BackGround: Preston Temple, Preston, England
John was born about 1608/1609 in Pembrokshire, Wales, the son of John GRIFFIN and Ann LANDFORD, and married 13 May 1647, in Simsbury, Hartford, Connecticut, Anna BANCROFT the daughter of John BANCROFT and Jane. She was born about 1627 in Swarkston, Derbyshire, England and died in Windsor, Hartford, Connecticut. John died August 1681 in Simsbury.
Simsbury Soldiers in the War of the Revolution
Two brothers emigrated to America, Edward and John GRIFFIN, sons of John and Ann (LANGFORD) GRIFFIN.
John GRIFFIN engaged in business in 1643, with Michael HUMPHREY, in making pitch and tar in Windsor, Connecticut.
In 1663 the General Court of Connecticut issued a Grant to John GRIFFIN "John GRIFFIN haueing made appeare to this Court that he was the first ( ) the Art of making pitch and tarre in these parts doe Order that the said GRIFFING shall have Two Hundred Acres of land between Masscoh (Simsbury) and Warranoake, whereof there may be forty acres of meadow, it is to be had, and be not prejudiciall to a plantation, and not formorly granted." John GRIFFIN took up residence in Massaco in 1664. Then, in 1648, he is given land at Massaco (Simsbury) because Indians set fire to his tar works in Windsor, thus, he moved on to the Simsbury area and the land granted him.
He was made a Freeman in 1669 and in 1672 he released to the propriotors of Massaco (Simsbury) a grant of land, subsequently known as "GRIFFIN's Lordship". In 1673he was appointed to command a traine hand in Simsbury and also represented Sinsbury at General Court in October 1670, May 1671, October 1673, and May 1674.
John married Anne BANCROFT (BANCRAFT).
EAST GRANBY the evolution of a Connecticut town
About ten years after the founding of Windsor, John GRIFFIN began harvesting the local forests. he and his business associate, Michael HUMPHREY, cut down pine trees in a swath along the Farmington River. They progressed from Windsor, where they lived, through what was to become North Bloomfield and the Tariffville section of Simsbury. In this search for pine John GRIFFIN crossed the river at "The Falls"1 and established his place in the history of east Granby. GRIFFIN was the first European to settle within what are now the town's boundries.
In 1662 after John GRIFFIN had been working at making tar alnmost twenty years, the governor of Connecticut, John WINTHROP Jr., delivered a paper on the subject to the Royal Society in London. He stated that in all New England "most tar is made about Connecticut above 50 miles up the River, where there be great plains of those pines on both sides (of) the river something up into the land from the riverside."
WINTHROP was under the impression that most of the tar made at this time was from pineknots found on the floor of the pine barrens. These knots were resin-rich limb joints, all that remained of trees that had fallen years before: wole trees were cut down only for candle wood, resinous splints used as substitures for candles, he says. At this time according to WINTHROP, colonial tar makers wre trying to develope a method for extracting resinous sap from living trees by girdling them, slashing the trunk so that the sap would ooze out.They would like to know if anyone from Norway, Seden, or elsewhere had found a way to do this successfully. He stated.
Winthrop gave a description of the process then in use to manufacture tar from pine knots: After bringing several cartloads to a convenient spot, the tar maker would construct a raised hearth from stones gathered in the vicinity and paved with clay or loam. He sloped the hearth to the middle and ran a gutter from the middle out one side. This was to channel the hot tar into a vessel placed besice the hearth.
Then the tar maker piled the knots on the hearth in the same manner used by charcoal makers and completed the kiln by covering the heap with a coating of clay or loam. He left a hole at the top through which he introduced fire and allowed smoke to escape. He also opened or closed at will smaller holes in the sides of the earthen kiln to regulate the amount of oxygen that got to the fire. As the knots slowly burned their sap, transformed into tar, dripped down to the hearth and out to the waiting pot.
Pitch, WINTHROP says, was made from tar in three ways. Tar could be boiled down into pitch, or second, tar could be boiled with rosin added to reduce the boiling time needed. Pitch made this way differed somewhat in quality from the first, he says. Third a pot of tar could be set afire and allowed to burn until it was the consistency of pitch. Colonial ship carpenters generally employed this method, he says. The English navy and merchant marine, as well as colonial shipbuilders, used tar and pitch to waterproof and preserve ships' hulls and lines.
Some time after this paper was written the colonials began to cut down the yellow "pitch" pines and manufavture tar from the whole tree. No one knows exactly what methods John GRIFFIN used in his manufacturing, but according to the text of a grant of land made to him by the General Assembly in 1663. John GRIFFIN "was the first [to perfect]2 the art of making pitch and tar in these parts.
GRIFFIN tended his outlying tar works for a number of years from his home, known as " the old Stiles place," in Windsor. He had come to Windsor a man in his thirties, during the first decade of the town's existance. There he married Anna BANCROFT on May 13th, 1647. Six or seven of their ten children were born while they lived in Windsor.
GRIFFIN moved his family to territory now in East Granby about 1664. He moved, most likely, as a natural step in the pursuit of his pitch and tar business. His "commute" from Windsor to his tar works probably becoming too wearing as he went farther and farther afield for new stands of pine.
The prevailing tradition holds that GRIFFIN built his house on the western slope of a hill that lies north of Holcomb Street almost across from the entrance to Heather Hollow. This elevation has been called Welsh Hill from the 1700s. According to the GRIFFIN genealogy, John GRIFFIN was a Welshman, and the hill, which in his day rose out of a sweep of pine forest, might have been named for him.
Perhaps, too, GRIFFIN felt it was at last relatively safe to bring his family to this distant outpost. Other windsor residents were beginning to build a new community on the fertile flood plains along both sides of the Farmington River in the Massaco Indian lands. They were thus beginning the settlement formint the eventual center of Simsbury. Some were grown sons of the first Windsor settlers who were looling for a good plsce to extablish their own families, since the better farmland in Windsor itself was already taken. Four of this group of pioneers, including Michael HUMPHREY, were Anglicans who left Windsor shortly after complaining to the General Assembly about the strictness of the "ancient" Reverend John WARHAM, Windsor's Congregational minister.
GRIFFIN himself had a vital interest in the Massaco lands, which stemmed from an incident many years before. In 1646 John GRIFFIN and others men from Windsor presented petitions to the commissioners of the United Colonies of New England. (This interr-colony agency was formed in 1643 to promote solidarity among the English plantitions and to deal with their common enemies--the Dutch, French, and Indians.) The men informed the commission that an Indian had willfully and maliciously set fire to a qantity of their pitch and tar, bedding, and a cart loaded with candlewood, tools, and other articles, causing damage valued at £100. They stated they could prove that the arsonist was MANAHANNOOSE, a Warranoke Indian.
Connecticut magistrates had issued a warrant for the Indian's arrest and he had been seized by the English, but rescued by a company of Indians led by CHICKWALLOP, sachem of the Nonatuck tribe of Connecticut River Indians based near Northhampton, Massachusetts. The Indians had "jeered and abused" the Connecticut men and had spirited MANAHANNOOSE into Massachusetts and out of their jurisdiction.
The commissionsrs sent JOHN GRIFFIN and JONATHAN GILBERT, a Hartford resident, to ask CHICKWALLOP to deliver MANAHANNOOSE for an impartial trial with assurance that the Indian would have safe conduct to and from the New Haven Colony where the commission was currently in session. The commissioners also instructed GRIFFIN, GILBERT, and the men accompanying them to use force if that seemed necessary and prudent to bring in MANAHANNOOSE.
GRIFFIN and GILBERT returned to the commissioners with a disturbing report. They had not been able to locate either CHICKWALLOP or MANAHANNOOSE. Furthermore, when they went to Warranoke, the sagamores and other Indians there confronted them fully armed with arrows, hatchets, swords, and cocked guns. The Indians, however, had offered the Englishmen eight fathom of wampum and promised more in restitution.
Hearing this the commissioners decided it would set a bad precedent if the Indians were allowed to rescue and protect the accused man. They declared thet thereafter a colony could send its forces into another colony to apprehend an Indian suspect. Being very particular, they also declared that the plaintiff in the case should pay the cost of the mission. Likewise, because it would be an expense to a colony to keep a convicted Indian in prison and there was danger that he might escape and cause more trouble, the Indian, if found guilty was to be turned over to the plaintiff. As his punishment, the Indian was to serve as a slave or be shipped to the West Indies and exchanged for a Negro slave. It was under this ruling that Indians later captured during King Philip's War (1675-76) were condemned to slavery, if not executed.
Apparently MANAHANNOOSE was eventually brought to trial. A copy of a deposition made in court by John GRIFFIN in 1662, and now in the Simsbury town records, tells the outcome of the case. The court delivered MANAHANNOOSE to GRIFFIN, but luckily for the old Indian, three of his friends interceded in his behalf. Since they could not raise the 500 fathom of wampum set as the price for MANAHANNOOSE's release, they signed over to GRIFFIN all their holdings in Massaco. GRIFFIN was not destined to exercise his claim in Massaco. A colonial law prohibited individuals from making land deals with Indians. In 1661 GRIFFIN surrendered his claim in Massaco "for the use and benefit of the plantation of Windsor.
However, stating the purpose to be a reward for his perfection of the tar-making prodess, two years later the General Assembly awarded GRIFFIN a grant of 200 acres in the Falls area. Both Pickerel Cove and the island within it were part of this grant. After Massaco became Simsbury, the town granted him additional property running from Pickerel Cove northward 1½ miles, plus scattered outlying lots. The greater part of GRIFFIN'S land is now within East Granby, with some also in Granby. The earliest records refer to GRIFFIN's land as his "Homestead." Later it became known as "Griffin's Lordship." With more than a thousand acres, GRIFFIN was by far the largest landowner in the area.
About twenty households, scattered over a 10 mile streach along both sides of the Farmington River, made up the frontier settlement of Massaco in 1668. That May the Massaco settlers petitioned the General Assembly to be allowed to form their own ecclesiastical society. The Assembly ansewred by ruling at its October session that Massaco "may be improved for the making of a plantation." It appointed a committee from its members to oversee the settlement's progress. The following year the Assembly excused the Massaco plantation from colonial taxes for three years, probably to induce more families to settle there.
Also in 1669 ghe General Assembly appointed John CASE to the office of constable of Massaco. CASE, one of the first settlers, was to keep the peace and to serve as a representative from the Assembly to the plantation. The Massaco Plantation elected two representatives, Constable John CASE and Joshua HOLCOMB, whom it sent to the next session of thje Assembly. During this session (May 1670) the Assembly incorporated the plantation, granting it the privileges of a town and recognizing the settlers' choice of the name Simsbury.
As soon as Simsbury became a town, John GRIFFIN began a career of public service. He and Michael HUMPHREY went to the General Assembly as Simsbury's representatives in the fall of 1670. In 1674 GRIFFIN and Simon WOLCOTT became Simsbury's first townsmen of record.3 These officials are now called selectmen. GRIFFIN was reelected in 1677 to serve with Joshua HOLCOMB and Samuel WILCOXSON, and apparently he held this position until he died four years later. At this time, a electman's responsibilities included managing town affairs and settling disputes over trespass and debts.
The General Assembly called on GRIFFIN numerous times to help distinguished colony leaders settle disputes with the Indians. Simabury had a particular problem with the title to its land stemming from the fact that the town's area as described in its charter, far exceeded the land GRIFFIN or any other local citizen had secured from the Indians. The Town streached 10 miles northerly from Farmington and 10 miles westerly from Windsor, a total of 64,000 acres. Recognizing the challenges would arise, the General Assembly had stated in the charter that it granted Simsbury this area, "provided it does not prejucice any former grant, and be in the power of this Court so to dispose." Finally, in 1680 the nine Indians who felt Simsbury had encroached on land belonging to them agreed to sell their claims. They reserved the right to hunt, fish, and take food on the land.
GRIFFIN also played a part in repeated attempts to establish a boundry between Windsor and Simsbury. In 1675 he was one of the preambulators chosen to negotiate and pace off a line acceptable to both towns. (The present boundry between East Granby and its neighboring towns to the east was not set until long after GRIFFIN'S time.)
The town government of Simsbury began with a minimum of officials and only added more of the offices required of towns by the General Assembly as the town grew. Besides its constable, representatives, and selectmen, the town 0GRIFFIN0 knew had a commissioner, who was similar to a modern justice of the peace, and a collector of rates, or tax collector.
In 1675 the town added two assessors, called listers, who compiled the Grand List from records of real and personal property each man in town furnished once a year. The items listed were evaluated according to assessments set by the General Assembly. Both the colony and the town based their taxes on the Grand List. In addition, a poll tas was levied on males over the age of eighteen. Taxes could be paid in grain for which the colony--and sometimes the town--set a value per bushel. Simsbury at times gave a discount for cash.
Wild and domestic animals constantly threatened fields of grain which were the mainstay of life for the early Simsbury settlers. Good fences were imperative. Simsbury, like most colonial towns short of labor and time, wanted to encompass as much land with as little fence as possible. The community financed the building of a five-rail fence around the perimeter of all its cultivated land rather than around each seperate field. The town assigned each householder a portion of the fence to maintain. Then it elected officials called fence viewers to inspect the fence regularly and to call to task anyone who neglected his duty.
The town also had a town clerk who doubled as a surveyor. Aside from keeping the records, the first known clerk, John SLATER, went on location to reckon property lines, using a surveyors chain and landmarks like trees and boulders. He also set off necessary roads which ran as directly as possible from house to house.
Way wardens, forerunners of the Highway Department, had the power to "call out" the men of the town between the ages of fourteen and sixty to contribute their carts and labor to keep the roads in good repair. In 1679 the General Assembly notified all towns that the main roads between towns must be made at least one rod wide. The earliest record of a roadway in Simsbury names "GOODMAN GRIFFIN'S Path." ("Goodman," like "Mister," was a designation of social rank.) This path came from Windsor, crossed the Farmington River at the Falls, and then branched west around Pickerel Cove toward the center of Simsbury and northwest towards GRIFFIN'S home.
Colonial law required each town to elect an Innkeeper "to provide for strangers and travelers and also such of the inhabitants as live remote... on the Sabbath, training days, etc." The town also had a number of minor offices such as inspectors of pork and corn, measures, and of leather.
Perhaps the most controversial town issue during John GRIFFIN's tenure was the selection of a site for the meetinhouse. While the inhabitants considered and then rejected one location after another, the traveling minister from Hartford, Mr. Samuel STONE, held services and the town officials held town meetings in private homes. The dispute reged for about twelve years, interrupted by King Philips War. The main question was whether the meetinghouse should be on the west side of the Farmington River, somewhere along what is now Hopmeadow Street, or on the east side of the river near Terry's Plain Road. Because there was no bridge across the river, getting to the meetinghouse whold be a hardship on those settlers who lived on the opposite bank.
Finally it was decided to draw lots, the perrferred Old Testament method for settling disputes. The west side won, and the meetinghouse was built in 1683 at what is now the front gate of the cemetery in the center of Simsbury. Consequently, to get to church and town meetings, John GRIFFIN's family and later residents in his locale had only to cross Salmon Brook, which was relatively easy to bridge. Simsbury's first bridge over the Farmington River near the center of Simsbury was built at Weatogue,but not until 1734.
Connecticut felt in constant threat of attack from the Dutch in New York, the French in Canada, and the Indians on all sides, so the colony required each settlement to man and maintain a military unit. By law, almost every able man over the age of sixteen bore arms and drilled regularly. In 1673 the General Assembly's Grand Committee for ordering of the militia appointed "Mr.Simon WOLCOTT and John GRIFFIN to those that shall command the Trainband of Simsbury.
That same year the Grand Committee raised a troop of 163 dragoons. Simsbury, the colony's smallest town was to supply seven men, compaired to the forty-four required of Hartford. Those foot soldiers were to be provided with "a good sword and belt, a serviceable musket or carbine, with a shot pouch and powder and bullets...and a horse to expedite their march." The dragoons could be called to aid any town.
When the Indian threat escalated into King Philip's War two years later, a contingent of soldiers, whether raised by the colony or the town is not known, was housed in a garrison in Simsbury. Also in 1675 the General Assembly made John GRIFFIN sergeant of the trainband, the highest rank possible in a troop as small as Simsbury's. That title has been linked with his name forever after.
The Town of Simsbury waited with apprehension as reports of Indian attacks and massacres showed the action to be spreading. In the fall of 1675, with "a deep sense of eminent danger," the General Assembly gave the people of Simsbury one week to evacuate, getting "their women and children, corn and the best of their estate to places of most hopeful security." The Assembly also ordered that the Simsbury garrison be abandoned. Many of the Simsbury townsfolk retreated to Windsor.
When no attack materialized, some of the people returned to their homes. The General Assembly again ordered them out on March 3, 1676, and they fled in haste, hiding what they could of their possessions. On Sunday, March 26, the deserted town was sacked and burned by a band of Indians. Simsbury historian Lucius I. BARBER states: "About forty dwelling houses, together with a large number of barns and other buildings, were thus consumed. During all the Indian Wars before or since, no English settlement suffered such a total and complete destruction as in this conflagration."
GRIFFIN was an aging man when the rebuilding of Simsbury began. He died in 1681 at about the age of seventy-three. His burial site is not known. His widow and ten children, ranging in age from eight to thirty-two, survived him.
The records of his personal property show a man typical of his time. He left a wealth of land, a few simple household effects, and none of the accouterments of ease or luxury.
1The Falls is the name given by the early settlers to the streach of the Farmington River between present-day Tariffville and East Granby. It was a shallow near the Northernmost bend of the river in the days before the river was dammed. An ancient fording place for the Indians. It was the only spot for miles where the river could be forded with any safty when the river was swollen during the spring thaws. The settlements on both sides of the river were later called "The Falls" a name that is no longer used.
John GRIFFIN was the first permanent European settler of Massaco and of the original Town of Simsbury, which then stretched far beyond the boundaries of that town today. GRIFFIN obviously never knew that would later also be acclaimed as the first settler of the Town of East Granby. In fact, he never knew about the settlement of Turkey Hills, the Forerunner of today's town, which would encompass most of his property in less than fifty years after his passing.
2The original record, housed in the Connecticut State Archives, is so worn in that the words in this space are missing. Richard H. PHELPS, who quoted the record in the mid-19th century, used the words "to Perfect," PHELPS' contemporary Lucius I. BARBER, indicated the words were missing when he read the record, but he also inserted "to perfect."
3Town records for the years 1670-80 are incomplete as they had to be reconstructed from memory and the remains of "the original and some other copies comming to my view," as the town clerk noted after the original records had burned.
A DIGEST OF THE EARLY CONNECTICUT PROBATE RECORDS.
1677 to 1687.
Page 64
Name: John GRIFFIN Location: Simsbury
Invt. £184-18-00. Taken 23 August, 1681, by John CASE and Samuel WILLCOXSON.
The children:
John 25 years, Thomas 23, Ephraim 12, Nathaniel 9, Hannah 31, Mary 27, Sarah 26, Abigail 21, Ruth 16, and Mindwell 19.
Court Record, Page 44--1st September, 1681:
Invt. exhibited. This Court grant Adms. on the Estate to Hannah GRIFFIN, the Widow, & her two sons, John & Thomas GRIFFIN.
Page 69--(Vol V) 4 April, 1694: An Account of the Wastage of John GRIFFIN's Estate being brought into this Court, amounting to £21-09-00, by the Account appears a clear Estate of £125-05-09, which this Court Dist: To the Eldest son a double portion, viz, £22-15-06; and equal portions, viz, £11-07-09, to each of the other nine Children. And whereas the Town of Simsbury granted to the Widow of sd. John GRIFFIN a peice of Upland of about 4 acres near John TERRIE's Land, and 12 acres under the Mountain, which, by the sd. Widow's mind declared, and consent of the Rest of the Children, the sd. Land should belong equally to Ephraim and Nathaniel GRIFFIN, This Court doth approve thereof, and doe order Mr. John HIGLEY, John SLATER & Peter BEWELL to make a Partition of the Estate accordingly.
CHILDREN of John GRIFFIN and Anna BANCROFT:
1. HANNAH b: 4 Jul 1649; Simsbury, Hartford, Connecticut.
md: ; Windsor, Hartford, Connecticut.
John HUMPHRIES.
md: 20 May 1667; Windsor, Hartford, Connecticut.
Isaac POND
md: 1669;
John LINSLEY.
d: 16 Feb 1736; Branford, New Haven, Connecticut.
2. MARY b: 1 Mar 1651; Simsbury, Hartford, Connecticut.
md: 1 Mat 1672; Simsbury, Hartford, Connecticut.
Samuel WILSON.
d: 23 Jun 1728; , , Connecticut.
3. SARAH b: 25 Dec 1654; Simsbury, Hartford, Connecticut.
md: 29 Oct 1676; Simsbury, Hartford, Connecticut.
Elias GILLETT
4. JOHN b: 20 Oct 1656; Simsbury, Hartford, Connecticut.
md: 7 Oct 1708; Simsbury, Hartford, Connecticut.
Mary BACON
d: 19 Aug 1737;
+ 5. THOMAS b: 3 Oct 1658; Simsbury, Hartford, Connecticut.
md: Mar 1693; Simsbury, Hartford, Connecticut.
Elizabeth WELTON.
d: 28 Aug 1719; Simsbury, Hartford, Connecticut.
6. ABIGAIL b: 12 Nov 1660; Simsbury, Hartford, Connecticut.
md: 20 Mar 1682; Simsbury, Hartford, Connecticut.
Richard SEGAR.
d: 31 Mar 1698; Simsbury, Hartford, Connecticut.
7. MINDWELL b: 11 Feb 1662; Simsbury, Hartford, Connecticut.
md: 1691; Simsbury, Hartford, Connecticut.
Samuel WILCOX Jr.
8. RUTH b: 21 Jan 1665; Simsbury, Hartford, Connecticut.
d: 27 Aug 1719; Simsbury, Hartford, Connecticut.
+ 9. EPHRAIM b: 1 Mar 1668; Simsbury, Hartford, Connecticut.
md: 9 Dec 1707; Simsbury, Hartford, Connecticut.
Elizabeth ADAMS
d: 26 Sep 1725; Simsbury, Hartford, Connecticut.
10. NATHANIEL b: 31 May 1673; Simsbury, Hartford, Connecticut.
md: 14 Mar 1711; Simsbury, Hartford, Connecticut.
Alice or Else WELTON.
d: 23 Feb 1712; Simsbury, Hartford, Connecticut.
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