Quaker Hill

Quaker Hill is a village in the town of Waterford, Connecticut, in the southeastern part of the state. It is bordered to the east by the Thames River. It is bordered to the south by the city of New London, to the north by the town of Montville and to the west by the Cohanzie district of Waterford.

Quaker Hill can be roughly defined by the mail delivery area that is comprised by the United States Postal Service zip code delivery area of 06375. It may also be defined as the area served by the Quaker Hill Elementary School or by the Quaker Hill Fire Company, Incorporated, as persons who live within the 06375 zip code but whose children attend other elementary schools do not always consider themselves residents of Quaker Hill. Quaker Hill lies at approximately Latitude 41.40 north and Longitude 72.11 west. The village is primarily residential with the center of the village being roughly the intersection of the Old Norwich Road and the Old Colchester Road. This intersection was made famous by the "House in the Middle of the Road," a house that stood in the middle of the intersection with no significant yard. This house was burned by the Quaker Hill Fire Company as a training exercise and its former site is now the Quaker Hill Village Green. The other significant feature of Quaker Hill is Smith Cove, a brackish cove which is navigable by small boats as far as the Old Norwich Road bridge. This cove empties into the Thames River directly opposite the Naval Submarine Base New London in Groton.

History

In 1645, Quaker Hill's meadows were used as hayfields. Quaker Hill itself belonged to New London. It wouldn't be until 1801 that Quaker Hill would become a part of Waterford.

The Rogers Family

A baker by the name of James Rogers was permanently established in the New London area by 1660. Rogers built a stone house near Winthrop's mill in New London and had extensive land holdings on Great Neck. His three sons - Joseph, James and Jonathan - later established farms on Great Neck.

It was the third son John who farmed at Upper Mamacock. It was because of his beliefs that this area became known as Quaker Hill by 1687. Through their trade with the Rhode Island Sabbatarians, or Seventh-Day Baptists, the Rogers were converted into that faith. John Rogers evolved an even more radical departure from that faith.

The Rogerenes differed from the orthodox of the day mainly in being against organized religion with its professional clergy, its meeting houses and special days of worship. To them prayer was a private matter between man and his Creator and it was a sin to use medicine and the services of a physician.

While they were silent in their prayers, they were just the opposite in proclaiming their distaste for conventional religion. The civil-disobedience demonstrators of their day, they would drive their carts by the meeting house during the worship services, chop wood on the doorstep outside or even bring a wheelbarrow into the building during services. Not content with all this, they even interrupted the sermon with denouncements so that there could be no misunderstanding whatsoever of their contempt for the established religion.

The Rogers - and especially John - courted arrest so frequently that it became almost impossible for the town to find a constable that would face arresting them. This was especially true after James Rogers, Jr. and his wife threw scalding water at a constable who was rolling a barrel of beef away from their farm for the non-payment of the minister's rate. John died of smallpox in 1721 and he and many of his followers were buried in Quaker Hill directly on the shore of the Thames River in the unmarked graves their beliefs required. [http://familytreemaker.genealogy.com/users/c/o/l/Larry--Roxie--Cole/GENE1-0002.html]

Quaker Hill Elementary School

Quaker Hill Elementary School, located at 118 Old Norwich Road, is currently under construction. Quaker Hill School was built in 1915, and opened in 1917. It was fully demolished on February 23, 2007. The current plan is to put a replica of the building in its place. The building was under construction but is now open to the public and students from Quaker Hill and Cohanzie will be going to the school end of August 2008. [http://www.theday.com]

About the construction

[http://www.waterfordschools.org/district/docs/sbc_minutes_20061121.pdf November 21, 2006]

[http://www.waterfordschools.org/district/docs/sbc_minutes_20061017.pdf October 17, 2006]

[http://www.keiarch.com/qhill.htm Construction]

References

ee also

* Quaker Hill, Rhode Island
* Connecticut College Arboretum
* New London, Connecticut
* Waterford, Connecticut