USA > Connecticut > Hartford County > The memorial history of Hartford County, Connecticut, 1633-1884, Vol. II > Part 53
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459
WETHERSFIELD.
west side of Cedar Mountain, south by Middletown, west by the Mile- in-Breadth. This great common of pasturage was probably the occa- sion of the title of Cow Plain, as applied to a large part of what afterward was called Newington. In 1754 the commons were divided up among individuals, and none have since been established.
The first public landing-place was along that side of the common adjoining the river, now the Cove. At present it is mostly a fishing- place. In 1674 a public landing was established by the town at Rocky Hill. Five acres of land were reserved for the purpose, it being specially provided that it might also be used for a ship-yard. This landing has remained in use to this day. The Wethersfield land- ing of to-day is the last of a series in the same vicinity, which was begun with Latimer's wharf, probably a hundred years ago. The Steamboat wharf is the property of the Wethersfield Wharf Company, organized in 1860.
There is no record evidence to show when and where the first ferry was established. In 1674 Richard Smith, Jr., was authorized by the town "to keepe a Ferry over the Great River in New London road." It is probable that he had kept this ferry before, and that his license was granted mainly to enable him to keep a tavern; for in it was included permission to entertain strangers and travellers. This ferry was kept in the Smith family for several generations, and Pratt's ferry, long since discontinued, was its latest successor. Daniel Pratt began to keep it in 1762, or earlier.
A ferry, first kept by Richard Keney in 1712, and hence known as Keney's, has been at times maintained near the north end of the town. Samuel Buck kept it in 1753. After a discontinuance of many years, it was revived in 1848, pursuant to order of the county court, but was abandoned after a few years. At Rocky Hill a ferry has probably been kept since 1650. Wethersfield voted in that year to lay out the highway to the landing on the west side of the river, and also the road to Nayaug Farms, directly opposite, on the east side. Jonathan Smith, in 1724, is the first keeper of it whose name the writer finds. The old ferry-boats were propelled by sweeps ; that of 1848 by a cable of wire or rope. Recently, that at Rocky Hill was worked by horses ; for some twenty years past, steam-power has been used.
The oldest place of sepulture - and indeed the only one within the present limits of the township - is in the rear of the Congregational church. Originally it included only the crown of the hill, its eastern slope, and a part of its western. It was a plot abutting the then great public square on the west. This burying-ground was the property of the town. In the mean time the town sold part of the public square to individuals ; so that in 1736, to enlarge the cemetery, land had to be bought of Nathaniel Burnham on the west and south. By this addi- tion the area of the enclosure was nearly doubled. The added land was granted to the First Society, but in reality the town paid for it by giving Mr. Burnham land of its own in exchange therefor. The same society has since, by purchase, thrice enlarged the cemetery. The latest extension was made in 1881, by the purchase of the Marsh (formerly Burnham) homestead.
The oldest existing monument in this ground is that of Leonard
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MEMORIAL HISTORY OF HARTFORD COUNTY.
Chester, in 1648; but his was not the first interment therein. Brun- dish, Ireland, Kilbourn, Mason, and some others, died earlier. In this cemetery, as in others, few monuments were set prior to 1712. Only three are to be found here earlier than 1700.
The burying-ground at Beckley Quarter was opened in 1760. Daniel Beckley, Jr., who died March 4, 1760, was the first whose remains were buried there. This is now in Berlin township.
At Rocky Hill a burying-ground was laid out on Cole's Hill in March, 1731. It was voted by the town of Wethersfield for the use of Stepney parish, and its area was one and one fourth acres. This, with its additions, is the only cemetery in Rocky Hill.
The beautiful cemetery at Cedar Hill, established in 1864, is mostly in Wethersfield. It is, however, a Hartford institution, and hence we omit further notice of it here.
Taverns were more numerous and of more importance formerly than now. There have been times since the Revolution when there were three or four taverns within the present narrow limits of Wethersfield. Now there is none, -the well-remembered May's Hotel having been the last. The first public house may have been kept by John Saddler, on the west side of High Street, on land he bought of Samuel Clarke in 1642, or earlier. It seems to have been a tavern in 1648. Richard Smith, Jr., the ferryman, had a tavern in 1675 on the New London road, at the Naubuc terminus of the ferry. John Belden was chosen " ordinary keeper " at a town-meeting the same year. He had a house on each side of Broad Street, but the ordinary was probably in that on the east side. Mr. John Devotion was licensed, in 1713, to keep a " house of entertainment." Benjamin Belden was also licensed the following year. In 1717 Corporal John Francis was licensed to be " tavern-keeper."
In 1781, when Washington and his military associates had their conference in Wethersfield, Stillman's Tavern - which stood until a few years ago where the house of Deacon R. A. Robbins is - was the principal public house in the place; and in it the distinguished company was part of the time entertained.
The first indication of the comparative wealth of the three river plantations is to be found in an order of the General Court in 1639, when the sum of £100 to be raised was apportioned among them as fol- lows : Hartford, £43; Windsor, £28 6s. 8d .; Wethersfield, £28 13s. 4d .: total, £100. At the same time the men subject to military duty were apportioned as follows : Hartford, 17 men; Windsor, 13 men ; Weth- ersfield, 10 men ; 40 men in all. It thus appears that while Wethers- field ranked second in wealth, she ranked third in population. In 1658 the ratio of " persons and estates " was as follows : Hartford, - persons, 187; estates, £20,547. Windsor, - persons, 160; estates, £16,209. Wethersfield, -persons, 103; estates, £12,397.
As between Wethersfield and Windsor, the population of the latter, within the old lines, has continued to be one third or more greater than that of the former within its old lines. Omitting Beckley Quarter, - now in Berlin, and a corner of Marlborough, - the inhabitants within the old lines of Wethersfield, in 1880, numbered 8,796 ; those within the
461
WETHERSFIELD.
old Windsor lines, 12,400. In this estimate Simsbury is not accounted as ever a part of Windsor. If we take the present townships of Wind- sor and Wethersfield, we shall find about the same ratio of population.
The earliest census that the writer has found of Wethersfield by parishes is that of the year 1779. Comparing that with the census of the same sections as towns, in 1880, we obtain the following results of one hundred years' growth : -
1779.
1880.
Wethersfield First Society (now town of Wethersfield)
1,910
2,173
Stepney Society (now town of Rocky Hill)
881
1,109
Newington Society (now town of Newington)
508
934
Beckley Quarter (now in Berlin) .
278
(say) 300
Total
3,577
4,516
In 1756 Wethersfield's population was 2,483. If to this be added Glastonbury's (1,115), we have 3,598, as the number of inhabitants then within the old limits of the township. The whole number at that time within Hartford township - whose limits included the present towns of West Hartford, East Hartford, and Manchester - was 3,027 ; showing that ancient Wethersfield was then, numerically considered, the more important of the two towns.
Of the five members of the first session of the General Court, April 26, 1636, one, Andrew Ward, was from Wethersfield. In September, of the same year, William Swayne, Gentleman, was added, when the whole number was six. In 1637, when the General Court was divided into an upper and a lower section, the two gentlemen above named became members of the upper section, -and hence may be said to have been the first members of what would now be called the Senate, from Wethersfield. When, in 1637, the lower branch of the General Court was constituted, its members were called Committees. Those for Wethersfield for that year were Matthew Mitchell and John Sherman.
In April, 1639, at the first General Court after the adoption of a con- stitution, Wethersfield had four committees : Thurston Raynor, James Bosey, George Hubbard, and Richard Crabbe. From this time until 1662 - when the charter limited the number to two from each town - she generally sent four persons to the lower house; and no other town sent so large a number, excepting occasionally Hartford and Wind- sor. In 1640 Wethersfield's deputies, as members of the lower house were then called, composed one third of the whole. Under the char- ter, Samuel Boardman and John Nott became, in 1663, the first two deputies from Wethersfield. Under our constitution, Ezekiel Porter Belden and Levi Lusk were, in 1819, the first two representatives.
The first Constable in Wethersfield was Daniel Finch, appointed by the General Court in 1636. So far as appears, he was the first one in the colony.
Who were the first Townsmen - or, as we now call them, Select- men - cannot be ascertained. The first of whom there is any record were those of 1646-1647 ; namely Robert Parke, John Deming (Sr.), Thomas Coleman, Nathaniel Dickinson, and probably Richard Treat, Sr. It is quite likely that Samuel Smith and Nathaniel Dickinson were in the first board. Townsmen were annually elected until 1682. But
462
MEMORIAL HISTORY OF HARTFORD COUNTY.
in the years 1666, 1667, 1679, and 1681, Selectmen were also elected ; and some of them were different men from the Townsmen. This shows, that in Wethersfield, at least, the two offices were not exactly the same.
Commissioners, whose functions were analogous to those of justices of the peace, were appointed by the General Court. The first for Wethersfield was Governor Thomas Welles, in 1659. Another kind of commissioners, to collect internal revenue, was provided for by the Andros Government, at Boston, in 1687. Wethersfield obeyed the "Usurper's " law, and in 1688 chose Samuel Butier, Sr., and in 1689 Lieutenant James Treat, commissioners for that town.
Governor Andros's Council also provided for the office of Justice of the Peace in 1687. Of those commissioned for Hartford County the famous Rev. Gershom Bulkeley, one of Andros's most ardent supporters, and John Chester, Esq., were of Wethersfield. In 1698 Connecticut's
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General Assembly commissioned Captain John Chester and Lieutenant James Treat to be the first justices for Wethersfield. The former was designated as justice of the quorum ; thus constituting him a " side judge" of the county court.
The first recorder (or town clerk), whose name is preserved, was Matthew Mitchell, in 1640. But the General Court, unjustly, as it seems, removed him from office. Thereupon Nathaniel Dickinson was chosen, and held the office until his removal to Hadley, in 1659.
Freemen, by the Fundamental Articles of 1639, were those who having been admitted as "inhabitants," by "the major part of the Towne wherein they live," and having taken the "oath of Fidellity," might vote in the election of deputies to the General Court. There were fifty-eight freemen in Wethersfield in October, 1669.
The members of the Continental Congress were elected at large, there having been at this time no districts. Wethersfield furnished for it in 1774 and 1775 Silas Deane. In 1783-1784, 1785-1786, 1786- 1787, 1787-1788, and 1788-1789, she furnished Stephen Mix Mitchell ; and in 1787-1788, and 1788-1789, Colonel John Chester. The last named did not attend.
To the United States Congress Wethersfield contributed for senator, 1793-1795, Judge Stephen Mix Mitchell. Chauncey Goodrich, senator, 1807-1813, did not live in Wethersfield; but his father was the Rev. Elizur Goodrich, D.D., of that place. Both Chauncey and his brother Elizur were representatives to Congress, 1799-1801. Judge Thomas Scott Williams, of Wethersfield, was a representative, 1817-1819.
To the Connecticut Convention to ratify the National Constitution, in 1788, the delegates from Wethersfield were Judge Stephen Mix Mitchell and Colonel John Chester. To the convention which framed the State Constitution in 1818 her delegates were Judge Mitchell and General Levi Lusk. Excepting Thomas Welles, 1655-1656 and 1658- 1659, no governor has been taken directly from this township.
463
WETHERSFIELD.
The following members of the Supreme Court have come from Wethersfield : Stephen Mix Mitchell. 1784-1793 and 1807-1814, being chief judge during the latter term : John Chester, 1788-1792 and 1803- 1807 ; Thomas Scott Williams, 1829-1847, being chief judge. 1834-1847 ; Thomas Belden Butler, 1861-1873, being chief judge, 1870-1873, the time of his death. Besides these. Judges Chauncey Goodrich, 1802- 1807, and Elizur Goodrich, 1803-1807, were sons of the Rev. Elizur Goodrich ; who, and whose long line of ancestors, running back to 1636, were Wethersfield people.
Of the part taken by Wethersfield in the Indian campaign of 1637 something has been said in our account of the Indians of and around that township. It remains to add some facts as to her early military organizations, and her part in subsequent wars and battles.
In 1639 James Bosey was chosen by the General Court a military inspector in the colonial service. In 1645 he was clerk of the trainband at Wethersfield, the earliest date at which that company is mentioned. John Hollister, in 1657, was a lieutenant, -first of that title after Robert Seeley.
Samuel Welles, son of Governor Thomas Welles, was made an ensign in 1658, a lieutenant in 1665, and a captain in 1670; the first one, so far as appears, of the trainband. John Chester was Captain Welles's lieutenant, elected 1671.
In 1653 Wethersfield furnished eight of the sixty-five men raised " to make warr against the Dutch." In 1654 she sent six for the expe- dition against Ninigret, the Niantic chief. In March, 1675, the " pali- sado," in the centre of the town, was constructed under the direction of Mr. Samuel Talcott, Lieutenant John Chester, Ensign William Good- rich, Mr. James Treat, and Mr. Eleazer Kimberly. The exact position of this defensive work we are unable to give; but it was probably a little east of what is now known as the Frederick Butler house, on High Street.
In the great Fort Fight, Dec. 19, 1675, with the Narragansetts, at South Kingston, Rhode Island, Major Robert Treat, of Milford, after- ward governor, son of Richard Treat, Sr., of Wethersfield, was in com- mand of the Connecticut section, and second in command of the united forces. The forces raised in Hartford County (including Middletown) were one hundred and ten men; and of these, Wethersfield furnished twenty-three men. She also contributed, in the person of the Rev. Gershom Bulkeley, the surgeon and chaplain for the Connecticut section. Among the Wethersfield combatants were the following: Lieutenant Jolin Steadman, killed. He commanded the Hartford County Dragoons. He lived in what is now Jordan Lane. Corporal Samuel Martin, of the dragoons, earned a lieutenancy and a bounty of two hundred acres of land. Captain Samuel Welles was there, as appears from written instructions to him from the Council of War at Hartford. He com- manded the Wethersfield trainband. It is probable that his lieutenant, John Chester, was there also. Among the sergeants of the trainband, it is nearly certain that Hugh Welles and John Wyatt were in the engagement. The latter was promoted ensign. Thomas Hollister, son of Lieutenant John, in all probability was present, and earned there the lieutenancy to which he was promoted. He lived on the west
464
MEMORIAL HISTORY OF HARTFORD COUNTY.
side of Broad Street, but removed shortly afterward to the east side of the river. Corporal John Edwards, son of John the settler, was killed. The Rev. Gershom Bulkeley, surgeon, was exhausted with the care of the injured men. The General Court voted to assist in supplying the Wethersfield pulpit during his absence therefrom. Lieutenant Samuel Talcott (brother of Major John Talcott) was occupied as a member of the Council of War. Private Jonathan Colefax, son of William, was wounded.
There were other campaigns in which Wethersfield men took part. Two men were sent in August, 1675, to Captain Bull's garrison at Saybrook ; twelve went to Captain Pynchon's command against the Nipmucks at Quabaug, near Brookfield, Mass .; twenty were with the battalion of dragoons operating in central Massachusetts ; ten men were in Major Treat's command at Northampton, Westfield, and Hat- field, in September. All these returned to engage in the Fort Fight. The victory of the Fort Fight, decisive as it was, did not at once bring peace ; for Philip was still at large and unsubdued. In January, 1676, ten men, out of fifty-six raised in the county, were sent from Wethersfield to General Winslow's command, in Rhode Island, for service against the remnant of Philip's warriors. Mr. Bulkeley accom- panied them. In February, 1676, eighty men from Hartford County were despatched to the Narragansett country, where Major John Tal- cott was operating; sixteen of the soldiers were from Wethersfield. It was at this time that William Hills was shot at by Indians in the Hoccanum meadows. Indians were "skulking" in the highway from Hartford to Wethersfield, and had waylaid and killed John Kirby, Jr., in the road between Wethersfield and Middletown. In the following March several houses in Wethersfield were fortified. Tunxis (Farm- ington ) Indians were, or were believed to be, hostile ; and Wethersfield believed itself to be beset with danger at the hands of the Red men.
Early in May, 1676, one hundred men of Hartford County were ordered to the relief of Hadley. Of these, twenty-one were from Wethersfield, at the head of whom was Lieutenant Thomas Hollister. There they met the minister of the place, the Rev. John Russell, who, at Wethersfield, had formerly been their pastor; also, Lieutenant Philip Smith and others, formerly fellow-townsmen. On the 20th, out of eighty men sent to Captain Newberry's command at Northampton, twenty were from Wethersfield. In August Lieutenant Hollister, with ten men, was sent to Pacomtock (Deerfield) to search for arms said by the prisoner Menowniett to have been concealed there.
Philip was killed on the 12th of August ; but there was still anxiety on the part of the settlers. In November Lieutenant Hollister let ten of the Indians he had brought in from "the swamp" return to Moheag, near Montville ; the rest were sold as slaves, by order of Major Talcott.
In consequence of the massacre of Sept. 19, 1677, at Hatfield, help was urgently called for, and fifty men were at once raised in Hartford County and sent thither. Wethersfield's quota was fourteen men, and Ensign John Wyatt accompanied them.
It is proper, in our account of Wethersfield's part in the memorable Philip's War, to record the part taken therein by her sons who had, in 1659 and subsequently, removed to Hadley, Hatfield, and vicinity.
Mr. Russell had conducted much of the military correspondence of
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WETHERSFIELD.
the colonial officers. According to some historians, he had also har- bored the regicides Goffe and Whalley. Others, Mr. Judd among the number, say that these fugitives were kept at the houses of Peter Tilton and Lieutenant Samuel Smith. The latter gentleman had been one of the original settlers of Wethersfield, and for many years a most influen- tial civil officer there. His son, Lieutenant Philip Smith, was now living in Hadley, and rendered great service in the struggles with the Indians. Richard Montague, from Wethersfield, at Hadley, baked the biscuit for the soldiers of the campaigns. Nathaniel Dickinson, the old town clerk of Wethersfield, was, with most of his sons, now living in Hadley. Of his sons, born and brought up in Wethersfield, Obadiah had his house burnt by the savages, and he, with a child of his, was carried captive to Canada. Returning thence, he soon after removed to his old home in Wethersfield. Joseph was killed in the fight at Squakheag (North- field), Sept. 5, 1675. He was then living at Northfield. Nehemiah was in the Falls (Turner's) fight, May 19, 1676. John was one of the sergeants at the Falls fight. Azariah, the youngest son, was killed in a fight near Hadley, Aug. 25, 1675. The people of Wethersfield should remember with pride the part taken in the war of 1675-1677 by this family, many of whose descendants are in that township and Rocky Hill at this day.
Sergeant Isaac Graves and his brother John, both of whom were killed in the fight at Hatfield, Sept. 19, 1677, had been residents of Wethersfield. John was a citizen of some importance, living on the east side of Broad Street. They were sons of Thomas, of Hartford. Jonathan Welles and his brother Thomas, Jr., of Deerfield and Had- ley, respectively, with their father, were in the Falls fight, and Thomas was wounded. Seventeen years later, in 1693, two daughters of Thomas were killed by the Indians ; his wife and a third daughter were scalped and left for dead. Noah Coleman, son of Thomas, also in the Falls fight, had emigrated from Wethersfield to Hadley. John Smith, of Hadley, born and reared in Wethersfield, was a son of Lieu- tenant Samuel. He was in the Falls fight, and was slain eleven days later in Hatfield meadow. Peter Montague, who had removed to Had- ley was in the Falls fight. Samuel Belden, son of Richard, of Weth- ersfield, was living in Hatfield, Ang. 19, 1677 ; and in the attack of that date his wife was killed. John Coleman, brother of Noah above- mentioned, lost his wife and a habe at the same time. And so the disasters at these river settlements of Massachusetts were largely a source of bereavement to the older one at Wethersfield.
Thomas Hollister was lieutenant of the "troop" for Hartford County. In that capacity he commanded forty men (fifteen each from Hartford and Windsor, and ten from Wethersfield) in an expedition to Northampton and Hadley, in October, 1677.
Andros's journey from Boston to Hartford in October, 1687, to possess himself of the colony's charter, took him (via New London, probably ) through Wethersfield. He, with his "gentlemen and grena- diers," about sixty in number, crossed at what was then Smith's ferry, which connected New London road with Wethersfield village, being the same ferry last known as Pratt's. This road passes the upper end of Broad Street ; and it was here, or at the ferry, that Andros was met by the troop, which escorted him to Hartford. The Rev. Gershom
VOL. II .- 30.
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MEMORIAL HISTORY OF HARTFORD COUNTY.
Bulkeley informs us that the meeting took place at the ferry. He also tells us that " the trained bands of divers towns had waited there some part of the week before [October 31], expecting his coming then." It is probable that no man in the colony welcomed him more cordially than did Mr. Bulkeley.
In June, 1689, Wethersfield had, for the first time, two trainbands. In September of that year they were officered as follows: South (Broad Street) Company, John Chester, captain ; John Buttolph, lieutenant ; John Chester, Jr., ensign. North (High Street) Company, Robert Welles (grandson of Governor Thomas), captain; William Warner, lieutenant ; Samuel Butler, ensign. Thomas Hollister was lieutenant of Captain Dennison's volunteers for Hartford and New London counties. Captain Samuel Talcott was in command of the dra- goons in June, 1690, at Deerfield, at the outbreak of King William's War. In October, 1692, Stephen Hollister, brother of Thomas, was made lieutenant of the dragoons; Samuel Talcott (son of Captain Samuel), cornet; and Joshua Welles (son of Thomas, the son of Hugh), ensign. This company was, the same month, sent to Albany, for service against the Indians of that vicinity, then threatening Massa- chusetts. In the following March (or June), 1693, Lieutenant Stephen Hollister was in Captain Whiting's picked company of sixty-four men, in the expedition to Deerfield, Mass., remaining several months. In October, 1696, he commanded the special detachment of forty men, sent from Hartford, Windsor, and Wethersfield, to Hadley. In Sep- tember, 1696, Daniel Belden (son of William, of Wethersfield), with a son, Nathaniel, and a daughter, Esther, was seized and carried away by Indians, at Deerfield. His wife was killed, as were three of his children.
Perhaps the last movements in this war in which a part was taken by Wethersfield were in the expedition to Albany, in October, 1696. Sergeant Jonathan Colfax, with the Wethersfield quota, joined Colonel Fletcher's command of sixty men. In June, 1697, Lieutenant Stephen Hollister was sent, with fifty men under Captain Whiting, to Massa- chusetts, where they remained until October.
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