Rev. Jonathan Ingersoll: 

A Historic Minister 

Ridgefield’s earliest Congregational preachers must have found something to their liking in Ridgefield. Between 1715 and 1811, nearly a century, there were only three settled ministers. But while each served many years here, the one in the middle — the Rev. Jonathan Ingersoll — lasted longer than any minister in the First Congregational Church’s more than three centuries. He spent 39 years as the congregation’s leader, and would no doubt have continued to serve longer had he not died of  “an apoplectic fit” at the age of 64. He left behind a family that became part of the town until the 1960s.

Ingersoll’s predecessor — the town’s first minister, Thomas Hauley — was only 49 when he died after preaching 25 years here, and his successor — the Rev. S. G. Goodrich — also spent 25 years here before moving to upstate congregation.

Jonathan Ingersoll was born in 1713 in Derby (then part of Milford), a son of Jonathan and Sarah Ingersoll whose ancestors were among the early settlers of Hartford and the Pioneer Valley of Massachusetts. Like so many ministers who came to Ridgefield, Ingersoll graduated from Yale, in 1736. His first preaching post was at a Presbyterian church in New Jersey (Congregationalists and Presbyterians were closely allied in the 18th Century) and in 1739, he was called to replace Mr. Hauley in Ridgefield. A year later he married Dorcas Moss, a minister’s daughter from Derby.

From all accounts he was well-respected in Ridgefield. “He is described as a man of brilliant intellect, of great strength and force of character,” said George L. Rockwell in his “History of Ridgefield” (1927).

Unlike most clergymen in Ridgefield’s long history, Ingersoll took a break from his local duties to serve in the military. He was chaplain for the town’s militia and, during the French and Indian War, he volunteered as a chaplain with Connecticut troops — including 22 Ridgefield men — serving around Lake George and Fort Ticonderoga (then called Carillon).  

According to Tim Abbott, a sixth great grandson of Ingersoll, “In 1758 he was chaplain for Colonel David Wooster’s 4th Regiment in Abercromby’s ill-fated expedition against the French at Carillon.  Wooster’s men were caught up in the attack, and Chaplain Ingersoll wrote to a fellow church colleague that God showed ‘distinguishing mercy to the Connecticut Troops’ who suffered few deaths in that dreadful slaughter.”

During Lord Amherst’s campaign the following year he was chaplain of the 3rd Regiment, again under Colonel Wooster, traveling from captured Fort Carillon to Oswego and then down the St. Lawrence.

His intellect, and perhaps also his notable family and his service with Wooster, gave Ingersoll a wide reputation and in 1761, he was invited to preach before the General Assembly on Election Day. He offered the colonial politicians a word of gentle warning: “You are the fathers of the common-wealth, and all our eyes are upon you,” he said. “See to it that your powers of mind are sanctified by grace, and always remember that you judge for the Lord. Let the interest of religion, and the welfare of the community (which indeed are necessarily connected), let these lye near your hearts.”

When it came to the Revolution, Ingersoll probably tended to be on the conservative side of the issues. When George III became king in 1760, Ingersoll had praised him as “richly endowed with all royal gifts and graces,” adding that through his influence, “we hope for the enjoyment of the best of liberties and privileges for for a great while to come.”

In “We Gather Together,” a 2011 history of the First Congregational Church, author Charles Hambrick-Stowe says, “Circumstances soon forced the church to decide how to pray for civil authorities, whether to continue to support George III and the Empire or the movement for independence. Jonathan Ingersoll probably shared  the views of his brother Jared, a political leader in the colony who hoped that compromise and moderation would resolve the Stamp Act crisis of 1765. Jared Ingersoll worked to reduce the rate of the tax and accepted the position of stamp distributor for Connecticut in order to soften its impact. His efforts were rewarded with accusations of treason that destroyed his political career.”

Ridgefield in the mid-1770s leaned to the Tory side. “Jonathan Ingersoll’s leadership is often cited as influencing a town vote opposing the Continental Congress in January 1775,” the Rev. Hambrick-Stowe writes. However, “the beginning of armed conflict at Lexington and Concord in April and the subsequent siege of Boston swayed many in town to the Patriot side.” It is unknown whether Ingersoll was among those so swayed, but many in his congregation were leading supporters of the revolutionary cause. So were three of his sons in law.

Capt. David Olmsted, who was married to Abigail Ingersoll, fought at the Battle of Ridgefield. He became a leading town and state official after the war.

Another of Ingersoll’s daughters, Anne, married Lt. Joshua King, a Revolutionary officer who was in charge of the imprisoned British spy, Major John Andre, before his execution. Because of Anne, King settled in Ridgefield, established the King and Dole store (which grew into Bedient’s Hardware), and became a major landowner. But, in the church’s eyes, what is perhaps more remarkable about this union is that it led to Henry King McHarg (1851-1941),  great great grandson of the Rev. Jonathan Ingersoll. McHarg,  a wealthy banker and railroad president, donated to First Congregational the land on which its current landmark stone church was built in 1888. (McHarg lived on Nod Road until his death in 1941 but his much younger wife, Elizabeth, remained in town until the 1960s, dying in 1976 at the age of 84.)

Another of Ingersoll’s sons-in-law, a lieutenant in the Revolution, did not fare so well afterwards. Ebenezer Olmsted, husband of Esther Ingersoll, got caught pocketing state tax money he had taken in as a Ridgefield tax collector and wound up having all his property confiscated by the town. Perhaps fortunately for Ingersoll, he had died before Olmsted’s malfeasance took place and threw the town nearly into financial ruin (see separate “Who Was Who” profile).

Ingersoll’s son, Jonathan (1747-1823), became a respected post-war political leader. The Ridgefield native, another Yale graduate, served as lieutenant governor of Connecticut and as a Superior Court judge. He was also elected a congressman from Connecticut, but declined the job before being sworn in.

Finally, his brother’s son, Jared Ingersoll, not only supported the Revolution, but also helped write the U.S. Constitution and was a signer of the document.

Although most people would not think of Ridgefield as being a place where people were enslaved, slaves were found in most Connecticut communities in 18th Century — and in the Ingersoll household. In 1730, Connecticut’s 38,000 residents included about 700 slaves. By 1770, it had more than 6,400 slaves, the largest population of any New England colony. Half of all the ministers, lawyers, and public officials owned slaves, and a third of all the doctors, reports Connecticut historian Jackson Turner Main.

Jonathan Ingersoll was among Ridgefield’s slave owners. However, in 1777, shortly before his death, Ingersoll asked the Board of Selectmen to approve making his slave, Cyphax, a free man. Under colony law, the selectmen had to make sure the freed person wouldn’t be a burden on the town. The selectmen approved of Cyphax, who was 20 years old, and he was freed. 

By 1790,  five slaves were still left in Ridgefield. 

Capt. David Olmstead: 

The Tale of the Red Petticoat

Capt. David Olmsted was a leading citizen in the last third of the 18th Century. He was a Revolutionary War hero, longtime state representative, and friend of the makers and shakers of Ridgefield. His father was descended from the founders of the town and his mother was the daughter of Col. David Goodrich, who fought in Queen Anne’s War. His wife was the daughter of the town’s second minister, whose nephew helped write the United States Constitution.

But if David Olmsted is remembered at all today, it for a few angry words he allegedly shouted at his wife after the Battle of Ridgefield.

David Olmsted was born in Ridgefield in 1748, a son of Deacon Nathan Olmsted and Millicent Goodrich Olmsted. He grew up in Ridgefield and, in 1769, married Abigail Ingersoll, daughter of the Rev. Jonathan Ingersoll, minister of the First Congregational Church and a cousin of Jared Ingersoll, who worked on and signed the Constitution. He was 20, she 18. The couple had eight children.

Unlike his father-in-law, who opposed the Continental Congress in 1775, David Olmsted was all for the cause of the revolution. As a captain in the continental army, he led companies of volunteers at West Point, in the defense of Greenwich, and at the alarm at Fairfield. But he is most important locally for his participation in the Battle of Ridgefield on April 27, 1777.

In his book, “Farmers Against the Crown,” Keith Jones describes major players at the battle scene and observes: “Nearby was Captain David Olmsted, whose little one-and-a-half story ‘saltbox’

home still stands in the south end of town along (what else) Olmstead Lane. Olmsted...was one of the first Ridgefield men to commit to the Patriot cause, having led a company to Washington’s army in early ’76. The commander-in-chief must have made a forceful impression on the 27-year-old captain, for on this very day one year earlier (April 27, 1776), he named a newly born son George Washington Olmsted! In addition to defending his home and four young children, Captain Olmstead had scores to settle with the Redcoats — cousin Roger fell in action in 1775, and cousin David was killed Jan. 4, 1777, in Washington’s victory at Princeton.”

But it was after the battle and presumably after the British left town when the story of the Red Petticoat finds its origin.

Smithsonian historian Silvio A. Bedini was the first person to recount the tale in print. In his 1958 history of the town, “Ridgefield in Review,” Bedini wrote: “The Red Petticoat story exists in

several versions in the local lore of the Battle of Ridgefield, which has been handed down by word of mouth from generation to generation. One account told of Mrs. David Olmsted, who lived in either the original Olmsted homestead … on Olmsted Lane, or  in the Olmsted house [just to the south]. Captain David Olmsted, the owner of the homestead, fought at the barricade and took shelter in the woods when the British advanced through the town.

“His wife remained at home with her children, anxiously awaiting word of her husband and of the progress of the conflict. When the detachment of British troops came marching along Olmstead Lane to the camp site [on Wilton Road West], she feared that her home would suffer the fate of others that had been burned by the British during the day. Looking about for some means of saving it, she thought of posing as a Tory. Having no other suitable symbol at her disposal, she removed her red petticoat and waved it from the house as the British soldiers came marching off West Lane Road and along the lane. The British, thinking it was a Tory house, left it unharmed.

“When her husband arrived home at last during the night or on the following day, Mrs. Olmsted proudly recounted the incident, pleased with her presence of mind. Not so her husband. Livid with rage, Captain Olmstead thundered: ‘Woman, if I had seen you, I would have shot you dead!’ Far better it would have been to have this home destroyed than to have his wife suspected of being a Tory.”

 Could the story be true and could Olmsted have really uttered such strong and offensive words to his wife? Possibly; he would probably have been exhausted and perhaps discouraged from the encounter with the British, and may have blurted out his frustration in the unkind words. If he said it, did he mean it? Probably not. It is quite likely that Abigail Olmsted was a strong, highly intelligent woman who would not have put up with a husband who said he would kill her. Since she and David went on to have four more children and remained together for the rest of her life, it seems likely that he would have apologized for his outburst — if it happened at all.

Adding some doubt to the veracity of the whole story is the fact that his homestead did, in fact,  suffer fairly substantial damage from the British. Property owners who suffered losses due to enemy action in the Revolution could seek compensation from the Connecticut government, and many did. According to research done by Keith Jones, “a reimbursement request exceeding £54 appears under Captain Olmsted’s name on the summary of damages submitted by town selectmen to the General Assembly.” £54 was a good deal of money back then.

Both town historian Dick Venus and battle historian Keith Jones said the house standing today at 91 Olmstead Lane is likely the Captain David Olmsted place. It was so marked with a sign during the town’s celebration of the Bicentennial in 1776, and Silvio Bedini said he thought of the three old Olmsted houses on the road, #91 was most likely the one owned by David. 

While the legend has no basis in historical records, it did inspire a 1969 book for youngsters. In “The Red Petticoat,” by Joan Palmer of South Salem, a girl named Eliza Bouton waves a red petticoat out the window while her father and grandfather are off fighting the British on Main Street. However, she did so not to save her house, but to protect a young, wounded patriot, carrying a desperately needed message for General Washington, who had collapsed on her home’s doorstep. Needless to say, no one talked of shooting her for her petticoat trickery.

Toward the end of the war, Olmsted was promoted to lieutenant colonel — but local history and perhaps his local contemporaries continued to call him Captain Olmsted. After the war he became active in the government, serving as a member of the Board of Selectmen and holding other offices. From 1781 until 1798, he was often elected one of Ridgefield’s representatives to the state Legislature — helping Connecticut and Ridgefield to recovery during the post-war years. He often served in the legislature alongside Col. Philip Burr Bradley or Lt. Joshua King, two veterans of the Revolution and leading Ridgefield citizens.

However, around the beginning of the 19th Century, Olmsted did what many New England

farmers were doing: He went west. Good land was becoming scarce here and western New York promised new possibilities. He and Abigail and their family moved to Onondaga County, N.Y., , becoming one of the first settlers of the area around Jamesville, now part of the town of DeWitt. There, he was known as Colonel Olmsted. By 1806, he owned a tavern, which a local history reported was “popularly considered the best hostelry west of Utica.” (This was a community that knew about spirits; Jamesville area was settled between 1790 and 1800 and, in 1798, one Matthew Dumfrie was already building a distillery, malt house and brewery there, producing the first beer and whiskey made in Onondaga County — a territory that includes Syracuse.)

Abigail died in 1805. Olmsted subsequently married Abiah Keeler, a native of Norwalk who, like others, had headed west. They had no children.

Olmsted died in 1815 at the age of 66. He is buried alongside Abigail in the Walnut Grove Cemetery, Jamesville, Onondaga County, N.Y.