In Olde Connecticut E-Book

Charles Burr Todd

• Herausgeber: Jazzybee Verlag
• Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 226

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2019

Beschreibung

The byways of history often have a fascination denied to the highroads. In these interesting pages Mr. Todd discourses pleasantly on various episodes in the past of an old England commonwealth. He takes us to Fairfield, to Lebanon, to New London, and gives us glimpses of matters not often set down. The picturesque side of our history is too often neglected. Even the strenuous resistance of the colonists to political and religious ideals they did not like did not deprive their lives of all salt and savor. There were dinners and dances at Lebanon, the home of Trumbull, when the French officers were there, and "the fair Connecticut girls" were considered attractive by the visitors. Here is an engaging record of the "unconsidered trifles, curious episodes, bits of quaint and curious lore" which the author had succeeded in rescuing from unworked mines of local tradition and chronicle.

Leseprobe

In Olde Connecticut

JAMES BURR TODD

In olde Connecticut, J. Burr Todd

Jazzybee Verlag Jürgen Beck

86450 Altenmünster, Loschberg 9

Deutschland

ISBN: 9783849652463

www.jazzybee-verlag.de

[email protected]

CONTENTS:

CHAPTER. THE HISTORIC BURR MANSION AT FAIRFIELD... 1

CHAPTER II. THE BURNING OF FAIRFIELD BT THE BRITISH.. 5

CHAPTER III. WHALEBOAT PRIVATEERSMEN OF THE REVOLUTION9

CHAPTER IV. SAYBROOK AND GUILFORD, 1880. 21

CHAPTER V. KILLINGWORTH AND ITS BIRDS. 25

CHAPTER VI. NEW LONDON, AN OLD NEW ENGLAND SEAPORT29

CHAPTER VII. GROTON AND MYSTIC.. 40

CHAPTER VIII. FISHER´S ISLAND... 47

CHAPTER IX. THE FROGS OF WINDHAM... 52

CHAPTER X. LEBANON, THE HOME OF JONATHAN TRUMBULL.. 54

CHAPTER XI. MOUNT TOM, A HAUNTED HILL.. 58

CHAPTER XII. A REVOLUTIONARY NEWGATE.. 62

CHAPTER XIII. CONNECTICUT'S DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE72

CHAPTER XIV. ANCIENT LITCHFIELD... 76

CHAPTER XV. MINING IN CONNECTICUT.. 80

CHAPTER XVI. THE PEQUOT INDIANS. 85

CHAPTER XVI. GREENFIELD HILL, A ONCE FAMOUS VILLAGE.. 89

CHAPTER XVII. THE BEGINNINGS OF A GREAT RAILROAD... 92

CHAPTER XVIII. THE PROBATE JUDGE AND THE TOWN CLERK.. 96

CHAPTER. THE HISTORIC BURR MANSION AT FAIRFIELD

I HAVE dwelt for some weeks near the site of the old Burr mansion house in this beautiful Connecticut village, and in these few days have become all that the most zealous antiquary could require. I have passed whole days in delving amid the musty records of the town and parish religiously preserved in the vaults of the town hall. I have held frequent chats with ancient gentlemen whose recollections extend beyond the Revolution to the palmy days of this village, and I have enjoyed the friendship and confidence of the Oldest Inhabitant, whose reminiscences go back to the founding of the village itself, which occurred soon after the pious and utter extermination of the bloodthirsty Pequots in a neighboring swamp. Most freely have been placed before me family papers and legends sacredly preserved, and the result is a mass of materials, legendary and historic, which the public, if it has the least flavor of antiquity in its composition, will be interested in knowing, and which I shall impart as freely, if not as gracefully, as it was delivered.

Every New England village with any pretensions at all to antiquity has its ancient mansion house about which local traditions cluster, and whose very walls are permeated with the subtle aroma of the past. Fairfield was no exception to this rule, and its Burr mansion house has as good a title to historic fame, perhaps, as any of the old-time dwellings of Middlesex.

Tradition says that it was built about 1700 by Chief Justice Peter Burr, one of the earliest graduates of Harvard, Chief Justice of Connecticut, and who once lacked but a few votes of becoming its Governor. The house stood somewhat back from the village main street on a slight eminence beneath a canopy of elms, and, with its dormer windows, its projecting gables and ivy-covered wings, presented quite the appearance of a manorial structure, the effect of which was increased on entering its wide hall with its heavy oaken stairway, or in wandering about its chambers with their lofty walls, tiled fireplaces and heavy oak panelings.

At the time of the Revolution, the period to which our recollections are limited, this mansion was owned by Thaddeus Burr, Esq., a grandson of Judge Peter Burr, a gentleman of culture and ample estate, and who like many of the colonial gentry exercised an ample hospitality.

The ancient chronicles record with pride that General Washington in his journeyings from New York to Boston was his frequent guest. Franklin, Lafayette, Otis, Samuel Adams, Quincy, Watson, Governor Tryon, Dr. Dwight, the poet Barlow, are on the house's bead-roll of famous guests. There Trumbull and Copley dreamed and painted, the latter doing full length portraits of his host and hostess which are still preserved in the family. Governor Hancock was married there, his foster mother, Madam Hancock, died there. Colonel Aaron Burr passed many of his youthful days there as the guest of his cousin (not uncle as Parton has it), Thaddeus Burr.

This fact is recorded by the old chroniclers with special pride, nor was it difficult to discover the reason. Burr's family was of the bluest blood of New England and had been seated in Fairfield for generations. His father, the Rev. Aaron Burr, the famous divine and real founder of Princeton College, was a native of Fairfield, Judge Peter Burr, before mentioned, was his granduncle. Colonel Andrew Burr, who led the Connecticut regiment in the brilliant attack on Louisbourg in 1745, was a cousin, and his family for generations had filled the various offices of state from deacon in the Puritan churches to magistrates, deputies and judges of the courts. Nor can one of those imbued in the ancient traditions of the village be made to admit that Burr was any other than a bitterly persecuted man, who, as has been said, suffered the fate of those who come into the world a hundred years before their time, and who was crushed by bigots, by the Federalists whom his defection to democracy had incensed, and by the powerful Virginia clique which his election to the Presidency had raised up against him.

To this mansion of historic fame, in May, 1775, came Miss Dorothy Quincy, daughter of Edmund Quincy of Boston, who had moved for three years as the belle of the polite circles of that town, and who was now the affianced bride of Governor John Hancock. A few weeks before she had witnessed the battle of Lexington from the chamber window of the house where she was visiting, spiritedly refusing Governor Hancock's command to return to Boston and, after the battle, had fled with Hancock and Samuel Adams to the protection of her father's old friend in Fairfield, Thaddeus Burr. She was accompanied, we learn, by a chaperone in the person of Madam Hancock, widow of Thomas Hancock, the great Boston 4 merchant, and uncle and foster father of John Hancock. The beauty, wit, grace. and dignity of this lady the gossips never weary of descanting on, and it is plainly to be seen that they regard her residence in their village as an event which added measurably to its historic fame.

Some two or three days after Miss Dolly's advent, a young cavalier rode into the village from the West and alighted at the old mansion house. He was dressed in the height of fashion. His sword clanked in its scabbard at his side, and the village critics observed that he rode with the style and bearing of a prince; this cavalier was Aaron Burr, then a youth of twenty years, in the first flush and beauty of manhood, who had come on a visit to his favorite kinsman Thaddeus Burr. When the young people were presented in the parlors of the mansion house that evening, it is said their surprise and pleasure were mutual, and it is more than hinted by the gossips that consequences destructive of Governor Hancock's peace of mind might have ensued had not the sage counsels of the elders prevailed over youthful passion and folly. It is at least true that Miss Dolly wrote a letter to a bosom friend not long after in which she spoke of Burr as a handsome young man with a pretty fortune and complained of the extreme caution of her aunt who would not allow them to pass a moment alone in each other's society. It has been said of Aaron Burr, with hundreds of other unkind things, that he never refused a flirtation, yet his conduct on this occasion was honorable in the extreme. Whether it was, as cousin Thaddeus is said to have hinted, that he could not afford to have so powerful a man as Governor Hancock for his enemy, or whether, as is more probable, thoughts of war filled his mind to the exclusion of those of love, certain it is that on this occasion he fled from temptation and, making a hasty departure from the mansion house, he set off for Litchfield where he entered upon his legal studies with his brother-in-law Judge Tappan Reeve. Nor did he revisit the mansion house that summer except briefly in July when with his friend Ogden he passed through the town on his way to the continental camp before Boston. Miss Dorothy, however, passed the stirring days of that eventful summer in the ancient village whiling away the time as best she might. She rode, she sang, she boated; she accompanied the young people to their "feasts of shells," on the neighboring beaches; she conducted harmless flirtations with the village youths, her aunt having relaxed her vigilance after Burr's departure; she wrote letters to her Boston intimates, some of which still remain, and every fortnight the lumbering mail coach brought her a packet from Philadelphia, addressed in the sturdy, upright and downright characters of John Hancock; for that worthy, after a brief stay in the village, had gone on with Adams and others to hold the first continental Congress in Philadelphia. One of these letters was shown me, having been preserved as a most precious relic. It is addressed to "My Dear Dolly" and is superscribed "For Miss Dorothy Quincy at the house of Thaddeus Burr in Fairfield." It was a cold, formal, unloverlike epistle, and from the nature of girls was no doubt very unsatisfactory to the fair one for whom it was intended.

In this way the summer days passed, and when the autumn purple and gold began to gather on the Fairfield elms a grand wedding was celebrated in the old mansion house — no less an affair than the marriage of Governor John Hancock, President of the Continental Congress, to Miss Dorothy Quincy, daughter of Edmund Quincy of Boston. One can but admire the thoroughness of detail, the nicety of finish, the old-fashioned enthusiasm, with which the village chroniclers describe the event. We see Governor Hancock, attended by a retinue of distinguished men — gentlemen, delegates, and others returning to their homes — ride up from the West, followed shortly after by a more glittering train from the East with prancing steeds and costly equipage and attended by gay cavaliers on horseback — the friends of the bride. There is Edmund Quincy, and there are Edmund Quincy's friends of Boston, grave, sober men and matrons of high degree, with gallant young cavaliers attending on stately maidens — near and dear friends of Miss Dolly, and all of the bluest blood of that ancient town. To swell this train of beauty and worth Hartford and New Haven, even then the seats of a cultured and refined society, had contributed their quota; and it is even said that later in the day the Governor and his staff added the grace of their presence to the festive scene.

At nightfall, when the mansion was brilliantly illuminated, the mild radiance of the lamps beamed on a courtly throng, and on costumes that would have made their wearers presentable at the court of King George himself. Indeed, at this period of their narrative the chroniclers grow a little wearisome detailing so minutely as they do the elaborate toilets of the ladies, the coiffures sprinkled with diamond dust, the long-waisted gowns, the shimmer of silks and satins, the ribbons, laces and ruffles, the priceless gems that gleamed on shapely wrists and snowy shoulders.

Nor were the gentlemen forgotten, for just as minutely were described the glossy queues, the plum-colored coats and velvet small-clothes, the white silk stockings, the elaborate ruffles at wrist and throat, which formed the costumes of the male portion of that august assemblage.

In the midst of this grand array, before Parson Andrew Eliot of the Fairfield church, the stern-browed Governor and the blushing Dorothy plighted their mutual vows after the simple ritual of the Puritan faith.

With the blessing of Parson Eliot the old chronicler closes his account of the wedding, but it is said that the merrymaking was only kept up until the morning, and that the next day the whole bridal train set out for Boston, leaving the old mansion to its wonted composure and quiet. This was the last merrymaking ever held within its walls.

During the four years of war which followed it was the scene of many secret conclaves of the patriot leaders, and in the British descent on Fairfield in 1779 the house was burned in the general conflagration of the village — a very particular account of which, by the way, is given in the " Travels " of the venerable Dr. Dwight

CHAPTER II. THE BURNING OF FAIRFIELD BT THE BRITISH

IN 1879 Fairfield celebrated in a fitting manner the centennial anniversary of the burning of the settlement by the British on the seventh and eighth of July, 1779. To Governor Tryon belongs the inception and success of that enterprise, and on him the stigma of the disgraceful deed will ever rest. Tryon, it may not be generally known, had a special grudge against Connecticut, the sturdy little colony having opposed and thwarted him in a variety of ways. Her dragoons had scattered the types of his newspaper organ through the streets of New York; her " Sons of Liberty" had plotted against him even in his own city, and she had treated with contempt his proclamations inviting her to return to her allegiance, even printing them in her gazettes as specimens of the Governor's pleasant humor. When an expedition was fitted out to humble her it was natural that a man like the Governor should be selected as the director of its movements. Reasons also existed for making Fairfield a special object of attack. The village had always wielded great political influence, which it had steadily exerted in favor of rebellion; one of her sons, General Silliman, was then in command of one of Washington's brigades; another, Colonel Abraham Gould, had fallen two years before in the skirmish at Ridgefield, a rebel in arms; Mr. Thaddeus Burr, a resident enjoying great prominence in the colony, was then publishing addresses inciting the people to resistance, and there were a score of families in the town who were among the most bitter and influential foes of the British Crown. One who depends upon the historians for his knowledge of the attack will find it dismissed with only a meager notice, but from a private letter written by the Rev. Andrew Eliot of the church at Fairfield, who was an eyewitness of the scene, a very clear and circumstantial account of the outrage may be gleaned. Mr. Eliot was a son of the celebrated Rev. Andrew Eliot, so long pastor of the Old North Church of Boston; he was an able divine and good man; it would be hard to find a more interesting bit of history than his simple, yet vivid narrative of the burning of Fairfield. The letter containing it is addressed to his brother, the Rev. John Eliot, in Boston, and is dated at Fairfield seven days after the events narrated occurred. It is given below almost entire: —

"It was in the beginning of wheat harvest, a season of exceeding labor and festivity; a season which promised the greatest plenty that has been known for many years within the memory of man. Never did our fields bear so numerous a load, never were our prospects with regard to sustenance so bright.

" The British fleet and army with the American refugees that had possessed and plundered New Haven set sail from that distressed place on the sixth about four o'clock. Next morning the approach of the fleet was announced by the firing of a small gun we have on Grover's Hill, contiguous to the Sound. They seemed, however, to be passing by and at about seven o'clock we with pleasure beheld them all to the westward of us steering, as we thought, for New York. A very thick fog came over, which entirely deprived us of a sight of them until between the hours of nine and ten o'clock when the mist clearing away we beheld the whole fleet under our western shore, and some of them close in under Kensie's Point. They presently came to anchor and lay until four in the afternoon when they began to land their troops a little to the eastward of Kensie's Point at a place called the Pines. From thence the troops marched along the beach until they came to a lane opposite the center of the town, through which they proceeded, and in about one hour paraded in three divisions on the green, between the meetinghouse and courthouse. From there they detached guards and, dividing into small parties, proceeded to their infernal business. Their commanding officers were Sir George Collier by sea and Generals Tryon and Garth by land.

" The approach of the fleet was so sudden that but few men could be collected, though alarm guns were fired immediately on the dissipation of the fog.

" There was no thought of opposing their landing as our forces were nothing to theirs; our little party, however, posted themselves so as to annoy them to the best advantage. The town was almost cleared of inhabitants; a few women, some of whom were of the most respectable families and characters, tarried with a view of saving their property. They imagined that their sex and character would avail to such a purpose; they put some confidence in the generosity of an enemy who were once famed for generosity and politeness and thought that kind treatment and submissive behavior would secure them against harsh treatment and rough usage. Alas! they were miserably mistaken, and bitterly repented their confidence and presumption.

"The Hessians were first let loose for rapine and plunder; they entered houses, attacking the persons of Whigs and Tories indiscriminately; breaking open desks, trunks and closets, and taking away everything of value. They robbed the women of their buckles, rings, bonnets, aprons and handkerchiefs; they abused them with the foulest and most profane language and threatened their lives without the least regard to their earnest cries and entreaties; looking-glasses, china, and all kinds of furniture were soon dashed to pieces. Another party that came on were the American refugees, who, in revenge for their confiscated estates, carried on the same direful business. They were not, however, so abusive to the women as the former party, but appeared very furious against the town and country. The Britons by what I could learn were least inveterate; some of the officers seemed to pity the misfortunes of the country, but in excuse said they had no other way to regain their authority over us. Individuals among the British troops were, however, exceedingly abusive, especially to. women. Some were forced to submit to the most indelicate and rough treatment in defense of their virtue, and now bear the bruises of horrid conflict.

"About an hour before sunset the conflagration began at the house of Mr. Isaac Jennings, which was consumed with the neighboring buildings. In the evening the house of Elijah Abell, Esq., Sheriff of the county, was consumed with a few others, and in the night several buildings on the main street. General Tryon was in various parts of the town plot, with the good women begging and entreating him to save their houses. Mr. Sayre, the Church of England missionary, joined with them in these entreaties. He begged the General to spare the town but was denied. He then begged that some few houses might be spared as a shelter for those who could procure habitations nowhere else; this was denied also. At length Mr. Tryon consented to save the houses of Mr. Burr and of the writer of this epistle; both had been plundered long ere this. He said likewise that the houses for public worship should be spared. He was far from being in good temper while in the town. General Garth, at the other end of the town, treated the inhabitants with as much humanity as his errand would admit. ... All the town from the bridge by Colonel Gould's to the Mill River, a few houses excepted, was a heap of ruins.

" About eight o'clock next morning the enemy sounded a retreat. We had some satisfaction amidst our sorrow and distress to see that the meetinghouse and a few other buildings remained, but the rear guard composed of banditti, the vilest ever let loose among men, set fire to everything that General Tryon had left, the large and elegant meetinghouse, the minister's house, Mr. Burr's and several other houses that had received protection. They tore the protection to pieces, damned Tryon, abused the women most shamefully, and then ran off in a most disgraceful manner. Happily our people came in and extinguished the flames in several houses, so that we are not entirely destitute. The rear guard which behaved in so scandalous a manner were chiefly German troops called Yagers. They carry a small rifle, and fight in a skulking manner, like our Indians.

"Our fort yet stands; the enemy sent a row galley to silence it, and there was constant firing between them all night; one or two attempts to take it were made by parties of troops, but it was most bravely and obstinately defended by Lieutenant Isaac Jarvis of this town, who had but twenty-three men beside himself. Many were killed on both sides; the number cannot be ascertained. They carried off some prisoners, but no persons of distinction. Our friend Joseph Bartram was shot through the breast. Old Mr. Solomon Sturgis, an Irish servant of Mr. Penfield's, and a negro man belonging to Mr. Lewis were put to death by the bayonet.

"The distress of this poor people is inexpressible; a most pleasant and delightful town in flames; what a scene did the eighth of July present! But I must forbear. Everything I have written you may depend upon as a fact. My pen has not been guided by prejudice, whether my feelings are, and should you publish this letter every reader may be assured that there is not the least deviation from what actually took place upon this melancholy occasion. Yours, etc.,

" Andrew Eliot."

A picturesque though somewhat grandiloquent account of the burning is given in those delightful chronicles the "Travels of Dr. Dwight," a few paragraphs of which will prove an interesting supplement to Mr. Eliot's narrative. After describing the attack, the capture of the town and the burning of the Burr mansion, which he says was done by order of Governor Tryon, he proceeds thus:

"While the town was in flames a thunderstorm overspread the heavens, just as night came on. The conflagration of nearly two hundred houses illuminated the earth, the skirts of the clouds, and the waves of the Sound with a union of gloom and grandeur at once inexpressibly awful and magnificent. The sky speedily was hung with the deepest darkness wherever the clouds were not tinged by the melancholy luster of the flames. At intervals the light played with a livid and terrible splendor; the thunder rolled above; beneath, the roaring of the flames filled up the intervals with a deep and hollow sound, which seemed to be the protracted murmur of the thunder reverberated from one end of heaven to the other; add to this the convulsion of the elements, and these dreadful effects of vindictive and wanton devastation, the trembling of the earth, the sharp sound of muskets occasionally discharged, the groans, here and there, of the wounded and the dying, and the shouts of triumph; then place before your eyes crowds of miserable sufferers, mingled with bodies of militia from the neighboring hills, taking a farewell prospect of their property and dwellings, their happiness and their hopes, and you will find a just but imperfect picture of the burning of Fairfield. It needed no great effort of the imagination to believe that the final day had arrived, and that amid the funereal darkness the morning would speedily dawn to which no night would ever succeed, the graves yield up their inhabitants, and the trial commence at which was finally to be settled the destiny of man."

CHAPTER III. WHALEBOAT PRIVATEERSMEN OF THE REVOLUTION

THERE was one phase of our revolutionary struggle peculiar in itself, and as interesting as a romance because of the skill, heroism and enterprise it developed, which historians have failed to limn in striking and positive colors, partly, perhaps, because the necessary data were difficult to obtain, and partly because the subject was not deemed of sufficient importance to justify so great an expenditure of labor. • I refer to the whaleboat warfare waged chiefly between the Tories of Long Island and the Whigs of the seaboard towns of Connecticut and carried on across the waters of the narrow Sound that separated the hostile parties. This warfare began with the outbreak of hostilities in 1775, continued to the peace of 1783, and affected the entire coasts of both communities, from Stamford to New London on the Connecticut shore, and from Throgg's Neck to Sag Harbor on the Long Island coast. The Cowboys and Skinners of the lower Hudson were organized gangs of plunderers who harried friend and foe impartially. The warfare between Staten Island and the New Jersey shore was largely a neighborhood skirmish, the partisan warfare at the South a conflict of clans; but the whaleboat service of the Sound combined the characteristics of all three, and to these added several peculiar features of its own, such as spying on the enemy, trading in goods declared contraband by the British, and abducting prominent gentlemen to be held as hostages or for exchange. As for the origin of this peculiar service, it is found in the political condition of the two communities at the outbreak of hostilities, and in the organizations known as whaling companies, which could be employed only in a predatory, intermittent warfare. Connecticut was intensely Puritan and Republican; Long Island, settled by the conservative Dutch and by English gentlemen whose sympathies were entirely with the mother country, was as intensely monarchial and loyal. The guns of Lexington made these two communities bitter enemies.