Western Reserve chronicle. [volume] (Warren, Ohio) 1855-1921, 1872-09-04
For the CHRoNIcLE.
WESTERN RESERVE.

In the year 1ool, when the soil ol
Connecticut, granted by the Council
ofPlymouth to the Earl of Warwicke,
was transferred to Lord Say and-Seal,
Lord Brooke and others, the western
boundary of the Territory was the
South Sea, since called Pacific Ocean.
A charter given by Charles II in
1862, (the same that was hidden in the
Charter Oak, in 1857 confirmed these
boundaries, excepting such lands as
were already settled.
a grant by the same King to Vii
liam Penn, in 1881. of three degrees of
latitude by five degrees of longitude
west of the Delaware, covered part of
the same Territory. But Connecti-
cut did not claim her lands west of
the Colony of New York for nearly n
hundred years. When, however, she
had granted all the LANDS east of the
New York Colony, a company was
formed in 1853, for the purpose of
planting the lands within her charter
on the Susquehanna.
Proceeding thither, the company
purchased a large tract at Wyoming,
from the Sachems of the Six Nations,
and called theirs sttlement Westmore-
land.
Very naturally a sharp controversy
arose between these settlers and the
proprietaries of Penn, which, though
suspended during the Revolutionary
War, was settled only by Commission
ers at Trenton, in 1852, when the land
was adjudged to Pennsylvania. Still
Connecticut maintained her claim to
the lands lying west of Pennsylvania,
and within the north and south bOun-
daries of the-State. to the Mississippi
river. But in order to obtain the
implied sanction of their charter
claims" the delegates in Congress
from Connecticut" /" ceded TO the Uni
ted States all the lands within the
charter limits west of Pennsylvania,
excepting a tract I2O miles in length
that State Oh the west.
Half a million acres of the reserUed
land was granted to inhabitants of
Fairfield, New London, and Norwalk
as indemnity for property burned and
destroyed by the enemy during the
Revolutionary war, and hence was
called Fire Lands. The fund derived !
from the sale of the remainder, con-
stitutes the General School Fund of
In 1900 the title of Connecticut to |
the Reserved land was confirmed by |
Congress, and has ever since been |
called the Connecticut Western Re
serve. On the 10th of July, 1900, the
whole was embraced and established |
as one county, and this received the
name of Trumbull, in honor of Gov.
Jonathan Trumbull of Connecticut.
lines, north and south. were
run in 1897. They were five miles apart
and the space for i've miles west of the
line was called First
Range, the next the Second, and con-
tinuing thus to the twenty-fourth
range. In the year following, town
ships lines were run 1OeSt from
Pennsylvania line, also five miles
apart: the space between two lines be-
ing called a tier; the most southern
was called First Tier, the next north
The Second, and in that succession to
he fourteenth. This division is said
10 have been established by the Legis-
ature of Connecticut. or the eight
townships into which Trumbull Co.
was originally divided, Vernon CON-
Drised those numbers, now known as
Gustavus and Greene, as
we'll as many others lying north and
.outh ofthese. Afterward these three
we're called Greene, in honor of Col.
5ardner Greene, who had title to the
western part.