The People and Lands of Christ Church Easton

The People and Lands of Christ
Church Easton

Article 4: Enslavement in the Lands and
Church
Enslavement in Connecticut ran wide and deep. In fact, by the time of the Revolution, an
estimated 5,000* mostly African and African American and Indigenous peoples were
enslaved in Connecticut (Hinks n.d.). Enslaved laborers built walls, farmed the fields,
worked the mills, tended the animals, transported the goods, and manned the ships that
fueled the colonial spirit and enterprise that, as outlined in Article 3, both drove and
benefited from the larger slave trade.

In Connecticut, enslavement wasn’t merely a practice of the elite but rather operated
widely. A survey of Connecticut estates found that in 1700, one in 10 “inventories”
included enslaved person(s), but by the Revolution one in four did, with one half of all
the ministers, lawyers and public officials enslaving other people. The priests and
leaders of Christ Church’s founding body were no exception. (Harper 2003; Main 1983)

The Protestant Episcopal Parish was successfully formed in North Fairfield in 1762
following a gradual loosening of the Congregational hold and the colonial petitioning,
though as a country parish in a Puritan dominant society, its survival was not assured.

The land for the Episcopal church, located between what is now Old Redding and S.
Wells Hill roads, was granted by Joseph Bradley, seemingly peeved that the
Congregational Church had chosen another parcel for their new location, to the
organizing Anglican bunch.

Joseph Bradley’s wealth and generosity was at least in part enabled by his enslaving. He
enslaved Peg, Simon, Dinah, and Dinah’s son Nimrod, all of whom possibly helped clear
the land for the original Episcopal Church (The Vincent J. Rosivach Register of Slaves in
Fairfield, Connecticut; Reeve et al. 2009).

   348 Westport Road. Google Map Image.

All of the land used by Christ Church and its predecessors was owned by enslavers

initially. After its founding in 1762, our church reconstituted twice, first as the Episcopal
Society of North Fairfield (1784)/Weston (1787) and then as Christ Church (1845ff).
Four separate church buildings were utilized on three different parcels of land.

The Episcopal Church at North Fairfield and then Episcopal Society of Weston would
maintain its home on the aforementioned Bradley lands until the middle of the 19th
century when the building collapsed and the church split alongside the town into
Weston’s Immanuel Episcopal Church and Easton’s Christ’s Church. The second church
in Easton was erected in 1873 at 348 Westport Road. (used today as a home) on part of
the former Samuel Staples’ lands.

Samuel Staples was known for feeding the enslaved the worst of his crops and to deal
directly in the trading of individuals. After the congregation outgrew the location, in the
middle of the 20th century, Christ Church occupied the Baptist Church at 29 Church
Road, still extant as a nondenominational congregation, before renting and ultimately
purchasing the lands at 59 Church Road.

Both sites were originally part of the Long Lot #12, split between brothers Ezekiel and
Thomas Sanford in the early 18th century. Ezekiel enslaved at least two people, Pegg
and her husband Plimmoth. Thomas’ portion passed onto his son Ebenezer, who was
involved with the Baptist Society’s founding in the late 18th century. Ebenezer’s
grandson Josiah owned at least one slave named Enoch (Cruson 2007; Reeve et al. 2009;
Jacobin 1930; The Vincent J. Rosivach Register of Slaves; Christ Church Easton 2002;
Nelson 2020, Google Map Image Capture).

At its first location, the church began without a firm leader at its helm and instead
employed lay readers and itinerant gospel preachers from the Society for the
Propagation of the Gospel. Lay reader Philo Shelton (who after the Revolution would be
ordained) and Anglican priests Rev. John Sayre, Rev. Richard Caner, and Rev. John
Beach all presided.

Philo Shelton (Sturges 2020)

Rev. John Sayre (Sturges 2020)

Among that group, three of the four, Philo Shelton, Rev. John Sayre, and Rev. John
Beach were enslavers. Rev. John Beach enslaved Clement, who self-liberated with intent
to remove to Boston. This seemingly enraged the supposed Christian clergyman, and the
Rev. John Beach posted ads almost daily describing Clement as “Negro Man..about a
middling stature, very black, has a remarkable twilt in his gait.”

Though we don’t know his ultimate fate, the frequency of the ads suggests that, for at

least two weeks, Clement succeeded in self-liberation. By 1774, there were 315 Africans
or African Americans mostly enslaved, in Fairfield County lands and 319 in Stratford
(Reeve et al. 2009; The Vincent J. Rosivach Register of Slaves; U.S. Census 1790; Hickox
1995; Sturges).

Some have insisted upon the humane nature of northern enslavement vis-a-vis the
plantation system of the South, Caribbean and Brazil, but while numerically the
difference is significant both the exacting complicity in the Slave Trade itself and the
draconian efforts in Connecticut to regulate and punish Black bodies suggests a
difference in magnitude, not severity.

Connecticut’s so-called Black Codes of the 18th century curtailed all aspects of Black
life, whether free or enslaved, and instilled white terror into the legal code. For example,
for simply speaking “actionable words” against a white person, any “black, Indian or
mulatto” slave would be whipped with 40 lashes. A Black person of any status would be
given 30 lashes for merely threatening to strike a white person based upon what was
cited as frequent clashes between the enslaved Black community and their white
enslavers, further evidence of the resistance of enslaved people documented below.

Free Blacks could not hold office or go into business and had to carry passes between
towns. A curfew was in place. Abuse in Connecticut was both banal and brutal and
designed to promote white control in all aspects of colonial life (Harper 2003; Ofgang
2019).

With gut-piercing irony, the spark to the colonial independence movement lay not in
emancipatory impulse, but rather colonial attachment to the slave trade. As the wealth
of white colonials increased, so, too, did their demand for manufactured goods. Colonists
in Connecticut imported clothing, metal ware, tea, and other goods from England, but as
their imports exceeded their exports and debt amassed, colonists traded with the Dutch,
French West Indies, too, running surpluses.

The controversy over the colonial trading practices that circumvented English trade
boards led Parliament to pass the now infamous Sugar Act (otherwise known as
Plantation or Revenue Act), an attempt to enforce the regulations of the West Indies
trade and collect duty on molasses. This act decried by colonists in New England
sparked colonial resistances in Boston and events throughout the colonies that would
ultimately lead to the second Continental Congress’s Declaration of Independence.

Since the molasses tax was actually decreased in the Sugar Act, it was the effort to
curtail West Indies trading, not the tax, that most enraged the colonists. Almost
everyone, it seemed, had a hand in the slave trade (Kimball 2009; cf 1619 Project).

    General Washington…always asserted and proved that Virginians
    loved molasses as well as New Englandmen did. I know not why we
    should blush to confess that molasses was an essential ingredient in
    American independence.”

    John Adams

Inadvertently highlighting the central role that enslavement played in the national story
(and our local one), John Adams would write later, “General Washington…always
asserted and proved that Virginians loved molasses as well as New Englandmen did. I
know not why we should blush to confess that molasses was an essential ingredient in
American independence.”

Yet, blush and repent, we should. Molasses and its ties to enslavement, indeed, were
essential ingredients in American independence. And, after the Revolution, enslavement
would continue to drive the economies of the nascent nation and our forebears in the
Episcopal Church in North Fairfield (Weston). Article 5 will discuss the perpetuation of
enslavement and promotion of racial inequality in North Fairfield (Weston) after

independence. (Adams 1856; Kimball 2009).

*Correction: As cited elsewhere, our original article stated that Connecticut enslaved the
most people in New England at 6,464. Because Connecticut’s census in 1774 included
both indigenous and African and African American people, as well as free and enslaved
individuals, historians estimate the more accurate number as that included herein. There
isn’t sufficient data to make a regional cross comparison. Thanks to Bruce Nelson with
the Easton Historical Society for his note of correction.

A word on citations: Our historical investigation draws widely from over 50 secondary
and primary sources (see here for a full bibliography). We are especially indebted to
Stuart Reeve, David Silverglade, and Kathleen von Jena’s 2009 Historical Archeological
Assessment and the Vincent J. Rosivach Register of Slaves in Fairfield, Connecticut.