One of the most active pioneers in the settlement of the Town of Cornwall,
Connecticut was James Douglas. He came here, in 1739, from Plainfield,
Cream Hill was his lot; it received this name from the superiority of the
soil and the beauty of its scenery. This name was given to it, as Town
Records show, before Mr. Douglas purchased. He bought two rights of
Timothy Pierce of Canterbury, an original proprietor, in 1738, for £400;
also, he bought fifty acres on Cream Hill, on which his first house was
built. The fifty-acre lot was purchased of Jonah Bierce of New Fairfield,
who had bought it of Nathan Lyon of Fairfield, an original proprietor.
James Douglas was brother of Benajah, an original proprietor in Cornwall,
but who settled in North Canaan, being the ancestor of the Douglas family
in that town, and great-grandfather of the distinguished senator, Stephen
Arnold Douglas.
James Douglas and his wife, whose family name was
Marsh taught the first school in Cornwall, he teaching in the winter and
his wife in summer. Cream Hill, before the woodman's ax was heard there,
was covered with lofty trees of various kinds, the surface not being
entangled with underbrush, as much of the forest in town was. Mr. Douglas
was an energetic and public-spirited man.
He expended much labor in
opening a mine one hundred and twenty feet in depth, for gold. Specimens
of the ore were sent to Boston for analysis, from which small sums in gold
were returned. But the expense of obtaining it was too great to make it a
paying business. Another mine was wrought for silver, sixty feet, with
like results. He is said to have wintered the first stock in town -- a
horse and yoke of oxen. Heavy snows caught him unprepared. Deer were
abundant; the boiled flesh made a nutritious soup for the cattle, which,
with browse from the trees felled for the purpose, was their support. The
horse refused both, but ate hair from the skins, and moss from the trees
gathered in blankets.
Mr. Douglas, about 1748, erected a large
two-story house, which, about two years after its completion, was
unfortunately burned down, and he built the house now standing on the same
ground, which he occupied till his death. This is supposed to be the
oldest occupied house in town. Capt. Hezekiah Gold, son of Rev. Hezekiah
Gold, who married Rachel Wadsworth, granddaughter of Mr. James Douglas,
purchased this property about 1790, of Mr. Joseph Wadsworth, a son-in-law
of Mr. Douglas. This house and farm is at present (1877) owned by T. S.
Gold.
Farmers were then their own mechanics. The old tan vat, where
James Douglas tanned his own leather, was but recently filled up -- on the
bank of the small stream now called the "Gutter," near his house.
Mr. Douglas had three sons and four daughters. The eldest of the
daughters, Sarah, married Capt. Samuel Wadsworth; the youngest, Eunice,
married Mr. Joseph Wadsworth; another, Olive, married her first husband, a
Mr. Johnson, and after his death, Dea. Eliakim Mallory. The other
daughter, Mary (or Rachel), married a Mr. Taylor, of New Marlboro, Mass.
Two sons, William and James Marsh, having sold their property on Cream
Hill, removed to Vermont, where some of their descendants at present
reside. James Marsh married Rhoda, sister of Judge Burnham, of Cornwall.
The other son, John, died in 1763, aged fourteen.
In the old
cemetery at South Cornwall, we find the tombstones of James Douglas and
his wife thus inscribed:
James Douglas, Died Aug. 18, 1785, ae. 74.
Mortals Awake
Your time review, think on
Death, Eternity is near.
Rachel, wife of James Douglas, died April 23, 1790, ae. 78.
Life how
short,
Eternity how long.
Deacon
William Douglas, b. 1610; m. Ann, d. of Thomas Marble, of Kingstead,
Northamptonshire; landed at Cape Ann 1639-40; removed to New London 1660;
d. July 25, 1683. He had five children.
Deacon William2 Douglas, fifth
child of Dea. William1, b. April 1, 1645; m. Dec. 18, 1667, Abiah, d. of
William Hough, of New London, and had eight children.
Deacon William3
Douglas, third child of Dea. William2, b. Feb. 19, 1672-3; m. Sarah
Proctor, about 1695, and in 1699 removed to Plainfield. He was one of a
little company who, in 1705, covenanted together and formed a little
church at Plainfield, of which he was chosen first deacon. He had twelve
children, of which Thomas, the eleventh, was also deacon, and settled in
Voluntown (now Sterling).
James Douglas, tenth child of Dea. William3,
b. May 20, 1710; d. Aug. 18, 1785, aged seventy-four.
Note: These
parental details do not tie in with other information I have. Benajah
Douglas was not Stephen Arnold Douglas's great-grandfather, as stated
here, though his Gt,-gt-grandfather was Benjamin.
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