New Milford

NEW MILFORD This beautiful valley, known to the Potatuck Indians as Weantinock, was purchased from them in 1703 by a company of individuals chiefly from Milford, Connecticut, hence the name New Milford. Its earliest white inhabitant, Zachariah Ferriss, arrived in 1706, followed in 1707 by the first permanent settlers, John Noble, his daughter Sarah, and John Bostwick. The area, originally a plantation, was incorporated with the first twelve families in 1712 as the forty-seventh Connecticut town. Daniel Boardman was called in that year to be the town's initial minister. Here on this site was erected the first meetinghouse in 1721. The earliest school opened in 1729. During the summer of 1725, William Gaylord moved farther up the Housatonic River and settled the area now known as Gaylordsville. The first bridge over this river from sea to source was erected west of this site in 1737. (Continued on other side) NEW MILFORD (Continued from other side) After the Lexington Alarm in 1775, some 285 men enlisted in the Continental Army. Many of these men in Captain Isaac Bostwick's Company crossed the Delaware River with General Washington on the night of December 25, 1776 to fight the Battle of Trenton. Roger Sherman, settled here in 1748, represented New Milford in the General Assembly in 1755 and from 1758 to 1761. He was the only man to sign the four great charters of American Liberty: the Articles of Association - 1774, the Declaration of Independence - 1776, the Articles of Confederation - 1777, and the Constitution of the United States - 1787. South of this marker lived Elijah Boardman, patriot, member of the General Assembly, United States Senator 1821-1823. With the opening of the southern portion of the Housatonic Railroad in 1840, New Milford became an industrial and trading center for the surrounding region.