By STEVEN JUPITER
PITTSFORD—In 1759, as the French and Indian War raged across New England, British soldiers under the command of General Jeffrey Amherst built a military road from the Fort at Number 4 in southwest New Hampshire to Fort Crown Point on the southern shores of Lake Champlain. At the time, most of what is now Vermont was not settled by Europeans and travel across the mountainous, wooded terrain was difficult. The new thoroughfare, now known as the Crown Point Road (CPR), allowed the British to move supplies across the Green Mountains to maintain the territory they had recently taken from the French (around present-day Ticonderoga, New York).
The CPR worked its way diagonally across Vermont, essentially from Springfield to the town of Addison. It crossed Otter Creek at Clarendon and followed the western bank of the waterway northwest, eventually passing through present-day Proctor, Pittsford, and Brandon.
After the war ended, in 1763, the CPR became the major route by which European settlers entered Vermont from elsewhere in New England, making the Green Mountains one of the last areas in the Northeast U.S. to be settled by Europeans. Unlike coastal New England, Vermont has few traces of European settlement that predate the American Revolution.
Over the years, with the proliferation of other overland routes, the CPR was either abandoned, reclaimed for farmland, or incorporated into other roads. Today, remnants of it are still visible in places, though much of it has been reclaimed by nature or reworked in other development.
In the 1890s, after the centennial of George Washington’s inauguration, a revived interest in colonial history in the U.S. also renewed interest in the CPR. The newly formed Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR) began placing markers along the route, beginning with Fort Ranger in Rutland in 1903. The Lake Dunmore chapter of the DAR, founded in 1896, began placing CPR markers in the Brandon-Pittsford area in 1911. They placed 1 marker in Pittsford, 2 in Brandon, and 3 in Sudbury.
However, the marker they placed in Pittsford was in the wrong spot.
Originally on Depot Hill Road between Route 7 and the eastern bank of Otter Creek, the marker was clearly on the wrong side of the river. It was known that the CPR crossed from the east side to the west side of Otter Creek down in Clarendon, so by the time it reached Pittsford, it would’ve been on the west side of the water.
But the marker had sat there for over 100 years, all 1,200 granite lbs. of it. Moving it would be no easy task. So when roadwork on Depot Hill recently necessitated the temporary removal of the marker, Bill Powers, president of the Pittsford Historical Society (PHS), asked the town to “just dig it up” put it behind the society’s building near Lothrop Elementary in Pittsford Village until PHS and the Crown Point Road Association (CPRA) could determine a more accurate location for it.
Last Sunday, the marker was given a new home in a rededication ceremony on Whipple Hollow Road in the Florence section of Pittsford, on the edge of a grassy meadow now owned by Josh Towne and Liz Willis. Looking at the site today, no one would ever guess that a road once passed through the field.
About two dozen people showed up to participate in the rededication, including officers and members of PHS, CPRA, and DAR. Alicia Malay, chair of the Pittsford Selectboard was also present.
The program began with a presentation by Barry Griffith, president of the CPRA on the significance of the CPR. Mr. Griffith emphasized that the road may have initially served a military purpose, but it was subsequently the primary means by which Europeans entered Vermont in the late 1700s.
Catherine Brodeur-Johnson, Vermont State Regent of the DAR, spoke about the DAR’s involvement with the CPR over the years, recalling that as a child she helped clean up a section of the road. She also noted that the Lake Dunmore chapter, which had placed the markers in 1911, had dissolved roughly a decade ago.
Mr. Powers then related the story of the relocation of the marker, known to CPRA as Marker 45A. Much of the research done on the proper placement of the marker relied on The History of Pittsford, Vermont by A.M. Caverly, a multi-volume account of the early years of the town, published in 1872. According to Caverly, there had likely been a tavern at the marker’s new site back in the 1700s, fitting for the intersection of two thoroughfares (CPR and what is now Whipple Hollow Road).
Finally, Jim Rowe, Jr., historian with CPRA, spoke about an outing that CPRA will be sponsoring in Pittsford on May 20, which will be a re-enactment of the first outing done by CPRA in 1958. Anyone interested should go to crownpointroad.org for more details.
The ceremony ended with the placement of two American flags on either side of the marker by Mr. Powers and Ms. Brodeur-Johnson.
“We’ve known for a while [that the marker was in the wrong location],” said Mr. Griffith, president of CPRA. “We’ve looked at maps and journals kept by soldiers. We consulted with DAR. We hope to make more people aware of the road and its history.”
CPRA Secretary Dale Christie of Proctor, who descends from a member of the Green Mountain Boys, hoped that such events would increase awareness of the CPR as well.
John Towne, who owns the land the marker is now on, hadn’t known much about the CPR when he bought the property.
“But I like that there’s history here,” he said. He added that extensive searches of the surrounding land, which had been farmed for years, had yielded no artifacts and cautioned people not to stray into the meadow.
There are two CPR markers in Brandon, one on Union Street just north of the intersection with High Pond Road, and one on Short Swamp Road, about halfway between Long Swamp Road and Marshall Phillips Road. The marker on Union Street is known to have been moved from its original location a quarter mile closer up the road toward Brandon Village, so it’s possible that at some point in the future, another rededication ceremony might take place in Brandon.
To learn more about the Crown Point Road and the placement of markers along its route, visit CPRA’s website: crownpointroad.org. You can also follow CPRA on Facebook and watch their videos (including of Sunday’s event) on their YouTube channel.
