USA > Connecticut > New Haven County > Wolcott > History of the town of Wolcott (Connecticut) from 1731 to 1874, with an account of the centenary meeting, September 10th and 11th, 1873 and with the genealogies of the families of the town > Part 31
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Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42
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Luman Lewis has been for forty years the principal stone . mason and mover of buildings in the town. He has raised up a large family of children of robust development. Two of his sons were volunteers in the late war.
Ives Lewis has long been a blacksmith in the town. .
Bennet J. Lewis, son of Nathaniel Lewis, is postmaster in Marion.
Simeon H. Norton, esq., was for ten years the first merchant and the first postmaster in Plantsville. For several years he was first se- lectman of the town ; has been member of the legislature, and for many years the acting magistrate of the place. He has performed the difficult duties of that office in such a manner as to secure the confidence and approval of all classes. He is withal a clear and forcible writer.
Julina Norton, wife of Prof. Bailey, of Yale College, had great literary ability.
Levi P. Norton has long been a leading merchant in Plants- ville ; has very good taste and judgment in dress and dry goods, and, being childless, has built his monument, better than marble, in a neat settlement of residences, west of the cemetery of Plantsville, now numbering eighteen, called Pine Park.
Deacon Edward Twitchell learned his trade of Deacon Higgins. In active, protracted labor, and executive ability the master and apprentice were alike. Edward Twitchell had a well-balanced mind. He devoted his leisure hours to reading, obtaining much practical knowledge, of which he made good use in conversation and address. His habits were to work from twelve to fourteen hours a day in his tanyard, and to spend his evenings in visiting the sick and poor, and watching with them, and attending religious . meetings. Soon after his apprenticeship, conversing with the speaker, he said: "I have looked over the fields of enterprise in life and concluded that the best way for me to serve God and be useful to my fellow men is to 'tan hides.'" His life of great usefulness and earnest godliness demonstrated the wisdom of his judgment. Joseph Twitchell, his son, fired with patriotism, left his studies, at the breaking out of the war, and was long a chaplain in the army. His fervid appeals did more to fill the quota of volunteers from Southington than any other agency. He is at
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present the well-known pastor of the Asylum Hill Church, of Hartford. Edward Twitchell, jr., inherited his father's name, business, and spirit - the last his best legacy. The business firm consists of Hon. H. D. Smith, son-in-law of Deacon Higgins, Edward Twitchell, and George Smith. It is but just to say of the firm, as it is of Wolcott parentage, that it gave ten thousand dollars toward the building of the Plantsville Congregational church. Sarah Jane Twitchell, his daughter, has long been a devoted and distinguished teacher of the children of the Freedmen of Atlanta, Ga.
Dwight Twitchell, brother of Deacon Edward, learned his trade also of Deacon Higgins, and was long a member and jobber of the Stowe Manufacturing Company ; now in a green old age of leisure, residing in a house lately erected, contrasting widely with his Wolcott origin. Mrs. Jennie Twitchell (Pultz), his daughter, is the gifted singer in the Plantsville choir.
Burritt Parker, a cabinet and coffin maker by trade, and such a man ought to have many serious thoughts.
Lucas Upson, long the leading merchant of Southington ; honest and genial, and sagacious in business; selectman, a great politician, and the most popular candidate of his party.
Jerry Upson. He does not belong to that class of so vinegar an aspect as would not deign to show their teeth by the semblance of a smile, though Nestor himself should say the jest were laugh- able. Jerry has a "merry heart, which doeth good like a medicine." The spirit is not catching, the more the pity. His only son gave his young life for the life of the country.
Parlia Perkins, wife of Dr. Noah H. Byington, whose husband is a leading physician in Southington ; she is very highly respected ; of pleasant disposition, and good judgment.
Lucius Sutliff is a prominent joiner of the town; is highly esteemed, as also his sons, who occupy important positions in the community.
Hopkins Upson, a merchant in partnership with his uncle several years, and an honorable citizen.
Deacon Lucius Upson, of Plantsville church, has been school teacher, mechanic, clerk, and farmer. In him is illustrated how the mind can hold the body up, by genial love, Christian zeal, and
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ceaseless labor for the good of others. Elijah was a man of like passion and prayer, who shut up heaven by the space of three years and six months.
"The place from whence such virtuous things proceed, is honored by the doers' deeds."
May the Lord bless this old church and the town of Wolcott, while the sun and moon endure, for the sons and daughters they have given to Southington.
The Hon. Elihu Burritt, of New Britain, made the following remarks :
I am happy to be here to-day to enjoy the fellowship of all the interesting memories which this occasion revives. These com- memorations are full of deep and varied interest. And there is one circumstance about them that we are entitled to speak of with just complacency. These commemorations are, as far as I know, exclusively New England institutions. They show the best characteristics of the New England mind. They show that our hard-soiled and hilly towns have a history far longer than the lives of their oldest inhabitants- a history that we revere, a history reaching back in some cases to those perilous years when the red Indians of the country outnumbered the whites-a history of hardship, privation, of faith, patience, and patriotism - one long battle of life, in which our forefathers and foremothers acted their parts with a Christian heroism that makes us love their memories. There are a hundred small towns and villages in New England in which you may read the continuous record of a century or more on the grave-stones in their church-yards. Many of these church-yards are divided in the middle by a kind of equatorial line. On the one side you will see the old red sand- stone monuments that tell us that the men and women beneath lived and died subjects of the British crown, and called England "home," just as naturally, proudly, and fondly as Canadians and Australians now call our common motherland by that pleasant Saxon name. Then, side by side with these colonial graves, sometimes on the same stone, we may read the names of the first men of the village who died in the full right and title of citizens of a new-born nation. Both English fathers and their American sons were happy and true in their lives, and in their deaths they
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were not divided. No volume ever written unfolds the history of the two Englands - of the mother and daughter-so fully and . impressively as any one of our grave-yards a hundred years old. And no stones in them should be more tenderly watched and cared for than those erected before the American Revolution. For what pages of our New England history are dearer to us than those that record the lives and characters of our pre-Revolutionary fathers and mothers.
Now it is these foot-prints of our history, hidden by a brook, but seen on either side, that give these New England centenaries their peculiar interest. No one of our smallest towns, in all the centuries it is yet to see, will, I am sure, ever erase the foot-prints on the farther side of that brook, or seek to break or tarnish the hasp that connects its history with the history of that noble mother country which has begotten and nursed more free and glorious nations than all the other kingdoms of the world, And it is a fact worthy of mention on an occasion like this. There is not a town or village like this in New England which does not resemble Old England more fully than any great commonwealth or nation can do. The children that England has sent abroad to people all latitudes and climates with young and growing nations, far out- number, with their offspring, all her population at home. Not one of these young and scattered communities but remembers her and speaks of her with filial pride and affection. Now, is not this goodly old town, set upon these eternal hills, just such an- other Old England in these pleasant maternal relations? Has not Wolcott sent out as many families into the broad territory of this great Union as England has sent colonies into the distant continents and islands of the globe? Do not her children and her children's children, thus scattered abroad in widely sundered families, think of her and speak of her with the same filial senti- ments?
This, then, to my mind, is the aspect and appreciation in which we should view the life and relations of any New England town as old as this, or younger still. It is not what it is and has been at home, but what it is, has been, and does abroad; what ele- ments of social, moral, and political life it has contributed to other communities far and near; what men and women it has
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sent out to impart the vitality of their characters to other towns, and States, and to the nation at large. Its history, without in- cluding this vital department of its being and influence, would . be like the play of Hamlet with Hamlet left out. Certainly this whole history of a town, the whole of its home life and outside life, should be passed in review on an occasion like this. And we have had some of these facts and aspects presented to us to- day.
It is both a necessity and custom for great commercial and manufacturing corporations to take stock of their establishments at the end of the year, to see what they have sold or produced in that period, what they have gained, and what material they have on hand to begin a new year with. Well, it is equally fitting that every town, at the end of its century, should take stock -an in- ventory of its being, faculties, and influence ; of the men and women it has produced, in the hundred years, who have made their mark at home or abroad; of the institutions it has estab- lished and sustained, and of the working material, the faculty, and the will it has for beginning a new century. I am sure that all the people of this town, and all who claim kindred with it, have good reason to be proud and happy at the inventory it pre- sents the world at the end of its first century. I am equally sure that the young generation here, who are to inherit the coming century, will remember this occasion, and resolve to make a his- tory in their day which their children's children will review with pride and gladness at the next centenary which Wolcott will cele- brate.
I think that not one of our New England towns could make a contribution to the history of the country at large which would be so interesting, instructive, and valuable as the simple record of its men and women; of the life it has lived at home, and the life and character it has sent abroad in a hundred years. I remem- ber well how deeply I was impressed with a few facts stated of another small, stony, hard-soiled Connecticut town. A distin- guished native of old Lebanon told me that that town had pro- duced five governors, and had given a full college education to seventy-two men for the ministry, and other learned professions, since its incorporation. What a record that to present to the
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world ! What faith and patience, what tireless industry and self- sacrificing frugality, are represented by these simple facts ! Think of a little community of farmers toiling on small and stony farms, and making them yield not only comfortable sustenance, clothing, and schooling for their children at home, but the means of giving a full classical education to seventy-two graduates of Yale Col- lege in the life-time of their town! How instructive and useful would the history of such New England towns be to the rich and fertile townships of our great West, who send agents to Lebanon and other small communities in New England, to solicit contri- butions for the support of Western Colleges !
We have seen what a record Wolcott has contributed to the history of our good old Connecticut, and the whole State may truly and proudly say, "well done !"
The following lines, written for the occasion by Amos M. Johnson, esq., of Wolcott, were sung to the tune "New Jerusalem," C. M .:
ONE HUNDRED YEARS.
One hundred years have passed away, And memory now revives ; One hundred years are passed and gone ! This Church,- it still survives.
One hundred years, - the greatest age That mortals ever knew ! One hundred years,- the wisest sage Will ever keep in view .
What scenes the memory brings to view ! What wonders have been wrought ! How many souls been born anew,- Their God and Saviour sought.
The fathers of this Church now rest, - In yonder graveyard lie ; Their spirits dwell among the blest, In bliss, beyond the sky .
One hundred years,-how great the sum, And yet how quickly sped ! One hundred years, the next to come, Will find us with the dead.
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Then let us live with Heaven and Hell And Death before our eyes ! One Hundred years,- we then shall dwell In glory ' bove the skies.
Mr. Orcutt again exhibited "antiquities." Among them was a pair of high-heeled slippers worn by a Wol- cott lady at the commencement ball of Yale College. The sword of Captain John Allcock, presented to him by George III, and now in the hands of a grandson, was shown by A. Bronson Alcott, who gave an interesting account of the high uses to which it had been put by his patriot ancestor. A large fan over one hundred years old was exhibited, which, in size and appearance, resem- bles the fans just coming into use. A musket made in London, and carried in the French war by David Welton, of Wolcott, was exhibited. Mr. George Pratt, of South- ington, stated a family tradition that this musket was once so skillfully used that it "brought down" in succession three British officers.
The Rev. Mr. Upson read a list of the deacons of the church in Wolcott from the beginning. Mr. Isaac Bronson, of Bristol, a descendant of one of the first deacons of the church, followed with some remarks. He gave interest- ing traditions of the Bronson family. A diary of Deacon Isaac Bronson, which had been preserved, was shown and extracts from it read by Deacon Samuel Holmes. Deacon Holmes read a hymn composed by Deacon Bronson on the death of Washington, and which was sung in the church at the time. Rev. A. C. Beach added some recollections of Deacon Bronson, who was an old man when he was pastor here, and he pronounced him one of the noblest men he ever knew. These allusions to Deacon Bronson brought A. Bronson Alcott to his feet again, who referred to the Deacon's efficiency as a church officer at a time the church was without a pastor. He was peculiarly gifted in prayer, and impressed every one with his deep sincerity and nearness to God. His
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counsels and prayers were sought by the sick and afflicted. No man ever lived in Wolcott with such natural gifts as he, and had he been favored with a liberal education, he would have equaled any of the great men this State has produced.
Judge W. E. Curtis, of New York, was introduced, and very tenderly alluded to a former pastor, Rev. Mr. Woodward. He held in his hand a small volume of poems by William Maxwell, esq., of Norfolk, Va. Mr. Maxwell, seventy years ago, was an inmate of Mr. Woodward's family, and by him prepared for college. Upon hearing of his instructor's death, he composed a poem upon "Wolcott," which is contained in this vol- ume. Judge Curtis read extracts from the poem. A general desire was expressed to have the poem published in an account of the proceedings.
A. Bronson Alcott was again called for to give an ac- count of his cousin Wm. A. Alcott, M. D., and widely known in our country as a teacher and author. He said that although cousins, they were more like brothers. They were much together in younger years, and helped one another in their literary course. Dr. Alcott has done more for primary education than any other person. He was very successful as a teacher and author. It is said that he wrote over one hundred books, and also edited three different journals. He was a "vegetarian," and for many years tasted no meat. Mr. Alcott, before closing, alluded very modestly to his own family, among whom is the celebrated authoress of " Little Women." This al- lusion awakened the people, who listened with "erect ears" to all that was said of their favorite authoress.
The Rev. Wm. P. Alcott, of Greenwich, and son of Dr. W. A. Alcott, having been called for, arose and gave some facts concerning the family. His grandfather, John Bronson, was a man of extraordinary strength and endurance. At eighty he challenged the young men of Wolcott to engage in a "mowing match " with him for a
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day, but none of the young yeomanry were bold enough to accept the challege. The lesson that Mr. Alcott would impress, was what could be accomplished by work. The sons of Wolcott had achieved all honor and influence by hard work. He mentioned that his father learned arithmetic at night, holding the slate on his left arm and candle (the candlestick being a potato) in his left hand. Under great difficulties he attained his final eminence.
The next speaker was George W. Seward, esq., of New York, only surviving brother of the late Secretary Seward. A branch of the Seward family lived in Wol- cott, and among the earliest settlers was Amos Seward, who is held in fragrant memory. Mr. Seward began by thanking the good people of Wolcott for the generous hospitality that had been extended to him since he came among them. He entered into some of the details of the family history. Without speaking of his immediate family, he related some facts concerning his ancestors who were prominent in the revolutionary war. His
grandfather was Col. John Seward, of Morristown, N. J. Col. Seward was not only a patriot, but one of the most active of patriots. He made himself felt as a power on the side of the colonies, and feared by tories. Several anecdotes of his skill as a marksman, and acts as a· soldier, were given.
As a general desire had been expressed to hear some- thing about his brother, the late Secretary Seward, he gave two interesting facts. When Mr. Seward was Gov- ernor of New York, in. 1839, he was invited, in connec- tion with President Van Buren, to attend a Sabbath school celebration on Staten Island. He addressed them, and in the course of his remarks said, that great wealth, education, and talents, even in this country, tended to aristocratical views and feelings, and were preju- dicial to the interests and well being of the masses. And the counteracting agency was to be found in the Sunday
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schools of the day. These are the great leveling agen- cies which are to educate the masses and fit them for citizens and voters, and to hold the institutions of the country and a free government in perpetuity. By some these sentiments were considered the noblest the Gov- ernor ever uttered during his long and eventful career. Another fact. The ex-Secretary, seated in the parlor with some friends, and talking of incidents during the war, stated that shortly after the Mason and Slidell ar- rest, he received a confidential communication from Louis Napoleon, in which was expressed personal respect for the Secretary, as a statesman, but that he (the Em- peror) must bow to the will of the French people, and recognize the confederacy, and declare war in its behalf. The same day this letter was received, a reply was sent to the Emperor, telling him, in substance, to keep hands off,- that we neither asked for nor would permit inter- ference on the part of any European government, -and should he recognize the Confederacy, and send troops to this country, we would emancipate the slaves, and before this Union would submit to a slave government, we would put arms into the hands of the slaves, and doom the Southern States to devastation and ruin. Some friends were at once sent to England and France to 'maintain our cause, and it only cost us $7,000.
The Rev. Henry Upson was the next speaker, and gave recollections of his childhood here.
Deacon Samuel Holmes, of Montclair, N. J., was now called out, and before he took his seat showed himself what all before knew,- that he was a prince among dea- cons. He urged with great practical effect that the peo- ple should at once establish a town library, and offered fifty dollars for the purpose. This generous offer was at once responded to by others, until two hundred and fifty dollars were subscribed.
.While the subscription to the library was in progress,
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Rev. Mr. Hillard, of Plymouth Center, was called on and spoke as follows :
MR. CHAIRMAN: - I consent to speak on one condition only, and that is that the subscription to the library shall go forward without interruption. That is of more consequence than talk. The library ought to be secured, and now is the time to secure it. So much butter at least ought to come of this two day's stirring of the cream. So let the subscription go right on. My estimate of that is about what the boy's was, on a certain occasion, of a collection. Three boys, the story goes, not much accustomed to religious services, strolled, one day, into a meeting, where, besides the usual exercises of prayer and song, a collection was taken up. On leaving the meeting they went off sailing together, and a squall coming up, and the case looking desperate, Jim, the leader ,of the crew, felt that they must have help. Turning to his companions, who were shivering with fright, he inquired, "John, can you pray?" "No," was the answer, "not here." "Joe, can you sing?" "No, not now." "Well," was Jim's con- clusion, " something religious has got to be done right off ; we'll take up a collection." So, in my opinion, one of the most religious things that we can do just here and now is to take up a collection.
I have been greatly interested in the exercises of this centennial. My heart has gone out in thorough sympathy with all your pride and joy. It has almost seemed to me that I had a personal share in it. You remember the affecting passage in Mark Twain's "Innocents Abroad," in which he describes his feelings on being shown, in his travels, the grave of Adam. It overwhelmed him, he says, with emotion, to come, in that far off land, upon the grave of a blood relation. So, though not myself born here, I somehow feel as though those who have been born here were my blood relatives, and so have been interested in their histories. [Question from the crowd, "Don't you wish you had been born here?"] Some one asks if I do not wish I had been born here. No, I do not ; for I do not believe in a man's going back on his mother, and so I am not going back on old Preston, the town where I was born, even for the sake of being born in Wolcott. But I will tell you how near I come to wishing I had been born
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in Wolcott. You recollect that Mrs. Jarley in the exhibition, in her wax works, of those miracles of art, the Siamese Twins, in- forms her audience that they were born, one on Cape Cod, and the other on the Island of Borneo. Now, since being here these two days, and listening to all that Wolcott has been and done, though glad that I myself was born in Preston, I have wished that instead of being born a single child, and so limited to a single birth-place, I had been born a twin, and that my twin brother had been born in Wolcott.
But though missing thus myself the honor of being born in Wolcott, I have become convinced that it must have been here that a certain distinguished character of history was born. I refer to the Roman Emperor Marcus Antoninus. I am not quite sure in my dates-this always was a weakness with me-but if I get muddled some one of the learned gentlemen here present can set me right. I am not sure about the dates, but I am con- fident, from internal evidence, that Antoninus, the Roman Emperor, was born on Wolcott Hill. And the ground of my confidence is this : In a passage in his "Meditations," weary of the littleness and meanness of life around him, and challenging to life high and noble, he exclaims, "Live as on a mountain;" and while listening to Mr. Alcott and others as they have entertained and instructed and inspired us with reminiscences of the fathers of Wolcott, I have said to myself, " It was from life here on Wolcott Hill that Marcus Antoninus got his idea." I am confident of it, and if those inveterate liars, the dates, deny this, I have only to say that if he wasn't born here, it would have been wisdom in his head if he had been.
But soberly, it seems to me a grand thing to have been born in Wolcott. We do not, in our fast and pretentious time, appreciate as we should these old hill-towns of New England. Why, here are the head-springs of all her greatness. Just as the streams which furnish the power in the valleys head on these hills, so the intelligence and strength and energy of manhood, which makes the villages and cities, come from these hill-parishes. Not more is the rich soil that forms the valley meadows washed from these rocky hills, than is the society which constitutes the valley com- munities the contributions of these hill-towns. Without this
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