NOR W .A L K .
 

H O ME-T. O T    IV
 

John Ri'scoe, Rrsco or Rescue, the Huguenot, of Lot No. 6, was the son of Wm.
Rusco' of Hartford, and afterward, evidentl}-, of Norwalk. The Rusco's ma}- have chosen
Norwalk for a residence through the intervention of the Marvins, w-ith whom the}- were
fellow passengers from the Old World and, later, fellow Hartford settlers. They came from
F.sscx Count}-, Britain, to Cambridge, and from thence to Hartford and Norwalk. John"'-
son of William, w-as married in Hartford on Jan. 2, 1650, to Rebecca Beebe.' These two
came with the pioneers to Norwalk and were allotted for a home the four acres, covered in
part, to-da}-, b}- the P2ast Norwalk Consolidated station for east bound trains. The lot
sloped pleasantly south, and Mr. and Mrs. Rusco had, for north-adjoining neighbors, Rev.
Thos. Hanford and Thos. Benedict, Sr. From this green meadow-lot w-ent forth their sons
John-''-and  Thomas, and daughters Mar}-, (unmarried,) and  Rebecca (Mrs. James Brown*)
 

'In the roll of "Ludlow Agreement" settlers,
see page 7S, is found the name of " .Nathaniel Rusco,''
who appears to have no after Norwalk connection.
Said Nathaniel is the same, probabl}', who married.
Now II, 1645, Joanna Corlet. (See Hartford Record.)
William, father of John Rusco of .Norw-alk, w-as born
abroad in 1594. His first wife is unknow-n, but it
w-ould seem that his second wife, whom he married in
1636, wtis a widow- Hume.

^Norwalk may point with pardonable pleasure to
one of its fathers of this name. James Beebe—of the
New- London Beebe's probably—arrived in Norw-alk
soinew-hat subsequently to the original lot Itiv-out and
was aw-arded the two acres now- covereil by the lower
portion of C. F. Osborn's homesteatl, and the adjoin¬
ing Thomas and Wood sites. His wife, w-hom he
married Dee. [9, 1675, was Sarah, daughter of Thomas
Benedict, Sr., who himself came :i little later than
t!ie first pioneers, to Norwalk. James and Sarah
Beebe here resided, having for neighbors, on the
opposite sitle of the street ( Selleck school property
to-day ) Judah (iregory and John Hoyt. There were
born to James Beebe, .Sr., two sons, James -^nil. and
.Samuel. These were infants at the time of the
faiuily's renun til to Danbury,--- in which place the boys'
hither, James Beebe, was chosen first justice of the
Iieace. James 'si, ixjrn in 1641, and coining in the
earlv life to Norw-alk, s]:!ent, afterward, forty-three
useful year's in Danbury, where tit length he died,
-\pr. 22, 1728, letiving his sons James 2 "1. ;uul .Samuel
to found families of influence. Jtiines -ii"', born, 1682,
who, like his father, w-:is ;i jusiice of the inaee, was
the jitirent in 1717, of the disliiigiiished North Strat¬
ford (Trumbull) Conn. 1747 pastor, and Ticoiulerogti
Chaplain, :ind Re\olutionary war ptitriot, and of his
brother .Samuel.
 

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.Ijames Brow-n is an early Norw-alk name which at
once arrests attention. He came to the town some
years after the arrival of the settlers, and according to
Bolton, ( see History of Westchester County, page
412) probably belonged to "a branch of the Brown's
of .Stamford, Lincolnshire, England, ,1 house of no
little repute." He is registered as ow-ning in 1687,
in Norwalk, 1:50 commonage, and himself and wife
Rebecca, brought up their family in the meadow now
occupied as the East Avenue home of the daughters of
the late Eli B. Bennett. There is record of the birth,
March i, 1690, of their son Isaac, and of the marriage,
Dec. 20, 1714, (to Joanna Whitehead) of their son,
James-^'l. w-ho afterw-ard flgured so conspicuously in
the history of The Oblong, and was, it is believed, the
ancestor of many of the Norw-alk and Oblong families
of that name. To James and Joanna wtis born, in
Norwalk, James.^rf- who first saw the light w-ithin,it is
siq-iposed, the very frame around which w-as built the
Eserselv and now- the re-constructed Eli B. Bennett
home, tind w-as one of the marked men of his gener¬
ation. His father, James-'''- was one of the purchasers,
in 1708, of Ridgefield, and had set off to him, in 1729,
one hundred Salem acres. He made his w-ill on Jan.
31st, 1769, and died within two months. He left a
negro inan, "'Tower Hill," to his wife and reserved
for her a portion of his " Mtmsion I louse in Norw-alk."
lie was a partner of William Smith, Chief Justice of
the Pro\iiu-e of New A'ork, the father of Joshua Hett
Smith, iit w-hose house, below- West Point, the .Andre
and .Arnold tretison Avas planned. 'These two hiw-yers
w-ere proprietors of some eleven thousand .Salem
ticres. 'The Brown ptn-tion was distributed by will,
to a goodly share of which ticreage James Brow-n.3J- fell
heir. ]amcs,!i'. died in .Salem, on Sunday, Feb. 19,
17S6.     He is not,  it  is thought,  buried in   Norwalk.

iieitrhl)..rs. James Beebe, Judah Gregory, and John I l.iy t \ acaletl
llieir X.iruall- hoiiie> and were among tlie eight t■.nlndt■.-,^ in
17X51,1' Pahqnioqne ( Danhnrv.)