USA > Connecticut > Hartford County > Windsor > The history and genealogies of ancient Windsor, Connecticut : including East Windsor, South Windsor, Bloomfield, Windsor Locks, and Ellington, 1635-1891 > Part 52
USA > Connecticut > Hartford County > East Windsor > The history and genealogies of ancient Windsor, Connecticut : including East Windsor, South Windsor, Bloomfield, Windsor Locks, and Ellington, 1635-1891 > Part 52
USA > Connecticut > Hartford County > South Windsor > The history and genealogies of ancient Windsor, Connecticut : including East Windsor, South Windsor, Bloomfield, Windsor Locks, and Ellington, 1635-1891 > Part 52
USA > Connecticut > Hartford County > Bloomfield > The history and genealogies of ancient Windsor, Connecticut : including East Windsor, South Windsor, Bloomfield, Windsor Locks, and Ellington, 1635-1891 > Part 52
USA > Connecticut > Hartford County > Windsor Locks > The history and genealogies of ancient Windsor, Connecticut : including East Windsor, South Windsor, Bloomfield, Windsor Locks, and Ellington, 1635-1891 > Part 52
USA > Connecticut > Tolland County > Ellington > The history and genealogies of ancient Windsor, Connecticut : including East Windsor, South Windsor, Bloomfield, Windsor Locks, and Ellington, 1635-1891 > Part 52
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Daniel Stoughton Timº. Stoughton
NATHAN DAY (s) JONATHAN STOUGHTON (s)
Manners, Conveniences, etc. - From the MA. of OLIVER ELLSWORTH. Jr., son of the Chief Justice, and written in 1802, we glean the follow- ing interesting items concerning Windsor in the previous century :
"Even by conversing with those who lived but fifty or sixty years since, one is astonished to learn the changes in the manners, &c. which have taken place in this town, within half a century. My father, who is now 47. says that, when he was a boy, the families in Windsor, or at least in his neighborhood, all ate upon wooden trenchers; and what is still more surprising, he says, that when he was born, he does not suppose that there was such a thing as a privy or necessary-house. in the town He says, as I can well believe, that the manners were then coarse and such as would now, in many respects, prove disgusting; that the men, in Windsor, formerly assem bled together in each other's houses and would drink out a barrel of culer in one
443
MANNERS, CONVENIENCES, ETC. IN OLDEN TIME.
night. As to carriages and dress, the change has been no less astonishing; for, by con- versing with elderly people. I have learned that 50 years since there was hardly stich a thing as a common two-wheel carriage in the town of Windsor, at least, my father says, that since he can remember, there was but one in town, which belonged to Capt. Wadsworth, a trader, whereas now (1802-3) a large proportion of the people in Windsor (i. e., of the families in Windsor street, both North and South of the bridge) possess one. The change in dress has likewise been great. My mother, who has now lived in Wind- sor street 20 years, says that when she first came here to live there were but one or two umbrellas, and but one or two broad-cloth cloaks in the town; let any one now ... .. . and one summer's day, they will almost believe this incredible."
" With regard to grafting of trees, a singular instance occurred in Windsor in graft- ing apple trees: a person took a twig of an early apple-tree, when the tree was actually blowing out and grafted this twig with its blossoms on another tree; the graft succeeded well, the season being moist and favorable, these blows produced fruit the first summer in 1802."
"Old Capt. Palmer related (to the Chief Justice) that he remembered when . the Island' was the thickest settled part of Windsor-the road to Hartford then ran through it and he remembers seeing warehouses, malt-houses, stills, ete."
" Mr. Josiah Barber told (the Chief Justice) that settlements along the Little River were made at an early date North, towards Poquonock, as well as upon the Mill Brook, near which he had found remains of oue ohl fort or house, in which neighboring old people who were born in beginning of 18th century (old Mr. and Mrs. Gilbert) told him they had loin some nights."
Coaches and other Vehicles. - In 1996, of coaches taxed at $17, East Windsor had three: in 1799 Windsor shared with Hartford " the highest dignity on wheels, having a coach taxed at $54; and in 1820. Windsor had sirty and East Windsor sixty-six riding carriages." - Hartford Co. M.m. Hist.
" Two-horse business wagons were common, but little used for ordinary travel. both men and women rode on horse-back. The first one-horse road wagon ever seen here was made in Pinemeadow, by David Birge, an elder brother of Horace, about 1800. He lived to see the street, nearly half a century after, filled with one-horse pleasure car- riages." -JJ. H. Ilden.
" Stills were probably introduced in Windsor soon after the first settlement. Mr. Thomas Stoughton, Jr., used stills in manufacturing cider-brandy." In 1819, Windsor had 4 stills; in 1820, 21; in 1428, 17; these were cider-brandy distilleries.
Brick and Stone House". - In 1840 there were only 29 " brick and stone houses," of which East Windsor, Windsor, and Wethersfield each held ore. - Hartford Co. Men. Ilist.
Iron. Workx -- As early as 1710 there were iron works along the line of Suffield and Windsor - making the iron from bog-ore. The iron manufacture carried on within the present limits of Vernon and Rockville, Ct. - 1737-1:50- tonches upon Windsor history, but our limited space forbids more than reference to two interesting articles upon the subject, published by ALLYN S. KELLOGG, of Newtonville, Mass., in the Rock cille Journal, dates of Nov. 14 and 21, 1889.
444
HISTORY OF ANCIENT WINDSOR.
RELATIVE POPULATION OF THE WINDSOR TOWNS, According to Census Report -. from 1756 to 1590- Taken from Hartford County Memor'd History.
1736 1274. 1782 1790. 1800. 1810. 1820
1-30 1840. 1800. 1560. 1870. 18 0
Windsor. 11 10 5
G
5
8
1
10 1.5
4
11 10
1.220 2.195 2,8M2 2.7142.773 2.86 3. 008 3.220 2.23 3.294 2,278 2.7 3 3, 05%
? 9 3 1: 10 -1 East Windsor 2,999 3,237 2,600 2 166 3.081 3.400 3 536 3.600 2.633 2. 502 2.019 7
2 19
Bloomhielt. 9-6 1. 412 1,401 1.4.11, 40
18 1:
18 1%
South Windsor,
Windsor Locks,
1,6381.749 1.684 1 902 19 16 11 1,5872,1542.332
NOTE .- The small figures represent the relative size of each town (as compared to other towns in the State), according to population.
Witches in Windsor. - In relation to this subject, I venture to repro- duce an article which I contributed to the Hartford Evening Post of July 29, 1885.
SIR : I have seen frequent allusions in your paper, of late, to " Windsor Witches "; and I wonder not that this is a subject of great interest to your Hartford gentlemen Being myself of Windsor and Hartford descent, and being, withal, much given to anti- yhallan .. centeher. I Love the best of reasons for knowing that, for the past 250 year- the Hartford witch-bminter- have taken genuine delight in the pursuit of Windsor witches. And, indeed. it could not be otherwise: for to my knowledge and to yours. Mr. Editor, so winsome have ever been the features, form, and manners of the genuine Windsor witches, that no one, knowing the nature of man, could blame the men of your town for going beyond " Hartford bounds" in the pursuit of such fair game And knowing, as we do, Mr. Editor, the virtue, discretion, and " faculty " (to use a good old New England term) of these Windsor witches to be equal to their other charms, we can better appreciate the life-long joy, peace, and domestic bliss which many a Hartford man has ensured to him-elf by securing and domesticating one of them. And, since the genuine breed is by no means extinct in Windsor tas I have bad ample meansof judging within the last few days) I wonder greatly at the folly of some who are now trying to dig up a specimen more than two hundred years old. Surely this (when one of the present generation, sixteen years old, is so much more buwitching and satisfactory in all her winning ways is a wilful despising of "the good which the gods provide." It somewhat reminds me of Bunyan's " man with the muck-rake." moiling and grubbing amid the dirt and east-off rubbish of the earth, and totally unobservant and blind to the brightness and beauty of the world around him. Still. as such a " witch hunter " is now atieid with his rake, ard seems disposed to produce for our inspection a very shabby and altogether doubtful specimen of the witch-genus, which he would credit to Wind sor, I feel impelled in defense of the good name of the real witches of that goodly town to examine the evidence.
In The Connecticut Post of August 11 and 18, 1883, under the loadings of . \ Witch of Windsor," and " Our Witch Histories," appeared a couple of articles which as we believe, affixed a most unjust stigma upon that ancient town. The writer having chanced upon a hint that one Mary Johnson, who was executed at Hartford about 1619 for witchcraft, was a resident of Windsor, proceeded to " interview " Rev. Mr. Wilson. the present pastor of the old church of Windsor ; and getting but little satisfaction trons that gentleman, he wandered into the Windsor graveyard, apparently expecting to find
7 -2
4
445
WITCHES IN WINDSOR.
therein the gravestone of Mary Johnson as proof of his theory. He found it not, but fortunately for his proposed article, he found enough quaint and interesting epitaphis to enable him to reel off a column or more on general antiquarian topics. In the succeed- ing week's isstle (the 1Stle he returned to the charge with another column of matter about the old gallow stree at Hartford, the indictment and trial of Mary Johnson, and some remarks on the literature of Connecticut witchcraft, all treated in the usual loose, disjointed fashion of such wusational articles. The totally irresponsible character of this " interviewer" of Mary Johnson's ghost is especially manifest in his statement that ". Dr. Stiles, in bis history of Connecticut. deliberately asserts that there were no trials nor executions" for witcheraft in the State. We may remark that Dr. Stiles wrote the history of Windsor, not of Connecticut; and that he made no such statement as the above. l'ev. Dr. Trumbull, however, in his history of Connecticut, said that "after the most careful researches, no indictment of any person for that crime, nor any pro- cess relative to fleet affair, can be found."
Our own immediate business, however, is not with the general subject of witchcraft in Connecticut, but with the statement which endeavors to fix upon Windsor the equiv- ocal honor of having been the residence of this Mary Johnson.
We call then upon the Hartford " witch hunters" to prove that Mary Johnson belonged in Windsor.
" Mary Johnson, for theuery, is to be pr'sently whipped, and to be brought forth a month hence at Wethersfield. and there whipped." See the records of a court held August the 21, 1646, in Trumbull's Public Records of the Colony of Connecticut, Vol. I. p 143.
No beiter proof is needed that her home was at Wetherstiekl, and not at Windsor. Was Mary Johnson the first person who was hangel as a witch in New England ?
She could not have been hanged before the action of " the particular courte. this ith December, 1645, "which action is thus recorded in Col. Rec. of Conn., Vol. 1711., p. 171: " The jmy finds the Bill of Inditemrat against Mary Jonson, that by her owne confes- sion shee is guilty of familiarity with the Degill."
Having fixed her home at Wetherstiehl, and fixed a date before which she could not have been hanged, her history, if it has not already been sufficiently told, may well be left to the witch-hunters of Hartford.
What authority can be found for the assertion that Mary Johnson, or any other wiech, belonged in Win Isor ? None, so far as history goes, except in Winthrop's Jour- nol, or Winthrop's History of New England (edition of 1553, Vol. IL. p. 374; former edi- tion, p. 307), as follows: " One [blank ] of Windsor arraigned and executed at Hartford, for a witch." This assertion, without date, without name, without any statement of authority : not made at the time of the alleged occurrence, nor in the regular sequence of the journal, but in a blank space formerly left therein, by a writer in Boston, one hundred miles from Windsor, and wholly unsupported by contemporary records of statements, is all that has been brought against the good fame of Windsor in that respect. And we respectfully submit that it is no more to be accepted as historical truth than would be a similar charge made by a paragraph-writer in a Boston newspaper, under similar circumstances to-day.
What have others said about the "first case " ? Dr. Hohnes, in his _American Innals (1., 345; second edition. I., 287-988.) under date 1648, June, says: " The first instance of capital punishment for witchcraft in New England, occurring in colonia! his- tory, was in this year. Margaret Jones, of Charlestown, was indicted for a witch, found guilty and executed."
It is evident that he considered Governor Winthrop's allusion to Windsor, a year carlier, as too vague to have any force or value: and who can say that he was in error ?
Howard's New England (published by the Massachusetts Historical Society in 18(5 ) page 530, says: " In June, 1648, one Margaret Jones, of Charlestown, was indicted for a witch, and executed for it."
Hutchinson (ed edition, 2 vol., published in London MDCCCLX) vol. 1., page 1.50),
446
HISTORY OF ANCIENT WINDSOR.
says: "The first instance I find of any person executed for witchcraft was in June, tofs. Margaret Jones of Charlestown was indicted for a witch, found guilty and executed. '
Drake, in " Annals of Witchcraft in New England, 1809," refers to each of the three cases, but makes no comment on that mentioned by Winthrop against Windsor except: "No circumstances have been found, nor the name of the sufferer." He puts it under the year 1446.
What was the dictum of Judge Savage in the case ? In commenting on the vague statement of Winthrop, he said: " Nothing of this is found in the . History of Connedi. ent' by Dr. Trumbull, yet it is deserving of melancholy commemoration as the first instance of delasion in New England, too soon infections. We may presume the un happy woman was tried as well as arraigned before execution, if the wretched cerem ... nies in such cases deserve the name of trial." See Trumbull, 1 8, in preface, where he says: " After the most careful researches, no indictment of any person for that crime nor any process relative to that affair can be found." Perhaps there was sense enough carly in the colony to destroy the record; but, at least, we know that in 1670 the court. after conviction of Catharine Harrisou, of Wethersfield, for that capital crime, had firm- ness and cunning iu their decision to dismiss her from her imprisonment, she paying her just fees: willing her to mind the fulfillment of removing from Wethersfield, which is that will tend most to her own safety, and the contentment of the people who are ber neighbors. The Connecticut law, December, 1642, may be read in three lines of Trum bull's Col. Ree., I., 77, including the authorities from Exodus, Levitiens, and Deuteronomy. Massachusetts borrowed every letter and figure of the text and comment.
Returning to the subject, in his Genealogiea Dictionary of New England, (11. 559. article Johnson), Judge Savage says: " The first person in New England guilty of the impossible crime of witchcraft, and executed at Hartford, was a Johnson of Windsor, and one of the most distinguished was Rev. Samuel Johnson, born at Guilford, 14th October, 1696, the first President of Kings College at New York, who died 6th Jante- ary, 1772."
In the same volume, page 568, he says. " Margaret Jones, the woman executed :s a witch, 15 Juue, 1648, was the second example of such infatuation in New England, the first being at Windsor a year before."
Wonderful wisdom. In each of the references he calls the Windsor case the first. though Winthrop had said no such thing. In the first he had learned the sex, and in the sceond the name of the person in question, though Winthrop had given neither, and though she whose name he gave belonged in Wethersfield, not Windsor, and was aut tried, and so certainly not hanged, till six months after the well-authenticated case of Margaret Jones, the first, though Savage makes her the second. " Melancholy com memoration," inderd' If he meant to class Rev. Samuel Johnson as " the most distin; guished person in New England, guilty of the impossible crime of witchcraft." he onght to Irive given some evidence of his guilt. If he really meant to call him the most distinguished of the Johnsons, he should not thus have grouped him with the most unfortunate.
Would not his purpose have been just as well served if he had charged apon Windsor the responsibility for Goodwife Elizabeth Johnson, who probably suffered in 1652 for committing one of the twelve crimes which were capitally punished under Connecticut laws. And who can tell which he really did mean ? The anacronism is scarcely worse in one case than the other. And who can tell why all cases of offewler- except for murder, under those twelve capital laws, should be called cases of witchcraft by the modern witch-hunters ? Why did Judge Savage attempt to reverse the decision of those historians who had preceded him ? Perhaps because they had left the intto- duction of witchcraft into New England to appear as a " Boston notion," the trial and execution having taken place there ; and he, a Boston man, desired to shift the doubtful honor upon the people of some other place.
A later historian, Rev. Samuel Orcutt, in his History of Stratford, Coun., gives a
,
417
WINDSOR WITCHES.
chapter on "witches and witchcraft," in which (at page 156), under the heading. " Witcheraft in Connecticut - Authentic Records, " he repeats the erroneous statements already made.
Matlar's Magnolia (Book six, chapter seven. " Thaumatographia Pneumatica," or "Wonders of the Spirit World "), gives as the " eighth example" a history of Mary Johnson, which the Hartford witch-hunters have read in that book, but it is curious that he gives it no date : while his first example was that of the Greensmith woman in Hartford, who, in 1062. so troubled "Aun Cole, a person of serious piety." that she could only be " happily delivered from the extraordinary troubles wherewith she had been exercised " by the execution of Mrs. Grechismith, or, possibly, as shown by the History of Stratford, by the execution of both Greensmith and his wife at Hartford, wid the flight of the two others " from the country."
Would it not be well for the Hartford witch-hunters to work out a full history of "Greensmith and his wife," and of the "two others" who "tly from the country " in 1662; as well as of Elizabeth Seager of Hartford. who, in 1665, was found guilty, but escaped by an informality in the verdict, - before hunting too much in other towns ?
They might then restore Mary Johnson to Wethersfield, look up her full history, and also that of Catherine Harrison, who, in 1670, was convicted, " but allowed to pay costs and leave the town." It might also be pertinent to inquire if Dr. Savage was cor- rect in his identification of Nathaniel Greensmith as the " husband " of the woman there executed for a witch in 1662; and to show, if he was not also executed, why his own conveyance of his property might not have been allowed, instead of appointing Mr. Samuel Willys, Captain Tallcott, and the secretary to convey it to Andrew Bouton. The property can probably still be identified, and it would be pleasant to know if Ben- ton or bis successors have ever suffered inconvenience from the visits of the spirits of the witches to their former haunts ?
When Hartford and Wethersfield shall have been fully worked, the experience there gained may help in the Windsor hunt. This ought not to be seriously difficult for Matthew Grant, the first town clerk of Windsor, whose veracity has never been ques- tioned, was in the habit of putting on record every occurrence which was of interest to Windsor people. If his records, either public or private, fail to show such facts, then the inference will be that no such facts existed; but if he did make such records, then we must accept them as true, even if they involve the best families of the colony.
H. R. S.
Since the above was written, I have heard that, upon the inside of the cover of a diary kept by Matthew Grant, and in his own hand- writing, is an entry to the effect that, on a certain day in 1647, "Achsak Younys was hanged for being a witch ;" and that the date corresponds with about what would be the date intimated in Winthrop's entry in his Journal (Vol. Il., p. 374) above referred to - which would seem to be from the context, in March, 1647, N. S. Such a record, by Matthew Grant, giving the name of the person executed, with a date fitting in with the imperfect record of Winthrop, would be quite conelusive : if our information as to the Grant record was fully satisfactory.
We know that a John Youngs bought land in Windsor, of William Hubbard, in 1641, which he sold in 1649; and thereafter disappears from record. He may have been the husband or father of " Achsah," the witch : if so, it would be most natural that he and his family should leave Windsor.
448
HISTORY OF ANCIENT WINDSOR.
It is but fair to admit, however, that there does seem to have been a " witch ease" which may be fully credited to Windsor ; and it was with the design of obtaining, if possible, more information about it that the above letter was written. In the lack of any further testimony, we proceed to tell what we know concerning the real Windsor witch case. which, however, dates as late as 1653-4, and therefore does not help the case of the " Hartford and other witch-hunters " who are trying to fasteu the Mary JJolnison case upon Windsor.
This " real, original," Windsor witch case, the author is happy to say, is intimately connected with the history of his own ancestry. The . Stileses, never baving had even a " family ghost " to prop their ancient greatness, can at least claim the honor of an ancestor killed by a witch! Smile not, gentle reader, at what to you may scom a singular and a tri- fling resting-point for family complacency. But hundreds of " high-born" families have held themselves above their fellow creatures, for successive generations, on much slenderer grounds of self-respect.
HENRY STILES, the eldest of four Stiles brothers who came to Wind- sor in 1635, a carpenter by trade, and a bachelor, was killed Oct. 3. 1651, at the age of 58 years, by the accidental discharge of a gun in the hands of Thomas (son of Mr. Matthew) Allyn, of Windsor, and, as tradition avers ( Pres, Stiles MIxx. ), " in a military Train waiting upon Gov. Win- throp when he was embarking for England to procure the Connecticut charter, which he obtained 1662." The records of the Particular Cont ( Vol. II., fol. 29), which met at Hartford on the first Thursday of Decem- ber. 1651, contain the following proceedings of "The Grand Inquest upon the death of Henry Stiles," -- the jury being Edward Stebbins. John Drake. John White, Humphrey Pinney, Will Gibbons, Steph. Terry, John Moore, Anthony Hawkins, Richard Goodman, Peter Tilton :
"INDITEMENT OF THOMAS ALLYN.
"Thomas Allyn, thou art indited by the name of Thomas Allyn that not having that due fear of God before thine eyes for the preservation of the life of thy neighbor didst suddenly, negligently, carelessly cock thy piece, and e rry the piece just behind thy neighbor weh piece being charged and going off in thine hand, slew thy neighho' to the great dishonor of God, breach of the peace, and loss of a member of the Common wealth, what saist thou, art thou guilty, or not guilty ?
"The Inditement being confessed, you are to Inquire whether you finde the fact to bee man-slaughter, or Ilomiside by misadventure.
"The said Thomas Allyn, being Indited for the fact, the Jury finds the same to be Homicide by misadventure.
" The Court adjudge the said Thomas Allyn to pay to the County as a fyne C20 for his sinfull neglect ant careless carriage in the premises and that hee shall be bound to his good behavior for a twelvemonth, and that hee shall not beare Armes for the same terme.
" Matthew Allyn Acknowledgeth himself hound to this Commonwealth in a Recog nizance of $10, that his sonne Thomas Allyn shall carry his good behavior for the spire of a yeare next ensuing."
449
WINDSOR WITCHES.
Henry Stiles's inventory of estate was also presented to the same court, and distribution ordered.
Subsequently, as appears from the records of "A Particular Court. held at Pequott, 24th of March, 1653-4" ( folio 51, same vol. ) an attempt was made to fasten the blame of this accidental death of Henry Stiles upon witcheraft. and the following indienment was presented against one Lydia Gilbert, who was probably a member of the family of Thomas Gilbert, of Windsor.
" Lydia Gilburt, thon are herein indited by that name of Lydia Gilburt, that, not having the feare of God before thine eyes, thou hast of late year-, or still dest give En- tertainment to Sathat[an]. the great Enemy of God, and mankinde, and by his helpe hast killed the body of Henry Styles, besides other witchcrafts, for which, according to the law of God, and the Established law of this Commonwealth, thou deservest to dye."
It is not absolutely certain whether the court which tried her was that held the first Monday of September. 1654. or that of November 25. 1654. If the former, the magistrates were Mr. Wells, Mr. Wolcott, Mr. Clark, and Mr. Taleott. The names of the grand jury at either court are not given: Imt there is the grand jury list of the court held first Thursday ( 7th ) December, 1654. The charge to the grand jury preced- ing the record of Lydia Gilbert's indictment is :
"You shall swear by the ever living God that you will diligently enquire and faith. fully present to this court whatsoever you know to be a breach of any established law of this jurisdiction, so far as may conduce to the glory of God, and the good of this Commonwealth, as also what criminal offenses you shall judge meet to be presented as you expect from God in Jesus Christ."
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