New Haven CT Directory Connecticut, 1874, Part 5

Author: J H Benham
Publication date: 1874
Publisher:
Number of Pages:

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We used to have to get a light from a tinder-box Sometimes neighbors went to each other's houses and borrowed a coal of fire. I saw, in 1829, the first friction matches in New Haven. They were kept in morocco cases and cost about twenty-five cents a box. I struck one of the matches in a barber shop, and they were aghast with surprise and admiration. Near the corner of Church and Chapel streets, in 1826, I saw hard coal first burnt in New Haven. People were incredulous of its merits, and bought wood still for a long time. Coal was mined then in very small quantities. People of Con- necticut owned some of the most prolific coal fields of Pennsylvania. Dr. Eneas Munson sold a field there for $2,500, which is worth now two millions.

There were three weekly papers-The Columbian Register, started in 1812, edited by Mr. Barber. The Connecticut Herald, edited by Thomas G. Woodward, the federal organ, afterward merged into the Journal and Cou- rier. The Palladium was begun by Charles Adams, now of Litchfield, in 1829. I began my connection with it in 1830, and continued thirty-two years George D. Prentice was editor of the New England Review, which had printed some scraps of compositions of mine. He received a letter from Hon. Thaddeus Betts asking for an editor for a paper in Norwalk, and he re- commended me. I was preparing to accept the offer, but just then I attend- ed a great celebration of the 4th of July, when a public dinner was given at the Tontine. Ralph I. Ingersoll was present. I arose timidly to respond to a toast. I was an admirer of Adams and Clay. I thought it would be in bad taste to give a party toast, but thought it no harm to express my preferences. I gave as a toast, "A place for everything and everything in its place ;

BENHAM'S NEW HAVEN CITY DIRECTORY.

fishes in the sea, birds in the air, Jackson in the field, Adams in the chair." To my astonishment my little toast was received with repeated rounds of applause. Mr. Ingersoll was favorably impressed with the toast and inquired who I was, and said I must not go to Norwalk. He loaned me 8300, his brother $100, and others enough to make $1000, which I afterwards repaid with interest. With Mr. B. R. Hitchcock the Palladium was purchased and conducted. It had then 500 subscribers. Providence overrules the affairs of men. But for that toast I might have spent my days and years in Norwalk instead of here. New York papers are not needed as formerly. Peop'e used to have great interest to see a weekly newspaper printed and gathered in crowds at the printing office, on the night before publication, to see one printed. Exciting news was then brought by steamboat by the various captains. Signal flags told which party had triumphed. I arranged with J. L. Boswell, of the Hartford Courant, to obtain news of elections the day the vote was polled. By horse express this was done It created great surprise, and Mayor Aaron Skinner could not at first believe it possible.

The electric telegraph was introduced soon after this. Morse had but little encouragement. Efforts were made to get a station here. Stock must be subscribed. No one would at first touch it. At last I headed the list with $150; my friend, Major Osborn, put down a like amount, and finally all was taken.

The speaker then compared the fine New York steamers with the old packets, and said that a citizen then declared, that notwithstanding the beauty and convenience of those boats, he believed some were now- living who would see a railroad between New York and New Haven; yet only five years elapsed before the New York railroad was constructed. New York and Connecticut had a difficulty about steamboats, and New York wanted that Connecticut boats should not run into her waters, so they stopped for awhile at Byram Cove, and the passengers went on to the city by stage. Connecticut retaliated. But Gov. Wolcott declared in a veto message that the whole thing was unconstitutional, and so in the end declared the Supreme Court of the United States

The speaker then described the excitement which the arrival, in New York, of the Sirius and the Great Western ocean steamships occasioned there and here The first was 18 days from Cork, and the other 15 days from Bristol. They arrived in April, 1838, and many of our citizens went down to New York to see these great wonders of the ocean.

Our fire department, now so complete, was then feeble. A great fire swept the wooden buildings on Chapel street in 1837. Rowdies ran the engines and did damage, and tried to overcome the city authorities. Several fires were traced to these rowdies. Then another class of citizens took hold, such as the late Henry Hotchkiss, Henry Peck and Elias Pierpont, and ran the machines. I was secretary of No. 4 company, in Grand street, near the railroad bridge. We fought gallantly but were glad to give up the work to others. At the fire wooden buckets and tin pails were occasionally used. People set out buckets and pails with water; sometimes women passed the empty buckets. The fire wardens were an august body-the Napoleons and Cæsars; among them were bold men who would risk their lives where there was no danger. Their unique uniform was described. They blew immense trumpets, enough to scare a fire out. Some of them, however, showed great executive ability. The first steam fire engine was in 1860, and was first

BENHAM'S NEW HAVEN CITY DIRECTORY.

used when the carpet factory was burned, and Mr. Colburn, wife and four children perished.

The police force formerly consisted of one policeman, Dr. John S. Skinner. He was a gentleman of the old school in costume and de- meanor. He was above six feet in height; a broad and heavy man; he wore the knee buckles and shoe buckles of the men of '76, a coat of the continental cut, a Quaker hat, and in rainy seasons a blue cotton umbrella, which he owned for many years; he was very proud of the old federal party, from which he derived his first .political honors, and he was never happier than when he was in hot pursuit of some wrong- doer, especially of a Sabbath breaker, or boys that profaned Fast or Thanksgiving days by playing ball in the suburbs. On sundays he would look over the fences and behind the barns for a stray boy, and if he found one, he would start him on the run, and the boy would speed his way as if bearing the fiery cross of Scotland, while the doctor, with his face in a broad grin would pretend to run after him. I remember on a Fast day afternoon being once led away by some older boys-I never led anybody away myself -- to a plain beyond the Cedars, near Neck Bridge; picket guards were stationed at various points to sound the alarm if Dr. Skinner should he be seen approaching ; after two or three games one of the pickets cried out "Dr. Skinner is coming !" Such a gathering up of coats, bats and balls, and such a scattering of boys, has rarely been seen in this vicinity I verily believe I ran nearly two miles without stopping or hardly looking back, and did not feel quite safe until fairly within reach of the maternal apron strings The doctor and myself, some years afterwards, had some hearty laughing over the tremendous fright which he gave the boys on that memorable occasion. I never before so realized the exceeding sinfulness of playing ball on Fast day afternoon, although at church in the morning, as I did when I took "the home stretch" through Whitney avenne, at the time afore- said, to avoid the grip of Dr. Skinner. But the doctor was a very genial, good-hearted man ; he knew almost everybody and their ancestors; he had a great memory, which easily recalled incidents in the history of prominent men, and of the State, and especially of the revolution of '76; but his name was a terror to juvenile trespassers; even in the nursery. refractory children were told that if they did not behave well Dr. skinner would be after them, which had a more quieting effect than a dose of "Godfrey's Cordial."

We had here in early times one trying justice, who constituted almost our entire police court ; he was a man of immense size, and dressed in the style of Dr. Skinner, except with more taste; his stockings instead of being like the doctor's of mixed blue and white yarn, were of pure white, and his knee buckles and shoe buckles were more sparkling with glass diamonds ; he wes rather proud of his blood and associations, and considered his dictum generally as good and effectual for the proper disposition of cases, as if de- livering the opinion of a full bench of the supreme court; in short, he felt that he had to be arbitrary at times and to take the law into his own hands, severely, in order to do full and speedy justice, as he understood it, to parties litigant.

In the opinion of the boys the High Sheriff of the county was scarcely less than an emperor in dignity and authority. Sheriff Rossiter is well remembered. His grey hair, trim whiskers, military air and black cockade, made him, to the juveniles, an object of reverence if not 8

BENHAM'S NEW HAVEN CITY DIRECTORY.

of awe. The boys would stop playing marbles when he came along, saying " Here comes the High Sheriff." The sheriff and his deputies from the country, on horseback, each holding the long rod of authority, used to escort our governors into the city on inauguration days, ac- companied of course by the military. I well remember the advent of Gov. Wolcott, who came by way of Westville, and down Broadway; he held the office from 1817 to 1827. Gov. John S. Peters was met by his escort in the northern part of East Haven, in 1831.

Our old State House in 1829, stood near Trinity Church. Near it was the whipping post. The speaker had seen the lash applied to the back of a poor negro. Offenders were often put in stocks and publicly exposed, and after- wards privately within the old State House. I saw a black woman punished for infanticide. She sat in a chair in front of what is now the City Hall, with a rope about her neck, one end of which was fastened to the limb of a tree; she was pelted with rotten eggs, and jeered at by vagabonds in the street. A white woman was thus punished, and the Misses Bakewell's school was dismissed to let the children see the show and take solemn warning. The Sabbath day was strictly regarded, and to a degree approaching superstition. Sunday preparations began Saturday noon. Preaching was generally controversial and doctrinal, and sometimes discussed their divided topics up to "sixteenthly."

Infidelity, too, prevailed extensively. President Dwight, of Yale College, fought infidelity among the students nobly. The old foot warming pans were the only fires in churches. It was cold work listening to the warmest exhortations. I recall indistinctly Rev. Moses Stuart, pastor of the Center Church, by whom I was baptized, and who died at Andover, Mass., in 1852. He, when a lawyer in Danbury, loved amateur theatricals. Dr. Holmes' tragedy of Douglas was his favorite. He personated Randolph, and my mother was one of the players. It created great excitement, for a citizen went and drowned himself over disappointment in love, aggravated at see- ing the tragedy of Douglass. This event broke up the young people's amusement, and caused Stuart to abandon the law and become a minister. I remember when the Methodists practiced their simplicities and oddities of costume.

The speaker spoke of the eloquence of John Newland Maffit, who, he said, was a most remarkable man, and whose style of speech resembled that of the lae Ogden Hoffman, of the New York bar. The effect of Mr. Maffit's movements in pulpits was electrical. Many of his converts here remain bright and shining lights of our churches to this day. When here he pub- lished a little dedicated to Elias Gilbert, then, as now, one of the strongest pillars of the Methodist church. The introducsory part of this little book was in this wise : " From the romantic shades of far-famed Erin, borne on the fickle winds and waves of adverse fortune, a lonely stranger brings his mite of sorrow, and lays the star-cleaved treasure at Columbia's feet." The speaker mentioned Heman Bangs, of the Methodist church, and spoke of the Baptists as having established the church, now Rev. Mrs. Hannaford's.

He spoke at length of Rev. Harry Crosswell, who died in 1858, aged 79. He was rector of Trinity Church. In physique, and as a preacher, contro- versialist and editor, he was noted, also, as a pastor. He spoke of Stonel Cook, Hawks and Bishop Littlejohn, and other former prominent Episcopa, alergymen in New Haven. He spoke of the old Blue Meeting House and of

Rev. Mr. Merwin, a former pastor of North Church; of President Dwight's funeral in 1817, at the Center Church, and of its impressive character.

He spoke in high terms of the late Dr. Nathaniel W. Taylor, pastor of the Center Church, and a professor in Yale College, a man great in learning, and a great writer and thinker. He was an anti-abolitionist, but he made an able national appeal against the spread of that institution, which excited great comment. He spoke very interestingly of James Hillhouse and Eli Whitney, of Abraham Bishop, for many years collector of this port, and a large land owner, which property is still held by his descendants. Mr. Bishop had great repugnance to tolling the funeral bell. and with Mr. Babcock's help, in his paper, it was abandoned, except for state occasions.

He compared the old postal facilities of New Haven with those of to-day, and paid a high compliment to the present arrangements of Mr. Sperry.

He spoke of Lieut .- Gov. Ingersoll, father of R. I. and C. A. Ingersoll, and paid a high tribute to the late Ralph I Ingersoll. He spoke of Mr. I's dis- interested efforts in rescuing a man from State prison confinement, whom he believed got there through legal technicalities. He acted purely nobly in this matter. I have assisted, said the speaker, to obtain the pardon of seven persons, and was deceived in but one of them, and that one was a woman, who repeated her offense inside of a week after being released. He spoke of Judge Simeon Baldwin, and paid tribute to his son, the late Roger S. Baldwin, recently among us. He related an incident when Mr. Baldwin pleaded the cause of a cargo of blacks stolen from Africa, who had risen against their captors, taken the vessel, and brought it into New Haven. They were lodged in New Haven jail. Through Mr. Baldwin's brilliant efforts before the United States District Court, and afterward as a colleague of J. Q. Adams before the United States Supreme Court, the blacks were rescued from slavery, though the Spanish nation demanded their surrender. The speaker illustrated how Mr. Baldwin was totally ignorant of what a billiard ball was. It illustrated also the conscientious scruples of the age.

He rehearsed briefly the careers of other eminent lawyers, such as David Daggett, Nathan Smith, William Bristol, Charles A. Ingersoll, Dennis Kim- berly, Samuel J. Hitchcock, Eleazar Foster, father of our Hon. E. K. Foster, and John Harte Lynde, grandfather of Judge H. Lynde Harrison. He spoke of their costumes and characteristics and power. He related a telling inci- dent when Gen. Kimberly and Silas Mix appeared in court, the former for a sea captain, and the latter for William Lanson, a noted black of the town, and how the sea captain put the cunning foxy colored rogue to his wits end to the immense amusement of the court and all hands. Judge Hitch- cock was the judge who presided. Mr. Babcock spoke of Gen. Kimberly and his noble appearance. Of Gen. Kimberly it has been truly said that he was a " natural-born gentleman." Take him altogether, I have rarely met his peer in personal accomplishments. His beauty was of the manly or masculine type. One might say of him, as Hamlet said of his father, the murdered King of Denmark :

"See! what grace was seated on this brow : - the front of Jove himself ! An eye like Mars, to threaten and command : A combination and a form indeed, Where every God did seem to set his seal, To give the world assurance of a man."

BENHAM'S NEW HAVEN CITY DIRECTORY.

The perfection of a polished gentleman, said the speaker, is completeness in every grace without seeming to know the fact-or so to mingle nature and art, that you cannot distinguish the one from the other -- or as Shake- peare has it, "hold the mirror up to nature." This was Gen. Kimberly. He was a model of every manly grace. Although a first-class lawyer, he never pretended, nor did his friends pretend for him, that he had the legal erudition of his friend Roger S. Baldwin-nor had he Mr. Baldwin's power over a large and promiscuous audience. As a legal adviser he had no superior. He looked carefully and conscientiously into every cause brought before him, and if his client had no case, he would frankly tell him so, and advise him to settle his controversy on the best terms he could. He had a horror of all kinds of pettifogging, and despised those who practised it. Mr. Babcock spoke of Gen. Kimberly in high eulogy as a military man, and of the Horse Guards commanded by the speaker's father, of the Governor's Foot Guards and their splendid history, the Grays, and Blues and Artillery, and complimented the Second Regiment, Col. S. R. Smith, as the outgrowth of such excellent military training.

He spoke of the growth of our Public Schools, with whose success Mr. Babcock is intimately connected, and gave an amusing sketch of how Rev. Dr. Todd, father ef Rev. Mr. Todd, used to belabor the wild boys, when he taught a school on Union street many years ago. He spoke of the sterling honesty of Dr Eli Ives, who wouldn't offer his stock in the Eagle Bank, when the bank was about to fail, because he felt that it would be wrong to take anybody in in that way.

He spoke of Dr. Nathan Smith and his lecture against tobacco, given to students in Yale, at request of the late Prof. Silliman, who was a tobacco hater. The Doctor delivered an eloquent appeal against tobacco, uncon- sciously taking snuff at the pauses; the students tittered, and the doctor looked amazed, when Professor Silliman pulled the skirts of his coat and whispered, "Put up your box, doctor !"

Mr. B. spoke in high terms of the late Henry Trowbridge, (father of Thomas R. Trowbridge), who was a great shipping merchant of New Haven. He spoke of the New Haven Bank and its first cashier, Col. Lyon, who, when he was ill and about to be prayed for by a good deacon, raised himself in bed and shouted to the deacon to "be fervent, Sammy, but brief."

In conclusion he spoke of our old hotels, our present noble charities, and other matters of interest, and said, "As we smile over the oddities and sim- plicities of our ancestors of forty or more years ago, so will our descendants smile over ours. Yet our fathers and mothe's did most of their work well, and gave us many examples of true manhood and true womanhood. They left an impress of devoted patriotism, earnest religious faith, industry, frugality, and good taste, in multiplied forms. The influence of their best teaching still lives, not only among us, but in the far West and in the South ; for New Haven has probably sent forth more noble men and noble women to other parts of the country, and even across the seas, than any other town of its size in the Union.

After the address several new members were added to the society. Upon the platform, listening to the address, were Lieut. Gov. Tyler, Hon. Henry B. Harrison, Rev. Drs. Bacon, Beardsley and Patton, ex-Mayor Fitch, Dr. Foote, Henry White, T. R. Trowbridge and Cyprian Wilcox.

NEW HAVEN AND ITS ENVIRONS.

Yale College.

The noblest monument to the wisdom of the fathers is found in the pro- vision made among us for education. Yale College ranks third in age, and first in the number of undergraduate members, among the multitude of col- leges which public policy or private munificence has spread over the country.

The college grounds occupy one-eighteenth part of the original town plot of New Haven, including, quite accidentally, the birth place of Elihu Yale, from whom the College has its name.

The new Theological Buildings are beautiful and imposing structures, on the corner of College and Elm streets, and opposite the College grounds proper.

The Scroll and Key Society has erected a very attractive Society Hall, on the corner of College and Wall streets, and the Psi Upsilon Society has a new building on High street, a few rods to the north of Elm.

The new College Building on College street bears the name of FARNAM HALL, in honor of Mr. Henry Farnam, of this city, who generously fur- nished the funds. At right angles with this, on Elm street, another large College building has been constructed of stone, at a cost of more than a hundred thousand dollars. It is the gift to the College of Mr. Durfee, of Fall River, Mass., and appropriately bears the name of DURFEE HALL.

YALE SCHOOL OF THE FINE ARTS .- This institution was founded in 1864, through the munificence of our late fellow citizen, Augustus R. Street, Esq., who in that year proposed to the Corporation of Yale College, to erect, at his sole expense, as a gift to the College, an appropriate building for a school of the fine arts

GRADUATES' HALL .- The lower story of this building is used for the ex- amination of the undergraduates and of candidates for admission to Col- lege. The College dinners are also given here. The very elegant rooms above, are occupied by the two literary societies, the Linonian and the Brothers in Unity.

THE LIBRARY .- The collection of books in the Library building is about 88,000 volumes.

THE MINERALOGICAL AND GEOLOGICAL CABINET of the College is regarded as one of the finest Collections now in existence.

THE SHEFFIELD SCIENTIFIC SCHOOL .- The building occupied by the Sci- entific Department of Yale College, stands at the head of College street, two blocks north of the other College buildings. This department is de- voted to practical and scientific education, classical studies being omitted from the course.

THE MEDICAL COLLEGE is located in York street, on the west side, between Chapel and Crown streets.

THE COLLEGE GYMNASIUM is the large brick building in the rear of the Colleges, on Library street. The arrangements for bowling, and other kinds of exercises, are thought to be very superior.

BENHAM'S NEW HAVEN CITY DIRECTORY.

Watering Places and Summer Resorts.

Waverly House.

Half a mile below Savin Rock, is the Waverly House and Grove, which is reached by pedestrians in a pleasant ten minute's walk, or a few minute's drive by a road recently constructed over the dyke from the Rock. The House is kept by Mr. Charles A. King, who provides refreshments of every kind at his hotel. Guests have the use of the bathing houses, the pavilion for dancing, &c. Sailing and fishing parties are accommodated at all times. No place in the vicinity is better provided with conveniences for pleasure parties than Waverly Grove. For the use of the tables, bath- ing houses, &c., a very small charge is made by the proprietor.

Railroad Grove.

The West Haven Horse Railroad Company are the owners of one of the most delightful and charming groves to be found any where on the line of Long Island Sound. It is situated a short distance north of Savin Rock, and is at present the terminus of the horse railroad. The company have re- cently purchased a very considerable addition to their former grounds, so that the Grove grounds proper now embrace something over fourteen acres. The trees are a beautiful growth of oak, hickory and chestnut, and are ad- mirably trimmed for the purpose of shade and adornment. A natural turf covers the ground, which is as smooth as if it had been artificially dressed and rolled for use, with the trees thinned out just enough to make the grove at once a perfect pleasure-ground, and the most desirable of leafy shelters. Within the grove are swings, both circular and upright, flying horses, seats and tables without number, two large pavillions with matched flooring for dancing parties, a saloon, water pipes from which the coolest and purest water can be pumped in different parts of the grove, and other accommo- dations on a liberal scale for the use of visitors patronizing the Company's cars. In the open grounds fronting the grove, and commanding a fine view of the Sound, is

Grove Palace.

This buildnig is also the property of the Railroad Company, and was de- signed for the accommodation of parties visiting the Grove by rail. It is a large two-story octagon building, sixty feet in diameter, with a wide flight of front steps ascending upon a platform veranda leading to the second floor, or the grand hall of the Palace. This is a large octagonal room, of the same diameter as the building, with music stand in the center, walls handsomely decorated and painted, and capable of accommodating at least thirty cotil- lion sets upon the floor at the same time. On the lower floor is a room of the same dimensions as the grand hall, designed as a salle à manger for such parties as visit the Grove by cars, the latter providing their own dinner, and the Company furnishing tables and seats without charge. This room, with its tables, will easily seat three hundred persons at a time, and those de- siring the use of crockery for the occasion, as well as the use of stoves for

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New Haven CT Directory Connecticut, 1874, Part 5

Author: J H Benham Publication date: 1874 Publisher: Number of Pages:

Author: J H Benham
Publication date: 1874
Publisher:
Number of Pages: