NORWALK.
 

321
 

H O ME-L O T  N N I

SAMUEL   HALE.

ROBERT   STU.XRT.

Samuel Hale's tenancy of home-lot xxi is mentioned in connection with that of his
supposed to be brother Thomas' occupation of home-lot xvi (see page 285). The Hale's
do not appear to have remained rnany years in Norwalk, nor here to have left descend¬
ants. Nathan Hale, the patriot-spy of the Revolution, came to Norwalk, (see Lamb's
New York, Volume ii, page 137) but his errand was entirely professional. He here took
a craft and, investigation errand-bound, sailed from hence' to the enem)-'s quarters at
Huntington, on the thither side of Long Island Sound,

Robert Stuart, the second occupant of home-lot xxi, made the purchase on Alarch
8, 1660, The lot was in the rear of the East Avenue Chichester property of 1896. Air.
Stuart may have made this purchase as anticipatory of his marriage, June 12, 1661, to
Bethia, daughter of Thomas and Rose (Sherwood) Rumble of Stratford. Airs. Stuart's
father, Thomas Rumble, was born in 1613, and came in Sept. 1635, to Boston, The )-ear
after Thomas Rumble landed, a small craft of 25 tons brought the brave L)on Gardiner,
and his wife Alary, to these shores. These two worthies were the founders of the well-
known "Gardiner's Island," in the eastern part of Long Island Sound. L)-on Gardiner
reached Saybrook Nov. 28, 1635, and the next season built the Saybrook fort At this time
Thomas Rumble put himself under Air. Gardiner's command, and fought against the
Pequots. The first white child born (Apr. 29, 1636) in Connecticut, David, son of L)-on
and Alary Gardiner, was the offspring of Rumble's leader, the birth of which lad the soldier.
Rumble, for thirteen years survived. Four years after his death, his witlow. Rose, married
Thomas Barlow of Fairfield. Airs. Barlow survived her second husband, and married,
third, Edward Nash, the founder of the Nash famil)- of Norwalk. Her daughter Bethia
had wedded Robert Stuart, and the two good people lived on the home-lot under descrip¬
tion (xxi). To the south of their domain stretched a tract east of the highway (rear of the
present Oscar W. Raymond  and  other properties) which (see note page 7) may originally
 

'The point on the Norwalk coast from which Na¬
than Hale embarked for Long Island is not, so far,
positively known. The Raymonds, in 1764-84, ran a
"ferry" to the Island, but there is proof that Hale's
conveyance was not a public one. There was private
transportation to the Island from "Pampaskashanke ",
and horses for the British w-ere "scowed" across the
Sound from Middlesex (Darien). The Sunday (July
22, 1781) route from the shore which the captors of
Rev. Moses Mather took, lay, one record states, from
just west of the head of Pampaskashanke inlet (Wil¬
son's Cove, 1896) near ''Witch Lane", and thence
o\er the present "old Five-Mile Ri\cr Road" to the
I'^Iiddlesex Church, along which same way they possi¬
bly inarched the prisoner-minister and  his assembled
 

people, in pairs, on the return to their boats at Pam¬
paskashanke beach. "Witch Lane" (see page 302)
is to this day a wierd spot. The present Norwalk
Tramway crosses it at a point not greatly distant from
the temporary quarters of old Phcebe Comstock's old
slave, "O'ne" (see note page 260). The Comstock's
who lived in Lower .Silver Mine, seem to have .trath-
ered their salt hay from the neighborhood of the
i8g6 Belden Point, and "O'ne," during the hay-cut¬
ting season, probably there inhabited. .\t the sum¬
mit of Witch Lane, and but a few rods northwest of
the Tramway crossing, is a small burial enclosure,
which formed a portion of the Esaias Bouton estate,
and within which are interred the mortal remains of
this Pampaskashanke resident and those of his wife.