2019 inductee
Henry Sherman
Henry Sherman was the last of the Paugussett Indians of Milford. Paugussett means “people who live by the bend in the river – Derby, Wepawaug means "People by the ford in the river" (Near First Church), and Peconics were those by “the shore where the seashells are,” Pequannocks lived on the "Cleared-land-place” and Potatucks were those who lived by various water falls. Though called Paugussetts, the Indians of which Henry was associated, are today described as “Iroquois linguistic group” and ranged the length of the Housatonic River. The greater “tribe” might more accurately be the Indians of the “Great River.” The Five great Iroquois Indian nations swept across New York State from the Mohawks in the northeast to the Oneida in the western end of the finger lakes.
When the Civil War broke out, Henry was living among the Schaghticokes (pronounced scat-a-cooks) at their reservation in Kent established by the Connecticut Colony in 1752. He came back to his ancestral home of Milford to enlist.
Little is known of his war activities other than he lost his left arm during the conflict. His first name was always Henry but he claimed that he added the last name of Sherman to honor General William T. Sherman, the distinguished northern general. There are many Shermans in the area, particularly in Stratford, who claim Indian ancestry so its quite possible it was a family name despite this claim.
Returning to the town of his ancestors alive he was the only identified Indian from Milford to enlist in the Civil War, though mixed white or persons of color with Indian blood lines certainly may have as well. Accepted for his service the town fathers let him stay in Milford awarding him the complete “Freedom of the Town” just like any other Milford citizen. At this time, Indians not assimilated by marriage or otherwise, generally kept to their various reservations and settlements.
Henry was a member of the Grand Army of the Republic (G.A.R.), the civil war veterans association which met in the old town hall. His name does not appear on the civil war monument so there is a question of whether he served in a regiment with the rest of the Milford men. Henry Sherman was not found in a search of the 29th Regiment of Connecticut's “colored” troops either so it is difficult to determine where he served. If he did add the surname Sherman after the war we cannot determine the name he enlisted under. Unquestionably he did serve as indicated by his acceptance by the other GAR civil war vets, and had served in battle as evidence by the loss of his arm.
One of his favorite activities was to play the bass drum in the Milford Coronet Band. A picture from the Moger Collection shows his tall figure next to the drum with the the band on the Town Green.
Also noted in the picture’s caption was that on occasionally returning to his home on the Wepawaug River above the Kissing Bridge late at night, “he would let out a war whoop that would make your blood run cold.”
“He was peaceful, never-the-less, and died about 1900,” the caption added. There are some other reports that toward the end of his life he rejoined other Indians living in Kent but this is unverified.
Jared Ingersoll Sr.
Jared Ingersoll Esq., 1722-1781, son of Jonathan Ingersoll and his third wife, Sarah (Newton) of Milford, was born in 1722 and baptized June 3, 1722 at the Milford First Church, where he was admitted to full communion Aug. 1, 1742. Jared, graduated from Yale in 1742 and by his diligence was awarded a year at Yale as Berkeley scholar. He then commenced to practice law in New Haven where he settled.
He married Mrs Hannah Whiting daughter of Joseph and Hannah (Trowbridge) Whiting on August 1, 1743 at the first Church in Branford and they became members of the New Haven First Congregational Church. They had three surviving Children, Jared Ingersoll (the second and surviving child of that name), born April 21st, 1748, who went on to also practice Law, become Pennsylvania Attorney General and a founding signer of the US Constitution. Hannah died Oct 8, 1779 at a age 66. Jared and Mrs. Hannah Alling, daughter of Samuel & Sarah (Woodward) Miles and widow of Enos Alling were married Jan 9, 1780. Jared died the following August 25, 1781.
By 1757 he held the office of King's Attorney, and in May 1758 the Connecticut colonial legislature appointed him agent to the English court in London, mainly to negotiate reimbursement for recent expenditures in the French and Indian War. In May 1760, he resigned and returned to Connecticut. In October 1764, he returned to England to sell a load of masts from the Connecticut River as agent and principle of a disfavored Connecticut lumber company. Their New Hampshire rival got the Admiralty business.
Ingersoll made the best of the business failure by working as Agent of the New Haven Colony with arguments he helped prepare for Parliament against the Stamp Act. It did pass in spite of his and the efforts of other Colonials. When the act became law, again making the best of a bad situation, Ingersoll accepted the position of Stamp Master of Connecticut, allegedly on advice of Benjamin Franklin. He thus became tax collector for the hated law. In 1765, he arrived in Boston as stamp agent for Connecticut and soon after authored a pamphlet titled “Stamp Act” (New Haven, 1766) explaining its need and merits to a doubting populace.
Throughout Connecticut there was a great deal of dissension and anger, both verbal and in the newspapers, directed at the Act and Ingersoll personally. Jared wrote spirited letters of defense but attacks escalated into demonstrations and threats of physical violence. Ingersoll, assured of the governor's protection, tried to reason with the people of New Haven. His arguments were not ultimately successful as neighbors surrounding his house, demanded he resign. “I know not if I have the power to resign,” he replied. He promised, however, that he would return any stamps that he received or leave the matter to their decision. He was finally compelled to offer his resignation. His actions did not satisfy the people of Connecticut so in order to save his house from an attack, he placed himself under the protection of the legislature in Hartford.
On September 23, 1765, Ingersoll rode from New Haven toward Hartford hoping for protection and to register a complaint at the general assembly called by Governor Fitch on the 19th. Near Wethersfield he met a band of 500 eastern Connecticut men preceded by three trumpeters and two militia officers. They rode with him to Wethersfield intending to compel him to resign his office. Entering a house for safety, he sent word of his situation to the governor and the assembly. After three hours they entered the house. Ingersoll, being a wise and educated man found “the cause is not worth dying for.”
Under duress he made a written declaration that his resignation was his own free act, without any equivocation. Nevertheless, he refused to "Swear" to it. He was ordered to shout three times “Liberty and Prosperity” (also recorded as "Liberty and Property") and throw his hat in the air. He wisely accommodated the request before he and the growing troop of about 1000 marched on to Hartford to confirm his resignation. Governor Fitch would later nullify his resignation and issued a proclamation against the rioters. The Public was not amused and attacks, apparently without violence, continued. The restored stamp tax collector again surrendered his office the following January before a Justice of the Peace. The reaction of the people to the Stamp act was a first hint of the dissatisfaction to come when loyal Colonists would become revolutionary Americans.
Ingersoll was appointed by the King to be Judge of the Vice Admiralty in the Middle District of America (South of NY and North of VA) in 1770, as a sort of compensation from the Crown for his ordeal in Connecticut. It was one of the permanent four districts and one of the most important offices ever held by anyone from Milford (Unless you include Bill Clinton's residency here while at law school). He removed his family to Philadelphia in 1771 where he worked as a judge until hostilities began. Then, for the first two years of the American Revolution he resided in seclusion in Philadelphia. As British General Howe approached the city he, under duress of yet more patriots, he returned to New Haven where he remained until his death. He never left his beloved land despite serving the king for much of his life. Most "Tories," as some called him, fled the country after the successful revolution or were forced to leave penniless.
As a lawyer, some of his cases were memorable. In addition to representing Connecticut lumber interests in England, Ingersoll defended Benedict Arnold for the whipping of one "informer Boles" who ratted out Arnold's smuggling activities. He also served on the NY- NJ Border commission and as agent for Lord Stirling's settlement of the Penobscot area of Maine, then part of Massachusetts.
Remarkably for a colonial tax collector who was routinely hung in effigy, Jared Ingersoll’s memorial boasts the most lavish praise found on any stone in the crypt, in part:
"...A man of an uncommon Genius …
He distinguished himself at the Bar ... twice honoured ... At the court of Great Britain.
His Morals were unblemished ... Sagacious ...sincere, mild, affable, and courteous.
Adapting himself to all …
Yet preserving in his whole Behavior
A graceful and majestic Dignity..."
Meg Casey
News of her death on May 26, 1985 brought national headlines.
“Oldest Survivor of Rare Aging Disease: Meg Casey, 29, Dies After an Eloquent
Struggle,” proclaimed the Los Angeles Times.
“Oldest Progeria Survivor Dies at 29 in Connecticut,” said the Orlando Sentinel.
Two years before, she did not escape the notice of President Ronald Reagan after he read “The Courage of Meg Casey” in Reader’s Digest, reprinted from the Hartford Courant.
“Meg, Mrs. Reagan and I want you to know that your courage and acceptance of your health problems give others hope that life can always be rich and rewarding,” the president wrote on June 22, 1983. “It is how we go forward and love each day that really counts.”
Margaret Mary (Meg) Casey, who weighed 40 pounds, was 40 inches tall, and wore a blonde wig, led a nearly normal life despite having progeria, a rare genetic disorder that stunts growth, disintegrates bones, and dissolves body fat, muscle and hair.
Victims of the disease usually die before adolescence, but Casey’s parents were determined to treat her as they had treated her six older brothers. She played sports with her brothers although the family dressed her like a miniature doll in lace and satin and the nuns at St. Ann Elementary School called her their “littlest angel.” She later graduated from Lauralton Hall where her mother went.
She wrote a column for the former Milford Citizen on the problems of the handicapped and helped form Milford Independent Disabled Persons. Through the efforts of MIDP all city buildings became handicapped accessible. The city also installed curb cuts on every street and a handicapped access ramp at Walnut Beach next to Meg Casey Pavilion.
The first 10 years of the Milford Oyster Festival, from 1975 to 1984, she designed the T- shirts. From 1982 to 1985 she wrote a handicapped issues column in the Milford Citizen entitled “Most Able Disabled.”
“Call her a Renaissance Woman,” her brother TJ Casey said of her writing and artistic skills. “She was in an area where she was loved and supported by friends and family. If she wanted to try something, we’d let her, and she succeeded most of the time.”
On a moment’s notice in 1981 Meg flew to Disneyland to speak up for some progeria pre-teens after seeing on the news how the press negatively treated them as oddities while on their trip supported by the Sunshine Foundation.
“Being the oldest puts an obligation on you to be the spokesperson,” she said. “I’m the only one. All the rest are children.”
“A lot of families and doctors have sheltered progeria victims,” she added. “They’re afraid of the public, afraid of the comments. Some of these children were eight years old and had never been in the company of anyone but their family.”
Progeria was named by Hastings Gilford, a British surgeon who had a fondness for conditions in which the body’s clock and the clock of nature did not quite correspond. In 1897, he published the case studies of four children –two with what he called “continuous youth” and two with “premature old age.” To the condition of perpetual childhood, in which children failed to grow or to go through puberty, he gave the medical name “ateliosis,” Greek for “not arrived at perfection.” For asynchrony at the other end of life, he gave the name progeria, Greek for “prematurely old.”
Upon moving out when she became an adult, a family cottage at Cedar Beach was rebuilt with lower windows and kitchen counters set at a height for her to reach everything. Judy Schubert, her roommate for five years, helped her with some tasks she had difficulty with such as shopping because she didn’t have a vehicle outfitted with special controls.
“Meg was just a kind of damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead,” Schubert said. “She loved going to parties and going out with friends. She just lived a full life.”
Meg was admitted to Yale-NewHaven Hospital late Saturday of Memorial Day Weekend after dancing for two hours at TJ’s 10th wedding anniversary party. A stubborn foot infection had flared up, and she was having trouble breathing. She died 12 hours later.
For her funeral psalm she had written: “I’m not sorry for myself; it wouldn’t do me any good if I were. I’ve had a happier and fuller life than many ‘normal’ people, and it’s alright to strive for dreams; that I can do anything if I set my mind to it. If you must bury something, let it be my thoughts, my weaknesses, my prejudices. I promise that then I will live forever.”
For more information on Meg Casey, go to http://mostabledisabled.com/ by Daniel Ortoleva.
Reverend Charles D. Walker
1903-1989
The First Baptist Church was founded by African Americans from Milford in 1893 that had previously traveled by wagon to worship at Immanuel Baptist Church in New Haven. Services for their first 7 years were held upstairs from a Daniel Street store. The Baptists moved to a 100 year old shoe factory on North Street. They converted the upstairs into their own “house of prayer.” They purchased and converted a store, once Danon's Delicatessen, also on North street, which would be their home for decades. On the same lot, the current three times larger church building, commenced in 1965, was finished. Walker stated the "builder and maker is God” (with interior furnishings from other Connecticut churches).
Born in Triboro, North Carolina on December 7 1903, Charles Walker was orphaned at three and raised by an uncle to age 14. Thereafter he supported himself through to graduation from Hampton Institute, an African American college there.
He worked as a cook and butler in the home of New York businessman William H. Wheelock. During his first week employed at the residence as the only African American, Walker was treated differently by other workers who separated and sanitized anything touched by him. Upon learning this, his boss, impressed by his intellect, put Walker in charge of those same help. When his boss’ company at 67 Wall Street expanded in 1922, Walker became an executive managing real estate properties in Harlem. In the midst of the Great Depression, he entered his “wandering phase” where he briefly lived in Washington D.C. before settling in the Milford-New Haven area around 1950 to work at aircraft companies.
Charles Walker’s assuming the life of a spiritual leader “was the farthest from my mind.”
In 1961, Walker’s experience in living of raising a family and success in business made him ideal to “serve the community.” In 1958 at age 56, Charles Walker had his calling to the ministry of Milford’s small congregation of about two dozen. A year later his step-daughter Marion Taylor followed the call organizing gospel singers in New Jersey. The church lacked the ability to pay what a larger church could afford. During his years leading First Baptist Church he also was a personal manager for the Hunt-Pierce company.
Rev. Walker sought to build a society “without barriers of race creed, or condition.”
He opposed “unhealthy attitudes” that fostered discrimination, envy, resignation and silence in the face of injustice, especially for all marginalized groups. In the 1960s and 1970s, Walker faced unfair banking and real estate practices such as redlining where housing discrimination often made it "virtually impossible for a black man to rent or buy wherever he wished, even with money and good credit rating. Rev. Walker was encouraged by those “committed to the task of making a better world.” Undaunted,
his first house was in a pleasant mixed neighborhood bordering a commercial zone.
In June 1962 Walker planned organizing a “Christian anti-Communist” group at his church. A year later a mixed race group of 14 people were among the first from Milford to speak up about their experiences traveling by bus to hear Martin Luther King at the March on Washington. Once back in Milford, Reverend Walker led all faiths from a platform outside the old Church in a “Call to Conscience and Action” for northern cities to be part of the civil rights movement. The 200 gathered included civic leader Thomas Parsons, future mayor Alan Jepson and representatives of two local interracial groups.
Commemorating the bicentennial in 1976, he led efforts to commemorate Connecticut's African Americans in the Revolutionary War including nine from Milford. A stone monument with each man's name inscribed stands in front of the North Street Church.
He solved problems working towards envisioning an integrated church. Everyone gained a better understanding of each other while they worshiped and sang together. In 1968 the soft-spoken reverend called for “application of the methods so ably expressed and nobly practiced by Dr. King” at a joint service of Milford’s churches where all walks of Milford joined in harmony.
Rev. Walker feared a lost generation of children leaving Milford for lack of opportunity.
Some Milford families in 1968 and 1969 under Project Concern, invited the 25 African Americans children into their homes who were bused from poor areas of New Haven. Others served as “Emergency moms” for those enrolled across Milford’s grammar schools. Milford did not see much of the kind of racial turmoil many other cities experienced during the 20 years Walker served God and the city. When Walker retired after almost 20 years of service, the church’s faithful flock had grown to over 5 times larger than when he began.
Walker was well-read and produced a wide range of written and recorded material. Besides sermons, his poetry was printed when he was only 20 and his unpublished novel "Unknown Journey," was written in the 1930’s. Shortly before his death on February 16, 1989, Walker donated newspaper articles, personal documents and audio recordings to the highly regarded Schomburg Center in New York for its scholarly records. Schomburg describes Walker’s papers as evidencing the “experience of African Americans in small Northern towns where they constituted only a small minority of the population.”
The accomplishment Walker was most proud of was that the goodwill extended by Milfordites towards building the new church continued long after the physical building was completed. A moderate and thoughtful man, The Reverend listened to gauge differing viewpoints on issues, gaining understanding, then offering a measured response to resolve conflicts. He felt “If we get rid of black and white prejudices, it would be like cleaning out the swamp that breeds the mosquitoes.”
Walker was involved in the community as treasurer for the Milford Council of Aging, vice-chairman for the Red Cross and a United Way board member. His church donated offering collections to Milford needs like Rape Crisis Center.
Maps from 1835 refer to the glacier kettle pond between Meadow Side Road, Turnpike Road (Bridgeport Avenue) and Bear Neck Lane (Seaside Avenue) as Negro’s Pond. One legend states the name was in remembrance of a black boy who drowned there in the 1800s. Another tale states it was where domestic staff around Milford Center were allowed to skate. Some long published references to "Neg's" Pond or worse were considered disparaging. The African American families in Milford in the 1960s didn’t publicly contest the pond’s old monikers. Walker noted in 1970 that many African Americans were quiet with the attitude that “this is a situation I will not disturb as long as I have some semblance of peace and security.” The possible slights were resolved in January 1995 when the pond was renamed Walker’s Pond in well deserved honor of the Reverend Walker.
George Clark
George Clark, was one of two George Clarks at the founding of Milford in 1639. He was known as the "Carpenter," George "Sr." and later "Deacon." "Farmer" George Clark, aka "Jr." was the other Clark who joined the congregation of Peter Prudden and established the Republic of Milford whose constitution was the Bible itself. It was one of the first times in history when individuals could own property in their own name and not be serfs on the property of the lord of the manor under royal or feudal control.
Church records at Milford state that on March 31, 1644, "George Clerck carpenter was admitted to the church," and on April 2, 1644, "Mary his wife," was admitted. This is the only time the name 'Mary,' appears on Colonial records. Mary appears with him on the Memorial Bridge on New Haven Avenue. Some other records state that Sarah was the name of his wife.
Carpenter George was likely instrumental in the building of the fort-like church that greeted the migrants marching through the woodlands from New Haven in 1639. Legend has it the building was pre-built in New Haven and barged over to Milford where it were assembled by the colonists.
Another building would bring fame and wealth to Deacon George. His "stockade house" was built on the Old Post Road (Bridgeport Avenue) outside the protective palisades. For his valor, he received an extra allotment of land. The home still stands, now on the Milford Historical site at the foot of high street.
Deacon Clark as a Hertford men, like the bulk of Peter Prudden's congregation, were an independent lot. Hertfordshire England was a hotbed of revolution against the king. The judges who pronounced the death sentence on King Charles I, now known as the Regicides Whalley and Goffe, escaped to Boston Harbor in the 1660s. They found comfort and protection among the puritan activists who faced charges of treason. They fled Boston to New Haven with the king's men in hot pursuit then fled to Milford and were secreted for part of their time in Milford by Carpenter George Clark. It was a perfect place to conceal refugees. It backed up to a wild craggy wooded area, which extended to the bay. Alongside this rough area was a level low land, which was thick with bulrushes. Any man hidden there would be hard to find and easily able to surprise any officer inclined to look there. After two years, in November 1661, they left their various Milford hiding places and were secreted to Hadley, Massachusetts.
Later Clark would serve the King. He joined Robert Treat and many from Milford and Branford in the founding of Newark, NJ. The Dutch under Peter Stievesent were building settlements up the Hudson and expanding New Amsterdam thus cutting off the British. Robert Treat and Deacon George Clark conspired with the king's men to found a settlement of puritans in what was then called New Town settlement near the mouth of the Hudson. Treat and Clark would return to Milford. Many of Deacon George's relatives remained in Newark. Descendant, Abraham Clark of New Jersey, signed the Constitution of the United States. On March 12, 1664, King Charles granted his brother, the Duke of York, all of New Amsterdam and most of the territory included in the adjacent New Haven colony finally resolving the Dutch issues.
As part compensation for the boxing in of the Dutch, Robert Treat and Deacon George Clark and others demanded a liberal Royal Charter for the government of Connecticut. This charter gave to Connecticut independence that no other colony enjoyed. Much of them dealing with puritan religious and Biblical principles of individual rights and the ability to create laws independent of the British Parliament. Hidden in an old Oak when the King decided to rescind colonial rights, it is the source of Connecticut's title as the Constitution State. In May 1664, George Clark was one of two Deputies chosen by the people of Milford to represent them at the New Haven General Court. He was there when the terms of surrender of the New Haven Colony to the crown had to be arranged. This event took place because of New Haven's absorption by Connecticut, under the terms of the Royal Charter of 1662. After the consolidation took place, Mr. Clark was chosen repeatedly to be one of the two Deputy's from Milford to the Connecticut General Court.
George Clark, proven by evidence in his will, was also, one of the first "recorded" slave holders in American history. Presumably he was an African slave though Indians and white "bond" slaves were also common at the time. If so, it proves Milford was home to blacks at the very beginning. Legend has it that Clark worked while his slave managed the household, at least partly turning modern ideas of slavery on its head.
Perhaps Clark's greatest accomplishment came because of his death. His Will changed British Law. Deacon George Clark made out his will on April 15, 1678. Leviticus provides that a man may distribute property to all the members of the family. British law leaves property to the eldest son. The doctrine of primogeniture was fundamental to preservation of the wealth and power of England's ruling elite. The will called for each child receiving a share, the eldest a double share. Eldest son Thomas (B: 1638) contested the will. The case, with a number of intrigues and sidelights, went all the way to Parliament. George Clark had died in 1690 but the settlement of his estate at the privy council level did not take place until 1745 after 55 years tied up in the British bureaucracy.
The Clark case involved fundamental rights between England and the colonies: must Connecticut submit its laws to the Crown for approval? Connecticut had a special charter so the Colony of Connecticut took over the prosecution of the case. The Clarks based their rights on their constitution and their constitution was the Bible, the King James Bible, the ancestor of the king. Historian Robert J. Taylor writes: "the whole point at issue was whether common law applied to the colonies automatically … The Clark case at long last resolved … in Connecticut's favor."
Second son, Samuel (b:1645) married Mary Clark, daughter of Farmer George Clark unifying the family names of the founders into one line. Daughter Sarah (b: bef April 1644) married Johnathan Law and third son George (b: 3/5/1648) was born. The Clark family has extensively expanded across America with early ties to New Jersey and Ohio, once Western Connecticut.
