Woodstock: An historical sketchBowen, Clarence Winthrop
History
Woodstock: An historical sketch
Bowen, Clarence Winthrop
Woodstock (Conn. : Town) -- History
The officers of the new town elected in 1690[55] were John Chandler,
Sr., William Bartholomew, Benjamin Sabin, John Leavens, and Joseph
Bugbee, as selectmen, and John Chandler, Jr., as town clerk. All
of those men to-day have descendants in Woodstock or its immediate
vicinity. At that time, the men of Woodstock imposed a fine of one and
six pence upon every one who failed to attend the town meeting, and six
pence an hour for tardiness. Disputes regarding titles to land, and the
boundary line dividing the north half of the town, and disputes with
the mother-town regarding this northern half, which belonged to Roxbury
according to the terms of the grant, were vexatious, and not in every
respect creditable to Woodstock. But Roxbury's interest in the northern
half of Woodstock continued till 1797, when the lands had all been sold
or become individual property. Large tracts, however, were held by
Roxbury and Woodstock speculators for many years afterward.
Troubles with the Indians, who returned to their old hunting and
fishing haunts after the settlement of the town, broke out in 1696,[56]
and again in 1700 and 1704, and even as late as 1724. When a war broke
out abroad, there was trouble with the Indians at home. When an Indian
outbreak was threatened, the town received some military assistance
from the colony government. Such threatened outbreaks retarded the
progress of the settlement.
After discussing the question for several years, the town determined,
in 1719,[57] to erect a new meeting-house near the burying-ground,
instead of at the south end of the village, where the old building
stood, yet so straitened were the people in their circumstances that
they applied to the General Court in Boston, requesting that the
unoccupied lands of the residents and non-residents of the town be
taxed to the extent of £250, to be applied to the building of a church.
As the non-residents' lands were almost entirely in the north half of
the grant, and belonged to Roxbury people, Roxbury stoutly opposed
the tax in a memorial to the General Court. When the General Court
refused the petition, Woodstock asked to be excused from sending her
representative to Boston. The town's representative at this time, in
fact the first and only representative for many years, was Captain John
Chandler, who, like his father Deacon John Chandler, was one of the
first settlers. He surveyed lands in Woodstock and neighboring towns,
and owned large tracts of territory in Connecticut and Massachusetts.
To avoid the necessity of sending to Boston to have deeds recorded
and wills proven, Captain Chandler tried to get the consent of the
General Court in 1720 for the formation of a new county, to be called
Worcester County, of which Woodstock should be a part, but a delay
ensued until 1731, when Captain, now Colonel, Chandler was successful.
Woodstock became one of the most prominent towns of Worcester County,
and John Chandler was made Chief-Justice of the Court of Common Pleas
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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