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"Sarah Noble: A part of New Milford's History", by Julie Blackman Barrows Sarah Noble: A part of New Milford's History Sarah was probably a typical girl and woman of her time. Although the facts concerning her life are meager and clouded by both time and legend, we can make assumptions that are based on our knowledge of the period. Sarah Noble was born in Westfield, Massachusetts on March 22, 1699, fourth daughter of John and Mary Noble. Her mother was 34, and Sarah was her seventh child. She would have three more children after Sarah, all of whom would live except a younger brother William. Also included in the family was a sixteen year old step-sister, Abigail, whose mother, John Noble's first wife, had died in childbirth. It was a busy household in which every member participated in the farming and household chores. Sarah's was not a life to be idealized, and was not without fear. Westfield was on the fringe of the frontier, and it had been only twenty years since Sarah's grandfather had been killed in King Philip's War. From what we know of John Noble, this frontier setting was partially responsible for his being in Westfield. Aside from the necessary farming activities, he was a trapper and fur trader, always fearful of civilization's encroachment upon the wild animals necessary for his trade. Perhaps this is why he chose to move his family to the next frontier, New Milford in the Colony of Connecticut. In the spring of 1707, Sarah Noble was 8 years old, but she would have been far more self-sufficient than we would think. For several years she would have participated in the family cooking. From the age of 4 she may have been responsible for carding, spinning, and knitting the entire family's socks. She probably knew how to make candles, soap, set dyes, do the mending and could prepare simple herbal medicines. She was not today's eight year old. John and Sarah, probably on foot, traveled the old trails, those paralleling our own, down Route No. 10 from Westfield to Farmington, west on Route No. 6 to Waterbury and Woodbury. From Woodbury they would have traveled over the Old Turnpike, up Chicken's Hill to the fording place at the foot of Bennett Street and then to Fort Hill and the main Native American Encampment. It is possible that John had traveled this route before and even had previous dealings with the local tribes on fur buying expeditions. It was likely, as Orcutt writes, noting Sarah's sister Margaret, at age 93, that Sarah was left with the Native Americans while John acted as a guide to the main Dutch fur-trading post at Fort Orange (Albany). It is also possible that he returned for the rest of his family, as the most popular story goes, but this is unlikely because his eldest son living at home was 22 and had purchased his own plot of land in New Milford on the same day as his father, therefore indicating his plans to move here with him. Sarah's life in New Milford continued as it had in Massachusetts, centering around the household chores with occasional visits to her Native American neighbors, who are reported to have often carried her on their shoulders across the river. With the exception of several threats of Canadian Indian attacks during the colonial wars, trips to Woodbury for church when weather permitted, and an occasional illustrious visitor, Sarah grew quietly to maturity in her home on the northern end of the Green. About 1721 Sarah Noble married Titus Hinman, Jr. of Woodbury, brother of her sister Mary's husband. She, like her mother, raised 11 children, although her first son died about the age of 2. Three of these children moved to Vermont in the general migration to a new frontier which moved Ethan Allen and his brothers shortly before the Revolution. Others of her family moved to New York and the Connecticut-claimed Wyoming Valley of present Pennsylvania. In fact, one of her grandsons was killed in the infamous Wyoming Massacre led by the Native American Joseph Brant in 1778. Sarah's husband died in 1747 leaving the majority of his property to his eldest son as was the custom and we find no further record of Sarah, not even a death record. It is possible that she remarried. Many strong women like Sarah were known to outlive three husbands. Most likely, she joined the household of a younger son making another long journey to bring a home and civilization to the next frontier in the Green Mountains of Vermont. The Settlement of New Milford: A Noble
Descendant Looks Back; Was it Courage or Economics? A year later, Mr. Noble set off with his eight year old daughter Sarah, to establish a homestead amidst the Native Americans. His first dwelling was a hut; the second, Mr. Orcutt reports, "a commodious House at the south end of the Town Platt," near Bennitt Street today. The land purchased by Mr. Noble and others had been given plantation status by the General Court, Connecticut's ruling body, and the area was established as a joint stock corporation, with interests divided into 104 parts or shares. Mr. Noble had chosen to leave his home in Westfield, Massachusetts, when he was 45 years old, and he would live in New Milford just seven years before he would be the first adult settler to die and be buried in Center Cemetery. But while he was alive he was prosperous: he was the first town clerk elected to office, a surveyor of lands and a member of the Woodbury Church. His daughter, Sarah, is believed to have become the first schoolmarm; his son Stephen, one of the seven other children, became the captain of the first military company in town. But there are many of us in the 20th century who wonder why Mr. Noble, who was believed to have run a trading post in Deerfield, Massachusetts, before settling in the Springfield Westfield, Massachusetts area, would choose to move again so late in his life. Two-hundred and seventy-five years later, Julie Blackman Barrows, a direct descendent of John Noble, searches for an answer. "I would not be at all surprised but what it had to do with the fur trade, " speculates Mrs. Barrows, a New Milford resident who is the director-curator of the Scott Fanton Museum in Danbury. "After the third generation, the Nobles had become tanners, and they continued in the trade until the 1850's. One branch went into shoemaking and another branch became tailors, but they were all involved in the clothing trades all along." The inventory in John Noble's will indicates he had half a share in a wolf pit; and while the colonists had trouble with wolves, Mrs. Barrows believes the pit probably supplemented his income. She wonders if his decision to settle here was not as courageous as is was entrepreneurial. "For one thing, it wasn't as difficult to travel as people thought," Mrs. Barrows said, "Tavern history goes back at least that far, so there were inns along the route, at least until you got to Woodbury. "Danbury and Woodbury had been settled before then, and New Milford offered excellent fishing, a good water supply, an sheltered area in which to live and friendly Native Americans, willing to share the land." As the town clerk, the records show that John Noble was literate, Mrs. Barrows said, "He could, for instance, write better than his grandson could." "He seems to have been well thought of, but there aren't that many references except at the Town Hall. New Milford is lucky; the town records go right back to the formation of the original plantation." As a child, Mrs. Barrows lived with her parents and grandparents for many years in the large cream-colored Italianate building that now houses the Danbury Savings and Loan. Historical landmarks from John Noble's time—the Great Falls, where the Native Americans have fished, and the rich river bottom land known as "the Indian fields," still were visible. The land was farmed until the late 1960's when it was sold for commercial development. Even a history buff like Mrs. Barrows, who also is related to the Bostwicks, another of New Milford's 12 founding families, however, has trouble putting "flesh" on the Noble ancestors. New Milford's town records go back uninterrupted to the town's plantation days, but beyond town records, nothing much from the family, with the exception of some heirlooms, remains. Throughout the centuries, however, it is not the men, but the women, who have intrigued her. The portrait of one aunt, painted by Ralph Earl, hangs in the Historical Society building. These women, from the missionary whose daughter was the first white baby born on the Hawaiian Island of Kaui, to the aunt in the portrait, "were handsome and strong-willed," she said; "but they're elusive." Sarah was the eighth child (of eleven) born to John Noble in Westfield, Massachusetts. Her birthday was March 22, 1699. She was 8 years old when she came to New Milford with her father in 1707. Her brothers' and sisters' names were:
Sarah married "about June 8, 1721" Titus Hinman of Woodbury, Connecticut. She had ten children of her own between 1722 and 1742. Their names were:
The Great River was the Housatonic. It was always called the Great River before 1800 on the New Milford records. The name Housatonic originated near Stockbridge, Massachusetts where it was interpreted by the Dutch of New York State and written "Wustenhuck". The history of education in New Milford is scanty. The early settlers were busy with problems such as erecting fences, building roads and getting a grist mill in operation for grinding flour. The children probably received instruction at home or in neighborhood "Dame Schools". But in the fall of 1721 there were 25 families in New Milford, and it was voted that a school would be opened for four months during the winter. We do not know where the first school was, but we do know how big it was: "Twenty feet long, sixteen feet wide and seven feet between joints". This is information was from the minutes of town meeting in 1725. Sarah Noble was apparently well educated and was one of New Milford's earliest teachers. Sherman Boardman, son of Reverend Daniel Boardman, mentions in his letter that he had attended school at which Sarah was "my school Dame". The people had no electricity, no cars and no phones. There was no library in New Milford until 1796 and it was called the "Union Library". It had 355 books. You probably have that many just in your classroom. Some of the foods were hickory nuts, wild turkey and deer. There were horses - "one well-known path traveled on horse-back was horse-beat, by the soldier scouts watching for the Canadian Indians in 1718, under the command of Captain Stephen Noble (Sarah's older brother). This was near Mount Tom in New Milford. It was against the law to trade horses on the Sabbath. Guarding Mountain is on the west side of the Housatonic, opposite New Milford village. It was so named from the fact of the Native Americans building signal fires on it to guard against an attack by the Mohawk Native Americans. These guarding Native Americans must have been Sarah's Native American friends. Fort Hill is where the Native American burial place was, at the foot of Guarding Mountain. This where John Noble first built a hut. It was a palisade house (a house secured as a fort). The house was built at the foot of the hill - the "Indian fort stood where he lived with his little daughter for some time, until some gentleman asked him to guide them to Albany, so he left his daughter in care of a squaw, fourteen miles from any white people, and was absent two or three weeks; when he returned he found her kept very neat and clean". Sarah retold this story to her sister Margaret, and to one of the students so this information is in two separate sources. Maybe this was Tall John's family. It says in one book that the site of the hut is still visible, but the book is 80 years old. The second Noble house was located at the west side of the Green near Bank Street. It was in this house that the entire family lived when they arrived in the fall of 1707 or spring of 1708. John Noble was 45 years old when he came to New Milford, and it is believed he ran a trading post in Deerfield, Massachusetts and did some fur trading. On his land deed he is called a "planter". He was the first Town Clerk elected to office. He was also a "surveyor of lands" and a member of the Woodbury church in these first years. He had to travel 28 miles through the wilderness in which the narrow Native American trail was the only path, to attend church. When he died in 1714, he was the first white person to be buried in the little New Milford graveyard. Sarah did not have a middle name, and she may not have really had a doll called Arabella. That may have been added by the author of "The Courage of Sarah Noble". But she must have had a doll of some sort as all little girls have and her name could have been Arabella. But maybe it was Patience or Sarah or Rachel, Ann or Lucy, for those were the names she gave her real daughters when she was mother herself. JOHN NOBLE, b. in Springfield, MA, 6 Mar 1662; d. 17 Aug 1714; son of Thomas and Hannah (Warriner) Noble. John came to New Milford from Westfield, MA in 1707. The next year he settled on the west side of the Green at the northwest corner of present Bank Street. He served as Town Clerk from Nov 1713 until his death. He m/1, in Westfield, 13 Sep 1682, ABIGAIL SACKETT, b. in Northampton, MA, ca. 1664; d. at Westfield, 3 Jul 1683 He m/2, in Westfield, in 1684, MARY GOODMAN, dau. of Richard and Mary (Terry) Goodman of Hadley, MA. She was still living on 15 Mar 1717. Child, by first wife:
Children, by second wife:
John's ear mark for cattle, etc. was recorded on 29 Jan 1713/14 References:
Malcolm P. Hunt SGT. TITUS HINMAN, JR., b. in Woodbury, Ct. in June 1695; d. 8 Mar
1746/47; son of Capt. Titus and Hannah (Coe) Hinman. He m. ca. 1720, SARAH NOBLE of New Milford; b. in Westfield, Mass., 22 mar 1699; dau. of John and Mary (Goodman) Noble. Children:
References:
Malcolm P. Hunt
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