Two Centuries of New Milford Connecticut: An Account of the Bi-Centennial Celebration of the Founding of the Town Held June 15, 16, 17, and 18, 1907, With a Number of Historical Articles and ReminiscencesVarious
History
Two Centuries of New Milford Connecticut: An Account of the Bi-Centennial Celebration of the Founding of the Town Held June 15, 16, 17, and 18, 1907, With a Number of Historical Articles and Reminiscences
Various
New Milford (Conn. : Town) -- History
The accompanying friends went as far as the first “nooning,” somewhere
below Derby. There, the last farewells were said, and Caleb, with his
sweet girl wife on the pillion behind him, journeyed to their future
home. They moved up the river, camping at night in some quiet nook,
their boat, with their provisions and camp equipment, securely fastened
to the river’s bank. The bright camp fires flashed out from under the
dense foliage of the grand old primeval forests that lined the banks of
the Great River, while this pair of children strolled in the deepening
gloom, whispering their love, their plans and their hopes of happiness
in their home in the wilderness. For four days they thus leisurely
journeyed towards the cot on Second Hill, reaching the Cove about noon
of the fifth day.
By the mouth of the little brook that falls into the Cove, just at the
foot of “Lovers’ Leap,” they made their last camp, while their boat was
being unloaded and a more permanent camp
[Illustration: FALLS BRIDGE AND THE GORGE]
established, for it would be several days before their belongings could
be conveyed to their home. As the sun was sinking toward the cover of
Green Pond and Candlewood Mountains, Caleb led his bride up the winding
trail that mounts the southern face of the grand old cliffs of Falls
Mountain to Waramaug’s Grave; and, from that sightly place, she had her
first view of the beautiful Weantinaug Valley. Waramaug’s grave has ever
been held an almost sacred spot by the descendants of Caleb and Abigail.
In my early youth, on just such another September afternoon, I was taken
by my father up this winding trail, and sitting on the grass by the side
of those honored stones, was told the tale I have been relating, as each
succeeding generation of the name had been told it before me.
The wedding journey ended in that rough little home on Second Hill.
There, the pair lived for fifty-eight years in happy wedlock; there,
they reared a family of fourteen children (eleven sons and three
daughters) of whom all came to manhood and womanhood; and, thence, in
1796, at nearly four score years, Caleb went to his eternal rest.
Abigail survived him more than twenty years, in the full possession of
all her faculties, and, at the extreme age of ninety-seven years, seven
months, and eleven days, was laid beside the husband of her youth and
the loving companion of so many years.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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