USA > Connecticut > In olde Connecticut; being a record of quaint, curious and romantic happenings there in colonial times and later > Part 8
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Having visited the mountain I became inter- ested in its history. Its Indian name was Mack- imoodus, signifying "the place of noises," and the tribe of Indians who inhabited the region about it bore the same appellation. They were remarkable for their piety, and sustained the re- lation of priests to the other Indians, to whom this mountain with its thunderings and quakings could be no other than the abode of Hobbamocko, the author of all human calamities, who was to
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be propitiated. Hence Pequot, Mohegan and Narragansett resorted thither with offerings, and the powwows of the Mackimoodus were kept of- fering almost daily sacrifices to the spirit of the mountain.
The first whites came here in 1670, and from this time minute accounts of the phenomena may be gleaned from the early writers. A long and de- tailed account is given in the manuscript of the Rev. Charles Bradley, for many years pastor of the church at East Haddam, which is preserved in the library of the Connecticut Historical Society at Hartford. The Rev. Mr. Hosmer, the first minister at Haddam, in a letter to Mr. Prince of Boston, dated August 13, 1729, thus speaks of the mountain:
" As to the earthquakes I have something con- siderable and awful to tell you. Earthquakes have been here (and nowhere but in this precinct as can be discerned; that is, they seem to have their center, rise and origin among us), as has been observed, for more than thirty years. I have been informed that in this place, before the English settlement, there were great numbers of Indian inhabitants, and that it was a place of extraordinary Indian Pawaws, or, in short, that
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it was a place where the Indians drove a pro- digious trade at worshipping the devil. ... Now whether there be anything diabolical in these things I know not; but this I know, that God Almighty is to be seen and trembled at, in what has been often heard among us. Whether it be fire or air distressed in the subterranean caverns of the earth cannot be known; for there is no eruption, no explosion perceptible, but by sounds and tremors which sometimes are very fearful and dreadful. I have myself heard eight or ten sounds successively, and imitating small arms, in the space of five minutes. I have, I suppose, heard sev- eral hundreds of them within twenty years, some more, some less terrible. Sometimes we have heard them almost every day, and great numbers of them in the space of a year. Oftentimes I have observed them to be coming down from the north imitating slow thunder, until the sound came near or right under, and then there seemed to be a breaking, like the noise of a cannon shot, or severe thunder, which shakes the houses and all that is in them; they have in a manner ceased since the great earthquake. As I remember, there have been but two heard since that time and both but moderate. "
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The venerable Doctor Trumbull, the Cotton Mather of Connecticut, in his search for its an- tiquities, gathered much concerning the Moodus noises, and printed it in his delightful chronicles of the State, now I believe entirely out of print; he publishes the letter given above and also the following account from a resident of Haddam:
"The awful noises continue to the present time. The effects they produced are various as the in- termediate degrees between the roar of a cannon and the noise of a pistol. The concussions of the earth made at the same time are as much diversified as the sounds in the air. The shocks they give to a dwelling house are the same as the falling of logs on the floor. The small shocks produce no emotions of terror or fear in the minds of the inhabitants. They are spoken of as usual occurrences, and are called Moodus noises. But when they are so violent as to be felt in the ad- jacent towns they are called earthquakes. During my residence here, which has been almost thirty- six years, I have invariably observed after some of the most violent of these shocks that an ac- count has been published in the newspapers of a small shock of an earthquake at New London and Hartford. Nor do I believe in all that period
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there has been any account published of an earth- quake in Connecticut which was not far more violent here than in any other place. By recur- ring to the newspapers you will find that an earth- quake was noticed on the 18th of May, 1791, about 10 o'clock p. M. It was perceived as far distant as Boston and New York. A few minutes after there was another shock which was percep- tible at the distance of seventy miles. Here at that time the concussion of the earth and the roaring of the atmosphere were most tremendous; consternation and dread filled every house. Many chimneys were untopped, and walls thrown down. It was a night much to be remembered, for be- side the two shocks which were noticed at a dis- tance, during the night, there was here a succession of shocks to the number of twenty, perhaps thirty, the effects of which, like all others, decreased in every direction in proportion to the distances. The next day stones of several tons weight were found removed from their places, and apertures in the earth, and fissures in immovable rocks, ascertained the places where the explosions were made. Since that time the noises and shocks have been less frequent than before, though not a year passes but some of them are perceptible."
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Mr. Barber in his "Historical Collections" says :
"The severest shocks are felt as far northeast- erly as Boston, and as far southwesterly as New York, and there noticed as earthquakes. In 1816 and 1817 in the night these noises were more than usually violent. A person was on Mount Tom about fifteen years since, at the time these noises were heard. It appeared to this person as though a stone or large body fell underneath the ground directly under his feet, and grated down to a con- siderable distance in the depths below. The cause of these noises is explained by some to be mineral or chemical combinations exploding at a depth of many thousand feet beneath the surface of the earth. The jar is similar to that of ex- ploded gunpowder."
And the " Connecticut Gazette " of August 20, 1790:
"Various have been the conjectures concerning the cause of these earthquakes, or Moodus noises as they are called. The following account has gained credit with many persons: It is reported that between twenty and thirty years ago a tran- sient person came to this town who called himself Doctor Steel, from Great Britain, who having had
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information respecting these noises made critical observation at different times and in different places, till at length he dug up two pearls of great value which he called carbuncles, near Salmon River, and that he told the people the noises would be discontinued for many years, as he had taken away their cause; but as he had discovered others in miniature, they would be again heard in proc- ess of time. The best evidence of the authentic- ity of this story is that it has happened agreeably to his prophecy. The noises did cease for many years, and have again been heard for two or three years past, and they increase. Three shocks have been felt in a short space, one of which, according to a late paper, was felt at New London, though it was by the account much more considerable in this and the adjacent towns."
An aged inhabitant of Haddam, in answer to my inquiry concerning the origin of the noises, related this legend, and I have given it as a valu- able addition to our stock of "folklore." He added that Mount Tom-which is the center from which these noises proceed-had been quiet for a series of years. The last violent outbreak he had himself heard. It occurred one Sunday evening in 1852, when the villagers had gathered for wor-
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ship, and I judge from his description was of the same general character as those above described.
From the foregoing account it appears that dif- ferent persons have entertained different theories respecting the origin of these remarkable natural phenomena. The simple Indians and the early colonists ascribed it to the agency of evil spirits; others attributed it to the explosive power of sub- . terranean gases; the scientific theory would prob- ably differ from all these; and, curious to know what it might be, I addressed a note to Professor Rice, of Wesleyan University, who is familiar with the mountain, expressing my desire, and received from him the following reply:
"I have never made any special investigation of the geology of Moodus. In general the rocks of that vicinity are of the micaceous metamorphic series. They would be called granite in the loose sense in which that word is colloquially used. More strictly they are gneiss and mica schist. There are no volcanic rocks in the vicinity. The noises are simply small earthquakes, such as are frequent in many regions of greatly disturbed metamorphic strata, as for instance in the Alps and Pyrenees. On page 350 of the abridged edi- tion of Charles Kingsley's memoir is an account,
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in his inimitably picturesque style, of one of these little earthquakes which he experienced at Pau in the Pyrenees. In regions of highly disturbed metamorphic strata the rocks are apt to be in a state of strain or tension, which will from time to time produce such slight vibratory movements as are heard and felt in the Moodus noises. The comprehensive cause, both of these and of the severer earthquakes, is the contraction of a cooling globe."
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CHAPTER XII
A REVOLUTIONARY NEWGATE*
[N East Granby, sixteen miles northwest of Hartford, on a bleak, barren hillside, plenti- fully sprinkled with half corroded fragments of . copper ore, there stands a mass of ancient, grim- looking buildings, which, frowning from behind a massive wall of stone, and displaying bastion, moat and watch tower, resemble somewhat the deserted castles that confront the traveler on every hilltop as he journeys up or down the Rhine. The moat is nearly filled now, and the wall might . be scaled by an active climber, but the visitor who declines this exertion by following the wall around to the east, comes presently to a gateway, through which he may enter unchallenged by warden or sentry, when he will find himself in the yard of what was once the most terrible of modern pris- ons,-from 1775 to 1783 the national prison of the Continental Government, and from 1790 to
*"Lippincott's Magazine," March, 1881.
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1827 the State prison of Connecticut. The ut- most desolation now reigns in the inclosure. The owlet rests undisturbed on the coping of the wall. The dust and mold of half a century have col- lected in the unused interiors of workshop and chapel. Bats cling in the dark corners, and the wary spider weaves his meshes and inveigles the silly fly, undisturbed by the housewife's broom or other signs of human occupancy.
The buildings above ground, which first attract the attention, are the former workshops, hospital, chapel and guardhouse of the prison. The dun- geons and cells-the prison proper-were one hun- dred feet beneath the ground; and it was this feature that gave to the old Newgate its unique and horrible character and made it the terror of evildoers wherever its ominous fame was sounded. The entrance to these dungeons is by a perpen- dicular shaft fifty feet deep, whose yawning mouth is still covered by the guardhouse standing in the center of the prison yard. To one of its sides is affixed a wooden ladder down which the visitor must climb to reach the dungeons below. At the bottom of the shaft a flight of stone steps leads down thirty or forty feet farther to a central cham- ber, which contained the sleeping apartments of
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the convicts. On one side a narrow passage leads down to a well of pure water, above which an air shaft pierces the sandstone for seventy feet until it reaches the surface and admits a few cheering rays of light into the dungeon. Every- where else a cimmerian darkness prevails. These caverns may be briefly described as comprising three parallel galleries in the heart of the mount- ain, extending eight hundred feet north and south, and connected by numberless cross-passages cut to facilitate communication, while lateral gal- leries honeycomb the mountain on either side. The lowest depth reached is three hundred feet. The galleries are cut through the solid rock, and are low and narrow, except in the case of the chamber above mentioned. Their floors are cov- ered with a soft adhesive slime, and in some places with water, which drips unceasingly from the roof, and the intense darkness and noxious gases which prevail render their passage difficult, though not impossible. Besides the main shaft there are other means of exit from the dungeons,-two air shafts, both of which open in the prison yard, and a level or drain leading from the northeast gallery and having its outlet without the prison wall.
The cavern was originally a copper mine, and
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owed its existence to the discovery here, about 1705, of a vein of copper ore, so rich that Pro- fessor Silliman, after careful assay, found it to yield fifteen per cent of pure copper, the yield of the Cornish mines being but eight per cent. It is a truism in mining lore, I believe, that all the minerals known to man may be found in Con- necticut in just sufficient quantities not to pay for working; but at the beginning of the eighteenth century this truth had not been discovered, and the entire range of sandstone hills which stretch from the prison to East Rock, near New Haven, fifty miles distant, is seamed with shallow holes dug by the prospectors of that age. One day these investigators discovered this rich vein of copper ore, and, as gold was believed to be not far distant, a company to work it was quickly formed. To give the history of the mining op- erations which hollowed out the dungeons of New- gate is not germane to our subject; it is, perhaps, sufficient to say that after being worked for seventy years by free labor, slave labor, and the imported article, the enterprise was abandoned, having bankrupted a score of chartered companies and , reduced as many once affluent families to the bit- terest poverty. This was in 1773. At that time,
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as it happened, the colony of Connecticut was feeling the need of greater prison accommodations than it then possessed. The county jails, its only penal institutions, were overcrowded with prison- ers, and were, besides, extremely insecure. It lacked the means to build a general or State's prison, even if the necessary authority could be obtained. In this dilemma some bright spirits suggested employing the abandoned copper mine at Simsbury (now East Granby) as a convict hold, -a suggestion received with great favor by the people and adopted by the Legislature of 1773. This body passed an act directing that male pris- oners not under sentence for capital crimes should be imprisoned in the mines, and appropriated a small sum for the purchase and for making the place secure; it also appointed a keeper, one Captain John Viets, and named the new prison Newgate, after the famous prison of that name in London. Another act prescribed the terms of imprisonment. Burglary, robbery and counter- feiting were punished, the first offense by impris- onment not exceeding ten years, the second of- fense by imprisonment for life. The punishment which might be inflicted on the convicts was mod- erate whipping, not exceeding ten stripes, and
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the putting shackles and fetters upon them; the keeper was also instructed to employ them at labor in the mines, but this was not practised long, as the convicts soon found that the pick- ax and shovel used in mining could be advan- tageously employed in digging a way out. John Hinson was the first prisoner formally committed to Newgate; his commitment bore date Decem- ber 2, 1773. Before entering the dungeons he had been so fortunate as to gain the affections of a strong-handed Phyllis serving on one of the neigh- boring farms, and she, on the eighteenth night of his confinement effected his release by drawing him up through one of the shafts in a bucket that had been used for hoisting ore. Captain Viets then guarded an empty prison until the 26th of the succeeding February, when three prisoners were received; of these, one escaped on the 9th of the following April, and the two others on the 23d. A prisoner committed April 5th escaped on the 9th, having been confined four days. All were released by accomplices outside, who drew them up through the unguarded air shafts,-a fact which led the Legislature to order a more thorough fortification of these approaches.
But events were hastening which were destined
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to bring about a new order of things and fill New- gate with a far different class of prisoners. The year 1775 found the colonies engaged in their - memorable contest with the mother country. At the outset the patriots found themselves ham- pered and their cause endangered by the adhe- rents of the British crown among them, men who had been their friends as well as neighbors, but who now became their bitterest foes, assailing them with the rankest epithets, denouncing their measures, spying into their actions and transmit- ting swift intelligence thereof to the British gen- eral, plotting to bring down on them the enemy's armed hordes, and, when they came, piloting them through the country. The patriot leaders, bold, resolute, blessed with abundant nerve-force and an utter absence of sickly sentimentality, took prompt measures to repress these traitors. In most of the colonies committees of safety were at once appointed, charged with a strict espionage of all suspected persons. When sufficient cause appeared, such people were visited and an avowal of their sentiments demanded. If only indiffer- ent, the espionage was continued, but if they openly avowed Tory sentiments they were forth- with apprehended, tried for misdemeanor, and
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sent to prison. It was important that such pris- oners should be securely confined. The county jails were quite the reverse of secure, and so the stern logic of necessity consigned them to the gloomy dungeons of Newgate. It is interesting to note that the first commitment of prisoners of this class was made by General Washington. His' letter of commitment, addressed to the committee of safety at Simsbury, is worthy of insertion as a literary curiosity : -
"CAMBRIDGE, Dec. 7, 1775.
"GENTLEMEN,-The prisoners which will be delivered you with this, having been tried by a court-martial and deemed to be such flagrant and atrocious villians that they cannot by any means be set at large or confined in any place near this camp, were sentenced to Simsbury, in Connecti- cut. You will, therefore, be pleased to have them secured in your jail, or in such other manner as to you shall seem necessary, so that they cannot possibly make their escape. The charges of their imprisonment will be at the Continental expense.
"I am, etc.,
"GEORGE WASHINGTON."
During the eight years of war that followed,
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Newgate became widely celebrated. Its name frequently appeared in the public prints, and tales of the horrors of its dungeons and of the suffer- ings of its prisoners were freely narrated at cottage firesides and industriously circulated by the Tories and their friends.
In 1781, one Ebenezer Hathaway had gained considerable notoriety as captain of a Tory pri- vateer boat named the "Adventure." With this boat and his crew of eight men he would steal out from his rendezvous on the Long Island coast, make a descent on some defenseless town in Con- necticut, plunder and burn at pleasure, and then return at leisure to his place of retreat. Of course reprisals were made by the other party, and thus originated the famous "whaleboat war- fare," waged with so much animosity by the pa- triots of Connecticut and the Tories of Long Is- land. In one of these reprisals Hathaway and his crew were taken and committed to Hartford jail for trial. A Tory newspaper furnishes the sequel: "After being tried before the Superior Court, they were ordered to Newgate Gaol, or rather to that inquisition, Simsbury Mines, which, from the following description, exceeds anything among their allies in France or Spain :
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"These poor unfortunate victims relate that they were taken from Hartford Gaol and marched under a strong guard to Simsbury Mines, distant about seventy-four miles. In approaching this horrid dungeon they were first conducted through the apartments of the guards, and then through a trapdoor downstairs into another upon the same floor with the kitchen, which was divided from it by a very strong partition door.
"In the corner of this outer room and near the foot of the stairs opened another large trapdoor, covered with bars and bolts of iron, which was hoisted up by two guards by means of a tackle, whilst the hinges grated as they turned upon their hooks, and opened the jaws and mouth of what they call Hell, into which they descended by means of a ladder about six feet more, which led to a large iron grate or hatchway locked down over a shaft of about three feet diameter, sunk through the solid rock, and which they were told led to the bottomless pit. Finding it not possible to evade this hard, cruel fate, they bade adieu to the world, and descended the ladder about thirty- eight feet more, when they came to what is called the landing; then marching shelf by shelf, till, de- scending about thirty or forty feet more, they
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came to a platform of boards laid underfoot, with a few more put overhead to carry off the water, which keeps continually dropping. 'Here,' say they, ' we found the inhabitants of this woful man- sion, who were exceeding anxious to know what was going on above."'
The year previous, a band of Tory marauders from Long Island bent on a predatory excursion had landed near New Haven and marched to Bethany, a town ten miles northwest,-their ob- jective point being the house of Captain Ebenezer Dayton, a gentleman formerly residing on Long Island, but whose Whig sentiments had forced him to fly from the wrath of the Loyalists. This house they broke open and pillaged from top to bottom, the master being absent, and then re- turned to their boats; but before they could reach the British lines they were captured by two whale- boat crews from Derby, and brought back to Con- necticut for trial. Graham, the leader, proved to be a deserter from the Continental Army, and was shot; the others were sentenced to Newgate. Not all the prisoners in these dungeons at this time, however, were of this character. There were men of learning, wit and talent among them, -physicians, lawyers, and one clergyman, the
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Rev. Simeon Baxter, who for his "exceedingly bitter and seditious" language against the Con- gress was sentenced to Newgate. It was his cus- tom every Sabbath to preach to his fellow-spirits in prison, and as he possessed a certain rude elo- quence, and some logic, and so constructed his discourses as to prove to his audience that all their persecutors "would swing before John Han- cock should be king," he was listened to with the greatest attention and respect. One of these sermons was published in London shortly after his release. It is entitled "Tyrannicide proved lawful from the Practice and Writings of Jews, Heathens, and Christians. A Discourse delivered in the Mines at Symsbury, in the Colony of Con- necticut, to the Loyalists confined by Order of the Congress, on September 19, 1781, by Simeon Baxter, a Licentiate in Divinity and Voluntary Chaplain to those Prisoners in the Apartment called Orcus."
Among prisoners of this character, strong, in- genious, desperate, and believing themselves un- justly imprisoned, the hope of escape was fondly cherished, and the attempt eagerly made when- ever opportunity offered. Next to the air shafts, the level or drain leading from the northeast gal-
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lery was the most common means of escape. The first to make use of this narrow road to freedom was Henry Wooster, one of those engaged in the pillaging of Dayton's house. The entrance to the drain had been closed by a solid wall of masonry, in which, however, a grated aperture was left for the passage of the water. Arming himself with a nail rod taken while at his duties in the nail shop, Wooster attacked the masonry, and picked it out bit by bit until the iron bars could be
wrenched from their position. He then entered the level, and, lying at length within its slimy confines, worked himself along, enlarging the pas- sage with his nail rod in places where it did not afford room for his shoulders. Toiling in this way for several weeks, he had nearly gained the outlet when he found one morning, as he was returning feet foremost, that a large stone had fallen from the roof of the drain and completely barred the passage. For a time he was almost in despair: he could not turn to reach the stone, and to escape by the outlet was to give himself up to the guards, as day had already dawned. At length, by a desperate effort, he succeeded in pushing the stone along with his feet till it sank into a hollow; he then passed over it and reentered
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