Landing of Tryon at Norwalk.

Destruction of the Village.

Conduct of Tryon.

Scenes at Darien Church.

They lay on their arms
At dawn they marched

east side of the harbor, within a mile and a half of the bridge.' all night, awaiting the expected arrival of a company of Loyalists. toward the town, and were met by a company of about fifty Continental soldiers, under Captain Stephen Betts, who were posted upon an eminence known as Grummon's Hill, a little east of the road. A skirmish ensued, but the little band of patriots were soon obliged to flee before overwhelming numbers, leaving four of their party dead. The people, greatly alarmed, fled to Belden's Hill, five miles distant, during the night. The Continentals and a few of the militia took post within "random cannon-shot upon the hills on the north," whence they annoyed the enemy exceedingly. Tryon halted upon Grummon's Hill until the other division landed at Old Well, on the west side of the stream. The two divisions joined, and soon drove nearly every Whig inhabitant from the village, dispersed the troops collected upon the hills, and seized one of their cannon. The destruction of property then commenced. Governor Tryon thus coolly related the circumstances in his official dispatch to Sir Henry Clinton: "After many salt-pans were destroyed, whale-boats carried on board the fleet, and the magazines, stores, and vessels set in flames, with the greater part of the dwelling-houses. the advanced corps were drawn back, and the troops retired in two columns to the place of our first debarkation, and, unassaulted, took ship, and returned to Huntington Bay."

While the village was burning, Tryon sat in a rocking-chair upon Grummon's Hill, and viewed the scene with apparent pleasure-a puny imitator of Nero, who fiddled while Rome was blazing. It was a cruel and wanton destruction of property, and none but a small mind and spiteful heart could have conceived and consummated so foul an act. Two houses of worship (Episcopal and Congregational), eighty dwellings, eighty-seven barns, twenty-two stores, seventeen shops, four mills, and five vessels were laid in ashes in the course of a few hours, and hundreds of women and children were driven to the woods for shelter. Only six houses were spared. One of them, now (1848) occupied by Ex-governor Bissell, was saved through the exertions of a maiden lady living with Mr. Belden, the then owner. Governor Tryon had been Belden's guest one night, several years previous, and the lady went up to Grummon's Hill, reminded him of the fact, and asked for and received a protection for the house. Tryon sent a file of soldiers with her to guard it. When the British left, most of the resident Tories went with them. Among them was the Rev. Mr. Leamington, the Epis copalian minister. He had continued praying for the "king and all others in authority," according to the Liturgy of his Church, until the people forbade him and threatened him with violence.

About five miles westward of Norwalk, on the main road to Stamford, is a Congregational Church more than one hundred years old. Its pastor in 1781 was the Rev. Moses Mather. On Sunday, the 22d of July, the church was surround

ed by a party of Tories, under Captain Frost, just as the congregation were singing the first tune. Dr Mather and the men of the congregation were taken to the banks of the Sound, thrust into boats, and conveyed across to Lloyd's Neck, on Long Island, whence they were carried to New York and placed in the Provost Jail. Some died there. Nineteen of the twenty-five prisoners were exchanged and returned to their families. Peter St. John, one of the prisoners, wrote an account of the affair in doggerel verse.

"I must conclude that in this place

We found the worst of Adam's race;

DARIEN CHURCH

Of the Provost he says:

tlers arrived at Norwalk. Further to the left, on the extreme edge of the picture, is seen one end of the rail-road bridge, which crosses Norwalk River. The New York and New Haven Rail-road was then in progress of construction. The point derives its name from its former proprietor, Governor Thomas Fitch. whose residence was Norwalk. He was Governor of the colony of Connecticut, and his name is among the beloved of his generation. He died July 18th, 1774, in the seventy-fifth year of his age.

Tryon's official dispatch.

This place is situated a little more than a mile from the center of the village of Norwalk. It received its name from an old well from which, in ancient times, vessels engaged in the West Indian trade took their supplies of water.-Barber.

Dr. Mather was cruelly treated in the Provost, until his situation was made known to Mrs. Irving, mother of our distinguished writer, Washington Irving, who obtained permission to send him food and clothing. He was released at the close of the year.

The Rev. Edwin Hall, of the First Congregational Church, whose historical researches have made him familiar with localities of interest about Norwalk, kindly accompanied me as cicerone. We rode down to Gregory's Point, from which I sketched Tryon's landingplace, pictured on page 413. On the beautiful plain near by stood the ancient village, the first settlers having chosen the sea-washed level for their residences, in preference to the higher and rougher ground at the head of navigation, on which the present town is situated. The old village had gone into decay, and the new town was just beginning to flourish, when Tryon laid it in ruins. A little further seaward, upon a neck of land comprising Fitch's

Point and an extensive salt meadow, is the Cow Pasture, so called from the circumstance that the cows belonging to the settlers were pastured there, under the direction of the town authorities.'

From Gregory's Point we rode over the hills to the estate of Mr. Ebenezer Smith, and from a high hill near his house I sketched the distant view of Compo, on page 402. From that eminence we obtained one of the most beautiful prospects of land and water imaginable. Southward was the broad mouth of the Norwalk River, with its beautiful green islands, and beyond was the heaving Sound, dotted with sails, and bounded by the wooded shores of Long Island in the distance. On the right were clustered the white houses of Norwalk, and on the left swelling Compo was stretched out, scarcely concealing the noble shade trees of Fairfield beyond.

Returning along East Avenue to the village, I stopped near the residence of Mr. Hall, and made the accompanying sketch of Grummon's Hill. It is a high elevation, a little east of the avenue, partly covered by an orchard, and commanding a fine prospect of the village, harbor, and Sound. Tryon sat upon the summit of the hill, where the five Lombardy poplars are seen. The venerable Nathaniel Raymond, still living, when I was there (1848), near the Old Well, or West Norwalk Wharf (where he had dwelt from his birth, ninety-five years), remembers the hill being "red with the British." He was a corporal of the guard at the time, and, after securing his most valuable effects, and carrying his aged parents to a place of safety three miles

GRUMMON'S HILL.

At a

The old records of the town, quoted by Mr. Hall, exhibit many curious features in the municipal regulations adopted by the early settlers. In 1665 it is recorded that "Walter Hait has undertaken to beat the drumm for meeting when all occasions required, for which he is to have 10s. Also, Thomas Benedict has undertaken to have the meeting-house swept for the yeere ensuing; he is to have 20s." Again: town meeting in Norwalk, March the 20th, 1667, it was voted and ordered that it shall be left to the townsmen from yere to yere to appoint a time or day, at or before the 10th day of March, for the securing of the fences on both sides, and that they shall give notis to all the inhabitants the night before, and the drumb to be beten in the morning, which shall be accounted a sufficient warning for every man to secure his fence, or else to bear his own damages." Again: "At the same meeting (October 17th, 1667), voted and ordered that, after the field is cleared, the townsmen shall hier Steven Beckwith, or some other man, to fetch the cows out of the neck [the Cow Pasture]; and he that shall be hiered shall give warning by sounding a horne about twelve of the clock, that he that is to accompany him is to repaire to him."

Time of Tryon's Landing.

Departure from Norwalk. New England Villages. The Green at Fairfield.

Pequots.

distant, shouldered his musket, and was with the few soldiers whom Tryon boasted of having driven from the hills north of the town. He says it was Saturday night when Tryon landed, and, like Danbury, the town was burned on Sunday. Mr. Raymond was quite vigorous in body and mind, and Time seemed to have used him gently. I desired to visit two other ancient inhabitants, but the hour for the arrival of the mail-coach for New Haven was near, and I hastened back to the hotel, whence I left for the east between three and four o'clock in the afternoon.

The coach, a sort of tin-peddler's wagon in form, was full, and, quite in accordance with my inclination, I took a seat with the driver. It was a genial afternoon, and all things in nature and art combined to please and edify. We reached Bridgeport, at the mouth of the Housatonic River, fourteen miles east of Norwalk, at sunset, and a more pleasing variety of beautiful scenery can nowhere be found than charmed us during that short journey. We passed through Westport (old Saugatuck), Southport, and Fairfield, lovely villages lying upon estuaries of Long Island Sound, and all replete with historic interest. Unlike most modern villages, with their rectangular streets, and exhibiting an ambitious imitation of large cities, the neat houses, embowered in shrubbery, are thinly scattered along winding avenues shaded by venerable trees, the ground on either side left undulating as the hand of Nature fashioned it. Herein consists the great beauty of the New England villages, a beauty quite too often overlooked in other states in the process of laying out towns. Nature and art have here wrought in harmony, and village and country are beautifully and healthfully blended.

I was informed, before leaving Norwalk, that the "Buckly House," the last relic of the Revolution in Fairfield, had fallen under the stroke of public improvement, and also that no living witness of the cruelty of Governor Tryon was there. I therefore concluded to go directly through to New Haven that evening. During a detention of the coach for half an hour at the post-office, in Fairfield, I made a rough sketch of the annexed view of the vil

.

lage Green, which I subsequently corrected by a picture in Barber's Historical Collections of Connecticut. The view is from the eastern side of the Green, near the spacious new hotel that fronts upon it. The jail on the left, the court-house in the center, and the church on the right were erected upon the foundations of those that were burned by the British in 1779, and in the same style of architecture. Such being the fact, the Green, from our point of view, doubtless has the same general aspect that it presented before the marauder desolated it. As the destruction of Fairfield was subsequent to the incursion of the enemy into New Haven, I shall give the record of its hard fate after noticing the movements of Tryon and his associates at the latter place. Immediately back of Fairfield village is the celebrated swamp where the warlike Pequots made their last stand against the English, in July, 1637. There they were overthrown

1 The Pequots, or Pequods, were a formidable tribe of Indians, having at least seven hundred warriors. Their principal settlements were on a hill in Groton, Connecticut. They were a terror to other tribes, and became a great annoyance to the Connecticut and Massachusetts settlements. Governor Endicott, of the former province, had tried to treat with them, but in vain, and their bold defiance of the whites increased. Early in 1637 they attacked the small English fort at Saybrook, murdered several women of Weathersfield, and carried away two girls into captivity. The colonists mustered all their able men, and, being joined by portions of the Mohegans, Narragansets, and Niantic tribes, fell upon the Pequots in their retreat upon the Mystic River. A warm battle ensued, and the Pequots were beaten. They fought desperately, but were finally driven westward, and took shelter in the swamp near Fairfield. Sassacus, their chief, escaped to the Mohawks, by whom he was afterward murdered. The Indian name of Fairfield was Unguowa. Mr. Ludlow, who accompanied the English troops, and was afterward Deputy-governor of the colony of Connecticut, pleased with the country in the neighborhood of the Sasco Swamp, began, with others, a plantation there, and called it their fair field. Hence its name.

. Destruction of the Pequots.

Greenfield Hill.

Dwight's Poem.

Journey to New Haven. A Stroll to East Rock.

They might

and annihilated, and the place has ever since been called the Pequot Swamp. have escaped had not one of their number, who loitered behind, been captured by Captain Mason, and compelled to disclose the retreat of his comrades. One hundred were made prisoners, the residue were destroyed. The fort at Mystic had previously been demolished, and they took refuge in this swamp.

We passed in sight of Greenfield Hill, near the village, renowned for its academy and churc, wherein President Dwight, of Yale College, officiated as tutor and pastor for twelve years. The view from the hill is said to be exceedingly fine, and from the belfry of the church no less than seventeen houses of worship may be seen, in Fairfield and the adjacent villages. Dr. Dwight, while minister of Greenfield, wrote a poem called "Greenfield Hill." Referring to the view from the belfry, he exclaims,

"Heavens, what a matchless group of beauties rare

Southward expands! where, crown'd with yon tall oak,
Round Hill the circling land and sea o'erlooks;
Or, smoothly sloping, Grover's beauteous rise,
Spreads its green sides and lifts its single tree,
Glad mark for seamen; or, with ruder face,
Orchards, and fields, and groves, and houses rare,
And scatter'd cedars, Mill Hill meets the eye;
Or where, beyond, with every beauty clad,
More distant heights in vernal pride ascend.
On either side a long, continued range,
In all the charms of rural nature dress'd,
Slopes gently to the main. Ere Tryon sunk
To infamy unfathom'd, through yon groves
Once glisten'd Norwalk's white ascending spires,
And soon, if Heaven permit, shall shine again.
Here, sky-encircled, Stratford's churches beam;
And Stratfield's turrets greet the roving eye.
In clear, full view, with every varied charm
That forms the finish'd landscape, blending soft
In matchless union, Fairfield and Green's Farms
Give luster to the day. Here, crown'd with pines
And skirting groves, with creeks and havens fair
Embellish'd, fed with many a beauteous stream,
Prince of the waves, and ocean's favorite child,
Far westward fading, in confusion blue,
And eastward stretch'd beyond the human ken,
And mingled with the sky; there Longa's Sound
Glorious expands."

The evening closed in, mild and balmy, before we reached Stratford, three miles eastward of Bridgeport, and the beautiful country through which we were passing was hidden from view. We crossed several small estuaries, and the vapor that arose from the grassy salt marshes was grateful to the nostrils. The warm land-breeze ceased at eight o'clock, and a strong wind from the ocean brought a chilling fog upon its wings, which veiled the stars, and made us welcome the sparkling lights of New Haven as we descended Milford Hill and crossed the broad salt marsh that skirts the western suburbs of the town. We arrived at the Tontine a little after nine, and supped with a keen appetite, for I had fasted since breakfast at Ridgefield at ten in the morning. It was Saturday night, and the weary journeys of the week made the privileges of the approaching day of rest appear peculiarly valuable.

"The morning dawn'd with tokens of a storm

A ruddy cloud athwart the eastern sky
Glow'd with the omens of a tempest near;"

Crossing

yet I ventured to stroll out to East Rock, two miles east-northeast of the city. the bridge at the factory owned by the late Eli Whitney, inventor of the cotton gin that bears his name, I toiled up the steep slope through the woods to the summit of the rock,

D D

East Rock.

View from its Summit.

Quinnipiack.

Settlement of New Haven.

nearly four hundred feet above the plain below. This rock is the southern extremity of the Mount Tom range of hills. It lies contiguous to a similar amorphous mass called West Rock, and both are composed principally of hornblende and feldspar, interspersed with quartz and iron. The oxyd of iron, by the action of rains, covers their bare and almost perpendicular fronts, and gives them their red appearance, which caused the Dutch anciently to designate the site of New Haven by the name of Red Rock. The fronts of these rocks are composed of assemblages of vast irregular columns, similar in appearance to the Palisades of the Hudson, and, like them, having great beds of debris at their bases. A view from either will repay the traveler for his labor in reaching the summit. That from the East Rock is particularly attractive, for it embraces the harbor, city, plain, and almost every point of historical interest connected with New Haven, or Quinnipiack, as the Indians called it.

"I stood upon the cliff's extremest edge,

And downward far beneath me could I see
Complaining brooks that played with meadow sedge,
Then brightly wandered on their journey free."

WILLIS GAYLORD CLARKE.

Winding through the plain were Mill River and the Quinnipiack, spanned by noble bridges near the city that lay stretched along the beautiful bay; and

"Beyond

The distant temple spires that lift their points

In harmony above the leaf-clad town-
Beyond the calm bay and the restless Sound

Was the blue island stretching like a cloud

Where the sky stoops to earth: the Rock was smooth,

And there upon the table-stone sad youths

Had carved, unheeded, names, to weave for them
That insect's immortality that lies

In stone, for ages, on a showman's shelf."

L. M. N.

East and West Haven, where the two divisions of the British invading force landed in 1779 ; Fort Hale, whence they departed; Neck Bridge, across Mill River, under which the fugitive judges of King Charles I. were concealed; and West Rock, where they "raised their Ebenezer" and dwelt in seclusion for some time, were all in full view. With a spirit fraught with reverence for the past, and with scenery hallowed by the presence of "young antiquity” spread out before us, let us sit down a moment and listen to the teachings of the chronicler. In the summer of 1637 several wealthy and influential English gentlemen arrived at Boston, preparatory to making a permanent location in wilderness America. The young colony of Massachusetts Bay regarded them with great favor, and various settlements coveted the honor of numbering them among their proprietors. But they determined to plant a distinct colony, and, having heard of the beautiful country along the Sound, from Saybrook to the Saugatuck, discovered by the English in their pursuit of the Pequots, they projected a settlement in that part of the land. In the autumn a portion of them made a journey to Connecticut, to explore the harbors and lands along the coasts, who finally decided upon the beautiful plain on the Quinnipiack for settlement, and built a log hut there.'

In the spring of 1638 the principal men of the new emigration to the colony-Rev. Mr. Davenport, Mr. Pruden, and Samuel and Theophilus Eaton-with the people of their company, sailed from Boston for Quinnipiack. They reached the haven in about a fortnight, and their first Sabbath there was the 18th of April, 1638. The people assembled under a large oak, that stood where George and College Streets intersect; and under its venerable branches the New Haven and Milford Churches were afterward formed. Designing to make a large and flourishing settlement, founded on strict justice, they purchased the land of Mau

1 This was upon the corner of the present Church and George Streets, New Haven.—Barber.