USA > Connecticut > Tercentenary pamphlet series, v. 1 Connecticut and the British Government > Part 30
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5 A "bit" or real, one-eighth of a Spanish dollar or piece-of-eight, equalled ninepence Connecticut currency. It is from this source that we derive the popular expression "two bits" for a quarter-dollar.
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it was none the less spirited. In the end, the first planters, greatly outnumbering their opponents, won the day. On January 27, 1713, the town meeting decided "by a very full vote" to grant out the common and undivided lands "to those persons and their heirs forever which are in the present publick List of Estates to be proportioned to or by the said List adding those persons which shall be agreed upon by the Town and excluding those in the List that shall be by Vote agreed upon to be taken out of it." No one, however, was to take possession of his share until the proprietors should so approve by a two- thirds vote. Two weeks later the town decided to exclude from the list all persons admitted to the town since 1688 and all apprentices. As before, a few individuals were to have £18 added to the value of their estates. Then, in a spirit of good will, the town authorized a committee to give£18 shares to such persons "that came into the Town since 1688 as they may judge Reasonable as also to admit some Orphans." The list as finally made up con- tained 197 names as compared with a total of 134 names in the last general division of 1687. How many were finally excluded it is impossible to say, but the number was probably not very large. The planters were obviously more interested in safeguarding their future rights than in oppressing the minority of present inhabitants. The Proprietors of the Common Lands in Milford, who now became a separate organization, received from the General Court of the colony a deed of release and quit- claim "of and in the lands within the said town" on May 22, 1713, which specifically confirmed their title to the common and undivided lands. This settlement soon won further confirmation. In 1720 the General Court decided a test case from New London in favor of the proprietors and three years later passed an act to regu-
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late the procedure of town proprietors which settled the vexed question for all time.
The interests of the Milford proprietors were now se- cure. The lands of the town no longer belonged to the community as a whole, to be disposed of as the majority might decide in town meeting. They belonged solely to the descendants of the first-generation settlers and such late-comers as were specifically included in the propri- etary body. Whatever of democracy had existed in the original control of land had now disappeared. An aris- tocracy of land-ownership, diluted but none the less real, had arisen in its place. The social and economic organiza -. tion of the town had undergone an important change.
The four proprietary bodies now owning land in Mil- ford continued to hold occasional meetings. For several years their chief business seems to have been to check unwarranted encroachments upon their lands. But from time to time they took other actions. Once the Proprie- tors of the Common Lands voted to let every inhabitant cut timber under certain restrictions. Again the Pro- prietors of the Sequestered Lands granted twenty acres of "ferry land" to encourage the establishment of a boat- man. This body also disposed of the wool from the town flock pastured on their lands.6 But eventually the pro- prietary bodies passed out of existence. The first group to wind up its affairs was that of the "Two Bit Purchase." In 1728, the shareholders voted to set off to each man his proportion of the lands previously held in common. Eleven months later the committee in charge made its final report. At the same time the proprietors of the "One Bit Purchase" voted a similar distribution, but for some
6 In 1728, for example, they voted that the profits from the sale of the wool crop of that year should be turned into the town treasury to be ap- plied toward the building of a new meetinghouse.
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reason which is not clear the land was not laid out until 1769. When each shareholder had received his lot, the organized body of proprietors, having no more land to control, quietly disappeared.
The Proprietors of the Common Lands voted to divide their scattered holdings in 1742 and the Proprietors of the Sequestered Lands followed suit in the years 1767- 1769. But, in contrast to the distribution of the two Indian purchases, these divisions did not bring the two proprietary bodies to an end. Both groups still had sev- eral small pieces of land scattered through the town which could not be conveniently included in the general dis- tributions. These remnants were not big enough to war- rant another general distribution, and the proprietors had no authority to sell them. But New England in- genuity met the dilemma with a device simple enough at the time, however vexing it may become to future gen- erations of lawyers. About 1770 the Proprietors of the Common and Undivided Lands began to lease their small tracts to adjacent landowners for terms of 999 years. The proprietors reaffirmed this policy at the open- ing of the nineteenth century and the Common and Un- divided Lands soon disappeared. With its lands thus disposed of, the proprietary body ceased to function, and its members merged once more into the general body of inhabitants.7 The Proprietors of the Sequestered Lands survived only a few years longer. In 1798 they also voted to make 999-year leases of some of their remaining plots. In 1803 they leased twenty acres of land reserved for the Housatonic ferry, together with the boat and ferryhouse, again for 999 years, to a young and optimistic boatman. The final action of these proprietors, always distinguished
7 The last recorded meeting of the proprietors took place April 20, 1801, and the last lease was signed eleven months later.
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for their public spirit, came in 1806 when they voted to lease for similar long terms all their remaining land, "the Avails of the Sales arising thereon to be added to the School funds and the Annual Interest to be applied for the benefit of the schools in Milford forever." Thus did the last of the Milford proprietors, in voting themselves out of existence, seek the welfare of the community their ancestors had founded 167 years before.
The disposal of Milford's last proprietary lands brought to a close another chapter in its history. All land except the original commons in the center of the town had now been granted out to individuals. The distribution was at an end and the era of expansion and pioneering was definitely past.
But the influence of the land-system upon Milford's growth persisted. In no way was it more marked than in its effect upon the development of new communities from the original settlement. Several of its neighboring towns owe their beginnings in part to the land-system of Milford. By 1700 the distance between farmlands and homelots had become irksome to many planters and some of them built houses and established "farms" in more convenient places. A few also began to consolidate their holdings into unified tracts by purchase and ex- change. Around them other planters gathered in greater or smaller numbers. The first such consolidation was made by Joseph Wheeler about 1705 in a section near the Housatonic River previously called the Upper Meadow or Sergeant Camp's Hop-Garden, but ever since known as Wheeler's Farms. Later instances within the present town were Merwin's Farms and Burwell's Farms, both in the southeast near the Sound in what is now the bor- ough of Woodmont. Although these settlements never became entirely independent of Milford, they were
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typical of those communities which did develop into separate towns.
The first such settlement to become independent is the present town of Woodbridge. The division of 1687 in- cluded many large grants five or more miles from town, probably used first only as woodlots. They were later brought under cultivation and a few men even built dwelling houses there to spare themselves the daily journey over the dubious roads. Started by Joel North- rup, the first hamlet that sprang up came to be called Northrup's Farms. A similar development in New Haven led to a small neighboring settlement across the town line. Members of these two groups found the weekly trip to church through snow or mud a great trial to their families and themselves. In the autumn of 1737 they petitioned the assembly to be joined as a separate parish and freed from the obligation of attending church in Milford or New Haven. The former town fought the re- quest. But the next year the assembly voted to create the parish of Amity and endow it "with all powers and privileges wherewith other parishes within this govern- ment are by law endowed." A large section in the north- western part of New Haven and all that part of Milford between Lebanon Brook and a line drawn a short distance north of the New Haven-Derby road were included in the new parish. In 1742 the assembly authorized the parishioners "to embody into church estate with the advice and approbation of neighboring churches." Though they gained independence in religious affairs, the Amity settlers remained for some time under the civil jurisdiction of their respective towns. Secular freedom came gradually. In 1742 the assembly let the people of Amity form a separate military company; four years later Milford appropriated £30 for a schoolhouse there;
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and in 1750 the town allowed the settlers to build and maintain a pound for their own use. By the time of the American Revolution the separatist feeling in Amity had become strong. The parishioners sent a memorial to the assembly in 1780 praying for the incorporation of a sepa- rate town. Milford, which always resisted its own dis- memberment, again opposed. But it could not perma- nently obstruct the natural course of events. In 1784 the parish of Amity was incorporated as the town of Wood- bridge, named in honor of the first minister of the parish. The last tie which bound the two communities together was finally severed.8
While this gradual separation was still in progress, a similar division was taking place within Amity itself. A number of settlers in the northern part of the parish found the roads to the meetinghouse almost impassable in winter. In 1755 the assembly gave them permission to have preaching among themselves during the four winter months and exempted them from one-third of the ministry rate of Amity. Seven years later they organized a regular ecclesiastical society under the name of Beth- any. When the "One Bit Purchase "was divided in 1769, this territory was added to Bethany, bringing its northern boundary up to the Waterbury line. Milford gave the parish the right to set up a pound in 1782. When Wood- bridge was incorporated two years later this parish was included within the new town, but in 1832 it also gained independence as a separate township.
The last unit to be set off from Milford grew directly out of the division of 1687. At that time Richard Bryan, the richest man in town, received 208 acres in a single tract about four miles northeast of the meetinghouse. Some forty years later his son moved to this land. A
8 See Map 2.
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little village grew near his home, known for many years as Bryan's Farms, to which in 1750 Milford gave the right to keep a winter school. This nucleus developed into the Ecclesiastical Society of North Milford in 1804. A desire for complete independence took root here as well as in the nearby parish of West Haven, previously formed from part of New Haven. In 1822 the assembly joined the two parishes as the new town of Orange.9 There was little real unity in the two parts of this town- ship, but it was not until 1921 that they were separated into the two present towns of Orange and West Haven.
Thus in the course of the years Milford has been gradually reduced from an area of almost sixty square miles to about twenty-five. The change was fundamen- tally the result of the land-system of the town itself. For it was only because of scattered holdings and far extended divisions of land that the need for local village communi- ties appeared. In three of these, new churches and new town governments eventually were formed. The distri- bution of property rights in Milford was thus the origin of religious and political organization in her daughter towns. From the adoption of the first church covenant in 1639, through the establishment of the political system and the distribution and occupation of the land, to the creation of the last church parish and town government, the progression was unbroken. And the central link in the chain, binding together the history of the older and the newer towns, was the land-system.
In contrast to some of the early New England settle- ments, Milford has never become large or wealthy. She has modestly rejected even the semblance of great size
9 Named, it is said, in memory of William of Orange, whose accession to the English throne in 1689 led to the downfall of the Dominion of New England and the restoration of the Connecticut charter.
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by refusing until now to adopt a city form of government. Her greatest merit, especially to the historian, lies not in her population nor in her fame but rather in the fact that she was and still is a typical Connecticut town. From her first planting she fully represented the ideals and practices which distinguished the Puritan settle- ments of New England from all other colonizing move- ments of mankind. Guided as they felt themselves to be by the hand of God, her founders set up in the wilderness a community which welded into one comprehensive sys- tem the church, the government, and the land. Primarily the town was a religious body, formed largely about the person of a well-loved pastor and having its birth as a community of souls before the actual settlement took place. It was also founded as an independent political unit, in which the same body of men who composed the church carried on the civil administration. Though they showed a little more tolerance to non-members of the church than did their brethren in New Haven, they still held as the central principle of government the theory that they should "observe and Apply them Selves to the rule of the Written Word of God."
Coordinate with the church and the government was the land-system. The founders set up the principle that the body of covenanting planters should control and distribute the land. Here the godly might receive an earthly reward while those who refused to conform might be kept away by exclusion from a share in the land. With perhaps more worldly motives the heirs of the first planters found means of similarly debarring late-comers from local privileges. In contrast to conditions in other colonies, the control of land in Milford, and generally throughout New England, lay in the hands of the actual inhabitants. As nowhere else, those most vitally affected
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could decide all questions in the open forum of town meeting. When they agreed that they needed more land for their growing families, they could set the necessary machinery in motion at once. And they could, and did for many years, take into consideration the individual needs of planters when making these divisions. Their system was perhaps far from perfect. But it represented an effort to attain justice and equality while still leaving full scope for the rewarding of personal ambition and industry. These principles were fundamental in the Puri- tan attitude toward life, and their application to the land- system was an essential part of the Puritan experiment in New England.
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Note
AT the founding of the old New England towns the most important resource at the disposal of the settlers was the soil. Except as commerce and industry might slowly de- velop, the effective use of the land was the only means through which the community might expand and grow. In this account of early Milford I have avoided the con- ventional treatment of local history. I have tried instead to trace the development of the town chiefly by describ- ing the steps in the process of dividing and occupying its land. For the most part, I have based my statements upon the manuscript land records and town records in the custody of the town clerk, supplemented by the printed records of the New Haven and Connecticut Colo- nies. In a very few instances I have had to rely upon the History of the Colony of New Haven published in 1838 by Edward R. Lambert, who apparently had access to some manuscript records now lost or destroyed.
974.6 5054 10.14
Connecticut . History
TERCENTENARY COMMISSION OF THE STATE OF CONNECTICUT
QUI
SUSTINET
TRANSTULIT
COMMITTEE ON HISTORICAL PUBLICATIONS
Roads and Road-Making in Colonial Connecticut
PUBLISHED FOR THE TERCENTENARY COMMISSION BY THE YALE UNIVERSITY PRESS 1933
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TERCENTENARY COMMISSION OF THE STATE OF CONNECTICUT
COMMITTEE ON HISTORICAL PUBLICATIONS
Roads and Road-Making in Colonial Connecticut
ISABEL S. MITCHELL
Nº. ATURE and art have here displayed all their treasures. It is really the Paradise of the United States." In such exuberant language did the French traveller, Brissot de War- ville, describe Connecticut in the year 1788. His enthu- siasm is, perhaps, not surprising, when one stops to con- sider under what favorable conditions his journey was made. He arrived in the late summer, when everything, even the weather, was at its best. The section that he had the good fortune to see first, was one of the finest in New England, the valley of the Connecticut from Windsor to Middletown. Here, not only was every prospect pleasing, but by an equally happy circumstance he was able to give himself up completely to the enjoyment of the smiling landscape, since the road which he travelled was a good one, indeed the only one in the colony to which this ad- jective could be applied without danger of the user being accused of hyperbole. To ride easily and comfortably along a comparatively smooth road, instead of jolting and bumping over rocks and stones, as he had done in
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Massachusetts, undoubtedly contributed not a little to the pleasant impression he carried back to France with him.
What a contrast to the accounts left by the travellers who chanced to go through the colony by other routes! They contain no such glowing descriptions of the attrac- tions of Connecticut. Instead of rhapsodies over "Na- ture's display of treasures," we find only unflattering observations on the state of the roads. Lord Adam Gor- don, who in 1768, traversed the lovely Greenwoods sec- tion famed for its magnificent scenery, left not one refer- ence to its beauty. He was apparently so absorbed in getting to his destination in safety, that he was oblivious to his surroundings, his only comment, significant in its brevity, being that the road from Norfolk was the "worst he had seen in America." Again, the unpleasant experi- ences of Josiah Quincy of Boston in 1773, when he went by the lower post road to New York, prevented him from even attempting to return by the same route. He wrote in his journal, "I was rather induced to this tour by water [down the Sound to Newport] than through Connecticut, having before been through that colony and my horses being so fatigued by their journey as to render doubtful whether they could reach home by land."
If, almost without exception, every traveller com- plained about the roads, comparing them unfavorably with those in other colonies, and if to the last decade of the eighteenth century, even the most frequented high- ways were still poor, it is obvious that the problem of road-making in Connecticut was a hard one.
Not large in area, yet Connecticut includes within its boundaries an almost infinite variety of topographical difficulties. The irregular coast line with tidal rivers cut- ting deep into the land necessitated the maintaining of
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numerous ferries, many of them wide and dangerous. The extremely stony soil of the south made the marking of a distinct and direct route an almost impossible task. The large number of "wild and hazardous" rivers, often overflowing their banks and becoming raging torrents, was a constant source of worry and expense to the towns through which they ran. The five considerable mountain elevations running generally from north to south, form- ing in some regions distinct ridges such as East and West Rock in New Haven, or other bolder heights such as Bald Mountain near Stafford, and little eminences and spurs such as Mt. Tom thrust themselves in the way of any road that presumed to keep a straight course from east to west. Finally, the Greenwoods section in the northwest with its deep and narrow valleys, jutting cliffs, rugged and precipitous declivities, all thickly covered with dark forests of evergreens, made a well-nigh impene- trable wilderness-only the most intrepid would venture to lay out a road there.
To appreciate fully the task confronting the pioneers, it must be remembered also that the primeval forest through which they had to cut the roads was entirely different from the woodland with which we are now fa- miliar. Instead of open spaces and comparatively small growth, it was filled with giant trees, soaring to a height of a hundred to a hundred and fifty feet and ranging from two to five feet in diameter. Only when a tree reached a diameter of six or eight feet did it attract the attention of travellers. Furthermore the earth was encumbered with fallen logs in all stages of decomposition, over which grew a thicket of vines and underbrush not unlike the barbed wire entanglements in No man's land where "men could not go upright but had to creep through bushes for whole day's marches, and impossible for horses to go at
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any time of year." As the moisture evaporated slowly, great swamps and weedy ponds formed where there is now dry land.
Fortunately, the seemingly impenetrable wilderness was, thanks to the Indians, crisscrossed in all directions by a network of trails. These were of material assistance in guiding the colonists in their migrations to new settle- ments. Yet here their usefulness generally ended, since the transformation of an Indian trail into a white man's highway was not very practical. Its inherent character tended to prevent such appropriation. A sure guide to destination, it was never direct but twisted and turned, now this way and that, doubling back and forth to avoid swamps and marshes, keeping to the high places along the ridges and leading to the easiest fords across the streams. In many places, particularly where the soil was stony, it was scarcely perceptible; while on soft ground it was never more than six inches deep and only twelve to eighteen inches wide. But few trails were widened into bridle paths, while a still smaller number were ultimately made passable for wheeled vehicles.
Since the Indian trails were not adequate, other roads had to be made. These were the "Country Roads" or "King's Highways" for general travel and the town ways for local. The former ran from plantation to plantation while the latter were within the township. They con- sisted of the "public town ways" laid out for the benefit of the community as a whole, and the "private town ways" made at the request of separate individuals for their own personal use.
To understand the way the road system developed, it is necessary to know the general layout of the townships themselves, as that determined the number and direction of the highways that were made. Almost without excep-
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tion, in the center of every town, we find a square, often called a green, or a long, wide street with house lots on either side, each one consisting of a parcel of land, large enough for a house and outbuildings, a garden, and usu- ally an enclosure for feeding cattle and raising corn, and varying in size from a quarter of an acre to ten or even eighteen acres. Near the center of the green a lot was reserved for the meetinghouse, and adjacent to this were the "Sabba' day" houses, where, as well as in the adjoining burying ground, during the welcome interlude between the lengthy sermons, the worthy church-goers gathered for a friendly chat and probably some liquid refreshment. Just beyond, and adjacent to the house lots, came the arable and meadow lands, grouped into large fields, where each proprietor had a strip assigned to him by lot, the amount being in proportion to the size of his home lot. Still farther out were the common or un- divided fields and wood lots where the cattle were pas- tured. As the population grew, lands for home lots were granted at greater and greater distances, until it was not unusual for an occasional dwelling to be as many as ten miles from the center of the town.
In practically all of the townships, when the plot was laid out and the lands in the outlying districts appor- tioned, a committee was chosen to make the necessary highways. In some, the needs of the settlers and the topog- raphy of the country, rather than any formal arrange- ment, apparently determined where the first roads were to be. The way found most convenient by one would be followed by others until it became a road. This seemed to be the case in Hartford. Whatever their origin, we find that there were always roads leading from the central home lots to the meadows, the pasture, the woods, and the mill. The arrangement was supposed to be such that
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