Capt. Joseph W. Holmes House (1851)

The brick house at 35 Church Street in Mystic was built in 1851. A sign on the house indicates it was the home of Capt. Joseph W. Holmes of the Corolanus. Joseph Warren Holmes (1824-1912) was noted for being the captain to have made the most voyages around Cape Horn (84). He also sailed around the Cape of Good Hope fourteen times. In 1865 he bought a larger house at the corner of High Street and Old New London Road in Mystic. According to the Biographical Review, Vol. XXVI: Containing Life Sketches of Leading Citizens of New London County, Connecticut (1898):

It is doubtful if Captain Holmes’s record as a mariner is paralleled by that of any other. For nearly or quite sixty years he has followed the sea. No vessel under his command has ever been lost or shipwrecked, and not a man of all his crews was ever lost.

The same book elaborates his career: at the age of seventeen, having made several early voyages,

in the spring shipped on the bark “Leander,” under Captain Bailey, with whom he made his first voyage around the world, completing the circuit in twenty-two months. The “Leander” was engaged in whale fishery in the South Atlantic, South Pacific, and Indian Oceans. At twenty-one he became master of the same bark, on which he made three voyages, the second and third of twenty months each. Leaving the ” Leander” in 1847, he went in the “Coriolanus” on a whaling trip to the Indian Ocean, followed by a voyage to the Arctic Ocean, where the ship was filled in sixty days. He continued to engage in the whale fishery until 1854. After leaving the “Coriolanus,” Captain Holmes was successively commander of the “Fanning,” “Frances,” “Haze,” “Twilight,” and “‘Seminole”; and for the past ten years or more he has had charge of the “Charmer,” a full-rigged merchantman, which sails from New York to San Francisco and foreign ports.

The house at 35 Church Street is nearly identical to the neighboring house, built in 1846 at 33 Church Street, but without the covered front portico and enclosed side porch that were later added to the earlier structure.

John Ingraham House (1734)

The main block of the house at 91 North Cove Road in Old Saybrook is thought to have been built in 1734 by John Ingraham (1679-1750). The house has later additions at its western end. The house passed through a number of different owners until it was purchased by Paul R. and Anna Opp of Irvington, New York in 1928. They built a sea wall and boat house. They used the home on weekends until 1937, then as a summer home until they made it their year-round residence in 1942. Mrs. Opp resided in the house alone after the death of her husband in 1944 She sold it in 1950.

Jonathan Pasco House (1794)

Built in 1784, the house at 31 South Main Street in East Windsor was later converted to use as a restaurant. For 26 years it was Jonathan Pasco’s Restaurant, named for the man who built the house. A captain in the Revolutionary War, Jonathan Pasco (1760-1844) was at the Battle of Trenton and at one point was held captive by Native Americans. By 1869 the house was owned by E. F. Thompson. Jonathan Pasco’s Restaurant closed in 2015. The house is now the location of Roberto’s Real American Tavern.

Eli Haskell House (1812)

At one end of old Main Street in the East Windsor Hill section of South Windsor are a pair of brick Federal-style houses with identical facades. The first, located at 1909 Main Street, was built by Eli Bissell Hakell, a merchant, in 1812. The second (featured in a post from the earliest days of this website) was built a year later by his father-in-law, Aaron Bissell. Eli Haskell (1778-1861) married two Bissell sisters: first Sophia (1785-1816) in 1810 and then Susan (1790-1871) in 1818. Eli and Susan Haskell later moved to Ogdensburg, St. Lawrence County, New York. Eli’s son, Frederick Haskell (1810-1890), was one of the founders of the Haskell and Barker Car Company.

Josiah Robbins House (1800)

The house at 401 Wolcott Hill Road in Wethersfield is thought to have been built about 1800 by Josiah Robbins. It originally stood to the south and was later moved to its current location. During the Revolutionary War, Josiah Robbins (1724-1794) served in Capt. Hart’s company in Col. Samuel Blatchley Webb‘s regiment from 1777 to 1781. He was then transferred to the Sappers and Miners and served under Capt. David Bushnell at the Battle of Yorktown.

Dr. Orin Witter House (1820)

Dr. Orin Witter of Chaplin built the brick house, with distinctive monitor roof, at 73 Chaplin Street c. 1820, when he was first setting up his practice. He also served as the first Town Clerk of Chaplin. The house remained in the Witter family until 1960, being the home of Dr. Orin Witter II and Orin Witter III. As related in the Commemorative Biographical Rrecord of Tolland and Windham Counties (1903), the first Dr. Witter

became a noted physician and one of the town’s most prominent citizens. He studied medicine with Dr. Hutchins, of Brooklyn, and later with Dr. Thomas Hubbard, of Pomfret, completing his studies at Yale Medical College in 1820. During the same year he established himself as a physician, in Chaplin, Conn., and soon gained the confidence and approbation of the people. Two years later, when the town was incorporated, he was chosen the first town clerk, and was later a member of the board of education, and was also made judge of probate in his district. The latter office he held for many years, until age excluded him from service.

For nearly fifty years Dr. Witter continued in practice, retiring about two years previous to his death, which took place Feb. 2, 1869. Dr. Orrin Witter was married to Florinda Preston and two daughters and one son were born to them, one daughter dying in infancy, and the other, Cornelia, marrying Dr. E. C. Holt, of Bennington, N. Y. The son, Dr. Orrin Witter, was born in Chaplin, Conn., April 25, 1835, and married Helen A. Utley, a third of the name, their son, also being a physician. Dr. Witter (2) attended Yale Medical College, and also the College of Physicians and Surgeons in New York City, graduating from the latter institution in 1859. He succeeded to the practice of his father and has since conducted the same with remarkable success, in spite of the fact that he has been blind for several years.

As noted in A Modern History of Windham County, Connecticut, Vol. I (1920):

The first Dr. Orrin Witter located in Chaplin in 1820, his son, Orrin Witter, Jr., began practice in 1860. The elder died in 1869, and the junior in 1907. Dr. Orrin Witter III retains the old homestead as a summer residence, but is a practitioner in Hartford.

In 1960 the house was purchased by another doctor, Brae Rafferty, M.D., who restored it with his wife, Ann Postemsky Rafferty. (more…)