The Indiana State sentinel. [volume] (Indianapolis) 1868-1895, 1893-11-01

The Norwich (Conn-) correspondent OF
the New York Advertiser writes: There
are large number of rocking stones,
so-called, in New England, but about
two years ago city geologist published
the statement that he knew Of less than
half a dozen of the kind in the region
noted. There are powders enough in
the New England states, he explained,
that are set up on small bases, and some
of them are more or less delicately bal
anced. but of genuine rocking stones,
that be made to rock, it is safe to say
that there are not more of them than
the number 1 have named"
The scientific mans statement was
published far and wide, and in three
months was contradicted forty times,
mainly by dwellers in rural towns IN all
parts of New England Three rocking
stones were reported in one town in
Massachusetts. and one or more OF them
were mammoth monoliths. Eight or ten
were reported in New Hampshire and
several in Maine, while no end OF rock
ing stones were located in Connecticut
and Rhode Island, since, it is we'll known,
these states. which evidently caught the
greatest part of the rocky debris of the
glacial era, are thickly bestrewn with
powders of all sorts and shapes. In
this county alone rural observers cited
not less than a dozen or more instances
of perfect rocking stones.
Recently an influntial Mystic citizen
has declared that there are no less than
five perfect rocking stones in the little
seashore hamlet of Quimbaug, near
Mystic. in the southern end of this
county. The quiet little village" he
says, "can boast of more rocking
stones than any other town of its size
in the United States can do. Good au-
thorities say that only two good speci-
mems exist in England, one in Massa-
chusetts and one at the Haley farm, at
Noank, a quaint little old-fashioned
hamlet on a knoll at the seashore, not
far from Mystic. 1t is evident, there
fore, that the present ones are not we'll
known.
But there is no doubt that they are
as excellent examples of the glacial
period any that can be found any
where. They vary In size from a stone
weighing about three tons, on the land
of Miss Nancy J. Moredock. to one
weighing forty-five tons, on the farm
occupied by James Lord. Another stone
is found on the lands of Elias Davis and
two on the farm of Ambrose Miner.
Perhaps the best specimen in the
whole lot is the rocking stone on the
land of Miss Moredock. 1t is about four
feet long. two feet wide and three feet
high, and it oscillates about five inches.
1t can be rocked by the pressure Of two
fingers. 1t is set on sloping ledge and
II looks as if it could be easily rolled off
and down the hill, but the combined
strength of half dozen men could not
stir IL an inch out of it's place. The rock
has been a great playhouse for children,
and the Oldest inhabitants can remember
the spot as their earliest playground"
All of these rocking stones are i'm the
immediate neighborhOod Of Fort HILL"
where the once powerful and illustrious
Pequot Indians made their last stand
against the whites, in the latter part of
the seventeenth century, a region that
is thiclkly dotted with lonely isolated
sentinel-like. tall powders. At FIT. Hill,
near Mystic, overlooking the ocean. the
Pequots with all their braves. squaws
and papooseS, were gathered in their
longest and strongest fort, when Capt
Jack" Mason and his band of Puritan
braves, coming from Saybrook, at the
mouth of the Connecticut river, stormed
the fort, burned the red mems wigwams
and massacred most of the warriors,
with the women and children who were
not burned in the wigwams.
The descendants of Capt John Ma
sons soldiers-the people of Mystic and
Noank-a year ago dragged a great
bowlder, with thirty yoke of oxen, from
its resting place in a lonely pasture
near the famous rocking stones and cut
and carved it in a handsome monolith
which they erected amid a great con-
course of people in honor of the Peuuot
massacre, on the summit of FIT Hill
This great bowlder, handsomely polished
and bearing on one of its finished sides
an appropriate inscription in commence
ration of the mighty deed of arms is
now one of the most conspicuous objects
along the sound shore as seen from the
ocean. 1t weighed in the rough not
less than twenty-eight or thirty tons In
an open mead near the old Norwich
town green, two miles north of this CITY,
there is similar monolith that was
erected a great many years ago at the
grave of Capt. Mason.
Bowlders, some of which weigh thou
sands of tons, are altogether too plenti-
full in Connecticut and Rhode Island to
have any commercial value, but not
many months ago wealthy Ohio gen
tleman journeyed TO the Quonochon-
taug Or. - bowlder plain on the shore
of the ocean, purchased a gigantic bowl
der there and shipped il to his home in
the West. It's weight was over thirty
tons. In transporting ii from it's site on
the plain six miles to the Mantle rail-
road station, several teamsters with fif-
teen or twenty yoke of oxen, were busy
for six days. 1t cost the Ohio man about
81 900 to get the big stone home with
him. 1t is now the central figure in his
spacious city lawn.
The array of powders on Quonochon-
taug plain. which are mainly oval in