LETTER IV.

Stonington; cultivated partly by Tenants. Indians still remaining here. Their degraded Character and Situation. The perfection to which Man arrives in a state of Nature. General Observations upon the remnants of the Indian Tribes now found in New-England. Means of effecting their Civilization.

DEAR SIR;

AFTER crossing the Mystic, we entered Stonington. The face of the country became immediately better; and, though rough and stony to a considerable degree, was formed of easy and beautiful slopes, levels of considerable extent, and finely rounded eminences. The prospects were generally pleasant, and in several instances superior. The soil also was rich, and almost everywhere well-cultivated. This description is applicable to most of the township, which is one of the largest in Connecticut, extending, with a breadth of about six miles, not less than sixteen from the Sound into the interior*. Beside grass, it yields maize, oats, barley, and rye, remarkably well. Wheat is cultivated in small quantities, and grows luxuriantly; but is often blasted. This is in part attributed to the exuberant vegetation of grass, which, when apparently destroyed by the plough, springs up from the seed, and choaks the wheat at the time when the kernel is forming. Flax formerly grew well; but lately has been blasted also, probably from some defect in the mode of culture. Orchards abound here; and are so prosperous, that apples and cider have become considerable articles of commerce. In the southern half of the township wood is scarce and dear, in the northern it is sufficiently abundant. The hills constitute almost the whole

Since this journey was taken, Stonington has been divided into two townships; the second named North-Stonington.

surface, and are altogether the best land. The vallies, which are usually narrow and rough, present to the eye a confused mass of stones and rocks, apparently rolled together from the hills by some violent convulsion.

Within the limits of this township are found, on the summits of hills, in about fifty places, single large rocks, lying loose on the surface of other rocks, imbedded in the earth. One particularly, in the southern part of the township, is raised up from the surface on three stones, about twelve or fifteen inches in diameter. The diameter of the rock itself is about fifteen feet. How or when it was thus placed is unknown, and has hitherto baffled conjecture.

The farms in this township contain from sixty to three hundred acres each. Almost half of them are cultivated by tenants. A great part of these are poor people from Rhode-Island, who make Stonington their half-way house, in their progress towards the new settlements. Accustomed from their childhood to labour hard on a sterile soil, and to live on very scanty means of subsistence, they come with their families to the rich lands of Stonington, and take small farms, or parts of farms, upon lease. Here, with the most assiduous industry and a minute frugality, they gradually amass money enough to purchase farms in the wilderness. They then leave their habitations to successors from the same state, who regularly follow them in the same track. In this manner a considerable part of the inhabitants of this township are almost annually changed. It is, however, to be observed, that some of the Stonington people lease their own farms, and hire and cultivate others, which are larger.

The rents of these farms are from one to seven hundred dollars per annum; paid usually in their produce, and, in the greater number of instances, in cheese only. Of this commodity 370,000 pounds are annually exported from this township. Seventeen thousand pounds have been made in a year on the lands of Mr. Denison, the gentleman with whom we lodged. The mode, in which each farm is to be managed by the tenant, is regularly described with minute exactness in the lease.

I have mentioned this subject thus particularly, because it is in a great measure peculiar to this spot. There are, indeed, several instances in which farms are taken upon lease in Groton;

BRITISH ATTACK ON STONINGTON.

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and, in solitary instances, the same thing exists in other places; but there are probably more cases of this nature in Stonington than can be found elsewhere in a third part of the state.

There are four villages in Stonington: one on the Mystic; another at the head of navigation on the Paukatuc; a third, four miles further up the same stream, called Mill-Town; and a fourth on Stonington Point. The population in these villages is increasing; in the rest of the township it is at a stand. The houses are, generally, good farmers' dwellings. The villages are built in a neat manner.

Stonington Point is a semi-ellipsis, a third of a mile in length; and, where widest, a fourth of a mile in breadth. From the centre the surface declines every way, with an easy, arched slope, to the shore. It is disagreeably encumbered with rocks, but is otherwise handsome and pleasant. The houses, about 170 in number, are neat in their appearance and their appendages. There are two churches on the Point; a Presbyterian and a Baptist; both new, and good.

The Point is accommodated with two harbours. That on the western side has a bold shore; is sufficiently deep for vessels, under two hundred and fifty tons, to load at the wharfs, and is safe from all winds, except the south-west, and in the upper parts even from that. The wharfs are built of stone, and are in good order *.

The following letter is an official account of an abortive attempt made during the late war, by the squadron under Commodore Hardy, to burn the borough of Stonington.

"STONINGTON BOROUGH, Aug. 21st, 1815.

"To the Hon. William H. Crawford, Secretary of War. "SIR;-The former secretary of war put into my care, as chairman of the committee of defence, the two eighteen pounders, and all the munitions of war that were here, belonging to the general government, to be used for the defence of the town, and I gave my receipt for the same.

As there is no military officer here, it becomes my duty to inform you of the use we have made of it. That on the 9th of August last, the Ramilies seventy-four, the Pactolus forty-four, the Terror bomb-ship, and the Despatch twenty gun brig, anchored off our harbour. Commodore Hardy sent off a boat with a flag; we met him with another from the shore, when the officer of the flag handed me a note from Commodore Hardy, informing me, that one hour was given the unoffending inhabitants, before the town would be destroyed.

We returned to the shore, where all the male inhabitants were collected,
VOL. III.
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Mystic river is a good harbour for vessels of not more than sixty tons; but they are loaded a mile and a half below the when I read the note aloud. They all exclaimed they would defend the place to the last extremity, and if it was destroyed they would be buried in its ruins.

We repaired to a small battery we had hove up, nailed our colours to the flag-staff, while others lined the shore with their muskets.

At about seven in the evening they put off five barges and a large launch, carrying from thirty-two to nine pound carronades in their bows, and opened their fire from the shipping with bombs, carcasses, rockets, round grape and cannister shot, and sent their boats to land under cover of their fire. We let them come within small grape distance, when we opened our fire upon them from our two eighteen pounders with round and grape shot. They soon retreated out of grape distance, and attempted a landing on the east side of the village. We dragged a six pounder that we had mounted over, and met them with grape; and all our muskets opened a fire upon them, so that they were willing to retreat the second time. They continued their fire till eleven at night.

The next morning, the brig Despatch anchored within pistol shot of our battery, and they sent five barges and two large launches to land under cover of their whole fire (being joined by the Nimrod twenty gun brig). When the boats approached within grape distance, we opened our fire upon them with round and grape shot; they retreated and came round the east side of the town. We checked them with our six pounder and muskets, till we dragged over one of our eighteen pounders. We put in a round shot, and about forty or fifty pounds of grape, and placed it in the centre of their boats, as they were rowing up in a line and firing on us; we tore one of their barges all in pieces, so that two, one on each side, had to lash her up to keep her from sinking. They retreated out of grape distance, and we turned our fire upon the brig, and expended all our cartridges but five, which we reserved for the boats, if they made another attempt to land. We then lay four hours without being able to annoy the enemy in the least, except from muskets on the brig, while the fire of their whole fleet was directed against our buildings. After the third express to New-London, some fixed ammunition arrived; we then turned our cannon on the brig, and she soon cut her cable and drifted out.

The whole fleet then weighed, and anchored nearly out of reach of our shot, and continued this and the next day to bombard the town.

They set the buildings on fire in more than twenty places; and we as often put them out. In the three days' bombardment they sent on shore more than sixty tons of metal, and, strange to tell, wounded only one man, since dead. We have picked up fifteen tons, including some that was taken up out of the water, and the three anchors that we got. We took up and buried four poor fellows that were hove overboard out of the sinking barge. Since peace, the officers of the Despatch brig have been on shore here. They acknowledge they had twenty-one killed, and fifty badly wounded; and further say, had we continued our fire any longer they should have

REMNANT OF THE PEQUOD TRIBE.

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settlement, at Packer's ferry. Paukatuck has a crooked channel, admitting small vessels only. Even these arc loaded at a considerable distance below the bridge. Those which are larger take in their lading at Stonington Point, appropriately called the Port.

Between forty and fifty vessels (coasters, fishermen, and others) are owned in Stonington. The cod fishery is by far the most profitable business done here. It is chiefly carried on at Green Island and the straits of Belleisle, and has been uniformly prosperous. The West-Indian business has been generally unprosperous.

A considerable number of Indians reside in this township also, and possess a tract of land on and about Lanthern-hill, in the northern part of the township, and the most elevated spot in this region. Here some of them live in weekwams, and others in houses resembling poor cottages; at the best small, ragged, and unhealthy. Others, still, live on the farms of the white inhabitants, in houses built purposely for them, and pay their rent by daily labour. Two-thirds of them are supposed to be contained in the Indian families, the remaining third are employed in the service of the farmers. One-half of the former division live on the lands reserved for them. These are held in fee simple, and cannot be disposed of without the consent of the legislature or of the overseer.

The whole body of these Indians are a poor, degraded, miserable race of beings. The former proud, heroic spirit of the Pequod, terrible even to other proud, heroic spirits around him, is shrunk into the tameness and torpor of reasoning brutism. All the vice of the original is left: all its energy has vanished. They are lazy in the extreme; and never labour, unless compelled by necessity. Nor are they less prodigal than lazy. The earnings of a year, hardly as they are acquired, they will spend in a day, without a thought of the morrow. Wherever they can obtain credit, they involve themselves in debt; and never dream of paying their debts,

struck, for they were in a sinking condition, for the wind blew south-west directly into the harbour. All the shot suitable for the cannon we have reserved. We have now more eighteen pound shot than was sent us by government. We have put the two cannon into the arsenal, and housed all the munitions of war."