apple tree-sole relic of an orchard planted in the days of Mr. Todd. A peculiar charm invests the Fenn homestead, in the wide outlook and beautiful panorama which it ever commands. Across the level expanse of the lots which lie in front of it, on the other side of the street, the far away highlands of the west are visible. Among the last homes of this part of earth, to which the setting sun flashes his evening farewell, is the old house on the hill. But far more extensive, comprehensive, and diversified, is the view to the east. Town Hill soon declines from the rear of the house, sloping steadily-yet with some hesi- tations of level reaches-towards the valley where lies the village of Terryville-a mingled scene of houses and foliage, and factory walls and chimney tops ; and central to all and prominent above all, the white tower of the church, where, for nearly fifty years, the subject of our story worshipped. This is the foreground. Beyond lies the wide landscape, swelling and sinking, shading from green to blue, until the sight, flying on its swift wings, touches the horizon soft as the air itself. The line of that hori- zon is twenty miles or so east of the Connecticut river-distant at least forty miles from the old house on the hill. In the great area between the signs of man are often seen, the church spire, the fragments of a village, the solitary home, the rising smoke marking factory or passing railroad train.
" In this house on the hill was born the man whose memory we cherish, and would prolong with greater distinctness and lastingness than the unaided recollection of men might effect."
ELAM ATWATER FENN.
Elam Atwater Fenn, son of Elam and Lydia Fenn, was born at Plymouth, Conn., March 2, 1821, and was married October 15, 1842, to Miss Mary J. Barker of Bristol. Conn. ; removed to Terryville in 1843, and in 1841 went to New York to work for Jason and Gaius Fenn, manufacturers of Fenn pewter fau- cets, and continued with them about eleven years, when he removed to Michigan in 1852, and engaged in the lumber busi- ness from 1860 to 1871. While thus in business he built and presented the people with the church at Fennville, which for
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HISTORY OF PLYMOUTH.
Elam Fenn.
Mrs. Elam Tenn
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twenty years was the pioneer church of that section of the State, Fennville being named for him by vote of the citizens assembled. In I891 the church was burned and a more modern one now takes its place in which a memorial window was placed that reads : " In loving rememberance of Elam A. Fenn." When Mr. Fenn first went to Fennville he had just resigned as superin- tendent of the Sunday School of the Washington street M. E. Church, Brooklyn, N. Y., and he did much for the upbuilding of the Church and Sunday School at Fennville. The terrible Michigan fire wiped out of existence all his earthly possessions, which would, at that time, have netted him some $20,000, since which time Mr. Fenn has resided much of the time at Allegan, Mich., engaged in manufacturing and wood work. He has served the city in various ways as president, and now holds the office of city clerk. Mr. Fenn, who is now seventy-four years old has written some of his impressions of his life in Plymouth for this book as follows :
" Plymouth Center, seventy years ago, was a very appropriate name for what was later, and, perhaps is at the present day, called Plymouth Hill. Not so much on account of geographical locality in the township, as from the fact that it was the real hub of the surrounding country even beyond the boundary of the township in every direction. It was a thrifty, enterprising mart for trade as well as the seat of learning. The old academy, which was located east of the green, was the university for all that region of country. The two great churches which stood upon that grand old Plymouth green were large indeed, and it seems to me now that their spires pointed heavenward as high as the ingenuity of man could get them. Then there were those majestic old buttonwood trees which adorned the green, sending out in every direction their numerous branches, some of them covering more ground than a church and shooting their topmost branches a little higher every year. Nothwithstanding their vigor and glory, they and the old church, of precious memory to me, were removed, like the old father and mother, to make room for a new house of worship, the more attractive elm trees, and a more vigorous and progressive generation.
" As I turn my thoughts backward I see a great multitude of people gathering at the Center upon the Sabbath day, coming from every point, the four roads which center at Plymouth being the grand trunk with numerous branches shooting off and reach- ing out to the remotest and most obscure parts of the parish, and even beyond the limits of the township. Some came in wagons, some on horseback, but the great majority were on foot. The seating of the Presbyterian or Congregational Church, which was about half and half, where my father attended, is indelibly im- pressed upon my memory. At the time of my earliest recollec- tion, seventy years ago. Luther Hart was the pastor. His place in the church was up two flights of stairs, securely shut in a strong box. three or four feet high, with a wheel or what was called a sounding board about eight feet in diameter suspended over his head. It is said what is up must come down, and that
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Old Todd Apple Tree.
Elam A Fenn
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was the method taken to get his voice down to the people below. At the base of the pulpit, and in front sat the grave old deacons facing the congregation. Deacon Hemingway, father of Street and Samuel; Deacon Dunbar, father of Deacon Ferrand, were old men then and usually occupied that seat. The other deacons were young men and sat there only on communion seasons. They were Andrew Stoughton, Tertius D. Potter, Miles Smith, Deacon Tuttle, who lived near Wolcott, Wm. Judson of Ply- mouth Hollow, and, I think, Lyman Baldwin. The old people whose faces loom up familiarly before me now are Deacon Hem- ingway, who lived north of what was called East Church ; Esqs. Lake Potter, Joel Langdon, Ransom Blakesley, Sr., Linus Blakesley, father of Deacon Milo Blakesley ; Captain Smith, father of Oliver and Deacon Miles Smith ; Captain Bull, Ran- dall Warner, Sr., Dr. Woodruff, Sr., Jonatham Ludington, Mr. Primas (colored), Captain Darrow, the undertaker ; Jonathan and Philip Pond, Ambrose Barnes, Lemuel Scovil, who lived on the place of the late Lyman Tolles; Captain Camp, father of Hiram, of the New Haven Clock company ; David Adkins, Sr., father of Mason, David and John ; John Osborn, father of Mrs. Elam 'Camp and Merchant Ives ; Thaddeus Beach, Sr., Jacob Lattimore, Stephen Brainerd, John Brown, Captain Wells, Sr., Daniel Smith, who lived opposite the Wyllys Atwater place, father of Sherman and the late Hon. Erastus Smith of Hartford ; Jesse Weed, father of David; Calvin Butler, Timothy Atwater, Truman Ives, Sr., Captain Stoughton, father of Deacon Andrew. No doubt there were others who do not materialize before me just now.
"The most prominent of the next generation who appear before my vision just now for recognition, a few of them at least, were: Ammi Darrow, Elam Camp, Benjamin Fenn, Seth Thomas, Henry Terry, Dr. Abraham Ives, Apollos Warner, Stephen Mitchell, 'Squire Mitchell, Edward Langdon, Lucius Bradley, Mr. Cooley, Ransom Blakesley, Sr., Joel Blakesley, Riley and William Ives, John M. Beach, Solomon Griggs, Joel Griggs, Landa Beach, Daniel Beach, David Beach, Thaddeus Beach, Lemuel Beach, James Beach, Henry Beach, Daniel Ad- kins, David Adkins, Jr., Mason Adkins, John Adkins, Chaun- cey Bradley, Levi Scott, Wyllys Atwater, Timothy Atwater, Jr., Ferrand Dunbar, Mr. Griffin, Street Hemingway, Samuel Hemingway, Wyllys Morse, Nathan Beach, Milo Blakesley, Jacob Blakesley, Erastus Blakesley, Marcus Cook, Truman Cook, Benajah Camp, Hiram Camp, Joseph Sutliff, John Sut- liff, Asahel Pardee, Lester Smith, David Weed, Lyman Dun- bar, Hall Dunbar, Randall Matthews, Jared Blakesley, Elam Fenn, Jason Fenn, Jr., Eli Terry, Jr., Phineas Hitchcock, Ly- man Baldwin, Bennett Warner, Gaius F. Warner, Orson Hall, Lyman Hall, Orren Brainerd, Jonathan Pond, Philip Pond, Wyrum Curtiss, Silas Hoadley, Eli Potter, Linus Fenn.
"Two noteworthy women were Mrs. David Sanford and Mrs. Daniel Lane, who lived upon the Wolcott road beyond Tolles station. Seldom were they absent from their respective
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The Fenn Homestead.
H
Jason C Fenn.
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churches at the Center upon the Sabbath day. I have seen them going there through blinding snow and pelting rain, always on foot, and happy in the thought that they were in the line of duty. " As a village, Thomaston was very small. Then it was Plymouth Hollow. Terryville had not then been thought of. I remember when the first clock shop was built by Eli Terry, 1 Jr., and went with my father to the raising in about IS27. can count on my fingers' ends every house between Robert John- son's, who had a little cooper shop at the place now owned by Elizur Fenn, to the fork of the road branching off from the turn- pike in Bristol at the Silas Carrington place. There was not a house from that point west until you came to the Claudius Allen place where the post office is now kept in Terryville. Where the upper lock shop now stands there was a saw mill (not of modern invention however), owned by Claudius Allen.
" Rev. Luther Hart was a familiar figure in every home in the whole parish, which in fact embraced the whole town. When Mr. Hart was a caller the dinner horn announced his coming, and all responded to the call and gathered for counsel and prayer. If any one was sick it was as much expected that Mr. Hart would be notified as that a physician would be called, and often he would be seen coming (always riding a small bay horse) and arrive before the physician. When watchers were needed to care for the sick Mr. Hart always saw to it that they were provided. Before the morning sermon on Sunday he would mention the name of the sick person and ask, 'Who will watch to-night ?' when some one would arise and he would say one is provided. Who Monday night ? and so on until watchers were provided for the week. Nearly every Sunday there was one or more notices read like this: ' Joseph Brown is sick and desires the prayers of the church that he may be restored to health, but if otherwise determined that he may be resigned and prepared for the Divine will.' After the death and burial of a person it was expected that the mourning family would be together in their pew the next Sabbath, before the morning prayer. Mr. Hart would mention the death of the person and say, ' The afflicted family (and here they would arise, and other sympathizing friends) desire the prayers of the church that this affliction may be sanctified to their spiritual and eternal good.' Then he would mention the names of those friends who had risen with the family and say, 'They desire to join in the request.' At one time a deaf old couple mistook the reading of a marriage notice for that of a death notice. They were tender hearted people, and it was almost a universal custom for them to arise as sympathizing with bereaved ones. On this occasion they arose as the notice of marriage was read, when Mr. Hart, true to his nature, with a broad smile, said : 'Ephraim Hough and wife desire to join in sympathy with them.' The evidences of solemnity were not apparent upon the faces of the congregation.
" But the unwritten history of Plymouth and the old church, 100 years ago, will not be revealed by human lips, as eye wit- nesses are but few that can testify of their own knowledge who
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were the occupants of those homes, the location of which is marked with cellar walls of moss-covered stones. I can remem- ber five generations in my own family who have attended church in Plymouth-my grandparents, father and mother, myself and daughter, my granddaughter, Mrs. Crane and her daughter, who have been guests of their aunt, Mrs. Cornelia Stoughton, the past winter.'
JASON C. FENN.
Jason C. Fenn, judge of probate and town clerk of Plymouth, son of Elam and Lydia Atwater Fenn, was born October 27, 1838, in the house now owned by him, and which was purchased by nis grandfather, Jason Fenn, in 1784, situated on Town Hill. He received a common school and academic education, and for thirty years was clerk in stores. He is a member and deacon of the Terryville Congregational Church. He represented the town in the House in ISSo; has served the town as selectman seven years, the last year being in 1890, when a building was provided in Terryville for the transaction of town business, and January, 1891, having been elected town clerk, he removed the town records and papers from Plymouth Center to the new town building. January 5, 1893, he assumed the duties of judge of probate, and removed the probate records and papers from Ply- mouth Center, both of which offices he still holds.
Mr. Fenn is the originator of the Fenn patent bridge, which is constructed of old railroad iron, unsurpassed for strength, cheapness and durability, and tasty in appearance. Several of these bridges have been built over the streams in Plymouth. With the exception of the plank flooring and a few compara- tively small castings, the construction is entirely of old rails.
REV. LEVERETT GRIGGS, D. D.
There seems a propriety in the insertion in this book of some account of the Rev. Leverett Griggs, D. D., who was for nearly fourteen years (February, 1856-December, 1869), pastor of the Congregational church of Bristol, and who resided in that town nearly twenty-seven years until his death, January 28, 1883. In periods when the Congregational church of Terryville, was without a pastor, he was often called upon for ministerial service in that parish, at one time supplying the pulpit for many Sab- baths in succession. And once, in view of representations made to him by members of the church in Terryville, he had in serious consideration whether he would encourage that church to extend a call to himself to become its pastor. And it was largely the result of the mutual regard subsisting between the church of Terryville and himself, that his son, Rev Leverett S. Griggs, became its pastor for a season.
He was born in Tolland, Conn., Nov. 17, 1808, the son of Captain Stephen and Elizabeth (Lathrop) Griggs. His grand- father, Ichabod Griggs, Jr., who was a citizen of Tolland, died a soldier in the Revolutionary war, September 30, 1776, aged 32 years, and was buried in New Rochelle, N. Y. He was the
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youngest of six children. He married August 28, 1833, Catha- rine, daughter of Hon. Elisha (graduate Yale, 1796,) and Ce- linda (Baker) Stearns of Tolland. She was the mother of six children, and died in Millbury, Mass., March 10, 1848. The following are the names of her children, viz: Maria, born July 19, 1834, married to J. Frank Howe, December 31, 1857; Catharine, born January 26, 1836, married to Benezet H. Bill, November 2, 1859; Leverett Stearns, born February 16, 1838, married to Cornelia Little, July 13, 1864; Elizabeth Celinda, born March 5, 1840, married to Harlow A. Gale, June 13, 1859 ; John Lawrence, born April 21, 1843, died a member of Com- pany G, 16th regiment, Connecticut Volunteers, September I, 1862; Joseph Emerson, born July 13, 1847, married to Ellen M. Little, January 3, 1867. He married November 30, 1848, Charlotte Ann Stearns, sister of the former wife, who became the mother of four children.
Dr. Griggs was born and reared upon a farm. He had but little promise of long life in childhood, being a great sufferer from salt rheum. So severely was he afflicted with that distem- per in infancy that a neighboring housewife advised his mother to give him something to put him out of his misery, saying: "He cannot live, and if he does live he never will know anything ;" an opinion he often quoted in later years, with merriment, some- times remarking that he ought to be patient with his infirmity and thankful for it, because it was the occasion of his being deemed unequal to the work of a farmer, and, therefore, had an influence in opening the way for his reception of the boon of a collegiate education.
When he was young "general training" of the militia was the great day of all the year for the boys. Then he wasgiven six and a quarter cents to buy ginger-bread with. Visiting his native town in the later years of life, he remarked when passing a certain house : "Here lived so and so, he used to get drunk, invariably, on training day. It was expected, as a matter of course, and the boys did not think the day complete if he and another man from the northeast part of the town, did not strip and go out into a lot to fight, so drunk that they could not harm each other much."
He was prepared for college in part by Rev. Ansel Nash, pastor of the church in Tolland from 1813 to 1831, who gave him instruction for fifty cents a week. As he was applying himself to his book one day in the " study," the good pastor and wise tutor came across the room to him, and putting his hand upon the boy's shoulder, said : "Seest thou a man diligent in his business ? he shall stand before kings; he shall not stand before mean men " Those words of encouragement electrified the lad and had a lifelong effect of good upon him. After further tuition in Monson Academy, Mass, he entered college in 1825, gradu- ating with honor in 1829. It was in the earlier part of his course at Yale that he gave his heart to God. He united with the col- lege church March 2, 1827, and continued a member of that church through life, a fact which correctly reports his strong at-
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HISTORY OF PLYMOUTH.
Rev. Leverett Griggs
J C. Griggs
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tachment for Yale college. He taught for a year as an assistant at Mount Hope Seminary, a school for boys in Baltimore, Md., and then pursued the study of theology at Andover and New Haven, acting as tutor in Yale College while studying theology in the Yale Divinity School. Declining a call to the North church of New Haven, he was ordained and installed pastor of the Congregational church of North Haven, October 30, IS33. His college room-mate and very intimate friend, Rev. Edwin R. Gilbert, had been settled in Wallingford, the next parish on the north, in October, 1832. Nearly twelve happy and fruitful years were spent in North Haven. A church and parsonage were built. There were accessions to the membership of the church aggregating two hundred and twenty-six. After the lapse of fifty years the name of Dr. Griggs is still " like ointment poured forth," in the parish of North Haven.
He was settled subsequently in New Haven, pastor of the Chapel street church, now the Church of the Redeemer ; in Mill- bury, Mass., and in Bristol, Conn. His ministry was largely blessed in all these places. His alma mater conferred the degree of Doctor of Divinity upon him in 1868. Many of his sermons and other productions have been preserved in printed form. He was a man of surpassingly genial disposition, full of the spirit of kindness, and endowed with exceptional tact in dealing with people. There was fitness to himself in what he wrote of his mother soon after her death in 1845: "She was one of the most * cheerful and even tempered persons that ever lived." He had the gift of utterance. always saying with apparent ease that which was happily suited to the occasion. At the same time he was a plain and faithful preacher of righteousness, fulfilling to a large degree the command. " Reprove, rebuke, exhort with all long suffering and doctrine." Of his countenance, thus wrote a brother minister who had long known him: "Few ever had such a loving, speaking, sweet face; itself a letter of credit." He served for about a quarter of a century as acting school vis- itor in Bristol, and he esteemed it " one of the highest honors" he " ever received," that the freemen of Bristol assembled in town meeting, October 8, 18SI, unanimously recommended that the selectmen, in view of the great value of his services in " elev- ating and advancing to increased usefulness our common schools," "to abate his taxes as long as he continues his residence with us." He was stricken with partial paralysis, July 4, ISSI, a disaster which was hastened apparently by the shock received from the tidings of the attempted assassination of President Gar- field. A second attack of the malady, October 29 of the same vear, prostrated him completely. but a year and three months elapsed before he passed away, departing this life on a Sabbath evening, as he had hoped might be the fact. It was the evening of January 28, ISS3.
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