USA > Vermont > Windsor County > Norwich > A history of Norwich, Vermont > Part 1
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Gc 974.302 N988g 1247293
. NYA 1700
GENEALOGY COLLECTION
1
ALLEN COUNTY PUBLIC LIBRARY 3 1833 01096 3350
GENEALOGY 974.302 N988G
Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2015
https://archive.org/details/historyofnorwich00godd
HISTORY OF NORWICH A
VERMONT
(Published by Authority of the Town)
WITH PORTRAITS AND ILLUSTRATIONS
M. E. GODDARD HENRY V. PARTRIDGE
HANOVER, N. H. THE DARTMOUTH PRESS 1905
COPYRIGHT, 1905 BY HENRY V. PARTRIDGE
1247293
PREFACE
In presenting this history to the public, I will state that at the request of a number of our people, and after formal action on the sub- ject by the voters of the town in town meeting, I reluctantly consented to play the role of a historian by carrying forward a task left unfin- ished by the decease of our highly esteemed fellow townsman, the late M. E. Goddard, whose scholarly attainments and deep interest in the subject eminently fitted him for preparing this work.
In the preparation of this pen picture of our town I have used the material prepared by my predecessor in the undertaking, and such other matter as the limited time at my control has enabled me to secure, striving, at the time, to present a correct, though not graphic, presentation of the subject.
In these pages the reader thereof will find the history of our Nor- wich from the time of the first meeting of the grantees of this newly granted township, held at the house of William Waterman, innkeeper, at Mansfield, Conn., in the summer of 1761, and within a little more than a month subsequent to the signing of the town's charter by the royal governor of the Province of New Hampshire; and the onward developing factors that were to crystallize into a well organized com- munity ; as, also, sketches of some of the families who early settled in town, and of individuals whose career in life added lustre to their home town, and warrants mention of them in this work; with illustra- tions of persons and places, and incidents of varied character in the town's life.
Circumstances have forced me to reduce, somewhat, from what I had previously intended, the contents of this history, by leaving unpub- lished some material already prepared for the work. Although the absence of that matter may detract somewhat from the interest of the work, it will not materially reduce its worth, historically.
In conclusion I will express a hope that this story-though a tale not well told in all its parts-may be both instructive and interesting to its readers, and that their mantle of charity may overcast the defects that may appear in the form of its presentation. H. V. P.
Norwich, Vermont,
October, 1905.
25% /
CONTENTS
PART I -HISTORICAL
Page
Chapter I
Norwich an Independent Township
3
Chapter II First Settlements in Norwich 2I
Chapter III
Norwich in the Controversy with New York 42
Chapter IV
Proposed Union with New Hampshire 48
Chapter V Norwich and Dartmouth College
53
Chapter VI
Hanover Bridge 57
Chapter VII
Church History 62
Chapter VIII
Church History Concluded
74
Chapter IX
Norwich in the Revolutionary War 84
Chapter X : Norwich in the Second War with Great
Britain 91
Chapter XI.
Norwich in the Civil War
96 .
Chapter XII
Educational
103
Chapter XIII
The A. L. S. and M. Academy 109
Chapter XIV
Political Parties in Norwich II6
Chapter XV
Postmasters and Postal Service 123
Chapter XVI
Growth and Decline of Population I28
Chapter XVII
Local Names
I 37
Chapter XVIII
Industries
I 39
Chapter XIX
Norwich Merchants
146
Chapter XX
Cemeteries 149
Chapter XXI
Epidemics in Norwich 151
Chapter XXII
Agriculture in Norwich 153
Chapter XXIII
Free Masonry 156
Chapter XXIV
Distinguished Visitors in Norwich 158
PART II - BIOGRAPHICAL 163
PART III -MISCELLANEOUS
253
ILLUSTRATIONS
Norwich Street Scene
9
The Newton Inn
51
Congregational Church, Norwich Village
77
Methodist Meeting House, Beaver Meadow
79
Methodist Church at Union Village
8I
Episcopal Church at Norwich
83
High School Building, Norwich Village
IO5
Norwich University before 1852
III
Norwich University, 1862
II3
Knapp's Mill
14I
Erastus Messenger House
2II
Col. Wm. E. Lewis
223
Loveland Homestead
225
Rev. N. R. Nichols
229
Capt. Alden Partridge (two)
233
Col. Truman B. Ransom
236
Norwich Public Library
273
PART I HISTORICAL
CHAPTER I
NORWICH AN INDEPENDENT TOWNSHIP
A. D. 1761-1782
"Town meetings are to liberty what primary schools are to science : they bring it within the people's reach ; they teach men how to use and how to enjoy it."
De Tocqueville.
In America the germ of political organization is the Township- older than the County, older than the State. In New England we find towns established as independent communities, endowed with distinc- tive rights and privileges, as early as the middle of the seventeenth century.
It is to these town governments that we must look for the foundation of republican liberty-to the town meeting, where all citizens meet on a plane of equality to choose their local officers and manage their local affairs. Here is the firm basis upon which all free institutions can rest.
Ralph Waldo Emerson once proposed that the records of a New England town should be printed and presented to the governments of Europe-to the English nation as a thank-offering and as a certificate of the progress of the Saxon race; to the continental nations as a lesson of humanity and love.
De Tocqueville said that the government of a New England town- ship was the best specimen of a pure democracy that the world has ever seen.
The town charters granted by New Hampshire conferred upon the inhabitants of each township, from its first organization, the right of self government in town meeting, by the election of town officers and general direction of town affairs,
4
HISTORY OF NORWICH
Such, also, had long been the practice in Connecticut, from whence a large proportion of all the early settlers had emigrated to their new homes in the New Hampshire Grants.
The royal decision of July 20, 1764, which extended the boundary of New York to the west bank of the Connecticut River, soon re- sulted in the practical relinquishment by New Hampshire of all claims to jurisdiction over these infant settlements. New York never suc- ceeded in establishing her authority over them, and the people were thus left for nearly twenty years solely to the town meeting and the officers therein chosen for the protection of life and liberty, as well as for the management of their local affairs.
It is a curious fact in the history of Norwich that the town was organized and officered before it contained a single inhabitant, and before the first white man had entered it for the purpose of settle- ment. It illustrates the aptitude of our ancestors for self government, and their dependence on law and order as a necessary basis for civil society.
The first town meeting was held at Mansfield, Conn., on the same day (August 26, 1761) on which the proprietors of the town met and organized for business, and was composed, beyond doubt, of the same persons. The following is its brief record :-
"At a Town Meeting of the Grantees of Norwich held on Wed- nesday ye 26 Day of August 1761 at the House of Mr Willm Water- man in Mansfield-Eliezar Wales being moderator of sd meeting-
"1 Voted that Eliezar Wales should be Town Clerk for the Current year-
"2 Voted Sam! West Capt Abner Barker Major Joseph Stores Select Men for the Current year-
"3 Voted Andrew Crocker Constable-
"6 Voted that the next anuel town meeting should be held at the dwelling House of Mr. Wm Waterman."
From the date of this meeting the records of the town are contin- uous and unbroken to the present time, except that there are no records of freemen's meeting preserved prior to the year 1794. It is thought that there are few towns in the State whose official records are more complete or in better condition. Previous to 1778 these are not original entries, however, but the records of preceding years were
5
NORWICH AN INDEPENDENT TOWNSHIP
transcribed and compiled (from loose sheets, probably,) by Abel Cur- tis, then town clerk, in a clear, bold handwriting, into a large folio volume given to the town by Captain Elisha Burton for that purpose. The annual town meeting in Norwich was generally held on the second Tuesday of March-sometimes still later in the month-in conformity to the custom in New Hampshire, the parent state, until about 1847, when the time was changed to the first Tuesday, as is now the uni- versal practice in Vermont.
Town meetings continued to be holden at the house of Wm. Water- man in Mansfield, annually, for the choice of officers, until 1768, when the first town meeting within the town of Norwich was held at the house of Joseph Hatch, on the second Tuesday of March. At this meeting, in addition to the officers mentioned in the record above, Elisha Partridge was chosen tithingman, and Peter Thatcher, Heze- kiah Johnson, Thomas Murdock, and Jacob Burton, fence viewers. Nathan Messenger acted as moderator and Thomas Murdock as clerk. Medad Benton was chosen constable, an office that he held both the preceding and following years. In 1769, John Hatch was elected town clerk, and was re-elected each year till 1780, with the exception of the year 1774, when Peter Olcott was chosen.
Town meetings were held at the house of Joseph Hatch from 1768 to 1774; in the latter year and up to 1780 at the house of Peter Olcott. On the 20th of April, 1780, town meeting was convened for the first time at the meeting house-then in an unfinished condition-and from that time forward all town meetings were regularly held there for more than sixty years. As there was no provision for warming this house, stoves not having yet come into use, the annual March meeting, and special meetings held in winter, were sometimes ad- journed to a neighboring dwelling house, usually to Colonel Olcott's, to Abel Curtis', or Lieutenant Roswell Morgan's. After 1846 town and freemen's meetings were held at the church on Norwich Plain for a term of ten years, after which they went back to the old meeting house at the Center again for two or three years. Town meeting was held for the first time at Union Hall, March 20, 1855, but freemen's meetings were continued at the Center meeting house* till 1858.
Additions to the short list of officers were made from year to year as the interests of the town were found to require, until prior to the
*This building was sold to C. A. and G. M. Slack for $150.00, and removed.
6
HISTORY OF NORWICH
Revolution nearly a full board of town officers, as now required, was annually chosen. In 1770 Hezekiah Johnson was chosen the first treasurer of the town and John Wright collector, although it does not appear that any town tax was voted until 1772. The first board of assessors (Phillip Smith, John Slafter, and John Sargent) was elected the same year, and likewise three overseers of the poor (Peter Thatcher, Aaron Wright, and Daniel Baldwin), thus showing that the poor, even in the newest settlements, are ever with us. One of the first necessi- ties of a newly-settled country is good roads, or at least, such roads as render communication and travel possible. The construction of these will always impose a severe tax upon the first settlers. The proprietors of Norwich, as we have seen, had already made some small beginnings in this direction, but the burden of that work was hence- forth to rest upon the inhabitants of the town to carry forward as they should find themselves able. At the annual March meeting in 1769, Hezekiah Johnson, Jacob Burton, Samuel Partridge, Nathan Messenger, and John Hatch, were chosen a committee "to lay out highways where they shall think needful."
In July, 1770, this committee made a report at a special town meeting. The proceedings of this meeting are copied entire below, as they show the action of the town on the committee's report as well as the location of some of the first roads opened to travel in town :
"At a Town meeting held at the house of Joseph Hatch in Norwich, July the 9th, 1770-
"1 Voted Mr Peter Thatcher moderator, John Hatch clerk.
"'2 Voted to accept the doings of Commite that was chose by the propriety to lay out H Ws.
"3 Voted to accept the alteration of the H W at pompanosuc.
"4 Voted to accept of the alteration of the H W by Joseph Smalleys.
"5 Voted that the alterations of the H W at Girl Island Brook* are received and accepted.
"'6 Voted that the alterations of the H W that goes through Mr Baldwins Land are accepted.
*Supposed to be the brook which empties into the Connecticut near Mr. Samuel Hutchinson's, since known as Johnson's Brook. The tradition is that a young girl was lost or left on the island in the river near the mouth of this brook, from a party of settlers pursuing their journey on the river in the earliest times. Among the old families the island still bears the name above given.
7
EARLY TOWN MEETING
"7 Voted that the H W that is laid from Hartford line to the Saw- mill and to the H W that goes by Elisha Burtons are received and accepted.
"8 Voted to lay out a H W on the top of the hill above Mr Water- mans to Joseph Smalleys-"
The "H. W." referred to in vote seven above, ran very nearly with the present road from the fork in the highway north of H. S. God- dard's to C. Bond's, and from thence easterly to the corner of the main street of Norwich village at S. A. Armstrong's (then Elisha Burton's). A road from the ferry then in use at the present site of the Hanover Bridge, past Captain Burton's to the site of the old corner store in Norwich village, burned in 1875, had previously been laid by the Proprietors' Committee. The first road placed on record as laid by the selectmen of the town connected the ferry with the grist mill on Blood Brook, already referred to as built by Joseph Hatch and Oliver Babcock. This road was located in 1768, nearly as the road now runs to the present mill. The following year a road was surveyed, "starting at a white pine tree," where the old corner store afterwards stood, and running two and one-fourth miles northwest towards Sharon. The course of this road was first west on the present road to A. G. Knapp's mill (where a grist mill was erected soon after by Elisha Burton), then crossing to the west side of Blood Brook it passed in a northerly direction, near an old barn now standing in Mrs. Dutton's meadow, up the hill past Deacon John Dutton's and the Crandall farm direct to D. H. Bragg's, and from thence continued in a northwest course on substantially the present highway to Jonas Richards' (now, 1888, Chas. E. Cloud's). In 1779, a four-rod high- way was laid direct from the ferry to the first meeting house, then building on the hill (near Henry Goddard's). This highway, familiarly known as "the road from the meeting house to the college," followed an existing road as far as Joseph Hatch's (Messenger house), thence ran 183 rods on the present main street of the village to a ledge just north of the upper schoolhouse, on a course one degree west of due north by the compass; and thence on to the meeting house much as the road now runs. The distance by the survey from Captain Hatch's dwelling house to the meeting house was 582 rods or 1.82 miles, nearly. This highway was continued through the town to Thetford line the
8
HISTORY OF NORWICH
same year, on about the site of the present road to Union Village, entering Thetford "1/4 mile N. E. of John Rogers' house, and about six rods from Umpompanoosuc river."
From the meeting house as a center, roads were projected during the years immediately following to all parts of the town. Many of these were at first, and for some time after their construction, mere bridle paths or cart tracks, which just sufficed for travelers to get through the woods on horseback, or with an ox-cart in summer and a sled in winter.
The need of a bridge over Ompompanoosuc River was early felt by the town. At the annual March meeting in 1771, it was voted to build a bridge at the expense of the town, and Captain Hezekiah Johnson, Daniel Waterman, and Peter Thatcher were chosen a com- mittee "to view the place to build sd bridge and oversee sd business." The location of this bridge, if ever built, is somewhat uncertain. No further reference to it is to be found on the town records for more than ten years, when (March, 1782) it was again voted in town meeting, "to build a bridge at some convenient place as the situation will ad- mit near Hezekiah Johnson's"-the site of the present lower bridge across Pompa River. It was also voted "to build sd bridge the present year," and a land tax of one penny per acre on all lands in town voted "to defray the expense." Deacon John Slafter, Daniel Waterman, Jr., and Captain Timothy Bush were made a committee "to effect the building of sd bridge." This second bridge seems also to have disap- peared not long after, as the town again voted, in April, 1787, "to build a bridge over Ompompanoosuc river near the mouth, opposite Capt. Johnson's." A tax for this purpose had been granted by the Vermont Assembly the October previous, and the expense of construc- tion was probably shared with adjoining towns. A fuller account of the building of important roads and bridges in town, with special reference to the several bridges on the Connecticut, connecting Nor- wich and Hanover, will be attempted further on in this sketch. Matters of more general concern and wider interest will now claim our atten- tion for a time.
As we have already seen, Norwich virtually had its origin in the colony of Connecticut in the year 1761.
I Blacksmith shop erected by Elihu Emerson
2
Formerly store building, now E. W. Olds' residence
3 Formerly residence of Elihu Emerson, now Wm. Bicknell's
4 H. Lary's residence, built by Joseph Emerson for a shop
5 Mrs. C. P. Newton's residence, originally Joseph Emerson's
6 Miss M. J. Davis' residence, originally a store building
7
Sawyer's harness shop, removed
7 1-2 C. E. Ensworth's residence, formerly Judge A. Loveland's
8 Mrs. Wheelock's school building, removed
8 1-2 H. Russ' residence, formerly Union Store, etc.
9 Mrs. S. H. Currier's residence, formerly Capt. Aaron Partridge's
10 Mrs. S. P. Benham, previously Gen. Ransom, earlier Judge Thomas Emerson
MAIN STREET, NORWICH VILLAGE, YEARS SINCE
1
9
MEETING OF PROPRIETORS OF NORWICH
On the 26th day of August of that year, at the house of William Waterman, inn-holder, in the town of Mansfield, in said colony, were convened the proprietors or grantees of a newly granted township of land situated 150 miles away to the northward, in a wilderness country then just beginning to be known as the "New Hampshire Grants."
These men were assembled to decide upon the first steps to be taken to open up to settlement and improvement a tract of forest six miles square located on the west bank of Connecticut River forty miles north of Charlestown (Number Four), then the farthest outpost of civilization in the upper valley of that river.
At the time of which we are speaking all that portion of the present state of New Hampshire lying west of the intervales of the Merrimac in the vicinity of Concord was entirely uninhabited, and lay in the primitive wildness of nature. A few townships along that river above Concord had been surveyed and located, and thither a few resolute pioneers had already penetrated-among them Captain Ebenezar Web- ster, the father of the future expounder of the Constitution, whose cabin was at one time, it is said, nearer the north star than that of any other New Englander. But beyond a narrow fringe of settle- ments along the Merrimac, the whole of western New Hampshire north of Keene was alike covered by primitive forests and untouched by the hand of man. To the westward of the Connecticut, as far as the mili- tary posts of Ticonderoga and Crown Point on Lake Champlain, and northward to the valley of the St. Lawrence, lay one unbroken, track- less wilderness, unoccupied by a human habitation and traversed only by a few roving bands of Canadian Indians or by an occasional hunt- ing party of white men from the older settlements of New England.
It was into surroundings such as these that the founders of Norwich thought to plant a town. Many conditions of the time, however, were favorable for leading out new colonies from the ever prolific New England hive. The long French and Indian War had finally ended in the complete conquest of Canada in the preceding year. Peace had now come, bringing security to the border settlements, harassed and terrorized by fear of hostile incursions from Canada for a long time. For nearly a generation the older settled districts of the New England colonies had extended their borders, but slowly and painfully,
HISTORY OF NORWICH
into the surrounding wilderness. With the reduction of Canada to English rule in 1760, a repressed and redundant population hastened to overflow existing bounds, and the instinct for emigration, always strong in the Anglo-Saxon blood, became irrepressible for expansion into new lands.
It was to prepare the way for such a migration that the proprietors of Norwich were assembled at the Waterman tavern in Mansfield, on the 26th of August, 1761, as we have already seen. They had re- ceived their charter on the fourth day of the preceding July, from the hand of Benning Wentworth, the royal governor of the Province of New Hampshire, within whose territory the new township was understood to lie. The neighboring towns of Hartford on the south and Hanover and Lebanon on the east bank of the Connecticut River, received their charters from Governor Wentworth on the same day with Norwich, and the proprietors of those towns met at the same time (Aug. 26, 1761) to arrange the business of preparation for the settlement of their respective locations *.
Like the proprietors of Norwich, they were mostly residents of a Sluall district of country lying along the Thames and its affluents, ti e Shetucket and Willimantic Rivers in Eastern Connecticut. It ap- pears that early in the year 1761 a petition had been circulated in that part of Connecticut and extensively signed, asking His Excellency the Governor of New Hampshire for a grant of four townships of land, "at a place known as Cohorse" (Coos), meaning the Lower Oxbow of: the Connecticut River where the towns of Newbury and Bradford, Vt., and Haverhill and Piermont, N. H., now are, a locality even then known to be desirable to the settler as having the advantage of con- taining a strip of cleared intervale along the river, which had pre- wwously been occupied and cultivated-in the Indian fashion-by a stall body of Indians of the St. Francis tribe. Colonel Edmund Freeman and Joseph Storrs of Mansfield were the agents of the syndi- cate to carry the petition to Portsmouth, then the seat of the pro- vincial government of New Hampshire. Unsuccessful for some reason in securing the coveted location "at the Cohorse," they succeeded in obtaining charters for four townships some twenty-five miles further south, adjacent to each other and lying on opposite sides of Con-
*The Hartford proprietors met at Windham and the Lebanon at Charlestown.
İİ
MEETING OF PROPRIETORS OF NORWICH
necticut River. The close associations of these four towns, at the very beginning of their municipal life, was maintained for more than twenty years afterwards, and should be borne in mind by the reader, as it serves to explain some interesting events in their subsequent history.
The proprietors of Norwich organized at Mansfield, as we have seen, on the day provided in their charter. The terms and conditions of this document were the same with those of other Vermont towns char- tered by Governor Wentworth. Among the most important of these conditions was the stipulation, that each proprietor or grantee should, within the term of five years, plant and cultivate five acres of land for each fifty acres contained in his share or proportion of land in said township, and continue to improve and settle the same, on penalty of forfeiture of his interest in the township lands. The usual reser- vations were made in the charter for educational and religious pur- poses, viz .: one share for the benefit of a school in town, one share for the first settled minister, one for a glebe for the Church of England, and one for the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts, His Excellency the Governor not forgetting to reserve for him- self the customary 500 acres or two shares, as was his invariable rule in granting each new township. This 500 acres, in the case of Norwich, was located in a body at the north-east corner of the town and includes some of the best farming land in town.
"NORWHICH.
L. S.
"PROVINCE OF NEW HAMPSHIRE
"George the Third by the Grace of God, of Great Britain, France and Ireland, King, Defender of the Faith, etc.
To all Persons to whom these Presents shall come, greating-Know ye, that We of our special grace, certain knowledge and mere motion, for the due encouragement of settling a new plantation within our said Province, by and with the advice of our trusty and well-beloved Benning Wentworth, Esq., our Governor and Commander in Chief of our said Province of New Hampshire, in New England, and of our council of said Province, have upon the conditions and reservations hereinafter made, given and granted, and by these presents, for us, our heirs and successors, do give and grant in equal shares, unto our loving subjects, inhabitants of our said Province of New Hampshire and our other Governments, and to their heirs and assigns forever, whose names are entered in this Grant, to be divided to and amongst them into sixty nine equal shares, all that tract or parcel of land situate, lying and being within our said Province of New Hampshire, containing by admeasurement, twenty three thousand acres, which tract is to contain six miles square, and no more, out of which an allowance is to be made for highways and unimproveable lands by rocks, ponds, mountains and rivers, one thousand and forty acres free, according to a plan and survey thereof, made by our said Governor's order, returned into the Secretary's office, and hereunto annexed, butted and bounded as fol- lows, viz:
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