Daniel Bacon House (1793)

At 5 Pleasant Street in Woodbury, facing the North Woodbury Green, is a house built in 1793. An imposing mansion with lavish interiors, the house was built for Daniel Bacon (1774-1828), a wealthy merchant, and his new wife, Rebecca Thompson, daughter of Judge Hezekiah Thompson. As described in Woodbury and the Colonial Homes (1900):

They entertained with a kind and generous hospitality. One of their descendants writes that Mr. Bacon was a remarkable man and his wife a queen among women.” They are credited with having the first cook stove in Woodbury, the ladies of the town expressing interest in the new invention.

Daniel Bacon inherited much business ability from his father Jabez Bacon for he was a successful merchant having a store near his home and adding to his already considerable wealth. He possessed great strength of character and filled a large place in the community in both political and church affairs. He was instrumental in having the North Church built on its present site giving five hundred dollars toward it.

Daniel Bacon, Esq. is vividly described by William Cothren in his History of Ancient Woodbury (1854):

In early life he was a merchant, as was his father before him, and in business added largely to his patrimony, already large; but he subsequently relinquished this for a semi-public life of ease and independence, employing his leisure in the care of a large landed estate, on which he resided until his death. It was here providence assigned his place, and this place he filled. In the struggle whence originated the north church, he had a large share of responsibility and labor, which he cheerfully bore.

In the community also, as an eminently useful citizen, he had his place, which he filled with credit to himself. Toward all ecclesiastical expenses he contributed a tenth of the sum to be raised, and said to others, “Come, fill the rest,” and it was done. Such a man, one to take the lead, and mark out the way, occupies a position in community seldom appreciated till he is removed from it. He was the friend of every young man in the town. Did a boy, “just out of his time,” in a trade, want a hundred dollars, Daniel Bacon gave it to him. Many of these, now first in society in point of wealth and character, leaned on Daniel Bacon’s purse and counsel in their “trial day.” Many in political life, had to assemble first, in Daniel Bacon’s “old counting-room,” in the old store now demolished, and take counsel of his foresight, and catch a little of his vigor, before they felt they were well prepared for the fray; and many, in different parts of the state, still remember him, pushed into the van and bearing the brunt of the fight in the legislature, at Hartford, in those somewhat Hudibrastic contests, for which our legislatures are making themselves every year more and more remarkable. When he died, it was found that men of moderate means, all over the town, were indebted to him, in small sums from fifty to two hundred dollars, for which he had their paper. Some of it, though regularly renewed, had been outstanding nearly a quarter of a century. This was because such persons found it inconvenient to pay, and he let the paper lie to accommodate them. Acts like this, in a man of large wealth, constantly dealing in public stocks elsewhere, where his money was worth double the legal interest, show the usefulness of the individual, and the sort of character he chose to make. It should be added, that he was a sincere Christian, and his monument has no epitaph but that consoling one of “Blessed are the dead that die in the Lord.”

In private life he was beloved by a large circle of relatives and friends. His doors were always open, his house always full, his tables ever groaning under the “old-fashioned profusion.” His descendant, now occupying the “old homestead,” said to the author the other day, “he could not but hear, almost every hour, as he walked about the grounds, the bustle, and almost roar of active life, that once swelled through the old mansion.” Alas, these old-fashioned men of strength and girth, this ancient hospitality of country life, are they not passing from among us? and do we not forget, in the hum and progress of the present, the old-fashioned, solid, country worth, that gave to such hospitality its greatest charm? We live, indeed, in a progressive age. Society is hurrying on with great velocity to a state of the highest intelligence, and the most extended power. The author is not of those who fear this state of affairs. He would, however, look back occasionally, receive the light of the past, and never forget the founders of that edifice that is so rapidly rearing its top in the sky.