USA > Connecticut > New Haven County > Waterbury > The town and city of Waterbury, Connecticut, from the aboriginal period to the year eighteen hundred and ninety-five, Volume I > Part 55
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The final triumph of the champions of a new constitution was effected by an alliance made in 1816 between the Democrats and the Episcopalians. In that year, a "toleration" ticket was nomi- nated by the opposition to the Federalists. At its head was placed
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Oliver Wolcott, formerly a strong Federalist, but one who had opposed the re-nomination of John Adams, and who had for the last eight or ten years approved in a general way the course of the Democrats under President Madison, successor of Jefferson. For lieutenant-governor, Jonathan Ingersoll of New Haven was nomi- nated. He was a Federalist in good standing, but a prominent Episcopalian and senior trustee of the Bishop's fund. When the votes were counted it was found that Mr. Wolcott was defeated, but that Mr. Ingersoll was elected, he having polled a considerable Federalist vote. In April, 1818, the same ticket was re-nominated and Wolcott and Ingersoll were both elected, the anti-Federalists also carrying the majority of the Assistants and the majority of the House. This settled the fate of the old charter which had come down from the days of Charles II. The Democrats and Toleration- ists were united in favor of the new constitution, while the Feder- alists were divided, the agitation having become so strong that in a number of towns the Federal representatives were instructed to vote for a new constitution. When the General Assembly met in May, 1818, Governor Wolcott said in his message:
If I correctly apprehend the wishes which have been expressed by a portion of our fellow citizens, they are now desirous, as the sources of apprehension from exter- nal causes are at present happily closed, that the legislative, executive, and judi- cial authorities of their own government may be more precisely defined and limited, and the rights of the people declared and acknowledged. It is your province to dispose of this important subject in such manner as will best promote general satis- faction and tranquillity.
The House appointed a special committee to report appropriate resolutions under which a convention could be called for consider- ing a new constitution. By this report the Fourth of July was chosen as the day when the freemen of the towns should elect delegates to the convention. Objection was raised to the choice of so patriotic a day for so patriotic an object on the curious ground that it was too much of a holiday. The animus of this objection was shown in the answer to it made by Col. John McClellan of Woodstock, who said that, although "he knew the Fourth of July was a merry day," he yet thought that "if the people began early in the morning they would be able to get through before they were disqualified to vote." Evidently in those days the " merriment " of Fourth of July consisted largely of a literal stimulating of patriot- ism. At any rate, the elections of delegates to the constitutional convention were held on July 4, 1818, and as a result the Tolera- tionists controlled the convention by a considerable majority. The delegates from Waterbury to this convention were Timon Miles and
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Andrew Adams, the latter a Salem (or Naugatuck) man. It met August 26 in the hall of the House of Representatives in Hartford, and Governor Wolcott was elected president.
The question of the establishment was disposed of in the seventh article of the new constitution-the article "Of Religion." Says Mr. Trumbull:
The Federalists contested its passage at every point, and succeded in modifying in important particulars the draft of the committee, but they could not prevent the complete severance of Church and State, the constitutional guarantee of the rights of conscience, or the recognition of the absolute equality before the law of all Christian denominations.
The constitution as finally accepted was approved by a vote of 134 to 61. It was then referred back to the towns to be voted upon at the town meetings to be held on the first Monday in October. Mr. Trumbull says that "ratification by the people was for some time doubtful." It was, in its final shape, more or less of a com- promise and was in some respects distasteful to the Democrats, and might, in Mr. Trumbull's opinion, have failed of ratification but for the fact that many Federalist votes were given for it. Elias Ford was the presiding officer of the town meeting in Waterbury which decided the important matter of ratification. The ballots were written, containing simply the word "Yes" or "No." The result is thus recorded by the presiding officer:
This certifies that at a town meeting legally warned and held at Waterbury on the first Monday of October, 1818, according to the edict of the General Assembly, May last, for the ratification of the Constitution formed by the Convention, the votes in said town were in the affirmative 191, in the negative 103.
There was one other movement which belongs to this period in which Connecticut bore a prominent and honorable share. That movement was the great emigration to Ohio by which a new terri- tory was peopled with New Englanders, carrying with them to the then remote west their own traditions and ideals of popular govern- ment. The territory which thus received the best that New Eng- land had to give passed into the hands of the Federal government by the voluntary cession of their claims by New York and Connec- ticut. Everything to which the latter state laid claim was included in this cession of 1780 except 3,230,000 acres on the southern shore of Lake Erie reserved for educational purposes. The fund derived from this tract was thus applied, and is to-day, and in 1800 Connec- ticut surrendered all rights in this territory to the United States.
At the close of the Revolution, Gen. Rufus Putnam of Massa- chusetts formed a plan for settling in these ceded lands the penni-
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less soldiers of the war, Congress to sell them the lands at a nomi- nal price. Congress would thus obtain an income and make to them some substantial return for their services which, with the treasury depleted as it was, it was impossible to make in any other way. The matter was formally taken up by Holden Parsons of Connecti- cut and Rufus Putnam, Manasseh Cutler, Winthrop Sargent and others of Massachusetts. They formed a joint stock company for the purchase of lands on the Ohio river and for the settlement there of impecunious veterans of good character. Before this com- pany could carry out its purpose, it was necessary for Congress-it should be remembered that this was in 1787 and that the constitu- tion was not adopted until 1789-to formulate general principles for the government of the northwestern territory. The man who was most prominent in obtaining from Congress the necessary leg- islation was Dr. Manasseh Cutler, then forty-five years of age and a graduate of Yale. After graduation he had taken degrees in the three learned professions of divinity, law and medicine, and had gained as well a considerable reputation as a man of science. In addition to these advantages, he was gifted with a charm of man- ner and knowledge of men that made him a true diplomat in his skill in dealing with the members of a legislative body. The ordi- nance of 1787 which defined the principles of government in the northwestern territory-a remarkable assumption of Federal authority by a body so generally pusillanimous as was Congress then-and which in Daniel Webster's opinion produced "effects of more distinct, marked, and lasting character" than probably any other single law by any law-giver, was in the main the work of Manasseh Cutler. Under this ordinance of 1787 the territory was governed by officers appointed by Congress, there was unqualified freedom of public worship with no religious tests for any public officials, and slavery was not permitted, although slave-owners were allowed to reclaim runaway slaves who escaped into the territory.
Connecticut had already shown that alertness of spirit which finds a natural outlet in emigration, as attested by her settlements in the Genesee region and in the Wyoming valley, which last had caused her many bloody controversies with Pennsylvania. It was, then, what one would have anticipated, to find Connecticut taking an active part in the initial Ohio movement. One of the Ohio Com- pany's first bands of pioneers left Danvers, Mass., in December, 1787. The second band followed from Hartford in the following January under the leadership of Col. Ebenezer Sproat. They encountered obstacles that would have proved insurmountable to less determined men. The Alleghanies were almost impassible.
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Gen. Rufus Putnam says in his journal that they "found nothing had crossed the mountains since the great snow, and the old snow, twelve inches deep, nothing but pack-horses." Gen. Putnam adds : "Our only resource was to build sleds and harness our horses to them tandem, and in this way, with four sleds and men marching in front, we set forward." After overcoming such obstacles as these, the expedition finally arrived in April at what is now Marietta. They built, for protection against Indians, a substantial stockade containing a building with seventy-two rooms, where in case of necessity nine hundred people could be accommodated. It was classically christened "Campus Martius."
The experiment thus auspiciously begun, and favored by Wash- ington and other leading men not interested in the company, did not prosper as was at first anticipated. Indian wars, besides the direct loss of valuable lives, prevented the material success of the farmers and for a time frightened others from joining them. The whole movement was exposed to a merciless fire of ridicule in New England, which, though unwarranted, no doubt proved a strong deterrent to emigration. When at last Marietta had fought its way to an assured existence, the settlement at Cincinnati and the gen- eral opening up of the Western Reserve region (Connecticut's own peculiar domain) had proved formidable rivals. At last the special Ohio emigration movement is merged, as the end of our period approaches, in the general emigration movement to the entire tract included in the Northwest.
The closeness of tie binding Connecticut to the Ohio settlements is well stated by Alfred Matthews in his article, "The Earliest Set- tlement in Ohio," contributed to Harper's Magazine for September, 1885. Mr. Matthews says:
The Western Reserve as a whole is essentially a reproduction of Connecticut- a copy in which the colors of the prototype appear at once faded and freshened; but Marietta is a brilliant, faithfully exact miniature of New England-a picture in which not only the outward form of resemblance, but the very spirit of likeness, is presented. . . The traveller from Massachusetts or Connecticut, who feels a most uncomfortable stranger within the gates of almost any other town along the Ohio, finds himself at home in Marietta. If he sojourns there a few days, he dis- covers that the names of the people whom he meets are familiar ones in his native state. It requires no stretch of imagination to detect resemblances to New Eng- land facial types, to New England manners and to New England speech. The sub- stantial dwellings have a comfortable, thrifty appearance, a homely dignity of expression which recalls those of the older Eastern States. The stately elms which shade the streets and spacious door yards offer a pleasant suggestion of a New Eng- land village; the surrounding landscape seems but to sustain the illusion; and even the little steamboats upon the Muskingum are like those which ply upon the Con- necticut river far up in Massachusetts.
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Mr. Matthews also notes that in the year 1800 the Muskingum academy was opened at Marietta, the first advanced school in the state of Ohio. It was presided over by David Putnam, a graduate of Yale and a grandson of Gen. Israel Putnam.
Waterbury had its share in this noble pioneer enterprise which laid deep and strong the foundations of New England life in what was then a wilderness. A number from this vicinity joined the Ohio emigration movement, encountering hardships which it is difficult to-day to realise in establishing their new homes in the forest. Among those of whose removal to Ohio we have reliable data-furnished by the late Mrs. Caroline A. Barnes of Tallmadge, O .- is Esther Upson, who was born in Waterbury in 1799, married Amadeus Sperry, united with the First church under the preaching of the evangelist Dr. Asahel Nettleton, and set out in July, 1819, with her family in an ox team for Tallmadge, arriving there the following September. Another Waterbury woman whose home was in Tallmadge, was Mrs. Jane Saxton. She died there in her ninety- ninth year, the oldest resident of the place. Two Waterbury broth- ers, Lucius and Abner Hitchcock, removed to Tallmadge in the spring of 1822. Abner's wife was a Waterbury woman, Emma, daugh- ter of Reuben Upson, and it is related that they began their house- keeping in a log house like the rest of their neighbors. Still another Waterbury woman, Mrs. Emeline Fenn, who removed with her father's family to Tallmadge in 1820, made the journey from Con- necticut to Ohio in an ox team. Of Ebenezer Richardson, who was a native of Middlebury, and who removed to Tallmadge in Febru- ary, 1819, it is related that he made four journeys to Connecticut on foot to pay visits to his old friends, and also returned on foot. On one of these journeys he started in company with a man who trav- elled on horseback. So good a pedestrian was Mr. Richardson that he reached Waterbury two days in advance of the man who had a horse to ride.
These little incidents, more or less trivial in themselves, throw a strong light on the perils which they had to endure who tried the hazard of new fortunes in the days of the Ohio emigration. It gives us of these modern days a certain sense of appreciative near- ness to their noble struggles and achievements to find among them those who can lay claim to an original home here in Waterbury.
With this inadequate sketch of the Ohio movement, we bring the history of the period to an appropriate close. It was in many respects the most remarkable period in our country's history. It saw the adoption of a new constitution, which has been the admira- tion of the world, and the successful launching of an experiment
33
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in popular government hitherto untried on any immense scale. It was a period which included great changes in the life of Europe through the French Revolution and the rise of Napoleon, and by those changes the life of our own country was affected to no incon- siderable degree. It was a period that saw the new nation hold equal contest with the mother country, and attain to an unexpected supremacy on the sea. It was a period in which the spirit of enter- prise and business adventure led to results which are only now beginning to be appreciated. It was a period in which the initial wave of immigration first invaded the great west. It was a period which gave to Connecticut a new constitution and forever abolished hateful church distinctions before the law. During all the upheav- als of the times, the life of rural Waterbury went on in quiet remoteness, yet not in separation, from the great events which made the world over.
SOME PROMINENT MEN OF THE PERIOD.
Lieutenant JOSIAH BRONSON, son of Isaac and Mary (Morgan) Bronson, was born in Waterbury, at Breakneck, in June, 1713. He was a man of robust constitution, cheerful disposition and iron will, and took a prominent part in the religious, social and military life of the town. He belonged to a family, several members of which were Revolutionary officers.
On July 23, 1735, he married Dinah, daughter of John Sutliff, who died the following year. He married his second wife, Sarah, the widow of David Leavenworth of Woodbury, May 15, 1740. She lived until August 28, 1767, and was the mother of seven of his chil- dren. A few months after her death, that is, on December 23, 1767, he took to wife Rebekah, relict of Joseph Hurlburt of Woodbury. After thirty years of married bliss she passed away on June 5, 1797, and one year later (June 12, 1798) he married Mrs. Huldah Williams, who survived him. He died, February 20, 1804, at the ripe age of ninety. (For his children see Ap. p. 26.)
Captain JOHN WELTON, the eldest son of Richard and Anna (Fenton) Welton, was born January 6, 1726-7. He was a farmer of Bucks Hill, and had only the ordinary advantages of an English education. From an early period he was a prominent member of the Episcopal society and held the office of senior warden. At the beginning of the Revolutionary war he espoused the cause of the colonies, became a moderate Whig and was confided in by the friends of colonial independence. In 1784 he was appointed a jus- tice of the peace, and the same year was elected to the legislature, of which he was a useful and much respected member for fifteen
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sessions. It is said that few men were listened to with more defer- ence than he. He died January 22, 1816. (For his children see Ap. p. 151. A sketch of his son Richard is given in Volume II, page 238.) Captain AMOS BRONSON, the eldest son of John and Comfort (Baldwin) Bronson, was born February 3, 1730-1, at Mount Jericho near the Naugatuck river. He fitted for college with the Rev.
Josiah Bronson
John Trumbull of Westbury, and graduated from Yale in 1786. He married Anna Blakeslee of Plymouth, and having become through her influence an Episcopalian, educated his family in that faith. He named his eldest son Tillotson, after the distinguished Church of England divine of that name.
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Captain Bronson built the turnpike road extending along the banks of the Naugatuck from Jericho to Salem bridge, which in those days was considered an achievement of no ordinary kind. The new road obviated the necessity which had before existed of fording the stream six times, and removing twenty-five or thirty sets of bars in journeying between the two places which it con- nected. He died in September, 1819. (For his children see Ap. p. 23. A. Bronson Alcott, of whom a sketch is given in the chapter on literature, was his grandson and namesake.)
Deacon THOMAS FENN, the son of Thomas Fenn of Wallingford, was born in that town in 1733, and while still quite young removed with his parents to Westbury. On April 19, 1760, he married Abiah, daughter of Richard and Anna (Fenton) Welton. He served as a captain in the Revolutionary war, and was a representative first of Waterbury, and afterward of Watertown, in the legisla- ture. It is a remarkable fact that he was a member of the General Assembly for thirty-five sessions, beginning in 1778. He was a justice of the peace, and held the office of deacon in the Watertown Congregational church for many years. Throughout his long life he was an influential citizen, much respected by his fellow-towns- men. He died August 1, 1818. (For a list of his children see Ap. p. 50.)
Lieutenant JARED HILL was born in North Haven in 1735. He married Eunice Tuttle, who was born in the same town in 1737. Both were descended from the first colonists of New Haven, Eunice Tuttle being a direct descendant of William Tuttle. They removed to Waterbury in 1784, and purchased a farm on East Mountain. They had twelve children, all of whom, except Samuel, were born in North Haven. Jared Hill was a private in the French and Indian war and a lieutenant in the Revolutionary war, and had the reputation of being a good soldier. He died April 20, 1816.
SAMUEL HILL, the youngest son of Lieutenant Jared Hill, was born in Waterbury, September 4, 1784. In 1807 he married Polly Brackett, eldest daughter of Giles and Sarah Brackett, who was born in North Haven, November 17, 1786. He was educated at the common schools and learned the carpenter's trade, which he fol- lowed in summer during his life, but taught school in winter. He was a fine musician and served in the capacity of fife major in the Second regiment from 1807 to 1818. In the chapter on literature he appears also as a poet. He died April 26, 1834. After his death the family removed to Naugatuck, where his wife died October 8, 1853. Both were buried in the Grand street cemetery, and their remains were afterward removed to Riverside. For their first
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four children see Ap. p. 65. Besides these there were two others, Ellen Maria and Robert Wakeman. (For R. W. Hill see under "Architecture " in the second volume.)
Lieutenant AARON BENEDICT, the son of Captain Daniel and Sarah (Hickok) Benedict, was born in Danbury, January 17, 1745. In 1770 he removed to Waterbury, and settled in the eastern part of what is now Middlebury. He was a leading man of the town, and represented it in the legislature of 1809-10. He served in the French and Indian war, and was a lieutenant in the war of the Revolution. Mr. Benedict was a true type of the old-time, strong- minded, public-spirited man. He was possessed of much more than ordinary ability, and was the builder as well as an owner to a large extent of the Straits turnpike, in the days when turnpikes held the same relation to the country at large as railroads do at the present time. On December 13, 1769, he married Esther Trow- bridge, and died December 16, 1841. (See Ap. p. 18.)
GILES BRACKETT (written also Brockett) was born in North Haven, April 30, 1761. On November 17, 1785, he married Sarah, daughter of Deacon Stephen Smith of East Haven. Both he and his wife were descendants of the first New Haven colonists, and his mother was a direct descendant of the Rev. James Pierpont. He was educated at the common schools, was bred a farmer, enlisted and fought in the Revolutionary war, and at its close returned to his farm in New Haven. In 1800 he removed with his family to Waterbury. He lived first at East Farms, and afterwards bought a farm on what is now Dublin street. He was a representative in the General Assembly in 1809. He and his wife were for many years members of the First church. They were persons of a happy temperament, very courteous in demeanor, generous and thought- ful of the happiness of others, honored and beloved by their family and friends. Mr. Brackett died June 2, 1842, and his wife Novem- ber 27, 1841.
ETHEL BRONSON was born in Waterbury, West Farms (now Middlebury), July 22, 1765. He was the son of Isaac and Mary (Brocket) Bronson, and a younger brother of Dr. Isaac Bronson (Vol. II, p. 861). He was a prominent citizen of the town, a justice of the peace and a member of the legislature for six sessions. In May, 1804, he removed to Rutland, Jefferson county, N. Y., and became the agent of his brother Isaac for the sale of lands. He was three times elected to the New York legislature, was judge of the county court in 1813, and was president of the Jefferson County bank. On December 30, 1787, he married Hepzibah, daughter of Joseph Hopkins, and died in 1825. "He was not ambitious for
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public office, but in those qualties that make a good citizen, a kind neighbor and a valued friend, he was preeminent. He was kind and liberal almost to a fault, yet public spirited and enterprising, and possessed a character marked by the strictest integrity." (See Ap. p. 25.)
Elvin Bronson
GILES IVES was born at North Haven, April 25, 1774. On October 9, 1799, he married Abigail Gilbert of Hamden, and soon after removed to Waterbury. He lived on West Main street, a little west of State street. He was a farmer, and a quiet man, but greatly respected by all who knew him. He owned land near his home on
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West Main street, and State street was opened through his prop- erty. (For his children see Ap. p. 76.)
The Hon. ALVIN BRONSON, second son of Josiah and Tabitha (Tuttle) Bronson, and grandson of Lieutenant Josiah Bronson, was born May 19, 1783. He attended the district school in winter and worked at farming in summer until he was thirteen years of age, after which he spent twelve months in the family of Captain Isaac Bronson, being engaged as an errand boy in a small country store. For the next three years he was employed as clerk in the store of Irijah Tyrrel, in Salem society. Afterwards for one quarter he attended the well known school of James Morris, Litchfield South Farms, and completed his education by spending a year with the Middlebury pastor, the Rev. Ira Hart. Thus qualified, and before the age of seventeen, he taught a district school in Woodbridge.
After serving again as a clerk for a year and half, he went into business as a merchant on Long Wharf, New Haven, and for four years conducted a successful trade with the West Indies. He after- wards engaged in the coasting trade on the great lakes, and with his partners conducted the larger part of the commerce of the lakes for the two years preceding the war of 1812. They established a store at Oswego-which afterwards became his home-and another at Lewiston. During the war he was appointed military and naval storekeeper, and was captured with the remnant of stores on hand. After the war the business was resumed, and car- ried on until 1822. In 1822 he was elected to the New York state senate, and in 1829 was returned again and placed on the finance committee, upon which he served for three years. As chairman of that committee he prepared an elaborate report on capital, cur- rency, banking and interest, which was published as "Senate Docu- ment, No. 106, April 12, 1833," and attracted much attention.
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