On this day in 1777, one day after William Tryon destroyed the Continental Army’s supply depot in Danbury with a party of 2,000 British troops and loyalists, a force of American troops and Connecticut militiamen struck back near the town of Ridgefield. Tryon’s raid on Danbury took local patriots by surprise; they had assumed…
Tag: loyalists
April 26: British Troops Attack Danbury, Connecticut
During the American Revolution, the western Connecticut town of Danbury served as a critical supply depot for Continental Army troops stationed in the New England and mid-Atlantic states, including the strategically-important Hudson River Valley area. In early 1777, Royal Governor William Tryon of New York attempted to sever the American supply line that ran…
December 22: Newgate Prison Receives — and Quickly Loses — Its First Inmate
Today in 1773, Newgate Prison, the first penal institution to open in Connecticut, received its very first prisoner: 20-year-old John Hinson, who had been convicted of burglary and sentenced to ten years of imprisonment. Newgate Prison was built on the site of a former copper mine in East Granby which had opened in 1705…