Wethersfield: The Historical Society and Cemetery!

Before I left Wethersfield and headed to Hartford and Simsbury, I waited for the Wethersfield Historical Society to open at 10 am.  This was Friday, April 22nd.  If you have never been to Wethersfield, CT then you are in for a treat.  Everything is in a one block radius.  There are shops, restaurants, museums in the form of houses that you can visit like Silas Deane's home.  There is the Wethersfield Historical Society and the Wethersfield Cemetery! The Chester Bulkley B&B is right next door to the historical society.  Of course you need to check the hours.

It was like a little oasis below Hartford.  You do have to drive through South Hartford to get to the Hartford downtown area if you want to do some research at the Connecticut State Library, the Connecticut Historical Society or go to the museums, public library and city hall.  It only took about 15 minutes to drive up to Hartford.  Of course you do have the issue of parking.  I did not see any hotels in downtown Hartford close enough to not have to walk a distance or get on a bus or drive to any of these Hartford sites.

Now I chose to drive through the Wethersfield Village Cemetery and what an amazing cemetery it is.  You cannot drive through the older section which is on the left up on a knoll or small hill.  You can drive through the newer part.  The cemetery is in good shape.  They were mowing and they get so close to the tombstones!! They were edging too.  People were visiting graves.  One man brought some flowers and walked determinedly towards a specific area. 

Find A Grave has 3170 internments in the Wethersfield Village Cemetery listed. That is pretty good but it is a big cemetery. As you can see from the pillars there are two named cemeteries. They may be lumping these two sites into one list.  I cannot find an ancient burying ground for Wethersfield as a separate listing.

The Wethersfield Historical Society Museum is in an old building with a fountain out front.

You can tour it for about $5.00.  The research center is down the street in another building so that means you need to make an appointment or contact them to make arrangements.  I was interested in the early years of Wethersfield and wandered around that section of the exhibits.  Silas Deane's name was rattling around in my brain and here is a little biography of his life:  http://www.silasdeaneonline.org/class_bio.htm

Rev. John Marsh kept good vital records!!!

Apparently he did an incredible about of baptisms and more!

An interesting map of Connecticut

So, I missed these two visits in my post dated April 22, 2011:  Treasures in Hartford and on to Simsbury.  In their gift shop they had this book:  A Visitor's Guide to Colonial and Revolutionary New England, by Patricia and Robert Foulke which sounded like an interesting book to review.  I did not buy it just took a photo of it to remember to check it out.  I assume that the historical society has information about the burials in the cemetery if you want to make sure and double check.  Wethersfield is definitely an area for more exploring.