BRANFORD

By Seraph Maltbie Dean

Lying secure amidst the isles,

And rocky headlands of the Sound,

Was a wild tract with harbor near,

More deep and wide than bays around.

Held by a race wild as this tract,

It caught the eye of pioneers

Seeking a place where merchandise

Might be transported without fears.

The harbor with its smiling grace,

The Stony Creek, the Thimble Isles,

All make a picture to enchant.

And lure one with its magic wiles.

Totoket, had the place been called,

Before our fathers changed the name

To Branford, for the English town

Of Brentford, whence some doubtless came.

For seventy dollars this bold site,

In 1638 was bought

By forty men, and soon became

Noted for shipping craft there wrought.

In that remote ancestral day

A rugged race in Branford stood,

Held fast by creeds and rules severe.

Yet laboring for the general good.

Whoever called the town his home,

Must all the rigid laws obey,

Attend the church, yea, keep awake,

Or heavy fine was his to pay.

A Whipping Post stood on the hill.

To frighten children of the flock

Who naughty were, and Curfew bade

Folk in their bed by ten o’clock.

In center of the town the Green

Was situate with rocky spires,

And round about were houses built

For Sabbath use, with open fires.

Where families gathered at mid-day

To lunch and rest – but dare we think

Our ancestors were frail as we,

Who love to gossip, eat and drink?

‘Twas here, in 1700, dwelt

The one whose birth we celebrate,

A man the Public Records show

Identified with Church and State.

Here, too, he died, and here would we,

A loving tribute gladly pay

To William Maltby, honored sire

Of our great family this day.

From homes so widely separate,

We cannot often here return

To solemnize on sacred ground,

The ancestral fires that now we burn.

Yet may we hold fast to the faith

Our fathers held in Church and State,

And write their inscription on our shields—

“Virtue increases under weight.”

And then some glad Reunion day,

In Land that knows no pain nor sin,

Meet, a united family,

With sainted host of Maltby kin.

(Written for the First Reunion of the Maltby Family at Branford.)

BRANFORD CONNECTICUT

In Part I. we gave several pen pictures of Maltby, Yorkshire, the home of some of the English Maltbys and it seems fitting that a short account of the home of our emigrant ancestor should also have a place in this work.

We can hardly do better than quote from an essay written by Miss Olive Hall Pond of Branford, as it gives a very comprehensive idea of the Branford our early ancestors knew.

“Branford was purchased from the Indians in the year 1638 for the sum of $70, and settled six years late (1644) by forty men and their families, who came from Wethersfield. .

“At first the chief occupation was farming but the people soon found that the land was not remarkable for its fertility.  Branford harbor was then much deeper than it is at the present time and furnished excellent facilities for ships engaging in trade with the West Indies.  Consequently, merchandise from foreign ports was brought to Branford and was then carried over the hills to New Haven, which at that time did not have a good harbor.

“Trading necessitated the building of ships.  Vessels suitable to transport merchandise to all parts of the world were built where the swimming pool at Mill Plains is now located.

“It is interesting to picture the town

BRANFORD

“As Branford may be considered our family home I copy quite an extended account of its early history (see also Mass. Hist. Coll., Vol. 6, p. 319) from the semi-centennial discourse (Morehouse and Taylor, Pub.) of Rev. Timothy P. Gillett (pastor of the church) preached July 7, 1858.  ‘The tract of land, which for almost two centuries constituted the town of Branford, was purchased of the town of New Haven in the year 1644, by colonists or immigrants from Wethersfield with William Swain at their head.  The settlers in New Haven had purchased it of the Indian Sachems in 1638.  (Sept. 1, 1640) Totoket, or Branford, was granted to Rev. Samuel Eaton, brother of Theophilus Eaton, Gov. of New Haven Colony, provided he obtained a sufficient number of his friends to settle it.  He went to England for that purpose, but was persuaded to remain and preach at Durbenfield and Stockport, in England.  As he failed of fulfilling his engagement, Branford was sold to Wm. Swain and others of Wethersfield.  Totoket, the original name, seems to have been given by the Aborigines, to a range of mountains running through the northern part of the town, and from them applied to the whole tract.  Its present name is said to have been derived from Brentford or Burntford, a village in England, near London.’  (Author’s note: “Brentford, Middlesex, their friends distinguished themselves on the side of Parliament there in 1642.”)

‘Probably some of the first settlers came from that place, who, after residing temporarily in other places finally fixed their residence here.  It does not appear that there were among them any persons of great wealth, or superior rank.  But they were men of strict Pritan principles, -- men of stern integrity and zealous for religious liberty, so far as its principles were then understood.  The doctrines of their creed were Calvanistic, or those which were embodied shortly after, in the Cambridge and Westminster Confession of Faith.  In church policy they were Congregationalists.  In common with other colonists of that age, they acted on the scheme of carrying the gospel and its ordinances, education and its advantages, with them, and having the church, the minister and the school, coeval with their settlement. . .  There are no records known to exist showing when a church was organized here, but as early as October, 1644, the salary of Mr. John Sherman as a preacher began, and the records show he was remaining here in 1646, though probably not as a settled minister.  (See Barber’s Hist. Coll. For further notice of Mr. Sherman.)

The first regular pastor was Abraham Pierson, whose name appears on the town records in 1647.  He was born in Yorkshire, Eng., graduated at Cambridge in 1632, preached some years in his own country, came to New England in 1639, joined the church in Boston, soon moved to Lynn, and the next year settled in Southampton, L. Il, probably in 1641.  In 1647 he removed to Branford, and was pastor of the church here about twenty years.  The union of New Haven Colony with that of Connecticut so displeased Mr. Pierson, that he, with many of his people, left Branford about June, 1667, and settled in Newark, N. J., where he died Aug. 9, 1678.  He probably carried away the church records, and they are supposed to be lost.  The town records were not removed.  Branford was without an organized church and settled minister for about twenty years.”   (Author’s note:  The descendants of Col. Stephen Maltby (4) have the above Rev. Abraham Pierson for an ancestor, through his daughter Abigail, who married John Davenport.)

“The first church edifice was erected within the old burying ground, and tradition says it was enclosed by a stockade to protect its worshippers for the Indians.  Four others have succeeded it, built where the present house now stands.  The centre burying ground was the only one in town, for about eighty years after its settlement.  There lie the remains of all the pastors and their wives, except Mr. Pierson, and there sleep the first settlers with many of their descendants..

“Formerly the shipping business and the West India trade from Branford were greater than from New Haven.  The harbor here was better and safer.  The Dutch, sagacious and enterprising, had discovered this long before Daniel” (Compiler’s query, William?) “Swain, of Wethersfield, and his company bought Totoket.  They had also established a trading house here, and opened a lucrative traffic with the Indians.  Their location is still known as Dutch House Point and Dutch House Quarter.  But the people of Branford met with great reverses, in the old French wars.  Their ships were captured or lost, their spirit of enterprise broken, and the improvements made in New Haven harbor removed the shipping business to that place.

“There is no record or tradition that the Branford Indians made war on our people, or offered any violence to them.  Their lands were bought and paid for, besides the price paid to New Haven for the township, and the town passed laws protecting them in all their rights, and prohibiting individuals from purchasing their reservations, lest fraud should be practiced.”