Benjamin Brown House (1833)

The house at 258 Bank Street in New London was built in 1833 (or as early as 1817?) with granite quarried from the ledge behind the building, known as Tongues Rock. Sailing ships would tie up at the shore at this granite outcrop. The building was constructed as the home and whaling office of Benjamin Brown, who produced soap and candles. According to an article (“Pioneers of Tilley Street Prominent in City Affairs,” by R.B. Wall) that appeared in the New London Day on February 13, 1815:

Benjamin Brown was a prominent figure in the whaling industry and he also had a slaughter house and candle factory. He cured beef and pork and shipped it in barrels to other places. After buying the Canada house in Tilley Street he bought considerably more land adjoining ion the west bounds. On this vacant land he used to store hundreds of barrels of oil while waiting for the market to advance. Benjamin Brown was a native of Waterford and came to New London a poor and friendless boy. The building connected with his enterprises once occupied the site of the coal ad lumber business of the F.H. & A.H. Chappell Co. in Bank street. His stone house alone remains on the east side of Bank street, opposite Tilley.

Brown’s property once extended to the water behind the house and had a well that supplied whaling and merchant ships. The house survived a fire that started during the 1938 hurricane and devastated Bank Street.